Chapter 38: Abandoned

Masaaki dialed his daimyō again, but again, the lady on the other end ignored his questions and told him to leave a message. Damn her. He threw the phone aside and once again fisted his hands on the judo manual until he felt the cardboard bending under the pressure.

Theo had been gone for hours. Masaaki didn’t know how many hours. He had been so anxious, so utterly paralyzed that each second had felt like centuries. Time had ceased to make any sense. All he could think about was that track of footprints that led off down the beach, and what he could find at the other end.

He was enthralled. Enthralled to a vampire. Yet knowing it, facing it, did absolutely nothing to stop it. Masaaki was having trouble breathing through his panic. His heart rate was leaving his veins throbbing from misuse, and his vision had closed to a tunnel, black around the edges.

“Theo,” Masaaki whimpered. The word escaped his lips before he could hold it back. Once again, grinding shame sandpapered his spine. A samurai…who had allowed himself to become a slave, who had begged for his life, who had made a woman his daimyō in an act of desperation, who had allowed himself to become the buffet table of vampires…had become enthralled—willingly—to a lord. The shame was unspeakable.

Yet, where before there had been nothing but darkness and despair, now there was that glorious, shining jewel of hope that Theo had given him. Free. Not just in body, but in mind and spirit, as well. Masaaki knew, deep down, that Theo could help him liberate himself of the vampires’ curse. Seven hundred years of torment had left him paralyzed in their presence, instinctive fear wrapping his muscles into a tight, protective ball around him, making him so useless as a warrior that Theo didn’t even want him coming along. He’d left him in the car.

The humiliation once more rushed over Masaaki in a wave. A samurai warrior. Left in the car while someone else fought a battle. Someone who had offered his friendship. It was beyond disgraceful. It was the total degradation of who he was.

But Theo could help him. Masaaki could feel it, in those brief moments when the vampire had called him into his embrace. The vampire had taken his fears and laid them bare, and then, when everything Masaaki had ever known expected Theo to crush him, to take what he wanted and revel in the power of his terror, Theo had simply held him like a friend.

…or a lover.

Masaaki was still trying to get over that horrible, mortifying dichotomy. For the first time, he had hope of being whole again, of regaining his pride, of being able to look in the mirror and not be shamed by what he saw—yet the draw of the vampire’s venom had left him craving the presence of another man like one might crave the presence of a lover. Yet another reason why he should simply draw his tantō and begin his jūmonji giri as penance, to release himself from this nightmare.

But after much anxious internal debate while trapped in a truck for four-hours with the vampire lord who had enthralled him, Masaaki had been able to convince himself that, at this point, he had nothing to lose. His honor could be sullied no further. So he craved the presence of a vampire lord. So the vampire lord could do unspeakable things to him, and Masaaki would come crawling back to him anyway. So he had trembled in terror the entire ride to Kenai, as Theo had tried to put him at ease. All of it would fade away into nothingness, if Theo could truly help him as he claimed. For that one reason, Masaaki didn’t seek dignity in seppuku. He had felt that pull, that knowing that Theo could help him. And was going to help him. Whether Masaaki wanted it or not.

Trust me, Masaaki. Theo’s words came ringing back to him, like a bell in the chaos.

“I’m trusting you,” Masaaki gritted, between clenched teeth. He could still see nothing beyond the boot-prints, leading away from the truck. “Now hurry up and get back here, vampire. Before I lose my mind to your poison.”

#

“You know, watching movies with you isn’t half bad,” the vampire queen said, reaching for the remote as another set of credits rolled. Shannon hit a button and the television thankfully went dark. “I mean, sure, you sit there all sulking and giving me the silent treatment, but at least you don’t critique the martial arts technique the whole time like Masaaki. I mean, seriously. Critiquing Chuck Norris’s technique? Who died and made him God?”

“Please let me kill Masaaki for you,” Björn heard himself whine.

“No. Stop asking.” She yawned and checked her watch. “So, I’m like totally skipping out on bojutsu and Kung Fu lessons, but Masaaki isn’t here to stop me, so no biggie. More Cheetos?”

Björn didn’t want Cheetos—he wanted to wrap his hands around her skinny neck and strangle her for making him watch fourteen hours of Chuck Norris straight—but he felt that overwhelming desire to make her happy once again spring forth from his veins and he nodded.

She squinted at him, a twisted orange crisp in her fingers. “You don’t really want Cheetos, do you?”

That stupid, imbecilic grin plastered over his face, it took every ounce of willpower that Björn had to force his head back and forth in a lazy negative. Even though he knew it was the vampire’s drug, Björn felt such utter contentment in her presence that he would say or do anything for her, if she but gave him the slightest wiggle of her eyebrow.

Damn it.

It hadn’t occurred to him that his new soulmate would not immediately try to please him, and he’d gotten lazy. Because he had killed plenty of queens, he’d never considered that Mardöll would be a danger to him in the body of a queen. But she was. Horribly so. Because Björn couldn’t get his thoughts under control around her.

He kept trying to conquer the anger he felt for her—which was always instantaneously squashed the moment it started to take hold—but it kept popping back up. Betrayed. He’d been gifted her and she had betrayed him. She’d fought him. Refused to submit. This was not what was supposed to happen.

Björn yet again had to steady himself before his fury could bring about another heady surge of the Nótt Danzleikr.

