Theron's Boys
by Kiernan Kelly
Sometimes, Christian thought, as the subway train bounced and rattled, the lights flickering on and off, being a vampire sucked big time—and not in the good way, either.
He was stuck riding the A train all fucking day, until the sun set again. Although, he thought, wrinkling his nose as a particularly pungent drunk staggered past him, if he had to spend the next fourteen hours inhaling the stench of the masses, he might just throw himself onto the tracks. He was fairly certain that being run over by a subway car would kill a vampire—the dismemberment clause, as Theron referred to it—but no matter what happened to him it would be worth it to escape the reek inside the train. It smelled like a potent combination of body odor, piss, and burritos, and made his stomach turn flip-flops already.
Actually, when Christian really thought about it, he realized that he’d jumped into his new life (for want of a better word) knowing very little about being a vampire at all. When Theron had first approached him about joining Theron’s Boys, as he’d called his little club, it had sounded like a sweet gig. Zero body fat, heightened senses, vastly increased strength, all the sex you could handle with none of the usual worries over disease, living forever—all tempting little perks that came with membership.
However, like a shady timeshare salesman, Theron had downplayed the negative aspects about the change and had conveniently left out a few pertinent facts altogether.
For example, the fact that exposure to the sun would cause terminal heartburn. Not that Christian would have considered that one to be the deal-breaker, but it would have been nice to know beforehand that there was a chance he might explode into a flaming shower of Christian-bits.
Another factoid Theron hadn’t mentioned was that gaining eternal life did not include winning the lottery. Forever was a long fucking time to spend slinging drinks and shaking your g-stringed ass so that you could barely cover your rent and not have enough money left over to buy a PlayStation 3 Game System.
That bit of information would have raised a big, fat, red flag.
Truthfully, though, Christian admitted that knowing the entire truth probably wouldn’t have made a bit of difference. He’d have accepted Theron’s offer anyway, mostly because Theron had Christian’s body so tightly wound with lust at the time that he’d nearly strummed. Theron could have asked him if Christian would have liked to have his tongue pulled out by the root with a pair of rusty pliers, and Christian would still have said yes.
A bag lady, clutching a frayed blue backpack to her chest, snarled at Christian as she brushed past him, leaving a nearly visible cloud of eye-watering stench in her wake.
Crinkling his nose and swearing a blue streak under his breath, for the umpteenth time that day alone Christian cursed the moment he’d first met Theron Shade.
Inferno
by Matt Brooks
He felt the music throb under his feet a block away. His tee shirt strained with his breath and he hurried toward the vibration, his jeans whispering as he strode, hungering. As he turned into the dark side street, the beat came stronger, rising like an electrical pulse through his legs and waking his groin with the pounding rhythm. He slipped down the alley. Ahead, over a shadowed doorway, tongues of neon flame licked at the club’s name: “Inferno”.
Blinking in the light, he waited anxiously as the doorman glanced at his card, took his entrance fee, stamped his wrist. Then he was through the heavy curtain, in the long passage that led to a narrow staircase and community.
The thud of feet grew louder as he moved downstairs. A turn and he was standing on a mezzanine looking down into the club, the music throbbing now in every vein, his eyes adjusting to layers of light and darkness. Below, shirtless men wove and spun, a heaving sea of flesh illuminated by flashes of red and gold, the energy a smoky aura that rose and fell, carrying the tribal scent of youth, sex, adventure. He barely hesitated before plunging down the final steps and onto the dance floor.
No partner necessary here. Just the willingness to surrender: music as master, feet and hips servants—or slaves.
Past
“Robert,” the bar tender said, by way of greeting, and passed a beer across.
“Thanks, Bud.” The newcomer’s voice was low, rich.
The young man looked up and saw that his neighbor was tall, not bulky but well built, an open leather vest revealing the layer of dark hair shadowing his chest. The face was strong featured, with an easy smile. Black tousled hair fell to eyes that shone grey in the flashing light. He felt his insides knot. He smiled back slowly, raising a brow.
The man tipped his own bottle in turn. “Hey.” He leaned closer to be heard.
“Hey. Hot.” He blotted his chest with his tee shirt before tucking it in to hang like a white tail over his small, round ass.
“I can see.” The dark-haired man smiled appraisingly.
They drank again, jostled together by the passersby. He felt the smooth coolness of the man's shoulder against his own heated skin and suddenly the roughness of the crowd didn’t matter.
