**Interlude 13 - For it is his to fill your need, but not your emptiness

Fabien met her eyes, and nodded lightly. The night air stirred the loose fabric of his shirt, and his eyes and the sharp points of his cheeks gleamed with tears.

The boy lowered his head, and his features were lost beneath the tangled sweep of his hair

"I cannot, Dieu aide moi, I wish it were so easy, but I cannot look away." He rasped miserably.

The urchin turned aside, and moved to retrace their steps from the dark courtyard and back into the quiet halls. As he passed Fakhir he hesitated, and reached out to affectionately brush his warm fingers across her cool hand.

"Merci, Madame." He murmured gently, his touch as tender and fleeting as the wing of a moth.

Then he was lost to the darkness, taking the scent of blood, sorrow and rising terror with him.

Doubtless the night had claimed much of the lonely old house, and unless Colombe had been swift, many of the lamps would not yet have been coaxed into life.

The library door swung open roughly, groaning torturously on its hinges as old oak and brass were subject to unwanted force.

The pale haired urchin rushed in like a desperate ghost returning to their resting place. The gold of his hair was made silver in the moonlight, and the shadows painted dark hollows around his eyes.

"Émile? Are you still in here?" He called out, his voice sharp as a blade, and only faintly trembling.

Fakhir watched his progress across the courtyard with hooded eyes. Her fingers flickered as though in surprise at his gentle touch.

"Prenez soin de vous, boy," she said, the words warm in her mouth.

She let him pass without further comment. As the door shut behind him, her gaze returned to the silvered horns of the distant moon.

Darkness had claimed this corner of the house. All was black and still as the door to the library creaked open.

Night had fallen as a shroud in the calm room, blanketing the books in a quiet dusting of gloom. Émile's slumped shape was hazy in the grey shadows. They were precisely where Fabien had left them, though curled tightly into the stern wooden back of the chair, their cheek resting on their shoulder. From their easy breathing, they were lost to a deep sleep.

They startled at the sound of their name, raising their head with a quickly drawn breath. Their eyes glinted as they struggled to make out his form.

"Oh, c'est toi," they murmured with something like relief. Their shoulders loosened.

They stirred and stretched their trembling limbs like a cat, their silhouette fluid against the light from the window. They had not buttoned their shirt and their ribs flexed beneath the long strip of exposed skin.

"Is your cat-eyed friend finished with you?" Their voice was soft and hoarse with sleep.

They straightened in their chair and let their bare feet find the floor. The raking of their fingers through the dark waves of their hair did little to neaten their bedhead, and it was charmingly disheveled. Dried blood darkened their lower lip.

"I think I was just telling you how I liked you best." Weariness rasped in the words. "Come here and I'll show you, mon ami."

Fabien slowly crossed the room, his careful tread marred only by the sharp crackle of the floorboards under his bare feet. The boy was silent, his expression impossible to discern in the shadows that clung to him.

He stopped in the centre of the room, perhaps eight paces or more from where Émile was seated.

The boy shook his head, and for a fleeting moment a shaft of moonlight illuminated one side of his skull. His dark eyes were hard, the set of his mouth tense as though his jaw was clenched painfully tight.

The muscles of the boy's throat flexed as he swallowed. He drew in a sharp breath that shuddered between his teeth, and the boy took time to steady himself.

"Non. You come here to me. Right now." He instructed, his voice little above a whisper.

Émile was oblivious to the hard set of the boy's jaw, did not take note of his harsh breath. With the cobwebs of sleep still clinging to their brain they were made inattentive and soft, and it was only at his sharp whisper that they looked up at him.

"Que voulez-vous dire?" they said irritably. "Pourquoi?"

Something in his urgent demeanour caused a spark of doubt to flicker across their features. They sighed and made to stand, though it took more effort than it ought and their movements were delicate as though to avoid overmuch jarring. It was clear they carried pain in their body.

They swayed softly on their feet, the shadows sinking their cheeks into their skull.

"I am not a dog," they grumbled, straightening the loose fabric of their open shirt. "And certainly not yours to come when called."

