1 comments/ 9488 views/ 1 favorites Abigail Forsythe Ch. 01 By: Otto26 Copyright Otto26, 2007 * The dungeon corridors had very low ceilings, such that Abigail was forced to bow her head. The torch of the guard in front of her danced in the puddled water on the rough-hewn stone floor and left thick ropes of smoke that quickly blended into the darkness. Even in the relative warmth of the Hungarian spring the tunnels were cold and the sound of coughing echoed through them. Abigail pressed a handkerchief over her mouth and nose and shivered for a moment within her cloak. The guard stopped abruptly at a door no different from the dozens of others they'd passed and inserted a large key into the lock. He drew a pistol and kicked the door open before standing to one side. A nod of his head indicated that Abigail should enter. The cell was barely larger than the corridor, which thought amused Abigail and caused a hint of a smile to play at her lips. Where the corridor had been stale, however, the cell was rank; the air felt heavy and oppressive. "Tarnation! I take back half of what I've said about them damned Hungarians! You ain't a blonde, but you'll do," a voice croaked. "Mister Cole, if you lay a finger on me the guard will shoot you," Abigail said coolly to the darkness. A shape began to form in the darkness in front of her. "He'll be doin' me a favor then, since they're gonna hang me tomorrow." "But I have another way for you to leave. Alive." The shadow stopped approaching, but Abigail could feel the effort it had taken the man and she worried that she had been incorrect in her assessment. If the man was more trouble than help, then she was better off without him. The thought worried at her for a moment before she quashed it. She was committed and second-guessing would profit her not at all. "What price?" the voice rasped. Again she felt a hint of the effort it was taking the man to restrain himself. "You were convicted of smuggling across the border between the Ottoman Empire and the Principality of Transylvania. I need someone who knows the back country of Transylvania, someone with the kind of contacts you have. I intend to kill... someone," Abigail explained. "I take you where you need to be and then I'm free?" "You are required to stay until I have killed the person I intend to kill or until I release you," she responded. "Fine. Let's go." "I will require your oath on this matter, Mister Cole," Abigail said coldly. She was not a simpleton to be taken in by a falsely given assurance and his treatment of her as such angered her. The shadow was silent. "That's the other thing I need, someone who can be trusted to do as he says. You have that reputation, Mister Cole. Of course, if you'd prefer to take your chances with the 'damned Hungarians'..." she let the suggestion trail off into silence, half hoping he would refuse her offer. "Fine. My oath on it." "Swear." The word was clipped by a steely tone better suited for a woman twice Abigail's age. "On my oath I will faithfully assist you in your quest to kill one person, yet unnamed, until that person is dead, or you have released me, or your death," the man said solemnly. "Done, then," Abigail agreed. "Follow me." The pouch she handed the jailer seemed sufficiently heavy to him so he holstered his pistol and gestured for the two to precede him down the tunnel. Abigail led the way, conscious of the man at her back, and not reassured by the presence of the guard behind him. Out of the tunnel the guard patted the pouch in his pocket to reassure his co-conspirator who tossed a cloak to Cole. "Walk out. No one notice." Abigail hesitated. "He's right," Cole advised her. "This happens all the time." Abigail nodded, as much to herself as anyone else in the room, and led the way out the door into the courtyard. The carriage she'd engaged was waiting and the driver held the door open for her with a knowing leer plastered across his face. Not until he'd engaged the engine and the carriage was chuffing out of the prison did she relax enough to ask the question on her mind. "People frequently buy the freedom of family members?" she asked. Cole, his eyes on the windows of the carriage, shrugged. "Sometimes. Generally they make their bribes before the trial. What the guard was referrin' to was the practice of the rich buyin' prisoners. That happens all the time." "And what do the wealthy of Hungary want with prisoners?" "Sport," was the reply. The word seemed to have been dragged out of his throat and came past clenched teeth. Abigail thought through the possible interpretations of that term and decided to leave off any further comment. Instead she leaned forward and lowered the window. Cole, frankly, reeked. The little of him visible from beneath the cloak was filthy. He made no apology for his odorous condition, however, and waited in silence until the carriage arrived at the house she had engaged. She took a purse from within a pocket of her cloak and counted out approximately one hundred