The Bottom Rung Read online

  As we went up to the big oak doors of the Palace, one of the blokes lounging in the doorway leant over as I passed and sniffed deeply. “Your pussy smells sweet,” he said.

  The wide grin was instantly wiped off his face as he was shoved halfway up the wall, feet paddling in the air, Bennett’s hand wrapped around his throat. I watched the others, fingers moved to triggers, but the muzzles of the guns remained pointing to the floor. “Bennett…” I said.

  “Don’t look at her, don’t touch her, don’t smell her, don’t even breathe the same air as her,” Bennett said.

  The vamp tried to gargle something out, but his crushed vocal cords weren’t up to the job. It wouldn’t have killed him, the symbiote rushing through his body would heal the damage the moment it stopped being inflicted. The croak seemed to satisfy Bennett as he let the guy fall. He turned, sweeping me inside the building with his brother at my other side.

  The Quarter was all about power, who had it, who could demonstrate it in a way to sufficiently cow others. It didn’t have to be physically impressive, most witchbreed looked like normal humans until they got their mojo on, then shit got weird. You might not be an especially talented witch, but no one would know, the weird aura enough to dissuade most people from messing with you.

  Power was what drove one vamp to take the title of king, despite the fact that the last one was executed in a bloody and public spectacle at the height of the Revolution. Power was what made him take over the old palace, with its gilt mouldings and desilvering mirrored ceiling. Power had clusters of vamps hanging out in the many, many rooms we passed as we walked to the main chamber: talking, smoking, feeding on so many pale bodies, fucking them afterwards.

  “You expected?” the vamp in a cobbled-together set of body armour asked as we approached the doors.

  “The king wants this one to make a delivery,” a woman said, imposing and tall enough to suggest some werewolf heritage.

  The door was opened for us, and we were ushered in. Power prompted the original designers of the Palace to instruct the labourers to cut the tiny pieces of marble in the elaborate parquet flooring, as well as the intricate wood carvings on the walls, the details picked out in gold leaf.

  Power had created the huge dais in the centre of the room, the rings of steps leading from it to the floor accentuating its position. Power had golden light coming through the massive skylight, the coloured glass used to create the rays of a faux sun, making Rohan glimmer against the relative gloom of the rest.

  He sat with one leg hooked over the arm of the golden throne, his leather pants stretched tight to make sure your eyes noticed what he was packing. When I looked up, he smiled, crooked and knowing, tilting his golden head in acknowledgement. “My little courier, you are quite tardy. Have my men been distracting you from your purpose?”

  “Your Majesty,” I said, sketching a quick bow. One recognised the power, or Rohan would seek to correct this oversight. “It was my brother, unfortunately. We had to make a detour.”

  “Ah, yes, the not so illustrious Marley. One of us can end him for you.” I shook my head quickly, a rush of fear filling me. “No? It is what he seeks. He would beg me for it if I made the offer.”

  “Please don’t… Your Majesty, as a favour to me.”

  Rohan shrugged, obviously bored of the topic. “You fight this, this natural fate of all the albinos. It is in your nature to seek oblivion; you were selectively bred for it for centuries. Those such as you that resisted…” his amber eyes slid to the boys beside me, “would have been slaughtered before maturity, not allowed to taint the breeding pool.” He leaned back in his throne, looking me over with a cat-like smile. “Well, perhaps my illustrious forebears were mistaken. I admit I find your resistance amusing, that and the fact that some of my strongest men are left dancing to your tune. Perhaps it will make your taste all the more delicious when you finally surrender.”

  “Your Majesty…” I looked down to see a pale arm reaching from one of the lower steps. Dressed in white, my fellow albinos blended with the marble of the dais, I’d overlooked them when I’d come in. There had to be at least twenty of them, looking like they lay where they’d been dropped on the steps. “Please…”

  Rohan pulled the petitioner to him, positioning the long, splayed limbs so she sat upon his lap. I saw a smile flash from behind the fall of white hair covering her face.

  “Ooh,” she purred, arching her back and grinding back on the king’s groin, “you’re already hard.”