Despite this protest they took an uncertain step forward, though they were still well outside his reach. They silently scrutinized his features for an answer.

"What is going on?" Their voice had fallen instinctively to a whisper

Fabien watched their efforts to rise with almost frightening intensity. He observed each soft flinch, every flicker of pain that twitched across their brow or darkened their beautiful eyes.

When they managed to edge closer to him, something within the urchin seemed to break. He released a short, bitter laugh and began to shake his head as though on the verge of something terrible.

"Merde, I am such a fool," he croaked, and raised his eyes to the ceiling.

"Non." He agreed lightly, and his feline-sharp gaze returned to Émile. When he spoke again, his voice was light, conversational.

"This is true. No dog I know sits with bones broken, still performing tricks."

He took a step closer, each word turning barbed upon his tongue.

"No dog I know drags its bleeding body through the muck, with tail wagging, and begs for more. That would require a special kind of training, non? Or something else entirely? Tell me Émile, I know very little about dogs."

The boy closed the space between them even further, his movements slow and stalking. His grey eyes were hard, and it was only the trembling of his lower lip that betrayed some deeper emotion.

"What is happening? Right now? I will talk you through it." He rasped, voice cracking as he attempted to regain something close to control.  "You are leaving this house. Tonight."

Fabien's words caught them by surprise, and they flinched as though struck. They looked up at him with wounded shock carved into their slack mouth, the still-weary corners of their eyes. For the first time since he had known them their eyes flashed with clear hurt, and he could see straight through to the wounded child beneath.

Their fists clenched and unclenched as they digested his words in venomous silence.

"You are a fool." Black anger rose hot in their throat and the words were a snarl. "A stupid, vile fool, and it sickens me to touch you."

They were shaking, heated rage vibrating in every taut muscle. They did not turn away as the boy approached but took a step forward to meet him, defiantly closing the gap between them. Their eyes were dark with a poisonous anger pulled from some deep, black pit inside.

"I can't leave, you enculé stupide. If I step foot outside that door, they'll-" Their voice broke and they turned away with a shudder, their shoulders heaving. They spat thickly on the floor at his feet.

"I haven't had the luxury to know little about dogs. Better you bash me to death, better the horrid girl poisons the food, better he goes too far and snaps my-" Their voice cracked and the words crumbled to ruins in their mouth.

When they raised their blackly-lined eyes, they were wet with that terrible, scorching fury, and dark with an anguish so chillingly deep it made one reel with vertigo.

They jabbed a sharp knuckle in his chest hard enough to take his breath. "You want me gone? You can't stand me in le vieil homme's bed? That I've taken your place, that he'd rather fuck me and toss me aside like scraps for you?" They were in his face, their shivering breath hot.

"Then you'll have to kill me yourself. Je n'irai pas.

Fabien's grey eyes watched impassively as he watched their expression change, as he followed the dark pattern of their pain and anger as it bled out like ink dropped in water.

The urchin had little restraint, and what resolve he possessed already appeared to be cracking under the weight.. Émile's evident hurt almost caused him to sag, and he shivered, feverish. A  thin veil of sweat had beaded across his brow, and his eyes appeared to lose their focus

"Now it starts to become clear." He stated hoarsely.

Immediately after their hand made contact with his chest,  Fabien caught Émile by their hair. He gathered a fistful of the dark strands at the nape of their neck, and pulled firm enough to expose the stretch of their bruised throat to him.

"You seem upset." He murmured soothingly, his head angled as he searched the green depths of their eyes.

"Non, non, I've made my peace with it now. You be his little whore lap dog, then come crawling back to me for treats."

The boy gently brushed aside loose strands of silken raven hair from their eyes. He stroked the elegant curve of their cheek with the back of his hand, unable to disguise the trembling in his fingers.

"I just wonder, Émile, what we will do when he hurts you so bad you cannot crawl." The boy's voice splintered again, his grey eyes storm cloud dark with anger and misery.

"Then, I think, you will just have to whine for me, oui? Just whimper my name, and I will come to you."