dinars. She held out the coins, pouring them into Cole's hand without touching him. "Get cleaned up and buy some new clothing," she told him. "I'll need to buy some equipment," he said quietly. She turned when she was out of the carriage and dumped some more coins on the interior floor. Two more coins settled her account with the driver and then she was into the warmth of the house. *** Radigan announced them as if they were noble guests arriving at a ball, instead of hired help being ushered into a room pressed into service as a laboratory. "Mister Timothy Cole and guest," he said in his clear baritone. Abigail looked up in idle interest that quickly became annoyance when the word 'guest' was uttered. Cole, dressed in local clothing, walked into the room trailed by a woman covered from head to toe. "Guest?" Abigail demanded. "What is she for?" Cole glanced back at the woman behind him. "She's for fuckin', and washin' my clothes, and cookin' food, and carryin' things I need carried." "You bought a slave with my money?" Abigail asked frigidly. Cole shrugged. "Bought a wife." "Get rid of her." "No." "No?" Abigail was flustered, a condition which three years of grief and hardened will had almost removed from her makeup. "No," Cole confirmed. "I don't consider that this falls within the scope of our agreement. If she starts to make problems then I'll get rid of her. "Radigan," Abigail began, but Cole held up one hand to gain her attention and wiggled the fingers of his other hand to draw her attention to the gun which it hovered by. "We can do this the hard way," he cheerfully offered. "I rather think the hard way would go poorly for all of us," an elderly voice pronounced. "A fight, particularly a gunfight, would release or ignite some rather nasty chemicals. I really do suggest, my lady, that you take your argument outside." "Yes, thank you, Doctor McCormac. Perhaps we'll simply dispense with the disagreement altogether. I'll accept Mister Cole's reasoning for the time being," Abigail declared. "I offer you my apologies, Mister Cole. I should not question how you go about accomplishing the tasks I set you." The icy tone was the opposite of apologetic and Cole was plainly clever enough to understand the second part of her statement; he served her and had enough sense to acknowledge this fact by inclining his head. "Reckon that's the truth, your ladyship. But you ain't yet said who you aim to kill," he pointed out. Abigail took her seat and Radigan stalked over to pour a cup of tea for her. "Miklos Brasolic," she informed him. "The 'Devil's Butcher'?" Cole exclaimed. "Lady, you're loco! Brasolic ain't human, he's a creature of Sam Hill. Can't nobody kill him." Abigail frowned. "I see you're familiar with the man, but how is it that you know he can't be killed?" "I put four bullets into him, and a good knife. I like to died from what he done to me. Took me all of a winter to get back on my feet and that whoreson was walking around good as new not a week later," Cole explained. "I ain't the only one, neither. He ain't filled the graveyards of Covasna, but he's for damned sure making a try at it." "Am I to understand that you survived an attack by Mister Brasolic?" the elderly doctor asked. "You are unless you're callin' me a liar," Cole responded. "And did Mister Brasolic... bite you in the course of his attack?" the doctor pursued, carefully, as if he was afraid Cole was going to disappear in a moment. Cole snorted. "Bit me, clawed me, punched me. He ain't human I tell you, got teeth like... an animal. That's how he fights too." "Remarkable," Doctor McCormac concluded. "In what way, Doctor?" Abigail asked. "People rarely survive such an attack, and I'm not aware of anyone that has ever survived a bite from someone infected with Van Helsing's Disease," he explained. "Aside from the novelty of the situation, what use is this to us?" Abigail asked. The doctor was brilliant but lacked the focused purpose that Abigail had cultivated. She found this a little grating, but something had told her that the elderly scientist was going to prove useful in bringing vengeance to her parents' killer. "Mister Cole has been exposed to the disease and has plainly not been infected. If I could get some of his blood I could isolate the serum and, perhaps, find a way to inoculate people, perhaps even cure them. The man is incalculably valuable." The excitement in the doctor's voice was unmistakable. "How long?" she pursued. The doctor straightened up. "You cannot predict the time such things will take, my lady. A week, a month, years?" Abigail sighed. "A week is what you have, Doctor." "Now hold on!" Cole protested. "He ain't bleedin' me none." "Yes, Mister Cole, he will be," Abigail assured him. "But not excessively." "It's really very safe, Mister Cole, and hurts only a little," McCormac assured him. "It aids me in my project, Mister Cole," Abigail said quietly. Cole swore under his breath, but he nodded. "Over here, Mister Cole, take a seat," the doctor