FIC The Mate Part 3
May. 18th, 2005 08:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jessara40k_ljSome more of my Anita fic.
Jean-Claude shivered slightly as he walked into the jeweller’s shop. He’d found out who Anita’d gone to for his necklace and their rings and made an order of his own, but he hadn’t expected to have an escort when he came to collect it – let alone for that escort to be Richard.
“Hello. Who’s your friend?”
“This is Richard. I am not permitted to leave my home without a bodyguard.” Jean-Claude knew there was a hint of bitterness in his voice, and he knew that was dangerous, but he hated that he was so vulnerable and that everyone could see his weakness. He knew that as a mate it was only his Sire’s strength that mattered, but old habits of thinking were hard to lose.
“Property of Anita Blake.” The human mused aloud, reaching to touch the chain around the vampire’s neck. “I thought that was just some sort of private joke, but it’s the truth isn’t it?”
“Yes.” Jean-Claude stiffened slightly under the human’s touch, what Hugo had done had brought it all too clearly home to him what he was, how very easily he could be controlled now. “You said you had finished what I asked for?” Anita would never think of having something like this made for him, but he knew it was necessary, a symbol of her control over him.
“Yes I did. Do you want to try it out?” He opened a large jewellery box, taking out three separate pieces of metal, one a two inch wide band of woven white gold with an open flat clasp, a second square of white gold that he slid onto the band, set with one square sapphire in each corner and another in the centre, and a ring at the bottom ready for the third piece, a white gold leash, to clip onto.
“I just need to try the collar.” Jean-Claude shivered and fastened it around his neck, feeding the end through the open clasp, then pushing it so it lay flat against his neck, trapping the band in place. “The keys?”
“Here. Not that they’ll do you too much good.” The human handed them over to Jean-Claude, and he was right. The vampire fumbled around with the keys until he finally managed to get the right one in the lock at the top of the clasp, the teeth of the key facing away from his neck – after ten minutes of trying. And even then he got his hair caught in it, making it hard for him to turn it – not that he knew which way to turn it. He spent another ten minutes trying to fit the second key into the lock on the bottom of the clasp, unsuccessfully. He knew he was blushing at his failure to do something so apparently simple, but then he had asked for a lock that he wouldn’t be able to open by himself, even with the key – or keys as it happened. Richard hadn’t said a word so far, but he’d been shocked when he realised just what the vampire, the master vampire, had ordered.
“Here, I’ll show him, and he can show your master. If that’s alright with you?” The human ignored Jean-Claude to speak to Richard, and the werewolf just nodded slowly as Jean-Claude obeyed the human’s order to hold his hair out of the way.
“I’d have thought the Master of the City would be a top, not a bottom. But you know I won’t tell anyone.” The human had offered to let Jean-Claude take his mind, provided he gave his word that the only command he would give would be a prohibition against mentioning what he’d just sold the vampire to anyone who didn’t see Jean-Claude collecting or wearing it.
“Yes, I know. And I didn’t exactly have a choice in the matter.” Jean-Claude shrugged and took out his wallet. “How much more do I owe you?”
“Another thousand. There were a couple of unexpected complications.” Jean-Claude had paid most of the price before the jeweller started the commission, but he’d expected to have to pay some more when it was completed. He handed over the money without hesitation. Richard watched him as they walked out of the shop.
“Raina told me that a slave was supposed to receive his collar from his master, not buy it himself.” A quiet comment, meant to encourage conversation, or an explanation.
“Anita wouldn’t. She doesn’t see that it’s necessary, although I did explain that for very formal occasions a mate is supposed to be on a leash. They are rare, but I have to be on a leash when she presents our first child, and when the Traveler comes to confirm that I am pregnant.”
“What other times do you have to be on a leash?”
“If there’s another mate found, and his first child is presented, or if Anita does manage to take Regulus from Hugo when she presents the first child he carries of hers. And of course if she feels like it.” Jean-Claude shrugged with one shoulder, it was a simple fact to him that his master would have the right to leash him if she wished, or restrain him in any other way that took her fancy. He tasted Richard’s shock at the idea and for a moment he regretted being so casual about it, but still he didn’t see what difference it made. Considering how protective Anita was about him Jean-Claude wouldn’t be at all surprised if she did use the leash to keep him in his bed for the last month or so of his pregnancy – that way she’d know where he was.
~~~000~~~
Anita hadn’t expected Richard and Jean-Claude to be waiting for her when she got home from her scheduled raisings. Gretchen or Jean-Claude, usually Gretchen, tended to warn her when her mate would be visiting her. To make Gretchen’s job easier Anita had required her mate to give the younger vampire full information on his planned movements at the beginning of the night before he made them. It had been Gretchen’s request and Anita had supported it, against her lover’s protests.
To add to her surprise Richard was letting Jean-Claude feed from his wrist when she walked in. The vampire was kneeling on the floor, on one of the cushions he’d given her, in front of the couch and Richard sat in front of him, his free hand stroking Jean-Claude’s hair. Anita quickly repressed a flare of anger and jealousy. Her mate would never lie with another without her permission, Richard was straight – and trying his best to deal with his depression and to overcome his own illness. If helping and protecting her mate could help their third then Richard could feed and pet Jean-Claude as much as he wanted, provided he didn’t hurt her mate. And he had seemed much healthier when he told Narcissus that he would never touch Jean-Claude again than after he let the pack vote her out as lupa. In a way they were right to vote her out, but as Ulfric she felt that Richard should have been strong enough to tell them he would take whoever he wanted to his bed.
“Hello.” Anita waited until Jean-Claude had finished feeding to speak, but he still looked up at her almost with panic in his eyes. “I wasn’t expecting you tonight. Why did you feel you had to come here?”
“I ordered something, and it arrived today. You need to see it, and Richard is the only one who can show you how some aspects work.” Jean-Claude bent down to pick up a jewellery box and held it out to her, head bowed. Anita knew that meant he thought she’d be angry with him about it. When she opened the box and saw the keys in one corner she knew he was right. He’d gotten himself a collar and a leash, something that she found disgusting. Admittedly she had to put him on a leash for when the Traveler came to confirm his pregnancy and when she presented their first child, but that didn’t mean she was happy with something like the, admittedly beautiful, specialised pieces of jewellery he’d plainly commissioned for the purpose. More than that, jewellery that locked onto its wearer.
“Show me then.” And she handed the box back to her mate. He fitted the front piece to the woven band that formed the collar itself and bowed his head forward, letting his hair fall away from the back of his neck so he wouldn’t get any trapped in the mechanism as he snapped it shut around his neck. Jean-Claude hesitated, then stood and clipped the white gold chain onto the ring at the bottom of the front piece, a simple square set with five square cut sapphires in total.
“I cannot unlock the collar myself, that is why Richard needs to show you how to.”
“Why can’t you unlock it? Why not make sure you’d be able to get that thing off your neck if you wanted to?”
“I can’t unlock it because the lock is too complex to open while at the back of my neck, and probably equally hard if I moved it in front of me. I wanted it to be a way to display my submission to you, and I know you will not use this unless you feel it necessary. If I don’t have a way to defy you I will be less tempted to do so. Please, I wanted this to be done properly, you are a generous master and it is one way to show how content I am to be yours.”
“We’ll discuss the matter later. At least you’re thinking for yourself, even if I don’t like the direction of your thoughts. Richard, how do I get this thing off him?” Anita watched as Richard unlocked the clasp. First he put one key in the lock at the top of the clasp, teeth facing away from Jean-Claude’s neck, then the second key went in the bottom lock, teeth towards his neck. He turned the top key clockwise and the bottom anti-clockwise, then held them in place with one hand while he pushed two levers set into the clasp together with the other and flipped it open.
“Like that.” Richard stopped short of pulling the collar open. “Do you want to try it yourself?”
“I should I suppose.” Anita managed to unlock the collar after only two tries. “Right. Now put those things away.” Anita forced herself to reach out to her mate and stroked his hair gently. “I’m not angry that you did this, but I don’t like what it implies. Do you want me to hold you for a while, or would you rather Richard took you back to the Circus?”
“I cannot ask the Ulfric to give up any more of his night.” Jean-Claude sounded as if he regretted that little fact.
“I already agreed to take care of you for another three hours if you need it. It’s not a school day tomorrow so I don’t need to worry about getting to sleep early.”
“Then if you do not object Richard?” Jean-Claude looked towards Anita from beneath lowered lashes anxiously. She caught that he’d noticed how much caring for Jean-Claude seemed to help Richard and he hoped that his master understood.
“No, but don’t you want to stay with Anita?” Richard obviously didn’t understand why Jean-Claude would choose to spend time with Richard rather than Anita.
“I do not wish to impose on her, and I did spring an unexpected surprise on her.”
“Besides which I want to get some sleep. You might not have anything on tomorrow Richard, but the mayor’s daughter got involved in Malcolm’s church and I’m supposed to talk her out of it – at ten in the morning tomorrow. Now that I know it won’t hurt my mate I’d rather you both go somewhere else, please?”
“Right. I’ll deliver him back to the Circus in three hours.” Richard put an arm around the vampire’s shoulders. “Would you like to learn to drive? I know Anita got all of her pard to learn.”
