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The Vampire District 4

Owen’s Promise

Frederik Fenrir is a noble vampire, and his affair with the servant
Owen has been discovered. Because of this, Owen is sold to a cruel

mage while Frederik is helpless to follow. His older brother does not
understand that Frederik loves Owen, and the moment he is able to
escape, he sets off to rescue his lover, abandoning his family forever.

Owen didn't know he was part of the fae until the mage told him.
Apparently fae pieces make for powerful potions, and the mage Alden

intends to harvest Owen's organs to enhance his powers.

Frederik quickly rescues Owen, and they both find themselves on the

run, hoping to make it anywhere safe while the humans revolt against
the vampires, and Alden gathers his army to track them down. Owen

and Frederik are not able to move quickly, however, because the fae
can become pregnant regardless of their sex, and Owen is carrying
Frederik's child.

Genre: Alternative (M/M or F/F), Paranormal, Vampires/Werewolves
Length: 37,754 words

OWEN’S PROMISE

The Vampire District 4

Marcy Jacks

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MANLOVE

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OWEN’S PROMISE
Copyright © 2013 by Marcy Jacks
E-book ISBN: 978-1-62242-757-4

First E-book Publication: April 2013

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Letter to Readers

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OWEN’S PROMISE

The Vampire District 4

MARCY JACKS

Chapter One

Because Owen was a slave, he was not permitted to so much as ask for

the privilege of seeing his ill lover. He may have been the one who found
Frederik and saved his life by calling the man’s brother and then speaking
to a guard, but he was still just a servant, and Frederik was a lord.

Their affair was suspected, if not passed around as common

knowledge among the other staff members, but to outright announce
himself as the one Lord Frederik shared his bed and body with would be
suicide.

And Frederik hadn’t called for him yet either, despite how he was

spending more and more time awake. One of the other servants even said
they saw him walking around his room, testing the strength of his still-
weak muscles.

Owen tried to not let it get to him that another servant had been

permitted to enter, especially considering a servant had been the one to
poison Frederik in the first place.

He thought of Frederik’s warm touch against Owen’s skin, how it

made him shiver. The way the man‘s mouth looked whenever he used it to
torture and tease Owen‘s cock. Owen had learned to do the very same
thing, taking Frederik’s prick into his mouth and using his lips and tongue

8 Marcy

Jacks

on it until the man was gasping and coming, simply by watching Frederik.
The man was an excellent teacher. He wouldn’t be doing those things with
another servant, would he?

He told himself that even if that was the case, it didn’t matter. The only

thing Owen cared about was that Frederik was alive and well.

Thankfully, Lord Frederik’s older brother, Lord Daren, had come to

the vacation house where all of this drama had taken place, and the man
was running the household and the servants smoothly, even if he stared at
them all with suspicious eyes. Owen most of all. He’d been the one to find
Frederik. Why would Lord Daren suspect him of trying to poison the
man? The poisoner had already been captured and executed, and because
he had been a borrowed servant from the Romonoff house, every other
servant from that house had been dismissed and sent on their way. Which
meant the house was woefully understaffed, and Owen was working on his
nineteenth hour of being awake and working.

The only thing he had to fill his thoughts with was Frederik. He

thought of their last night together, how his recovery was moving along,
and whether or not he would finally call Owen to him tonight.

If Frederik really was feeling better, perhaps he would. It had been so

long since Owen had felt his touch that he was being driven to insanity.
Even when Owen stroked himself, it didn’t help. He wanted that physical
confirmation that Frederik was not only in good health after his ordeal, but
that he also still cared for Owen.

He’d been so wrapped up in those thoughts that he stubbed his toe on

the doorway and dropped the heavy basket of wet laundry he’d been
carrying all over of the floor of the basement where the washer and dryers
were kept.

That alone wouldn’t have been so bad if Marge hadn’t been there to

see it.

She was a bigger lady with a round face and poor eyesight, but despite

that, she was a master at finding faults and pointing them out.

Owen’s Promise

“Jesus bloody Christ, Owen! Those were the tablecloths! Look at

them! They’re on the filthy floor and will have to be washed again. They
won’t be dry in time for the lordship’s dinner.”

Just the word dinner made Owen’s stomach rumble. He’d been much

more hungry than usual lately, which was likely due to being overworked
and under-rested. He was burning through his energy too quickly.

He ignored the pain in his foot and bent down to pick up the still-

sopping-wet tablecloths. The washer was broken so it didn’t properly
drain, which meant that Owen and another servant had to wring everything
out before it could go into the dryer. “I’m sure it’s not that bad,” he said,
then lifted one of the white tablecloths to have a look and saw that it
indeed was that bad.

It was like the wet, white cotton material had soaked up every bit of

dust and sand that hadn’t been swept off of the cement floor and was now
staining the cloth an ugly brown color.

“What do you call that?” Marge ranted into his ear as she bent her

large body over his shoulder to have a closer look. “It’s all splotchy!
You’re taking the fall for that, not me!” she snapped.

Owen groaned. He wasn’t used to working for Lord Daren, so he

didn’t know what to expect as far as punishments went.

Owen had worked for masters who would punish this sort of offense

with a harsh whipping on his back, while other masters would simply deny
him an evening meal.

Neither were options he wanted to deal with.
“I’ll put them back in the water,” Owen said. “Maybe I can get the dirt

out without wasting another hour.”

Marge actually made an angry growling sound in the back of her

throat. Sometimes he swore she was half werewolf or something, what
with the way she growled, ate, got angry, and just everything in general
that she did.

“Better hope you can. I’m not taking the fall for this. The last thing I

need right now is to miss a meal.”

10 Marcy

Jacks

“I’m hungry, too, you know,” Owen said, quickly losing his patience.

Marge was large and liked to think she was in charge, but she wasn’t the
head server. She was on the exact same step on the social servant’s ladder
that he was.

“Wouldn’t know it to look at you,” Marge said with a sneer, and her

cloudy blue eyes frowned at him from top to bottom.

Frederik had always kept Owen well fed, but now that he was out of

commission and recovering, it wasn’t like Owen could go to his room to
share a meal with him before going into bed with the man. Frederik had
always been generous like that. Sometimes they didn’t even have sex,
though that was what Owen did look forward to. They would just eat and
lie together. Frederik had even taught Owen how to read, and one of his
favorite pastimes was reading those erotic romances to his lord while they
relaxed in his large and comfortable bed.

Usually, it was reading such explicit things that made his cock stir, and

Frederik would smile and reach for him. Stroking his dick, kissing his
throat and drinking his blood, all the while thrusting his own erect prick
against Owen’s hip. Perhaps that was the real reason why Frederik enjoyed
those tales so much. They did tend to get the both of them in the mood.
Not that they ever needed the help.

It was during those times when Owen could trick himself into

believing that he wasn’t merely another servant that Frederik wanted just
to warm his bed at night, and he’d become spoiled under the attention.
There had been a time in his life when he could go for a few days without
food and still work just fine. Now, even though he had managed to grab a
small sandwich at lunchtime, he felt like he was about to fall over from
exhaustion.

He stayed silent as Marge dished out her verbal abuse for having time

wasted on her, and together they attempted to clean off the dirt and small
rocks from the sheets before they set in.

He wasn’t aware that anything was wrong with him until he suddenly

became short of breath, and he fell backward into a black void.

Owen’s Promise

* * * *

Frederik stared down at his evening breakfast with distaste. He didn’t

know what it was, but lately, everything had lost its flavor. It might’ve
been something to do with the fact that he’d been poisoned in some weird
takeover scheme by the other noble vampire families. The Romonoffs in
particular.

Damned Ignor Romonoff and his hoard of bastards.
They’d tried the same on his older brothers, Daren and Tristan, the

latter of whom was the head of the Fenrir house. Still, if all the brothers
were dead, then that meant the other families could divide the assets of the
house, their share in the blood market, the servants, all of it.

He didn’t much care about the hows and whys of it. All he knew was

that he hated how sluggish his muscles were, even a week after he’d been
rescued from what should have been imminent death.

And he missed Owen.
“You need to eat something,” Daren said.
Frederik glared at the man. “I’d have an easier time if you weren’t

hovering over me all the Goddamn time.

Really he just wanted his brother out of the house so that he could

invite Owen back to his rooms. He’d barely seen the other man since that
night when he’d woken up feeling worse than he had in his entire life, but
at least he’d been out of the danger zone.

Owen hadn’t looked so great. It could have been because he worried

for Frederik’s life, which Frederik childishly liked. Or that gray tone on
his skin could also have been a by-product of some type of torture.

When Frederik had asked, all Daren would tell him was that he’d had

the servants questioned, and Frederik hadn’t had the chance to speak to
Owen since his brother’s arrival.

12 Marcy

Jacks

After what had happened with Tristan and his servant lover when they

were found out, Frederik wasn’t willing to risk Owen’s life by revealing
they were lovers. Even though he was pretty sure Daren suspected it.

Frederik liked the other man too much for that. He also loved his

brother, but he really wished the man would get back to the main house
instead of hounding Frederik so that he could check up on Owen.

Owen was a gentle sort of man, and Frederik liked having him around.

He also liked the taste of his blood, and for whatever strange reason,
Owen liked being fed from. He actually got sexual pleasure from it, and
there was nothing Frederik loved more than having Owen come hard
while Frederik’s fangs were in his neck or thighs. Sometimes Frederik
didn’t even have to touch his cock for that reaction to come about. He just
had to bite him.

“That’s a rather stupid smile on your face. What are you thinking

about?” Daren asked, folding his arms in the seat across from him and
smiling.

Frederik yanked himself out of the little fantasy world he was just in

and shook his head.

“Uh, nothing. Nothing at all,” he said, maybe a little too quickly,

because Daren frowned at him.

Fuck. Did he know? There was no way he couldn’t know.
“Frederik, you and I need to have a little talk,” he said.
Fuck! He did know. “Daren, it’s not—”
Frederik was cut off before he could say anything more by the

untimely arrival of that scraggly mage who’d helped to pull most of the
poison out of Frederik’s bloodstream.

The man had burst in on them. A servant girl scrambled behind, clearly

trying to stop him, but he moved right up to their table and stared down at
the both of them.

It seemed that mages didn’t hold noble vampires in the same regard as

others did. Maybe he was just so powerful that he wasn’t afraid of the idea
of being locked away in the basement for presuming to barge in on them.

Owen’s Promise

“You didn’t tell me that one of your servants was a member of the

fae.”

“Fae?” Frederik asked, looking over at his brother.
“Yes! Fae! What in the hell is one of their kind doing in your

basement!”

Alden, if Frederik recalled the man’s name right, was quickly building

a name for himself as something of an eccentric who was used to making
demands and getting his way. As one of the few mages roaming around the
vampire district, selling his wares and his magical talent, Frederik guessed
he’d earned that right.

Daren put his coffee cup down on the table and frowned at the man.

He didn’t rise from his seat, however.

“No one in this house is part of the fae,” he said, then turned to the

servant girl, who was shaking like a leaf behind the man. “What is the
meaning of this?”

Her shaking increased tenfold, and Frederik shook his head and

sighed.

“Brother, you’ve just had some of the servants executed and a lot more

banished from the house. You can’t speak that way to the rest of them if
you expect answers.”

Frederik reached for the cane that was leaning on the small, round

breakfast table beside his seat. He’d needed the thing ever since getting up
for the first time from his sickbed.

He hated his reliance on it, but he swallowed down his annoyance at

having to use the thing and focused on calming the girl.

He stood up and crooked his finger for her to come forward, making

sure he looked like the picture of patience and forgiveness. Maybe if he
was kind enough to her, he could convince her to deliver him messages
about Owen’s well-being and health later on.

He put his hand on her shoulder when she finally stepped forward.

“You’re not in any trouble, my rude brother is just curious if you know
what our guest is talking about.”

14 Marcy

Jacks

“Frederik,” Daren said. There was a warning in his voice, but Frederik

ignored it.

The servant girl nodded and swallowed hard before speaking. Alden

just threw his hands up and started muttering to himself.

“One of the men downstairs fainted, my lord. Marge tried to wake him

by splashing water on him, but he wouldn’t get up. I fetched your guest
here—I’m sorry that I did it! He said he would look at the man for free—
and he came down and saw him.”

Just that she’d said the word man made Frederik worry that perhaps

they were talking about Owen.

He shook the thought away. It couldn’t be him. What reason would

Owen have to faint? He was perfectly healthy, the last time Frederik had
seen him, and he wasn’t the kind of man who was prone to fits of terror
that would knock him out.

“What did this man look like?” he asked, suddenly brutally aware of

the burning sensation on the back of his neck as Daren stared at him.

It wasn’t exactly normal for a vampire lord, even a youngest son, to be

asking questions like this. He wasn’t supposed to care about the servants.

The young woman blinked. Apparently, it shocked her as well that he

would ask.

“He’s a servant, my lord,” she said, in case he hadn’t already figured

that out.

“Yes, but what did he look like? Who is it?”
Daren chose exactly that moment to get to his feet. “I’ll speak with the

both of you in another room. My brother is tired.”

“I’m well enough to be here when there’s a problem with the

servants,” Frederik snapped, causing the young servant girl to back away
from him.

Shit, he’d pulled his fangs out. If Daren only suspected that he had

something going on with Owen before, he must know it for sure by now.

Daren glared at him. Frederik glared back.

Owen’s Promise

He was a younger son, however, and though the number of brothers he

had was smaller than before, thanks to that attack from the werewolves, he
was still as low on the hierarchy as ever.

“The both of you, out. We’ll have this conversation in another room.”

Daren was already moving toward the door. Frederik hobbled after them,
wishing that the muscles in his legs weren’t so damn stiff.

He no longer cared about being polite, or hiding his relationship with

the servant. He needed to know if it was Owen they were talking about.

“Daren, don’t you dare keep me in here!” Frederik bellowed, but

Daren had the servant woman and the mage out of the room, the door
slamming shut behind him, before Frederik could get to him and wring his
neck.

The sound of the lock sliding into place from the other side of the door

was the thing that really sent Frederik into a rage. That dirty bastard was
carrying keys to the doors? Frederik was going to kill him for this!

He pounded his fists against the heavy, painted wood, but vampire

homes built so close to the border were made to be reinforced. There
would be steel inside of the wood, and the locks would be just as strong.
Frederik wasn’t going to get this door off of its hinges. Not when he was
as weak as this.

That servant girl didn’t have the chance to tell him just who was ill

down in the basement, but there was something in Frederik’s gut that told
him it was Owen.

The mage had said he was a member of the fae. Maybe that was what

sent the alarm bells off in his head. Owen always did have a sort of
ethereal quality about him that Frederik couldn’t resist. He found the
man’s blood to be delicious, and Owen was always eager to have Frederik
drink from his vein, which was another anomaly humans weren’t exactly
known for.

Mages also loved getting their hands on the fae people. They loved

chopping them up and using their body parts and blood in all sorts of
potions and poisons, and if Alden wanted Owen while he was trapped in

16 Marcy

Jacks

here, there would be nothing Frederik could do about it. He hadn’t felt this
helpless since the werewolf uprising when he’d been forced to watch his
father and older brother being torn apart right in front of him. Only this
was worse. His father and eldest brother had both been pricks. He actually
cared about Owen’s well-being.

He pounded his fists on the door until the wood splintered and chipped

away, leaving nothing but the metal that had been reinforcing the door.
Frederik couldn’t break through that, and no matter how much he
screamed, no one came to let him out.

Owen’s Promise

Chapter Two

When Owen opened his eyes, the room swirled around him, and he

had the nauseating sensation that he was about to puke. It didn’t go away
immediately, and he felt something surging up his throat.

He rolled over and heaved over the side of the bed. Someone cursed

and jumped away from him. Marge was definitely in the room, but it was
strange that he was in a room at all.

He couldn’t recall anything, and his brain didn’t want to think, not

when his stomach and throat were currently the stronger things on his
mind.

He puked again, the scent and taste of his own vomit just making it

worse and bringing the urge to be sick on him even stronger. Eventually, a
large metal bowl was placed under his face, and he grabbed it and started
being sick in that while a pair of hands hurriedly cleaned up his vomit
before it could stain the carpet.

The servants’ den didn’t have carpet, and the beds weren’t as soft as

the one he was currently lying in.

Even when he finally stopped bringing stuff up, his stomach, chest,

and throat still all constricted, and Owen kept the bowl under his face in
case something did come up.

“The poor dear. I told him he was working too hard, but he kept on

pushing himself. Said he wanted to lead by example. He wanted to serve
the masters with me like he should.”

Marge again. Clearly she was kissing up for a reward of some kind if

she was making up that sorry shit. Though, why she would assume to gain
some kind of reward by telling a story like that was beyond him. Unless

18 Marcy

Jacks

Frederik was in the room and he was openly showing some kind of
concern.

There were soothing hands rubbing his back and pulling his hair out of

his face, now that he noticed.

It was a long shot, but Owen looked away from the bowl he’d lost the

little food he’d eaten to and saw the face of that old mage, the one who’d
come to save Lord Frederik with his magic. He was sitting on the side of
the bed beside Owen, and he was looking down at him as though he’d just
discovered a prize of some kind.

Lord Daren was standing at the foot of the bed, ignoring Marge’s

ramblings as she cleaned away the vomit, and he stared down at Owen
with his arms crossed and a calculating look on his face.

“You’re absolutely sure he’s part of the fae? I didn’t think they got

sick.”

Fae? What were they talking about?
“What are you—” Owen tried asking them what was happening to

him, what they were talking about, but just opening his mouth and
speaking brought on another round of vomiting.

“It’s a product of his condition, my lord,” said the mage. Owen wished

he could remember the guy’s name. “Likely as well, at least partially,
brought on by your brother’s recent sickness, if their relationship is
anything to go by.”

Owen felt his insides go absolutely cold. Another round of sickness

was held off entirely by the fact that he was suddenly staring up at both
men with the worst sort of fear twisting inside of him like a snake.

Lord Daren had a similar look on his face. His body was stone-statue

still, and his eyes were wide. “Get out of here, right this second,” he
snapped suddenly at Marge.

She liked to pretend she had a little influence in front of the other

servants, but she was still trained as a slave, and without hesitation or
question, she picked up the soiled rags and bucket she’d been using to
clean away Owen’s vomit, and she quickly left the room.

Owen’s Promise

When the door was shut behind her, Lord Daren was still careful to

keep his voice low. He knew that she was likely pressing her ear against
the door, hoping to hear something.

“Now, you listen to me, mage, my family had suffered enough. Name

your price to keep this silent, and be gone with you.”

“Very well. My only price is him.”
Owen had to speak. He had to defend himself before he was sold and

never saw Frederik ever again. His tongue felt thick in his mouth, and his
voice scratched at his throat. “My lord—”

“You stay silent,” Lord Daren snapped, pointing a long finger in his

direction. Then he looked down at the old mage, who was still brushing
Owen’s hair out of his face. He turned away, hoping to get the man to stop,
but then he just kept on rubbing Owen’s back. “This is your price? What
do you intend to do with him?”

“Does it matter? I’m offering to remove something that would only

cause your family grief and embarrassment. You do not want a pregnant
fae in your household carrying the bastard hybrid of your brother, do
you?”

Pregnant fae? Frederik had gotten some other fae woman pregnant?

When did that happen?

Both men in the room continued to talk about this mysterious woman,

and about Owen, as though he wasn’t even in the room. The strange thing
was the way that the mage continued to stare down at him every time he
mentioned the half-breed fae and vampire child.

Maybe he and the other servant woman would be traveling together.

Getting both of Frederik’s lovers out of the house was likely the only thing
that Daren could think of doing now that his brother’s indiscretions had
been found out.

It really shouldn’t have hurt Owen so much to know that he wasn’t the

only one Frederik had been calling to his bed, and the fact that this other
woman was pregnant, and Owen would have to see her and travel with
her…

20 Marcy

Jacks

That was going to make for some awkward small talk. His eyes burned

with tears, but that was only because of all the vomiting he was doing, or
so he told himself.

“My intentions are not your concern, my lord,” the mage eventually

snapped, and it was that which pulled Owen out of his self-pitying
thoughts.

For the first time ever, Owen saw a look of uncertainty pass over the

face of one of his lords. Lord Daren stared down at him as though he was
entirely uncomfortable with being there. “I simply want to make sure that
you won’t take the child and cook it in a potion or something. Frederik
will never forgive me if I were to release his…well, this servant into your
care and your intentions with him were foul.”

“What would make you think something like that?”
Lord Daren actually snarled at the mage in the room. “I’ve heard of

your kind and what they do to the fae. Not that I’ve ever before cared, but
never has one been in my house before, or pregnant.”

“Let me assure you, my lord, that those are all superstitious stories,

and that none of my people care for them. I intend to study the boy, yes.
The chance to fully observe such a phenomenon up close is a once-in-a-
lifetime opportunity. The only hardship he will suffer in my care will be
helping me to pick my herbs while his belly gets rounder. If that’s even
how this works for them.”

His. That mage had said his belly gets rounder. They were talking

about him as though he were the pregnant one.

“My lord, who is the pregnant fae female?” Owen asked, quickly

before he could be told to be silent again.

Lord Daren’s face actually turned a shade green, and the mage’s eyes

widened with absolute delight. “I see even he isn’t aware of how this
works! You see, it’s better if he comes with me. I’m the only one who can
give him the care he needs to come to term. He could very well die before
having the chance to give birth if he stays within these walls, which your
brother might insist on if he knows the truth.”

Owen’s Promise

They really were talking about him. Owen had fallen unconscious and

woken up in a strange land where nothing made sense anymore.

He had to set it right. He tried to sit up, as quickly as possible, but that

only brought back his nausea, and he turned over the bed and grabbed for
the bowl so he could start heaving into it.

For God’s sake! He was sick! Not pregnant! Couldn’t those two see

that he was a man? Frederik had once told him he was pretty, but Jesus
Christ!

He couldn’t much make out what else Lord Daren and that hateful

mage were talking about. Owen just wished the guy would take his hands
off of him. He did catch the part where Daren gave his last order to the
man, right before he left the room.

“You have an hour. Get him ready. For God’s sakes, give him

something so he can stop puking all over the place. I want the both of you
out of here. I’ll let my brother out of his room in a few hours, but then you
both should be long gone.”

“Yes, my lord,” said the mage, still rubbing soothing circles on Owen’s

back.

He finally managed to stop being sick just long enough to look up at

him and be disgusted by his brown, decaying teeth as he smiled down at
him.

“You’re mine now.”

