Blood Red

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Author: Willa Okati

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Blood Red Willa Okati

All rights reserved. Copyright ©2005 by Willa Okati No part of this e-book may be reproduced or shared by any electronic or mechanical means, including but not limited to printing, file sharing, and email, without prior written permission from Changeling Press LLC.

ISBN 1-59596-118-6 Formats Available: HTML, Adobe PDF, MobiPocket, Microsoft Reader Publisher: Changeling Press LLC PO Box 1561 Shepherdstown, WV 25443-1561 www.ChangelingPress.com Editor: Katriena Knights Cover Artist: Sahara Kelly

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This e-book file contains sexually explicit scenes and adult language which some may find offensive and which is not appropriate for a young audience. Changeling Press E-Books are for sale to adults, only, as defined by the laws of the country in which you made your purchase. Please store your files wisely, where they cannot be accessed by under-aged readers.

Chapter One

It had to be a dream. Things like this did not happen to him. Ros, poorest among peddlers, stretched out his limbs and luxuriated in the feel of silk and satin, of cotton woven so close and thick that it felt like the finest linen. There seemed to be no end to the bed he lay in. It went on and on, further than he could spread his arms and stretch his legs, the toes arched out like a dancer’s. Though nothing covered him, not even a scrap of the rags he’d been wearing, the air felt warm, and wisps of the bedding brushed his skin like a lover’s kisses. How glorious to be naked in winter, yet warm as if he lay in a grassy meadow on the height of a

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summer’s day! Surely it was a dream. His rational mind, that part of it that remained active, told Ros so. Perhaps it was a fever vision. A snow hallucination. But if it was a dream, why not enjoy it? Better yet, if it was reality, why not revel in it? Ros laughed out loud. “To think that such a thing could happen to me,” he said softly, tasting his words. They were heavy with slumber, rich and deep as they rolled off his tongue. Yet once it left his mouth his voice sounded lonely, the echoes of his words trailing off like mocking little faeries. His lips twisted. Well, and wasn’t that what had brought him here to the bed, to his current situation, at least in part? His predilection for telling fairy stories? Tales of magic and mischief, forbidden by the pious elders of the villages he stopped in. He should have known better than to keep on telling them, even in secret. Yet the children who had come to his fire to barter trinkets and bits of clumsy weaving for what he carried in his peddler’s pack were so eager to hear about a bit of magic. For that gift alone, being able to bring a little enchantment to their dreary lives, his banishment from the world of men had been worth it in the end. But he knew, deep down, that he would not have been rejected from their world if he had merely kept it at that. No, he’d had to look at the young men who came, sometimes a bit reluctantly, sometimes eagerly, to rummage his packs for ribbons to give their sweethearts, or sort through the slim stock of daggers and knives he carried. He’d had to look at them. Had to let his eyes trail down long, slender limbs, and linger on thin but beautiful faces. Had to let his hand rest a little longer than need be on deceptively fragile-looking shoulders. Had to tease and coax them into meeting his eyes, gazing into their hearts, in search of the one who he would ask to share his shabby furs in secret that night. More often than not, when he invited them, their answer was ‘no.’ Ros had understood. Even if tempted, the randiest of men could be put off by the thoughts of the punishment that awaited them if they were caught lying with another of their same sex. Gelding, for one. His hand slipped hastily down to check his own cock and balls. When his fingers met solid flesh, his breath escaped in a ragged gush of relief. Still there, though the gods only knew why. Village elders were notoriously quick with their knives, and he should have been made a eunuch before being cast aside. Should still be bleeding, gushing out rivers of crimson from the wounds between his legs. No doubt they would disdain using a cautery on such a criminal as he. A mystery indeed, then. What had prompted their mercy? It was beyond his mind’s ability to puzzle it out.

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Ros’ hands felt over his manhood, testing to see that nothing had been damaged. He cupped his heavy sac in one palm, testing the weight, rolling the balls with his fingers. So, he still had seed, for what that was worth. And he still had his cock. Though it had lain flaccid on his thigh while he rolled in the luxurious bedclothes, it rose a bit at the feel of his own rough hand touching himself. He resisted the urge to grip his cock with his fist and stroke it. Ah, the thought of coming to a climax here in this bed, surrounded by the warmth and the richness of the coverings he lay on… But no. He was meant to be nearly asleep. Though it almost hurt him to let them drop, he relaxed his hands away from his cock and balls and let his slightly twitching fists fall back against his sides. He needed to have his wits about him, not to be lost in a self-induced haze of orgasm. To have been snatched out of the blizzard and into this paradise was mystery enough. He needed to know what would happen next. His passions for the flesh had brought him to that place. If he had been meek and chaste, he would lie in his peddler’s wagon still, not in this strange place, in this luxurious bed. It had been his fault, getting caught with a delicious young man. Bolder than the others in the last village Ros had stopped in, he had met Ros’ eyes with a flicker of mischief and teasing, taunting him with what he had to offer. Ros had accepted the offer with a look, and watched the man’s shapely ass as he strolled away. That night, the man had come back. Ros hadn’t abandoned the hope -- no, the knowledge -- that he would, though he had long since banked his fire and rolled himself up in his rough and ragged sleeping furs. He had left enough room for another to slip in beside him. And sure as the moon that rose in the sky above, when the midnight hour passed, he’d heard movement outside. Then the slow creaking of someone slipping into the wagon. The pattering of footsteps, hurried from the cold. And then, ah, then, the warmth and chill of a bare body burrowing close, hungry hands already reaching for him. They’d had a marvelous fuck, the two of them. The young man hadn’t been so innocent as one might think, sheltered in the country, and Ros laughed to himself at the thought that he was likely cuckolding some shepherd or woodsman by taking this young treat for a night. Oh, yes, he’d known what he was about, that one. Clever hands had worked Ros’ cock as their mouths met, ravaging one another with hungry kisses. It had been far too long for Ros, and the young man seemed to fancy a taste of the exotic. When he had turned the man onto his belly, it had been all Ros could do to summon the patience to stretch his small rosette of a hole with fingers and tongue. His cock had been burning for the heat and tightness to be found when he finally buried it deep inside the man’s channel. Oh, but they’d set that wagon bed to rocking. He remembered hearing the rhythmic creak of it on its wheels. The cranky whickering of his horse at the untoward noises. Stifled moans, bitten-off cries, and steady panting as Ros thrust deep and hard into that velvet, molten heat. Again, and again, and again… Perhaps the noise had been what summoned the elders. Or perhaps it had all been arranged. Some part of Ros argued against that. Unwilling to think his eager young lover had only had deception

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on his mind when he thrust against him, when his hands had grappled for purchase and his cock pulsed in Ros’ palm. When he had been at Ros’ mercy, to bring him to completion or deny him climax as long as he chose. The thought of being played for a fool by someone who despised him, who loathed the act -- it made him ill. He would rather not believe the man had been part of a plan to catch a blasphemer. A willing lamb led to sacrifice. Even if he knew that was the truth. But however it had been laid out, the elders had come to catch him. Torches held high, they had ringed the wagon. The blazing lights had alerted Ros too late. He’d started up violently, cock still buried in his night-lover’s ass, blinking at the fires surrounding him. Fires that had kept burning while he was dragged from the wagon, naked as the day he was born, and been held tight by two sour old woodsmen as the priest chanted out his sentence. While the young man, Ros’ erstwhile lover, dressed inside his wagon, calm as the surface of a glassy sea. “Banishment,” the priest had intoned. “One so vile as you is not fit to walk among us.” Vile? When his only crime was loving those of his own sex? Ros had been tempted to open his mouth and let boiling words pour out at the hypocritical old toad. No doubt he had his altar boys, and his acolytes, that he taught right and wrong by example. Pious old liar! But he knew the futility of it. This had happened before, and he’d been lucky to have been cast out of that village with his manhood intact. That had been in a place, though, where all they cared about was being rid of him. He hadn’t been so lucky the second time. In this new village, their holy men were more ambitious. Eager to secure the favor of the stiff, unloving gods they served. And so it had been banishment, not only from the village -- from their world. Expulsion into the deep, deep forest that no one with any sense entered. He’d even been stripped of his wagon and horse, permitted neither food nor sleeping furs, and only been covered by the barest of summer rags in the dead cold of winter. Hard hands gripping his arms, they’d taken him past the safe places where men cut wood and thrust him deep into the underbrush. There they had left him to fight his own way out. No doubt they thought they’d abandoned Ros to his death, tangled in the briars. But when he’d managed to tear through the thick windbreak of brush and weed, of thorn and bush, he had stood up and been in a world apart. A thickly wooded, bitterly cold world, where the blizzard’s leavings came up to his knees. But then, there had been a trail, beaten-down in the snow, leading into the distance. He had followed it dumbly for -- how long? -- a league, perhaps more? Desperately hoping in his cold-addled mind for shelter somewhere, deep within the woods. Imagine his surprise and delight when he had found a roughly cobbled-together fence barring the trail! He’d tripped the latch, stumbled inside… …and found himself in a brand new world. In a garden where it seemed like summertime. Not that he’d had time to enjoy it. A thousand hands -- magic! -- had swept him away to this ocean of tapestry and

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silks in a bed bigger than a cottage. He’d only just had time enough to see to a bit of insurance for himself. And that, ha-ha, was something he’d be telling no one about any time soon. Perhaps what he needed was sleep. A bit of sleep, and he would be able to piece together how it was he had come from near falling on his face in the snow, to coming to rest in this bed that seemed built for a king’s loving tryst. But -- no. If he slept, he might lose track of his surroundings, the time, himself. Who knew what would happen then? He had to remain awake. Awake, and aware of what went on around him. Because there were the hands. As if summoned by his thoughts, they returned to him. “Back again?” Ros murmured as they approached in a cloud, like birds fluttering. Just hands, gloved and ungloved, soft and hard, pulling away what bits of covering lay over his skin, baring him to their touch. One hand slid down his thigh, tickling at the springy hairs, and cupped his balls gently. Another gripped his cock, running a thumb up the long vein on the underside. A third ran up his chest, pinching and tugging at one nipple. A fourth attended to his other nipple. A fifth ran a finger across his lips, soft and warm in its glove as the lips of a lover. But there were no bodies in the bed with him. Only hands. Hands, attached to nothing else at all. They were the same hands that had seized him and dragged him out of the garden that looked like summertime come to life. A warm summer, the kind he remembered from when he was a boy, with the scent of jasmine rich and heavy in the air, and roses hanging full and heavy on every trellis and arch that could be seen. Enchantments. Magics, straight from his stories, had seized him from the brink of death, and brought him here to this bed. Stroked and caressed and teased him. Pleased him until his toes curled, his back arched and, unable to help himself or the hot need curling in his abdomen, his body seized up and he shot hot spurts of seed across his belly. The hands had done it before. Come and gone, and come again. Sometimes they brought wine with them. Rich claret wine, smooth as velvet, laden with enough herbs that he could smell them even in his dazed state. He had pretended to drink, pouring it instead into rich, sweet-smelling plants beside the bed, and laughed when they were gone. He still had a few tricks that no one knew about. He shifted his head on the pillow, and felt the welcome prick of a thorn. It was still there, and had gone unnoticed: the rose he had stolen from the bushes in the garden. There had been time to eat only three of the petals before he’d had to hide it, but if old wives’ tales were to be believed, the petals of a red rose guarded a body against enchantment. Hedge-witchery had saved his life more than once, and it looked to be a sure guard against magics as

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well. He licked his lips, tasting roses, and watched the hands attending to him, driving his body into a frenzy while his mind remained sharp. Yes. As his body digested the rose petals, he found he was slowly coming back to himself, not fading further into sleepy, satiated helplessness. And no one was the wiser! He held that knowledge tight and dear to his chest, even as the hands set to work. Preparing him for something. Who knew what? They could not be pushed away, even had he wanted to deny them access to his body. Even if they had been untalented, Ros would not have been able to say no. To deny himself pleasure was not in his nature, no matter how strange or unnerving the source. So, instead of bolting or running in terror, he spread himself wide to their inquisitive touches, these bodiless hands, and let them have their way with him. Probing and stroking, pinching and caressing, they came one after another, soft and hard and demanding he give in to the climax his body clamored for., time and time again. He let them have their way, but he kept his wits about him. And so it was that Ros, the peddler, cast off from the wide world, waited in that royal bed, in that strange summery room, wide awake behind half-closed lids and eager to see what would happen next. *** Sebastien tilted his cup this way and that, peering into the dark red wine within. Gazing at the images reflected inside. Watching Ros, as he lay in his luxurious bed, writhing in the throes of orgasm. Sebastien’s face revealed nothing of the feelings churning beneath the surface, and his expression would have been a mystery to any watching. Only his eyes betrayed him. Green as the leaves on the rose bushes outside his palace, they flared with the fires he kept so well-concealed otherwise. Now, they concentrated on the cup of herb-enchanted wine, his scrying mirror of preference. In the bowl of the goblet, the wine’s surface reflected both the flames crackling in the hearth before him, and the handsome young man his servants had collected in the forest. Exquisite, he decided. “So fair of face,” he murmured softly. “See the little curls on his forehead, falling down as he grows so hot and flushed under my servants’ attention. Ah, but you know how to please him, do you not?” A lover of men, cast aside to die in his forest. It was not the first time such a thing had happened. Nor, he was sure, would it be the last. Sebastien had savored many a handsome young man who had dared to love outside the laws the so-called holy priests set up to fence them in. This man, who had called himself ‘Ros’ in his drugged mutterings, was just another of the same. There would be more after him. It was his punishment, his blessing, and his curse. Sometimes Sebastien thought fate dangled these lovely prizes before his nose to taunt him with what he could no longer have. “So long,” he said softly, stroking the rim of the cup with his thumb. “How many years have passed me by, here in the keep? When the curse fell upon me, a man could lie with another, and never fear for his life. So many ages. So many laws. So much change to the world that surrounds me without knowing

