Anthony Blake
Oct. 1st, 2013 09:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
a_sporking_ratI've been wanting to write some more with Anthony Blake ever since I posted about him here. I wondered why, since I could just write about Anita instead. After all, they're basically the same, right? At first I worried that maybe I'm more into bashing a male character than a female, but that didn't seem to be it (especially given how much I *love* bashing Anita!), nor did any other gender-related reasons I pondered. Then I remembered that a few commenters had said Anthony is less scary to them than Anita because he's pretty clearly not meant to be taken seriously or as a hero, whereas Anita is intended to be both. Even when I treat her as an idiot and a villain in fanfiction, the fact remains that the person who came up with her still writes her doing horrible things while 100% unaware of how horrible they are and in fact portraying them as good, and that's MORE scary than the deeds themselves. Anthony, on the other hand, was created and written from the start by someone (moi) who considered him to be nothing more than a mirror-image of the world's biggest fictional asshole, and is never going to be presented as anything else. Thus, he's always going to be less scary than Anita and more comfortable to write/read about, at least to me.
But that's good, because it means you can laugh at him, whereas with Anita there's a lot you can't laugh it. And me, I write this for laughs. Plus, it would be a shame to come up with all those gender-swap names and then never use 'em!
If you're wondering about the nipples thing...the first time that Anita sees Melanie in her true form, she happens to be topless. The first thing Anita notices and describes to us is not the fact that HER BOTTOM HALF IS A GIANT SNAKE but that her nipples are reddish. Because priorities!
I live part-time at the Circus, part-time at my house with my live-in sweeties. Today was one of the Circus days. I was just coming back from helping Malitia and Veritas give training lessons to our guards. Malitia and Veritas are two of the most feared fighters in all of vampire land, and they're security here at the Circus of the Damned, as well as having been occasional lovers of mine, though only in order to feed the ardeur, not as my sweeties.
A description of their height, figures, eye color, hair color/style/length/texture, distinguishing features and marks, and fashion styles
As I was coming back with the guards, flanked by them and all their weapons, as well as my own Cut: list and description of said weapons, which are absurdly numerous, our testosterone buzzing in the air, giving us that almost palpable charge that men at full adrenaline have and that so many women misunderstand, are afraid of. It's really just boisterous male energy, and my girls all understand that. As we passed, a vampire, not a guard, gave me a hard look. It was Cardinal, the other lover of Dagmar, my Vampire Servant. A description of what a Vampire Servant is, how Anthony is the first one to have one, how this is because he's the first true necromancer in over a thousand years, what being a necromancer means, how the Council usually kill necromancers and why, how Dagmar forms a triumvirate with Anthony and Natalie and how having two triumvirates is supposed to be impossible but Anthony has done it and his other triumvirate is with Jeanne-Claire and Rachel and how they are Master of the City and Lupa, respectively, and some snide remarks about Rachel, and a lengthy physical description of Dagmar, and a less lengthy but still too long and rather snide physical description of Cardinal.
I assumed it was jealousy. Some people, especially men, just can't quite get their heads, or hearts, or other things, around the idea of sharing. They want to be the one and only, and, if not that, at least the most important, and they get huffy if they're not, even if it's what's making their lover happiest. I didn't know Cardinal well, but he seemed to be a typical macho man, and he was clearly very into appearances, as evident by how he and Meng Dao had made me get into super-stylish sexy suit for seeing the weretiger clans when they'd all come to St. Louis for help against the Father of All Darkness and to make me the new Master of Tigers. So he probably cared enough about appearances to be bothered about how it might look, might reflect on him as a man, that his main squeeze preferred me as her primary lover. Explanations of what 'primary' and 'secondary' mean in the context of polyamory, explained in the most patronizing and inaccurate way possible, and how Anthony doesn't think of himself as poly because he's still such a pure guy at heart --and isn't he AWESOME for being the ONE man on the planet NOT obsessed with sex?-- but he's still totally a perfect example and deserves all the edgy cred ever for it
He looked like he wanted to say something. I looked at him, but did not stop in my stride. If he wanted to speak up, he damn well could, I liked people to be direct and open if they had a problem with me, but I also wasn't going to slow down for his benefit.
"What's his deal?" asked one of the guards.