“Thank you. It gets harder to fly, or use preternatural speed later in pregnancy from what Damian says. And I think it might be bad for my child if I tried too hard. It will be good not to be too dependent on others for transportation later.” That was the last thing Anita heard as Richard led her mate away. She knew that Jean-Claude was telling Richard things he thought would please the werewolf, but he hadn’t been lying about the effects of his pregnancy and she vowed to help her mate learn to drive as well. He wouldn’t get his licence in time to do any good for this pregnancy, but perhaps it would help the next, if he decided to have another child.
~~~000~~~
Three weeks later Jean-Claude was starting to show and he called a meeting of his inner circle to decide how to best disguise Jean-Claude’s absence from the social scene. Anita was present of course, as were Asher, Damian and Faust.
“I’ve refused all interviews from now until the end of May, but the press will need some sort of distraction from me, and there’ll have to be some show of vampiric presence or they’ll question my absence.” Jean-Claude spoke quietly, looking at Anita, he wasn’t sure if it would be a good idea to mention what he was thinking. Fortunately he didn’t have to, she said it for him.
“And our relationship is pretty high profile, just because of who we are.”
“Yes ma petite. If I am going to spend the rest of my pregnancy in the Circus, or hidden away then we need to give the press something equally appetising to discuss.”
“If we don’t they’ll start lying in wait for you. And you won’t have any freedom at all will you?” Jean-Claude smiled gratefully at his master, glad she recognised why he was scared.
“No, I won’t, and if they find out that I’m pregnant...I don’t want to be an oddity, a freak. I don’t want the media to feel they have the right to ask questions about me, and they won’t understand what it means.” Jean-Claude shivered at the thought of how people would react when they found out that Anita for all intents and purposes owned him.
“I can understand that, I don’t understand this very well either.” Faust sounded totally mystified by Jean-Claude’s situation.
“You don’t have reason to, I only told you the bare minimum about mates, I didn’t think you would need more, after all you knew how to make sure that potential was never awakened, if it’s there.” Jean-Claude hated knowing that he’d broken the rule he’d taught Faust, the rule that would have ensured that his knowledge of mates remained merely abstract – never get involved with anyone living who you consider dominant to you. But he hadn’t thought of Anita as dominant the first time he marked her, and then it had become a matter of pride, and then he’d fallen in love with her. “You’ll probably understand more if you spend more time around me. That’s why Damian is a better source for information on mates than I am; he spent a lot of time around Regulus, more than I did.”
“What did you want to do to distract the press Jean-Claude?” Jean-Claude felt grateful that his master was changing the demoralising line of conversation
“I hoped we could get them to focus on you instead of on me.”
“How?”
“If you were willing to go on public dates with Asher, and with your servant then it would make it look as though you had a harem of vampires – you could if you wanted to. And then they’d be more interested in speculating about your love life than my absence. And you could make a point of taking your pomme de sang out on dates as well.”
“That would make me look like a slut.” Jean-Claude bit his lip and stayed silent waiting for his master to give her verdict. “But I swore to protect you. And we might be able to find another explanation if the press actually ask. I’ll do it.”
“Thank you, master.”
“What do you want me to do then?” Faust sounded confused and Jean-Claude bit his lower lip nervously.
“I was hoping that you’d agree to be the Traveler’s horse when he comes to confirm that I am in fact pregnant with Anita’s child. I don’t think it will be for too long...” Jean-Claude trailed off, he wasn’t entirely certain that he had the right to demand anything of his people any longer. Anita let him continue as Master of the City, but it was only so long as she felt generous.
“As long as he doesn’t do any serious damage I’m willing. I don’t want to be left healing from broken bones or anything though.”
“He usually accepts that condition when he’s visiting.” Jean-Claude smiled in relief, then he turned to Anita, Asher and Damian. “If you want I’ve got tickets for the opera tomorrow night. I thought perhaps you could get a start on giving the press a new interest.” This particular opera was going to have fairly heavy press coverage because it was for charity, and some celebrities were attending.
“If it makes you feel better. Nathaniel’s no use to you as food anyway, and perhaps I can try my vampire servant afterwards.” Damian looked so hopeful at that suggestion that Jean-Claude knew he couldn’t object, not really.
“Just not full intercourse, please ma petite?” He didn’t know why he wanted that restriction, it was still sex, and he certainly didn’t have any right to control Anita’s choice of lovers, but whenever he thought about Damian having full intercourse with Anita it scared him, in a way the idea of her having intercourse with any of her other men did not.
“I don’t need it to satisfy the ardeur. Damian?”
“Anything you offer me will be wonderful master.” He smiled with adoration in his eyes and Jean-Claude had to fight down a sudden flair of jealousy.
“Asher?” Jean-Claude hated sounding so uncertain.
“I’ll help you hide what you are. Until then ma cherie.” The blond vampire stood and left with his final words. Anita took that as her cue to leave, saying that she needed to tell Nathaniel that he would be going on a date with her – and two vampires. Faust returned to his duties and Damian stayed behind to watch over Jean-Claude.
~~~000~~~
It turned out that Jean-Claude had booked an entire box, to accommodate up to ten people. Truthfully Nathaniel wasn’t very interested in the opera, and neither was Damian. Instead the two redheads were talking about what sort of music they preferred for their performances and how beautiful Anita was. She found it flattering, but slightly distracting and she leaned up against Asher in an attempt not to think about it. The master vampire held her and stroked her hair. Anita knew that he enjoyed being tactile with her anyway, but not in public, this was only to play up to the media and to soothe her. She was a bit nervous about what she planned to do that night, and confused as to why Jean-Claude had asked her not to have full intercourse with Damian, after all he was the one who thought what Anita considered foreplay was sex, but she was willing to abide by his wishes. Even heavy petting by her standards could sometimes feed the ardeur, and orgasm always did. Still it would be her first time with Damian, and that was reason enough to worry.
Anita took Nathaniel with her to get refreshments during the interval, leaving the two vampires behind them. “I’m sorry to have dragged you to this Nathaniel, but I needed to make a public appearance with some of my other men, to distract the press from Jean-Claude. If we give them a scandal of some sort then they’re less likely to notice that Jean-Claude isn’t showing up where they can see him.”
“Why is he hiding from the press anyway?” Anita realised with that question just how successful they’d been at hiding what Jean-Claude was. She thought about it for a moment, and then decided that she had no reason to hide the truth from Nathaniel, he wouldn’t tell anyone.
“He has some unusual abilities. I’ll tell you about them when the opera starts, but one side-effect leaves him vulnerable for nine months at a time when he gets a power boost, and there are outward signs during the last five to six months when he’s vulnerable.” Anita did her best to speak in riddles, in the hope that even if Nathaniel caught on anyone listening wouldn’t. He did get the message and didn’t ask any more about Jean-Claude as they bought their snacks, vanilla ice cream with fudge sauce for Anita and chocolate ice cream for Nathaniel.
When Anita got back she sat by Damian, and began to explore his body with her fingers while Nathaniel sat on the other side and Asher watched with a wistful look on his face. Nathaniel didn’t speak until the opera started again, and then he asked Anita to explain what she’d meant. “It almost sounded as if you were talking about him being pregnant, but that’s impossible...isn’t it?”
“No, it isn’t. A few vampires, all but one male, can give birth to healthy human children sired by living people they consider dominant to them. You don’t need to know all the details, but Jean-Claude is one such vampire and I’m the 'father' of his child. It gives him a power boost every time he gets pregnant, but while he’s pregnant he’s terribly vulnerable. That’s all you need to know.” Anita refused to say anything else, but watched and listened to the rest of the opera, and when it finished she made certain to grope both Damian and Nathaniel in front of the press. She’d be able to make the same sort of displays with Asher later; they’d probably end up in the celebrity column or something. Jean-Claude had already decided what to say if anyone called him for a comment – that as far as he was concerned Anita could have as many lovers as she wanted, whoever and whatever made her happy, as long as it did make her happy and she supported him as Master of the City.
“Damian, what would you like to do?” They were in his bedroom at the Circus and they hadn’t even got undressed when Anita asked the question.
“I want to undress you and to explore your body. I want you to explore my body as well, and I’d like it if you’d take me in your mouth.” The vampire’s voice became lower and lower as he reached the end of his requests.
“That sounds like a very good idea.” Anita smiled at Damian and moved to the bed where she slid her gun beneath the pillow and then sat waiting for him. Damian approached her and knelt, pulling her sandals from her feet and kissing them reverently. He ran his hands up her legs over the silk of her pants and beneath her velvet shirt. She’d already discarded the jacket and gun holster and Damian rested his hands at her ribs for a moment before bringing them back out and beginning to unfasten her shirt. Anita ran her hands up and down his arms, carefully not getting in his way, letting him do as he wished, but still enjoying the chance to touch him. Damian was wearing a pair of dark green pants and a matching waistcoat, embroidered at the edges in black and leaving his arms bare to her touch and Anita enjoyed the interplay of power between them.
