My Little Ventrue Pt. 03 Ch. 08

"Elder Jacob." Jack offered the man a bow, but Jacob laughed and nudged the kid back up with a few fingers to the shoulder.

"So you're the middleman in this zoo, eh kid?" The Nosferatu looked up at the walls like his witch did, before he sat down—on the stairway. "And you've made friends with an unusual monster. Look at you, getting stuck in shit no matter where you step."

Seeing Jacob get chummy with his childe set Julias on edge. What a way with words the old snake had.

"There does seem to be some dangerous people coming to Dolareido, Elder Jacob, that... I keep stumbling into."

Kid managed to keep a steady voice as he turned to watch the old man. Never easy. Jacob was as old as Antoinette, and being around him always fired Julias's fight-or-flight reflex, let alone Jack's.

"For what reason do I owe the honor of—"

"Oh stow the niceties, Julias. I'm not here on official business. I'm here cause I want to talk about the werewolves."

Sounded like official business. "Couldn't wait for the next Primogen meeting?"

"Prince said herself we can come to Jack. I knew he'd be here, after that shit show, to talk about the Begotten I imagine." The old bastard laughed and shook his head a few times, like a condescending parent. "That Fiona was a cute little thing wasn't she? Really liked the accent."

Right, right, it was going to be like this, Jacob dancing around whatever information he was trying to get. Never direct. Probably wanted Avery dead, but it wasn't like Jack would have any information to help with that. Then what angle was Jacob aiming for?

"I like her," Jack said, arms folded across his chest, on guard.

Julias came to stand beside his childe, while Jennifer seemed content to walk up the stairs past Jacob, and start exploring. The mansion held nothing that she'd want to steal or pry into, but she looked intrigued nonetheless, eyes scanning the walls and paintings and fortune in meaningless furniture.

"What's she like?" Jacob said.

Jack looked up at Julias before Jacob again. "Thought you wanted to talk about the werewolves?"

"Aren't I?" the Nosferatu said. Jack flinched. Kid was doing good standing up to the fucking snake, but something Jacob said managed to break his composure. "Not like you need to be a genius to realize there's a connection. Fiona starts indulging her appetite when Viktor and Tony die. Understandable. Her kind have a good sense for the predators in their area, and if two of the major ones die, she'd naturally feel more comfortable eating more. A few months later, werewolves are in our city, hunting something."

"Well," Jennifer said, leaning over a railing above them, "there's always the chance of coincidence."

Jacob snorted and looked up at his fellow witch. "You seriously believe that?"

"Are you suggesting the werewolves are hunting Fiona?" Julias said. "Why would she be their prey?"

"... what is their usual prey?" Everyone turned to look at Jack, and the young Ventrue met each of their gazes with something close to a frown. "I've been kept in the dark about this, but it seems pretty damn important. The wolves won't tell me, the Invictus won't tell me, the Primogen won't tell me, and now I'm expected to be an intermediary for a bunch of dangerous beasts without even knowing what they're after."

"Tell you if I knew," Jennifer said, still above them, still drifting around and admiring Julias's decor. "Jacob figures only person who knows exactly what they hunt is Antoinette, but she denies knowing the details."

"Really?" Jack blinked at Julias, and turned around a bit to face him, stepping closer to Jacob in the process. "Kind of figured the triumvirate knew their motivations at least."

Julias's turn to wince. "They hunt... we're not sure on the details. It's something... abnormal. Jacob might know more."

Jacob lowered his head to look back at Julias, and Julias's wince turned into a quiet smirk. No reason Julias couldn't turn Jacob's manipulation of the dialogue back on him. All's fair.

And the look on the man's face was perfect. Even with the bandage covering his eyes, his jaw clenched and his teeth clicked as they grit and ground. Julias knew better than to play with fire, to piss off his blatant superiors, his elders, but the damn witch really got under his skin.

"I don't have the same knowledge on the situation as the Prince," he said. "The talks between her and Simon didn't end well, but only she knows what was said in that room. I assume Simon is dead if Avery's running her own pack now. But... but the wolves don't hunt things of the world."

"Not of the world?" Jack rubbed his buzzed head, and stepped closer to the witch. "... that's the most ambiguous thing I've ever heard."

Julias laughed. Kid was growing balls. Jennifer chuckled too, before disappearing into the hall of his mansion.

