In the Company of Vampires

Chapter 9

Sounds, thick and heavy, like they were wrapped up in thunder, rumbled in the distance, slowly, ever so slowly sharpening until I realized I was hearing two men talking.

“—you told me not to hurt her doing it, so I used chloroform,” one man said.

“Where the hell did you get chloroform?”

I frowned to myself. I knew that voice. It resonated within me. Through the dense fog in my brain, an image rose.

Ben! It was Ben.

Francesca?

The floor beneath me rocked. I cracked an eye open to see what was going on, and found myself held in Ben’s arms. “You got your cross back,” was the first thing I said, touching the Celtic cross he wore.

He smiled, his eyes so beautiful, so warm and sexy I just wanted to lick them.

That sounds uncomfortable, but I appreciate the sentiment. You’re still a bit drugged, aren’t you?

“Drugged? Hrr?”

“Let’s sit you up. Maybe that will help.”

The world wobbled around quite a bit but finally settled into a familiar orientation, and after a few minutes to clear my head, I had enough wits to realize I was sitting on the ground, leaning against a smooth boulder, Ben squatting on one side of me while another man knelt on the other. Two camping lanterns sat next to them, casting a thin white-blue light around us. It was dusk, the sky a deep indigo, with just a smidgen of the moon starting to come up.

“Hello,” the man said, smiling broadly when I looked at him. He had kind of a singsong accent, something I hadn’t heard before. It sounded almost English, but wasn’t quite. It was a nice voice—not as intriguing as Ben’s, but nice. The rest of him wasn’t bad, either. He had a squared chin with a little cleft in it, very pale blue eyes, like polar ice, and reddish blond hair that made me think of the word “russet.”

“Hi. Are you the one who put a bag over my head and drugged me?”

“Yes.” He grimaced a little. “Well, it was a blanket, but yes, that was me.”

“Ah. Gotcha.” I made a fist and slammed it into his nose.

He fell over backward with a squawk. Ben, who quickly righted me when I tipped over from the momentum of punching the man, laughed loudly. “I told you she wouldn’t take kindly to that sort of treatment.”

The man sat up, gingerly feeling his nose, his eyes crossing as he tried to look at it. “Next time I’ll take your word for that. I’m sorry if you’re feeling any after-effects of the chloroform, Fran. I assumed that since you were a Beloved, you wouldn’t suffer any of the normal unpleasantries that mortals might.”

“Well, I’m not a Beloved, so don’t do it again. Who are you?” I asked, taking advantage of my wobbliness to lean into Ben.

“Benedikt’s blood brother. And I’m delighted to meet you at last. He talked about nothing else for so long, I was beginning to think he was mad. But now I see why he did so.”

“You’re . . . uh . . . Daffy?” I asked, racking my brain for his name.

Ben laughed even harder as the other man pulled a face. “David Kneath, actually.”

“I’m sorry.” I rubbed my forehead. “I could have sworn Ben wrote me an e-mail about you and your name was Daffy. I must be punchier than I thought.”

“It’s spelled Daffyd, but pronounced ‘dav-ith’ actually. I’m Welsh, you see.”

I didn’t see what that had to do with anything, but nodded.

“If it makes it easier, just call me David. Most people do.”

“Thanks. Would you mind terribly me asking why you kidnapped and drugged me? And where we are? And what you’re doing here?” The last question was asked of Ben.

“I told you that the secrets I had were not mine to share. They’re David’s,” Ben answered, his voice seeming to skitter along my skin. I shivered and rubbed my arm, trying to pull my mind from all sorts of thoughts about Ben so I could focus on what was important.

You’re going to make it difficult for me to court you if you think those sorts of thoughts.

I told you the idea of courting is outdated. I don’t want some grand, epic love story sort of saga, Ben. I just want . . .

You want to fall in love with me.

Yes. No. Both. I just want to know if I want to be with you because I’m in love with you, or just programmed to be with you.

I understand. But it’s still going to make it difficult for me to restrain myself from making love to you if you think about doing all those things you’re thinking about doing with your tongue.