"Probably Dagmar being gone," said Clay, a wererat. He was remarkably short and feminine-looking, but he had appointed himself my personal bodyguard, and was always ready to step in when any of the ladies in my life were being what he considered henpecking or pussy-whipping towards me. So far that had been Rachel and Eden, and I could deny Clay was right about them both. Lots of whining about Rachel, and faux-guilty recounting of how Anthony 'had' to shoot Eden and how jealous she was over him because she was soooo in love with him! Absolutely no mention is made of Noelle or her sacrifice
"Gone?" I made it a question. A strange look passed from the other guards to Clay, one I didn't understand, one of those guy looks that I so often find myself left out of that are made to keep secrets and left things unsaid. From the down the hall, I heard Cardinal, still close enough that he could say it rather than call it, ask, "You didn't know?"
I stopped and turned now, and the guards stopped and turned with me almost in perfect unison. They were giving that hard guy look to Cardinal now too. He looked at them, and then said, "He doesn't know. You've been keeping it from him, haven't you? I should have known if Jeanne-Claire was making me stay quiet, she'd get to you too."
"What are you talking about?" I asked.
"Haven't you wondered where Dagmar has been?" he said. One of the guards grabbed my arm, and I almost reacted by doing a reflexive judo throw, but I stopped myself and instead gave him a hard look of my own, and something in my eyes made him know to let go.
"Dagmar hasn't been missing," I said to Cardinal.
"He's been gone for over a month!" Cardinal raised his voice, and sounded angry. Angry at me. I guess when there's a problem like that and you can't blame anyone else, you just blame whoever is handy, whoever you already dislike enough anyway. For Cardinal, that was me. Yea.
I thought for a moment. When was the last time that I had seen Dagmar? Probably more than two months ago, actually, but it was different for us. Because we had a metaphysical bond, I was always aware of her on some level, and so we didn't need to physically see each other to know that the other was well, to be connected. We were always connected, on a level that no one else could share or understand, not unless they had a metaphysical bond like it. And since nothing was amiss with Dagmar that I could feel through our connection, how could I be blamed for thinking all was well? If anything, Cardinal was to blame if Dagmar had vanished on his watch, since, lacking a connection like ours, he was the one who had to be physically close to her all the time like the clingy jealous mess he was, and I told him as much.
"And besides," I added, "why did you wait until now to tell me? She's my Vampire Servant, I should have been informed if she didn't turn up for a single night, let alone almost a month! Kind of suspicious on your part there, Cardi."
Cardinal looked enraged; I guess the truth hurts. "I wanted to tell you, you idiot! But Jeanne-Claire told me not to bother, that you had it well in hand and were not to be deserved! After two weeks I tried to get word to you, but she caught me at it and made damn well sure that I knew it'd be my neck if I tried again! Now it's been a month and it turns out you knew nothing of this? Did you never even care to ask?"
"Jeanne-Claire does what she has to to keep us safe and the ship running smoothly," I said, not giving in to his jealous attempt to tear me apart from my Master of the City main squeeze. "Just because she doesn't trust you enough to share every little detail of how she's running things doesn't mean she's not doing a good job."
"You're missing the point!"
"That's enough, Cardinal," said one of the guards, and he actually raised his job. "You've just admitted that you're knowingly going against Jeanne-Claire's orders as we speak. She told you that the Dagmar situation was being taken care of and not to bother Anthony."
"And where the hell is Li Lin?" Cardinal did not stop, but took a step forward instead, pointing an accusing finger at us all, at me. "Cris hasn't been around lately either.
Explanation of who Cris and Li Lin are, how they are Anthony's white and black tigers to call, and a lot of really obnoxious sexist/homophobic prattle about how Li Lin is the one exception that he'll be 'heteroflexible' for because he's so frail and delicate and abused and needs big strong mighty-whitey manly Anthony that he's practically a woman anyway
"Cardinal," said another guard in a warning tone. They all had their hands on their weapons now.
"I thought I'd start with the ones you wouldn't miss," said a voice from behind us, and we all turned, except for Cardinal who was already facing that way. It was a man that I didn't recognize, and he continued, "Just to make a point, when someone finally told you they were even gone, of how little they mean to you...before I take the ones you actually gave a damn about. Which I think I will now."
