Chapter 1
Kazeielan Caenust
The night sky was filled with the glow from the city streets and the skyscrapers. Their was not any sort of view of the stars. The smog in the sky was far too thick for that. All of this I noticed as I turned from the greasy, smoke-covered window of the bar. The brown grime on the window was streaked from the condensation. The bar was filled to capacity- probably passed . None of that bothered me. It never did. I had spent long, dead years accustoming myself to the crowds of people, to the thick smoke that burned my lungs.
Expertly, I weaved my way through the mass on the dance floor, the pounding music and flashing lights driving my senses mad. That was the only thing that I hated about the club, aside from the vulgar displays of sexual attraction I saw there frequently. I had almost no drive for that then. Too much had I seen, too much had I done. At a table in the corner sat a man, and what he had was what I wanted. What the painful burning in my veins needed.
"You have it, yes?" I asked, slinking and folding my form into the booth next to him. My baritone voice was low and even, barely audible about the roar of the club.
"Yes, yes," he said, waving his hand and turning his attention back to his prostitute.
"Give it to me." This was not a request. Such a talent I had with manipulating my voice, I could convey any meaning in my words.
"Why should I?" He said, irritated now. He turned his attention back to me. It was then I chose to use my glamour, my vampiric hypnotism.
"Because," and my voice slipped into a more seductive tone, the one that I used with all prey, man or woman, "I will pay double, triple even, if that is what you ask." But I knew that I would not have to. He was mortal, and with them, I always got my way. Into his pocket slipped his hand, and out he withdrew a syringe. That was what I needed, yes. Oh, how my heart pounded with anticipation of the high to come. He placed it into my own, and my long, thin fingers closed around it, slipping it into the jacket of my suit. Out came a fold of bills, which I pressed swiftly into his hand before I slunk away.
I glided back through the crowd, the transaction unnoticed by the patrons. Normally, I would go upstairs to the secluded, unused rooms of the motel-turned-strip-club, but I was weary of the people that night. I cast a swift glance around the room, over the heads and flailing arms of the crowd, past the stage and the bar, before I slipped through the door and out into the cold night air.
My long, thin legs carried me over the parking lot to the darkest corner, the most removed from the bright lamp posts. I pressed the button on my keys and the headlights of my Gallardo flashed on, and it beeped once. I slipped in the door and started the engine, guiding the beast of a car out of the lot and onto the back streets.
I tried to make it home, to control my hand and the quivering of my muscles until I was home and in the quiet of the Estate. But, oh, how my drug called to me! How long had it been? Eight, maybe twelve hours? Dear Zeus, it had not been that long... But... Still...
Into an alley I guided the monster that was my pride and joy. Off went the engine. I slid out of my suit jacket, setting it on the passenger seat. I loosened my tied and separated the knot with all the skill of someone who knew it well. Then, I rolled up the sleeve of my button-up, starched white shirt and tightened the tie around my upper arm. I stuck a needle into the body of the syringe and gripped the tie tightly in my inhumanly pointed teeth. I rested the needle against my flesh, watching the vein throb with my slow, even heartbeat. Slowly, though, it became erratic with the suspense.
A noise stopped my thumb and fingers as I prepared for my next wild ride. For a moment, I thought it to be the police, and I quickly dashed away the tie and slipped the needle into my sleeve. But, I saw no headlights. It had been a voice, calling out some term, maybe a name? My ears picked away at the sound that I had mistaken for a siren. It had been a squeal, one of the most complete and utter terror. That of a person who knows that they are going to die, and there is nothing they can do about it.
I yanked down my sleeve and seized a knife from the glove box. The gull-wing door could not open fast enough. There was no reason for an innocent to die. From that scream, I could tell that whoever it was had not asked for death. It was not someone who had been in a fight because they wished it. And, it sounded like a woman. There were many worthless and cruel men in this city, many that would rape and kill a woman if they got the chance. I would not allow for that to happen.
There was the sound of whimpering as soon as I reached the cold city air. The sound of many rough voices, in the alley across from mine. My eyes adjusted to the brightness swiftly- though it was a painful process. Eight figures, surrounding one that was on the ground. I drew my lips back from my rapidly extending fangs, and my heavily-accented voice called out the first word that I thought of. "Hey," I roared. They did not stop, and so, my fury was unleashed.
The first fell quickly under the force of my shoulder, the breath knocked from him and his ribs shattering against the wall. A swift slice across the throat silenced him. The second and the third perished in a similar way, and from the fourth, I saw the gleam of metal. It was not a blade he held, but a gun, and that was not something I could fight. But this was my chance to redeem a bit of my soul from Hades's grasp, to take a little bit back of myself, and I would not be deterred from that chance.
The was the bright light of gunpowder, the explosively painful sound of gunshot. A cracking of bone in my left arm and a pain in my side. For once, I cursed the magic of my phantom limb, but that did not stop me. Another shot, this one landing in my thigh and stopping dead against the bone there. He fell quickly and soundlessly as I buried my blade in his stomach. Hot blood rushed over my right hand that tightly grasped the blade. I felt a different kind of high then, one that was just as wonderful- maybe moreso- than what heroin did. The high of having the most divine power, the power to be a god. To decide who dies when, and how. The pain did not help my haze of wild abandon.
The fifth fell to my fangs, all blood drained from him. Instead, it splattered the front of my shirt, and dripped down my ghastly pale chin. The sixth and the seventh hardly put of a fight, and the eighth broke my nose.
Standing there, dripping blood with a severed human head in my hand, I would have forgotten entirely my purpose, why I had gone on such a spree, if the victim had not whimpered. I turned, my eyes becoming close as they could to human, and knelt in front of her. It took a second for me to realize that the beaten and broken one was not a girl, but a boy, dressed as a girl, miniskirt and all.
"I will not hurt you," I whispered through my fangs. Gently, I took him in my arms and against my chest as I carried him to the car. Tiny arms snaked around my neck, and he pressed his face into my hair that fell over my shoulders, down my chest and past my hips and knees in thick curls. It was a strange feeling, and I felt my body tense. I set him down in the passenger seat of my car, and the feeling drifted away into the realm of the forgotten.
I poured gasoline over the bodies, and tossed a match onto them. Carefully enough crafted to make even a massacre that horrendous look like an accident. Then, I slipped back into my car, and headed home, mind hazy with blood loss and the thrill of the kill.