I’m a modern woman, Ben. I can actually have sex without being head over heels in love with a man.

His eyebrows rose.

That didn’t quite come out the way I hoped it would, I admitted, feeling pretty trashy. I just meant that I like you well enough to have sex without formally declaring that yes indeedy, you are Mr. Right Forever. And while we’re on the subject, stop eavesdropping on my smutty thoughts about you.

I can’t help it. You’re sharing them with me.

No, I’m not. I have made very sure to keep secret all those fantasies about licking you, and nibbling on your chest, and touching your . . . Gah! Now you’re putting thoughts into my head!

He chuckled.

David shot him a startled look.

“My apologies. Continue, David.”

“Benedikt told me that you’d come here to Join with him, but the work he’s doing for me has interfered with that,” David said slowly, his face suddenly grim.

You told him that?

I thought it was best.

Well, you can just straighten him out on the subject!

I will if it becomes important.

David sat down next to me, his elbows on his knees as he looked out into the gathering night. “There are not enough ways to apologize for messing up what should have been something wonderful between you, so instead of even trying, I’m going to explain to you what’s going on.” He glanced over at Ben. “People’s lives are at stake, Fran, so I’m going to ask you not to repeat anything we say here.”

“Of course I won’t, not if it’s that important.” He looks sad, Ben.

There has been much tragedy in his life the last few years.

Is he the reason you disappeared those couple of times?

Yes.

“Benedikt has been assisting me the past six years to uncover who is behind the disappearances of my pride members. It took us until this year to finally pinpoint the group we believed was behind it all, and Benedikt, in an attempt to infiltrate the Agrippans, connected with Naomi. He got her a job at the Faire, since he knew that would give him a cover to travel with her.”

“Wait a second. Did you say pride members? Like gay pride?”

David looked from me to Ben. “You didn’t tell her?”

“Tell me what?”

Ben shook his head. “No. You swore me to secrecy, if you recall.”

“Tell me what?”

“That’s right, I did. Do you want to tell her, or shall I?”

“Someone better tell me, before Mr. Punchy Hand gets annoyed,” I said with a narrow-eyed look that I split between them.

“David is a therion,” Ben said, just like that explained everything.

“Bully for him. What’s a therion?”

David laughed and stood up. “I think in this case, seeing is believing.”

My eyes widened as his body did an odd sort of shimmer, rippling and twisting until it turned into a sandy cinnamon-colored lion, an honest-to-Pete lion, complete with big brown mane, pale light blue eyes, and what I assumed were exceptionally big teeth.

“Goddess above,” I said, my eyes almost bugging out at the sight of the lion as it turned and faced me. “That’s a . . . that’s a . . .”

“A lion, yes,” David said as the lion form shimmered back into that of a man. A naked man.

Stop ogling him.

I’m not. But . . . holy crickets. He’s naked.

You are ogling. I wish for it to stop.

I’m trying, I’m trying. Oh man! My eyes widened further as David nonchalantly bent to retrieve his pants.

If you wish to ogle someone, you may ogle me.

Yeah? Think Naomi would let me?

He was silent, but I could feel his irritation.

David buttoned up his shirt and gave me a rueful smile as he sat down again. “A therion is a shape-shifter with two primary forms. One of mine happens to be that of an Asiatic lion.”

“You’re like a werewolf, but with a lion instead of a wolf?” I asked, then craned my head to look behind me, where the moon was beginning to clear the horizon. “Is it a full moon?”

“Therions can shift at will, Francesca,” Ben said, taking my hand and rubbing his fingers across mine. It was a possessive move that I knew had its origins in the eye candy David had provided. I smiled to myself. “The myth about the full moon is a human fiction, nothing more.”

“Oh.” I looked back at David, my mind struggling to cope with the fact that he was a lion. “I thought . . . This is really stupid, I know, but I have to ask . . .”

