She laughed loudly, the humor reaching her eyes and this time he did notice one more surprising change. Her eye teeth, slightly longer than his canines that resembled little mini fangs were no doubt longer and sharper looking. There was no way they were this long before and a chill went up his spine. Her laugh stopped quickly when she noted his expression. "Now what?" she demanded, a little uncharacteristic in tone of voice.
"Honey," he explained carefully, "I just noticed your teeth. You're growing fangs. Long ones at that."
Her eyes went wide as she seemed to make a connection. She uncharacteristically dropped the water jug and ladle with a clang and splash, looked at her nails again while her lavender eyes blazed in sudden wonder, then raked them through her thicker light blue hair. "Oh my," she started, "oh my oh-my-my!" She ran into the house without saying another word, the jug on the ground forgotten.
Alarmed and worried, he followed her as fast as he could. She was even quicker than before and vanished into the doorway before he could take a few steps. After a few pounding heart beats, he found her in front of the wall mirror, the covering tapestry torn off and lying in a heap. Her mouth was open and she was wildly staring at her new fangs. Those large almond shaped eyes were even bigger pools of lavender kissed wonder.
"What's going on?" he asked and she jumped, turning to him with a wild look. Beautiful and frightening at the same time, he never expected to hear what was about to come out of her pretty lips.
"My nails and teeth, they get like this for only one reason among my people. Only women get like this. We can't help it. It's a natural measure to give us better defenses when we're like this," she said, words rapid shot through her amazement.
"Like what?" he demanded, confused and puzzled.
"Like this!" she almost shouted. She spread her fingernails and displayed her fangs for him as if she was some creature of the night, then she hit him with the thunderous news. "Can't you see? I'm pregnant! You're going to be a father!"
He felt dizzy. There was a ringing sound in his ears. His perception returned to normal as his chest felt filled with air. A warm feeling traveled up and down his back. Surprise gave way to joy and when he held out his arms to her, she flew into them without hesitation. "This is great news," he finally got out as he hugged her tightly. "We're going to have a baby!"
"I'm going to have the baby," Myra corrected him playfully, happy beyond measure that he didn't disapprove. "You're going to have your hands full building a nursery."
This gave Ryan a moment of pause. "It's going to be difficult at best to have it built by the time winter settles in."
"Silly," Myra accused him playfully. "The baby won't be here for a year. Don't you know it takes fourteen months to birth?" As she snuggled in his arms, glowing in the moment, he felt a nagging familiar sensation in the back of his stubbornly dark memory.
"It's nine months with my people," he said casually, as if getting this information was no big deal. Inwardly to him it was a major accomplishment. This was specific information and it came easily, no pain involved. He continued his train of thought, but carefully. "Between us both, this baby being half me and half you, it could go either way."
Their discussion was interrupted by a knock on the door which startled them both. Nobody really dropped by unless there was a problem or somebody wanted something. Ryan released his hold on Myra and motioned for her to stay back. Then he carefully opened the door to reveal a short lad with a scroll. With a practiced flourish, he held it out and announced, "Please accept Lord Avrohom's tax agreement, should you wish to make a counter offer, I'll stay until it's written up."
"Please come in," Myra said from the table, setting a place for the official messenger boy. He couldn't have been more than twelve or thirteen, Ryan guessed. "I'll take that." The lad whisked in, all but prancing to the table and two waiting bowls of fruit. Myra took the scroll as he passed her.
She wrinkled her brows together as she finished reading the scroll, then explained. "Avrohom knows about the corn sale, wants one hundred silver, or one gold, the first warm day after winter. That's not a bad tax rate considering what happened last time."
"It's terrible," Ryan said, smiling like a wolf. "Write back that his service to the king was less than ideal the last time he arrived. There is a fine of twenty five silver for putting his hands on my wife while standing on our property. Then put down if such an amount is unacceptable, that I will come to his place to negotiate face to face, man to man."