Xander had said that the wounds on the boy were severe, but I never assumed that they would be this severe. As I listened to my brother list them off-several broken ribs, a shattered cheekbone, a crushed hand, a broken collarbone, and so many bruises, cuts and scrapes that the boy would not want to move for weeks-my mind wandered as it always did. Why had they done that? Surely there was better motive than the skirt I found him in. If not, then society was in a far faster downward spiral than I first assumed.
“Xander. Is it intolerable if I check on the boy? I have seen wounds like that in my day, and I think it would do well for me to at least have a look,” I asked, cutting across a sentence. So often I interrupted him, one would think thta he had gotten used to it. But, from the slightly offended tone in his voice, I could tell that he had not.
“I… Um… I’m the doctor,” he shrugged, “but if you think you should, go ahead. He’s been patched up for a couple of hours, though. But, hey, try not to wake him.”
“I will try,” I said with a small dip of my head. The boy had been taken to my quarters. No room in this house- not even Xander's labratory in the basement levels- had been built for the wounded. So often did I come home with similar wounds, whether it be from my own fighting desires or by chance my target had been notified of my presence, that my brothers and I finally decided that it was the best idea to modify my very bedroom. I strode silently across the persian rug and up the stairs, through the widing halls to the back of the house, up another flight of stairs and slipping into the thick oak door of my bedroom without a sound.
I was hit by a wall of a smell unlike anything in the world. It was so… remarkable. Better than chocolate, by far. It was sweet, and yet carried the salt-and-rust undertones of blood. I then realized that it was blood. The boy’s blood. It was his blood that made my fangs run to their fullest and my pupil shrink to a thin pinprick.
There was a tiny gasp as soon as the door clicked shut. My eyes darted guiltily away from the blood in the drains around the room. the boy sat bolt upright in my bed, the thick, bearskin blanket clutched around his chest. From him rolled the stench of fear.
“Where… Where am I? Who’re you?” The voice sounded like bells, horribly confused bells. The boy whimpered again as the pain of sitting up hit him. I strode over and spread my fingers on his chest over the blanket, pushing him back down.
“Kazeielan,” I answered quietly, my speech unhindered by the daggers of bone.
The boy did not attempt to speak my name. It was difficult to pronounce, and I was aware of it. For centuires, I have not been called that, at least not by most. "Kaze will work just as well," I added.
The boy was quiet for a long while, whilst I was fighting a battle with my nastiest of instincts. I watched him carefully, my stare unhindered by the decree of modesty. He was not quite as pale as I, no one was. His jaw was soft and his eyes were the darkest blue I had ever seen. He was not entirely feminine, not now that I was not intoxicated with killing. There were bruises on his face, and they were visible now that Xander had cleaned the makeup off.
“Permit me to ask your name?” I requested, still staring.
“I… uh… What?” He seemed confused as his tiny voice quavered in his pain.
“What is your name?” I repeated, this time dropping my scrutinizing stare from him.
“I… uh… Garnett Oxford… um… sir,” he stumbled and tripped over words and I knew that it was most probably my fault. I knew that I had that effect on anyone, though, with the scars on my face, I could not see why.
I dipped my head. “Thank you, Garnett, but there is no need for chivalry of that level here.”
“Okay,” he said quietly, and that was all.
I let the silence stretch on, and, finally, just as I had known, Garnett spoke up again. “W-Where am I?” He cast his eyes about my lavishly decorated bedroom, pausing on my precious Renaissance paintings.
“My home. My bedchamber, actually.”
“This… This is… where you… live?” his eyes went wide and he looked back at me.
“Yes…” my eyebrows came together in confusion, “Where else would I have brought you?”
He was silent again. “This... Is your bed then?”
"Yes. Of course it is."
"I'm sorry."
"What in the world for?"
"For taking up where you sleep." He moved to sit, and most likely stand. I pressed him onto his back again.
"Balderdash. I have no use for it. It is about time that it has some use other than to hold laudry."
"But... You need somewhere to sleep..."
"And when I do sleep- which is rarely , mind you- there are plenty other rooms for me to do so in.
"I'm still sorry."
Why in the world would someone be sorry to me? I told myself that I would not think of it at the moment. "That is fine, though I see no logic in it." I shook my head.
Garnett was silent again, for a while. For quite some time, actually. "Why... Why did you save me?" He asked, after he caught his breath.
“You appeared to have needed my assistance.”
“T-Thanks.”
“There is no need.”
He seemed stunned at that. “But… you saved my life… you’ve got to… to…. want something.” His voice trembled with fear as he said want.Like he feared that I wanted the most terrible thing from him.
“Must I?” My question left him speechless.
Garnett motioned to the bandages. Weakly. His thin chest was rising and falling with his heavy breathing. “You did… this…. too?”
“No, no. I am not quite so neat. You have Xander to thank for the actual saving. I was only the ambulance.”
“Who… is… he?”
“You ask many questions. It is my turn. Are you hungry? You are almost as thin as I am,” I could see from the stunned look that my turning of the tables had the desired effect. Garnett had begun to make far too many inquiries for my comfort. Already, Xander was saying that he would know to much. That I should not have brought him here, when recently he himself had brought his now-lover here. Most of my brothers and I have a hero complex of sorts.
“I… Um…” his stomach snarled and he appeared as if he were to be sick. That seemed to change his mind on something. “Yeah.”
I nodded. “I will have one of my brothers bring you something.” I said before I stood, bowed deeply at the waist,and left.
I walked quietly across the marble floor, and stood behind the sofa. “Alexander… Will you make him something?”
“Who?” I will admit Alexander can be slow sometimes. Maybe that is because of all the illegal drugs he uses, and then again, maybe not.
“The boy. His name is Garnett."
“Sure,” Alex smiled and set off to the kitchen.
I threw my leg over the recently vacated couch, laying down carefully. Pain shot through open wonds that I had not yet closed, and especially the bullett wound. Xander had finally retrieved the lead this morning, after repairing Garnett, and it still smarted when I moved around too much. My cell phone vibrated, and when I pulled it out, I found there to be a new text message. From the man at the club, demanding I pay him more, saying that I had taken more than what he had given me. No doubt his whore stole it. I replied with a simple threat and the word "no."
