Page 24 of Maker

There were grunts and groans coming from the dark depths. He heard them before he saw them. His prisoner, Ivan, was forced to reckon with a very cruel captivity, bound not in iron, but moonsilver, a cursed material that caused extreme pain to those of wolf blood and sapped their preternatural strength. Ivan had managed to press little odds and ends between the silver and his skin, preventing the worst of the burns, but the sheer proximity of the material left him weak and likely in constant pain. Maddox did not concern himself with Ivan’s pain. The man had been given many opportunities to make good on his evil past, and at every turn he had made the wrong choice.

Ivan was Will’s father, so Maddox could not kill him outright. He was also of a very old and powerful lineage, so they had that in common. If Ivan were a better man, he would have made an excellent ally, but his insistence on choosing base instinct and cruel acts over any wise or kind course of action had led him inexorably to this point.

Maddox took his time descending the last round row of stairs and crossing the rancid, stinking floor to stand over his captive. Ivan looked a lot like Will in some respects. He had not only given his son the gift of powerful blood. He had given him the same striking eyes, wild hair, and handsome features. Ivan’s were more brutish and wily, though maybe he had looked like Will as a younger man, before the cruelty of the world and his own acts shaped him.

There was a certain barbed feeling Maddox felt inside himself when looking down at Ivan. He missed Will every second of the day and being confronted with a creature so close and yet so far from his boy gave him a certain melancholy.

“What do you want?” Ivan’s opening conversational gambit was not charming. Maddox had wondered if Ivan might beg him for release. The answer, apparently, was no.

“I promised you that you would be interred here as long as you lived,” Maddox said. “However, fortunately for you, the one creature I would consider making a deal with any number of devils to avoid has risen and intends to kill Will. We must stop him.”

Ivan looked at Maddox balefully. “You put me underground with no food save the occasional scrap, no dignity, save for the occasional bucket. You made me weak. You did everything besides kill me. And now you want my help?”

“Will is your son. He needs your help.”

“Maybe he is better dead than suffering a life of vampire predation.”

“I don’t think you mean that, Ivan. I have shown you mercy by saving your life. If you’d prefer I end it, that can be arranged.”

“What about me?” Chauvelin asked. Mad had almost forgotten about him completely. Several months pinned in the dark had been good for him. He had been quite unattractive as a human; however, as a vampire he had a certain dark allure. Not one Maddox found in any way intriguing, but one that might make him palatable to a mate eventually, if he were ever to be freed from this deserved prison.

“You? I hardly see what use I might have for you. I imagine you would immediately ally yourself with Gideon, given you are a simpering little sycophant who yearns for power and loathes me.”

“Yes. Well,” Chauvelin said. “Worth a try.”

Maddox found himself briefly amused, and that brief moment of levity was almost enough to make him unpin Chauvelin. But not quite.

“What will it be, Ivan?” He turned his attention back to the man at his feet, the cowering wolf suffering in silver. There could be only one response.

* * *

When Maddox returned home, he did so with reserved trepidation. He was certain the stench of the hole clung to him, as no doubt did the guilt. Yes, he felt guilty hiding his actions from Gideon. There was loyalty deeply built into his very being. He owed Gideon a lot. More than sneaking around and hiding his intentions. He felt like a teenager sneaking out of the house trying to get access to a lover his parent did not approve of.

Would Gideon know where he had been and what he was doing? Or had he been suitably distracted by Lorien?

If he had been human, he would have blushed when he stepped through his front door — a door that no longer felt like his — and almost directly into Gideon himself.

“Careful,” Gideon said as Maddox stepped through the front door. “He’s had a little too much to drink.”

“Who has?”

Gideon jerked a clawed thumb upward. Maddox cast his eyes in that same direction and saw that Lorien was clinging to the ceiling, fangs bared, eyes bloody, face entirely healed but now scrunched into a hissing rage.

“What is…”

“I gave him some of my blood,” Gideon said. “It seems to have been a little rich for him. These modern vampires are so dilute.”

“I thought when you said you’d feed him, it would be from some of the stored blood.”

“He needed fresh blood. Besides, it has been too long since I fed a young vampire.”

THUD!

That was the sound of Gideon’s blood wearing off, and gravity reasserting itself with immediate effect.

“Fuckkkkkk…” Lorien grunted, writhing around on the floor. Now he had a new wound.

“And where were you?” Gideon asked the question, irritatingly, ignoring Lorien’s pain.

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