Havermouth, Present timeHeath was not entirely sure what was real and what was dream. Or was it all dream? Did he dream that he was awake, fighting his eyes open as Talen moved around the room clearing their possessions from the table, and laying upon it hundreds of candles and incense, in a make-shift altar.Did he dream the drift of the vampire’s hair over his body as Talen leaned over him, the golden, shifting candlelight playing over his face and catching in the stubble that dusted his cheeks? “I had hoped to do this with the full moon, as it should be,” the vampire said softly. “A mate should be taken with ceremony, with the moon upon our skin, and an altar adorned with flowers and tributes.”He cupped Heath’s cheek, stroking his thumb over his skin. “We should spend three days and nights exchanging blood and making love, bonding in every way there is to bond, as slowly you turn vampire, taking each other into our bodies, our hearts, our souls. You will be my first mate, and fou
Havermouth, Present timeIn Aislen’s dream, Havermouth was burning. Many of the store-front windows were shattered and boarded up, but where the glass was intact, it reflected a sky that flickered and danced with flame. The smoke was thick, stinging at her eyes, and as she stumbled through it, she tripped on something soft, falling heavily to her hands and knees, her hand going to her stomach protectively in instinct.Her stomach was round. She was heavily pregnant. “F-k,” she whispered, staring down at herself in surprise. She was dressed in thick, grey cargo pants, a knit top, and army boots… She was dressed as a soldier and had dropped a gun when she’d fallen.She reached out to pick up the gun and realized that she’d fallen over a body. “F-k!”As she straightened, she heard a scream in the smoke – not the sound of terror, but the sound of something terrifying. A man lurched out of the smoke, his mouth and torso smeared with blood. He reached out gory hands towards her.She shot hi
Havermouth, Present timeLark was trying a new shade of lipstick, and a new way of wearing her hair, angling her head at the camera of her tablet in order to study the effect. Meguitte watched her through her eyelashes, studying her opponent for weakness.Lark looked up as Meguitte ripped a page from the book. “What are you doing?” She demanded sharply.“Nothing,” Meguitte replied as she began to fold the page. “Just entertaining myself.”“Destroying books is very disrespectful,” Lark said with disapproval.“Mhm,” Meguitte had a created an array of origami sparrows which she was lining up on the bed cover before her, each with a smear of her blood inside – blood which Talen shared as he had given it to her. “Not much else to do.”She had a headache and her stomach had a greasy, bloated feeling to it. Her breasts were sore. She hadn’t had a period since being turned vampire, a sign of the damage within her that had not been fully healed by Talen’s blood, but she remembered the feeling
Havermouth, Present timeThe Donald’s had unravelled the rope of flags and tied a bottle of water to one end. In a team effort, at the signal from several lookouts stationed around the gym, Rhett and Cameron took turns throwing the bottle of water up, seeking to hook it over the suspended walkway.“What the f-k is wrong with us today?” Rhett grumbled when their fourth and fifth attempts went astray. “We could this with our eyes closed at any other time.”“Try that, son,” Jules suggested. “Close your eyes.”Cameron’s jaw set as he looked up, taking his measure as he drew in a deep breath. He closed his eyes and breathed out slowly.“You’re right to go,” Rhett murmured not wanting to break Cameron’s zen.Cameron drew in another breath and threw. The bottle soared high, and the string caught around the hand rail, the bottle swinging around and tangling, the metal rattling and groaning. On cue, the werewolves waiting by the bathroom wheeled out buckets and mops, and cleaning products, mak
Havermouth, Present time“What f-king signs?” Aislen wondered.“Born in the year of the Griffin, maiden born in crone, on the day of Ash,” he replied. “Dreamer who will close the circle. Witch-taught but not wrought. Mother of blood and wolf. Four kings will worship at her breast. Storm, flood, and fires will herald her coming. The dead will rise, and the streets run with blood. It rhymes in the original tongue,” he added helpfully.“Yeah,” she dragged the word out slowly, arching her eyebrow. “That’s just bullshit, Aaron.”“You were born in the year of the Griffin, under the crescent to waxing moon. The day of Ash refers to the final day of the war of the Nyxsians, an ancient people that we only know of from records such as these,” he blocked the way when she went to leave the kitchen with her bowl of stew and coffee. “Aislen means dreamer, and Morgana great circle. You are witch-trained, but not a witch.”Aislen narrowed her eyes at him. “Ten minutes is up, Aaron.”“Morgana, give me
Havermouth, Present timeThe man had been wearing a cuff.Meguitte sat staring at the notepad on her lap without seeing the list of spell components that she had been compiling. Think, Meguitte, she told herself firmly. Think about this carefully. Could it have been the second cuff? She closed her eyes. She would be lying to herself if she believed that, she admitted.She understood, now, why Logan had insisted on a second cuff for a sister who had died long before they had met. He had kept one cuff for himself, to control the lycan within him, and had given Lark, Dove, and Robin the other cuff, along with the footage from the camera button which Lark had told her Logan had been wearing, and Logan’s trio of witches had managed to reproduce Meguitte’s spell.He had watched Meguitte cast it, and like a fool she had even glibly listed the ingredients for him as she had done it.Her heart ached at the betrayal so much that the pain eclipsed the important fact of why. Why had Logan done th
