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The slight swinging of the tree crowns in front of the moonlit sky made him nauseous. He could hear Clifton’s frantic shouts in the distance. And what sounded like Stu’s footsteps – coming closer. That’s good. That meant the pack had made it safely through the night, right?
The trees seemed to move in a circle around his field of vision. Ugh.
He shivered. His shoulder felt weird. It was cold. Was it cold? He was still naked. Wait. Naked? Last thing he remembered, he was still covered in thick protective reddish-brown fur. Oh yeah. Full moon. Hunters.
It slammed into him all at once, and it actually made his head hurt even more. As if something had actually physically slammed into him.
“Ah – that was probably the ground when you fell and hit your head,” said Stu, crouching down beside the alpha. Had he said that last part out loud, Anton wondered. When he stayed silent, however, Stu spoke to him again. “Hey, Anton. So glad we've found you. Can you hear me?”
Anton blinked. The trees switched to counter-clockwise swaying. “Stop moving!” Anton yelled. Well - it sounded like a yell in his head. Must’ve been more like a mumble. His shoulder throbbed.
“Oh, hey, hi, there you are!” A new but oh so soft and very familiar voice exclaimed from above him. Anton felt cold slender fingers caress his cheek. “Vi!” he managed to get out, “How did you….”
“Oh, that was me, boss” Clifton chimed in before Viago could answer for himself. “I was talking to Stu about how we’d get you back to civilization, and Stu suggested to call Nick, and Nick suggested to ask the other vampires, and then pouf – Viago was here.”
The exaggerated and overly dramatic hand gesture that had accompanied the ‘pouf’ was Antons' final straw. He heaved himself over to the side that hurt less and retched miserably into the grass. Viagos' steadying hands on his shoulders helped him back to a lying position when the retching finally subsided.
He shivered again. Oh shit. He was naked. Completely naked. In front of Viago. Oh, that was not how he had dreamt or hoped this particular scenario might go. He looked back up to the sky. The treeeeeeeees… suddenly, a hand was waving in front of his face. Slowly. But still too much movement for his current taste, adding to the tree chaos in the background.
“Hey Anton, let’s get some pants on you, yeah?” Stu coaxed softly. “Yeah, great,” Anton mumbled, “m’ cold. M’ shoulder ‘s wet.”
“Ah, that vould be the blood.” Viago said, sounding a little strained. “I’ll fly you home first and then Dion will deal vith that, yes?” the vampire whispered from somewhere close to his ear. He tried to turn his head to look around at the others, tried to help when Stu and Clifton wrestled him into loose sweatpants, but he was of no help, really. His wrists stung. His shoulder throbbed, more insistent now, somehow. Where's that damn healing factor when you need it. His head hurt so much still.
“…should really leave now!” Viago said in a very insistent tone. Leave? Viago?? Anton wanted to tell him to stay, to ask what part of the conversation he had been missing there, but his head hurt something fierce.
He felt Viago picking him up bridal style and all of a sudden the damn circling tree tops where beneath him and his head felt like it was about to explode and he caught a glimpse of the moon above the mountains and his packmates getting smaller down in the distance and then everything turned black.
--🐺--🦇--🐺--🦇--🐺--
When he came too there were no more trees in his field of vision. Small mercies. He couldn’t help but groan when he took stock of himself. He wasn’t naked any more, at least not from the waist down. Awesome.
The smell of blood still clung to him, but not quite so persistent and tangible as before. His left shoulder throbbed fiercely. Oh yes. The gunshot wound. Ah shit.
He turned his still thrumming head and spotted Viago sitting on the coffee table next to his hip, one hand resting softly on Anton’s thigh. Oh, that was his coffee table. And he was lying on his own couch.
Stu suddenly appeared in his line of sight. “Hey Anton,” the recently turned werewolf inquired, “how do you feel?” “Honestly, still pretty bad.” Anton ground out, voice tinged with pain. “Everyone make it home safe?”
“Yes, don’t worry.” Stu leaned over him and carefully lifted one side of the dressing that someone had taped over the wound in his shoulder while he was out.