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what canker lies at its heart.” Vampire. Drinker of blood, it was his punishment to find these scraps of beautiful humanity. To imprison them in his garden, and bring them to his sinfully soft and wanton beds. To sweeten their blood with his herbed wine and the stimulation of a hundred talented hands. To yearn for the touch of their bodies against his own, only partly assuaged by watching his invisible servants pleasure the young men. A vicarious satisfaction, and a paltry one, laced with the knowledge of the inevitable. When they had been drugged by wine and lulled into an erotic stupor, Sebastien would strike. Slip into their chamber under guise of invisibility, pull the beautiful heads into his lap, bend his mouth to their necks, and drink. Pierce their flawless skin and sup deeply of the hot blood running through their veins. Drain them dry, until they were mere husks of the glorious young men that they had been. Never once had he made love to one. The hunger for blood, for food, always beat him when he struggled against it. No matter how he longed, his body’s hunger defeated his yearning for climax, for caressing and stroking the lovely naked bodies hedonistically spread out for his pleasure. He gazed into the cup, at the beautiful young man as he slumped bonelessly back against linen and silk, his cherry lips parted and his taut belly striped with salty come. So handsome. So tempting. But he could never be Sebastien’s lover. Hardening his jaw beneath his mask, Sebastien put down the wine. Enough. The last orgasm would have made this Ros pliant as a rag doll. His servants would have seen to it, plying him with drugs and expertly ravishing his body as he could not. He would be ready to be consumed, if not loved. Sebastien stood. Murmuring the words of the incantation that made him temporarily invisible, he felt his outward form seem to dissolve. He would make his way to the sleeping chamber. He would eat, and be filled. And the curse of the vampire, cast upon him, would thrive for another day. “There is no escape,” he murmured, thinking of the man’s beautiful young face. “Not for you. And certainly not for me.”

Chapter Two

Something was about to happen.

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Ros shifted just a little in his bed, feeling the soft goose-down of the mattress sink beneath his weight. The hands were acting differently. He had grown accustomed to their swarming him like a flock of hungry butterflies, devouring his body with their clever touch, and then flitting away in a cloud of gloves and bare fingers. Now, instead, a few of them lingered. One had procured a bronze bowl, and another some warm water that smelled of cinnamon and cloves. The rarest of spices, things he could never dream of carrying for trade in his peddler’s pack, being wasted on a bath. A third hand dipped a soft cloth into the bowl and massaged it gently over his chest, where fresh and dried stripes of come marred his skin and tangled in the soft down of curls. Another took the cloth and gently stroked his cock and balls with it. The spices made his flesh tingle, but not hurt. More wine had been brought, and he had pretended to drink. From the way other hands kept testing him with gentle pinches, light shoves, and delicate pokes, he surmised that he was meant to be lulled into a drugged stupor by then. Well. Far be it from him to disappoint them. He let his eyes sag nearly shut, open just wide enough to peek through his lashes and watch the enchanted hands at work on his body. It took all the strength he had not to curl and uncurl, so sleepily contented under their light and soothing touch. The smell of the spices made him think of rich homes during high holy days, when the merchants would have mulled ale in plenty. Enough to spare a cup for the peddler bunked down in their stables, even if it was the leavings from one pot before the next was brought out for richer guests. His sense of drowsy contentment was marred by only one thing. Even a child could tell the hands were preparing him for something. They had cleaned him up before, but perfunctorily, as if it were only part of a job. Certainly not with warm, scented water, or with the care they now showed. Fingers trailed along the line of his jaw. Almost reluctantly? Ros wished he could speak to thank the hands for their care of him. Truly, no one had ever taken such pains over him, not even when he was a child toddling around his parents’ one-roomed, clapboard cottage. To receive it now, in the midst of these rich surroundings, was almost an overflow for the senses. He would like them to know how much he enjoyed it. But he knew that to speak, and show himself awake and alert, would be the greatest mistake he could make. The hands thought he was lulled into quiescence, stupefied by sex and scent and wine into a near-killing sleep. There could only be one reason why they wanted him so pliant, so willing to cooperate with anything new and strange. Something was coming. Or someone. Most likely the latter. Perhaps the master of this keep approached, bent on inspecting his new prize. For Ros, though he lay in silk and satin, knew himself. No one took in a freezing, starveling peddler and ensconced him in such riches if he was not to be a possession. He had seen zoos in rich men’s houses. The animals’ bedding was of the best straw and in some cases there were even fine trees growing up through the floor. Birds of every jeweled color had flitted from branch to branch, stopping only to sip sugary syrup from little beakers. Snow-white wolf dogs and

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cavorting monkeys, unicorns and griffins, all had been made as comfortable as possible in their quarters so that they would not grow afraid and bite. What difference between their circumstances and his? None. So, his new master must be approaching, and the hands prepared him for the man or woman’s approach. Ros drew in a slight breath. What would the creature want of him? Given the hands’ treatment, he could only guess that they wanted his body to service their master’s needs. The hands had made sure he was primed for action, so sensitized that he could go off at a touch, or, with the right amount of teasing, last for hours. He had heard of sex slaves, though only in rhymes and in the stories he told around fires at night, to an older crowd whose eyes gleamed at the idea of anything salacious. But that had all been before. Now, it seemed the stories might well be real. If he had drunk the wine, he would be a mindless automaton by now, willing to bend or break as his new master demanded. But he had not. He still had his wits about him, and he could face what lay ahead. Pleasure or punishment, he lay ready to cope with it. He fought not to smile. Of course, if it was pleasure, he could hardly see himself putting up a fight. The hands finished their ministrations and withdrew. They took bowl and sponge and water with them, though they left behind the lingering scent of cinnamon and cloves. Only two pairs remained, hovering in the air. Beneath his lashes, Ros examined them. They seemed hesitant, as if not sure about what they should do next. Had they had humans attached to them, Ros could almost imagine that they were arguing about what to do. One with a decided opinion for a certain course of action, one against it. They wore rich velvet gloves. Perhaps they were chief among the hands? Those with the power to make important choices? Finally, one set drooped, as if in acquiescence. The other patted its fingers, then fluttered off. The remaining set of hands drifted down to his legs, pulling them apart. Mindful of his supposed state, Ros let them have their way, pushing his thighs wide open. The hands paused, then nudged at his hip. Trying to roll him over. The other hands returned with another bronze bowl of steaming water, this time plain, without a scent, and another cleaning sponge. Ros pretended to obey as he would in a dream, sloppily flopping over onto his belly and sprawling out, legs parted. Was it his imagination, or did he hear a sigh of relief? The enchanted rose’s thorns pricked at his cheek through his pillow, and he heard the whisper of air again. Voices that seemed far away, as if he heard them from a distance. They faded quickly as the hands laid themselves on the dips and curves of his ass. Gently, they pulled his cheeks apart, and he felt the first touch of cloth and water on his tightly puckered hole. Ahhh , he

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thought. So that is the way of it . It took great strength not to respond to the stimulation, particularly when the hands cast their gloves aside and poked within him, washing inside and out. Fingertips rubbed over his special spot deep within, causing his cock to swell almost painfully. He twitched just a little to relieve the distress. The pleasure ran hot in a low thrumming of his veins, enough to keep his cock full and heavy, but not enough to bring him that all-shining moment of climax. He savored it, but he kept his wits about him, and he planned. So. A master was coming (though he did not discount the idea of a mistress) who had a taste for men, and the thought to take him. Should he lie still, and obey? Should he wait until the master was vulnerable, and fight? Should he lunge up while there were only hands yet here, and flee? But flee where? Out into the cold of winter, with only his skin to protect him? Not likely. He’d be dead within hours. And if he were lucky, if the master were at all handsome or gentle, he might instead face the bliss of feeling a heavy, hard cock sliding into his channel, pounding against him, driving him to the precipice of climax and over into a sea of bright white light. It sounded appealing. Only one thing bothered him, deeply enough that for a brief second he entertained the idea of running again. What was so wrong, so hideous, or so awful about this master that his bed partners needed to be nearly insensible before he would come to them? Ros kept his eyes closed as the hands maneuvered him over onto his back. His erection waved obscenely before slapping against his belly, a little damp at the tip. There was an attitude of definite pleasure from the hands when his cock was revealed. One ran a finger down the length of him, and squeezed enticingly when his flesh jumped. He wished he could bid the hands goodbye. They’d brought him the ultimate pleasure not once, but several times, and they had been gentle in their care for him. If they were stupid, not noticing the wine disappearing into the plants beside the bed instead of being drunk, that was hardly their fault. But he could do nothing, or say nothing, as they slowly withdrew. Taking bowl and sponge with them, they flittered away down to the end of the room. He could not see how they disappeared, or when they left, but suddenly he knew himself to be utterly alone. For a brief moment, all was quiet and still. Then Ros heard it: footsteps. Approaching from somewhere outside the room. Heavy footsteps, coming slowly on. He heard the sound of a hand landing on a door-latch. The creak of the latch coming open. The door, out of his field of vision, squeaked open wide. Well, Ros, my lad, he told himself. Now you find out what you’ve been prepared for. What is your fate to be?

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*** Those who knew of his kind called them demons. Sebastien could not blame them for that. Creatures of the nighttime, death-walkers, those who drained the lifeblood from men, women, and children for their food. But if there were demons, should there not also be angels? He did not see why not. After all, there were far more things in their world than most humans dared to dream of. There existed the Furies, who had condemned him to this existence. Why not, then, angels? Proof that angels existed lay in his most prized bed. A man, so very beautiful, naked and surrounded by rich coverings that framed his body. Sebastien inhaled sharply as he drank in his first clear look at tonight’s harvest. “A vision,” he whispered, knowing that his voice would not be heard past the magics that cloaked him. “You are a vision indeed, handsome one.” Had he ever seen any creature so very tempting as this one? Long, slender legs, nearly smooth save for the softest-looking down of light hair upon them, stretched out for his inspection. A leanly muscled torso, the stomach taut beneath skin that looked soft as velvet. Arms, lax by his side, lined with hard, wiry muscle. How would those arms feel, gripping him as they rolled together, naked and erect, in the big and luxurious bed? If only… But no. Sebastien shook his head. What point in lusting after dreams that could never be? He had come for one purpose only. To feed. To drain the life from that vibrant creature, whose very body seemed made for the purpose of pleasure. Such a ride he would give this man, if only he could. He closed his eyes and moaned softly. The thought of the man -- Ros -- impaled on his cock, rising and falling, his head tilted back, sweat shining on his marvelously sculpted face. That was the face of a poet, an artist, an angel. Sebastien wondered briefly if this denial of pleasure was the ultimate torment of his curse. The vision, once it had flickered into his mind, would not be banished with stern command or effort of will. He could see it, angel and demon thrashing together, arms locked about one another. Mouths meeting and clashing in a frenzy of lips and teeth and tongues, each devouring the other’s ambrosia with the frenzy of a hummingbird at nectar. He could almost feel Ros’ heartbeat fluttering trip-hammer-fast against his chest, pressing close to his own body, bereft of such life. To drink from this man, and leave him only a chalk-white husk, seemed the height of wrongness to Sebastien. He crept a little closer, staring at Ros. Drinking in the small details, from his long and talented-looking fingers to the damp brown curls that fell over his forehead. Beautiful. So very beautiful. His hands clenched. Damn the Furies! Damn their curse, which made him unable to take this man as he so desired. Awake, alert, and a willing partner in sexual frenzy. Damn them for preventing him from even sipping at the fountain. If he stayed too long near the man without drinking, his dark presence would filter through the strongest of drugs. Ros would start awake in deep alarm, and the only way to silence him would be to lunge for his neck, bite, and drink until he fell still and limp. “My only dream is to touch you,” Sebastien murmured, daring another step closer. “My only fantasy, to

