My Little Ventrue Pt. 03 Ch. 11

"... you are worse than Jessy. Yes, I do, with Antoinette. Sometimes her ghouls join us, sometimes they don't. Didn't we talk about this before?" The Jessy comparison was enough to make the Nosferatu sneer.

"Yeah just, I dunno, you're still young and your opinion on this is valuable. You think it's weird? Kindred just fucking everything and everyone all the time?"

"Um, not sure what you mean."

"Yeah uh... nevermind, forget it."

He raised a brow as he looked at the deadly woman next to him. What was on her mind? No need to push though, not with Triss. If she wanted to talk about it, she'd talk about it.

It took a little while to get down to the tunnel beneath Morning Street. They passed some Nosferatu on the way, but no one Jack didn't know. A small nod was enough for him to go by with only an innocent question or two from them. It meant Julias and the others would know he was down here, with Triss, but that was inevitable. Besides, he wasn't doing anything wrong, he was nowhere near Devil's Corner.

Julias would have words for the two of them later, no doubt. But it was easier to ask for forgiveness than permission. That philosophy seemed to come up a lot lately.

They turned off the flashlights as they got closer to their destination, and Beatrice covered them in the cloak of night. An invisible force that made his skin tingle as he felt his new partner's vitae extend its influence out and over him. Like that force, they were now invisible. From a distance people would not be able to see them. From close, their eyes would pass over them like shadows. Not as strong as Tasha's, much stronger than Amanda's. Hopefully strong enough to let them approach the beast.

Humming. A voice. A quiet, gentle hum. Jack raised a brow and looked at Triss, but she shrugged and pushed on. The tunnels opened into a large room, and the two Kindred poked their heads out from around the wall into the enormous cavern.

A stage of concrete. Furniture. Some very ugly, old furniture that belonged in his grandfather's home. No bed, but there were some drawers and a cabinet, and a changing curtain on a rod. A horrible, ugly green recliner, color faded and stained and covered in equally dingy red and blue flower prints. Good god if he sat in the chair, he was sure he'd find cigarette burns and smell cat.

But there was no nearby cat in the huge room. Just concrete walls, old lights, and an older woman sitting in the chair. Eyes closed, faded silver hair, short with the way age could make you shrink, and skin hanging off of her withered frame.

It was like Grandma had moved her living room and bedroom — minus the bed — into the Dolareido tunnels.

"Two children have come to my little home. Come closer, before I kill you."

Welp, fuck. Every time he thought he had his bearings, something flipped them. Antoinette and Avery were the deadliest women in the city, but just a peek, just a glance, just a single fucking moment of voice, and this woman joined the list. How quickly he was reminded that he was an insect before gods.

The old woman's voice was exactly what you'd expect from a old woman, complete with the history of smoking and screaming at children to get off her lawn. Her eyes were open but only a sliver, and she wasn't even looking in their direction. As comfortable with her surroundings as an old woman in her living room.

Sighing, Beatrice stepped out from around the corner, and turned off the cloak. "Yeah, sorry. Kindred habit, you know?"

"Yes, I know all too well. I'm Azamel Venastroth, as I'm sure you're aware." Grandma leaned up from her chair and blinked her worn eyes at them, skinny and wrinkled fingers clutching at the arms of her recliner. "I said come closer."

"Closer, right." Shrugging off her shoulders, Beatrice started the walk toward the woman's stage, and Jack fell in behind her. "I'm Beatrice, and this is Jack."

"Little vampires that scurry and roam." The old woman shrugged and brought a hand up so she could lean down, and rest her chin on her knuckles. "It was bound to happen with those dogs causing chaos above, I imagine. I wonder what they're up to."

She talked like a super villain, vaguely referring to things and letting their imaginations fill in the blanks; she knew more than she was letting on. The feeling in his gut as he got closer and closer to the old woman suggested as much, if not more, like instead she knew everything that was going on. Every step toward her felt like a step toward something terrible and vicious. Beatrice could feel it too; Jack could see her shivering a little as they came closer.

Begotten could see the beast in other creatures, according to Fiona. Kindred couldn't, but they could feel something, they could feel an aura, something inhuman, some with hunger inside other Kindred, in the Uratha, and in Begotten. It was like trying to describe something you could only touch, its shape hidden in total black. You could feel something like teeth, feel something like bones and spikes and talons and claws and muscle and fur. You could hear the rumbling voice, silent but to the beast within. You could feel the heat of its breath, and taste the blood in it too.

