Hi!

Alexander's back - and, really, what more can I say? I hope you like this one :-)  And, what are your theories on the last sentence of this chapter?

Lara

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Chapter 4

I blinked. A shallow breath inflated my lungs. The room was drenched and soaked in shadows. The sight of him, impossible and all-consuming; his figure, stranded in the soft glow of the single floor lamp in the corner. The head vampire was standing behind the couch with his back turned to the entrance, apparently deeply engrossed in reading some sort of document. His short black hair was smoothed back and tamed. It seemed to shimmer in the eerie blueness of the room.

Alexander was wearing a white shirt that most certainly was only buttoned up half way, and black slacks. He didn't need to turn around. I knew that all the blue in the room combined couldn't compete with the intensity of his eye color. I'd seen it. Multiple times.

Another detail. Another illusion.

Like a devil in disguise, his looks belied who and what he was. He had the kind of face that made you stop and stare in the middle of a goddamned street. It was the kind of beauty that reminded me of snow and blood. A sculpture carved of concrete and ice come to life. An intricate piece of art behind an impenetrable sheet of glass. You may look at it, but you can never even think of touching it. It's just not made to be touched.

I sucked in a breath. Where did that come from?

I glared at his back. Like I didn't know. I knew it from the moment I left Boyd Park – that one fateful night. I went after Raphael Medici, blinded by rage and something else, that one dangerous emotion I was not going to give a name. I would have set the world afire just to save a vampire that only saw and used me as a tool.

And that was exactly where the danger lay. How long could I walk this road without being sucked under? How much longer before I started to lose bits and pieces of myself?

Then, before I knew it, the corpse turned around, was in fact facing me before the motion fully registered. That I hadn't seen him move bothered me more than I liked to admit.

I was right. Alexander hadn't taken the trouble to fully button his shirt.

For a moment the vampire simply looked at me. Then he directed his eyes back to the sheets of paper in front of him again.

"You are punctual, little witch. How unusual," he stated it in a flat tone of voice. Like my presence meant nothing to him. It didn't.

I forced my limbs into motion, shrugged, and made my way to the couch.

"Don't get used to it," I said and let myself flop down, acting like his two-thousand yard stare hadn't affected me at all.

The vampire, meanwhile, made no sign of finishing his reading exercise. Seconds of awkward silence ticked by.

"Start with your report, little witch. I have a meeting with one of the coven leaders in about half an hour," he finally said without looking up.

The situation clearly called for a distraction. The high art of stalling was something I had perfected during my years as aspiring young witch student. Back then I did it because I didn't want to study. At this point in time I did it because I didn't want to face the head vampire's wrath. How quickly paradigms could shift.

I crossed my arms, assuming a playful attitude. "Who is it this time? Thyler?"

The vampire looked up, probably hearing the slightly derogative tang in my voice. "Yes, it is indeed Thyler, little witch."

"You know, I have no idea how you're able to put up with all those sycophants. The three great witches know, I'd refuse to meet any of them."

The barest hint of a smile tucked at the corner of his mouth. "Foregoing a reprimand for the disrespect you just showed for one of the coven leaders, I have to agree. The position of head vampire does indeed include unpleasant tasks."

I blinked. Had he just shown faint signs of sarcasm?

I shook my head. I'd be damned if I tried to figure out his warped sense of humor, or if he had any for that matter.

"Now, little witch, any new developments?"

Looked like my tactic of stalling hadn't worked as well as I hoped. I looked away. My eyes fell on the full glass of brownish liquidity on the table – right beside the behemoth of blue furniture I was currently occupying. Alcohol. Probably not the solution, but worth a try. I could take the subway home. I got up and meandered to the small bar opposite of the blue bed-couch.

"May I have a drink?"

"Help yourself," the head vamp said, eyes flying over the black-dotted white of the paper again.

I got up and grabbed the first bottle that looked like something that would knock me off my feet and loosen my tongue enough to relate what I would have to at some point. I poured the brown-red fluid into one of the glasses unceremoniously.

Intending to down it in one go, I tilted my head. The first drops of burning liquor tumbled down my tender throat. Fire rattled my system, burning from the inside. I put the glass down and stared at the liquid, wheezing.

What the hell was that?

Shaking my head, I counted to three before I went for another, bigger sip.

"It did not occur to you to ask whether this was one of my special blends, little witch?"

I choked and spluttered on my drink, staring at the bottle I had poured from with horror.

"This is a blood-spiked one?"

Low chuckling sounds made me track him with my eyes.

"I never said that," the vampire said. The corners of his mouth lifted ever so slightly. The expression on his face was so out of sorts with what I had seen from him on all other occasions, for a moment all I could do was gape. He didn't look like a vampire at all. He looked ... alive.

As fast as it had appeared, the expression was gone. Seconds stretched and morphed into what had to be minutes. He went back to studying whatever ridiculous scrap of paper he had immersed himself in. I stared at the top of his head for another long moment.

"I have no idea what this is really about, but if you're trying to make me believe that you actually have a sense of humor, well, it's not one I particularly like," I finally muttered.

The comment made him abandon the sanctum of the written word and look at me. "Are you complaining, little witch?"