“You need to stop that for a moment.” When Damian spoke Anita realised that he’d finished unfastening her shirt and loosened the ties on her pants as well. “Just put your arms back so I can slide this off you.” He matched actions to words as she complied, and then continued. “And if you’ll just stand up for a moment.” When she did her pants fell to the floor in a pile of silk. She stepped out of them and lay down on the bed, where her vampire servant joined her. This time she was wearing lingerie in a green that almost matched Damian’s eyes and he caressed her appreciatively before removing her bra and kissing her breasts. Anita pushed her servant onto his back and knelt above him opening his clothes so she had access to his body, and then removing it. First she played with his nipples and then she began kissing her way lower, until she reached his groin and took him deep into her mouth.
Damian had incredible self control, Anita found herself thinking, he never once tried to thrust up into her mouth, but just lay there under her ministrations. When she realised this she backed away immediately.
“You can respond you know. You won’t hurt me.” She’d been keeping her hands on his hips to brace herself and make sure he wouldn’t be able to thrust far enough into her mouth to hurt her.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you. She-Who-Made-Me liked to force me to stay still when she did this. If I didn’t she would bite me, it took a long time to heal. And sometimes if I did she’d let me come. I haven’t done this with anyone else since then.”
“You didn’t offend me, I was worried about you.” Anita pushed her hair back out of her face, and smiled up his body at him. “Respond however feels best for you.” She changed to bracing herself with her hands on either side of his hips so he wouldn’t feel any restraint and soon had him bucking up into her mouth. As he came she fed the ardeur and sat up after she’d swallowed everything.
“Let me satisfy you now.” And with that Damian pushed Anita down to lie on her back and put his head in her groin, pulling her panties off. Anita wasn’t quite as considerate as he was, she scratched him very badly around the shoulders, and herself on the arms as she came, but he seemed pleased by that. Still she returned to Nathaniel to sleep with.
~~~000~~~
Jean-Claude paced around the living room anxiously while they waited for the Traveler to arrive. He was wearing a black wool jumpsuit with cotton robes in shades of blue ranging from royal blue to deep midnight blue, they’d sworn the seamstress Anita had used for the original silk jumpsuits and robes to secrecy and had her make up more jumpsuits to fit her mate as his body changed. The robes had been voluminous enough that they would still fit even when he reached full term.
Anita couldn’t avoid smiling in amusement as her normally smoothly composed lover was letting himself show how very worried he was. He was wearing his collar and leash for the first time since the day he bought them and the leash was trailing behind him as he paced.
“Calm down Jean-Claude.” Anita spoke for the third time, she wasn’t going to give him another warning. He paused long enough to sit by her on the couch, nuzzling at her hair for reassurance.
“I’m sorry master, but I just feel nervous. What if he’s angry about my pregnancy, or thinks this isn’t my first child? Or what if he realises that you killed the Earthmover?” Jean-Claude stood and made to continue his pacing, but Anita grabbed hold of his leash and jerked him down to his knees at her feet.
“I told you to calm down three times. Now stay where you are. Even if he does realise that I killed the Earthmover he can’t do anything about it now. He won’t be angry that you’re pregnant, and this is the first time that you’ve shown the sort of power boost that comes with pregnancy isn’t it?”
“Yes master.” He nuzzled at her knee for a moment and then settled back. “I did not mean to anger you with my foolish fears.”
“You didn’t. I’m not angry. But you should try to relax. I won’t let anyone hurt you if I can prevent it.”
“Master the Traveler has arrived.” Willy sounded uncertain who to address, settling for looking between them and addressing both of them.
“Bring him in then.” Anita stood waiting for her guest and Faust led the Traveler and Balthasar into the living room. “Hello Traveler, Balthasar. You are free to hunt in St. Louis, provided you only take willing victims. Traveler, Faust has agreed to act as your horse if you wish it, provided you don’t do any serious damage.”
“Thank you.” The Traveler glanced at Jean-Claude, taking in his swollen belly and the leash around his neck, as well as the matching rings he and Anita were wearing for the first time since they signed their contract. “I mainly came to confirm that Jean-Claude is pregnant and he plainly is. I also need to check that you have in fact claimed him, so if you’ll send him over to me?”
“Go ahead Jean-Claude.” Anita stroked her mate’s hair as she seated herself, before letting him walk over to the sitting Council member. The instant his hands began exploring between the younger vampire’s legs Anita shot to her feet and crossed to them in two steps.
“Get off him!” She took hold of Jean-Claude at his still slender waist and pulled him away from the Traveler.
“That was the easiest way to check that you’ve claimed him. You are very protective.” The Traveler sounded as if he approved.
“I promised that for the next hundred years no one but me and Asher would touch him sexually. I’m possessive anyway and he was afraid of being passed around.
“I see. Well you have obviously claimed him. How much has he told you about what this means for you?”
“Why don’t you tell me what it means as it involves the council, Jean-Claude focused on the parts that affect him?”
“You need to give us a contact address for anywhere you intend to stay more than a month, and we’ll give you the current addresses of other Sires upon request. You need to check with us before you go anywhere to make sure you won’t be visiting the lands of another Sire. You don’t need to give us an itinerary, just ask what territory the other Sires claim. But we do need to be able to contact you if need be, within a week.” While the Traveler was explaining what sort of involvement Anita would have with the council Anita guided her mate back to the couch and pulled him down to sit beside her, wrapping his leash around her wrist. Balthasar watched her jealously from where he stood beside his master’s seat as she began stroking and petting Jean-Claude and he leaned into her touch.
“As a Sire you are considered equal, or superior, to any vampire outside of the council. It depends on how hard you want to press the issue, your status that is. But you, your mate and any vampires personally sworn to you can travel anywhere that isn’t claimed by another Sire without needing to clear it with the local master.” That still left pack and pard politics Anita mused, then she considered what the Traveler had asked for.
“I’ll give you my cell phone number and address before you leave. Will you be able to give me the contact details for the other Sires? I’m going to need to arrange some sort of party when my mate gives birth.”
“Yes of course. I take it you mean that you need to contact them so you can arrange the presentation of your first child. Incidentally, do you intend to leave your mate in command of the city?”
“I don’t see any reason not to. He’s perfectly competent and good at taking care of the city. And the only other vampire I’d trust to take care of the city with enough rank is Asher, and I want him sworn to me.” Asher was considering Anita’s offer, he wasn’t entirely convinced that Anita wanted him for himself and not because of Jean-Claude’s memories.
“I can understand that if he means so much to you that you’re willing to share your mate with him. Tell me, how do you discipline your mate when he needs it?”
“Is that really your concern?” Anita felt furious and shocked that the Traveler could ask her such a question.
“I cannot take him from you easily, but I can do my best to find out if you are abusing him, and if you are there is one way to free him of you at the moment.” Anita could taste the ancient pain in the Traveler’s voice and she couldn’t help but respond to it.
“Jean-Claude, go and get our bonding contract.” After her mate had left Anita explained to the council member. “My claim on Jean-Claude is a contract that we each signed in our mingled blood. It has a period of one century and I think that it might actually only work as a claim for that long, but I’m not certain about that, and anyway we’ll renew it before it runs out. I asked Jean-Claude what three things he feared most about being my mate and gave him protection against them in the contract. If you want you can help me test if it’s magically binding. I believe it is, but I do want to know for certain.”
“How?”
“I’ll give permission for you to have sex with Jean-Claude and you can try to grope him the way you tried to earlier.”
“Then yes.”
“You have my permission to fuck my mate if you can then.” Anita felt as if she’d just betrayed her mate, but they did need to know and she’d stop it before it went too far if the contract wasn’t magically binding. She knew they had some time before Jean-Claude returned so she decided to distract the Traveler. “Why are you so concerned about the possibility that I might be abusing my mate?”
“Hugo abuses Regulus, he was a lover of mine, as was Leo when he first got pregnant. Leo was willing to share Regulus with me, but they wanted to spend some time away from the council lands, and Regulus wanted to give birth where he was born, in Rome, that’s why I couldn’t stop Hugo claiming Regulus. And when I did try to take Regulus back from him Hugo made sure I would never be able to use my own body again.” Hatred for the shapeshifter flared in the Traveler’s voice, and Anita couldn’t blame him. “You still haven’t answered my question about how you discipline your mate.”
This time Anita understood what was behind the question, so she smiled and told him what he wanted to know. “The most severely I’ve had to punish him was the first time, he’d lied to me about how safe my claim would make him and what it protected him from. I used the back of a hairbrush on that lovely ass of his thirty times – it was the way I’d punish a misbehaving child. And his ass didn’t heal until the second night after that so he’d have a reason to remember it.
“Now tell me what you meant when you said there was a way of freeing him from me.”
“Until your child is born you can still die. I could find a protector for Jean-Claude easily enough.”
“You won’t. I would rather die than belong to anyone but Anita.” Jean-Claude sounded furious at the idea and Anita smiled to see him looking and sounding confident.
“He isn’t going to Jean-Claude, give the contract to him.”
The Traveler grabbed Jean-Claude by the wrist as he handed the contract over, trying to grope him again – this time Anita didn’t interfere and Jean-Claude looked at her in shock and betrayal. The Traveler let go of the younger vampire with a sigh. “I still couldn’t touch him, but what does that prove?”
“That the contract is magically binding. If it holds for one clause it will hold for all, read it and you’ll understand. Come here Jean-Claude. I had no intention of lending you to him, it was only a test.”
“Couldn’t you have tested the second clause instead? And if you never intended to lend me to him is it a true test? I’m not sure if it works from what you say, or what you intend.”
