Grovel

"Welcome back, my child," Lord Solveig purred, extending a pale, deceptively strong hand in Cain's direction. He sat on his raised dais, a throne-like seat where he played at monarch over his little fortress. He owned no lands and had no true authority outside the walls of the fortress (though of course the surrounding area was often considered his 'territory' because no other vampire clans dared tread here), and had no armies or citizens beyond the thralls that lived to serve him. Still, the man loved to think himself a regal figure, and often demanded acts of submission from his thralls to maintain the illusion.

Swallowing back the disgust he felt, Cain did what was demanded of him, the weight of expectation leaning heavy on whatever it was he had instead of a soul. He crossed the room, head bowed in respect as he approached the throne. He walked up the steps, ignoring the two vampires standing on either side of the dais, despite the way they curled their lips at him, revealing threatening fangs. He was never popular, and it was well known that he hated Solveig. But that was part of why Solveig so enjoyed forcing him to do things like this. It must be nice, to make someone who despised him so keenly roll over and show his flank like a well-trained dog. 

Once he had ascended the steps to the throne, Cain knelt, deliberately taking his vampire master's hand in his own, bending low to press his lips to it, a sign of fealty they both knew was as false as the platitudes that fell from Cain's tongue. "I am glad to be once more in the presence of my master."

The short chuff of breath from Solveig clearly indicated he knew it was a lie, though he was clearly gratified to see that Cain had no choice but to say it. 

The game of politics was always much more fun for the ones with all the power than those scraping by just to survive. New vampires rarely survived long among Solveig's retinue, and Cain's survival had as much to do with his willingness to lick boots as it did with his unusual strength for one of his age. 

"I am pleased," Solveig said, each word deliberate and measured. 

Cain hated the way some part of him preened at the praise, despised the way that no matter how deeply he hated the monster before him, somewhere within the very core of himself was the creature that saw Solveig as kin, always seeking his approval. 

"You have earned a reward for pleasing me," Solveig added, a hint of a smirk gracing his pale, strong features. He leaned back in his throne-like seat, eyeing Cain pointedly. "What would you have from me?"

Your head, Cain thought viciously. Forcibly removed. Decapitation was, after all, one of the few foolproof ways to kill a vampire. That would hardly be an acceptable comment, though, so he didn't even try. "I want a thrall," he said, instead. He pretended not to see the way the two vampires standing guard at the foot of the dais poorly concealed their surprise. He was rather infamous for not taking thralls, and this was surely going to be the talk of the fortress for some time. Even so, he had no time to waste on something as foolish as image. Clearly the werewolf was in immediate danger. He could solve the problem of the boy being enthralled or maimed beyond recognition after he got him out of Crowe's clutches. 

"Oh? One of the lovely girls you brought back caught your eye?" Solveig asked, a hint of a smirk tugging at his lips, allowing the barest glimpse of a fang. 

"No, my lord," Cain answered. "Before I left, I had my eye on one of the thralls, but he had taken ill, and was removed from the feeding list." He thought for a moment about how to phrase this next part - Solveig very rarely concerned himself with the sorts of infighting that involved taking thralls from other vampires, so ensuring that he had access to Damien would be something of a longshot. "I hear that he is now being fed from, so I assume that means he is available once more. I would like permission to reclaim the thrall that caught my eye."

Solveig's brow raised ever-so-slightly. "It's not like you, Cain, to want what someone else has," he said, not quite accusing, but neither was his question totally innocent.

"I can be jealous when it suits me," Cain answered, as neutrally as he could manage. If he couldn't keep his cool, Solveig might get irritated, and change his mind. Then Cain wouldn't have his blessing to retrieve Damien, and he would have a much more difficult fight on his hands. 

Solveig, fortunately, seemed amused by the situation. "Oh-ho," he said, "A jealous Cain? This I must see." He waved a hand dismissively. "You have my blessing," he said. "Retrieve the thrall. If your own enthrallment is able to overcome that of your bretheren, the thrall is yours."

Cain fought to keep his reaction to those words from showing on his face. "My…enthrallment, Lord Solveig?"

"How do you hope to claim the thrall as yours without enthralling him?" Solveig asked, a dark fire sparking in his gaze as he stared down at Cain. 

"And if the thrall is not enthralled by me?" Cain asked, hesitation stealing all the bravado from his tone.

"Cain, my silly child," Solveig practically cooed. "How can you lay claim to that which is not yours? To enthrall is to claim. No thrall is truly ours, if they are not held under our enchantment. Surely you've learned this by now."