* * * *

Daren was on his way back up to the second floor of the vacation

house. He couldn’t believe all this bullshit was happening. First the
werewolves revolted in the main house after Tristan had been found out
with a werewolf lover, and they had killed his father and older brother,
leaving Tristan in charge and angry at the universe, and now, because
Frederik was the kind of idiot who didn’t learn lessons from other people’s
mistakes, he’d gone and started an affair with a servant as well.

22 Marcy

Jacks

Daren had suspected, but he hadn’t approved of it, but the only reason

he didn’t mention anything was because the servant in question was a
male, and supposed to be human.

The humans didn’t have the strength that werewolves did, so there

wasn’t much of a concern about a rebellion from the human servants.
Also, last time Daren checked, men couldn’t get pregnant, so there was no
risk of producing bastard half-breed heirs.

No. It couldn’t be that simple. The guy had to be a member of the

damned fae, and according to that mage down there, if Daren even heard it
right, they didn’t have males and females in the traditional sense of the
word.

Ugh, he didn’t even want to think about it.
He just wanted to get back and check on his brother.
The man was still screaming through the door, and the thing was

vibrating as he slammed his fists into it. Clearly he couldn’t be let out yet.
Daren still had to figure out what he was going to say to the man to make
him forget that the servant even existed.

There were some servants in the hallway, dusting, or just pretending to

do some work so that they could gawk at the door and whisper to each
other about what they thought was going on. They hadn’t even noticed
Daren at the end of the hall.

He was about to demand that they get back to work when his phone

vibrated in his pocket.

He gave a quick look back to the door, but despite the show that was

going on, it didn’t look like Frederik would be breaking free any time
soon.

He headed back down the stairs and pulled the cell from his pocket.

The only other person in the world who had this number right now was
Tristan. He would throw a fit if Daren told him that his youngest brother
had been seduced by a servant, and that he’d impregnated that servant. He
might even think that Daren was playing a joke on him when he

Owen’s Promise

mentioned the part where the servant was a man, or, at the very least, a
creature that looked like a man, but was capable of reproduction.

Maybe he would just keep it to himself and deal with it on his own.

Tristan had gone through enough hell when his werewolf lover betrayed
him.

Daren put the phone to his ear. “Hello?”
It was Tristan’s voice all right. “Are you both still at the lake house?”
“Yeah, and Freddie’s getting better, if that’s what you’re calling for.

Needs to walk around with a cane though since the poison fucked up the
nerves in his legs. He’ll eventually be fine, we think.”

“Both of you get home now,” Tristan said, not even acknowledging

what Daren had just said.

That wasn’t like him at all. All of his calls had been nothing but

worried checkups on Frederik’s health and progress.

“Did you hear what I just said?” Daren asked.
“Did you hear me?” Tristan snapped. He had become more like this

ever since their father and eldest brother were killed. He was likely just in
an even worse mood than usual.

“The Delany house was attacked by a bunch of humans from some of

the free villages.”

Or he’d gotten some bad news about one of the other noble vampire

houses. “I’ve got servants and vampires coming here looking for shelter.
That house you’re in is barely a day away from there on foot, if those
humans are walking.”

“And if they’re even coming in this direction. They might be heading

back to wherever they came from now that they’ve sent their message.”

Not too long ago, Tristan was engaged to be married to one of the

Delany vampires. That vampire in question, however, ran away from
home, and was apparently captured by a band of humans.

When the Delany nest retaliated along with Daren’s father, pretty

much all of their assassins were killed, and both families were left almost
entirely without protection.

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Jacks

Guess the humans thought that would be a good time to strike.
“I don’t care. I’m not risking either of you. Pack up your shit and get

back here. With all the added servants this house is at least safer, though
the two vampires who came are preparing to leave already.”

“Where would they go?”
“Don’t know, but they‘re not noble. They‘re just tenants who were

living on the land, and they don‘t feel very safe here with almost no
guards, and I don‘t feel safe with you there.”

He was right. Frederik was angry, but he still wasn’t at a hundred

percent. If anything, this might be just the sort of situation to help him
forget about that servant who bewitched him.

He could give Tristan the details when he got back home. Tristan

wouldn’t know if he waited at least an hour or so before leaving. He still
had to give that mage time to get off the property with that slave he
wanted so badly.

Now more than ever Daren was glad he’d made that deal. Humans

wouldn’t attack other humans unnecessarily. The servant would be safe on
the road with Alden. Safer than he would be if he stayed in a house of
vampires that may or may not be about to face attack.

“I’ll be back as soon as possible,” he promised.
“Almost all the Delanys are dead. There’s only a few left according to

the people I spoke to, but they’re missing and were last seen pretty badly
injured.”

Maybe he would cut down that time limit of his and leave the house in

a half an hour. He was going to have to tell Alden to hurry up and go.

“Understood. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Stay safe.”
Daren hung up, blew out a sigh, and ran his hands through his hair. Of

all the fucked-up things to happen. Humans picking a fight with the
vampire nobles. He didn’t see that one coming.

He went downstairs to tell Alden that he had to leave pronto, then he

was going to have to give some bad news to his brother.

Owen’s Promise

Chapter Three

Frederik only stopped yelling when his voice grew so hoarse that his

throat swelled and ached. He stopped pounding on the door when he felt a
crack somewhere in his hand.

His legs were feeling pretty weak again, and he had to take a chair and

sit.

Kill him. He was going to kill Daren when he got out of here.
He was surprised when the metal lock on the door clicked. He would

have shot to his feet if he’d had the energy, but instead he remained sitting
while Daren opened the door a crack, surveyed the destroyed room, and
then let himself inside.

It had maybe been only forty-five minutes or so since he’d last seen

his brother, but it had felt like a lifetime, and Frederik was angry.

Daren closed the door, and to Frederik’s annoyance, he locked the door

behind him as well.

“Afraid I’ll run out?” he said with a sneer, and then because his cane

was still in his hands, he tossed it at his brother’s feet. “Can’t run very
well anymore, remember?”

“Yeah, look, Freddie, I have some bad news…”
Aching body or not, Frederik shot to his feet. “If you hurt him—”
“What? No, I didn’t hurt the servant. Jesus, Freddie, what the hell were

you thinking? After what happened with Tristan—”

“Tristan was having an affair with a werewolf. Owen’s human. That’s

different.”

“How so?”

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Jacks

“Because Father isn’t around to have him whipped and sold, and even

if he was, the humans wouldn’t rise up and try to take revenge like the
werewolves did.”

“Then why did you hide this? If you were so convinced that this

wasn’t a bad idea, why not tell Tristan or me?”

“Because I knew Tristan would overreact after what happened. I didn’t

think you would,” Frederik said. He clenched his fists tight, wanting so
badly to go over there and punch his brother in the face for what he was
doing to him.

“Well, humans can be prone to wanting revenge as well, especially if

they think they’re being used,” Daren said.

“I wasn’t using him!” Frederik snapped, enraged that Daren could

even suggest such a thing.

“No? You were in a position of power over him. How do you know if

he didn’t want it or if he was just trying to please his master?”

“He did want it,” Frederik insisted. He thought back to all the times

he’d been with Owen. Sure there had been shyness in the beginning, but
Frederik hadn’t pushed him for sex. He didn’t think he had. He liked his
partners willing, thank you very much.

Still, the seed of doubt had been planted, and now Frederik found

himself frantically searching through all of his memories for any sign that
Owen had been less than willing, and maybe just doing the things he’d
done because he knew it would make Frederik happy.

No. That couldn’t be right. Frederik didn’t always ask for sex anyway.

Sometimes they would just lie in bed together, and Owen would read to
him some of his books. That was a favorite pastime of theirs. Just because
reading those erotic stories tended to get the both of them hard and ready
for each other, usually followed by Frederik turning the man onto his
stomach and pounding him into the mattress, didn’t mean a thing.

“Just tell me what you did with him,” Frederik demanded, a surge of

fear lodging deep inside of his ribs where he couldn’t get it out. That other
servant girl had said that he’d collapsed. “Is he okay? Is he sick?”

Owen’s Promise

Daren looked more troubled than Frederik had ever seen him. It was

right up there with that look he’d carried around on his face after their
father and brother were both murdered in front of them.

“Did you know he was a part of the fae?”
That again. “No! I always thought the fae were…I don’t know, maybe

smaller? More in tune with the forests or something. I’ve never even seen
a faery before.”

“Alden suspects that he might have been a half-breed. Fae apparently

have this habit of looking neither male nor female. He was fair enough, I
suppose, but he definitely looked like a man.”

Frederik instantly caught onto the way his brother was using the past

tense when talking about Owen.

“Where is he?” he demanded, his voice a deadly whisper.
Daren licked his lips. “I’m only being so harsh with you now because

you need to know that we have to leave. The Delanys were attacked and
we have to leave for home right away—”

“Where is he? Where is Owen?” Frederik screamed, bringing back the

raw soreness of his throat.

Daren’s eyes widened a little. “Is that his name? It didn’t occur to me

you’d bother to learn it, but I guess that makes sense.”

“Where is he? I swear to God, Daren, if you don’t tell me right now,

I’m going to attack you.”

Just to show his brother that he meant it, he lengthened his fangs,

feeling them slowly slide farther out of his gums and into clear sight of the
other man.

Daren rubbed the back of his neck and looked away for a brief

moment before he would finally meet Frederik’s eyes. There was such an
expression of guilt there that Frederik had never seen before in his life.

“He’s dead. I’m sorry, brother, I didn’t realize you would have cared

so much.”

Frederik stopped listening after Daren told him that Owen was dead.

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Jacks

He shook his head, letting his denial take over as he stepped away

from his brother. His heart began pounding in his ears, and the worst pain
imaginable bloomed in his chest. “You’re lying,” he said. He had to be.
There would have been something, some sign that something more was
off. Frederik would have felt it in his gut if Owen’s heart ever stopped
beating.

“I’m so sorry, brother, but you had to know. There’s no time for us to

stay here. I’ve wasted enough time already.”

“Doing what? What would you be wasting time on instead of letting

me see my sick lover?” This time Frederik did let his anger take over. He
surged forward and grabbed Daren by the collar of his dress shirt and
slammed him up against the wall.

Daren was older, but Frederik always had a bit more bulk than he did.
Daren didn’t so much as blink in surprise. It was as if he’d known

Frederik was going to have this reaction.

“I was dealing with the body. He was put in the pyre with the other

servants who were killed recently.”

The only other servants who had been killed were the ones to be

executed for trying to murder by Daren and Frederik.

Frederik’s jaw dropped as he slowly started to believe his brother’s

words. “You—you put him in a fire with those traitors?”

“Yes,” Daren said. “There wasn’t enough time to make a new one and

I didn’t want to leave his body here and unattended in case the humans
didn’t attack.”

“Didn’t want his body to stink up the house, did you?” Frederik asked

with a sneer. He wanted to collapse on his knees and bawl his eyes out like
a child. He’d always favored Owen, but only now that the man was dead
did he realize just how much he’d cared. To know that he would never
again know his touch, or his kiss...

He didn’t have the energy anymore to hold his brother against the wall.

He released him and backed away. He turned around and hid his face in

Owen’s Promise

his hand, just in case he did unman himself and shed tears. He didn’t want
to do it in front of an audience.

He felt Daren’s hand on his back, and he didn’t even possess the will

to shrug him off.

“He didn’t suffer, brother. Know that, and Tristan would not have

allowed you to keep him anyway. Not after what happened with the
wolves.”

Frederik scrubbed his face with his hands and inhaled a long breath.

“You’re sure he didn’t suffer?”

“I’m sure.”
“Did he ask for me?” He had to know that much. He had to know if

Owen was frightened and wanted him.

“Don’t look for reasons to blame yourself for this, brother. He was

delirious, so he couldn’t have asked for you even if he tried. The mage did
what he could, but I sent him from the house. All the servants are now
packing up. We have minutes before we need to be gone. Tristan will want
us close, and you still need to recover before you can even think about
going into any battles.”

If Frederik was to go into any battles, it would only be because he

wanted to die.

“I–I need a minute. I know you said that time is short, but just give me

one minute.”

Daren’s hand squeezed his shoulder. “I’ll go and see if the cars are

ready. You have one minute,” he said, and then the comforting hand on his
back was gone, and so was Daren.

Frederik could only stand there in complete shock for what he’d just

learned. Somehow, Owen was no longer in the world, but yet things still
needed to be done, to be taken care of. The humans were actually waging
war on them, and all the while, Owen was gone forever.

He bent down and picked up his cane. Funny, his legs weren’t paining

him as much now that he had something else that was so much worse to
think about. He had to see the fire, to see if it still burned. It wouldn‘t be

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Jacks

the same as seeing Owen‘s face one last time, or visiting a grave, but he
could not leave without at least doing that.

The door opened and shut again quickly behind him, and he thought

his brother had returned.

The man really meant it when he’d said only one minute.
When he turned around, he was shocked to see a plump servant

instead.

The woman looked to be about middle age, for a human, with a round

face and hard lines marring her features. He doubted there had ever been a
time in her life when she’d been considered beautiful, but he liked to think
he wasn’t the sort of man who picked his partners solely on their looks.
That had a lot to do with it, sure, but the fact of the matter was that her
very aura that surrounded her, and the downturn of the heavy unibrow on
her face coupled with a snarl that he’d never seen on the face of a servant
before, made her downright ugly.

He was in no mood to be humoring anyone, but then again, maybe she

was another assassin, hiding amongst the servants, and she was going to
try and pick him off with a concealed weapon.

“What do you want?” he demanded, snarling right back at her.
She sniffed at him, looking him up and down with the sort of self-

satisfied snobbishness that would have gotten any other servant in any
other house murdered.

She was definitely on a mission of some kind.
“I never liked the boy much myself. Took too long to do his chores and

has been moping around the house for days already, but I don’t like seeing
good people get sold off and sent away to be all helpless out in the wild
right when there’s a group of humans out looking for blood.”

The woman had his complete attention now. “What are you talking

about?”

“Owen. I was the one who sent Jennifer off to find someone for him.

That mage came, started spouting about the fae, and then he rushed off
without any reward for myself or the girl even though he promised us one

Owen’s Promise

to keep quiet. Left the house in a fine hurry he did, dragging the poor guy
behind him by a leash, like he was a dog.”

He rushed to her and grabbed her by the arms. She squeaked, and for

the first time, real fear entered her eyes.

“Owen is alive? Tell me!” he demanded, shaking her a little. She

squeaked again, and Frederik could suddenly smell blood. He looked
down and saw that his fingernails had actually pierced the flimsy material
of her teal uniform and broke through her skin as well.

He pulled himself away from her. “I’m fast losing my patience. My

brother just told me that he died and his body was put on the pyre with the
traitors who tried to poison me.”

The servant was a tough woman, he had to give her that. She rubbed at

her shoulders and stretched them out a bit, and now the angry look was
back on her face.

“His lordship had us light the fire again for when you left the house

and saw it. The corpses are still in it, and what with you all leaving in such
a hurry, barely making sure the servants will be able to follow, mind you,
he knows you won’t be able to count the skeletons inside.”

It was a solid plan. Daren was a bastard for even thinking he could get

away with something like this, and Frederik couldn’t wait for him to come
back here so he could confront him with this new information.

Then he thought of something, and he stared at the servant woman

with a new found suspicion. “Why are you telling me this? Aren’t you
frightened that Daren will have you punished for letting his secret out?”

Her face colored a little, but the overall expression didn’t change. She

was determined.

“I spied outside the door while his lordship spoke with that mage.

Strange man that smelled off. Didn’t trust him for a second. Lord Daren
asked him what his plans with Owen were, trying to make sure that he
wouldn’t put Owen in a soup or something for being part of the fae. Of
course he said that was all nonsense, and that mages didn’t do that, but I
stayed and listened, even after Lord Daren left.

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Jacks

“I heard the things that freak said he was going to do to Owen. Study

him for as long as possible, have him work on dangerous magic potions to
earn his keep, and then when the child was born, take it to raise as a
mage’s apprentice, and then put Owen in his soup. Said he would get a
good price out of selling his hands and feet to his friends.”

“Did you say child?” Frederik hadn’t known that Owen was getting

ready to have children. “Did he take another fae woman with him? Why
would he need to keep Owen alive until the birth?”

He would ask Owen for the details later. There had to be a good

explanation for it, and Frederik would give him the benefit of the doubt
until that explanation was obtained.

If it turned out that Owen had a lover, or even a wife, and he really had

only been coming to Frederik’s bed because Frederik had requested it,
then he would set him free to go off and be with his family. He wouldn’t
hold it against the man.

The round servant woman barked out a laugh. “Ha! That boy with a

woman? I don’t think he ever saw a real pair of tits in his entire life.”

“Then what are you talking about? Who else does that mage have?”

Frederik looked down at his watch, becoming more and more impatient.
Daren would be back any moment now, and it was still daylight outside.
Frederik was going to have to find a way to track down that mage before
he could get too far away with Owen and whoever else it was that he had.

The servant woman shook her head and made a sound of disgust.

“Feh! They could have been having me on, but with mages and
werewolves and ghosts out in the world, why not this, too? Owen is the
one who’s pregnant. Somehow being a faery means he’s not really a he
after all. At least on the inside.”

Frederik’s entire body went cold. He felt as though someone had

drained him dry of all his blood, and the room started to spin around.

He was also enraged. “You dare play a trick like this on me—”
The serving woman’s eyes widened to the size of golf balls, and she

lumbered back a step. “I’m not playing any games, my lord! That’s what

Owen’s Promise

the mage said. Something about breeding and survival for the fae. With no
fae women around, and Owen being with a man all the time, his insides
changed sexes. That’s what I heard.”

Maybe Daren had been playing a trick on her. It wasn’t like Frederik

hadn’t done the same thing a time or two before when he knew he was
being spied on by the help.

Whether or not Daren was yanking her leg, and Frederik was willing

to bet that was exactly what was going on, the fact of the matter was that
Owen was still gone and out of the house, and there was a human uprising
happening.

He needed to find the man and fast.
“I promise, you’ll be rewarded for your efforts, after I get Owen back.”
The serving woman huffed. “A fine promise for you to make. You

might never get him back.”

“I have every intention of getting him back.” To do that, he needed to

get out of this room and down to where the assassins and guards kept all
of their equipment. Daren had forced every assassin and guard he’d
banished to leave behind their day suits and weapons. There had to be
something down there that fit him so he could go out hunting in the
daylight.

He’d worry about his legs later. He left his cane behind and hobbled

out of the room. He was going to have to learn to walk and run really
quickly without it at this point.

“And what if Lord Daren, or even Lord Tristan finds out about what

I’ve done before you can give me this reward? I’m hoping it’s freedom, by
the by. I wouldn’t be risking all of this for anything less at this point.”

“You’ll have your freedom one way or the other. If we’re attacked by

human bandits, just don’t fight back against them and they might take you
with them. If I can’t find Owen and am forced to return”—his throat
swelled up just thinking about that—“I will set you free anyway, with
enough food and valuables to trade on the road until you can find
somewhere safe to stay.”

Owen’s Promise

Chapter Four

Owen heard about the destruction of the lake house where Lord

Frederik had been staying with his brother only two weeks later.

That night, while the mage had been sleeping, he’d made another

escape attempt, wanting desperately to get back to the house and see it for
himself, even though he knew the likelihood of making it that far on his
own and with no supplies was slim at best. That other mage traveler, the
one Alden had sold some of Owen’s hair to who had told them the news,
could have been misinformed, or lying on top of things.

Maybe Frederik was still there, waiting for him.
Of course, getting the ropes off of him when Alden was sleeping was

easy enough. It was sneaking past his spells, the ones that he placed
around their small camp that acted like strings tied to bells when Owen
stepped through them, that was the hard part.

Owen had tried running when the alarm sounded, but with his body

aching and swelling the way it did, he didn’t make it very far.

Apparently fae pregnancies were only half as long as human ones, and

Owen was already showing and feeling the effects of the added weight
inside of him.

He felt like his body was being taken hostage, and not just by Alden.

He hated this.

Owen had been so careful this time. He took his time even though his

instincts screamed at him to run. He’d even spotted two of the little string
traps that Alden had set up that would alert him if someone was coming or
going, and he managed to step over them both just fine before he tripped
the third.

36 Marcy

Jacks

He felt it the instant the little bit of string snapped against his ankle,

and he groaned before taking off at a wild run.

There was no sound or anything like that. The traps were meant to

alert Alden, and not anyone who could be near. He was probably awake
right now, and he would notice that Owen was gone again before he gave
chase.

For such an older man, he was sure fast.
It was like being chased by a demon. Owen suddenly became aware of

the man’s feet running behind him. He didn’t dare look because he knew
what he would see: Alden’s face twisted in anger and focused entirely on
his goal as he pumped his arms and legs to catch up.

Owen was sure he had to be using some kind of spell that helped him

to do that. It was cheating. There was no way the bastard should’ve been
able to catch him, pregnant or not.

It was a lost cause, but Owen didn’t want to give up. If Alden wanted

to keep him, then he was going to have to work to do it.

He heard the old man shout something behind him, and with the wind

in his ears, Owen thought he was just screaming curses at him or
something. Instead it was a spell.

Owen ran with all his strength and speed and smacked against an

invisible wall. It was a soft wall, like it was made of the pillows in
Frederik’s bed, and when he fell backward, the ground was equally soft
when he landed on it.

Didn’t stop it from scaring the hell out of him when he smashed into

something he couldn’t even see.

Though he looked like a man who was pushing seventy, Alden’s hands

on him were strong when they yanked him up. They were so strong that
Owen couldn’t even push him away, even when he started hitting him.

Alden wasn’t the sort of man who used his fists often, but the palm of

his hand striking Owen’s face again and again still hurt like hell,
especially when he grabbed Owen by the ears and started shaking him
around.

Owen’s Promise

“You pathetic creature,” he said with an upturned lip. “When will you

stop running from me? This is getting tiresome.”

“Fuck you,” Owen said when the shaking stopped. His ears felt hot

and tender, like they were about to fall off. The only thing Owen had to be
grateful for was that Alden never touched his stomach. He wanted Owen’s
child too much to risk hurting him there.

Unfortunately, it meant Owen’s face took on much of the abuse

whenever he heaped it onto him.

Alden looked like he was about to blow his top. “You are my slave!

You are supposed to obey me!”

“I don’t accept you as my master, you fucking freak,” Owen said, then

he threw his fist out.

The sudden movement shocked Alden so much that Owen actually

landed the hit. It was a good one, too. Right against his eye. He was
thrown back only a little, however, and he recovered quickly.