“You have a point, do you want me to test the second clause then?” Anita laid her hand against Jean-Claude’s face as he knelt in front of her.
“You intend to hurt him just to find out if this contract is magically binding?” The Traveler sounded almost outraged.
“If he’s willing, yes.”
“How is trying to grope me before I know what’s happening any better? It is my body Traveler, and even if the contract is not magically binding my master will not leave me in pain for too long.
“Breaking a finger would be easiest master.” Jean-Claude turned back to Anita, watching her with pure worship in his eyes, despite the fact that the Traveler had tried to grope him with her full permission. That brought home to Anita, in a way nothing else had, how much he loved her as he presented his left hand for her to break a finger.
Anita took hold of his little finger and broke it quickly and carefully. “Traveler, it’s one in the morning now. Faust can take you to your rooms and I’ll send Jean-Claude to you there about midnight tomorrow so you can tell whether or not he heals without my permission. If that is acceptable to you?”
“Yes. This contract does seem to give him protection from abuse, but still...I want to see it for myself.”
“Then we are agreed.” Anita stood, and took the contract back from the Traveler before leading her mate out to feed.
~~~000~~~
Jean-Claude pulled his robe around his body more tightly before he knocked on the Traveler’s door at midnight the next night. He knew that the Traveler and his human servant were having sex in there, but he’d been given instructions to go to the Traveler and he didn’t have the option of refusing his master.
“Come on in.” The Traveler sounded slightly annoyed at the interruption, but when Jean-Claude obeyed and walked in he was sitting up in Faust’s body with the sheets covering his hips. He smiled gently at Jean-Claude, the younger vampire could see that it was forced but he’d made an effort for some reason. “Come here and let me look at your finger.”
Jean-Claude obeyed, mystified by the Traveler’s apparent concern, and let the older vampire examine his broken finger gently. “It is still broken, and my master has not said anything about permitting it to heal.”
“No, it wouldn’t be a true test if she had. Why aren’t you wearing anything under that robe?” The Traveler gave a lascivious grin as he asked the question.
“It is more comfortable not to wear anything under my robe. I’m having problems with my pregnancy, nothing serious but I can’t keep blood down unless I take a lot less than I need. So I have to feed five, six times a night. And there is no need to wear anything if I’m not going where people can see me, is there?”
“I suppose not.” The Traveler seemed to find that amusing for some reason, then he looked back at his lover, wistfully. He seemed to dismiss the possibility of continuing what they had been doing, but Jean-Claude spoke up then.
“I have not fed the ardeur tonight, should you wish to continue what you were doing when I knocked I would ask permission to feed it here and now. I do not wish to trouble you.”
“Go ahead and feed. Just sit over there, and tell me if your finger heals. Balthasar, love, come here.” The human moved into his master’s arms and Jean-Claude shut his eyes, drinking in their lust and pleasure as they made love. He could hear the sounds of their lovemaking and smell the scents, but he would at least give them a modicum of privacy by blocking the sights. They were comparatively quick about it, finishing in half an hour and then Jean-Claude heard them moving about, perhaps dressing, or perhaps just pulling on robes, because the next thing he heard was one of them coming towards him while the other went to shower. He opened his eyes, to see that it was the Traveler approaching him.
“You were never shy before.” There was laughter in the Traveler’s voice as he reached out to check Jean-Claude’s finger again. He remained silent; the council member’s comment didn’t seem to require an answer. “Still broken. Come and sit beside me for a while.” The Traveler put an arm around Jean-Claude’s waist and guided him over to the bed to sit there. He petted the younger vampire’s hair absently while they were waiting.
Balthasar returned to the bedroom and for a moment he looked furious to see Jean-Claude sitting there with his master, but then he calmed and sat on the Traveler’s other side, insinuating himself into his embrace. Jean-Claude gasped when he realised that he wasn’t feeling pain from his broken finger anymore – a full day had passed since Anita had broke it, and so it had healed.
The Traveler immediately took hold of his hand and examined it minutely. “Your contract does protect you then. And she doesn’t force you in any way?”
“No, she is very considerate of my needs. She hasn’t taken me to her bed since she realised I went to her from duty after the second month.” Jean-Claude paused, unsure how to phrase his next sentence, but knowing that Balthasar at least wanted him out. “I need to feed again. I can’t keep enough blood down at once to be able to miss it, and my master will want to see this.”
“Go on then. We’ll probably be leaving tomorrow.” And Jean-Claude accepted the dismissal.
~~~000~~~
Jean-Claude drew away from Micah slowly as he heard Balthasar arriving. Still curled around the wereleopard he twisted to look at the human, glancing up from beneath lowered eyelids.
“Did your master send you here for a reason?”
Balthasar looked furious for some reason that Jean-Claude couldn’t understand. “Yes. We are leaving now and he wants you to see him off at the airport. Your master has assigned a limo to us and that blond wolf, Jason, is the driver, so if you need a bodyguard he’ll do.”
“Yes, I do need a bodyguard; it is my master’s wish. And she has told me that Jason is acceptable. You have her approval for this?”
“Of course I do.” Balthasar sounded arrogantly confident, perhaps overly so, and for a moment Jean-Claude considered finding his master and asking her if she wanted him to accompany the Traveler in person. “Now get dressed and quickly. Don’t spend an hour deciding what to wear.” But he could see how impatient the older man was and he pulled a wool jumpsuit from the dresser, hoping it was one fitted for this stage of pregnancy, and red cotton robes from the wardrobe, dressing as swiftly as he could and slipping on a pair of black loafers. From the lack of patience with which Balthasar watched he knew not to ask for a chance to brush his hair, which was falling in a tangle around his shoulders and upper body.
The human actually grabbed Jean-Claude by the wrist as soon as he stood, dragging him along behind him to the garage.
“Jean-Claude, I hoped you would be willing to see me off at the airport.” The Traveler had returned to the body he’d used when he first arrived and he pulled Jean-Claude into a hug. “You do know that if you are in trouble I’ll do my best to help you.”
“I know.” Jean-Claude refuse to look up and meet the Traveler’s eyes, he didn’t want to embarrass Anita by appearing to have ideas above his place. He slid into the back seat of the limo, fastening his seatbelt and garnering surprised looks from Balthasar and the Traveler.
“Why do you bother?” Balthasar demonstrated his contempt for modern safety laws and Jean-Claude’s actions in obeying them by leaving his seatbelt open.
“It is my master’s wish. She does not permit anyone in a car with her who does not wear a seatbelt.”
“But why are you bothering now? She isn’t here to see.” The Traveler sounded curious, and he wasn’t demanding answers.
“It is in part habit; also it might prevent a miscarriage if we are in a crash. I know I would survive, but my child might not.”
“You know that it would break your bond if you miscarried, and you don’t want that. Did Anita tell you that she isn’t immortal until your child is born, until then she can still be killed, or did you overhear it?”
“No, I only heard you talk about finding a new protector for me, is that how you intended to 'free' me if she was hurting me?”
“Yes. I couldn’t help Regulus, but I vowed that I would help any future mates I could.” Not that there had been any new mates since Regulus first gave birth, not until Jean-Claude had conceived. But the Traveler had been the one sent to confirm Severus’ claim on Inanna and to represent the council at the presentation of their first child together.
“I appreciate your concern, but I am content to be Anita’s.” Jean-Claude put gratitude in his voice and smile, but further conversation was cut off by the fact that they’d arrived at the airport. Jean-Claude accepted the Traveler’s help in getting out of the limo, and a breeze plastered his robes against his body, displaying his altered figure for the photographers he hadn’t expected to take pictures of. Jean-Claude froze for a moment in shock, and then scrambled back into the limo.
“I have to get back to Anita. I do not know what her decision on this matter will be. But she will be the one who decides what the humans need to know.”
“Of course.” The Traveler seemed to be just as shocked at the press’ presence as Jean-Claude was...but Balthasar looked as if he’d expected it. Jean-Claude didn’t want to think about it and he just let Jason drive him back to the Circus in silence.
When he got back he went to his bedroom and knelt, waiting for Anita to return from whatever she was doing on Christmas Eve. She’d promised to drop in around two, and it was twenty to already, so hopefully that would be soon enough to tell her. Jean-Claude was getting a sick feeling in his stomach that she hadn’t told Balthasar he could go with the Traveler to the airport, that he’d been set up, and he was certain Anita would punish him severely for his error.
“Jean-Claude?” Anita sounded surprised to see him on his knees – not bowed down as it was getting uncomfortable by this stage. “What’s happened?”
“Did you give Balthasar permission to take me to the airport to see the Traveler off?” Anita pulled him up to sit beside her on the bed as he spoke.
“No, did he tell you that I had?”
“Yes, and then when we got there the press was waiting.”
“They know then.”
“Yes master.” Jean-Claude shut up then, he knew if he said any more he’d start begging for her to be merciful, and that was a sure fire way to be punished more severely.
“The only way I can think of to control this is to give an exclusive interview with someone, and make sure we get final say on what gets published.” Anita laid him down and stroked his hair. “Now relax.”
“I wanted to give you your present now, so you could open it in the morning...” Jean-Claude trailed off asking for permission, something Anita refused him.
“No, I’ll open it tomorrow night, when you open yours from me.”