"Well, that's part of the reason I came here to talk, Jack." Jacob leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and stared ahead at the boy. "I want to know what they're hunting."

"I don't know what they're hunting. They wouldn't tell me."

"And Fiona, what do you think of my suspicion, that she and the wolves are connected somehow?"

"... there may be a connection, but I don't know what it is. We don't know what the wolves hunt, so I can't piece together a hypothesis." Jack took another step toward the ancient beast, and lowered his arms from his chest. "And if I knew, why would I tell you?"

Well. Damn.

Silence hung on the walls like ice, and Julias forced himself to stare at Jacob as the old man stared at Jack. Didn't need eyes to show the frustration on his face, the annoyance with the muscles in his neck bulging and his fingers curling the air like weaving thread.

"... you going home anytime soon kid?"

Julias stepped in until he was beside Jack again. "You threatening my childe?"

"No, no." Jacob took a long, slow breath, put up his hands, stood up, and walked off the stairs. "I wanted to talk to Jack in private."

Jack blinked, and glanced between the witch and his sire. "Me?"

"You."

"... um, I was... but... uh..."

"Jacob," Julias said, "I don't—"

"I'm serious Mire, I won't hurt him, just wanted to talk to him alone. He's neck deep in shit and I happen to know a thing or two about this particular flavor of shit."

True that. Julias glanced between Jack and Jacob, and looked for any hesitation or worry. Jack dripped of both, but nodded to him, and stepped forward toward the door.

"Ok," the kid said.

"Excellent. No worries Jack, Julias, just looking for... some common ground." Jacob saluted, stepped out the door, and waited for Julias's childe to follow.

God damn the kid was getting tougher by the second. Jack peeked over his shoulder back at Julias, smiled, gulped, and walked out into the city night with one of the two oldest Kindred in the city. Kid had a knack for making friends; funny that it never manifested until he died.

"Guess it's just you and me now."

Julias raised a brow and looked up the stairs. Jennifer had returned, a smile on her lips and her fingers sliding along the rail of the grand stairway as she descended.

"Jennifer... I'm afraid I don't know your last name."

"It was Darla, back when I used it. What use does a witch have for it?" Confident smile, a smile he knew all to well as she finished her hip-swaying descent of the stairs to stand before him.

"I suppose the Circle doesn't keep records do they?"

"No. We remember our deeds and actions, not titles." Jennifer, looking him up and down, started to circle him in a slow walk, each step specific and exaggerated. "You, we remember as the man who survived Viktor and Tony's squabble, survived the purge, survived the werewolves the first time they came, and survived Azamel's hunger."

He didn't follow her with his head, but did with his eyes once she was in front of him again. Woman never stopped smiling, but it was becoming more of a sly grin as time went on.

"The other Primogen did as well."

"Ah, but they were older, and had to deal with those out of a necessity for their positions. You were just a neonate when Azamel first arrived, no? And a young ancillae when Simon and Avery stuck their claws in our affairs. All before my time." One of her hands reached out, and started to trace a finger along his shoulders as she circled him a second time. "And do not worry for Jack. Jacob does truly only wish to speak to him about our new troubles."

"I think that's reason enough for worry."

"Ha. Jacob is a bastard isn't he? A manipulative, smart bastard. But you should trust him more. He has the Kindred's interest at heart."

"Forgive me if I feel differently, specifically in the context of Avery." The desire for revenge could turn anyone into an obsessed, selfish villain.

"... he still hasn't told me about what happened with Avery," she said, and she sat down on the couch with a sigh. Comfortable getting comfortable, with all the confidence of a Ventrue. Different from Jack, a Ventrue with tenacity but without the confidence. Not yet, at least.

"Horrible things happened, Kindred died, and Jacob suffered a terrible, personal blow." Julias matched Jennifer's poker face, and sat down beside her. "So we don't talk about it. If you ask him, he might tell you."

Jennifer put up her hands and shook her head before settling them in her lap. "All I need to know is that he dislikes the wolves. I don't need to get on his bad side."

"... why are you here, Jennifer?"

"Figured you knew." She folded a leg over the other, and twisted on the couch to rest an elbow along its back, fingers to her chin and nudging her lips. A seductive pose, complete with a batting of the eyelashes. "We both have a common interest."

"Yes, Beatrice tells me you've grown quite affection toward her. Color me jealous."