His eyes blazed like fire, and he grabbed Owen by the throat and lifted

him clean off his feet.

“To the devil with this! The moment I think you’re ready I’m going to

cut that child out of your stomach and then cut you into pieces and eat
every last bit of you myself. I don’t care about selling your fae flesh
anymore!”

Owen struggled as much as he could. He gripped Alden’s wrists tightly

and tried to keep as much pressure as he could off of his neck, but air was
still in short supply. He tried telling Alden this, but the man was in a rage.

Suddenly, and without warning, he shrieked and dropped Owen on his

ass.

Owen thought the man had finally just lost control and dumped him on

the ground in a fit of anger, but then he looked up and saw the long arrow
sticking out of Alden’s shoulder.

The mage clutched at his arm and stared at the long and thin wooden

stick that was poking out of his flesh.

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Jacks

Owen’s first thought was that it was a group of rebel humans, but then,

to his absolute shock, a man wearing the black armor, mask, and goggles
of a vampire assassin jumped out of the bushes and into their clearing. He
had another arrow pulled back on a long bow that looked to be made of
metal and even had a scope attachment on it.

It definitely wasn’t one of the handmade things that came from a

human village.

Alden hissed at the man, reminding Owen of a vampire as well with

the fangs that were in his mouth, but then the assassin released his arrow,
and as it punctured Alden’s chest, his body began to flake apart like dry
mud.

A red-orange light appeared between the cracks of his dying flesh, and

with a scream, his body seemed to explode in a cloud of dust that caught
on the wind and flew far away.

Owen watched it go, unable to comprehend what he’d just seen. Was

the man dead? Had that been some magic trick so he could escape?

Owen didn’t even remember the other man that was near him until a

pair of black boots stepped in front of him. He looked up and saw the
assassin staring down at him. His bow was held idly in one hand, but that
didn’t mean that Owen feared him any less.

Now that he could remember there was someone else he needed to be

afraid of, Owen shot to his feet as quickly as possible, which wasn’t that
quick at all considering his condition.

This was clearly a vampire assassin, so Owen was fairly sure telling

the man who he was and where he came from wouldn’t hurt anything.
With luck, the man would think Owen was just a little fat or something.
He could only hope that the man would be willing to take him back to
Frederik, and not any of his older brothers.

“I’m a servant of the Fenrir house. I was taken away by that mage.

Who are you?” he asked.

Owen’s Promise

With the safety of the night, the assassin must have thought it was

okay for him to remove his mask, even though they were forbidden from
showing their faces while out on a job without good cause.

The man reached up to his neck and found the fold of his mask, and

then he pulled it over his head.

Owen nearly fell back on his ass at the sight of Frederik’s face. Despite

all of his hopes and his belief, there had been a part of him that was
convinced he would never see the man ever again.

Here he was, wearing an assassin’s costume, of all things. His black

hair was only a little longer than the perfectly trimmed cut it had been the
last time Owen had seen it, and his permanent five-o’clock shadow was
now a real beard that hugged his jaw. He looked like he hadn’t been
sleeping for some time now.

“Fre—Lord Frederik,” Owen said. He smiled and took one step

forward, and then another step back. He loved this man, and everything
inside of his body ached to go to him, to hold him and touch him just to be
sure that he was real, but he had to remember that a sentiment like that
wasn’t necessarily returned. He was still a servant, after all.

“You came for me?”
“Of course I did,” Frederik said, then he opened his mouth, as if to say

something else, but then stopped himself and looked down at Owen’s
stomach, and his eyes became so wide that Owen could see the whites all
around his dark eyes.

“Is it…true then?” he asked and then made a vague gesture down to

Owen’s stomach. “You’re carrying…”

Owen looked down at himself. Alden had told him he still had another

two months to go, give or take a week or two, but Owen still felt huge
compared to what he used to be not so long ago. “Yes. I am.”

Frederik rubbed his face with both hands, never taking his eyes away

from Owen’s swelling stomach. “Good God. I thought that serving woman
was just having me on.”

“What?”

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“Daren told me you’d fallen sick and died. Another serving woman,

mean and mouthy, came to me and told me otherwise. I knew I had to find
you, but I didn’t think you would be…”

“Pregnant?” Owen asked when Frederik wouldn’t say the word. It felt

strange even on his tongue, and he was the one carrying here.

“Yeah.”
Owen felt that he owed the man some sort of explanation. He’d had

fantasies of Frederik coming to his rescue and taking him back to the
vacation house where everything had been perfect before he’d been
poisoned and his brother had arrived. He’d imagined the both of them
kissing and having frantic reunion sex right there, but that was not how
reality worked. Frederik had come, and he’d killed, or banished, Alden,
but now he was the one in shock.

“I swear, Lord Frederik, I didn’t know I was—that I am, part of the

fae. And I didn’t know fae males could get pregnant either. If I had I
would’ve done something about it.”

Frederik’s eye sharply met his. “Done something?”
Owen didn’t understand the hard edge in his voice. “Yeah. We

could’ve used…I don’t know, protection or something.”

Vampires didn’t carry sexual diseases. It was one of the reasons why

they’d gotten such a bad—and not even true—reputation for being a
promiscuous species. Some vampires liked sleeping with anything on two
legs, but others were more reserved than that, even if they all did enjoy
sex.

Because they were both men, and Frederik was a vampire, using any

kind of protection never even crossed Owen’s mind. It certainly never had
for any of the other vampire masters he’d served in his life.

“Oh,” Frederik said, and then he didn’t say anything else. His face

went bright red, however, and his lips tightened in that way that they did
whenever he was trying to hold something back. Usually a frown.

It suddenly occurred to Owen what Frederik had been thinking Owen

was talking about, and he found himself having trouble holding back his

Owen’s Promise

temper. “Not that I have a problem with other slaves who go that route, but
I wouldn’t have done that.”

It wasn’t unknown for a slave to do away with an accidental

pregnancy. Owen had personally known one or two would-be mothers
who struggled with the idea of ingesting something they knew would
terminate their pregnancies but were also terrified of the thought of having
their children taken from them and sold off to other houses where they
would never be seen again. Then there was the part where the children
would become slaves regardless of where they were raised, maybe even
killed without proper care. There wasn’t exactly a safe place where the
infants of slaves could go to be watched while their parents worked.

He didn’t realize he put his hands protectively over his stomach until

they were there, and he didn’t want to lower them in front of Frederik, so
he kept them there as well.

Frederik nodded and looked away from him, as though he were a little

ashamed for thinking something like that. The color didn’t diminish a bit,
however.

Owen was incredibly disappointed. He wasn’t sure exactly why

Frederik had come for him, but clearly things weren’t about to go back to
the way they had been before.

“Where are your guards?” Owen asked.
“What?”
Owen looked around, very aware of the fact that they were still alone

in this dangerous place. “Don’t you have any guards or assassins with
you? Where are they?”

“There’s no one else. It’s just me,” Frederik admitted.
Owen swallowed hard. “Were they…were they all killed? When the

house was attacked?”

Frederik actually managed a smile, although what he thought there

was to smile about was a complete mystery. “No. As far as I know,
everyone got back to the main house safely. I left right before Daren could

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catch me and started tracking you and Alden, but I guess I’m not as good a
tracker as I hoped I was.”

He wouldn’t be. Even for a vampire. He was still a lord, and he

wouldn’t have had to develop those skills to the point where he would
need to rely on them for survival.

Then the main part of that confession sunk into to Owen’s brain. “You

were tracking me? Right after I left?”

Frederik nodded. “The minute I heard you were alive, the only thing I

could think about was getting you back.”

Owen couldn’t contain himself even if he’d wanted to. He launched

himself at the other man. His hands found Frederik’s bearded jaw and
back of his neck like they belonged there, and he pulled Frederik down for
a long and desperate kiss.

Owen released a soft moan the second their mouths touched. It felt like

forever since he’d kissed Frederik, and now that he was finally doing it, he
didn’t know how he’d gone so long without it. His cock became hard and
his balls were heavy. All were demanding immediate attention.

Not yet.
His lips were softer than Owen remembered, that was for sure. Even

with the cracks he felt on them from being out in the harsh weather and
not taking care of himself as he was used to, they were so soft. The beard
tickled, but only a little more than he was used to whenever he kissed
Frederik. He had to say that he liked it even more than the stubble that he
always refused to shave off entirely.

Frederik’s hands went around Owen’s hips, and he didn’t hesitate to

pull him close, even though Owen knew he must not look or feel exactly
the way Frederik would remember. Frederik held him tightly with one arm
around his waist and the other around his shoulders as he coaxed Owen’s
mouth open with his tongue and kissed him like it was going to be their
last. His tongue thrust against Owen’s, mimicking the act of sex. That was
enough to send a jolt of pleasure to his dick.

Owen’s Promise

“Missed you so damn much,” Frederik said between kisses, and he

groaned with each one. “Was so fucking scared…I couldn’t take it when
Daren said you’d died.”

The fact that Frederik’s older brother had to make up a story like that

for Frederik said something about Frederik’s feelings for him. Frederik
came for him, had hunted Alden down, the moment he knew it was all a
lie.

Owen wanted to melt into his arms and never leave that warm space

that made him feel so safe.

Frederik was the one to break away with a harsh breath and a curse.

“Damn, we can’t do this.”

Owen body pulsed with how much he needed the other man. His cock

ached from a lack of attention for the last two weeks. More than that,
even. Owen wasn’t able to go to Frederik’s side after he’d been sick from
the poison he’d been given, and there was no way Owen was going to
touch himself while he was that mage’s prisoner.

“Why not?” Owen asked, and he looked down at himself as his

stomach pressed a little more against Frederik’s firm abs.

Oh, right. There was something literally between them now that

changed everything.

Frederik’s whole body stiffened around him. He must’ve seen where

Owen’s eyes had gone. “It’s not that,” he said quickly. “I promise that’s
not what it is. You’re still so gorgeous and believe me when I say I want
nothing more than to throw you down and have my way with you—”

Owen couldn’t help the barked laugh that escaped from his throat at

those words.

“I’ve missed you, but that doesn’t change the fact that we’re out in the

open right now.”

Owen didn’t want that to stop him. He’d missed Frederik, too, and he

wanted this more than anything now that the man was here and had given
him a taste of his need with those kisses. “There’s a camp not too far back

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that way,” Owen said, pointing the way. “Alden has some spare blankets
and a tent.”

Frederik looked in the direction Owen had just pointed, then back

down at his face, and then back toward the camp.

He was clearly struggling with this. Owen was going to have to help

him a bit.

“I’ve missed you, too, so much,” he said and then reached his palm

down and cupped his hand around the swelling erection that was beneath
the assassin’s suit between Frederik’s legs.

Frederik bit down on a groan as his cock was squeezed in just the way

he liked. “Fuck, I can’t say no. Let’s go,” he said, and he grabbed hold of
Owen’s hand, leading the way to the camp Owen said was there and
walking with only a slight limp.

Owen smiled the whole way.

Owen’s Promise

Chapter Five

Owen mentioned the tent, but there was no way in hell he wanted to

have sex in it with Frederik after everything that old bastard put him
through. It was a small enough thing anyway, barely big enough for one
person, and Owen only ducked inside real quick to pull out the extra
blanket he had but never gave to Owen even on the coldest of nights.

It was all wrapped up nice and clean inside of a traveling pack, so it

didn’t smell like Alden either, which was a bonus.

Frederik lit a small fire for warmth while Owen arranged the blanket in

a spot that wasn’t too far away from it, but still out of the way of the tent
and the spot where Owen had been tied down.

“The fire will be good for scaring away any large animals that might

be around,” Frederik said, slapping his hands together as he got to his feet.
“But we shouldn’t make it any bigger than that, in case there are humans
hunting around the area.”

“Alden was careful to keep us out of sight, unless it was to speak with

other mages who were traveling around,” Owen said, thinking of the times
when Alden had cut off bits of his hair to either use in potions or sell to the
mages they came across.

Owen thought it was a damn miracle that none of them realized the

hair came from his head. It wasn’t like he was wearing a hat, or a wrap or
anything to hide the color.

He could still recall the looks in their eyes every time Alden presented

his wares. They all traded whatever they could spare just to get their hands
on a few strands of the fae hair, and they looked at the stuff as though they
were holding diamonds between their fingers.

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Owen supposed he should’ve been grateful that Alden hadn’t been

cutting off strips of his flesh to sell those instead, though the old man had
threatened it a couple of times.

“Still with me?”
Owen jumped a little as he suddenly felt Frederik’s presence beside

him. He hadn’t even noticed the man approaching him.

Frederik offered him a weak smile, and he touched his cheek. Owen

had always liked that about Frederik. He was the kind of man who showed
his affection through touch.

“We don’t have to do this if you’re not feeling comfortable,” he said,

then laughed a little. Owen had never heard a nervous laugh come out of
his mouth like that. “Not that I’m not dying for it or anything right now,
but you just looked like you were about to be sick there for a second.”

Owen turned his head to look at the spot barely twenty feet away

where a large steel pike had been hammered into the ground. He’d been
tied to it and told to sleep on moss and dirt in the cold. Every night since
he’d been taken, and he was always fearful that the next time Alden came
to him with a pair of scissors, it would be to cut off one of his ears, or even
the tip of a finger, instead of his hair.

“Just thinking about some of the stuff that mage put me through. I

hope you killed him.”

Frederik’s eyes darkened. “If he’s not dead, then I’ll hunt him down to

the ends of the earth and make him pay for stealing you away from me.”

Owen thought to remind Frederik that his brother had been the one to

allow that to happen but then decided to shut his mouth before the words
could come.

“The last thing I want is to talk about this,” he said and then reached

for Frederik to pull him into another kiss.

Frederik moaned again, just as he always did whenever Owen took

command like this. He savored the taste of Frederik’s lips and tongue as
well as the heat of his body, but the fact that he couldn’t press himself as

Owen’s Promise

close to Frederik as he would’ve liked was a stark reminder that he
wouldn’t be on top tonight, or any night for a long time coming.

He could live with that. He would be perfectly happy with that so long

as he and Frederik were together. Frederik had come for him when he
didn’t have to. Owen would never forget that.

Frederik’s mouth against his lit up something inside of him that Owen

thought was dormant ever since the other man was poisoned and fighting
for his life. His cock throbbed between his legs as it lengthened and
hardened, and his balls became tight. His body woke up after weeks of
slumber, and now it wanted only one person.

“I want you, Frederik,” Owen said.
Frederik moaned against his mouth and pulled him even closer. They

squeezed each other tightly, but somehow it wasn’t enough. For Owen, he
couldn’t seem to get enough of the other man, and no matter how tightly
Frederik held him, he couldn’t seem to get close enough either.

He pressed his mouth to Frederik’s neck, knowing just how much that

drove the other man wild when he suckled on the places where blood flow
was at its strongest.

As expected, it damn near stole the man’s voice away. “Did…ah…did

that mage have any medical salve or…or anything like that?”

Owen pulled his mouth away abruptly, recalling that Frederik was still

walking around with a bit of a limp. “Are you injured?” he asked, and now
he was letting his hands roam over Frederik’s perfect body to try and find
any unseen injuries, instead of just trying to feel him up.

“No,” Frederik said, a smile on his face, and Owen could see his fangs

through that grin. “To ease the way. I didn’t exactly pack lube on this trip.”

Owen’s face suddenly felt way too hot. Was he really that desperate for

it that he’d nearly been willing to forgo the basics? He loved Frederik, but
he was pretty sure that wouldn’t be enough to make him enjoy Frederik’s
dick in his ass when there was nothing to help. “Right, of course, I think
he’s got some spare supplies in another bag in his tent.”

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“Wait here, I’ll go get it,” Frederik said, and he pressed a quick kiss to

Owen’s mouth before shooting off to the small tent. He moved so quickly
that it was almost as though he didn’t have a limp at all.

Owen smiled, hoping that the limp was slowly leaving him now that

more time had passed and he was better recovered from that attempt on his
life. He didn’t know what sort of poison it was that Frederik had been
given, but the fact that it was having this kind of impact on his nervous
system made Owen worry.

Frederik crawled back out of the small tent with a bag in his hands.

Alden was strange in the fact that most of his gear was made out of animal
hide and the like. The bags he’d traveled with were no exception. Even the
blankets, while not animal skins, looked as though they had been made
from the wool of an animal, and hadn’t come from a factory somewhere.

Frederik held up the bag and grinned at Owen. There was a clinking

sound of glass vials and wooden jars inside. “This feels like it might have
something we can use.”

“Will you know which one is which?” Owen asked. He certainly

wouldn’t know the difference.

“If something looks too weird for me to identify then don’t worry. I

wouldn’t put something that I don’t know what it is on your skin. Not
ever.”

Owen believed him, and together they set the bag down right next to

their blanket and sat down together, and Frederik began rummaging
through the contents.

Of course, there were several jars that Owen had no idea what they

were, and the only ones he did were the ones he’d seen Alden make when
he’d stolen his hair and saliva.

Frederik gave those ones a curious look, but he was too eager to

question them since they both were after something pretty specific.

“This has to be it,” Frederik said, pulling out a smooth wooden jar that

was barely bigger than his fist. It had a carved leaf on top of the lid.

Owen’s Promise

“It does look kind of familiar,” Owen said, and his dick gave another

desperate throb as he was one step closer to being filled.

“I’ve seen these jars before. Mages label their healing salves like this.

Usually they keep them in wooden jars with the leaf on top. I’ll check it
just in case,” he said, and Owen caught the way that Frederik’s eyes kept
on moving down to Owen’s swelling stomach.

He really didn’t want to take any chances of hurting the baby. Owen

was warmed by his concern.

Frederik twisted off the wooden cap and looked inside. “It looks like

the stuff my father used to purchase,” he said, and then sniffed the
contents before sticking two fingers inside. He pulled them out and rubbed
his fingers together, and then he grinned at Owen. “This is what we want.”

“How can you tell?” Owen asked. He took hold of Frederik’s hand and

moved it enough so that he could see what was inside of the jar. It was
only about half-full, and it looked like a pearl-colored gel. It glimmered a
bit in the firelight, even.

“I can already feel it working through my fingers. Traveling for so

long and chasing after you and that mage by myself hadn’t exactly been
easy on the skin.”

Frederik looked at him and frowned a little. Then he put the jar down

and touched his cheek, right where one of the fading bruises was from
when Alden had thrown one of his fits.

“This isn’t dirt, is it?”
Owen took his hand and kissed the palm. “No, but it doesn’t hurt.”
“Well, try some of this anyway,” Frederik said, and using his other

hand with the gel still on it, he gently smeared some of the slick substance
over Owen’s cheek.

There was an immediate cooling tingle that seemed to move all across

his face. Owen reached up to touch his face. The creamy gel, whatever it
was, was still there. And it was slippery against his skin.

50 Marcy

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He wished he had a mirror to see his face, but he knew that when he

wiped away the salve with the back of his hand, his face wouldn’t have so
much as a scratch on it from when Alden had been hitting him.

“That’s amazing,” he said.
“It is. It also serves another purpose,” Frederik said, and then leaned

forward and kissed him.

With the educational lesson suddenly over, Owen’s cock came back to

life with a vengeance. If Frederik said this stuff was good for lube as well,
then he would gladly believe him.

“Hurry and get inside me,” he said and then leaned back on their

blanket and pulled Frederik on top of him, spreading his legs so that his
lover could get between them. He was done with these distractions, and he
needed the other man more than ever.

Frederik came down easily on top of him, and Owen’s stomach wasn’t

so big that they were separated by that much, and he still held himself up
on his elbows to keep from putting too much pressure on him, his hard
dick brushing against Owen’s, creating friction where he desperately
needed it.

“I love it when you order me around, do you know that?”

* * * *

Though Frederik had a thousand questions running through his head,

he knew he could put them off for as long as needed so long as he had
Owen here with him. He’d thought about what could happen over and
over again as he tracked the pair across the vampire district.

He’d had thoughts of finding Owen in bad health and moments away

from death. He’d imagined finding him in perfect health and what it would
feel like when he flew into his arms after he defeated that mage who took
him, and then he’d thought about what it would be like if that serving
woman had been telling him the truth and that he really was…with child.
Just thinking the word pregnant and combining that with Owen just didn’t

Owen’s Promise

seem right somehow. He was still a man, so he couldn’t be pregnant, but
clearly he was with child.

Maybe that was his own inner way of dealing with the reality of such a

strange situation without losing his mind entirely.

Owen was not wearing the normal clothes that the servants and slaves

of his house wore as they performed their duties. Alden must have
provided him with some clothing for his expanding waist.

Owen wore an overly large cotton T-shirt, black joggers, and the

sandals must have been for swelling feet. It was easy enough to get the T-
shirt off of him, and when his belly was exposed entirely, Frederik’s breath
got caught in his throat.

His heart actually made a little flutter in his chest. There it was. The

proof that Owen was carrying and not merely hiding something under his
shirt. Not that Frederik had thought something like that, but all things
considered, it made more sense.

He wasn’t that big, however. It looked more like his stomach was

swelling out a bit. His belly button, which Frederik could remember
lavishing all kinds of attention on at one point, was now pointed out
instead of inward.

“Weird, isn’t it?” Owen asked.
Frederik gently touched his fingertips to the stretching skin. He felt

something push back against his fingers, and he swore he fell in love all
over again.

“Not weird at all,” he said, and with a stunning clarity he knew that he

meant it. It wasn’t just something he said to Owen to ease his fears. This
was his lover, and beneath his swelling stomach was their child.

Frederik understood why the fae kept mostly to themselves. If any

other vampire men with an interest in their own sex discovered that fae
males could conceive, well, there might be more problems than just
slavery to deal with.

Owen’s blue eyes lit up, and Frederik leaned down and kissed him.

There was nothing in the world more handsome than the man beneath him.

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His brothers could go to hell if either of them tried to separate him from
Owen ever again.

He felt Owen’s fingertips scrabbling against his suit, over the many

buttons and zippers that kept his skin safe during the daylight. He was
surprised when Owen managed to get the top half off without looking at
what he was doing.

The night air was cool against his hot skin, but then Owen’s touch

burned him in a way he’d begun to fear had been lost to him forever.

No. Owen was here with him now, and there wasn’t anything anyone

would do that would separate them again. Even if Frederik had to take him
to the fae district and live as a slave to be with him, that’s what he would
do.

Owen wiggled beneath him. “Need to get these off,” he said, and then

Frederik realized that he was struggling with his pants.

