DOUBLE UPDATE PENDING!!!!!!!!!!!

SO CHAPTER 47 (THIS CHAPTER) IS UP NOW, BUT TOMORROW EVENING, CHAPTER 48 WILL BE OUT TOO!!!! SO IT’S A DOUBLE UPDATE, JUST WITH A DAY BETWEEN CHAPTERS!!!!!!!!!!!

HOPE YOU ENJOYYYYYYYYYY

———————-

Malcolm

°

I pluck at the dirt with my fingers. These days, it is all I can do to keep my fingers out of it, but it keeps me busy and functionally sane.

Peeking upwards, I pass my gaze over a shivering Wequie before shifting it onto Lincoln, or more specifically, the phone he keeps dangerously close to his ears. I still do not understand how he trusts the technology so blindly, or how its range reaches the peak of the mountain we now sit on, but that is the least important matter right now.

He stepped away to make the call and lingered afar despite knowing our ears to be sharp, but I think he meant to shelter the anxious look on his face while he spoke to Kalem.

Something was wrong. My fingers dig deeper into the soil while I listen with an open ear, not to Kalem’s replies or their intimacies, but for the elf who must be close by on the other side.

I strain my ears as though I might catch his breath amongst theirs, or hear him throw a curse at Lincoln, but it is Kalem and Lincoln who speak and clog the line with their breathing. There is mention of him, of a unique salad, and I know immediately what meal that is, but nothing more— nothing of him. Perhaps I should have chanced damning my soul and gotten him a phone, too.

Surely, a curse would hurt less than this absence of him.

I turn away, looking to the dirt I muddy my fingers in while he shares a parting word of love before the call is ended, and my feeble hope of hearing from my pyro is gone with it. And I am left with nothing but the weeds I’ve unearthed.

Three days we’d been here, three days we’d been apart, and it was three days too many.

The journey itself was simple, if enlightening. After retrieving Wequie, much to Lincoln’s feigned dismay, we had found our way to the remote Anouk Clan. We’d done so by being teleported by a rather unwell Amorenia witch whom Lincoln now doltishly owed a favour to, and now, here we were, sitting on the mountain above them because we were yet to strike a deal.

Their leader, a stalky woman named Alexander, was confident and formidable, with a personality I might like under different circumstances, but as she was proving to be a pain, it was still up for debate.

It was odd because she did not like Diablos any more than we did, seemed to have personal strife with him, in fact, and appeared wise enough to know without a shadow of a doubt that anything besides joining our side was a promised death for both her and her people. And yet, she stalled on becoming allies.

Though ‘allies’ maybe was not quite the right word for it when the terms we sought would have their clan be absorbed by our freshly forming one, with Lincoln at the helm. We were promised strength, but unfortunately, we were also largely seen as ghosts to these new-aged vampires who gawked at us as though we were alien.

I hold in my sigh, and feel choked for it as my body strains to be unbowed.

I did not expect this to weigh on me so heavily— the bloodlust, yes, but that had become a dull annoyance after the second day compared to the sheer longing I felt for my pyro.

My stomach twists, but I swallow the ache and upset and force my fingers to release their cruel hold of the earth while I’m at it. I dust them free as Lincoln returns from his brief retreat, his frown still fixed in place.

“All is well?”

“For the most part,” he replies as he lowers himself into the space on the other side of Wequie. “But I get the feeling the faster we return home, the better.”

I nod. I wanted to be home already.

There was Aias’ timeframe that I already felt I was testing, but last night, I had felt… something. It was not like the first night when I had been haunted by the ghost of my desire, and spent the entire evening chasing it up this very mountain. No, it was bone-deep— the very sensation that spread through my marrow whenever Aias frayed and needed help.

I had felt it before when I found him outside Lincoln’s castle, again in the library after Kalem’s nature was revealed, and then, last night. And instead of being with him, I was here, sitting on the top of a mountain with Lincoln and—

“I think my dick is frozen.”

