When Ahren was gone, Angelus turned back to Darla who was now leaning over the
map a picture of concentration. Unwilling to push his luck, he stayed silent
helping himself to a drink and pouring another for her. When he calculated enough
time had passed for her to be at least speaking to him again, he asked as soothingly
as possible, “What does the letter say?”.
Rather than answer, Darla held it out behind her for Angelus to take. He did, and what he read was both good and bad news.
“Brauerstrasse. It sounds like him. What the hell is he doing over there?”
Darla looked up from the map, her face grim. “Not going willing, I’d hazard,” she said, her finger marking the location. “Brauerstrasse is right in the middle of Tyran territory.”
“Ahren!” Angelus bellowed over his shoulder and then, more quietly said, “We’ve been looking for a clue as to where they have their lair and I think we’ve just found it.”
Darla nodded in agreement, neither of them mentioning the other reason for going. The chances of rescuing Spike before he was dust were slim, but Aurelians looked after their own and the insult could not be allowed to go unchallenged.
“Sir.” Ahren appeared in the doorway, his arms marred with scratches beneath his rolled up shirt sleeves.
Angelus ignored them, he had more important things to deal with than squabbles amongst the minions. “Ready the boys,” he snapped. “We’re raiding the Brauerstrasse lair at dawn.”
There was a moments silence and then Ahren said, “May I ask, sir. Is this connected to Spike’s disappearance?”
“Possibly. That’s why we need to move.” Angelus glanced round and seeing Ahren was still there shouted, “Well, get a move on. Or do you want to be responsible for bringing down half the Order?”
An unpleasant smirk jumped to Ahren’s face and he ducked his head, backing hurriedly out of the room. Bringing down half the Order? It would be his pleasure and, once the Master found out, his reward as well.
***
Quite why they hadn’t started torturing him immediately, Spike wasn’t sure and at this point he wasn’t about to argue. Though there was a significant part of him that wanted to scream, “Get on with it, you bastards,” just to bring an end to the constant waiting.
Currently he was huddled in the corner of the warehouse the Tyran’s used as a lair. The chains were gone, having been removed once they’d arrived, and no one had thought to secure him since. Not that he was going anywhere; it was as much as he could do to hold his head up. Around him, heated voices rose and fell as vampire after vampire took the floor arguing about something in a language Spike didn’t understand. It wasn’t even German, that much he could tell, though there were echoes of that guttural tongue about it. If he had to guess, he’d have hazarded at one of the Scandinavians ones; Swedish or Danish, maybe. The Tyran vampires all looked the Viking type, anyway. Big buggers with jaws you could crack skulls on.
With a little more concentration Spike started to see a pattern to the discussion even without the benefits of a shared language. All the protagonists addressed their comments to the female vampire sitting in the centre of the group and she, in turn, listened to all of them, offering the occasional word or comment. And of all of them, hers were the only opinions not being shouted down or sneered at.
Did that make her the leader? Spike hadn’t heard that the Tyran’s had a female in charge and he found it highly unlikely himself. Vampires were an old fashioned lot when it came to the gentler sex and in his experience, excluding Darla of course because she was always a law unto herself, they did appear to be more delicate than the male of the species. Despite his desperate situation, Spike found his spirits perking up at the idea. Maybe that was why they hadn’t begun torturing him yet? Maybe this female vampire didn’t have the stomach for it?
Craning his neck, Spike peered through the posturing throng and managed to make eye contact with the Valkyrie, forcing his lips into his most endearing little boy smile. Surely it couldn’t harm to try out his wiles. The Tyran leader frowned back at him, disapproval mixing liberally with confusion in her expression and, with a single word, dispatched one of her minions over to Spike’s side.
“Gudinna Hilde wishes it to be known that you should not be impatient. She will get to you soon enough.”
“That right, mate.” With some effort Spike raised his head and squinted up at the brute looming over him. “Well, tell the lady to get a move one will ya. I don’t plan on waiting all night.”
The minion squatted down and considered Spike quizzically from under his prominent brows. “I do not understand why you should wish your ending to come so quickly but if it will please you, my mistress has instructed me to inform you of current discussions.”
