To Bleed for Him

"Detest me,
Arrest me.
Don't test me,
'Cause I might go a little too far.
The perfect,
Imperfect.
Restless surface,
Got you nervous.
Cutting up the faceless people,
Sorting out the page and reason now.
The rest of the story to fill the new sequel
Is burning the steeple
And might just go a little too far."
- Ill Nino

"Why didn't you kill him?" Skylar asked in a rasp as they started down the walkway toward Antony's home — her home, she had to remind herself. She tightened her supportive hold on Ripley's waist.

"The Lord?" she asked, and he nodded. "Because that would probably cause more problems than it'd solve. Honestly, beyond losing his marbles a bit at the end, he seemed like a pretty decent guy. I'd hate to see who would replace him and how many people would die in the process." He eyed her quizzically, no doubt questioning her logic, and she shrugged. "Being with Antony has given me some insight into these things. Better to leave the delicate power structure of the covens as they are than to try to stop them altogether."

"Wise girl," her father murmured, but Skylar only shook his head.

"If you say so," the boy said, and she chuckled, her gaze drifting to Antony's back as he stopped before the two shadowy forms on the doorstep. Her smile instantly fell.

Something wasn't right.

"Mom?" Torryn queried as she rocked to a stop before the woman, taking in the sight of her furrowed brow and tightly pressed lips. "What's wrong?"

"Vampires are no good bastards," she snapped. "That's what."

Torryn frowned, confused, but Becca was quick to fill in the blanks. "They're staging a coup. They don't want Antony in power any more, and they've decided to back someone else who's been vying for his place." Her tone was bitter, angry, and Torryn watched helplessly as her slippered foot tapped angrily against the concrete. She looked up at Ripley, but his eyes were fixed on her mother, who stood scowling off into the distance as if she had no idea who was standing right before her — and she probably really didn't.

"What?" Antony growled, fire dancing behind his eyes. "Who?"

"Who do you think?" Her features tightened further, and she crossed her arms over her chest to tightly hold herself. "It's Caleb. When something goes wrong for you, it's always Caleb. I knew you should've taken him out when you had the chance! I knew it!"

"So he's the one who orchestrated that small rebellion the other night," Antony murmured to himself, calming as he began to contemplate the situation. Torryn remembered that night, remembered the rage the mere thought of betrayal had sent her stumbling into head first, and she clenched her fists.

"The night you two thought it would be just dandy to have dinner over top of me?" Skylar remarked wryly, and she shot him a glare. "That was a fantastic night. One of my favorites."

Antony ignored him and turned his gaze to Becca. "What do they want? Anything?"

She shook her head. "Just power. Just getting rid of you. They told me that we all get to live if we just leave peacefully. I don't think you're going to be able to reason with them."

"Margaret?" Ripley tried softly, and the tone of his voice brought Torryn's eyes to him again in surprise. It was nearly a gasp, that single, gentle word — shock, awe, and a growing happiness, all wrapped up into one. Her mother's eyes darted to his, wide with the same surprise that still coursed through her daughter.

"Ripley?" she whispered in wonder. "Oh, God. Ripley!" She threw her arms around him in what looked to be a painfully tight embrace, but he only grinned and held her just as tightly. Antony, who had just begun to speak, fell silent and looked upon the scene. Torryn smiled at him. Small moments, she thought to herself. She would never get over the sweetness that could and so often did pervade these tense moments, the "I love you"s that came before the battle. They made it worth the pain.

"We, uh, we don't have time for that just yet," Antony interjected as kindly as he could. "I wouldn't mind your opinions on what we should do now."

"We go in and try talking to them, obviously," Torryn said, still smiling. "If they can't be reasoned with, we fight. Duh."

His look hardened. "No. How about I go in and see what I can do, and if they turn on me, I get my ass out of there and we leave to recuperate? I'm pretty sure some conversation will get us somewhere with them."

"As long as we include me in that plan, it sounds perfect," Torryn said, but he was already shaking his head.

"Yeah, let's risk two of us for no real reason," he said sarcastically. "That sounds perfect."

She glared at him. "We should never leave each other alone. We already talked about this once before."

"There's no need for you to go in," he said, returning her glare. "If things go wrong, I'll be able to get out quicker on my own."