This tiny, frail old woman's beast felt like some lost, ancient deity, long buried in the desert, unearthed by curious explorers who didn't know when to quit.

"Come then, speak little leeches, why have you come to my tiny hole in the Earth?"

Triss frowned and adopted a classic fuck-you-I-won't-do-what-you-tell-me stance, arms across her chest and one of her feet out to the side. "We wanted to talk about Fiona."

"Fiona." Azamel shrugged, and sat back up straight in her chair. Her feet, complete with slippers, pushed against the concrete stage in a slow rhythm to get her chair rocking back and forth. Squeak. Squeak. "Why do you think I would know anything about her?"

"So... she hasn't come to speak to you yet then?" Jack said.

"Not yet, no. I'm sure she will, as all Begotten should." The old woman started to cough, the deep gargling kind that came out of the lungs. "And if she did, why would that matter to a couple of young Kindred?"

"We're her friends," Triss said, "and we're hoping to stop the Uratha from killing her."

"The Uratha are hunting Fiona?"

Jack nodded. "We were hoping you'd know why." And he doubted her ignorance was genuine.

Azamel stroked her spotted chin, and looked down as she contemplated. Such an odd scene, an old woman god thing, sitting in Grandma's chair, in abandoned tunnels beneath a city.

"The Uratha," she said, "are hunting spiders, as they are wont to do. Vermin according to them, relics from an era long gone, when their so called Father Wolf prowled the lands of flesh and spirit. Abominations, as they are. The wolves will not stop until the spiders are gone. I warned Antoinette these vermin would call attention to Dolareido."

Jack came in closer, and stepped up onto the stage. A bit presumptuous maybe, but she did say come closer. "You knew the wolves would come?"

"Of course. It is in their nature. And if I had known those spider vermin were making their nest in the city, I would not have come."

Triss raised a brow and came up to the stage, but not onto it. Defiant just to be defiant. "Why don't you leave?"

"I have plans." Grandma coughed a few more times, and gestured to the dresser near her. "Fetch my cigarettes."

Jack shrugged, slid open the drawer and got her cigarettes, a lighter too, and handed them to the deadly monster.

She snapped them up, but her efforts to pull a cigarette from the pack took time. Arthritis maybe. Naturally, the old woman refused to ask for help, and with time managed to pull one from the pack and light it herself.

"Now," she said as she balanced the lit cigarette on her lips, "you two either have a lot of courage or lack of brains to come visit me. And you Nosferatu are walking on thinner ice with each moment, so zip it."

Jack choked down his desire to chuckle, and Triss lowered her arms with a grimace.

"I like to think we're somewhere between," he said. "We want to help Fiona, and we were hoping you could give us information about this mess of a situation."

"Your goal to help Fiona is misplaced." Azamel took a long drag of the cigarette, and tapped its ashes into the ashtray that sat upon the recliner's arm. "But before I answer any questions, why should I help you? What does old Azamel get back for this?"

"An opportunity to help a fellow Begotten?" Triss said.

The old woman frowned at Triss, since she refused to 'zip it', but shrugged. "She's not part of my plans."

Plans plans. This Begotten sounded like a Kindred.

Jack scratched his buzzed head. The conversation was going well, surprisingly well. Just like talking to Grandma. "If the Uratha are hunting Fiona, they—"

"As I said, they hunt the spiders. What do Fiona and the spiders have in common?"

"Way Damien tells it," Jack said, "Fiona's monster half is very spider-ish."

"Interesting." Azamel nodded, took another puff, and blew the smoke toward Jack. "What else?"

"Uh... um... I don't know? I mean... wait, Fiona mentioned something about there being an extra disappearance in Devil's Corner that she says she's not responsible for."

Azamel chuckled, coughed her lungs raw, and continued to rock. "If this extra kill is being attributed to her, then it must have happened around the same time, in the same area."

The longer the conversation went on, the less she seemed like some unknowable monster, the more she seemed like a perfectly reasonable person. Maybe Antoinette and Julias were overreacting. They had a lot of hate for the Begotten, and so far he couldn't see why. Kindred had fuckups too, draugr vamps and such, let alone the nasty bastard elders like Viktor, Tony, and Lucas. This old woman deserved a chance. Right?