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taste your skin. To sample the ambrosia from your cock. Would you let me? If I were careful, so careful, would you let me put my mouth around your manhood and taste of you?” Another step closer. The man lay still and placid, no doubt drugged beyond sensibility. Sebastien’s nostrils flared. He smelled of cinnamon and cloves and roses, the faintest hint of roses. The roses that could not exist outside his garden. The briefest flicker of hope rose within him. Could this be a sign? Had the Furies relented a little, at last, perhaps just for this one fallen angel in his bed? “I must know,” he whispered, drawing a little closer. He closed his eyes for a brief moment. “Do not wake,” he pleaded. “Lie still, and let me take my pleasure of you. Give me this much before I do what I must with you. Let me taste you.” The man lay still. *** Ros dared not move a muscle. Not from fear, no, from excitement. All the tales told around uncounted campfires, they were true! The door had opened, and through his barely-parted eyelids, he had glimpsed the faintest shadow of a form step through. Nothing so defined as the shape of a man, it was merely a glimmering of shade that stood before him. An invisibility charm. It had to be. Negated, though only a little, by the petals of the enchanted rose he had eaten. A little thrill of fear ran through him. What creature was so hideous or terrible that it had to come cloaked in the dressings of invisibility? Yet when the man began to speak, Ros’ bones melted under the deep, honey-velvet of his muffled tones. He could only just make out words in the sibilance of his voice, muffled by the enchantment. The shadow-man begged -- nay, pleaded -- Ros’ permission to take him into his mouth. To permit him kisses and caresses before he did what he came to do. Aye, what you came to do, Ros noted to himself. There was perhaps a darker purpose to the shadow-man’s visit. But he had his wits about him, and he could be ready for any attack. However, if the attack were prefaced by the mouth from which that voice flowed, surrounding his cock in tight, hot wetness, he was willing to submit. Still, he reminded himself, lie still. You are drugged. You cannot say yea or nay to his request. He begs you only because he thinks he has you here against your will. He had to stifle a laugh. If only the creature knew how very much it was his will to bend to its plaintive demands! ***

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Sebastien reached the foot of the bed and found that he trembled. So long. It had been so long since had dared even that much. He had learned his lesson well in the early days. He could drink from the men in his beds, but he could not love them, or touch them to bring himself and them pleasure. That was his curse, to see such beauties nearly within his grasp, and to be unable to taste anything but their life itself until that was all gone. “I will not hurt you,” he lied, lifting one knee onto the soft mattress. “I will not hurt you. Will not hurt you…” Sebastien reached out his hand, caressing one of Ros’ slim ankles. He shivered. Warmth. Life. Everything he had been denied for ages. “I only mean to bring you bliss,” he promised, slowly inching his way up between the man’s widely parted legs. Sliding his hands along heated calves and thighs until they came to rest on the narrow hips. Ros’ cock was already full and heavy, so erect that it lay flat against his stomach. As Sebastien moved his hands along the man’s legs, his shaft twitched as if eager for the vampire’s touch. And now that Sebastien crouched close enough to see, he realized it was already bubbling out small pearls of pre-come, creating a sticky patch on Ros’ hard, flat stomach. Not quite daring to believe he could do so, Sebastien dipped a finger into the small pool of fluid, and slid that finger into his mouth. He moaned. So much better than blood. The come was life itself, salty and rich and musky, scented faintly with cinnamon and clove. He had not tasted a man’s juices in -- how long? A hundred years, a thousand? Man after man had lain in that bed, their cocks as full and needy, yet he had not dared to touch and taste. But with Ros… The man sighed heavily, and shifted a bit when Sebastien’s fingers brushed the tip of his cock. Sebastien stiffened, drawing back. But no, Ros did not awaken. He merely turned his head a little to the side, exhaled a long breath, and lay still. “Good lad,” Sebastien finally dared to whisper. “Oh, be good for me a little longer. Let me taste you deeper. Lie still, I beg you, lie still. I only mean to pleasure you.” Then, not quite believing his daring, the vampire dipped his head down and ran his tongue along the length of Ros’ cock. The swollen organ jerked, as if the body could not help its reaction to the cool, wet touch. For a moment, Sebastien yearned for the warm mouth he had once had, but without blood to warm him, he was cold as a marble statue in the moonlit garden. “Forgive me,” he whispered. “I would be warm for you, if only I could be. Lie still, still, and let me sample your delights.” Slowly, ever so slowly, watching Ros for any sign of movement, Sebastien lifted the weight of Ros’ hard cock from his belly, letting it rest against his palm. He could feel the pulse beat within it, so full of life. He paused to swallow. The hunger raged within him, blood-hunger, demanding that he feed from this man. No ! He forced it back down. He would drink the man in the end. But now, he would taste him in a different way, even though his fangs descended and his mouth watered for rich redness to pour over it in a flood. The cries from his sex-starved body were stronger. Deliberately, he deafened himself to any other plaints.

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Slow and careful, he slid his cold mouth down over the dripping fullness of Ros’ cock. The taste and flavor of it hit him like an arrow in the stomach, near punching him back and away. So long -- too long. He had to devour the man, had to taste all of him, then . No waiting. He slid his mouth up and down the length of Ros’ cock, working his tongue along the veins as he went. Ros filled his mouth, stretching his lips a little painfully as he skated them along the now-slick surface of that cock. Down to the bottom, burying his nose in crisp, scented curls, and back up to the tip, suckling at it as he would at a teat, running his tongue in circles around the small hole and supping down the bubbles of pre-come hungrily as if it were the blood he craved. Ros began to twitch, but Sebastien watched carefully and did not worry. This was the reaction of a man deep inside a drugged coma to the manipulations of his body. He did not fear. He did not jump up and shriek in terror. He did not fight and struggle to run away. The cock in Sebastien’s mouth throbbed eagerly. Unconsciously, he thought, Ros’ hips began to work slightly, thrusting himself forward. Sebastien took every inch and more gladly, feeling the weight slide down his throat, and swallowing around it. A light sweat broke out on Ros’ brow. His forehead wrinkled. Furies, no. Have mercy. Let me finish this.Sebastien suckled harder, faster, savoring the taste and texture of the heavy cock on his tongue. He pressed down on the moving hips with his hands, kneading Ros’ silky skin as soothingly as he could. He would not drink from the man’s neck, he decided. If Ros remained pliant until the end of their coupling, he would bite him at the juncture of his thigh at the height of his pleasure. He would never know a moment of pain, only sheer bliss as the euphoria from his orgasm and the bite took him deep into the shadowy hills of death. Soft groans rolled out of Ros’ throat, and Sebastien knew the man had to be close. He, himself, felt a tightening in his balls and lower belly. Oh, for more time! He would undo the lacings of his trousers and take his own cock out, pumping it in time with his greedy sucks at Ros. But no, he had to hurry. The drugs only lasted so long, and then… Ros’ back arched up, delicate as a dancer, and his hips jerked hard. A river of salty, creamy come poured into Sebastien’s mouth. Greedy, the vampire seized at Ros’ hips and drank it down, every drop. He licked the corners of his mouth where it threatened to escape, and suckled eagerly, milking him for more. He felt the deep, cold-hot burn, and saw for a moment the bright whiteness that came with his own orgasm. Something he had not felt in he knew not how long. But he ignored it, for the pleasure of the man lying in his bed. Ros’ head thrashed on the pillow. The scent of roses filled the room. Sebastien dug his fingers in deeper, sucking the man’s cock into his throat to swallow again and again. Soon, too soon, he had to pull himself away from the deliciousness of the man’s orgasm. It would fade straightaway, and he would be in danger of feeling pain. Sebastien knew, now, he could never bear to bring that man any sort of displeasure. He had given him a gift the vampire thought forever lost. Thank you, Furies, he thought wordlessly. Perhaps this was a sign. Perhaps the curse could be

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breaking? But no. Even with the taste of salty-sweet come still coating his mouth, the hunger for blood rose up in a red tidal wave and nearly overcame him. He had to feed. Had to drain this creature. Damn you! he raged against the night, and the creatures who had cursed him. But he heard not even a faraway laugh at his plight. It could not be helped. It could only be done. Shutting his eyes tight, Sebastien nosed into the crevice of Ros’ thigh, the juncture of hip and leg. “It will not hurt,” he murmured, softly as if he soothed a child. “A little sting, and then, all is over.” He could not resist one last look at the beautiful man’s face before he turned it into a pinched husk. Glancing up, he drank in the sight of the carven features, the full lips, and the deep brown eyes -Deep brown eyes that were open, wide-awake, and gazing straight at him. “I see you,” Ros whispered. The hunger fled on a wave of terror. Sebastien screamed, one long keening note, and bolted. A hasty word threw up a portal to his chambers, and he plunged through it, vanishing from the rich bedroom and the young man’s sight.

Chapter Three

Outside the keep, snow began to fall. Thick, heavy flakes, wet as raindrops and falling with a soft patter, like elfin feet dancing across the garden. Ros heard them as he lay in the bed, still breathing heavily from the force of his orgasm. What possessed you to do that? he asked himself. Ah, but he knew. He’d recognized the shadowy creature just as it had been nuzzling down into the juncture of his thigh. Sharp teeth had prickled along his flesh, and he realized what it was that kept him in that magnificent bed, in that enchanted room, in that keep. The Beast. Hedge-witch lore had it that there was a vampire, a Beast, who lurked within a keep inside the woods, waiting to drain the blood of innocents who fell into his clutches. Well. It would appear that he had found that creature. Or that the creature had found him.

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Outside, the snow continued to fall. Ros thrashed a little, freeing his naked limbs from the luxurious bedding he’d been lolling in, and rolled to one side. He had to roll again, and then crawl, but finally he found his way back to the edge of the bed. It had steps to climb down it, it stood so high off the ground, but he managed to make his way down. His muscles were loose from so much pleasure, and he wobbled, but he made it to the bottom without incident. By the gods, this floor is cold! he thought frantically, hopping from foot to foot. Apparently whoever had hung the walls with thick and faded tapestries hadn’t even bothered to lay down straw mats to walk upon. His warm feet burned on the freezing floor-stones as he leapt from one to another. The room was cavernous, and his bed the only thing within it. He glanced back over his shoulder at the island of warmth and comfort as he made his way farther from it, longing to go back and bury himself in the sanctuary that it provided. But no. Finally, finally, he made it to the wall. He ran his hands over the tapestries. Did they hide windows beneath them? His first efforts proved fruitless, but soon a careful tapping yielded the thin, hollow sound of knuckles against expensive glass. Pulling the heavy wall hanging back, he frowned at the blackened window behind it. Scrubbing with his hand only bought him so much vision, but at last he could see outside. Could confirm that his suspicions were correct. The garden that the hands had dragged him into had been like summertime, with rose bushes in wild bloom and jasmine flourishing everywhere it draped. But now, ah, now, the snow fell in thick wet flakes and coated the leaves. Crystalline roses bore a blanket of white, and the jasmine had drooped. Grimly nodding to himself, Ros let the tapestry fall. So. The Beast’s control over his keep was slipping. And he had brought it about. What, then, would happen next? His death? Or perhaps another adventure entirely? Slowly, Ros smiled. He had his wits about him, he did. There was always a way to change a situation to one’s own advantage. Turning, he made his hasty way back to the bed, and warmth, to plan. No doubt the Beast would put in an appearance soon. And when he did, Ros would be ready for him. *** Sebastien leaned against the wall of his private chambers. His body was dead; it had no need for breath, but still he panted. From fear? From shock? He didn’t know. His heart did not beat, but he could swear that he felt it squeezing in his chest. Panic, he thought

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distantly. How could that peddler have seen me? He felt me, that I know, but to see me ? No one should have been able to pierce his invisibility charm. No man could be afraid of what he could not see, and thus Ros could not have feared Sebastien slowly snaking closer, preparing for the bite. But Ros had known. He had been awake, aware, for everything that passed between them. He had smelled like roses, like the enchanted roses in his garden, and he had opened his eyes and said: “I see you.” Impossible! Yet it had happened. Swallowing back a mouthful of acrid bile, Sebastien ignored the hunger howling in his gut. He’d been denied a bellyful of blood to stay the craving. Why? He should have lunged for the man’s neck. Should have buried his sharp fangs in the soft thigh. Should have drunk until Ros was dead, and there were no questions left to be asked, save requesting that the hands dispose of his body. But he had run. Why? Why had he run? His head spun and ached. It made no sense. The Furies, when they placed the curse upon him, had made themselves so very clear. He could still see them in his mind’s eye whirling in a mad circle about him as his body bent, leathery wings sprouted from his shoulder blades, and his face changed into the visage of a monster, his mouth crooked and filled with sharp, sharp teeth. “No one shall see you, nor, in the end, shall you see them as anything but food. You devoured the livelihood of your people and enjoyed it,” the Furies’ mocking, chiming voices had chanted. “Now, you shall devour their lives. Years of loneliness will pass you by, with only hands to keep you company.” “Hands?” he had protested, even through the pain of his spine bending. “My servants -- the keep --” “It shall fall into ruin, save for the garden,” the Furies had taunted. “There it shall remain forever summer, to entice the unwary into your trap. You cannot prevent it. The rose bushes that we place there we have enchanted. Once he has breathed in their scent, a man will not be able to walk away from them. And then, the hands we send you strike!” “You bitches --” They had laughed at him. “Men shall come, beautiful men, such as those you lusted after. But you will not be able to keep them, to play with them, oh, no. You shall weep bitter tears over each lovely man who ventures into your keep, knowing that with each you might have found happiness, were you still able to know what happiness is. The need for blood will consume you. You shall drink away your chances at escaping the all-consuming loneliness to stem the howling hunger in your belly.” They’d touched him then, their fingers flittering across his skin like a flock of hungry butterflies. Run their hands down his ridges and protruding bones, across the tough leather of his shriveled wings. “We have said it, and so it shall be. You are a Beast. You are a vampire. This is your curse, brought upon you by your own animal hungers. May they now bring you misery, not joy!” Damn the Furies!

