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Chapter 20: Aiden
I stand motionless as I try to persuade myself of what I just heard. A vampire, a senior vampire, a very senior vampire, owes me a favour. For having got lucky when jumping into a fight that hadn’t been mine. Not only that but, from the sounds of it, I have immunity from his… family? Faction? His people, until I claim that favour. Perhaps I should never cash in. That sort of immunity sounds useful.
The nondescript woman is waiting, holding out her hand with a chunky signet ring nestled in her palm. “He sends you this token, to present at the Club as your identification.”
I draw on my training and give a polite dip of my head. “Please convey my acknowledgement to Aloysius Cavendish and inform him that I appreciate his honourable conduct. You may place the token here.” I point to the cleanest-looking patch of ground I can see, and step back. The woman- the vampire, I suppose- crouches to place the ring where I indicated, and
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Rhapsody for a Wolf Chapter 21: Sarah
How I get through that evening’s performance, and the next day, I don’t know. I’m playing on autopilot. I can say without boasting that I’m good enough that only another good musician would notice, but I’m failing myself and everyone else who has helped me to get to where I am by giving less than my best. Roberto has decided I have a mild bug of some sort, and is letting it slide, but I’ll have to pull myself together soon or that excuse won’t cover it any more. What I need is more information, something to help explain what I experienced. I still haven’t heard back from my contact at MI5, and my own research has uncovered nothing new. To cap it all, it’s the polo match. The excitement of plotting to make David look bad has completely lost its shine. If it wouldn’t feel as if I’d be letting Holly and Francesca down, and Rupert, I’d probably not go through with it. My enthusiasm is somewhat reawakened by David’s behaviour on the coach. There is more than one coach, it
Rhapsody for a Wolf Chapter 22: Aiden
There isn’t a nearby coffee-shop where I grew up. There isn’t a nearby anything, unless you count trees. The Shining River Pack house is actually a cluster of housing, storage buildings and workshops. The nearest town is twenty miles away, and it doesn’t have a coffee shop. It has a gas station with a coffee vending machine, and the coffee was never worth the journey. Here in London, there seems to be a coffee shop, cafe or takeaway every twenty yards. I choose Al Cappuccino because it’s on one of the coupons I picked up at the Freshers’ Fair, and I only go in because I can get a pastry and a coffee for a pound if I use the coupon, but the cafe next door charges five pounds for a sandwich. A pastry and a coffee is not a good lunch, but beggars can’t be choosers and my first pay-cheque went on text books for college. My injuries are almost healed, the last of them nearly gone, but the ones still left are at the itchy stage. Just one more stress on top of mystery vampi
Rhapsody for a Wolf Chapter 23: Sarah
I drop into the Al Cappuccino coffee shop on a whim, before rehearsal the day after the polo match. Holly was asking me about a third date as we were travelling back in the coach, and I need to get my head on straight before I see him again. I’ve promised myself to give him a proper chance over three dates. That means not starting the third date already convinced that I need to tell him it’s not working. The coffee shop is crowded, almost every table full. It’s comforting, in its own way. I am alone in the crowd, cushioned by the mass of humanity. I manage to grab a free spot by slotting myself in just as a couple are leaving. It’s a small, square table attached to the wall with barely enough room for two chairs. I’ve just got settled with my long black- no syrups or milk, just plain caffeinated goodness- when I spot another patron searching the tables. My eye is drawn to him instantly, although I couldn’t tell you exactly why, other than the way he looks out of plac
Rhapsody for a Wolf Chapter 24: Aiden
