Vampire's Embrace

“You know I’d never do anything to hurt you.” That had been the promise, Waverly remembered it now.1

“And yet you persist in asking for my life?”2

“That is not what I ask!”3

“Damn you Jasper! And Damn your lies!”4

“Waverly?” The voice hit her like a bucket of ice water, and against her will, Waverly was drawn up out of the void of memory, and back into the waking world. She blinked, glanced upwards, and cursed the darkness that kept her mortal eyes from seeing the source of that voice. “Waverly, are you awake?”5

“I’m awake.” Waverly answered.6

“What are we going to do?” The fear in Megan’s voice made Waverly want to hurl.7

“I don’t know,” she answered, shaking her head and sighing bitterly. “Die.”8

She regretted the comment instantly, and ground her teeth at the other girl’s long wail of despair. Right, she thought, Sarcasm is out. Already anticipating the futility of the action, she tested her bonds once more, and was rewarded with pain alone as her struggle tightened the cords about her wrists and throat.9

She gagged.10

“Waverly!” Megan cried.11

“I’m alright.” She managed, and forcing herself to relax into her captivity, leaned back against the hard staircase on which she sat. “Be quiet, let me think for a minute.”12

The minute took an eternity to pass, but for all of her attempts, she could wring no answers out of the dark silence that she had requested. She fidgeted impatiently, then winced when the action drew blood from her tightly bound wrists. It hurt like hell, but at last, she had her inspiration.13

She let her limbs go loose, then, using the slack that her compliance had earned her, caressed the flesh of her own breast with her tongue, searching for the dangling amulet she knew would be there. Her captors had not taken it from her, the silly fools, but such was the price of instructing minions to deliver their prey unspoiled.14

At last, she found what she sought, and maneuvering the chain of the talisman into her mouth, she clenched it firmly between her teeth and jerked her head. The action broke the chain. It also drew the cord about her neck dangerously tight, and for a moment, she had to struggle for breath, lying limp until the cruel bind loosened again.15

“Waverly?” Megan questioned, tone anxious.16

“I’m alright!” Waverly said again, this time unable to keep impatience out of her tone. “Hold on, I think I can get us out of here.”17

Leaning forwards, she let the amulet fall to the stairs below her, then, careful not to put too much pressure on her bonds, she edged down until she sat on the thing. Wriggling forwards, she leaned back, and in hands already made slick with blood, clasped at her prize. She had done it.18

Now for the hard part.19

“Megan.” Waverly said, doing her best to keep her distain for the other girl out of her voice. “Megan.” She paused, and did not go on until she was sure she had her companion’s complete attention. “I’m not going to answer for a while, and you must not speak. Do you understand. You must not speak.”20

“Your not playing with that damned amulet again are you?” Megan asked, not hesitating to obey even orders so fresh as the ones she’d just received.21

“It’s the only way we’re getting out of this one Meg,” Waverly returned, with no patience for argument. “Now shut up! I know what I’m doing.”22

I hope.23

Laying back again, and doing her best to make herself comfortable, Waverly closed her eyes and massaged the blood-slick medallion she held. The remembered fear of her last experience with the thing impeded her concentration for a moment, but soon she had forced even that dark terror down. It was nothing compared to what lay ahead if she did not act now.24

Flash!25

In an instant, Waverly’s surroundings changed. The dark room that held her body disappeared, and her consciousness was whisked far away. A thousand mirrors danced by on either side of her, a thousand voices called out, but she knew where she was going, and she bent her mind to that place.26

Flash!27

She was there, and a whole new world composed itself around her. Tall windows let in the streaming sunlight, a gentle breeze riffled the silken curtains, all was calm, quiet, and dry. The dampness of her body’s prison was as remote as a forgotten dream.28

But this is the dream, she reminded herself.29

Tearing her eyes away from the view beyond the windows, she turned and looked at the rest of the room; rich with scarlet upholstery and expertly carved wooden furniture. A cluttered desk stood in its center, a high-backed chair empty but still in attendance.30

Waverly resisted the urge to examine the contents of the desk, walking around it instead, pacing her way deliberately across the plush carpet and throwing open the doors – set in dark relief of the ocher-walled room – that awaited beyond it. There, she froze.31

In a tall bed of carved oak, to figures lay sleeping, their bodies entwined, their hair; fair and dark, mingling upon the pillow. They were unaware of her, and had she desired, she could have withdrawn, but need made her bold where it hadn’t before. Steeling herself against the storm she knew was coming, she went forwards instead. 32

She didn’t have much longer, already her weariness was making her grasp upon the dream tentative at best.33