"Actually, if things go wrong, you probably won't even be able to get out without me there." She crossed her arms and straightened to her full height. "If you need back-up, I want to be there for it. You're not going in alone."

"So I'll take Becca with me," he said, and the girl guffawed at his side.

"Uh, no," she laughed bitterly. "No, no, no. I saw what happened to that other girl in there, and I am not about to join her in slutty girl heaven."

Antony frowned. "What other girl?"

"That human you nommed on earlier, before you rode off into the sunset," she answered, nose wrinkled in distaste.

Antony's eyes widened, and Torryn could see guilt flooding those perfect blue depths, plain as day. "Alexis?" He put a hand over his face and shook his head. "Damn it. I'd completely forgotten about her."

Becca nodded, but she seemed almost pleased by it. "Uh, hell yeah, ya did. She's a puddle of goop on the kitchen floor right about now. Just came down for a glass of water and some bread to gnaw on, and bam!" She clapped her hands together, and Skylar jumped. "They fell on her like a lioness on a zebra carcass."

"And you didn't stop them?" Antony snarled, baring his fangs at the girl. Jealousy stabbed through Torryn. Why would he care? What does she matter? But she was dead now, and she couldn't deny that she got some sort of sick satisfaction from it.

She may have forgiven Antony — for the most part, anyway — but she couldn't help being a bit bitter.

"Oh, yeah," Becca said mockingly. "Let me just throw myself into the middle of a vampire feeding frenzy. You're lucky I managed to grab Mommy Dearest over here and get the hell out of there before they got her, too!"

"You got her out?" Torryn asked, thoroughly surprised.

"Sure did," the vampire said, puffing her chest out in pride.

"All of my stuff is still in there," Torryn's mother muttered darkly, but she didn't look too unhappy, wrapped up in Ripley's arms as she was. Ripley looked like he was in Heaven.

"Thank you," Torryn said softly.

Becca grinned. "No problemo. Anything for Antony's lady." Her smile fell as she looked Torryn over, her head tilting slowly, creepily, to one side. "You're not lookin' so hot these days, though." Torryn felt her face warm. She couldn't even imagine how bad she looked right now, and she didn't dare look. Her throat mauled — as usual — her shirt torn and covered in blood — as usual — her hair tangled and matted with crimson — as freaking usual — a dagger shoved haphazardly into the waistband of her stained jeans…

"And that's exactly why she shouldn't come in with me," Antony said sternly, trying desperately to be the voice of reason, and she glared at him once again.

"I'm sorry," she started venomously. "Who was it that took down the Lord? Who was it that beat down a horde of his little minions? And, hm, who was it that ended up laying helplessly in a pile of books?"

His glare hardened. "I don't think stroking your ego is really going to help your case at all."

She rolled her eyes and pushed past him, stepping onto the porch. "Shut up and let's do this," she said, then threw the front door open.

Well, this isn't quite what I was expecting. Two dozen vampires faced her, standing in a semicircle with the front door as their center — smirking, grinning, some of them even covered in the blood of the human they'd torn down. Caleb caught her eye immediately after her initial scan, standing oh-so-proudly at the front of the pack, dead center, a shit-eating grin on his face to bare his fangs. They were longer than she remembered. And sharper…

Oh, shit.

"Didn't Becca tell you the deal?" he said smugly. "If you guys leave now, we won't have to hurt you."

"Are you sure this is what you want?" Antony asked as he calmly shut the front door, then turned to regard the crowd, unperturbed. "It really doesn't have to go down like this."

Caleb chuckled. "Just turn around and walk out of here, or you'll end up wishing you had."

Antony forced a sigh from his breathless lungs and crossed his arms. "Can we at least get some of our stuff first?"

"No," Caleb answered, his smile cruel now. "Get out. This place is mine now, along with everything that's still inside it."

A couple of the tightly clumped vampires to one side of the pack shifted, giving Torryn just enough room to peer between them, and what she saw nearly brought up what remained of the McDonald's she'd eaten hours ago. Alexis lay in the doorway of the kitchen, recognizable only by the strands of brown hair sprawled in the sticky blood around her. Her shirt and bra had been torn away, her pants and panties pulled down around her ankles, and what should have been tan, healthy skin showing through was only shiny red. Every inch of her, crimson. Her face was turned away from Torryn, and the girl had never been so thankful for anything in her life. But a hint of white shone through, she realized — the bandages around her neck from where Antony had dug into her.

