The Siren Series 1: Ember (2 page)

His bed was the most bizarre, it was tub-like
with water from the sea that churned and stayed at the host's body
temperature.

Ember had shown him his room in the huge
compartmentalized caverns that comprised the dwellings of the Mer
when they were land bound.

When they had come upon the “bed” Constantine
had asked why there were two bathing areas.

“This is where you shall sleep,” Ember said in a
matter of fact way.

Constantine had been staring at the pulse
beating in her throat, his hunger coming alive again.

She laughed when she saw his expression. “You
will see. Now that you are amongst us, the part of you that is Mer
will manifest. If your Mer blood is invigorated by our environment,
it will become dominant.”

So I will grow the revolting gills?
A
horrible thought. He looked at her bare throat free of the rippled
airways. “You do not have the breathing slits?”

She unconsciously touched her throat and shook
her head slightly, a slight flare of color giving away an emotion
Con thought sat oddly on her. “We are not sure why my gills
disappear then reappear.”

“When?” Con asked, curious despite his resolve
to feign indifference.

“Whilst I am in saltwater.”

“Fresh water doesn't do it?”

She shook her head.

“What about your eyes....?”

She stiffened. “We are not sure about that
either, however, there is a rumor of some of my kind having the
fire eyes....”

“Fire eyes?” Con said, a little humor leaking
out around the edges.

She nodded solemnly.

Ember cast those molten eyes down at the ground
and Con instantly caught sight of her perfect small toes with
webbing, it was not much, but noticeable. It marked her as Mer but
she could pass within human norms if she so chose. Con wondered if
she walked amongst the cattle that roamed the land with her blood
from the sea.

“Desmond has asked that I feed you.” She snapped
her eyes up to meet his. “Before you think that it will make me
vulnerable to you, it will not. I am a Siren of royal blood. It
will tie you further to me. It will feed you but you will be even
more bound to my call.”

She gave him choice. Con understood that, yet,
in his experience everything bowed to the Thirst.

Constantine rebelled but his lust for blood was
crushing. And again, he had come to Desmond. For a place to call
home. Now the princess of the Mer came before him offering her blue
blood.

His sadistic side, always present, wished to
bend her, break her with his cock, his hands pinning those pale
wrists above her head while he caused her pain as he beat his
fleshen tool into her maiden sex. His prick pressed against the
inside of his pants, begging for a release that would not be
given.

The call she had sent to him, her Siren's
wail... had made that blood awaken and now it warred with his
perverse nature.

As he stood there those opposing natures
battled. His heart wished to dominate, his body to protect and it
was at that emotional intersect that Ember pushed her pale and
shining hair away from the precious sweet spot he had admired but
moments before.

The pulse of the maiden pushed that delectable
flesh in a drumbeat of seduction he could no longer deny.

Constantine struck, his fangs piercing her
deeply and as her blue blood flooded his mouth it was a cool press
on his taste buds and he groaned.

The first emotion that reached him forced his
arms around the small maiden that he drank from, her fragrance was
the freshest of breezes across the water, sea mist captured and
released for that moment of entwined feeding.

Her head was flung back and he bent her backward
to draw her closer, bending her as he hauled Ember into the
intimate shadow of his body, his huge hands kneading her soft
curves buried underneath the sheer fabric that floated between
them.

When her blood reached the most basic knitting
of the molecules of his body it reacted as before with the lovely
Exotic vampire female, Lucia.

His mouth came away and his body bowed
backwards, their two figures suspended like a loose heart as they
stayed locked together, his arms holding her to him but
separate.

“Ah!” Constantine said as her blood began to
fuel him, healing the damage of his arm, the mild throbbing in his
head and small battle wounds that low quality human blood could not
cancel.

Her blood made him whole.

Constantine opened cautious eyes to find her
languid gaze like low flames of fire traveling over his face.

