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LENGTH: Epic Novel
SENSUALITY: Spicy

Cover art (c) Alex DeShanks 2008
ISBN 978-1-60394-164-8
Download: $5.99
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Unofficially, Avana Soulsmith has become a consultant to both the police force and the FBIC, the Federal Bureau of Interspecies Coexistence,
but she's far more interested in protecting humans from the 'others' than protecting the rights of the paranormal, especially those of the vampire persuasion.

Unhappily, when her friend, Detective Ian Traeger, drags her into a murder investigation, she finds herself neck deep in vampire territory, specifically the territory run by Constantine, the Great, the city's premiere progenitor. And Constantine, it seems, has plans for her that's she's very much afraid include recruiting her as one of the undead. Unfortunately, his arch enemy, Rasputin seems to have similar plans for her and he's just down right nasty!

Rating: Spicy. Warning: adult situations, graphic violence, language.

ETERNAL BONDAGE

By

Chapter One

Never Scoff At The Supernatural

“Do you, Avna Marie Soulsmith, take this vampire as your lawfully wedded husband?” Judge Oscar Hyacinth, a tiny, bespectacled man, balding and kindly, was officiating at a very unlawful wedding, doing so under the powerful mind control of the groom. From over top of his old fashioned spectacles, Judge Hyacinth grinned at me expectantly, wearing a loopy, drugged up expression, rather than the horrified one of a mortal ringed by a pack of the undead.

There were seven of them. Three males, if you were charitable and counted Snitch in that category--he and I had some bad history, so I can’t exactly be impartial about the one-eyed pipsqueak. The other four were female. The worst of the lot being Donata, the ultimate vampire bitch, her voluptuous form encased in a skintight black unitard, while her long matte black hair hung shroud-like about her face and body. She’s the one who had slashed open my back, from shoulder to hip, trying her best to rip me into shreds, by way of welcoming me into the clan, no doubt. But these unpalatable seven were just the minions.

Rasputin was the Master. The boss. The groom.

He was a brutish seven feet tall. Huge. Blubbery. Strong. A leprous, scabrous, diseased thing. And he had my arm gripped in his rusty-colored talon-tipped hand like a vise, because his most unwilling bride, moi, couldn’t be allowed to escape, now could I? This was the ultimate marriage of convenience.

Since the early 1990’s, when a bushel full of federal statutes had created the Federal Bureau of Interspecies Coexistence, the FBIC, a bureaucracy to protect and further the rights of vampires while also ascertaining and maintaining the growth of their population, marriage was the fastest ‘legal’ way to bring a human into a vampire family. The other less used means was to petition the courts for a change of status, from living to undead. Each-to-his-own, I guess. But there were supposed to be safeguards—like six human witnesses and the accompanying sworn affidavits filed with the FBIC to insure all parties were willing and under no hypnotic compulsions—to prevent an unwanted union. And this one was definitely unwanted.

Vampires were not my favorite species.

Judge Hyacinth tugged at his collar then cleared his throat of non-existent phlegm, prompting me for an answer. These nervous gestures indicated for the first time that he had any awareness about the unusual ceremony, being held in an unusual location, an eerily lit hangar-sized abandoned furniture warehouse. Most brides, I’d bet, did not need to be asked twice.

“Miss Soulsmith?” The poor little man’s cherubic grin faltered. He blinked, anxiously shifted his eyes behind those bottle-thick lenses from me but-not-quite-to the hideous groom, then back again. Judge Hyacinth, clutching hard at both his bible and a semblance of reality, waited for the bride to speak.

Not that it really mattered what I answered. The Judge would ‘hear’ whatever Rasputin ‘told’ his mind. And, as for any objections from me, once the ceremony ended with ‘you may now kiss the bride’ that was all she wrote. Rasputin, a powerful centuries old progenitor, would suck me dry, of both blood and free will, and possibly accomplish my transformation into a vampire, right then and there. The commonly held belief was that it takes three successive bites from a vampire to do this. However, with a progenitor involved, some sources (whose reliability was questionable) maintained that one all-consuming bite was sufficient. I tended to believe in the progenitor-one-bite-theory. Lucky me.