The fact that Frederik was on top of him, and Owen’s swelling belly,

likely wasn’t helping anything.

Frederik took hold of elastic waistband and pushed it down. Owen

wasn’t wearing any smallclothes, so his heavy cock sprang free. It was
thick and dark in color from the other man’s need. A drop of cum pearled
at the slit, and Frederik couldn’t help himself.

He moved his body down just enough so he could get closer to it, and

then he craned his face forward and licked at the tip of his cock to take the
drop into himself. Then he hardened his tongue to a point and pressed it
into the slit.

Owen moaned and clutched at the blanket beneath them, and when he

gently thrust his hips forward, Frederik took the hint and put his entire
mouth around Owen’s dick, tightening his lips as he sank down before
coming back up.

“Oh God, Frederik!” Owen gasped and looked up so he could see his

lover, just to have his view blocked by Owen’s belly.

Right. He’d forgotten that would be an issue for this. It didn’t matter,

though, because he could still hear the other man, and feel him. The way

Owen’s Promise

he gasped and moaned as Frederik sucked back on his dick, and the way
his hips shifted and body shuddered. His elbows came up high, and
Frederik got the impression that he was grabbing at his hair as he
struggled for control.

Good. He liked it when Owen lost himself like this for him. To

Frederik, there was nothing sexier in the world than making his lover let
go of all the boundaries that were placed between them and just be like
this.

The fact that Owen was with him at all was a turn on after much too

long spent worrying. Frederik could suck on the other man’s dick for
hours and not grow tired of the taste or sore in the mouth.

Owen’s breathing picked up, and his chest began rising and falling

heavily. “I’m gonna come. Frederik, stop, I’m coming!”

Unless Owen was too excited and came quickly.
Though Owen demanded him to stop, he didn’t reach down to push

Frederik away.

That was all right. Frederik pulled his mouth away with a satisfying

pop anyway, but he replaced his lips with his hand, and started squeezing
and stroking the length of the other man’s cock, adding just enough
pressure at the base to prevent him from orgasming just yet.

“Say my name,” Frederik demanded, and then he licked around the

head, paying special attention to the slit of skin connecting the head to the
base of his hard dick. “Say my name again.”

Panting, Owen sat up and looked down at him. “W–what?”
Now that he could see his lover’s beautiful blue eyes, so cloudy with

lust, Frederik thought he might implode from his own desperate wanting,
but he had to remain in control.

“I love hearing you say my name, without the lord bullshit in front of

it. Say my name and I’ll fuck you until you come screaming.”

“Holy shit,” Owen said, and before he fell back against the blanket,

Frederik caught sight of the way his face went entirely red.

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He’d heard his instructions, however, and apparently he understood

them just fine as well as he thrust mindlessly into Frederik’s hand.
“Frederik. Ugh, God, Frederik!”

That was exactly what he wanted.
Frederik placed a kiss along the side of Owen’s dick and then got back

up onto his knees. He quickly undid every safety clasp and buckle there
was on his pants, and he pulled them down.

The suits were designed to be tight, so that was something of a

challenge, and the boots, while not connected or anything, still needed to
come off as well before he could get completely naked.

Maybe it only seemed to take forever just because he was in such a

hurry, but as he undressed, needing both of his hands at one point, Owen
took the initiative to take his cock in hand and stroke himself as he
watched Frederik remove his clothing.

Frederik swore several times as he lost his patience. Owen laughed at

him when they were both finally and completely naked.

“Yeah, yeah, very funny,” Frederik said, and he pressed his mouth to

Owen’s quickly one more time before reaching for the jar of salve.

He felt Owen shiver beneath him as he grabbed for it. “Fuck me hard

and fast. I can’t wait to have you inside me again,” he said.

Frederik could hardly wait either. His fingers were shaking as he

dipped them into the slick salve. He tried to control his body, to take his
time, but so many weeks apart, most of them worrying over whether or not
he would even see Owen again, were having a negative effect on his
nerves.

The shaking stopped the second he felt the touch of Owen’s hand on

his arm.

The other man was breathing deeply, and Frederik could hear the

frantic beating of his heart, but he was still smiling with all the trust in the
world up at him.

“Take whatever time you need,” Owen said.

Owen’s Promise

That was why Frederik loved him, because he just understood without

words what it was that had Frederik so tense.

He smiled back and pressed his fingers against Owen’s tight asshole.

No one had been here after Frederik had. Good. If he’d so much as
suspected that mage of harming Owen in that way then he would have had
to find a way to bring him back to life so he could kill him again.

If he was even dead.
“Taking our time might have to come later. I don’t know how gentle I

can be with you,” Frederik said, and then he cast a glance back at Owen’s
stomach. “I won’t be too rough, though.”

“I can take it,” Owen promised, and then he arched his back just a little

as Frederik pressed two fingers into him. “I need it.”

“You’re not the only one.” Frederik’s body started to shake again as he

fought against the urge to just claim the man as his own and damn
everything else. He held off for as long as he could, however, adding in
another finger and stretching Owen until he was sure there would be
minimal pain.

Owen rocked his hips wantonly against Frederik’s fingers, and when

he grabbed hold of his cock and started to stroke himself again, quickly
this time, that was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

“So damn gorgeous,” Frederik said, and he reached for more of the

salve and coated his dick with it. He smoothed a little more around
Owen’s stretched pucker just to be safe. “I can’t wait to make you mine.”

“I am yours,” Owen said.
Well, Frederik supposed that was true, in a way, but he hadn’t meant it

in the master-slave way, and he didn’t want it to be in that way either. He
was going to have to have a talk with Owen about that.

After they finished here.
Frederik took himself in hand and pressed the head of his cock slowly

into Owen’s asshole. When Owen‘s body accepted him, and the man
moaned softly beneath him, Frederik pushed dick in even farther until his
balls touched the back of Owen‘s thighs.

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The greatest thing in the world, what Frederik most enjoyed about this

position, was the way Owen always hooked his feet around Frederik‘s
legs, keeping him close as he thrust back against him.

“I missed you so damn much,” Frederik said, and he pressed a kiss to

Owen‘s throat as he pulled out until just the head of his dick was still
inside of the other man. Then he pushed himself back in, using his
knowledge of the other man’s body to find his prostate.

When Owen’s eyes widened, and he gripped his cock to prevent an

orgasm instead of to bring one on, Frederik knew there was no point in
drawing this out.

Neither of them was going to last beyond a few hard thrusts.
When his cock was fully submerged inside of Owen, Frederik moved

his hips in a back-and-forth, side-to-side roll that he and Owen both
tended to enjoy. Owen‘s fingernails scratched at his back, but any pain he
should have felt at that was only turned into more pleasure as his cock was
squeezed tightly by Owen‘s asshole.

“Harder!” Owen said through clenched teeth. His eyes were bright and

sweat was beading on his forehead as he looked into Frederik‘s eyes. “I
want to feel you in me all the way into tomorrow night.”

Owen‘s wish was his command.
Frederik’s breathing was hard and fast, and he couldn’t stop himself

from just moving and punching his hips back and forth even if he’d tried.

Owen didn’t say anything else. He just cried out, and Frederik felt his

cum spurting between them, and as his asshole tightened even further with
his orgasm around Frederik’s dick, that only drove him to move faster. He
felt the blanket beneath them crinkle up and become messy as he fucked
Owen across it right before his balls tightened up, and that wonderful
surge of pleasure ran through his cock and released deep inside of his
lover. He felt almost like he was claiming him like a werewolf would
claim a mate. Owen was his, and he was Owen’s.

Owen’s Promise

Frederik remembered to catch himself on his elbows before he could

fall on Owen, and then he rolled them over to the side, still inside of him,
wanting to lie with him.

Owen’s lips were against his neck, and Frederik felt them pull up in a

smile. “You always do that.”

“Do what?” Frederik asked, still waiting for his heart to slow down.

Now that he was covered in sweat and his adrenaline was dropping, he
was beginning to realize how chilly it was, even with that little fire he’d
built. Too bad making it any bigger than that would be too dangerous.
Frederik reached around Owen and pulled on the side of the blanket they
weren’t lying on to drape it over their bodies.

Much better.
“Roll us over. You do that so you don’t crush me, even before…”

Owen trailed off.

Frederik already knew what he was about to say anyway.
“About that.”
Owen stiffened in his arms.
Frederik ran his fingers through the man’s blond hair and kissed his

temple. They both needed to bathe, but right now there was nothing more
perfect then being right here.

“Don’t be scared, I’m not going to say anything bad,” Frederik said.
“I didn’t think you would,” Owen said, clearly pretending as though he

hadn’t been worried at all.

Frederik smiled and stroked his arm. That was part of the thing he

loved about Owen. Even though he’d been born to slavery, he still had a
strong spirit. Sometimes it just needed a little coaxing to get out.

“We’re going to have to talk about where we’re going after this. Do we

go back to my brother’s house where it’s safer against human attacks, but
risk that they try to separate us again, or do we take our chances on the
road, with the little that we can salvage from this camp?”

“And go where?” Owen asked.

Owen’s Promise

Chapter Six

Alden was lucky to be alive, and he knew it. He was a mage, not a

powerful warlock, and if he hadn’t been drinking those potions he’d made
with that fae’s hair and saliva, then he doubted he would have survived
taking an arrow to the chest.

Thankfully, ingesting anything from his pregnant fae slave had given

him a much-needed boost to his abilities. He was faster and stronger than
ever before thanks to that slave, and he’d managed to pull together enough
power quickly enough to whisk himself away and heal himself from that
arrow wound.

Now, he was just angry.
So, that vampire lord sent one of his assassins after him to take the

slave back, eh? It made him wonder when the man had figured out the
value of owning a fae, especially a pregnant one, when their blood, hair,
saliva, when basically every part of them was so potent.

Alden had to get him back. There was an entire village of mages who

would benefit from having fae potions to drink, not to mention the value
they could add to their magic if they raised one amongst them and
harvested the hair, saliva, and blood.

Vampires harvested blood from humans, so why shouldn’t the mages

harvest the blood of the fae?

He was loath to do it, but if this was to work, then Alden knew he

would have to get some help, and with him still a ways away from the
mage district, that required hiring others he didn’t fully trust to come to his
aid.

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* * * *

Owen traveled with Frederik for several days without any signs of

human life. He was miserable and sore all over his body. His belly itched
something terrible, and he never stopped being hungry.

One thing that did take his mind away from his own suffering was

Frederik’s. Owen didn’t fully appreciate the idea that Frederik had braved
the sunlight to rescue him until their first morning together had come.

He’d watched Frederik under the shade of their tree, sweating

something fierce as he hurried into his protective suit, and even then the
other man still needed a good five minutes of long and calm breaths before
he pulled together enough courage to step out of their small and protective
space.

It had been a reminder that Frederik, although trained for battle and

daylight travel, had never been in either. Many vampires were trained in
some basic way should there ever be an emergency, but Frederik was still
a noble vampire, youngest son or not. His training would have been more
or less to keep him in shape, and anything he knew about vampires
traveling during the daylight hours he would have learned through books
on the subject.

Despite all that, he’d still come for him.
Owen had held his hand and rubbed his arm, telling the other man how

well he was doing out in the blazing sunlight, and he’d made a mental
promise to be as helpful as he could on their journey.

Speaking always seemed to help keep Frederik’s mind off the fact that

he was walking around in broad daylight without a cloud in the sky, and so
they’d packed up everything that looked to be of use from the small camp
and left, chatting the whole way.

Frederik had refused to let Owen carry anything too heavy, so his

cargo consisted of a single bag that was slung over his shoulder, and held
only their blanket, a tarp, small bits of dried food so he could snack as he
walked, as well as that jar of healing salve. He’d found himself using it a

Owen’s Promise

time or two on his ankles, as well as the positively grotesque stretch mark
that was slowly building on his stomach.

Frederik carried his weapons over his shoulder and strapped to his

body. More knives than Owen thought were necessary, as well as his bow
and arrows, three water jugs, which they were both quickly depleting, and
every recognizable potion Alden had kept in those animal hide sacks.

Owen had explained to Frederik as much as he’d learned from Alden

about his condition, which wasn’t much, so they found themselves going
over the same topics over and over again, trying to piece together what
they could from the bits they had learned.

“I don’t think there are any female fae,” Owen said when Frederik

brought up the strangeness of a male conceiving for what seemed like the
hundredth time.

There had even been a brief moment where he’d panicked as he asked

Owen if Frederik himself would conceive, considering they had
sometimes switched their positions in bed.

Even Owen knew that wasn’t possible.
“What do you mean?” Frederik asked. His voice always sounded

slightly muffled beneath that damn mask. Owen wished he could see his
face, but at least there was no sign of anxiety coming from him anymore.
Probably because the shadows were starting to get long and dusk was on
its way.

“Alden told me this when he was in one of his better moods,” Owen

said. “I guess technically there are male and female fae, but they—we—
are like a type of plant or lizard.”

“Ooh! Sexy,” Frederik said, and then laughed when Owen swatted his

arm.

“I’m being serious. It’s like, well, you’ve clearly seen that I have a

dick and a pair of balls.”

“And they are my favorite part of your body,” Frederik said.
Owen smiled. He was trying to be serious, but he liked that Frederik

was in a good enough mood to joke around like this. Previously he’d spent

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much of his time grumbling about what he would do to Lord Daren when
he finally got his hands on the man. He’d even questioned Owen about
whether or not his brother had tortured him, to which Owen was still
having trouble convincing his lover that Lord Daren hadn’t touched him
after the poisoning had occurred. Though there had been enough
frightening threats.

“From what I understood, I can get another woman pregnant, if I ever

had sex with one,” he added, “but, if I was ever in an environment or
situation where I wasn’t having sex with a woman, but a man instead, my
body would change just enough to make sure I could still…”

“Populate the world with more fae?” Frederik asked.
“Not the way I would have said it, but yes. It’s the same way for

female fae, too. If two female fae come together, I guess one of their
bodies would switch over so that she could impregnate the other.”

Frederik stopped suddenly. “So, wait, are you going to grow a vagina

or something?”

“What? No! I mean…” Now Frederik had him worried. Alden hadn’t

specified that, but Owen had damn sure been checking every morning to
make sure his plumbing was still right, and ever since Frederik had
rescued him, he’d basically been seeing that everything was still normal
down there, too.

“I’m going to develop a pouch on my stomach. I told you that.” He

hoped that was the case and that Alden wasn’t just lying to him about it
anyway. It might’ve even been what that particularly nasty stretch mark on
his stomach was. Maybe he should stop rubbing it with that health salve.

“Hm, that’s good. I mean, I would still love you even if you did grow a

set of breasts and a vagina and everything, but it would be
pretty…distracting I think.”

“I’m not growing breasts either.” He’d been checking to make sure

that was also the case. So far as he could tell, his chest was still the same
size, there was no tenderness, and he was fairly sure he wasn’t going to
start lactating.

Owen’s Promise

It made him wonder how he was supposed to feed the infant he was

carrying, however.

He looked up at Frederik. The man wasn’t that much taller than he

was, and he still had only a mild limp, but in that uniform, and carrying all
of those weapons, he looked like he could take on the world.

It made Owen smile a little as they continued walking. So long as

Frederik was beside him and helping him, he knew their child wouldn’t go
hungry, that was for sure.

It still humbled him to think that a vampire lord, that Frederik, would

love him. He was just a servant, someone for the vampires to drink blood
from after he’d finished making their beds and serving them dinner.

But Frederik loved him. He’d said it enough since they’d found each

other that Owen believed him, and Owen had gladly returned the
sentiment. Every night together was like a sex marathon that only left
Owen feeling happy and sated in a way he’d never felt in his entire life.

Now the only thing left for them to do was keep moving. Frederik

wanted to take him to the fae district where Owen and the baby would be
safe from any mages that wanted to hurt them, and because Owen wasn’t
just thinking about himself anymore, he reluctantly agreed.

His only hope was that, if the other fae people saw that Frederik was

the other father of his child, then they wouldn’t immediately make a
prisoner out of the man. Or a slave.

He only wished he knew more about his own people. Then this

wouldn’t scare him so damn much.

The only thing they had to do first was make a stop back at the

vacation house on the lake where Frederik had been poisoned. He hadn’t
even known that the attack had come until Owen told him the news and
where he’d heard it. It was practically on the way, and Owen didn’t want
to deny Frederik the chance to see the house with his own eyes.

Owen wanted to see it, too.

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Frederik pulled off his mask and took in a long breath of air the minute

the sun was low enough in the horizon for him to do so, then he pulled out
his map and compass.

“Are we almost there?” Owen asked. He sat himself on the ground and

pulled off his sandals. They weren’t made for traveling, and he was glad
for the chance to rest his feet.

“Maybe in another two hours if we keep moving,” Frederik said, and

then he turned to look back at him. “How are you holding up?”

“If it will only take another two hours to get there then I’ll be fine.

Five minutes to rest would be great, though,” he said. He was still getting
used to speaking to Frederik as an equal instead of a superior, but the more
he did it, the more comfortable he became with it.

Frederik smiled at him. His beard was slowly getting bigger, but Owen

could still see his smile through it. “We’ll make it a half hour. We can both
snack on something and I can go and see if there’s a stream nearby where I
can refill our water jugs,” Frederik said, lifting one of the empty plastic
containers. “Since we’re getting closer to the lake we should be coming
across more of them.”

“Should I start a fire?” Owen asked. He’d learned how to do some

small things since he and Frederik started traveling together.

“Are you cold?”
“A little, but I don’t need one.”
Frederik shook his head. “Light a small fire to warm your feet and

hands. I’ll come back soon and we can share body heat.”

Frederik wiggled his eyebrows at Owen when he said that before

taking off into the trees.

Owen laughed as he vanished and got to work gathering small twigs

and dry leaves for his little fire.

He had to admit, he liked this new side of Frederik. It was almost as if

he was being set free as well with their decision to leave behind the rules
of vampire society and run away together.

Owen’s Promise

Or he could just be trying especially hard to not show his worry for his

brothers. He might say that he was angry at Daren for selling Owen to
Alden, but Owen could see the truth. Lord Tristan and Daren were
Frederik’s only surviving family, and he was worried about them.

It was only for that reason that he hoped Lord Daren had made it far

away from the lake house before it could be attacked. He didn’t want
Frederik to lose any more members of his family, and even though he was
also angry with the man, considering everything that had happened lately,
he couldn’t blame him for wanting to protect Frederik.

Much.
He kept his fire small as promised, but because of that he was forced

to feed it often with many dry twigs just to keep it from going out. He was
still grateful to have something hot to put his feet and hands next to. The
heat soothed his aching calves at least.

He was so distracted with keeping his fire alive and small enough that

it wouldn’t attract any nearby humans, that he wasn’t aware of it when one
started sneaking up on him until it was too late.

He felt a large hand that didn’t belong to Frederik circle around his

neck before clasping down tight on his throat.

Owen’s heart immediately pounded inside of his chest as he thought of

who it might be. Frederik had taken off in the other direction to search for
water, and with the danger they were both in, he knew better than to play a
trick like this on Owen.

The hand was also rougher, more callused, and felt thicker and dirtier

than Frederik’s as well.

“Make a sound and I’ll slit your throat,” said the unknown voice

behind him. A knife appeared in Owen’s line of vision, and it glinted in the
light of his small fire.

Apparently it had still been big enough that a hunter of some kind had

found him.

Owen thought he might pass out from fear. This wasn’t Frederik. This

wasn’t Frederik. This wasn’t anyone Owen knew at all. Was he dealing

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with a vampire slave hunter? Or one of the many humans running around
the area fighting and killing whatever vampires they could find.

Though he could barely focus beyond the ringing in his ears, Owen

nodded anyway. The knife moved away from where Owen could see it,
and when that same large hand returned, without the knife this time, and
made a flourished movement that put the fire out with a quick rushing
breeze, he knew what he was dealing with.

A wind mage. Whatever had happened to Alden, there was a new mage

here, and he had his hand around Owen’s throat.

Maybe he didn’t know that Owen was fae.
“Please,” he whispered.
The hand around his throat tightened before he could say anything

else. “What did I just say?” the voice behind him seethed.

Owen stayed silent, and the man behind him chuckled.
“That’s a good boy. You vampire pets never forget your place, it

seems. Now get up, hurry up, now.”

With his entire body shaking, Owen did as he was told, but then he

heard a rustle in the bushes ahead of him. His eyes were having trouble
seeing now that his only source of light had gone out, but he recognized
the shape of Frederik’s body, and he heard the water sloshing around in the
jugs that he carried.

Frederik was a vampire, and so his night vision was much better. He

stopped instantly at the sight of Owen, and then just as suddenly dropped
the water jugs and pulled his bow from his back.

“Let him go!”
There was a brief flash of light that came from another direction

entirely than the mage behind him. It struck Frederik square in the chest,
and their small space was lit up as his entire body tensed and he screamed
as shocks of electricity surged wildly through him.

“Stop it! Frederik!” Owen tried to move to him, but the hand on his

neck was tight again, and when he ignored that and continued to struggle,

Owen’s Promise

the knife came back, and the sharp blade pressed against his throat,
keeping him still.

Then the light went out entirely and Frederik collapsed.
“That was too easy,” said another voice, likely the one that belonged to

whoever had used that electricity spell. The bushes rustled, and Owen got
the feeling that whoever it was was coming out of his hiding place in the
bushes to check over his handiwork. Only a little bit of that same
electricity crackled around his hand, bringing enough light so he could
survey his work. “Vampires are too easy.”

Owen’s entire focus was on Frederik. The light that the mage emitted

was too dim for him to see if Frederik’s chest was rising or falling. He
could be lying there dead for all Owen knew.

“Don’t hurt him,” Owen begged, just in case he was alive. He prayed

that Frederik was alive, and he wasn’t even religious.

The hand in his hair went tight. If the mage behind him gripped it any

more than he already was, then he was going to pull out a good chunk of
hair, skin and all.

“You stay quiet now, and don’t try making any spells while we have

you.”

“I can’t make spells!” Owen said, feeling his chest seize up as it

became harder and harder to take in a decent breath. “I’m not fae! I’m
human!”

He was raised as a human, and he still believed it to some extent, he

supposed.

“This says otherwise.” The mage’s hand left his hair, and his palm, his

disgusting, sweaty, unwanted palm, stroked gently over the swell of
Owen’s belly.

“He looks of a decent size. How far along did Alden say he was? We

might be able to cut the kid out of him right now and take care of this one
while we’re at it.”

