The Selkie Ch. 02

That needed to be fixed immediately.

"Darling, you know you can be as loud as you want to be in my house?"

She craned her neck to look into my face, her brow furrowing deeply as she tried to comprehend the paradigm shift I proposed for her. Ina found a place in the world where she could comfortably express herself sexually without fear.

Since the build to climax distracted her attention from the fullness of the adjustment, the concept of her new form of social freedom may have been a bit much for her to come to terms with. But she did get loud.

Her moans of open pleasure spurred me on and my fingers charged within her. She called out, not yet knowing my name.

"Bella à ravir, bella à ravir!"

Her voice lilted as she spoke normally. With the rich tone of desire, the musical beauty of Middle French, and a touch of that throaty honest delighted surprise, no woman ever sounded more alluring.

I regretted breaking off the melody of her words, but I wanted her lips again. I wanted to consume the fresh and beguiling girl that had brought a breath of eroticism and intimacy into my frozen romantic life.

The kiss reflected my need to communicate my rapid obsession with her, my elation at finding my Ina. I may have bruised her sweet lips a little.

Meanwhile, my two fingers continued to punch in and out of her, pushing her up and up. Her strong young legs squeezed hard on my hand. I muscled a knee between her knees to give my wrist more room to maneuver.

I kept her rolling through her maiden voyage with me, letting her dip and crest with the waves moving her along ever faster. Her first scream of passion was cut short as she realized just how loud she'd gotten and strangled it off.

Her second was positively ear-piercing as she realized that she needn't practice self-restraint.

That was handy, as she seemed to have so very little restraint. Her orgasm hit her fast and loud, her back arched wildly and twisted in ecstasy. I felt honored and satisfied giving it to her.

She slept for a couple hours in my arms after. Holding her brought me a peace that I hadn't known in years.

We woke and I decided to forgo a day's labor to teach her the mysteries of bathing. Then I played my psaltery inside our little house while we both sang.

We stayed in that little house together for all 26 years, although my business expanded under her watch to a rather bustling cottage industry employing about two dozen people and trading up and down the river. She'd ambition that I'd lost centuries before.

As she gained the confidence that accompanied her ambition, I failed to hide my wereself from her as I had most others. After leaving for "trips" every month for the first year or so and putting off her questions each time, she finally confronted me directly, demanding my whereabouts. I hadn't the heart to lie to her and trusted her enough to shift in front of her once, swearing her to secrecy.

She kept my secret for a quarter century, all the way to the grave.

Those years were happy. Working, loving, watching her siblings and then her nieces and nephews grow up and have families of their own. Most of them were employed by her as weavers, dyers, traders, and beer wives.

Even with such obvious evidence of the passage of time around me and while watching her age gracefully into a mature woman of industry as we still shared our little lovenest, I maintained my denial of her mortality. I could not accept that the only woman I'd ever truly loved had no choice but to leave me.

I returned from one of my "trips" deep in winter. Her sixteen year old niece, I can't remember her name, but she was the spitting image of my lovely Ina as a teen, ran up to me as I arrived.

"Aunt Ina is sick. She's asking for you."

I ran to our bedside. Even as she lay dying in a fever, Ina's authority as the matriarch was an absolute and she cleared the room with a word.

"My love." I took her hand, but she pulled it away from me and shot me a look of such hate that I physically cringed.

"You...stole...everything...from...me...and...you're...still..." Her eyes closed, the effort of her accusation taking all she had left.

I stayed by our bedside, but let her family and the priest back into the room. I held her hand for hours, until it grew cold and there was no more pulse. I left then, not staying to see my lovely Ina buried.

A kind of madness overtook me at her death. Her ending shocked me as much as her love had renewed me, as though I'd convinced myself that my loving her might make her immortal with me. And then she died cursing my youth and my theft of hers.

I ran, ever North, I ran. My clothes rotted on my body, and I ran. I occasionally stole food from peasants too horrified at my appearance and demeanor to stop me, and I ran. The soles of my feet were black with caked filth and my hair matted into damp broken straw, and I ran. Through the deep dark woods of the Holy Roman Empire, I ran.

When my seal form was forced upon me in the fullness of the moon, I cried. There's no emotional override or false escapism for the purity of animal sadness. I'd curl up alone in the dry darkness and cry until I could run from my problem as a human again.

