Sorin paid her the honor of turning away from his new Guard. “Galatea.” He had given her fellow Groupies who manned the control panel instructions to allow her in without a fuss.
She saluted him, bowing until her dark, wild hair rolled over one shoulder, blocking her face. Today she wore it in tight curls, beads shimmering through strategic locks. A sheer purple robe revealed a petite figure accessorized with merely a network of fine silver chains. One of them, Sorin could not help noticing, slipped through the cleft of her sex, no doubt rubbing her with each movement.
His blood thrashed at the notion of slowly sliding it back and forth until she moaned. Her throat would hum as he bit into an engorged vein.
She stood upright again, hair falling away from high cheekbones and slanted, silver-tinged eyes. A pang of parental loss—one of the only deep emotions he had ever felt as a vampire—stole over him. Long ago, he had taken two vampire daughters. Before they had left this Underground to return to the Old World and eventually go missing without another word, they, too, had produced preternatural children. Consequently, the Groupies of today were his own daughters’ progeny.
Unfortunately, generation to generation, the blood weakened through exchange, leaving each succeeding child less powerful. Their talents paled in comparison to Sorin’s, leaving them exposed to elements such as religious symbols. Even their Awareness was a mere shadow—a feeling as opposed to words spoken mind to mind. It was nonexistent from a distance.
This helplessness was the reason Groupies were the pets of the Underground: lovely, useful decorations who existed on blood and pleasure alone.
“You’re working too hard, Master,” Galatea said with a sparkle in her eyes. “Don’t you have any time for play?”
“Play.” He laughed. “It has been nothing but that for your kind since the lockdown.”
“Maybe we haven’t done any spy work lately, but I hear that might change with the threat of that Jessica Reese murder.”
“You hear too much. They say, ‘loose lips sink ships,’ yes?”
That would also apply to what only he and the Master had heard tonight via spy work: Limpet and Associates’ recent efforts at cornering Milton Crockett, plus Lee Tomlinson’s family and lover, had proved futile, thank the day. It seemed that Limpet’s little psychic had not obtained valid readings from any of them. However, Sorin still knew trouble was ahead. As a realist, he fully expected it, taking the precaution of directing spies to keep watch over the growing list of Limpet interview subjects.
“I will play after I am done here,” he said to Galatea while restraining a surge of ravenous need for her. Too much labor to complete. And perhaps the Master would be calling him to conference about further strategy.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be waiting.” Galatea grinned at him, so rash and young, a product of over three decades ago, when she had chosen to be turned.
Behind her, the Guard who had started the most recent round of chanting for food began sniffing at the blood she carried. Its nostrils flared, its eyes blaring red.
“Groupie blood,” it growled.
Galatea assessed the creature, unafraid. Her kind had aided in giving birth to the Guards, lending their bite to the process. Thus, the Guards had powers equal to the Groupies, though the latter had the gift of free will whereas Sorin was the keeper of the lower vampires in every way.
Sorin cocked an eyebrow. “Galatea, please, splash the creature’s mouth with your blood.”
Surprised, she nevertheless did so, flicking drops from her fingers onto the Guard’s lips.
The low-ranked vampire feverishly licked every fleck of moisture, grunting. “More, more, more…”
Sorin concentrated on its eyes. They flared with flame, excitement, the pupils expanding and blocking all color, the black center consuming the red. In that fathomless space, Sorin believed he could detect a foreign blankness…. A hole filled with something he could almost comprehend yet…could not.
Something just beyond his reach. Something he might have even known in another lifetime?
Before Sorin could grasp the meaning of what he was witnessing, the Guard’s eyes contracted to red again, returning to the color of eternity.
“More, more, more,” the Guard said, shaking its cell bars.
They had never shown this sort of fervor for blood until fairly recently; the Guards normally ate to survive. Had they become addicted? Or what if the Guards had developed a taste for Groupie sustenance in particular? Perhaps he needed to synthesize generic blood devoid of anything Groupie. The last scenario the Underground needed to endure was one in which the Guards craved the citizens.
“More, more…”
The others joined in, rattling their bars until the ground trembled. “More, more, more…”
“Stop.” Sorin’s tone was harsh. A chill traced the edges of his body, and he resented the disturbance.