‹ Prequel: From Her Vein to the Floor
Sequel: As She Fades ›
To Bleed for Him
Are You Breathing?
"I'm trapped inside your soul.
Can you hear me?
You're losing all control.
Are you breathing?
I'm feeding on your fears.
Can you feel me?
I whisper in your ear.
Are you breathing?
Are you breathing?"
- Exilia
A hand caught Torryn's wrist, and she was suddenly sailing across the room, the chill of the air hitting her tenfold as she flew. She crashed into a dresser against the wall to her right, the wind knocked from her lungs and a sharp pain beginning in her side. Somehow, she caught herself, her fingers splayed across the fake wood that made up the dresser as she fought to keep herself upright.
"You really need to calm down," the man — that patronizing bastard of a fucking man — told her as she turned toward him, gasping for air even as her side throbbed and stung and told her to stop. He smiled right back at her hard scowl. "Before you get hurt."
"What did you do to my mother?" she snapped, drawing herself to her full height in spite of her body's protests. "Why the hell are you even here?"
He raised his hands in placation. "We didn't want to hurt her, but she, much like you, didn't understand why we were here, and she panicked. We had to…calm her."
She clenched her jaw. Calm her. Right. "Is this how you greeted her, too? Just appearing out of nowhere with your fangs out, expecting her to offer you some tea and sit down for a nice chat?" she nearly spat, sneering.
"We were hoping for coffee, actually," he countered with a smooth smile. "Would you mind making some for us?"
Her jaw went slack, every ounce of ire seeping from her flaming expression. Had he really just…? "You're damn right I'd fucking mind," she snapped. "You'd better tell me what you asshats are fucking doing here, or I'll —"
"You'll what?" he interrupted, a challenging edge to his smile that only sent her blood pressure rising higher. "Make me throw you into another dresser? You don't have a chance against us, my little half-Progeny friend, and I believe we have some information you'd like to know."
She could only grit her teeth for a moment and glare into the muddy depths of his brown eyes. He and his little bloodsucking crowd had her cornered. Damn it! "What kind of information?" she finally asked, her voice tight. "What could you possibly tell me that I even give a rat's ass about knowing?"
He chuckled. He knew he had her between a rock and a bastard. "How about making that coffee first?"
-?-
"How often do you feed?" the girl — Alexis, if Antony remembered correctly — asked after a long pause, a long moment in which they only stared at one another. "I'm going to guess not nearly often enough."
He shrugged. Why was she still here? Why hadn't he thrown her out yet? "A few times a week. Whenever Torryn's up for it, really."
She nodded, smiling knowingly. "Just as I thought, then: not nearly often enough."
His eyes narrowed. "And just how often should I be feeding, then?"
"You're an undead now, Antony," she said, rising gracefully to her feet and starting toward him. Her hand fell to rest on his forearm, crossed over his chest, and she went on. "Not only that, but you're a master vampire. You should be feeding daily, maybe even multiple times a day."
"She can't give me that much," he said, but he knew that she already knew that. He knew that that was the point.
"Take from me, Antony," she said softly, pushing her hair over her shoulder to bare more of her throat to him. "You need it."
He could only stare at her neck for a moment, glowing at him through the heavy darkness that blanketed the room. An emptiness awakened within him, a hollow at the pit of his stomach that he hadn't felt so intensely for quite sometime. Did he really hunger so? Or was this merely the effects of this know-it-all girl toying with his mind?
"I don't," he whispered after a moment, though he couldn't tear his eyes from her throat. "I don't need it. I have all that I need for now." Torryn was all that he needed. She'd sated him dozens of times before, and she'd sate him a thousand times more in the future.
"You know that's not true," the girl snapped, and his eyes darted to hers to find them narrowed in a glare. "You have to stop being so Goddamn sentimental if you want to survive in this world, Antony, and you shouldn't need a Goddamn human to tell you that."
He wanted to be angry at her, wanted to deny her words, but he knew that she was right — that she was still right. "But I have no desire to feed outside of her," he said quietly, dropping his eyes to her neck when he found himself unable to meet her stern, knowing gaze.
"You have no desire to do a lot of the things you need to do," she retorted, "but of all the things you could turn down, this is the most innocent." She took his chin gently between her fingers, pulling his head up, and his shoulders tensed at her touch. Her eyes were gentle, but he knew what lay behind them. "You don't have to leave her right now. You don't have to run off and find a pretty vampire to mate with. Just feed — for her sake and for yours."
Cheating on Torryn? For her own sake?
"I don't —" But she put a finger to his lips with a whispered "Hush, boy," and brought his face to her throat with a light tug at his jaw.
He fell headlong into her scent, the scent of soft skin and blood pumping just beneath the surface, the lingering scent of vanilla body wash and strawberry conditioner. His fangs grazed her skin, and she shuddered, and he let them slip gingerly into her.
She tasted of warm gin and apricots.
-?-
Not a single vampire said a word as Torryn carefully propped her mother's head up on a pillow and made sure that she was in an overall comfortable position on the living room couch. The half-dozen bloodsuckers merely watched her and sipped quietly at their coffee, spread out across the room, some on the love seat and some sitting cross-legged on the floor.
