Imogen laughed, but Kasar felt her body tighten even more. “Nonsense. Do you believe every story you hear?”
They went back and forth, taunting and testing each other. They both looked like ravenous wolves that could fall on him in an instant, but for Imogen’s possessive hand on the leash and Sandahr’s looming presence behind them.
Kasar’s mind raced at the possibilities. Imogen had promised him his greatest desire. Had those raids been…collection projects? It explained the food for humans. He didn’t dare truly hope that his sister—and the child, his niece or nephew—might yet survive.
“No,” Imogen said, ice in her tone, and Kasar realized she’d frozen the visiting vampires with her gaze. “That is my final answer. Go now and never return. If you do, you will be dropped into the nearest volcano. I could make you dance into one yourselves, should I choose.”
The two, now clearly terrified, nearly collapsed as she released them. With vicious glances at the unsympathetic gathering, they slunk out, humiliation and bitterness radiating out of them.
“My Queen?” the giant Sandahr asked.
“Yes. Have them followed.” Imogen sighed. “But the compulsion should hold.”
“It is good to see you…looking so well,” Sandahr rumbled.
The queen’s nails scraped along the back of Kasar’s neck, tracing the line of the collar and he knew that his blood was the cause.
“I am concerned, however,” a smaller man, nearly clerical in appearance, spoke up, “about the spread of these rumors. And now this free human knows.”
Imogen flinched and Kasar pressed a kiss to the warm skin under his cheek, reflexively soothing her.
“My pet is not free, Terence. He belongs to me.”
“Your pet should live in the compound with the herd. Not here where he will attract stray vampires like that lot.”
“Our queen should have her pet,” Sandahr argued. “We need her healthy and strong.”
“What I need is unimportant,” Imogen snapped.
“This is not true.” Sandahr rounded in front of them. “Many depend on you. We won’t stand by and allow you to…” The big man stopped himself, sighed. “To follow an unhealthy path.”
“He is not the usual sort of human man. I won’t force him to be captive.”
“If you mark him, he can go back and forth, if he chooses.”
Imogen’s body sat unnaturally still next to his. “I won’t ask it of him.”
“Try me.” Kasar spoke up, deliberately catching her gaze and meeting the others’ eyes in a scan around the gathering. Only Imogen had that trick and she wouldn’t use it now. He smiled at their astonishment. Look, the pet dog can speak! “I will take this mark.”
Imogen’s golden eyes were dark with trouble. “You don’t know what you ask for.”
“I suspect I do.”
“Human man—will you take your queen’s brand, so that all will know you as hers?” Sandahr glowered at him from under beetled brows.
“Yes.”
“You don’t know the bargain you’re making,” Imogen hissed. “The cost or the gain.”
Kasar wrapped a hand around her furry boot and squeezed the slim ankle beneath, the chain binding his wrist clinking. “Oh, but I do, my queen.”
She looked angry. Or afraid. Except that nothing frightened her.
“So be it.” Her whispered decision set the group into a flurry of motion.
They brought out a brazier of coals and an iron, which was thrust in to heat. Imogen looked ill, as much as a vampire could, and he felt sorry for that.
“Is it the same?” he asked her.
“Yes.” She cupped his chin. “Unless you want something else. Or not at all.”
“I want this. We shall be the same.”
She shook her head, sadly. “Oh Lapushka, we can never be the same.”
Should be isn’t is.
“I’ve learned the value of living in the moment,” he replied.
Sandahr took up the iron, now glowing yellow-white. “Do you wish to be restrained, human?”
“Or placed unconscious.” Imogen stroked his hair. “I can do that.”
“Were you unconscious?”
Her expression crumpled, ever so slightly. Such a liar that she didn’t remember. “No.”
“Then I shall stand for this.” He untied the black fur vest and shrugged it down his shoulders to catch on the manacles. Facing the big vampire, he braced himself. “Do it.”
“No.” Imogen rose and took the iron from Sandahr. “It should be me.”