"Eight bodies were found this morning at two o'clock..." The newswoman began. I lefted my eyes from the phone and set it back down on my chest. Another of my brohters, Romius, looked over at me.
"This's your doing, eh, brother?" he asked with a raucous laugh.
I nodded. "Yes. But I thought I burned them..."
The camera footage showed the charcoal remains of the men that had attacked Garnett. "... All of them charred so far beyond recognition that their dental records have had to be used for identification..."
"That answer your question?" Rom inquired as he walked by the couch, ruffling my hair. I growled at him. They had found my work; this was not a time that I wished for humor. There was no way for them to trace me- I had no fingerprints to trace, and though my hair was long, not a thread ever fell out.
"...There is absolutely no forensic evidence at the scene..." Her words stilled the worry in my heart. I did not want to have to move. Again. And this world seemed to be shrinking with every decade. There were fewer and fewer places to hide. After a month or so, I knew that it would all calm down, like things always did. A chuckle roused itself in my chest, an evil chuckle. One of madness, just as my smile was. And my brothers knew that my crazed times would come and go, much like a woman's bad humor every month.
"...Our news crew is waiting for more information from the police chief, but so far there has been no word..." Of course there would be no word! No evidence! I knew I had not left any evidence behind. No matter what I did, no matter my state of mind, I was always careful.
Alex went by the couch, carrying a steaming plate of food. It made my stomach growl, and I stood, walking into the kitchen and fixing myself a heaping plate of steak tartae. Raw meat was always something that stilled all my needs at once- blood, carnage, and food. I walked back into the living room just in time to see the last bit of a conference with the police chief. He had said again what the newswoman had already confirmed. Lack of evidence. I chucked and finished eating. All my brothers said that I ate like a starved wolf, and it was then that I finally noticed. I set the plate down on the coffee table, and propped my legs up on the glass.
The heavyset mastiff my brothers had gotten for me last Christmas tromped his way over to my and rested his head on my lap. I took the remote in one hand and stroked his wide forehead with the other, flipping channels until I reached a documentary on the hunting habits of sharks.
In a way, they reminded me of myself. Stalking down their prey, waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike. Always solitary. Their way of scenting blood from miles away. All of this was things that I could do. But I did not swim, I was not camoflauged. At eight and a half feet tall, paler than snow and with natrually red-as-blood hair, how could I be called camoflauge? I chuckled at the thought. The dog climbed up and laid on my lap, a trickle of drool finding its way onto my suit. I chuckled again and patted Cerberus' shoulder. "Good dog," I laughed a little. It took so much to make me laugh those days that I was surprised that a dog could. Even Romius- the reputed joker of the family- had trouble even making me smile. Always I had had a better connection with animals. Even my own brothers could not get past that wall.
Alex walked back down the stairs, smiling broadly. "He's so key-oot!" his girlish voice giggled. I looked up from the television and around my shoulder.
"What makes you say so?" I inquired. I should have thought first. Alex is the kind of man that can think me cute. Anything Garnett would do would make him think so.
"He just... is!" Alex giggled again. I shook my head and gently pushed Cerberus off of my lap. He looked up at me with scorned eyes.
"Oh, stop that," I said, narrowing my eyes slightly. His tail darted between his legs. I patted him on the head, chuckling slightly. Everything I did was taken as a threat, even when it was not. I strode across the immense living room and kitchen and set my plate in the sink. Alex wrinkled his nose.
"Why do you always have to eat meat raw?" His high voice sounded disgusted.
I raised my eyebrow at him. "Because it tastes better that way." One would think that Alexander would have learned not to question my ways in the centuries he has known me. But no, not Alex. Always questioning, always asking. Almost like a child, but far, far from that innocent, no matter how childish he acts about most things.
"You're gross."
I shrugged. "Each man to his own." I pulled a bottle from the refridgerator and popped the cork. It was only a few hours now before I had to go to a meeting of sorts. I had been called forth- once again- by what I call my little "Brotherhood." A gathering of the city's leading bloodletters, all of us gathered to keep the peace in the world of crime. It made me feel strangely like the Godfather, when I thought of it too much. But, those few hours, before the Gathereing were always the longest. It filled me with adrenaline, knowing of the fights that often broke out. And the knowledge that none dare report a death of one of the Brotherhood did not help.
Xander entered the kitchen and sighed. "You couldn't have picked a different time to play hero, could you, Kaze?" he asked, setting down his suitcase.
"Why do you say this?" I replied. Oftentimes I answered with a question, being the philosophical man that I am.
"I'm catching a plane in an hour."
"Yes, I know. Three-week conference in London. What does that have to do with Garnett?"
"I'm the only doctor."
I chuckled darkly. "Xander, you forget so easily! I have seen and treated wounds far worse than that. So has Rom. And Alex. He will be fine."
"But, what if he isn't? What if something goes wrong?"
"You sound as though you love him. You barely know his name."
"Forgive me for valuing human life."
Xander and I hardly see eye to eye, and this was one of the major issues. He thinks that humans- all of them- diserve to live. He was a sheltered child, coddled by his mother until her death. Made being king of the viking hordes difficult, his love of human life. Xander had not seen the cruelty of man that I have. Never seen the dark side. "Not all of them need valuing or saving." This often ended the argument. "But, you need not worry about your patient. He is in good hands."
"You know I'd hardly ever trust anyone to you, Kazeielan." His voice was short and sharp, and he used my full name. If it were not for Nienna entering the room, he might have cracked and missed his plane. What a pity that would have been! She wrapped her arms around his barrel of a chest and rested her chin on his shoulder.
"Xander, babe, do you really have to go?" she asked, her bell-like voice and her eyes pleading. Xander turned to face her.
"Yes, love. I really do. I can't worm my way out of this one." He attempted one of those carefree smiles of his, and maybe she did not see through it. But I did. Xander truly did not want to leave.
That was when my own fury subsided greatly. Thrown was I into the realm of memory. Arra. Fiamme. Gwen. All of them, they loved me, for what I was. All of them died because of me. I had absolute faith in the fact that their deaths were because of me. Because the gods so despised me that they sought to kill everything good that came within my reach. The backs of my eyes stung and I bit down hard on my lip and took a massive swig from the bottle.
Nienna, somehow, saw this. She looked at me for a second, her sharp-featured and wonderfully human face concerned. "Kaze... Are you okay?" She asked, resting her cheek against Xander's immense shoulder and looking at me.