"So, now that you have your coffee," she began as she got to her feet, doing her best to keep her voice even in spite of her ever-growing rage, "will you tell me why you broke into my house and assaulted my mother?" They were lucky she seemed like she was going to be all right. Any more than a bump on the head, and she'd — oh, who the hell was she kidding? She'd flip her shit and try to take them out, but she wouldn't be able to leave a single scratch.
The only vamp who had spoken so far, the obvious leader of the group, smiled at her in a way that was almost empty. It wasn't pleased, it wasn't sarcastic, it wasn't cruel; it was just…there, a decoration with little to no point other than to pretty the place up. "She called us here," he said simply, and Torryn felt her expression empty once more.
"And why, exactly, would she do that?" she asked sharply, not believing the asshole one bit. She didn't think much of her mother, but she knew that the woman was mean, not stupid.
"She was searching for your father, of course," he laughed.
"What? Why would she do that? And why would that bring a bunch of living vampires to my house?" Either he was lying or her mom really was a bit of a moron. But either way, she couldn't stop the confusion — or the hint of excitement that rolled through her at the thought of finding her father.
"You'd have to ask her why she was after him, but I'm sure it has something to do with you, my little half-Progeny friend." His smile grew, and her mood quickly darkened. Smug asshole. "As for why that would bring us here…Well, to put it simply, we're the vampires in charge of him — or, rather, the vampires he's been put in charge of." There was a nasty edge to his grin now, a nasty air to his movements as he set his coffee mug on the table before the couch, and she felt her entire body tense as red flags sprang up all around her — the men and the woman on the floor lowered their cups, the woman perched daintily beside the leader on the love seat smiled to bear her ivory fangs over top of her mug, and tension weighed heavily upon Torryn's shoulders. "We were curious about his half-human spawn, and lucky us, she drew you right to us. It's very nice to meet you, Torryn."
"You're much lovelier than I was expecting," the woman at the leader's side said, pleased, as she continued to grin at Torryn. "You've got so much of your father in you that I just want to eat you where you stand."
"She's right," a man said from his spot on the floor, eyeing her as if she were no more than a piece of meat. "The hint of human only emphasizes the Progeny."
"I think it dulls it," another woman drawled, her lip curling in a sneer. "But then, I've never had much of a taste for humans."
Torryn felt a gust of air at her side, and suddenly, a third man was beside her, his face bent to her neck and his nose straining to take in her scent. "She smells amazing, though," he said in a dreamy sigh, even as she leaped away from him and spun to face him. "I would have to taste them both one after the other to know which one I'd like more." He took a step toward her, arm outstretched, and she took a quick step back. Her legs caught on the table's edge, and in her haste to move, to be free of this leering man, she tumbled backward over it and took the whole thing down with her in a crash of wood and shattering porcelain.
Lukewarm coffee splashed across her arm from the broken mug as she landed, and her mind flashed briefly back to the last time she'd been here, when her mother had spilled coffee on her leg — when her mother had been crying and lamenting her father's loss. Why would she go after him? Why would she bring all of this trouble upon herself? Why?! But she knew the desperation that came with wanting the one you loved, with needing them and desiring nothing more than to find them and know that they're all right — and, in her mother's case, why they'd left that one fateful day long ago.
"You're not taking me," she barked suddenly, leaving her reverie to find the six vampires closing in around her. She lurched to her feet and whirled, trying to find an opening through which to escape, but there were only the bodies of the soon-to-be dead. "I've already had one vampire try to claim me, and I'm not about to deal with any more of this shit. You can give me my dad back, too, while you're at it." She stopped spinning and just looked at the smirking faces that had closed in all around her, faces that were much too close for comfort. Living vampires weren't supposed to be this cold. Living vampires still had souls, morals, all of their humanity intact. So how could they look at her like this? How could they be plotting to kidnap her, to enslave her, just as one of the cruelest undeads she'd ever met had done?
She had so much more to learn about vampires — but she sure as hell didn't plan on learning from these fucks.
"A Progeny belongs in the care of a vampire clan," the leader explained, grinning coldly down at her, "where he or she can protect and serve her betters and be protected by them all the while."
"Pretty pets, right?" she spat, squaring her shoulders and trying to make herself look threatening. "That's all we are to you, isn't it?"
"It's what you were made for," a woman murmured, her breath leaving a trail of lingering heat along the side of Torryn's throat. "It's what your entire race was made for. It's not that we're cruel or greedy or gluttonous. It's just that we're using you as nature intended."
"A nature you manipulated to your own advantage early on in the game, you cocksuckers," came a bitter, familiar voice, and Torryn turned to find her mother sitting up on the couch, her lips lifted in a brutal snarl.
"Mom!" she cried, elated, but the woman didn't even glance her way as she rose to her feet with a creak from the couch.
