Trick or Treat: For Lor. Vibes are more your style, and comedy's mine, so here's something that we both might like. Fingers crossed.


"Tom…" The spicy scent of cinnamon wafted to Harry's nose as Tom stirred the whipped cream into the hot chocolate like a heathen. What could Harry have expected from the older man anyway? This was the same man who poured ketchup into his soup for flavour. But it was not the drink—or Tom's strange choices—Harry was concerned about at the moment.

"Yes, Harry."

Harry hesitated, tapping his nails on the wooden table. Tom seemed to be in a good mood, but his personality could change in a split second. One moment, he could be sulking like a petulant three-year-old child, while the next, he'd be dragging Harry into the bedroom by his collar. Harry didn't mind that part, but it was when Tom got furious for no apparent reason that worried him.

"Can…Can I ask you something?"

"I don't know. Can you?" Sarcasm dripped from Tom's words, and Harry bristled with indignation. Tom was a grammar police through and through.

"Ugh, you're such an arse. Fine. May I ask you something?" Harry glanced at the object in the middle of the kitchen and grimaced.

"Of course. But I might or might not deem you with an answer." Tom still hadn't turned around to face him.

Tom had kidnapped him while he was walking through Knockturn Alley one night for no apparent reason other than that Tom was bored, and then, he'd managed to get Harry to fall for him instead of fear him like a normal human being. Harry wondered why he liked the man anyway. Was it his charm? No, Tom had never tried charming him like he did with the others. He was brutally honest to a fault. Was it his devilishly good looks then? Probably. Or the way he swirled his tongue over Harry's dick before torturing him relentlessly? Yes. Definitely that. Harry was a masochist.

He took a deep breath in and slowly let it out, counting to ten in his head. Finally, he asked, "Why is there a barrel full of blood in the kitchen?"

Tom was silent for a few moments before he said, "Oh, that."

"Yes, that. Tell me, Tom."

Tom pivoted and shot him a pointed look. "What's the magic word?"

Tom was a stickler for manners. Harry bit his lower lip before softening his tone. "Please tell me why is a barrel full of blood in our kitchen?"

Tom turned back to the mugs and went back to stirring. It was obvious to Harry that Tom, his assertive—correction: manipulative—Tom was stalling for time. Finally, he asked, "Remember what happened last night when you got drunk and confessed to me that you thought of me as your soulmate?"

Harry frowned. He had no recollection of what had happened last night at Abraxas' engagement party, but if Tom said he had called him his soulmate, then it must have happened. Tom never lies to me. Never has…I think.

He shrugged and said, "No, not really, but go on. This should be interesting."

Tom brought the mugs over and handed the larger one to Harry. "Well, you climbed onto my lap and said—and I quote this verbatim…If you ever need blood, we can share a pint or two. That's what lovers do for one another."

Harry's heart almost gave out on him. Shit. This wasn't good. He sipped the warm beverage to calm himself down. "What…Oh, Merlin. What did you do, Tom?"

Tom gestured at the barrel and asked, "What do you think?"

Harry clenched his eyes shut and prayed for patience.

This was just like the Bones Incident all over again. When Harry had absentmindedly mentioned that he needed some human bones for a ritual some time ago, Tom had disappeared for a few hours before returning with five corpses he had personally dug up from the local graveyard. After manually extracting the bones Harry had needed, Tom had boasted about his achievement to anyone who would listen—and because everyone was terrified of the man, they had to pretend they were amazed by his actions instead of horrified.

Harry often wondered if Tom had been dropped on his head as a baby, or had someone kicked his mother in the abdomen during her pregnancy, injuring Tom's head. He strongly suspected both.

After a few uncomfortable moments of silence in which Tom's eyes bore into him from where he stood by the kitchen counter, Harry's eyes flickered open. He pleaded, "Please tell me you didn't kill someone."

"I didn't kill someone." It didn't sound like a lie, so Harry let out a loud sigh.

"Oh, thank Merlin! That's a relief—"

"I got Abraxas to do it for me."

"Fu—Tom!"

Tom scowled and crossed his arms. His tone was a bit defensive when he said, "Abraxas needs to pull his weight around here more. After all, I don't pay him to laze about the house."

"You don't pay him anything, Tom. He pays you!"

"Correction: I allow him to share his fortune with me, in exchange for a place by my side."

"That's not even how the exchange system works!"

"It's not like he has anything better to do. This way he gets some experience in the fine art of blood-draining. Anyway, do you really care if I make Abraxas do my chores?"

"Killing someone is a chore to you?"

"I'll admit that it's fun…but I didn't want to leave you unsupervised last night, so I allowed Abraxas to drain the bodies for me instead. "See how considerate I am?" Tom actually smiled; it was the creepiest smile Harry had ever seen in his life. Also the sexiest. He cursed Tom for being so stupidly attractive.

But Harry was stuck on one word. "Bodies?"

Tom uncharacteristically shrugged a shoulder. "I couldn't just bring you a small bag of blood. You would have assumed that I'm so miserly I couldn't afford to kill a few more people for your sake. I couldn't have you think of me like that, so I got Abraxas to drain two dozen bodies to fill the entire barrel with blood. Now, we can share as many pints as we want! What do you think?"

Harry dropped his head onto the table and groaned.