“You thought vampires and werewolves hated each other?” David grinned at Ben. “That’s a fallacy, too. For one, the therions who favor wolf forms tend to be a very tight-knit group, and don’t mingle much with outsiders. For another, therions have no reason to dislike Dark Ones.”

“I’m glad to hear that. So, people in your . . . er . . . pride are disappearing, too?”

“Too?” Ben asked.

“There are a lot of things disappearing around me lately,” I told him. “My mother and the Vikingahärta, to name two. And Imogen’s boyfriend.”

“That’s no great loss,” Ben said in a tight voice.

I just bet Imogen loves it when you give her boy-friends a hard time.

If she had better taste in men, I wouldn’t have to.

Spoken like an overprotective brother.

“These disappearances have been going on for years, so I’m afraid they’re not related to yours,” David said, rubbing his face wearily.

“All right, but what does Naomi have to do with anything? And why is Ben letting her touch him and slobber on him and think she’s his girlfriend?”

Jealous much, sweetheart?

Perhaps. Or perhaps I just don’t like seeing a friend hooked up with someone who’s not good for him.

That gave him something to think about, I noted with satisfaction. Until, that is, it struck me that he didn’t protest being called a friend. And then I realized that I had better take some responsibility for what I wanted, and not dump it all on him. I couldn’t think of anything worse than to realize I had fallen in love with him, only to find out he didn’t reciprocate the emotion.

Okay. I will admit that I’m the teensiest bit jealous. I don’t like her touching you . And kissing you. And pushing her boobs on you. And while we’re on the subject, do you have to put your arm around her? It makes it look like you’re enjoying it when she rubs herself all over you , which from what I’ve seen is pretty much every time you’re together.

Yes, that’s just a teeny bit jealous.

I ignored the laughter in my head to deliver a glare at him before turning my attention back to David.

“Benedikt said you weren’t happy about that. I’m sorry, but Naomi is familiar with members of the European therion community,” David explained. “We needed someone who could get into her confidence, and that required an unknown. Benedikt offered to do the job, and although I know you don’t like it, he’s been tremendously helpful to us by allowing Naomi to believe he’s romantically interested in her. He found the group that we believe is organizing the abduction of therions across Europe.”

“Agrippans?” I asked, remembering the word he’d used.

“Yes. Do you know what an Agrippa is?”

I shook my head.

“Originally, it was the name of a book of mystical spells. A few millennia ago, the word came to be applied to the people who created those books, the seekers of knowledge who spent their lives locating and learning magic, which they offered to wield for a price.”

“Sort of walking encyclopedias of magic?”

“More or less. They hired themselves out to support their endless thirst for knowledge. Today, there are three Agrippan sets: one in North America, one here in Europe, and one in Africa.”

“I don’t see the connection between a seeker of knowledge and missing therions,” I said.

“Neither do we. Yet,” Ben said, his thumb sending little tendrils of heat up my hand with every stroke of it across my fingers.

“Benedikt’s been pressed hard by Naomi to join the local tyro—that’s a ceremonial meeting of Agrippans—so he can be inducted into the group, but he’s resisted so far.”

“Oh? Why?” I asked Ben.

He was silent, his eyes turning dark.

“Why?” I asked David instead.

He looked extremely uncomfortable. “Tyros are . . . The Agrippans tend to celebrate their baser natures, and that’s especially true at their ceremonies.”

He’s talking about sex, isn’t he?

Yes.

He wants you to have sex with Naomi? I asked, ignoring as best I could the cold wave of nausea that hit me with tidal force.

He wishes for me to participate in the tyro. Unfortunately, that would require me to be a part of the group sex that is conducted during the ceremonies.

You can guess how I feel about that.

Yes, I can. And just so you stop thinking lovingly about a serrated grapefruit knife in relationship to my testicles, I will point out that the reason I haven’t attended a tyro is that I have no desire to engage in sex with anyone but you.

I will admit that both his words and the emotion behind them made me feel all warm inside, but David’s next words killed that.

