alf an hour and a turkey sandwich later, V materialized to the terrace of his private downtown penthouse. The night was a bitch, all March cold and April wet, the bitter wind weaving around like a drunk with a nasty attitude. As he stood before the panorama of Caldwell's twin bridges, the postcard view of the twinkling city bored him.

And so did his prospects for the evening's fun and games.

He supposed he was similar to a long-standing coke addict. The high had once been intense, but now he serviced the monkey on his back with no particular enthusiasm. He was all need, no ease.

Planting his palms on the terrace ledge, he leaned way over and got sandblasted in the face with a rush of icy air, his hair blowing back all fashion-model and shit. Or maybe... more like in superhero comics. Yeah, that was a better metaphor.

Except he would be a villain, wouldn't he?

He realized his hands were stroking the flat stone they rested on, caressing it. The ledge was four feet high and ran around the building like the lip of a serving tray. The top of it was a three-foot-wide shelf just begging to be leaped off of, with the thirty feet of thin air on the other side the perfect breezy prelude to death's hard fuck.

Now, this was a view that interested him.

He knew firsthand how sweet that free fall was. How the force of the wind pushed at your chest, making it hard to breathe. How your eyes watered and the tears streaked up your temples, not down your cheeks. How the ground rushed up to greet you, a host ready to welcome you to the party.

He wasn't sure he'd made the right decision to save himself that time he'd jumped. At the last moment, though, he dematerialized back up to the terrace. Back into... Butch's arms.

Fucking Butch. Always came back to that son of a bitch, didn't it.

V turned away from the urge to pull another flier and unlocked one of the sliders with his mind. The penthouse's three walls of glass were bulletproof, but they didn't filter sunlight. Not that he would have stayed here during the day even if they did.

This was not a home.

As he stepped inside, the place and what he used it for pressed into him as if the force of gravity were different here. The walls and the ceiling and the marble floors of the sprawling one-room spread were black. So were the hundreds of candles that he could light at his will. The only thing that could be classified as furniture was a king-size bed that he'd never used. The rest was equipment: The table with the restraints. The chains mounted into the wall. The masks and the ball gags and the whips and the canes and the chains. The cabinet full of nipple weights and steel clips and stainless-steel tools.

All for the females.

He took off his leather jacket and tossed it onto the bed, then ditched his shirt. He always kept his leathers on during the sessions. The subs never saw him completely naked. No one did except for his brothers during ceremonies in the Tomb, and that was only because the rituals demanded it.

What he looked like down below was no else's fucking biz.

Candles flared at his command, the liquid light rebounding off the glossy floor before being sucked up by the black dome of the ceiling. There was nothing romantic in the air. The place was a cave where the profane was performed on the willing, and the light was only to ensure proper placement of leather and metal, hands and fangs.

Plus, candles could be used for a purpose other than illumination.

He went to the wet bar, poured himself a couple of inches of Grey Goose, and leaned back against the short stretch of counter. There were those among the species who thought coming here and withstanding intercourse with him was a rite of passage. Then there were others who could find their satisfaction only with him. And still more who wanted to explore how pain and sex could mix.

The Lewis-and-Clark types were the ones who interested him least. Usually they couldn't handle it and had to use the safe word or safe hand signal he gave them in the middle. He always let them go readily, though any tears were theirs to soothe, not his. Nine out of ten times they wanted to try again, but that was a no-go. If they broke too easily once, they'd probably do it again, and he wasn't interested in coaching lightweights into the lifestyle.

The ones who could take it called him lheage and worshiped him, not that he gave a shit about their reverence. The edge in him had to get dulled, and their bodies were the stone he used to grind himself down on. End of story.

He walked over to the wall, picked up one of the lengths of steel chain, and let it slid through his palm, link by link. Although he was a sadist by nature, he didn't get off hurting his subs. His sadistic side was fed by his lesser kills.

For him, the control over their minds and their bodies was what he was after. The things he did to them sexually or otherwise, the things he said, what he made them wear... it was all carefully calibrated for effect. Sure, there was pain involved, and yeah, maybe they cried from the vulnerability and the fear. But they begged him for more.

Which he gave to them, if he felt like it.

He glanced at the masks. He always put them in masks, and they were never to touch him unless he told them where and how and with what. If he had orgasms during the course of a session, it was unusual and regarded by the subs with great pride. And if he fed, it was only because he had to.

