Title: Acceptance
Fandom: Kim Harrison's "The Hollows Series"
Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. Mature content such as love, life and death may be covered.
Summary: A story told from Ivy's point of view that takes place just after Fistful of Charms. Sometimes you have to accept who and what you are before you can understand what you want. Ivy/Rachel femslash.
UPDATE: I've pulled down the old version because I didn't like some of the plot elements I'd added. I went back and removed them and focused the story on Ivy & Rachel's relationship and its complications. .
I woke up to the distant sounds of Kisten and Rachel talking.
He might as well move in as often as he's over, I thought.
"Have you told Ivy about your feelings for her?" Kisten said.
Wait, they're talking about me. I rolled onto my side facing the door to my room hoping to hear more of their conversation. I could hate him for how Rachel felt about him but, as a living vampire, he was dangerous enough to catch Her interest; the temptation to have him bite her and pull the ecstasy from her scar without the issue of her needing to figure out whether she was straight or not. She was in danger. She'd been bitten and pumped full of vampire venom but left unclaimed. The fact that it was a demon who'd bit her while in the form of a vampire didn't change the fact she was now a tempting treat left unclaimed. Any vampire could feel her unclaimed status and play with the venom flowing through her veins until she was a mindless shadow of herself. Only the threat that, as Piscary's Scion, I could - would - end them kept them in check. Only because Kisten was a good man, someone who was worth Rachel's love, kept me from interfering. I loved him as well, and if he was just a bit stronger, he and I would have been married with kids by now.
"She's avoiding me," Rachel said. "She gets up and leaves; won't come home 'til past dawn. It's worse now than when I first moved in."
It's true, but not for the reason you think, Rachel, I thought. After letting a single tear escape to roll down my nose and drip onto the pillow, I rolled over onto my back and took a deep cleansing breath. I would be strong enough, please let me be strong enough - strong enough to do what needed done to keep Rachel safe.
Piscary was a constant pressure in my mind twisting my thoughts. He wanted Rachel dead - worse, Piscary wanted Rachel as an unclaimed shadow years in the dying. As Piscary's scion, he could use me to harm her. It would be best if I left and never saw her again.
"You love her, anyone can see it" Kisten said. The last bubbling hiss from the coffee maker filled the sudden silence. "The spark when you two look at each other fills the room." Kisten continued over the sound of the cupboard opening and three cups being set on the counter. Rachel's heartbeat picked up, her chair squeaking in agitation. "I can't compete with that. You need to tell her," Kisten finished.
I know what she feels for me. That's not the problem; that she's too afraid to admit what she feels for me is, I thought, rolling back onto my side and punching my pillow into submission.
"I can't love her the way she wants me to," Rachel said, her chair squeaking as she shifted uncomfortably. "I'm just not wired that way," The sounds of Rachel's forced sigh echoed through the church until it settled into a dull ache in my chest. "She means so much to me," The sharp clunks of two coffee cups being set on the table filled the pause in her confession. "I can't even give her a hug without triggering her bloodlust. I want to find a blood balance with her, but she won't even talk about it anymore. She's hurting, and she won't let me help her" She paused to draw a deep breath; I could imaging her head down over the cup breathing in it's caffeine laced steam. "I can't find a way to show her she's my friend without the blood getting in the way and I can't share blood with her without us finding a way to express our feelings for each other." She blew on the coffee before taking her first noisy slurp. "She blames herself for what happened."
Yeah, for nearly killing you. Kind of a big deal.
"So we made a mistake," Rachel continued, "It just means we need more practice."
The rich smell of coffee blending with Rachel's adrenaline spiked scent brought me fully awake and hungry. It was a hunger that reached deep down to my soul, touching an emptiness I hadn't known existed until I had finally tasted Rachel. Just the memory of the pop my fangs made as they slid into Rachel was enough to drive a hot shiver deep into my core; a frustrating pressure that ran from between my legs to my brain thumping "Rachel, Rachel, Rachel" in time with my erratic heartbeat that rose as I lost myself in the memory.
#
"You give this to me?" I had asked through the blood-lust filled haze. The moonlight seeped through the van's thick curtains, profiling her face as she faced me trembling with both fear and desire. My lips pressed gently against the rapidly pulsing spot on her neck. Her aroused scent shredded my rapidly fading will.