"Progeny didn't exist until you made them exist," she went on, stepping slowly around the overturned table, her eyes never leaving the leader of the pack, "shaped to fit your own selfish desires. They're not pets to you; they're slaves. That's why Ripley" — Ripley? My father? — "ran from you all those years ago. It's why he…" She faltered, and Torryn watched her throat shift but not her expression as she swallowed. "Why he left when Torryn was born — so you wouldn't find her."
The man all but cackled, clapping his hands together in a joyful way that reminded Torryn of Antony's father as he turned to fully face her mother. "And yet, here we are, drawn to the girl by your own pleas for Ripley. How does it feel to know that you've condemned her?" His lips curved in a cruel smile — Caesar without the slip of fang. "How does it feel to know that you've entered your own daughter into servitude?"
"How cute," Torryn cut in before her mother could speak, smiling icily. She was done with this. She was done with this conversation, with these vampires, with her own weakness, with her mother having to come to her rescue. "You sound like you actually believe the bullshit that's coming out of your mouth." She grabbed a handful of his hair and tossed him across the room.
He didn't go far, but at least he took a vampire bitch down with him.
-?-
He was ravenous, his gut a black hole that he hadn't realized existed until her taste hit his tongue. "Antony," she gasped — a warning? A plea? But he didn't care. He pulled roughly from her neck, her blood rolling down his throat like sweet molten lava, his hands pressing into the warm flesh of her lower back as he eagerly brought her closer. Her fingers began to wander, slipping beneath the hem of his shirt to tiptoe up his sides and leave a tingling trail of warmth behind.
Her breath hissed against his ear. "Slow down," she murmured, her hands a conspicuous pool of heat at his hips. "You're starting to hurt me."
But he didn't stop, he didn't slow, he didn't listen. He could do anything he wanted to her, he knew. He could kill her, and she wouldn't be missed. And it was tempting, with that taste on his tongue too good to stop and those soft gasps and groans in his ear. He could even sleep with her, if he so desired. He could fuck her and bleed her dry, and no one would notice a thing.
His grip on her body tightened, crushing her against him, and the tips of her nails dug into his back in warning. "Antony," she hissed as he forced his fangs in deeper, pain stabbing through his gums as his teeth met the resistance of her flesh. "Antony, stop," she tried again, shoving at him. "Stop!"
But why should he? She was a human — a human who sold her body and soul to the undead, no less. She was useless but for this purpose — for the purpose of satisfying the undead she served. And she'd said herself that he was a master vampire, that he needed more than the others. She'd told him to take from her — and that's just what he was doing. Why should he stop?
The black hole grew wider, darker, deeper, and he sank his teeth in farther, farther. Blood flooded his mouth, bringing with it the spice of fear and bits of broken flesh. "Stop!" she shrieked, shoving at him harder. But shouldn't she have been enjoying it? Shouldn't his saliva have been soothing her? Did it even matter? "Antony! Antony, stop! You're better than this!"
Abruptly, he pulled away, pain stabbing through his jaw as his teeth, so deeply caught in her skin, tore free, and she toppled backward onto the floor with a ragged cry. If he'd had the breath, he would've been gasping, panting for air, panicking as he stared down at this innocent girl clutching at her throat, blood gushing between her fingers like the steaming water of a geyser. But he only gazed down at her, slack jawed and still, his gut still aching and begging for more while her succulent flavor trilled across his tongue with no signs of stopping.
Oh my God. What have I done?
-?-
Another man lunged at Torryn from the side, hissing and spitting like a rabid cat as he bared his fangs and darted toward her throat. She danced backward, bumping into a third man, who eagerly wrapped his massive arms around her and held her still for the man who still chased after her. He dove toward her throat once more, his head lashing out in a grotesque pecking motion, but she was quick to whip her head forward and into his, their foreheads meeting with a dull thunk. Pain exploded in her skull, but she didn't let that deter her. She lifted her legs and kicked at the vampire who still staggered back in pain before her, and her feet connected squarely with his chest just as she whipped her head back and into the other vampire's nose.
The one before her fell back, coughing and gasping for breath even as his back hit the floor, but the one who held her didn't even loosen his hold. The scent of blood grew strong as he craned his neck over her shoulder to murmur mockingly in her ear, "Do you forget who you're dealing with so easily?"
"Not quite," she growled darkly before throwing her head sideways and into his as hard as she could. Pain lanced through her skull again, stars springing to life in her dimming vision, but the man only grunted as he drew his head back far behind her. She tossed her head toward where she could hear his breath hissing out in lingering pain, and their heads connected again, then again, and again, until finally, nearly blind with cranial pain, she fell to the floor at the man's feet.
She dove forward a few feet and spun to face him, seeing a dark-tinted version of the man clutching at his forehead and nose, blood dripping from beneath his pale fingers. Another man stood at his side, lip curled, and she could just barely make out through her darkened vision the small pocket knife he held in his right hand as he advanced.