Cain shut his eyes briefly, fighting the urge to scream. Of course it wouldn't be as simple as 'hello bird, give me the wolf'. Of course Solveig would give him caveats. No gift ever came without strings attached. And this one was one of the worst, demanding that Cain claim the wolf as his own thrall. Cain had no interest in enthralling the wolf. Nor could he feed from the thrall, even if he'd wanted to, given his current predicament. Solveig had set before him an impossible condition, and yet for any other vampire it would have been the simplest of solutions, and he knew it. 

But Solveig was no fool; he knew this was a condition that Cain could not, would not meet. Because Cain intentionally distanced himself from all the thralls and enthrallment practices. This was his way of pushing Cain closer to the true nature of vampires, a reminder that Cain was still fighting against his inner nature, and how his master disapproved of the fact, even if he'd never explicitly said as much. 

Cain supposed he could try and enthrall the wolf with his eyes; but if the young man had been fed from, it would be quite difficult to overcome a feeding enthrallment with something as minor as his gaze. It wasn't practical. Yet, if he could not accomplish it, then it would be a sign of weakness, and he wouldn't be protected by Solveig's favor. Crowe would win. 

So which was more deplorable to him, Crowe keeping total control of the werewolf, or rejecting the personal principle he'd set for himself? He had already been forced to do far worse things, from a technical perspective. But the thing that so grated on him was that this was ultimately chosen by him. He couldn't write it off as something his master forced him to do the way so many of his enforcement duties couldn't be avoided. Lord Solveig hadn't given him an order, he'd phrased it as an opportunity. One that Cain was well within his rights to refuse, but he just as sincerely knew he could not refuse. He couldn't allow the werewolf to remain in the clutches of Crowe.

But were his own clutches much better?

In the end, he wasn't being given anything but the illusion of choice. And still, he was obligated to play at gratitude. "I understand, Master. Thank you." Cain dipped his head in a grudging bow, but not before he caught the cruel glint of victory sparking in Lord Solveig's blood-red eyes. 

"Go, my child, and claim your prize," Solveig said, his voice uncharacteristically quiet and teasing. He was enjoying this, enjoying the way that Cain squirmed under his metaphorical heel, like a worm struggling to escape from under a heavy boot. 

"Yes, Lord Solveig," Cain replied, and retreated from the great hall, spite churning his stomach with a sickness akin to eating human food, or consuming the blood he was unable to drink anymore.

-- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

Despite the sickness he felt, Cain knew exactly where he needed to go. So, it was with no small measure of disgust that he made his way for the vampire residence halls. He knew that Crowe kept his thralls close, and had confidence in his ability to suss out the location of the werewolf. If nothing else, the boy probably hadn't been given opportunity to wash, and werewolves tended to be… odorous, when they went unwashed. Though he had been surprised by how little scent the werewolf in question gave off, he thought part of the issue might have been connected to his 'mate-sickness', since it had (according to the wolf, anyway) affected other aspects of his body, such as his ability to transform during the full moon. 

If luck was on his side, though, he wouldn't need to use his nose to track down the young man; finding Crowe would probably be enough. He thought the vampire wasn't the sort to be particularly secretive about where he tortured his thralls. And beyond that, he was the gloating sort. He'd probably take Cain right to the boy, never suspecting that Solveig had given Cain permission to take him back. After all, Sovleig almost never involved himself in the affairs of his inferiors. Crowe would hardly expect Cain to try and enthrall one of the thralls caught in his web of torment. 

And beyond that, Cain wasn't the type to try enthralling anyone, much less trying to enthrall someone else's claimed human (or werewolf, as the case may be).

Cain found himself lost in thought as he made his way through the corridors, so wrapped up in his own plans and predictions that he failed to notice the presence of a particular thrall, who made a beeline for him once he spotted him.

"Mister Einhardt," Johann called, striding down the hallway, his long legs and steady gait carrying him close in a matter of seconds. His hair was pulled half-back, and his skin was a smooth as ever. His neck, unscarred but not necessarily untouched, was bared by the way his hair was styled. From the way he lifted his chin and quirked his lips, he knew that Cain had noticed it. "Welcome back."

"It's good to be back," Cain said, rather insincerely. Coming back had been like plunging into a hellhole and he wasn't sure if he'd ever be able to drag himself out of it. Especially not if he had a new pet werewolf he was even less able to avoid than before. The mate-sickness had been bad enough, surely enthrallment would be even worse. 