“Jasper.” She uttered, stopping at the foot of the bed. 34

The darker of the two figures’s stirred in the bed, but still did not awake. With one artful hand, he clasped more firmly the breast of the woman that slept beside him. Waverly nearly turned and fled. “Jasper!” 35

The man awoke, and as though he had never been asleep, his eyes were at once alert, his body swift and supple as he drifted from the bed. His body sculpted like a dancer’s, his nakedness worn proudly; he stood and stared in quiet hostility at Waverly. 36

She shuddered, and averted her eyes, her cheeks heating, her control over her body tremulous even in this land of dreams. Only the rustle of the sheets drew her eyes from the floor again.37

“There,” the man said, his dark hair flowing unbound over his shoulders, contrasting starkly with the sheet he had wrapped about himself. “Now you have no reason to gag upon your tongue. You can tell me why you have come, and then you can go!”38

The coldness of his tone cut like a knife.39

“I need your help.” Waverly said, speaking quietly lest she wake the woman still at slumber in the bed.40

“Oh ho!” the man cried, “So you come to me when you need my help. But where were you when I needed you, my lady? Get out, you are wasting my time!”41

“Jasper…”42

“What?”43

“I’m sorry.”44

The two words, simple though they seemed, affected the man before her more profoundly than anything else she might have said. He paused in the act of turning from her, and instead, paced across the floor towards her. He did not stop until they were only inches apart, until she had to turn her chin up and stand on her toes just to meet his gaze, until she could feel the heat of him radiating through the sparse pall of cotton between them.45

“Sorry?” he said, “Is that all that you can say? Is that supposed to make up for what you did to me? I have a heart, my lady, though it has long since stopped beating.”46

“And yet,” Waverly answered, his tone drawing out her temper, “My acts have clearly not damaged you permanently!” She glanced inferring to his bedfellow, still half hidden by the coverlet, unaware of the battle that raged over her.47

She regretted it at once, for the look Jasper gave her was damning.48

“Has it damaged you?” he asked. “How many beds have you warmed since we parted, Waverly?”49

The question was clearly meant to raise her hackles, and it did, as ever Jasper’s taunts had done, but she forced down her desire to respond to him.50

“Jasper,” she said, making her voice pleading instead of cross, “There is no one else. If you do not help me, I will die.”51

“If I do help you,” Jasper returned, “There will yet be a cost. You feared it once, are you so willing to accept it now?”52

Waverly fought the desire to recoil.53

“I loved you.” She said, “You must know that I loved you, that I love you still. But it is not the life I would choose.”54

“It was not the life I chose!” Jasper cried, “but were we together it would be a better life then it has been for me alone! Call me a coward if you will, but I do not love facing it alone!”55

“Alone!” she repeated, tone mocking, and then flinched when he grasped her, though the hold was not nearly so painful as others had been.56

“Alone!” he returned, and spun her to face the figure asleep on the bed. As though by his desire, it rolled, golden hair spilling back from an all too familiar face, and in an instant, even as Waverly gaped, resolved itself into mist.57

She turned back to him, “Very well,” she said, “You will have what you ask.”58

Flash!59

With a gasp, Waverly started up from where she lay upon the rotting wooden stairs of the basement. The movement drew her bounds tight, but she could not relax. Her chest was heaving with the exhaustion of controlling the amulet, but it was not exhaustion that made her pulse race.60

She and Megan were no longer alone.61

As she had felt the heat of his body in the dream realm, Waverly felt the presence of Jasper now, irresolute and intangible, but quickly congealing at her back. In another instant he was with her, and she felt his heat once more, and felt his hands upon her, grasping easily at the bonds that his superior vision showed him. Even in the dark.62

Soon, as though they had melted away, the ties that had hurt her so only an instant before were gone, and there were only his hands upon her. Softly, sensually, they explored the flesh where the sharp wire had cut her.63

“Will you take me now?” she uttered, leaning back into his embrace though the fear of him was still heavy upon her.64

Even as Megan’s squawk of inquiry came at her through the darkness, Jasper laughed softly. Megan’s inquiry was stifled.65

“Nay,” he whispered, “Not yet. Or am I mistaken in assuming your business here unfinished?” 66

Knowing he would see as well as sense the gesture, Waverly shook her head.67

“Then get thee to the task! For blood is sweeter when its satisfied. I will see to your friend.”68

Without taking his hand from her abused throat, he stood, and as though drawn to her feet by that contact alone, Waverly followed in suite. Then, against the desire that was in her to maintain that contact, they parted, she galloping up the creaking stairs, and he dancing lightly down to find Megan where she squirmed upon the floor.69

