He glares at me with all the fierceness of youth. His ragged clothes show he was once in the gutter, but his pretty face tells me everything I need to know. Everything Damek saw in him.
“Damek told me you would torture me,” he spits, fangs protruding over ruby lips.
I drop onto the chair set in front of him and dip my head, cocking it to one side to pin him with a stare of my own, and for a second his eyes flare, my movement unexpected.
I put my hand on his knee, and he flinches, unable to help himself. I am far more superior, far more powerful. My presence should make him want to wither. But he rallies. Damek always knew how to pick his progeny. To make them in his own image. To make them as vicious and as daring as he was…still is.
I slide my hand up his thigh, leaning forwards, pushing out all the pheromones I can, ones which should be as close to Damek’s as those exuded by him. The young vamp shivers.
“That depends very much on what you want,” I purr. “If you like being tortured, then I might do it anyway. If you prefer a belly filled with a good, hot meal and a comfortable place to wait out the day, then I could offer you that too.”
I’m not sure when he last fed, and young vamps are always hungry.
The youngster licks his lips, his eyes flaring red for an instant.
I slowly withdraw my hand from his leg, lingering over the movement. All young vamps love the touch of an ancient like me.
It tells them their future.
Although this vamp’s future is limited. Damek can see through his eyes, and I can’t have that in my nest.
“Tell me where he is, and you can have both or the one of your choosing,” I add quietly.
“I…I…can’t tell you,” he blurts out. “Damek will…he will kill me.”
“But you’re dead already.”
“He willendme.” The young vamp shakes from head to foot.
His fear of my brother is greater than his fear of me. That will not do.
“Put him in the pit.” I stand up, pushing the chair back with a screech. “If he doesn’t give up the location of Damek in an hour, open it up.”
I turn my back on the young vamp, hearing his screams, his cries for mercy as I leave the room. He can shout all he wants. He had his chance, and he refused to see where it might have taken him.
I have a place for all those turned by my enemies.
His cries are cut off abruptly when the door closes behind me. I unclip my cape and sling it at one of my thralls.
“Where is she?”
“Where you asked us to put her, sir. In the tower cell,” he says, with a bow of his head.
I have attempted to modernize my operation. Many of my progeny, and those who are bound toHáz Király,have been more than happy to move with the times. It gets boring being stuck in a coffin without Netflix after all, but the thralls? They’re still stuck in the Sixteenth century. Eighteenth if I’m lucky.
Most of the time, I am not lucky.
Another thrall comes panting around the corner and struggles not to run straight into me, his arms windmilling and his feet attempting to run backwards.
I catch him with an outstretched hand around his neck.
“My king,” he begins.
“Cut the crap. What is it?” I growl.
“The human female.” He stares at me, his eyes agog.
“Yes. What about her?”
