rotworld

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“He does not want your pity,” Athanasius says.

Water splashes in the sink. You hear the snap of cabbage leaves being peeled from the core and then crunching beneath a knife, a softer sound than the hiss of diced onions and rice sauteeing in a pan. 

“Then what does he want?” you ask.

“Time, for now. Losing control in the presence of much younger nightbound brings a unique sort of shame. Allow him a moment away from prying eyes.”

Several nights after your trip to Council headquarters, Mihai has started keeping his distance again. He’s not avoiding you completely. If anything, he never seems far away. You feel eyes on your back all the time. None of your things have gone missing but they seem to move on their own. Jackets you forget in the library reappear neatly folded just outside your room. Books left strewn across the parlor coffee table are neatly stacked the next time you walk by. Conspicuous leaf piles appear throughout the halls as you go about your business, as if he planned to say something, to show himself, and lost his nerve before you arrived.

Athanasius’ touch makes you flinch. You didn’t hear him move but he’s right beside you, peering over your shoulder at the pan you’re stirring. His hand settles on your back. “That looks ready,” he says, approving. “Here. Add it to the bowl.” 

You work surprisingly well together in the kitchen. Athanasius is faster at everything, more practiced and precise, but he doesn’t seem to mind when you take a little longer mincing parsley. He rolls up his sleeves and churns a mound of soft, seasoned and herb-speckled ground pork with his hands.

“And this’ll help? He’ll like it?” you ask.

“Yes. It is his favorite. I contacted someone more knowledgeable to ensure the accuracy of the recipe.”

According to Athanasius, food is closely entwined with positive memory for the nightbound. Feeding means peace and comfort. Blood flavors remind them of previous donors. Their favorite dishes from their human lives can spark the faintest impressions of beloved people and places, even in those who’ve lost their earliest decades to PPA. It didn’t take much for him to talk you into helping prepare a surprise for the hatchlings, especially since this part of the surprise is for Mihai.

“Where is he right now?” you ask.

“In the forest that borders the estate. Out of earshot, if that is what you meant.”

You work side by side at the counter, rolling fragrant pink clumps into cabbage leaves. You notice Athanasius slowing his movements to match your pace, taking his time and turning the rolls over in his hands before moving onto the next one. Prolonging the process, you think. Ensuring there will be plenty left for you.

“Do you know the phrase, ‘birth by burial?’ It refers to the practice of burying hatchlings alive. At times…” Athanasius stops, glancing at you. You know he saw you stiffen. He probably feels your growing unease through the connection. “You have heard of it,” he says, audibly surprised. “I admit, this is unexpected. I would not consider it common knowledge for witches of the modern age.”

“I’ve heard rumors,” you say. You’re unnecessarily aggressive with the next cabbage roll and it oozes on one end. You don’t like thinking about this. You wish he hadn’t brought it up. “I know it happens. I don’t know why.”

Athanasius hums in acknowledgement. Gently, he plucks the lumpy cabbage roll from your grasp and deftly smushes it into a more even shape. “The process and the reasons for it are different between us. Those concerned with the building of dynasties did not consider turning a sufficient measure of one’s strength, and so thinned their already meager clutches further. Some encouraged their progeny to fight to the death. Others believed the test must come sooner. Newborn and starving, hatchlings would fight the earth itself to earn their first feeding.”

“Was Mihai…I mean, did his sire…?”

He steps closer, his hands folding around yours to guide your fingers for the last cabbage roll. There’s food all over both of your hands but his warmth against your back and the sudden intimacy make your pulse pick up. “You care for him. More than I realized.”

“He got a raw deal, that’s all. It doesn’t seem fair.” 

Athanasius produces a cast iron pot from one of the cupboards, a battered antique that would look right at home hung over an open fire. Together, you line the inside with all the leftover scraps of cabbage and neatly arrange the rolls on top. You lean over to check the recipe scrawled on notebook paper in Athanasius’ elegant handwriting. Ingredients on the left, numbered steps on the right, starred notes at the bottom. Cut up some bacon. Pour in tomato juice. Start the polenta in half an hour. 

“To answer your question, no. Not quite,” he says absently. “His sire would not have done it. They could not afford needless waste during the Century of Nightmares. His birth by burial was performed in the witch tradition by those he was sent to kill.” 

You lean against the counter, watching Athanasius gracefully move around the kitchen. Somehow, you aren’t surprised to hear this. Mihai’s circumstances have been weighing on your mind for days now. Part of you had already guessed his fear of you must come from firsthand experience with witches, though you hesitated to guess at the specifics. 

“Why go to all that trouble? Why not just kill him?” you ask.

“Because for witches, birth by burial is a form of absolution. Mihai must have surrendered in order to have been given the opportunity. And yet, a wolf cub is still a wolf. Would you let an animal into your home without first testing its instincts? You do not know how readily it will bite.” 

The pot goes into the oven. Athanasius finds you still lingering at the sink when he brushes past to rinse his hands, staring into the basin. You feel restless with nothing else to do. 

“Sacrament?” he asks gently.

“Has he ever told you what happened in the cloister? He has all those scars,” you say.

“What he remembers, yes. Some of it has thankfully faded with time.” He pauses. You feel him staring but you don’t look at him. “What pains you? The thought that his wounds may have been inflicted by witches?” His hand drifts into your periphery. He reaches for you, his palm slipping under yours and lacing your fingers together. “Ah, yes. Understandably. But there is also something else weighing on your heart,” he murmurs.

You pull away from him but you don’t get far. He doesn’t let go. You’re so used to him indulging you, extending your cat-and-mouse chases for his own amusement, that his unyielding grip frightens you. Athanasius cages you against the kitchen counter with his own body, one hand splayed beside you, the other keeping your fingers connected. 

“I don’t wanna talk about it,” you say, looking anywhere but his eyes. It’s probably too late with your minds joined the way they are, all of your thoughts and feelings laid bare beneath his scrutiny. He must see the fire in your memory, that open pit in the ground and plumes of black smoke rising towards the sun. He must hear the screaming.

If he does, he pretends he doesn’t; a mercy for you both. “Very well,” he says gently. “Shall I distract you from these worries?” He lifts your hand to his lips. He brushes his mouth against your fingers along the knuckles, then your wrist. He doesn’t bite. He breathes in the scent of your skin and sighs softly against your quickening pulse.

“What are you doing?” you ask. Your voice is hushed in a nervous whisper, like you’re both doing something you shouldn’t.

“Do you dislike this?” he asks.

You want to lie but he’d know before the words left your mouth. Your face feels hot and your skin is tingling. He’s not really doing anything. He’s close enough that he could but everything is chaste, not tongue or teeth. You’re reminded of your encounter with Renaud at Cassowary Tattoo, the discovery of erogenous zones you didn’t know you had and the intimacy of a nightbound pressed close before the bite. They’re ruining you. You’re starting to associate the places they feed with pleasure. Warm breath fans over your veins and you clench in anticipation, waiting for what surely comes next.

Your eyes are drawn to Athanasius’ mouth; the plumpness of his lips and the curl of a teasing smile. What does his bite feel like? you wonder, and then feel a jolt of embarrassment at your wondering. 

“Yes, sacrament?” he says, his voice dipping to a low, pleased purr. “Is there something you would like to ask me?” He’s even closer. He relinquishes his grip on your hand so he can stroke your cheek instead, his fingers tracing along your jaw to the tense line of muscle in your throat. His lashes flutter along his cheek, his gaze half-lidded and hungry.

It’s mesmerism. It must be, you think. But mesmerism doesn’t usually let you tremble like this. Athanasius traces your lower lip with his thumb and leans in closer until he’s all that you see and all you can think of. He’s undeniably beautiful, luscious black hair and long-lashed, eyes a blend of dark oak and umber, golden-brown in the glow of the mansion’s dulled lamps. 

Maybe it’s the light you’re using in the kitchen, foregoing lamps for candles, but somehow, they seem closer to mahogany than they should be. Brighter. Redder. 

And then he draws back. Pulls away, lets you go. Your hands come away slick with sweat and your heart is racing. “I seem to recall a reluctance to be observed in moments of intimacy,” he says simply and rummages through the refrigerator as though nothing happened. The sound of footsteps and the voices of the hatchlings drift down the hallway, close enough that you should’ve heard them sooner, and you’re torn between gratitude and indignation. 