"Jealous?" Chuckling, Jennifer slid a little closer to him, close enough so the leg folded over the other nudged her shoe against his leg.

He didn't move. "Yes, I am. She tells me the Circle of the Crone have no desire for privacy, or need for doors."

"True. We have little care for barriers about things like sex. We all enjoy our ghouls or meals in clear view of each other."

Smirk. "Yes, but you don't enjoy each other."

"... oh, I see." She looked away, and down at her foot where she bounced her leg lightly on the other. "It's that I am Kindred, that's the problem."

"You could say that... You ever been in love, Jennifer? Before or after your embrace?"

"Puppy love?"

"No, lasting love. Ever been in a long term relationship?"

"No," she said, voice once crisp and clear, now quietening and lightly wavering.

"I have, before I was embraced. I know what it's like to be in love, Miss Darla, deep love, the sort that'd last a life time. Even had the sort of marriage used as an ideal by wedding planner companies, to reel couples in." He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and sighed as he looked down. "I know what it feels like to have to let that love go."

"... you were married when Viktor embraced you."

"Yes." And the whole conversation was dragging his mind through the memories like he'd been tied to a horse and drawn, each memory cutting him open, rocks in the road. He just smiled, and let the pain pass, like it always did. Let her face fade with a century of experiences to bury her.

"Was it a choice for you?"

"No. Viktor forced it during the first World War."

"... you did not embrace your wife?" Jennifer raised a brow and frowned at him.

"Almost. One night, I nearly broke into her room and turned her, but I didn't have permission to sire a childe; I'd just be dooming us both. And... and I'm not sure I'd have wanted this life for her, Jennifer."

"... Beatrice warned me you'd be like this." She slid in closer again, and frowned at him from close enough he could see the different shades of amber and brown in her eyes. "You always this morose? You hate this life so much?"

"It comes and goes," he said, grinning. That managed to get a chuckle out of her. "Beatrice is the best thing to happen to me in a long time, and you'll have to forgive me Jennifer if I'm hesitant to share our bed with another Kindred. With ghouls or a kine, it's different; they're food, and connections with them are fleeting. Did Beatrice tell you she's the first Kindred I've been with in a very, very long time?"

"She did. And I get that you consider Kindred-with-Kindred sex to be special, meaningful... intimate. How delightfully archaic." Returning his smirk, she leaned toward him until their noses were only an inch apart. "You really love her."

"Yeah, I do. You think I'm morose now? I used to dread every moment of this life, and I drowned my self in sex with my meals most nights to try and forget it."

"I enjoy sex with my food almost every night as well, but I'm quite happy being Kindred. And besides, you're not drowning yourself in sex with Beatrice?"

Good point. He laughed, leaned back and snapped his fingers.

"How much do you like her?" he said.

"I like her a lot. And that ass, oh my god that ass."

They both laughed. The amount of sex he and Beatrice had had in the past month was astounding. Girl liked her ass more than he did, and anal sex was a frequent vice.

"Do you love her?" he said.

She shook her head. "Romantically? No. But she's fast become a close friend, Mister Mire, and I... well, I'd hate to ruin that." Sighing, she got up, straightened out her skirt, and leaned against the stairway railing. "So, the offer is there. I don't want to taint what you have with Beatrice. But, at the same time, I would not belong in the Circle of the Crone if I did not pursue my desires, Mister Mire."

"You sleep with all your friends?" A little jab, to test the waters.

"No, I do not. I do with my meals, as you once did, but other Kindred? Not since the first year of my embrace." She winked at him. Knew what he was getting at, no doubt. "And to think, I found this suit to impress you."

Julias stood up as well, and as Jennifer walked toward the front door, he followed behind her before opening it for her.

"It worked. And... let me think about it."

"Please do. I think you'll find I'm a joy to have under your sheets. I'd even share her." The raven-haired Ventrue grinned at him, licked her lips, and finger waved as she walked backward through the doorway, and out into the night.

She was a very, very attractive woman. Julias couldn't help but admire her butt when she turned around and put the rather tight skirt on display. Not as big or toned as Beatrice's, but close.

He closed the door, and smacked himself in the forehead. Was he being too dramatic, being so careful about this? He was worried about damaging his relationship with Beatrice, the first relationship he'd had in decades, a relationship he was so damn thankful to be in. Threesomes didn't exactly have the best track record with relationships, in his experience.