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So clever, so cunning, and so cruel, they were. It had happened exactly as they said. Months, perhaps years, had passed in his keep, slowly crumbling away into ruins. He had no one to talk to and no one to serve his needs. The first time a man had fallen into the garden’s trap, and laid eyes upon Sebastien, he had shrieked out his terror to the skies. But Ros -- he had not been disturbed. He had seen Sebastien, and not screamed. He had allowed the Beast to take him into his mouth, and had orgasmed gouts of rich cream, almost better than blood as it spurted into his mouth. And then he had said it: “I see you.” “Furies!” Sebastien lifted his face to the ceiling. His overlarge eyes and his protruding fangs were bared in humiliation for the creatures he summoned to see. “Furies, I call unto thee. Come to me once again. Tell me what I have done! Surely you would not have cursed me if there were no point to it all. “Explain what has happened, and let me learn how to break my curse.” There was no answer. “Furies!” he bellowed into the night. “Furies, come and answer me! Furies!” Resounding silence was his only reply. *** Ros lay back in his bed. Yes, he had come to think of it as his own, and he would be surrendering rights to no one any time soon. He wriggled his toes beneath the heavy linen and silk and sighed. Ah, at last they would be warm again. The bed seemed to radiate a sort of heat that filled and suffused him with a rosy glow, blocking out the harsh, cold air that choked the rest of the keep. The chill would grow worse now that snow fell outside. A light touch on his arm made him start and look to the side. A pair of hands, perhaps the ones that had turned and washed him before, brushed his skin tentatively. He thought he recognized the slim ring that it wore over its gloved finger. Had there been a human attached, he thought in amusement, it would have been asking, “Can I serve the master in any way?” “Nay,” he said, gently brushing the hand off. It retreated, fluttering in the air. Ros smiled at it, showing all his teeth. An idea occurred to him. A wicked, delicious idea. “This, I need no help with.” He slid his own hands down his body, arching with the pleasure of the contact. He lingered at his nipples, pinching and tweaking them until they stood up like red berries, luscious and waiting for a mouth to suckle them in. He slipped his fingers down his body, and to his cock, lying heavily against his thigh, waiting for him. He gripped his shaft with one hand, hissing in delight. “Yes,” he said aloud. “I am thinking of you, Beast. Can you see me? Perhaps you can. How else would you have known I was prepared and ready for you? “Yet,” he murmured, “you only took me into your mouth. Did you not know that you could have had me any way that you wished? Perhaps on my stomach, my legs spread wide for your pleasure?” He gripped his cock in one fist and began pumping slowly, feeling himself swell into hardness. Images swam behind his eyes of the shadowy figure who had sucked him off with such skill. “You might have had me on my back,” he whispered wickedly. “Can you not imagine? My legs, flung

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over your shoulders? Your cock, cool as the rest of you, firm as marble, driving deep within me? Can you imagine how the heat would feel, enveloping you tightly as a vise, squeezing down on your hardened manhood? I would have milked every drop of pleasure from you. I know how to do it; I have the skill.” He stroked himself harder, feeling the first dampness begin at the tip of his cock. “But you loved the taste of me,” he whispered. “You loved my salt and my musk. And I loved you having it all. I gave it to you gladly. I know what you are. A Beast, and a destroyer of men. I am still your willing slave.” He paused in his worship of his own cock, holding it out, letting it rest in the palm of his hand. Hot, eager, and ready for riding or suckling or for being gripped in cool fingers and stroked to completion. “Come to me again,” he whispered, arching his back and thrusting his hips forward. “Come to me again, talk to me, and let me know you. Come to me, Beast. Come and taste what pleasures await you.” *** Sebastien gazed into his scrying cup. Such an imperfect image, but he could see the peddler Ros lying in the middle of the rich bed, lifting himself off the mattress in ecstasy. Tempting him with words he could only faintly hear. No courtesan or harlot could have enticed him better. But he dared not go. Dared not let Ros see him as he truly was. Not again. Perhaps the man was mad, that he did not fear. His own cock, hard and ready, strained at the laces of his breeches. Still wet, from where he had shamed himself before when Ros came to his completion. Slowly, fumblingly, he reached down and undid the strips of deerskin binding his cock away from freedom. It fell out into his hand. Closing his eyes, Sebastien hissed at the feel of cool fingers on colder flesh. It had been years since he had done even this much. The Furies had been thorough; finding pleasure on his own was nearly impossible, and orgasms rare as the pearls within oysters. Yet there and then, watching Ros writhe upon his luxurious bed, he felt his cock pulse in his hand, and knew that he would be able to reach completion. He stared at the peddler, at his hand stripping up and down the length of his heated manhood, and began, a little awkwardly, to pump at his own erection. What magic did this Ros possess? He could hear the snow falling outside. Snow that should never have desecrated his garden. Was the spell breaking? Were the Furies loosening their grip upon him? No. He could still feel his body, so changed from the handsome young king that he used to be. His wings dragged heavily down his back, and his teeth were sharp within his mouth. He had to know more. Pumping himself, writhing and groaning with the pleasure of it, Sebastien knew he had to learn everything he could about the young man. There was a spell. A spell he had never dared to use, for fear of the Furies’ wrath. But he knew of it, all the same, and he knew it was one he could employ to have his answers. Very well. He would create a simulacrum of himself, the way he used to be as a man, and send it to Ros’ chamber. There, he would interrogate the man until he learned how it was that he could see through the web of enchantments, and why it was that he did not fear.

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But that would wait until later. The time for rational thought was past. All that mattered now was his hand on his cock, and watching Ros writhe under his own hands on his body. Feeling the orgasm racing toward him with the power of a killing wave, of a ground-shaking earthquake, with a bliss that could not be denied even by the righteous wrath of a Fury. Within the scrying glass, Ros bowed and arched as he came, seed splattering across his belly. Sebastien let out a low, howling call as he felt his own heavy sacs tighten, and then exploded into the light, juices spurting over his hand and dripping onto the unforgiving stone floor. The rich smell filled the room, making him dizzy. When Sebastien came to, he discovered that he had gripped the table so hard that his long, jagged nails had left shallow cuts in it. His head swam, and he gulped hard. In the scrying glass, Ros slumped bonelessly back in the bed, his eyes wide open and dazed. But still his lips moved, murmuring wicked things. Come to me … come to me… Sebastien tilted up the goblet and drank it down, wine and image and all else besides. He slammed the glass down, and rose staggering to his feet. His library. He would make for his library, and for the book that contained the spell of the simulacrum. “I will do this, Furies,” he whispered. “I will do this, and may you be damned.” That night, he would send a part of himself to visit Ros, hidden in the golem. And he would have his answers. Have them, or die in the effort.

Chapter Four

The hands had returned. Ros, still sheened with sweat from his performance for the Beast, now found their presence as welcome as he had once felt it unnerving. “Hello, little friends,” he said softly to the fluttering crowd. “Have you come to see to me once again?” The pair of hands that wore the rich velvet gloves and a small silver ring bumped their way to the head of the crowd. Dipping low before him, they came up with palms outspread. How may we serve you, Master ? He could almost hear them. Almost, but not quite. They felt like ghost voices, tickling at the corner of his mind.

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“You can begin,” he said, “by never revealing what I’m about to do.” Fishing beneath the slip of his pillowcase, he withdrew the smashed remains of the red rose he’d plucked from the Beast’s garden. The hands flew back. Startled to see it, Ros supposed. He grinned wickedly at them. “This is a secret,” he warned. “And it is to stay a secret, come what may.” Plucking off a soft, scented petal, he placed it on his tongue. The pulp of it seemed to melt like finest sugar candy in his mouth, filling it with the taste of roses. He’d had sugared violets once, just once, when a fat merchant’s wife had taken pity on him at a holy feast. But even they could never compare to the taste of the Beast’s rose. Hungers he had never known awakened at the sweetness between his lips. Hastily, he tore off a second, and a third petal, popping them into his mouth. He swallowed the fragments of rose whole. Sliding down his throat like wisps of sweetmeats, they filled his senses with their taste and scent. When he breathed out, the smell of roses filled the room. The hands fluttered nervously. Ros felt fairly certain none of them had ever been witness to such a thing before. Roses belonged in the garden, not in this luxurious bed. He paused for a moment to wonder if the Beast had seen him do this thing, and understood the import of it. Then, he shrugged. What if the Beast had? He knew Ros had seen past his shields of invisibility. Now perhaps he realized that he could certainly not cloak himself in any way to slip in unobserved. He would just have to be seen. And that, oh yes, that was something Ros looked forward to. Very much. He slipped the blossom back inside his pillow. The rose petals, settling in his stomach, sent out a glow that suffused his body. He laughed in delight, spreading his arms and his legs wide. “Have you come to service me?” he playfully demanded of the hands. “Then take me. Please me. Do what you will. And if the master Beast watches, let him watch! Let him see what it is that he is missing.” A second pair of hands, gloved in white, nudged up behind the pair that wore the ring. One finger probed at the back of that hand, as if shyly asking permission. The ringed hands hesitated in the air -then, nearly causing Ros to laugh out loud, splayed themselves wide apart and curled into fists. It looked as if an impatient man were putting his hands upon his hips! He could so clearly envision the creature’s foot tapping impatiently. Perhaps they were annoyed at the white gloves’ request. “Come on,” Ros coaxed. “I know what you are. You were sent to care for me and to please me. Do it, then. Show me how talented you can be.” This time, he heard it. A bare whisper on the air. “ May I?” And in rejoinder: “ The Master might be displeased. We were sent to clean him, and nothing more.” “ If the Master is watching, he’ll find nothing but pleasure in the sight. Oh, do come on,” the voice coaxed. Ros watched with great interest. The pleading voice, he decided, came from the white pair of gloves. A delicious shiver ran down his spine. What did it have in mind that caused even the ringed gloves to hesitate?

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The ringed gloves fluttered, then flattened, palms up. “ If you must, you must.” “ And you will join me?” The hands linked for a brief moment. “ When could I ever deny you any pleasure?” Ros curled his toes and stretched like a great, lazy cat. “I can hear you,” he murmured. “Come and take my body for your plaything. Do what you will.” His mouth curled in a wicked smile. “Just promise to leave me screaming.” The white gloves flew upwards, just as if they belonged to a young lad delighted with a new toy. “ He not only gives us permission, he welcomes us! Come, come and play with me.” “ That I will.” One ringed glove stroked the white glove gently. Then, with the faintest of coughs, those hands clapped together. “ All of you -- you know your places, you know what to do. Clean him first, and please him after.” “ And then clean him again?” the white gloves suggested slyly. “ At your pleasure. Is he ready for us?” Ros spread his arms open wide. “Ready, waiting, and willing,” he said hungrily. “If I cannot have the Master of this keep in my bed, you are marvelous substitutes. I should want to keep you around even after I’ve conquered him.” “ He doesn’t know what we are.” “ Who we are.” “ Who we were.” “ Hush!” The ringed gloves clapped again. “ No more of that nonsense. Every one of you, to a man, now. Begin!” Those hands that wore gloves began to strip them off, letting them fall to the floor like denuded butterflies. When they were done, there floated before him hands of every type and sort. Some had long, strong fingers, some had square palms, or callused thumbs, or smoothly manicured nails. Only the ringed gloves remained on their hands. Those fluttered up to his face, cupping his cheeks between their palms. “ You give us such a gift,” the hands’ voice murmured. “ Thank you for all that you are, and all that you might be…” But before he had a chance to question that, the hands were upon him. Ros gave one arch of his back in sheer bliss, and lost himself to the pleasure of their touch. Running down his legs, from thigh to toe, warm and callused. Pulling his arms above his head in a silken grip, and securing his wrists with strong velvet ties to the far-away bedposts. Stroking over his taut chest and belly, circling his navel. A glass of wine appeared from nowhere, not smelling of herbs for once, and hovered invitingly toward his mouth. He smelled no trace of any potion and so gulped it down, glorying in the tart, dry taste of the good red drink. The bowl and cloth that he had grown familiar with appeared from nowhere. Hands seized other cloths, and began to sponge him down, running up the length of his limbs and across his sticky torso, sponging