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Owen’s pulse hammered in his throat. The hand on his stomach

tightened, and he felt the fingers pressing possessively against his skin.
“Now why would we want to do a thing like that?”

As Owen’s night vision became better, he was able to see as the other

man shrugged one shoulder. “We’ve got the fae here and all the supplies
we need to take care of him. Let’s just do it ourselves and take everything
we can off him and go. Then we can sell his bones for a decent price, eat
what we can, and carry the rest.”

Owen wanted to be sick. They were talking about eating his flesh, like

he was a cow or something.

“What about the others?” asked the mage holding him.
“Do you really want to share a catch like this with three other people?

Alden can even keep the kid if he wants it so bad. We can leave it here for
him to find. I’m not interested in—”

The mage with the lightning hands stopped speaking with a sudden

choked gurgle. Owen could see from the black outline of his body the way
he reached up and clutched at his neck.

“Nira?” the mage holding him asked.
When Nira gurgled some more and dropped to his knees, the grip of

the mage behind him went unbearably tight. Owen could hardly breathe as
his neck was grabbed and his body was used as a shield.

“I can’t see you but I know you’re out there! Come any closer and

I’ll…I’ll snap his damn neck!”

If it was another mage out there then that kind of threat wouldn’t work.

They all wanted to make potions out of Owen’s flesh and hair. They
wanted to drink his blood and increase their power somehow. He didn’t
need to be alive for them to do that.

A whizzing sound passed by his ear and stopped with a clunk. The

mage behind him was thrown back a little, and his grip on Owen’s body
immediately went slack as he fell backward.

Owen’s Promise

Owen was too scared to move. Someone was out there shooting at

them, and he couldn’t see a damn thing. He couldn’t even run to Frederik’s
body if he wanted to. He was frozen completely on the spot.

He always knew he would have made a terrible guard.
He started to shake, and he clutched at his stomach, hoping to draw

some comfort, or maybe even a little parental courage out of it, but he had
nothing, and the woods around him were deathly silent for what seemed
like an eternity.

“Please,” he said, hoping that whoever was out there would just leave.

“Don’t kill us.”

There was a rustle in the bushes just ahead, almost right in the spot

where Frederik had originally come from, and then the snapping twigs on
the ground became louder.

Whoever was out there didn’t care if Owen heard him or saw him.

That could only mean he, or she, had the intention of killing him
regardless of what happened.

It didn’t help when a battery-operated lantern was lit, showcasing the

entire scene.

Owen blinked against the light, and when his eyes adjusted, he got a

good look at the two mages who, just seconds ago, had been talking about
cutting his baby out of him and then eating Owen’s corpse as they left the
child to the elements.

There was a long arrow sticking out of the neck of the mage in front of

him. The one who had used some kind of lightning spell on Frederik. He
turned to look behind him, because he thought that might be better than
staring at the assassin with the lantern in one hand, and a mean-looking
bow in the other.

Then he wished he hadn’t looked. The mage who’d been holding onto

him had an arrow lodged right in the middle of his forehead.

Owen’s stomach gurgled. His throat constricted, and he was

bombarded with the feeling of being utterly too hot.

He stumbled over two steps and vomited in the shrubs.

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That was apparently all it took for him to get his head straight, because

when he finished he was feeling right as rain, and when he noticed the
man in assassin’s clothing approaching him, he ran as quickly as he could
to where Frederik was still lying, all the while keeping one hand on his
expanding stomach.

“Stay away from us!”
While keeping his eyes on the new man in the camp, Owen blindly

moved his fingers around until he found Frederik’s neck. He couldn’t feel
a pulse, but he told himself that was only because he was shaking so hard
and scared so damn much that he couldn’t feel one.

Frederik still had his bow over his shoulder, and his arrows had spilled

all over the ground when he was electrocuted. Owen reached for them, but
the man standing before him was much faster.

He grabbed Owen’s shoulder and shook him before Owen could lift

Frederik enough to free the bow.

“That’s enough. I’m not going to hurt you, so don’t even think about

trying to hurt me.”

Owen looked up at the man. He was wearing the exact same assassin’s

uniform that came from the Fenrir house Frederik and Owen came from.
Maybe he was from there. It made sense considering they were mere hours
away from the lake house.

Then again, it wasn’t exactly unknown for humans to steal the

uniforms of the assassins they’d killed and wear them. Sometimes they
also ripped the teeth out of the vampires they murdered and wore them
around their necks like they were trophies.

“You won’t hurt him either, right?” Owen asked, though he knew

better than to trust anything the man said.

His masked face turned a little, and he stared down at Owen’s hand

and the infinity tattoo on that was there, marking him as a slave, before
looking at Frederik for some seconds. Finally, he released a sigh.

“Lord Frederik. What the hell is he doing out here wearing that?”

Owen’s Promise

“You are from the Fenrir house!” Owen said. Despite everything that

was happening, and everything that could still happen to him should this
assassin bring them back to Lord Tristan, Owen was relieved.

This man could get Frederik the medical attention he needed to

survive.

“I used to be,” the man said, and he lifted his mask to reveal a scarred

face that looked to be set in a permanent frown.

One of his scars ran down the right side of his forehead, cutting

through his eyebrow and eye, and then stopping halfway down his cheek.
The other scar was on the side of his lips, which was probably what gave
him that fierce-looking expression. One of his eyes, the one that the scar
was running through, was a pale blue, and the other was a deep brown.

“I know you. Noir, right?” Owen asked.
He only knew Noir because, even though the servants didn’t usually

speak with the guards or assassins, Noir wasn’t the sort of assassin anyone
forgot easily. His face saw to that. There were also stories that were passed
around about him, that he was also a slave because of his mixed heritage.
The man was wearing gloves, so Owen couldn’t check to see if he had the
infinity tattoo on him as well.

Noir nodded, and he ran a gloved hand through his sweat-dampened

hair. “That’s me.”

“I heard you’d died. They said you were killed.”
He laughed a little. It was a humorless sound. “They would have

passed around that story after I betrayed the family and went to live with a
village of humans.”

That brought Owen’s fear full circle once more, and he found himself

leaning over Frederik’s body to protect him.

Noir laughed. “I have no interest in killing either of you. I’m a traitor,

but judging from the look of you, and the fact that you’re both all the way
out here, there’s clearly something going on.” Noir’s eyes stayed on
Owen’s stomach for much longer than Owen was comfortable with.

“Will you stop staring at me?” he demanded.

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“Yes—I…Sorry about that. What are you, exactly?”
Owen sighed. “A member of the fae, apparently.”
“And, are you suffering from some sort of affliction? Or is it normal

for the fae people to look like that?”

“Look like what?”
“Like you’re pregnant. I would otherwise assume you are simply a

little overweight, but your chest, face, and arms all appear normal to your
height.”

Owen didn’t think he was going to get out of explaining this anytime

soon, but Frederik still wasn’t waking up, and Owen wanted to check him
over for other injuries.

“I’ll explain what’s wrong with me later. I’m not sick and I don’t have

anything that contagious, but, please…” Owen took Frederik’s hand into
his.

He didn’t know Noir at all, and he knew it was an incredibly stupid

move to have to trust him, but with Frederik injured, maybe even badly so,
he had no choice.

Noir made a grunting sound, and then looked down at his former

master. “He’s alive and healthy enough. I can hear his heart beating, and
even smell the bit of blood on him that’s leaking from his body.”

“Jesus,” Owen said.
“Nothing fatal that I can tell, but staying out here is a bad idea. I’ll

take you to the lake house.”

“You’re staying at the lake house?” Owen asked, and he reluctantly

got out of the way to allow Noir to pick up Frederik’s body.

He did it with such ease, and he swung Frederik over his shoulders like

the man was a sack of potatoes.

“Be careful with him!” Owen snapped.
A sharp look from Noir had him apologizing rather quickly.
“He will be fine,” Noir assured him. “And yes, the lake house was

taken. You should know that there is a band of humans there however, as
well as another vampire and a werewolf. Some are my friends, Hawke in

Owen’s Promise

particular. He is the leader of the group, and if I ask him to listen to you,
maybe you can convince him to show your master here some mercy.”

The knowledge that there were humans waiting for them at the lake

house, and that he and Frederik would have practically walked right into
them before knowing they were there, maybe getting shot with a few
arrows and bullets for their trouble, made Owen want to be sick again.

He held himself in check and swallowed hard. “Are there any mages

there?”

Noir looked down at the two men he just killed, then he grinned. If that

twisted look on his mouth could be considered a grin at all. “Those you
don’t have to worry about.”

No mages, and the humans even had some vampires and werewolves

in their employ. There might be a chance here that the both of them could
get out of this alive.

“Then let’s go.” Owen had never been particularly good as far as the

powers of persuasion went. Being a slave meant he was never allowed to
ask for anything, never mind mastering the art of getting people to give
him something that he wanted.

For Frederik, however, he was going to make damn sure that those

humans knew he was a vampire worth keeping alive.

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Chapter Seven

When Frederik opened his eyes, he thought he still might be dreaming.

He was in a bedroom, and not just any bedroom. He was in his bedroom.
The windows were dimmed, but it didn’t feel overly hot, so it must have
been just coming upon dusk, and he was wearing a pair of his pajamas
beneath the soft quilt of his bed.

It took some doing, but he managed to sit up. He felt clean at least.

Someone must have been bathing him, and a quick hand across his jaw
told him that someone had also shaved him.

It made him shiver to think of an unknown hand moving across his

throat with a razor.

His room was a mess. It looked like there had been a minor fire on the

far side of the wall, probably some electrical thing, because there was a
long strip of burned wallpaper rising up to the ceiling.

There was a single reading chair next to his bed, which hadn’t been

there before, that also had a slash mark running down the fabric.

Once he looked at it closely, he realized it came from the study he used

to sometimes read in when he was feeling bored. Or when he wanted to
drag Owen in there for the two of them to have a little privacy.

He and Owen had spent some wild times on that chair.
There was a fire burning in the fireplace, but it looked like it hadn’t

been cleaned out in a good long while either.

He wasn’t dreaming, and something was definitely wrong.
Frederik’s head pounded, and he was about to reach up to feel what

was the matter with him when the handle of his door clicked and turned.

Owen’s Promise

The door opened, revealing a blond-haired man that Frederik had

never seen before. He was good looking and young, but he didn’t hold a
candle to Owen. He was pale skinned, and despite that, his blond hair was
still a shade darker than Owen’s as well.

The man stopped at the sight of him, amber eyes flashing in a mild

panic, but that lasted for only a fraction of a fraction of a second before he
smiled warmly.

“Awake at last. We were starting to get worried.”
There were more of them then. It occurred to Frederik that he could

very well be a prisoner here if the humans had taken command of the lake
house.

“Who are you?” he demanded, but the sound of his own voice made

the pulsing in his skull that much worse. This time he did bring his hand to
his head, and he felt the heavy bandage that was there.

“Here, let me take that off and have a look,” the man said.
Frederik eyed him with distrust, but he had no choice. He might as

well do as the man said. For all Frederik knew, there were a dozen human
guards outside, waiting to come in here at the slightest provocation to stick
a sword in his heart or put a bullet through his head.

He nodded, and the man stepped forward. “You have nothing to fear

from me,” he said when Frederik still flinched as his hands came forward.

The man lifted a hand to his lips, and using his fingers, pulled them

back just enough so that Frederik could see the fangs that were there.

Vampire then. Frederik immediately relaxed and allowed the man to

do his job. Owen would have shown him the infinity tattoo on the back of
his hand and said that he was Frederik’s servant. That was probably why
Frederik was given a bedroom. He hoped his lover was okay, well taken
care of, and not too worried. He wanted to get out of bed and go and find
him, but he suspected that would be up to the man in front of him. “Was I
badly injured?”

“Yes and no,” the man said. “You were electrocuted. It wasn’t like you

had any bullet holes or knife slices all over your body for me to treat, but,

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well, you were electrocuted. You’re lucky to be alive, and several of your
blood vessels did pop.”

“Shit,” Frederik said.
“Yeah. You had a lot of that health salve on you when you came here,

though. We’ve been rubbing it on your body. There’s no open gash or
anything on your head, but we’ve been soaking the wraps in the salve and
wrapping them around your skull anyway, just to make sure you got a
healthy dose of the stuff at all times. I was worried about swelling in your
brain, and it seems like the salve is finally working if you’re awake.”

The man spoke like he was a healer. “Who are you?”
“Oh, right, sorry. William Delany. Formerly of the Delany house, but

not anymore.”

“Delany. Jesus Christ, your nest, your family, I’m so sorry, I’d heard.”
“Yeah, well, don’t be sorry. I got over it real quick.”
Frederik didn’t understand that at all. “You don’t care that most of

your family was attacked and killed by humans? How did you escape
them?”

“I wasn’t there when the attack went down. I was with my husband.”
Frederik hadn’t heard anything about any of the Delanys being

married. There was that one who was supposed to get married to Tristan,
but then he ran away.

That last thought made Frederik stop cold. “Who is your husband?” he

asked.

“You don’t know him. His name is Hawke.”
“And, is he a vampire as well?”
It was when Will’s fingers went suddenly still on his temple that

Frederik had his answer. The man was with a band of humans. He’d been
part of the attack on his own nest, including Frederik’s lake house.

And somewhere, they were keeping Owen away from him.
He reached out and snagged Will’s wrists, his body moving fast and

through the pain he still felt now that he knew his and Owen’s lives were
in danger.

Owen’s Promise

Lord William Delany had clearly never so much as trained himself in

the arts of self-defense. Frederik got his hands around him and flipped him
over onto the bed quickly. He straddled him, using the weight of his body
to keep the man down. Will struggled, but Frederik wrapped one hand
around his throat, and he quickly grabbed Will’s wrists with the other and
held them above the man’s head. Frederik was bigger, so it wasn’t that
hard.

He could feel Will’s heart beating quickly through the pulse in his

neck. He was scared. Good.

“Where is Owen?” Frederik demanded. He kept his grip tight, but not

so tight that Will wouldn’t be able to breathe or answer him.

“The man who was with you. He’s fine,” Will said.
“Not what I asked. Where is he? If your human hunters hurt him I

swear to God I’m going to—”

Frederik stopped speaking when he heard the familiar click of a gun

being cocked.

Will looked over first, and a relieved breath escaped him. “Hawke.”
Frederik purposely turned his head slowly. The last thing he wanted

was to make any sudden movements that would give the man named
Hawke a reason to blow his head off, especially since Frederik was in a
pretty compromising position with the man’s spouse.

He was a dark-haired man, with a decent amount of muscle on him and

the makings of a beard. He also had the nastiest scowl on his face behind
the shotgun he held.

Only upon realizing that it was a shotgun did Frederik breathe a little

easier. The man was clearly hoping that Frederik would be a stupid
vampire noble, and that he wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between
his weapons.

“Are you really going to risk shooting your husband with that thing? It

looks like someone sawed off the end a bit, so he will take some of the hit
if you pull that trigger.”

He felt Will’s heart speed up a bit at that knowledge.

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Hawke’s lips thinned, and he abruptly put the gun down. He’d likely

only pointed it at them because it was the only weapon he had on hand.
“Let him go.”

“Where is Owen? The man I came here with. What did you do to

him?”

“Frederik!”
Frederik jerked at the sound of his name. It was far away, and it

sounded like it was coming from down the hall outside the door.

Will used this sudden distraction against him and kicked him off. He

rolled out of the bed before Frederik could make a grab for his hostage
again, and then ran into the arms of his husband, just as Owen waddled
quickly into the room.

The sight of him, alive and healthy, made all of Frederik’s worries

vanish. Owen kept one hand under his expanding stomach but reached out
with the other. Frederik came off the bed quickly and enveloped him in a
tight hug.

As tight as he could manage with Owen’s swelling stomach between

them.

“Thank God you’re awake.”
“Thank God you’re safe.”
They both spoke at the same time. Owen laughed at that, but Frederik

was still shaking with the fact that he’d had all sorts of horrible thoughts
running through his head about what could have been happening to the
other man. He was just grateful that Owen was here now.

Owen then looked over at the other pair in the room. Hawke was

holding onto Will just as tightly as Frederik was doing to Owen. The only
difference was the glare Hawke was giving to Frederik.

Owen immediately noticed. “What happened?”
He reached his hand up and gently touched Frederik’s temple. “Are

you okay?”

Likely he wouldn’t be in another few minutes.

Owen’s Promise

Hawke opened his mouth, likely to tell him what a complete dick he

just was and the terrible consequences he would suffer for it. “You—”

Will put a hand on his shoulder, and oddly enough, that calmed the

human down. “It was an accident. He didn’t know.”

Hawke’s body loosened up a little, but he still looked like he wanted

nothing better than to mop the floor with Frederik.

Let the human try it.
“Do I want to know what happened?” Owen asked, taking hold of

Frederik’s hand and holding onto it tightly.

“I’ll tell you later,” Frederik promised, squeezing back.
Hawke looked down at their hands, and he regarded Frederik coolly.
“So it’s true then, you and this man are together?”
“Yes, we’re together,” Frederik said, and because he wasn’t entirely

comfortable with them even looking at Owen in his condition, maybe
wondering what was wrong with him, he stepped in front of the other man
to block their view of him. The only thing he wanted them to know about
him and Owen was that Frederik was a vampire lord who’d taken a human
for a partner. They didn’t need the fae details and pregnancy thing to use
against them. “Is there a problem with that?”

Owen sighed behind him. “Frederik, they know about me. I told

them.”

Frederik stiffened. “You did what? Why?”
“Because I’m a healer mage,” Will said.
Just the word mage made Frederik tense up again, and he stared at Will

with even more distrust than before. “I thought you were a normal healer.
If you even think about coming near Owen—”

“Frederik!” Owen snapped, and he grabbed hold of Frederik’s hand

and yanked him back a step. Frederik was a little shocked to see the
warning glare on his face.

“They saved your life, and Will isn’t like that. He’s been helping me

along with…things.” His face turned a bright red when he said that, and

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Frederik could only assume that those things were of a personal nature
involving the pregnancy.

Well, he was the other father, and he wanted to know. “What kind of

things?”

“Making sure his pouch is forming at a normal level,” Will said. The

strange thing was how he blushed, too, and refused to look at Frederik’s
face.

That might have something to do with the fact that Frederik had held

him down and all but threatened his life minutes ago.

“I apologize for what I did. I thought Owen was in trouble and I didn’t

mean to scare you.”

Will nodded, but Frederik got the feeling that while he was forgiven,

this incident wouldn’t easily be forgotten. Especially by the man’s
husband.

“I’ve never known another human to take a vampire for a partner.

You’re both an unusual couple,” he said.

Hawke held onto Will tighter. “Says the guy who’s with a pregnant

fae.”

There was a commotion outside of the room, and suddenly there were

more humans in the doorway. No one entered. They all just looked to
Hawke, and then at Frederik, and they must have judged the situation
relatively under control.

“Everything all right here?” asked one of the men. He was young,

maybe about Frederik’s age, with black hair and blue eyes.

Frederik still caught the way his hand was resting on a gun at his hip,

just in case.

“Everything’s fine, Dorian. Hear back from Vaughn yet?”
“Still missing,” Dorian said. A few of the men beside him folded their

arms and looked at Frederik accusingly, as though he had something to do
with their missing friend.

Owen’s Promise

Hawke sighed. “Take a few more men out to scout the area. Maybe he

dropped something and we can track where he was taken, or where he
fell.”

Dorian’s mouth twisted, as though he’d swallowed something he

didn’t like the taste of.

Frederik had to admit that he was impressed when all of the men

turned around and immediately did what their leader told them to. There
were no bullshit arguments or sighing about the matter. They all nodded
and did as commanded, like good little soldiers.

“Free humans don’t usually receive the kind of training your men

have,” Frederik said.

Hawke smiled at him. “They work for me, so they know what to do,

and ever since Noir came to us we’ve only gotten better at our teamwork
skills.”

“Noir?” The name sounded familiar.
“Sometimes I forget that you nobles don’t necessarily pay attention to

the people who make sure you’re all well fed and protected at the end of
the day.”

Frederik bristled at the insult. There were at least a hundred assassins

and guards in his family estate alone before his reckless father sent them
all off on a suicide mission. How was he supposed to know all of their
names?

He was about to argue that point when Owen gently touched his arm.

“He used to work in your house. He was the one who found us and
brought us here.”

“He’s a vampire then?” Frederik asked.
“Yes,” Hawke said. “And don’t even think of calling him a traitor.

He’s a half human and a former slave, and your father tried to kill him.”

“I wouldn’t have dreamed of calling him a traitor,” Frederik said. “I’m

hardly better myself, all things considered.” He hugged Owen a little
tighter to him, just in case Hawke was too stupid to notice that he also
didn’t fit the bill for what a normal vampire was.

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Hawke nodded. “So I see.”
“What are you going to do with us?” Frederik asked.
“Well, we can’t have you running off to warn the other vampire

families about what’s coming, even though they all must know by now
that something’s up.”

“The other vampire families can all go and fuck themselves,” Frederik

said. “They made deals behind my brother’s back, and tried to have him,
myself, and my other brother assassinated just to get at his share of—”

Frederik cut himself off quickly. He was pretty sure that this human

wouldn’t have any sympathy for vampires fighting and backstabbing each
other over the blood trade that stole blood from their human slaves and in
turn kept the vampires alive.

“They wanted to steal my brother’s house and his land,” he said,

hoping that his hesitation wouldn’t be noticed. He wasn’t really lying
about that part either.

If Hawke did notice his stall in words, he didn’t point it out. “So long

as you don’t cause us any trouble. We’ve had enough injuries and even a
few deaths. Mostly from the reckless assholes from other villages who
don’t listen, so it doesn’t look like we’ll be moving ahead with the attacks
for another little while.”

That was good. Frederik might not care about the other vampire

families, and he was pissed off at Daren, but that didn’t mean he wanted
his last two surviving brothers murdered in a human revolution. Maybe he
could convince this human to ignore the main house. He did seem to be in
charge here, but he had to deal with himself and Owen first.

“You didn’t answer my question about what you were planning on

doing with Owen and me,” Frederik said. Owen had the best shot at
survival here, considering he wasn’t a vampire. These men might take in
vampires and make them part of their own village collective, but Frederik
wasn’t about to breathe a sigh of relief just yet. They were still out to kill
other vampires.

Owen’s Promise

“That will be entirely up to you,” Hawke said. “Your partner has been

well behaved enough, and he’s even started helping out with the cleaning
and cooking. Will and I have told the other men that he’s got a stomach
infection, which is causing the swelling. Noir and Anderson are the only
other two people who know the truth.”