“I know it’s asking more from you than I should, but, Fran, it’s important that we find out as much information as he can before Naomi discovers the truth about him. There’s a tyro scheduled for tomorrow night. Benedikt told Naomi he wouldn’t go, but she’s already suspicious, and if he misses yet another one . . . Well, it could make the last couple of years’ work all for nothing. Not to mention risking the lives of two of my pride members who have gone missing in the last six months.”

I stared at him in horror. “You are not asking me to sanction Ben having sex with a bunch of other people, are you? Because that’s what it sounds like to me, and if you are, you’re seriously in need of some mental counseling.”

“You have every right to be angry, and I completely understand your reaction, but it would be for just one night. You are Benedikt’s Beloved—he would never want to be with any woman but you.”

“No,” I said, wanting very much to punch David again.

“If you understood just how close we are to getting the names of the people involved, and how they are related to the disappearances of my pride members—”

“No!”

“If I can do it without the sex, would you agree?” Ben asked.

I looked at him thoughtfully. “Could you do that?”

“It might be possible.” He was silent for a moment. I could feel him considering and discarding various options. “I might be able to use you as an excuse. Naomi knows you are my Beloved, but that we’ve had some relationship issues. If I told her that you being here is hampering my ability to make a final commitment to her, she might believe it.”

And what if I wasn’t here? What if I was back home where you thought I was? Would you be going ahead with this tyro and all it implies?

He didn’t answer me for a good thirty seconds. When he did, his words were stark with honesty. If you weren’t here now, I would feel compelled to participate in the tyro, but in such a way that allowed me to keep my oath to help David at the same time it honored the bond between us.

You’d have sex with strangers.

No. I’d pretend to have sex with strangers.

How do you pretend to have sex?

You get naked and roll around with a bunch of other naked people.

Fury unlike anything I’d ever felt burbled up inside me. And you think that would be honoring me?

No. I think that would be getting naked and rolling around with other people. That is not sex, Fran.

It’s close enough to make no difference! I snapped.

You think not? Let me ask you this—you believed you had severed our relationship a year ago. How many men have you slept with since then?

You know full well I haven’t been with any man, sexually or romantically. What’s your point?

My point is that I did not believe our bond had been broken. I did not have then, nor do I have now, any desire to engage in sex with any woman but you.

I thought about that for a moment, strangely pleased by the little tinge of outrage to his words. But you would if you had to?

He sighed. There is no way I’m going to be able to continue this discussion without you becoming angry with me.

I was going to point out that was a cop-out, when Inner Fran piped up once again with yet another dish of wisdom: What might have been was not important. It was the here and now that mattered. You’re right. I won’t lambaste you for something you haven’t done.

I didn’t think it would happen, but you have changed, Beloved.

Matured?

Not in the sense you mean. Before, you were fairly insular, very reticent to become involved with anything or anyone. Now you are more aware of others. You are more . . . earthy.

I hope being earthy is a good thing.

Oh, yes. He let me feel his emotions. The little spark that had always been between us shimmered into an electrical charge of attraction that skittered down my back. I could feel him considering me, as if he was seeing me with new eyes, and what he saw pleased him immensely.

I basked in that for a moment before I realized David was saying something to me.

“Fran? Benedikt has said he would not attend the tyro unless you agreed.”

I looked from David to Ben, my emotions torn. On the one hand, I wanted to tell David to stuff the tyro where the sun doesn’t shine. On the other hand, I knew from feeling the strength of Ben’s emotions just how much this mattered to him, to them both. And while I didn’t have any qualms about dissing Naomi, I hesitated at giving in to jealous anger if it meant that David’s lion friends might suffer for it. “There will have to be conditions. I want to know exactly what is involved in the orgy part of the evening.”

Ben’s lips thinned. “I will escort Naomi to the tyro. She will name me as a new member. They will initiate me into the group.”

“With sex.”

“A group celebration of primal forces.”

“Sex,” I said, nodding. I held up a finger. “Condition one: no sex.”

“Agreed,” Ben said. David watched us warily.

“No getting naked and rolling around with other people.”