"Yes," She said, an answer to prayers a year in the making. Pulling her gently to me, I cradled her in my arms. Slowly, I increased the pressure until my fangs sliced into her smooth and gentle as two lovers entwined. The first pulse of blood washed down my throat setting my nerves aflame. Rachel collapsed into my arms like a puppet whose strings had been clipped. The taste of her blood as it filled my mouth was better than I could ever imagine - redwood and amber mixed with deeply repressed lust and excitement, infused with her aura into that erotic elixir that was Rachel. Drinking deeply of her essence in an attempt to fill that bottomless need I had for her brought a sudden spike of fear in her taste. Clutching her arms about me, she gasped.
Please don't let me have hurt her! I thought, pulling back to look at her.
"No. Don't stop," she moaned. "Oh..." Pulling me back down to her, her skin broke against my teeth as I bit down harder this time. My scars responding in kind as bliss ended all thought.
We needed that bed. Breaking contact for the moment necessary, I gently lowered her down on the van's thin mattress.
"Ivy." She sobbed as I slid into her again. The trickle of blood was eclipsed by the sudden flood of her aura pouring into me, swirling and blending with my own, before, like the tide, our blended auras crashed back into her linking our thoughts and emotions until we became one being, two parts of the same soul coming home after being separated for so long.
She loved me. She loved me without restraint, I thought. I wanted, needed, to show her that I loved her as well. Shifting her in my embrace until I could hold her to me one handed, I allowed my other to explore her body - to seek out and caress away the last hesitation she had for me. Laying my palm on her stomach, I held her until her quivers ceased and she became malleable to my will. Circling up higher until the side of my hand just brushed the underside of her breasts, I again paused and let that barrier fade. Working my way lower, claiming every inch of her as I went, I paused again with my fingers on top of her zipper until she again relaxed. Moving back up under her shirt, now I went to claim those final barriers.
"Ivy," she gasped jerking away as I cupped her left breast. "Wait..." No! Please be strong. I knew she wanted this as much as I did. Her thoughts were my thoughts as I heard her prepare to lie.
"But I thought..." I tried to interrupt her, our blending beginning to break apart. It was starting to go wrong. She was afraid to take that final tiny step.
"You said the blood was enough." She pleaded, blinking up at me. "I ...can't..." She hedged, pulling back from the edge. Her eyes were so full of fear and longing.
"I misunderstood," I lied, pulling her back into my embrace and laying my head upon her shoulder. I didn't want to call her bluff and hurt her with the truth. She wasn't ready yet. "I'm sorry. Do you want me to stop entirely?" I didn't want it to end this way. Her discomfort would grow into doubt. And that doubt that would become a wedge driving us apart until she finally left. She was too scared to move forward, and too much had happened to go back to how we had been.
"No," she whispered returning my embrace. I had to do this right. I had to hold back my feelings for her so she didn't have to face her lie while still giving her the safe experience she craved. Swallowing my desire and burning frustration, I returned to her pulse.
I fed as her blood ignited the lust within me and battered against my will.
"Ivy?" The question was faint, as if in the distance...
I fed.
Rachel's push against my shoulder only served to take the blood lust to even greater heights.
"Ivy! Let go!"
God, she tasted so good. I wanted to pull her down into me and let her fill that emptiness inside. The terror in her blood called to me. Looking down where she fell, I knew Piscary was right when he said, "Stop playing with your food. Only the strong are worth being our companions." The terror in her eyes as she looked back at me, paralyzed with fear, confirmed it. She wasn't strong enough to believe in herself - she was food.
"Ivy no!" she yelled as I struck and fed. Her fists battered my shoulders as if pounding out the baseline of this final song. Yes, she knew she was mine. It was right that she should give the last of herself to me as her fists fell away limply to her sides.
#
Yanking myself back from the memory, I sat up and pulled my legs up into my chest - sobbing.
Never again, I thought. I wouldn't ever risk Rachel that way again. The lies Rachel told herself made her weak and that weakness would get her killed.
"Ivy's awake," Kisten said. Chair scraping, he stood up. I could hear the sounds of coffee sloshing as Kisten's foot steps came closer.
"Crap on toast. Do you think she heard us?" Rachel said. The sound of Kisten's quiet footsteps filled the hallway, coming closer before pausing at my bedroom door. Wiping my cheeks, I quickly composed my face to the emotionless mask of confidence I used to hide from the world. The ease of storing my emotions was a hard won skill after years of surviving in Piscary's camerillia; in this world only the strong survived.