  It was Molly, I noticed as her hair fell back, her mouth open, gasping as the king’s fingers dug into the seeping wounds in her wrists.

  Symbiote formed a clear barrier over vamp bites, keeping them clean and free of infection but making it easy to reuse over and over. The skin became sensitised, receptive because of the symbiote’s side effect. Some vamps thought it an art form, to remap their prey’s body with new erogenous zones.

  He picked up her wrist, licking along the punctured skin, making the girl writhe, lipping the surface in a series of soft kisses. “I can’t claim to understand your need to resist, particularly when I have great experience with the singular pleasure that results from our two species coming together.”

  He reached down and unbuttoned his pants, shifting Molly. I knew the moment he entered her by the guttural moan she gave. Seriously, I’d seen women give birth with less noise than her. When she was fully seated, she gave a little wriggle of her hips and then giggled. “Make it good, Your Majesty,” she said, pushing her wrist towards his lips.

  Rohan’s fingers closed hard around her arm, immobilising her, his other sliding to her nape which he used as a lever to force Molly to begin to move up and down his cock. “Nonetheless, you are useful. Your skin allows you into any of the enclave camps, my men’s blood protects you from what you encounter there. Bring me Nathaniel,” he said to the boys.

  “We were going to give Lethe a ride,” Bennett said.

  “You may do what you like in your own time, but during your shift, you are mine. I want the two of you looking over the latest gun shipment. There is something happening there, at least half the units delivered have some kind of fault. If that fucker on the other side of the Wall thinks he can shortchange me… Get Nathaniel, then report back once you’ve assessed the shipment.”

  Power had the men who promised they would always stand by my side leaving me to watch the increasingly rapid shift of the king’s hips as he ploughed into Molly. Power had me standing there, unable to look away for fear of reprisal. His lips pulled back from his very impressive sharp teeth and he kept his eyes on me as he struck, biting down hard into Molly’s arm.

  “Ahhh!” Molly screamed. She made it all seem very tempting, her whole body shaking with pleasure. Her screams now were just an incoherent rattle of sounds, completely uncontrolled and echoing around the great chamber. She jerked and thrashed on his dick like a hooked fish, it was as if she wanted to both throw herself clear of him and slammed her body down harder on him.

  He smiled as he fed, the blood smeared around his lips, not quite as stark against his golden skin, before pushing her off to land in a messy pile on the floor, still gasping.

  “Another,” Rohan demanded with a click of his fingers to one of his men loitering at the edges of the throne room. “I find myself quite stimulated this day.”

  He didn’t even look to see if his orders were followed, just slouched there, dick hard against his lean belly, watching me with a glitter in his eyes. A limp body was picked up by the scruff, moaning incoherently when the vamp’s skin touched theirs.

  She slumped between the king’s legs, only coming to life when Rohan reached down and clasped her head in his hands. Her spine straightened like a snake’s and her mouth sought the cock that he pointed towards her, it disappeared rapidly down her throat, his hand laying across her skull. Despite being the administerer of pleasure, the symbiote leaking from the head of his cock had her legs twitching spasmodically on the marble as she scrabbled
to fit more and more of the king’s length in her mouth.

  “Mmm, yes…” Rohan said, his eyes finally falling closed.

  The boys returned after both the girl and the king had come. I admit my head jerked around when the doors opened in relief. Coming to the vamp court was always like this- like they couldn’t fuck without making it some kind of huge spectacle.

  A stranger, taller than the boys, with a long fall of light brown hair and a strange shuttered look to his face, followed them inside. He looked odd, wearing a white wife-beater and jeans that’d seen better days. Vamps could be grungy, but always, always in black.

  Everyone waited patiently for Rohan’s head to roll on his neck and acknowledge our existence. “You two may go. Nathaniel, take the girl to the werewolf enclave ruled by Miriam. She’s to take the package and the offer in the envelope attached, and wait for a reply.”

  Nathaniel nodded in response.

  “He’s reliable, hasn’t been here long,” Gavin said. “We’ll be back for you tonight.”