As for coerced marriages, there had only been one federal case where a newly made vampire sued a sire for unlawful conversion, and it, needless to say, remained in a limbo of appeals. Most vampires, depending on the strength and spirit of their original human personality, were for all intents and purposes subjugated to the will of their master.

“You will answer in the affirmative.” Rasputin’s voice was a guttural croak. His breath-like exhalation washed over me like a truckload of rancid garbage.

“Like hell I will.” How’s that for independence? If I couldn’t escape, I at least aimed to thwart his complete control of me in my next incarnation. If I maintained enough identity, I would be my own mistress. At least theoretically!

So, hell, no, I wouldn’t say yes to my own demise, to meekly accept eternal bondage to a horrific demon, to accept domination from a master vampire like Rasputin. I wouldn’t, couldn’t, accept such a fate with any vampire. Save, perhaps, one. And he was dead. I mean really DEAD. By fire, no less, when he, ancient progenitor Constantine, The Great, an all around arrogant SOB and recent pain-in-my posterior, had once CLAIMED TO BE INVULNERABLE to it. Instead, not more than twenty minutes ago, Constantine had been fried by Snitch’s gasoline fueled Molotov cocktail. So much for his self-proclaimed invulnerability to fire. Although, now that I thought about it, he had, contrary to all anecdotal vampire mythology, remained relatively intact!

Constantine had flared torch-like for one incendiary instant, engulfed in a flash of heat that had instantaneously plumed up his body then just as quickly snuffed out with such force that he had fallen flat to the ground. Oddly, his clothes had seemed to disappear rather than disintegrate. Stranger still, while the unmistakable acrid pungency of singed hair had fouled the air, Constantine’s longish coal-black waves hadn’t actually burned away! Nor, as he had lain there a smoking, peeling ruin, had his hypnotic ice-blue eyes been damaged. Unblinking, sightlessly trained upon the starry sky, they had glittered like bits of bright blue glass from out of his blistered and sooty mask-like face. The final indignity had been Snitch, after a cowardly fearful hesitation, grabbing, no ripping, the heavy, golden signet ring from off of Constantine’s smoldering hand.

If I didn’t hate vampires so much, I just might have admitted to a tear, or two, as I had knelt on the pavement to view the remains, seeing how patches of Constantine’s skin nearly sloughed off like a snake shedding, revealing deceptively healthy, vibrant pink flesh underneath. The sight had given me the forlorn hope that Constantine, The Great, might, indeed, arise phoenix-like from his own ashes as he had once boasted to me. But ... he hadn’t done so. Thus, here I stood at the proverbial altar with vile bloodthirsty Rasputin for a groom.

Even now, many city blocks away, in the middle of my ‘marriage’ vows, I couldn’t shake those vivid images of Constantine’s demise, nor that sickening, gut-wrenching smell of burnt flesh mingled with singed hair. All this sensory recall, distressing and raw, overwhelmed me. Nauseated, emotionally and physically overloaded, I swayed. Rasputin shook me like a rag doll, snarling, baring his immense, lethal canines. A sudden crazed gleam filled his rheumy black eyes. He shook me harder and harder, nearly tearing my arm from its socket.

“Pronounce us united! Pronounce us united!” He shrieked at the Judge, who seemed abruptly released from his hypnotic state. Judge Hyacinth trembled, visibly, dropping the holy bible to the ground. His eyes, magnified by his glasses, went ridiculously wide as saucers and his mouth dangled open with fear. He backed away several steps to escape the monster before him.

“You shall be mine. Mine.” Rasputin’s clawed fingernails, nearly as sharp and long as daggers, punctured through my right arm. I tried to concentrate on the sound of bone crunching, rather than the unendurable pain. Maybe my strategy worked. I began to black out, carrying with me the grotesque sound of my cracking forearm, the awful smell of burned flesh, and the instantaneous remembrance of the events leading me to this awful point in my life … even as I was most assuredly about to die.

* * * *

“De Facto Self Defense, this is Avna Soulsmith speaking. How may I help you?” I answered the phone in a breathless rush, having heard its insistent ringing from the sidewalk outside my building. I had crammed the key into the weathered brass lock, set the old fashioned bell-pull cord to swinging with my whirlwind entrance, then dove for the receiver of my old style rotary. What can I say, business times are hard. And I like antiques.