Lincoln and I look at the incubus between us, and while Lincoln gazes at him as though he is contemplating ripping his right horn out, I free my first smile for the morning.

Wequie was always a requirement for any adventure, even if this hardly counted as one, and I, for one, was glad for his company because he always knew how to make me smile. Like this morning when he’d come trudging up the mountain in at least three coats with a bundle of blankets huddled in his arms— I had not been able to stop my laughter. He had no business being somewhere so cold when his blood ran hot, but he’d refused to be left out when Lincoln set out in the morning to find me.

He’d led the pair of them with a glare, scolding me again for making him climb a mountain when I’d done no such thing. He was the one who’d come looking for me, and now he’s the one scowling at me with regret written all over his face.

“Malcolm’s the one who invited you,” he says to Wequie, “so kindly divert all of your complaints to him.”

Wequie, the bastard, snaps his head towards me, actually taking him seriously. “Malcolm?”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” I retort while I roll two pebbles between my fing— what the hell— I drop them hastily. “I was trying to be a good friend, but I’ll try to be more of an asshole in the future, just like Linc.”

“Don’t you dare,” Wequie scolds while Lincoln wrinkles the end of his nose. “I can barely handle the one.” I chuckle, and Wequie smiles proudly before looking to Lincoln again. “Since you haven’t had sex for three days, I’m going to let you be cranky.”

Lincoln groans, and I toy with the pebbles again, resigned to the fact that it is now my coping mechanism.

I understood being cranky without sex, even though it’s only been three days without it after a lifetime of not knowing it, but it wasn’t the sex alone that I craved. I wanted the hand passing over my hair, his rumbling laugh, and the amusement in his eyes whenever he found me staring.

“…more time than I expected it would,” Lincoln says as I push away the ache in my chest and tune back in. “They are more stable than we anticipated.”

He looks to me then, as if urging me to corroborate, and Wequie does the same. I suppose we were talking strategy now.

“We assumed they would be more susceptible to our offer,” I confirm, more so to Wequie because he’s the one wearing a confused frown. “They have good numbers and no cracks we’ve seen since being here, but they are weak, physically, and most of them are newborns.”

Wequie’s mouth makes a little ‘o’. “That would explain why it was so easy to get a few in my tent. I hadn’t even released my aroma, and they were stripping.”

Lincoln groans like an ailing alleycat. Wequie and I ignore him. “They?” I ask, and he grins.

“Once I got a taste, I couldn’t stop,” he whispers, the end of his tail tracing his arm suggestively. “And before you attack me, Lincoln, I only approached those whose bodies responded to mine.”

“I’m glad to hear.” Lincoln might as well be gargling sand.

Wequie winks at me before he looks down the mountain, eyeing the vampires at the base for his next meal. I look for our way in.

“Do you think they’ll join us?” I ask after a moment.

“With some more persuasion,” Lincoln replies, his dark eyes indifferent. “They are managing, but this won’t last much longer. If they stumble into a coven, they’d be decimated within seconds. Not to mention, their numbers are far too large to be all together like this while out in the human world.”

A century ago, I would hardly count the open wilderness as part of the human world, but their technologies had seen to it that it was.

“I am sure Alexander already knows that. She’s a smart woman,” I say as I roll my thoughts around just as I do my pebbles. Three now in total. “Joining us is the only way to preserve what is left of this clan.”

“So why is she being so stubborn,” Lincoln spits through gritted teeth.

“I don’t think she’s what’s holding everything up,” Wequie pipes up suddenly. “I think that one has been on board since day one.”

Lincoln’s sharp eyes immediately shift like mine to our self-assured friend who is busy burrowing deeper into his blankets.

“Why do you think that?” Lincoln asks carefully, not wanting to spook him. “Is it an incubus thing or…?”

Wequie’s bundle shrugs. “Yeah, kind of. We’re better at observing body language than most species, but I’m also just good with people.” His tail works around him while he talks, stabbing at the edges of his blanket to better tuck him in. “She’s clearly got some fight in her, and the moment you mentioned taking Diablos down, she practically lit up. She’s not the problem here. It’s the rest of the vampires— particularly the newborns.”