"Are you unhinged?" Myra replied, voice rising in surprise. "You can't fine the king. It doesn't work that way."
"I may not be able to fine the king, dear, but I can and will fine Avrohom," he explained quickly with a tinge of humor. "Let him pay the difference out of his own pocket, not ours. Go ahead, honey. I don't think he'll argue the matter too much. Offer seventy five silver, no more."
"Alright," she replied, surrender in her tone. "I'll write it up that way, but I think you may be in for a good round of negotiation before this matter is settled. You may have wished you merely paid the one gold and have done with it."
Nor was she wrong. When the letter arrived again via the same boy two days later, the scroll was longer and with a good deal more writing.
"What does it say now?" Ryan asked cheerfully, but the look on Myra's face was anything but happy.
"He says it's one gold fifty silver for mentioning the problems you incurred the last time he was officially here," she explained, tone deflating into a zone of regret. "That any threat to him will only increase the amount and arguing about it isn't in our best interest."
"Does he now?" Ryan replied, his eyebrows climbing up. "Please, write down my reply exactly, word for word." He waited until she had the feathered pen in hand and poised over the page. As he spoke, her script flowed with a distinctive elegance. "As head of my house, I do not threaten. I make promises. Your extortion for a safe collection that never makes it to the king, but stays in your pocket is more than adequate to reduce my taxes to seventy five silver. If you feel such a promise isn't good, then feel free to show up and demand whatever high price you wish. I am sure the king himself would find such action interesting, since your stealing takes from him. Your choice, Avrohom. It's seventy five silver or the king finding out about the extra you demand for you and your guards."
Her hand paused and her large lavender eyes roamed his serious expression a moment. "You would do that?"
"Yes," he said, smiling coldly more to himself than anyone else.
She finished the writing with more words that he couldn't read, rolled up the scroll and handed it to the boy who had just belched from finishing the bowl of fresh fruit. Then she turned to her husband and wagged her finger as she told him in her most serious musical accent. "If you were of my people, darling, I would expect an assassin in the night or poison in our well for making such a threat."
"I made a promise," he gently corrected her.
"Alright, promise," she continued. "Such is the way for dealing with farmers who make threats on authority, even when that authority is wrong. I don't think Avrohom would do anything to us just because of who you are. The garrison likes you. The mayor likes you. People feel protected. If he was even rumored to have done anything to you, the king would need a new tax collector as the garrison just may kill him."
"That's pretty brutal," Ryan stated as he evaluated the situation out loud. "A people who relish in honor, doesn't eat meat because they don't like killing animals, would use politics and corruption as a means to end a life."
"Hey," she said defensively. "What would your people do to Avrohom?"
"That's easy," Ryan replied with relish. "We'd cook him up for dinner." As he said that, he smiled large at the messenger boy. The lad took that moment to bolt out the front door. Ryan laughed out loud, but Myra didn't find it funny and scowled.
"I doubt your people would do that, dear. I know better because I know you." She scolded, but only mildly.
"You're right of co
urse," Ryan confessed to her, then grinned as she realized with a mild shock just why he had said something so terrible. "But the messenger boy doesn't know that, and when Avrohom hears what the kid has to say, I'm sure the next letter will be a bit more favorable."
Two days later the next scroll was small with very little writing on it, and Ryan boomed with laughter when Myra read it to him out loud, surprise in her sweet voice. "Seventy five silver. Agreed."
Chapter Thirteen - The Bite
Myra's pregnancy changed her behavior in surprising ways, and even the bitter cold of winter couldn't dampen her energy and growing wildness. Like the previous year, they had labored hard to make sure the food harvest was finished and any upkeep on the property was completed. She seemed hardier and was able to complete the same amount of tasks he did without growing sore, which impressed him considerably.
Her sexual desire and need for intimacy also increased, which he didn't object one ounce until she accidentally drew blood on his shoulder one cold night during a powerful love making session. Her needle sharp fangs were a touch longer than even before, curved inward so her bottom lip wouldn't be pricked. Her passionate kissing of his shoulder got a little too deep and just a bit too careless.