He never degraded those who came here, never made them do some of the nasty things he knew damn well some Doms favored. But he did not comfort them in the beginning, the middle, or the end, and the sessions were on his terms only. He told the people where and when, and if they pulled any jealous entitlement horseshit, they were out. For good.

He checked his watch and lifted the mhis that surrounded the penthouse. The female who was coming tonight could track him because he'd taken her vein a couple months ago. When he was through with her, he would fix it so she would leave with no memory of the location where she'd been.

She would know what happened, though. The marks of the sex would be all over her.

As the female materialized on the terrace, he turned around. Through the sliders she was an anonymous shadow of curves in a black leather bustier and a long, loose black skirt. Her dark hair was coiled up high on her head, as he'd required.

She knew to wait. Knew not to knock.

He opened the door with his mind, but she also knew better than to come in without being summoned.

He looked her over and caught her scent. She was totally aroused.

His fangs elongated, but not because he was particularly interested in the wet sex between her legs. He needed to feed, and she was female and she had all kinds of veins to tap into. It was biology, not bewitchment.

V extended his arm and crooked his finger at her. She came forward, trembling, as well she should. He was in a particularly sharp mood tonight.

"Lose that skirt," he said. "I'm not feeling it."

She immediately unzipped the thing and let it fall to the floor in a rush of satin. Underneath, she wore a black garter and black lace-topped hose. No panties.

Hmm... Yeah. He was going to cut that lingerie off her hips with a dagger. Eventually.

V walked over to the wall and picked out a mask with only one opening. She was going to have to breathe through her mouth if she wanted air.

Tossing it to her, he said, "On. Now."

She covered her face without a word.

"Get up on my table."

He didn't help her as she fumbled around, just watched, knowing she'd find her way. They always did. Females like her always found the way to his rack.

To pass the time, he took a hand-rolled out of his back pocket, put it between his lips, and picked a black candle from its holder. As he lit his cigarette, he stared at the little pool of liquid wax at the foot of the flame.

He checked on how the female was progressing. Well-done. She'd positioned herself faceup, arms out, legs spread.

After he restrained her, he knew exactly where to start tonight.

He kept the candle in his hand as he stepped forward.

Under the caged lights of the Brotherhood's gym, John Matthew assumed the ready position and focused on his training opponent. The two of them were as well matched as a pair of chopsticks, both thin and insubstantial, easily broken. As all pretrans were.

Zsadist, the Brother who was teaching the hand-to-hand tonight, whistled through his teeth, and John and his classmate bowed to each other. His opponent said the appropriate acknowledgment in the Old Language, and John returned the statement using American Sign Language. Then they engaged. Small hands and bony arms flew around to no great effect; kicks were thrown out like paper airplanes; dodges were made with little finesse. All their moves and positions were shadows of what they should have been, echoes of thunder, not the bass roar itself.

The thunder came from elsewhere in the gym.

In the middle of the round, there was a tremendous WHOOMP! as a solid body hit the blue mats like a bag of sand. Both John and his opponent glanced over... then abandoned their meager mixed-martial-arts attempts.

Zsadist was working with Blaylock, one of John's two best friends. The redhead was the only trainee who'd been through the change so far, so he was twice the size of everyone else in the class. And Z had just rugged the guy.

Blaylock sprang to his feet and once more faced off again like a trooper, but he was just going to get his ass handed to him again. As big as he was, Z was a giant as well as a member of the Black Dagger Brotherhood. So Blay was facing a Sherman tank with a fuckload of fighting experience.

Man, Qhuinn should be here to see this. Where was the guy?

All eleven trainees let out a "Whoa!" as Z calmly clipped Blay off balance, tossed him sunny-side down on the mats, and cranked him into a bone-bending submission hold. The instant Blay tapped out, Z got off him.

As Zsadist stood over the kid, his voice was as warm as it ever got. "Five days out of your transition and you're doing good."

Blay smiled, even though his cheek was mashed into the mat like it had been glued down there. "Thank you..." He panted. "Thank you, sire."

Z extended his hand and hooked Blay off the floor just as the sound of a door opening echoed through the gym.

John's eyes bulged at what came in. Well, shit... that explained where Qhuinn had been all afternoon.