gushed, enthusiasm for his project plain in his every line. Abigail sipped her tea. *** Abigail, though she wouldn't say it aloud, was concerned for Doctor McCormac's health. And his sanity. The man had pushed himself relentlessly for five days, sleeping in little naps and eating only when he stopped to consult his notes. He'd torn equipment apart to build new equipment and the little steam turbine that powered his makeshift laboratory was running round the clock. He'd insisted he was fine, however, and close to a breakthrough. He'd taken yet more blood from Cole and was certain he'd succeed in properly extracting the serum. She wasn't certain he was correct, and she wasn't certain she'd made the right decision in allowing him to try. He looked like he was working himself to a collapse and possibly taking Cole with him. She couldn't have that, both men were necessary. She found the door to Cole's room open and entered. The man was nowhere to be seen and neither was his 'servant'. Abigail's lip curled as she remembered the woman. A slave from the Ottoman Empire, without a doubt, and Cole permitted her to cover herself in their fashion. Abigail had disliked her from the start, though the woman was at pains to keep her distance from Abigail. She saw the open doorway leading to the closet and walked in. "Cole?" she called. But the room was empty. She turned to walk out and saw Cole's servant run from the bathroom. The woman was as naked as the day she was born, Abigail realized. She started to walk out of the closet, but Cole emerged from the bathroom in the same state as his servant. Embarrassed, Abigail remained in the closet and stepped behind the door. The quick movement didn't prevent her from getting an eyeful of Cole. 'He's enormous!' was the thought that rose unbidden to her mind. Struggling for a moment with her morals, she applied her eye to the gap between the door and the frame to observe. Cole was not a particularly tall man, but he was broad and built like a bull. Abigail had labeled him a brute after the first day of associating with him and that appellation described his manners and form well enough. Now that she could see him unclothed, she found her assessment still accurate. What caught her eye, despite her wishes, was the large male member that rose from between his thighs. Abigail remembered the portraits of Priapus in the Roman ruins of Pompeii, and blushed to remember sneaking in with two other friends while the guard's back had been turned. Cole was not as ridiculously large as Priapus, but the comparison was closer than she'd thought possible. Cole's wife was laying at the edge of the bed and had drawn back her knees and spread her legs. Her sex, Abigail was shocked to see, was completely bare. She blinked and then Cole was obscuring the sight, standing between her legs and pushing into her. The woman moaned loudly in delight and then Cole's hands were at her breasts, roughly kneading at them, fingers rolling and pulling at her nipples. Abigail wondered what that felt like, idly imagining the sensation before she could clamp down on the thought. Cole was pumping into the woman like a steam piston, and with the same amount of compassion. Each thrust audibly slapped against the woman and rocked her body on the bed. She was repeating something in a language that Abigail didn't recognize, but the tone was clearly that of pleasure. Her own hand, she discovered, was between her legs, pressing through the layers of garments and circling firmly. She bit her lip in anger, frustration, and desire. Taking a step back into the closet she lifted her skirts and plunged her hand down the front of her drawers. It passed through the soft pubic down and she began to slowly stroke, circular motions that fanned the warmth in her loins and caused her breath to come more quickly. She heard screaming from the room and looked up to see Cole's wife writhing in the throes of ecstasy. Cole, it was plain to see, was not finished. When his wife had calmed somewhat he withdrew from her, his cock dripping, and flipped her over, taking her from behind. Abigail was astounded, 'Surely he spent himself at least once! How is he still able to perform?' She realized that her stroking had fallen into the rhythm of Cole's thrusts and felt a moment of shame that a sudden orgasm swept away. Gasping quietly, she shuddered within the privacy of her hiding place until she was calm again. Cole's wife screamed through another orgasm and then Cole threw himself onto the bed, laying back and watching as the woman fellated him. It was lewd, Abigail thought, but also strangely exciting to watch the woman lap their commingled fluids from his rampant member. She watched in fascination as the woman's tiny hands rapidly stroked Cole while her mouth encompassed as much of him as she could. When she suddenly pulled back, Abigail wondered what had happened, a question answered by the sight of Cole fountaining into the air while his wife, giggling, tried to catch