Lincoln looks to me. I raise a brow.

I was good at reading people, but I could not compare to an incubus, and not to one as aged as Wequie. “Why the newborns?” I ask with casual interest.

When Wequie was distracted and speaking his mind, it was best to let him trace his thread. Anything else, and he’d fall into a tangent about some experience with a gnome.

“They’re afraid of you guys,” he blurts with a laugh. “Why, in all the realms, would they want to follow you if you scare them?” He shakes his head. “You said it yourself, most were recently turned. I doubt they have much experience with other vampires outside of those in this clan, and even less knowledge about how things operate in the vamp world.

“Then you guys, the first and the fifth ever made, stroll in wanting to take over… Of course, that’s fucking terrifying! Plus all you guys have done since we got here is watch them— you were literally just doing it two seconds ago.”

Lincoln looks at me, but I’m as speechless as him, and Wequie’s not yet finished.

“They probably think you guys want to eat them,” he chuckles before sobering. “Alexander is their leader, so she’s got the ultimate vote, but she can’t just take a deal when most of her followers are afraid of you.”

He looks up then, only now noticing our ajar mouths, and he is quick to straighten within his bundle of warmth. “But that’s all just my thoughts. I could be wrong.”

“No, I think you’re right,” I say before he can shut himself down. “It makes sense in that light. Alexander does seem to have some personal vendetta against Diablos, which was why I could not quite understand why she was stalling so much. But if the problem is with her followers, then that makes sense.”

“So you just have to get them to like you, or at the very least, want to follow you,” Wequie retorts between blows to his palms.

I nod, but Lincoln is already grumbling. “I’m not really a likeable guy.”

It is a feat that I do not laugh outright. A feat Wequie does not achieve. “You do not have to tell us that, Lincoln. We know.”

Lincoln’s eye twitches while Wequie cackles, but I jump in before they can get into another worded set of blows. “It is a good thing that I am, then.” Lincoln looks to me, and I smile. “I’ll get them to like me, but we’ll get them to respect you. They know our goals and purpose for being here, so showing them a more personable side should help.”

The question was how.

“Our ‘personal side’?” Lincoln mocks with flagrant discomfort. “So, what are we supposed to do? Play tag.” He says it to discard it, but my mind does the very opposite. His face falls. “That was sarcasm, Malcolm.”

“But it is a good idea,” I turn towards him as resolve courses through me.

Lincoln shakes his head. “I am not playing tag like some…some—”

“Newly turned vamp?” I offer, my lips straining from my smile. “Is that not one of the first things vampires do when they are turned? It is like a rite of passage.” Or so I had heard. Seeing as my turning or making was followed by blood and destruction for years, I could not quite apply my own experience. “I’m sure not all here have tried it, and it’d be great to do it here with so much free land.”

The mountains were only one of the beautiful features offered in this open landscape. There were acres of untouched woodlands with more than enough room for vampires to run free.

“We are long past the age of playing tag, Malcolm,” Lincoln sighs, head still shaking as he tries to dislodge the idea from me. “Not to mention it would be a complete waste of time with the two of us. We are faster than them all.”

“But that is exactly it,” I argue. “They know that we are old and strong, but I’m sure they’d like to test the boundaries of that. The challenge to catch us would be stimulating to them, especially if we put all of them against us.”

“That honestly sounds fun,” Wequie adds as his eyes dance between us, “and also like it would work here.”

Lincoln scowls, the grimace sinking deeper than usual as he peers at me as though I am a child.

“You want us to play tag, Malcolm,” he says, spelling it out. “We are here to negotiate terms, and you want to play tag.” He squints. “Diablos is trying to kill Kalem, and me, and you want to play tag.”

My smile grows larger. “Yes.”

He pales. “If it does not work, then it does not work,” I argue with a shrug. “We lose nothing by trying, Lincoln.”

He parts his mouth as if to argue that he would lose his dignity or something, but we could not afford pride along the path we’d chosen to walk, and there was no room for it here.

