Vampire cult nonsense (PSL for Natasha)

[worthallthis]

It had taken her a while to get far enough into the ranks of this... organization. They have half a dozen names for themselves, depending on where one gains entrance, and most people don't ever go beyond those half-dozen entrance groups. Natasha is good, but these people are paranoid, and death cults are not a thing that you get access to immediately.

But because she is good, here she is finally, fresh from the ritual bath and dressed in undyed cotton, barefoot, ready for her first ritual. She's the only new one today, but there are other junior members walking in their two lines from the baths to the ritual room and its five sealed coffins. Natasha has yet to be told what's in them, only that they are very powerful.

"Which one is it today?" the young man who'd introduced himself as Stolen Moon (junior members tend to pick very pretentious ritual names) asks, quietly, of the senior member walking in front of him, who was known by the (slightly less pretentious) name Fox.

"You'll see when we get there," Fox says.

"Don't ask questions in front of the initiate," adds the senior at the head of the second column, an older woman called Hawk.

There are already three senior members waiting inside: Raven, Star, and Shimmer. Fox and Hawk motion for everyone to take their places, in an outward-facing ring inside the circle of coffins, and then join them, each standing between two of the coffins.

Comments

[ofmarble]

"So she's cocky," Natasha says, tone slightly absent. "Likes to show off."

It's something pit fighters and bullies have in common, that need to be seen, to be acknowledged, like their skill only means anything if there are witnesses present, and someone to make feel small.

[worthallthis]

"Maybe. Kinda stupid to be in a secret death cult if you want to show off, though," he muses. "She does teach initiates the basics in self-defense sometimes. If there's ones they think need that kind of training. I've seen them in one of the other temples, before. Not the one you were in, that one doesn't have a room for it. It was dedicated to just us, not a lot of other purpose that I ever saw."

[ofmarble]

"They ever have you train their initiates? Or one of the others?"

It would, she thinks, be a very risky endeavour, if they wanted to keep their initiates in one piece, but it could also pay off. That sort of experience can't be discounted.

[worthallthis]

He opens his mouth to say "no" but he can't make himself. It doesn't feel right. It feels like a lie. "Maybe," he tries again, and it feels better. "I don't... remember it real clear. But I think maybe I did, at least once. A really long time ago. I can't put a face to anyone, or a-- a room around it. But I feel like I might have."

He can feel the motions of guiding a hand into a punch, nudging shoulders and fingers into a proper stance, knows the sense of squaring off against someone with the intent of instructing them rather than hurting them. But he has no idea where from. For all he knows, it was before being a vampire, that life that's entirely gone now.

[ofmarble]

There's something a little bit sympathetic in the sidelong look she gives him. It would drive her crazy to have that much of her past missing; the fact that he is relatively stable bodes well. She hopes.

"Hopefully long enough ago that we won't run into any of them," she says. "Having to take down someone you had a hand in training is never fun."

[worthallthis]

She sounds like she's speaking from experience, almost. He glances sidelong at her, trying to decide whether he ought to ask. If he wants to know the answer.

He decides, after a moment, that he doesn't. "Do you have any other questions? Before we start planning actually taking Pierce down."

[ofmarble]

Natasha considers for a moment, before shaking her head. "No. I'll have more while we plan."

Contextual questions, things that will help them refine their strategy. It's an inevitable part of that process.

[worthallthis]

He lets it go, then, and spends the rest of the walk back around to where they started mostly quietly, just a comment here or there about something they see or people they pass. It's normal. Ish. As normal as walking with someone living and full of blood can ever be, these days.

Then it's back to waiting, sketching out maps and memories he thinks might be useful, reading when he can. Watching tv and trying to figure out the internet.

He wants to get this over with, but he knows there's too much riding on it to just run in without having everything in place. But he wants to get it done. There's a stupid part of him that thinks maybe he'll feel safe again when Pierce is dead, that maybe he'll be able to think of a future once that obstacle is removed. He knows that's not how any of this works, but he still can't really think beyond that task, like it's going to be his salvation.

Natasha visits again, at last. He's hungry, trying to keep the local blood banks and late-night wandering population from running out, but keeping it under control. He's probably more twitchy about the plans she's bringing, anyway. He wants them.

[ofmarble]

When she arrives at the safehouse, she doesn't just have plans, she has gear. She parks around the back, and hauls in a large trunk. Weapons, body armour - he may not, strictly speaking, need either, but the mission is dangerous enough, is crucial enough, that any little edge might make a difference.

"Happy birthday," she says, tipping her head back to look him over. He looks paler, tenser than the last time she saw him, and the corners of her mouth crimp a little in concern. "You okay?"