"Someone needs to put you in your place, girl," came the voice of the leader from somewhere behind her, but she didn't dare turn to find him, didn't dare remove her eyes from that glistening blade, small but deadly in the hands of someone with such potential strength. She rose slowly to her feet, her vision gradually clearing, only to be fogged again as the familiar taint of vampiric pheromones seeped into her system. The man before her stopped uncomfortably close, only a foot from her, but his face was blurry now, almost entirely distorted in her eyes. Something tugged at her attention from behind, begged her to face it, and she knew then that it was the leader whose chemicals bled into her, the leader who her body so desperately wanted to turn toward. It would be crystal clear, she knew, and his voice would boom like soothing thunder as he lured her in — but she wouldn't let him get to her. She wouldn't let any of them get to her.
She was done being weak. She was done needing rescued. She was just done.
"I'd like that someone to be me, if you don't mind," the leader went on, speaking to his companions though it was Torryn who felt the full force of his words. His voice iced its way down her spine; her body rocked with the chills it left. He was strong — for a living vampire.
I can do this, she told herself as confidently as she could, but her thoughts were muffled even to her own mind, and her certainty quickly began to fade. Just block it out. Force it out. The man before her flipped his blade shut and eased his body into a casual stance, taking a step back to stand beside the bigger man with an obedient nod. His nose is still bleeding, she thought, trying to focus on him through the fog. He has blue eyes. He's angry — angry at me. And that man behind you, the one who's calling out to you with these Goddamn pheromones? Yeah, babe. He's not Antony.
"Torryn," her mother said cautiously from one side, and her voice rang like an alarm bell loud and clear in Torryn's mind. Her vision slowly cleared; the lethargy that filled her limbs began to ebb away. His eyes aren't blue. They're green, she went on. And that woman is your mother. She's a woman you need to get your shit together for and protect. "Torryn, w—" But she stopped suddenly, and Torryn turned to find the leader with a finger to her lips and what looked to be a painfully tight grip on her arm. Torryn's eyes narrowed, and what was left of the haze met its match in her anger.
The vampire gave her his most patronizing smile, locking eyes with Torryn even as his finger glided from one side to the other across her glaring mother's lips. "Quiet down, now, Miss —"
"Don't touch her," Torryn all but snarled. "Get your hands off of her, or I'll be putting you in your place here soon."
His smile became transparent, obvious confusion and annoyance lurking behind his suddenly tightened lips as his gaze darted pointedly to the men behind her. The effects of the pheromones suddenly hit her threefold — her vision flickered to near darkness, her face slackened, her legs began to wobble beneath her as if these chemicals were a physical weight that she just could not bear.
No, she thought, but it was just a whisper in her mind. No, I will not let them do this to me. I will not let them win. But her knees buckled, and she fell to the floor with a soft grunt of pain that just barely reached her ears. A blurry woman appeared at the leader's side, and Torryn squinted through the haze to try to make out her features — but she couldn't. She couldn't even tell if the woman's long hair was blonde or brown. No, she snarled inwardly. No, no, no!
"Does that feel better, my girl?" the leader asked in a drawl that reminded her far too much of Caesar, and she gritted her teeth together. He is a Caesar, not an Antony. He is not my Antony. "Aren't you feeling much lighter and more complacent now?" He stepped away from her mother, and the female vampire at his side took his place, throwing an arm companionably across Torryn's mother's shoulders. Come on. I can't just let them… But her thoughts were muffled, fuzzy. She barely knew what was going on anymore. She could only see the leader's grinning face, glowing pale and beautiful in the light from overhead as he made his way slowly toward her. She wanted him to hurry; she wanted him to touch her. Her body ached for it. But Antony…
Finally, he reached her, hooking a finger under her chin to send a chill racing along her spine. "Doesn't that feel much, much better?" he murmured with a seductive smirk, and she felt herself begin to melt completely into his thrall.
"Torryn, get up!" her mother yelled suddenly. "You can't let him —" A gasp and a crash sounded almost simultaneously, and Torryn just barely managed to force her eyes to drift languidly to where her mother now lay on the floor beside the overturned coffee table, completely still. Mom, she thought, worry clawing at her even through the lingering fog, but her face was unmoving and empty, and her mother's form was but a blurry heap on the carpet. My mom needs me. Mother needs me. I hated her once, my mother, but never again, she ranted at herself, calling up thoughts and facts and the painful memories of her childhood in a desperate attempt to stave of the effects of the pheromones.
Her mother passed out drunk on the couch after a night of partying when she was too young to understand. Her mother not waking up to take her to her first day of kindergarten. Her mother threatening to put a cigarette out on her arm if she didn't stop talking about the science project she was so proud of. Her mother refusing to pick her up from a school dance even after her friend stole her date, her ride home. Her mother refusing to take her to the doctor when she fell down the stairs and broke her arm. Her mother telling her that she never loved her.
Her mother telling her that she hated her and wished she'd never been born.
Her mother never showing a single sign of fucking remorse for any of it.
But she didn't deserve to be treated this way, her mother, and it was with boiling blood that she looked the leader dead in the eye, his face and her every surrounding vivid through the dissipating fog, and said evenly, "You've just crossed a line that you can never uncross, motherfucker."