“Fuck you. Don’t act like you care,” you mutter. You’re overheated, flushed with shame and residual tinglings of arousal. You don’t need to rinse your hands again but you do, splashing cold water on your face in desperation. Athanasius acts busy and keeps his distance, rummaging leisurely through the cabinets as if he doesn’t know where everything is, and the whiplash of this nonchalant act fans the flames of your anger to new unreasonable heights. “Maybe I’m into that. You wouldn’t know. You have no idea what I like.”

“Oh? My apologies, sacrament. I should not make assumptions,” he says mildly. He turns just enough to glance at you in his periphery, but even that brief moment of attention feels like a brand on your skin. “Next time,” he murmurs, “I will not stop.”

Orion and Renaud find you staring resolutely into the refrigerator. “Ohhhh, I knew it! I knew there was a surprise. You had us buy each other’s homesickness meals,” Orion says smugly. He pulls one of the kitchen stools out of the corner to sit down and sets the paper bag he’s carrying on the counter. “Is that Mihai’s? What’re you making? It smells good.” 

“Sarmale,” Athanasius says. He brushes past you and you’re absolutely certain that the lingering graze of his shoulder against yours is on purpose. “An hour from now, I would like the two of you to make the polenta. I will explain the steps.”

“Oh, polenta’s easy,” Renaud says. He saunters over to the counter and leans against it. He has a takeout bag, too, larger than Orion’s with a grease stain along the bottom. 

You watch them swap bags across the counter, grinning like they already know what’s inside. The unveiling happens with deliberate, emotional slowness. Orion lifts a burger out of his bag and holds it in its white brand-stamped wrapper like a priceless family heirloom. Renaud opens a takeout box and you swear there are tears in his eyes at the sight of a decadent brioche stack dusted with powdered sugar and topped with blackberries.

“Eat slowly,” Athanasius says, his tone suggesting this warning often goes unheeded. “And save room. Mihai will want to share.”

The food puts everyone in high spirits. Even a dispute over whose leftovers go where in the refrigerator is settled amicably, and Orion and Renaud tackle the polenta with surprising enthusiasm. 

“Does it surprise you that we are so enamored with the culinary arts?” you hear echoing through the connection. 

Athanasius joins you at the far end of the kitchen, keeping an eye on the maelstrom of movement and chaos at the stove; spilled flour, dirty whisks, two and a half cups of water in a puddle on the floor. The hatchlings can’t seem to cook without making a mess. Athanasius chuckles under his breath and shakes his head. 

“It is an anchor. A joyous remnant of the life that came before. For hatchlings, it is even more important that they practice so that one day, they may prepare food for their partners.”

You can feel him watching you. Expecting some sort of quip, probably, a bitter remark about how everything always comes back around to keeping witches against their will somehow, but you just nod and stare straight ahead. Not at the hatchlings. Past them; before them, and this place. 

You want to leave. You don’t want to be alone. Athanasius knows before you say anything. His hand settles on your back, between your shoulders. He doesn’t have to push for you to walk with him to the parlor. He helps you settle against the arm of the sofa, draping the blanket over you like a child home sick from school. Suddenly, you’re so tired you can barely keep your eyes open. You’re certain it’s his mesmerism. The fog of exhaustion grows thicker when he bends down to kiss your forehead.

For once, you don’t mind and you don’t fight. The fire and the fear retreat into old, faded memory. You let go, headfirst into the dark.

*

You dream about the forest. Moonlight and night wind. Moss and petrichor. A beast nuzzles its bloodsoaked maw against your hand, begging for warmth, affection, and forgiveness. Butterflies drift languidly on the breeze. You both wish you could stay forever, but—

The knocking isn’t all that loud but a gentle nudge in the back of your mind helps wake you. Athanasius would’ve come in, would probably be at your bedside already. The hatchlings would say something. That leaves Mihai. You blink the bleariness from your eyes and get up to find him right outside your door. He’s still hiding behind his bangs but his hair’s neater than you’re used to seeing it, smoothed down and combed through, and that makes the jagged, uneven cut even more obvious. The ends fall past one shoulder but taper just short along the other. 

“You helped,” he mutters. “Athanasius told me.”

It takes your mind a minute to catch up. He must mean the food. “Oh, yeah. Did it turn out alright?” you ask.

He nods. He’s staring intently at the floor. “There’s a place I like downtown.”

“Uh-huh?” you say. 

He shifts nervously. Seconds pass in silence. “Do you want to see it?” he asks.

He’s inviting you out again. You’re surprised and a little worried. “Sure. Is that…?” 

“Allowed?” he finishes the thought for you with a wry smile tugging at his lips. “Yes, it’s fine. I made sure to exert myself and haven’t fed since last time. Not enough strength to maintain my hunting form right now.” That doesn’t put your mind at ease. Is he starving himself? Is he expected to? You feel the familiar caress of mesmerism like fingers sliding up your spine and settling at your nape. “Hm. You’re worried.” It sounds like this troubles him. “Follow?” he says. You’re used to that sounding curt, like an order, but it’s softer this time. He takes a step down the hall and stops, watching you over his shoulder. 

You always end up thinking about dogs when you’re around Mihai. Dogs with pricked ears and sad eyes, that press into corners with their tail between their legs and bite anything that comes close. Dogs that always look back to make sure you’re still there.

“Yeah. Lead the way,” you say. The weight of centuries lifts from his shoulders all at once and he stands a little taller. If he had a tail, you think, it’d be wagging.

Athanasius sees you off again but he keeps you at the door a moment longer. He telepathically deliberates with Mihai for a moment and the conversation looks tense. There’s a disagreement of some sort, an indignant huff from Mihai and the exasperated sigh of a parent from Athanasius. You don’t know what exactly they fought about or what they decided, but Athanasius produces a thin strip of leather. It’s plain on the outside but there are small symbols engraved along the soft black inner edge and a silver clasp at the end. He drapes it across his palms and holds it out to Mihai. 

You grimace. You were starting to hope you’d never see that collar again.

“You should,” Mihai pleads.

Athanasius presses the collar into his hands. “No. You will. If there is no need, all the better, but I will not leave you both defenseless.”

“I’m undeserving. And they shouldn’t be defenseless, you should’ve taught them something simple, at least—”

“Mihai,” Athanasius says sharply.

Mihai clenches his jaw and ducks his head. It takes a while, an uncomfortably long silence and an exchange you don’t hear, for his shoulders to loosen and droop again. He shares a meaningful look with Athanasius and nods sheepishly, then glances at you with apprehension. “Sorry about this,” he mutters, moving behind you. His hands are shaking. He keeps bumping his fingertips, his knuckles, the back of his hand against the nape of your neck and every accidental brush makes his breath hitch. When you turn your head, trying to make it easier for him, he goes completely still for a moment. You hear a shaky exhale before he gets himself together and successfully secures the clasp.

The trip into town is awkward as usual. You have to win over the same scared, feral dog all over again, letting him sniff your hand and proving you mean no harm. Mihai stays close but not too close, steals glances but can’t quite work up the nerve to speak. This time, he leads you to a quiet part of town you haven’t been to before. It looks old but not as imposing as the Council buildings, the street bumpy cobblestone and the buildings made of faded, weatherstained brick. 

Almost everything is closed. The businesses out here, sweets shops and antique stores with apartments up above, have dark storefronts and shuttered windows. It’s unusual but not unheard of for a town with so many nightbound. Some places can’t afford to staff an overnight shift, and some places prefer not to, leery of the nightbound or the noise that comes with late night foot traffic.

A soft glow emanates from an eatery on the corner. They don’t look open. The string lights stretched around the outdoor seating area are off. But Mihai goes right up to the door and knocks a couple times, then leads you to one of the wicker tables beneath the awning. The text on the window says “Komorebi Cafe.” You see a forest of potted plants inside. A dark-haired woman in a pastel flower-print sweater comes out a moment later.

“You brought a friend,” she says, sounding pleased.

Mihai’s rumbling, “hm,” is more of a purr than a growl. “Not a friend, exactly.” 

“Oh, hush.” No eye shine. She’s human. You’re surprised she’s so comfortable around him. She sets a tray on the table between you with two ceramic mugs exuding curls of steam. “Come by sometime in the daylight. I’ll make you something on the house,” she tells you. You nod meekly, unsure of what to make of her, but she just smiles good-naturedly and walks away.

