There´s sometimes more than you´re expecting
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Tanya Huff and the writers of the show Blood Ties. I´m only writing for entertainment and I don´t make any money with it! No copyright infringement intended.
Rating: Rated M for reason. You have to be at least 16 years old. Content not suitable for children and teens below age 16. hurt/comfort, Angst, drama, some coarse language
A follow up to Myxine- What the hell is that? The story takes place shortly after Heart of Fire and after the hunt down of a monster fish that unfortunately had left his normal area to reap the peaceful, snow covered Toronto and lake shores. After Henry had a rather unsuccessfully discussion with a hardheaded Vicki, he needs some sort of relaxation from the pressing events of the last time, in order to get his mind grounded again. So he decides to allow himself some entertainment vampire style...
This is about to become part of a series, that is loosely tied together and takes place during season one and two of Blood Ties.
Chapter 1
Looks like...
Henry let his look glide over the young woman from the side and his fingers were playing with a strand of her dark brown hair that was lying on the backrest. Soft as silk, not unequal to his own curls but of darker color. Her fine lined lips and her gentle eyes were reminding him of an Italian woman, whom he had known and loved a long time ago; Ginevra.
And whom he had lost...
Loss was hurting. Always. Also after such a long time. And the discussion with Vicki tonight had anyway torn open old wounds, he had believed to be healed. Henry himself wasn´t sure anymore why he was lamenting. Maybe it was because of the events of the last time. He had only scarcely escaped death, the physical traces of it had been healing with the usual speed and enough blood. But sometimes, shortly before sunrise when he was lying alone in his bed and waiting for his daytime sleep to come, he meant to feel the glowing hot clasp of the golden Illuminacion around his heart...as if it was still there. The pain and the icy stranglehold of glowing metal, that had clung to his heart, making every heartbeat, every intake of breath a fight against the clasp of approaching death.
Then with an iron will he was forcing himself to lock that up into a mental safe, turning it into only being an image of memory, that would be sealed in the deepest and hindmost corner of his brain.
I have to get away from it! I definitely need some distraction!
And this young woman at his side, Tonia, seemed to be the right one to share the rest of the night with him. He might drive home with her later...
Vicki and Mike were still in his condo. Since they had saved him from that dungeon, the detective was one of these few authorized persons, who were allowed to enter his refuge, his sanctuary. He would simply complement them off. Over and out. Or adesso basta as Mike used to call it. Vicki was used to it. She had already met him when he had a guest, allowing himself a snack. No problem for him.
"Henry...?!" she whispered and her eyes were looking over his pale features. "Henry? What is...?" Tonia was shifting a bit in his arm when she turned so, that she could lift her hand to play with a curly strand of his hair. "Lean back and relax...I can help you to get your head free, Henry..." she whispered in his ear and her breath was grazing over his ear conch, causing a slight tingling under the skin of his temple. Her fingers were gliding in his neck, under the curls.
Henry sighed unintentionally and he shuddered slightly. It was long ago, since a woman had touched him that way. Christina. He was quite aware, that his neck was an especially sensitive zone.
"Relax..." the soft voice whispered.
Henry leaned his head back in his neck and into the touch.
For a fraction of a second he was tempted to act with caution, the caution of a hunter and predator. Forget it! He ordered himself.
What for? Tonight he was tired of things, which didn´t run the way he wanted them to run and now he simply wanted to relax and he urgently needed the distraction. And may it only be to get down so far, that he might fall asleep at sunrise without any gnawing thoughts. Once again to be fed up and sated and plain and simple righteously tired falling into daytime sleep.
Righteously tired!
Henry had to smirk. This expression he had heard when he had watched the movie Witness. The story of a detective who had to investigate the murder of a dealer, his only witness was a small Amish boy. Righteously tired:The Amish were calling a condition that way, when one had become tired after work agreeable to God. After day work 18th century style.
For some people it would be good, when they would have to work that hard like the humans in his father´s time, he fleetingly thought, before he was leaning in the touch of these soft fingers again. These fingers which were crawling along his shoulders, slowly moving up his neck to finally work their way up his hairline into the back of his head.