Havermouth, Present timeTalen propped himself on one elbow and looked down at Heath. The golden candlelight danced over his mate’s skin catching in the fine fuzz of hair, in the gilded strands of his eyebrows, the stubble of his jaw. He was fascinated by this mate, Talen admitted to himself, and had been from the moment the rude pup had spat vitriol at him out front of Morgana’s house. In his sleep, Heath’s face softened, the tension eased away in dream, the burden of responsibility that he carried with so much determination lightened, and suddenly he was so very, very young.It was easy to forget just how young his mates were, Talen admitted to himself. They were all such fierce individuals, each burnt so brightly.He stroked his palm lightly down Heath’s arm to where the cuff rung his wrist. Just above the thin band of metal, Heath’s pulse kept rhythm. Talen rested his fingertips there, monitoring the pace, trying to judge the health of his mate.There was a faint knock at the door
Havermouth, Present timeThe reception only just held them all, and the circle was a little malformed as a result of the shape of the room, everyone a little closer together than they were entirely comfortable with, considering a good number of them chose to go sky clad again. Sigrid and the mysterious vampire, Samuel, joined the circle, as did Leighton and his family, with Aislen and Bianca in the centre, sitting cross legged and knee to knee.“I can’t tell you how grateful I am that you kept your underwear on,” Aislen smirked. She was also grateful for Bianca’s wards, as otherwise she would not be able to concentrate. Bianca snickered. “For a bitch f-king four men, you’re so prudish.”“I truly, truly am,” Aislen agreed wholeheartedly. “In some circumstances. Like I fully believe that you should not know if your best friend has freckles on her labia from personal experience. That’s taking the best friend thing a little beyond comfortable for me."“Are we?” Bianca asked quietly, her
Havermouth, Present Time Heath woke into darkness. His werewolf sight could not even determine a pinprick of light. The darkness was heavy, smothering. “Talen?” He asked. His voice sounded muted, as if he were in a closed, tight space. He reached out and felt nothing however… And that was terrifying. There was no floor, no walls. He did not understand how it was that he was not falling… or perhaps he was. His breathing was rasped through lungs constricted by panic. “Shh,” a woman murmured. “Hush now, do not fear. Nothing will harm you here. Indeed,” there was amusement to her voice. “There is nothing here to harm you.” “Who are you?” He demanded, fear turning into anger. “Some Van Helsing trick?” “Hmhmhm,” she chuckled softly. “No, white wolf.” “Where is Talen?” He sat up slowly, relying on his stomach muscles as there wasn’t a floor to brace his hands against. “Where are we? Why… isn’t there a floor?” “So many questions. We are in the beginning, the aether, the place where we
Havermouth, Present TimeCameron and Rhett stood by the front window of Mr Claymont’s house with the lace curtains pushed back, looking out at the street as the crowd began to clear. A riot had broken out in response to the explosion of the school and had blocked the Van Helsings’ efforts to reach their destroyed base. The Havermouth rioters had destroyed several of the Van Helsings’ vehicles until guns had been drawn and bullets had been fired.Just as things had been on the verge of turning into a massacre, the fire had begun to spread out from the school, and Havermouth’s residents had rushed to help the homeowners save their property whilst others had dragged those injured by the Van Helsings retaliation into nearby houses.Into the chaos and mania of it all, the fleeing werewolves had just been another strangeness of the day, with people shrieking and screaming as their fur brushed against them, but otherwise taking no action against them, too occupied with the fire and gunmen, a
Havermouth, Present TimeThe f-ker!Aislen woke angry and sore. Her whole body ached, but her head and throat most of all. She was f-king going to kill that arsehole of a torturer, she thought.She was lying on her back on a bed, but not somewhere private. Around her she could hear the murmur of voices, groans and moans, the rattle of metal against metal, and crying. It stank. Layers of sweat, urine, faeces and… rotten meat.She opened her eyes and looked through a mesh of metal bars at the pressed tin tile design within the coffered ceiling high above her and the elaborate chandelier that dangled from it. Not what she’d expected having smelled the room, she thought, sitting up.It was a large long room, with a heavy velvet curtained stage set on one end and a wall of double doors at the other. In between the two ends, rows of cages had been set, each one only long enough to fit a trundle bed and twice as wide. Many of the cages were empty, like the one directly next to Aislen’s bed,