~~~000~~~
Jean-Claude shivered slightly as he walked into the jeweller’s shop. He’d found out who Anita’d gone to for his necklace and their rings and made an order of his own, but he hadn’t expected to have an escort when he came to collect it – let alone for that escort to be Richard.
“Hello. Who’s your friend?”
“This is Richard. I am not permitted to leave my home without a bodyguard.” Jean-Claude knew there was a hint of bitterness in his voice, and he knew that was dangerous, but he hated that he was so vulnerable and that everyone could see his weakness. He knew that as a mate it was only his Sire’s strength that mattered, but old habits of thinking were hard to lose.
“Property of Anita Blake.” The human mused aloud, reaching to touch the chain around the vampire’s neck. “I thought that was just some sort of private joke, but it’s the truth isn’t it?”
“Yes.” Jean-Claude stiffened slightly under the human’s touch, what Hugo had done had brought it all too clearly home to him what he was, how very easily he could be controlled now. “You said you had finished what I asked for?” Anita would never think of having something like this made for him, but he knew it was necessary, a symbol of her control over him.
“Yes I did. Do you want to try it out?” He opened a large jewellery box, taking out three separate pieces of metal, one a two inch wide band of woven white gold with an open flat clasp, a second square of white gold that he slid onto the band, set with one square sapphire in each corner and another in the centre, and a ring at the bottom ready for the third piece, a white gold leash, to clip onto.
“I just need to try the collar.” Jean-Claude shivered and fastened it around his neck, feeding the end through the open clasp, then pushing it so it lay flat against his neck, trapping the band in place. “The keys?”
“Here. Not that they’ll do you too much good.” The human handed them over to Jean-Claude, and he was right. The vampire fumbled around with the keys until he finally managed to get the right one in the lock at the top of the clasp, the teeth of the key facing away from his neck – after ten minutes of trying. And even then he got his hair caught in it, making it hard for him to turn it – not that he knew which way to turn it. He spent another ten minutes trying to fit the second key into the lock on the bottom of the clasp, unsuccessfully. He knew he was blushing at his failure to do something so apparently simple, but then he had asked for a lock that he wouldn’t be able to open by himself, even with the key – or keys as it happened. Richard hadn’t said a word so far, but he’d been shocked when he realised just what the vampire, the master vampire, had ordered.
“Here, I’ll show him, and he can show your master. If that’s alright with you?” The human ignored Jean-Claude to speak to Richard, and the werewolf just nodded slowly as Jean-Claude obeyed the human’s order to hold his hair out of the way.
“I’d have thought the Master of the City would be a top, not a bottom. But you know I won’t tell anyone.” The human had offered to let Jean-Claude take his mind, provided he gave his word that the only command he would give would be a prohibition against mentioning what he’d just sold the vampire to anyone who didn’t see Jean-Claude collecting or wearing it.
“Yes, I know. And I didn’t exactly have a choice in the matter.” Jean-Claude shrugged and took out his wallet. “How much more do I owe you?”
“Another thousand. There were a couple of unexpected complications.” Jean-Claude had paid most of the price before the jeweller started the commission, but he’d expected to have to pay some more when it was completed. He handed over the money without hesitation. Richard watched him as they walked out of the shop.
“Raina told me that a slave was supposed to receive his collar from his master, not buy it himself.” A quiet comment, meant to encourage conversation, or an explanation.
“Anita wouldn’t. She doesn’t see that it’s necessary, although I did explain that for very formal occasions a mate is supposed to be on a leash. They are rare, but I have to be on a leash when she presents our first child, and when the Traveler comes to confirm that I am pregnant.”
“What other times do you have to be on a leash?”
“If there’s another mate found, and his first child is presented, or if Anita does manage to take Regulus from Hugo when she presents the first child he carries of hers. And of course if she feels like it.” Jean-Claude shrugged with one shoulder, it was a simple fact to him that his master would have the right to leash him if she wished, or restrain him in any other way that took her fancy. He tasted Richard’s shock at the idea and for a moment he regretted being so casual about it, but still he didn’t see what difference it made. Considering how protective Anita was about him Jean-Claude wouldn’t be at all surprised if she did use the leash to keep him in his bed for the last month or so of his pregnancy – that way she’d know where he was.
Anita hadn’t expected Richard and Jean-Claude to be waiting for her when she got home from her scheduled raisings. Gretchen or Jean-Claude, usually Gretchen, tended to warn her when her mate would be visiting her. To make Gretchen’s job easier Anita had required her mate to give the younger vampire full information on his planned movements at the beginning of the night before he made them. It had been Gretchen’s request and Anita had supported it, against her lover’s protests.
To add to her surprise Richard was letting Jean-Claude feed from his wrist when she walked in. The vampire was kneeling on the floor, on one of the cushions he’d given her, in front of the couch and Richard sat in front of him, his free hand stroking Jean-Claude’s hair. Anita quickly repressed a flare of anger and jealousy. Her mate would never lie with another without her permission, Richard was straight – and trying his best to deal with his depression and to overcome his own illness. If helping and protecting her mate could help their third then Richard could feed and pet Jean-Claude as much as he wanted, provided he didn’t hurt her mate. And he had seemed much healthier when he told Narcissus that he would never touch Jean-Claude again than after he let the pack vote her out as lupa. In a way they were right to vote her out, but as Ulfric she felt that Richard should have been strong enough to tell them he would take whoever he wanted to his bed.
“Hello.” Anita waited until Jean-Claude had finished feeding to speak, but he still looked up at her almost with panic in his eyes. “I wasn’t expecting you tonight. Why did you feel you had to come here?”
“I ordered something, and it arrived today. You need to see it, and Richard is the only one who can show you how some aspects work.” Jean-Claude bent down to pick up a jewellery box and held it out to her, head bowed. Anita knew that meant he thought she’d be angry with him about it. When she opened the box and saw the keys in one corner she knew he was right. He’d gotten himself a collar and a leash, something that she found disgusting. Admittedly she had to put him on a leash for when the Traveler came to confirm his pregnancy and when she presented their first child, but that didn’t mean she was happy with something like the, admittedly beautiful, specialised pieces of jewellery he’d plainly commissioned for the purpose. More than that, jewellery that locked onto its wearer.
“Show me then.” And she handed the box back to her mate. He fitted the front piece to the woven band that formed the collar itself and bowed his head forward, letting his hair fall away from the back of his neck so he wouldn’t get any trapped in the mechanism as he snapped it shut around his neck. Jean-Claude hesitated, then stood and clipped the white gold chain onto the ring at the bottom of the front piece, a simple square set with five square cut sapphires in total.
“I cannot unlock the collar myself, that is why Richard needs to show you how to.”
“Why can’t you unlock it? Why not make sure you’d be able to get that thing off your neck if you wanted to?”
“I can’t unlock it because the lock is too complex to open while at the back of my neck, and probably equally hard if I moved it in front of me. I wanted it to be a way to display my submission to you, and I know you will not use this unless you feel it necessary. If I don’t have a way to defy you I will be less tempted to do so. Please, I wanted this to be done properly, you are a generous master and it is one way to show how content I am to be yours.”
“We’ll discuss the matter later. At least you’re thinking for yourself, even if I don’t like the direction of your thoughts. Richard, how do I get this thing off him?” Anita watched as Richard unlocked the clasp. First he put one key in the lock at the top of the clasp, teeth facing away from Jean-Claude’s neck, then the second key went in the bottom lock, teeth towards his neck. He turned the top key clockwise and the bottom anti-clockwise, then held them in place with one hand while he pushed two levers set into the clasp together with the other and flipped it open.
“Like that.” Richard stopped short of pulling the collar open. “Do you want to try it yourself?”
“I should I suppose.” Anita managed to unlock the collar after only two tries. “Right. Now put those things away.” Anita forced herself to reach out to her mate and stroked his hair gently. “I’m not angry that you did this, but I don’t like what it implies. Do you want me to hold you for a while, or would you rather Richard took you back to the Circus?”
“I cannot ask the Ulfric to give up any more of his night.” Jean-Claude sounded as if he regretted that little fact.
“I already agreed to take care of you for another three hours if you need it. It’s not a school day tomorrow so I don’t need to worry about getting to sleep early.”
“Then if you do not object Richard?” Jean-Claude looked towards Anita from beneath lowered lashes anxiously. She caught that he’d noticed how much caring for Jean-Claude seemed to help Richard and he hoped that his master understood.
“No, but don’t you want to stay with Anita?” Richard obviously didn’t understand why Jean-Claude would choose to spend time with Richard rather than Anita.
“I do not wish to impose on her, and I did spring an unexpected surprise on her.”
“Besides which I want to get some sleep. You might not have anything on tomorrow Richard, but the mayor’s daughter got involved in Malcolm’s church and I’m supposed to talk her out of it – at ten in the morning tomorrow. Now that I know it won’t hurt my mate I’d rather you both go somewhere else, please?”
“Right. I’ll deliver him back to the Circus in three hours.” Richard put an arm around the vampire’s shoulders. “Would you like to learn to drive? I know Anita got all of her pard to learn.”