The iron smell of fresh blood – his blood - overwhelmed his nose again. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Viago's pupils dilate. Stu quicky stuck the dressing back to stop the flow threatening to ruin Antons beloved beige couch. In hindsight, it was quite impressive that it had lived without major stains for quite some years already.
“…still bleeding?” He caught the end of what Stu had been saying. “What?” He murmured, feeling nauseous again. Still missing out on parts of the conversation, apparently.
“Oh,” Stu turned back to him, “I was just asking Clifton if that is normal? Shouldn’t that at least have closed by now?” he said, gesturing to the alphas' wounded shoulder. “Yes,” Viago chimed in, “I vas of the impression verevolfes have a pretty good healing factor as vell.”
Anton took a deep breath through his nose. He had wanted to ask how much time had passed since the forest, but the nausea was crescendoing again all of a sudden. After a while of steady breathing it seemed to have calmed down again, and he managed to tune back in to the ongoing discission. “Stop, stop, guys, give me a heads up. What the hell happened?”
“Vell,” said Viago, giving his thigh a soft pat that felt actually more like a caress. “Maybe you should start vith the first part of the story. The story I got from your packmates vas pretty chaotic and more unconsolidated fragments than real story.”
“Let’s see,” Anton murmured, trying to sort the pieces he remembered in his muddled brain. “Somewhere around the middle of the night, I smelled hunters. Don’t know how they found us, something like that has never happened before.” “Guess it was just bad luck,” Nick interrupted without looking up from his computer.
“Yeah, well, so, I heard them come closer and I needed to get them away from you guys, so I furiously ripped on my chains until they broke and alerted the hunters to my presence so they would follow my trail, away from your trees. I ran for a while but somehow they got too close and one of their bullets hit me in the shoulder. I went down, but when they came to capture me I managed to tear them to threads by sheer force of will, and then I was out, I guess.”
Anton took a measured breath against the burning in his shoulder and side before he continued. “And suddenly I was lying there, back in human form, and everything hurt, I couldn’t form a coherent thought…” “…and then we found you,” Stu finished for him.
Anton groaned at a spike of pain in his side. And was it getting hotter in here? He started to feel sweaty. His eyelids felt so heavy. “…so Viago could bring you home. Then Dion got the bullet out, really glad you weren’t conscious for that part, ugh. Then we cleaned and bandaged it and also the scrapes on your wrists and belly where the chains rubbed while you fought to get free, and then we waited for you to wake up again.” Stu finished.
Anton blinked, confused. Oh – he had missed some of Stu’s explanation there again. He shivered.
Viago, with his impeccable perception of those around him, noticed. Oh, and the vampire’s hand was still on Anton’s thigh. Viago got up and then his cool hand was on the alphas’ forehead. Anton groaned again, this time with relief.
“He feels very hot, guys. And it’s been hours by now.” “I feel like there’s something we are missing,” Stu agreed. He turned to the more experienced werewolf sitting in an armchair in the other side of the couch table. “Clif, you’ve been shot before, right? When you had that thing with that guy in that bar?” Oooh yes, Anton remembered that one. What a doozy. He tried to turn his head to glare at Clifton, but that had probably not come across as threatening as he had wished it would. It was mostly a grimace of pain, really. But the pure mention of the unpleasant evening was enough to make the normally brash werewolf pull his head down between his shoulders and sink into the cushions even more anyway.
“Correct me if I’m wrong, I mean I wasn’t there at the time, heh, still human then,” Stu continued, unaware of the unspoken tension the memory created, “but that took like, what did Dion say, all of 30 minutes and then everything was as good as new?”
“Yep, maximum,” Dion shouted through the closed bathroom door. The shout drilled a hole into Anton’s brain, and he tried to shut his ears with his hand which pulled at the gashes on his belly and jostled the damn hole in his shoulder and he wailed in pain before Viago grabbed his hands, as gently as the situation allowed, and pressed him back down into the couch.
“Keep it down, guys,” he hissed, and Anton was quite impressed at the aggressiveness his favourite vampire managed to convey while still not deviating from a low soothing tone that gave Anton goosebumps on the regular and recently also other… bigger… erectile problems every instant Viago adapted it whenever they spent time together.
Anton was determined to give Dion extra praise for the self-control it must have taken him not to shout ‘Sorry’ through the closed door in response.