Chiaroscuro
by Erastes
Now I think back on it all, it's ironic and yet so very apposite how I always associate him with light. It seems impossible to think of him in any other way but surrounded by a bright halo of iridescence. The bright yellow glare of candles, or the greener glow of the gas lamps. Light clung to him always, like a jealous lover, like a second skin. Even in the dark he was never obscured by it but shimmered with a phosphorescence all his own. Even his very name meant light.
I remember our first touch and my fingers tingle at the memory of it. But it was not that touch that which changed my world. That happened at our first meeting; and that was a week before he held my hand in his. I hadn’t even learned his name until our third meeting; no one had said his name, least of all Signora Guildeccia.
Signor Bettano had taken me to her box for an introduction and my Patron had been almost out of character in his loss of composure as we moved through the lushly carpeted hallways on our way to meet the great lady herself.
“Try to say no more than you have to, Michel,” he instructed. “She will be interested in you, oh yes indeed.” His voice dropped a tone as if suddenly talking to himself, “But you must trust me, you know little of this city and its politics. Leave the talking to me.”
“Si, Signore,” I said earnestly. “But what about next week? When I go to the house to start work? What then?”
“Next week is a long time away. Let us worry about tonight.”
I obeyed, keeping silent as two liveried servants standing watch outside opened the doors of the box and one of them took Bettano’s card. My Patron adopted his 'number four persona'; the effusive toady, the one he saved purely for aristocracy and we were ushered in.
After nauseating compliments to a seated, silent figure draped in black lace, Signor Bettano turned at last and gestured to me.
“Here is our new talent, Signora, as promised. Allow me to introduce Michel di Posco.” I bowed low, my hat trailing the floor and stayed down as I had been tutored until a deep and amused voice asked me to stand.
“Come closer, child,” the voice requested, and I stepped further within the box and up to her chair where she sat as if enthroned. I tried to ignore the fact that, despite my twenty-five years she had called me child. “Look at me,” she ordered and I raised my eyes to her face.
I was astounded at what I saw. The Signora was breathtakingly beautiful; every tale of her was true. Slight and pale, with skin like finest Pietrasanta marble, dark hair scraped back from a tall brow and eyes so brown as to be black voids. She seemed younger than I had imagined, than I had been told; looking more like mid forties than the early seventies I thought I knew her to be. She held me in her gaze for a long moment, and I was unsure whether I was expected to stare, or to look away.
Finally she laughed; a tiny tinkling sound like the shattering of a champagne flute. “I have seen your work, Signore. Do you think you will be able to do justice to your subject?”
A direct question. My brain went numb as I hesitated for a second or two, expecting my Patron to deliver on his promise to talk for me. He said nothing and I was left looking foolish, gasping for words.
“I...I...feel confident that if the Signora likes my previous work she will be satisfied with my humble efforts on her behalf.”
“Don't emulate your Patron, boy.” Her voice was amused and sarcastic. “He knows half of what he thinks he knows and thinks half as well as he speaks. I did not say I liked your work. Merely that I had seen it.”
I bristled at this, my youthful pride getting the better of me. “The Signora surprises me then by allowing such an amateur to paint a member of her family.” I heard my Patron gasp and he attempted to intercede.
“Signora, excuse him. He is young, stupid...” but the Signora laughed again, ignored him and held out a pale hand in lace gloves for me to clasp. I did so, confused, and with surprising strength she pulled me up close to her chair. Keeping my hand trapped in hers she traced my cheek with a finger.
“Strength of mind. Yes. I had heard as much. A proper respect for your own talent. A good thing. Now, my question remains. Can you paint this face?”
I expected her to keep me captive, but instead she turned me sideways and pointed toward a figure in black which I had not seen before then, as he had been obscured by the curtains. The gas lamps were behind him and his head was in darkness, the glow of the lights shimmering like a corona behind him. For a second, even without the detail of his features, he looked like a Russian Icon with an aureate glow emanating from around his head.
Then he stepped away from the curtains and the light hit the sides of his face and my world, as I had known it, ended. My mouth dried, and I felt that my eyes were being seared from the insides out, that I was losing my sight.
It would have been ironic indeed if such beauty could rob a man of his vision. Men were not born to be so beautiful. Such exquisite features were the masks of gods and heroes, not mere mortals suddenly stepping into a pool of light in a chilly opera house. As I stood there gaping like a schoolboy, my heart pounding and a heavy pressure rising in my loins, there was a low chuckle behind me.
“Well, child?”
I tore my tortured eyes from the face, looking around in confusion—no one else seemed to find his appearance surprising.
“Can you paint him or not?”