He did not give them the opportunity to reply, before he pressed his lips to Émile's beautiful, torn mouth.

Émile did not surrender easy to the fist in their hair - they fought fiercely against him, thrashing like a fish on a hook. Their body twisted with surprising agility in an attempt to wrench away. But the strain was palpable, their energy limited, and they soon lapsed into hateful submission, panting hard. The raised jut of bone was visible beneath the skin of their exposed chest with their exertion.

Their lips curled into a snarl of disdain when he jerked their head back. They were vibrating like a plucked string, their skin flushed hot with anger.

They were beyond any hope of being calmed by his words, and they jerked their head in a vain attempt to wrest away from his grasp. The muscles of their taut throat flexed as they gnashed their teeth.

"Va te faire foutre. I don't need anything from you," they spat, shuddering like a shot bird against him. They kicked, found nothing, and winced at the effort. "I'd sooner die, I'd rather die."

He would find little but hard resentment in their shuttered eyes. The whites of their eyes rolled like that of a feral dog as they twisted against him.

"Miserable cocksucking gutter-rat, get your filthy who-" This colorful litany was thankfully interrupted by the press of the boy's mouth over theirs.

They met with a clash of teeth. Their body jerked with a jolt of indignation and initially, their curled lips were stiff against him.

Their angry hands reached blindly for him, but they did not seek to hurt, to claw - instead they took him by the collar and roughly tugged him close, and then closer. Their mouth opened to him with the fierce desperation of one drowning.

They were hot with fury, writhing with the shivers that took their limbs, and when their teeth scraped on his bottom lip their low moan was nearly a growl.

Fabien weathered the storm of their anger in silence. He allowed the insults to come, his easy strength infuriatingly secure as they struggled and twisted against him.

The boy anticipated teeth and rage when he laid his lips to them. So when Émile broke and softened to him, he tasted deeply of their mouth with groaning relish. His tongue scraped teeth, his breath came in a hot, shuddering pant.

The boy's hand did not loosen as he dragged his mouth along the side of their jaw with fierce, unrestrained desire. His teeth scored over bruises, his lips sucked hungrily on the smooth skin of their throat.

"Want to feel you," he managed to huff into the bend of their neck.

His other hand moved hastily undo the fastenings of Émile's shirt, his agile lockpickers fingers able to undo what efforts they had put into correcting it with thoughtless speed. His fingers plucked irritably at the barrier to his hand, until he had bared their smooth shoulders to him, the soft curves of their moonlight doused chest.

"Take it off me," he rasped, and jostled their hands on the collar of his shirt  to make plain his want. "Touch me. S'il vous plait."

His mouth was never far from Émile lips, brushing over their cheek or panting close to one finely shaped ear. Nor did his hand dare to completely loosen its hold on their hair, as though a part of him feared they would slip away into the darkness.

Émile’s body trembled like a taut wire at the taste of Fabien’s mouth. They sucked hungrily on his tongue, their teeth sharp and their mouth coppery with the blood of their split lip.

They caught his wrist in their palm, their skin hot to the touch, and held it as though grasping desperately for a tree branch to save them from drowning.

When he pulled away they were left panting. They strained against his fist in their dark hair like a dog on a leash, though the fury in the motion had dwindled. They lifted their chin to thrust the bruised skin of their throat against his teeth and their breath shuddered at the pressure on sore nerves. The fingers around his thin wrist tightened.

Their movements were hurried to the point of being frantic. When Fabien bared their shoulders they hastily shrugged the rest of their shirt off, quickly tearing it away to discard it on the floor at their feet. Their skin in the moonlight was as rich as the soft petals of a cream-white rose, the bruises that darkened their neck like deep, black cuts in the pale light. The skin of their shoulders pebbled in shivers beneath his touch.

They did not need to be told twice. They hungrily unfastened the buttons of his shirt, their hands clumsy with the intensity of their want. They impatiently forced the fabric aside. Their nails scratched along the skin of his chest in their hot agitation.