[worthallthis]

The trunk of interesting stuff does get an interested look, enough that he's already rifling through it when she asks her question. He looks up, frowns a bit. "Yeah. Mostly. Just ready to get this done."

He huffs a needless breath out and adds, "And ready to relocate, honestly. If I stay here much longer I'm going to run out of easy meals." Because maybe she has another safehouse she can dump him in. One closer to Pierce. He doesn't want to mess anything up just because he had to eat and gave away his location to anyone looking for him.

[ofmarble]

She's quiet for a long moment, weighing their options. Then she nods, mostly to herself, and rolls up the sleeve of her light sweater.

"Here," she says. "We'll have to move before the strike, so we're close enough to get the timing right. But this is at least one meal you don't have to worry about."

[worthallthis]

He stares at her a long moment. He's bitten her before, he knows her blood now and knows it's good, but neither time had been her choice. Both times, in fact, had been more on the fraught and even frightening side of biting. Once he'd been trying to kill her.

So he hesitates. He doesn't know why she'd offer. It's her blood.

"Are you sure?"

[ofmarble]

"I'm sure," she says, then pauses, cocking her head slightly. "Unless there's some significance to three times that I should know about first?"

She's done what research she can, but folklore is contradictory, and vampires are rare enough - or good enough at hiding - that even her magical contacts don't agree on what's fact or fiction.

[worthallthis]

He pauses. Then realizes, "I don't know. I haven't fed from anyone that many times that I can remember." They usually feed the kids to him, and they're always cycling through those... has he had a bite from any of the older ones more than twice? It's hard to tell. He doesn't really think so.

He shakes his head. "I just didn't think you'd want to. I tried to kill you last time."

[ofmarble]

"If I held everything people did under mind control against them, it would put a surprising dent in my social circle," she says, a little bit dryly. That it's only true because her social circle is actually tiny is beside the point.

"And since my Plan A hinged on you biting me to get the counterspell into your system, I really can't complain too much. You stopped once you were free."

[worthallthis]

"I stopped because it hurt and it surprised me," he admits. "It took a minute to actually be free."

If it was part of her plan to get bitten, though, that might... make it less awful, he supposes. For her.

"If you're sure," he says finally, and tentatively holds his hand out for hers, looking like he'll jump back if she so much as twitches like she's afraid.

[ofmarble]

"I'm sure," she says. She places her hand in his, squeezing his fingers briefly to reinforce her statement before she lets her hand go slack so he can manoeuvre her as he needs to in order to make this as easy as possible.

[worthallthis]

He hasn't bitten anyone who's actually offered since his escape. His rescue, at the hands of this woman. He knows the motions, but he's always done it with threat, knowing half the time he was supposed to kill the person. Half the time so wild with hunger and hatred and the binding spell that he'd do it, whether he wanted to or not.

But he has self-control. He knows how not to kill a person. And he doesn't want to hurt his rescuer. Neither does he want to be weird about it. He's a job to her, maybe someday a coworker if she succeeds in recruiting him, not-- anything else.

So he lifts her arm to his mouth, eyes down on her skin rather than her face, and gingerly slides his fangs in with the numbing venom ready. He finds the vein readily and bites down. It won't hurt. Like last time, her skin and muscles around the bite just goes numb.

[ofmarble]

It feels as strange as it had the last time, like a shot of Novocaine to her wrist, but far more thorough and faster acting. A small corner of her mind wonders if there's ever been a vampire anesthesiologist, if that would be a reasonable profession to keep one of them hidden. Probably not, given the hours.

Her heart rate picks up a little - but only a little. It isn't panic, just animal reaction to the sight of his fangs in her skin. She has excellent control. She's still a mammal.

[worthallthis]

He's bitten enough people to know the difference. He knows true fear, and this-- isn't it. She's not afraid of him. Maybe because she's seen him on the floor holding his head in agony, or maybe because she's seen him in mental chains, or maybe because he's wearing one of the shirts she left for him and he sent her pictures of flowers and books. But it's-- unfamiliar. He's bitten all of two people that he can remember who weren't afraid of him, and one was a very wild-eyed fanatic and the other was extremely drunk.

He thinks he might like this better. Not just because he doesn't know that he likes scaring people-- cultists, maybe, sure, but regular people? But it tastes different. The adrenaline in the blood is something he can taste, and this has so little of it.

He doesn't take too much. Not even as much as he took the first night they met, but enough to hold him for a day or two if he doesn't do anything strenuous. And then he holds his thumb over the bite marks, applying pressure. The numbing venom should help them heal without the need for a bandage, but pressure helps, too.

It's only then that he risks a glance up at her face.