And she let loose a punch to his jaw that sent the gruesome sound of a breaking jaw echoing through her thoughts like a soothing melody.
Can you hear me?
You're losing all control.
Are you breathing?
I'm feeding on your fears.
Can you feel me?
I whisper in your ear.
Are you breathing?
Are you breathing?"
- Exilia
A hand caught Torryn's wrist, and she was suddenly sailing across the room, the chill of the air hitting her tenfold as she flew. She crashed into a dresser against the wall to her right, the wind knocked from her lungs and a sharp pain beginning in her side. Somehow, she caught herself, her fingers splayed across the fake wood that made up the dresser as she fought to keep herself upright.
"You really need to calm down," the man — that patronizing bastard of a fucking man — told her as she turned toward him, gasping for air even as her side throbbed and stung and told her to stop. He smiled right back at her hard scowl. "Before you get hurt."
"What did you do to my mother?" she snapped, drawing herself to her full height in spite of her body's protests. "Why the hell are you even here?"
He raised his hands in placation. "We didn't want to hurt her, but she, much like you, didn't understand why we were here, and she panicked. We had to…calm her."
She clenched her jaw. Calm her. Right. "Is this how you greeted her, too? Just appearing out of nowhere with your fangs out, expecting her to offer you some tea and sit down for a nice chat?" she nearly spat, sneering.
"We were hoping for coffee, actually," he countered with a smooth smile. "Would you mind making some for us?"
Her jaw went slack, every ounce of ire seeping from her flaming expression. Had he really just…? "You're damn right I'd fucking mind," she snapped. "You'd better tell me what you asshats are fucking doing here, or I'll —"
"You'll what?" he interrupted, a challenging edge to his smile that only sent her blood pressure rising higher. "Make me throw you into another dresser? You don't have a chance against us, my little half-Progeny friend, and I believe we have some information you'd like to know."
She could only grit her teeth for a moment and glare into the muddy depths of his brown eyes. He and his little bloodsucking crowd had her cornered. Damn it! "What kind of information?" she finally asked, her voice tight. "What could you possibly tell me that I even give a rat's ass about knowing?"
He chuckled. He knew he had her between a rock and a bastard. "How about making that coffee first?"
-?-
"How often do you feed?" the girl — Alexis, if Antony remembered correctly — asked after a long pause, a long moment in which they only stared at one another. "I'm going to guess not nearly often enough."
He shrugged. Why was she still here? Why hadn't he thrown her out yet? "A few times a week. Whenever Torryn's up for it, really."
She nodded, smiling knowingly. "Just as I thought, then: not nearly often enough."
His eyes narrowed. "And just how often should I be feeding, then?"
"You're an undead now, Antony," she said, rising gracefully to her feet and starting toward him. Her hand fell to rest on his forearm, crossed over his chest, and she went on. "Not only that, but you're a master vampire. You should be feeding daily, maybe even multiple times a day."
"She can't give me that much," he said, but he knew that she already knew that. He knew that that was the point.
"Take from me, Antony," she said softly, pushing her hair over her shoulder to bare more of her throat to him. "You need it."
He could only stare at her neck for a moment, glowing at him through the heavy darkness that blanketed the room. An emptiness awakened within him, a hollow at the pit of his stomach that he hadn't felt so intensely for quite sometime. Did he really hunger so? Or was this merely the effects of this know-it-all girl toying with his mind?
"I don't," he whispered after a moment, though he couldn't tear his eyes from her throat. "I don't need it. I have all that I need for now." Torryn was all that he needed. She'd sated him dozens of times before, and she'd sate him a thousand times more in the future.
"You know that's not true," the girl snapped, and his eyes darted to hers to find them narrowed in a glare. "You have to stop being so Goddamn sentimental if you want to survive in this world, Antony, and you shouldn't need a Goddamn human to tell you that."
He wanted to be angry at her, wanted to deny her words, but he knew that she was right — that she was still right. "But I have no desire to feed outside of her," he said quietly, dropping his eyes to her neck when he found himself unable to meet her stern, knowing gaze.
"You have no desire to do a lot of the things you need to do," she retorted, "but of all the things you could turn down, this is the most innocent." She took his chin gently between her fingers, pulling his head up, and his shoulders tensed at her touch. Her eyes were gentle, but he knew what lay behind them. "You don't have to leave her right now. You don't have to run off and find a pretty vampire to mate with. Just feed — for her sake and for yours."
Cheating on Torryn? For her own sake?
"I don't —" But she put a finger to his lips with a whispered "Hush, boy," and brought his face to her throat with a light tug at his jaw.
He fell headlong into her scent, the scent of soft skin and blood pumping just beneath the surface, the lingering scent of vanilla body wash and strawberry conditioner. His fangs grazed her skin, and she shuddered, and he let them slip gingerly into her.
She tasted of warm gin and apricots.
-?-
Not a single vampire said a word as Torryn carefully propped her mother's head up on a pillow and made sure that she was in an overall comfortable position on the living room couch. The half-dozen bloodsuckers merely watched her and sipped quietly at their coffee, spread out across the room, some on the love seat and some sitting cross-legged on the floor.