It was a ridiculous notion on paper, but it made sense, and he knew it— knows it, because once again, he closes his mouth and cranes his head to the sky before sighing with all his favourite dramatics.

“Very well…”

I cheer, Wequie laughs hysterically, and we are all soon marching down the mountain with Lincoln leading the way.

°

It is not hard convincing the Anouk Clan to give chase to us. Slightly embarrassing, especially with how Alexander first looks at us when we propose it? Yes, but not hard.

As predicted, the newborns are more than eager to toss their hats in, but to my surprise, so are the longer-aged within the clan. In fact, each and every vampire adds to the number setting out to try to catch Lincoln and me.

It excites me more than expected, loosens me too, because while this is for Lincoln more than it is for me, I had never gotten to play tag.

I wanted to, but I’d always been too distant from the younger ones to join, and those who shared my age were always above such things. But not today, for the vampire who subtly shakes his fingers out at my side, readying to run, is none other than the eldest of us, and my very best friend.

Fitting we’d share this too.

“On your call, Wequie,” he says, glancing up to the position in the trees Wequie has taken above the fray to watch.

He twists to let his legs hang and peers sharp eyes over the buzzing newborns. “When I say go, and not a second before.”

Understanding tremors through the masses, and I struggle to cap my own excitement as I take the stance of a runner. I hardly needed to, but fun did not need rules.

“Three,” Wequie begins, and that tremor turns into a quake.

“Two.” I hold my breath.

“One.”

Stillness, utter stillness before—

“Go!”

Lincoln disappears to the right, and I take the left.

The majority follow him, all wanting a piece of the first, which was expected and preferred for the betterment of my plan, but I garner a surprising amount of predators who chase after me like nipping hounds.

Running is simple, familiar. It’s moving as fast as magic made us for, but being alert enough to not let anything stop you. It has always been transport, today, it is fun.

I race through the unfamiliar woods, learning the paths that lend my pursuit the advantage as they come at me from all sides, taking shortcuts I had not glimpsed, but it is still not enough for their outstretched hands that come at me like slowed lassos.

They are fast, not fast enough— though still passionate enough to make it fun, doubled by their varying speeds. Some are quicker than others, more agile, more familiar with their turned bodies so I can not account for their speed, only avoiding them by instinct.

When I turn and send a number stumbling behind me, I almost turn to apologise before I remember myself. The whole point of this was to prove myself a worthy opponent, and so I do.

I take the most treacherous paths, forcing myself between trees and boulders that shave away the numbers of my pursuers. I search for more, allowing myself more. Then, glistening water catches my eye, and I don’t even think. I turn and run towards it.

I hear drawn breaths at my nape, scent their disbelief, and soon teach them to never entertain it as I run straight onto the water.

Those gasps expand around the lake I race over, turning into laughter when some try to follow but soon sink, splashing about behind me while I dash over the water’s surface like a skipping stone.

Speed was not the trick to this. We all had speed.

It was lightness, lifting yourself in the same breath your foot touched the water so that you did not break the surface. The trick— my trick— had taken a year to perfect because while Lincoln was jumping about, bored, I’d been doing this.

My eyes lift in time to catch him in the midst of his getaway as he sails through the night sky, flying high by a jump like nothing I have seen him do in years. His smile shines like starlight.

The earth shakes with the force of Lincoln’s landing, but that is the least of my concerns as the lake’s bank approaches speedily with vampires already lining every inch of it. Smart. They ignored the chase and set up a trap. It would work with any other.

For me, I only have to think of a chameleon, with the shifting crystals in its skin, and make my skin the same, and to every outstretched hand, I disappear. It is my luck that they drop them, that some shift and scramble, thinking I’ve passed them and unintentionally making room for me to.

I slip through those offered gaps and into the woods, leaving them as ghosts with no trace to follow, until I slow myself to allow a breath.

Tired was not the word. Exhilarated was closer to it, but if I kept running now while no eyes were on me or knew where I was, I would run straight to him, and I could not do that yet.