It was in that state, an unprepared and weeping little broken seal, that a group of vampires set upon me. I still tore out the throat of the one fool enough to lean over me first, though I doubt it died of the attack. One of the others clove in my head with an ax.

I came to in an underground cellblock. Iron bars, iron chains, and iron manacles kept me in place, with the long thick chain joining the wrist cuffs running through an eye hook screwed into the stone floor. The solid wooden walls kept in the heat well and the peat mattress and woolen blankets were warm.

Just as well, since there was no fire for either warmth or light. They'd enter often to drink and less often to leave food or water, but I wouldn't see them.

The only times I could see passed the nose on my face were when nature forced me into my seal form, but I'd close my eyes against the sight in the cells across from me, just as I wished to close my ears at all times.

Dozens of prisoners at a time were grouped into the other cells. The mortals consigned to death down there lacked stoicism in facing their end, bleating in their fear. My sorrow at the loss of Ina was drowned in theirs and I became numbed.

All of them died quickly at the first feeding. In order, the most likely causes of death from vampire bite are exsanguination, cervical fracture, and heart failure. Any that survive an initial bite will eventually die from a wasting disease, unless possessing the rare immunity. Even when "turnable" human victims are chosen by chance, survival requires the luck of being bitten by a vampire knowledgeable enough to recognize the condition, disciplined enough to stop the feed short, and inclined enough to care.

Years passed in the dark. Six years and ten months to be exact. I made a mark on the stone floor with the manacles each time I shifted back into my human form and they re-attached them.

Sometime in that month, I noted a screaming voice that reoccurred for far more days than had happened previously. A high male tenor calling out in Greek from the cell next to mine, "βαμπίρ, βαμπίρ! Βοήθησέ με! Όχι!"

Ironically, the length of time he survived proved that he wasn't human, but it also humanized him to me. Further, he reconnected me to the world in a way I'd thought lost to me. I broke my futility-inspired obstinate silence and spoke to him. As fucked up as it sounds, it was a singularly wonderful experience to have an acquaintance who wouldn't die on me.

Phixidis grew up as a Greek warrior, with no better estimate of his age than I had. We'd no common word for his alternate form, but I gathered he's a large cat that's neither a lion nor a tiger. He'd started to crack mentally in his anguish, so his communication wasn't entirely clear.

There was a plausible, but highly undesirable, way out of those cells. The conspicuous lack of fire, the obvious tinder, and the dried-out wooden walls had occurred to me more than once over the years.

The thought of consigning my fellow prisoners to the flames didn't stay my hand. They were doomed anyway and I reasoned they'd would suffocate rapidly in the smoky fire. The opportunity to avenge myself on my captors didn't drive me. Their predatory behavior held nothing personal that required vengeance.

I just hadn't built the courage. The smoke wouldn't suffocate me. The fluid loss from massive heat wouldn't fell me. I'd experience every second of my flesh melting from me. Moreover, I'd be committing to the pain, thirst, and hunger of the months of healing I remembered from my last total immolation. Even then, escape from below ground in the aftermath of the flames was far less certain than the pain.

Phixidis gave me the courage I needed to go forward with the fire in his vocal terror, although I haven't seen him again to ask if he appreciated my destruction of our prison. He undoubtedly endured the same unreal pain and extended recovery that I did.

I tried banging my wrists together, but couldn't generate the force required to make a spark. So I piled my blankets and some peat torn from the mattress on top of the mattress itself and against the flammable timbers of the cell wall. I found that if I slammed myself onto the floor with the weight of the chain to help, sparks would fly. On the fifth try, one ignited the old brittle peat moss.

The fire took. The screaming and pain ensued. I closed my eyes to the light, the heat, and the pain.

Thankfully, the dream generally ends there, with that awful decision. Despite months of cursing myself after, I believe it was the best choice. Phixidis and I would have been trapped endlessly had I not acted.

The dream still preys on my unconscious mind, but the memory can be dismissed easily enough once I'm awake. Meanwhile, Crystal felt cuddly with her fecund body against me and her experienced hands on my back.

I rolled over and checked the time. It was past noon and I should have left hours earlier. But the bed and Crystal were warm. I'd nothing to look forward to but another three days on the run and then the swim across the pond to who knows what. I didn't know how long it would be until I had someone like Crystal to be with again.

I kissed her neck and the soft place where her jaw met her ear.

"Mmmm. We still have an hour, if you want..."

I cut her off by kissing her lips and putting her hand against my mound.