Thankfully these thoughts had diverted his brain from the worst spike of pain for the moment, and he breathed deep controlled breaths while Viago stroked soft circles into the skin on the back of his hands with his thumbs until the intensity of agony was back to a more manageable level.
When he opened his eyes again - wait, when had he closed them in the first place – Viago’s face was right in front of his. The vampire looked very worried. His brown warm eyes were so big. “Beautiful,” Anton whispered, without his conscious consent.
“Is it better?” Viago asked, unsure what Anton was referring to. “You have such beautiful eyes,” the alpha went on, undeterred. “And they don’t spin, like the tree tops. They’re so calm. Did anyone ever tell you you have stunning eyes? It’s like you invented eyes.” Antons’ dreamy sigh mingled with another groan of pain.
Viago softly snapped one finger in front of his face now. “Hey Anton, can you try to focus, please?” He inquired softly. Stu pointedly looked to where Viago was still clutching Anton’s other hand, then over to Clifton, who rolled his eyes “Oh no, they’re doing it again.”
Nick made some kind of exaggerated retching noise from behind his computer.
A faint cheering could be heard from the bathroom.
Anton heard the fake retching noise and it nearly trigerred a real one from himself. Viago, as always, noticed. He was so perceptive. And still a mere five centimeters away from his face. Sadly, Anton had to screw his eyes shut when the new bout of nausea was accompanied by a piercing jab in the general area of the stab wound. His left arm started to tingle painfully.
“Can’t ve give him something for the pain?” Viago asked the other werewolves, seemingly unbothered by the packs’ shenanigans. “There’s pills humans take novadays, right?”
“Yep,” Dion answered, now thankfully back in the living room. Dion had done basic training as an emergency medical technician back in the days. “But that stuff doesn’t really work on werewolves, you know? Higher metabolic activity, thus the speed healing. Maximum dose of painkillers works for like 5 minutes.”
Anton tried to keep up with the conversation, but the tingling in his arm gradually turned to real pain. He tried to cradle it against his chest protectively, but that movement only made the shoulder wound throb harshly again. “Vi, my arm,” he groaned. Viago looked him over, eyes sad. “I don’t see anything, mein Wölfchen. I vish I could help you.”
Stu winked Dion over to the couch. “I mean, the bullet was probably silver, right?” “Yeah most likely,” Clifton agreed, “but that only makes healing somewhat slower and a little more painful. I know Anton can handle a lot, so this must be caused by something else too.”
“Does it feel like the pain is spreading?” Dion inquired suddenly, insistently poking along Anton’s arm and chest. Anton tried to squirm away from the touches. “Hurrrts, please stop,” he pressed out from between clenched teeth.
“I’m barely even touching your skin, mate,” Dion said, looking very sorry and also very alarmed. “That looks like symptoms of poisoning to me.”
“Vhat if they drenched the bulled in liquid silver right before firing it?” Viago suggested. “The council mentioned some hunters were recently caught doing this.”
“Yes, that must be it. Oh boss,” Dion said sadly, “looks like you must ride this one out.”
“No,” Viago said indignantly, “we can’t leave him like that, who knows how long this will last. Maybe the fever gets too high for his body to handle!”
Anton couldn’t help it, he whined at the prospect. His whole left side felt like it was on fire now, and he once again could barely keep up with the conversation. Viago softly stroked a loose strand of reddish hair from his forehead. “Shhh, Wölfchen,” he shushed him as Anton groaned from another spike of pain in his shoulder, spreading all the way down to his fingertips.
“Or,” Nick suddenly spoke up, setting his computer aside on the table, “we could try something experimental. I read about it on the internet. Don’t know if it’s actually a thing, but it’s not like we have any good alternative, so…” he trailed of, voice unsure now that all eyes and ears in the room were on him.
“Well, out with it,” Anton ground out angrily between bursts of pain.
“Youhavetodrinkavampiresblood” Nick said, loudly and forcedly and all at once.
“Vhat?” Viago asked. Everyone looked slightly startled by this prospect.