The only answer was heavy breathing.

“Detective Traeger?” I asked, strenuously pretending that I hadn’t received a sixth-sense-like flush of recognition before I had picked up the line. I secretly, affectionately, dubbed the father of four Pater Traeger because he had filled that role for me over the past ten years, being as strict and stern and sympathetic to me as I imagined him with his own kids. Over that period, there had been many overtures and invitations from the Traegers, always trying adopt me. But my history, my personality, my pain, kept me away from healthy normal relationships. Instead, I subsisted with them as my vicarious family.

“That’s right, Soulsmith.” Suspicion, as to how I knew it was him, since caller ID was another technological advance I couldn’t afford, colored his husky voice. As usual, he scoffed at the idea of precognition while simultaneously suspicious that I might have it! Which, of course, I absolutely, categorically DO NOT.

Detective Ian Traeger, a fantastic twenty-five year veteran with the Charleston Police Department, but without the generally requisite extra twenty pounds around the middle, was burly, muscular, possessed of the hearty stature and disciplined posture of a drill sergeant. He kept his silvered-red hair in a military flat top. No one could deny how extremely effective Pater Traeger was on his capital city beat, which now-a-days included a lot of activity with the Federal Bureau of Interspecies Coexistence. After all, he constantly reminded me, vampires and other incarnates have constitutional rights to be protected, too. Even in the Mountain State of West Virginia. I just didn’t appreciate the fact that Traeger and the Bureau had tangled me up in this battle. A vampire lover, I ain’t.

I had, for all intents and purposes, been gently blackmailed with veiled references to possible City B&O infractions into the voluntary position of community liaison for vampire-human rights, an offshoot of the community crime watch program, because I had a growing reputation as a reliable consultant for most things paranormal. Unfortunately, notoriety was good for business but bad for my health. Unnatural things tended to be attracted bug-like to the bright light of publicity, such as my involvement as a prosecution witness in the recent Lantaglia voodoo murder case when I had actually, formally been certified as a U.S. Court designated ‘spiritualist’ in order to legally channel a ghost—that of Salvator Lantaglia, murder victim—to testify in the judge’s chambers. If it had been anything less than a capital crime I would have refused such an accreditation. No way did I want to be any kind of paranormal authority. I just wanted to be normal!

“How did you know it was me?” Traeger prompted for an answer. Being inquisitive was his nature, especially if it touched upon me or the paranormal. He trusted that I could take care of myself, yet he still worried about the supernatural aspects of my business. Vampires, on the one hand, presumably because they, to Pater Traeger’s way of thinking, ‘retained’ their humanity, didn’t bother him, but ghosts and ghouls and things that bumped in the night were a whole different story. Most people, including Ian Traeger, acknowledged—but ignored—the otherworldly within the worldly realm. Out of sight is, after all, out of mind. Safer. Saner. Sorry to say, I knew better, so I couldn’t pretend that unnatural things didn’t lurk in the dark. And, sometimes, in the light.

When I answered him, I tried to sound casual. “Just a lucky guess.” And that’s all, I convinced myself, that it was, a guess. I knew a few real psychics, the kind with detailed, all-knowing all-seeing premonitions, and I flatly rejected that label. I just sometimes guessed really, really well.

With a sigh, I plunked myself down into the rolling office chair and propped my legs up onto the scratched-up, second-hand desk. Before me, through a huge plate glass window, stretched an unobstructed view of the quiet downtown street. I liked to see trouble coming, that’s part of the De Facto Self Defense Credo. Behind me were floor-to-ceiling glass-fronted cases full of my stock -in-trade, vials of holy water, amulets with semiprecious stones, dream catchers, any number of silver tipped or plated items—from the traditional bullets to the less so collection of pagan or Christian crosses, stilettos, scissors, or most anything with a sharp point—and a variety of crystals, herbs, and folk remedies, an ever growing catalogue of paraphernalia, that, depending on any given circumstance, might have the property to protect or heal. That seemed to be my instinctual power, to glean the best defense to a supernatural force. I scorned the title of expert, however, because, in-point-of -fact, I was not an expert in any field. I simply ran an Army-Navy Surplus Shop for the paranormal.