Stubbornly, I let my face slip behind a veil of my bright crimson hair. "Yes. I am fine." And my voice held the conviction of a man who really was. The wounds were still there, and they still smarted at the touch. Cautiously, I turned my mind away from that, and into the bubbles of my bottle of champagne. I sighed and turned, walking out of the kitchen.
Chapter 2
Kazeielan Caenust
I guided the car up the steep, snow-covered mountain road. With the help of my hypodermic aide, I had regained control of myself. Gone were the thoughts of the blood and of the torn bits of my soul. Instead, was the high, the racing of my heart and the speeding of my breath. My hands shook and I felt the drug running through my veins. I pulled up to the gate and rested my head against the leather seat. There was a rapping on the window and I rolled it down, opening my eye a crack and peering out at the guard.
"Do you have...?" he asked, in a trembling fearful voice. Customary to myself, I cut across his sentence by holding up a sheet of paper. It was all the identification I needed. He returned to his booth next to the gate and opened the wrought-iron fence.
I pulled the car around the drive and up to the hilltop mansion. All of the Brotherhood had the riches of any, but none had quite the time to accrue what I have. I slid out of the car, dropping my keys and cell phone into the pocket of my tuvedo jacket. None of them would dress for the occasion as I did, but, then again, I dressed like this habitually. I threw open the huge oak doors and walked through the enterance hall toward the back, and then through the doors to the dining room. There, I took my typical seat at the end of the table.
"You are late, Kazeielan. Again." The wrinkled old man said from the opposite end.
"I know. Bit of trouble on the highway," I chuckeld evilly. Trouble? Oh, no. Just finishing up a little job handed to me a week ago.
"Do not let it happen again."
"I might not. But, why would I be punctual to arrive somewhere I do not wish to go?" I laughed again, raising my arms in mock confusion and leaning back in my chair, propping up my feet on the expensive table. Rash, I became, with the drug.
The man glared at me. The rest were shocked into silence. None of them dared go against the Master, their precious, precious Master! Ha! That was all the good time I had here, making the aged man angry. One of these days, I was hoping that I would anger him enough to trigger a heart attack, but, so far, my efforts were unsuccessful. Then, in the typical drone of his, he began to cover who we had killed that month and deal out the payments. Vaguely, it reminded me of the Alchoholics Anonymous meetings that Xander forced me to go to in the nineteen-eighties. He came to me last, dealing a few hundred thousand to each of the other brothers.
"Kazeielan, as usual, you have pulled in an unusually high payment."
The corner of my mouth pulled into an evil smile. "I thought as much."
"You're the only man I've met to kill seventy men in a month."
"The only man you will ever meet to accomplish it." I dipped my head in what was to me a mocking hal-fbow. To him, though, I could see it was a compliment. Across the table he slid a briefcase of my earnings. I popped it open and counted out eighty-four million. Six million short of what I should have recieved.
"Where is the rest of it?" I demanded, my voice growing cold and angered.
"I call it a 'finder's fee.'"
"What in the name of Persephone is that supposed to mean?" I asked, hissing slightly. I dropped my feet and leaned forward against the table. "You had best pay me my due. Else you find yourself on my list of victims."
The old man did not answer. I saw his wrist flick slightly and another case brought to me. "I had hoped to do you good. Save you the wrath of your brothers by at least cutting your pay a little. You seem to prove difficult to reason with."
"Zeus-damn right I am hard to reason with!" I snarled, snatching the second case away and empting it slowly into the first. Then, I stood and took it under my arm. "Forgive me for my rude exit, but I find myself growing weary of your ridiculous antics." I bowed deeply, and this time it was obviously sarcastic.
I strode out to my car, still fuming. The old git thought that he could cheat me out of money, claiming it for my own good! Oh, call me greedy, and I would not deny it. There were few things I hated more than a cheat, especially one who lied about it. I slid into my car and fired the engine, blaring the stero and loud and I could without having to fear blowing the speakers. It hurt, greatly, and I felt a bit of hot blood trickle down my jaw. But I ignored that, hoping that it would knock the anger out of me. Out through the gate I sped the car, weaving through the tight corners and sliding on the ice. Once, the rear bumper scraped the guardrail. But, even this I ignored, no matter how much I loved my car.
I think that it was the stereo that made me miss it. The incessant ticking of a bomb. Before I realized it, the heat and the inferno were upon me. Splinters of metal scraped my flesh, the heat burned away my coat and much of my flesh. Mostly, it was on my back, and I was thrown from the car. I skidded a few hundred feet across the road, stopped by the painful rolling into the ditch. For a long time, I laid there, staring at the cloudly sky and feeling snowflakes fall on my face. A massive column of black smoke rose for the reminants of my beloved Gallardo. Oh, what a fool I was! Again and again I cursed myself for even coming. For not getting my money in private, as I had always done. I rolled agonizingly onto my side, my eyes watering. I groaned.
As I laid there, I ran through injuries. Half my face was shattered bone and scrapes from the pavement. My right arm was limp, and I could see the awkwardness in my shoulder that hinted toward dislocation. Four ribs, broken. The flesh on my back was burned nearly off. That I could feel, horridly. Every slight gust of wind, the barest touch from the shreads of my shirt, the light dancing of the snowflakes. All of it shot pain through me. I rolled into a tight ball, closing my eyes. Moning. I should wait for morning... Or at least dawn... No. The blood... It would attract things that I could not deal with at the moment. Other vampires. Werewolves. The supernatrual. I forced myself to roll until I was kneeling with my hands drawn to my chest. Then, slowly, I hauled myself to my feet. Cell phone. Yes. Reason found its way though my high and through my instinctive survivalism, and I stumbled over to the tiny speck of black on the road and flipped open the phone. One bar of service. With my one good arm, I punched in the speed dial for Alexander.
"Hello?" he asked, his voice chirping up happily.
"Alex... Hurry... Twelve miles... Up Ash Mountain... Bomb..." That was all that I needed to say, and I knew it even before Alex hung up. I collapsed onto my side, amazed that my phone and made it through the fire. But I would not question that. I was merely thankful that I had survived. Though immortality has its benifits, Death is never freindly, even if the Death is a gentle one, it always seems that all the pain of every other death collected into the most horrid of blows.
