The square did not move.
Eyes dozens stared at Archie. Fangs half revealed and muscled tensed. starvation honed to purpose.
A single misplaced word would turn the rock under his feet to red.
The vampires did not rush.
She drew herself to her feet and wiped the drop of his blood off her lips with the back of her hand. Her eyes were on Archie, not the others.
"Enough."
The single word made everyone quiet.
Every vampire froze.
The enforcer, who was the tall man, dropped into position. The others followed. No hesitation. No reluctance just obedience.
Archie noted it carefully.
It appears the female vampire is the leader.
The Baroness came nearer to him, and she no longer looked surprised. Now her eyes was focused.
"He is a wolf-blooded man" she said. "But he is not wolf, which is strange. I can sense the terrifying strength of an alpha overlord in his veins but only a trace amount of wolf blood"
There was a wave of fuzzy, and no man challenged her.
The man of middle height frowned slightly. "Baroness, the scent—"
"I know what I tasted," she cut in.
Silence returned.
Her eyes locked onto Archie's.
You, she said, voice smooth again, in control. "Who marked you?"
"No one," Archie replied with a straight face. He obviously couldn't tell them that the werewolf leader himself claimed him.
There were a couple of mutters, but they died soon.
The Baroness tilted her head.
"No pack scent. No territorial claim yet there is wolf in your blood and one of terrifying strength at that." she asked as her gaze sharpened.
"And there you come strolling into my district."
Archie held her eyes evenly. "I walk where I choose."
The air tightened again.
The enforcer also hardened his jaw, but the Baroness did not turn her head.
Something weak flickered behind her eye instead. Interest.
"Bold," she murmured.
She stepped even closer. Near enough that he was the only one who could hear her.
"you are either so stupid that you are willing to walk into the my territory or you are strong enough to challenge me"
Archie did not answer.
She looked at him a few seconds longer, and then drew herself straight and addressed the square.
"He is not our prey."
The statement altered the entire fact.
The stress changed to watch kill.
"I will have my eyes on him" she went on. "Until I decide otherwise."
No one challenged her.
The message was clear, if anyone was to touch him the end result will be her wrath.
The Baroness returned to Archie.
"You will come with me."
It was not a request.
The enforcer stepped aside. The path opened.
The square gradually returned to its mumbling murmur, but the air was now different.
Archie walked along with her in silence.
One night in the city of vampires and he was already under the watching eyes of a vampire baroness.
Soon the arrived at the Baroness Manor. The large entrance of the manor was pushed open with a wave of the Baroness hands.
The doors were banged with a sound reverberation in the stone halls.
Archie walked in relaxed as he looked around for signs of threats and attackers.
The Baroness remained silent till they were themselves alone.
The passage was broadly lighted by cold blue smoke. There was a fragrance of iron and ancient perfume in the air.
She stopped as they entered a large room with an artificially made lake in the center.
Archie stopped too.
They said nothing to each other, just a few seconds.
Then she turned about to face him.
"Like I said you're not our prey so no one in my territory will dare attack you" she said calmly before she started taking of her clothes. "If you had been, the square would have been stained with your blood by now"
Her eyes looked him over one more time old and evaluative, but not hungry.
"I bit you,so that I might know what you are"
She said as she entered the lake slowly
"When my fangs entered through your flesh, your blood responded to me."
She looked at him with curiosity in her eyes
"There is power in you. The kind only found in wolves. Wild and untamed"
Her gaze sharpened slightly.
"Do not mistake me. Not a single one of the square could feel the wolf in you. There is no pack smell on your body and I sense no hunger for territory from you."
Her lips curved faintly.
Archie did not change his expression.
She watched him in response to which she saw little.
"Aren't you interested in joining me in the pool, I can assure you that soaking in it is quite comfortable" she said
In this city, she went on smoothly, everything is determined by strength, alliances, respect, desire.
The latter did not appear to embarrass her, she was openly expressing her desire for Archie.
Vampires do not pick mates depending on poetry but power.
Archie didn't reply her instead stated at her intensely
" You stood in my square
You did not grovel, you did not pose so I'm willing to reward you with a bath with me"
A pause.
"I do not choose weak men."
Silence settled again.
Then she raised herself a little at the edge of the lake.
"I am Seraphina Valcrest."
"I govern a land radius of seven miles around this manor."
Her eyes held his steadily.
"And you are?"
She did not enquire how he had got there.
She didn't ask what he was.
She asked only his name.
The two predators were examining each other inside but neither one was an enemy nor even an ally yet.
After she tasted his blood something had changed.
Both of them did not want to spend that shift in vain.
Archie thought for a while before replying "Archie Ambrosius. Nice meeting you Sera" Archie said taking off his clothes as he joined her in the lake. "It's Seraphine not Sera" Seraphine said with a frown as she saw Archie getting comfortable in her pool
"I know and do not stare at me with that frown. You invited me in, I didn't break in" Archie said as he closed his eyes.
The water was hot.
This heat was not fire or magic of which he could feel; but as though it were a source of heat in itself, as though there were something alive beneath. The artificial lake was stagnant and deep and dark, the bottom of it unseen by his observation.
Seraphine did not turn her eyes, but looked at him.
The vast majority of men would have hesitated, looked too long or made an attempt to impress her.
Archie did none of that.
He entered the water in order to be in his rightful place.
The blue smoke that illumined the room was smouldering lazily above the surface and created a perception that they were in the depths of the night itself.
"You are either very fearless" she thought, or very much confident.
Archie woke with a slow opening of the eyes. "Is there a difference?"
She smiled faintly in a measured and not playful manner.
"In this city, yes."
The water caused a motion as she came near, yet was too distant that he could reach it. there was tension between them, stillness, not hatred or love, but something more.
"You act like you own the place", she said
Her eyes fell very lightly to the water and then to his face.
She was not wrong.
Archie let the silence sit. Nothing can disturb humankind like silence.
Beyond the manor walls the city lurked along silently. Shadows flitted between roofs. Windows glowed faint red. Negotiating of territory by predators was carried out without sound.
He was inside that system now.
Seraphine leant back a little on the edge of the stone on the lake.
"You will not go out of my district" she said. "Not as a prisoner. Not as property."
A small pause.
"As my guest."
That was a weighty word in the vampire society. There was a guest safeguarded and simultaneously the guest was responsible. His behaviours would be a commentary on her authority.
"I will watch you, I said. And I hope you learn how this world works with time"
Archie nodded a little before sinking his head into the water as his hair floated on the water.
This was what he needed.
Information.
Structure and weak points.
The first night he had not come to dominate. He came to understand.
The chamber fell quiet again. Two mighty things with identical water gave no solace, but only a brief truce.
Then something changed.
A little wave went flashing over the water.
Not from either of them.
The eyes of Seraphine were drawn in somewhat.
The wave diffused out in an ideal circle, as though something has been pressing the water down beneath.
A narrow strip of crimson light flashed across the surface, and created symbols which faded away nearly instantly.
Archie felt her change in expression. Not fear.
Irritation and Respect.
She got out of water leisurely.
"It appears, we are already the subject of attention by our meeting."
Towards the end of the chamber she walked to a stone pedestal. It was covered with a small disc of obsidian, not bigger than a palm.
The disc pulsed once.
Then again.
A message had arrived.
Seraphine hovered her fingers over the disc but she never switched on.
Her eyes moved back to Archie.
"The Earl sent me a message", she remarked.
The atmosphere was more oppressive in the room.
A third pulse of the obsidian disc, even brighter, resulted.
Seraphine at last laid her hand on it.
The chamber lights dimmed.
And the disc exploded into a bunch of words that floated in the air.