When his chest was laid bare before them, they touched him as though to devour him. Their hands followed the curve of his ribs, the flicking tail of the inked fox along his torso. They restlessly relished the smooth skin of his stomach before their hands fell to his hips, fingers sliding beneath the fabric that concealed his lower half from their impatient hands.

Resentment still darkened their gaze, but in the soft light of the moon with their trembling hands on his body, their eyes were as liquid and bright as cool, still green water.

Fabien's breath grew ragged with desire at the sight of Émile's bare skin. And when their nails scraped his skin, the boy was unable to suppress a shuddery groan.

The urchin almost appeared to soften at the touch of their hands, his body trembling in pleasure at the feel of contact on his skin. He tipped back his chin, exposing a throat which glinted with strange scars in the half-light, as though some beast has put its teeth to him over and over..

The grey-eyed boy's grip tightened in Émile's hair, and there was a tremble in his arm that spoke of something savage.. As though he might extract something more, with his hand still fierce in his companion's dark hair. The boy seemed to struggle with himself, then closed his eyes with a sharp shake of the head

"Wait, Émile," he managed to gasp, and his grip on their softened before he released them entirely. The boy's hand moved to settle on their forearm, stilling the movement of their hand beneath his clothes.

"Not here,” he breathed. "You should… come to my room." His hand moved to Émile's chin, and stroked the corner of their mouth with the rough skin of his thumb.

“I have paiement d'avance if you want it."

The youth did not wait to see Émile's response before he turned aside. He moved through the dark, following a part from the library that was illuminated by a streak of moonlight.

“Or sulk here in the dark, your choice." He spoke over his shoulder, before he disappeared from view.

The soft lines of Émile’s body, blued in the silvery light of the peeping moon, sang electric as the boy groaned into the curve of their jaw. Their eager palms stroked the smooth skin of his slender waist with brazen want, hands sliding around to his back to pull him closer against the quiver of their body. They were so warm in the growing dark.

When Fabien exposed his throat they had to lean onto their toes to press their mouth to the glimmer of scars on his neck. Their tongue was hot on the skin of his throat and when his hand tightened in their hair, their soft groan vibrated.

They froze in trembling anticipation. They met his grey gaze through dark lashes.

“D'accord,” they whispered, shivering, breathless, against the press of his thumb at the corner of their mouth. Their breath was hot, eager, the flick of their tongue wet.

But as the boy pulled away and their connection was severed, they were left bereft. Their eyes, bright with moonlight, searched his face. Displeasure returned in a shadow like that left by a blotting swarm of locusts to their features.

“Pourquoi?” they croaked, their hands clenching and unclenching at their sides. The shiver that traced up their bare spine seemed more from cold than anger.

Their body listed towards him as he departed, but their feet did not follow. They stood, restless in the dark, as though in the vain hope he would return.

They took a hesitant step forward. Distantly, the front door closed with a soft click and they froze like a startled hare in the dark, their heart pounding in their throat. They shrank silently into the shadows of the room and fumbled for the discarded shirt at their feet. Their hands were shaking.

"So, are you coming then?" He drawled, with a hint of mocking amusement.

The closeness of his voice made clear that the boy had not gone far. His shadow stirred in the hall, flickering imp-like in the dark hall like a pointy limbed shadow puppet.

He sighed softly, his weight resting against the wall and arms crossed over his slim chest.

The ever deepening dark appeared not to trouble the boy. His lengthy time spent in the house had afforded him the privilege of being able to navigate the dark halls with ease.

"I'm not going to beg, Émile. Either you co--"

The boy swallowed whatever he was going to say.

The sound of the door made his young heart fret in his chest with all the instinctual terror of a startled stag. He turned his attention, arrow sharp, to the main entrance, and his casual slouch at once hardened into straight-limbed alertness.

The crisp poise of his limbs afforded him an air of polite respect, a stance that would not have looked amiss on a eager young servant waiting to greet his freshly arrived master. But there was something almost quietly defensive in the boy's limbs. His body created an unwitting barricade along the narrow stretch of the hall between the library door.

Fabien did not speak anything by way of affectionate greeting, and his feline eyes, half submerged in shadow, were narrowed in displeasure.