Immortal Steps
by Kira Stone
“Tain O’Halloran, get your prima donna ass back here!” Tain ignored the waspish demands of the tour’s publicist and kept on walking through the bowels of the Grampian Theater to his dressing room. It was hardly more than a closet with grandiose pretensions, but it would hide him from the rabble seeking his attention. What could he possibly say to the reporters and sycophants that hadn’t already been said a thousand times? Why did they care what his favorite color was, or how many shoes he’d worn out in his career? He lived to dance. If they saw the show, then they already knew everything important there was to know about him. He was hot, tired, and annoyed. The cheery inner glow he’d gotten from the audience’s applause had been entirely wiped out by the fawning boot-lickers waiting for him in the wings. They were nearing the end of the show’s two year run, and he no longer felt the need to bow to the whims of the people who tried to choreograph his private life as well as his professional one. As soon as his contract was up, he was bailing on the pro dancing circuit. He wouldn’t be rich, but he’d be the hell out of the spotlight and able to do what he wanted when he wanted to do it without a hundred cameras on his heels. At the moment, that seemed like the perfect world. He entered his room and shut the door behind him. He tapped his dance shoe on the floor to count the seconds until Julia barged in. “You’re really pissing me off, Tain. I’ve got a room full of moneybags ready to fork over cash—cash this show needs badly if we’re going to extend the run for another season, might I add—for a chance to brush elbows with the male lead, and you’re hiding in your room like a sulky child.” He sank down onto a wooden chair and started unlacing his dance shoes. His long hair fell forward and formed a curtain to hide his face. “And your point is?” he asked without looking up. “My point is that you need to haul your stubborn ass out there and help me pick their wallets.” “No.” “No?” Her voice rose several octaves. “No?” “I think your curls are wound a little too tight if you don’t recognize the meaning of the word.” Tain rubbed his sore feet. The old, familiar pain made him think of another time and place where a pair of warm, strong hands would soothe away his cares along with his aches. He rarely thought of his old teacher these days. The fact that Kale Lowe entered his mind now just proved how much he needed a break. “Your ego is wound a little too tight if you think being the lead means you don’t have to schmooze with the great unwashed masses. Look in your contract if you don’t believe me.” He knew damn well what his contract said, and he’d learned it was worth as much as the paper it was written on when it suited the company. Tonight he would do only what suited him. “Give me a break, Jules. I’m not in the mood to play Prince Charming.” Acrylic nails clicked against her silver necklace as she studied him. Since Tain was used to her ways by now, he let her stare as he stripped off his sweat drenched, skin-tight silk shirt and reached for a bottle of cold water that he then dumped over his head. He shook his head to get the droplets out of his eyes before grabbing the second bottle. He removed the cap and looked up at her. Her breathing was a little too fast to be sheer irritation. Her heavy breasts rose and fell as the coral tipped nipples tried to poke through her classic black gown. How he knew they were coral in color was not a memory he cared to dwell on. He had to give her credit though. She was one of the few who’d been honest about her motives for getting in his pants. So he’d given her one hell of a screaming orgasm, then coolly informed her it would never happen again. It didn’t prevent him from teasing the hell out of her upon occasion though. He dribbled the icy liquid across his chest. The rivulets coursed over his smooth, sculpted torso like tributaries coming together at the juncture of his thighs. His pants were cut to enhance the outline of his package, and her brown eyes glowed when she spotted the bulge there. Sorry, babe. This one’s not for you. “Play nice, and I’ll make it worth your time,” she offered, her voice much sweeter than her previous tone. “Not interested.” “Your cock says otherwise.” He could hardly refute her since the evident was pretty plain. Honestly, he didn’t know what was making him so damn horny this week. Dancing in front of an appreciative crowd often gave him the equivalent of a runner’s high, but this feeling was more than that. It was a persistent gnawing at the base of his spine, the kind of anticipation that boiled inside him when he knew he was on the verge of getting well and truly fucked. It wasn’t the sort of feeling that lasted, and certainly not for days at a time. But that was his problem. He’d deal with it later. Right now, he just wanted to get rid of Julia so he could have a few peaceful hours to himself. “Then it’s a good thing I don’t let my dick do the talking for the rest of me.” He was growing bored by the game he was playing with her and used a towel to wipe the water off his bare chest. “Give it up, Jules. You’re not going to win this one.” “Oh yeah? What if I told you a dedicated fan hoped to meet you tonight? Would that change your mind?” His hands stilled. “A dedicated fan. You mean… my dedicated fan?”