“I thought this was tag, not hide and seek,” a voice purrs above, prompting my gaze to lift to where Wequie straddles a thick branch above. “You’re not playing fair, Malcolm.”

“They wanted to catch me— this is me,” I retort, and his grin is quick to widen while his tail swishes behind him. “How is Lincoln?”

“Enjoying it more than he will ever admit,” he muses while I quietly scale the tree to sit with him. “He jumped, ya know? Had to stretch first, but still.”

“I glimpsed it, and felt the landing,” I say with my own fond smile. “It is working then?”

“Perfectly,” he assures me. “They worship him, if they do not love him.”

“Which means we will soon return home,” I breathe, body giving into relief for the first time.

“To your lovers,” Wequie muses, “and… to your elf…”

I glance at him, but there is nothing but warmth in his eyes while he studies me. “You’ve been plucked.”

“Wequie,” I groan, face heating, but he hears none of it as he swats at my arms.

“No, I have been waiting forever to ask, but Lincoln would’ve been all ‘ugh’ and ‘my eyes’ as though he’s not a deviant himself. Do you know that I once saw a glimpse into his mind, and it was no better than a wild incubus’ and—”

“Wequie,” I groan once again, and he is quick to put himself back on course.

“Tell me then,” he demands, eyes alight. “How was it? He was great, wasn’t he? I bet he knew just what to do, and exactly what you needed. Ugh, I bet it felt even better finally being filled up. It did, didn’t it?”

I wait until he allows himself a breath to answer.

“Yes and yes,” I admit, laughing harder when he squeals and kicks his legs about. “He was very gentle the first time—” More squealing. “He would not stop making me cum—”

“Gods, what a man!”

“The second time,” I begin, and he holds his breath, “…he was an animal.”

Wequie shudders right down to his bones, eyes rolling. “Please, please, please let me take a peek of that in your mind for my birthday?”

“I will consider,” I chuckle, and he moans as if that adds to his sweetened torture.

“Sex aside— just this once,” he coos, and I smile as I watch him soften to take my hands in his. “That is so wonderful, Malcolm. I am so happy for you.”

He squeezes my fingers, and I squeeze them back, if only to quell my own sounds. “Thank you, Wequie. I…I am happy with him.”

“Don’t I know it,” he retorts, grin blinding. “You’ve been uprooting everything in sight for days and stewing up on that mountain every chance you got.”

I wince. “I did not realise I was so obvious.”

“With the pouting or the rock picking? What is up with that by the way— the rock thing?”

“I don’t know,” I reply with a feeble shrug. “I did not even realise I was doing it so much before today.”

Wequie frowns, head tilting in consideration. “Are you telling me that after all these years, my Calm Malcolm has become all twitchy and anxious because he misses his man?”

I look away, body heating as fast as my face. I pull my hands from his to tug at my sleeves. “I do not know if I can call him my—”.

“Malcolm,” Wequie says, cutting me off. “I’ve seen the way that elf looks at you. He is yours.”

My teeth sink into my lip, not willing to free the hope or glee his words set off inside me. I had wanted to know what Wequie thought observing us that night in that human club, but I’d been too afraid to ask. Wequie was brutally honest, always, and I did not know if I could handle such honesty when it came to Aias.

“Let yourself enjoy this, and him,” he adds softly. “I think… I think you both need it.”

I blink at him, wondering what he had seen in Aias.

I knew that he had more on his shoulders than was likely healthy for any creature, elf or not, but I hoped that being with me made it easier. That I did for him, what he did for me. Aias made me feel free in ways I had never imagined possible— seen.

If I could give him even a measure of the comfort he gave to me, then I would be doing something right.

Vampires rush by, pausing to glance at Wequie, but when they find him alone to their eyes, they continue onwards in their blur.

“And you?” I ask once they’ve passed, but he is already shaking his head. “Wequie.”

“No, this was a catch-up about you. My life is wonderful with orgies and waterfalls. On good days, orgies in waterfalls.”