“Her name is Kano,” Mihai says. “She's the first human who ever spoke to me in Skelveross. I think we’re friends.” He lifts the mug to his face and shuts his eyes, taking a deep breath of the sweet, earthy aroma. A strangely familiar aroma, you think. It reminds you of nectar. “It is,” Mihai says. He averts his gaze when you look at him sharply. “Ah. It’s habit. I prefer the connection. I know what you think and feel without asking.”

“Is it hard to ask?” you say.

“Yes.” He slides the tray closer to you. “The other one’s for you.” 

Intrigued, you pick up the mug. The scent of nectar is somewhat diluted but unmistakable up close. It’s some sort of tea, lightly floral with hints of berry and citrus. You take a testing sip and hum in satisfaction. “It’s good,” you say, impressed. You were sure Athanasius’ concoctions had ruined you for anyone else’s recipes. “And Kano seems nice. How’d you meet?” 

“In a waiting room. We both had appointments at the Dusk Council headquarters.” He glances at the cafe windows. Kano sits in a corner booth with a book open in front of her and a notebook off to the side, pencil hand. Her brows are furrowed in focus. “She’s latent,” Mihai says.

That makes you look at her again, more carefully and with a pang of sympathy in your heart. She slides her pencil along a line of text and then scribbles something. “That must be hard,” you say quietly. 

Mihai looks at you curiously. “Weren’t you latent once?” 

“No.” 

Mihai must sense your discomfort because he doesn’t press you for details, but you do feel him in your head again, tiptoeing and cautious. You’re thinking that it’s easy to hide if you know how, but only if you start young. Magical potentiality evaluations for children can be either interviews or written questionnaires, and most families opt for the latter. There’s no face-to-face meeting, no verifying background checks, and no magical-medical scans, just a piece of paper with some boxes to check and some space to scribble answers.

You drink your nectar tea and watch Kano study. You don’t meet Mihai’s probing gaze. He’s searching again, carding through your memories in search of whatever it was that shattered your confidence and left you vulnerable. You squeeze your eyes shut and envision barriers. Walls, hedges, metal bars—doors. That’s what your mind settles on. An endless corridor with a thousand locks. The books in the library said this is easy magic if you can stay focused and hold the image in your mind.

You know it worked when you hear a grunt across the table, a little noise of shock and indignation. A sense of mounting pressure begins building behind your eyes like the start of a migraine and you swallow nervously. You’re not confident you can keep him. “Please don’t,” you say. The pressure eases but never fully dissipates. You know he’s still in there, leaning against one last flimsy door. “Please,” you repeat, your voice wavering in desperation. 

Mihai frowns. He stares down into his tea, considering. “I’ll trade you,” he says after a long silence. “One of my secrets for yours.”

“Why?” you ask. You don’t want that. You don’t want to talk about this, or even think about it.

“Don’t have to talk. Just show me.” 

“Why do you want to know so badly?”

He tilts his head. “Because I’m trying to understand you. I want to know everything. I’ll tell you everything, too, in exchange. It’s the only way we’ll ever really trust each other. That, or…you could perform a birth by burial. I would let you—”

“No,” you say.

He hesitates, taken aback by your vehemence and the stricken look on your face. “It would be faster. I could prove myself in a single night. You'd see everything I have to offer. I know I’m an elder, but I’ve made myself weak tonight. You can test me properly.”

“I said no.” 

Mihai growls at you, and for once, the dog companion is not endearing. He sounds like he’s going to lunge across the table and go for your throat. He looks ashamed for all of a few seconds before he’s glowering again. “Then what do you want?” he snaps. “How do I make you stop pitying me?”

“I don’t—”

“You do! I'm a useless wretch in your eyes, too broken to be of any value.”

“I don’t think that,” you insist, but he doesn’t believe you.

“I was wary of you at first. I know what witches can do. But the more I watch you, the more I realize you’re still young. Painfully young, and fragile. You can’t even defend yourself. So I have to protect you. I…” Mihai stops. He takes another whiff and a long drink of his tea, and it helps him steady his breathing. “I will never lose another witch as long as I live,” he says, his voice lowered to its usual low rasp again. “If you won’t bury me, let me prove it some other way.”

“You don’t have to prove anything.”

“I do. You need to know. How can you trust me otherwise?”

Silence settles over you both and the sounds of the city rush in, footsteps and rumbling engines and the squeal of a car alarm a few streets down. The moon is lopsided and waning. Your tea cools in your hands. You can feel it when the anger seeps out of Mihai. The pressure fades. There’s nothing clawing at the hinges of the door in your mind.

“I don’t…” You swallow the lump in your throat. Mihai watches you intently but he’s patient this time. He sips his tea gingerly. 

To your surprise, you don’t think of a dog—he does. The image slips into your mind vivid but hazy at the edges, the colors runny and the textures rippling like water. A dog. A large dog. A guard dog that pads around in a circle right outside your door and then settles down with a loud thump, wanting you to know he’s there. 

I’m listening, he says wordlessly. You take a deep breath and try again.

“I’ve seen a birth by burial before,” you admit. “And it wasn’t…Mihai, listen, it really scared me. I think it must mean something different to you, but to me, it’s…I could never do that to someone. So please don’t ask me to.”

He doesn’t say anything. You don’t even get a nod. Then another vision comes and fills your senses, the table and the cafe and Harrow Creek fading into a different night scene. The ground is firm underfoot but softer than concrete. You smell earth and decay. Moonlight strains through a net of leaves and branches. And there are people here, humans—

Witches. You know somehow. A dozen, maybe more, young and old, gathered around you in a fearless huddle as they whisper amongst themselves. An old woman stands in front of you, barefoot beneath a long, embroidered skirt. Her face is a churning cloud but her voice is clear and strong. You can’t understand her, and yet somehow you know she asks, “You will not fight?” 

You will not fight. You groan and lower your head. It is too large and heavy for your starved frame. You are a beast and you can’t remember how you came this way and you don’t know how to unbecome it. You hear their heartbeats and you smell the tang of their sweat and exhaustion, but fear is a thin quiver and only from the youngest, the littlest things clinging to their elders. 

You do not see death but you know you would if you walked far enough. Piles of it. Gruesome mounds of skewed limbs and blackening flesh left for the animals and for anyone who might come looking. The reek stings your nose and eyes. In that pile rests your entire world, clutch-siblings and strangers and superiors and blood-bonded lovers who you knew for mere months that felt like lifetimes. Most fell in the fighting but they kept some of you, bound you in ropes you could not break. One by one, they poked and prodded and asked their questions.

Who was your sire? Who was his sire? Who did he answer to, and who had sent you, and who else was coming? How many and when? Listening to the others, you began to understand that this forest was the only home the witches had left, and that there had been many more of them once before all the fighting and running and death in the night.

And when they had their answers, they left you in the sun to wilt then tossed those charred bones upon the pile. And now, at last, it was your turn.

“How long have you been bound to the night?” the old woman asked.

Not long. You try to tell her but all you can do is rumble and whimper like an animal, and even that you cannot do well with the rope tying your mouth shut. Not a year yet. Not even a whole season. You were the youngest of your clutch and your flock and the followers of your maker. You try to say that. You try and you try and the only noise that comes out is pitiful keening, so you count the moons you have seen. “One,” you try to say, and grunt instead. You think of the crescent. The sliver. The moonless night. You keep counting until you have told her all of them. You know she is wise. She will know what you are trying to tell her. 

When you finish counting, she sighs sadly. The witches chatter all around you. 

“He is an infant!”

“Were the others?”

“It does not matter.”

“We must not share their bloodlust.”

“No. They could not have been.”

“Not all of them, surely.”

“They do not turn them alone.”

“A clutch. Maybe five. Maybe six.” 

“They would not have spared a chrysalis.”

“And we did not spare them. Does that make it right?” 

“There is no making this right. He will want vengeance.” 

“Give him to the sun.” 

“We cannot give him to the sun.”

“Make him sleep. Then give him to the sun.”

“Mumă, what have we done?”

