Chapter 8

Nikola started spending his days with Freddie the following month. They hunted together, and their little breakup routine got better and better until the women would flat out go to Freddie in a record of around 2 minutes or so. Freddie complimented Nikola and called him the best partner for a hunt possible. He also started calling him buddy. It was good to have a friend again, Nikola reasoned to himself. Even if the main activity they did together was run a con to kill people.

Freddie had started upping the hunts and reverted to stealing pin codes and wallets from his victims, He explained to Nikola that he had refrained to do so the first time so Nikola wouldn’t stop hunting with him. But as they hunted every day together and Freddie was running out of money, he started stealing again.

He dumped half of the money and cards in Nikola’s hands without asking, engraving the pin codes in Nikola’s mind. Oh, sure, the banks will cancel the cards as soon as the corpse was discovered, but until then, Nikola had money of his own, and it was really liberating not to have to ask Dimitri or Malkav for simple things like clothes and candy making supplies.

 One day, as they were coming back from a hunt, they passed a jewelry shop. Nikola had started to take out as much money from the cards as possible and then depositing them in his new bank account that was made with the fake id Malkav had made for him.

Deciding to go and check it out, he went inside, and immediately a ring took his attention. It was definitely for a man, but it looked delicate. It had fern carvings on the sides and a flower in the middle. A smiling Dimitri suddenly came to mind. It would suit the vampire’s look, if not his demeanor. God forbid, Nikola delude himself that Dimitri was either nice or delicate.

He called the clerk and had the ring packed, then he stopped in his tracks. Did he have to get something for Malkav too? It was easy to decide for Dimitri. The blonde had taken his joke about them being married too far and had put his name with a dash together with his own on Nikola’s new ID. He behaved like a husband too, always demanding but with the occasional nice gesture to spice things up.

But what of Malkav? His sire wasn’t like Dimitri. He didn’t speak constantly of a dark, twisted love. If anything, what the two shared was more of a profound understanding of the other’s needs. It was hard not to when their existence was literally linked to the other.

Did Nikola want for Malkav to treat him the same, as Dimitri did? He could do without the obsession and the false sweetness. Still, he slept with the man, fed from his vitae, took his lessons to heart. In a sense, Malkav really was his lover. But Nikola didn’t want him to be a third wheel. He liked him better than he did Dimitri, and it might have been the blood talking, or maybe he was losing his mind, but he couldn’t imagine a day without him.

Thinking that, he noticed a ring that was carved up to resemble a clock. It didn’t have any gentle carvings like Dimitri, but then again, Malkav was not a gentle soul, and he wouldn’t appreciate any frivolities. Deciding to get the ring for his sire, he had it bagged by the clerk.

“Anything else we can interest you in, mister Popescu? We have fine bracelets for sale, made with platinum as well as gold!”

He thanked the overeager clerk but declined and exited the shop. The git Dimitri must have known that people will use the last name in the line from now on, when he had that dash put. Nikola wondered if Dimitri would ever stop marking his territory. Probably not.

When he reached his apartment, he separated from Freddie and entered it quietly. He was nervous. How was he to present the two vampires with rings? How does one go about admitting to his captors that he enjoyed playing house with them?

Dimitri was putting the finishing touches to his sorbet in the kitchen, and Malkav was reading a heavy tome on the couch. They both looked so peaceful. Nikola regretted not having a camera to capture the moment. His heart sped up in his chest and he attempted to force it to stop, so it could stop fueling his blush with the blood of his most recent victim. It didn’t listen to him.

There was another thing that had changed for him ever since he started adding human blood to his diet. While it had taken some effort before to appear alive back when he only drank from Malkav and ate sorbets now it was as easy as well…breathing. He couldn’t even stop his blood from fueling the process, and that forced him to feed from both Malkav and Dimitri, even though he already drank with Freddie.