Not waiting for Spike to respond, the minion started up a running commentary on the discussions going on across the room. “Donar, the one in the blue coat, tells our Gudinna that you should be buried and left to starve. She does not like that idea and asks for other suggestions. Now Ingo speaks, saying that he has personal experience in flaying if that would be more suited to her desires… Ah, no. That has made Gudinna Hilde angry and she curses Ingo, reminding him that his last victim met her final death very quickly and that is not good enough. This makes everyone laugh and Ingo is cross. He shouts and says someone else should have ideas…”
Spike stopped listening in too much detail at that point, his stomach clenching with horror at the litany of pain spilling impassively from the minion’s mouth. Dropping his head, he slumped back against the wall, trying to block out the words he didn’t want to hear. Flaying, partial incineration, total slow disembowelling… Far from being a lightweight, this Gudinna Hilde could give Angelus a run for his money in the torture department. The last few hours of Spike’s unlife were not looking to be the happy pain-free ones he’d dared hope for. His only chance lay in the sheer amount of time it was taking for them to decide how best to do it. Every minute that ticked past was a minute that brought rescue closer, or so Spike prayed, anyway.
***
Ahren turned away from the wagon with a deep sense of satisfaction. Behind him heavy doors slammed shut and the air shrieked with the protesting screech of metal as the train inched forward, its wheels grinding unhappily against the track. Twenty-four hours would see it in Vienna and its contents delivered to the Master much to Ahren’s glee. Stalking out of the yard, the vampire’s hand drifted to his face, fingertips brushing across bruised gouged skin, a parting gift from fists and claws before the prisoners succumbed to the inevitable and went down, howling, under superior numbers.
He smiled, turning the memories over and over in his mind and relishing every second the three traitors spent chained at his feet. The fleeting look of fear from Darla, Angelus’ sneer that Ahren took such pleasure in wiping away with his boot. Only the mad one, Drusilla, had surrendered without a fight, offering her wrists for restraint with her head bowed like a silent offering of innocence. That had been disconcerting but not enough to ruin Ahren’s mood and now, after the best part of six months under Angelus’ thumb, there was only the single loose end to tie up and Hamburg would be his.
***
When twenty Aurelians dropped, literally, into the Tyran lair an hour later, Spike whispered his thanks to whichever deity had listened to the prayers of an unsouled creature and, as the battle whirled around him, did his best to help out. In his current weakened state that consisted primarily of hiding under a table and tripping any Tyrans foolish enough to come near. At least he hoped they were Tyrans. It was a little difficult to tell with the blood scent of both Orders thick in the air and frankly his victims could have belonged to either side. One of them, at least, was the enemy because as he fell, the Tyran knocked himself unconscious on the table and presented Spike with a much needed, if somewhat cool, meal.
Finally, as the sounds of fighting began to fade, Spike felt confident enough to poke his head out and see who was winning. Across the room Ahren slugged it out with the Valkyrie, while the seven remaining Aurelians made short work of her bodyguards. It was looking good for the good guys.
Hang on. Ahren was fighting the Valkyrie? Spike’s gaze scanned the room searching for the familiar figures he had expected to come for him. They were conspicuously absent. After momentary panic, he relaxed, arguing that Angelus and Darla were probably heading up raids in other parts of the city. Still, their absence left feeling him distinctly uneasy.
The Tyran leader vanished in a cloud of dust at the same time as her last remaining minions and Spike scrambled shakily out of his refuge, a huge grin spreading across his face. “You took yer bloody time, didn’t you?” he beamed, sauntering over to little gaggle of Aurelians. “Thought I was a goner for a bit there.”
An answering smile appeared on Ahren’s face, or at least Spike thought it was an answering one, until he got closer and saw the sneer. Only then did it occur to him that the other minions were not showing their usual respect; all stood straight and proud without a trace of the sycophancy he was used to seeing in their body language. In the forty-eight hours he’d been gone, something had changed in the Aurelian camp. Drastically.
“So, um, Angelus busy?” he bluffed looking around the cluttered lair as though expecting his mentor to appear from a dark corner.
“You could say that,” Ahren answered with a distinct smirk. “He was a little tied up the last time I saw him.”
Spike gazed around the half-circle of minions warily and began to back away. Their eyes looked distinctly… hungry. Locking his gaze with Ahren’s, Spike jerked his thumb over his shoulder, swallowed and announced, “Right, I’ll, erm, go see what he’s up to, then.”
His next move, in retrospect, was his undoing. Stepping back, Spike put his foot down heavily on a stake that rolled out from under him and then, while trying to retain his balance on legs still weakened from enforced starvation, he broke eye contact with Ahren.