“Anderson?” Frederik asked.
“Noir’s partner. He’s also a werewolf, and he was able to tell almost

immediately that there was another life inside of him anyway, so it’s not
like we could’ve kept it a secret from him anyway.”

“Everyone’s been real nice so far, Frederik,” Owen said.
Sometimes Frederik despised the fact that his lover was as trusting as

he was.

“If you want to join us, then you can. Will can help Owen to deliver

when the time comes, and as far as anyone else in camp or my village
needs to know, the baby could have been adopted by you both, or one
could be the father and the other a stepfather.”

“I don’t want my child to grow up believing in a lie. He will know that

we are both his parents,” Frederik said.

His words made him look down at Owen’s swollen belly, and for the

first time, he wondered exactly what it was that his lover was carrying.
Boy or girl. Fae or vampire. Maybe a bit of both?

“Then you won’t be joining our village?” Hawke asked.
Frederik made a noise in the back of his throat, and he looked back at

Will.

“Will you really be able to help him deliver?”
Will shrugged. He’d finally stepped out of Hawke’s protective hold to

stand on his own. He stood just a little taller as he was asked such a
question. “I’m a mage healer, and Owen’s told me everything that Alden
told him. I didn’t even know fae had this ability until I met him, or that
mages hunted them like they do, but I am the most qualified to make sure
the birth goes smoothly.”

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“And I would like him to help me with it,” Owen said, giving Frederik

a pointed look.

Frederik swallowed hard. Right, he should have known this was

coming. Frederik was scared shitless about how all of this was going to go
down, but this was happening to Owen’s body. He was the one swelling
out so much, and he hadn’t even known this could happen to him.

He could very well die. Frederik couldn’t blame him for wanting to

cling to the other vampire in the room, even if he was a mage.

“We’ll stay for now, until after my child is born, then we’ll decide

what to do. I’ll be sticking by Owen the entire time. I don’t want to risk
that any of your men hurt him, even by accident.”

“I’ve been fine so far. You don’t have to coddle me,” Owen said,

though he hardly sounded impatient with Frederik.

He almost sounded comfortable with the whole situation, like he

wasn’t afraid to be in a house filled with humans. Free humans who would
look at him and wonder just why he would serve vampires so
complacently for his entire life.

And wasn’t that just a mind fuck?
“How long was I unconscious for?” Frederik asked, realizing just how

much bigger Owen’s stomach looked since they were in the forest
together. His face was even a little rounder. Not by much, but the humans
were definitely feeding him well enough.

“Nearly three weeks,” Hawke said, a satisfied grin on his mouth that

Frederik wanted to knock off. “If someone in this house really wanted you
dead, they’d have done it by now.”

Three weeks. Frederik thought he felt the floor drop out from beneath

him. He’d been helpless in the hands of humans for three weeks, and
instead of waking up in a nightmare where he was to be tortured and
starved, Owen stolen from him to never be seen again, he was perfectly
okay, and Owen was right here with him.

Someone had to have been feeding him. No vampire could go for so

long without blood without waking up starved and crazed for it.

Owen’s Promise

“Who’s been feeding me?” Frederik asked, and then he looked at Will.

“Who’s been feeding you?” It was hard to not stumble over his words as
he asked such impossible questions. He looked at Owen’s neck and saw no
fresh bite marks on his throat. There were none on Hawke’s throat either.

Surely no one else would have volunteered the blood.
Will grinned at him, but it was a nervous thing. “Yeah, about that,

we’ve sort of been giving you animal blood.”

“What?”
Owen chimed in before Frederik could flip out at the thought that he’d

unknowingly been ingesting something as disgusting and disease ridden as
animal blood. “Noir and Will drink it every day. The humans hunt for their
food, and they collect the blood for them to drink. I’ve been giving it to
you as well. You seemed to like it, and you always finished what you were
given.”

“But, but that’s not right. We can’t survive off of it. It’s not supposed

to taste right and doesn’t have the same nutrients. It comes from dead
animals, and it’s disease ridden—”

Will cut him off before he could keep on with his rant. “You’re going

to have to get those thoughts out of your head if you plan on surviving
with a group of humans who are trained to kill. Animal blood isn’t what
we were brought up to think it was. I’ve been living off of it for months,
and I know that he’s your partner and everything,” Will said, gesturing to
Owen. “But if any of the men outside see any bite marks on him, whether
he volunteered to give you his blood or not, they will take offense to it.”

Frederik wanted to be sick.
Hawke was apparently done with the explanations and decided he had

better things to do. “Owen, could you just walk him around? Get him used
to exercise again and maybe introduce him to the man who saved you
both. Keeping him out of trouble would also be a good idea.”

Now the human was talking to Owen as though he were an equal, as

though they were friends. Three weeks was a long time to get to know
someone, Frederik supposed.

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“I’ll stay with him. I want to monitor him, and I don’t think Lord

Frederik will attack me in front of his partner,” Will added when Hawke
gave him a disbelieving look.

“Fine,” he said with a nod.
“Wait a minute, where are you going?” Frederik asked when Hawke

turned to leave the room.

“I still have to make plans to try and find my friend. I’m hoping he’s

still alive out there somewhere, and not in the hands of vampires, or
mages.”

“Mages?” Frederik asked. “Why would they involve themselves in

your uprising?”

“The mages are the reason why we’re still stuck in this house,” Hawke

said. “They didn’t take kindly to Noir killing two of their own to save your
ass, so we’ve been defending against them for the last little while. They
want Owen.”

Owen’s Promise

Chapter Eight

Vaughn never said a word to any of the men who took him. He didn’t

speak after they beat the shit out of him, or during the truck ride he was
forced to go on, and he made damn sure not to say a word, even when
confronted with the very real possibility that he was about to enter the
mansion of one of the vampire lords he’d been preparing himself to attack.

The guards who had him were all either human, or half-human and

half-vampire slaves who worked for the vampire lord who owned the
forbidding mansion. Vaughn had seen the tattoos in the backs of their
hands.

It was strange. He was used to seeing the infinity tattoo on Hawke’s

hand, but Hawke never seemed like the type who could be easily
brainwashed, and yet here these men were, doing the bidding of the
vampires. None of them seemed to realize they could just run away. It
likely hadn’t crossed their minds. The scariest thing was wondering if they
even wanted to.

There certainly was no love for their own kind when they roughly

pushed Vaughn out of the back of the truck, and with his hands tied behind
his back, he had no choice but to land on his chest and get the wind
knocked out of him.

His hair had been grabbed, and he’d bitten back a moan of pain

through his gag.

“Just tell us how many men you came with. How many assassins are

there, how many dogs, mages, just tell us and you don’t have to go
inside.”

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Yeah right. Vaughn would die before he ever let any of these assholes

have any kind of advantage over his friends. They already knew that
Hawke and the others had taken the house, and Vaughn wasn’t about to
give them anything else they could use.

They would kill him, or bring him to the lord of this estate, to be

tortured and killed even if he did say something. That was his only
comfort when they brought him inside.

That had been days ago, after he’d stupidly wandered off too far from

the other hunting party. He’d had two of his dogs with him, so he’d
thought he was safe.

It had been a stupid assumption, one that had gotten him captured, put

his beloved animals at risk, not to mention the rest of his team.

They were coming in for him every day now. The half-vampire

servants used him as a feeder in between his beatings, and he was getting
delirious from the lack of blood. They didn’t even bother to chain him up
anymore because he was so damn weak.

The worst part was that Vaughn knew it was just a matter of time

before he cracked. He was already close to the breaking point, and if he
didn’t find a way to end it soon, he was going to sing like a songbird just
to give them what they wanted so they would put him out of his misery.

Maybe he should just make up a story for the next time someone came

to see him. Hopefully his captors would end it for him after he talked and
wouldn’t bother with checking the facts, but somehow he doubted he
would be that lucky.

The heavy metal door to his cell made a loud clunking noise as the

lock on the other side was undone and the oversized handle turned.

There was no handle on Vaughn’s side of the door. He only knew what

it looked like because he’d seen it once before being dragged into the
windowless room.

Probably because they feared he would try to rip it out of the door and

use it as a weapon. As if he had the strength for something like that.

Owen’s Promise

Vaughn lay on his side in the cold cement floor as artificial light

flooded into his space. He didn’t bother to turn and look at whoever came
in. He’d learned that by faking unconsciousness, sometimes the men
wouldn’t bother with him.

Unless they were in a particularly playful mood and wanted to wake

him up for some fun. That always sucked.

The strangest thing happened. Instead of a hard kick to the spine or a

bucket of cold water splashed over his head, there was a gentle hand on
his shoulder.

Oddly enough, that seemed to be the trigger his nerves were waiting

for, and his body just started to shake uncontrollably.

Fuck. So much for pretending to be asleep.
“I won’t hurt you,” the man said.
Vaughn knew it was incredibly stupid of him, but he cracked his eyes

open and turned as much as his aching body would allow so he could look
at the guy.

That was almost too much, and the shaking intensified. He was having

a hard time adjusting his vision to the light that was behind his captor
compared to the darkness he’d been living with in this cell for so long. He
might as well have been looking at a ghost.

“Yeah fucking right,” he said, and his voice was barely a whisper, and

a hoarse croak. Vaughn tried to smile, to show the man that he wasn’t as
close to breaking as he really was, but then his dry lips cracked and split,
and God, that annoying sting hurt so much more than it was supposed to.

The man said nothing, but his hand came down again, still gentle, and

his soft, warm palm pressed against his forehead. It was almost as if the
guy was taking his temperature.

“When was the last time you were given any water, or food?” he

asked.

Vaughn hadn’t been given food since he’d arrived. As for water, well,

he didn’t want to think about it, except that now that the bastard had

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mentioned it, it was suddenly everything that Vaughn could think about,
and his throat felt drier than it had only ten seconds ago.

It was enough to make him want to cry, but he couldn’t do that in front

of this guy. Please, God, don’t let him cry.

“I only want my brother back,” he said. “My name is Daren.”
“Don’t care who you are,” Vaughn said. Despite his words, he shifted

as much as he was able to closer to the man. The man who said his name
was Daren had a gentle touch and was likely one of the vampire lords who
owned this prison that Vaughn was stuck in.

He also had incredible body heat, and Vaughn was so cold. Getting

drenched with cold water and then being left to dry on his own in what
was essentially an already chilly and damp basement wasn’t exactly doing
wonders for his health.

This had to be a ploy. The master was going to show his new slave

some kindness and mercy, and in return he was hoping Vaughn would talk
to him.

Vaughn only hoped he was strong enough to resist. He wanted so

badly to be the sort of man who could power through it and say with a
strong voice tough shit, I’m not telling you a damn thing! But he wasn’t.
He wasn’t a soldier, he just trained the dogs and got roped into going out
on patrol because there weren’t enough men to do it, and he’d stupidly
volunteered, thinking that his dogs could keep him safe.

“Are you listening to me? Wake up!”
Vaughn felt his shoulder being shaken just a little, but he ignored it.

Blissful unconsciousness was calling to him, and he wanted to slip into its
merciful arms and never leave them.

“Fuck,” said Daren. Vaughn felt the world beneath him shift as he

became weightless, and then there was nothing else after that.

* * * *

Owen’s Promise

Frederik walked around the grounds of his own vacation home, still

having a hard time believing that he was even being allowed the ability to
do so, considering he was the enemy to everyone here.

He wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth, and despite his

worries, aside from a few suspicious and curious glances, pretty much
everyone left him alone, and Will and Owen updated him to the things that
had been happening while he was unconscious.

He was so lucky that he wasn’t dead and Owen wasn’t a slave in the

mage district right now. If it hadn’t been for Noir, whom he’d met and
who turned out to be a stand-up guy, then everything Frederik had done
would have been for nothing.

He was introduced to a few key members of the group, Noir and his

partner, Anderson, amongst many others. Anderson repaired the weapons
and had an innocent enough smile, even if it was a tired one, though there
was something about him that made Frederik want to keep his distance.
Frederik was torn between annoyance and respect at Noir for teaching the
humans the tactics that the assassins and guards used to protect their
masters. The annoyance stemmed from the tiny part inside of him that felt
betrayed that another vampire could spill secrets like that. The respect
came from, well, he was spilling secrets, and he was doing it without a
care in the world, like the thought of what other vampires would do to him
should they find out and catch him didn’t scare him in the least.

He had a set of brass balls on him, that was for sure.
There were other men, mostly soldiers. Hank was the most irritating of

the bunch since he was the only one who looked at Frederik and glared at
him, as though he thought that alone would scare him.

Will certainly didn’t seem to like Hank much. Hank had even tried

gripping Frederik’s hand in that tight warning way that people did when
they met someone they didn’t like.

Of course, he didn’t much like it when Frederik squeezed back. He

tried to hide it well enough, but Frederik could tell he was in pain.

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There was also a man named James. He had a short, pale beard and the

oddest hair color Frederik had ever seen. It was blond, he was sure of it,
but there were hints of rich brown and red highlights. Considering the man
came from a poor human village, it had to be natural, and the guy was
ripped with muscle. He wasn’t as quick or fast as Noir was when he
watched them spar, but for a human, he was a tank.

The only other man whom Frederik could remember off the top of his

head was a man with pale-brown hair that seemed to be going prematurely
silver in some places, Oliver Moreau. He was quiet, and though he had
some weapons strapped to him, he seemed more interested in getting the
hounds to listen to him. They were an interesting breed that Frederik was
sure he’d never seen before. They were large and intelligent. He almost
wanted one. Oliver was the replacement caregiver then for the man who
was lost and supposed to be watching them, it seemed. He was having
some difficulty in getting the dogs to follow his commands.

Of course, he should have known better than to think that this

hospitality in his own house would be free.

Hawke joined them as they watched Oliver struggle to make the dogs

follow his commands.

“That’s how I know Vaughn is alive. The dogs want to go to him, but if

we let them run off, we’ll be even more undefended against the mages,
and we might walk into a trap.”

“What makes you think that?” Frederik asked.
“We’ve been stuck here a little too long. By now the other vampire

nobles know what we’ve done. I haven’t heard word from any of the other
villages who were part of the attack either. At this point, I can only assume
either the worst for them, or that they’ve given up.”

“Many other humans before you have staged these sorts of rebellious

attacks over the years, and they’ve all failed,” Frederik said, noting the
way Owen squeezed his hand in a warning manner.

“No offense,” he added.

Owen’s Promise

“None taken, it’s true at any rate. We’re not the first, but if we live

through this, I’d like us to be the last.”

“My brothers are good vampires,” Frederik said. He’d hoped to have

this conversation in private, but he was going to have to do it here with
Hawke saying things like that. “I don’t want them dead simply because
you paint us all with the same brush.”

“Uh-huh, didn’t one of your older brothers sell your lover here to one

of the mages we’re fighting off now? We also ran across a small pack of
werewolves not too long ago. They were traveling, and they were even
saying that your other older brother was ordering them to be killed.”

“They attacked my family first.”
“Maybe because you keep them as slaves.”
“Hawke, please,” Will said. Apparently, like Owen, he was the sort of

person who would rather be a peacekeeper.

Frederik couldn’t stop himself from looking down at Will now that

he’d drawn attention to himself. “You are a vampire of noble birth, how
can you stand by and help him while he does this to your own kind? I
know you explained there was no love lost between you and your family,
but for God’s sake!”

“That’s enough,” Hawke said through clenched teeth.
It was only then that Frederik realized the other humans around the

camp were looking at him, and between all the torches and fires that
they’d lit for light, there was an eerie sort of look about the lot of them
that made Frederik shiver and inwardly curse himself for losing his
patience.

He had Owen to think about, and the little one. He couldn’t draw

attention to himself like this.

Hawke must have taken note of the people staring as well, because he

cleared his throat. “Will, see if you and Anderson can’t help Oliver get the
dogs to settle down in their kennels. I’m going to take our guests back to
their room,” he said and then looked pointedly at Frederik. “I won’t have
any trouble with that, will I?”

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He asked the question but was clearly not worried about the answer.

Of course, he had no reason to be. Hawke had him by the balls so long as
Frederik and Owen were in the middle of their camp. He was playing nice,
but this was still a small human mercenary group he was dealing with.

“None at all. Can I trust that we won’t be locked in and trapped should

the mages attack tonight? I wouldn’t want either Owen or myself to be
entirely helpless, since it is him and my child they want.”

“Hawke said he wouldn’t lock us up so long as we didn’t do anything

dangerous,” Owen said, then he looked at the man who held their lives in
his hands. “You won’t lock us in, right?”

Hawke bit his lips together. In the short amount of time that Frederik

had spent with Will as he was brought around his own house, told where
to go and where not to go, and who best to avoid, he got the impression
that both Owen and Will were very similar in their mannerisms. Owen,
however, had a slightly more shy nature, considering his time spent as a
slave.

Owen was also using that against Hawke. Frederik could tell. His

voice was softer than usual, and his eyes were wider. The hand he held
beneath his stomach was an added touch that he was no doubt using to stir
up some added sympathy.

Frederik was suddenly that much more attracted to, and in love with,

the man beside him. His Owen had a talent for manipulation, it seemed.

“I won’t have you locked in, but I’ll put someone outside the door to

stand guard.”

“Don’t want me going anywhere in case I can give you some solid

information on my family, right?” Frederik asked.

“I’ll keep your family out of it for now. I only know who they are

because we questioned Owen about you, but for now, I’ll back off of
them.”

“And the rest of your human friends?”

Owen’s Promise

Hawke clenched his hands into fists. He clearly didn’t like having

these demands heaped upon him by a vampire, and Frederik was too livid
to care.

“If anyone from the other villages contacts me and say they’re still on

the battlefield, I’ll ask them to back off, but that’s all I can promise.”

Hawke pointed with his hand back to the main house, where he wanted

Frederik and Owen to quietly go. “Please,” he said.

The other members of Hawke’s team were still staring at Frederik,

waiting for the chance for him to step out of line and punish him. He could
tell. If it had only been him, he would have taken his chances and gone up
against as many of them as possible.

He squeezed Owen’s hand and smiled down at his lover instead.

Together they walked back to the house. Frederik didn’t trust any of these
men to do their absolute best to keep Owen safe. For all he knew, there
was a plan in the making to hand Owen over to the mages should they
become too dangerous.

Frederik would keep Owen safe from anyone who tried to harm him,

whether it was these humans, or the mages. No one else was going to
dictate their lives when this was over.

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Chapter Nine

Owen could feel how thick the tension in the air was now that he was

finally alone and at least relatively safe in the old bedroom where he and
Frederik used to come together.

Before there was an assassination attempt and Owen was sold off.
Frederik was steaming mad. Owen began to think that simply being

near him wasn’t helping, since he was highly suspicious of the fact that
Frederik might just have fought a little harder on behalf of his family had
Owen not been there.

He couldn’t blame him. Despite what Lord Tristan and Daren had

done, they were only looking out for their safety, and the safety of their
family. Hell, if Owen had any siblings that he loved like that, then he
might just have done the same thing.

He didn’t, however. Frederik was the only person in the world to ever

offer him love, real love, and not the kind of manipulated, ugly thing that
was a product of a noble master wanting the use of a servant’s body.

Owen’s body felt sorely neglected after Frederik’s run-in with the

mages. It wasn’t Frederik’s fault that he’d been put into a coma of sorts,
but Owen desperately wished the man would stop pacing around the room
like a caged animal and sit with him on the bed.

Owen no longer feared Hawke, which was probably a stupid thing. In

fact, he knew it was a stupid thing. He barely knew the man, and just
because Owen and Will got along well, and Will was a vampire, did not
mean that Hawke would be willing to spare another vampire if he stepped
out of line.

Owen’s Promise

Despite that, he didn’t fear him. If Hawke wanted Frederik dead, he

would have killed him a long time ago. Hell, he would have handed both
him and Owen over to the mages when they demanded their compensation
for the men they lost.

He hadn’t, and he hadn’t tortured Owen for any information either.

That may have only been because he didn’t want to risk harming the child,
but either way, it still spoke to Owen about Hawke’s character, and it also
showed the amount of loyalty that his men had for him, considering they
were also protecting Owen and Frederik from the mages, thereby trapping
themselves here, and one of their own was now lost somewhere,
potentially captured, injured, or dead, and all because Hawke had some
honor.

“I wish you would sit down,” Owen said, finally giving a voice to his

thoughts.

He didn’t expect his words to have the effect that they did. Frederik

actually stopped pacing and seething to look at him.

His anger melted completely off his face into something much more

horrible. Despair.

“You think we’re going to die here, don’t you,” he said. He didn’t have

to ask that because it wasn’t a question at all.

“No,” Frederik said. “Not really. I don’t believe we are as safe here as

Hawke would like us to believe. The door might not be locked, but we are
not permitted to leave. We could die here, but somehow I don’t believe
Hawke is the sort of man who would needlessly kill us. He would only do
so if he had no other choice, and considering the strain his men are
currently under…” Frederik trailed off.

Owen rubbed his stomach. He didn’t need Frederik to continue to

know what he meant. If Hawke had no other choice, and if the mages
overpowered the men here, or the projected losses would prove to be too
much, he would hand them over to see to the safety of his friends.

“There has been an attack by the mages already,” Owen said.

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Frederik looked alarmed at this information at first, but then he

calmed. “I should have figured as much. When was this?”

“A week ago. They weren’t very powerful. Apparently they aren’t

warlocks or anything, none of them are.”

“What’s the difference?”
Owen thought back to the conversation he’d had with the vampire

Will, the good-natured man who was acting as his healer while he
approached the end of his…pregnancy. He’d asked the man that same
question.

“Mages aren’t particularly powerful. Anyone can be born a mage, but

they only specialize in one or two spells. Warlocks can do all sorts of
things, and are much more powerful. Will specializes in healing, so that’s
about all he can do. Others might work only with fire, water, air, or
transforming into other creatures.”

“I understand. It’s good to know for when we go up against them, but

it would only be useful if we knew specifically the powers these mages
have, and how many of them there are,” Frederik said.

Owen nodded. Attacking Alden had been one thing. He also

specialized in healing, but had since become more powerful since making
his potions out of Owen’s hair and dead skin cells. But to go against a
group of them, all of whom could have different abilities...Things just did
not look good.

“Will told me that he didn’t know mages were like this to”—Owen

lowered his voice, aware that there was likely a man or two outside of the
door, and that they were most likely listening in on them—“to the fae. He
said he thought the mages were only suspicious of people born without
magic.”