  “I have no idea where I’ll be,” I said.

  “We’ll find you. Look after her,” he said to Nathaniel.

  “Come on then,” the stranger said and walked out of the throne room.

  I followed along in his wake, running to keep up with his long stride. One didn’t wander around unescorted in Vamp Central. He produced a key and unlocked a door, leading me into a small room packed with shelves full of stuff. He walked along the aisles until he found a black duffle bag and pulled it down, handing it to me. “Do I ask what’s in this?” I said.

  “I can tell you, if you want,” he said, regarding me with cool hazel eyes.

  “Nah, probably better off not knowing. How we getting to Miriam’s?”

  “I’ve got a bike.”

  “You don’t say much,” I said.

  “Yeah?” He stopped and looked back at me, “What do you want me to say?”

  “Ah… anything you want, I guess.”

  “Better get this job done,” he said and turned away. “I reckon you’re going to get a bit of work from the king.”

  “What?” I said, hurrying to keep pace with him. “What do you mean?”

  “This place, the currency it runs on is desire,” he said jerking his thumb to indicate an orgy taking place in one of the rooms we passed. There were so many limbs flailing that I couldn’t tell how many participants there were. "Outside of the meat stock the dark witches keep and the few that have connected with wolves, all your kind are here, unless they’re too old or too fucked up for use. Nothing manufactures desire like resistance. You’re resistant.”

  “How the fuck would you know?” I said. “I could be jumping into vamp gang bangs every night.”

  He tapped the side of his nose, “I’d smell it if you were.”

  We ran down the stairs, past the resentful gaze of the guy Bennett had pinned, and into the fresh cool air of the day. Nathaniel walked up to a shining black bike and grabbed the bag from me, strapping it on.

  “Nah, you smell like frustrated desire and fear.” His grin was so sudden it was startling, his teeth white against the bronze of his skin. “The most alluring scent for a vamp, bar none. He’s gonna have you back, again and again, until that scent goes away. C’mon.”

  I looked dully at the bike as he threw his leg over it. I shook my head and slipped behind him. Frustrated desire and fear?.

  “Put your arms around me or you’ll fall off,” he ordered.

  We tore through the streets, the bike sweeping along the road in a series of lazy curves. I noted the black-clad bodies lurking in the landscape as we passed. Low-level vamps would be out procuring for the Horde: booze, cigarettes, more of my kind, or any others they could persuade or coerce, to donate blood, or food for the feeders so they didn’t die.

  As they moved up, they’d run in groups, enforcing arbitrary turf lines depending on where the borders were that day. Those that distinguished themselves would get invited into the inner circle, be allowed into the Palace freely, and get their own digs to share with their crew.

  We pulled up when we came to the checkpoint, a line of vamps standing around in the middle of the road. “Where you off to?” a woman said, aiming her gun at the ground.

  “This one’s a messenger for Rohan,” Nathaniel said. “Got to make a drop with the wolves.”

  “Hopefully that’ll settle shit down. They’ve been active lately, a few of ours have been taken,” she replied. Nathaniel just shrugged. “Go through and best of luck, brother.”

  3

  Lethe

  On the border between the vampire and werewolf sectors

  The Quarter

  It took a while, but the land cleared the further out we travelled. The vamps had been attached to old Meridian City; they’d had it built to their specifications. Wolves rarely came into the more urban area, preferring the wide-open spaces of the plains, but that all changed during the Revolution.

  The vamps were taken down and interned first, along with the witches based in town. Then, as the human army grew and more effective weapons were developed, in came the rest. The subsequent jostling for position was still yet to be resolved, two hundred years later.

  The wolves with their superior strength and plentiful numbers, had the tenacity to clear the rubble from their sector, letting the earth regenerate and greenery grow again. It endeared them greatly to the many witches who used herbs or pulled their power from nature. Quite a few of the young wolves worked for the witchbreed, labouring until they earned seniority.