"I'm so sorry!" she exclaimed, face covered with sweat as she looked down on him, teeth stained with flecks of red blood. She liked being on top more often than not when her system was changing from pregnancy and he had no reason to complain until now. "Does it hurt, honey?"
"Am I still bleeding?" he asked with a meek rumble in his low voice, husky from the building passion. Physically thrilled with her increased wild need for him, the pain from her bite was only a mild sting, it did nothing to mute his desire. He hoped this wouldn't turn her off enough to stop, unless of course, she did more damage than what he could feel.
"It's stopped, sorta," she blurted out, her expression growing more concerned mixed with regret. "I got carried away, love. Forgive me?" She gazed down at him in apology, her hands gently caressing his tight chest muscles.
Looking up at her in his best expression of love, he smiled in response. She smiled back, and her bloodstained fangs gave the dark mass of hidden memory in his mind a little jiggle. A word popped up, and he knew its definition without hesitation. He also knew it did not apply to her, but the image is almost mirror perfect in his mind. Vampire. He almost chuckled, instead he caressed her sexy thigh and gave it a gentle tap.
"I'll always love you, Myra. No matter what." His voice was firm yet gentle, and he could see her worry melt away. With a firm resolution to be more careful, she started to move on him again and he groaned with pleasure. It was a good long time before they finished and got to sleep.
The next morning, Ryan went to get up to start the fire for his wife but he could barely move. It felt as if his entire body was made out of lead and he wasn't strong enough to lift his arm. He called out but his volume was muted almost down to a harsh whisper. He could hear Myra in the kitchen cooking breakfast over the iron wood burning stove. The crackle of the flaming logs was unusually loud in his ears. Good, at least she's not overly cold. All he could do was lay there collecting his strength, and his second attempt to call for her actually made it past the whisper stage and into the realm of a hoarse cough.
It felt like an eternity, but she finally came into their bedroom and cheerfully announced, "Breakfast is ready dear," but got no further with her attempt at teasing him for sleeping in. He was covered head to toe in a thick sweat, his eyes seemed distant and his shoulder was a deep dark bloated purple where her fang marks had scabbed over. "Oh no! I'll be right back, don't try to move," she commanded in sheer panic, then hurried away.
Another eternity later, though he knew it only to be a few minutes, she returned with a bowl of slushy ice water scooped from the outside trough. She dipped a rag into it and started to wipe him down from forehead to his chest. Normally such a freezing cloth on his bare skin would have made him yelp, but this felt like heaven. Each damp swipe took the damaging heat from his skin and replaced it with a calm coolness. As the heat started to return, she would wipe him down again and the relief would return in a large swatch while the rest of his body attempted to cook itself.
Ryan knew he had a bad fever, but couldn't recall ever getting this sick before. In fact, he recalled being healthier than normal compared to... to... his mind stayed dark at that point, refusing him the knowledge. He felt the gist of truth for his ability to be healthy, but without anything else coming out of his amnesia laced memory there was no way he could voice it. Then another cool swipe and the heat that was trying to fry his brain got less intense.
He started to drift in and out of sleep. A few times when he opened his eyes, he noticed Myra was putting on winter travel clothes. Where was she going? The cold hurt so she hated traveling in the snow. Bad enough she would have to go out to get the firewood until he felt stronger, but she never bundled up in her winter traveling clothes.
His eyes opened and closed two more times. The third time he opened them, he was looking into an older man's face. His dark blue hair straight and pointed ears sagging from age, his gentle eyes spoke of years of confident experience. His clothes were covered with snow. Ryan went to speak but the old man put his hand gently over his lips and shook his head slowly, letting the patient know he wasn't to try.
"How bad is it, Doctor Haka'Zal?" Myra asked, fear riding her musical accent.