"So, now that you have your coffee," she began as she got to her feet, doing her best to keep her voice even in spite of her ever-growing rage, "will you tell me why you broke into my house and assaulted my mother?" They were lucky she seemed like she was going to be all right. Any more than a bump on the head, and she'd — oh, who the hell was she kidding? She'd flip her shit and try to take them out, but she wouldn't be able to leave a single scratch.
The only vamp who had spoken so far, the obvious leader of the group, smiled at her in a way that was almost empty. It wasn't pleased, it wasn't sarcastic, it wasn't cruel; it was just…there, a decoration with little to no point other than to pretty the place up. "She called us here," he said simply, and Torryn felt her expression empty once more.
"And why, exactly, would she do that?" she asked sharply, not believing the asshole one bit. She didn't think much of her mother, but she knew that the woman was mean, not stupid.
"She was searching for your father, of course," he laughed.
"What? Why would she do that? And why would that bring a bunch of living vampires to my house?" Either he was lying or her mom really was a bit of a moron. But either way, she couldn't stop the confusion — or the hint of excitement that rolled through her at the thought of finding her father.
"You'd have to ask her why she was after him, but I'm sure it has something to do with you, my little half-Progeny friend." His smile grew, and her mood quickly darkened. Smug asshole. "As for why that would bring us here…Well, to put it simply, we're the vampires in charge of him — or, rather, the vampires he's been put in charge of." There was a nasty edge to his grin now, a nasty air to his movements as he set his coffee mug on the table before the couch, and she felt her entire body tense as red flags sprang up all around her — the men and the woman on the floor lowered their cups, the woman perched daintily beside the leader on the love seat smiled to bear her ivory fangs over top of her mug, and tension weighed heavily upon Torryn's shoulders. "We were curious about his half-human spawn, and lucky us, she drew you right to us. It's very nice to meet you, Torryn."
"You're much lovelier than I was expecting," the woman at the leader's side said, pleased, as she continued to grin at Torryn. "You've got so much of your father in you that I just want to eat you where you stand."
"She's right," a man said from his spot on the floor, eyeing her as if she were no more than a piece of meat. "The hint of human only emphasizes the Progeny."
"I think it dulls it," another woman drawled, her lip curling in a sneer. "But then, I've never had much of a taste for humans."
Torryn felt a gust of air at her side, and suddenly, a third man was beside her, his face bent to her neck and his nose straining to take in her scent. "She smells amazing, though," he said in a dreamy sigh, even as she leaped away from him and spun to face him. "I would have to taste them both one after the other to know which one I'd like more." He took a step toward her, arm outstretched, and she took a quick step back. Her legs caught on the table's edge, and in her haste to move, to be free of this leering man, she tumbled backward over it and took the whole thing down with her in a crash of wood and shattering porcelain.
Lukewarm coffee splashed across her arm from the broken mug as she landed, and her mind flashed briefly back to the last time she'd been here, when her mother had spilled coffee on her leg — when her mother had been crying and lamenting her father's loss. Why would she go after him? Why would she bring all of this trouble upon herself? Why?! But she knew the desperation that came with wanting the one you loved, with needing them and desiring nothing more than to find them and know that they're all right — and, in her mother's case, why they'd left that one fateful day long ago.
"You're not taking me," she barked suddenly, leaving her reverie to find the six vampires closing in around her. She lurched to her feet and whirled, trying to find an opening through which to escape, but there were only the bodies of the soon-to-be dead. "I've already had one vampire try to claim me, and I'm not about to deal with any more of this shit. You can give me my dad back, too, while you're at it." She stopped spinning and just looked at the smirking faces that had closed in all around her, faces that were much too close for comfort. Living vampires weren't supposed to be this cold. Living vampires still had souls, morals, all of their humanity intact. So how could they look at her like this? How could they be plotting to kidnap her, to enslave her, just as one of the cruelest undeads she'd ever met had done?
She had so much more to learn about vampires — but she sure as hell didn't plan on learning from these fucks.
"A Progeny belongs in the care of a vampire clan," the leader explained, grinning coldly down at her, "where he or she can protect and serve her betters and be protected by them all the while."
"Pretty pets, right?" she spat, squaring her shoulders and trying to make herself look threatening. "That's all we are to you, isn't it?"
"It's what you were made for," a woman murmured, her breath leaving a trail of lingering heat along the side of Torryn's throat. "It's what your entire race was made for. It's not that we're cruel or greedy or gluttonous. It's just that we're using you as nature intended."
"A nature you manipulated to your own advantage early on in the game, you cocksuckers," came a bitter, familiar voice, and Torryn turned to find her mother sitting up on the couch, her lips lifted in a brutal snarl.
"Mom!" she cried, elated, but the woman didn't even glance her way as she rose to her feet with a creak from the couch.