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away both sweat and come. Rivulets of warm, scented water dribbled down his sides, yet the bed did not get wet. An enchantment? More than likely. Unguents and oils came next, richly scented as the tents of the Bedouins he loved to tell stories about. Eager fingers rubbed them into his skin, turning it all soft as the inside of his thighs. Powder followed, in a smaller bowl, with a lamb’s wool puff. The soft talc glittered as it wafted across his skin, then disappeared, fading into his skin and leaving it feeling silken-smooth. Pampered as a prince, Ros lay naked, bound and waiting. “Come and have me,” he goaded. “Do what you will to me. I am your slave.” A chorus of laughter went up. “ Our slave. Our willing slave. How funny -- so funny -- if only he knew --” The ringed gloves floated toward him yet again. “ To me goes the honor of touching his cock,” Ros thrilled to hear them order. “ To me the pleasure of bringing his climax.” The other voices hushed, though they did not stop their avid stroking and rubbing of Ros’ body. They ran up his arms and down his chest, tweaking at his nipples until they hurt and stood up hungrily, aching for a mouth to suckle them. “ Mine, for the moment.” The ringed hand reached for his cock, already half-erect, and gripped it tightly. The long-awaited touch sent skyrockets through Ros’ brain; he arched off the bed in utter bliss, groaning out his pleasure. One finger swiped at the fat, bulbous head and came away with a damp splotch. “ Mine.” “No,” a new voice said -- not a shadow voice, but a real voice. “Mine.” *** Though the bindings at his wrists limited his movement, Ros jerked up, straining to see who had spoken. A figure, cloaked in black, stood at the door, at the far end of the room. “Away,” it said quietly. “You have done your job. Leave him to me, now.” The hands flurried back, as if driven by an unseen wind. Some gave him surreptitious strokes as they departed, but oh, they left quickly. Hovering in a cloud away from the bed, they turned their fingertips toward the man in black. Awaiting orders, Ros realized. “Go!” the man barked impatiently. “I need no audience, nor do I want one. Fly away, and tend to other parts of the keep!” Away the hands fluttered, scurried, flew, disappearing in a dark, and then an invisible cloud, vanishing when they hit the tapestries. Ros almost expected to see a multitude of fingerprints lingering on the ancient hanging, but no, they were utterly gone. Leaving him alone with the man in black. The man who could be none other than Master of the keep. A vampire. The Beast. The man stalked forward, his face hidden in the shadow of his cloak. At the foot of the bed, he

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hesitated. One hand stretched out a little, as if he would reach for Ros, but did not quite dare. Ros arched himself up as much as he could, thrusting his pelvis into the air. “Have you come to take me?” he asked, his voice husky. “Is it this that you want?” “You can see me,” the Master said slowly. “How is it that you saw me, before?” “You truly wish to know? Ah, but that’s my secret to keep.” Ros grinned, and rolled his cheek against the remainder of the rose inside his pillow. “You smell of the garden.” “I smell of life.” Ros undulated, lifting his knees and parting them briefly. “Rich, hot life. That which you must hunger after.” The hooded man stumbled a step closer, his hand extending. Still not far enough to touch even Ros’ toes. “You dare,” it breathed. “You have the effrontery to come into my home, and flaunt what I cannot have before me. Who are you? What are you, that you can do these things?” Ros grinned a devil’s grin. “I am a man. I am a peddler. I am a teller of tales, and I know your story. I am Ros.” He lifted his head. “Who are you, Master?” The man hesitated. *** Hidden within his chamber, gazing eagerly into his cup of wine, Sebastien hesitated. How much to give away? All, or none? And by all the damned Furies, how could he possibly think when that man lay naked, ready and waiting in his bed? Begging for it, with his arms bound above his head and his stiffened cock slapping thick and heavy against his belly. Sebastien felt as if he stood poised on the edge of a great and yawning precipice. He had risked much of the Furies’ ire by creating the simulacrum that he had sent to Ros’ chamber. What it felt, he felt. When he moved, it moved. He felt what it touched as if he were there. His voice came from its lips. It had no thoughts save for his own. But for all his cursing and manipulating of the magics, he could not make the creature into a perfect seeming of himself, as once he was. The best he could do was smooth the face a little. Make it seem more human. Less twisted, less like a true Beast. Thus, a terrifying creature, beneath the shrouding cloak that hid his wings and warped limbs. Would Ros show any fear? Or would he writhe like the wanton thing that he was, and demand that Sebastien come even closer? Sebastien shook his head to clear it. He could not help but feel that Ros posed a great danger to him. Despite the helplessness of his situation, this single man had managed to shake him down to his very foundations. Wrestle with the thought though he might, it came down to the fact that no one should have been able to see him. And no one should have been without fear in his presence. Yet, even at his most vulnerable, Ros

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lewdly welcomed a stranger into his bedchamber. Sebastien cleared his throat and spoke, his words echoing through the mouth of the simulacrum he had sent to Ros. *** “I am,” the golem said with Sebastien’s voice. He reached out to Ros, then hesitated. Would the heat of such skin burn him if he touched? The man nearly glowed with the warmth of the bed and the attention he had received from Sebastien’s servants. Ros laughed. “Come now! How can I hurt you?” Sebastien drew back. Could the man read his thoughts, then? “Look at me,” Ros coaxed. “I am bound.” He tugged at the velvet strips fastening him tight to the bedposts. “What could I do against you? How could I hurt you?” His tongue flickered behind his teeth. “Or is that, perhaps, what you desire most? You have spent a century or better hurting others. Maybe it’s that you crave the feeling of teeth sinking into your flesh and drawing out the dark blood within. Is that it, Beast? Do you want to feel as your sacrifices did?” Sebastien drew back in dismay. Ros laughed. “Yes, your sacrifices. I know things, you realize. This flock of hands? All that remains of your previous victims. You drain their blood away and they die, but their hands are reborn to serve your next prize as it lies in this luxurious bed. To tease and coax it into submission. To feed it the drugged wine that brings about such a stupor that the poor fools never realize they are dying until they’ve gone. Tell me, what does it feel like when flesh parts beneath your sharp, sharp teeth? Does the blood dripping down your throat move slow and sluggish, like a man’s cream, or does it flow thin, like wine or cider? It must be warm, while the rest of you is freezing. Does it tempt you, the thought of taking all that heat inside you?” He tilted his neck to the side. “Do you want to drink of me, then?” For a long moment, Sebastien could not find words. “You are taunting me,” he accused at last. “Do you think my control is made of iron? Be careful how you tempt me, or I --” “Or you might what? Come and vanquish me?” Ros rolled his hips. “But what part of me demands the most of your attention? Is it my neck, with the big, gushing vein, or is it this?” He thrust his hips up lewdly. “You do toy with me,” Sebastien rasped through the golem. Ros tossed his shoulders. “Perhaps I do. But I know this much: you couldn’t bear to drink of me. Because I know you. I have my wits about me. I remember the tales about the Beast. Nothing you do can surprise me.” Sebastien saw red. “Truly, nothing? What of this, then?” Surprising even himself, Sebastien tossed aside his cloak and watched, in the cup, as the golem threw his garment off and raised his leathery, bat-like wings high over his back. Ros drew in a sharp breath. Sebastien nodded grimly. Yes. Time to complete the spell.

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He fell forward into the vision within his glass, allowing it to consume his consciousness. When the simulacrum opened its eyes once more, his being inhabited the thing wholly. He, not a mindless creature, gazed down at Ros in challenge. *** Ros stared. The tales had not prepared him for this. The Beast looked human. Pale, to be sure, pale as the chalk that men dug out of cliffs. His eyes were dark, inky pools in the middle of that face. Perhaps a bit too large, too wide and hungry. His mouth, with lips of cherry red, seemed both wide and narrow, as if he hid the proof of his fangs. Beneath his tunic and trousers, his legs seemed somehow wrong. Bent in some ways that a man’s limbs should not bend. And on his shoulders, wings. Wings, on the back of a man? They arched above his head, flapping angrily. A rattlesnake would shake his tail just so, warning those who dared get too close that here was danger; here was a creature that could take a man’s life. And yet he was not without appeal. In Ros’ eyes, the Beast looked suddenly like one of the fallen angels holy men warned others about. Plummeted from grace, to the bottom of the pits of pleasure and pain. Ros shivered, hungry and anticipatory. He found himself aching to touch one of those wings. To see if it was hard and tough, or if it felt soft and supple between his hands. But ah, yes, his hands were bound. What, then, would it feel like if those wings surrounded him, blocking out the light, as the Beast mounted him? His cock gave a mighty twitch at the thought. That, he realized with a sly knowingness, had not escaped the Beast’s attention. “Come to me,” he coaxed. “See? I’m ready for you. Take my cock, if you can’t or won’t take my blood.” “You have tricked me somehow,” the Beast rasped. “No trick,” Ros lied. “How is it that you see me, and you are not afraid?” “How?” Ros tilted his head to the side on the pillow and gazed at the Beast as it drew a little closer still, lifting its knee to rest on the foot of the bed. “I see your eyes, and there’s kindness hidden in the bottom of them. I see how you restrain yourself, no matter how hungry you must be. I see that you might be gentle and kind, if given the chance. And,” he licked his lips, “I haven’t been taken by a man in far too long. The thought of you filling me with your coldness, splitting me apart until I feel that I’ll be torn in two… it tempts me. It makes me burn.” He spread his legs wide. “Come and take what you will,” he invited. “I give you permission and blessing. Fill me up, and make me whole. Use me to satisfy at least one of your hungers.” He glanced slyly at the starkly outlined cock in the golem’s trousers. “At least a part of you is interested.” The Beast climbed up onto his bed and rose upon his knees. His hands dropped to the ties of his trousers, and hesitated. “You are not afraid?” Ros let a ripple of lust run through his body. He watched the golem’s eyes dilate as he saw the

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movement of his muscles, and perhaps even smelled the need radiating off his swollen cock. “Of you?” He smiled slyly. “Not in the least. Now come and have me. I’m tired of waiting.” Snick-snick-snick. The Beast’s nails were razor-sharp, and sliced through the ties of his breeches. Too big for him, as though he had not fed in an age upon an age, they slithered down his hips. His cock, wet and ready, fell forward, jutting at a lusty angle. Ros swallowed hard. He had willingly spitted himself on the largest that the villages had to offer, gladly gone down under the heated, sweaty grip of the burliest shepherds, but the Beast’s cock was a creature unto itself. Long and thick, chalk-white as the rest of him, it looked as if a statue had come to life and approached him, bent on devouring what remained of his virtue. “You’re large,” he said huskily. “Too large?” The Beast dropped to all fours, seemingly a more comfortable position, and began prowling like a great cat up the bed toward Ros’ spread legs. “Too large even for you?” “Not too large for me.” Ros stretched his thighs wide open. “But the hands have left oils and lotions. Use those on me, to make me ready for you.” “Where?” The Beast reared up his head. He looked almost baffled, as though the thought had not occurred to him. A twinge of sympathy reverberated through Ros’ heart. “It truly has been an age for you, hasn’t it?” he said softly. “Here. The lotions are by my elbow. I think that if you had not come by, the hand with the ring on it would have found its way, the entire fist, up my channel.” The Beast growled. “But ah, no,” Ros went on, licking his lips. “That pleasure should be for you only. The Master of this keep. The Beast that rules these halls. Would that be what you want to do? Push your fingers into me, one after another, until all that remained was tucking your thumb under and pressing. Pushing in, deep and deep, until the whole of your hand was gripped tight inside me?” The Beast growled again. “You tempt me too far.” Ros laughed lowly. “Not far enough. You haven’t even touched me -- oh!” The Beast seized both of Ros’ ankles in a grip colder than the rime of ice on a man buried in snow. It burned. And from that burn, up his ankles it sent a wave of heat that filled him with a burst of lust and need. “Not just my legs,” Ros panted. “Come closer, and fill me. Spit me on your cock. I need to feel you deep inside.” The Beast’s hands ran down the length of his legs. Strong hands, they were, if thin. Ros could feel the strength resonating in them, taut as the strings of a mandolin. “Go on,” he urged. “You don’t need to be gentle. I can take you. I want you. Need you.” The Beast loosed a low, ragged groan. “You push me too far,” he muttered. “Though the Furies damn me to this state forever, I must have you.” “Then take me.”