Moreover, he felt hunger for blood candy and ate his sorbet with a hunger that made Malkav attempting to steal some of it quite difficult. That in turn tickled Dimitri’s pride. Nikola licked his lips and felt saliva pool in his mouth at the thought of the delicious sorbet that was now being sprinkled with cacao powder, yet again another thing that vampires could digest safely.

He went first to Malkav and extended the small red box to him. Dimitri noticed them and ran towards them to complain why he wasn’t receiving anything, when Nikola put the small black box in his hands and retreated to the kitchen to eat his sorbet.

He hid his face when he heard Dimitri’s giggle. He wanted to avoid looking towards the living room. No, definitely not. Dimitri slanted towards him with Malkav in toll and took away his sorbet just as he was about to dig in. Instead, he placed his ring in Nikola’s hand and looked expectantly at him.

“Well, won’t you say anything, Niki? No, “With this right, I pledge my love now and forever.” No “I want to fuck tonight so consider this a hint.” You just ran off to hide with your sorbet. Niki, romance is not done half through. You have to place my ring on my finger, just like I placed yours on you. Now, dazzle me!”

  “Dimitri I…” Began Nikola nervously. What does he say? I like you? He didn’t like Dimitri. He still remembered the trauma the man caused him while still alive. I bought you the ring as thank you? For what? For taking over his life and being the main cause, it was over? I desire you? Now that hit the nail on the head.

He did desire Dimitri and Malkav. And it wasn’t just the blood talking, since he had experienced the blood bond with Malkav in the beginning, and this wasn’t the same feeling of painful obsession. And no matter how much blood Nikola consumed, the obsession had lessened, so he couldn’t even blame Malkav’s ring on that.

But if he blurted out that he only wanted sex, he would get only sex. He realized he wanted more from Dimitri. He wanted the man to make love to him for once, instead of simply fuck him. He wanted for Dimitri to just agree to cuddle him once he got home from his hunts and ask him what his day was like. He wanted beautiful Dimitri to be as pretty on the inside as he was on the outside.

But that was impossible. Dimitri didn’t feel emotions, he understood and faked them. As far as the vampire was concerned, Nikola’s gift probably lead him to believe that he had the masochistic urge to be prey again. His dear morsel. But Nikola didn’t want to be viewed as something, he wanted to be viewed as someone.

“I just wanted to do something nice for you. Here, let me put the ring on you. Do you like it?”

He placed the ring on Dimitri’s finger, and the blonde hummed appreciatively at it as he looked it from all angles.

“Oh, it’s a bit too delicate for my liking. You seem to still be harboring some illusions for me, but that is my fault. I spoil you rotten. But now that you gave me a ring, I feel like a newlywed. This sorbet is coming with me to the bedroom and if you don’t get your ass in there I’ll eat it myself instead of feeding it to you with my tongue. Time runs, my dear glutton, I’m waiting in bed.”

With that, Dimitri took his delicious sorbet with him and walked calmly towards the bedroom. He hadn’t expected anything else, and yet he was still disappointed. Meanwhile, Malkav also extended his finger towards him and pushed the unopened red box in his direction with his free hand.

Deciding to put a bit more effort in the gift giving process, he placed a gentle kiss on the tip of Malkav’s finger before putting the ring on. It suited him. A clock made of gold that didn’t show time for an immortal vampire.

“Do you want me to tell you why I got you the gift too?”

“I can sense why, childe. And I’m not so cruel as to tease you by pretending a lack of knowledge. I’ll have the documents drawled up and take your last name. Your gesture moves me, now come to the bedroom before our sorbet gets eaten.”

“Ours? You think that Dimitri will feed you some of it too?”

“I’ll steal some of it from him, just like I steal it from you every day.”

With a predatory smirk, Malkav turned around and went to the bedroom himself. The bed cricked and Nikola was put out of his thoughts. They were starting without him. And Dimitri had the gall to say that romance was wasted on him! With a heavy sigh, he got up and went to the bedroom to join them.