“I suppose this is an official call, Traeger?” I gently rocked back and forth on the chair’s wheels, ignoring my copycatting reflection in the plate glass, a reverse image of a woman of medium build with a thick mop of dirty blonde, short, almost ill-cut hair, ordinary green eyes, but nice lips, hips and curves. I tried to waste little time in viewing life as a beauty contest. Still, if not a runner-up, I might have made the top twenty. Or not.

“Yeah, kid, I’m afraid it is.” He exhaled a long breath. “This one’s bad. A body, female, Caucasian, in her mid-to-late twenties, was reported floating in the Kanawha by a passing barge early this morning, right before daybreak. She was tangled near the bank about a hundred yards upriver of the South Side Bridge. So far, we haven’t ID’d the body.”

“Do I get three guesses as to the cause of death?” Anger sifted into my poor attempt at humor.

“Nobody hates this more than I do, Avna. It was a vampire kill, all right. With multiple bite wounds and no attempt to hide or disguise the fact. There’s a rogue on the loose. But it is the first such murder in this city in over fifty years. ’’

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ve heard this story before. Killers come in all shapes, sizes, sexes, AND species. But you’ve never given me a good answer for all those unsolved missing person cases still on the books.” Whenever this argument came up and my prejudice started showing, I never reminded him just how close I had come to being a part of that invisible statistic while a sophomore at the State College of West Virginia, SCWV some ten years earlier. Surviving that attack had been the end of my collegiate career as an English major and begun my personal crusade with De Facto Self Defense. It had also brought Ian Traeger, the lead investigator of that unprecedented attack, into my grim nineteen-year-old life where he had remained to one degree or another ever since.

“Just because I’ve been pressured into being the ‘supernatural’ eyes and ears of the Charleston police force doesn’t mean I necessarily have to like it, or them.” I practically spat out the word. “Remember, my interest is in saving MY kind. I can‘t seem to be as fair-minded as you. Nor do I necessarily want to try.” Statistics be damned! Vampires, as far as I was concerned, were nothing more than predators.

“So, we have differing opinions on this subject. That’s old news, Avna. We agree to respectfully disagree, regardless of the fact that when it comes to vampires you’re paranoid and biased. Nevertheless, the Department has always considered you an indispensable and dependable resource.”

“Thanks for the flattery, I think.” I whuffled out a sarcastic chuckle, smiling against my will at how easily my mentor and moral compass had lectured to me yet again on this personal bias, this sore spot, of mine. Boy, could he zing ya! “You know you can count on me. I’ll keep my ears open. If I hear of anything out of the ordinary, anything at all, you’ll be the first to know.”

Traeger cleared his throat.

“What is it, Traeger?”

“The higher ups are looking for more depth than street chatter. This type of aberrant homicide could rattle the public, could incite vigilantes. They want specifics. So do I.”

“Such as…?” A chill ran up my scalp. My reflection in the storefront’s window was definitely tense, suddenly sitting up ramrod straight. I nervously toyed with my favorite silver plated ink pen, which I, then, soothingly, familiarly tucked behind my ear.

To distract myself, I took inventory of the neat desktop, smack-dab in the middle of which lay a pristine business card with intricate black-traced red lettering. Ginny Bahr, my business manager and best friend ever since I had rid her house (not once but twice) of a very recalcitrant and difficult-to-banish poltergeist, had left this very same card on my desk for the past two weeks, insisting that I follow up on a potential client. I did not want business that bad. And even now, listening to Traeger’s husky voice, I picked up the delicate card with all the relish of touching, barehanded, a black widow spider.

“Some reliable sources claim that there’s a possible turf war about to flare up. This ‘floater’ in the river might be the beginnings of something ugly. I don’t have enough manpower for sufficient undercover work. Then, too, the quieter this is kept the better. That requires someone outside the force. We need an informant to unofficially infiltrate the favorite vampire environs, to try and get a lead on any renegades. To verify, one way or another, if this is one vampire gone bad …,” he paused, then added grimly, “or an entire family.”