I gulp down the muggy, traffic fume laiden air of the street and fight for control. Frost’s distraught howling in my head is drowning out the rumble of car engines and the wail of bus brakes. I don’t know where I’m going. I’m not even looking. I’ve got to get away before my savage and bloogthirsty werewolf instincts cause an incident that would hit every news feed around the world and plaster the knowledge of werewolf existence across every television and computer screen.I finally regain enough self control to pay attention to what’s around me. I’m still on the same street, I think. Several blocks down, maybe a mile, which isn’t as far as I thought I’d gone. Maybe I wasn't almost out of my mind for as long as it seemed at the time. They're all big public buildings here, museums and libraries and stuff like that. It's all grey stone, fancy pillars, spiky black metal fences and and trees growing out of metal doors in the si
Rhapsody for a Wolf Chapter 25: Sarah
I wish I could hole myself up in my apartment, spending all day wearing pyjamas with my hair in a mess, eating ice cream out of the carton with Netflix providing a distraction from thinking. I wish I could turn the clock back and go change my mind the first time Holly asked me out, so I never got his hopes up only to go stomping all over them. I wish Holly wasn’t so d*** nice, so I could blame him instead of drowning myself in this ocean of guilt. If I wanted to lie to myself I could blame the stranger in the wine bar. I felt more then, caught between him and Holly, than I have at any time before. It’s the only time Holly has ever had my belly tingling and my panties growing wet. I didn’t need a creepy weirdo to remind me of what I could feel for the right partner, though. If I could blame anyone it would be the art student from the cafe, who was a million worlds away from Holly, all rough edges, surprise and disjointed conversation but who piqued my curiosity in just one ch
Rhapsody for a Wolf Chapter 26: Aiden
The concert hall is a modern building that looks a bit like a bunch of glass huge glass blocks stacked up by a toddler. It’s on a street corner with roads on two sides and older grey stone buildings shoved up against it on the other two. The front of it has a row of glass doors beneath illuminated letters that spell out its name. Display cases beside the doors have glossy photos of the stars that have featured in previous performances. Here are doormen. I doubt I’ll have any luck trying to find Sarah through that entrance.The side around the corner is more industrial, with rambling pipes, steaming vents and two fire escapes. There’s a couple of black dumpsters against the wall. There’s a doorman here too, next to a door labelled ‘stage exit’, only this guy looks more like a bouncer. He gives me a suspicious look as as I approach. I keep walking.Once I’m past him I cross the street. The other side is mostly more of the same, but there
Rhapsody for a Wolf Chapter 27: Sarah
Werewolf. That’s what they had to be. Part man, part wolf, shape shifter. Monster, in so many stories, but I’ve learned something about monsters in my lifetime and I know that they come in as many shades as humans. Some of them are human. My pulse is still racing, my fingers trembling from the remembered terror of that looming figure closing on me, but I know the danger to me is over even while another figure bearing claws, and fangs, and fur is hovering right by my side. I can sense the danger in every last hair and tooth and talon of him, but none of it will harm me, and my voice is calm when I thank him. I should be running screaming, my rational human side tells me. Instead, his presence soothes me. He looks hesitant, this monstrous werewolf beast, when I turn to him. What would such a killing machine to be so hesitant around me? Bellmouth may be something to do with it. I try to reassure him, laughing at myself for it but then pausing to wonder.
Rhapsody for a Wolf Chapter 28: Aiden
When I was younger, Caleb dared me to jump off a cliff into the river. I was fourteen, he was eight. We were both trying to catch the attention of a girl, although I had a lot more of an idea about what I might get up to with her if I succeeded. Caleb was always the risk-taker, the type to lead from in front, to leap first and look afterwards. I was the one who wouldn’t do anything without thinking it through first, without having a plan. Spontaneity was dangerous. Thoughtless impulse got you killed.I remember what it felt like as I was standing on the cliff edge, my stomach in my throat, my mouth dry, my knees shaking. Caleb’s argument had seemed persuasive to fourteen-year-old me. I’d seen the older teens jumping before. It was an unofficial rite of passage for the Pack, for those who had turned eighteen over the winter to leap into the spring meltwater and bathe before the dancing and partying of the May Day celebrations.I hadn’t had the cour
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