Kasar met her grim eyes. So ferocious. Brave and responsible. “Yes. Mark me, Imogen.”
Pulling herself up, every inch the siren, queen of his fantasies, she placed the burning brand on his chest. Throwing his head back, Kasar screamed.
Chapter Six
The moment seemed to last forever. Kasar’s full-throated scream echoing through the yurt while the smell of burning flesh filled her head. She’d seen it done enough times to know exactly how to do it. She remembered the scent of her own branding.
She tossed the iron aside and waited for him to collapse. He didn’t. He stood still, fists clenched at his sides, smoke rising from his previously smooth pec, riding the agony, looking much the same as when she’d sucked the climax from him. It made her hunger stir and she hated herself for that.
“Fetch him wine,” she ordered.
He lowered his head from the stretched-back pose when he heard her voice, then looked at the burn. He grimaced, nodded, then raised an eyebrow at her.
“Take off the chains, Imogen.”
“You do not order—” Terence started forward and Imogen waved a hand that silenced him.
“Kasar has paid his price.” She unlocked the wrist manacles and collar, letting the chains fall to the floor.
He leaned forward, lips brushing her cheek. How he could look so very cocky after suffering such a thing, she didn’t understand. “I’ll let you put them on me again for sex, if you want to, my Queen.”
“We shall see,” she told him. If he decided to return with her. She wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t. She handed him the wine and he drank it down. “Tonight you may rest and recover. Tomorrow night you shall see our secret.”
“Why not tonight?”
Because she’d hoped for one more night with him. But it wouldn’t be fair to torment him more than she already had.
“If you wish. Sandahr, prepare the horses.”
“I’d like to join you.” Domino swept forward, bowing with a veneer of charm, but sharply hungry beneath.
“No.”
“I’ve paid my dues, my Queen.” Domino’s eyes glittered, snakelike. “How much longer will you dangle me on a leash like your human pet?”
Fixing him with a look—and, oh yes, it did feel good to be strong again, if only for a little while—she spoke coolly. “As long as I please, Domino. Or until I trust you. Whichever takes longer. Let’s go, Lapushka.”
Kasar shrugged the fur-lined vest back into place, hissing as it touched his seared flesh.
“Do you wish a bandage?”
He shook his head, flashing a grin at her. “No. I want to feel this.”
“You are a fool.”
“So you keep telling me.”
Oddly, she found herself smiling back. Such an odd man, this son of kings.
They rode out, surrounded by her nightriders, her favorite gelding easily carrying them both. Kasar wore a cloak and, riding behind her on the flat saddle pad, wrapped the cloak she’d given him around her also. His big hands wrapped around her waist, his powerful thighs straddling hers, his hard cock pressing into her ass—she tried to savor the moment.
“Do you feel the cold?” Kasar asked her, nuzzling her neck.
“No, not like a human does.”
“But you always seem so warm to me.” Under the cloak, he unlaced her vest.
“Anything that burns energy produces heat. You are an engineer—you should know such
basic principles.”
“And you breathe, your heart beats.” He slid his big hands up under the blouse she wore, cupping her breasts, thumbs brushing her nipples. The heart he spoke of tripped a beat.
“Fluids must circulate. Technically I don’t need to breathe oxygen, but my brain still performs that function. I’m told it’s buried deep in the physiology.”
“Yet your digestion has changed to consume only blood.”
She should have known he’d have to analyze this. Endless questions in this one. “Not exactly. We do not digest or void our systems. The magic that sustains us grows stronger when fed, but without it we do not die. We grow weak.”
“Aged-looking.”
Ah yes, he’d seen the ill-fated Mélanie. “It’s not pretty.”
“You are beautiful though.” His grip tightened on her breasts and he pulled her hard against him. One hand dropped to her spread thighs and pulled her skirt up, fingers pushing her panties aside and dipping into her wet sex. “Mmm.” He nipped her ear. “And hot and wet.”
“Stop that.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re here.” She pulled up on the reins and the nightriders fanned out.