Crystal took the hint and rolled on top of my prostrated form. She caressed the insides of my opened thighs, tickled my lips, and flicked her thumb over my hooded clit.

"Damn, that's good. Finger me?"

"Yes, ma'am." Her fingers slipped into me and curved up, punching into my g-spot. Her thumb kept right on flicking my my happy clit.

Her lovely breasts pressed into my chest and her rounded hips gave a comforting weight. I rubbed my cheek to hers and sank into the feeling of her touching me.

The warm sun streaming in through the windows and the simultaneously languid and purposeful stoking of my sapphic fires by Crystal's hand made me lazy and cozy.

I ran my hands over her naked back, ass, and thighs, memorizing the slope and smooth of her gentle curves. I squeezed her ass a couple times because she had a very squeezable ass and the beautiful woman made a cute little squeaking sound each time I did.

Leisurely, she brought me to a nice short morning orgasm in less than a quarter hour as I intermittently kissed on her neck and threw my own head back to moan.

"Ahhh, ahh, ah, good, good job, Crystal." I complimented the girl as she pushed me gently off my orgasmic cliff.

She kissed me for a couple minutes as I came down, then got up for some reason and didn't return right away. I was too contented in the moment to dissuade her.

"I thought I'd feed you. Before I sent you on your way." Crystal returned with a tray of breakfast foods. She set the cereal, fruit, sausages, toast, and coffee between us on the bed and we shared a quick breakfast.

I kissed her cheek and said goodbye before I left her room, escorted myself back to my stuff, and jumped on my bike to hit the road east.

I'd only rode about 5 or 10 miles when I saw the black sports car pull onto the 80 behind me from under the cover of an old billboard and thick brush. The billboard was for milk. Strange how that detail sticks in my mind.

Even though the windows were tinted, there was no doubt in my mind as to who was following me and why.

I'd little choice but to pull over. There was no civilization in which to hide for 50 miles and no other vehicles on the road. The Ninja couldn't transverse the rocky terrain of the desert offroad. The sports car would have caught up to me and plowed me over if I kept going east or tried to turn back. Even if I wasn't badly injured in the ensuing accident, I couldn't outstrip a vampire on foot in the open desert.

My best chance was the combination of my stolen Desert Eagle .50 and the lethal overconfidence of an apex predator.

I slowed and signaled pulling over and the sports car followed suit, coming to a stop about 30 yards behind me. I laid the bike down on the shoulder without killing the engine. Then I unzipped my jacket to draw the .50. I'd only have a few seconds once it saw the gun to get off a head shot.

The thing got out of the sports car with its hands up, which threw me. To fire on a creature signaling peace, even an inherently deceitful and murderous creature, would break my cultural creed. But - of course - it wasn't the first time I'd forsworn myself.

"Easy, little selkie," it tried to calm me as it stepped away from its vehicle. The fact that it continued to wear modern clothes off-campus surprised me, a dark fitted tee with an apsasu emblem on the chest and black jeans. "I won't hurt you if I don't need to."

Hardly the first time I'd been lied to in my long life either. That thing fully intended to drink my blood, which is fucking painful, no matter what it said. However, I'd never been called by my proper classification before. It gave me pause.

After the death of the vampire that killed Johanna, I traveled ceaselessly and found short work as a governess, barmaid, field hand, hired blade, sailor, healer, translator, and most often just a plain thief. Whenever I saw or heard of vampiric activity, I skipped town. I even spent years at a time in my seal form except for the three days a month that humanity was forced upon me.

Only for Ina did I put down roots and stay in a community for more than a decade. Nonetheless, in the three centuries between Johanna and Ina, I killed over 50 vampires while tramping about Northern Europe, armed only with fire, steel, and trickery.

Killing one at short range with a high caliber handgun shot to the head is child's play in comparison.

Recognition flashed in its terribly beautiful eyes as I leveled the gun and took aim. It ran at me, lustrous black hair flowing in the desert wind. Its long legs and preternaturally strong muscles propelled it at a speed only dreamt of by Olympic athletes.

Even vampires can't outrun bullets though.

I got a round off in seconds. The headlights gleamed through the hole blown through the thing's stomach with the first shot. The second shot left an adjacent wound that brought it to its knees about thirty feet away from me.

I fired once more, but didn't look back to see what the effects of my third shot were. After hurriedly holstering my weapon, I squealed away east on the 80 at the Ninja's top speed.