The Muse And The Vampire

13

Leaving Flint with Ms Day and Ms Hunter, Sol went to the kitchen.

Opening the fridge he grabbed a bottle of deer blood and drank it down. He would have to visit a human donor to get some real nourishment soon. Animal blood could sustain him for a while but only if he had a live donor occasionally.

Would it be enough? Not really. He worked it out, it had been more than a month, maybe closer to two? He couldn't remember. The fog in his mind was getting worse.

His last human. Was she? He should have never given in. He banished the thought of Faith from his head.

The plan had been to send Ms Hunter to the library doing some pointless task with reading until she left out of boredom. Constructive dismissal they called it. At the very least she would be out of the way, so he could concentrate on finding more capable employees. Perhaps Flint was right they should visit Leafe pack for recruiting. That would be amusing, turning up at the compound and asking for a couple of Alphas. He chuckled at the thought of two vamps near wolf shifters, they would positively reek of desperation, the wolves would scent it. No, better not think about it until all options had been exhausted.

Another deer blood bottle opened and drained. He would have to go hunting again soon, maybe tomorrow.

Speaking of wolves he was glad he was not a shifter, having a dual animal spirit would have made life difficult right now. Having a part of you yelling in your head like a hormonal adolescent arguing with the rational part of you would be irritating. He just had to suppress the desire to bite into Faith's neck. Again.

I need her out of my life. Then I will request a transfer. Somewhere far away. Edinburgh perhaps? He had not been there since they drained the loch in the middle of the city. Edinburgh stank before then, especially if you lived in the poor area where the sewage drifted downwind. Maybe a stint in Paris? He couldn't see himself in Paris either, it was too decadent for his liking.

He couldn't go yet, not with the hungry ones. A few cropped up now and then, when old buildings were disturbed. They were the remains of the uprising, thirty years ago. Old and disintegrated, so weak even a human could destroy them. It was the law to send teams into old buildings before demolition to destroy the stragglers. You would think that by now none existed but yet, like the two that night, they persisted. They must have been lying dormant under the pier rotting away until Ms Day upset them, maybe they detected an undead lifeforce or sensed a primal urge? What of the one in the club? definitely more than a newborn who had not fed. Why? The Initiate houses were supposed to train them how to keep well fed. What house could afford the bad publicity these days? Bad publicity meant few recruits and less profit.

Except Ms Day had not an Initiate. She was nothing but a murder victim. A secretary and lover of the councillor, employed more for the latter than the former.

Old men were such fools.

He laughed, he was at least six times older than the man he was calling foolish. Being older did not make you wiser, it just gave you more opportunities to be a fool.

Like drinking his employer's wife's blood and taking one of her recruits.

Tomorrow after hunting he was going to write a letter of resignation to Richardson, possibly. Maybe even sign up to the clowns? Once you got past the beaurocracy, the Crimson guard paid very well.

Ricky would refuse of course, especially when he found out the real reason. Which he would.

It was all hopeless. He was being a coward.

So what else is new? He thought as he went to the fridge for more blood.

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