Triss started to pace. "So these strange spider things show up in Dolareido, and... the wolves show up to hunt it. There just happens to also be a Begotten here that is also a spider-like thing? So... these spider things are—"

"Sneaky." Azamel tapped the cigarette fresh of its ashes once again, before setting it down to rest. "They are not mere spiders. They can act with far more intelligence than such creatures should be able to. And no doubt, they have been drawn to Dolareido, as its landscape has changed dramatically in a small amount of time."

Jack winced. To say the Azlu coming to Dolareido was his fault was a scary thought, but at the same time, three elders dead at his hand was probably what Azamel was talking about.

"So they're smart enough to take advantage of power vacuum?" he said.

"Nothing so political, I imagine. No, they took advantage of the chaos, and when they realized Fiona was here, they saw an opportunity to create confusion."

"... fucking smart for spiders," Triss said.

"I said they're more than spiders, stupid girl. Would you... it's ok Athalia, these two children are just curious about the Uratha."

Athalia? Jack looked around, but didn't see anyone. For a second he thought maybe the woman was senile, but after underestimating crazy shit enough times, you learn to stop underestimating crazy shit. Someone else was in the room.

A woman stepped from a nearby wall. She hadn't been there before, and as she came off the concrete, her whole body emerged from black. It faded with a few moments, and soon became a beautiful woman of dark skin, slender and somewhat tall, with long black hair and soft features. Looked a bit like that Stephanie wolf now that he looked at her, but a kinder face.

Kinder face on the monster. Fitting metaphor, or a mask?

Triss frowned at her. "What are you supposed to be?"

Athalia shrugged, climbed up onto the stage, and sat down in one of the wooden chairs. "The two of you have a lot of guts just randomly coming down here."

"I guess," Jack said, "but we didn't think you guys would attack us or anything. We're all friends here, right?" Athalia and Triss both snorted, and Azamel coughed. Ok maybe not. "We're confused as hell and we're trying to save Fiona."

Athalia turned the chair so she was sitting facing its back, and she folded her arms across it as she shifted eyes between Jack and Beatrice. "Give me one reason to believe you."

"What?" the two Kindred said.

"Give me a reason to believe you. Kindred here don't like us. Your Prince and Primogen would prefer we didn't exist. Daniel and Jacob... So, you have to convince us that you two are genuinely trying to help out a Begotten. If what you say is even true, and the Uratha are hunting her, which makes no sense."

Jack looked to Triss for some sort of help, but she looked at him with as much confusion.

"Uh..." He hopped down next to the Nosferatu and turned to look at Athalia, his palms against the stage edge. "Fiona has come to me on multiple occasions, looking for help getting used to Dolareido. I was the one that introduced her to the Primogen, at my choosing."

"And," Triss said as she came up to stand beside Jack, putting her hands on the stage edge in the same way, "I don't give a rat's ass about Begotten, none of us do. The Primogen and older Kindred may have something up their ass about you guys, but Jack and I didn't even know your kind existed a month ago. Far as I'm concerned, this Fiona is a fun gal with a big appetite."

"Big appetite?" Athalia said.

Jack nodded. "Yeah, she's eaten twelve people in less than a year, and I get the impression she could have doubled that number if she feasted as much as her hunger told her to."

"... then, perhaps we should speak," Azamel said, "sooner, rather than later. If she does not learn to eat without killing her prey, she'll attract more attention than the Azlu and Uratha. Athalia, bring her to me."

"Fine." Athalia got up, tilted her head until her neck made a rather disgusting crack sound, and started walking. Without them.

"I suggest," Azamel continued, "that you two go back to the surface, and wait. Stay out of the way, and perhaps, the deaths will be minimal."

Minimal deaths. Not exactly the peaceful solution he was looking for.

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~~Natasha~~

Natasha opened her door, and did her best to hide her smile. Better to not let the two wolves know she enjoyed their visits; if they knew that, she'd lose the power. Or so Antoinette suggested as a means of seduction. Playing hard to get. Did she want to seduce one of them? She had to admit, as her conversation with the Prince had gone on, she'd found herself opening more and more to the idea.

Little her, seducing the big bad wolf. Antoinette had also suggested she wear a red dress with a hood, just to see if they'd get the joke. Look at her being all fun fun. She hadn't played around and laughed and been silly about things since Julias and her were close friends.

She had to visit him sometime. It'd been so long since they talked.