Kazeielan Caenust
The night sky was filled with the glow from the city streets and the skyscrapers. Their was not any sort of view of the stars. The smog in the sky was far too thick for that. All of this I noticed as I turned from the greasy, smoke-covered window of the bar. The brown grime on the window was streaked from the condensation. The bar was filled to capacity- probably passed . None of that bothered me. It never did. I had spent long, dead years accustoming myself to the crowds of people, to the thick smoke that burned my lungs.
Expertly, I weaved my way through the mass on the dance floor, the pounding music and flashing lights driving my senses mad. That was the only thing that I hated about the club, aside from the vulgar displays of sexual attraction I saw there frequently. I had almost no drive for that then. Too much had I seen, too much had I done. At a table in the corner sat a man, and what he had was what I wanted. What the painful burning in my veins needed.
"You have it, yes?" I asked, slinking and folding my form into the booth next to him. My baritone voice was low and even, barely audible about the roar of the club.
"Yes, yes," he said, waving his hand and turning his attention back to his prostitute.
"Give it to me." This was not a request. Such a talent I had with manipulating my voice, I could convey any meaning in my words.
"Why should I?" He said, irritated now. He turned his attention back to me. It was then I chose to use my glamour, my vampiric hypnotism.
"Because," and my voice slipped into a more seductive tone, the one that I used with all prey, man or woman, "I will pay double, triple even, if that is what you ask." But I knew that I would not have to. He was mortal, and with them, I always got my way. Into his pocket slipped his hand, and out he withdrew a syringe. That was what I needed, yes. Oh, how my heart pounded with anticipation of the high to come. He placed it into my own, and my long, thin fingers closed around it, slipping it into the jacket of my suit. Out came a fold of bills, which I pressed swiftly into his hand before I slunk away.
I glided back through the crowd, the transaction unnoticed by the patrons. Normally, I would go upstairs to the secluded, unused rooms of the motel-turned-strip-club, but I was weary of the people that night. I cast a swift glance around the room, over the heads and flailing arms of the crowd, past the stage and the bar, before I slipped through the door and out into the cold night air.
My long, thin legs carried me over the parking lot to the darkest corner, the most removed from the bright lamp posts. I pressed the button on my keys and the headlights of my Gallardo flashed on, and it beeped once. I slipped in the door and started the engine, guiding the beast of a car out of the lot and onto the back streets.
I tried to make it home, to control my hand and the quivering of my muscles until I was home and in the quiet of the Estate. But, oh, how my drug called to me! How long had it been? Eight, maybe twelve hours? Dear Zeus, it had not been that long... But... Still...
Into an alley I guided the monster that was my pride and joy. Off went the engine. I slid out of my suit jacket, setting it on the passenger seat. I loosened my tied and separated the knot with all the skill of someone who knew it well. Then, I rolled up the sleeve of my button-up, starched white shirt and tightened the tie around my upper arm. I stuck a needle into the body of the syringe and gripped the tie tightly in my inhumanly pointed teeth. I rested the needle against my flesh, watching the vein throb with my slow, even heartbeat. Slowly, though, it became erratic with the suspense.
A noise stopped my thumb and fingers as I prepared for my next wild ride. For a moment, I thought it to be the police, and I quickly dashed away the tie and slipped the needle into my sleeve. But, I saw no headlights. It had been a voice, calling out some term, maybe a name? My ears picked away at the sound that I had mistaken for a siren. It had been a squeal, one of the most complete and utter terror. That of a person who knows that they are going to die, and there is nothing they can do about it.
I yanked down my sleeve and seized a knife from the glove box. The gull-wing door could not open fast enough. There was no reason for an innocent to die. From that scream, I could tell that whoever it was had not asked for death. It was not someone who had been in a fight because they wished it. And, it sounded like a woman. There were many worthless and cruel men in this city, many that would rape and kill a woman if they got the chance. I would not allow for that to happen.
There was the sound of whimpering as soon as I reached the cold city air. The sound of many rough voices, in the alley across from mine. My eyes adjusted to the brightness swiftly- though it was a painful process. Eight figures, surrounding one that was on the ground. I drew my lips back from my rapidly extending fangs, and my heavily-accented voice called out the first word that I thought of. "Hey," I roared. They did not stop, and so, my fury was unleashed.
The first fell quickly under the force of my shoulder, the breath knocked from him and his ribs shattering against the wall. A swift slice across the throat silenced him. The second and the third perished in a similar way, and from the fourth, I saw the gleam of metal. It was not a blade he held, but a gun, and that was not something I could fight. But this was my chance to redeem a bit of my soul from Hades's grasp, to take a little bit back of myself, and I would not be deterred from that chance.
The was the bright light of gunpowder, the explosively painful sound of gunshot. A cracking of bone in my left arm and a pain in my side. For once, I cursed the magic of my phantom limb, but that did not stop me. Another shot, this one landing in my thigh and stopping dead against the bone there. He fell quickly and soundlessly as I buried my blade in his stomach. Hot blood rushed over my right hand that tightly grasped the blade. I felt a different kind of high then, one that was just as wonderful- maybe moreso- than what heroin did. The high of having the most divine power, the power to be a god. To decide who dies when, and how. The pain did not help my haze of wild abandon.
The fifth fell to my fangs, all blood drained from him. Instead, it splattered the front of my shirt, and dripped down my ghastly pale chin. The sixth and the seventh hardly put of a fight, and the eighth broke my nose.
Standing there, dripping blood with a severed human head in my hand, I would have forgotten entirely my purpose, why I had gone on such a spree, if the victim had not whimpered. I turned, my eyes becoming close as they could to human, and knelt in front of her. It took a second for me to realize that the beaten and broken one was not a girl, but a boy, dressed as a girl, miniskirt and all.
"I will not hurt you," I whispered through my fangs. Gently, I took him in my arms and against my chest as I carried him to the car. Tiny arms snaked around my neck, and he pressed his face into my hair that fell over my shoulders, down my chest and past my hips and knees in thick curls. It was a strange feeling, and I felt my body tense. I set him down in the passenger seat of my car, and the feeling drifted away into the realm of the forgotten.
I poured gasoline over the bodies, and tossed a match onto them. Carefully enough crafted to make even a massacre that horrendous look like an accident. Then, I slipped back into my car, and headed home, mind hazy with blood loss and the thrill of the kill.