his seed in her mouth. Cole made a comment that Abigail couldn't catch and then rose from the bed, walking back to the bathroom. His wife, thighs and face sticky with his seed, followed him in. Quickly, Abigail took advantage of her opportunity and slipped from the closet and fled the room. *** Abigail absently rubbed at her arm as she waited to descend the steps. Doctor McCormac had assured her that the irritation of the injection would last only for a week and, in truth, most of the bruising had healed. The fever had faded as well and it was likely she was simply imagining the little twinges she sometimes felt. Irritated by her own behavior, she shook the feeling off and stepped carefully down the stairs onto the platform. Covasna was the biggest city in this part of Transylvania, but it was little more than a large town. 'Not so large, really,' she thought. The city had been over-run several times within living memory, a victim of the nearly constant border warfare and cycle of invasions between the Austro-Hungarians and the Ottomans. Every building was stone, a miniature fortress in its own right, and they were packed cheek and jowl. "I have secured our luggage, my lady," Radigan informed her. "Thank you, Radigan," she replied, pulled out of her reverie and back to her plans. "If you will engage a taxi for us we can proceed to our lodgings." They had to settle for two horse drawn carriages as Covasna was too remote for steam cars, much less steam turbine cars, to have found their way there. *** Settling into the rented house had taken several days. Her instructions about not needing a staff had been ignored by the agent. This, she found out from Cole, was because the staff had bribed the agent. They had done so because they made money renting space in the servants quarters to lodgers who paid a pittance for a relatively warm space on the floor and out of the elements. Evicting the servants had meant evicting the lodgers which had caused something of a scene. That was unfortunate, but necessary. Unpacking the equipment and testing everything had taken two days. Professor McCormac's traveling laboratory and medical equipment had taken another day to set up. The explosive charges had taken yet another day, but Abigail had not begrudged that time; it had even been informative. Cole, it turned out, had been both a miner and a soldier at points in his past and knew more about explosives than Abigail had been able to learn. It was difficult to work side by side with the man. When she looked at him she remembered the sight of him ravishing his wife, as he apparently did several times a night from the sounds which emanated from his room, and remembered her own actions on that day. For his part, he was insufferable. The liquor had to be locked up or he'd be at it at all hours, and his gaze was, frankly, all too knowing. He appraised her body every time he encountered her and his grin made it plain he'd enjoy ravishing her, too. Yet he kept his distance and carried out his assigned tasks with an efficiency matched only by his insubordinate attitude. He'd found Brasolic by the simple expedient of drinking in a number of bars until he found one where someone remembered him and his fight. Brasolic, it seemed, had come up in the world and was able to maintain a large house by Covasna standards, in a better part of town. He'd also come up with a plan for drawing Brasolic out of his little fortress. True to the man's nature it was simple and brutish, but effective. *** The last flaming bottle went into a basement window and Cole walked nonchalantly down the street. When the first call of "Fire," rang out he stopped and turned, as a bystander would be expected to do, and then ran back down the street towards the house. He joined the crowd of people forming themselves into a line and passed buckets of water from a position where he could watch the house. When he spotted Brasolic he simply carried his bucket forward and threw the contents into an open window. Then he approached the man. Brasolic turned his eyes from the fire and gave Cole a withering look and asked a question in a contemptuous tone. "I'm hurt, Miklos. Just plumb hurt. I thought I'd made more of an impression on you," Cole said sadly. He saw the man's eyes narrow and then Brasolic jumped as though he'd been stung by a wasp. His hand reached around to the side of his neck and pulled a dart from it. As he regarded it Cole heard the muffled thump of another dart striking him. The man snarled and lifted his hands to attack Cole, but he fell to the ground. "He's fainted!" Cole pointed out to another bystander in his best Hungarian. "Must be the smoke. Help me get him to a carriage and we'll take him to a doctor. Quickly now." Abigail Forsythe Ch. 01 Two other bystanders pitched in and the four of them quickly loaded Brasolic into a nearby carriage. "To a doctor!" Cole cried out. Radigan, who didn't speak a word of Hungarian, whipped the horse into motion. *** "I'm glad to see you are