The next morning, Nikola woke up feeling refreshed. He was all sticky from when Malkav had accidentally spilled the contents of the sorbet on him as soon as he got naked to eat it up. Nikola had felt like a lollipop when Dimitri joined in too and began licking the sugary treat from him.

He had gotten to all the trouble to get them rings, and he had ended up with his sorbet stolen. Bastards, both of them. As he slowly untangled himself, Dimitri stirred and bit his sticky flesh.

“We’ve been eating my sorbets all wrong all this time. You are the perfect plate for them.”

“I didn’t get to have any, though. Why don’t you start making a separate sorbet for Malkav? You know he likes sweet things.”

“But Niki, Malkav enjoys stealing from your sorbet in new and original ways, and it’s so fun to watch you two battle over my cooking that I think you will just have to keep sharing with your dear sire. Now be good and lay back down. I want another round.”

“It’s light outside, Dimitri. My days are my own. And I don’t want to spend the whole day having sex. I actually like going outside and getting some fresh air.”

Dimitri pulled him down with more force than necessary and straddled his legs. Then he bared his fangs and slowly ran them on the length of Nikola’s neck.

“Niki, your little deal about your days was made with Malkav. I never agreed to it. Now be a good morsel and spread your legs for me.”

With a sigh, Nikola did just that, and then he breathed in a labored breath as he was entered and Dimitri began to gently rock them.

“What do you have planned for today, Niki?”

“I…ah, I just wanted to spend the day with Freddie. He is a good friend and he…Dimitri, did you really have to bite me?”

“Finish what you were going to say, dear morsel.”

“He has been introducing me to other Malkavians. Its, ouch. There is a difference between love bites and what you are doing, you know?”

“Would you like a love bite from me, Niki?”

“Would it kill you to be gentle, Dimitri?”

“Sweet Niki, you want gentle, but you enjoy the bad.”

That was followed with Dimitri quickening the pace and trusting deeper into him. It was painful. It was turning him on.  Dimitri was driving him insane. He felt fingers in his hair and turned to the side to see Malkav staring at him. Dimitri laughed a mocking laugh and began whispering in his ear what he should do with his free hand and the Antediluvian’s cock.

Nikola couldn’t take it anymore and orgasmed at the filth that was streaming into his ear. Dimitri kept going in and out of him and whispering as he began kissing his earlobe between whispers. He should have known that when Dimitri meant another round, he didn’t mean just one. He whined deep in his throat, and suddenly Malkav was guiding his hand down to his groin and getting close to his other ear to make his own demands on how he should be treated.  Nikola whined again.

He was finally released from the two at about noon. After showering and getting the last of the sticky sorbet out of his skin, he dressed warmly as it was winter outside. He didn’t know why, but the cold still bothered him, even though he shouldn’t feel it.

Was something wrong with him? Were there any vampire doctors that could check up on him? Then he remembered that vampires were all bastards and that one was more likely to open him up with a scalpel than actually do a full check up on him.

He went to Freddie’s and knocked on the door. He was let in easily, and he noticed how Freddie was watching a YouTube video of a couple having sex in a cat scan. He raised an eyebrow at the vampire’s strange choice of pornography, and Freddie was fast to defend himself.

“It’s just that my walls are very thin, you see? And I can hear what you three do back in your apartment loud and clear and this morning I was watching an anatomy lecture, and then you started moaning and saying some very interesting things, so I got curious on the inside picture of coitus. Then I found this very intriguing video on YouTube. It’s with kines and it lasts 50 minutes. Would you like to watch it together with me to compare notes on how coitus is different with only males as participants? I couldn’t find a homosexual experiment, no matter how much I looked.”

Nikola blushed at that and hid his face into his hands. Darn Freddie and his curiosity. And darn the fucking walls that didn’t do their job.

“No! I came here to take you out for a hunt in the park. There are supposed to be more street performers than usual because its nearly Christmas. We can even visit the Christmas bazaar. What do you say?”