The old woman raised her hand and the forest fell silent. Even the leaves ceased rustling and the wind died. She stepped forward and you shrunk back, head bowed, whimpering. You waited for something that hurt but it never came. She stroked your beast-maw, sliding her palm up and down the strange expanse of flesh that smelled and felt and tasted too much. Your legs gave out beneath you. You had forgotten how weak and tired you felt until this moment. When she scratched beneath your chin, your chest rumbled and your throat vibrated with a low noise you did not know you could make. When she looked at you, you felt that she saw through skin, blood and bone and knew who you truly were.

You spoke without words. You felt that she was very sad, and very sorry, and very angry but not at you. She felt guilty for what had happened and what would happen next. She must have felt all that you felt and known that you were afraid. All you wanted was to be warm and swaddled in someone’s wings.

“Dig a grave,” the old woman said. The witches left the clearing in all directions, some more reluctant than others. She gathered her skirt and sank to her knees beside you, and she let you set your head in her lap, whispering, “You are strong, yes? You are very strong to survive all that you have. Be strong one more time. When you are born again from the earth, the past will be the past and all will welcome you. You will not be cold, or hungry, or alone ever again. This I swear beneath the moon.”

The vision flickers. The forest fades. You’re in Harrow Creek again, sitting at a cafe table across from Mihai. Tears stream down his cheeks and yours, you realize, wiping your face self-consciously. You don’t know what to do with this. You don’t know what to say, what to think or feel about what he’s just shown you, but there’s warmth unfurling in your chest; a spreading sense of peace. You don’t have to say anything. He’s glad that you saw it. He needed you to know. 

After you finish your tea, Mihai takes your mug and sets it beside his on the tray. You follow him into the Komorebi Cafe where Kano hasn’t moved, still hunched in the corner with books and papers spread across the table. The bells jingling over the door make her mutter and sit up, rubbing her eyes. 

“Mihai! You didn’t have to, I could’ve gotten it,” she says.

“Hm,” Mihai says, setting the tray into an alcove on the wall for used dishes. “Didn’t mean to keep you so late.”

“Don’t be. I’m glad you came.” She slides out of the booth and stretches with a yawn, then ambles over to you both at the door with her hands in her pockets. “So? How was it? I’m still tinkering with that recipe. Ah! I’m Kano, by the way.” She holds out her hand to shake. The moment your fingers touch, a pleasantly cool sensation sweeps up your arm like a spray of mist. Kano feels it, too. Her eyes widen slightly but she’s quick to cover her surprise with a laugh and starts rambling, “I’m calling it ‘Sugar Water!’ It’s actually based on a family recipe. Grandma would kill me if she knew how much sweetener I’m putting in, but the first customers I gave it to said it was kind of bland…”

She’s not just latent. She’s a witch. Her grip on your hand lingers a moment too long, squeezing firmly before she lets go. Her eyes dart down to the collar on your neck, seeing it for the first time in the light, and then she makes herself look away. You wait for something more; another meaningful glance, a smile, telepathy, even just her lips shaping secret, silent words. Nothing happens. The reunion you’ve dreamed of never comes. 

“So what did you think?” Kano says, something nervous edging into her tone. She glances up again but stops short of your face, looking warily at your collar. 

“I liked it,” you tell her. “The steam is really nice and fragrant.”

She beams and clasps her hands together. “Oh, I’m so glad! So you’ll definitely come in again sometime, right? Wait, hold on, I’ll give you a card! I have a hole-punch reward program and everything.” 

Maybe there’s a message hidden in the blocky text printed on the cardstock, or an enchantment concealing something. You hope there is and you know there won’t be. It wouldn’t be safe. Your fingers brush as she passes it to you and the sensation of chilled sparks from your magic greeting hers is weaker this time, deliberately smothered. You shut this secret behind door after door after door, quarantining it in the back of your mind under lock and key. You swallow all the questions you want to ask and stifle the urge to wrap your arms around her and never let go. 

Kano looks at you like she wants to say something, but she never does.

Mihai is standing in the doorway when you come back to his side, green and pink Komorebi Cafe loyalty card safely ensconced in your pocket. “We can come back another time,” he says. Your dismissive shrug makes him laugh. “You don’t want to go yet. It’s all over your face…” 

He trails off, staring into the distance. Then he shoves you back, hard enough that you stumble and have to catch yourself against a table. “Stay. And lock it behind me,” he says. Then he slips out the door and he’s gone. You’re still standing there in confusion when Kano moves around you, touching your shoulder as she goes, and fiddles with her keys. 

“It’s safer in the kitchen,” she tells you. 

The question doesn’t quite make it off your tongue when you’re struck with an awful feeling. You’re nervous without knowing why, your pulse racing, cold sweat and goosebumps prickling all over your body. You feel watched. Trapped. You back away from the door and the windows. You know what this is. You felt something like this every night at your last job. The whole building exuded this same nauseating aura of dread. 

“That’s…” You don’t finish the thought. Your throat constricts with terror and you can barely breathe. 

Kano just nods and you follow her without hesitation. The door to the kitchen is flimsier than you’d like, a lightweight faux-wood panel that even a hatchling could rip off its hinges, but it’s all you have. The back door, at least, is a proper metal slab, so that’s one less point of entry. Kano hands you a roll of sticky, transparent material stamped with protective enchantments and she takes another, and you paste them all over the vents, the drains in the sink basins, all the little gaps in the door frames, anywhere that something might try to squeeze through.

“Don’t be stingy with it,” she says, plastering over your work with even more clingy sheets. “The Council hands these out for free. I’ve got a pretty big stockpile.” 

“Do you get a lot of lemures around here?” you ask nervously.

“Not usually. But they come in seasons, you know. Sometimes you won’t have any for a while, then they all come at once.” She checks her phone, then texts someone who texts back almost immediately. “The CTF’s on it. Looks like there’s been a couple sightings tonight.” 

The lights flicker. You cram yourselves into the safest spot you can find, crouched between industrial refrigerators and storage cabinets.

“Come on,” Kano whispers. “Come here.” She holds her arm open. 

You’re trembling. You want to be there, squeezed in beside her, but…

“Just for a little bit,” she says softly.

So you go. This is how it’s meant to be; tucked against each other, leaning into your shared body heat and feeling your hearts beating together. You can breathe again. Your magic twines together, ebbing and flowing, pulled between you in playful tugs before it settles into perfect equilibrium. You nuzzle like cats, cheek to cheek, nose to nose, buried in the crook of her neck as she hums in quiet contentment. You can’t remember the last time you had the chance to do this. It’s hard to pull away. Kano manages it first but she gives you one last affectionate rub, nosing against the side of your head and letting out a breath. Her magic leaves with her and yours lurches, wanting to follow. 

You want to know who she is. Where she came from. What she likes and where she lives and all of her favorite things. If there are others, if she knows. You want to know how and why the Council thinks she’s latent. You want to know if she plans to leave, and where she’ll go. And if she’d take you with her.

You don’t say anything. The words build up in your throat, behind your teeth, and you have to swallow them back down because the moment has passed and anyone could be listening.

The lights flicker again, dimming longer this time. That’s when the skittering starts. You exchange nervous looks with Kano. No, you didn’t imagine it. She heard it, too. You can hear something in the walls. Scraping sounds. Breathing. 

It tries the vent first, clanging around above one of the industrial ovens. You hold your breath watching the warding enchantments bulge from the other side. Nothing should be able to squeeze itself between the metal slots on the cover, and yet a thin, sharp appendage like an oversized proboscis pokes and prods through the narrow openings. The enchantments hold. The thing retreats from the vents and starts circling again, searching for openings. It sounds like a tangled mass of rats all running in different directions; a spider the size of a car. Leg after leg after leg crawling up into the ceiling and down beneath the floor tiles, tapping against the other side of the wall.

It hisses, long and shrill. Then the hiss warbles, pitch zigzagging, and other rumbling noises join in. It keeps trying, adjusting, softer than firmer, higher then lower, until it settles on something convincing.

“Hhhhhhh. Hhhe. He. Lo. Hhhhhellooo. Hhh. Hha. Hello. Hello. Kano.” 

Kano grabs your arm and squeezes so tightly it hurts. The thing’s hiss becomes a sigh, and then quiet laughter. You hear an unpleasant, wet sound like a dog noisily drinking something. Tasting the air, the walls, the memories left behind in the Komorebi Cafe, Kano’s thoughts and fears settled into the foundations. Its voice strengthens the more it speaks. It sounds like a man, settling into an airy tone and playful cadence. It must be imitating someone she knows. Someone she doesn’t want to see.