Xander had said that the wounds on the boy were severe, but I never assumed that they would be this severe. As I listened to my brother list them off-several broken ribs, a shattered cheekbone, a crushed hand, a broken collarbone, and so many bruises, cuts and scrapes that the boy would not want to move for weeks-my mind wandered as it always did. Why had they done that? Surely there was better motive than the skirt I found him in. If not, then society was in a far faster downward spiral than I first assumed.
“Xander. Is it intolerable if I check on the boy? I have seen wounds like that in my day, and I think it would do well for me to at least have a look,” I asked, cutting across a sentence. So often I interrupted him, one would think thta he had gotten used to it. But, from the slightly offended tone in his voice, I could tell that he had not.
“I… Um… I’m the doctor,” he shrugged, “but if you think you should, go ahead. He’s been patched up for a couple of hours, though. But, hey, try not to wake him.”
“I will try,” I said with a small dip of my head. The boy had been taken to my quarters. No room in this house- not even Xander's labratory in the basement levels- had been built for the wounded. So often did I come home with similar wounds, whether it be from my own fighting desires or by chance my target had been notified of my presence, that my brothers and I finally decided that it was the best idea to modify my very bedroom. I strode silently across the persian rug and up the stairs, through the widing halls to the back of the house, up another flight of stairs and slipping into the thick oak door of my bedroom without a sound.
I was hit by a wall of a smell unlike anything in the world. It was so… remarkable. Better than chocolate, by far. It was sweet, and yet carried the salt-and-rust undertones of blood. I then realized that it was blood. The boy’s blood. It was his blood that made my fangs run to their fullest and my pupil shrink to a thin pinprick.
There was a tiny gasp as soon as the door clicked shut. My eyes darted guiltily away from the blood in the drains around the room. the boy sat bolt upright in my bed, the thick, bearskin blanket clutched around his chest. From him rolled the stench of fear.
“Where… Where am I? Who’re you?” The voice sounded like bells, horribly confused bells. The boy whimpered again as the pain of sitting up hit him. I strode over and spread my fingers on his chest over the blanket, pushing him back down.
“Kazeielan,” I answered quietly, my speech unhindered by the daggers of bone.
The boy did not attempt to speak my name. It was difficult to pronounce, and I was aware of it. For centuires, I have not been called that, at least not by most. "Kaze will work just as well," I added.
The boy was quiet for a long while, whilst I was fighting a battle with my nastiest of instincts. I watched him carefully, my stare unhindered by the decree of modesty. He was not quite as pale as I, no one was. His jaw was soft and his eyes were the darkest blue I had ever seen. He was not entirely feminine, not now that I was not intoxicated with killing. There were bruises on his face, and they were visible now that Xander had cleaned the makeup off.
“Permit me to ask your name?” I requested, still staring.
“I… uh… What?” He seemed confused as his tiny voice quavered in his pain.
“What is your name?” I repeated, this time dropping my scrutinizing stare from him.
“I… uh… Garnett Oxford… um… sir,” he stumbled and tripped over words and I knew that it was most probably my fault. I knew that I had that effect on anyone, though, with the scars on my face, I could not see why.
I dipped my head. “Thank you, Garnett, but there is no need for chivalry of that level here.”
“Okay,” he said quietly, and that was all.
I let the silence stretch on, and, finally, just as I had known, Garnett spoke up again. “W-Where am I?” He cast his eyes about my lavishly decorated bedroom, pausing on my precious Renaissance paintings.
“My home. My bedchamber, actually.”
“This… This is… where you… live?” his eyes went wide and he looked back at me.
“Yes…” my eyebrows came together in confusion, “Where else would I have brought you?”
He was silent again. “This... Is your bed then?”
"Yes. Of course it is."
"I'm sorry."
"What in the world for?"
"For taking up where you sleep." He moved to sit, and most likely stand. I pressed him onto his back again.
"Balderdash. I have no use for it. It is about time that it has some use other than to hold laudry."
"But... You need somewhere to sleep..."
"And when I do sleep- which is rarely , mind you- there are plenty other rooms for me to do so in.
"I'm still sorry."
Why in the world would someone be sorry to me? I told myself that I would not think of it at the moment. "That is fine, though I see no logic in it." I shook my head.
Garnett was silent again, for a while. For quite some time, actually. "Why... Why did you save me?" He asked, after he caught his breath.
“You appeared to have needed my assistance.”
“T-Thanks.”
“There is no need.”
He seemed stunned at that. “But… you saved my life… you’ve got to… to…. want something.” His voice trembled with fear as he said want.Like he feared that I wanted the most terrible thing from him.
“Must I?” My question left him speechless.
Garnett motioned to the bandages. Weakly. His thin chest was rising and falling with his heavy breathing. “You did… this…. too?”
“No, no. I am not quite so neat. You have Xander to thank for the actual saving. I was only the ambulance.”
“Who… is… he?”
“You ask many questions. It is my turn. Are you hungry? You are almost as thin as I am,” I could see from the stunned look that my turning of the tables had the desired effect. Garnett had begun to make far too many inquiries for my comfort. Already, Xander was saying that he would know to much. That I should not have brought him here, when recently he himself had brought his now-lover here. Most of my brothers and I have a hero complex of sorts.
“I… Um…” his stomach snarled and he appeared as if he were to be sick. That seemed to change his mind on something. “Yeah.”
I nodded. “I will have one of my brothers bring you something.” I said before I stood, bowed deeply at the waist,and left.
I walked quietly across the marble floor, and stood behind the sofa. “Alexander… Will you make him something?”
“Who?” I will admit Alexander can be slow sometimes. Maybe that is because of all the illegal drugs he uses, and then again, maybe not.
“The boy. His name is Garnett."
“Sure,” Alex smiled and set off to the kitchen.
I threw my leg over the recently vacated couch, laying down carefully. Pain shot through open wonds that I had not yet closed, and especially the bullett wound. Xander had finally retrieved the lead this morning, after repairing Garnett, and it still smarted when I moved around too much. My cell phone vibrated, and when I pulled it out, I found there to be a new text message. From the man at the club, demanding I pay him more, saying that I had taken more than what he had given me. No doubt his whore stole it. I replied with a simple threat and the word "no."
