Page 24 of Captive
An orc's wrist appeared before him, marked with fresh knife cuts and traces of older wounds. Sebastian's senses flared with recognition, this blood, this scent, his body remembered it even if his conscious mind didn't. This was what had been sustaining him in his unconsciousness. He tried to turn away, conflicted by the offering andby how desperately he wanted it. A noble of House de la Sang did not feed directly. Did not take unprocessed blood. His father's careful training warred with primal need.
His fangs struck before conscious thought could intervene, not the careful pierce of synthetic precision, but something savage that made the orc grunt in pain. Council members surged forward, weapons rising, but the witch's sharp command stopped them.
"Don't! Breaking the connection now could kill them both."
The taste of unprocessed blood hit Sebastian's tongue like lightning, pure and overwhelming in its intensity. Vapor rushed from his pores as his body seized, natural sustenance fighting against metal components, burning through dead systems like liquid fire. Part of him recoiled at this violation of everything he'd been taught, yet a deeper part welcomed the raw connection to something real.
"The crystals, look!" cried one of the orcs.
The ancient power responded to the primal feeding. Light surged across crystal formations embedded in living wood. Where the radiance touched Sebastian's brass components, the metal rippled as if it no longer belonged in his body.
"Too much," the eldest warned, her magical patterns flaring. "He takes too much!"
But Sebastian couldn't stop. Each swallow burned through more synthetic regulation, stripped away more artificial control. The massive orc's hand gripped his shoulder, not pushing away, but ready. Tension transmitted through that grip, through the blood, through everything.
"His heart rate spikes beyond safety," the witch reported as magic crackled around them. "The pure blood accelerates-"
Another surge of crystal light cut her off. Sebastian's body arched as more synthetic components failed, but still he couldn't break away from the orc's wrist. Pure need drove him deeper than training, deeper than enhancement, deeper than anything his father's artifice had built into him.
"Now," the massive orc's command cracked like steel on stone. "Break it now."
Strong hands wrenched Sebastian back, tearing him away from sustenance his body screamed for. The sound that escaped him held nothing of nobility, just raw, animal fury at being denied what heneeded. His eyes snapped open, and the orcs recoiled. Whatever they saw in his gaze made weapons rise again and the crystals pulse with ancient warning.
"Blood madness," someone whispered. "Like the old stories..."
But through the haze of need and pain, Sebastian saw the largest orc still kneeling before him. Blood flowed from the rough wound Sebastian's unregulated strike had left, not the clean punctures of synthetic feeding, but something messy. Something real. The sight filled him with a complex mix of emotions, concern, shame, confusion.
"Enough," the big orc said quietly. Their gazes met across the space between them, predator and prey, noble and warrior, both roles suddenly insufficient to describe what was happening. "Show us you can stop."
Sebastian recognized the test in the moment. Everything he'd been taught, every careful regulation his father had instilled in him, insisted that unprocessed feeding led to exactly this, loss of control, surrender to base instinct, confirmation of why House de la Sang needed artificial precision. Yet here was a chance to prove that control could come from within, not just from brass and copper.
He fought against instincts that screamed to strike again, to burn through every synthetic regulator ever carved into him. The crystals shifted to paler blues and greens that spoke of change, of possibility, of choices.
He forced his fangs to retract. The effort sent fresh waves of agony through failing systems, but he held onto that small victory, that tiny piece of control seized back from pure animal need.
Blood still flowed from the rough wound on the orc's wrist. Sebastian's gaze fixed on it, but not with the desperate hunger of moments before. "I can't leave you bleeding," he said, voice steadier now. He gestured weakly toward the wound.
The council members tensed, weapons shifting forward. "Don't," one warned the large orc. "It's a trick."
"Warchief," another cautioned, "he still hungers."
But the large orc studied Sebastian's eyes. Without a word, he extended his wrist again, a gesture of either tremendous trust or calculated risk.
Sebastian leaned forward slowly, deliberately, never breaking eyecontact. When his mouth met the orc's skin, there was no bite, no desperate pull. His tongue moved with careful precision over the wound, cleaning, not feeding. The intimacy of the act hung in the crystal-lit air, charged with unspoken tensions that transcended enemy lines.
He could taste the power in the blood, feel it calling him to take more, but he refused that call. That moment was about control. About choice. About proving something to himself as much as to his captors.
When he finally pulled away, of his own volition, not because hands forced him back, he methodically licked his own lips clean of the orc's blood. The gesture was both fastidious and defiant. Not just pride, but the possibility that there might be more to him than his father's enhancements had allowed.
"Well," the large orc said, dark humor threading his voice as he withdrew his wrist. "At least we know he can be taught." His spear remained ready, and the other council members kept their weapons raised, but something had shifted in the chamber's atmosphere.
Sebastian's body shuddered as the unprocessed blood worked through his system, burning through components never meant to handle such potent sustenance. The chamber's magic sang through his veins, calling his brass to remember, his copper to wake, his whole being to transform into something his father's improvements had never meant him to be.
Something that lived in the spaces between synthetic and organic, between artificial and real.
Something that might survive transformation, if it didn't burn him alive first.
The real question was whether he could survive long enough to understand what he was becoming, and what it might mean for everything he had once believed about himself and his kind.