“Kano. Hi, Kano. Can I come in?” It paces around you again, circling behind you, on your left, nudging through the pipes in the sink before it hits the enchantments stuffed in the drain and then slinks back down. “Hey, don’t be like that. You know I’m here to help. Kano. Don’t keep me out like this.”

Kano can’t go any further into the corner but she tries anyway, curled up as small as she can make herself. You get in front of her so you’re all she can see, hands on her shoulders, resting your forehead against hers. “Stay calm,” you tell her, hoping you sound even a little bit calm or certain. “Look at me or close your eyes. We have to stay calm.”

Being scared makes it stronger. You can both hear it under your feet, in tunnels or pipes or, impossibly, just on the other side of the tiles, prowling inverted mere inches away. It sounds big and it’s solid enough to touch things, to make noise and have weight. You’ve never seen a fully matured lemure like that before, only the destruction they leave behind.

Kano’s hands shake around her phone. She calls someone but it never goes through. Little red exclamation points appear beside every text she tries to send. 

Mihai! you think desperately. You squeeze your eyes shut and throw your thoughts as far as you can, shouting into the dark. You don’t know if he’s close enough to hear you but you keep calling for him, searching for the snapped threads of connection.

The skittering stops for a moment. You hear the lemure scraping at the other side of an outlet. When it starts to pace, it’s slow and meandering. It tastes the air again. It makes a hoarse barking sound like it’s clearing its throat. Its voice changes, thinner and raspy.

“I’ve made myself weak tonight,” it murmurs, and your heart drops into your stomach. It sounds just like Mihai. “You can test me properly.”

It tries the vent again. The sink again. The outlets, wriggling more of itself against the wards. It pushes against everything at once and you hear things shattering above and below, wood snapping, steel groaning. A bulb bursts, raining glass on your shoulders. Kano sobs into your chest. Something violent happens in the next room and you know it’s gotten into the building, its skittering louder and sharper than before. The handle on the kitchen door rattles but doesn’t budge, slathered in paper wards. 

“Someone should clip your wings,” it whispers, and then something slams against the door. And again, harder. And again, making the wards peel back and rip down the middle. Kano wails and you cling to each other as the door cracks and splinters further, and tendrils of shadow pour through every space in greedy eagerness.

Something else comes barreling through the cafe with a bestial roar, its heavy sprint smashing tile with every step. The lemure rips away from the door, shrieking. There’s a thunderous collision; furniture snapping like twigs. Two behemoths smash into each other and all you hear is carnage, the squelch and bodily splatters of something being butchered alive. You don’t think you’ll ever forget the noise. Chunks of meat hit the floor and gore sprays the walls. They rip and tear and pulverize until only one remains, panting like an animal in the awful silence. Something lands heavily on the ground.

Your pulse pounds in your ears. Kano doesn’t move. You don’t want to but in the quiet, there’s this soft wheeze and the strained start of a whimper. Like a dog, you think with dawning horror. A dog who’s hurt, who can’t get up. Kano grabs at your sleeve when you start to stand and follows you to her feet. You inch towards the door, the wards now a cloudy, sun-baked yellow speckled with mold-like splotches to show their damage. It opens easily. Chunks of wood fall off when you push through. 

All that’s left of the lemure is a giant stain, black and faintly iridescent like an oil slick. It bubbles and gives off heat. Collapsed in the boiling ink spill is a nightbound with a hunting form unlike anything you’ve seen before. It’s wolf-like, its strangely bent legs and elongated paws distinctly canid. There are so many scars on its body that its fur only grows in thin tufts and patches, most of it gathered along its shoulders and back in a thick black mane. The head is its strangest feature, disproportionately large and unwieldy. Its snout protrudes far beyond a wolf’s maw, the flesh teeth-lined and gnarled stiff. 

A borzoi and an alligator, you’d thought before. You had no idea how right you were. It’s Mihai, just as he was in the Council headquarters. This is what he looks like in hunting form. He’s curled up defensively, the sharp angles of his shoulders straining beneath the skin of his back.

He doesn’t have wings. There are no nubs or growths where something might have been cut, no scars suggestive of anything more than general injuries. You stare at the ridge of his spine and his blood-slicked mane in dim confusion. He’s supposed to have wings, isn’t he? Don’t they all have wings?

Screeching brakes and whistling wind alerts you to someone’s presence outside. The CTF, probably. You’re in shock, only faintly aware of noise and movement around you. Nightbound fill the cafe, speaking solemnly to one another. One inspects the lemure’s remains. Several start hauling boxes full of equipment for a cleansing. You’re herded out the door with Kano and surrounded by glinting eyes and worried faces. 

“I want to go home,” Kano insists over and over, her voice quivering, but they keep asking her if her head hurts, or her throat, or if her eyes are burning, or her nose is running. “I’m fine. Can I please go home? I don’t want to be here anymore.” 

Someone volunteers to give her a ride. You don’t say goodbye but you look at each other one more time before she’s gently eased into the passenger seat of a CTF vehicle. You try to go back inside but someone stops you.

“Is he okay?” you ask. The frown you get in response makes you even more frantic. “Is he hurt? Let me see him.” 

“It’s alright. Everything’s going to be fine,” the nightbound says with patronizing softness. His gaze flits down to your collar. “Who’s your partner? We should really get you home.”

“He’s part of my convenire. Please let me see him,” you say desperately.

The nightbound looks startled. He steps aside reluctantly and starts to say something about how it’s all very delicate and you need to be careful, but you’re pushing past him before he’s done. Mihai is out of his hunting form. Not enough strength to maintain it, isn’t that what he said? This could’ve gone badly, you realize, horribly if he’d fallen out of it any sooner. Several CTF agents huddle around him, their voices low and pleading, but he keeps shaking his head and mumbling weakly. 

“Mihai!” 

The sound of your voice makes him twitch, muscles flexing like he’s trying to get up. He looks up at you with a tired smile. It’s easier to tell he’s hurt without all the fur. It was a close fight. Blood pours from somewhere beneath his bangs and slicks his shoulder, forcing one eye shut.

“Okay?” he rasps. Blood dribbles from the corner of his mouth. “Not hurt?” 

“No,” you say hoarsely. You kneel beside him, pushing his hair out of his face. His skin is clammy with sweat. He trembles and leans into your touch, whining softly.

“He’s not taking blood,” one of the nightbound tells you. He holds up a plastic pouch with fine print all over the label pasted across the front, a butterfly stamped in the corner. 

“What? Why?” 

Mihai shakes his head again and groans, burying his face against your knee. He feels feverish. You squeeze his hand and he barely squeezes back.

He speaks through the connection so only you can hear. Even there, his voice comes through strained and quieter than usual. “All emergency medicinal blood is witch blood,” he whispers. “It comes from captives and strangers. I won’t take it. I haven’t earned it.”

“Then take mine.”

He makes a pained sound. When you stroke his hair, he turns to kiss your fingers. “I haven’t earned yours, either.”

“You can have it! I’m offering it!” 

“You shouldn’t,” he chides you. “You don’t trust me yet.”

You don’t know what else to do, so you resort to the language you know he prefers. You clutch his hand to your heart and close your eyes, and you imagine crisp, night wind, rustling leaves and the scent of moss. 

In the forest, you find him staring back at you in surprise. You are both bare, the moonlight shining upon your shoulders. There is a fire burning behind you; heat on your back, a halo of scarlet. Mihai sees the flames but not the thing that’s burning. You’re not ready to tell him about it. You’re not sure you’ll ever be ready. You might take that with you to your grave. But you’re here with him. You’re not going to leave him alone.

His brows furrow. He thinks you pity him. 

You smile and shrug. Maybe you do. Maybe you feel a lot of things for him and it’s hard to separate or name them. But there’s a sense of kinship, too. You feel it more than you’d like to admit for all of the hatchlings, but it’s strongest for him. You reach for his hand, lifting it, threading your fingers together. You won’t bury him. Your trust won’t come all at once. It’ll have to be a slow thing; more quiet nights, more glimpses, more drinks shared over the same table.

He has some of it already. Just a little bit. Just enough that you’re willing to lift your head and bare your throat to him in offering. You feel him tense; see him swallow. His hand shakes when he brings it to the side of your neck, stroking your pulse. Asks, wordlessly, if you’re sure.