“Eh, Nikola. You know that us “breaking up” every day for me to act as bait is just an act, right? I don’t want lord Malkav to do a diablerie on me once he finds out that you took me out on a date. I’m too young for a Final Death.”

“It’s not a date!” Began to defend himself, Nikola. “It’s just a friendly outing and a hunt. If we could still drink beer I’d suggest going to a pub but well…”

“Ok, ok. We can go. Let me just save this video for later watching and grab a coat.”

The day with Freddie was spent well. They found a con artist who was selling false charity tickets and cornered him near a bar where they played drunk for a change and dragged the unconscious man to the back alleys. Then they visited the bazaar.

Nikola ended up picking all kinds of Christmas decoration and a tree for the apartment. He wanted a bit of normality, and he doubted that Malkav had any Christmas things back at the apartment, so he got everything. Freddie was very amused at his enthusiasm and helped carry the things back home.

Once he was home, he began to decorate the apartment with gusto. His two lovers weren’t there, so he went to his laptop and put some Christmas music on repeat. As he was busy putting the star on the tree, he didn’t notice Dimitri getting behind him and kissing his unguarded neck.

The blonde then rummaged in his bags with decoration and took a silk ribbon that Nikola was going to use for the door. He then proceeded to put the red silk around his neck and tie it into a bow. Then he rummaged some more until he found the little antlers he had bought on a whim and put them on Malkav’s head with a devious smile and kissed the elder vampire. Nikola’s throat was suddenly very dry at the display.

“So, Niki. Are we going to celebrate Christmas together this year? You know what that this means, don’t you?”

“You’re going to say something perverted, aren’t you?”

“Oh, I was, but then you ruined the mood. Once you are done playing around, come eat your sorbet in bed. There are some things I would like to teach you while you enjoy yourself. I can’t have you act like a blushing virgin forever. It speaks badly about me as a lover!”

With that, Dimitri started humming the carol of the bells and retreated to take away his sorbet to the dreaded bedroom. He stared at the bow around the blonde’s neck and couldn’t help but think how the red matched the color of Dimitri’s eyes.

Malkav, instead of joining Dimitri to the bedroom to start early on stealing away his sorbet, rummaged into the bags and began to help Nikola decorate. When they were done and not even a ribbon was left, Malkav embraced Nikola and danced with him to the beat of the still playing song. They danced until a very amused Dimitri poked his head to watch them and took one of the festoons from the tree and wrapped it around the still dancing pair, slowly guiding them towards the bedroom. An amused Malkav kept dancing with Nikola the whole way.

Christmas day came and Nikola untangled himself from Dimitri after the blonde was finished drinking from him. Apparently, he needed some daylight and so with it, Nikola’s blood.

He took a shower with Malkav, who didn’t give him much of a choice. The man had put on the reindeer antlers again. They made him look cute in a way that Nikola hadn’t expected possible.

Today he didn’t go to Freddie’s but went outside with Anna who, despite being a vampire, seemed to share his excitement for Christmas. The two Malkavians used their powers to put an entire hospital in a state of confusion, so they can rob a blood bank.

Once this was done, they went home with their equally split shared of blood. He had toughed Anna how to properly mix candy, and she had given him the idea on how to make jello figurines from blood. She had even tasted if the gelatin was fine to eat at first too. She was nice and helpful like that.

Although she did say she had tasted it on her lover as punishment for him cheating on her, and had tested so many things on him that the poor man had ended up just quietly heaving over a toilet bowl as he was force-fed human ingredients. Ok, maybe she wasn’t so nice, either. Maybe one day he would find a genuinely good vampire out there. One day.

Once in the kitchen, he got to work. He made minty Christmas tree candy. Candy canes. Santa and Satan, the latter mostly as a joke, candy figurines. He made cookie like figures from jello in the shape of gingerbread men and placed some of them below the three together with a glass of blood with herbs. Was there a vampire Santa? Or was he actually summoning Satan? He chuckled at his thoughts. Either Malkav or Dimitri would eat up the offerings. Gits.

