The Merciless Alpha(erotica)

“You don’t think it was an accident do you?’

She shook her head wildly.

Vlad glanced over at his sister who was fast approaching, easily able to discern that something was wrong. “Where are you going?”

“A friend’s hurt,” he explained. “We don’t know how bad.”

“Fleet of foot,” Anya said, reciting an ancient werewolf blessing of safe travel. “Call us if you need anything.”

Sadie wondered what would happen if Vlad really called on his people. If this wasn’t an accident and he got mad enough, she was convince that there would be a war in the Gravestones before sunrise.

They both jumped in Sadie’s truck, their quarrel forgotten as she peeled out, throwing her siren on the roof and pumping it up. She broke speeding laws, as well as the laws of physics it seemed in her efforts to get to her friend.

When they pulled into New Plymouth, Sadie’s throat swelled when she saw that cute little Mini crumpled in the ditch next to the road. She could see Mary hovering over Mel’s body next to the road, and the wraith was glowing with rage. She wanted someone to strike out at . . . wanted Melissa to call out for vengeance so she could do what wraiths were created to do, but Mel was unconscious.

Sadie knelt by her friend as the wraith screamed in anguish. Mary had been alone so long, and now a friend and lover was slipping out of her hands.

“Mel,” the Arbiter whispered, “Can you hear me?” The goth chick’s vital signs were so weak, and there was blood all over the seat. It looked like Mary had ripped the door off to get her lover out. “Mary, what happened?”

“I don’t know!” the wraith shrieked. “I heard a crash, but I can’t teleport unless vengeance calls. By the time I got here, the other car was gone.”

“Melissa, who hit you?” Vlad asked, compassion overflowing in his voice.

Mel’s eyes crept open, but only barely, and she gasped in pain. “Duh . . . Dazza,” she whispered.

“I’m going to kill him,” Vlad said. “I’ll get 911 here.”

“It’s too late,” Mary whispered, now hovering closer to Mel. “I see her life force fading . . . she’s dying.” Then a look of pure desperation crept over that pale visage. “Sadie, you can save her!”

“I’m not a medic!” Sadie replied, looking confused. “I can’t –” She stopped. She knew what Mary wanted. “Mary, I can’t –”

“Yes you can!” The wraith grabbed the vampire by the neck and shoved her against the ground. “You can save her! You can keep her with me! Damn you, you can’t let her leave! She doesn’t deserved to die for YOUR war!”

Sadie was tired of being smashed around, but she was too terrified to do much about it. She wasn’t terrified of Mary, but rather was scared to death of what the wraith was asking. Mary didn’t understand . . . couldn’t understand. She didn’t know what Sadie really was.

“Please?!” Mary’s whisper was so heated and hungry that Sadie couldn’t face her. The Arbiter felt a chill in her own heart as she watched her friend bleeding on the ground. “I don’t care about the law or the rules,” the wraith continued. “I just can’t be alone again. I can’t lose her. She’s so beautiful –”

“What’s going on?” Vlad asked, his phone still in his hand.

Sadie looked at Mary first. The wraith, in the matter of a week, had fallen in love with a twenty-something computer geek. It was a star-crossed romance . . . one in a million shot that they would ever meet. Sadie had given them to each other, and now she was being asked to seal the deal in blood.

‘But I’ve only ever done it once,’ she thought. ‘And my blood . . . it’s tainted.’ She was different than any other vampire walking the earth.

“Please?” Mary asked again, her voice almost a whisper. She was fading, and Sadie was left wondering if the wraith had bonded with Mel in someway. She wondered if Mary would survive without the first love she had felt in centuries.

Sadie knelt beside Mel and lifted her head. Time was running short, so she would have to move quickly. “Melissa Neron, meet my eyes.” She did something she almost never did, certainly not in the presence of other people. She let her guard down a bit and let loose some of her presence, letting it wash over the dying girl’s body.

Vladimir shuddered as a deep, chilling power seeped into the area. ‘What the hell is . . . she’s not going to–‘

“Melissa, I need you to look at me.” Sadie waited until somehow Melissa was able to comply. “Look upon me, for I am Death. Do you fear me?”

Melissa shook her head. She knew of these words, for they had been spoken by the vampires at moments like these for thousands upon thousands of years.

“Look upon me, for I am Death. Do you accept me?” Sadie waited a moment, and this time Mel nodded. “Then let life end with death, and death begin with new life.” The vampire was crying. She was scared out of her mind, and she couldn’t even tell anyone why. She would tell Melissa . . . when she got the chance, she would tell her friend the whole truth. But that was for later.