Henry had his eyes closed and he sighed lowly.
He shuddered under these electrifying fingers. His sighs were deepening. Tonia had damn skillful, if not to say, exceptionally gifted hands...
Henry felt her warm breath on his face and he blinked from under his eyelashes. Tonia´s face was hovering right in front of him and her lips were touching his, when she looked at him with her fawn brown eyes. He opened his lips to a slit, feeling something rising deep within him and he felt when he was growing hard. The vampire within was rising to the surface, but he forced that longing back inside him, before his eyes would be turning dark and she would feel the tips of his four fangs. Tonia wasn´t one of his regular donors and this wasn´t the moment to confront her with something, what she could misunderstood., or what could scare her.
Her tongue shoved between his opened lips and her hand crawled in the back of his head.
"Relax, Henry...!" she anyway managed it to mumble under her tongue play.
Her fingers, a nail, slit slightly over his neck, scratching along there. He shoved his hand deeper, to her waist... Some relaxation. Yes. He needed that now. And more. Afterwards...
"Yes...relax, Henry...relax and you will experience things you aren´t aware that they even will be existing..." she whispered. Her tongue was skillfully moving in his mouth, diving deeper. With blunt teeth he fixed her tongue, feeling the tip almost touching his roof of the mouth. In a reflex he fought down the urge to choke. He lowered the fixing pressure and Tonia went on, her lips pressing to his own. Her tongue was...
...warm, rough, sweet...
Bitter. Hot and...
Henry choked when suddenly something incredible bitter was filling his mouth, his throat and he almost cramped when he fought for breath which he couldn´t suck in. Suffocating...suffocating on all-consuming blackness...
His hands came up, he couldn´t scream, unable to push off the weight of that body on him, when anything was boring thru the skin into the base of his head with the sharpness of a dagger. His brain seemed to explode and to go ablaze. He couldn´t scream because darkness was thrusting its way down his gorge, filling it completely.
Before darkness clasped his brain, dragging him down, he could see vertically slit, yellow eyes...
"Got you, my darling! You can´t even imagine what you will be expecting...!"
Her voice was like a dagger of glass.
Darkness was whirling in front of darkness...and his lights went off...
Anywhere...
Stygian darkness. Darkness, anything dark, anywhere or darkness was whirling in front of darkness, was whirling in front of him? Was this hell, that was sucking him up? Astaroth, who simply had gulped him down?
The darkness got lit up a bit, when he forced his eyes open to narrow slits. Only to found it being exchanged by emetic nausea and headache, that felt as if a driller was working its way thru his brain. More than narrow slits wasn´t possible and more he didn´t dare to try.
As far as his dizziness allowed him to see, he seemed to be lying anywhere. At least the perspective of a ceiling above him indicated it...when it would be a ceiling and not a wall... Otherwise that would mean that he´d be standing anywhere at a wall, what won´t be possible due to his current condition without help or any support.
Wooden cross. Chains. The awakening after the blow torch attack, after the relief of unconsciousness, had been filled with pain all over his body, dizziness and fear.
When he would be tied up again...
Carefully Henry tried out if he might move a hand. His fingers stretched, shoving over the whatsoever under his fingertips. His wrist was following. Test. Test.
His fingers were moving, his arm. He tried to force his brain to move a leg. With full concentration he managed it to curve his toes at least, when he imagined his toes. Or was it only an imagination? As numb as his legs were feeling, Henry didn´t believe, that he would be able to use his walking tools for a simple standing only over the next time.
What for Christ´s sake was going on with him? What had happened?
Anything had been drilling into the back of his head with the force of an icy and at the same time glowing hot needle, almost driving his brain to explode. Had...? Was...? Had this woman, this...thing...perhaps anything...into his spine, his spinal marrow...? Heaven, Vicki had explained him, that damages of the sensitive, nerve filled channel inside the spine could cause paraplegia.
Was he paralyzed perhaps?