Kasar stared around at the waving grasses, the slightly rising hills. It gave her a surge of satisfaction that he didn’t see it. She might be a monster, but she was damn good at it.
Upon her signal, Sandahr and his men began digging at the disguised entrance, clearing the dirt from the metal panel set in the ground. There had been other entrances. She’d ruthlessly ordered them sealed.
One makes choices, after all.
With vampiric strength, the riders lifted the plate, revealing the industrial stairwell beneath, lit with low-beam halogen lights.
Kasar whistled under his breath, casting her a hooded look. She gestured for him to descend before her, leaving Sandahr and the others to close and hide the entrance. They took no chances.
“What is this place?”
“First underground caverns. Nomadic tribes used them for centuries to store food. And to hide from the Mongol hordes.” She smiled at the irony and found him grinning back. Excitement radiated from him. Such a bittersweet moment before he went back to hating her. The weight of the keriss in her boot reminded her of his vow. That, too, she could give him. “Then it was co-opted by the Soviets, to make their weapons and hide against the ones the Americans might send.”
“And you watched them build it.”
She shrugged. “It was easier to stay hidden then. We kept tabs on the humans. Spying kept the younger vampires busy.”
“I thought there are no new ones.”
“Younger than five centuries,” she conceded. “Immortality wears on a person. Especially when they figure out how much they’re forgetting, how much of themselves erodes away.”
Kasar took her hand, weaving his fingers with hers. She allowed it. He wouldn’t want to hold her hand again in a few moments.
“Stand back.” They came up to a fire door. It took most of her strength to lever the massive door—meant to be electronically powered, until they’d disabled it—open enough for them to slip inside. “Observe.”
Kasar walked up and placed his hands on the shielded glass. She followed, seeing it all through his eyes, this elegant zoo she’d built.
Below them, a village of people slept under lowered lights, snug in their replica houses. In an adjoining cavern, herds of cattle and goats also dozed, waiting for their false daylight.
“The generators were already here, adaptable to various energy sources, depending on what we can supply at any given time. The hydroponics are quite advanced I’m told. Baking is advancing at a nice rate and we’ve found a number of plants that can be grown in these conditions to provide Vitamin C. That’s been a great concern.”
Kasar didn’t reply. Just stared, fingers flexing against the heavy glass.
“The thickness of the rock protects them from the nuclear radiation. Right now the biggest problem is replacing the light bulbs that simulate daylight. We try to minimize breakage.”
“We?” Kasar whispered.
“From my tribe. We take turns working with the people, teaching them what they don’t know, acquiring what they need.”
“And do they know what you are?”
She didn’t look at his face. Didn’t need to.
“We don’t do this out of the goodness of our hearts, Kasar. This is our captive herd, my private zoo, kept healthy and alive so that we can continue. We feed them. They feed us.”
“And Galeria is down there?”
“Yes.” Imogen remembered the dark-haired woman quite well and her imperious demands to serve her pregnancy. The resemblance to Kasar was unmistakable, in bearing, arrogance and sheer strength of will. “She bore twins—a niece and nephew for you.”
“I can see them.”
The wonder wound through his voice. A sense of awe.
“You may live here if you wish. Or go. Both. This is what you won by taking my brand.”
He turned and leaned an elbow on the one-way window, leaning his head on his hand and scrubbing his forehead.
“This was all your idea. This ‘zoo’ as you called it.”
“Yes.”
“And now I know where you got the idea.”
She’d expected that and yet part of her shriveled. Part that shouldn’t even be alive to feel pain. She iced it over.
“What is it the modern psychologists say? This ‘cycle of abuse”. I was put in a zoo, thus I put others in zoos. I’m fully aware of the irony.”
“Why were you so hungry?”
“What?” That was not what she’d expected.
He straightened, folding his arms, scowling.
“Until you fed from me, you were starving. Dying.”
“We don’t die,” she snapped.