Then he took out the dry chicken spices and made a big block of jello. He made a couple smaller ones and put them in the freezer to tighten faster. Then he mixed the food coloring and left them in the fridge. Thereafter, he looked around to check if either of his lovers were lurking somewhere, and he took out two packages from the back of his side of the wardrobe and placed them below the tree.

Malkav and Dimitri probably didn’t get him anything, but it didn’t matter. He was going to have a proper Christmas even if it meant Final Death, and proper Christmas meant giving presents!

He had gone back to the jewelry shop from last time and had gotten the two matching medallions with compartments for pictures.  He was sure that Dimitri will paint something small for them to put inside. For now, he put two cute little figures of reindeer inside. It had been hard finding such small figures, so the two better appreciate them!

Oh, who was he kidding? Dimitri will mock him for the gesture, and Malkav wouldn’t understand it. Still, he liked his idea way better than leaving the two compartments empty. And it followed in the Christmas spirit. And since he no longer had a family to celebrate properly with, he guessed that Dimitri and Malkav would just need to bear with his excitement for today.

While he waited he, in a tradition from time immemorial, watched a Christmas chick flick on Netflix. His mother would always make him watch them, even though as a child, he had only wanted to watch Home Alone this time of year. That and horror movies. But he didn’t need a horror movie anymore. They looked bleak and uninteresting to him now. So, he might as well honor his mother.

Thinking of his mother, he couldn’t help but wonder if she set out a plate for him even though he wasn’t there to eat it. Was she going to visit his fake grave? And with who was his father going to go shopping for the ingredients for the dinner this year?

 His back had hurt his dad a little from the bags, and that was when he did have help carrying everything. Now that he was alone, he would probably bring his mother along, and she wouldn’t have time to prepare some of her dishes that she made every year. That was a pity.

He checked his clock and found out that the jello should be about done. And it was. He took it out and gently sculpted a roast chicken out of the light-brown jello. Then he made vegetables of the various other jellos. The corn pieces were the trickiest as they were so small, but he managed to make enough of them to make the illusion of a varied and very full plate.

Then he opened his last bag of blood and put it in three equal glasses, and then he put the herbal syrup he made yesterday to lessen his workload a little into them and mixed them. He then took some ginger and sprinkled it over the vampire version of, well, cold cacao.

He then set the plates. Lit the candles and breathed in the gentle scent of mint and vanilla that was coming from them. His mother always placed Christmas scented candles on the dinner table for the holiday. She would giggle like a little girl and stalk his father with a mistletoe while their scent waffled across the house. Nikola had found it annoying at the time. Now he could only smile sadly at the memory.

Once the table was set he sat down to read from the Encyclopedia Vampirica which he had gotten out of curiosity. Vampires really shaped history around them. He was still at the A’s when the door opened and Malkav and Dimitri entered.

He didn’t notice them, at first, as they were both quiet, and he was too engrossed in reading. Then he heard footsteps approach him, and he looked up. Dimitri was looking at the table and then back at him. He had a bouquet of roses with holy mixed in. Malkav was carrying what could only be a stuffed reindeer plushy.  So, they had gotten him presents. He felt an odd flip in his stomach at that.

Without talking, Dimitri placed the flowers in his lap and went to make himself a plate from all the sweets and salty jello that decked the table. Malkav followed his lead and deposited the plushy right next to the flowers. He kept sniffing the air, and then he noticed the candles, and then his blank expression turned to one of confusion. So, he really didn’t understand such gesture. Nikola brought the plushy closer to himself and hugged it. He didn’t imagine how one can live like that.

“Won’t you two open your presents? They are beneath the tree.” Said Nikola once he found his voice. An unreadable expression passed on Dimitri’s face as he was still making plates for them. He didn’t tease him at his statement and instead let the knife down on the table and went to the tree. With shaky fingers, he gently unwrapped the package that had his name on the card. He then opened the medallion and the reindeer figurine fell down from it.

