Blood of Lilith

The sound of clanking glass rings too sharply against my ears. I flinch before I even decide to, my head tipping slightly as if that will dislodge the sound. It doesn’t. It only settles deeper.

The bartender drops a glass and it shatters, the sound splintering. My grip tightens around the cold frosted glass in front of me. It’s supposed to anchor me, and it almost does. The chill presses back into my palm, a brief interruption against the heat building under my skin.

But the heat doesn’t stop. It spreads instead.

I adjust, hoping to find fresh comfort in my existing situation, but my shirt pulls tight across my chest as I breathe in, then tighter when I breathe out. I roll my shoulders once, then again, like I can physically shake something loose. My sleeves get pushed up without me even thinking about it—anything to feel less contained, less trapped in my own skin.

The relief doesn’t come. Only the next wave.

My stomach tightens, not from hunger I can name, but from the absence of what I need. I swallow against it and take a drink, the glass lifting on instinct more than choice. The liquid burns down and settles warm, dulling the edge for half a second before it fades back into noise again.

The room returns in pieces.

Voices. Laughter. Chairs scraping. Sticky bar tops.

And behind it all, the reminder that I’m here, in Mystic, a small town where nobody knows me. That’s why I come. That’s why I stay when I shouldn’t. Thunder rolls through the building like something moving under the floorboards, and I let myself lean into it, like it can steady what the rest of me won’t. Most people stay home in weather like this. I don’t. It’s revitalizing and zen-like, which is precisely what I need right now.

It’s a moderately busy Friday night at the pub, and I’m three shots in. The alcohol sits warm and heavy in my stomach. I settle deeper into the stool with my next drink. Leaning into the bar with my too tight body, locks of my long straight white hair slip over my shoulder from the high pony on my head. I flip it back and take a slow, long sip, watching the room around me.

At my back, three older men in denim and flannel huddle together. Loud laughter cuts through the bar as they banter—rehashing about some rookie messing up an inspection, from what I can catch. When they notice me looking over my shoulder at them, their eyes soften as they offer me genuine smiles.

I give them one in return.

At the far end of the bar, a lone stranger is stroking his mustache as his eyes rove over me a bit too intimately for my comfort. When he sees me catch him at it, he tips his head and winks, waggling his brows at me suggestively. I roll mine and tip my drink, my eyes flicking back to the bartender who mixes me another refill.

I don’t like being watched, but I’m used to it. You don’t spend long in places like this without learning there’s no real way to disappear.

Even the bartender can’t seem to help himself. He stays a little too long each time he refills me, his fingers brushing against mine as he sets down a new drink.

But something pulls at my attention harder than all of them.

Across the room I see a lean man wearing jeans and a leather jacket holding a woman in front of him, between his legs. With his back to me I see his hands sitting on her waist as she embraces him at his shoulders. Her hair frames her thin face full of thick makeup. I don’t like makeup, it hides truth and anything that lives on a lie isn’t worth my time. I wonder what lies she’s hiding. She looks past his ear, watching me like she’s already decided something about me.

Demon… I’ve heard that word all my life. I should leave before things get out of hand. But I don’t.

Something in her eyes makes me pause. I glance her way again—and this time she curls her fingers over her tucked thumb, where he can’t see it. Her eyes pleading and locked on mine. That’s what she hides…

And just like that, my restraint dies.

Tipping back the last of my drink, I rise from my stool. When I’m close enough, I stumble into leather jacket’s lap with a startled giggle. Beer splashes across the front of his jeans.

“Oh shit, I’m so sorry.”

My hands slide over him as I clean up the mess. The air around him is thick with cheap beer and synthetic pine, as well as cigarette smoke. The odor of an ordinary man with a lazy habit and no control. I ignore the fact that nothing about him draws me in, until I feel him stiffen beneath my palms. A purr makes its way into my ears. I look up to see him bite his lip, his eyes firmly stuck on the dip of my collar, where my breasts are still swollen, straining against the fabric of my top. The woman I interrupted him from, clearly forgotten.

Up close, I realize he isn’t unremarkable, he’s handsome even. I can see the reason women might flirt with him, but he’s not my type. It doesn’t matter though, not today. Hunger coils in my ribs, slow and certain; today, all that matters is that I feed.

But feeding isn’t easy, I hate it. I don’t want to do it. I don’t want to be what I am. But when the hunger gets too great, I can’t help it. That’s the other reason I like this bar, why I come here. If I have to feed, this is the kind of place to find my prey. Bars like this collected men with rotting edges. The ones women learned to avoid after midnight.