at last awake, Brasolic," Abigail said. "I was rather afraid the good doctor had miscalculated the amount of curare needed to sedate you. That would have vexed me. My name is Abigail Forsythe and you killed my parents, Lord Reginald and Lady Florence Forsythe. Why did you do that?" "They annoyed me," Brasolic said in heavily accented English. "You have angered me. I will rape you to death for this." "I rather doubt that," Abigail disagreed with him. "This is Mister Cole, who you already know. He helped me set the explosives in this house. And this is Radigan, who served my father and now serves me. Radigan is holding the control that will allow him to blow this house to God, or Satan. And this is Doctor McCormac, who is very excited to meet you. You are in his laboratory and he has some questions to ask you." "I will tell you nothing." "My good man, I believe I may be able to help you, perhaps even cure you. If I am able to do so I might be able to prevail upon her ladyship to spare your life. She plans to kill you, you know," the doctor protested. Brasolic laughed. "Cure? I am a god! What sane man would wish to give up this power? Better that you kill me than turn me back into food like you. I remember your mother," he said to Abigail in a voice dripping with malice. "She was pretty, so I did not kill her at once. I turned her and made her my willing slave. She sucked my cock and licked my feet and came to my heels when I snapped my fingers. She killed your father at my order; she sucked the last drop of blood from his body while I fucked her like the bitch she was. And when I tired of her..." His smile was the epitome of evil and McCormac took an involuntary step backward. Abigail, without any visible emotion, pulled a switch next to her hand and the steam turbine whooshed to life. Brasolic felt the result but couldn't tell what was causing it. Then his eyes caught sight of the glass vial that was rapidly filling with blood, his blood. He screamed and thrashed at the restraints to no avail and his struggling grew weaker and finally ceased. When the blood stopped flowing into the jar, Abigail broke the connection and turned away from the corpse. "We'll leave tomorrow morning," she announced. "You have until then to take your samples and do your dissection, Doctor. Mister Cole, you will remain with the Doctor while he works and ensure that Brasolic does not revive somehow. When the doctor is done, cut Brasolic's head off and put it into the jar the doctor has prepared. Radigan, please begin packing." "My lady," McCormac protested, "I needed him alive to test his responses to stimuli. His eyes, I needed to see if he displayed a sensitivity to strong light as Mister Cole does and...." he trailed off as he saw his words were addressed at Abigail's rapidly retreating back. "The information I could have had," he moaned. "Less talkin' and more workin', Doc," Cole advised. *** There was express train service to Covasna, but not from Covasna, which Abigail thought reflected an entirely disturbed sense of priorities. The local service stopped at every small station, sometimes for hours, as passengers disembarked and boarded and freight was loaded and unloaded. "Faster to go by carriage," she muttered. "But not as safe, my lady," Radigan commented. Abigail nodded in agreement. The railway was protected by Imperial soldiers while the roads were, at best, protected by local militias who were often indistinguishable from the bandits they hunted. "I should have let the doctor have his time, Radigan," she said. "Perhaps, my lady. But he has his samples." "I let him goad me," she confessed. Radigan remained silent for a moment. "Perhaps it's better this way, my lady. You gave him a better death than he allowed your parents. This is... cleaner, I believe." Abigail nodded. "Perhaps. Why haven't we moved yet? The platform is quite empty of passengers and has been so for the last five minutes." "Completely clear, my lady?" Radigan asked with concern. "Yes," she replied, a worry taking root in her own mind. Sudden gunfire erupted from down the hallway and she heard Cole yelling something and his wife screaming. Radigan pulled a revolver from his pocket and pressed it into Abigail's ready hand. With a knife in his other hand he approached the door to the passageway from one side while Abigail aimed the revolver at the door. She heard the crash of glass just before she felt herself being pulled backwards, through the broken window, by impossibly strong arms. She had a glimpse of Radigan's shocked face looking towards her as the door to the compartment burst open and two men fell upon him. The revolver was smacked from her hand with brutal force as she was dragged out of the train station and into a carriage. A moment later Cole's wife was thrown in beside her, wailing in terror. An explosion from the direction of the train spooked the horses and they bolted while the driver tried to bring them back under control. *** Cole wearily kicked the door off