Biffy leaned back. Trying not to slide comfortably into the ridiculous banter of Lord Akeldama’s household. Trying not to enjoy the conversation too much. Trying not to jump in and mediate, as once would have been his role. It hurt. By George, it hurt. Although not as much as it once had. Twenty years were remarkably numbing.
“But sir! They are so cute. A brother-and-sister pair.”
Lord Akeldama frowned. “Do they match to my aesthetic?”
“A ginger and a tabby, sir.”
Lord Akeldama winced. “I shall have to entirely redecorate the sitting room. Ginger indeed!”
“He has the cutest little face...” Winkle gave a winning smile. “Looks like he’s got a most serious statement mustache.”
“Mustache? Mustache! In my house?” Lord Akeldama was not to be persuaded by mustaches on cats. Or anyone else, for that matter.
Winkle made his eyes big. “Please, sir?”
Lord Akeldama gave a very elegant snort. “I shall think about it. Now, bring us the slurps and leave us be for twenty minutes. I trust you can entertain the candidates until then? How many of you are home at the moment?”
“Only four of us drones, my lord.”
“That should be enough for two kittens.”
More fateful words were never spoken. Biffy hid a grin.
Winkle nodded. “I hope so, sir. They are most ebullient.”
“Well, you’d best hop to it, then, hadn’t you, my sweet?”
Winkle hurried off, returning in mere moments with the champagne mixed with blood, and then excusing himself with a slightly panicked look in his eye.
Lord Akeldama sipped his slurp and turned his piercing eyes back to Biffy.
“So, Alpha, how is everything with your new pack?”
“As well as can be expected.”
“It has only been a few months since you became the power behind the fur. Is that correct? You know me and time.”
Biffy could have calculated to the exact hour he’d assumed leadership of the London Pack, but he didn’t want to let his former master know how much the responsibility weighed upon him. “A few, as you say, my lord.”
“None of that anymore, my dear. We’re equals now.”
Biffy winced. Technically, of course, he was Lord Akeldama’s social superior. An Alpha werewolf with a full pack outranked a rove vampire. He’d recently been learning all about it. He didn’t think Lord Akeldama would like it if he mentioned that little fact.
Lord Akeldama put down his drink softly. “A little bird told me you’ll be leaving us soon.”
Biffy wasn’t surprised at all by the knowledge, although he was a little shocked by the seriousness of the accusation. Lord Akeldama was never serious.
“Yes.” He made the excuses in his head because it would never do to volunteer information to a vampire, least of all Lord Akeldama – not anymore. I don’t think it’s healthy for werewolves to be in such close proximity to a vampire. I need my own space, to establish a change from one Alpha to the next. I need change. And I need to redecorate.
“Sweetie, I think it’s a wonderful idea.”
“You do?” Biffy blinked at him.
“You’re taking into account established influence of the supernatural set in other parts of the city? We’re a bit weighted at this juncture to north and west London.”
Biffy fell, too easily, into their old strategic confidences. “Of course.”
“Not Dulwich?” Lord Akeldama gave a delicate little shudder. “The name alone.”
“Certainly not! Greenwich.”
“Ah.” The pink drink swirled in the glass as the vampire contemplated the bubbles therein.
“There’s Blackheath right there and it’s still close enough to the important parts of town.” Biffy tried not to sound as if he were defending his decision.
“Not too rough-and-tumble?”
“For me, perhaps, but not for them. In addition, there is the theater and the music hall.”
“You’re thinking of new clavigers? Very wise, dear boy. Very wise indeed.”
Biffy tried not to puff up at the praise from his former master.
“Well, my pet, you will bring some charm and civilizing force to the area.”
“That’s the general idea, yes.” Biffy leaned forward, determined to get them away from this serious track. “How do you feel about purple curtains?”
“What shade of purple?”
“My point exactly!”
And just like that, they were back on familiar ground. Biffy spent a comfortable quarter of an hour debating the measure of interior decorating and the relative advantages when combined with the rather brutish attitude most werewolves extended towards furniture and finally rose to depart.
Cries from the sitting room notwithstanding (the kittens, it seemed, were indeed a handful), it was time for Biffy to take his leave.
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, what has their britches in a bunch now?” Lord Akeldama pondered, as he led Biffy towards his inner sanctum rather than the front door.
Biffy hesitated to follow the vampire into his private quarters, but he was wildly curious.
Lord Akeldama pushed open the sitting-room door to chaos. One of his drones was perched precariously atop the back of a settee trying to reach a small ginger fluff-ball that was, apparently, climbing the (not purple) curtains. Another drone was trying to gently shake said kitten off said curtains. The kitten clung as if life and limb depended upon it.
Two other drones were down on their knees (at great risk of indelicate rending, given they took after their vampire master in the matter of tightly fitted trousers). They were fishing about under the self-same settee, presumably for the second kitten. Several chairs had been knocked over and there was a bowl sitting in what could only be a damp patch of spilled milk.
Biffy glanced at Lord Akeldama to assess his reaction to the madness. The vampire’s first glance was one of shining affection, but he quickly schooled his features into that of disciplinarian and teacher. Biffy also watched him take in Winkle’s pert bottom as he attempted to retrieve the tabby. Or perhaps that hunger was the result of a bit of naked neck (between hair and cravat) exposed by the kneeling drone.
Even as a drone himself, Biffy had never deluded himself about Lord Akeldama. Perhaps there had once been a youthful fantasy about Biffy becoming a vampire and the two of them immortal together forever. But in his heart, Biffy had always known that he was a one-immortal kind of dandy, and Lord Akeldama was not. The vampire had never led him on. Lord Akeldama’s love, such as it was, was always transient and shared.
Now Biffy understood why. True, Biffy was a young immortal, but he was almost fifty, and he’d seen his mortal friends grow old while he had not. Or die in the attempt to become like him. He wasn’t yet old enough to have grown the protective thickness around his heart, the one that made Lord Akeldama’s smiles brittle, but Biffy now knew why it was there. Frankly, he wasn’t convinced he’d ever be the type that preferred to share. For now, he’d decided he’d rather be alone than constantly watch his lovers leave him, one way or another. As a drone, Biffy had understood, and had shared, because that was the only way he got a piece of Lord Akeldama. As a werewolf, even if it were possible, he wouldn’t take that wager.
I’m on my own now.
Lord Akeldama was distracted, on to the next crisis, on to the next evening’s entertainment, on to the next toy. It was how he weathered immortality. I wonder if he’s as lonely in his way as I am in mine.
Biffy bent and kissed the vampire’s cheek, aware of the imposition. Aware of the hairs rising on his arm and the press of his own supernatural instincts urging him to change shape. Protect himself. Instincts that screamed in his head. Vampire. Predator. Not pack. Enemy. He was aware too of the faint smell of carrion, like rotting flesh and decayed bones, that hung under the citrus cologne that Lord Akeldama always wore. Something Biffy had never scented when they lived together. When Biffy was human.