Panic was crawling up in him from the darkest corners of his mind, before he could bring up so much brains against it, that he could act on the assumption, that his vampire body should be able to repair something like that. Should! What if it was anything else? The Illuminacion, this devil´s tool, had paralyzed him too. Black magic? Devilish witchcraft, which could paralyze him, the vampire...?
Drugs?
That would explain his paralyzed, half numbed state, when anybody had shot him anything. Sounded reasonable...no finger, but a cannula, directly into his spinal marrow.
With a groan he clenched his teeth so hard, that his fangs were almost digging into his lower lip, when a new wave of weakness and nausea was rolling over him. He hadn´t felt so sick to the stomach anymore, since Vicki had helped him to throw up the Jia-o-gulan poisoned blood of this mad priest.
Who was this woman who had kidnapped him? Because this definitely looked like a kidnapping. The room in which he was, didn´t look like a laboratory at least. Since there were laboratories set up, he had never been able to get rid of the irrational fear again, that anybody might displace him to such a laboratory any day. And he would be ending up, transfixed to an examination table like a laboratory rat, to be cut in pieces in undead state. In the old ages they had only hunted him to kill him. Not to cut him in his parts, at least not by curiosity...only by rage.
If his arm would be working, he could at least roll over to the side, when his stomach would decide to do what vampire stomachs won´t do...normally. To get rid of stuff... Henry concentrated on his right arm, imaging how he would be extending and the fingers would be pressing to the ground and his muscles would tense, so his arm would be able to pull his body around. Only that there was no firm anchor for his hand, which would be a fixing point for such a movement.
He gasped when he tried to move his fingers...
Nothing.
He tried again. Again it didn´t work. His arm, like his leg, seemed to be completely numb, insensitive. What the heck had she shot him? Even opium wasn´t that paralyzing. I´ll have to ask Dr. Mohadevan for it. If I´ll be surviving this...
In the moment his chances were looking rather bad, because whosoever had done whatsoever and out of which reason to him, had done this thoroughly! In fact; she.
Only his head seemed to work, his hearing. His hearing that was telling him now that anybody was approaching. It were light-footed steps like by a woman. And for a split second he had the hope that Vicki might have been following his kidnapper and that she would come for him now. Like she had been when Mendoza had hold him captive. He had smelled her specific scent, recognized her heartbeat, but the dragging sound told him that she wasn´t walking on her own feet, but was dragged by someone. Mendoza. He has had her! Intending her to become his unfortunate and unwilling blood source. Donor would have been the wrongest of all words to name her...
His hope died faster than a heartbeat when he heard heels. No booties. Vicki was always running around in booties, because it was more practically. That was definitely not Vicki! Neither her scent nor her heartbeat which was so familiar to him now.
Anybody was tampering with a lock and massive bars. A heavy, wooden door was opened and when it swung open, some more light came into the room than by the old, half burned out fluorescent tube that came to life now with a flickering.
Because Henry couldn´t neither turn his head nor move any part of his body, he had to wait until the person was beside him, so he could see who or what it was. Human, demon or...? As not to be expected otherwise, it was Tonia, this little, disingenuous slut, who first had seduced him...yes, seduced...and then had gotten him down stone-cold.
"What do you want? You?" Henry cawed. He was astonished, that he was able to speak at least, when even with much effort and with a fraction of his normal voice power. But here was nothing to be called normal.
"Hi, sweetie!" she grinned derisively, when she bent half over him, certain that he couldn´t attack her as long as she didn´t shove her hand between his teeth.
Henry growled, his eyes had turned bled black and his fangs were extended to their full length. Despite his helplessness he looked dangerously enough.
"Ochh, did you hurt you..." she directed to his lower lip which he had broken with his teeth and where the blood was drying yet. But the bite marks didn´t heal. Henry could feel it and this was no good sign, showing him that anything was wrong with him.
"I wish...I could...hurt you!" Henry growled.
"But you cant! And when this..." her finger was moving half an inch away from his face. "...hurts, then wait, what else I´m able to do to you, Henry Fitzroy!" Her finger was hovering along his torso down to his feet.
