Blood Ties

Title:Intoxicating
Summary: Choose your prey wisely.
Impliments: Belt
Warnings: Surprisingly... none.

Arlis winced at the sound of the front door slamming. Even at the
other end of the house his super sensitive hearing had amplified the
sound enough to hurt and the slam must have shaken the frame of the
entire house. Almost immediately he heard the additional sound of
raised voices. When they continued beyond the expecting minute or so,
he got up from his comfortable seat in their library and left his
book to see what the arguing was about.

The closer he got to the front of the house the more distinctive the
voices became. "Just SHUT UP, Dimitri!" That was definitely Erik, who
had been out hunting and must have just returned home. The other
raised voice was therefore, obviously, Dimitri's.

"I just want to know what the hell's wrong with you," the elder
vampire yelled. "All I did was ask you not to slam the door and you
practically rip my face off!"

"Well maybe I wanted to slam the door," Erik roared in return, his
normally tightly plaited, thigh length braid uncommonly ragged as it
swung violently behind him as he spun to face his accuser. "Who are
you to demand anything of me anyway, huh? Just because your the
eldest of us, you think you can order all of us around! Well guess
what, maybe I don't think you should!"

As if his words weren't confusing enough, the usually graceful vampire
tripped over his own two feet and caught himself on a small table by
the wall before finally slipping to the floor, holding his head in
his hands as if in pain. Arlis had to consciously close his mouth at
the actions of his brother as he stood looking on from a doorway. He
knew that Dimitri had every right to very firmly remind Erik of
exactly where his place was in their little family and he could see
in the elder's eyes that he was thinking about doing just that.

He was rather confused as to why Paulos had not arrived yet to see
what all the commotion was about. He came to the conclusion that the
Master must still be patrolling the city as, usually, he was
immediately present if anything unusual happened. And this certainly
counted as unusual. Armand had apparently slept through everything so
far, and Markeen was still away finding his own entertainment, else
they would all be there to watch the fireworks. A quick glance at
Dimitri was answered with a confused and slightly exasperated shrug.
Neither was quite sure what to do in this situation.

A muffled moan from the silk clad vampire near his feet gained his
attention. "Erik? Hey, Erik, is everything alright?" Not receiving an
answer, Arlis slowly moved towards his fellow childe, stretching out
a hand to place it on his shoulder. "Erik?"

At the contact, the vampire suddenly leaped forward with a shriek and
slapped Arlis to the floor. The youngest vampire looked up at his
brother from where he lay with wide eyes. One hand reached up to rub
the stinging jaw and came away red with blood from three shallow,
parallel scratches made by Erik's claws.

Erik looked almost as stunned as Arlis at what he had done. Fighting
amongst themselves, especially physically, was expressly forbidden,
and he himself didn't really know what had caused him to react in
such a way. His vision was oddly blurred and he couldn't quite seem
to get his balance. And his head was killing him. A low growl drew
his attention away from Arlis even as he watched the younger
vampire's wounds begin to close. Looking at his elder brother from
which the sound originated and the anger in those eyes, he gulped.

Dimitri only said, "Arlis, go back to what you were doing." Before he
could say anything, Dimitri continued. "Just go, Arlis. Let me take
care of this." His eyes never left the offending childe, and Arlis
had a pretty good idea what was going to happen. Getting slowly to
his feet, he glared at Erik before silently doing as he was
asked. "Oh, and Arlis? Don't say anything to Sire about this, ok?"
Looking back from the doorway he raised a questioning eyebrow, but
finally nodded in agreement before continuing out of the room.

Erik looked apprehensively across the room and into the icy blue eyes
that had never left his own chocolate brown during the entire exchange and tried again to
swallow past the lump in his throat. "Now that it's just you and me,"
said Dimitri, "I believe we have some business to take care of." Erik
watched the slender, manicured hands of his elder as they reached
upwards to begin undoing his belt.

Immediately Erik began to back away. "Oh, come on Dimitri..." He
licked his lips as he continued nervously, "This isn't really
necessary, is it? I mean--"

"Yes," Dimitri interrupted, "I believe it is VERY necessary." Holding
the belt folded over in his hand he began to stalk the younger
vampire. "Just be glad that I'm not intending to tell Sire."

For a moment Erik considered running as his back hit the wall behind
him, but he knew that it would be useless. Not only would it mean
that Dimitri would then tell Sire EXACTLY what had happened, but he
would still be caught in the end anyways. Physically, Erik was
heavier than the elder vampire, but he wasn't nearly as strong or
fast. Dimitri was well more than 400 years older than he was, and
vampires gained strength as they aged, so no matter his own 139
years, he could never match the strength of his brother.

Dimitri reached him in a few steps and grabbed him roughly by the
arm. Practically dragging the seemingly young man, he pulled him into
the dining room and pulled one of the chairs well away from the
table. Instead of sitting in it as Erik had assumed he would, Dimitri
reached over and ripped the button off the pants he wore as he forced
them down around his knees. Ignoring the protests and half-hearted
struggles of his brother, he hesitated as he caught a whiff of a
strange scent.

Allowing the belt to drop to the floor for the moment, he quickly
reached up to grab Erik's long braid at the base. Wrenching the
childe's head to the side, he sank his fangs into the slender neck as
an indignant hiss answered his actions. Instead of drinking the blood
brought to the surface, he allowed it to run down it's owners neck,
not caring if it stained the attractive silk shirt, and only lapped
once at the thin red flow. He screwed up his face at the unusually
bitter taste and looked his suddenly much more frightened brother in
the eyes. "You're drunk."