"I'll have to lance his shoulder," he replied calmly. "He is not of our people, so your venom reacted with him a lot worse than if he was one of our kind."
"Venom?" Myra all but spat out.
"Your first pregnancy?" the doctor asked, got his answer when he glanced at her and she nodded woodenly. "I see. Normally this is explained in your youth, but sometimes it's not taught as well as it should be."
"What?" she demanded, then quickly apologized. "Really, Doctor, I'm sorry for snapping. I'm scared for my husband."
"Quite alright," the doctor consoled her, his understanding tone professional and detached. "Women with child develop defenses, as you're now well aware of. You also have a small amount of venom in your bite, it turns on when you're with child. Anything not of our kind will be paralyzed almost instantly and can die within a few hours. For our own people it's just a mild headache at best. We have a natural immunity, the defense is geared to wild creatures nature might send to try to hurt you."
"My biting him was an accident," she exclaimed.
"The venom doesn't know that," Doctor Haka'Zal said. "I think his size and strength has spared him from the worst of it, he would be dead by now if this wasn't the case. The wound is badly infected and filled with puss. Once I drain it he should start feeling better within a few hours. But he'll be weak as a flower in the storm, possibly for days."
Ryan had heard it all. She had gone out and got a doctor for him while he was going in and out of stupor. His heart was constantly warmed by her caring nature but also troubled by what he heard. Her bite was poisonous, venom filled and deadly dangerous. It amazed him quite a bit though he was too weak to show it. The paralytic in her venom was extremely effective.
As his artificially slowed thoughts crawled by, he didn't even notice the steel needle that pricked his inflamed shoulder. He didn't see a tear filled Myra flinch when the thick yellow puss shot across the room. When the doctor poured the astringent liquid over the bleeding patch, it stung like hell but not enough to make Ryan react. He just didn't have the energy.
"This is strong antiseptic wash," Doctor Haka'Zal told Myra. "He must really be out of it not to holler. It burns like acid on open flesh." His skilled slender fingers started to apply a clean bandage. "I’ll leave supplies with you to change this twice a day. Use the strong wash I leave with you each time until it's all gone, in the amount I used just now. Do you understand?"
"Yes Doctor," she said, voice low with grief. Her bite almost killed her husband. She would have to be ultra careful in the future, determined to never let this ha
ppen again.
Ryan opened his eyes and saw the doctor leave. Then Myra came over to him, placed her cool hands on each side of his face, bending over to snuggle her cheek against his cheek. "I'm so sorry, love," she whispered into his ear. "I would have died with you if this turned out bad."
His rebuttal was thoughtful, inspired by his wanting her to live a normal life even if something bad happened to him and to not blame herself for his current condition. It could only remain a thought, dizziness washed over him like a breeze from hell. He fixed the sentiment in his mind and promised that when he could speak normally, he would tell her. Then fatigue came waltzing into his head, stomped on his brain with an evil cackle and the lights went out as he slipped into a deep obsidian sleep.
Chapter Fourteen - Taken
The people in Ocaza didn't turn their heads as often as before when Ryan walked down the street. The novelty of his existence was starting to wear off which made him exhale with relief. With the taxes paid to the guards while Avrohom hid safely in town on the first warm day, he knew exactly how much he had to spend on building the nursery. Just as he spotted the merchant that sold construction materials in the distance, Vendegal came trotting up with a welcoming smile.
"Lord Za'Ryan, it's so good to see you!" The garrison commander was dressed in simple clothes, which meant he was off duty. He held out his hand and Ryan clasped it.
"Likewise," he returned with a friendly grin. "It seems the locals are getting used to me."
Vendegal chuckled. "Getting used to hiding their reaction, maybe. You were the talk of the town all winter long. How's the shoulder?"
Ryan blushed, surprised. "How did you know about that?"
"As part of the garrison," Vendegal explained openly, "even if only part time, the good doctor is tasked with reporting injuries to me. Even accidental ones. I need to know if my men are at one hundred percent when we go on patrol."
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