Could Rachel survive my love or would she be food for the first vampire that slipped past my guard?
"Mornin' love," Kisten said, opening my bedroom door. "Brought you coffee." Lifting up the cup as a shield he strode forward to the bed. "It's a bit after four. Why don't you come out and join us before we have to leave for our show?"
A few minutes of light banter and feigned happiness and I was left alone to putter about my bedroom. Realizing I couldn't hide in here all evening until they left, I put on my robe, grabbed my empty cup, and marched out to the kitchen. Ignoring them, I refilled my cup, sat in my seat and grabbed the newspaper off the table.
I casually sipped my coffee as I feigned interest in some news article attributing the drop in violent crime to the new IS policy of zero tolerance for traffic violations. Inderlander Security was the police, also Rachel and my ex-employer, that kept the peace among us non-humans. The cookies had their own police called the FIB. After Rachel's bumbling caused us to work a few cases for them, I - reluctantly - decided a few of them were worth a second bite. As I was saying, I was feigning interest. What I was actually doing was waiting to see if Rachel would bring up the whole blood balance again.
"So," Rachel said, breaking the silence. Turning away when I met her gaze, Rachel stood and walked to the coffee pot. "Kisten has to work Piscary's tonight..." I watched and entire inner conversation flash across her face as she refilled her cup; doubt, hope, fear, desire, It was all there. Leaning against the center island, holding her coffee mug with both hands, she absently rotated it back and forth; a familiar action she had when she was about to make a decision - or jump in with both feet.
"Steve called off so I have to open the floor again and keep an eye on things is all." Kisten said, when it looked like Rachel wasn't going to continue. Rachel stiffened as Kisten came up behind her and reached around to grab his coffee from the counter.
Something was definitely going on with those two, I thought. The ass was unconsciously rubbing his scent off onto Rachel like a dog marking his territory and she was acting like she was caught cheating.
"So anyway..." Rachel said, breaking eye contact and chewing on her lower lip. "We've changed our plans to a late lunch and a movie. Why don't you meet me there and we can have a girls night out?" She quickly slipped past Kisten and sat down in her seat across from me. Setting her coffee down on the table and wrapped both hand around it in a death grip before looking up and meeting my gaze. "Tuesday's karaoke night" She said with a grin as if to share the memory of Jenks gyrating his hips while singing American Woman.
If Rachel ever decided to make him big again he could make a mint working the bachelorette circuit, I thought. Who would of thought a four inch pixy would have eight pack abs and a chiseled butt.
"Depends." I responded, glancing at Kisten's surprised expression while keeping my indifferent mask in place.
Well, well, maybe Rachel decided to call his bluff. What the hell, we needed a night out to ease the tension between us. The club would dilute her scent enough that we could both have some fun and if this turned into another insane demand to establish a blood balance, Kisten would be there when I told her to shove off.
"What time? I've got a run but I should be done around one." I shut down the computer and started gathering up all the paperwork and research I would need for tonight's run.
"Run? I didn't know you had anything lined up." She said, sitting back in the chair and glancing over her shoulder at the fridge. After I chewed her out last year for not having a backup plan as she went off half-cocked, I had asked her, calmly I might add, to at least put her plans up on the fridge so I would know where to start if I needed to come rescue her. She challenged that she would if I would - so I did. I'd posted my runs and an emergency plan on the fridge ever since - and the stupid witch kept on going off half-cocked. Well, at least she would call now before she jumped off the cliff...or chicken out and have someone else call like she did in Michigan. Thank the turn for small steps.
"New possible missing persons case, I'm meeting with the parents a little after full dark. It sounds like the IS gave them the brush off with their daughter being over 18 and able to give legal consent. Her parents believe the consent-to-be-bound form signature was forged." I said, picking up my backup plan from the top of the stack and sliding it towards her.
"She's a vamp? I could see the IS sweeping some cookie getting bagged under the rug, but a vamp kid?" Rachel said, scanning my notes.
"Maybe it's another master testing Piscary's strength now that he's behind bars," Kisten said, reading over Rachel's shoulder. "I'll put some of our people on it from that angle." he said, straitening up. He paused as if expecting me to speak. "Ivy...it be best if you were the one to tell Piscary."
"No. Our agreement is that you police his crap and I only step in as muscle if you need it. If he wants better than that he can make you his Scion again."