It was all the provocation they needed to attack and when the first punch hit him like a bludgeon in the side of the head and his knees wobbled, Spike knew he’d had it. The second took him by surprise, a slamming uppercut to the jaw and his eyes rolled back. For a few precious, irreplaceable, seconds, complete disorientation ruled and the minions pressed their advantage, using sharp blows to stop him retaliating, sending him finally careering to the ground with a frustrated snarl. Manacles snapped fast around his wrists and a sharp tug on the chain dragged him staggering to his feet to land face down over the battered table. He kicked out, twisting and thrashing against the restraints, managing to land at least one decent kick before a series of rabbit punches threatened to shatter his spine. But it was the weight that landed on his back, complete with the sharpened point of a stake pressing between his aching ribs, which gave Spike pause for thought.
“Move again and I’ll send your dust to the Master,” a voice that Spike recognised as Ahren’s grated in his ear.
“What?” Shock saw Spike reverting to his human features, the need to think suddenly outweighing the need to fight.
“He wants you in one piece but there are witnesses here who will swear you staked yourself.”
The Master? Spike’s mind flew immediately to Drusilla’s vision, remembering her screams about treachery and blood, pain and suffering. Had she foreseen something?
“Now,” Ahren’s voice rumbled again, interrupting Spike’s train of thought. “I want you to give Angelus a message for me.”
A very bad feeling crept into Spike’s belly. A feeling that got distinctly worse when his trousers were ripped down his thighs. When another hand grabbed his hip, he squirmed, trying to get away. The grip tightened and the stake pushed in hard enough to pierce the skin. “Ah ah. Hold still and this won’t hurt. Much.” The last ended on a snigger that mutated into a groan as Ahren forced his cock into Spike’s unprepared hole.
Muscles clenching and trying to reject the intruder, Spike gasped and then clamped his jaw tightly shut, determined that Ahren would get nothing more from him. The combination of pain and the scent of his own blood brought his demon forth again and his fangs sliced through his lip as he fought to stay silent.
Ahren had no such qualms and, as he thrust deeper, he grabbed Spike’s head forcing it up and round so he could look the younger vampire in the eye as he fucked him. “This,” he said conversationally with a snap of his hips that brought fresh blood into Spike’s mouth. “Would have been for Angelus if there had been more time. Unfortunately for you, there wasn’t, though I suspect he will suffer far worse at the Master’s hands.”
“Angelus?” The word escaped before Spike could stop it and brought an even more smug expression to Ahren’s face.
“The Master isn’t fond of traitors. Particularly when it is close family that turns on him. I hear he can be most inventive in his punishments.”
Traitors? Why would the Master think Angelus was a traitor? Spike closed his eyes and tried to ignore the tearing burn in his back and rectum, the feel of unfamiliar claws scraping over his skin and blood trickling down his thighs. He needed to concentrate, to remember something…
He couldn’t. It was beyond him. There was no intent for pleasure in what the other vampire was doing. No twist of the hips designed to heighten the experience, no scrape of fangs down a sensitive spine, no whispered encouragement to join him in ecstasy. This was about domination and revenge, pure and simple. Despite his best efforts, Spike’s world narrowed down to all consuming sensation, wood splintering under his fingernails, bitter breath grunted into his face, the wet slap of flesh that brought fresh waves of pain until they merged into something he needed to scream away.
Moments before Spike lost control, Ahren shuddered against him, filling Spike’s unwilling body with his spendings and leaning in to whisper in Spike’s ear, “Plenty more to come and no more than such a traitorous thief deserves.”
It was then, in the brief respite before another minion stepped up to take Ahren’s place, that Spike remembered another detail from Drusilla’s vision. She had known that the theft of the infant would be discovered. The question was why hadn’t she warned them in a way they could at least understand?
***
Angelus had never witnessed his sire abase herself before and he never wanted to see it again. Closing his eyes, he refused to watch her crawl to the Master’s feet and wished he could seal his ears as she began to beg.
“Master, Sire, forgive me. It was never my intent to betray you. Please, please believe me.”
The dull thud and a pained cry of anguish testified to the effectiveness of her pleas and Angelus tightened his hold on Drusilla’s arm for fear she may try to run. The minions surrounding them were unlikely to be gentle. She didn’t. Indeed, she displayed no response whatsoever, still strangely silent and malleable as she had been since her vision. His girl had always been a one for peculiar moods but this one had continued longer than most and though Angelus didn’t want to admit it, even to himself, he was starting to worry.
“Angelus.”
He cracked an eyelid at Darla’s hiss and found himself staring into her face, pale and scared with a purple bruise starting to ripen on her jaw line.
“The Master asked you a question.”