“Well,” Nick continued, somewhat sheepishly, “you know how among certain circles humans consume a drug made from vampire blood that gives them a, what do they call it, a temporary vampire high? The heightened senses, the speed, the healing. Someone on r/vampexperttips proposed that fresh vampire blood might also restore the healing factor for another vampire with silver poisoning. So, I thought, maybe that would work on werewolves as well?”
“Does he have to drink it?” Stu asked immediately, “fresh blood while killing when we are turned is one thing, but drinking it pure and while in human form? Ugh.”
Clifton rolled his eyes again, even though no one was looking at him right now. “Guess it still beats being like this for very long, right?”
Anton howled when Viago finally let go of his right hand, so very slowly, but still the movement transferred to the left side of his body and it hurt. He was so tired. Tired tired, and tired of being in pain.
“Then I have to go drink something, be right back!” Viago exclaimed, “you go and prepare everything else.” And with this he hurriedly turned into a bat and was out the window before any of the wolves – or Nick – could even blink.
“Well, that settles that,” Clifton said, getting up from his armchair. “I guess we better not move him from the couch, right? But we should try to cover it a bit? To avoid blood stains?”
“How bloody do we expect this to get?” Stu asked, looking uneasy and a little pale.
“Why don’t you go and prepare some steaks, Stu? Anton hasn’t eaten anything yet after being turned, so in case this will work, he’ll need to get some energy back fast,” Dion suggested.
“I’ll go with Stu and help,” Nick chimed in immediately and followed his friend into the adjacent room.
Dion looked at Clifton. “So that leaves us to sort this out until Viago comes back. You’ll go get some towels and I’ll fetch that ratty old blanket from the back of Anton’s car, okay?”
Anton, once more in a state of semi-consciousness, whimpered when he heard everyone leaving. Why were they leaving? Everything hurt. And he was so tired. Someone placed a cold rag on his forehead, balm on his overheated skin. “Hey, come on mate, you need to stay awake for a little while longer,” Clifton says, determined. “M’ so tired” the alpha slurred in response. His mind drifted.
A hand touched his good shoulder. “Anton, we have to lift you a bit to put that blanket under you, okay?” Dion inquired softly. Anton opened his eyes. Had he closed them again? His side was still on fire, right down to his hip now.
When Dion put his other hand under the alphas’ left shoulder, Anton wailed and nearly passed out from the bright burst of pain.
“I’m so, so sorry,” Dion whispered. Then he lifted his upper body from the couch and Clifton shoved the ugly red and brown cross-hatched blanket under him. Anton barely held onto consciousness when Dion carefully lowered him back down on the cushions before briefly replacing the cold rag with his hand.
“Woah man, you’re really burning up now,” he told Anton. Anton was too focused on breathing to even think about forming actual words. Groaning was the only language he was fluent in right now.
“I hope Viago hurries up.” Anton groaned, the hole where they had dug out the bullet was throbbing angrily. “Viago’s a fast flier, and it’s about you, so….” Clifton remarks in Anton’s direction from where he is strategically placing extra towels on the coffee table, within easy reach from the sofa.
“And Viago sure likes you a lot,” Dion agreed, “So he will be extra fast.” At this point, Anton wasn’t quite sure if they were really trying to reassure him, or more themselves. But at least the intense pain from the movement had made him wide awake again. For now.
“Oh boy does Viago like you,” Clifton added with a slight smirk. That was when bat Viago turned back to human Viago right over the coffee table, which joined Anton in groaning when the vampires’ weight came down on it full force. Dion almost fell over backwards in shock. The towels remained unimpressed, still neatly stacked at the edge.
“Wow, that was like Beetlejuice. We must have said his name one too many times,” Clifton said from behind the armchair.
The second he was back in human form, the vampires’ sole focus was on Anton. “How is he?” Viago asked the two werewolves without taking his eyes off the alpha.
“Fever’s still rising I think,” Dion answered. “I brought you one of Antons’ sharp outdoor knives. Disinfected it, of course,” he hastily added.
Viago arranged himself to sit down behind Anton on the couch, so very gently lifting the werewolves’ head so it rested in the vampires' lap. Antons groan at even this minimal movement turned into a whimper of relief when Viago’s cool hand stroked his overheated cheek.
“Give it here” Viago demanded, and as soon as Dion had handed him the knife, he made a cut to the inside of his wrist without a wince.