“No, but you waste away, don’t you? Weak and attenuated until you’re just the shreds of consciousness clinging to a wasted, barely animated corpse.”
She stared at him, wordless.
He waved a hand at the sleeping captive village. “So why didn’t you feed from them?”
When she didn’t answer, he seized her by the arms and stared into her eyes. Here was the fury she expected. “Tell me. I need to know.”
“I didn’t deserve it,” she whispered. “All of this is my responsibility and I know full well what I’m doing to those people. I won’t stop it. But I won’t benefit.”
“And if I choose to stay here—you’ll no longer have me.”
No. She wouldn’t. Wrenching as it would be, she could give this up too. After all, she’d become accustomed to that sort of life. In time, she would forget him, along with all the others.
“There is a price for all things. You belong with your human family. Not with a monster.”
She bent, slipped his keriss from her boot. Wrapping Kasar’s hand around the hilt of his knife, she spoke with the power of a vow.
“Take your freedom. Do with it as you wish.”
Chapter Seven
The keriss fit into his palm like an old lover. Imogen watched him with a flat gaze, the vitality gone from her face. Waiting with old resignation. Forever looking like the young woman she’d once been.
She wouldn’t fight him, it was clear. He could turn the angle slightly, and slide the blade between her ribs, to sever the aorta, the first step to killing her.
Feeling his intent, she closed her eyes, her lashes a luscious sweep against her delicate cheekbones.
He hesitated.
“There is nothing new under the sun,” she whispered without opening her eyes. “Just the same crimes, again and again.”
A tear leaked from under her lashes and rolled down her cheek.
He tossed the keriss aside and seized her again by the arms, kissing the tear away.
Her eyes flew open in shock when he lifted her and pressed her back hard against the glass. Such a petite thing for such strength and will.
She g
asped and clung to him, golden eyes wide.
“You’re wrong.”
“Do you defy me?” She tried to sound tough, his vampire queen, but her voice shook.
“Yes.” Desire for her flooded him, ever renewing. “Now listen to me, Imogen. You protected your own kind. That’s what a queen does. You say you don’t care about humans, but you’re a liar. I’ve seen how it’s going down. You’ve given these people—my people—the best chance for survival there is.”
“But they have no choice in it.”
Taking her wrists, he stretched them up over her head, enjoying the way she wrapped her long legs in those furry boots around his waist.
“That’s a problem and we’ll discuss it. I will lead these people, yes?”
She considered him, thoughtful. “Perhaps it’s meant. You carry the blood of kings. Strong blood. Vital. Thus you are able to resist me. Sometimes.”
“More than sometimes.” His cock throbbed, thinking of her collar around his throat and her hands and mouth on him.
“And I will also live with you. We will be consorts of a sort—joining our respective nations.”
She pretended to pout, but relieved joy lit her eyes. “I liked having you as a pet.”
“Oh, I’ll be your pet, darling Imogen. I’m yours to possess. And you’ll be mine.”
He kissed her and she responded, sweetly, her fangs just brushing his lips. He reached under her skirt and tore away the lace panties. While she gasped against his mouth, he opened his pants and plunged into her. She was hot, wet and welcoming. Home.
“All we have is right now,” he told her, and offered her his throat. “Drink. Eat.”
“For the time of our life on earth is short and uncertain,” she replied, then sank her teeth into his flesh.
Above the layers of rock and earth, the grasses of the Steppes whispered their agreement.
About Jeffe Kennedy
Jeffe Kennedy is an essayist and fiction-writer. Her work has appeared in diverse magazines such as Redbook, Puerto del Sol, Wyoming Wildlife, Under the Sun and Aeon. She has been a Ucross Foundation Fellow, a Wyoming Arts Council roster artist and winner of their Poetry Fellowship. She has published an essay collection and several erotic novellas. Jeffe lives in Santa Fe, with two Maine coon cats, a border collie and plentiful free-range lizards, and frequently serves as a guinea pig for an acupuncturist-in-training.
HuntingtheSiren Page 6