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The first time Jaing led Anomaly into a back alley and took the amorous neck-biting a little far, he was only a nameless man, and Jaing was a monster—but not too much of a monster, and he put the slight stranger’s arm around his neck and walked him back to the bar where Jaing had picked him up, and left him slumped unconscious and still breathing in a corner booth, Jaing’s cold glaring eyes and softly-murmured, quickly-fading thrall keeping anyone who saw them from thinking too long on it.
The second time was a coincidence, and the little stranger wrapped his fingers around Jaing’s throat as he leaned in—they were in a club this time, a pounding bass almost making Jaing remember what it had been like to have a heartbeat—and he felt the spark of magic under the magician’s skin, a distant shivering ache of fire. It was a silent threat and Jaing was certain that he would make good on it if he felt the need.
“A little rude, don’t you think?” The stranger’s head was tilted, the brim of his hat hiding an eye, but the visible one burned hot blue, like a gas flame. “Nice boys ask before they take.”
“I’m a vampire,” Jaing said, low and angry.
The stranger raised a pale brow, lifted his chin and gave Jaing a heavy-lidded stare. His fingers tightened on Jaing’s neck.
“Not to sound even more horribly rude, but if I don’t take what I need, I don’t get what I need,” Jaing snapped.
“That’s terrifically presumptuous of you,” the magician said coolly. “You sound like the kind of man I should set on fire, and pour myself a nice brandy and warm myself over the flames.”
Jaing bared his teeth, snarling, thick knife-sharp fangs out and gleaming. “It’s not the same,” he growled. “You think I like this? The desperate and starving resort to theft.”
A slow smile curled across the man’s face, and Jaing suddenly had to fight to keep his fangs out. They wanted to retract, submissively.
“What’s your name, you pretty, desperate bloodsucker,” he said, his eyes nearly glowing—petroleum blue and a brown that was closer to gold, and burned just as hot as the other—and Jaing shivered. He didn’t want to give the man his name. It felt like a dangerous line to cross.
Still, Jaing had already crossed the line between life and death, and more-or-less come back out the other side, so everything else didn’t seem to bad by comparison. “Give me yours and I’ll give you mine,” he said.
“Promise?”
“Yes,” Jaing hissed, quick and final, no take-backs. He always got impulsive when he was hungry.
“My name is Anomaly,” the magician said, and Jaing almost laughed out loud because what kind of name, but he was already giving his own up, like crossed wrists, like an offering, and Anomaly smiled and tilted his head, baring his throat, and oh gods, Jaing was so hungry.
“Ask,” Anomaly said softly, magic flaring at his fingertips which were pressing into Jaing’s throat, the pulse of the music almost like a hot living pulse in his own body, and he was starving—
“Please,” he gasped, and Anomaly flicked his hair aside and raised his chin and Jaing leaned forward and sank his fangs deep.
Anomaly’s low laughter choked off in a gasp. His hands moved to clench onto Jaing’s shoulders and his head went back, spine curving sweetly. He was pressed against Jaing, pressing himself, hot and lithe and strong, too strong for any mortal, and his blood in Jaing’s mouth sparked with magic. He could have drained every bright drop if he had wanted to; the magician’s hands were gripped tight in Jaing’s shirt, defenseless, and it would have been easy to slip a thrall over him and hold him down with it until Jaing let the drained corpse fall.
“I didn’t think you were going to stop,” Anomaly murmured, when Jaing sealed the bite and drew back. The magician’s hot eyes were dark, pupils blown wide, and he hadn’t let go of Jaing.
“Why didn’t you burn me to a crisp?”
“Bodies are messy,” Anomaly said. His hand slid down and rested over Jaing’s heart. He wondered if it was noticeable, the lack of heartbeat. The stillness. “Why did you stop?”
“Bodies are messy,” Jaing said, quiet.