A complete lack of anger was the key, he knew, to breaking a vampire queen’s Nótt Danzleikr. Anger—that sense of self, that indignity to being conquered by her magic—gave the vampire’s Nótt Danzleikr power. It fed it. Every time a victim’s rage evoked the rush of magic to wipe it away, the queen’s Nótt Danzleikr grew stronger in his blood, and he fell deeper into her thrall. Fed by himself.

Stay calm, Björn thought, trying to focus. Just stay calm. You can beat this. You have beat this. Hundreds of times. You are the Dröttning Banamaðr. It’s what you do.

If he could keep himself from being angry long enough for the queen’s magic to starve itself out, he could make the mental jump he needed to swim out of the bliss, rearrange the devotion in his mind, and step beyond it.

Clarity of mind. Usually, it was easy. A simple trance, carried over the course of a few days, and the queen’s magic simply died in his veins. The Nótt Danzleikr needed that fury, that pang of injustice to feed it. Usually, Björn stepped into the dance with the mind of a warrior. He was, after all, Nökkvi. It’s what the gods made him to do, once the vampires infested his realm. He was the Dröttning Banamaðr. The Queen Slayer. He was created to keep balance.

And, though he killed whomever Odin sent him to destroy, Björn’s specialty was the queens. A simple warrior’s trance and, after a few hours, he’d break their Nótt Danzleikr and kill them. Simple. Easy. Quick.

Yet he had spent an entire lifetime in anticipation of finally meeting her, and in fourteen hours, Björn had no more been able to fall into a trance than he had been able to wrap his hands around her neck and squeeze.

How dare she? She had been a gift to him, something to ease the pain of the violence he was forced to commit by edict of the gods. A balm to his troubled soul. A salve to his warrior’s spirit. A little bit of happiness to keep himself from falling into the despair of a destroyer of bodies and lives. Now she had him wrapped around her little finger, making him catch Cheetos with his mouth like a dog. The bitch.

Instantly, the Nótt Danzleikr tightened on his soul.

“How about now?” Björn blurted, on the sudden rush of desire that followed. He leaned toward her again, completely forgetting what had bothered him only a moment before, totally awash in bliss.

“Um. No.” Shannon set the Cheetos bag aside and squirmed around on the couch beside him so that she was facing him. She had freed his arms, as offered, and commanded him to bathe. She’d also dressed him in a blanket. And painted his fingernails.

Unmanned. He’d been unmanned by the very creature that belonged to him. Given to him as a prize by his god, because she was going to die anyway. This was really starting to piss him off.

Instantly, Björn felt another flood of adoration, stronger than before, leaving him leaning towards her, trying for another kiss. Stop it, you fool! he babbled to himself, as he realized he’d been angry with her again. You’re only making it stronger…

She shoved her hand between them and said, “Huh-uh.”

The feel of her hand upon his flesh was like heaven itself. Björn shuddered as her inhumanly smooth fingers held his chest in place like they were forged of flawless silk. He reached up, wrapped her hand with his, and bent to kiss it.

The vampire queen held him there, cocking her delicate head up at him. “You try to kiss me when you’re really pissed, don’t you?” she asked.

Björn felt a startled part of him give her new measure of respect before it was once again dulled by the total wash of devotion. Moaning in bliss, he nodded.

She was watching him all-too-carefully. “Like, what, I say something that makes you mad and the venom magic switches that around and makes you wanna get laid or something?”

She’s sharp, Björn thought, reluctantly. “Can we get laid?” he blurted, unable to stop the words that spilled forth from his drugged lips.

She gave him a really long look. “Okay, time for Twenty Questions. I need you to think really clearly for me and tell me the truth, okay?”

Björn instantly felt the fog of bliss clear, for which he was grateful beyond words. “Thank you,” he said.

“No prob,” she said, though he could smell that she was more anxious than she was letting on. “Okay, here goes. Do you really believe everything you said before you bit me?”

“It’s not something to believe,” Björn said, keeping his rage in check that she would even question it. “I know it. I was there when Odin bound you to me.” All the lifetimes were available to him when he could sink into trance, though they were currently clouded by the haze of bliss. He knew that much, though. She had been gifted to him. To ease the loneliness.

“You said I didn’t want him to do it?” she offered.

“You fought and called him names.” Björn remembered that clearly, too. Odin had been forced to drag her to the ritual. He could still see the lines her feet had made in the snow, as she’d struggled to stay put.

“So, what, you’re my soul mate or something?”

“You were given to me by Odin,” Björn corrected. “I needed someone to keep me company.”

She narrowed her eyes at him for a moment. “So, you weren’t given to me to replace my last one?”

Björn snorted at the sheer stupidity of that idea. “Women are given to men. It is the way of nature.”

“Uh-huh.” She looked dubious. Almost like she’s trying to decide whether or not I’m insane, Björn thought.

“If they are not given, then they are taken,” Björn growled.

“Is that a threat?” the queen demanded.

“It’s fact,” Björn snapped. “I have taken enough to know.”

“Oh, great, a serial rapist.” She skittered backward on the sofa, looking like a spooked Chihuahua. “I just spent all day cuddling a serial rapist.”

“Things are different in the Third Lands,” Björn said, furiously keeping his anger in check so the Nótt Danzleikr didn’t overwhelm him again. “It is not rape. It is the male asserting dominance, ensuring the female’s continued submission and devotion.”

The girl’s mouth fell open in a startled O.