Pulling himself up straighter, Angelus transferred his gaze to the old goat lounging on his throne. “I’m sorry,” he said with all the hauteur of a condemned man. “There something you wished to know?”
The insolence hit the elder vampire like a head-on wave, leaving him sputtering with fury and Angelus didn’t attempt to conceal his smirk. If there was one thing he was good at, it was this, driving the old bat into a frenzy by the simple expedient of not seeming to give a damn. For once, though, the price was more painful than his grandsire’s tongue. A fist, wielded with all the force of club smacked Angelus around the head, sending him staggering and yanking Drusilla with him. She followed like an anchor tied to his arm, weighing him down and making no attempt to save herself or him from toppling to the ground at the Master’s feet.
“Now isn’t that a more suitable position for a supplicant at my court.”
“I am NO supplicant!” Angelus exploded up from the floor, only to be driven back by the crowd of minions surrounding the dais. The beating continued until his blood pooled on the floor and when the Master finally called a halt and the minions backed away, Angelus rose to his knees swaying yet still unrepentant.
“Not a supplicant,” he muttered hoarsely, flinching as a racking cough heaved on his fractured ribs, and spat a mouthful of blood and spit from between his pulverised lips.
The Master treated him to a condescending smile and said, “We shall see,” before turning his attentions back to Darla. “Come, childe. Show me your thoughts.”
Angelus blinked, shaking his head in an attempt to clear it and then glanced at his lover with questioning eyes. For a moment there he’d thought the Master had asked to see Darla’s thoughts? How was that even possible? A brief flash of panic raced across Darla’s face but, to Angelus’ bemusement, she dutifully bowed her head and approached the throne, kneeling at her sire’s feet and presenting her neck. Leaning forward, the Master tangled his fingers in her unbound hair and lowered his mouth. For a second he hovered, his tongue darting out to taste her and then, with deliberate laziness, he bit down, fangs piercing the taut pale skin. Darla gasped; her hands rising to clutch the older vampire’s shoulders and the scent of her blood blossoming on the air sent a rush of lust through Angelus’ body.
Tension in the hall rose, notch by tightening notch, every vampire reacting with clenching fists and silent snarling lips. The Master continued to drink, filling the otherwise silent chamber with the sounds of greedy feeding until, finally, he lifted his head, grimacing and displaying fangs and lips coated with Darla’s blood. She dangled from his fist, lax and half comatose with bloodloss and around them, the hovering minions poised themselves for dreadful violence the moment the expected command was delivered.
It didn’t come. The Master’s thumb drifted across his chin wiping away imagined spills and a thoughtful look took up residence on his face. When one minion, bolder than the rest, stepped forward, a sharp gesture saw the impertinent individual crumbling to the earthen floor and vanishing into nothing.
At last the Master’s voice rang out, not calling traitor as everyone had expected, but in raucous laughter that echoed and re-echoed off the stone walls, filling every crevice and corner with its violent sound. Darla pushed herself shakily to her knees and stared up at him, wide-eyed with fear. She had expected anger, rage even, but this… this was terrifying.
Her discomfort spread rapidly, the minions shifting their feet and glaring at each other and the prisoners. Angelus kept his eyes fixed on his grandsire and shuffled backwards, dragging Drusilla with him. The more space he could put between himself and the mad vampire on the dais, the happier he would be. Angelus didn’t understand exactly how, but he knew that the Master now knew everything.
The laughter stopped as abruptly as it had started, the sound outlasting its production and swarming back up the tunnels, dying away as slowly as a human’s death rattle.
“Whore!”
Darla was flying across the room before Angelus had a chance to react, the Master striding after her and landing blow after shattering blow to her face and torso. Making no effort to escape, Darla clung to his legs, accepting the punishment, and begging and pleading to be forgiven.
The beating went on for longer than Angelus thought possible, Darla’s beautiful face vanishing under bloody splits and bruises, her hair torn in great hanks from her head as her sire forced her back again and again. He could have rescued her but really, what was the point. If she was defending herself in any way, then Angelus may have felt inclined but for now, at least the Master’s attentions were focused elsewhere.
As the minions watched open-mouthed, Angelus began to back away, heading steadily in the direction of the door and towing Drusilla behind him. They were mere feet from the door when Dru went down screaming and holding her head.
“No! No! Don’t make me go! Don’t send me away!”