’It’s easier this way—cleaner, and no other woman will have to deal with him for the rest of night.’ I tell myself as I thread desire into him. A slow, deliberate pulse of lust coiling through his body, sharpening his interest in me. He responds immediately, locking his hands around me and dragging me in close between his legs.

“Careful there, sweetheart. Keep rubbing up on me like that and you’re gonna unleash something dangerous.” He tisks.

I’ve heard some variation of this line by six other men in the last three months, but I bite my lip on cue and let him think it’s a new one.

“You sure you can handle that kind of reputation?” My fingers drag slowly along the front of his shirt, teasing the curling hair at his collar while he drags me harder between his legs. Desire never took long to rot men from the inside out.

“Why don’t we head out back…” His voice drops lower, deliberately rough. He tightens his grip and leans into my ear. “I’ll show you exactly why women can’t stay away from me.”

I tilt my head slightly and lick my lips. “Mmm, now you’ve got my attention.” I purr as I play with the ends of his beard.

Leaning into him, I kiss him slowly. He moans into my mouth, his eyes shut tight as I tangle my tongue with his. Taking a chance, I glance past him as our lips are locked toward the front windows. The woman who signaled me is already outside. For a moment she turns her head, finding me through the glass and mouthing ‘thank you’ before rushing down the street.

She’s safe.

When I pull back, a smug smile spreads across his face.

“By all means, little lady.” He bites his lip and gestures toward a door in the back, offering me his hand. I take it and let him lead me.

I don’t take my time once out back with him though; I don’t savor. There is nothing here to indulge in. Hitching up my skirt, I simply shove him back against the brick. A rumbling laugh pours off him, his arms extending wide and inviting more from me. His cock is already hard when I reach between us. One slow stroke, then I pull him free.

I line myself up, then in one fast slick move I plunge myself down onto him. I don’t stop to adjust, I just ride him, hard. Our still-clothed bodies collide, thumping together as I work to fuck myself with his cock. His grip tightens around my hips, and for a second I have to fight the urge to peel his hands off me. The urge is so great it slows my rhythm. By instinct my eyes flick over our surroundings and notice the Wisteria vines along the wall, just a couple of feet down from us.

“Refrænare,” the word is barely audible but effective.

I watch the vines slither toward us, wrapping around his wrists and pulling them over his head and off of me. He notices nothing, too lost in his lust and my potent aura to even form a clear thought. Rocking against him with rough, jerking movements, I take him without further hesitation. As the hunger rises, a pressure builds between my shoulder blades. Familiar. Persistent. Like something folded too tightly for too long.

‘Monster’

‘Freak’

Voices from home assault me, and for a moment, I lose where I am.

“Yeah… just like that… don’t stop.” His voice breaks through it though, bringing my focus back to the moment. I can feel his body trembling, coiling. I roll my hips harder, sharper.

“Oh, Fuck! I’m gonna… I’m gonna…” His breath breaks against my throat, desperate, needy, human. But mine doesn’t.

I pin him down as the rhythm turns merciless.

“That’s it, come apart for me, feed me.”

The moment his head tips back, and his mouth opens on a moan, I lean in. His fixation on me blinds him to the revulsion curdling beneath my flesh as I press my lips to his.

Gold flickers beneath his skin as some of his lifeforce streams from his body into mine, like a trail of light moving through the vastness of space.

Tears sting the corners of my eyes as something tight and ugly crawls up my throat. This is not the life I choose, I don’t want to be a creature that feeds like this. I force the moment of guilt and grief back down. Squeezing my eyes shut, drawing a deep breath, and continue.

He moans again, but this time it’s weaker as warmth leaves him. The moment his strength falters, I pull back. The Wisteria vines slacken around his wrists too, and return to their natural state. Leaving a drugged smile across the man’s face and red marks around his now delicate wrists. He loses consciousness. All his energy depleted, for the moment.

The guilt still rides me though. I reach down and pull his pants closed, tucking his shirt around him before I leave him. He’s decent enough to be left in an alley. He won’t remember me when he wakes.

After straightening my clothing, I slip a small blade from my pocket, hitch up my skirt again to reveal my outer thigh. Pressing the blade to my skin I find the next empty space beside the others. Another reminder of what happens when hunger wins. Below these cuts, a thin black vine tattoo that winds from my ankles to the top of each thigh peeks out. Its delicate tendrils twist up my leg with small Dracula vampira orchids blooming along the stem. I stanch the blood and put my knife away, covering up my legs once again and turning towards the street.

As I step away from leather jacket guy, the echoes of his pleasure fading behind me, something stops me. For a moment, I thought I scented something…

‘Mine,’ the word whispers in my thoughts, but it’s gone before I can grasp it. Shaking myself back into the moment, I turn and slip through the shadows.