Concordia, Nine Hundred and Forty Five Years Before Thaelen fixed a smile on his face as he walked towards the soldiers. They were laughing and muttering amongst themselves, their attention on the house where the young woman’s screams had changed tone, losing the sharpness, becoming resigned to her fate. I’m sorry, Thaelen thought to her. He had made a callous choice to use her to buy the time to tend the child and old woman. It had been a dispassionate, cruelly efficient prioritization. The guard before him met his eyes, his expression becoming alarmed as he recognized the death in Thaelen’s expression. He began to draw his sword, but Thaelen reached him first, snapping his neck and throwing him into the others, so that they fell under the weight. He caught the arm of a soldier who escaped the burden of the body, preventing his sword from striking, and pulled the arm from the socket, tearing the sword from the hand as the soldier screamed, whilst catching the soldier against him, hi

Concordia, Nine Hundred and Forty Years Before Thaelen paused in his labor to remove his shirt and cast it to the ground. He was filthy but had almost completed caulking the hull with oakum. He squinted up at the sun. Another hour, and he would go down to the beach for a swim. He might encounter Ettel’s husband, Ferin, on the sand, and be able to discuss the next stage of the ship building with him. As a fifth-generation fisherman, Ferin had participated in many ship-builds and would, on occasion, come and assist Thaelen with his project. Thaelen would then wait until night fell to head down to the village for his evening meal. There was always someone who wandered from the house alone, to take a piss, meet a lover, or to check something that they left undone from the day. He would stalk through the houses until he found a likely human and could discretely take what he needed from them. He had his favorite regular meals - the repressed priest of the One God who preached about purity

Havermouth, Two Weeks Before“Uh-ah,” Heath snagged Rhett by the wrist when his dark-haired mate went to get into the front passenger seat. He tugged him back and nudged him into the backseat. “You’re mine,” he leered, gripping the doorframe and caging Rhett in as he landed on his back and pushed himself up on his elbows his face lighting in surprised laughter.“F-king oath, Heath, be gentle,” Rhett snickered. “Take me to dinner first, perhaps?”“You are dinner,” Heath swung into the cab and closed the door behind him.“I’m always driving,” Cameron pouted as he put the Ute into reverse and backed out of the driveway of Aislen’s house.“Ute is best for this. Small windows, high up,” Heath replied as Rhett slid along the seat until the back of his head and shoulders were against the door. Heath crawled over him, and ran his tongue over Rhett’s bottom lip, nipping the lip ring between his teeth and giving it a slight tug. “I’ve been thinking,” he murmured against Rhett’s lips. “About how

Havermouth, Two Weeks Before“So, these boys did not realize that you were important to them,” Talen turned his attention back to the conversation, and digging into the problems between his mates.“They didn’t know about me,” she explained. “The pack thought that I was a human. And…”“Humans are complicated,” he nodded slowly in revelation. “A bi-sexual polyandrous group with a human mate. Complicated is somewhat of an understatement,” he murmured to himself. Perhaps it was not going to be as difficult as he had thought. Such things could seem insurmountable to the young, and no obstacle to the older and wiser. With years of perspective, once they got past their injured pride and wounded hearts, they might find the road smoother than anticipated.“I didn’t understand, and they could not tell me without breaking their laws, and things between us…” She shook her head to indicate the relationships’ disintegration. “It started badly, and just became worse. The pack offered me a scholarshi

Havermouth, Two Weeks Before“Hmm, good,” Talen kissed the crown of her head, and took a breath to control himself. Leave it there, Talen, he cautioned himself. Change the subject, tackle the harder aspects of the relationship when she’d had time to adjust and accept, and think it through for herself. “Let us have a glass of wine to celebrate our agreement and look at whatever you have on Zeus.”“Sounds good… So, the vitamins and food aren’t to fatten me up to be your blood slave?” She added as they walked down the hallway towards the kitchen hand in hand.He smothered his laughter. “The vitamins and food were because I had a look in the refrigerator. Anyone who, after a week of living here, had a fridge that bare, wasn’t eating a balanced diet. I have other resources for sustenance,” he clarified, his eyes flicking to her face, trying to judge her thoughts. He was nervous, he thought with amusement. Over a thousand years old and sweating over what a girl thought about him like an ado