Torryn put a hand over her mouth and turned away, horrified both at the scene and at herself. She'd been happy about this? No, Alexis could've fed Antony a million more times, and she still never would've deserved this.

"Yeah, I claimed her early on," Caleb said so smugly that her cold blood was set boiling in an instant, and her hard glare darted to him, tears welling in her eyes. "I'm glad you're enjoying our handiwork." He winked at her, and she felt her skin crawl as memories of the night he'd nearly overcome her, right in this very room, flashed through her mind.

God, she hated him, more than anyone else she'd come across in all her years — more even than Caesar, than Antony's mother, than all of the vampires who had ever messed with her combined.

She felt her fingers tighten around the hilt of the dagger at her hip. "Tell your lackeys to back off, and we can finish this now," she said, and her voice sounded wrong when it reached her ears. How could she seem so calm? Her heart beat heavily in her chest, ice-cold stone where their should've been blood and tissue, warm and alive. She didn't know what to do, how to handle this. She could only pull her knife from her jeans and stare at the vampire through rage-reddened lenses. "I'd really like to give you what you deserve."

His grin only broadened, cocksure and amused. It almost reminded her of Antony, in a way, but this son of a bitch would never be anything like Antony. "Get off of my property before you end up like her. I won't say it again."

"Too afraid to fight me by yourself?" she asked, still deathly calm, dagger clenched in a painfully tight hold. "Too afraid to face someone who isn't just a human?"

"Torryn," Antony murmured in warning, and she felt the light chill of his hand on her upper arm. "We're going," he said to Caleb more loudly, and she saw his lips curve in an unpleasant smile out of the corner of her eye. "But I'm sure we'll be back. This isn't going to end well for you, Caleb. Savor the position while you have it." He opened the door and took her hand, ushering her out into the night ahead of him. Caleb's mocking laughter followed her out, reverberating through every nerve, every cell, every pore, and she wasn't sure her blood would ever stop boiling.

"I have 30!" the vampire called after them. "How many do you have?" But Antony calmly pulled the door shut, and Torryn spun to face it, desperately wanting to go back inside, nearly doing it. He pulled her along by his tight grip on her hand, however, when she reached for the knob, and she let out a disgruntled growl.

"We can't just leave," she snarled, whirling on the boy, but he kept pulling her down the pathway, and the others looked silently on from their stations around the porch. "Did you see what they did to her?!" she roared, digging her heels into the concrete and tugging with all her might. "We can't just leave! We can't let him live!"

He released her and spun as she staggered back, nearly toppling over. His eyes burned with the same passionate anger that she felt, maybe even more. "He's not alive anymore," he hissed. "I know you know that. And I know you know that we don't stand a chance against them — not right now." His face fell into the calm mask he always wore, and he turned his gaze to the others, who now gathered behind them on the sidewalk. "We're going to the Arena. We all need some rest, and that's the safest place to get it in."

"We could always use my house," Skylar suggested, but the vampire shook his head.

"You have roommates, don't you? They're innocent. They don't need to get hurt because of this, and if Caleb were to follow us and launch an attack, they would get hurt." His eyes drifted over the others. "At the Arena, everyone in attendance can hold their own in a fight, which could be an added benefit to us if Caleb does show up. We'll be safe there. Are we in agreement?"

Torryn scanned the crowd, rage still setting her skin aflame and burning away at her reason, and the hot, humid summer air did nothing to help. Skylar nodded, Becca nodded, Torryn's own mother and father nodded. "Why?" she burst out. "We'd be wasting time. We need to do this now, while they're all just standing around in there. We need to do something!"

"You need to rest," Ripley said softly, and she saw his arm around her mother's waist, but not even that little happiness could calm her. "You're running on an adrenaline high. I know what that's like, and I know what it's like to want revenge." She wanted to argue, but his calm, knowing voice was already beginning to dampen the fire in her blood. "But there's a time, there's a place, and there's a way. You'll get what you want, but not if you run in half-cocked. Rest. Eat. Prepare. We'll come back, and we'll end them." His eyes narrowed, and she saw herself in them, in that smoldering silver hatred. "We'll punish them for everything they've ever done to you."