It was unnerving. It was arousing, his cock
getting hard and at the exact moment he wished not to be vulnerable
to her.

Con released her and she smiled, those full lips
stretching and revealing small and perfect teeth. A kissable mouth.
One that could travel his shaft very well,
Con
speculated.

“Better?”

“Yes,” Con answered thickly, watching her like a
cobra preparing to strike, thinking about the positions he could
force upon her. Unbidden images of holding her tenderly as he
fucked her rose against his every wish where they became hopelessly
mingled with his sadistic impulses.

She cocked her head. “You are most strange,
Constantine of the Faction.”

Con shook his head, his gaze darkening on the
pinpoint marks that marred the luminescence of her skin.

He had branded her but Con made no move to close
those holes. The blood trickle was a tantalizing reminder of what
she'd given.

His Druid nature was a little closer to owning
her. The blood that fueled his system demanded that he fuck her,
mate her.

No!
Constantine yelled in mental denial,
he would never belong to a female.

Care for a female.

“I am Faction no longer,” he responded
instead.

Ember inclined her head in acknowledgment then
said, “Then it is Constantine.”

“It is who I always was.”

He watched as she turned from him, slipping out
like a pale ghost of floating azure ice, captured wisps of frozen
smoke.

Her blood coated his mouth and he licked his
chops.

Constantine knew that he was seen as the bitch
guard dog to the princess of the Mer.

He thought that eventually Desmond would regret
Constantine's inclusion in the Siren ranks.

It may even be sooner than he realized.

Constantine bedded down in the warm water of the
sea, the tub remarkably easy to slide into.

A heartbeat or two passed before the blackness
of sleep washed over him and his last thought was of Ember.

Her blood laced his mouth and he unconsciously
sipped at his lower lip where the faintest traces of her remained
on his skin.

Fire and ice.

He slept on a wave of dreams dominated by flames
and errant surf.

Constantine was swept into the current, a bottle
in the ocean, shuttled about without course.

CHAPTER 2

Con stared in the mirror, knowing the reflection
did not lie. He was mesmerized by his neck which sported the
breathing apparatus of the Mer.

Ember had told him that he would become more Mer
than vampire but what kind of mutt was he now? He turned away from
his reflection in disgust and his eyes fell on the object of his
musings.

Ember stood before him, her skin shining with
that faint iridescence that all the Mer possessed, a lustrous
pearl. Disregarding his unhappy expression she said in a flat
voice, “Come, Desmond makes plans for a raid.”

She turned away from him and he was suddenly
directly behind her. The sea fragrance of her skin infiltrated his
body like a sly poison.

“Do not touch me, Constantine,” Ember said in a
voice that was accustomed to commanding all who were in her
presence.

Constantine was utterly unaccustomed to
following directives.

He would not begin now; he wrapped her against
him from behind. Her surprise came through the tether of their
unsanctioned embrace. “Do not,” she hissed softly.

“Or what?” Con purred in a hard voice against
her ear, squeezing those delicately constructed wrists together
behind her with one powerful hand. With the other he grabbed her
slender throat, bending it against himself as his fangs grazed the
skin that now ran hot with fear.

The smell of her vibrating terror grew his cock
into a hard pole of seeking invasion.

“I do not wish to injure my best guard,” she
said softly, unable to move with his dominating hold on her.

Constantine's mouth salivated with the wish to
subdue this female. Her haughty manner was something to break down
to its basest level.

Ember would grovel and beg for him.

Con's hard shaft pressed between her ass cheeks,
seeking entry even as she tried to move her hips forward.

“I feel your arousal, Faction,” she said in a
dry voice, squeezed tight by his hand on her slender neck.

“What of it? You are female, made to be fucked
and bred, no more,” Con stated by rote.

“I am a Maiden of the Mer and by all
supernaturals' presumptions, quite rare. Would you rape a female of
such rarity? You impressed me as someone who used their brain on
occasion.”