Traeger’s words seemed to electrify the card. Instantly, I knew the identity of this reliable source and that I was being manipulated into this unofficial operation, but what really terrified me was I did not know why. My fertile imagination could easily contrive a million reasons, none of them pleasant.

My voice went harder edged than steel. “Constantine is behind this. He’s your source. Don’t deny it.” Everyone in the city of Charleston knew that name. Knew what he was. A vampire. How powerful. Extremely. And how wealthy. Disgustingly. Nor was he a simple run-of-the-mill vampire. Constantine’s legal status was that of a progenitor. He was old, perhaps of the first of his kind. His real history was a blank. If anybody had a clue, they weren’t talking.

There were real benefits to being recognized by the FBIC as a progenitor. Tax breaks for one thing. That explained why Constantine was so heavy into real estate. But more importantly, where other, younger vampires, those under one hundred years, could only legally sire a family, or clan, of ten members, Constantine fell under a grandfather clause that virtually placed no restrictions on the number of undead he could personally create, so long as he followed the legal FBIC mandated and sanctioned procedures, i.e. through marriage or court-granted change-of-status. This generous part of the law had been enacted because the United States government thought there were less than a hundred true progenitors in the world, and only a quarter of those ‘residing’ in the states. (I personally think the numbers are much, much higher.) Furthermore, because of his extraordinary powers, when each of Constantine’s ‘issue’ sired their allotment of ten—which if he partook of and shared blood with—he effectively extended and controlled all those bearing his lineage. This type of power, over those of your bloodline and not strictly of your creation, was a mark of an ancient and powerful vampire. There seemed no way to regulate that.

He was one scary son-of-a-bitch.

It was his business card that I had ignored for over two weeks.

I don’t fraternize with his kind. Much. And, then, only as a member of the local FBIC-Citizens Review Board which infrequently met to hear preliminary complaints filed by vampires over unfair housing violations—some humans refused to sell or rent or renovate, as per the Reanimate Fair Housing laws, to the undead. And, once again, I had Pater Traeger to thank for my involvement on this Board. He liked to call it my civic duty. Oi! Sometimes at the beginning of these Board Hearings I would have the uncanny, and unwanted, ability to spot which were the complainants. In other words, I could often spot the vampires amidst the humans, although I had gotten pretty good at denying, at disregarding, at disbelieving this knack, rather than honing it.

My real job, the purpose of De Facto Self Defense, was to help humans protect themselves from dark things. Of necessity, I had become a paranormal jack-of-all-trades but a master of none. I offered advice, dug up information, sought out experts, sold mystical charms, lectured, held an occasional séance, all to help PEOPLE, real, live, warm bodied people. Vampires were most definitely of the dark, and thus to be avoided. Therefore, over Ginny’s objections, I had refused all overtures from Constantine, The Great, specifically the business card that so vividly in black-traced scarlet lettering, reminiscent of blood, proclaimed him proprietor of The Bete Noir Club and Escort Service.

“Traeger.” I squinted my eyes shut tight and tried to block out the niggling mix of anger and fear my next question elicited. “Are you asking me to voluntarily go undercover at a vampire owned and operated brothel? Because, as far as I’m concerned, that’s exactly what the Hotel Constantinople is, no matter how upscale and ritzy.”

“Don’t necessarily focus on the Constantinople. Charleston has several nocturnal watering holes that could offer some good intelligence. Ask a few questions. Be nosy, but be careful. There’s Pastiche, The Merry-Go-Round, Belay’s Eternal Nite Club. Just steer clear of the seedier dives.”

I grinned, humorlessly. “Yeah, I know the ones. I wouldn’t be caught dead, so-to-speak, in any of those places, especially the Smorgasbord on Route 60. But, Traeger, since this warning of a possible vampire war came from Constantine, it makes sense to start digging around his place, his people, first. Right? And however luxuriously you dress it up, the Constantinople is renowned for its excess, including a glorified escort service.”

“Look, Avna, for over two years now we have unsuccessfully tried to prove Bete Noir hired prostitutes. It’s run by the books as an escort dating service. Every raid has failed. Either it’s legitimate, or somebody tips them off.”