He had long black hair, golden skin, a narrow face and fine features, and while his features were mostly Ancient Mediterranean in nature, there was a touch of Libyan to him as well. Most striking were his eyes, which were solid yellow with slit black pupils, but what finally jogged my memory were the sight of his reddish nipples on his bare chest.
"Melanthios," I said aloud.
"Anthony," he said back, "Long time no see. Did you think I'd forgotten my promise to you?"
Melanthios was a male lamia, the only one of his kind, and perhaps the only lamia of either sex left in the world. If he had been a female, there might have been a hope of repopulating the species, but male lamia are made, not born. The real lamia, the females, use a special venom to transform mortal men into creatures like themselves, so they can then breed and bear their all-female offspring, who then grow up and do the same. A male lamia, however, being only a transformed human himself, can't do the same to mortal women. They weren't like therians, where the infected could spread the infection. They were more like the reverse of Typhoid Mary An explanation of this metaphor, because it's not like readers could get it on their own
"You stole my sweeties!" I yelled as I instantly put the pieces together. Being a detective means thinking on your feet like that.
"Stole? Oh no no no, Tony-boy, I made them an offer, the choice was theirs! But don't take my word for it...ask the ladies and Li Lin yourself."
From the alcoves in the natural stone walls of the tunnel halls Cut: All about how the Circus of the Damned was carved out of a natural underground cavern that was used in the Prohibition days emerged my missing lovers, as if they had been waiting for this cue. Head-to-toe physical descriptions of Cris, Dagmar, and Li Lin. Ethel was there too; I guess no one had noticed she had been gone. How careless; I'd have to have words with the guards about that oversight! What Ethel looks like, how she is a mixed tiger, how Anthony had to take her home to protect her from the Harlequin because of her golden heritage and how that was only discovered with his help and how, as with Domino, he is such a fucking saint for being willing to have sex with those icky ~mixed breeds~...as long as they're, y'know, hot cisgender white women
"I give them so much more attention...and I'm far more willing to let them share and be shared. Just ask Li Lin. Boys aren't up my ally, but the poor guy was so desperate to get away from you that I thought I'd let him in on the deal too and give him shelter, as well as letting him have the girls, if they'll have him. Between you and me, I think he and Cris might start making some Domino-style babies soon! And Cardinal, Dagmar and I promise you, I'm not going to be half the jealous asshole that Anthony has been."
He stepped aside, and Dagmar rushed to my arms. However, in her excitement, combined with her vampire speed, she accidentally missed me and wound up embracing Cardinal instead. I heard her saying something to him in a comforting tone. I guess she was trying to let him down easy about the fact she'd meant to run to me instead. She realized I was busy, though, because she didn't come back and try again. As for his remark on Cris and Li Lin... Explanation of who Domino is, weretiger pureblood culture, and how Anthony is such a saint for screwing Domino despite it...even though it's not like he was raised in said culture himself anyway. Lengthy pondering of if Anthony has room for children in his life, which he is against but for all the really wrong reasons, and wonders if this could be like his child with Li Lin and Li Lin being like the mother instead and also like his child with Cris at the same time, and how this would make sense...in a way that doesn't really make sense at all.
"You can't make them into lamia like you!" I pointed out, since there was a good chance he probably hadn't already thought of this, after all, and I figured it must be his plan. Behind me, the guards, unsure what to do, stood still. Female lamia are true immortals, but the males can still be killed, and they didn't know how much damage Melanthios could take and still heal from, if his healing abilities were lesser or better than their own, and they didn't want to risk killing off Jeanne-Claire's main attraction at the Circus of the Damned.
"That's not my plan," he said, smiling. His fangs weren't out yet, but I knew they were longer than those of a vampire by far, and possessed of deadly venom. Like a snake, however, lamia keep their fangs folded up against the roof of their mouths when they're not using them. I wondered if this meant he didn't think he'd even have to use them with me.
"What is your plan?" I asked. You can always get bad guys to tell you the truth if you just asks them.
Still smiling, he said, "I just wanted to rub this in your face before I killed you."