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The Beast paused, his hand plunged into the small bowl of sweet-smelling lubricant. “Oh, I will.” His mouth parted in a hungry grin. “Again. And again. And again. Until you’ve screamed your throat raw, and come in vast and creamy stripes across your belly. Not once, but many times.” “Then what are you waiting for?” Ros asked huskily. “Nothing.” Two slick fingers slid between the cheeks of his ass, unerringly seeking out his tightly puckered hole. The Beast shoved them in roughly. His eyes glittered at Ros’ choked-back cry of pain and bliss. “Do you like that, little whore?” he murmured. “I can do better.” Sebastien added a third finger, and twisted them inside Ros’ tight channel, seeking -- ah, there! He pressed down on the spongy lump as his tempter writhed, howling out his pleasure. Spread his fingers wide, not bothering with being slow or gentle, as he might have with another lover, but taking Ros roughly with his hand, knowing that the man thrived upon it. The sight of Ros spread wide and wanton, damp with sweat, his cock leaking a steady, thin stream of pearlescent strings onto his belly, proved more than Sebastien could bear. It had been so long. Far too long. Gripping Ros’ legs by the ankles, he lifted them over his shoulder. “I won’t loose your hands,” he warned. “You come when I allow you to come. Otherwise, you will be punished.” The peddler had the cheek to raise his face, eyes glittering, and breathe, “Promise?” Lining up the head of his pale, fat cock with Ros’ stretched entrance that fluttered eagerly with every beat of his heart, Sebastien wished he could breathe. He would inhale the scents of sex, of longing and need, and taste them on his tongue. But since he could not, he would have to satisfy himself otherwise. He thrust his cock into Ros in one long, swift glide, filling the man utterly and sinking in balls-deep. “Little vixen, how do you like that?” he hissed, knowing that his cold seared the writhing man from the inside out. “Do you enjoy knowing that you are mine?” “Yours,” Ros choked out. “Only move, move now .” Sebastien obeyed, caught in the moment as if in a great hand that pushed him onwards. He drove his cock deep into that scorchingly hot channel time and again, his balls slapping hard against the man’s tight, rounded ass. Beneath him, Ros gasped and moaned like a creature possessed. Bent on their shared pleasure, Sebastien adjusted himself so his cock massaged and drove hard against Ros’ pleasure spot, taking a vicious delight in seeing the thin strands of pre-come drooling from his cock become a string of pearls, bubbling out to decorate his taut skin. Ros thrashed against his bonds. “Beast,” he rasped, “you push me close.” “To the edge?” Sebastien thrust again. “Then fall over it. Without a hand upon your cock. Feel me deep inside you, and let go. Pitch headlong into the chasm, and let me follow fast upon your heels.” The peddler’s eyes rolled back into his head. He pushed back hard with his hips, setting up a rhythm that almost immediately faltered. “I can’t. Cannot --” “Let go,” Sebastien urged, struggling for the last shreds of his control. The man was too hot, too tight, this a pleasure far too long denied, yet he was determined to make Ros come from the thrusts of his cock alone. “Let go, and let me see you come.”

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With a muffled roar, Ros strained his head back on his neck, tendons standing out like rope, and thrashed his hips. Thick gouts of creamy come shot from his cock, splattering in heavy strands across his belly, even up to the soft, downy hairs upon his chest. Howling out his completion at the sight, Sebastien felt his own control give, and spurts of icy seed erupted deep inside Ros. He filled the man with his juices, full to bursting, until they slid back along his own length and dripped out of Ros’ stretched hole. The Beast collapsed atop the man, allowing Ros’ legs to slide off his shoulders and splay open at his sides. Ros’ heavy breathing lifted him up and down in a rhythm that nearly made his manhood twitch again, as if it were ready now for another taste of the tempting man. As he lay still, a soft hand came down to stroke along the line of his temple, twining in his hair. Sebastien jerked his head up. “What? But your hands, they are bound!” “Only for as long as I wanted them to be,” Ros murmured. He slipped the other hand free of its tether, and brought it down to trace a finger across Sebastien’s cheek. “And what I want now is to touch you.” The finger paused. “More than anything, I want to touch you. But this isn’t really you, is it?” Sebastien reared up. “It is me. Every bit and morsel of me.” “No.” Ros shook his head. “I have my wits about me, and I can tell true from false. This isn’t you, the true vampire Beast. Perhaps a golem, sent in your place. A creature so cleverly made that you feel what it feels, that speaks with your voice and words. But it isn’t you.” He tangled his fingers in the Beast’s dark hair. “What I want is you. No games, no gimmicks. I’m no child to be put off with tricks, Beast. Come to me. In your person and your flesh. Let me love you as I’ve loved this pale imitation, and I’ll show you what passion really is.” “I don’t -- I cannot --” Ros placed a finger across his lips. “But you can. You must. And you will.” He sounded so very sure of himself. Sebastien backed off, feeling the gush of fluid as he slipped from Ros’ gripping hole. “If you saw me,” he whispered, harsh and urgent, “you would run. You would never be able to look at my true face without screaming, and I could never bear that. I would have to kill you, to stop you from shrieking out your fear. Is that what you want?” He captured Ros’ face between his cold, cold hands. Forced their eyes to meet, inky black to wicked, twinkling brown. “Is that truly what you want?” he demanded. “Or are you nothing more than a madman, bent on inviting death into your arms?” “You’d love to know,” Ros whispered. “Come to me yourself, and find out.” “I cannot.” Sebastien scrambled back off the bed. “Hands, attend him!” he called out. “I must go. I cannot stay.” “Then go.” Ros raised himself upon one elbow. “But when you come back, let it be yourself that approaches this bed. I want you, Beast. None other. Come back to me, lie in my arms, and drink deep of my seed instead of my blood.”

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Sebastien flung his hands in front of his face. “You tempt me too far, once again. I must go. Hands! Hands, come quickly!” The simulacrum raced for the door, dove through it, and disappeared, used up. *** Within his chambers, Sebastien came to himself with a deep gasp -- his first real air in centuries. It burned in his lungs like fire and ice together. Startled, he took a second breath. And then a third. His chest rose and fell, like a mortal man’s. In amazement, he looked at his hands. They had straightened. Once again, he had the long and narrow fingers with the look of a king that had vanished so long ago he’d nearly forgotten what they looked like. He could feel, too, that his legs and his back had straightened. The heavy wings still bowed him down, and the sharp pointed teeth of a vampire dug into his lips, but -- by all the mercies ! -- he seemed nearly human once again. “What game is this?” he rasped, staring about himself in the gloom, as if hunting for answers. “Furies, what new riddle do you taunt me with? Furies! Furies!” There came no answer. Enraged, he flung his scrying glass hard against the opposite wall. The breath, so new to his chest, filled it in hard, angry bursts. “I will find out what game you’re playing with this man and with my body,” he warned. “I will find out, or I will bring this keep down around me!”

Chapter Five

The hands had returned as soon as the Beast’s simulacrum left, and hovered in a thick, anxious cloud by the side of Ros’ bed. He smiled at them, the lazy, satiated smile of a man who had been thoroughly fucked and come out on top in a battle of wits to boot. “Welcome back, friends,” he said softly. “I’m guessing you saw all of that?” “ We did not go far,” said the ringed hands. “ We feared for your safety. The Master is a creature to be dreaded. You know what he does?” “He’ll not be drinking my blood any time soon.” Ros reached out and caught the hand with the ring, squeezing it. “Just you trust me. I’ve got my wits about me, and I know what I’m doing.” The hand hesitated, though it twitched as if it wanted to squeeze back. “ So many of us failed before we even began. How can you be so sure?”

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“Because.” Ros winked. “There’s such a thing as a secret weapon.” He slipped his hand inside his pillow, and brought out the remainder of the crushed rose. “There’s this.” “ We know. How did you get that? No one saw you take it. We should have noticed.” “Should you have? Funny, seeing as how you didn’t spot a thing. I’ve traveled in my life, and I know a thing or two.” He grinned. “None of you saw me getting rid of that drugged wine, either, now did you?” He heard a rueful laugh. “ We did not. You tricked us, as you did the Master.” There was a pause. “ Will you believe me when I say we are glad?” “That I will.” Ros gazed at the crushed and wilting rose resting in his palm. “I don’t know how much good this has in it yet, but you never know a thing until you find out, eh?” He popped the rose, pips and all, into his mouth. As before, it seemed to dissolve on his tongue, tasting of magic and mystery, sugar and the scent of flowers. The pips remained hard seeds on his tongue, and he swallowed them in a great gulp. He blinked. Behind the hands, faint figures shimmered into his vision. “I can see you now,” he said slowly. Though their hands remained the only solid part of them, he could see the men they were attached to. A crowd of beautiful young lads, from the rich to the poor, all shimmering ghosts who gazed at him in awe. Each one bore the remains of two ragged holes on their neck, and each was pale as death. “I’m that sorry about the ends you came to,” he said quietly. “But I’m here now, and if I have my way, it’ll never happen again. I can see clearly, and I think I know what to do.” The owner of the ringed gloves, a slight young man with the clothing and haircut of minor royalty, opened his mouth in a slight ‘o’. “ How can you possibly--” “Hush, now.” Ros struggled to sit up. “I’ve a plan, and I’ll need your help. Can you find me clothes? Not the ones I came in, but good clothes? Solid and warm, yet a little tantalizing?” He winked. A small pair of gloved hands near the back, attached to a boy barely out of his teens with red hair falling across his face, clapped in eager excitement. “ I know! I know where the Master stores such things! Shall I go and fetch them?” The ringed specter flickered a glance at Ros, hesitated, then decided. “ Yes, go. We trust in Ros, now, to break the Master’s curse and stop this cycle of death and despair.” The small hands flew away, straight and true as a hummingbird. Others followed in their path, fluttering away in eager haste. The ringed ghost turned back to Ros. “ You seem so sure. How is it that you know how to break the Master’s curse?” Ros grinned broadly, then tilted his head back and laughed. “Because, handsome, I’m a storyteller,” he said. “And in the stories, there’s only one way to break a curse.” His grin turned hungry and eager. “With the kiss of true love, of course.” ***

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Sebastien threw another moldering book against the wall, growling deep and low in his throat with frustration. For hours, he had been searching, digging deep into tome after tome, and nothing! He could find no record of such a curse ever being wrought before, much less anything on how to break it. He felt like a fool, searching for a spell that couldn’t possibly exist. Why would they have left him with a possibility of salvation? They would want him to despair, not hope. He slumped in a nearby chair, wincing and cursing as his leathery wings caught on the back of it. And he thought of Ros. No virgin, Sebastien had had a hundred -- a thousand -- beautiful men in his bed before the curse caught him and made him what he was now. He had taken them all, from the innocents to the most skilled of courtesans, and none of them had made him feel as Ros did after just one taste of his cock, and one fuck that still had his head spinning. That face, like an angel’s. That voice, so low and wicked, luring him on until he could bear no more. That body, knowing just how to respond, how to squeeze his cock tight until the pleasure nearly drove him mad. The first man he’d had since the curse fell upon him, and the best of Sebastien’s life. No matter where he came from, or what he was, Ros was fit to be a king’s consort. Ros was what he wanted in his bed at night and by his side at day. He wanted to break the curse. Bring the forest down around him, and his keep back up to the richness it once boasted. Rule the land that had grown so small and narrow-minded, showing them by example what benefits lay in letting love grow where it might. He laughed a little, mixed with a dry sob. But wasn’t that why he had been cursed in the first place? He showed the people, through his leadership, that it was acceptable to bleed the poor dry and pamper the rich. He had taken what he wanted, whether it came willingly or no. Thinking along those lines would do him no good at all. No, he decided. Let the kingdom run itself, if that was how it should be. He would step down, gladly, for a better ruler to take his place. All he wanted was Ros, the wicked, tempting Ros, in his bed whenever the both of them pleased. And by the Furies, that would be all the time, if his dreams could only come true. But as it stood, he dared not even approach the man by himself. He closed his eyes briefly, remembering all the sensations that had rushed through him as his simulacrum-self had lain with Ros. The tight, searing heat around his cock, the squeezing vise of Ros’ muscles, the legs draped across his shoulders. The hands that came down to touch him with such unexpected gentleness. Why would the Furies give him such a gift, and no way to explain it? Sebastien’s jaw hardened. Very well, then. He would do what it took to find some answers. Standing, he hobbled over to a small treasure chest set up on the mantle above a fireplace that had gone cold ages ago. He had left it there until the dust grew into a thick gray blanket over the thing, terrified of

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opening it. The power of the Furies was not to be toyed with. He had thought it a cruel jest, leaving him a token that he could use to summon them for one question. One single question from each of their aspects. He had never known what to ask. They had made it clear enough that they would not restore him to what he had been. He was doomed to be a Beast forever, never knowing the love or touch of another man. But now, Ros had proved them wrong. Was there any hope that perhaps they were relenting? That Ros would be the key to unlock his prison of unhappiness? He had to know. Grabbing the box, he held it tight between his two still slightly misshapen hands, and tugged. The lid stuck, warped by time and damp, but as he cursed and struggled, it opened just a crack. “Furies,” he gritted out between clamped teeth, “come to me again. I summon you with your own token. Give me the answers that I seek. Do it, or I smash your box to bits.” The lid squeaked, wood rasping painfully. “You promised me a question. I have saved it all these years, despairing of there ever being any way to escape my prison. Now I call on you, and I demand that you answer.” Almost open, now. Sebastien gripped the lid for one last, solid pull. “Open,” he ordered it. “Open, and let the Furies come to me once again. I order -- I command -- I compel it!” He tugged, hard. The lid flew open. White light filled the room. *** Ros caught a pair of white gloves in his hands, squeezing the lean palms hidden within. Their owner, a young man with a shock of dark brown curls, looked at him in surprise. “ What do you wish, young master?” Young master. Ros liked the sound of that. He gave the man, so very temptingly beautiful, one of his best smiles. “I trust you. What might be your name?” The ghost’s eyes turned sad. “ I have forgotten it,” he said. “ It’s been centuries since I was bound here, and no one calls another by name.” Sorrow plucked at Ros’ heart. “When I have broken the curse,” he swore, “if you are still here, then you’ll have a name again.” The ghost smiled. “ If it so pleases you.” “It does. For now, though, I’ll call you Hunter, for what I want you to do.” Ros sat up straight and tucked his legs underneath him, tailor-style. “It’s snowing outside. Go to the garden and dig through the snow. Find me all the roses you can, whether living or killed by the cold, it doesn’t matter. Bring them back to me. Can you do that?”