Frederik shrugged. “Makes sense if you think about it, though. If the

mages really didn’t care about the social structure of everything, and if
they really had no agenda, then the fae wouldn’t have claimed their own
district to get away from them.”

Owen’s Promise

It was true, and so obvious that it was a damn near shame that no one

had thought of it before. The districts were separated because everyone
hated each other. The fae wouldn’t have gone off on their own if they
didn’t have something to fear like everyone else.

Owen had slowly grown to accept the fact that he was different, and he

was sure that what he felt for the little one inside of him was love, but he
couldn’t help but think about how much more simple everything had been
back when he’s assumed he was just another human slave. At least the
vampires only wanted to drink his blood. They didn’t literally want to eat
him.

“Oh, shit, Owen, I’m so sorry,” Frederik said, and suddenly the bed

dipped as Frederik finally did the thing that Owen had desperately wanted
him to do since he woke up.

He hugged him. A real, warm, I’m-glad-we’re-both-here-for-each-

other kind of thing.

“I don’t mean to cause you any more stress, not with everything that’s

been happening, but I just thought…I don’t know.”

“It’s okay,” Owen said, and it was. So long as he and Frederik held

each other like this, and Frederik continued to run his hands through
Owen’s hair, he was going to be all right.

His child was, at any rate. He’d spoken to Will, and he’d made plans

for what would be done should Hawke feel he had no choice but to give
Owen up to keep the lives of all of his men intact.

Frederik didn’t need to know about that, however. He would be livid if

he did know, and he also wouldn’t approve. Owen couldn’t have that. If it
came down to it, well, Frederik would understand later on.

It was likely his fears that spurned him on, coupled with the fact that

he hadn’t been able to so much as sleep next to Frederik ever since they’d
been brought here, and now he was tucked against Frederik’s chest with
his head beneath the man’s chin.

He was so warm and inviting. Owen tilted his head and pressed a kiss

to Frederik’s throat.

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He felt it the second that Frederik tensed up, but Owen didn’t stop. He

didn’t have much of a choice when Frederik cleared his throat and put his
hands on Owen’s shoulders, gently pushing him back.

Both of them kept their hands on each other, however. The fact that

Frederik didn’t break all contact was what kept Owen’s heart from
thumping painfully in his chest.

“Should we? I want to, but you look so far along,” Frederik said, and

his dark eyes held all the worry in the world as he stared down at Owen’s
belly.

Owen sighed. He understood now what those other mothers meant

when they complained about having their bodies taken hostage, but that
wasn’t the only thing that bothered him.

“I don’t think it will harm the child,” he said. Just saying the word

child made that one particular stretch mark in the middle of his belly itch.
It was now connected to his belly button in a sinister way that he didn’t
particularly like, but that wasn’t the point that he had to remain focused
on.

“What’s the matter?” Frederik asked, immediately picking up on the

fact that there was a problem.

He was good at that. It made hiding things from him difficult, but not

entirely impossible.

Owen rubbed his stomach again, even though that only made the

itching worse. He remembered to keep his voice low, just in case the walls
had ears. “Frederik, I’ve never felt the child kick. The women, the other
slaves I’ve worked with, they always spoke of it. They were excited for
it.”

“You’re not human and you’re not a woman, this could be something

different,” Frederik said, although he couldn’t hide the worry in his voice,
and he was back to staring at Owen’s belly.

He reached out to touch it but then pulled back at the last second,

clenching his fingers into a fist and pulling away.

Owen’s Promise

101

“You can feel if you like,” Owen said, and he reached for Frederik’s

hand. He didn’t fight against him.

The material Owen wore wasn’t that of the slaves. Though he knew

where those garments were kept, Hawke absolutely refused to allow him
to wear them. Owen was comfortable enough in what he had, but it was
still another layer between him and Frederik. He pushed his shirt up and
out of the way, allowing Frederik’s bare hand to touch his stomach.

Frederik’s hand settled as easily as though it belonged there. Which it

did. “Your skin feels different. The mark is deeper,” he said.

“Will believes it will split open when it comes time for the, uh, birth,”

Owen said. “I know the child is alive, even if Will cannot find another
heartbeat. He senses nothing but an empty lump inside of me. But I keep
getting bigger. It’s growing.”

Owen saw the way Frederik’s throat bobbed as he swallowed hard.

“An empty lump?”

“That was the way Will described it. He can sense the things within a

person. He told me it was how he’d saved Hawke’s mother’s life. When he
looks inside of me, however, something in the…well, womb, I suppose, is
blocking him, and he can’t see or hear anything.”

Frederik breathed hard through his nose, and his nostrils flared wide. It

was like he was fighting not to panic.

“And that mark is supposed to be where the child will come from? It

doesn’t look big enough to comfortably fit a hand, let alone a child.”

“Will offered to…cut it wider, should there be a problem,” Owen said.

He put his hand over top of Frederik’s and laced their fingers together.

“I believe the child is still alive, but it scares me that I don’t know

what’s blocking Will’s attempts to see it, or my ability to feel it. Maybe it’s
being protected by something. My fae blood, anything. Maybe there really
is a problem.”

It scared him so much more than he thought it did. He actually started

to shake when those words left his lips. His bottom lip trembled, and he
could barely hold himself back from bursting into tears.

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He hadn’t realized until now just how much he wanted this child to

live. If it died, or was already dead inside of him, he didn’t think he could
survive it, and that scared him even more. It made him want Frederik’s
comfort more.

“I…I don’t know what I expect you to say to make it right. There’s

nothing that can make this right, but I just…I don’t want to die, Frederik. I
don’t want this child to die either. I want it taken care of and protected
from the life that I had and from people who would hurt it or use it for evil
magic.”

Frederik shifted onto his knees on the bed quickly, and his hands

cupped Owen’s cheeks. “I should never have allowed you to serve. I
should have done something to free you, and that is my fault and I will
forever be sorry for it.”

“You couldn’t have saved me. We would have been torn apart like

Lord Tristan and his lover,” Owen said.

“Just the fact that you still use the word lord when talking about either

of my brothers is enough to shame me. I don’t know what I could have
done that would have been different, but I didn’t even try. I thought it was
better if things stayed the way they were. I should have tried something,”
Frederik said. He pressed a quick kiss to Owen’s mouth. It was hard and
desperate, but then they were staring into each other’s eyes again, and
Frederik was still holding onto him as though he feared Owen would
vanish if he let him go.

“I will not let you die. Do you understand me? I failed you before and

I will not fail you now.”

“You can’t promise things like that. You’re just a man,” Owen said,

shaking his head. He was torn between loving Frederik’s declaration and
being terrified of what it would do to the man if he was unable to keep to
it. Owen knew better than to think that they might have a happy ending.
Those were rare and nearly impossible, especially between two different
species.

Owen’s Promise

103

Noir and Will along with their respective husbands, well, Owen was

not feeling like much of an optimist at this point to believe he might have
the same blessings they did.

“I promise it anyway,” Frederik said, being stubborn. “You will live,

and so will our child. We will find a place to settle that will be safe for the
both of you. I could care less about myself. I will be your slave in the fae
district if that will wipe my soul clean for the things that I have done. If
you wish to pass yourself off as human and the child yours, then we will
do that and I will still be your servant, but I will not let anything happen to
you.”

Frederik kissed him again, harder than before, and Owen knew without

a doubt that this would indeed be happening. He needed it, and he wasn’t
about to let Frederik back out of it now that he’d gotten started.

His cock throbbed and was hard already, desperate for Frederik’s

touch, his mouth, his tongue, hands, anything. Owen was quick and eager
to get Frederik out of his clothes and naked as fast as he possibly could,
but Frederik was still gentle with him, forcing him to take it slow.

He was no less considerate than he had been any other time they had

come together, but he was not being overly gentle either. In fact, there was
barely a difference in the tenderness of their lovemaking between now and
the times they snuck around before.

It was different, somehow. Not in the physical sense, but when

Frederik gently eased him onto his side and prepared him with the healing
salve that was being kept in the room, Owen definitely felt as though an
unspoken agreement had been come to.

Then he stopped thinking about agreements, and what was different

and what was the same, when Frederik eased his cock inside of Owen’s
asshole.

He’d missed it so much that he sighed through the burn. He tried to

push back against his lover, but it seemed that was where Frederik drew
the line.

“Not too much. I’m in as far as I need to be,” he said.

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He was only halfway. “If you make love to me like this it will be the

worst sort of teasing I will have ever gotten,” Owen complained, and then
sucked in a shaking breath and moaned when Frederik began thrusting
shallowly inside of him.

He had to grab his cock and stroke himself just to keep from going

completely out of his mind.

“Then this will last longer,” he said, and Owen could practically hear

the grin in his words.

“I doubt it,” Owen said, and he grunted deep in his throat before

continuing, “will last as long as you think it will.”

“Are you that hot for me?” Frederik asked, and on his next forward

canting thrust, his cock inched deeper into Owen’s pucker. “Do you want
it that much.”

“Always,” Owen said, and he changed tactics as he stroked his cock,

switching it up so that he was also twisting his hand back and forth in a
tighter fist. That, combined with the way Frederik insisted on teasing his
prostate, was fucking amazing. He moaned into his pillow before Frederik
reached around, touching his chin, and guided him to turn his face.

Frederik’s lips and tongue were the icing on the cake. Owen loved

kissing during sex, there was something intimate about moaning and
gasping into each other’s mouths while Frederik pumped his cock into
Owen’s asshole.

Not only that, but it was the way the other man held onto him, like

Owen was being hugged tightly to Frederik’s chest, that made him feel
absolutely adored and loved, all the things he shouldn’t be considering
who and what he was, not to mention what he was carrying.

Owen reached his hand around and held tightly to Frederik’s back,

trying to pull the man closer, as well as hug him back while he was being
so thoroughly and amazingly fucked.

Frederik groaned deeply, and despite how he’d tried not to just pound

all the way inside of Owen before, he suddenly couldn’t seem to stop or
slow down.

Owen’s Promise

105

“Fuck!” Frederik cried out, pulling his mouth away as he hissed out

deep breaths and his cock just started slamming into Owen uncontrollably
fast.

Owen moaned loudly now that his prostate was no longer being teased

and barely nudged against, but full-on slammed into by the head of
Frederik’s dick. “That’s it! Don’t stop!” he yelled, and his balls became
incredibly heavy as that familiar surging sensation began within them, and
then shot all the way through his swollen and darkly colored dick.

He came stroking himself hard and fast as his cum splashed onto his

swollen belly, his asshole clenching around Frederik’s cock, and Owen
sighed as he felt the man’s warm cum shooting inside of him.

Frederik didn’t stop right away, not until he finished milking himself

until his dick was soft, and only then did he pull out.

He gently turned Owen over, and Owen couldn’t keep the lazy smile

off his face.

“I guess that means I didn’t hurt you,” he said. “How is...” He trailed

off but stroked Owen’s belly.

Owen had no idea how the little one was doing, but he didn’t feel any

pain or cramping, so he took that as the sign they both needed that all was
well for the both of them.

“Perfect, now come here,” he said, and pulled Frederik down for a

series of lazy kisses.

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Chapter Ten

James considered himself to be fairly good at what he did, despite his

large size. He could sneak around without most people noticing him,
because he was always the first to see when they weren’t paying attention.

That, and despite his size, he was quiet. It was likely due to all the

training he’d had over the years, but that training was really just an excuse
for him to practice sneaking up on Hawke, who was almost impossible to
surprise. James was five years older than Hawke was, but they’d still
played games together as kids.

James, as a cocky teen, couldn’t handle the fact that some younger kid

was better able to slip around unnoticed than he was. Their childhood
game to always try and outdo each other turned into something that James
found incredibly useful as an adult.

He still couldn’t quite get the jump on the other man, but as far as

everyone else in the village was concerned, he was as much of a ghost as
Hawke was when they were in battle together.

He was fine with being second best, considering how good he really

was, especially when, tonight on guard duty, he remained perfectly still,
despite that odd flash of light that he caught out of the corner of his eye.

Anyone else would have charged over to see what that strange light

had been. James waited. He could hear cursing, and someone was
fumbling through the shrubs and trees as though they were unused to
being out like this.

There was another flash of light. It was red-orange, like fire, then more

cursing and what sounded like the guy was slapping at the leaves. He’d
probably accidentally set them on fire.

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It was a fire mage, not a very good one from the sound of things. He

was alone, and he was closer to James’s hiding place behind the tree.

He probably kept on lighting fireballs to see where he was going in the

dark. Stupid, stupid.

The guy didn’t even notice when he stopped to stand right beside

James in the dark. James’s night vision was still well adjusted, and even
with hardly any moon in the sky, he could see the man perfectly.

He was alone. And he was handsome, if a bit young. Looked to be

early twenties or so. He only had the moonlight to go by, so all that James
could tell was that he had dark hair and eyes. The moon perfectly
highlighted his cheekbones, however, and his slim, square jaw. He was
just standing there. He folded his arms close to his chest and breathed out
a loud sigh, as though he were cold. That tight T-shirt that hugged his back
and abs likely didn’t do anything for warmth.

It had been way too long since he’d gotten laid if he was staring at the

enemy and having thoughts like this. He had to stay focused.

James knew what was happening here. They were sending in a fire

mage to act as a distraction. Likely the guy was waiting for a signal, or
maybe he was the signal.

James had to act fast. He pulled his knife out of its sheath at his wrist,

hoping the threat of the blade would be enough to keep the guy from
burning him.

He reached out and had his hand around the man’s mouth—it was

soft—and yanked him back before he could scream.

James showed him the blade, and he didn’t summon any fire.
“You are coming with me, and you are going to tell us how your men

are planning the attack.”

The guy nodded. He was shaking with fear. Clearly he wasn’t a

soldier. What the hell was he doing here?

James removed his hand, but he kept the blade handy. “It’s already

starting. Don’t kill me. I was just supposed to light the way so they’d
know where to run when it ended.”

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“What?” James asked through clenched teeth.
“Please, the truck’s over there. I didn’t want anything to do with this. I

had to.”

“Shut up,” James said, and before he could even think about what

could be done about this new setup, one of the windows on the side of the
house blasted open, and a naked man was sent flying out. There were
fearful and enraged screams mixed together, and the guy in James’s arms
started to shake even more.

“Shit.”

* * * *

Frederik sat up from his landing place with a groan. Everything on him

hurt. The air stung his skin. He looked down at himself and groaned. Air
stinging his skin might have something to do with the fact that so many
places on him were scraped raw. He also had several long gashes all over
his arms, legs, and stomach. Probably a few on his face, but nothing
looked like it was bleeding overly much.

Frederik moved to get to his feet. There was no time to check if

anything on him was broken. When he stood up and didn’t fall back down
again in mindless pain, he was pretty sure everything was in working
order.

He could hear Owen screaming.
He ran two steps before he was forced to stop.
“Not so fast, sunshine,” said a man Frederik had never seen before. He

did something with his hands, and a blue light appeared there. A mage. He
didn’t have time to deal with this.

“I bet I could get a good price for a vampire skin—”
Whatever else the man had been about to say was cut off when he was

hit over the side of the head with a metal shovel.

“Hawke,” Frederik said, shocked to see the other man.

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“Hi.” Hawke took one look at him and then quickly darted his eyes up

to look over his shoulder, his entire body stiff. “You’re naked.”

“I know. Thanks for saving me, but I’m in a hurry,” Frederik said, and

he quickly moved around the other man.

There was an explosion of light off to the right, and more angry shouts

from the men who ran toward the fighting, along with the barking of those
huge dogs, but Frederik didn’t pay any attention to it.

Oddly enough, neither did Hawke. “I’m coming with you,” he said.
“Don’t get in my way,” Frederik said as he jogged toward the side

door to the house that the servants had used. The lock was broken, but not
just broken, it looked like it had been melted a bit and now the door was
slightly ajar. Not good.

“You’re the one that’s naked and bleeding, and my husband is

somewhere in this house, asshole,” Hawke said.

“My—” Frederik couldn’t call Owen his husband. That wasn’t what he

was. If he had his way, that’s what he would make the man. “My lover is
in there, and do you even have any of your weapons on you?”

“Of course.” Hawke pulled out his handgun and showed him the knife

he had hidden under his sleeve. “Didn’t want to waste the bullets on that
other guy, and we might need him alive to ask questions.”

Frederik now understood just why this was the man the other humans

respected so much.

“I like you, human,” Frederik said. Together they ran inside of the

house and up the stairs to where all the shouting was taking place.

* * * *

Owen screamed as he watched Frederik sail through the window from

the force of Alden’s blast.

They’d been lying in bed together, snuggling peacefully in the

afterglow of satisfying sex, and Owen’s dick had twitched when Frederik

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touched his thigh, signalling that they were about to enjoy themselves
again, when the door burst open without warning.

Owen was shocked into immobility at the sight of the man he’d hoped

desperately was dead. Frederik was the first to act. Ignoring his nudity, he
jumped up from the bed and charged at the man with an enraged roar.

Alden lifted his hand and made a long swipe with it across the air. He

unleashed something from himself that shattered the mirror on the other
side of the room as a gust of wind caught hold of Frederik and threw him
through the window, showering more glass outside.

“Frederik!” Owen screamed. He got up from the bed and ran to the

window, but he couldn’t see where Frederik had gone. There was blood
dripping from the sharp bits of glass that hadn’t come loose from the
window, however, and it made Owen sick to look at them.

“So much power, just from drinking a little bit of potion made from

your hair and skin,” Alden said.

Owen cringed when he felt the man put his hands on him. He held

onto Owen’s shoulders and squeezed just enough that Owen knew he
wouldn’t be fighting the man off.

Alden was staking his claim. Owen belonged to him as far as he was

concerned.

He could hear men rushing around on the property. Likely they were

going to check on Frederik. Owen just hoped that he was okay.

Alden’s fingers moved up and played along the back of Owen’s neck

before threading gently through his hair. “Just think of the power I could
have if I cut you into a thousand pieces and used you for soup.”

“Please,” Owen said, and he watched a show of lights illuminate the

property outside. It looked like Alden had recruited more fire and lightning
mages. There were more gusts of wind, and the dogs barked and guns
went off. “Don’t hurt my child. Let me give it to the humans, just, please,”
he said.

Alden’s nose pressed down on Owen’s neck, and he inhaled deeply, as

though sniffing a fine wine. “I would like to, but no. I am determined. You

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will always try to run. I thought being a slave wouldn’t have given you
those instincts, but now I know better. I will harvest everything you have,
and raise the child as my own. It won’t run from me. It will love me, even
when I take its blood, and its skin, and its hair, and use it for my own.”

Owen’s fears left him at those words. It was like a button had been

pressed inside of his head, and he couldn’t let that happen. He was furious,
and there was nothing he could do to stop from acting on it.

Owen turned around and charged at the man with a loud roar. He threw

his fists out and punched everywhere he could on Alden. He’d never been
taught to fight, but the slam of his knuckles against Alden’s face, jaw, and
chest felt rough and satisfying.

Alden backed away from him. He didn’t fight back or use magic, and

that only spurned Owen on even more. “I do not belong to you!” he
roared, hardly seeing anything through the blood on Alden’s face, and
pulled his fist back hard to give him one more shot to the face before
Alden’s eyes suddenly burned a bright red, and his hand flew out and
grabbed a hold of Owen’s wrist before he could land his last punch.

Owen cried out at the tight grip that put immense pressure on the

bones in his hand, but then he screamed when Alden’s hand clenched even
more so, and he felt the crack on his wrist.

It was so painful that he dropped to his knees.
Alden backhanded him.
“I’ll fucking kill you right now. Let the others fight over your body.

I’ll cut that child out of you now and be done with it!” he shrieked.

Owen tried to scramble away, but every limb felt sluggish and heavy.

Alden grabbed him by the shoulders and threw him against the door.

Only he missed and Owen hit the side of the door. He barely managed

to turn his body enough to keep his belly safe, but it was still struck hard,
at least on the side.

The dark stretch mark that had been slowly growing while Owen’s

body changed sliced open on the impact. Blood spilled out of him. Owen
held onto his stomach to keep it inside, but it seeped through his fingers.

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A loud ringing sounded in his ears as he stared down at the mess. The

child. What was happening to his child? Did Alden just kill his baby?

More blood poured out of him, as if to answer his inner question, and

Owen slumped against the door.

He turned around when the ringing went away and he heard a shifting

sound behind him.

Alden was there, and he held an iron poker from the fireplace in his

hand.

“Not going to finish me off with magic?” Owen asked, hardly caring

what happened to him now that the infant inside of him was gone.

Alden shrugged. “Taking a fae creature inside of a mage doesn’t give

permanent power boosts. I’ll save what I need to get the child and get out
of here.”

He still thought the infant was alive? Did he not see how much Owen

was bleeding?

He certainly didn’t have the energy to get out of the way when Alden

lifted the poker high above his head.

Owen winced and huddled in on himself, waiting for the final blow to

come. Will unexpectedly burst through the door and tackled Alden to the
ground.

The two men yelled and fought and rolled with each other on the

ground. Will tried to bite Alden a couple of times, and his fangs were out,
showing just how much he meant to do just that. Alden used some of his
magic to make the fire poker hot, at least to Will, and he screamed as he
was forced to let go of the thing and back off.

Without taking his eyes away from Alden, Will went to Owen and

crouched down next to him. He gently touched Owen’s stomach.

“Is he dead?” Owen asked.
Will was still staring at Alden. “No, just keep pressure on that wound

for now. He’s coming.”

“What?” Owen had gone from complete despair to relief and then back

to despair. But it was mostly fear. “It’s too early!” he said. He was also

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about to argue the fact that he didn’t feel like he was getting ready to give
birth. The women he’d been close to who had done so all screamed and
shrieked like they thought they were going to die from the pain, some
actually did die, and Owen felt nothing.

Then he did feel it. Like a pair of hands were grabbing at the open

slice on his stomach and forcefully pulling him apart, stretching and
ripping his skin, making the hole wider, and he did scream and fall on his
back.

Christ, this was going to kill him and Alden wouldn’t have to do a

thing.

Will still wouldn’t look at him as he got back to his feet. He was

actually going to try and fight off a man with that much power to defend
him.

At that point, Owen didn’t care. All he wanted was to get the child out

of him and make the pain stop. He would worry about his life when it was
over.

Everything else in the world was suddenly so far away aside from the

pain. He turned away from the light show Alden made and rolled onto his
side. That actually diminished the pain a little, and he sighed, but then it
started up again, and the ripping of his skin started back up full force.

He really was going to die.