“Thank you. It gets harder to fly, or use preternatural speed later in pregnancy from what Damian says. And I think it might be bad for my child if I tried too hard. It will be good not to be too dependent on others for transportation later.” That was the last thing Anita heard as Richard led her mate away. She knew that Jean-Claude was telling Richard things he thought would please the werewolf, but he hadn’t been lying about the effects of his pregnancy and she vowed to help her mate learn to drive as well. He wouldn’t get his licence in time to do any good for this pregnancy, but perhaps it would help the next, if he decided to have another child.
Three weeks later Jean-Claude was starting to show and he called a meeting of his inner circle to decide how to best disguise Jean-Claude’s absence from the social scene. Anita was present of course, as were Asher, Damian and Faust.
“I’ve refused all interviews from now until the end of May, but the press will need some sort of distraction from me, and there’ll have to be some show of vampiric presence or they’ll question my absence.” Jean-Claude spoke quietly, looking at Anita, he wasn’t sure if it would be a good idea to mention what he was thinking. Fortunately he didn’t have to, she said it for him.
“And our relationship is pretty high profile, just because of who we are.”
“Yes ma petite. If I am going to spend the rest of my pregnancy in the Circus, or hidden away then we need to give the press something equally appetising to discuss.”
“If we don’t they’ll start lying in wait for you. And you won’t have any freedom at all will you?” Jean-Claude smiled gratefully at his master, glad she recognised why he was scared.
“No, I won’t, and if they find out that I’m pregnant...I don’t want to be an oddity, a freak. I don’t want the media to feel they have the right to ask questions about me, and they won’t understand what it means.” Jean-Claude shivered at the thought of how people would react when they found out that Anita for all intents and purposes owned him.
“I can understand that, I don’t understand this very well either.” Faust sounded totally mystified by Jean-Claude’s situation.
“You don’t have reason to, I only told you the bare minimum about mates, I didn’t think you would need more, after all you knew how to make sure that potential was never awakened, if it’s there.” Jean-Claude hated knowing that he’d broken the rule he’d taught Faust, the rule that would have ensured that his knowledge of mates remained merely abstract – never get involved with anyone living who you consider dominant to you. But he hadn’t thought of Anita as dominant the first time he marked her, and then it had become a matter of pride, and then he’d fallen in love with her. “You’ll probably understand more if you spend more time around me. That’s why Damian is a better source for information on mates than I am; he spent a lot of time around Regulus, more than I did.”
“What did you want to do to distract the press Jean-Claude?” Jean-Claude felt grateful that his master was changing the demoralising line of conversation
“I hoped we could get them to focus on you instead of on me.”
“How?”
“If you were willing to go on public dates with Asher, and with your servant then it would make it look as though you had a harem of vampires – you could if you wanted to. And then they’d be more interested in speculating about your love life than my absence. And you could make a point of taking your pomme de sang out on dates as well.”
“That would make me look like a slut.” Jean-Claude bit his lip and stayed silent waiting for his master to give her verdict. “But I swore to protect you. And we might be able to find another explanation if the press actually ask. I’ll do it.”
“Thank you, master.”
“What do you want me to do then?” Faust sounded confused and Jean-Claude bit his lower lip nervously.
“I was hoping that you’d agree to be the Traveler’s horse when he comes to confirm that I am in fact pregnant with Anita’s child. I don’t think it will be for too long...” Jean-Claude trailed off, he wasn’t entirely certain that he had the right to demand anything of his people any longer. Anita let him continue as Master of the City, but it was only so long as she felt generous.
“As long as he doesn’t do any serious damage I’m willing. I don’t want to be left healing from broken bones or anything though.”
“He usually accepts that condition when he’s visiting.” Jean-Claude smiled in relief, then he turned to Anita, Asher and Damian. “If you want I’ve got tickets for the opera tomorrow night. I thought perhaps you could get a start on giving the press a new interest.” This particular opera was going to have fairly heavy press coverage because it was for charity, and some celebrities were attending.
“If it makes you feel better. Nathaniel’s no use to you as food anyway, and perhaps I can try my vampire servant afterwards.” Damian looked so hopeful at that suggestion that Jean-Claude knew he couldn’t object, not really.
“Just not full intercourse, please ma petite?” He didn’t know why he wanted that restriction, it was still sex, and he certainly didn’t have any right to control Anita’s choice of lovers, but whenever he thought about Damian having full intercourse with Anita it scared him, in a way the idea of her having intercourse with any of her other men did not.
“I don’t need it to satisfy the ardeur. Damian?”
“Anything you offer me will be wonderful master.” He smiled with adoration in his eyes and Jean-Claude had to fight down a sudden flair of jealousy.
“Asher?” Jean-Claude hated sounding so uncertain.
“I’ll help you hide what you are. Until then ma cherie.” The blond vampire stood and left with his final words. Anita took that as her cue to leave, saying that she needed to tell Nathaniel that he would be going on a date with her – and two vampires. Faust returned to his duties and Damian stayed behind to watch over Jean-Claude.
It turned out that Jean-Claude had booked an entire box, to accommodate up to ten people. Truthfully Nathaniel wasn’t very interested in the opera, and neither was Damian. Instead the two redheads were talking about what sort of music they preferred for their performances and how beautiful Anita was. She found it flattering, but slightly distracting and she leaned up against Asher in an attempt not to think about it. The master vampire held her and stroked her hair. Anita knew that he enjoyed being tactile with her anyway, but not in public, this was only to play up to the media and to soothe her. She was a bit nervous about what she planned to do that night, and confused as to why Jean-Claude had asked her not to have full intercourse with Damian, after all he was the one who thought what Anita considered foreplay was sex, but she was willing to abide by his wishes. Even heavy petting by her standards could sometimes feed the ardeur, and orgasm always did. Still it would be her first time with Damian, and that was reason enough to worry.
Anita took Nathaniel with her to get refreshments during the interval, leaving the two vampires behind them. “I’m sorry to have dragged you to this Nathaniel, but I needed to make a public appearance with some of my other men, to distract the press from Jean-Claude. If we give them a scandal of some sort then they’re less likely to notice that Jean-Claude isn’t showing up where they can see him.”
“Why is he hiding from the press anyway?” Anita realised with that question just how successful they’d been at hiding what Jean-Claude was. She thought about it for a moment, and then decided that she had no reason to hide the truth from Nathaniel, he wouldn’t tell anyone.
“He has some unusual abilities. I’ll tell you about them when the opera starts, but one side-effect leaves him vulnerable for nine months at a time when he gets a power boost, and there are outward signs during the last five to six months when he’s vulnerable.” Anita did her best to speak in riddles, in the hope that even if Nathaniel caught on anyone listening wouldn’t. He did get the message and didn’t ask any more about Jean-Claude as they bought their snacks, vanilla ice cream with fudge sauce for Anita and chocolate ice cream for Nathaniel.
When Anita got back she sat by Damian, and began to explore his body with her fingers while Nathaniel sat on the other side and Asher watched with a wistful look on his face. Nathaniel didn’t speak until the opera started again, and then he asked Anita to explain what she’d meant. “It almost sounded as if you were talking about him being pregnant, but that’s impossible...isn’t it?”
“No, it isn’t. A few vampires, all but one male, can give birth to healthy human children sired by living people they consider dominant to them. You don’t need to know all the details, but Jean-Claude is one such vampire and I’m the 'father' of his child. It gives him a power boost every time he gets pregnant, but while he’s pregnant he’s terribly vulnerable. That’s all you need to know.” Anita refused to say anything else, but watched and listened to the rest of the opera, and when it finished she made certain to grope both Damian and Nathaniel in front of the press. She’d be able to make the same sort of displays with Asher later; they’d probably end up in the celebrity column or something. Jean-Claude had already decided what to say if anyone called him for a comment – that as far as he was concerned Anita could have as many lovers as she wanted, whoever and whatever made her happy, as long as it did make her happy and she supported him as Master of the City.
“Damian, what would you like to do?” They were in his bedroom at the Circus and they hadn’t even got undressed when Anita asked the question.
“I want to undress you and to explore your body. I want you to explore my body as well, and I’d like it if you’d take me in your mouth.” The vampire’s voice became lower and lower as he reached the end of his requests.
“That sounds like a very good idea.” Anita smiled at Damian and moved to the bed where she slid her gun beneath the pillow and then sat waiting for him. Damian approached her and knelt, pulling her sandals from her feet and kissing them reverently. He ran his hands up her legs over the silk of her pants and beneath her velvet shirt. She’d already discarded the jacket and gun holster and Damian rested his hands at her ribs for a moment before bringing them back out and beginning to unfasten her shirt. Anita ran her hands up and down his arms, carefully not getting in his way, letting him do as he wished, but still enjoying the chance to touch him. Damian was wearing a pair of dark green pants and a matching waistcoat, embroidered at the edges in black and leaving his arms bare to her touch and Anita enjoyed the interplay of power between them.
“You need to stop that for a moment.” When Damian spoke Anita realised that he’d finished unfastening her shirt and loosened the ties on her pants as well. “Just put your arms back so I can slide this off you.” He matched actions to words as she complied, and then continued. “And if you’ll just stand up for a moment.” When she did her pants fell to the floor in a pile of silk. She stepped out of them and lay down on the bed, where her vampire servant joined her. This time she was wearing lingerie in a green that almost matched Damian’s eyes and he caressed her appreciatively before removing her bra and kissing her breasts. Anita pushed her servant onto his back and knelt above him opening his clothes so she had access to his body, and then removing it. First she played with his nipples and then she began kissing her way lower, until she reached his groin and took him deep into her mouth.