and stood up. The dynamite had demolished a good half of the car and the rest of the woodwork was smoldering as it worked its way up to a genuine blaze. He emptied the spent shells from his revolver and thumbed more rounds into it before making his way forward in a search for survivors or foes. He found Doctor McCormac, his throat ripped out, sitting in a puddle of his samples. Radigan he found a few moments later. The big butler was bleeding all too slowly from obviously mortal wounds. When Cole tried to staunch the bleeding the man opened his eyes. "They took her," he croaked. "Jasmina too," Cole said. "McCormac's dead." "Save her," Radigan ordered. "Reckon I might give that a try," Cole told him. "I'm a might peeved at these folk. Don't worry none, Radigan, I'll save her or I'll see you soon. Save me a spot close to the fire." The butler's laugh turned into a choking cough and then ceased entirely. Cole closed Radigan's eyes and took a look around. The far end of the train car had caught fire and the dry wood was burning merrily. Outside he saw a crowd beginning to gather. He crawled down the passageway back to his compartment and grabbed his pack of gear. "Time to absquatulate," he muttered. *** The driver, it seemed to Abigail, had given up on controlling the horses and had settled for guiding them in their madness. The repeated crack of the whip, however, suggested that he habitually drove in such a manner. She and Cole's wife were tossed about by the rough roads and the laughing men in the carriage seats helped matters along with the occasional kick. After what felt like hours the carriage skidded to a stop and the door was thrown open. The men in the carriage pushed them out, and into the arms of others waiting outside. Abigail looked around and saw that they were in the courtyard of a castle. It was lit by torches held by men and women dressed in black clothing; they followed as Abigail and Cole's wife were dragged into the castle and down a set of stairs into the basement. The crowd took it in turns to rip a portion of their clothing from them, and by the time they were each chained to a wall they were completely nude. Laughing, the men and women left and took the light with them. Abigail squatted down, wrapping her arms around her legs to try and conserve body heat, while she tried to think of a plan. Nearby, she could hear Cole's wife sobbing quietly. 'I told him to get rid of her,' she thought irritably. *** The door to the room crashed open and naked men carrying torches poured in. Abigail stood on shaky legs, determined to meet her fate with courage, but the men simply unlocked the manacles and herded them out of the room and through the castle. In a large room a long, black carpet flanked by still more naked men and women led to a raised stone dais at the far end of the room. A man in black robes reclined on a throne of skulls surrounded by naked women. The crowd pushed them along the carpet until, at last, they stood in front of the man. He regarded them coldly, 'Like a snake,' Abigail thought, and then gestured. She found herself knocked to her knees. The man addressed Cole's wife in a language that Abigail didn't recognize but guessed to be Turkish or Arabic. She replied tearfully in the same tongue. The exchange went on for several minutes and gave Abigail time to look around. The women around the throne were examining them with hungry eyes and when one them licked her lips, Abigail shuddered. "And you must be Lady Abigail Forsythe," the man said. Abigail looked up at him. "I am," she replied. The man chuckled. "I was so very upset with Miklos when he killed your parents. Your father, perhaps, but your mother... That was not at all what I wanted. I had planned to kill him for that when the time was right. But now you have done the work for me and given me my entry into England. We'll have to educate you, of course. Did you really have to blow up the house with Miklos' body inside it?" "Not really. I'd already had his head cut off and placed in a jar of acid. But it seemed prudent to be safe. I didn't want to leave trash lying around," she replied. A few hisses behind her told her that she was treading on dangerous ground. "You will need to learn some manners, too, it seems. I enjoy teaching manners, however." He stood and left his robe on the throne. He padded forward on bare feet, his erect cock bobbing between his legs. "You will come to enjoy it," he promised. Abigail, despite her fear, responded bravely. "Good heavens, I employ men who are better endowed than you." The smile on the man's face broadened. "Your Mister Cole? I do hope it's Mister Cole. Because Doctor McCormac and your man Radigan are both dead. Only Cole remains to mount the heroic rescue attempt. He's on his way, you know. I think we'll arrange to play a little joke on him when he arrives." The laughter that swept the room washed over Abigail from a dull distance. The news of Radigan's death seemed to have stabbed her heart with an icicle