But that was a long time ago, and things were different with Kindred. Sex was different. And Beatrice was the one who'd first mentioned interest in the idea.

He sat down, and burst into laughter. How much life had changed. Used to be all he was worried about was if he pissed off his sire. Now he was worried about whether a threesome with another Kindred would ruin his relationship, and whether the Invictus would suffer under the claws of visiting monsters and wolves.

All in all, a step in the right direction. Now if Jack survived his midnight stroll with the deadly Nosferatu, maybe things would start looking up.

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~~Jack~~

If there was one way he was going to die, it'd be on a stroll home with the deadliest vampire in the city as his escort.

He thought Daniel or Antoinette had earned the title, but the longer he walked beside Jacob, the more he was starting to feel he'd earned it instead. The way the other Primogen looked at him, even Antoinette, was one he hadn't expected. A weird respect, like you might give a bully in school or dangerous cellmate who needed to be kept at a distance. But then, maybe deadliest vampire was the wrong title; rather, he was the most volatile.

"Not taking a ride back to South Side?" Jacob said, voice casual and body language just as casual as the two walked down from the Rich Side hills.

"I thought you wanted to talk?" It was difficult, finding a balance between defensive and not offensive with the elder Kindred. Didn't want to help him necessarily, but didn't want to piss him off. A tightrope Jack did not want to be on.

"Midnight stroll with old me? I'm touched." Another laugh, but Jack didn't join in. Jacob stopped laughing, suddenly, and frowned down at him as they walked. "You know kid, you got me all wrong."

"Do I?"

"Yes, you do. Think I'm a villain, a devil, out for his own gain."

"... do you think I'm stupid enough to blindly trust you?"

"Heh, touche. A little paranoia is perfectly healthy for a Kindred, can't fault you there."

Jack didn't like the paranoia, he didn't enjoy having to be suspicious of everyone. So he frowned up at the five-hundred-year-old vampire walking next to him.

"Are you going to try and convince me that you're working for my best interest? The interests of Kindred?"

"I am working for that goal, Jack."

"How's that? Far as anyone's told me, you create chaos so only the strongest are left standing."

Another chuckle. They never broke their stride as they walked, even as more kine started to show up on the sidewalks. Where South Side and Rich Side connected, it was an expensive neighborhood, a large one, and it'd take a while to walk it. Jack could call for a ride, but Jacob wanted to talk; not like he could call for an Invictus ride and just leave Jacob mid conversation, not without pissing him off.

"It's not nearly that simple kid, and you know it isn't. The Danse Macabre is a complicated thing, and we all have our goals. You think you can summarize me so easily? All I'd have to do is mention that you were the one that killed Viktor and Tony, and Maria and Michael would have your ashes by sunrise."

Oh shit. Shit shit shit. Jack looked up at the bastard again, eyes wide, jaw dropping.

"H-How—"

"I was there when Daniel brought in your broken body, kid, covered in ash-filled burns. Saw you had a pretty nasty sword slice from head to crotch too. Sort of mark Viktor liked to leave on more than a few victims I've known." Jacob grinned at him, showing off his teeth, and how his face could look fucking evil as hell even with a bandage over his eyes. "Tony and Viktor were elders. You don't get that age being careless with fire." He leaned in, close enough Jack could feel the creature's gaze, eyeless or not. "And your reaction was admittance enough."

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck him, fuck him god damn it. Don't say another word Jack.

But Jacob started walking again, and with a glance back to him, motioned for him to follow. And now, Jack had no fucking choice.

"... you have no proof," he said. Please don't know about Lucas for the love of god.

"You're right, I don't; I wouldn't need it. But this is just between you and me. And Annie of course." Smiling, grinning, smirking, Jacob kept walking, and Jack had to jog to catch up to him. "I never did thank you."

"Thank me?"

"Yes. Annie and I worked hard to get those two to meet head to head, but I doubted it'd end with either of them dead. Thanks to you, they both died! God damn what a fucking relief that was."

Jack fell in step beside the old monster, and glanced left and right with quick snaps of the eye. Jacob was good at timing his words, controlling his voice, speaking in ways to prevent nearby kine from overhearing. But he was still risking Jack's life just by bringing it up. Fuck him. Fuck him fuck him.

Wait.

"... you... were working with Antoinette?" Jack reached out, and grabbed Jacob's wrist.