You think of the lemure; your fear and your relief hearing him tear it to pieces; his smile, lying on the floor bleeding out. You shut your eyes. You’re sure.

The forest recedes in a rushing blur, overtaken by the wreckage of the Komorebi Cafe. You’re on the floor, staring at shattered tiles, and can’t remember how you got there. 

“Easy now,” someone says warily. The CTF are still here but they’ve backed off, keeping to the edges of the room. “No one’s going to take your witch.”

Mihai growls. He’s on top of you, you realize, his voice directly beside your ear. “No need to use that tone. I’m not a hatchling. I’m lucid, but my instincts are aggravated. Keep your distance. Wait outside, preferably.” Nobody moves. Mihai sighs heavily and grumbles something you don’t catch, his hand sliding up and down your spine reassuringly.

When you try to lift your head, his grip turns harsh. Mihai grasps the back of your neck and keeps you down, the growl returning softer than before.

“Don’t move,” he murmurs.

“Are you okay?” you ask. You can’t help but try and turn, wanting to look around, see the room, the CTF—

“Still,” Mihai orders. A rush of mesmerism forces your muscles to unclench and your limbs to drop. The floor tiles are cool against your cheek. “Sorry,” he says, sounding strained. “I’m not—this isn’t how I’m used to feeding. Doing it so rushed, on the floor like this, makes it feel like play. Like…”

He shifts his weight on top of you and you feel the unmistakable twitch of his cock, half-hard against your ass. Embarrassed heat fills your veins. He’s naked and arched over your back, panting quietly against your ear. 

You raise your voice to address the CTF agents who you never heard leave. “Do you really have to be here for this?” 

“Yes,” one says bluntly.

“Nothing we haven’t seen before,” says another.

A third adds, a bit too cheerfully, “Arousal is a perfectly natural reaction to feeding, it’s really nothing to be embarrassed about. I’d be surprised if either of you last long—”

“Please shut up,” you beg. 

Mihai works the collar’s clasp apart. It takes him a while with his hands shaking as badly as they are. Once it’s loose, he tosses it somewhere beyond your line of sight. His lips are on your nape in an instant. The bite is a quick, shallow pinch and it hurts more than they usually do. Mihai doesn’t drink from the puncture. He kisses it instead, lavishing the small, oozing mark with long, sensual drags of his tongue. His hands start to roam, slipping under your shirt and palming your chest, mapping out your skin as he keeps you close to him. His hips move in languid drags like he’s teasing you. You feel his cock fill gradually, hardening a little more with every small sound he drags out of you.

“Relax,” he whispers. 

One of his hands trails lower, working at your clothes until you feel the cold air on your backside. He doesn’t undress you completely and that makes you feel even more exposed somehow, your shirt bunched up and your legs trapped together as he slots his hips against yours and pushes his cock between your bare thighs. He keeps stroking your spine with one hand as he squeezes your hip with the other, thrusting in a slow grind that smears precum along your inner thighs. 

“Arch your back. A little more. Lift your hips.” 

Mihai arranges you into an even more compromising situation, raising your lower half while keeping your head on the floor. You get it wrong the first time, trying to sit up again. He corrects you with a nip beneath your ear, pinning you by the nape again and squeezing. Your skin tingles beneath his palm. When you stay put, you’re rewarded by his hips moving again, his cock pushing between your thighs and grinding against your sex. Arching into the friction and moving back against him earns you a soft moan.

“I wanted to prepare you more, but there’s no time,” he says, his voice strained. “It’s going to hurt. I couldn’t get enough venom out to put you into heat.” 

You’re not sure you heard him right and you don’t get the chance to ask before Mihai sinks his fangs into your neck. He wasn’t lying. It really hurts. The pinch you felt before is nothing compared to the deep, penetrating sting of a proper bite. It aches worse every time he draws blood from the wound and you can’t help but squirm instinctively, trying to wriggle away. 

Mihai’s grip tightens. Wordless animal ferocity surges through the connection between you. You feel his hunger and indignation. He caught you, pinned you, made you surrender, and won’t deny him his prize. But beneath the red hot flashes of this showy anger like a wolf baring its teeth, you also sense the bubbly excitement of a wagging tail. It’s all a game; a play-hunt. The pain won’t last and he will lick your wounds when it’s over.

He tries to help. He explores your skin, searching for weak spots where you’re most sensitive. His hips move faster and his thrusts grow harsher, every frantic back and forth motion rubbing against your sex. Bent over on the floor with your legs caught in your clothes and his weight holding you down makes it feel dirtier, more primal, and the tingling all around his bite starts to warm into pleasant shivers.

“Are you starting to feel it?” he whispers into your mind. He’s louder than you thought he’d be. He moans into the bite and breathes in harsh pants through his nose. “I had to teach myself how to administer venom so neither the technique nor the results are typical. You’ll experience it properly next time. This is just a taste.”

It’s nothing like Orion’s or Renaud’s. Their venom hit you all at once and drowns you in sharp, unrelenting pleasure, heightening every sensation and turning the pain of the bite to ecstasy. Mihai’s takes longer, its influence gradually creeping up your spine like the lick of flames growing larger and hotter. You feel feverish, lightheaded and achingly empty. You try to spread your legs without thinking about it and whine when you can’t get them far enough apart. Mihai’s hand curls around your neck and cups your chin, gently guiding your head to a slightly different angle so he can drink more deeply. The sensation is maddening, still painful yet deeply satisfying.

Inside. That’s all you can think about. Mihai, inside you, however you can have him. His fangs hurt but they belong there and you feel yourself arching your back, begging him to penetrate you more, again, deeper. Mihai groans against your neck and his hips buck wildly, the head of his cock catching and slipping past your entrance. His hand leaves your hip to grasp himself by the base and you feel him shift on top of you, his stance changing, widening, his weight settling differently. 

Dimly, you recall he said something about heat. Like an animal. That must’ve been what he meant, because he’s mounting you like a beast about to rut its mate. The noises he makes are feral, grunting and growling with his teeth in your neck as he folds himself against your back with his hips molded to yours. He moves completely on instinct, humping mindlessly. Every quick jolt drives him closer to your entrance until you feel the thick head of his cock stretching you open. 

The forest flashes through your mind. Mihai’s mesmerism drags you there again and somehow you are both places at once, surrounded by beige walls and evergreens, the scent of coffee beans mingling with moss. Mihai takes you on the floor of the Komorebi Cafe and in this strange wilderness, his claws scraping broken tiles and tangling in the grass. He drags his fangs out of your flesh and pants against the slow ooze of blood trickling down your neck, but his hips never stop moving. If anything, he ruts even harder now that it’s all he has to focus on.

“Thank you,” he whispers, his voice in your mind gone breathless. “Thank you for this gift. For your blood and your trust. Next time will be different. I’ll show you how it’s meant to be.”

You couldn’t answer him if you wanted to. His relentless, animalistic fucking drives the air from your lungs and the pleasure echoes, the warmth of satiation and burning lust blooming in the connection between you. You lose grip on everything but the sensations of being claimed.

Mihai doesn’t tell you he’s close but his body warns you. There’s a growl rumbling beneath every sound he makes and he starts shifting restlessly, subconsciously searching for the right angle to press even deeper into your tight heat. His stance widens and his nonstop pounding rhythm falters, his thrusts getting slower, more rolling and grinding, refusing to pull all the way out of your body. He drags you to the edge with him with wave after wave of smothering mesmerism, emptying your mind of everything but your shared pleasure.

You cum when he does. He doesn’t give you any other choice. You cry out and tremble uncontrollably, consciousness wavering at the onslaught of his ecstasy cresting alongside yours. You feel warm; heavy; truly sated. Full to the brim and sheathed in squeezing, pleasant heat. Mihai pumps his hips in several last, frantic thrusts. He stays buried inside you until he’s fully spent and soft. When he pulls out, his cum spurts out around him and trickles slowly down your thighs. He collapses onto his side and drags you with him, still catching his breath. 

“Need something for mending,” he says raggedly, holding out his hand. There’s footsteps; shadows moving over you both. Mihai holds you, murmuring indistinctly and rubbing your back when a sudden cold, wet sensation on your neck makes you whimper. Feeding often leaves you a little groggy but this is worse than you’re used to. Everything sounds muffled and you can barely keep your eyes open. Mihai strokes your cheek. “You’re alright. It’s a side effect of my venom. I’ve got you.”