and it filled her with remorse, for she'd led him to his demise. The shriek from Cole's wife snapped her back to the moment and she saw that the man had fallen upon her. His cock was buried inside her and his mouth was at her throat. The shrieking went on, but the timbre changed, from fear to... passion. As Abigail watched, the woman shook in what seemed like a continuous orgasm that rolled on and on. Then the man withdrew from her and stood. He smiled at Abigail, his mouth bloody. "Watch," he told her. "Your turn is next." Then he turned his attention back to the woman trembling on the floor before him. "Suck, my slave. Taste my seed." Slowly, unsteadily, the woman rose to her knees and took him into her mouth. Abigail saw the women from the throne crawling forward, gathering in a pack around his feet, licking their lips in anticipation. A moment later she understood why, as he filled the woman's mouth and then overfilled it. The women rushed forward, lapping at the edges of Cole's wife's mouth, at the underside of the man's cock and balls, at the heavy drops falling to the floor. Chuckling, the man left the women to their efforts as he approached Abigail. She tried to flee, but the crowd formed a wall of flesh that pushed her toward him. Then she felt his hands on her ankles and he flipped her over onto her back and was over her and then in her, his cock tearing through her virginity. His laughter filled the room. "Virgin blood, my pets! Come, taste," he called and withdrew from her. The women rushed forward, Cole's wife with them and began lapping at the blood between her thighs and streaking the man's cock. Warm tongues seemed to cover her sex, to fill it, while lips pulled at hers. And then the women scattered into the crowd, sharing the blood with those who sucked at the traces around their mouths. The man lowered himself onto her again and his cock forced its way deep inside her. The moment of dull pain was replaced by a sharp pain at her neck that made her gasp and her entire body stiffened. Then her blood seemed to boil with lust and she screamed in pleasure. The divine torture lasted for longer than she could imagine and then it was gone and there was only a deep need to have it again. "Suck, my pet," she heard and saw his distended cock in front of her. A distant part of her protested even as her body crawled forward and her mouth engulfed him. The more of him she took, the better she felt, and the harder she sucked. She could feel the other women gathering around and when he erupted into her mouth she felt their tongues again at her cheeks and competing for a greater share of his seed. His seed seemed to tingle in her mouth and filled her belly with a warmth that spread throughout her body. When he pulled away from her and stalked to his throne she felt... empty. "Go back to the cell," he ordered. "We'll let Mister Cole come and find you. When he rescues you, kill him. After this is done, we will discuss your role in advancing our interests in England." "Yes, master," Cole's wife replied. Abigail was silent and felt the man's eyes boring into her. 'Something's wrong,' she thought. Desperate to shift the suspicion that seemed to be falling upon her she blurted, "Please, master, I beg for another taste of your cock." The man chuckled and then laughed, all trace of suspicion vanishing from his face. "No, my pet. Not now. Obey my every command or it will be a long time before I allow you that privilege again. Go." "Yes, master," she remembered to say. She crawled after Cole's wife, down the black carpet and through the crowd that parted like a sea before them. Her mind was racing. 'I felt no compulsion to obey him,' she thought. 'Why...? The serum! I wasn't immune to the lust he engendered, but perhaps it prevented him from gaining control over me. That means...' She darted a glance at the woman crawling next to her. "I am Jasmina," the woman said. "You saw Cole when he fucked me. I saw you leave. You did not want to come and join us. How amusing that together we will end his life and serve a truly strong master." Abigail forced a smile to her face. "Yes, very amusing." 'You've got to go,' she thought darkly. *** The castle hadn't been hard to find after Cole had offered his first informant a chance to tell him where the vampires were. If he did, then Cole promised to beat him up a little and leave. If he chose not to tell Cole where the vampires were, then Cole promised to put a large sum of money on the table and thank the man loudly. It had been a bluff, Cole didn't have any money to speak of, but it had worked. Transportation had been somewhat more difficult, but it wasn't the first time Cole had stolen a horse. The act had been somewhat nostalgic, in fact. And once he was within ten miles of the castle he couldn't possibly miss it. He'd pressed on, riding on the road as far and as fast as possible in the belief that it would take him days to negotiate the wild terrain on either side of the road. Time was key if he