A split second later, the guards collapsed. Dagmar and Cardinal had reached into their backs from behind and grabbed their hearts, one hand per guard, quite possibly killing them and, if not that, definitely making sure they'd be down a long while before their healing factor patched the ol' tickers up. Therians were faster than vampires, true, but they'd had the element of surprise and the advantage of coming in from behind. It was very clear now to me why my girls were with Melanthios; he had to be mind-controlling them into this, possibly with Cardinal as a fellow victim...or in cahoots with him out of his jealousy over me. Sure, he never showed any mind-control abilities before, but it clearly had to be the case! The females could perform illusions on men...perhaps the males could do something similar to women?
I didn't want to shoot my sweeties, so I tried to snap them out of it, yelling, "He doesn't love you, he's just using you for vengeance against me!"
"Oh, we know that," said Cris, placing a hand on her hip while Li Lin and the others picked up the weapons from the fallen guards and pointed them at me. "He's not demanding we be his girlfriends or anything. But we wanted to!"
"Yeah, when we signed up for this group thing we were expecting someone who actually knew how to make it work fairly," said Ethel. Li Lin added, "At least my original Master, she called me what I was, a slave and toy. She did not pretend like you. Melanthios is like that; he calls his harem just that, and yet still treats us better than you did."
"Aw, girls! Aw, Li!" Melanthios clasped his hands over his heart. "That is so sweet of you to say! And Cardinal, I'm so sorry no one said anything about it to you till now...but you understand we had to keep this thing secret. Jeanne-Claire had been searching high and low trying to weasel out where the spare sweeties had gone, and, well, you're blood-oathed to him and all..."
"I understand," Cardinal nodded, then turned his blue eyes to me, "So, how shall we do this?"
Melanthios licked his lips with a forked tongue, "Slowly. And with each 'sweetie' getting a chance to have her say with him."
"Speaking of sweeties...what about Jeanne-Claire? She can't be dead yet, Anthony would feel it, and we feel it through her," said Ethel
"You think he'd care?" asked Melanthios.
"Hey!" I interjected, which was hard considering that Dagmar had a blade to my throat so tightly that the slightest breath caused it to press against my skin.
"Oh, Jeanne-Claire is still alive...but she won't be interfering," Melanthios smirked, "The venom of a mere male like myself isn't enough to kill a vampire...but it can sure keep one down for the count. We've probably even got enough time to figure out how to make sure you don't get taken with her, Dagmar."
"I don't care if I do," said the redhead bitterly, pressing the blade harder against my neck so that a thin red line of blood opened up against my beautifully pale flesh that was so striking with my dark eyes and hair, giving me a bi-racial appearance which had haunted me most of my life despite the alluring mystique and exotic beauty it also granted. Yup, she was clearly brainwashed. Dagmar's maker and first master had been Mormo, the father of all fear vampires, and he'd been a true monster. Dagmar had cried in my arms about it one night, and I knew he was grateful for me, a kind master who could give her more power than she'd ever have had on her own. She'd still never be a Master vampire herself, but she was part of a much rarer thing: a triumvirate. What reason could she have ever had to refer to me in such a tone? And as for Ethel Utterly redundant recounting of allll Anthony has done for her by letting her...relocate to suit him, possibly lose her free will to some degree or another to him, and stand in line to bone him.
"You see what you've driven them too?" said Melanthios as he stepped forward towards me. "I want to show you more. You took my harem from me. It would be too much of a mercy for me to kill you before you could see your own abandon you, for me or for freedom. But before we get started...let me give you a taste of what Jeanne-Claire has already had. To ensure you'll be...cooperative as we take you somewhere more suited for slow humiliation and eventual death."
His fangs uncurled from the roof of his mouth, and the pain of them plunging into his flesh was the last thing Anthony Blake felt before everything went black.
If he was lucky, Melanthios had miscalculated the dose, and he would never awake.
But Melanthios was a very old lamia, and he had been doing this a very long time.
But that's good, because it means you can laugh at him, whereas with Anita there's a lot you can't laugh it. And me, I write this for laughs. Plus, it would be a shame to come up with all those gender-swap names and then never use 'em!
If you're wondering about the nipples thing...the first time that Anita sees Melanie in her true form, she happens to be topless. The first thing Anita notices and describes to us is not the fact that HER BOTTOM HALF IS A GIANT SNAKE but that her nipples are reddish. Because priorities!