How could her words disagree with her scent?
Constantine knew the smell of fear. It was something that pacified
him, calmed the demon. Ember spoke with bravado yet her fear of him
permeated the air like an aphrodisiac.

Dear goddess she drove him mad. He pushed her
away from himself before he lost his tenuous control.

She spun gracefully to face him. Livid red
handprints were stark puzzle pieces on the skin of her throat,
shaped in a necklace of anger. It made Constantine hard all over
again.

Ember studied his expression and laughed. “You
are such a dog, Faction. You seek to control me without control of
yourself.”

Constantine hissed, his talons sliding out of
his fingers in a smooth practiced motion as timeless as ever, while
his fangs elongated.

Con could feel the extra oxygen the gruesome
slits afforded him and his thoughts sharpened. Along with his sense
of smell.

When his vampiric senses mingled with his Mer
blood, he understood something.

For all his violent nature, Ember wanted him. He
could smell it. Her mermaid pussy was wet with it.

It was Constantine's turn to grin, like the cat
that swallowed the canary.

Ember looked flustered before him and turned to
go but his hand snaked out, latching onto her small wrist. Those
deep red eyes looked into his like banked fire. “It is nothing,”
she shrugged dismissively. “It is but a biological response to your
blood of the Mer.”

Right,
Con thought,
and he was a human
scourge.

“
So you are a bitch in heat
with all the guard of the Mer? All the warriors cause you to drench
your undergarments?”

Her slap rung throughout the stone chamber
they stood in. “I am not a whore to be bred like the ones you're
used to rutting with. I am a princess of the Mer,” Ember said,
holding her hand in such a way to cradle it, her chin kicking
up.

She had hurt herself more than Con. He
smiled.

“
Have you thought that maybe
it will be different between us?” Constantine asked in a low voice,
neutrality taking over where mirth had stood a moment
before.

Her eyes blazed into his. The heat was a
breathable thing between them.

“
No,” she said emphatically,
her eyes flashing in her expressive face.

Ember put her back to him, walking away and
Con followed her out of the chamber.

The lady protests too much, methinks,
Con mused, the smile taking up residence on his
face once again.

*

Constantine's body hung with fifty extra pounds.
He'd been outfitted with weaponry like the other Mer Warriors. They
all had gills, as he now did.

They did not possess fangs or talons. Con
did.

There had been great curiosity with his unusual
attributes. The warriors that he had punished earlier were whole
again, thanks to Ember's strange magic cauldron of healing. She was
not even a Druid witch but somehow possessed magic. Interesting.
Something Con would explore in great detail in the future.

He looked at her now and saw that she was
outfitted as a warrior. It was ridiculous.
She was so small
compared to her male counterparts, Ember would be helpless against
a male
, Constantine thought with a low snort and Ember gave him
a sharp glance as Desmond droned on about their mission.

Con was a point and shoot soldier. Russel of his
vampire kiss had decided on the target and Con would... do his job
for the coven. No matter how long, how hard. It would get done.
After all, it was Russel that had freed him from the prison of his
upbringing. Constantine was not proud of how he had repaid the
coven leader. The truth was as Con saw it: Russel had seen his
value as a Faction vampire and taken him for his own use.

It had been a gentler form of exploitation and
it was something Constantine had always known about his life. It
was a greedy and abiding thing that he wished to be freed of. Yet,
here he stood again, being used for his mixed heritage yet
again.

Con realized he'd been doing what passed for
daydreaming as all eyes were on him.

Desmond drummed his fingers on the thick table
of quartz-like stone centered in the cavernous room, giving him a
level stare.

Not wishing to admit his inattentiveness he
cocked a brow in question. Desmond sighed. “I do hope that this is
not the level of your prowess in the field?”

“No. I have much to consider and deliberate
upon, Desmond. As you are very aware,” Constantine replied
smoothly.

“I will repeat my question then: can you use
your Exotic skills?”