"Progeny didn't exist until you made them exist," she went on, stepping slowly around the overturned table, her eyes never leaving the leader of the pack, "shaped to fit your own selfish desires. They're not pets to you; they're slaves. That's why Ripley" — Ripley? My father? — "ran from you all those years ago. It's why he…" She faltered, and Torryn watched her throat shift but not her expression as she swallowed. "Why he left when Torryn was born — so you wouldn't find her."
The man all but cackled, clapping his hands together in a joyful way that reminded Torryn of Antony's father as he turned to fully face her mother. "And yet, here we are, drawn to the girl by your own pleas for Ripley. How does it feel to know that you've condemned her?" His lips curved in a cruel smile — Caesar without the slip of fang. "How does it feel to know that you've entered your own daughter into servitude?"
"How cute," Torryn cut in before her mother could speak, smiling icily. She was done with this. She was done with this conversation, with these vampires, with her own weakness, with her mother having to come to her rescue. "You sound like you actually believe the bullshit that's coming out of your mouth." She grabbed a handful of his hair and tossed him across the room.
He didn't go far, but at least he took a vampire bitch down with him.
-?-
He was ravenous, his gut a black hole that he hadn't realized existed until her taste hit his tongue. "Antony," she gasped — a warning? A plea? But he didn't care. He pulled roughly from her neck, her blood rolling down his throat like sweet molten lava, his hands pressing into the warm flesh of her lower back as he eagerly brought her closer. Her fingers began to wander, slipping beneath the hem of his shirt to tiptoe up his sides and leave a tingling trail of warmth behind.
Her breath hissed against his ear. "Slow down," she murmured, her hands a conspicuous pool of heat at his hips. "You're starting to hurt me."
But he didn't stop, he didn't slow, he didn't listen. He could do anything he wanted to her, he knew. He could kill her, and she wouldn't be missed. And it was tempting, with that taste on his tongue too good to stop and those soft gasps and groans in his ear. He could even sleep with her, if he so desired. He could fuck her and bleed her dry, and no one would notice a thing.
His grip on her body tightened, crushing her against him, and the tips of her nails dug into his back in warning. "Antony," she hissed as he forced his fangs in deeper, pain stabbing through his gums as his teeth met the resistance of her flesh. "Antony, stop," she tried again, shoving at him. "Stop!"
But why should he? She was a human — a human who sold her body and soul to the undead, no less. She was useless but for this purpose — for the purpose of satisfying the undead she served. And she'd said herself that he was a master vampire, that he needed more than the others. She'd told him to take from her — and that's just what he was doing. Why should he stop?
The black hole grew wider, darker, deeper, and he sank his teeth in farther, farther. Blood flooded his mouth, bringing with it the spice of fear and bits of broken flesh. "Stop!" she shrieked, shoving at him harder. But shouldn't she have been enjoying it? Shouldn't his saliva have been soothing her? Did it even matter? "Antony! Antony, stop! You're better than this!"
Abruptly, he pulled away, pain stabbing through his jaw as his teeth, so deeply caught in her skin, tore free, and she toppled backward onto the floor with a ragged cry. If he'd had the breath, he would've been gasping, panting for air, panicking as he stared down at this innocent girl clutching at her throat, blood gushing between her fingers like the steaming water of a geyser. But he only gazed down at her, slack jawed and still, his gut still aching and begging for more while her succulent flavor trilled across his tongue with no signs of stopping.
Oh my God. What have I done?
-?-
Another man lunged at Torryn from the side, hissing and spitting like a rabid cat as he bared his fangs and darted toward her throat. She danced backward, bumping into a third man, who eagerly wrapped his massive arms around her and held her still for the man who still chased after her. He dove toward her throat once more, his head lashing out in a grotesque pecking motion, but she was quick to whip her head forward and into his, their foreheads meeting with a dull thunk. Pain exploded in her skull, but she didn't let that deter her. She lifted her legs and kicked at the vampire who still staggered back in pain before her, and her feet connected squarely with his chest just as she whipped her head back and into the other vampire's nose.
The one before her fell back, coughing and gasping for breath even as his back hit the floor, but the one who held her didn't even loosen his hold. The scent of blood grew strong as he craned his neck over her shoulder to murmur mockingly in her ear, "Do you forget who you're dealing with so easily?"
"Not quite," she growled darkly before throwing her head sideways and into his as hard as she could. Pain lanced through her skull again, stars springing to life in her dimming vision, but the man only grunted as he drew his head back far behind her. She tossed her head toward where she could hear his breath hissing out in lingering pain, and their heads connected again, then again, and again, until finally, nearly blind with cranial pain, she fell to the floor at the man's feet.
She dove forward a few feet and spun to face him, seeing a dark-tinted version of the man clutching at his forehead and nose, blood dripping from beneath his pale fingers. Another man stood at his side, lip curled, and she could just barely make out through her darkened vision the small pocket knife he held in his right hand as he advanced.