The vampire’s steps were soft as velvet, light as a cat’s silken tread, and the boy would not hear his approach in the inky gloom. His instincts as to Tariq’s destination were proved correct as the vampire’s dusky voice resounded like the prelude of a violin’s strings.

“Bonsoir, Fabien.” It was uncanny, how the white whorl of those sightless eyes seemed to see straight into him. His hair fell in an indulgent cascade of tousled waves over his shoulders. It gave him the distinct appearance of having just roused from a boudoir.

Émile straightened and quickly ran the hand not clutching their shirt to their bare chest through their hair in some attempt to disguise their disarray. Their eyes were on Fabien but they did not see him - their attention was fixated on the voice in the hall, their breath fluttering quick in their throat.

They would not have noticed the warm, rich ochre of his flushed skin, nor the torn collar of his uncharacterically rumpled shirt as though he had been in a tussle on the street. These fine details were only for Fabien’s narrowed eyes.

Were they not clear enough evidence of the fresh blood pumping hot in his veins, the rough amusement raking across his genteel tone would surely betray his recent feeding.

“Do not let me disturb you; I am only here to collect our guest.” Émile trembled in the dark.

He did not make to step past the boy standing jealous sentry at the door but considered him in silence. When he idly tilted his head, his pale eyes glinted with predatory mirth.

“Do I interrupt?” His voice was low and rough in his throat.

The bare skin on Fabien's exposed chest pebbled as though an unkind breeze had swept through the house. His grey eyes examined his host carefully, the extraordinary beauty of his eyes, the warm flush of his skin. This was always dangerous, for once he had begun to look, the boy seldom found he could severe the contact between them.

For a tender moment his stern expression softened, and other emotion crept into the delicate skin of his sleep-hungry eyelids. Whatever it was, the boy managed to swallow it down and stifle it.

“Welcome back, Monsieur.” He rasped amiably, his voice only lightly lined with pain. 

The urchin held steadfast to his position in the hall, and when when his host stated his intention, the boy's fingers curled at his sides.  He made no move to turn aside and allow the vampire to pass him, but stood resolute with all the bristling agitation of a street dog standing guard over its wounded mate.

“Well ah, actually Monsieur, I am glad that I have caught you. I want to speak with you,” he continued conversationally. It was a passable act, to seem as though being so near the vampire did not cause him such hurt.

“I know I ask a lot, as you have only just returned. But I - I would like to request a meeting with you. Alone. Right now.” The boy continued carefully.

His storm cloud eyes flitted momentarily to the library door, before they returned to his host. His voice lowered to little above a whisper, and the urchin began to shift his weight uncomfortably between his bare feet.

“Je suis désolé if- if that means I –I may be ruining your plans, with your guest.”  Scorn rose hot within his throat, so fierce it crackled through him like dormant embers stoked back to life.

“Mais je serai ravi de vous servir in... in whatever way you wish, to make it right.”

The words of this bargain did not sit entirely comfortably upon the urchin's lips. After they were said, he immediately grew quiet, his heart throbbing wildly in his throat. The darkness at least provided some protection for the boy, and concealed the soft flush of shame which rose to redden his chest and the sharp point of his cheeks.

“Please Monsieur? Let me have some of your time this night?”

The vampire allowed the boy to finish without interruption. He considered his request in inscrutable silence.

“Dubois.” His voice lifted as though he were calling a dog.

Émile, who under different circumstances would have had an illustrious career on the stage, rounded the corner of the doorway with cool nonchalance. The soft green of their gaze flicked to Fabien only briefly before holding the vampire’s sightless gaze. They licked their torn lips.

“Oui, monsieur?” It was the first opportunity Fabien would have to hear the tone they took with the master of the house and the contrast was striking - the dour grit was ground away to reveal a shockingly polite civility beneath.

“Await me upstairs.”

“Oui, monsieur,” they agreed pleasantly. They did not meet the boy’s eyes as they slunk past him down the corridor. They had slipped their shirt over their shoulders and it hung loosely on their torso.