I eyed him over the rim of my glass, forcing myself to take another sip. I'd be damned, if I let him see how much the thought of drinking human blood appalled me.

"Didn't you want to hear my report? I thought you were in a hurry?" I said, setting down the glass.

The vampire laid down the papers and moved closer in that eerie float-glide-style of the undead. If he expected me to flinch and cower, or applaud for that matter, he had another think coming.

"I do always have time for my human servants, little witch. You should know as much by now."

Know, my ass. What I would like to know is what you wanted a witch for to begin with.

It had been something smack on my mind, for weeks. The tasks I'd been performing so far where not earth-shattering. Was investigating the half-witches really the only reason? Did he see them as threat enough that, at some point, he decided it was worth commandeering a witch for his services? And if that wasn't the case, what did he really want me for?

I wasn't sure I really wanted to find out.

Alexander stilled. He looked at me, really looked at me, for the first time since I entered his blue sanctum.

I had managed not to flinch under that steely gaze of his many times before, and yet the sensation of someone taking a peek into my soul stole over me in one cold shiver.

I stared back at him, willing my brown eyes not to fall into his entrapping gaze. Self-consciousness surfaced and did a mocking line dance in my mind. I would never break the 5.3 foot mark, so what? Being short and female also had its perks. But right in this moment I couldn't seem to recall any. Standing in the line of his two-thousand-yard-stare, I felt small and weak.

This is not the time for inferiority complexes. Get a grip.

My jeans, black shirt, and the matching leather jacket weren't runway material, granted, but they were mine and I liked them. My hair was in a moderately high ponytail, brown strands trailing over my back and shoulders in loose, unkempt locks. Black-rimmed eyes, the color strong and defined on the lower lid, softened with a touch of gray eye-shadow on the upper one. I had never seen putting on make-up as something coming close to a weapon, but I felt better wearing it whenever I had to enter clubs in the Crimson District. Maybe working undercover in the countless Goth clubs had not failed to leave its mark on me. Or, maybe, I was simply trying to cover the fact that I was scared shitless by the camel train of vampires that didn't ever seem to stop entering my life.

Movement trickled into our miniature cosmic system. The vampire cocked his head. A human gesture. And not real. It was just one out of the endless bag of tricks he kept dragging around.

"How are you, little witch? Has Gustav finally allowed you to join the task force again?"

I shook my head, grimacing. I didn't like him bringing up my boss and the TF3. It hit way too close to home.

"I guess he's still waiting for me to drop to my knees and beg for forgiveness. Or maybe he just enjoys yanking my chain," I said.

"So he has not." The vampire said. "Knowing him, it would in all likelihood be the latter."

I blinked at him. I glimpsed another one of those unusual smiles.

There were moments of ice-cold bitterness and a sharpness in his voice I had come to know like my own. The spell of erratic behavior paired with silent treatment started the night I betrayed him. The night we left the rogue witches to die in that run-down printing plant. But the familiarity and ease with which he had begun to treat me at times lately was disconcerting.

I did a mental head shake. Comprehending the head vampire's motivations and inner thought mechanisms was like trying to nail jelly to the wall. Figuring out the dark swamps of emotional landscape inside of him? Suicide.

"You know, I have no idea what you're trying to do with all this," I waved my hand at him in a vague gesture, "but I'm not here to swap notes on my personal life, which by the way is none of your business. I'm here to-"

My voice ebbed and died as Alexander's gaze deepened.

I stared at him.

It was one of those moments in which I was aware that something between us had changed, as if someone had shifted tectonic plates I hadn't even known existed. It was one of those moments in which my mind flashed back to the night in Boyd Park, remembering the feel of his lips against mine; the way his body was molded against my front.

I fisted my hands at my sides, trying to rid myself of the graphic reminders of our kiss. Not real. A lie.

"You will exchange any information I ask for, little witch. That is what a human servant does. In fact, a human servant will do anything a master requests of him or her. Without questioning. You are my human servant." He took a step closer, penetrating my personal space without the slightest hint of hesitation. "How much longer do you think I will let things continue the way they are?"

The words were like splinters of glass penetrating my brain. I recognized the sound of his voice, that eerie silence he always used as threat and weapon at once.

"Rogues are still roaming the city. I will not keep protecting you simply to satisfy your need for an illusion that you should have long dropped." He took another step towards me. We were so close, our chests were almost touching. "I named the price for your betrayal in exchange for your life. You agreed to pay it."

I raised my chin and held his stare. I was not going to cave in. Not this time. Not ever.

The corners of his mouth curved into a cruel smile. "I am truly sorry if you find my demands hard to meet, since they interfere with the lifestyle you so vigorously cling to. Nevertheless you agreed to pay. Fully."

I shook my head. As if the motion was enough to parry the accusation cleverly and hassle-free.

"I'm not quitting the TF3," I said.

Not yet.

Among all the mayhem in New York, it was the one thing tethering me to the life I had, the sense of normalcy I felt I needed to come out alive of this. Being a human servant was not something I had chosen of my own free will. It was what I was fighting for. My life. My own free will.

Alexander smiled without showing fangs. It was another one of those cruel, conceited smiles. "What makes you believe that I was merely talking about the TF3?"