"I´ve been tortured recently and as you see, I´m still alive!" Henry shot back. That was more born by rage then by the hope, that he could anyway impress his opponent by it. Her next words let him solidify inwardly.
"That, what Javier Mendoza had done to you?" Her lips pursed in a malicious gesture of pity, when she tilted her head to the side. "That? That was child´s play...kid´s stuff! Mendoza was a baby when it came to such things!"
Where the heck did she know Mendoza from, the Inquisitor, whom he already had seen at his father´s court. But Henry had no time to think about her answer.
"Once I´ve been beginning with you, you will...before I really got started with you...be whimpering to be at Javier´s to enjoy his baubles instead of getting involved with me, Henry Fitzroy!" she sharply laughed, orbiting him before she stopped again in front of his face that was a mask of rage now.
"There´s much more worse than death! And you´ll be still whimpering for it! Believe me!" She laughed with a devilish sparkling in her eyes. She walked around him once again, looking down at him as if she was thinking of what she might do first. He could literally see her mind working on the most effective procedure of torturing. She would begin with something that was causing pain, but not that much pain that he would become unconsciously directly. The torturers of Inquisition first tried to cause that kinda pain, that would convince a victim, an accused, that it would be better to confess fast...before further techniques came into use.
There´s much more worse than death, this you must believe me...
"How much has Lord Astaroth paid you...that you wanna kill me?" Henry´s voice was dark and he hissed the words from between half opened fangs.
"Lord Astaroth? Lord Astaroth...who´s that guy? I´m working alone. Almost...at least." She seemed to believe Lord Astaroth to be any guy, any killer, who named himself from a creature from hell. Either she wasn´t familiar with Christian faith or she didn´t care about, the less being afraid of the forces of hell as a modern time woman, or she felt strong enough to come up against almost everything, fortified by the Holy sacraments. As he was still wearing his pendant with the small cross, she could see, that neither a cross and the less the silver could do him any harm, nor that it could weaken or stop him anyway. He asked himself if she was able to feel the power that was emanating from the sacred cross. There were creatures of hell which were warded off by the power of sacred silver...and the sign of the cross. But she had been so near to him, that he´d have seen any effect on her, if any...
"Who are your principals? When you are going to kill me anyway, I want to know at least why I have to die!" Henry pointed out.
"You´ve killed my uncle, Henry Fitzroy! Fra Franceso dos Santos Angelico di Domenico."
Santos Angelico di Domenico. That was the Dominican order who had tortured Ginevra to death. His heart almost stopped at the memory and the relation she pointed out.
"And you´ve killed my father!" she spat at him full of hatred, her once beautiful face was torn by rage.
"Who is your father?" Henry gasped.
"Javier Mendoza! The Great Inquisitor at the Spanish Court! And therefore you´ll pay, vampire! Her brown eyes turned to vertical, yellow slits and her hands clenched to fists.
Definitely not human!
At least he was knowing now with whom he had to cope. When she was telling the truth, then she was either a ghost or an animated corpse or Mendoza has had a secret fruit of his even not so virginal loins. Or she had kept herself alive with the same wicked methods as her father had formerly used.
"Which devilish deal has he urged you to make, to get your hands on me?" Henry snarled.
"The misery with you is, that you´re always so fixed on your thing with the devil. But of this, my father has warned me about, after you have killed him!" She made a disdainful gesture, hauling off and kicked with the tip of her foot against the side of his head, using full force without any visible effort. Wouldn´t his bones haven´t been strengthened by the turning, he might have heard his temple bone crackling when it would have fractured.
After he had killed him!The church there hadn´t been used anymore and though! When it hadn´t been desecrated, defiled by satanic rites, then it had still been a place of the Lord. He had killed Javier and had hidden his body, returning in the following night to bury the halfway decayed corpse in an empty tomb in the ground, despite of what the man had done to him. Had buried him by the Roman Rites which allowed every believer to bury a passed away without a priest, when it happened with the just thought and willing. What actually obviated that Javier´s ghost would be roaming restlessly. But if anybody had opened the grave and had subjected Javier´s mortal remains a forbidden ritual for an awakening of the soul...