Damian had incredible self control, Anita found herself thinking, he never once tried to thrust up into her mouth, but just lay there under her ministrations. When she realised this she backed away immediately.
“You can respond you know. You won’t hurt me.” She’d been keeping her hands on his hips to brace herself and make sure he wouldn’t be able to thrust far enough into her mouth to hurt her.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you. She-Who-Made-Me liked to force me to stay still when she did this. If I didn’t she would bite me, it took a long time to heal. And sometimes if I did she’d let me come. I haven’t done this with anyone else since then.”
“You didn’t offend me, I was worried about you.” Anita pushed her hair back out of her face, and smiled up his body at him. “Respond however feels best for you.” She changed to bracing herself with her hands on either side of his hips so he wouldn’t feel any restraint and soon had him bucking up into her mouth. As he came she fed the ardeur and sat up after she’d swallowed everything.
“Let me satisfy you now.” And with that Damian pushed Anita down to lie on her back and put his head in her groin, pulling her panties off. Anita wasn’t quite as considerate as he was, she scratched him very badly around the shoulders, and herself on the arms as she came, but he seemed pleased by that. Still she returned to Nathaniel to sleep with.
Jean-Claude paced around the living room anxiously while they waited for the Traveler to arrive. He was wearing a black wool jumpsuit with cotton robes in shades of blue ranging from royal blue to deep midnight blue, they’d sworn the seamstress Anita had used for the original silk jumpsuits and robes to secrecy and had her make up more jumpsuits to fit her mate as his body changed. The robes had been voluminous enough that they would still fit even when he reached full term.
Anita couldn’t avoid smiling in amusement as her normally smoothly composed lover was letting himself show how very worried he was. He was wearing his collar and leash for the first time since the day he bought them and the leash was trailing behind him as he paced.
“Calm down Jean-Claude.” Anita spoke for the third time, she wasn’t going to give him another warning. He paused long enough to sit by her on the couch, nuzzling at her hair for reassurance.
“I’m sorry master, but I just feel nervous. What if he’s angry about my pregnancy, or thinks this isn’t my first child? Or what if he realises that you killed the Earthmover?” Jean-Claude stood and made to continue his pacing, but Anita grabbed hold of his leash and jerked him down to his knees at her feet.
“I told you to calm down three times. Now stay where you are. Even if he does realise that I killed the Earthmover he can’t do anything about it now. He won’t be angry that you’re pregnant, and this is the first time that you’ve shown the sort of power boost that comes with pregnancy isn’t it?”
“Yes master.” He nuzzled at her knee for a moment and then settled back. “I did not mean to anger you with my foolish fears.”
“You didn’t. I’m not angry. But you should try to relax. I won’t let anyone hurt you if I can prevent it.”
“Master the Traveler has arrived.” Willy sounded uncertain who to address, settling for looking between them and addressing both of them.
“Bring him in then.” Anita stood waiting for her guest and Faust led the Traveler and Balthasar into the living room. “Hello Traveler, Balthasar. You are free to hunt in St. Louis, provided you only take willing victims. Traveler, Faust has agreed to act as your horse if you wish it, provided you don’t do any serious damage.”
“Thank you.” The Traveler glanced at Jean-Claude, taking in his swollen belly and the leash around his neck, as well as the matching rings he and Anita were wearing for the first time since they signed their contract. “I mainly came to confirm that Jean-Claude is pregnant and he plainly is. I also need to check that you have in fact claimed him, so if you’ll send him over to me?”
“Go ahead Jean-Claude.” Anita stroked her mate’s hair as she seated herself, before letting him walk over to the sitting Council member. The instant his hands began exploring between the younger vampire’s legs Anita shot to her feet and crossed to them in two steps.
“Get off him!” She took hold of Jean-Claude at his still slender waist and pulled him away from the Traveler.
“That was the easiest way to check that you’ve claimed him. You are very protective.” The Traveler sounded as if he approved.
“I promised that for the next hundred years no one but me and Asher would touch him sexually. I’m possessive anyway and he was afraid of being passed around.
“I see. Well you have obviously claimed him. How much has he told you about what this means for you?”
“Why don’t you tell me what it means as it involves the council, Jean-Claude focused on the parts that affect him?”
“You need to give us a contact address for anywhere you intend to stay more than a month, and we’ll give you the current addresses of other Sires upon request. You need to check with us before you go anywhere to make sure you won’t be visiting the lands of another Sire. You don’t need to give us an itinerary, just ask what territory the other Sires claim. But we do need to be able to contact you if need be, within a week.” While the Traveler was explaining what sort of involvement Anita would have with the council Anita guided her mate back to the couch and pulled him down to sit beside her, wrapping his leash around her wrist. Balthasar watched her jealously from where he stood beside his master’s seat as she began stroking and petting Jean-Claude and he leaned into her touch.
“As a Sire you are considered equal, or superior, to any vampire outside of the council. It depends on how hard you want to press the issue, your status that is. But you, your mate and any vampires personally sworn to you can travel anywhere that isn’t claimed by another Sire without needing to clear it with the local master.” That still left pack and pard politics Anita mused, then she considered what the Traveler had asked for.
“I’ll give you my cell phone number and address before you leave. Will you be able to give me the contact details for the other Sires? I’m going to need to arrange some sort of party when my mate gives birth.”
“Yes of course. I take it you mean that you need to contact them so you can arrange the presentation of your first child. Incidentally, do you intend to leave your mate in command of the city?”
“I don’t see any reason not to. He’s perfectly competent and good at taking care of the city. And the only other vampire I’d trust to take care of the city with enough rank is Asher, and I want him sworn to me.” Asher was considering Anita’s offer, he wasn’t entirely convinced that Anita wanted him for himself and not because of Jean-Claude’s memories.
“I can understand that if he means so much to you that you’re willing to share your mate with him. Tell me, how do you discipline your mate when he needs it?”
“Is that really your concern?” Anita felt furious and shocked that the Traveler could ask her such a question.
“I cannot take him from you easily, but I can do my best to find out if you are abusing him, and if you are there is one way to free him of you at the moment.” Anita could taste the ancient pain in the Traveler’s voice and she couldn’t help but respond to it.
“Jean-Claude, go and get our bonding contract.” After her mate had left Anita explained to the council member. “My claim on Jean-Claude is a contract that we each signed in our mingled blood. It has a period of one century and I think that it might actually only work as a claim for that long, but I’m not certain about that, and anyway we’ll renew it before it runs out. I asked Jean-Claude what three things he feared most about being my mate and gave him protection against them in the contract. If you want you can help me test if it’s magically binding. I believe it is, but I do want to know for certain.”
“How?”
“I’ll give permission for you to have sex with Jean-Claude and you can try to grope him the way you tried to earlier.”
“Then yes.”
“You have my permission to fuck my mate if you can then.” Anita felt as if she’d just betrayed her mate, but they did need to know and she’d stop it before it went too far if the contract wasn’t magically binding. She knew they had some time before Jean-Claude returned so she decided to distract the Traveler. “Why are you so concerned about the possibility that I might be abusing my mate?”
“Hugo abuses Regulus, he was a lover of mine, as was Leo when he first got pregnant. Leo was willing to share Regulus with me, but they wanted to spend some time away from the council lands, and Regulus wanted to give birth where he was born, in Rome, that’s why I couldn’t stop Hugo claiming Regulus. And when I did try to take Regulus back from him Hugo made sure I would never be able to use my own body again.” Hatred for the shapeshifter flared in the Traveler’s voice, and Anita couldn’t blame him. “You still haven’t answered my question about how you discipline your mate.”
This time Anita understood what was behind the question, so she smiled and told him what he wanted to know. “The most severely I’ve had to punish him was the first time, he’d lied to me about how safe my claim would make him and what it protected him from. I used the back of a hairbrush on that lovely ass of his thirty times – it was the way I’d punish a misbehaving child. And his ass didn’t heal until the second night after that so he’d have a reason to remember it.
“Now tell me what you meant when you said there was a way of freeing him from me.”
“Until your child is born you can still die. I could find a protector for Jean-Claude easily enough.”
“You won’t. I would rather die than belong to anyone but Anita.” Jean-Claude sounded furious at the idea and Anita smiled to see him looking and sounding confident.
“He isn’t going to Jean-Claude, give the contract to him.”
The Traveler grabbed Jean-Claude by the wrist as he handed the contract over, trying to grope him again – this time Anita didn’t interfere and Jean-Claude looked at her in shock and betrayal. The Traveler let go of the younger vampire with a sigh. “I still couldn’t touch him, but what does that prove?”
“That the contract is magically binding. If it holds for one clause it will hold for all, read it and you’ll understand. Come here Jean-Claude. I had no intention of lending you to him, it was only a test.”
“Couldn’t you have tested the second clause instead? And if you never intended to lend me to him is it a true test? I’m not sure if it works from what you say, or what you intend.”
“You have a point, do you want me to test the second clause then?” Anita laid her hand against Jean-Claude’s face as he knelt in front of her.