I live part-time at the Circus, part-time at my house with my live-in sweeties. Today was one of the Circus days. I was just coming back from helping Malitia and Veritas give training lessons to our guards. Malitia and Veritas are two of the most feared fighters in all of vampire land, and they're security here at the Circus of the Damned, as well as having been occasional lovers of mine, though only in order to feed the ardeur, not as my sweeties.
A description of their height, figures, eye color, hair color/style/length/texture, distinguishing features and marks, and fashion styles
As I was coming back with the guards, flanked by them and all their weapons, as well as my own Cut: list and description of said weapons, which are absurdly numerous, our testosterone buzzing in the air, giving us that almost palpable charge that men at full adrenaline have and that so many women misunderstand, are afraid of. It's really just boisterous male energy, and my girls all understand that. As we passed, a vampire, not a guard, gave me a hard look. It was Cardinal, the other lover of Dagmar, my Vampire Servant. A description of what a Vampire Servant is, how Anthony is the first one to have one, how this is because he's the first true necromancer in over a thousand years, what being a necromancer means, how the Council usually kill necromancers and why, how Dagmar forms a triumvirate with Anthony and Natalie and how having two triumvirates is supposed to be impossible but Anthony has done it and his other triumvirate is with Jeanne-Claire and Rachel and how they are Master of the City and Lupa, respectively, and some snide remarks about Rachel, and a lengthy physical description of Dagmar, and a less lengthy but still too long and rather snide physical description of Cardinal.
I assumed it was jealousy. Some people, especially men, just can't quite get their heads, or hearts, or other things, around the idea of sharing. They want to be the one and only, and, if not that, at least the most important, and they get huffy if they're not, even if it's what's making their lover happiest. I didn't know Cardinal well, but he seemed to be a typical macho man, and he was clearly very into appearances, as evident by how he and Meng Dao had made me get into super-stylish sexy suit for seeing the weretiger clans when they'd all come to St. Louis for help against the Father of All Darkness and to make me the new Master of Tigers. So he probably cared enough about appearances to be bothered about how it might look, might reflect on him as a man, that his main squeeze preferred me as her primary lover. Explanations of what 'primary' and 'secondary' mean in the context of polyamory, explained in the most patronizing and inaccurate way possible, and how Anthony doesn't think of himself as poly because he's still such a pure guy at heart --and isn't he AWESOME for being the ONE man on the planet NOT obsessed with sex?-- but he's still totally a perfect example and deserves all the edgy cred ever for it
He looked like he wanted to say something. I looked at him, but did not stop in my stride. If he wanted to speak up, he damn well could, I liked people to be direct and open if they had a problem with me, but I also wasn't going to slow down for his benefit.
"What's his deal?" asked one of the guards.
"Probably Dagmar being gone," said Clay, a wererat. He was remarkably short and feminine-looking, but he had appointed himself my personal bodyguard, and was always ready to step in when any of the ladies in my life were being what he considered henpecking or pussy-whipping towards me. So far that had been Rachel and Eden, and I could deny Clay was right about them both. Lots of whining about Rachel, and faux-guilty recounting of how Anthony 'had' to shoot Eden and how jealous she was over him because she was soooo in love with him! Absolutely no mention is made of Noelle or her sacrifice
"Gone?" I made it a question. A strange look passed from the other guards to Clay, one I didn't understand, one of those guy looks that I so often find myself left out of that are made to keep secrets and left things unsaid. From the down the hall, I heard Cardinal, still close enough that he could say it rather than call it, ask, "You didn't know?"
I stopped and turned now, and the guards stopped and turned with me almost in perfect unison. They were giving that hard guy look to Cardinal now too. He looked at them, and then said, "He doesn't know. You've been keeping it from him, haven't you? I should have known if Jeanne-Claire was making me stay quiet, she'd get to you too."
"What are you talking about?" I asked.
"Haven't you wondered where Dagmar has been?" he said. One of the guards grabbed my arm, and I almost reacted by doing a reflexive judo throw, but I stopped myself and instead gave him a hard look of my own, and something in my eyes made him know to let go.
"Dagmar hasn't been missing," I said to Cardinal.