*****70

A dozen bodies lay upon the floor, the crimson stains of their lifeblood still coagulating around them.71

Drip, drip, drip.72

From the knife she held in her left hand, still more of the scarlet flow ran to the floor. Waverly listened, but not to the sound of the blood, and not with her ears. 73

Then, abruptly, she leapt forth, stepping lightly across the bodies that decorated the sad little kitchen, using their mass as bridges to keep her feet from the slickness that had poured out of them.74

Passing the basement door through which she had come upon the far more pastoral scene a moment before, she left the death-poisoned house behind her, flying out onto the porch.75

Down a dozen creaking steps, she ran at full kilter, then stopped at their base and stared at the obstacle blocking her way.76

She didn’t look much, the slight, shade-haired beauty before her, but all of Waverly’s instincts and experience told her that such was not true.77

“Angeline.” She said, and grasped more tightly the blade she held.78

“Waverly.” The woman replied, giving a slight and condescending nod. “It has been too long.”79

“It will sound cliché,” Waverly answered, “But I’d rather it had been longer.”80

“Oh come darling,” Angeline said with a pout, “Don’t be like that, you’ll hurt my feelings.”81

“I’ll carve out your heart!”82

Angeline smiled. Scarcely audible above the softly hissing wind of the summer evening, the whisper of a blade being let from its housing reached Waverly’s ear. From where it had been hidden behind the shelter of her svelte body, the other woman displayed a fatal blade, glowing hard and cold in the moonlight. Its gleam was matched by a still more malicious twinkle in its bearer’s eye.83

An assassin’s knife.84

An assassin.85

“You may try.” Angeline responded at last, “But I must warn, that you will feel the bite of my fangs, Waverly, one way or the other.”86

Waverly flexed her hold upon her knife. Angeline flexed her hold upon hers. Before either of them could move a step closer however, another whisper overrode the wind, and with his dark garments floating around him, Jasper dropped down from the roof of the porch, landing on Waverly’s flank.87

“Am I interrupting anything?” he asked, coming forwards until his lithe form pressed against Waverly’s back. His presence as much a comfort as a peril, she leaned into him.88

“Fly away, Faust!” Angeline hissed, “This is not your fight.”89

“And let you slay that for which I have come?” Jasper asked.90

“I can take her!” Waverly spat.91

“Not yet.” Jasper answered.92

“Never!” Angeline countered.93

“Megan?” Waverly pressed, anything to get Jasper away, anything to leave her to the fight ahead. She had waited for it for so long.94

“Safer than you.” Jasper said. “You are not ready for this fight!”95

“Who are you to say so?” asked Waverly and Angeline as one. Waverly shivered at the identical tone in their voices.96

“One to whom you owe a debt,” was the answer, and before Waverly could protest, his arms were about her, one coiled tight about her waist, the other at her neck, a clever hand brushing her chin aside, exposing her throat to the moonlight. “One to whom you owe a debt.” He repeated, this time speaking to Angeline, facing her over Waverly’s shoulder, cat-like eyes gleaming in the moonlight. Catching her breath, the woman stepped back, fear of him finding her were no terror that Waverly broadcast had ever come close.97

“Another day then, slayer!” Angeline hissed, still backing away.98

“Another day.” Jasper said, as their foe melted into the darkness. 99

Then, like the shifting of the winter wind, cutting and tangible, his attention came back to Waverly.100

“And will you come away with me my dear?” he queried, speaking in her ear as his hot breath caressed her throat. “To spend twilight in roaming, and only ever see the sun in dream?”101

“Such is my debt,” Waverly answered, “It is your right, you make take It.” Despite her words, she fought to keep her breathing even beneath his grasp.102

“Ah, but such is my love.” He whispered, “That I would not have it tainted by your hate.”103

“Is it my blood that you love?” she asked, and felt the hand that caressed her throat and breast falter in its steady march.104

“Yes, that too.” He answered.105

“Then you had best take it.” Waverly said, “For it may heat the form of my phantom, and make your evenings with her more pleasant.”106

“Your phantom?” he asked, taking a weary step back at the conflict he sensed in her tone, and he would have released her, but reaching up she held his arm firm beneath her breasts.107

“Why yes dear.” She said, “For I am a Slayer after all. I cannot always be with you.”108

For an instant more he stood stiff against her, until her words sank in. Then the stiffness drained from him – or at aligned itself to a more romantic purpose – and laughing the light and triumphant laugh of a lover, he stepped in, and lowered his mouth to a throat borne willingly to his advance.109

Then no more words were needed between them.110