Instead of stepping on it as Nikola expected, he picked it up and begun to inspect it as if it was made from diamonds. Nikola couldn’t understand what was happening. Why wasn’t he teasing him and calling him a fool? Then Dimitri put the medallion around his neck and murmured in a barely audible manner on how he needed a special painting for it. Judging on how quietly it was said, Nikola thought to himself how it wasn’t for his ears and that the vampire didn’t even know he said it.

Then he got up and went to finish making the plates, while Malkav unwrapped his medallion and began to play with his figurine. He would throw it in the air and then catch it and smile every time he did so. So, someone liked his idea. That was good to know, at least.

They had dinner in silence. Each filling themselves with candy. His two lovers were awfully quiet. Neither of them spoke as they both ate. They did compliment his cooking though by cleaning their plates' thou. Then, when they were done, Dimitri opened the fridge and took out his signature sorbet.

He took a small spoon and brought it to Nikola’s lips. Malkav was about to steal a lick when Dimitri didn’t let him as he usually did and hoisted the spoon in the air and unreachable for the Antediluvian. Then he sent Malkav a look, and the vampire must have understood something from it, as he moved back into his seat and began to watch as the spoon once again made the journey to Nikola’s lips.

Nikola didn’t understand why Dimitri was behaving so strange. He could almost call him soft at this moment. Nevertheless, he opened his mouth and ate his spoonful.  Then Dimitri gave the spoon over to Malkav and instead of the vampire helping himself to the sorbet, he replicated Dimitri.

The two vampires took turns feeding him until the sorbet was all eaten up. Then Dimitri scoped him up from his seat and brought him to the couch. Neither vampire made to kiss him, and they just placed him between them and hugged him while watching a movie.

 Nikola didn’t know when, but he fell asleep like that. When he woke up he was still on the couch, unmolested and still in his clothes from yesterday. Malkav was resting his head on his shoulders and hugging his arm, while Dimitri was making soft circles on his hand.

The TV was turned off and the two must have spent the whole time just sitting there. Dimitri actually smiled at him when he saw him staring at him with a dreamy look on his face. Then a camera snapped, and he finally noticed how there was one placed just above the TV. Dimitri was holding a small laser in his hand. He winked at him when he saw him looking down at it. Huh, so that’s how this trick was made.

Nikola made to get up, but he was squeezed gently by Malkav. Dimitri kissed his hair in a deceptively gentle fashion and turned on the TV to watch Christmas movies. They must have turned it off when they noticed how he had fallen asleep. It was very thoughtful of them.

Figuring out he wasn’t getting away anytime soon, he relaxed and begun to think on the situation. What had he done right to be rewarded with consideration? Was it the food? Sure, it had taken a bit of effort, but he made such treats for the two vampires every day. Maybe not in such big quantities, but they should have gotten used to it by now.

Was it the decoration? He could still smell the candles in the air. Their scent mixed well with the scent of his lovers. He smiled to himself and then felt another gentle kiss and another snap of the camera.

Why had Dimitri chosen to pick this moment to use the camera? Then with sudden clarity it hit him. Dimitri was an artist. He understood emotions. Sure, he didn’t do them himself, but he understood them. Then Nikola understood himself why he had put all the effort into the perfect Christmas.

He was guided by an emotion he shouldn’t be feeling while held captive. He had felt happy while cooking not because he was making candy, but because of who he was making the candy for. He gulped and admitted it to himself.

 He felt love towards his captors, and that was what Dimitri was capturing with the camera. Something about his expression must have given up his thoughts because Dimitri used the laser to make another photo. He had seen that Nikola knew. He now knew that he had gotten what he had wanted from the start. The gentle smile spread on Dimitri’s face further. And Nikola dreaded to think how the revelation will be used against him.