Chapter 286: Hunger and Half-Gods II
---
Then they turned and slipped into the darker stretch where the holding ground waited. A few breaths later, the first frightened movement from the captives reached the air as they realized what was coming.
Sekhmet did not look that way again.
He turned instead toward Sofia and Natasha.
The two true vampires were already watching him.
Of course they were.
Even sealed, even weakened, even made human-looking by the layered suppression on them, they remained too old in instinct not to recognize hunger walking toward them. They had felt Lily’s transformation. They had felt the trapped shockwave. They had watched him leave, watched him return, and now they saw the extra stillness in his body, the focus in his eyes, the way he no longer moved like a strategist solving house problems but like a predator choosing where to feed.
Natasha was the first to speak.
"So," she said softly, "the girl still lives."
Sekhmet stopped in front of them.
He did not answer at once.
Sofia’s eyes moved once toward the red sphere behind him, then back to his face. "We felt the blood wave. We felt the containment. Clever." Her mouth curved faintly. "Cruel, but clever."
Sekhmet folded his arms loosely. "She is my wife, not any girl. You know what she is becoming?"
Sofia’s expression did not change much, but there was something like reluctant respect buried inside it now.
"Enough to guess," she said.
Natasha leaned back against the stone behind her. "It did not happen like that with your twins."
No point lying.
"No."
Sofia spoke more softly. "Then the girl had foreign blood."
Sekhmet looked at her.
She smiled without warmth. "You did not know."
No answer.
That told her enough.
Sofia’s smile deepened by a hair. "How entertaining."
"It is not," he said.
Natasha’s eyes sharpened. "She is still in one piece, then. Lucky."
Sekhmet’s gaze turned colder. "Do not speak about her."
"Or what," Natasha asked, too calm for someone bound. "You bite me."
The line hung there.
Then Sofia, because she was older and understood the consequences better, cut in before Natasha’s mouth dragged her into something stupid.
"He did not come here for conversation," Sofia said quietly.
Sekhmet’s eyes shifted to her.
"No," he said. "I came for blood."
That changed both of them.
Not dramatically.
Not the way mortals changed at the mention of pain.
The change here was subtler. Tension in the shoulders. A brief sharpening in the eyes. The kind of fear older predators felt when they knew exactly how much of themselves could be taken before strength turned into permanent loss.
Natasha’s voice turned rougher. "Use the mortals."
"I considered it."
"Then do it."
Sekhmet crouched slightly so he could look at them at a closer level, not looming, not kind.
"No."
Sofia studied him. "Your instinct must have chosen us."
He did not answer, which was answer enough.
That made something ugly and amusing pass through her face.
"How flattering," she murmured. "We survive capture only to become rationed food for an original vampire."
"Food implies concern," Natasha said. "This is butchery."
Sekhmet looked at both of them.
"If I wanted butchery," he said quietly, "you would be dead."
Silence...
"Let them sit in that truth." He thought.
He drew the ring from his pocket and let them see it. That was enough to keep the next few breaths obedient. The ring pulsed once in his hand.
Natasha’s expression hardened instantly.
Sofia’s became more carefully controlled.
"The first one who forces me to spend extra patience loses more blood than necessary," Sekhmet said to them.
Natasha gave him a look full of hate. "You feed like a parasite and speak like a noble."
He tilted his head faintly. "And you insult like someone still imagining she has choices."
That shut her up.
He turned to Sofia first. Partly because she was calmer. Partly because he wanted Natasha watching.
Sofia noticed the choice and smiled without joy. "Ah. Beginning with me."
"Yes."
"And should I feel honored?"
"No."
Her smile faded.
Sekhmet extended one hand toward her. "Come here."
For one heartbeat, she did not move.
He let a thread of pressure from the ring awaken.
Not much.
Just enough.
Sofia inhaled sharply and rose at once, every line of her body tight with controlled fury as she stepped into reach.
He caught her wrist first, not because he needed the grip, but because the touch itself told him things. Weakness. Suppressed power. Old blood is still rich under the seal. Hunger in her too, though not strong enough to matter beside his. The vulnerability beneath all her elegance.
"You hate this," he said quietly.
Sofia met his gaze. "I hate you. But I would love some torture by an original."
"What!!! You hate me and love me?" Sekhmet asked as a joke.
"Not the same thing." She replied with a pout face.
He turned her head slightly, exposing the line of her throat.
She did not flinch. That was pride.
He respected it just enough not to comment. Then he sank his fangs into her neck.
Sofia gasped.
Unlike Lily, there was no trust in the sound.
Only pain and fury and a faint, unwilling current of fear under both because she knew exactly what he could take if he chose not to stop.
Her blood hit him like dark velvet and old violence.
She enjoyed it very much. Her face became lustful red. Her gasp became like a pervert enjoying it.
The blood was nothing bright like Lily’s hidden angel blood. Nothing clean. Nothing shockingly strange. This was true vampire blood. Mature. Refined. Dense with old predation just like Alex’s.
It entered him and spread through his body in a richer, heavier wave than the blood of ordinary mortals ever could.
The effect was immediate. Hunger eased and Power steadied inside him. The edges of strain in his body softened into strength again.
And inside his mind, the system rang.
[Ding! SYSTEM Notification: The Host’s Blood Proficiency increased by 50%.]
There it was.
Worth it.
Sofia made a low, sharp sound when he took a little more than comfort and a little less than danger. Her fingers tightened once against his sleeve. Not clinging. Bracing. Her mouth was full of saliva. Her tongue was giving erotic poses.
Then he pulled back.
Blood ran down the side of her neck in a thin line before her body’s own healing began to close it. It was slow because of the seal. But it was there.
She took one step away from him, breathing harder now, and her eyes burned with undiluted hatred and lust.
"You feed like a thief," she said.
Inside her mind she thought, "I really enjoyed it. I want to feel that more. If you feed on me a bit longer. I might have released something..."
Sekhmet wiped the corner of his mouth with one thumb. "No. Thieves run."
Natasha laughed once, brittle and ugly. "Look at her. He did not even need to force enough pain into the ring. Your expression told everything to me."
Sofia made a face, "Hmph!"
Sekhmet turned toward Natasha. Her expression changed. Not enough to call it fear openly.
He reached for her without ceremony this time.
Natasha resisted just long enough to make the ring flash once.
Pain snapped through her.
Her body betrayed her by freezing half a heartbeat, and that was all he needed. He gripped the back of her neck and pulled her closer.
"Say something hateful," he said quietly. "It makes you easier to drink from."
Natasha’s eyes blazed. "I hope your little bride screams when she wakes."
The line hit hard inside Sekhmet mind. It was hard enough that his fingers tightened.
Very bad choice by her end.
He bit her neck immediately.