"Someone needs to put you in your place, girl," came the voice of the leader from somewhere behind her, but she didn't dare turn to find him, didn't dare remove her eyes from that glistening blade, small but deadly in the hands of someone with such potential strength. She rose slowly to her feet, her vision gradually clearing, only to be fogged again as the familiar taint of vampiric pheromones seeped into her system. The man before her stopped uncomfortably close, only a foot from her, but his face was blurry now, almost entirely distorted in her eyes. Something tugged at her attention from behind, begged her to face it, and she knew then that it was the leader whose chemicals bled into her, the leader who her body so desperately wanted to turn toward. It would be crystal clear, she knew, and his voice would boom like soothing thunder as he lured her in — but she wouldn't let him get to her. She wouldn't let any of them get to her.
She was done being weak. She was done needing rescued. She was just done.
"I'd like that someone to be me, if you don't mind," the leader went on, speaking to his companions though it was Torryn who felt the full force of his words. His voice iced its way down her spine; her body rocked with the chills it left. He was strong — for a living vampire.
I can do this, she told herself as confidently as she could, but her thoughts were muffled even to her own mind, and her certainty quickly began to fade. Just block it out. Force it out. The man before her flipped his blade shut and eased his body into a casual stance, taking a step back to stand beside the bigger man with an obedient nod. His nose is still bleeding, she thought, trying to focus on him through the fog. He has blue eyes. He's angry — angry at me. And that man behind you, the one who's calling out to you with these Goddamn pheromones? Yeah, babe. He's not Antony.
"Torryn," her mother said cautiously from one side, and her voice rang like an alarm bell loud and clear in Torryn's mind. Her vision slowly cleared; the lethargy that filled her limbs began to ebb away. His eyes aren't blue. They're green, she went on. And that woman is your mother. She's a woman you need to get your shit together for and protect. "Torryn, w—" But she stopped suddenly, and Torryn turned to find the leader with a finger to her lips and what looked to be a painfully tight grip on her arm. Torryn's eyes narrowed, and what was left of the haze met its match in her anger.
The vampire gave her his most patronizing smile, locking eyes with Torryn even as his finger glided from one side to the other across her glaring mother's lips. "Quiet down, now, Miss —"
"Don't touch her," Torryn all but snarled. "Get your hands off of her, or I'll be putting you in your place here soon."
His smile became transparent, obvious confusion and annoyance lurking behind his suddenly tightened lips as his gaze darted pointedly to the men behind her. The effects of the pheromones suddenly hit her threefold — her vision flickered to near darkness, her face slackened, her legs began to wobble beneath her as if these chemicals were a physical weight that she just could not bear.
No, she thought, but it was just a whisper in her mind. No, I will not let them do this to me. I will not let them win. But her knees buckled, and she fell to the floor with a soft grunt of pain that just barely reached her ears. A blurry woman appeared at the leader's side, and Torryn squinted through the haze to try to make out her features — but she couldn't. She couldn't even tell if the woman's long hair was blonde or brown. No, she snarled inwardly. No, no, no!
"Does that feel better, my girl?" the leader asked in a drawl that reminded her far too much of Caesar, and she gritted her teeth together. He is a Caesar, not an Antony. He is not my Antony. "Aren't you feeling much lighter and more complacent now?" He stepped away from her mother, and the female vampire at his side took his place, throwing an arm companionably across Torryn's mother's shoulders. Come on. I can't just let them… But her thoughts were muffled, fuzzy. She barely knew what was going on anymore. She could only see the leader's grinning face, glowing pale and beautiful in the light from overhead as he made his way slowly toward her. She wanted him to hurry; she wanted him to touch her. Her body ached for it. But Antony…
Finally, he reached her, hooking a finger under her chin to send a chill racing along her spine. "Doesn't that feel much, much better?" he murmured with a seductive smirk, and she felt herself begin to melt completely into his thrall.
"Torryn, get up!" her mother yelled suddenly. "You can't let him —" A gasp and a crash sounded almost simultaneously, and Torryn just barely managed to force her eyes to drift languidly to where her mother now lay on the floor beside the overturned coffee table, completely still. Mom, she thought, worry clawing at her even through the lingering fog, but her face was unmoving and empty, and her mother's form was but a blurry heap on the carpet. My mom needs me. Mother needs me. I hated her once, my mother, but never again, she ranted at herself, calling up thoughts and facts and the painful memories of her childhood in a desperate attempt to stave of the effects of the pheromones.
Her mother passed out drunk on the couch after a night of partying when she was too young to understand. Her mother not waking up to take her to her first day of kindergarten. Her mother threatening to put a cigarette out on her arm if she didn't stop talking about the science project she was so proud of. Her mother refusing to pick her up from a school dance even after her friend stole her date, her ride home. Her mother refusing to take her to the doctor when she fell down the stairs and broke her arm. Her mother telling her that she never loved her.
Her mother telling her that she hated her and wished she'd never been born.
Her mother never showing a single sign of fucking remorse for any of it.
But she didn't deserve to be treated this way, her mother, and it was with boiling blood that she looked the leader dead in the eye, his face and her every surrounding vivid through the dissipating fog, and said evenly, "You've just crossed a line that you can never uncross, motherfucker."
And she let loose a punch to his jaw that sent the gruesome sound of a breaking jaw echoing through her thoughts like a soothing melody.