Dion, however, winced in for him instead when blood welled up in the deep incision almost instantly. Clifton just watched in rapt fascination.
Viago swiftly brought his bleeding wrist in front of Anton's mouth while he used his other hand to prop the alpha's head slightly more upright.
“Na komm, Wölfchen, open up,” the vampire coaxed gently. Anton felt a drop of viscous fluid on his bottom lip. He carefully swiped it up with his tongue, almost out of instinct. The metallic taste had him on the verge of nausea again within seconds. “Ugh, that’s…” he tried to complain, but Viago's hand on the back of his head gently but firmly prevented him from turning away.
“Please,” Viago pleaded softly, “you have to drink some. Do it for me.”
Anton swallowed the first drop down with an effort and opened his mouth. Viago lowered his arm and then Anton could feel the cold skin of Viago’s wrist against his lips while a steady drip of blood started to fill his mouth. To his surprise, his stomach was so tired of being completely empty that he could even make friends with such unusual filling, and after he had swallowed the first few times and managed to leave the unpleasant tase aside, it became a lot easier. And more pleasant.
Already after the first 20 seconds, a new kind of warmth spread through his body. A good kind. He moaned against Viago’s wrist, bringing his right hand up to grasp the vampires’ forearm so he wouldn’t pull away, and drank greedily.
“Yes, that’s good,” Viago said softly, “take as much as you need.”
Dion handed Viago a towel and pointed to the side of Antons’ mouth, hoping Viago would understand but unwilling to step in himself and ruin – well, it just felt wrong to interfere at this point.
Viago understood, and although he didn't share the werewolves' reservations about bloodstains on furniture or clothing, he briefly let go of Anton's head to catch the excess blood running out of the side of the alphas’ mouth.
Through the haze of drinking and swallowing, Anton mourned the loss of the Viago’s hand on him, but thankfully it returned shortly after, now softly combing through his slightly sweaty hair.
After a while, the urgency with which he drank seemed to diminish, and Viago carefully pulled his hand out of Anton's grip.
“Did it work?” Nick immediately inquired from the kitchen doorframe, and the fact that this loud inquiry didn’t feel like a sharp tool drilling into his brain made Anton nod slightly in the affirmative from where he was still mostly in Viago’s lap.
The vampire, who hadn’t taken his eyes off the alpha for minutes at this point, carefully answered “I think so, but maybe give it a minute.”
Anton’s head felt clearer. And now he noticed that he had been moving his arm to grasp at Viago’s, which must have traveled to his left side, which should have hurt like hell, but actually hadn’t. He tried again, lifting his right hand and once again grasping the vampires’, carefully running a finger over the already closed laceration.
Viago shivered.
Oh shit, was this transferrable? Had he infected Viago with the silver poisoning by drinking from him? He turned his head to look up at his favorite creature of the night, but when he met the big warm brown eyes, there was no pain in them, only relief and what looked like – adoration?
“How’s the fever?” Dion asked from somewhere in another universe.
Viago didn’t break eye contact. Then he leaned down slowly and pressed a gentle kiss to Antons’ forehead.
“Almost back to normal temperature.” Viago answered, eyes crinkling at the corners where he smiled down at his favourite werewolf.
They didn’t break eye contact when Nick and Stu declared the food to be ready for consumption, kept warm in the oven, and announced their departure to spend the rest of the night gambling at the vampires’ house. Vladislav had become determined to beat them on the Wii. But this will probably not happen within this century.
Their shared gaze also lingered during Dion’s examination of Anton’s wounds, which were already closed and even mostly healed at this point.
It also persisted through Clifton’s deliberately vociferous clearing of bloody and unbloody towels from the living room table.
They still stared into each other eyes after the two werewolves had left Anton’s apartment, finally leaving Anton and Viago to themselves.
Anton felt good. Back as new. Nothing hurt anymore, the headache gone as well. He was tired, but that was currently pushed into the background by a cozy warmth that kept spreading through him.
In contrast to the unpleasant heat of the fever, he could feel himself craving this one.
And so they were pulled closer and closer by their gazes, gravitating inexorably towards each other, until Viago’s lips finally met his.
THE END