"He's been gone for over a month!" Cardinal raised his voice, and sounded angry. Angry at me. I guess when there's a problem like that and you can't blame anyone else, you just blame whoever is handy, whoever you already dislike enough anyway. For Cardinal, that was me. Yea.
I thought for a moment. When was the last time that I had seen Dagmar? Probably more than two months ago, actually, but it was different for us. Because we had a metaphysical bond, I was always aware of her on some level, and so we didn't need to physically see each other to know that the other was well, to be connected. We were always connected, on a level that no one else could share or understand, not unless they had a metaphysical bond like it. And since nothing was amiss with Dagmar that I could feel through our connection, how could I be blamed for thinking all was well? If anything, Cardinal was to blame if Dagmar had vanished on his watch, since, lacking a connection like ours, he was the one who had to be physically close to her all the time like the clingy jealous mess he was, and I told him as much.
"And besides," I added, "why did you wait until now to tell me? She's my Vampire Servant, I should have been informed if she didn't turn up for a single night, let alone almost a month! Kind of suspicious on your part there, Cardi."
Cardinal looked enraged; I guess the truth hurts. "I wanted to tell you, you idiot! But Jeanne-Claire told me not to bother, that you had it well in hand and were not to be deserved! After two weeks I tried to get word to you, but she caught me at it and made damn well sure that I knew it'd be my neck if I tried again! Now it's been a month and it turns out you knew nothing of this? Did you never even care to ask?"
"Jeanne-Claire does what she has to to keep us safe and the ship running smoothly," I said, not giving in to his jealous attempt to tear me apart from my Master of the City main squeeze. "Just because she doesn't trust you enough to share every little detail of how she's running things doesn't mean she's not doing a good job."
"You're missing the point!"
"That's enough, Cardinal," said one of the guards, and he actually raised his job. "You've just admitted that you're knowingly going against Jeanne-Claire's orders as we speak. She told you that the Dagmar situation was being taken care of and not to bother Anthony."
"And where the hell is Li Lin?" Cardinal did not stop, but took a step forward instead, pointing an accusing finger at us all, at me. "Cris hasn't been around lately either.
Explanation of who Cris and Li Lin are, how they are Anthony's white and black tigers to call, and a lot of really obnoxious sexist/homophobic prattle about how Li Lin is the one exception that he'll be 'heteroflexible' for because he's so frail and delicate and abused and needs big strong mighty-whitey manly Anthony that he's practically a woman anyway
"Cardinal," said another guard in a warning tone. They all had their hands on their weapons now.
"I thought I'd start with the ones you wouldn't miss," said a voice from behind us, and we all turned, except for Cardinal who was already facing that way. It was a man that I didn't recognize, and he continued, "Just to make a point, when someone finally told you they were even gone, of how little they mean to you...before I take the ones you actually gave a damn about. Which I think I will now."
He had long black hair, golden skin, a narrow face and fine features, and while his features were mostly Ancient Mediterranean in nature, there was a touch of Libyan to him as well. Most striking were his eyes, which were solid yellow with slit black pupils, but what finally jogged my memory were the sight of his reddish nipples on his bare chest.
"Melanthios," I said aloud.
"Anthony," he said back, "Long time no see. Did you think I'd forgotten my promise to you?"
Melanthios was a male lamia, the only one of his kind, and perhaps the only lamia of either sex left in the world. If he had been a female, there might have been a hope of repopulating the species, but male lamia are made, not born. The real lamia, the females, use a special venom to transform mortal men into creatures like themselves, so they can then breed and bear their all-female offspring, who then grow up and do the same. A male lamia, however, being only a transformed human himself, can't do the same to mortal women. They weren't like therians, where the infected could spread the infection. They were more like the reverse of Typhoid Mary An explanation of this metaphor, because it's not like readers could get it on their own
"You stole my sweeties!" I yelled as I instantly put the pieces together. Being a detective means thinking on your feet like that.
"Stole? Oh no no no, Tony-boy, I made them an offer, the choice was theirs! But don't take my word for it...ask the ladies and Li Lin yourself."