Tariq waited in silence for their footsteps to dwindle before returning his attention to the urchin.

“Very well. We are alone. Right now,” he said. He took a step nearer, and another, until he was close enough that Fabien could smell the cool night air clinging to his skin, see the flash of ivory teeth in his mouth when he spoke.

“You wound me to suggest you would not serve me in any way I wish when you are not disrupting my plans.“ It was coquettish, the words prickling with soft insinuation.

“You have my time. Speak with me.”

Fabien bowed his head when the vampire summoned Émile from the library, and his eyes followed the movement of their feet as they passed him by.

He watched until they were lost to the shadows of the house, and when they were at last fully alone, his attention returned razor sharp to his host.

The boy lifted his chin, and his eyes gleamed liquid dark beneath the tangled strands of his flaxen hair. His upper lip curled from his teeth, and the vampire's words were greeted with stony silence.

Irritation thrummed electric beneath the boy's skin, and his foot shifted, as though he intended to step back insolently as he approached. Then the youth's spine straightened, and he swallowed softly before allowing a breath of silence to pass between them. When he was ready, he spoke again.

“Merci, Monsieur.” He replied, with blisteringly curtness. “I will try not to keep you long.”

“I have only... some simple questions-,” he began slowly, his lips trembling with fierce restraint. “-About your guest.”

The boy tilted his chin upwards to meet the vampire's sightless eyes.

“I want to know... for how long you plan to have them stay here.” The boy continued carefully, selecting each word with such exquisite care that sweat glistened upon his youthful brow.

“I want to know, in detail, why they remain here for so long.”

The urchin's grey eyes darkened, and he shifted his weight between his heels with something akin to the slinking distrust of a wild fox.

“Forgive me, Monsieur. It is not my place to pry into your affairs-

-But even a house this size, does not give me room enough to avoid them. It would be some small kindness to me ... to make clear your intentions."

Tariq considered the boy’s requests in silence. The white of his eyes gleamed as pale funeral lamps in a sepulchral chamber. His face, ever difficult to read, was bathed in shadow, and it was impossible to glean his thoughts beneath the dark hollows of his eyes, the coal-darkened line of his cheeks.

"Certainement. I plan to have them here until they no longer please me," he said plainly. He regarded Fabien with eyes that glinted with a predatory humour.

"I can tell you, in detail, how they please me, if you are so inclined." The words were low, but barbed as a cat’s tongue.

"But I would think you were familiar with the finer points,” The vampire closed the distance between them with silken ease. The smell of him was like copper coins left to warm in the sun, the petrichor marrow of cool night air, the peppery fragrance of autumn leaves crumbling to dust in black earth. “Given how they return to me smelling of your hands.”

His breath was cool as mist. “Given the scent of their blood on your mouth.”

"You are right not to pry into my affairs. Really, their presence does not seem so great an unkindness to you.”

He reached for the boy and, should he not duck away, held him gently by the back of his neck, his fingers tangled in his hair. His touch was cool, his eyes bright.

"Say what you mean." The words were soft and silver as the moonlight streaming through the library windows.

Fabien's dark eyes grew wide at his host's words. Flustered, he began to carefully adjust the collar of his open shirt, as a wave of heat crept incriminatingly over his skin.

"Et alors? Pourquoi est-ce que tu t'en préoccupes?" He snapped breathlessly.

"You...you bring another back here. You choose someone... so beautiful. You leave them alone with me, while you are gone, when I have little else to do here."

The urchin stiffened when his host drew near, and his shoulders ceased their trembling and suddenly grew tense. When he reached for him, the youth flinched, as though had the gall to shrug the vampire's hand aside.

"Oui, so maybe I enjoy making use of them. Maybe their trembling pleases me. Or at very least, it is a distraction from wanting you."

The boy's skin was hot to the touch, and the sudden closeness between them caused his breath to quicken. His fingers began to clench and unclench at his side with bitterly suppressed longing.

"You are wrong," he hissed. "It has been nothing but an unkindness to me."