Ben frowned. “That is not sex.”

“I don’t care. I don’t like the idea of Naomi seeing you naked.”

Ben said nothing.

I gasped, and socked him as hard as I could on the chest. “You didn’t!”

“I have to take a shower sometime, Francesca. I try to do it when she’s not around, but there are times when it is inevitable.”

I seethed for a few minutes, and desperately tried to remember a curse I had learned when I was fourteen. When my mother found out that I was trying to practice what she called harmful magic, she grounded me for three straight months. “There will come a day, Ben, when I am going to settle things with Naomi.”

To my surprise, he grinned. “I look forward to seeing that.”

Don’t be so happy—I have a few things to settle with you, too. “Can you at least try to limit the nudity in quantity and time? Maybe just take off your shirt and hope no one notices your pants?”

“Yes,” he said gravely. I thought I heard David snort, but when I looked, his expression was blank.

“Condition two: no touching or kissing Naomi.”

“Francesca,” Ben said on another sigh.

“I don’t want you kissing her,” I said, realizing full well I sounded like a petulant child.

“She will be suspicious if I distance myself from her in that manner. I don’t enjoy it, if that’s what you’re worried about,” he said.

I ground off a layer or two of enamel. “Fine. You can kiss her. But I get to kiss other men. In fact, I think I’ll start with David.”

David’s eyes widened as I leaned toward him, reaching for his shoulders. Before my mouth was even close to his, I was yanked backward, onto my feet, and spun around to face a Ben whose dark oak eyes fairly spat flames. “You will not kiss other men!”

I raised my eyebrows and tapped my fingers on his chest.

His jaw tightened as David laughed.

“Fine,” Ben snarled, letting go of my arms. “I won’t kiss Naomi. But I can’t stop her from kissing me.”

I thought about that for a minute. “Fair enough.”

Once again, he looked surprised at my acquiescence. I made sure I kept hidden the thought that I’d just see to it that Naomi didn’t have the chance to try any moves on him.

“Are those your only conditions?” he asked.

“For now,” I said. “I reserve the right to include others at a later date.”

“And I reserve the right to qualify any subsequent terms,” he added.

I made a face, but stopped when David took my hand and shook it vigorously. “Thank you, Fran. I know that you must be anxious to Join with Benedikt, and I appreciate you putting it off on my behalf.”

I glanced at Ben. You’re going to hell for all those lies you told him.

I haven’t lied. The Joining has been delayed until such time as you feel comfortable with it. His mind felt shuttered, as if he was trying to keep something from me.

And if that is never?

Then it will still be postponed.

This is because of Naomi, isn’t it? I asked, trying to see what it was he wanted to keep hidden.

He didn’t answer. The patented Ben silence . . . but I was no longer a teenager intimidated by that sort of tactic.

Let’s say I was ready to Join with you right now. Why couldn’t you use that as your excuse for not wanting to indulge in the orgy at the sex party?

Unfortunately, Naomi knows enough about Dark Ones to realize the difference between a Beloved who is not yet Joined and one who is. If we Joined, she would know that you would take precedence in my thoughts, and that she could never hold sway over me. That isn’t the case now.

I didn’t know what hurt worse: the thought that Ben was willing to continue with the farce, or that I didn’t matter as much to him as David.

Francesca—

No, don’t say it. I am ashamed of myself for even thinking that. I gave him a chagrined smile. I’m going to have to get used to you seeing the real me, warty thoughts and all.

There’s nothing about your thoughts that are warty. I just wish—

I know, I interrupted. I’m being selfish and self-centered, and you’re only trying to help your friend. All right, we’ll help him.

David had been thanking me during that entire exchange, finally finishing with, “I can’t tell you how much this means to my pride and me.”

I was even more ashamed that I had put my own feelings so far ahead of his concern for his family. “There’s no need to thank me. Is there anything I can do to help you?” I glanced at Ben. “I assume Ben told you about my abilities?”