“Is that hygienic?”

“Not my concern. Now, go rejoin the game before they give up.”

“But—”

“Go or I will shove you off.’

I frown. “You would not.”

Wequie raises a brow before the world tilts and I am falling to the ground. I land soundlessly, purposefully so, but Wequie makes sure that he is anything but as he screams, “Malcolm, is that you?!?”

Steps instantly pound towards me. I glare at him. “You will pay for that,” I warn while I shed my chameleon skin.

Wequie’s eyes sparkle with delight. “Oh, I sure hope so.”

I take off just as the first vampire spots me, racing back through the woods and allowing them to give chase. I avoid the lake, because I am no bastard, instead focusing on having fun, because it is fun.

It is young and free vampiric fun like nothing I have ever experienced, and I am sure to make the most of it, teasing them with near touches and taunting them where I can. They love and hate it, and I simply adore it.

I spot Lincoln sitting at the top of a cliffside, having shaken his oblivious troupe, and I am quick to use my speed to do the same and join him at his side. He looks to me, and I almost falter at the look on his face.

Lincoln is smiling.

Not the small thing he sported reluctantly, or the kinder thing he shared with Kalem. He is smiling wildly, unabashed, and he is flushed with colour. He looks alive.

I don’t bother taming my own as I join him, filling the seat beside him to watch the scrambling vampires as they search for us.

“How long do you think it’ll take them to find us?” He asks curiously.

“They are not half bad,” I admit, pondering it. “I give them… ten minutes if they don’t give up first.” I grin at him, and he returns it with a soft laugh. I find myself staring at him, long after he’s parted his gaze. “We should have done this years ago. It is so much fun.”

To my surprise, Lincoln does not scorn the statement or try to deny it. He nods, whispering, “Surprisingly,” and then, “I.. I had… a good time.”

I do not stare or pause because I know better, know not to place too much attention on this earnest confession and risk not seeing it again for another decade.

“Also known as fun,” I tease casually, knocking my shoulder to his. “You had fun.” He rolls his eyes, but does not rid himself of his smile. “And don’t speak in the past tense. The night’s barely begun. We are still having fun.”

Lincoln sighs, but nods as well, leaving his smile where it is, and I can not help the way my excitement surges through me until my legs are flailing with it.

“I can not wait to tell Aias about this,” I admit. I can already see his face, his confused little frown as he tries to listen, and I can not wait to kiss it. I glance at Lincoln, trying to keep my tone neutral as I ask, “I suppose we’ll be leaving tomorrow after all? This was a success?”

Lincoln does not hesitate to agree. “Yes.”

The word might as well be a blessing from the Gods.

Tomorrow. I’d be seeing Aias tomorrow. My pyro. And then everything would be as it should be and was, and better. So much better.

Had he missed me too? He would never say it, but I hope that he did, that he missed me so much he imagined me as I did him. Cruel as it is, I hope that he was dying without me.

“Let’s not waste time sitting around,” I say, jumping to my feet, eager for the day to go and bring the next. “This is our first game, and I intend to make it an extremely memorable one so I can tell stories about it for years to come.”

“Very well,” Lincoln agrees, letting me pull him up when I offer him a hand. He holds it longer than he needs, squeezing, but I do not make a fuss of that either. “Try not to get caught.”

“I’m not the one who needed to stretch.”

I am off before he can punish me for the cheek, but it does not matter, for when we rejoin the fray, we still wear our smiles, and me, my hope.

This night of fun, and then… home. Blessed hardly covered it.

———————————-

Malcolm just keeps getting cuter and cuter like what the fuck?????????

Thoughts????????????

Thoughts on Malcolm’s POV of the famous tag game????? Thoughts on the new scenes, like his debrief with Wequie and also his internal thoughts?????

What about the rock thing????

As I said at the start, this is part of a pending double update, so tomorrow, chpater 48 will be right here, and if you read Master, you should know what’s the come next hehe

Until tomorrow,
Byeeeeeee Humansssssssss