All eyes turned towards them. Angelus grabbed the nearest minion, launching him towards the others and bowling them down like skittles. The rest scattered giving Angelus the precious seconds he needed to break for the exit. He dived into the tunnel and ran, stretching his preternatural abilities like he never had before. Dodging and twisting, he thundered through the labyrinth, automatically reversing the route that had brought them into the Master’s lair. Several times minions stepped out to stop him and he dusted them with his bare hands, tearing their heads from their shoulders before they had a chance to raise the alarm.
He was not scared; fear was an emotion Angelus did not allow himself to feel. But he was getting worried. As a vampire he had never really been threatened. Yes, there had been the whole debacle with Holtz but even then he’d always known escape was inevitable. Right now, he wasn’t so sure. As he wove through the tunnels the sounds of pursuit got louder; presumably the residents knew of short cuts, which didn’t bode well for Angelus’ chances of getting clean away.
Darting through the next arch, he turned sharply left and started to climb. Two more levels would see him to the surface and he sniffed the air trying to get a sense of whether it was night or day. Not that it would stop him. Angelus was perfectly prepared to dare a summer’s noon in the Sahara in preference to staying around here and letting the Master peel him alive.
**
As Angelus fled, the room behind him disintegrated into organised chaos. Chains were slammed around Darla and Dru, the former unconscious, the latter uncaring, and the minions scattered pouring up through the lair in pursuit of the third prisoner. The Master watched on in silence. He had no need to command, they all knew the penalty for failure.
Soon he was alone on his dais, the two females recumbent at his feet, and he took the time to study them and think. Darla had betrayed him, though not to the extent he’d first believed. This was no political posturing but rather an act of lust; she was still besotted with Angelus and was willing to go against her sire’s orders so as to remain on the surface and in the Irishman’s bed. Did this make her actions forgivable? No. But it made the Master less likely to condemn her to death. All in all, Darla was more useful to him alive than ashes, as proven by the speed at which the couple had driven back the Tyran invaders. But she would have to be punished.
And what of Angelus? He would need to be tasted, of course, to ascertain the depth of his blame, but again he was useful to the Order, raising their profile amongst demons who were quick to forget and lose their respect of those who chose to dwell below.
Tapping his nail against his lips, the Master concluded that that verdict would have to wait, at least until Angelus was once more in chains. That left the mad girl. Drusilla. She was staring at him, her eyes huge and luminous, her mouth slack. He had heard she had visions, a useful gift if true and one he would like to exploit for more than a night’s good hunting. Crooking his finger, he gestured for her to rise and come to him. She obeyed, her body lax and submissive as she fell to her knees resting her head in his lap.
He took her hand, raising it to his lips, and bit deep and sharp into her wrist. Blood, piquant and sweet, wine and sugar, spilled into his mouth carrying with it more knowledge of what had transpired. Jumbled images, memories, glimpses and flashes of conversation.
Dead humans, some arranged in decorous poses around a polished table, others with their bodies strewn carelessly around, exposed and bleeding under holy eyes. Equal horror at both, magnificent terror the like of which the Master had not tasted in a century or more.
A china doll, its eyes bandaged, talking, whispering secrets in a dead girl’s ear. This child was truly insane and yet her mind spoke truths others could not comprehend.
Watchers dying and a baby, stolen from its crib, its mother weeping and tearing at her clothes as it was born away. And another crying in the corner of a room as the bliss of familial lust saturated the air around it.
None of this was new, though seen through different eyes. Was all as Darla believed? Was the human brat in his dungeons, safely cozened at its wet nurse’s tit, really the one he had been searching for?
He took another draught of blood, forcing his consciousness further into the girl’s mind, scratching around for hidden secrets and there it was. A different face – male and tousle headed – holding another infant – this one stolen under the influence of magic… and at this girl’s instigation!
The Master tore his mouth away from Drusilla’s wrist, spitting the last mouthful of blood into her face. It dripped from her eyebrows and nose, a mask of gore on a traitor’s visage, casting her the colour she deserved to be. He waited for the reaction; the rage that any vampire would display at such an insult. He waited in vain. She lay unmoving, as placid as a cow under the butcher’s knife.
With a roar, he threw her away, tossing her skinny frame across the room, and strode after her determined to get his revenge. His boot connected with her belly, tearing muscle and skin, ripping her open from sternum to groin and yet still she would not stir, would not give him the satisfaction he craved.
In sheer frustration the Master began to smash everything in sight. His throne, inherited from his own sire a thousand years ago, turned to matchsticks in his hands. Cushions and drapes were rags, with candles thrown atop to fuel his rage. The work of half a millennium lay in ruins. The human baby he needed to forestall the prophecy was gone, stolen by his own family from under his very nose. Snatched by a madwoman and an imbecilic fledgling, and now lost, condemning his Order to wordless history and ignominious failure.
