Striding down the narrow street, Eryk Solie took in the variety of smells around him. The lingering scent of cooked mutton and rice from the evening meal teased his nose, while the taint of human bodies and, more importantly to his hungry cock, the scent of unbridled sex pushed him forward. On to his destination - a gambling hall where his friend, Svann, had assured him he could find any number of vices to sate the hungry wolf inside of him. It was a bitch being an Arctic wolf shifter in Tajikistan. His kind were rare enough as it was, and being in a foreign land, a foreign city, did little to soothe his wolf.
Turning the corner, he nearly ran into a couple fornicating against the side of a stone walled building. As the man thrust his hips, rough and tumble against the moaning prostitute, he was tempted to snarl in frustration. Seeing sex, even that not to his taste, was a blatant reminder of how long it had been since he’d felt a tight ass wrapped around his own cock, let alone felt one sink inside of him. Damn his company for keeping him from his home in Oslo and its hopping gay nightlife. He needed to get laid in the worst way.
Hurrying past the couple, he was several yards down the narrow alley when the man’s hoarse groan of release echoed through the night. He moved faster. He needed to find this club. Xenres was supposed to be a place a person could indulge in any sin imaginable, and was exactly what he needed. Maybe a few hands of five card stud and a willing ass would set him right. Or at least, he could hope.
Even as he kept moving, his hope of finding Xenres began to fade, until finally out of nowhere, it arose in the night, like a beacon showing the way to paradise. Set back from the street by a stone-paved courtyard, the building had a very distinctive Russian feeling - probably a relic left over from before Tajikistan had declared its independence from the Soviet Union in the early nineties. The pointed arches of the wide doorways reminded Eryk of the pointed domes on top of the Kremlin, while the sprawling building closed in on him from both sides as he came to a stop in the center of the courtyard.
He stood mesmerized by the dark beauty of the place. It was a true den of darkness, if the huge behemoth of a man smoking at the door was any indication. His sensitive nostrils could smell the vampyre from his position nearly twenty yards away. The reminiscent scent of dry books mingled with the harsh bite of what smelled like Turkish tobacco. But Eryk wasn’t fooled by the man’s posture. He might look like a guy just sneaking out for a smoke dressed in dark slacks and an azure silk shirt, but the man was nearly the same height as Eryk’s own six foot-eight height, and sure to be more than his match physically. He wasn’t about to underestimate the vampyre. If the man decided he didn’t want to let Eryk into the club, there was a very good chance he wouldn’t be going in.
Manning up, Eryk approached the door. Now close enough to get a better look, he re-evaluated the man. The silver hair streaking through his long dark mane was more telling than most realized. The vampyre was old - probably an ancient. From his limited knowledge of the undead, he knew they could look like they were in the prime of their lives for centuries before they finally started to show any sign of aging. And when they did, silver began to show in their usually midnight black hair. It was that reason, the ageless number of years, why they were so sought after by shifters. They made perfect mates for Eryk’s kind. Nearly immortal as a werewolf, he could live to over fifteen hundred years if unmated, and even longer if he mated. But at a little over two hundred years of age, Eryk didn’t need to worry about a mate just yet. He had plenty of time.
“Rypr.” The deep rumble from the vampyre stroked down his spine like a physical caress, and Eryk had a feeling the man wasn’t asking, but merely stating a fact as the bouncer called him a wolf in his native tongue. With the vampyre’s ability to see auras and their own sensitive sense of smell, Eryk knew there was no need to deny the fact. The man protecting Xenres’s front door knew just by looking at him, breathing him in, Eryk was a shifter.
“Yes. Am I allowed within?” He nodded towards the dark paned door with the brass handle. There would be no silver if this place was a true vampyre haunt.
The man pushed off the side of the building with a graceful movement. “It depends. Can you abide by the rules? There are humans present.”
Eryk gave a short nod. “Of course. I’m assuming it’s the standard ‘no shifting in front of the humans, or doing anything that would expose humans to the paranormal around them, unless you want your ass handed to you by a coven of pissed-off vampyres.’ Anything else?”
A smile tugged at the man’s full lips as he looked Eryk up and down. “Yeah, if you treasure your belongings, don’t wager against Asha.”
His wolf’s ears perked in interest at the name. He’d heard rumors about a vampyre named Asha from Dushanbe. The man was supposed to have given a new meaning to the idea of ruthlessness. “Asha?”
The vampyre nodded. “Yeah, he’s one of the owners of Xenres and he happens to be a ruthless son of a bitch. He’ll take you for everything you got, including your body - if you wager against him.” He laid a hand on Eryk’s shoulder. “And he has a thing for hulking shifters - especially wolves. So consider yourself warned.”
©Dakota Trace All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, locations, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination, or have been used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, locales, or events is entirely coincidental. No portion of this work may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the author.
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