From the alcoves in the natural stone walls of the tunnel halls Cut: All about how the Circus of the Damned was carved out of a natural underground cavern that was used in the Prohibition days emerged my missing lovers, as if they had been waiting for this cue. Head-to-toe physical descriptions of Cris, Dagmar, and Li Lin. Ethel was there too; I guess no one had noticed she had been gone. How careless; I'd have to have words with the guards about that oversight! What Ethel looks like, how she is a mixed tiger, how Anthony had to take her home to protect her from the Harlequin because of her golden heritage and how that was only discovered with his help and how, as with Domino, he is such a fucking saint for being willing to have sex with those icky ~mixed breeds~...as long as they're, y'know, hot cisgender white women
"I give them so much more attention...and I'm far more willing to let them share and be shared. Just ask Li Lin. Boys aren't up my ally, but the poor guy was so desperate to get away from you that I thought I'd let him in on the deal too and give him shelter, as well as letting him have the girls, if they'll have him. Between you and me, I think he and Cris might start making some Domino-style babies soon! And Cardinal, Dagmar and I promise you, I'm not going to be half the jealous asshole that Anthony has been."
He stepped aside, and Dagmar rushed to my arms. However, in her excitement, combined with her vampire speed, she accidentally missed me and wound up embracing Cardinal instead. I heard her saying something to him in a comforting tone. I guess she was trying to let him down easy about the fact she'd meant to run to me instead. She realized I was busy, though, because she didn't come back and try again. As for his remark on Cris and Li Lin... Explanation of who Domino is, weretiger pureblood culture, and how Anthony is such a saint for screwing Domino despite it...even though it's not like he was raised in said culture himself anyway. Lengthy pondering of if Anthony has room for children in his life, which he is against but for all the really wrong reasons, and wonders if this could be like his child with Li Lin and Li Lin being like the mother instead and also like his child with Cris at the same time, and how this would make sense...in a way that doesn't really make sense at all.
"You can't make them into lamia like you!" I pointed out, since there was a good chance he probably hadn't already thought of this, after all, and I figured it must be his plan. Behind me, the guards, unsure what to do, stood still. Female lamia are true immortals, but the males can still be killed, and they didn't know how much damage Melanthios could take and still heal from, if his healing abilities were lesser or better than their own, and they didn't want to risk killing off Jeanne-Claire's main attraction at the Circus of the Damned.
"That's not my plan," he said, smiling. His fangs weren't out yet, but I knew they were longer than those of a vampire by far, and possessed of deadly venom. Like a snake, however, lamia keep their fangs folded up against the roof of their mouths when they're not using them. I wondered if this meant he didn't think he'd even have to use them with me.
"What is your plan?" I asked. You can always get bad guys to tell you the truth if you just asks them.
Still smiling, he said, "I just wanted to rub this in your face before I killed you."
A split second later, the guards collapsed. Dagmar and Cardinal had reached into their backs from behind and grabbed their hearts, one hand per guard, quite possibly killing them and, if not that, definitely making sure they'd be down a long while before their healing factor patched the ol' tickers up. Therians were faster than vampires, true, but they'd had the element of surprise and the advantage of coming in from behind. It was very clear now to me why my girls were with Melanthios; he had to be mind-controlling them into this, possibly with Cardinal as a fellow victim...or in cahoots with him out of his jealousy over me. Sure, he never showed any mind-control abilities before, but it clearly had to be the case! The females could perform illusions on men...perhaps the males could do something similar to women?
I didn't want to shoot my sweeties, so I tried to snap them out of it, yelling, "He doesn't love you, he's just using you for vengeance against me!"
"Oh, we know that," said Cris, placing a hand on her hip while Li Lin and the others picked up the weapons from the fallen guards and pointed them at me. "He's not demanding we be his girlfriends or anything. But we wanted to!"
"Yeah, when we signed up for this group thing we were expecting someone who actually knew how to make it work fairly," said Ethel. Li Lin added, "At least my original Master, she called me what I was, a slave and toy. She did not pretend like you. Melanthios is like that; he calls his harem just that, and yet still treats us better than you did."
"Aw, girls! Aw, Li!" Melanthios clasped his hands over his heart. "That is so sweet of you to say! And Cardinal, I'm so sorry no one said anything about it to you till now...but you understand we had to keep this thing secret. Jeanne-Claire had been searching high and low trying to weasel out where the spare sweeties had gone, and, well, you're blood-oathed to him and all..."