"Eight bodies were found this morning at two o'clock..." The newswoman began. I lefted my eyes from the phone and set it back down on my chest. Another of my brohters, Romius, looked over at me.
"This's your doing, eh, brother?" he asked with a raucous laugh.
I nodded. "Yes. But I thought I burned them..."
The camera footage showed the charcoal remains of the men that had attacked Garnett. "... All of them charred so far beyond recognition that their dental records have had to be used for identification..."
"That answer your question?" Rom inquired as he walked by the couch, ruffling my hair. I growled at him. They had found my work; this was not a time that I wished for humor. There was no way for them to trace me- I had no fingerprints to trace, and though my hair was long, not a thread ever fell out.
"...There is absolutely no forensic evidence at the scene..." Her words stilled the worry in my heart. I did not want to have to move. Again. And this world seemed to be shrinking with every decade. There were fewer and fewer places to hide. After a month or so, I knew that it would all calm down, like things always did. A chuckle roused itself in my chest, an evil chuckle. One of madness, just as my smile was. And my brothers knew that my crazed times would come and go, much like a woman's bad humor every month.
"...Our news crew is waiting for more information from the police chief, but so far there has been no word..." Of course there would be no word! No evidence! I knew I had not left any evidence behind. No matter what I did, no matter my state of mind, I was always careful.
Alex went by the couch, carrying a steaming plate of food. It made my stomach growl, and I stood, walking into the kitchen and fixing myself a heaping plate of steak tartae. Raw meat was always something that stilled all my needs at once- blood, carnage, and food. I walked back into the living room just in time to see the last bit of a conference with the police chief. He had said again what the newswoman had already confirmed. Lack of evidence. I chucked and finished eating. All my brothers said that I ate like a starved wolf, and it was then that I finally noticed. I set the plate down on the coffee table, and propped my legs up on the glass.
The heavyset mastiff my brothers had gotten for me last Christmas tromped his way over to my and rested his head on my lap. I took the remote in one hand and stroked his wide forehead with the other, flipping channels until I reached a documentary on the hunting habits of sharks.
In a way, they reminded me of myself. Stalking down their prey, waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike. Always solitary. Their way of scenting blood from miles away. All of this was things that I could do. But I did not swim, I was not camoflauged. At eight and a half feet tall, paler than snow and with natrually red-as-blood hair, how could I be called camoflauge? I chuckled at the thought. The dog climbed up and laid on my lap, a trickle of drool finding its way onto my suit. I chuckled again and patted Cerberus' shoulder. "Good dog," I laughed a little. It took so much to make me laugh those days that I was surprised that a dog could. Even Romius- the reputed joker of the family- had trouble even making me smile. Always I had had a better connection with animals. Even my own brothers could not get past that wall.
Alex walked back down the stairs, smiling broadly. "He's so key-oot!" his girlish voice giggled. I looked up from the television and around my shoulder.
"What makes you say so?" I inquired. I should have thought first. Alex is the kind of man that can think me cute. Anything Garnett would do would make him think so.
"He just... is!" Alex giggled again. I shook my head and gently pushed Cerberus off of my lap. He looked up at me with scorned eyes.
"Oh, stop that," I said, narrowing my eyes slightly. His tail darted between his legs. I patted him on the head, chuckling slightly. Everything I did was taken as a threat, even when it was not. I strode across the immense living room and kitchen and set my plate in the sink. Alex wrinkled his nose.
"Why do you always have to eat meat raw?" His high voice sounded disgusted.
I raised my eyebrow at him. "Because it tastes better that way." One would think that Alexander would have learned not to question my ways in the centuries he has known me. But no, not Alex. Always questioning, always asking. Almost like a child, but far, far from that innocent, no matter how childish he acts about most things.
"You're gross."
I shrugged. "Each man to his own." I pulled a bottle from the refridgerator and popped the cork. It was only a few hours now before I had to go to a meeting of sorts. I had been called forth- once again- by what I call my little "Brotherhood." A gathering of the city's leading bloodletters, all of us gathered to keep the peace in the world of crime. It made me feel strangely like the Godfather, when I thought of it too much. But, those few hours, before the Gathereing were always the longest. It filled me with adrenaline, knowing of the fights that often broke out. And the knowledge that none dare report a death of one of the Brotherhood did not help.
Xander entered the kitchen and sighed. "You couldn't have picked a different time to play hero, could you, Kaze?" he asked, setting down his suitcase.
"Why do you say this?" I replied. Oftentimes I answered with a question, being the philosophical man that I am.
"I'm catching a plane in an hour."
"Yes, I know. Three-week conference in London. What does that have to do with Garnett?"
"I'm the only doctor."
I chuckled darkly. "Xander, you forget so easily! I have seen and treated wounds far worse than that. So has Rom. And Alex. He will be fine."
"But, what if he isn't? What if something goes wrong?"
"You sound as though you love him. You barely know his name."
"Forgive me for valuing human life."
Xander and I hardly see eye to eye, and this was one of the major issues. He thinks that humans- all of them- diserve to live. He was a sheltered child, coddled by his mother until her death. Made being king of the viking hordes difficult, his love of human life. Xander had not seen the cruelty of man that I have. Never seen the dark side. "Not all of them need valuing or saving." This often ended the argument. "But, you need not worry about your patient. He is in good hands."
"You know I'd hardly ever trust anyone to you, Kazeielan." His voice was short and sharp, and he used my full name. If it were not for Nienna entering the room, he might have cracked and missed his plane. What a pity that would have been! She wrapped her arms around his barrel of a chest and rested her chin on his shoulder.
"Xander, babe, do you really have to go?" she asked, her bell-like voice and her eyes pleading. Xander turned to face her.
"Yes, love. I really do. I can't worm my way out of this one." He attempted one of those carefree smiles of his, and maybe she did not see through it. But I did. Xander truly did not want to leave.
That was when my own fury subsided greatly. Thrown was I into the realm of memory. Arra. Fiamme. Gwen. All of them, they loved me, for what I was. All of them died because of me. I had absolute faith in the fact that their deaths were because of me. Because the gods so despised me that they sought to kill everything good that came within my reach. The backs of my eyes stung and I bit down hard on my lip and took a massive swig from the bottle.
Nienna, somehow, saw this. She looked at me for a second, her sharp-featured and wonderfully human face concerned. "Kaze... Are you okay?" She asked, resting her cheek against Xander's immense shoulder and looking at me.