You don’t want to fall asleep here but exhaustion tugs your mind deeper into the dark. You cling to Mihai and he keeps you curled against his chest, stroking your spine reassuringly. “Wanna go home,” you mutter.

“I know. I’ll get us there,” Mihai says. He nuzzles into your neck and hums softly, sounding perfectly content. 

“I didn’t…I meant…” 

“Hush. I know,” he says gently. Connected and nested in your conscious mind, he knows you’re lying. You didn’t think of your old apartment when you said “home.” You thought of ornate wrought iron gates, a long, steep driveway, and the parlor where you spend most of your time. 

there are nightbound out there who are absolute fiends for menstrual blood. some probably dislike it and some are ambivalent because they tend to have very particular preferences, but there are some who are heartbroken that it’s only an occasional treat and they can’t live off of it all the time. 

beyond the taste, it also gets their instincts going to have a partner vulnerable, weak or in pain, who might be shy or alarmed about giving blood this way, and be able to satisfy them while also slaking their own thirst. not all nightbound bother with sex or all that much foreplay beyond using venom, so this is a unique form of intimacy that some might find extra appealing. 

menstrual cycles require a slightly intensified roseblood regimen to compensate for the extra loss of iron, but proper adherence will ensure it has no effect on the feeding schedule.

there’s almost certainly a guide, maybe even a class or mentorship, that partnered hatchlings go through for the safety of their first witch. they don’t generally get partnered before they’ve mastered self-control, but they’re still young and inexperienced. the ctf checks in a lot during the early days to make sure everything is going smoothly.

when it comes to blood disorders, some things can be treated or managed with the roseblood regimen and some can’t. hunger drives nightbound ingenuity so they’ve spent centuries refining the feeding process and ensuring as many humans as possible can give blood. roseblood allows a single donor to produce much more blood than they need but it creates serious chemical imbalances that have to be mitigated with a fortifying diet, so there might be people who can’t use it safely.

.

.

.

You know this one is different. It looks just the same as always. No heavier and no less ornate, but you know. This is the one you’ve dreaded.

The envelope is a genuine antique. Aged to the soft, crumpled yellow of old parchment, it arrived mysteriously in your mailbox unblemished by a sender or return address. The wax seal is plum-colored and misshapen like a bruise with a stylized flower stamped at the center: five tapered petals, a star of blushing indigo. You hesitate before you rip it open, unfolding five pages of vintage letter paper adorned with calligraphic penmanship. The formality is jarring spread across a cheap folding table.

“Child of Mandragora,” you are addressed in elegant cursive scrawl, “the time has come for you to return home.”

You should read it carefully but you don’t have the patience, skimming empty platitudes, stupid questions, irritating assumptions, flattery, poetic turns of phrase, hollow words from a stranger who claims to love you. You used to look forward to these. Used to believe, unquestioningly, everything they said. Love is the greatest wish of any child adrift and unanchored, no matter how strange. You never wondered how these letters made their way to all of your foster homes, or how they came like clockwork for every birthday, holiday and school year milestone. You only cared about the sweet words they held, the love they proclaimed and the promises they made.

Someone out there loves me, you always believed, no matter what happened. Someone will come and save me. 

Here, at last, after you’ve aged out of the system and clawed your way into a miserable life of your own, sitting in your shitty shoebox apartment with mold speckling the ceiling and generations of flies caught in the window screen, it finally happens. The letter you’ve always wished for arrives years too late.

“Everything has been prepared for your arrival,” it says. The penmanship gains an uncharacteristic messiness here, loose and oddly spaced as though the writer could not contain their excitement. “Your chambers have been furnished with the necessities, though I have left ample room for anything you would like to bring with you. The day of your return shall be one of feasts and celebration. The House will suspend official operations and all members shall be recalled so you may have an opportunity to become acquainted with your true family in your true home.”

That’s it, more or less. There are some weak apologies, some insistence that the wait was necessary, some more assurances that you are precious, perfect and more beloved than you could ever know, but no explanations. No acknowledgement of how long you’ve waited or what you’ve endured. A printed ticket is tucked between the fourth and fifth pages, informing you that you’re expected at the train station early tomorrow for a one-way trip to Belvedere Point. The flourishing signature at the bottom of the last page is illegible save for a capital “O.” 

You think about ripping it up and burning the scraps. Maybe you should. Maybe that’s the wisest decision; certainly the safest one. Decades of disappointment and the pangs of adulthood gave you the distance necessary to understand the freakishness of these letters. No faceless stranger should be able to track you so efficiently. You think it might be a relative. Your “true kin” from your “true home,” someone who thinks blood ties mean anything when you’ve always had to fend for yourself. Now they expect you to drop everything and come back.

But you don’t burn it. You don’t even shred it, or throw it out, or fold it up and put it away. You sit there and stare uncomprehending at words that another version of you, long dead, would have given anything to read, and you feel so many bright and blistering things at once that they turn to the muddy color of every paint on a palette mixed together, leaving you numb. 

What am I supposed to do with this? you think. 

You don’t go, for starters. Obviously, you don’t go. All that sweet talk and not a single question about who you are now, what you do, what you like, what you dream of. Just a ticket to a place you’ve never been and complete confidence that you’ll do as you’re told. You don’t know these people and they don’t know you, no matter what they say. So you won't go. It would be insane to go.

The ticket is an awkward email printout, full-page size. Extraneous information at the top, barcode at the bottom. It’s the page you look at the longest, imagining things that won’t happen and people you won’t meet, because you aren’t going to go. You know you’d only end up disappointed. 

You know that, and you still stare at the ticket, and an hour passes in indecision. 

Thunder rolls along the apartment roof and throttles the windows in their frames. You get yourself together. No time to worry about anything but getting to work before the downpour. The letter stays right where it is, spread across the table, the ticket off to the side. You give them one last look before you leave it behind.

Standing beneath the gray awning of a bus stop, you look up Belvedere Point on your phone. Just for fun. Just to see. It’s a place you only know in an abstract sense; a name with no face, letters on signs that point elsewhere. Seaside Chicago, they call it apparently, a consistent top three contender in Hidden Gems of New England listicles. It’s got art deco skyscrapers, Cape Cod houses, yacht-filled marinas, old churches, streets lined with lanterns that they wrap garlands and string lights around in the winter, blue skies and brownstone apartments and hilly boardwalks descending onto beaches. And you know there’s more to it, that it can’t all be pretty and pristine, but seeing it and thinking about handwritten letters on fancy paper gives you an awful feeling. 

The bus comes squealing to a stop in front of you, full of the languid sort of crowd that comes in the lull between lunch and the evening rush. People fidget nervously when you get on. The boldest inch away, abandoning their seats entirely for the more congested end furthest from you. They stare like caged animals. You look out the window and your weary reflection looks back. You wonder about the buses in Belvedere Point.

The rain’s coming down in sheets by the time you get to work. There’s a bad storm brewing and the sky keeps getting darker. You fight the wind to keep your umbrella open, pushing towards the superstore glow at the end of a strip mall where Chateau Chic looms over its own stretch of sparsely occupied parking lot. You’re greeted by a reluctant coworker whose name you should really know but you won’t be here long and you both know it.

“How about this weather?” he says.

“Sure is something,” you say. And then he wanders off, pretending that something needs doing. Chairs pushed closer to tables. Bedspreads rearranged, retucked, refolded. Anything to be elsewhere. There’s just a handful of you on second shift and they all make themselves scarce when you show up. It’s no different than the people you see on the bus; downtown; in line at the grocery. You lasted a couple weeks at the front of the store before your boss put you in the back handling inventory instead. 

The kinds of customer complaints you generate are nonspecific and unactionable. “Just kind of creepy,” people say, but no, you didn’t say anything off, and no, you didn’t really do anything wrong, and well, no, actually, you weren’t the one aggressively pitching a five year warranty on couch springs and upholstery like a used car salesman, but that doesn’t matter. Sometimes you’re elsewhere in the store entirely, putting another fake plant on a shelf full of them, and a couple looking for new patio furnishings will feel the need to ask for management to make sure you’re supposed to be there, doing that. 