"I understand," Cardinal nodded, then turned his blue eyes to me, "So, how shall we do this?"
Melanthios licked his lips with a forked tongue, "Slowly. And with each 'sweetie' getting a chance to have her say with him."
"Speaking of sweeties...what about Jeanne-Claire? She can't be dead yet, Anthony would feel it, and we feel it through her," said Ethel
"You think he'd care?" asked Melanthios.
"Hey!" I interjected, which was hard considering that Dagmar had a blade to my throat so tightly that the slightest breath caused it to press against my skin.
"Oh, Jeanne-Claire is still alive...but she won't be interfering," Melanthios smirked, "The venom of a mere male like myself isn't enough to kill a vampire...but it can sure keep one down for the count. We've probably even got enough time to figure out how to make sure you don't get taken with her, Dagmar."
"I don't care if I do," said the redhead bitterly, pressing the blade harder against my neck so that a thin red line of blood opened up against my beautifully pale flesh that was so striking with my dark eyes and hair, giving me a bi-racial appearance which had haunted me most of my life despite the alluring mystique and exotic beauty it also granted. Yup, she was clearly brainwashed. Dagmar's maker and first master had been Mormo, the father of all fear vampires, and he'd been a true monster. Dagmar had cried in my arms about it one night, and I knew he was grateful for me, a kind master who could give her more power than she'd ever have had on her own. She'd still never be a Master vampire herself, but she was part of a much rarer thing: a triumvirate. What reason could she have ever had to refer to me in such a tone? And as for Ethel Utterly redundant recounting of allll Anthony has done for her by letting her...relocate to suit him, possibly lose her free will to some degree or another to him, and stand in line to bone him.
"You see what you've driven them too?" said Melanthios as he stepped forward towards me. "I want to show you more. You took my harem from me. It would be too much of a mercy for me to kill you before you could see your own abandon you, for me or for freedom. But before we get started...let me give you a taste of what Jeanne-Claire has already had. To ensure you'll be...cooperative as we take you somewhere more suited for slow humiliation and eventual death."
His fangs uncurled from the roof of his mouth, and the pain of them plunging into his flesh was the last thing Anthony Blake felt before everything went black.
If he was lucky, Melanthios had miscalculated the dose, and he would never awake.
But Melanthios was a very old lamia, and he had been doing this a very long time.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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Date: 2013-10-01 04:33 pm (UTC)"He stepped aside, and Dagmar rushed to my arms. However, in her excitement, combined with her vampire speed, she accidentally missed me and wound up embracing Cardinal instead. I heard her saying something to him in a comforting tone. I guess she was trying to let him down easy about the fact she'd meant to run to me instead. "
Priceless.
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Date: 2013-10-01 05:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-10-01 06:13 pm (UTC)Melanthios is hot XD.
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Date: 2013-10-01 06:17 pm (UTC)He is! The idea of what male!Melanie would be like was a really striking image for me, the most of the gender-swapped lot in fact, so I really wanted to do something with him especially =D
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Date: 2013-10-01 06:31 pm (UTC)It's not just Melanthios' appearance that's hot (though it is), but I love his personality. The whole bad guy but not quite as bad as the guy he's kicking the ass of thing. And he's rescuing the women, or giving them a way to rescue themselves, but being clear that he's gonna expect them to join his harem in return. Which would be a good base for an actually erotic story, rather than the lying and obfuscation and therefore ickiness we get with LKH.
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Date: 2013-10-01 06:40 pm (UTC)And yeah, he's...not a good guy and totally doing this for the wrong reasons but damn you gotta root for him considering who he's calling out here.
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Date: 2013-10-01 06:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-10-01 06:45 pm (UTC)EW NO MELANIE I DON'T WANT YOUR BOYS AFTER *YOU* TOUCHED THEM ICK
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Date: 2013-10-02 03:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-10-02 03:57 am (UTC)Hello creepy creeper. Who's scarier than Armel is.
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Date: 2013-10-02 07:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-10-02 08:05 pm (UTC)Anthony: Manages to creep out just about everyone.
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Date: 2013-10-02 08:41 pm (UTC)