Erik rapidly opened and closed his mouth as if desperately searching
for something to say. "Don't bother with any excuses," continued
Dimitri, "You KNOW I can taste it all over you. You also KNOW that
it's forbidden and for good reason, damn it!" His brother was trying
to shrink away from him as his eyes filled with tears but the grip on
his long braid wouldn't allow for any movement. Dimitri shook him by
said braid and demanded, "Where were you feeding?"

He yelped at the rough treatment his hair was receiving and distantly
regretted the split ends he was sure he would have the next night
before he tried desperately to find an answer for his brother. "I-
I... ummm..." When he couldn't come up with an answer fast enough,
Dimitri suddenly released his grip on his hair only to lean down to
grab up the dropped belt. Erik tried to lurch away, but the elder
used his free hand to grab a flailing arm before a sharp crack of
belt on flesh filled the room. Another yelp filled the room, but
Dimitri only asked, "Where, Erik."

"On the south side, the south side," he answered desperately, trying
to avoid another swat, though he knew he and that belt would be
getting to know each other quite well and all too soon. "There was a
small group of guys at a little bar there, partying. They all came
out and it was just too easy a meal to pass up." He looked down to
avoid the angry eyes of his brother. "I didn't KILL anyone, Dimitri!
I just took a little from each person. They must have been drinking a
lot though... I just- I just didn't think it would effect me so much."
A single bloody tear ran down his cheek as he said this last.

"You know better, Erik," Dimitri said. "You know Master forbade us to
drink tainted blood and you know he had very good reason for it." The
fact was, vampires couldn't get drunk. At least not from drinking
alcohol directly. Nor could they get high as drugs didn't effect them
either. Well, most didn't. There was a rumor going around that there
was one that DID have strange effects on vampires, but Dimitri hadn't
been able to confirm anything yet. Drinking the blood of an
intoxicated or high person, however, allowed the vampire to absorb
what was already in the victims blood stream. It didn't always have a
positive effect though.

Some vampires would pass out almost immediately and once the sun
rose, they were never given the opportunity to learn from their
mistakes. Others had horrible mood swings or were forced to relive
their worst memories. And it almost always was accompanied by a
throbbing headache. Apparently, blood tainted with alcohol left Erik
unusually violent and very unpredictable. Of course that's what
alcohol did to most humans as well. It could NOT be allowed to happen
again.

Dimitri forced the childe to look him in the eyes and asked, "What do
you think it would do to Sire if you never came home? How do you
think the rest of us would feel to lose yet another brother? I was Sire's
first childe and I have seen what was left of the five he lost. I do
NOT want to lose another! Especially to his own idiocy!"

Blood tinged tears ran down Erik's face as he looked into his
brother's eyes and saw that it was the truth. Guilt consumed him. He
remembered the betrayed look on Arlis's face as he lay on the floor
and understood exactly what Dimitri meant. Two of those that had been
lost had been known to him as well and it hurt that he had harmed one
that he still had. What hurt most was that he had disobeyed his
Master and knew that the vampire would be disappointed in him if it
was ever found out. He hoped it wasn't. Not just because he didn't
want to see that look in his eyes, but because he knew what Dimitri
would do to him was nothing to what his Master would inflict.

At sight of the tears, Dimitri pulled his brother into his arms and
held him for a moment. "We'll take care of this, Silk," he said,
using the nickname that Erik's clothing preference had earned
him, "And we'll move on." The vampire sighed and added, "I won't tell
the Master about this, though I know I should. We'll deal with this
now and keep it between ourselves. Agreed?" Dimitri pulled back
enough to look at Erik who nodded his acceptance. "Good."

Still Dimitri did not take his place in the chair, but instead guided
his brother to lean over it, placing his hands on the seat. Erik
groaned as he realized this punishment was really going to
hurt. "Here," said Dimitri, "hold this too." Even Erik had to smirk
as he accepted the tail end of the long dark brown braid to hold it
out of the way.

With his pants still around his knees there wasn't anything keeping
Dimitri from continuing what he had started with the warning swat a
few moments before. Erik gasped as the first stroke landed across the
fleshiest part of his ass. His pain tolerance was usually very high,
but apparently the alcohol had lowered that as well. And Dimitri was
NOT holding back, which he proved as he rained down another three
dozen stripes onto the younger vampires bottom. When he was finished,
Erik's backside was a hot and blistered red from the top of his
buttocks to half way down his thighs. Even with supernatural healing,
there were a few welts that would last into the next night.

As soon as Dimitri dropped the belt to the floor and lay a comforting
hand onto his sobbing brothers back, Erik allowed himself to fall to
the floor. Dimitri followed him down and sat on the floor with the
childe half in his lap, offering comfort where before there was pain.
The sun was due up in an hour and the elder knew that their Sire
could arrive home at any moment. As quickly as possible he helped
Erik to readjust his clothing before leading him downstairs, an arm
around his waist.

Usually the two wouldn't be going to sleep for over an hour yet, but
the events of the last hour had taken their toll on both of them.
Dimitri led his brother to his own bed and helped him get undressed
before pulling the covers over him as he lay on his stomach. Erik
looked at him beseechingly and whimpered when he started to turn
away. Dimitri smiled at the obvious need and nodded in
acknowledgment. "Ok bro, I'll stay with you today." That said, he
stripped down himself and crawled into the bed to hold his brother
close. Together in the comfort of brotherly love, and other kinds as
well, they fell asleep in each others arms.

To be Continued........