David looked down at my black-laced hands. “Yes, he did. I don’t know how psychometry can help us now, but I appreciate you offering your assistance, and I’m just desperate enough that I will ask for help should you be able to give it. I just hope you forgive me for . . . er . . . bringing you here as I did. Benedikt told me to bring you without causing you any distress, and it seemed easiest to simply drug you.”

“I won’t say I enjoyed it, but there’s no harm done.” I looked around us, trying to figure out just where we were. We seemed to be in some sort of thickly wooded area. A faint thrum of noise sounded in the distance. “Are we near the Faire?”

“About seven miles,” Ben said. “This is a small wild-life preserve that David uses when he’s in the area. No one ever comes out—”

He stopped speaking when three people, two men each wearing half a horse costume, and a woman clad in a nude-colored body stocking and knee-length blond wig, strolled past with polite greetings.

“—here,” Ben finished, looking after the threesome.

“This is the weirdest town I’ve ever been in,” I commented.

“I’ll take you back to the Faire,” Ben said, holding out his hand for me. I took it, smiling to myself when he peeled off both sets of gloves, handing them back to me before taking my hand again.

“Will David be all right out there by himself? Well, by himself and with whatever oddballs are walking through the woods in the middle of the night in stage costumes?” I asked, glancing over my shoulder to see David waving at us before disappearing into the shadows.

“Yes. His kind prefers solitude to intense contact with mortals. Would you have really kissed him?”

My secret smile grew a lot bigger. “What do you think?”

He helped me down a gravelly incline, holding back the branches of a scraggly fir tree. “I think you were deliberately trying to bait me.”

“Then that must be the answer,” I said complacently, greatly enjoying the irritated look he shot me as he lifted me over a fallen tree. I debated pointing out that I was perfectly able to clamber over obstacles on my own, but decided to enjoy his show of masculinity.

Ten minutes later we reached a narrow dirt track. Ben’s lantern didn’t cast much light, but there was enough for me to see no bulky shape of a car. “We’re walking to the Faire?”

“No.” He tugged me after him. A few hundred yards down the track, it curved. As we rounded it, a black shadow loomed up against the darker trees. I stopped, a strange joy filling me. “Your bike! You still have it?”

“Of course. It’s a classic.” His lips quirked for a moment. “No helmets, though. Do you think your mother will be angry?”

“No doubt, but I trust you not to kill me or leave me brain dead,” I said, waiting for him to get onto the motorcycle before climbing on behind him. “At the risk of inflating your ego past bearable levels, I have to admit that I’ve often thought of the rides we took together. For some reason, they always left me . . .”

I hesitated, searching for the right word.

“Aroused?” he asked, looking back at me.

“Yes. I just didn’t realize that’s what it was.”

He grinned. I’m glad I wasn’t alone in that. The last few times, I was afraid I’d scare you off forever with the natural consequence of you riding in front of me.

Oh, I noticed you were in a very happy mood. I was flattered, to be honest. And more than a little intrigued.

He gave me an unreadable look before turning around to start the bike.

A little thrill ran through me at the combination of the motorcycle vibrating beneath me and the fact that I was plastered up against Ben’s back. “I’ve missed this.”

“As have I. If you want to drive, though, I’d prefer you wait until we get onto the road proper.”

“Hang on a second.” I wrapped my arms around him, made an unhappy noise, and slid my hands beneath the black leather jacket he’d donned. That wasn’t enough, either. Ben looked down in surprise when I yanked the front of his shirt out of his pants, slipping my hands under it to his bare stomach. The muscles there contracted as I spread my fingers out across their warmth. “Perfect. Let’s go.”

I swear I heard him mutter, “You have no idea,” but contented myself to rest my cheek against his shoulder, silky little wisps of his hair brushing against my face as he drove us through the night. I wondered if sex on a motorcycle was possible.

No, but it is on horseback if you have a very welltrained horse.

I pulled back from where I had my nose buried in his nape and pinched his belly. Stop reading my wicked thoughts about you!

He laughed in my mind, and I settled back against him, my heart and my mind, for the moment at least, at ease.