  I felt Nathaniel’s abdominal muscles tighten as we swung around a corner, toward the road that led to Miriam’s stockade. A lot of the rubble and girders her people had removed from the land, were used to make the thick walls that enclosed her camp. I watched the figures on top of the jagged ramparts get to their feet. Some peered at the bike, others leapt off their vantage points to the ground below, no doubt to alert Miriam.

  I tugged at Nathaniel’s torso, “We want to stop here.” He nodded and pulled off the road, getting off the bike with his hands in the air. I followed suit, standing beside him. Out the front gate, a stream of weres in wolf form came sprinting towards us. “Stay very still,” I said as the beasts circled us, teeth bared, thunderous growls rumbling in their chests. They were big fuckers, their backs up to my waist. A tall, lean woman with long dark hair pulled into a braid joined the group, looking us over. The wolves fanned out, each one moving around us, sniffing the bike, my parcel and then us. I found a furry snout being shoved between my legs, making me stumble back.

  “Back off, Rudy,” the woman said. “I don’t need to know who she’s been with; I can smell the stink of the McIntyre’s from here. Focus on the stranger.”

  “Hey Dawn,” I said, smiling and waving now it seemed that we’d passed inspection. “Got something for Miriam from Rohan.”

  She rolled her eyes, “Probably still trying to force the treaty. Thinks he can use us to 'divide and conquer’. I might not want to serve under Sharee or Rhiannon, but we’re not going to join forces with the vamps against them. “Divide and conquer,” she said with a sneer, “think he’s the first one to come up with that concept?”

  “Yeah, this is Nathaniel, my ride. He OK to come in or you want him out here?”

  “Can you vouch for him?” she said, looking Nathaniel over.

  “I don’t know him.”

  She looked down at one of the wolves with an eyebrow cocked. The wolf rearranged in a rapid blur of disturbing snapping sounds until a very tall man with a mop of dark brown hair stood before us; a very naked man.

  “Doesn’t smell like a bat,” he said with a shrug, then looked back at me with a smile, moving subtly so that the very impressive muscles on display popped out in further relief.

  Dawn inspected Nathaniel for a moment and then said, “Fine, we’ll hold Rohan responsible if he tries anything. Stick to Lethe like glue, bat fucker.”

  “Understood.”

  The camp
was quite expansive, was more like a small village. Huts had been built around the main building with an extensive plot of vegetables and grains growing in the back. Kids roamed freely, while adults chased after toddling babies, worked in the garden or vehicles and lounged around the doorways of huts. It’d be easy to think that the wolves had a more egalitarian, less power-driven society, but you’d be wrong.

  “She’s in the big house,” Dawn said with a smile as she turned and loped away. I climbed the steps, hefting the bag up into my arms and entered.

  The big open space smelled of fresh herbs and wood smoke. There was space in the front for village meetings, where rough spun rugs and lumps of timber acted as group seating. Out the back was a big table and at its head sat the silver-haired Miriam.

  “Hello, little white one,” she said when she saw me.

  I was actually pretty tall for an anomalous, but everyone was little compared to the wolves. She got to her feet, the loose green gown she was wearing swishing as she moved. She smiled as she placed a hand on my hair, pushing it behind my ear before patting my head. The fact that she towered over me, along with her gentle gestures, all reminded me of the mothers I saw in the old TV shows.

  “What has the little monster got you doing now?” I gestured to the bag I was carrying.

  Also sitting around the tables were the Elders, older members of the camp who acted as advisors to the Alpha. One of the men’s nostrils flared as I moved, then put his hand out. I froze where I was. Even with heads of grey or white hair, every single one of them radiated muscular strength. They could flatten me with a sweep of their hand. Their power might not have been wealth or desire, but the wolves still held it. Miriam nodded to the table, indicating I should put the bag down. She opened it with some wariness, her nose working overtime.

  A plastic bag with some kind of indiscriminate meat inside it was dropped onto the wood surface. The elders reacted as one, some recoiling as if repelled by it, other’s eyes shining green temporarily as they sniffed the air, trying to determine its worth. “Not willingly given,” one of the women said, her lips pulling down in a frown.