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Hunter’s smile was blinding bright. “ That I can. And I will. Dare I say that I think I know what you have in mind?” Ros laughed. “You can dare, all right. But just go and get them for me, will you? There’s a fine man.” “ Don’t patronize me.” Hunter turned with a saucy swivel of his hips. “ If I were still alive, I could best you between the sheets without breaking a sweat.” “And if you were alive, I’d test that notion.” Ros grinned lasciviously. “But I’ve bound myself to the Beast, even if he doesn’t accept it yet. He will, though.” Ros swallowed, tasting roses. “Soon, he’ll see me and know that I’ve brought his salvation in my hands. Then, all he’ll have to do is take it.” *** Sebastien cowered back from the bright light, shielding his sensitive eyes until it dimmed and faded into something he could bear. Peeking out fearfully, he saw them, the Furies, as beautiful and terrible as he remembered. He gasped at the sight they made, spinning in a lazy circle in his dusty, ruined chamber, and wished he could close his ears to block out the sound of their mocking laughter. But no. He’d summoned them for one reason, and one alone. “Furies,” he croaked, wishing that he could stand and face them. But his wings, always so heavy on his back, hung with a leaden weight in their presence that forced him to nearly bow. “You?” one of the women, with her ever-changing face, from maiden to mother to crone, said scornfully, deigning to glance at him. “Hundreds of years have passed for you, Beast. We thought you would never find the courage to summon us again.” Sebastien swallowed painfully. “I would have left that box to rot until the end of time,” he said, his voice rough. “But something has happened.” “Oh, yes, we know.” “We know, we know,” the other two parts of Herself chimed. “A man, Ros. He sees me, and does not fear me. He welcomed my image into his bed last night. Urged me on.” “Spare us the details,” a Fury scorned. “So, after all this time, you think you have discovered a crack in the walls of the curse we threw up around you. You wonder if perhaps this Ros is the beginning of the end.” Sebastien struggled to straighten himself. “I do. And I must know what new game this is. If I am damned forever, yet he has broken through, he must play a part. I need to know what in heaven and hell is meant by permitting this.” The Furies laughed, tinkling sounds that threatened to shake the walls. “Foolish Beast,” they admonished. “Not able to see what lies before your very eyes.” One touched an elegant finger to the tip of his nose. “Not able to smell out the truth.” “To smell.” A vivid sense-memory flooded Sebastien’s mind. The scent of roses. “Ros! He’s stolen the magic from the garden and used it against me!”

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“So. You show a little sense after all.” The Furies danced in a circle, hand linked in hand, laughing as they whirled slowly to a stop. “He has. This Ros has eaten a rose from your garden, and it has made him immune to the magics in this keep. Made him able to see you, and to see the cloud of ghosts whose hands are yet solid to serve. Even now, he is devouring more of your roses. Soon, you will have no barriers against him.” Sebastien struggled to make sense of it. “He knows me for what I am, then.” “Idiot Beast. There are stories and legends of you in the wide world, and he is one that has learned and told them. He knows what you are, and how you continue existing.” “Yet he does not fear me,” Sebastien breathed. “No. The poor young fool, he thinks he knows how to save you.” The Furies spun in a tight, dizzying spiral. “Enough of this palaver! We promised once, and now we keep our promise. One question for each of our aspects. One question, and one answer. You try our patience, but we are benevolent. We’ll allow you one more chance.” Sebastien swallowed hard. “Maiden,” he said, voice shaking. “How does Ros believe he can break the curse?” A light, girlish giggle prefaced the answer in a young and breathy voice. “With a kiss, silly creature. The kiss of true love, despite your face and form.” A kiss. Sebastien’s breath caught in his chest at the thought of those lips pressed against his. Hot and vital, salty and alive. “Will it work?” “Only one question, and only one answer!” Sebastien closed his eyes tight. Unbending to the last, these creatures. “You have no mercy.” “We are not creatures of mercy. We are beings of judgment.” “Very well.” His hands balled into fists at his side. “Mother, will what Ros plans work? Will it break my curse?” “A kiss from a mortal, breaking the bonds placed upon you by the Furies? Never, foolish child, never,” a motherly voice replied from the spinning circle. “There is no chance?” “Only one question, and only one answer!” “Very well.” With an effort of will, he stood up as straight as he could. “Crone, how do I break the curse? Is he a part of it?” The Furies broke into mirthful giggles. “A part of it, oh yes, a part of it. At last, he asks the right question!” they chimed among themselves. “Are you ready to hear what you would rather not hear, to know what you do not want to know, to take on your shoulders a weight they cannot bear?”

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Sebastien flung his head up. “A burden I cannot bear?” he cried. “You have turned me into a killer of men. Locked me away here for centuries in this moldering keep. What greater burden can you place upon me?” A Fury turned its head toward him. The creature’s eyes were like diamonds, glittering and sharp, piercing through his defense. “There is always something worse,” it said with an amused little laugh. “Are you ready? Do you want to know?” “I do.” Sebastien’s hands balled into fists at his sides. “Come, then. Tell me.” The Fury giggled. “There is a way to break your curse. Ros has taken the magic of the roses inside him. Even now, he devours more of the blooms, dug from the snow in your garden. He has broken through the outward layer of the magics, and become more than mortal.” A sick feeling began to form in the pit of Sebastien’s stomach. “If you would be a man again, free to live and love, to reign and rule the land, there is but one way.” The Fury separated itself from its sisters, and wafted close enough to touch him. Her hand burned, icy cold. “You must kill Ros. Drink deep of his blood, and take the magic into yourself. Only then, will you break the bonds. Only then, will you be a man again.” She withdrew, chortling. “And such a man! Your keep will be restored to you, as if it never crumbled. All the beautiful young men you murdered, returned to life, in your employ as your harem. Think of it. All the lovely bodies that have decorated your bed, yours to take and pleasure as you desire.” “But Ros,” Sebastien pleaded. “Surely he does not have to die?” “Only one question, and only one answer!” the Fury rapped out. “The choice is yours. Drain Ros of his blood and magic, and be a man again. Spare him, and remain bound in your vampire chains forever.” Their light began to disappear. “He comes, even now,” they chimed. “Think quickly, and make your decision. The time is now. The time is now. The time is now.” And like a star disappearing from the sky, the white light of the Furies faded, leaving Sebastien alone within his dank chamber. Alone. But hearing the sound of footsteps pounding toward his door. Sebastien let out a sharp cry and hid behind a cracking pillar. “Ros?” he called out. “Go away! For pity’s sake, go away.” “Now why would I do that?” Ros’ voice mocked from outside his door. “I’ve dressed in the finest this keep has to offer, the garments of a prince, and I’ve come to deliver you from your chains.” “You have not,” Sebastien said, his voice catching. “Go! I command you, go!” “Never.” The door-latch began to move. “Locked from the inside, eh? Well, I have my wits about me. I know a trick or two. I’ll be in before you know it, and I’ll give you the gift of freedom once again. Only promise me,” his voice dropped into a husky lover’s tone, “that you will reward me with your body, your true body, in the rich and royal bed.”

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“Ros!” Sebastien pounded the flat of his hand against the pillar. It creaked ominously. “I beg you, do not come in.” “I’ve seen the worst of you.” The latch creaked. Ancient wood, near to breaking, was almost giving way. “Now I would see the best.” “You don’t know what you --” The latch broke. The door swung open with a mighty creak and a cloud of dust. Sebastien coughed, hiding behind the pillar. “Don’t look at me!” “Not look at you?” He heard the sounds of Ros stepping into his chamber. Shoes, soft leather by the sound of them, padded against the cold stones. “When I’ve come all this way?” “Please,” Sebastien begged. “You mustn’t see me like this.” “But I will. You can’t escape me.” “I beg of you!” The hunger, the almost ever-present hunger that Sebastien had managed to quash in Ros’ presence rose up in a blood-red tide within him. “Come no closer!” Silence. A warm hand landed on his shoulder. Shocked, Sebastien looked straight up into Ros’ warm brown eyes. Eyes that sparkled at him, glowing with lust and, yes, with sympathy. “But here I am,” he said quietly. “I see you. All of you. Clearly. And I’ve come to give you a gift that’s been waiting through the ages.” He placed a finger beneath Sebastien’s chin, and lifted his face. “A kiss,” Ros breathed. “One single kiss, to break the chains that bind you.” He lowered his mouth to Sebastien’s. One kiss. Not a tender, chaste kiss, no, not for Ros. He deepened it immediately, sliding his tongue past lips parted with surprise. Sebastien groaned. By the Furies, he had only but so much self-control. His hands stole out despite themselves, wrapping around Ros’ waist. His lips moved in response, sliding along Ros’ mouth with the hunger of centuries. Deep within him, the hunger rose and raged. The words of the Furies echoed in his ears. And his sharp, sharp fangs pierced the delicious, swollen plumpness of Ros’ lower lip.

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Chapter Six

The small trickle of blood on his tongue tasted of heaven and roses. Sebastien swallowed heavily, feeling the magic run down his throat. Yes, now that he knew what to look for, he could smell the magic of the garden lying thickly over Ros. His being was suffused with the life of the enchanted roses, making him stronger, more vital, more alive than a human could possibly be. Draughts of that blood would break even the strongest spell. Sebastien groaned, drawing back. Ros’ arms prevented him from moving far. The man held him tight, stronger than a mortal should be, one hand on his waist and one at his hip. A thin line of blood ran down his lip. “You bit me,” he said, sounding stunned. Sebastien turned his head. “Please,” he said, struggling for control. It was a battle he felt himself in serious danger of losing. The hunger ate at him, demanding that he feed. He could nearly taste the sweet blood sliding down his throat. “You must let me go. And run. Run as fast and far away as you can.” “Or you’ll lose your control?” Ros’ hand slipped further down, cupping the lean swell of Sebastien’s ass. He squeezed it, rubbing with the ball of his thumb. “Lose it,” he whispered. “Love me. Have me. Take me. Do what you will.” “Even if it means your death?” “Perhaps a little death,” Ros murmured. He shifted Sebastien so that the vampire could feel the heavy swell of his erection trapped between their pressing groins. “And a kiss, to break the spell.” “Foolish man. You have kissed me once, and a Beast I remain.” “Or a kiss just because I want it.” Ros lifted his other hand to tilt up Sebastien’s chin. He pressed his lips against Sebastien’s, ignoring the sharpness of wicked teeth pressed to his tender mouth. “Because I want you. Beast or no, vampire or not, you are the man I choose. I hold the key to setting you free of your burden. Take it from me. Again, and again. As many as you crave.” He dropped a third, light kiss onto Sebastien’s pale lips. “Take it. Take me.” Sebastien clawed at Ros’ arms, gripping the fabric covering them, clutching the flesh beneath. The heavy weight of Ros’ cock pressing against him had woken his own member and brought it to eager readiness, swollen thick and damp. “You do not know what you ask for.” Ros did not understand. Could not understand. He would never offer, if he only knew. And Sebastien could not bear to tell him. “How could you be prepared for what a creature like myself might demand?” He resisted the urge to caress that warm, inviting body. The temptation was almost too much for him to bear. Ros smiled, a wide, bright smile brimming with mischief and infectious life. “I am a storyteller,” he reminded Sebastien. “And I know how to make a happy ending. Trust in me.” The words cut like a knife. Sebastien shook his head. “I have no trust left for anyone or anything,” he