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Chapter Eleven

Frederik came up the stairs just in time to watch Owen roll over onto

his side and scream bloody murder. That was what the scene looked like,
anyway. His entire middle was covered in blood, and so was the floor he
lay on. It was leaking out of what looked like a slash down the middle of
his swollen belly, right where the dark stretch mark had been.

Frederik froze at the sight of him.
To make matters even worse, Will’s body suddenly flew out of the

room and hit the wall of the hallway with the same force Frederik had felt
when he was thrown out the window with magic. It actually put a huge
dent in the wall before the vampire fell to the bloody floor. He tried to get
back up, but failed.

“Will!” Hawke screamed and ran for his lover. Will appeared to be

conscious, but he was clearly in pain from fighting with a powerful mage.
Will only had powers of healing, if Frederik understood everything right.
He wouldn’t be able to go up against a man who used potions to give him
dark magic.

Hawke pulled his gun quickly, just as Alden stepped out of the room to

stare down at them. He had a sneer on his face as he looked down at
Owen, like the man was a crying dog instead of someone giving birth, and
then he turned that glare onto the other two men. He didn’t seem the least
bit scared for having a weapon pointed at him.

He also didn’t notice Frederik standing at the end of the hall. Despite

how much he wanted to run to Owen and comfort him, his training, little
of it that he’d had, told him to use that to his advantage. He’d been too
shocked at first, but now he knew what to do.

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Owen saw him. Their eyes met, and Frederik never wanted to see tears

of pain in those blue orbs ever again.

“Do you really think I would let you shoot at me?” Alden asked.
Frederik didn’t understand what the man was doing at first, but then he

took note of the way that Hawke’s whole arms seemed to shake. His elbow
then bent, and he was suddenly pointing his own gun under his chin.

Alden was using his magic on someone, and he still didn’t see

Frederik blatantly standing there. He was that focused on his task and
putting that much effort into his spell. That had to make him vulnerable.

“Stop! Stop it!” Will screamed, and he even grabbed at Hawke’s wrist

to try and pull the gun away from his husband’s face.

Frederik didn’t think there would be a better time to act.
He charged, fangs out and eager to sink into the man who wanted to

steal his child and harvest his lover’s body and organs.

Alden turned his head and noticed him coming much too late. Frederik

tackled him, and he sank his fangs into Alden’s throat. He didn’t do it the
neat and tidy way that noble vampires did whenever they wanted a sip of
blood from a feeder or a slave. Frederik bit down hard, driving his fangs
deep into the mage’s throat until he had a good chunk of flesh in his
mouth, and then he bit down harder and started to pull until blood started
shooting from the man’s neck like a broken fountain.

The blood in his mouth awakened his hunger for it. Not only that, but

it intensified his deep desire to make sure the man beneath him was dead.
Frederik went into a frenzy, and he was no longer himself.

There was more screaming. More people entered the hallway.
“What the fuck?” someone screamed.
Hawke yelled and Owen screamed some more, and the sound of a gun

shooting off blasted through the room.

Frederik would kill them all. Everyone who wanted to hurt Owen, he

would kill them.

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“Frederik. He’s dead.” A gentle touch on his ankle pulled him out of

his blood haze, and only then did he realize that the body he was mauling
beneath him was no longer moving.

Frederik pulled his fangs out of what remained of Alden’s throat and

moved back a bit to stare down at his handiwork.

He’d done that? Alden wasn’t bursting into a cloud of dust and coming

back from this any time soon, that was for sure. Had Frederik not been
used to the sight of blood, and trained to kill to defend himself, the sight of
the body beneath him would have made him want to be sick. As it was, the
sight of the neck bone and freshly ripped-open flesh that was still leaking
lifeblood did make him a little queasy, and he was a vampire, for God’s
sake.

He could only imagine what he looked like. There was probably blood

all over his face.

Owen didn’t wince when Frederik turned to look at him. Or maybe he

did, and it was just masked by all the pain that was on his face.

“Owen,” Frederik said. He moved to turn around and get closer to him,

but the sound of a shotgun being cocked sounded, and he looked up.

Fuck. There were more humans in the hallway. Not everyone in

Hawke’s team, but enough. They all stared down at him, and at Owen as
he clutched his stomach and made faces of agony.

Will and Hawke were the only ones up and moving. Hawke stepped in

the way of the man holding the gun so that the dangerous side was no
longer pointed at Frederik, and the man was forced to lower his weapon if
he didn’t want to be pointing it at his leader.

“Frederik,” Owen said. His voice cracked, and that only made Frederik

worry even more.

“I’m here.” He took hold of Owen’s bloody hand and squeezed it tight.
“Dear God, Alden,” said one of the men in the hall.
Frederik looked over and saw a young man that he really didn’t

recognize. The horror on his face as he stared down at what used to be the

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man in charge of the mages, along with the chains on his wrists, told him
that the scared boy was a mage himself.

His fangs came back out, and he released a warning hiss.
James was there, and he quickly put his hands on the man’s shoulders

and started to lead him away, muttering about how he shouldn’t have
brought a captive into the room.

Frederik would deal with them later.
Will returned with one of the bedsheets from Frederik’s bedroom, as

well as several pillows. From the way he covered Owen’s genitals with the
sheet that quickly soaked up blood on the floor, and placed the pillows
beneath his head, it almost looked like Will was preparing Owen to give
birth right there on the floor.

“What are you doing? The bed is fifteen feet away,” Frederik said.
“Do you really want to move him with his stomach burst open like

that?” Will demanded. “I don’t know a lot about this, but I’d say it’s
probably safer that he stays how he is until we can get the baby out.”

“Baby?” someone asked, and there was all kinds of shock in their

voice. Was that James again? No, it was Carl. Christ, Frederik needed to
calm down and think. He could barely recognize the voices around him.

Hawke quickly spoke up. “You need to get out of here, Carl. Go tally

the wounded and the mages we captured. James got one, so see if you
can’t figure out if that was the last of them now that their leader is dead.”

So much for keeping Owen’s pregnancy a secret, but Frederik was still

grateful to Hawke for his quick thinking as he hurried everyone out of the
hallway.

Only the man with the severely scarred face remained, Noir. “Would

you like me to do anything to help?” he asked.

Owen picked that time to let out a particularly loud scream, and

Frederik swore he saw the slit in his belly widen another inch. It was like
an invisible knife was cutting him. There was also something inside of
him that did not look like an infant that was the only thing that allowed

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Frederik to remain calm instead of flipping out over what he could not
protect Owen from.

“What is that?” he asked, pointing with the hand that Owen was not

crushing.

“What is what?” Owen asked.
Will gently nudged Frederik out of the way to have a look, and then he

looked up at Noir and his husband. “If you both want to be useful, get us
some clean water. Lots of it.”

Both men turned around and left without another word. From the looks

on their faces, they were glad for the reason to go.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Owen demanded, and Frederik regretted

saying anything.

Will actually put his hand within the open slit and touched the thing

that was pushing against it, ripping his stomach muscles and skin apart.

“What is it?” Frederik demanded, fighting against the urge to become

hysterical.

“It’s an egg,” Will said.
Owen’s head fell back against the pillows. “Unbelievable.” There was

sweat on his forehead, so Frederik took a clean portion of the bedsheet and
wiped his face with it.

His weak smile lifted Frederik’s spirits.
“Is this good or bad?” Frederik asked.
Will was still prodding around. He actually stuck his hand beneath the

skin of Owen’s stomach, but Owen hardly seemed to notice now that he
wasn’t looking. “Don’t know. I would say good, because there’s no elbows
or legs to make things difficult.” He moved his hand around a little more,
and then he frowned. “The egg is cracked, though. The shell feels in place
and I don’t think there are any openings, but we should get it out of you
quick just in case.”

“Cracked?” Frederik asked.
“Alden threw me against the door. My stomach hit,” Owen said, and

then his face twisted again in agony. Will removed his bloody hand

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quickly, and Hawke and Noir returned with the water. They carried it in
bowls and had freshly filled water skins attached to their hips.

“Here’s your water,” Hawke said, and his face actually turned a little

green at the sight of the blood on Will’s hand, and the increasingly wide
hole on Owen’s stomach.

“Can’t you just repair the egg? You’re a healer, aren’t you?” Frederik

demanded. “Repair the egg and heal him up so he can finish the time he
needs.”

“An egg isn’t something I can heal, and he’s already giving birth.

There’s nothing I can do but help him get it out,” Will said.

There was very little Frederik could do except for get out of the man’s

way and let him work. Will quickly washed his hands in one of the bowls,
though Frederik didn’t see the point since he’d already had his hand inside
of Owen, but then poured a bit of the water onto the open wound on
Owen’s stomach, clearing away the blood and exposing more of the egg.

“I’m going to…I think I’m going to be sick,” Noir said, and he ran

down the hallway and out of sight. Hawke looked very much like he
wanted to follow, and his legs twitched as though he was fighting against
the urge to do just that, but he stayed where he was.

“Is it bad?” Owen asked.
“No, it’s not,” Frederik assured him, and he squeezed his hand tighter.

He was telling the truth, too. It really didn’t look all that terrible,
especially now that Will was really working on him.

Will didn’t blink. He frowned in complete concentration as he gently

touched the side of Owen’s belly, just beneath the spot where his ribs
started.

That seemed to help push the egg out.
Owen yelled out in pain and bit down on one of the pillows to muffle

himself.

“We have to do this fast so nothing breaks off and gets stuck inside of

him. I doubt that would be good,” Will said, then he looked at Frederik.

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“Get ready to catch it when the egg slips out. Owen, I need you to push as
hard as you can, we’re going to try and do this in one shot.”

Owen nodded, and Frederik smiled at him and inched closer to his

stomach. He put his hand right where he thought the egg would land.

“You’re doing so well. I can’t even believe you’re doing this, Owen,”

Frederik said.

“Never doing this again,” Owen panted, then he took a deep breath and

pushed. He pressed his free hand beneath his stomach while Will gently
did the same to his sides. Frederik’s eyes widened as he watched the egg
move, and then it pushed past the hole it had made in Owen’s abs.

It was one smooth transaction. In retrospect, the egg was small, and

didn’t weigh much, but considering where it had come from, it seemed
huge.

Owen gasped and sighed when it was out of him and then immediately

rolled onto his back. Frederik was forced to let go of his hand so that he
could have a better grip on the egg.

“You did it, Owen. You did it,” Frederik said, though he could hardly

take his eyes away from the object in his arms.

“Jesus H. Christ,” Hawke said.
Frederik had entirely forgotten he was still there. Will seemed to be

more interested in checking Owen’s wound, cleaning it, and then healing
it, which gave Frederik time to really look at the bloody thing in his hands.

It was baby blue through the red blood, and speckled with light spots.

It kind of reminded Frederik of a robin’s egg, only bigger. There was
indeed deep cracking on one side of it, but other than that, it was perfect.

“Is it okay?” Owen asked, looking at Frederik while Will cleaned him

up and rested his glowing blue hands on Owen’s stomach.

Frederik honestly didn’t know. He began thinking about how they

would care for the egg, what would be required, and how long it would
take before the thing would break, before it started to crack even more in
his hands.

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Frederik froze. “What’s happening? I’m not putting any pressure on

it!”

It cracked some more, all over the shell, and then a cry sounded from

within it, and only then did Frederik work to remove the pieces and toss
them away quickly.

Inside was a regular baby. It was small and red in the face and angry.

Likely due to the cold it felt now that the protective shell was in crumbles.
Some of the pieces of the shell were likely poking it as well. There was a
healthy set of lungs on him—and it was a him—that was for sure.

Frederik fell in love immediately. This was his child. His blood, with

Owen’s blood. That shouldn’t have been possible because they were both
male. Sort of in Owen’s case, but still, Frederik was a youngest son, and
he had a preference toward his own sex. He’d come to accept the fact that
he wouldn’t have children, and it hadn’t bothered him.

Now, holding this screaming child with tightly shut eyes and clenched

fists, he didn’t think he ever felt a stronger emotion swell within him.
Well, maybe what he felt for Owen was stronger, or it was the same. He
wasn’t sure, and he didn’t want to look into that too much right now. It
wasn’t the right time. There probably wasn’t ever a right time for that
because it didn’t matter.

“I want to hold him,” Owen said.
Frederik looked down at him. Will’s hands were still glowing blue

over his skin, and the slice on his belly looked more like a crooked stretch
mark now instead of a gaping hole, but he was still gray in the face.

He was smiling, however, and he held his hands out for the boy, and

despite all the blood and sweat, he never looked better.

“Give me a second,” Will said, pulling his hands away from Owen’s

belly. He rushed back into Frederik’s bedroom, and for the first time
Frederik noticed that the blood, which had spilled on the floor and soaked
through the bedsheet he’d brought out to help keep Owen’s modesty, had
also stained the legs of his pants. Will hardly seemed to notice as he came
back with another crisply folded white bedsheet. Must have come from the

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closet. There was also the blanket that Frederik and Owen had slept with
in his arms.

He threw the blanket over Frederik’s shoulders, and it was only then

that Frederik remembered that he was still naked.

He laughed and adjusted it over his shoulders, and when Will reached

for his son, Frederik handed him over.

Will might not have known what he was doing when it came to a male

fae birth, and had been forced to work with the few clues that Owen had
given him, but he certainly knew how to clean the baby quickly with the
water that had no blood in it, checking the boy’s mouth with his pinkie to
make sure there was nothing lodged inside, and then wrapping him up all
nice and warm before giving him to Owen with a warning to keep the
bundle off of his stomach and rest the child on his ribs should his arms get
tired.

Owen only had eyes for the boy, and they had never been so blue, or

happy. Frederik touched his sweat-soaked hair.

He was a lucky man.
Hawke had apparently come up behind them and knelt down to have a

look as well. It was when the baby didn’t stop fussing that everyone
seemed to get worried.

“So,” Hawke started. “You don’t have any lactating boobs or anything.

How are you going to feed that kid?”

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Chapter Twelve

They ended up staying in the vacation house for another week before

Hawke made the decision to move on. By then, Frederik and the other
humans had come to a sort of understanding. There was no hiding from
them what Owen was, or where their child had come from, and oddly
enough, aside from a few odd glances, the warriors remained friendly.

It might have had something to do with Will’s ability to speak with

them and have them understand things that otherwise might not make any
sense to them, as well as the fact that Hawke had drilled it into them that
Frederik had saved his life when Alden had tried to use his spells on him.

Because of that, when Hawke made the invitation for Frederik and

Owen to take their child and live in the human village to the west,
Frederik considered it.

It was their last night in the house when Hawke made the offer, and

Frederik thought he could bring it up with Owen.

Owen walked around in their bedroom, their son in his arms, and he

fed the child with an old bottle that had been discovered in the abandoned
servants’ rooms.

The first night had been the worst, especially considering all of the

chaos that had just been unleashed.

Hawke and his men, along with Frederik, were forced to brave the

forest in search of any animals that had escaped from any of the farms
nearby after the humans had attacked the vampire families and their
tenants.

Some chickens and pigs were recovered, but no cows.

124 Marcy

Jacks

Frederik had lost his temper entirely and yelled at James when he was

presented with a goat after what had seemed like an eternity of searching.

“Give the infant the goat’s milk,” James had said, and he stared at

Frederik as though he couldn’t understand what his problem was.

Frederik thought he was being played with. “Goats have milk?” He’d

then leaned over to the side, and indeed, there was something down there
that appeared to be lactating.

James shook his head in disgust and muttered something about the

rich, while Hawke laughed and clapped Frederik on the back.

They’d brought the animals back, and Little William had been

surviving on the milk ever since.

Owen had insisted on naming the boy after the vampire who had

helped him come into the world.

Owen smiled at him, that same bright smile that he always had

whenever Frederik walked into the room. “I spoke with Hawke,” Frederik
started, moving across the room to give his lover a kiss and touch his son’s
soft head.

“Oh?” Owen asked, somehow managing to not sound worried, as if the

idea that Frederik conversing with the leader of the human resistance
didn’t bother him at all. “What did he say?”

Frederik cleared his throat. “We have been offered a place to live at his

village. Tolerance for vampires is fairly decent there, because of Will and
Noir. I would have to become either a guard for the village or an assassin
to their cause, however.”

Owen didn’t say anything. He stared down at the child in his arms

thoughtfully. It appeared as though the boy had fallen asleep while he was
being fed, and Owen pulled the bottle away and rested the boy against his
shoulder.

Frederik didn’t take the silence as a good sign. “I promised you I

would take you to the fae district, and I will. I just wanted you to know
that this option was available, too.”

Owen’s Promise

125

“It’s not that,” Owen said, quickly shaking his head. “I mean, they’re

both unknown factors, aren’t they? We don’t know anything about the fae,
other than the fact that you’ll probably become a slave the second you step
over the border, and their land is supposed to be haunted, and even though
the people here have been nice, we don’t know how everyone will act
when they find out about, well, me. We don’t even know if William is a
vampire yet,” Owen said, and he stroked the boy’s back, though Frederik
had gotten the impression that he did it to comfort himself more than the
sleeping child.

Then there was the vampire thing. To be safe, they hadn’t introduced

the boy to sunlight yet, and Frederik was not in the least bit interested in
his son being out in the light, but they would have to discover which side
his blood favored more eventually. Would he have powers if he was more
fae than vampire? Did Owen have any special powers that he was not
aware of? So many questions.

“We don’t have to go. I will stand by my promise to you. I want you to

be safe in the fae district.”

Owen smiled at him. “I love you for that. That you’re always thinking

of me, but I think about you, you know. I don’t want you to be a slave.”

Owen was silent for only a few seconds before he spoke again. “I grew

up believing that I was a human, so it’s not like living in a village that was
full of them will make for a learning curve, and they’ll treat you right, so
long as we both pull our weight, though I’m not sure that I like that James
is still keeping that mage a prisoner.”

“He hasn’t been mistreating him, from what I’ve seen. The mage’s

brethren abandoned him, and James is gently trying to find out if more
will be coming, or if the mages were the ones who took their friend
Vaughn.”

So far, it appeared that neither was the case, but still James refused to

set the mage free. Had the young man not been a fire mage, Frederik
would have assumed that he’d cast a spell of some kind on him.

126 Marcy

Jacks

Owen came and sat down next to him on the bed. With his free hand,

he took hold of Frederik’s and held on tightly. “I’m glad you brought this
up, and I’m glad that Hawke and his men would be willing to have us. To
be honest, I’ve been dreading going to the fae district for a while. I
wouldn’t know the laws, or what would be expected of me. Would they
separate the three of us for not being, you know, to their standards?”

Thoughts like that had never even crossed Frederik’s mind, and he was

both angry with himself for not having thought of it and extremely pleased
with Owen for doing so.

“Should I go to Hawke and tell him to expect two more travelers with

his party? They leave at dawn.”

Even now, Hawke had ordered his men to salvage and take whatever

could be carried, and useful to their village, from the house. Hawke had
looked at him apologetically when he gave the order, but Frederik didn’t
mind it in the least. The humans could consider it an act of goodwill on his
part if they needed the blankets, pots, pans, tools, and whatever else could
be used in their village.

“It doesn’t even feel like we were back here that long,” Owen said.
“I know, and they still want to find their friend, but it’s becoming too

dangerous to stay. They plan to go back to their village and make plans,
tell their village leaders what was found here, but the nobles will
eventually come back to try and retake this property. Hawke does not want
to be here when that happens, and considering what happened with my
brothers, neither do I.”

Frederik had no illusions about the future. If they chose to go, then

Frederik might very well be one of the men chosen to go along on the
rescue mission for that missing human.

Owen and the little one, however, would be safe. They would be in a

village of humans who would help him to care for the child, though he
was doing a remarkable job already. Frederik was much too scared to hold
the boy when Owen was out of the room, never mind when he was
standing right beside Frederik and watching him.

Owen’s Promise

127

“Then, I think we should go,” Owen said.
Frederik looked at him.
“I’m being serious. This really does sound like a better option, for all

of us. William might even have some friends to play with when he gets
older. You and I, neither of us, will have to worry about slavery anymore,
we can build a small house, we can just be together.”

Frederik smiled, and then he kissed his lover, putting his free hand

behind Owen’s neck to bring him as close as he could. “I can make you
my husband, as well,” he said, smiling as they pulled away from each
other.

Owen’s soft blush was beautiful. Their child was beautiful, too.
“In a safe setting, perhaps I can get you with child again and give

William a sibling.”

The sour look on Owen’s face made Frederik laugh.
“Not funny,” Owen said. “I hope you like this son, because I’m not

giving you any more. I know females say that after giving birth, but I’m
being perfectly serious. Fae or not, I wasn’t built for that.”

Frederik stopped laughing, and he wiped his eyes, but he still couldn’t

stop smiling. “Yes, one is more than enough. We will be careful to make
sure it doesn’t happen again.” Frederik looked at Owen, at the man he was
planning on spending the rest of his life with, and thought about how their
lives had been so different mere weeks ago. Owen had been different.

“I like this side of you, you know.”
Owen blinked his wide blue eyes curiously at him. “What side?”
“This one. I make a joke about wanting to get you with child again,

and you put your foot down about it. You’ve been thinking about our
future and what’s best for the three of us. I don’t think you would have
done those things, or been able to do them, when…our relationship was
different.”

Frederik didn’t even like mentioning Owen’s former time as a slave,

let alone Frederik’s slave.

128 Marcy

Jacks

“Well, I don’t think I would be the way I am now if it weren’t for

you,” Owen said, picking up on what Frederik was having trouble saying.
“You fought for me, and you saved me. I am how I am now because I
want to be like you.”

Frederik thought he might start to cry with a revelation like that. He

cleared his throat and coughed instead, covering it all up with a wide
smile.

“I love you,” Frederik said. “With everything inside of me, I love

you.”

Owen released a soft breath. “I love you, too. I promise I won’t make

you regret any of what you’ve done for me, for us. To get us here, I mean.
I’ll make you happier than you’ve ever been.”

Frederik looked down at their child, and then back up at Owen. He

was going to make Owen his husband, and they were going to live
together as complete equals. They were both free from their former lives,
and all they had now was their future together. Frederik didn’t know what
he would do with all of that wealth.

“You already have.”

THE END

WWW.MARCYJACKS.COM

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Marcy Jacks lives and works in Ontario, Canada, where she is

fervently pursuing the writer’s life while writing about lots of gorgeous
guys. She loves hearing from readers, and you can reach her
at authormarcyjacks@gmail.com.

For all titles by Marcy Jacks, please visit