Johann had a sort of appraising air about him as he fell into step beside Cain. "I heard that thrall of yours was taken," he said, his tone a little too innocent to be truly uninvolved. It made Cain pause, and he turned to stare at his former thrall, feeling his ire rise as suspicion crept into his barely-restrained mind. 

"I don't have thralls, Johann," Cain said, cautiously. "You know that."

"Well, perhaps not in a technical sense," Johann replied, a hint of bitterness to his tone. "You sure seem to be favoring some thralls, though. Or rather, one thrall in particular."

Cain's sick feeling in his stomach seemed to twist more deeply. "Johann," he said, hearing the sharpness in his tone and not caring enough to soften it. "Do you know something about what happened?" Were you involved? He didn't ask. Didn't want to ask. Didn't want to know. 

Johann, however, ignored the danger in his tone, preening a little bit, baring the pale column of his throat as he tossed his hair to one side. "I know you gave him a vampire repelling charm," he said. "I'm not sure how you managed to make it work against other vampires but not keep you away, though."

Cain still didn't understand exactly how that amulet worked, or if it even worked at all. But what concerned him more was that Johann knew about it. "How did you," he started, then stopped, turning to look at Johann. 

The thrall drew up short beside him, meeting his gaze. "Yes?" he purred, his voice all sweet seduction and breathy desire. 

Cain felt as if his mind was an embankment holding back a flooding river, moments from collapse. "You took the amulet from him?" he asked, or maybe demanded. He felt like maybe he was drowning in the flooding river of his mind, now. He'd known Johann could be jealous, but he'd never suspected the man to be capable something so cruel as the intentional sabotage of a sick thrall.

Johann didn't seem to understand what had Cain so upset. "It's all right," he soothed. "You can always feed from me, instead.

"I wasn't feeding from anyone!" Cain snarled, feeling the rage building in his chest. Setting the river to boil. "I didn't want to feed from anyone! And now look what's happened!" In the heat of his anger, he forgot that no one else knew, yet, about Lord Solveig's stipulation to ensure Damien's rescue. 

Johann's seductive look faltered into one of confusion. "What… what's happened?" he asked hesitantly, the confidence falling away as he began to realize there was more to this situation than he'd realized. 

Cain almost said it; he almost told the thrall that he was being forced to take a new thrall; not just to place him under his protection, but to actively stake a claim. Except, Johann had already proven just how little he cared for anyone who might come between him and Cain; he was willing to throw them to the carrion, to allow the likes of Crowe to prey on them. Anything, if it meant he could be closer to Cain for just a little longer. "You willingly sacrificed that boy," he said, feeling his boiling rage cooling into something more like despair, heavy on his chest like he was trapped beneath a boulder. "Because you thought I was feeding on him?"

"I didn't sacrifice him," Johann protested. 

"You knew Crowe was after him," Cain said. It wasn't a question, because he knew someone like Johann couldn't possibly be so uninformed as to be unaware of Damien's precarious circumstances.

Johann's eyes narrowed. "I," he said primly, "did nothing wrong."

Cain wanted to grab the beautiful man and shake him by the shoulders. He wanted to somehow impress upon him, physically, that what he'd done was the closest thing to murder a thrall was capable of in a place like this. Instead, he stared at Johann, allowing all the disgust he felt to show on his face. "Never speak to me again," he said, the icy cold of his despair coating his words like a thick layer of frost. 

Johann's already pale skin grew more bone-white than Cain had seen in a long time. The last time Johann had seemed so deathly pale had been the day Cain told him he would no longer need him for feeding. Like that time, the thrall fell to his knees, and began to beg. "Mister Einhardt," he pleaded, reaching out and grabbing Cain's borrowed traveling cloak, clinging to the coattails, "please, no, don't leave me."

Unlike the last time, though, Cain felt no sympathy. This wasn't him choosing to separate himself from the clingy desperation of an enthralled human too obsessed to distance himself as he should. This was punishment for a thrall who would willingly harm anyone who appeared to come between him and the vampire he still wanted, even after all this time. "You left me behind," Cain said, "when you chose selfishness over compassion for your fellow thrall."

Johann's face twisted at the words, and Cain wondered why he hadn't seen the hatred hiding in the man's eyes sooner. "That fucking boy," Johann snarled, "had no right. Everyone knows to keep you at arms length, but he kept pushing for more, demanding your time, your energy, your closeness… And you didn't stop him, not the way you tell everyone else to keep their distance."