Sadie leaned in, gently lifting Mel’s bloody and broken body closer. She pushed Mel’s head slightly to the side, exposing that slender, perfect neck. She saw where Mary had marked the girl, and set her fangs down just beside it. It had to be a clean puncture. Without further adieu, her fangs penetrated the surface of the skin and drank of the blood below.

Even on the verge of death, Melissa’s body reacted as if she were experienced great pleasure. The draw of the vampire was powerful, and Sadie . . . Sadie was special. She took more and more of her friend’s blood into herself, letting it mingle with Sadie’s own. She released her hold on Melissa’s neck for just a moment. “Now let the circle begin anew . . . take from me life, sleep, and be prepared to be born again.” Then she bit down again, injected the mixed blood into Mel’s bloodstream and let that mystical concoction take effect. Soon, Melissa would die, but it didn’t mean that her story was over. Sadie held her friend who was also now, in the realm of the vampires, Sadie’s daughter, waiting for the last of the girl’s life to leave her. She had done it just in time. If the sharing of blood didn’t occur before death, then the Turning wouldn’t take. And at last, Melissa Neron rested in a temporary peace.

Sadie looked at Vlad. “I need a grave,” she whispered. “Help Mary find a place. Put it in her yard. We’ll need a sheet big enough for both of us to lie in –”

“Both of you?” Mary asked. She’d never heard of a fledgling vampire’s master lying with them during First Day.

“Don’t argue with me or question me,” Sadie replied, fear still in her voice. “Not this time.” She knew she would have to answer to the law for this, but she would risk it. Mary had been right when she said that Melissa shouldn’t die because of Sadie’s personal feud. She looked at Vlad again. “Make sure the grave is in the shade, but we’ll need more shade still. Then, I want Dazza arrested and put in jail. I don’t care where he is or who he’s with. And I will take full responsibility for what has happened here,” she added.

Vlad was mentally playing catch up, but that last statement hit like a brick. This was a rogue Turning, which meant that Sadie had put herself under the thumb of local authorities and the vampire council. And who knew what it would mean for her status as an Arbiter. She had risked everything to save Mel. ‘She doesn’t do anything with half a heart does she?’ he thought as he followed Mary back to her home. He would dig a grave and then he had work of his own to do.

Ever so gently, Sadie picked up Melissa’s body and carried it to Mary’s house, where the wraith and werewolf were frantically tearing up earth in a backyard flower garden, trying to create a daytime resting place for the newly dead. When a vampire was Turned, he or she had to spend the first day of undeath under the earth, and Sadie intended to stay that day with her. She didn’t understand why vampire masters and mistresses never did that anymore. To her, it was no different than leaving a day’s lover before evening fell . . . it took away the magic of the thing. The thought of being buried, even partially, filled her with dread that most vampires couldn’t even imagine. The very notion brought back memories she had fought to suppress: blood and decaying fleshing filling her nostrils and throat. She was possibly the only vampire walking the earth who suffered from severe claustrophobia, and for good reason.

Mary and Vlad had dug a grave in record time, six feet long and only about three feet deep. Vlad had actually taken his shirt off while digging, and Sadie’s eyes caressed the lightly furred muscles of his chest and abdomen. She was appreciative, but past the point of lustful thoughts.Contentt bel0ngs to N0ve/lDrâ/ma.O(r)g!

“A thin layer of dirt on top of the sheet,” Sadie said, her voice quivering, “That’s all we need. Then throw a tarp over to keep out any direct sun . . . I don’t know how resistant to sun she’ll be.”

“Could she inherit your immunity?” Mary asked.

“It doesn’t work like that and you know it,” Sadie practically snapped. By the dark that hid behind all things, she was afraid. “Sorry.” She saw Vlad laying a blanket down in the grave, apparently hoping to make the experience a little more comfortable. She appreciated his efforts, though she knew they would be mostly in vain. Humans had romanticized this process to make themselves feel better. Sadie had seen it done many times, but it was only the second time she had ever Turned anyone. And this time was much different than the last.

She looked at Mary. “Each vampire is unique.” Sadie jumped down into the grave, then met her friends’ faces with tears in her eyes. “She’ll be different,” she said. “She’ll be different than other new vamps.” Sadie locked eyes with Mary. “She’ll be stronger. Will you still want her then?”

“Of course! She is a servant in name only. I would dedicate my existence to her happiness,” Mary replied. A small, sick part of her was happy about this. Now, Melissa would not grow old and die. Mary would never have to be alone again. She hated thinking such things, but could not deny the power of the idea.