"Have you...desecrated...your father´s soul? Snatching it from death by a damnable ritual!?" Henry choked under the tormenting headache that was milling thru his skull with the force of a crushing mill.
"I have WHAT?" she grabbed him by the collar of his shirt, dragging up his body with an astonishing strength and brutally banged him back on the ground, so that Henry´s head hit the moist ground tiles with a thud. Henry´s lips opened and a dull sound slipped from his mouth, half stifled and darkness was rolling over him.
"Uh, don´t become unconsciously! I´m by no means ready with you! I didn´t get started rudimentary with you at least! Just as I said; the baubles of my father are nothing in relation to the methods, which are offered to us by the modern times to take my revenge on you!"
"Wha...what have..." Henry breathed stertorously when his skull was pounding.
"I don´t need such gadgets like the Illuminacion, to make those of your kind manageable. Even your vampire body isn´t immune against some certain stuff!" she bent over him, her hands were at the neckline of his hoodie again.
Not again!
When she would smash his head on the tiles in this manner more often, even his bones would give in and he would lose blood. Lots of blood. Though he even hadn´t been feeding this night to cover his normal need.
His head remained on the ground.
"You...you have...me..." he gasped barely audible.
"Yes!" her smile was so devilish, that even the servant´s of Astaroth would have shuddered from fear. "I´ve shot you something what is preventing you from moving! Most of these substances like Curare have the handicap that they additionally paralyze the breathing reflex, so that I would have to ventilate you to keep you alive. But this one...this one has the benefit, that you can´t move, but you´re staying consciously and you will be able to speak...
...and to scream!"
Had Henry tried to provoke her until yet, to explore her real strength and to find out about weaknesses, which might be useful for him, so that had come to an end now at the latest. His stomach was revolting and his intellect, his mind threatened to stall by the clear imagination of what he had to expect...
There´s much more worse than death, this you must believe me.
"I´ll be right back, Henry!"
Henry heard her steps disappearing. Heard. It was impossible for him to follow her with his eyes, because he couldn´t turn his head, the less to lift him but if someone would straighten him up. He rarely had physically been feeling so helplessly like now, when he couldn´t move by his own strength. The last time he had been in an equal state, had been when he had this damn Jia-o-gulan in his system, which kept him off his daytime sleep because his heart was beating too fast. But there had been Vicki and Mike with him, humans whom he could trust to.
Not someone like this...woman...this thing, whatever she also was...
Henry tried to concentrate on his breathing, to get some calmness in his system, what was easier said than to be done. He had experienced torture in his career twice by Mendoza, additionally to it countless injuries in his long lifetime when he had been hunted over and over again. But anywhere deep from his capacity of remembrance was some information coming up, which he had caught occasionally. CTV, the main TV channel in Canada was bringing information, which were critical to the system when it came to the violation of human rights in certain countries. In order to protect his psyche, his mind denied it to realize, that he was exactly in the same situation like the victims of these assaults and abuse. He desperately tried to concentrate on any possibilities of an escape, but all his thinking didn´t help as he realized after every thought, that he could kick that down the drain, because he was unable to move a single finger. In the moment he was entirely busy with regaining control over such discomforts like nausea and these attacks of dizziness. When his body would lose control, that would turn out to be more than a medium catastrophe. Principally a vampire couldn´t die from suffocation, but the imagination of whatsoever of stomach contents in his wind-pipe...
Anywhere a cellphone was ringing...
Henry´s head was suffering from emetic headache, that was a result from this devilish stuff that she had shot him and the fact, that she had used his head as a football. So it took him some time to identify the ring tone as his own.
Damn it!
Anybody tried to reach him and his cellphone was definitely anywhere in this room, where it had been placed by someone, together with his other belongings. When he would have a cell now, which could be switched on by his voice...as far as he could remind it, this was called voice controlled...then he could have answered the call. Should it be Vicki, then he could only hope, that she would get the idea to locate it, before this monster would react to the ringing and switch the cellphone off. Fortunately he only switched it off when he was busy, that is when he was about to feed...
To be continued