“You intend to hurt him just to find out if this contract is magically binding?” The Traveler sounded almost outraged.
“If he’s willing, yes.”
“How is trying to grope me before I know what’s happening any better? It is my body Traveler, and even if the contract is not magically binding my master will not leave me in pain for too long.
“Breaking a finger would be easiest master.” Jean-Claude turned back to Anita, watching her with pure worship in his eyes, despite the fact that the Traveler had tried to grope him with her full permission. That brought home to Anita, in a way nothing else had, how much he loved her as he presented his left hand for her to break a finger.
Anita took hold of his little finger and broke it quickly and carefully. “Traveler, it’s one in the morning now. Faust can take you to your rooms and I’ll send Jean-Claude to you there about midnight tomorrow so you can tell whether or not he heals without my permission. If that is acceptable to you?”
“Yes. This contract does seem to give him protection from abuse, but still...I want to see it for myself.”
“Then we are agreed.” Anita stood, and took the contract back from the Traveler before leading her mate out to feed.
Jean-Claude pulled his robe around his body more tightly before he knocked on the Traveler’s door at midnight the next night. He knew that the Traveler and his human servant were having sex in there, but he’d been given instructions to go to the Traveler and he didn’t have the option of refusing his master.
“Come on in.” The Traveler sounded slightly annoyed at the interruption, but when Jean-Claude obeyed and walked in he was sitting up in Faust’s body with the sheets covering his hips. He smiled gently at Jean-Claude, the younger vampire could see that it was forced but he’d made an effort for some reason. “Come here and let me look at your finger.”
Jean-Claude obeyed, mystified by the Traveler’s apparent concern, and let the older vampire examine his broken finger gently. “It is still broken, and my master has not said anything about permitting it to heal.”
“No, it wouldn’t be a true test if she had. Why aren’t you wearing anything under that robe?” The Traveler gave a lascivious grin as he asked the question.
“It is more comfortable not to wear anything under my robe. I’m having problems with my pregnancy, nothing serious but I can’t keep blood down unless I take a lot less than I need. So I have to feed five, six times a night. And there is no need to wear anything if I’m not going where people can see me, is there?”
“I suppose not.” The Traveler seemed to find that amusing for some reason, then he looked back at his lover, wistfully. He seemed to dismiss the possibility of continuing what they had been doing, but Jean-Claude spoke up then.
“I have not fed the ardeur tonight, should you wish to continue what you were doing when I knocked I would ask permission to feed it here and now. I do not wish to trouble you.”
“Go ahead and feed. Just sit over there, and tell me if your finger heals. Balthasar, love, come here.” The human moved into his master’s arms and Jean-Claude shut his eyes, drinking in their lust and pleasure as they made love. He could hear the sounds of their lovemaking and smell the scents, but he would at least give them a modicum of privacy by blocking the sights. They were comparatively quick about it, finishing in half an hour and then Jean-Claude heard them moving about, perhaps dressing, or perhaps just pulling on robes, because the next thing he heard was one of them coming towards him while the other went to shower. He opened his eyes, to see that it was the Traveler approaching him.
“You were never shy before.” There was laughter in the Traveler’s voice as he reached out to check Jean-Claude’s finger again. He remained silent; the council member’s comment didn’t seem to require an answer. “Still broken. Come and sit beside me for a while.” The Traveler put an arm around Jean-Claude’s waist and guided him over to the bed to sit there. He petted the younger vampire’s hair absently while they were waiting.
Balthasar returned to the bedroom and for a moment he looked furious to see Jean-Claude sitting there with his master, but then he calmed and sat on the Traveler’s other side, insinuating himself into his embrace. Jean-Claude gasped when he realised that he wasn’t feeling pain from his broken finger anymore – a full day had passed since Anita had broke it, and so it had healed.
The Traveler immediately took hold of his hand and examined it minutely. “Your contract does protect you then. And she doesn’t force you in any way?”
“No, she is very considerate of my needs. She hasn’t taken me to her bed since she realised I went to her from duty after the second month.” Jean-Claude paused, unsure how to phrase his next sentence, but knowing that Balthasar at least wanted him out. “I need to feed again. I can’t keep enough blood down at once to be able to miss it, and my master will want to see this.”
“Go on then. We’ll probably be leaving tomorrow.” And Jean-Claude accepted the dismissal.
Jean-Claude drew away from Micah slowly as he heard Balthasar arriving. Still curled around the wereleopard he twisted to look at the human, glancing up from beneath lowered eyelids.
“Did your master send you here for a reason?”
Balthasar looked furious for some reason that Jean-Claude couldn’t understand. “Yes. We are leaving now and he wants you to see him off at the airport. Your master has assigned a limo to us and that blond wolf, Jason, is the driver, so if you need a bodyguard he’ll do.”
“Yes, I do need a bodyguard; it is my master’s wish. And she has told me that Jason is acceptable. You have her approval for this?”
“Of course I do.” Balthasar sounded arrogantly confident, perhaps overly so, and for a moment Jean-Claude considered finding his master and asking her if she wanted him to accompany the Traveler in person. “Now get dressed and quickly. Don’t spend an hour deciding what to wear.” But he could see how impatient the older man was and he pulled a wool jumpsuit from the dresser, hoping it was one fitted for this stage of pregnancy, and red cotton robes from the wardrobe, dressing as swiftly as he could and slipping on a pair of black loafers. From the lack of patience with which Balthasar watched he knew not to ask for a chance to brush his hair, which was falling in a tangle around his shoulders and upper body.
The human actually grabbed Jean-Claude by the wrist as soon as he stood, dragging him along behind him to the garage.
“Jean-Claude, I hoped you would be willing to see me off at the airport.” The Traveler had returned to the body he’d used when he first arrived and he pulled Jean-Claude into a hug. “You do know that if you are in trouble I’ll do my best to help you.”
“I know.” Jean-Claude refuse to look up and meet the Traveler’s eyes, he didn’t want to embarrass Anita by appearing to have ideas above his place. He slid into the back seat of the limo, fastening his seatbelt and garnering surprised looks from Balthasar and the Traveler.
“Why do you bother?” Balthasar demonstrated his contempt for modern safety laws and Jean-Claude’s actions in obeying them by leaving his seatbelt open.
“It is my master’s wish. She does not permit anyone in a car with her who does not wear a seatbelt.”
“But why are you bothering now? She isn’t here to see.” The Traveler sounded curious, and he wasn’t demanding answers.
“It is in part habit; also it might prevent a miscarriage if we are in a crash. I know I would survive, but my child might not.”
“You know that it would break your bond if you miscarried, and you don’t want that. Did Anita tell you that she isn’t immortal until your child is born, until then she can still be killed, or did you overhear it?”
“No, I only heard you talk about finding a new protector for me, is that how you intended to 'free' me if she was hurting me?”
“Yes. I couldn’t help Regulus, but I vowed that I would help any future mates I could.” Not that there had been any new mates since Regulus first gave birth, not until Jean-Claude had conceived. But the Traveler had been the one sent to confirm Severus’ claim on Inanna and to represent the council at the presentation of their first child together.
“I appreciate your concern, but I am content to be Anita’s.” Jean-Claude put gratitude in his voice and smile, but further conversation was cut off by the fact that they’d arrived at the airport. Jean-Claude accepted the Traveler’s help in getting out of the limo, and a breeze plastered his robes against his body, displaying his altered figure for the photographers he hadn’t expected to take pictures of. Jean-Claude froze for a moment in shock, and then scrambled back into the limo.
“I have to get back to Anita. I do not know what her decision on this matter will be. But she will be the one who decides what the humans need to know.”
“Of course.” The Traveler seemed to be just as shocked at the press’ presence as Jean-Claude was...but Balthasar looked as if he’d expected it. Jean-Claude didn’t want to think about it and he just let Jason drive him back to the Circus in silence.
When he got back he went to his bedroom and knelt, waiting for Anita to return from whatever she was doing on Christmas Eve. She’d promised to drop in around two, and it was twenty to already, so hopefully that would be soon enough to tell her. Jean-Claude was getting a sick feeling in his stomach that she hadn’t told Balthasar he could go with the Traveler to the airport, that he’d been set up, and he was certain Anita would punish him severely for his error.
“Jean-Claude?” Anita sounded surprised to see him on his knees – not bowed down as it was getting uncomfortable by this stage. “What’s happened?”
“Did you give Balthasar permission to take me to the airport to see the Traveler off?” Anita pulled him up to sit beside her on the bed as he spoke.
“No, did he tell you that I had?”
“Yes, and then when we got there the press was waiting.”
“They know then.”
“Yes master.” Jean-Claude shut up then, he knew if he said any more he’d start begging for her to be merciful, and that was a sure fire way to be punished more severely.
“The only way I can think of to control this is to give an exclusive interview with someone, and make sure we get final say on what gets published.” Anita laid him down and stroked his hair. “Now relax.”
“I wanted to give you your present now, so you could open it in the morning...” Jean-Claude trailed off asking for permission, something Anita refused him.
“No, I’ll open it tomorrow night, when you open yours from me.”
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Date: 2006-07-04 01:47 am (UTC)I seem to be saying this a lot today but this was REALLLY AWESOME!!!!! I can't wait to go find the next chapter!
*dies*
^~^