Stubbornly, I let my face slip behind a veil of my bright crimson hair. "Yes. I am fine." And my voice held the conviction of a man who really was. The wounds were still there, and they still smarted at the touch. Cautiously, I turned my mind away from that, and into the bubbles of my bottle of champagne. I sighed and turned, walking out of the kitchen.
Chapter 2
Kazeielan Caenust
I guided the car up the steep, snow-covered mountain road. With the help of my hypodermic aide, I had regained control of myself. Gone were the thoughts of the blood and of the torn bits of my soul. Instead, was the high, the racing of my heart and the speeding of my breath. My hands shook and I felt the drug running through my veins. I pulled up to the gate and rested my head against the leather seat. There was a rapping on the window and I rolled it down, opening my eye a crack and peering out at the guard.
"Do you have...?" he asked, in a trembling fearful voice. Customary to myself, I cut across his sentence by holding up a sheet of paper. It was all the identification I needed. He returned to his booth next to the gate and opened the wrought-iron fence.
I pulled the car around the drive and up to the hilltop mansion. All of the Brotherhood had the riches of any, but none had quite the time to accrue what I have. I slid out of the car, dropping my keys and cell phone into the pocket of my tuvedo jacket. None of them would dress for the occasion as I did, but, then again, I dressed like this habitually. I threw open the huge oak doors and walked through the enterance hall toward the back, and then through the doors to the dining room. There, I took my typical seat at the end of the table.
"You are late, Kazeielan. Again." The wrinkled old man said from the opposite end.
"I know. Bit of trouble on the highway," I chuckeld evilly. Trouble? Oh, no. Just finishing up a little job handed to me a week ago.
"Do not let it happen again."
"I might not. But, why would I be punctual to arrive somewhere I do not wish to go?" I laughed again, raising my arms in mock confusion and leaning back in my chair, propping up my feet on the expensive table. Rash, I became, with the drug.
The man glared at me. The rest were shocked into silence. None of them dared go against the Master, their precious, precious Master! Ha! That was all the good time I had here, making the aged man angry. One of these days, I was hoping that I would anger him enough to trigger a heart attack, but, so far, my efforts were unsuccessful. Then, in the typical drone of his, he began to cover who we had killed that month and deal out the payments. Vaguely, it reminded me of the Alchoholics Anonymous meetings that Xander forced me to go to in the nineteen-eighties. He came to me last, dealing a few hundred thousand to each of the other brothers.
"Kazeielan, as usual, you have pulled in an unusually high payment."
The corner of my mouth pulled into an evil smile. "I thought as much."
"You're the only man I've met to kill seventy men in a month."
"The only man you will ever meet to accomplish it." I dipped my head in what was to me a mocking hal-fbow. To him, though, I could see it was a compliment. Across the table he slid a briefcase of my earnings. I popped it open and counted out eighty-four million. Six million short of what I should have recieved.
"Where is the rest of it?" I demanded, my voice growing cold and angered.
"I call it a 'finder's fee.'"
"What in the name of Persephone is that supposed to mean?" I asked, hissing slightly. I dropped my feet and leaned forward against the table. "You had best pay me my due. Else you find yourself on my list of victims."
The old man did not answer. I saw his wrist flick slightly and another case brought to me. "I had hoped to do you good. Save you the wrath of your brothers by at least cutting your pay a little. You seem to prove difficult to reason with."
"Zeus-damn right I am hard to reason with!" I snarled, snatching the second case away and empting it slowly into the first. Then, I stood and took it under my arm. "Forgive me for my rude exit, but I find myself growing weary of your ridiculous antics." I bowed deeply, and this time it was obviously sarcastic.
I strode out to my car, still fuming. The old git thought that he could cheat me out of money, claiming it for my own good! Oh, call me greedy, and I would not deny it. There were few things I hated more than a cheat, especially one who lied about it. I slid into my car and fired the engine, blaring the stero and loud and I could without having to fear blowing the speakers. It hurt, greatly, and I felt a bit of hot blood trickle down my jaw. But I ignored that, hoping that it would knock the anger out of me. Out through the gate I sped the car, weaving through the tight corners and sliding on the ice. Once, the rear bumper scraped the guardrail. But, even this I ignored, no matter how much I loved my car.
I think that it was the stereo that made me miss it. The incessant ticking of a bomb. Before I realized it, the heat and the inferno were upon me. Splinters of metal scraped my flesh, the heat burned away my coat and much of my flesh. Mostly, it was on my back, and I was thrown from the car. I skidded a few hundred feet across the road, stopped by the painful rolling into the ditch. For a long time, I laid there, staring at the cloudly sky and feeling snowflakes fall on my face. A massive column of black smoke rose for the reminants of my beloved Gallardo. Oh, what a fool I was! Again and again I cursed myself for even coming. For not getting my money in private, as I had always done. I rolled agonizingly onto my side, my eyes watering. I groaned.
As I laid there, I ran through injuries. Half my face was shattered bone and scrapes from the pavement. My right arm was limp, and I could see the awkwardness in my shoulder that hinted toward dislocation. Four ribs, broken. The flesh on my back was burned nearly off. That I could feel, horridly. Every slight gust of wind, the barest touch from the shreads of my shirt, the light dancing of the snowflakes. All of it shot pain through me. I rolled into a tight ball, closing my eyes. Moning. I should wait for morning... Or at least dawn... No. The blood... It would attract things that I could not deal with at the moment. Other vampires. Werewolves. The supernatrual. I forced myself to roll until I was kneeling with my hands drawn to my chest. Then, slowly, I hauled myself to my feet. Cell phone. Yes. Reason found its way though my high and through my instinctive survivalism, and I stumbled over to the tiny speck of black on the road and flipped open the phone. One bar of service. With my one good arm, I punched in the speed dial for Alexander.
"Hello?" he asked, his voice chirping up happily.
"Alex... Hurry... Twelve miles... Up Ash Mountain... Bomb..." That was all that I needed to say, and I knew it even before Alex hung up. I collapsed onto my side, amazed that my phone and made it through the fire. But I would not question that. I was merely thankful that I had survived. Though immortality has its benifits, Death is never freindly, even if the Death is a gentle one, it always seems that all the pain of every other death collected into the most horrid of blows.