A sudden look of pained desperation overcame his youthful features, and the flames of the boy's scorn appeared almost to diminish entirely.

"You ...you keep me away, and I do not understand it." He confessed softly, and lifted his hand to gently graze the cool skin of the vampire's wrist.

"Mais bon, fais comme tu veux. I won't keep you longer."

The boy attempted to struggle free from his host's grasp, to extract the fingers that held him so that he might turn miserably aside.

Humour pricked at the corner of the vampire’s mouth at the flush of heat on his boy’s cheeks. The gloom shrouding the corridor seemed to deepen to a velvety black as he considered Fabien’s flustered defense.

“Then you can not fault me,” he said. “That their trembling also pleases me.”

Tariq did not relinquish him, but pressed his body close to still his attempt to turn away. He stroked the smooth back of his neck with his thumb. His pale eyes did not quite find him.

“It is not my intention to be unkind to you,“ he said. Despite the throaty pleasure in the words, they were not mocking. “Nor to keep you away.”

There was a beat of silence as though the vampire were contemplating his next words. When he spoke, his voice was slither-soft.

“My bed is occupied,” he said.

His hair fell around his chest as he leaned close as though to press his mouth to Fabien’s. His soft breath was cool on the boy’s lips. “Perhaps that would not stop you from joining me in it this evening.” The proposition was warm with affection.

The  vampire’s words caused a flame of resentment to blaze within the storm cloud depths of the boy’s eyes. His fingers remained curled at his sides, and at the press of his host’s body, he released a sharp, frustrated breath.

The boy was still so susceptible to even the slightest display of his affection. The muscles of his shoulders softened under his hand, and he swallowed softly. Even with anger and pain travelling quicksilver through his veins, the fine hairs on the back of his neck lifted under the vampire’s touch.

The urchin’s expression remained hard, the set of his jaw tense. He lifted his chin to study the vampire’s unseeing eyes, as though he were seeking some veiled clue to his intentions. At the mention of having a guest in his bed, he flinched as though he had laid salted fingertips to some open wound.

Fabien’s trembling anger did not lessen, but he responded to the closeness of his host’s body in a slow, gentle unfurling. His neck arched, and his upper lip curled from his teeth as a sharp note of desire surfaced from within him, clear as a solitary chord of music on the night air.

The boy’s eyes lowered to regard the vampire’s mouth, only his mouth, and the closeness between them was made so agonising that it made his hands quiver.

It was difficult to for a time, to tell whether his reaction to the vampire’s invitation was stunned silence, or white hot rage. His breath was ragged, his skin so hot to the touch it seemed almost feverish.

“D’accord, Monsieur. If...if you want me,” he managed to whisper faintly.

He added nothing further to colour his acceptance, nor did he delve further into the vampire’s intentions.

The vampire did not unweave the boy’s silence, but allowed him to contemplate his answer without interruption. Where his shoulders softened beneath the vampire’s touch the gentle press of his fingers grew firmer, more indulgent, as they relished the warmth of his skin and the delicate hairs that raised beneath his hand.

Tariq’s eyes were pale as stones, the curve of his cruel mouth wickedly tempting in the soft grey shadows that dusted the pair. With the moon dappling half of his mouth in radiant silver light, it was not difficult to picture the wicked gleam of the sharp teeth concealed beneath those lips.

The boy’s soft response sparked a glow of delight in the vampire’s eyes like the lit flame of a paper lantern, and before the words had died on his tongue he had swept him up to part his lips with his insistent mouth. The press of his mouth was hungry, demanding, and stripped entirely of any hesitation. The taste of blood echoed on his lips.

“I want you,” he confirmed in a hoarse breath. Perhaps it was only optimistic desire that adorned the words with such sincerity.

He kissed him once more before reluctantly pulling away. The back of Fabien’s neck was apt to feel warm where his hand had lay.

“Get dressed,” he said. His breath had quickened, as evidenced by the rapid rise and fall of his chest. “And join me. Ne me fais pas attendre. ”

Apparently satisfied with this command he turned and departed, slipping away into the night-black of the house with feline tread.