The male coming slowly across the mats was a six-foot-five-inch, two-hundred-and-fifty-pound likeness of someone who'd weighed about as much as a bag of dog food the day before. Qhuinn had been through the transition. God, no wonder the guy hadn't Y-messy'd or texted during the day. He'd been busy growing a new body.

As John lifted his hand, Qhuinn nodded back like his neck was stiff or maybe his head was pounding. The guy looked like shit and moved as if every bone in his body hurt. He also fiddled with the collar of his new XXXL fleece like the feel of it was bugging him, and he kept jacking his jeans up with a wince. His black eye was a surprise, but maybe he'd bumped into something in the middle of the transition? Word had it you flailed around a lot when you were changing.

"Glad you showed," Zsadist said.

Qhuinn's voice was deep as he replied, a totally different cadence from before. "I wanted to come even though I can't work out."

"Good call. You can chill over there."

As Qhuinn went to the sidelines he met Blay's eyes and they both smiled real slow. Then they looked at John.

Using American Sign Language, Qhuinn's hands spelled out, After class we go to Blay's. Have a shitload to tell both of you.

As John nodded, Z's voice cracked through the gym. "Kibitzing break's over, ladies. Don't make me lap your asses, because I will."

John faced his little partner and settled into his ready position.

Even though one of the trainees had died from the change, John couldn't wait for his to hit. Sure, he was pants-down terrified, but better to be dead than stuck in the world as a sexless scrap of flesh at the mercy of others.

He was beyond ready to be male.

He had family business to take care of with the lessers.

Two hours later, V was as satisfied as he ever got. Not surprisingly, the female was in no shape to dematerialize home, so he put her in a robe, hypnotized her into a stupor, and took her down in the building's freight elevator. Fritz was waiting at the curb with the car, and the elderly doggen didn't ask any questions after her address was given.

As always, that butler was a godsend.

Alone again in the penthouse, V poured himself some Goose and sat down on the bed. The rack was covered with hardened wax, blood, her arousal, and the results of his orgasms. It had been a messy session. But the acceptable ones always were.

He took a long pull from his glass. In the dense silence, in the aftermath of his perversions, in the cold slap of his zero reality, a cascade of sensual images came to him. What he'd seen weeks ago and now remembered had been caught by mistake, but he'd macked the scene like a pickpocket anyway, stashing it in his frontal lobe even though it didn't belong to him.

Weeks ago he'd seen Butch and Marissa... laying together. It had been when the cop was at Havers's clinic on quarantine. A video camera was set up in the corner of the hospital room, and V had caught the two of them on a computer monitor: she dressed in a vibrant peach gown, he in a hospital John. They'd had been kissing long and hot, their bodies straining for sex.

V had watched with his heart in his throat as Butch had rolled over and mounted her, his John breaking open to reveal his shoulders and his back and his hips. While he'd started in with a rhythm, his spine had flexed and released as her hands slid onto his ass and her nails dug in.

It had been beautiful, the two of them together. Nothing like the sex with hard edges V had had all his life. There had been love and intimacy and... kindness.

Vishous let his body fall loose and slap back onto the mattress, his glass tipping until it almost spilled as he lay out. God, he wondered what it would be like to have that sort of sex. Would he even like it? Maybe it would get claustrophobic. He wasn't sure he'd be into someone with their hands all over him, and he couldn't imagine being fully naked.

Except then he thought of Butch and decided it probably just depended on who you were with.

V covered his face with his good hand, wishing like hell his feelings would go away. He hated himself for these thoughts, for this attachment, for his useless pining, and the familiar litany of shame brought on a whitewash of fatigue. As bone-deep exhaustion Tom Sawyer'ed him from head to foot, he fought the wave, knowing it was dangerous.

This time he didn't win. Didn't even get a vote. His eyes slammed shut even as fear licked up his spine and left his skin in a quilt of goose bumps.

Oh... shit. He was falling asleep...

Panicked, he tried to open his lids, but it was too late. They had become masonry walls. The vortex had him and he was being sucked down no matter how much he tried to pull himself free.

His grip loosened on the glass in his hand and he dimly heard the thing hit the floor and splinter. His last thought was that he was just like that tumbler of vodka, shattering and spilling, unable to hold himself inside anymore.