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whispered. “Then learn to trust again. Here.” Ros removed his hands from Sebastien’s body, and turned to face the wall. He leaned against the stones, his legs spread wide, bracing himself with his palms. “Trust in me.” Sebastien shuddered. The sight of him, like a sacrificial lamb, waiting to be split open, tantalized him beyond bearing. He tore his gaze away. “You do not know what you ask!” he rasped harshly. “If you would save your life, leave now!” “No.” “I beg you.” “No.” Ros moved his hips in a slow rhythm. “Come and take me. Break your spell. If a kiss will not do it, then perhaps…” Sebastien found himself mesmerized by Ros’ enticing, dance-like undulations. His hands moved forward despite his better intentions. “You offer yourself freely.” “Freely? Not only that, but gladly.” Ros’ eyes glittered. “If there is a price to pay, then I offer it with all my heart. Do you need my blood? Then drink of me, and live again.” Sebastien groaned softly. “Come,” Ros coaxed. He lowered a hand, working at the laces of his trousers. With another tantalizing twist of his hips, they slid down to puddle on the floor, revealing the globes of his ass. “I’ve waited for this, ever since I first saw your shape in the bedchamber.” He bent a little. “Touch me and see. I’ve prepared myself for your pleasure. My own fingers have prepared the way. I’ve slicked and stretched myself, and I only wait for your cock to fill me. Come to me. Do it!” Sebastien moaned. The temptation, the hunger, for flesh, and for blood! “You do not know,” he said weakly. “It will be the death of you.” “Will it?” Ros winked. “I know a thing or two. Whatever you fear, stop your worrying. I have my wits about me. Now, come. Come and take me, before I die from wanting you!” Sebastien drew closer. His hands, as if they had minds of their own, fumbled at the laces to his trousers. “You give yourself freely,” he said slowly, his mind going wildly over what the Furies had told him. He breathed in, and felt the scent of Ros’ wild magic suffuse him like a potion. To touch that enchanted body. To plunge his cock deep in Ros’ tight, velvet channel. To drink deep at the height of his pleasure. “Forgive me,” he whispered, as he freed his cock from its prison. He slid his hand forward, first cupping Ros’ ass, then sliding two fingers between his cheeks. “By the Furies!” He had prepared himself. Stretched and waiting and oh, so hot, offered to him as if it were a prize. And it was a prize, a gift beyond compare. “Forgive me,” he murmured again, grasping Ros by the waist and maneuvering his stiff, heavy member so that the tip prodded against the man’s waiting hole. “Do you promise that?”

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“I do.” Ros’ voice was husky. “Don’t make me wait any longer.” “Then forgive me, forgive me, for what I must do.” His voice broke. “Forgive me even more for how much I will enjoy it!” Setting his hips, Sebastien drove deep into that waiting, willing warmth. Almost immediately, he gasped and dropped his head against the heat of Ros’ back. His cock burned icy-hot as he plunged it into Ros’ channel, drawing back until he nearly slipped free, and slamming forward once again. “Say that you want me,” he blurted. “Say that you need me.” Ros’ head was tilted back in ecstasy as Sebastien shook his body with the force of his rough lovemaking. “I adore you,” he breathed. “I’ve wanted you all my life. Gods, yes, harder! I would have looked for you earlier, if only I had known. Fuck, ah, fuck!” he gasped. “Beast, you may have the body of a demon, but you rut like a god. And soon I’ll set you free. You’ll see. Only don’t stop. Don’t, don’t stop!” “I have no plans to stop,” Sebastien said raggedly. The hunger burned, engulfing him from the inside. “I’ll never stop wanting you.” Not even when you are dead and gone. Ah, Ros, forgive me ! He slid his hands up beneath the tunic draped over Ros’ chest. His fingers found the man’s nipples, pebbled from the cold, and pinched them hard. The gasp of pleasure he received in return was a benediction and a curse. “You like that, I know,” Sebastien whispered. “No. Don’t say a word. Not another word. Let there be silence.” The silence of a death knell. Ros exhaled heavily, then dragged air in with a rough sound, but he obeyed. Sebastien thrust in again harder, angling his cock so that it bashed against his pleasure spot deep within, exulting in the man’s wordless voicing of his pleasure. If I must take your life, then may you go at the height of bliss , he thought savagely. He moved his hand down to Ros’ jutting cock, dripping with eager pearls of pre-come, and seized it in his fingers. “Let me show you all that I learned, when I was a man,” he said softly, his words only just audible. “Let me take you to the heights.” Pinching the base with one hand, he brought the other down and began to pump at Ros’ cock, stripping it ruthlessly, with the motions he had long ago learned brought the most pleasure. Ros began to writhe and groan under the sweet torture, straining his hips forward, then shifting back against the cock that split him open. Wordless cries filled the air, pleading for the bliss of release. “A little longer,” Sebastien breathed. “Only just a little longer.” A few more moments to savor the clenching heat around his cock. To smell the magic hanging rich and thick around the man, like finest perfume. A little longer, for his lover to be alive. He strained against the mortal, pumping his hips with a furious threshing motion. “Are you close?” he whispered. “Do you feel it, rushing onward like the tide?” Ros nodded his head frantically. Drops of sweat that had beaded on his forehead rolled down his cheeks, smelling of roses and salt.

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“Do you want me to take you over? Do you want my cock, inside you?” He drove deep. “Pushing you past the edge?” The hunger rose in Sebastien again, and this time, at last, he was not strong enough to stand up against its power. “Then forgive me,” he whispered. “I will remember you forever. My heart is yours, given to you as freely as what you give to me.” He loosed his hold on Ros’ cock. The orgasm burst through him, fierce as the sea, shaking his every muscle. He cried out, long and low and deep; a lion’s roar of triumph. Sebastien listened, and gloried. Then, swift as a snake striking, he buried his mouth in the curve of Ros’ neck, bit down deep, and drank. The blood rolled over his tongue in thick, honeyed mouthfuls. Though Ros gasped and let out a small cry, his muscles trembling, he stood still, riding out the waves of his climax, even rolling his head so that Sebastien’s bite was unhindered. Sebastien suckled eagerly, drunk at the first taste of the rose-infused blood. Good -- so very good ! It filled him as nothing ever had before. He could feel his muscles swelling with life, his back straightening, the wings withering away. And yet, at the same time, Ros began to sag in his arms. He loosed a low, mournful wail. Sebastien tore himself away, rich red blood staining his lips. “I thought I knew,” Ros whispered raggedly. “And now I see.” “Yes,” Sebastien replied. “Forgive me. I beg you. Forgive me.” To his shock, Ros’ hand came back to stroke his thigh. “What better way to go?” he murmured, lolling his head forward to expose the bite. “Drink. Devour me, while I can still feel you deep inside. I choose this, Sebastien. I choose you.” Sebastien shut his eyes tight. By the Furies, he could not. But he had to. The taste, so intoxicating… “No!” Gasping, he jerked back and flung Ros far away from him. The man collapsed like a rag doll thrown carelessly aside. Frantic, Sebastien wiped the rich red blood from his lips. “Ros!” The wings on his back began to rise again, leathery and heavy on his shoulders. He felt them un-crumple, unfurl and rise above him, as if a harpy perched below his neck. But he didn’t care. Not when Ros, his Ros, lay bleeding, perhaps even dying before him. He rushed to the mortal’s side, taking his wrist between both hands. The pulse still beat, though it faltered and felt thready as cotton. “I forbid you to die.” The words sprung out, sounding ridiculous as he heard them. Words he might have spoken so long ago, when he was still a king. “Even if it broke my curse, I would never take your life.” Ros laughed a little, roughly. “Tell me.” He coughed. “Tell me, Beast, vampire, what is your name? I never knew it.” “Sebastien.” He chafed Ros’ hand between his own. “Don’t go. You are the only who’s ever seen me,

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known me, loved me. Don’t go and leave me here, alone.” “Would you keep me?” Ros struggled to raise his head. “You really want me, just as I am?” “Just as you are.” Gently, gently, Sebastien turned the man -- so pale, now! -- over onto his back, cradling him in one misshapen arm. “Only stay with me. Join with me. Love me. I will be your slave, if only you do not go. I will remain like this forever, if only you love me.” Ros’ whitened lips parted in a smile. “You know,” he said, with the smallest of laughs, “I was hoping that you’d say that very thing.” The mighty gong of a bell split the air apart. White light filled the room. Sebastien heard the sound of the Furies screeching, enraged. And then -And then -Blackness. *** “My lord! Sebastien, love, wake up!” Gentle hands slapped at his cheeks. “Open your eyes and see!” Sebastien swam up out of the murky deeps of unconsciousness, pulling his lids apart with effort. “Ros?” he said slowly, bewildered. The man crouched in front of him, sparkling with life. “So you are alive!” Ros laughed loudly, seeming to be delighted. He held out his hands. “Take them, and stand!” Sebastien found himself being pulled to his feet. He stumbled, automatically trying to adjust his wings for balance --- and froze. No wings. The heavy weight that had burdened his back for ages was gone. “Ros, what have you done?” he demanded, jerking back. He stared down at his legs, his arms. All straight, all perfect, with no hint of wrongness to them. And his mouth! He ran a tongue across his teeth, finding them smooth and human, the wicked fangs vanished. By the Furies, his skin looked pink, as if healthy blood rushed through his veins. And there, just within his chest, he felt his heart beating in a steady rhythm. He stared up at Ros. “You,” he repeated slowly. “What did you do?” Ros winked at him. “I told you. I had my wits about me, and I am a storyteller. I knew that the creatures who bound you here would tell you they demanded a life for a life, but when they were thwarted, well, something else, even better, would have to happen.”

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“Gods,” Sebastien breathed. Damn the Furies! They had tricked him. The curse could only be broken not by taking Ros’ life, but by sparing it. What would have happened if he had drunk Ros’ lifeblood down to the last ruby drop? Nothing. He would have continued on as ever before. Perhaps healthier, perhaps stronger, but still a vampire. Still damned and doomed. But instead there had been Ros’ sharp wits, and his own compassion, and willingness to be a sacrifice in his stead. “You see?” Ros almost glowed with delight. “I told you I’d come to break your chains.” “And so you have,” Sebastien said. He held out his hands, perfect healthy hands, and seized Ros’ own. “Glorious one, you’ve done it. You’ve set me free!” Ros smiled softly. He touched Sebastien’s warm, curved cheek gently, tracing a wisp of light brown hair. “No, love. You did that all by yourself. All I did was show you the way.” Sebastien caught Ros’ hand. “Together,” he said firmly. “It took both of us, together.” Ros’ eyes twinkled. “So you’ll not be casting me aside now that you can be king again? A lord of the lands, with an ex-peddler as his consort? What will the old women say?” “Whatever they damned well please,” Sebastien said roughly, seizing Ros in his arms, “so long as I have you!” He brought their mouths together in a harsh, bruising kiss that went on until they lost track of the seconds, the minutes. Mouth glided over mouth, tongues danced and tangled together, and hands roamed freely over bodies. At last, they parted, both panting and staring at one another with hungry eyes. “Listen,” Ros whispered. “Do you hear it? The keep’s repairing itself.” Sebastien cocked his head. Yes, he could hear it: the sound of masonry, crumbled for centuries, now dragging itself together. And looking around, he could see that the dust of ages was gone. His books gleamed as if new in their shelves. Across the room, a bright fire crackled in the long-dead grate, sending heat curling out toward them. “There will be much to do,” he said, feeling for the words. “The land has been so long without a king. Perhaps they won’t accept me.” “They had better. And if not, then you and I shall live a long life together, no matter what they think. Be we beggars or be we kings, we’ll be together.” Ros kissed him again, hot and hard against his swollen lips. “Do we have a bargain, Master? Sebastien?” Sebastien laughed. He couldn’t help it. Warm air filled his lungs, his heart accelerated, and he felt dizzy with the pleasure of being alive. “Together!” he shouted, setting the rafters to vibrating. “You and I, Ros. Come what may.” “Then come.” Ros tugged at his hand, a wicked smile tilting up the corners of his mouth. “It’ll be hours

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before the keep is back together again, and tomorrow we can go out into the world and let men know they have a king once again.” “But in the meantime?” Sebastien smiled broadly, allowing himself to be led. “In the meantime,” Ros said with a mischievous grin, “there is, not far from here, a bed fit for a king, and for his consort.” Sebastien laughed again. “Lead on, my love. Lead on!” And so Ros did.

The End

Willa Okati

Willa Okati is a long-time devotee of all things vampire and supernatural, but an even bigger fan of stories that feature beautiful men exploring their desires for one another. Physically, she lives in North Carolina, but mentally thrives in a world where each adventure is bigger and brighter than the next. She is also owned by far too many cats, but she insists that they serve as emissaries from the Muse and can’t spare a one of them. You can visit her at her web site, www.willsheornillshe.com

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