Your boss pokes her head out of the office in the back. She wants to talk, she says. Just real quick, she promises. It feels a little too soon for the shaky excuse of position cuts but she’s around you more often than most of your bosses and has gotten wary even faster. You slip inside and she hurriedly assures you that you don’t need to close the door behind you, and really, don’t worry, this won’t take long. You pull up a chair and she leans back further in hers. She’s smiling like she’s got a gun to her head and you think this is probably it.

And then the power goes out. 

It all quits at once. The vents stop humming. The music dies, one last squeal of melodic synth fading into an echo. Total darkness consumes the store, too sudden for your eyes to adjust. A few people shout in surprise. You fumble for the flashlight on your phone. Your boss is half out of her chair by the time you can see anything again, looking alarmed as she rises to her feet.

“Everyone alright?” she calls.

Someone says, “Yeah.” Someone waves across a sea of heavy vintage bookshelves and king sized beds. Little phone lights come on across the store. It’s pitch black everywhere but the very front where it’s only dark gray, the rain casting slithering shadows on the windows. 

“Door’s stuck,” somebody calls from the front. 

Someone else screams, and then stops screaming just as fast. Shock holds everything frozen in its grasp for an agonizing moment and then all hell breaks loose. 

“Oh god—oh my god!” shouted and echoing, and running and tripping and scrambling, chairs toppling over and ceramics shattering, shelves teetering and wood splintering in a panicked rush to get out. And someone—a man; a stranger, not a coworker, not a voice you recognize—someone saying something, and saying it again louder and angrier and too close to where you are. Your boss is gone and you’re not going to look for her, stumbling your way to the wide double doors that lead to the warehouse.

You don’t get that far. Someone snags you, catches your arm and drags you to a bruising stop, manhandling you closer and saying, “Listen to me, listen, don’t fight, I need you to listen—”

You twist and lash out and that makes him angry, makes him have to wrestle you around and drag you to the floor with him, and you know you’ll die if he gets you still. You know, in flashes, in heartbeat flashes of lightning, that he’s got a gun or a knife or something gray that glints that can hurt you, so scream and flail and you bite when you get the chance. He’s got gloves on, leather from the smell and the creak of it when he tries getting a grip on your windpipe, but you latch on like a wild dog anyway and find flesh where his sleeve rides up. You taste skin; sweat; blood; meat. He screams and kicks you in the head.

It’s all in and out. Nothing, then everything, then ears ringing. Pitch black and then shadows and shapes. Vertigo, and then you’re crawling, one arm, the other, dragging yourself behind a heavy, angular something that you can’t quite see in the dark, dropped your phone and can’t remember how, when, where. You curl up on the floor and wait for the hurt and the throbbing to stop. You fade and then you snap awake, jolted out of a daze by voices breaking the quiet. It’s eerily, hauntingly quiet except for two people talking.

“…really fucked that up.” 

“Looks fine to me. No witnesses.”

A sigh. “No intel, either. You even ask anybody?” 

A scoff. “Yeah, and what fucking difference did it make? Nobody knew anything. Let’s go.”

“Can’t leave yet. We’re supposed to confirm—”

“He’s supposed to confirm. Look at him go, he’s doing it now.”

“You’ve never done a Styx job, have you? They’re not gonna like this.” 

“Why? We did everything—fucking shit, goddammit!” A pained hiss and then movement; leather peeling off, a sleeve pushed out of the way. “Fuck, what the fuck! Shine a light over here, I think I’m bleeding. Hurts like a bitch.”

“Bleeding?” 

“Got bit,” through gritted teeth. “Fuck, it really hurts. It’s burning all up my arm.”

Coarse laughter. “What, was one of ‘em rabid?” A faint glow. Then a primal, choked sound of disgust. “Oh Jesus.”

A little louder now, “What is that? Is it blood?” 

Louder, “It’s your fucking skin. You’re—god, it’s falling off, man!” 

Screaming, “What do you mean it’s falling off what the fuck do you mean!”

Your head’s still spinning, pain still radiating from the bruise on your scalp where he hit you, but you have to get out of here. Have to try. It takes everything you have to roll over and then lay there, nauseous with pain and catching your breath, staring up at

eyes.

Your pulse starts thundering again. That’s not—that doesn’t make sense. It’s too dark. But there’s someone standing over you and you can see their eyes in the dark the same way you’d spot an animal on the side of the road, a glinting leer from the ditch as your headlights sweep past. You can tell they move. That they come closer, crouching beside you. That they lean in and take loud, audible sniffs of the air and shut their eyes, those twin silver gleams hidden for a moment before they shine bright again. Fingers, tipped sharp like claws, caress your cheek.

“Aren’t you peculiar?” the thing murmurs. Human after all, or something close to it. Its eyes grow distant again, looming high above. It looks over the back of the couch you tried to hide behind. “Is this the one that bit you?” it calls.

The men are still panicking when they come rushing over. One shines a light directly into your eyes and you wince, squeezing your eyes shut. “I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t fucking know,” one of them babbles. “Maybe? Yeah? I guess, yeah, I didn’t finish the job. Look at my fucking hand. What am I supposed to do?”

The light shuts off. You can’t see anything but spots for a minute but the dark smooths into silhouettes eventually. Two men and one thing pretending to be a man.

“You die. Within the hour, ordinarily, but this one hasn’t been eating properly,” the thing muses. “The Ferrymen offer their sincerest gratitude for your service. You have been tremendously useful, albeit through sheer incompetence.” You can’t tell what happens, only that it’s swift and comes without warning. Both of the men cry out in pain and then they crumple at the thing’s feet. Puddles of blood spread like ink across the floor.

You try to move. It doesn’t stop you. But it follows as you twist around and start to crawl again, walking beside you like a wolf trailing a limping rabbit. 

“And now you,” the thing says, sounding intrigued and furious. “What am I to do with you? What else can I do but what the lords have asked of me?” It lowers its voice to a soft murmur, something almost tender. “Don’t they know what you do to me? The mere sight of you, the scent of your poisons, however diluted, on your breath, it’s…” You hear a long, trembling sigh and then you’re rolled onto your back again, pinned in place with the thing’s weight settling on your hips. It wears something leathery and form-fitting, coarse and flexible material that clings to slopes of solid muscle. It feigns humanity in ways you weren’t at all prepared for, a distinct bulge of arousal twitching against your core.

Its hips jolt in a short, involuntary movement and it chokes back a moan, a claw pinning your shoulder to keep you down as though it fears coming any closer. Its breath comes in quick pants and it works itself into frenzied anger again.

“And they call my master ‘mooncalf.’ You are an abomination. A bastard, only half-formed and undeserving. You…you…!”

You’re going to die. You don’t have a fucking clue what’s happening, what this thing is, what shattered your entire world tonight, but it’s going to kill you. You feel its muscles tense, the air shift, its eyes lunge closer, and then it’s gone. Something else stirs the shadows and drags it away. You don’t wait to see what awful thing might happen next. You crawl, and then you shove yourself up to your knees, and then you limp, and stagger, and run. Hands in front of you, feeling your way through a lightless maze, you keep moving until the sounds of animals snarling is far behind you.

You don’t know how you get out. You aren’t thinking, aren't feeling the bruises and scrapes you get blindly throwing yourself forward into coffee table corners and sofa frames. You just keep moving until you’re standing in the rain, under the halo of the parking lot lights. It’s shockingly cold and that snaps you out of your fight-or-flight adrenaline haze long enough to realize you're tired, afraid, and hurt all over, and you don't know when the next bus is coming. 

Someone calls your name. 

You turn around and he’s right there. You’d scream if you had the energy. You didn’t hear him coming. He’s one of them, a monster with eyes that shine in the dark, but he might’ve fooled you in the light. You see some kind of bodysuit, the kind of dark, elegant garment that thieves and assassins wear in fantasy movies. Dark hair trimmed to the nape and bangs slicked down with rain. An angular jaw; a smile. His eyes are silver even beneath the shine, the irises a stark, striking color like the steel of a blade. He looks at you the way you have always wanted to be looked at—warmly, wanting, full of love—and you are even more afraid.

“Hello,” he says. He almost sounds breathless.

You don’t say anything. You don’t think you could speak if you wanted to.

“It’s wonderful to finally meet you.”

You stare at him. It takes a couple tries, swallowing, wetting your lips, taking deep breaths, but you manage to force out your voice. “I don’t…I don’t understand. I don’t know who you are or what you want.”