"Hey Tasha," Art said, sneaky bastard smile on his face. Matt was behind him, and the big guy offered a wave.

"Hi. What're you guys d-doing here? I could have been gone; you should t-t-texted me instead." She stepped back and motioned for the two werewolves to come in. Less stuttering finally, even when looking up at two frustratingly handsome, very dangerous men.

"We're still working on the phone situation," Matt said. As per usual, Art forgot to take off his shoes, and Matt stopped him from getting her floor dirty.

"Officially we're here because we convinced Avery that you provide us with valuable insight into the Kindred situation." Art shrugged, and slid onto a stool at her counter. "But we're really just here for the TV." He gestured to the enormous device against the wall.

"You know," she said, "if you wanted, it'd b-be easy to get you a better place... t-t-to stay than those old buildings in North Side. I c-could even get you a TV." It'd be easy, very easy.

"Heh, maybe!" Matt took a chair from her living room table; easier to fit his body than a stool. "We still don't know what'll happen after we catch our prey. I'd love to stay, so would Art, but Avery seems to think Jacob will make life hard for us. Not worth dealing with according to her."

They've loved to stay! She smirked and slid off the stool. Blood in the fridge awaited her, and she poured herself a glass as she struggled to contain her smiles. It was silly and dumb to get so happy just because a couple of guys were showing up at her apartment, but it was a first, and she wasn't used to it. It made her giddy.

"Blood out of a fridge?" Matt said.

"Mmhmm. Not n-nearly as effective as drinking it out of someone, b-b-but this works enough to tide Kindred over for a couple d-days."

"How do you get it?"

"The Prince owns many of the companies in D-Dolareido, including the hospitals. We p-pay kine to donate blood, handsomely. They d-d-don't know where a lot of it goes."

Art laughed and reached out to take her glass. She let him, and grinned as the man held it in front of his face and tilted it to watch the thick liquid move and dip. Satisfied, he gave it back.

"Cozy situation," he said. "In Tijuana the vamps had nothing so symbiotic. Kindred killed humans without mercy."

"That... is sad." She took another sip of the liquid, and stared into the crimson life. "I remember every kine I've... k-killed. Sometimes, when we're so hungry we can't stop ourselves, w-w-we drain a human dry. But the P-Prince doesn't like that, and... and most of us agree."

"What if they deserve it?" Art added, eyes darkening as a strange, subtle grin marked his face.

"Some Kindred take it on themselves t-to kill kine who deserve it, b-b-but I never... did it on purpose, I guess." Her kills were specifically only on kine who deserved it, but also only when she was so hungry she couldn't resist; which was the typical approach for Kindred outside a few vigilantes. Her answer seemed to satisfy Art.

"The bloodlust in Dolareido is very low. Interesting feeling, being surrounded by Kindred but not worrying about a sniper bullet to the skull everywhere I go. Don't see vamps fighting vamps in the streets, don't see humans being torn up on a regular basis, don't see any of the violence in Tijuana. I guess those three elders dying really agreed with Dolareido."

"It has." Though, from what they were describing, Tijuana was a far more dangerous place than Dolareido ever was, even before the purge. "The w-worst you'll find here is... sex holes and d-d-drug abuse." Not entirely true of course. Kine had their own ring of crime, but nothing worse than found in most cities.

"Sex holes?" Matt said.

"Y-Yeah." She poured herself another glass of blood. "I—wait, did... I uh, you t-two want food? I d-d-don't have, uh, any meat." Putting something other than blood into her fridge? She frowned at the thought, then laughed at the irony.

"Nah." The giant shook his head. "We ate before coming over... so all these cupboards are empty? You don't put spices in your blood? I'm sure honeyed blood would taste pretty sweet."

She snorted, something between a laugh and a groan. "Ick." Another sip, and she started to walk around, the way she did when she was talking on the phone. "Sex holes are... a f-frequent feeding place for Kindred. They're clubs, sometimes just t-t-tiny rooms in the back of bars or similar, where kine show up for d-drugs, and sex." Not exactly the sort of feeding ground she used, but the more confident Kindred, Daeva in particular, used them frequently.

"Man," Art said, "Avery was right about that."

"W-What did she say?"

"That the younger Kindred take every opportunity to get laid, as often as possible, and basically fuck all night every night."

Natasha frowned, but the frown faded as she thought of Jessy and her squad of delicious ghouls. "Some of us... d-do things like that."