“Master?”
The first minion to dare the Master’s wrath cascaded through his fingers, heart ripped from its chest.
The second hovered in the entrance awaiting permission to speak but found herself an undead torch when she did not bring news of Angelus’ recapture.
The third, wiser or more cowardly than the others, closed the door firmly and left his Master alone until the news they brought was more to his liking.
***
Huddled in the corner of the goods wagon, Spike tried not to breathe. The stench
of his attackers surrounded him, a loathsome miasma that wouldn’t be dispelled
by a simple bath. His muscles ached and each time he moved more blood and come
trickled from his arse, a reminder, as if he needed it, of just how many times
he’d been used.
A flask hit him in the side of the head and he grabbed it, unscrewing the top and downing a few mouthfuls of cool congealing blood. It was hardly what he could call a decent meal but, starving as he was, it tasted as sweet as the finest virgin.
“Enough!”
Ducking the incoming blow, Spike managed to steal another swig before the flask was snatched away.
“I said enough, traitor.”
A boot connected with his ribs and he rolled with it, avoiding the worst of the damage, and covered his head in case there was more to come. There wasn’t. Maybe he was injured enough to satisfy them. And yeah, he probably did deserve the title even though he hadn’t known what the fuck he was doing at the time, just following one of Dru’s whims, keeping her quiet like he was supposed to. Not that he wouldn’t have done it anyway. Loved her more than anything, he did, and would do it all again in a heartbeat just to see her smile.
The guard backed away, off to rejoin the rest of the vamps making up Spike’s escort to Vienna, and turned his back on the prisoner. Spike pulled himself up by the chain that secured him to the wooden partition. It gave under the pressure and he froze, shooting a quick look at the others squatting in the opposite corner. They were busy sharing a railway worker foolish enough to enter the closed wagon back in Prague and beyond them the sliding side was slightly ajar, presumably in readiness to dispose of the body when night came. Currently though, the sun streamed in creating a lethal river of light some three feet inside the carriage.
When he was certain they hadn’t heard him, Spike tugged again, carefully studying the restraints to see where the weakness lay. There, near the top. The bolt was pulling loose from the dry timber. If he could just…
“Hey!” he called out. “Spare a bit for a condemned vamp?”
The four glanced over at him, exchanged a few words and snickers, and then one, Ahren’s lieutenant, stood up and wandered over, his steps swaying in time with the train.
Stopping right in front of Spike, he slammed a hand into the wall and rubbed his crotch suggestively. “If you’re still hungry, boy,” he said, “I’ve something here you can suck on.”
The others roared with laughter and Spike ground his teeth against the rage. For once he needed to play coy and losing his temper was not the way to go.
“If I do, will you let me feed?”
More hilarity and when they’d finished, the lieutenant jerked his head over at the gang and said, “Depends on how well you suck dick. Give us all what we want and I’ll think about letting you finish the human off.”
“Deal,” Spike agreed, twisting round so that the bolt was above him and raising his hands so they were tangled in the chains.
A discontented mutter filtered over from the rest and the head vampire snarled something in German before undoing his trousers and releasing his cock. Spike closed his eyes and opened his mouth, nearly gagging when the meaty erection was thrust straight down his throat. He swallowed reflexively and the other vampire groaned, starting to hump his face. It was foul and disgusting, not least because the bloke really needed a bath, but right now Spike was willing to suffer any indignity for a chance to escape.
Cracking his eyes a little, Spike glanced up, opening them fully when he saw the lieutenant had his screwed shut, carried away with what he was doing. Perfect. Carefully, Spike tightened his hands around the chains, tugging against them in rhythm with the face fuck he was enduring. As he’d planned, the clanking sound was totally in keeping with the thump of his head on the wood and the other vampire’s mutters and moans. With each tug the bolt got looser until Spike was convinced that one decent yank would pull it clear. Now, he had to judge this just right.
The cock in his mouth twitched and a hand came down to hold his head still. It had to be now or he was getting a mouthful of something he really didn’t want.
His fangs dropped as he chomped down and the wagon was suddenly full of blood and movement. The lieutenant screamed and collapsed. Spike spat the severed prick in his face and pulled hard on the chains. They came free and he was across the car before any of them could stop him. The half open door smashed under his weight and he was outside, in the sun, burning – running and jumping and burning and falling and then… his last conscious memory was of cold, cold water, bathing away the heat and the pain.