Stigamta

Ira hurried down the crowded streets, not really having to think about where he was going. He’d been to the club so many times it was like second nature. Quil clung to the hem of his shirt, where his arm wrapped around Ira’s waist and fought to keep himself from pressing as close to Ira as he could. Crowds made him nervous after a vision, like his mind couldn’t separate dream from reality. Ira supposed they would make him nervous too, if he could see the world the way that Quil did. The Quil could see all the monsters of the world for what they were. Demon spells and fey glamour’s didn’t work on his eyes…well, eye. And they knew. That was how the boy had lost that eye in the first place.

Ira could feel them, sure, feel their aura’s wash over him. But the vast majority of the soul traffic he sensed was very benign, even in the nonhuman. Fey beings weren’t malevolent, as a general, just pissed off. That he could deal with, as long as he didn’t have to see them for what they were.

They turned the corner and Ira caught sight of Stigmata. During he day the nightclub was a sad, lifeless, shadow of itself. After dark, the place was ablaze with bright red neon and pounding bass. But now the building itself seemed to sag, and a sense of foreboding spilled out from behind the closed metal door like a miasma of danger. Ira felt Quil shrink against him. It made him nervous, Quil wasn’t the cowering type.

“I know Sug, but we got to. You know we do.”

Quil swallowed hard, never taking his eyes of the door. Ira wondered what the boy was seeing that he wasn’t, then decided he’d rather not know. Quil usually had a ‘prey with an edge’ strength to him, silk over steel. He rarely aloud the fear he felt to show through. To see him so terrified left Ira almost as shaken.

“Come on baby. I know you can do this.”

Quil nodded and took a deep breath. Ira wrapped a comforting arm around Quil’s shoulder’s and dropped a soft kiss into the boy’s hair as crossed they street.

Ira didn’t bother trying to open the heavy metal door before he knocked. Stigmata was always locked during the day, to keep out the undesirables as Alexi put it.

He gave the door three hard raps with his knuckles and for a moment there was no answer. Then a small panel where a window should have been slid open. Ira could only see a pair of dark wary eyes in the darkness.

“Whatdya want?” snapped a gravelly voce behind the door.

The whole scenario reminded Ira of a black and white movie from the thirties, expect the he wasn’t in a Zoot suit and Quil wasn’t a girl in a fur coat.

“We request audience with Alexi.”

Gravel-voice gave a sharp barking laugh. Quill kept his head down, looking at his feet.

“And who should I say requests the pleasure of his company?” he questioned mockingly

Ira bit back a growl. This guy must be new.

“Tell him that the Seer has news. He’ll understand. That’s all you need to know.” Ira left no room for argument.

The man behind the door stopped laughing then and he gave Ira a hard stare. The tiny window slide shut. The moments passed and the door remained closed.

“They’re not gonna let us in today,” Quil said, not sounding as if he believed the words but wished he did.

Then door opened and Ira heard Quil’s breath hitch a little. Whatever lurked behind Stigmata’s doors during the day, had the Seer terrified.

“Alexi accepts your request.”

Inside the door a man, Ira assumed it was Gravel-voice, was waiting for them. His massive, sold bulk matched the rough tone. As they stepped into the club, Ira felt a surge of unearthly energy so great he nearly stumbled. It was a feeling he would never get used to.

“Follow me,” the big man barked

Quil let out a breath as he passed them. Ira’s arm tightened around Quil’s shoulders.

“What do you see,” Ira whispered in Quil’s ear

Quil shook his head, turning his face into Ira’s shoulder, trusting his lover to lead him. It was a rare occasion for Quil to give his control in these situations. Ira was steadily getting more worried.

“Trust me, you don’t want to know. Besides he’s one of those I’m not sure I could describe, anyway.”

They followed the big man through the small dark hallway and into the main room of the club. In the evening this place would be filled with people, pressed together and lost in the pounding bass from the speakers. There wouldn’t be an open space at the bar, the trickle and shake of alcohol almost as constant and entrancing as the music. But for now the place felt quiet and cold. Several of the dark round tables were filled with huddle groups of people speaking in a hissing language that Ira couldn’t understand. From the corner of his eye, he saw one of the lovely androgynous creature’s that sat on the bar, was watching him. Ira couldn’t tell if it were male or female, only that it watched him hungrily with eyes as black and shiny as oil slicks, long fingered hands running up and down it’s thighs suggestively. It smiled at him and licked it’s pink lips, and he could see that it’s mouth was full of sharp serrated little teeth.

“Pretty,” It hissed, “so pretty. Sooo…warm”

Ira looked away and let out the breath he hadn’t know he was holding as Quil’s fingers wrapped around Ira’s forearm, his hackles raised. He stared the creature down and it cackled wickedly.

Then the big man was back.

“Alexi will see you now.”

The room they followed the big man into was far more rich and lush than the rest of the club. The floor was covered in thick carpets and the walls were upholstered in padded fabric instead of paper. Thick smoke hung in the air, smelling of clove and tobacco, and thrummed with feeling of ancient power. Alexi sat on the over stuffed couch near the far wall, puffing lightly on his long cigarette and sipping lightly at the dark red liquid that swirled in his wine glass. His dark eyes rested intensely on Quil, like butcher eyeing a fine cut of meat.

