A/N: Chapter 4 will be up tomorrow after work.

Blood Bound Promise
Chapter 3

Would she have killed Mai under any other circumstance?

Probably…

The woman had a point though, loathe Shizuru was to admit it. Mai was a particularly alluring little human. It was too hard to explain, but, Shizuru found that she hadn't needed to question her own logic on the matter -or what little logic was left to ease what her instincts were telling her to do. Kill the girl. Kill her, be done with her. Shizuru knew that was just a hungry, ravenous desire, not the truth of the matter.

The truth was, she cared about Mai, it was more than just a passing interest.

Mai was a bundle of emotion, like an ocean. Easy to temper, quick to forgive. There weren't many like her, most humans held a grudge. Mai was too free spirited for that, she seemed to find such an action upsetting. Even during their worst arguments, the silent treatment annoyed Mai, drove her craze, made her alert and put her senses on overdrive. Then again, when riled up, she always seemed so, and it was beautiful.

It was maddening.

Shizuru had made note of Mai's scent, the fear whenever she lifted her voice in annoyance. They had more tiffs than Shizuru wanted to admit, and god help her, it would have just been easier to consume the rage with something else, divert it into something erotic. If Mai denied even that, at least she'd have a particularly tasty meal to eat afterwards, if nothing else.

It served no good use to turn Mai into a vampire, and it served no reason to keep the woman around as a pet either. Even though she was quite the beauty for the eyes, and that said nothing of the way her kiss felt. Molten hot passion in and of itself. Then again, Mai always seemed passionate, even in her fury. Even in her oddities, of which she had a great many.

...and yes, even when she toyed with the sharp trinket in her hand, even then, she was passionate about her plan.

"I'd be careful with that, if I were you…" Shizuru warned her lazily one afternoon when a meal was hard to come by, and the rain was making the day even bleaker. "That's a tool used for bloodletting, not for your amusement."

"I know what it is, Shizuru." Mai said then looking up from her place. "I just wonder why a person would want to use this contraption on themselves."

"A thinner blade than a kitchen knife." Shizuru shrugged, plucking the sharp utensil from Mai before the woman could truly hurt herself. "A trinket such as this is really none of your concern."

"It concerns you." Mai shot back, rolling up her shirt sleeve. "So it should concern me. Is that the same one you used on Natsuki? What did you do once she bled, did you lick it off of her, Shizuru? Is that a kink to you?"

"Accusing me of being a monster, are you?"

Mai frowned. "You know what I'm asking."

Shizuru nodded, and decided she would amuse the woman. It might prove beneficial, but if nothing else it afforded honesty. She considered this, just as she considered the tool in her hand, the thin blade glimmering dangerously. Such an implement was not for the faint of heart, and it certainly didn't belong in Mai's hands. Shizuru set it aside. "She draws her own blood from someplace along her arm."

"And I'll just bet that makes you wet, doesn't it?" Mai asked. "You certainly get that way when you smell mine."

"I wouldn't know." She licked her lips, wondering just where this was going. Was Mai offering herself? Dangerous move, dangerous woman. "She places it in a glass. I've never asked to taste Natsuki's skin directly. If I were to do that, I'm very sure she would decline."

"Oh really?" Mai was in disbelief. "Why? You two are good friends aren't you? Natsuki's always been hinting that you might have wanted something more at one time."

Crimson eyes found Mai's. "It's lewd to lap at the skin of your meal."

"Somehow, I don't think that would bother you under the right circumstances." In fact, Shizuru liked to get a little raunchy every now and then, behind closed doors. A little hair pulling here, a spank on the ass there. Shizuru wasn't exactly a wallflower. "You make no bones about where you put your tongue."

"With you, not in the slightest." Shizuru let the organ of Mai's fixation flick out across her luscious lips. "But, you my dear, are the acceptation." Shizuru gentled her eyes then, softened her gaze. "Natsuki's a woman untouched, and I think she wants to keep it that way."

Violet eyes, uncertain and uneasy went into hiding as Mai sighed deeply. At first, she said nothing to this, and Shizuru expected that maybe Mai was beginning to understand her personal situation…how truly powerless she was. How in too deep she could fall, if she kept provoking the fawn haired vampire. "I don't...I don't believe you."

"I make it a habit not to use my lovers as a place of nutrition. You are not the only woman I've taken to my bed, Mai. It is merely that you are the only woman who desires to contend with my baser instincts." Shizuru sighed then, taking the girl's chin in the palm of her hand. "Natsuki has no desire to stand in the place that you do, and so I sometimes use her as a way to feed my baser urges. The ones that you have no place fulfilling." Shizuru couldn't understand why a human might be jealous over that. "You should fear me, if I ever look at you as a replacement for food."

"Should I?" Mai smirked but it wasn't entirely pleasant. It was different, more edgy, as she licked her lips, and sighed away a great deal of her own inward turmoil. Her hand coming up to rest at the base of her own neck, she wondered what Shizuru might do, seeing her as a meal. How deadly was it, how much of a game could this turn into? Was it even a game worth playing? The vampire, the woman, it didn't matter, Shizuru was a greedy sort of person though she didn't look it.

Mai was starting to realize, maybe she felt a little greedy too. "Feed on me." She said, baring her neck in a docile way. "Feed on me, fuck me, just take me for god's sake."

"You do love to live dangerously, don't you?" Shizuru sighed as she leaned in, letting her lips caress the smooth skin on Mai's neck.

"I'll be everything you ever need, Shizuru." Mai said with absolute certainty, knowing that if Shizuru really did bite her, it was going to hurt. "So please, just let me."