That's because he's not a thrall, and his presence here is my fault, Cain didn't say. He just listened as Johann continued his rant, caught between horror and disgust at the revelation of the thrall's deep-seated hatred for Damien. 

"You touch him, without recoiling," Johann almost wailed, "and you won't hardly even look at me anymore! What do I have to do to get you to look at me?" His hands were shaking with rage as he clawed at Cain, struggling back to his feet, looking like he wanted to stake him. Or kiss him. Maybe both? The emotions on his face warred with one another, and the madness in his eyes was nearly all-consuming. 

"Not this," Cain answered quietly. "Never this."

"But it's worked, hasn't it?" Johann replied, a bitter laugh falling from his lips. "You're looking at me, now. You're letting me closer than I've been to you in years, and it's all because of that fucking boy."

Cain recoiled, trying to step away from Johann's grasp, but before he could move too far, the thrall pulled out a knife. It wasn't a stake, which was a small mercy, but for a moment Cain was certain the thrall intended to stab him. Instead, the thrall sliced his own forearm with the blade, the force of the cut sending a splatter of blood spraying across the floor and up the opposite wall. 

"Is it really so bad?" Johann almost screamed, his arm shaking as he shoved the bloody appendage in Cain's face. "Don't you want it?" He shook his arm, sending the blood dripping down his arm and plopping in little drops on the floor. 

Cain tried to step back again, and his back ran up against the wall. Johann crowded against him, smearing the wrist against Cain's mouth. "Why won't you drink?" he screamed, flecks of spittle flying from his mouth with the force of his words. 

Cain tried to answer, but when his lips parted, several drops of blood smeared over them, and one landed on his tongue. He didn't have time to think, his instinctive response so immediate and forceful that he had no time to temper his reaction. The blood hit his tongue, and Cain doubled over, dry heaving so forcefully that it sent him to his knees, choking up a burning bile-like substance, until saliva mixed with blood trailed from his lips. He kept choking, his body shaking with the force of rejection, for almost a minute. When he was finally able to stop the forceful rejection of blood, he wiped at his face, clearing the bile and blood from his lips, and struggled back to his feet.

Johann was staring at him, wide-eyed. "...Cain," he said, voice soft, all the madness gone from his eyes. "What…?" 

Cain felt the cold grasp of despair in his chest cinch a little tighter. "I can't feed on anyone, Johann. Not you, and not the innocent thrall you've betrayed."

"But," Johann's voice was small. "You need to feed." Don't you? was implied, but not spoken aloud.

"I do," Cain answered. "But I cannot."

"Not even the kitchen?" Johann asked, eyes now widening with real concern. 

"My blood was blessed," Cain said, feeling exhaustion sweep over him. If Johann wanted to tell the thralls, or even another vampire, he was welcome to do so. He didn't think he would last long anyway, and was beginning to wonder what he'd been thinking, expecting to keep a secret of this magnitude for so long. So long as he could manage to free Damien before it all went to hell, he'd count it as a success. Hopefully the moon goddess would find some way to cure the wolf's sickness once he inevitably passed from undeath into true death. 

"You're dying," Johann said. Tears were forming in his eyes. 

"I am," Cain said. 

"You really didn't want him?" Johann asked.

"It's none of your business, Johann," Cain said sharply. 

"You do-?"

"I said enough," Cain repeated, snarling a little, allowing his fangs to show for a moment. "It changes nothing, Johann. I don't want to see you. I don't want your blood. I want you to think about what you've done to that poor thrall, and for nothing."

Johann recoiled as if struck a physical blow. "But…"

"Go," Cain said sharply. "I don't want to see you again."

"But-"

"Leave me," Cain snarled, putting a bit of force in his voice, meeting Johann's eyes and drawing on the power he knew lay in his gaze. He could feel it building, the way layers of magic wove their way into his command. 

Johann felt the power of Cain's thrall immediately, scrambling to his feet and running down the hall, his arm still dripping blood as he fled. 

Cain stared at the splattered blood at his feet, lingering on the flagstones, and felt anguished relief mixed with dread at the way he felt absolutely no draw towards the crimson liquid. His days were numbered, but at least he knew, now, that he could still use the power of thrall through his eyes. He hoped it would be enough to wrest Damien back from Crowe, because he was certain beyond a doubt that a direct feeding would be impossible. 

Sighing, Cain proceeded down the hall, resuming his trajectory. He needed to get this done before Crowe learned of his weakness. He would help the werewolf escape, and then return to the fortress to die. There was no alternative, and he couldn't even argue that he deserved better. He knew he didn't.