Havermouth, One Week BeforeTony had the police officer tied by his wrists and dangling over an open oubliette in the barn when Talen arrived, and looked up from a toolbox which was set on the pushed back stone lid. “Alex, this is Talen. Talen, meet Alexander Grennith.”“F-k you,” the werewolf was in the policeman’s eyes, but with his weight on his shoulders, and his wrists tied, he could not shift without risking tearing his arms from the joint, an injury that would be both intensely painful and potentially life-alteringly disabling.“No thank you,” Talen replied as he rolled up his sleeves. “Did you have any trouble?” He asked Tony.“No,” Tony was amused. “I took Sigrid with me, and she distracted him at the front door whilst I took him from behind. He did not know what happened. We bundled him into his own car, and I wore his jacket and hat. Anyone who saw me would have thought he was going on a date. I dropped Sigrid at the Ute and she drove it home for me.”“I didn’t know that Si
Havermouth, Two Weeks BeforeCameron creeping out of the bed and around the room getting dressed woke Heath. He was pressed tightly to Talen’s back, half drowning in the vampire’s blonde hair, with his arm over Talen’s waist and he was disinclined to move from the position. Used to Cameron’s early mornings, once he’d registered what the movement was about, he closed his eyes and tried to go back to sleep only for Aislen to mutter a complaint as Rhett wriggled out from under her.“I have a client coming at nine,” Rhett explained his movement. “I have to go set up.”“Too early,” Aislen grumbled.“I know, but they work afternoons, and it will take a good three hours,” Rhett yawned widely as he slid out of the bed.Talen shifted in order to pull Aislen back against him, snuggling her into the spoon of his body. “Sleep some more, Morgana,” he murmured. “You need to rest in order to heal.”Rhett cursed as he stumbled and Cameron smothered his laughter. “Careful. F-k man, you’re not a good m
Havermouth, Two Weeks Before“I could do with a cigarette too,” Aislen announced. “And a glass of wine.”“It’s not even midday,” Heath protested immediately.Aislen’s eyeroll said it all. “I wasn’t asking for permission. I’ve had a pretty shitty couple of days, and I want to f-king have a cigarette and a glass of wine on the porch of my house and so that’s precisely what I am going to do,” she began to get dressed. “If you’re all going to be bitches you can leave.”Heath spotted her underwear tangled at the foot of the bed and retrieved them, untangling them as he handed them to her. “I’ll go open a bottle.” He stepped out into the hallway and closed the door before leaning against the wall and heaving out a sigh.Rhett and Cameron now knew about the miscarriage, but he felt as if the Triquetra had narrowly avoided disaster with the discussion that had followed, and the adrenaline spike had left him shaky with his heart racing against his ribs. The conversation had also shaken free a
Havermouth, Two Weeks BeforeRhett laughed. F-k this was going to be fun, he thought lifting up onto his elbows in order to improve his view.“Oh.” Aislen had realized that the double-sided dildo was for her.Talen’s shoulder shook with his silent laughter as he helped her into the harness and eased her end of the dildo into her.“F-k that’s hot,” Rhett groaned as Talen tightened the harness around her waist. There was something so naughty about Aislen with a c-k, and the leather straps compressing her soft skin, the contrast of white to black and soft to hard… “F-k,” he groaned, and Heath compliantly gripped his c-ck, stroking from base to tip so that he sighed out his pleasure.“Very nice,” Talen approved leaning back to inspect his workmanship. “Who would you like to f-k, little demon?”“Choices, choices,” Aislen’s response was pure devilry.“Me,” Rhett gasped out rolling up to sitting. “I want to try that.”“Why not?” Aislen was amused by his eagerness and by her new accessory, re
Havermouth, Two Weeks BeforeRhett used the trolley to herd Tabitha and her cameraman away from Cameron and Aislen so that they could make their escape, his vindicative ramming of the reporter’s heels fuelled by the nasty volley of questions she had just thrown at Aislen.“This is assault, Rhett Salem!” Tabitha snarled at him.“Oh, f-k off Tabitha,” he replied. “For a f-king desperate ambulance chasing vulture you are pretty righteous. F-king chasing down a woman who was just shot, and shouting out her personal business… You are slime. The worst type of slime. Just own it and shut the f-k up.”He abandoned the trolley inside the doors of the hospital and trotted across the carpark to where Heath was picking up shards of broken vase and ignoring Tabitha’s attempts to engage him into an interview. Heath surprised Tabitha by passing her the broken pieces. “Throw these away for me, please, like a good girl,” he told her.“Ah, shit, Heath, don’t call her a good girl,” Rhett laughed as he h
Havermouth, Two Weeks BeforeCameron almost stopped dead. From the corner of his eye, he saw Rhett fumble a vase of flowers that he was loading into his car, the vase shattering with a loud crash as it hit the ground and distracting the reporter and her cameraman.Miscarriage? What miscarriage? And… if Aislen couldn’t have a child… what did that mean for their Triquetra?“I don’t hit women,” Heath growled down at Tabitha. “But you are testing my resolve. Get the f-k away from us, and stay away.”Cameron pulled himself together and crossed the last distance to the Ute, easing Aislen into the passenger seat, and closing the door before turning back to help his Triquetra drive off the reporter and her cameraman. Rhett drove the now empty trolley directly at Tabitha and the cameraman, forcing them backwards, and used it to herd them towards the hospital and away from the Ute.“What the f-k?” Cameron asked Heath in shock. “What the f-k was that?”“Take her to her house, Cam, I’ll meet you