“All criminals can smell a cop, Traeger, not just the fanged ones.” Although, I inwardly admitted, vampires were well documented as having superior sight, smell, hearing, and strength. There was, however, a lot of debate between the so-called ‘experts’ on the degree of this superiority. Most, i.e. the Von Heslings and their stupid clinical trials, espoused the old truism that older vampires displayed greater physical senses and paranormal abilities. Duh!

“What about trying to shut it down due to Health Department regulations?” How obviously was my vampire phobia showing?

“The FBIC is still trying to go this route. Agent Zellden is persistent.” Traeger’s phrasing forcefully revealed his distaste for these tactics. Using mandates for public health to try and close a minority owned business made him, I knew from our many debates, feel like a Nazi. The law specifically allowed that any business associated with the sale of food and drink, and the Bete Noir Club had a liquor license, and employed ‘reanimates’ of any kind could expect regular and/or spontaneous Health Department inspections. It was a valid safeguard to ensure that infectious pathogens were not being spread between the two populations, living and undead.

“The monitors go in every week, sometimes twice a week, take the blood samples, check the premises.” In his evenhanded manner, Traeger added, “Constantine’s people are always cooperative.”

“Weekly, huh?” I mused out loud, for that fact starkly revealed a truth of which I was already aware. The small metropolitan city of Charleston, capital of the state of West Virginia, had more than its fair share of true, dyed-in-the-wool Vampyraphobe zealots, plus many respected organizations that supported them, such as the Congregation for Integrity and Morality in Education, a fact to which I could personally attest. And, disappointingly but not surprisingly, Traeger’s comment revealed that some of these vampyraphobe crusaders even struck at their undead enemies from within the FBIC, the very Bureau meant to protect and further vampire rights. For a while now, I had even suspected that the Senior West Virginia FBIC Agent, one Ezekiel Zellden, a single-browed Neanderthal who had somehow managed to earn a Bachelors degree in Occult Studies, numbered amongst them. Now I knew for sure. I detested the man. Therefore that old adage that the enemy of my enemy is my friend was bullshit.

“It’s a necessary evil, Traeger.” Then I hesitantly laughed. “How come you almost make me feel sorry for,” and I deepened my voice to mimic his, “trampling the basic Constitutional Rights of vampires?”

His answer was totally serious, totally heartfelt. “Deep down you know I’m right, Avna.”

I did not have a glib answer for that, so, instead, I went back to the real issue at hand. “I do not want to walk into that viper pit.” Because it was full of vampires!

“Who better than you, Avna? You’re level-headed, observant, knowledgeable, and you have great instincts. You should have been a cop.” His voice had dropped to a disappointed mutter. None of his kids had followed in his footsteps, not even the conscripted one. “Just blend in at the club, attend a few of the Bete Noir private parties. Snoop around. You’re not attached to the force. No one is likely to recognize you. Civilians tend to respond better to questions asked without a badge.”

“What if, heaven forbid, I get into some kind of trouble?”

The telephone seemed to transmit the warmth of his smile, which he very seldom gave, and usually only when he had gotten something over on me. Pater Traeger had won this argument, and he knew it. “Nobody can handle that kinda trouble better than you, not even Zellden out of the Bureau. He has some pretty diplomas, but that’s it. You’ve got the real stuff, Avna. I wouldn’t send you if I felt it was too dangerous. Stick to the legitimate clubs that toe-the-line. Listen and look sharp.”

“Promise not to ever mention Agent Zellden to me again and I’ll do it.” Zellden, with his expensive sheepskin, considered me a credential-less charlatan. I considered him a complete and utter jerk. Why? Mainly just on instinct. But, also, Zellden believed himself superior to EVERYBODY. I designated him a WASP plus M&M, which basically meant if you weren’t a white Anglo-Saxon protestant mortal male, he despised you.

“Besides, Detective, when you have that much faith in me, what’s the worst thing that could happen?” But I wanted to retrieve those fatalistic words the minute they left my mouth. Instead, I had to settle with knocking on the wood of my desk. Oh, and, I crossed my fingers, too. Superstitions had their raison d’etre, and that was another De Facto Self Defense credo—never scoff at the supernatural. Because, nine times out of ten, it would turn around and bite you on the butt. With needle sharp teeth.