He stood up, pulling out of Anomaly’s grasp, and looked down at him for a moment. Slumped back in the padded booth, shirt collar open and his hat nearly falling off, Anomaly looked very… small. Small, and pale even in the club lights, and wide-eyed like he wasn’t quite sure what he’d gotten himself into yet. Jaing wasn’t sure either.
He turned away and moved into the crowd, crossing the room. He was sure Anomaly had lost sight of him; he could leave, he could vanish into the night and Anomaly would never catch word of him again, and Jaing could cut the fragile new links of a chain binding him to—to what, he didn’t know. He could end this here and now, and go back to his old familiar life—undeath, whatever—or he could accept it.
Jaing was somehow absolutely certain that if he went back to Anomaly his life would be fundamentally different, unrecognizable, and he would never be able to get back what he’d had before.
Jaing scowled, suddenly bitter. What he’d had before. What he had was nothing. A strange new body he didn’t understand, an unending hunger he didn’t know how to sate, a past he only remembered enough to long for, a mean and lonely present with no promise of ending. As if the magician could change any of that, as if he would ever care.
But apparently Jaing had already made his choice, because he was leaning against the bar, asking the bartender for a bottle of orange juice and a Snickers. It got him a weird look, and Jaing shrugged off his dour mood and grinned back, displaying a harmless, fangless smile.
Anomaly gave him a weird look too, when Jaing slid back into the booth and set his prizes on the table. He pushed them towards Anomaly.
“Go on,” Jaing said. “It’s not good for you to give blood on an empty stomach.”
Anomaly took them, twisting the lid off the orange juice with a disgruntled expression. “You still owe me,” he said. “For the first time and for this time. A pint of blood isn’t worth a Minute Maid orange juice and a Snickers.”
“Darling, I look forward to settling my debts,” Jaing said, leaning towards him and leering, and Anomaly gave him a startled look before smirking back, slow and wide and satisfied. He turned his attention back to the orange juice, a little smile still playing around his lips, and Jaing settled back, a pleased warm glow settling in his chest.
They sat together, not talking, while Anomaly finished the food. It wasn’t uncomfortable even though it should have been; the music was loud enough to excuse their silence anyway, and Jaing felt oddly at ease. He realized that he was slowly shifting closer to Anomaly, leaning towards his warmth. They were nearly shoulder to shoulder now. Jaing looked down, away from the flashing lights of the dance floor, blinking stars out of his eyes. Anomaly folded the candy wrapper and it vanished with a twist of his fingers.
“Jaing,” Anomaly said, barely audible even to Jaing under the noise of the club, and his name on Anomaly’s lips hit like a drop of holy water rolling down his spine. He shivered, skin prickling, and met Anomaly’s eyes. It was like watching a candle flame, lovely and hypnotic and dangerous.
Jaing murmured, “I’m never going to get out of this, am I?”
“No,” Anomaly replied, his eyes widening a little as if he was surprised by his own answer. He reached up and cupped Jaing’s face in his warm, calloused hands, and Jaing hadn’t been able to shake it out of his head, what it had felt like to kiss Anomaly, to kiss the beautiful stranger in that cold, wet alley.
Jaing lifted Anomaly’s hat off and set it aside on the table, and he wound his fingers into Anomaly’s hair as he drew Jaing down. The strands slid through Jaing’s fingers, silk-soft, and they were kissing slowly in the dark, like lovers.
It was better than Jaing remembered. Anomaly’s mouth was searingly hot, soft against Jaing’s, sweet with magic and the taste of oranges.
The third time Jaing met Anomaly, he was as close to sated as he ever got, and Anomaly laughed glitteringly at him and then stole his watch, whispering to Jaing that this time, you can come and get me, and Jaing, grinning wide and knife-edged, stalked after him. There was time enough, to play whatever game Anomaly wanted to set, time to hunt and to have, time to chase Anomaly down and repay every debt Jaing owed him, and maybe, if he was lucky, Jaing would rack himself up a few more.