My maker and Master and god

—Mira

I quickly started to understand a few things about my existence. I learned that there was a large difference between the sensation of hunger and the sensation of thirst.

I thought that maybe I could live without satisfying the thirst longer, of the two.

The hunger had felt so painful, so horribly unending, while the thirst only left my mouth dry, so that I had to work my lips and tongue just to speak.

I also learned that my mind wouldn't work on anything if Master didn't hurt me somehow or tell me what to do or scold me or...

Oh, God. I didn't know what criteria the need followed, but just thinking about those things made me go weak in the knees, and the way the demon in his blood rose to the surface to say, "Daddy wants to take care of you"? Delicious.

But if I had those moments, then I wasn't lost in a shattered world.

It was like my mind became trapped in a terrible mirror maze and I couldn't see anything except dark fairy lights. It was like I was lost to one incredibly vast desire and that emotion was all that fueled me.

It turned me into nothing until he shattered the mirrors and satisfied that craving. And I wasn't sure, but I thought he was the only who could do that.

We spoke of all these things during the daytime hours where he would sit in a chair by the fire and I took to sitting at his feet and staring up at him.

He considered all of my theories thoughtfully, attentive to every word I said while we both tried to figure out my existence. "I do not think it is necessarily I who has to calm that desire. I think it is Depravity who does, so if anything were to happen to him, you would be lost forever in that insanity. You would become what he is. From what I've seen of darker creatures and their evolutionary tendencies, it would be a way to ensure he has procreated, so that his kind and form is always a force in the world, should anything happen to him."

I shivered at that. "I don't want to be lost like that."

In answer, he chuckled wryly. "I can assure you, little one, that it will be a minute or two before something will hurt the demon I hold. Even if I died, I think he would just return to his own realm and your body would eventually try to reach hell with him."

"That's not any better!" I stared up at him from his cozy hearth, panic rising in me at the thought. "I don't want-!"

"Peace." He was by my side with the speed of our kind and I looked up at him with wide eyes while he reached down and stroked my hair. His palm was cool on my forehead and some sense of vast serenity opened to me. "That's it. Borrow some of my security."

I did, my breaths coming calmer while I took from that vast river with wonder. It felt like an endless well for my newly born vampire wildness, a pit that came from all of his experiences and his age. "You are much older than I," I finally whispered.

He laughed. "You could say that. I'm older than Christianity, actually."

I smiled, a little bit of dark insanity covering my mind again, so that my look turned sensuous and adoring. "You're a god, a deity all your own, and you were kind enough to make me." I nuzzled his thigh at that place where he had let me drink from.

His touch was gentle when he pushed me away and his voice was patient, a guiding light in the midst of the mirrors inside my mind. "Think, Mira. Focus and come back to me."

I learned those words, too, and how to obey them. I would breathe and focus my attention back on our conversation so that the maze of mirrors fell away, at least for a time. "Thank you, Master. It feels like it gets harder each time and it makes me scared for when I won't be able to come back like that."

He inclined his head. "Don't be afraid. When that happens, then we take care of you until you're sated again. It's just like when you're hungry, how I'll fuck you again."

He touched my nose, with amusement in his gaze, while I grinned. "I can promise that I won't complain too much with either occurrence. Also, my name is Lucius, baby. You're allowed to use it when you wish."

"The name of a god," I whispered, mind wandering before I could get it in check, but then I made myself say it, where I still gazed up at him. "Lucius."

He nodded and stroked my hair. "Are you ready to talk some more?" At my nod, he went on, pacing to the fireplace. "The symbols you see on the wall interest me quite a bit. Will you do me a favor, little one? Take this sketchbook for me and start to draw them?"

I took the book and pencil he gave me and smiled. "I wouldn't deny you anything, Master, but it will take a while. There's all kinds and they all glitter and shimmer in and out sometimes."

"That's alright. Just do what you can for me and start in this room. We'll work our way together. I want to see if I can find matches for any of them and what they do."

I took the book and went to the wall obediently, while he started music in the background, a soothing kind that made me smile to hear the lyrics.

Sex, Murder, yeah. It's just a shot away. It's just a shot away.

While I drew, he waited for a bit and then took the first few drawings as I finished them.

When I turned around, he had gotten books from the huge library room he had and he had them spread across the table while he held my drawings up to them thoughtfully, trying to compare images.

I kept drawing, happy and content to be working with him while the music played and I found I loved his music.

I set out running, but I'll take my time. A friend of the devil is a friend of mine.

"Well, blasts. This one looks dead on this symbol, but this is for demon containment and what the bloody hell would that be doing here as protection in unhallowed ground?"

I turned without even thinking of the answer because I just knew it.

I didn't know how or why, but I did. "Well, with the amount of bloodshed in certain places, it would have attracted demonic presences and once they figured out how to encase the presence in a body, without killing themselves in the process, they'd want it to stay there, so they'd protect and ward for it."

He blinked at me while the song changed again. "Right, yeah, why wouldn't I think of that? It's only a demon presence that rapidly increases a human's mortality rate. Of course they want that trapped in them."

Catch the wind, see us spin, sail away, leave today, way up high in the sky.

I giggled at his matter-of-fact tones.

My Master, I quickly realized, had an amazing wisdom that came with his age.

Even though he had never seen a creature like me before, he had logical thoughts on how my hungers might act, on how I might work as a species. He guessed things that I didn't even know about myself.

These moments only served to make me adore him all the more.

I had known him for a short time compared to his life, but I was infatuated with him, loved listening to every word he spoke.

In the quiet of the daytime hours, he sometimes spoke to me softly and told me of his life, holding me in his bed while he pet my hair.

He had this lilt to his voice that was something exotic, something that I thought was uniquely him.

I didn't know anything about other creatures or people or vampires for comparison, but the cadence in his speech struck me as something created from 2,500 years' worth of experiences.

***