was to have a hope of saving Abigail and Jasmina. Not that he had much hope, but he was going to try. He'd cut the horse's throat as far from the road as possible to keep it from wandering away and then trudged into the mountainous terrain. The walls of the castle had appeared unguarded, so he'd simply climbed up and over. Once inside he headed for the basement in the hope that vampires would have dungeons the same as normal people. *** Abigail heard the door open and saw Cole's face. The relief that appeared there was strangely touching. He walked in and closed the door behind him. "My love!" Jasmina exclaimed. Cole turned to look at her. "Hang on a minute, I'm gonna have to cut the chains," he said and turned to set his pack down. "It's a trap, Cole! Don't turn your back on her!" Abigail snapped. Cole whirled as Jasmina leapt and there was a muffled explosion as she crashed into him and a large hole appeared in her back. Cole pushed the body off and Abigail saw the smoking carriage gun in his hand. "Thanks," he grunted. "Guess we're divorced." Abigail, despite the situation, laughed, and then she saw the gun was pointed at her. "He bit me," she confessed, showing him the bruising at her neck. "Raped me as well. He did the same to Jasmina. But I think the serum Doctor McCormac made from your blood changed something. I didn't feel any compulsion to obey him. And I did warn you," she pointed out. Her hands undid the unlocked manacles to add additional weight to her argument. "Reckon that's so," he agreed. He dropped the carriage gun, which hung from a cord looped around his shoulder, and extracted a bundle from one of his pockets. A match flared and he held it up to the fuse. "Ready to run?" he asked. "Of course not," she replied as she gathered her feet beneath her and nodded. Cole tossed the makeshift grenade out the door. Shouts of alarm were drowned out by a wall of noise and Cole was out the door before the shrapnel had stopped pinging off the stone walls. His shotgun fired once and then he knelt to light another grenade. Abigail, spotting movement behind them, snatched a revolver from Cole's waistband and emptied it into the two vampires trying to sneak up on them. Another explosion announced that Cole had cleared another segment of hallway and she dashed after him, emptying the spent cartridges from the pistol as she went. Two more grenades got them to the courtyard and Cole was giving her a hand up onto one of the horses. Bareback they galloped out of the courtyard and down the road. "We'll have to rest them soon," she shouted at him after five minutes. "We can't kill them." "They will," he said, gesturing vaguely behind them. "But maybe we won't have to. Just a bit further." She watched, fascinated, as Cole leaned out over the side of the horse and stretched his arm out. She'd ridden all her life and, despite the danger of their situation, she was fascinated by his display of horsemanship. He swung upright after a moment with a branch in his hand and kicked his horse, spurring it forward. Behind them, the weight he'd restrained with the branch fell to the ground and a length of wire stretched itself taut above the road. The vampires barreling down the road after them barely had time to recognize the danger before they were upon it. It didn't hurt them, except for the one who snapped his neck on the ground, but it tumbled the horses into a pile of broken limbs and necks. It effectively ended the mounted pursuit. *** "Tell me something, Cole," Abigail said. "Why did you buy Jasmina?" "Well..." Cole began. It occurred to him that the time for delicacy had passed. "I've always been a mite... randy. But it had gotten real bad. Workin' around you, I figured I'd need someone to take the edge off." "That's what I thought," she said. "I think we need to go to Mercury for a time." "We?" he echoed. "Mercury?" he said as the second part of the statement registered in his brain. "Mercury," Abigail confirmed. "Unless someone has managed to map a route to Jupiter it's the farthest we can get from these creatures. That seems rather a good idea to me at the moment. Doctor McCormac also mentioned that he had a colleague who shared his interest in vampirism. He works in the Russian enclave on Mercury. I should like to consult with him." "Well.... I'll allow as how that makes sense. But why 'we'?" he asked. "Because I suspect I'm afflicted with the same hyper-sexuality you suffer from," she told him. "I've been raped, have lost my virginity, and have ridden bareback, in every sense of the word, for several miles. I should be in agony. But all I can think of at the moment is that there had better be some sexual relief at the end of this ride or I'm going to become the first woman in history convicted of rape. Besides, your salary will be excellent." Abigail Forsythe Ch. 01 "Benefits?" he asked puckishly. "A few," she allowed. TO BE CONTINUED... Be sure to look for the next exciting adventure: Abigail Forsythe and the Aetherships of Mercury.