Alexi must have picked up on that thought, because he smiled then and set his glass on the table.

“Dobriy vecher Milaya moya, I was wondering when you’d be visiting me again.”

Quil slide out from under Ira’s arm and Ira fought down the urge to snatch him back. He felt like he was sacrificing a lamb to the wolves. Ira knew better than anyone how deceiving the other man’s youthful face could. Alexi was an ancient, it was clear as day in his parchment thin skin, in his colorless hair, his garnet eyes. If he wanted to kill Quil there was nothing Ira could do to stop him, he could snap both their necks in the time it would take Ira to blink. He felt helpless here, unarmed, despite the press of his gun into the base of his spine, where it rested in the holster. The thought left a bitter taste in his mouth.

Alexi stood and met Quil half way. He embraced the boy and kissed his cheek. It made Ira cringe. Quil pulled away, turning his other cheek to miss Alexi’s second kiss. He reached a hand in his pocket and pulled out a folded scrap of paper and handed it to the vampire. Alexi unfolded the paper as he walked back to his seat, examining it with a skilled eye. It was a harsh sketch but the figure was discernable enough. A the face of a boy, maybe sixteen or so, eyes cast up to an unseen source of light. His dark curls feel away from his face. Tear tracks glistened on his cheeks and pinprick wounds, forming the shape of a crown, trickled blood down his forehead and along the long straight bridge of his nose. His dark eyes were huge, pleading and panicked.

There was a long moment of tense quite in the room before Quil spoke.

“He’s Puerto Rican I think, by the sound of his accent and very thin. He’s probably homeless, and his hands were all bandaged up. I saw him here, in the club, and flashes of him on the street out side. He was crying, like that,” he said, indicating the picture, “then I saw him again in the alley, running, looking over his shoulder, like something was chasing him.”

Alexi nodded slowly, still examining the drawing, but said nothing.

“Do you know him,” Ira barked out, growing impatient. He wanted to be away from this place and the creatures it held.

“I know his face but not his name or where you can find him,” Alexi responded lazily,” he comes here from time to time, I feel his presence and I think he feels mine too. He leaves before I can speak with him.”

“Why would he run from you, if he’s in a demon club anyway? There are a lot more frightening things here than you,” Ira stated, matter of factly, but not really believing the statement himself.

Alexi took a long deep drink, eyeing Ira with razorblade smile.

“ That is a matter of opinion Angel-ling. He is of special interest to me, perhaps he knows this and that’s why he runs,” The vampires eyes slid to Quil, admiring him like a hunter admires his elusive prey.

Ira felt the creeping up his spine again, the flare of need to pull Quil into his arms and flee this place.

“Why,” Quil asked his eyes never breaking Alexi’s gaze,” what does he have that you want?”

Everyone in the room was of the knowledge that the only person Alexi helped was Alexi. He was a business man, one who only ever entered a relationship if it benefitted him. Ira knew they wouldn’t be here were it not for the fact that helping them kept Alexi in the Ridden’s good graces, a very comfortable place for a vampire to be. This mystery child was no different. If Alexi wanted him there was a good reason. The Ancient prided himself as a collector, a vampire who made a habit of keeping human servants with exceptional abilities.

Alexi chuckled darkly and smiled, taking another drink of the thick red liquid. But once again he remained silent.

“Please Alexi,” Quil pleaded, stepping closer to the vampire, “Nothing happens in this city without you knowing about it. Why do you want him?”

Alexi stood, setting his glass down on the table. He stepped towards Quil slowly, circling him with a collectors eye. Ira fought back a growl when the vampire touched Quil’s face with a cold hand.

“For the same reason I want you Milaya Moya. He would make quite the addition to my menagerie… “

“He’s a seer?”

“No. Far more rare. He’s a stigmata, marked with the wounds of Christ.”

Ira froze. Stigmata? He knew they existed, but he’d never seen one. He thought they had all died out. Father Andrew said there were only ever a handful in a life time.

“Why would my visions show a stigmata? Why would he be important? Why would he need us or vice versa,” Quil asked turning away form the touch .

Alexi’s smile turned bitter and he stuck his hands in deep pockets of his black trousers.

“Perhaps I am not the only one looking for him. Stigmata’s are rare and very, very valuable.”

“For what,” Ira asked, taking a small step towards Quil, unable to fight the urge to close the distance between them.

“Have you not been doing you’re homework Ridden,” Alexi asked mockingly, “ The blood of a Stigmata has many uses in the dark arts.”

“But you can’t tell us who he is, or who would want him,” Quil asked

“Unfortunately not.”

“Then we’re done here,” Ira cut in, closing the distance between him and Quil in a heartbeat, and placing a hand on the smaller man’s shoulder

“It would seem so,” Alexi quipped with a bitter smile, “A pleasure as always.”

Ira pulled Quil close to him, and turned to leave without another word.