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Habit of A Lifetime Ch. 01

This was a piece of Vampire Fiction that I began as an exercise in collaboration with Emily Palmer in 1999. Gradually Rayne Wylde developed a life (or perhaps I should say an UnLife) of his own. People have asked me how he came to be a Vampire. This is his story.



CHAPTER ONE – TURNING THE PAGE



RAYNE



21.30: June 26th 1999 – MANCHESTER



It was time…. the others had gone ahead and now they were out there waiting. Waiting for him.



The dense column of swirling white smog descended slowly wrapping Rayne Wylde in its chill clammy folds. He tasted it bitter and dry in the back of his throat and coughed to clear the choking sensation that invariably threatened to strangle his voice on nights like these. It was time. They were out there waiting and he felt their keen anticipation though the thick cold mist muffled virtually every sound and reduced his vision to an all-consuming opalescent greyness that swam and shifted around him like a thousand ghosts. On his left a towering block of solid darkness loomed up out of the fog and he used it as his guide. Picking his careful way through the impenetrable gloom he trailed long fingers against its pitted flanks feeling the vibrations run through it like the rapid heartbeat of a living thing. A shiver of anticipation ran through his whole body a surge of sudden adrenaline – fear and longing combined – that tightened his gut and made his own heart pound faster.



Through the shifting mist a single piercing shaft of ultra-violet light sliced upward cutting through the curls of smog like a blade made from pure energy etching sharp-edged cavorting patterns on the impenetrable field of silver-grey. He dodged backwards avoiding it pressing his spine to the wall behind him sliding sideways into the gloom. Another quickly joined it cutting across at an angle – parrying it – then a third slashed through the cloak of fog sweeping the scene like a searchlight. Now the screaming started.



Rayne’s blood raced. Shrill disembodied cries stabbing through the icy mist goaded him on. Fearless he stalked from the shadows to meet them – a king coming back into his realm – striding through the dancing light-beams bolder with every step. Then dodging them like a fugitive as they strafed the rolling silvery pall that hid and protected him. The sudden staccato rattle of sound in his ears was deafening like the crackle and thunder of repeated gunshots. He paced onward a seasoned warrior on the field of conflict unperturbed by the noise calm and ready in the eyes of all that observed him – and there were plenty of those!



Rayne heard the screams intensify as he glided gracefully through the swathes of dry ice and let the tendrils of light sweep down over him like a falling net. He was not trying to hide. Let them find him. Let them see him at last in all of his lean wasted street-glam glory. He stretched out a pale-skinned long-boned hand for the only thing on this platform that was thinner than he was. Towing the mic-stand to his black-clad body he hugged it tight as the pounding rhythm of Simon Hathaway’s drumkit drowned out even the most ardent screamers. Behind him Ciaran Hart’s bass kicked in pulsing a rich resonant counterpoint to the percussive rattle of noise. He kept his eyes fixed forward oblivious to everything but his own breathing. Away to his right little Sean Courtney huddled low over his precious blood red Stratocaster and made it scream far louder than any member of the mainly teenage crowd below.



A speculative smile haunted Rayne’s generous mouth. He straddled the stand provocatively rubbing his whole body along its length taking his time. Closing pouting bloodless lips over the bulbous head of the microphone he wooed it like a lover as the Strat’s wail keened in his ears setting off his breathy growl to perfection.



“’She… Comes… like the Night…’” Rayne Wylde snarled seductively into the mic and Whipsnade slammed headlong into ‘Dark Paths’. It was the track he had always considered the strongest on ‘Drowning Fields’ even if the Board at SOLD Records were too damned scared to put it out as a single.



Going by the reaction of the Whipsnade Party Faithful down below the record company could go to hell tonight!



JABEZ



On the periphery of the bouncing thrashing crowd within the decaying art-deco theatre a single silent motionless figure observed the night’s events with a sorrowful speculative smile. At least in here it was warm. This country was a mess Jabez Everman thought to himself sadly. For a hundred and fifty years he had dwelt here and he was yet to experience an appreciably warm summer. Of course compared to Egypt the land of his birth even its warmest days were unsatisfactory. And Manchester quite rightly was famed for its chill drizzle in summer and winter alike.



He yawned and huddled deeper into his overcoat watching the dry ice billow across the stage below. As a single dark-clad elegant figure gyrated out of the midst of this seeping smog his smile broadened. He was transported back over thousands of years to Memphis where he had encountered the original incarnation of the current object of his intrigue. Neferuaten had been beautiful then as she was tonight dancing for him in the palace chambers her back straight and motionless as her hips swayed and her long hands traced elegant patterns in the darkness with the tapers that she carried.



How easily their bliss was rent asunder. For a few short tender precious years she had been his Moon and Sun. He would have done anything for her to see her smile and glory in the sweetness of her kisses and the hot wetness of her willing cunt.



Back then his people had named him King Amenhotep III and afterwards called him by the name they would later sweep from the face of history Akhenaten the great Heretic.



When he was still a boy one had come to his father’s court that professed to be the Prophet of Atum Re Lord of Light. Once Pharaoh Tuthmose IV had been a mighty warrior King but in his twilight years his senses were failing him. His eldest son was dead of the plague and he grasped for any straw of guidance that the Gods could offer even down to giving the prophet his younger son to be an acolyte and devotee of the Cult of the Light. For all of his teens the young Amenhotep worshipped the Light. When his father went at last to his final rest and he was crowned Lord of the Two Lands he took the name that would blight him. He became Akhenaten meaning ‘the Aten is Satisfied’.



The Mighty Prophet of Atum Re was certainly satisfied. The young king had been his student and catamite for many years slaking his lusts upon the altar of the God of Light each morning and evening until it seemed a natural way of life for him. In the name of the Aten he built a new city and temple in T’el Amarna and forsook the gods his predecessors had worshipped for aeons. Akhenaten took the princess Nerfertiti to be his bride and she changed her name as he had done in honour of the new God. Nerferuaten as she became bore him six beautiful daughters and he cherished them all. Their life was good.



It took the Pharaoh many years to see the Great Prophet for the charlatan he really was but even unmasked he was not a man without power. In all the years he had been at the courts of the Pharaohs Akhenaten s Instructor had swayed others to his ear and set in course many plans that would run for centuries unchecked until this very day.



When Neferuaten could only bring Akhenaten girl children who might not inherit his crown in spite of his love for them it had been his Prophet who steered the Pharaoh’s own mother to his bed. This she did willingly for the Gods had bidden it – or so she believed – carrying two fine sons the younger of whom would one day be known to the world as the Boy Pharaoh Tutankhamun.



The Prophet then promised Akhenaten life unending and in his vainglory seeing a world where Neferuaten was at his side for eternity the bold Pharaoh accepted his offer. But it was not to be. The old gods who could tolerate most violations or their laws saw this pledge as a gift only to be bestowed by the Deities. Even Maat to whom he had devoted his most fervent prayers after his worship of the Aten turned her face from him and cursed him to walk the earth eternally until such a time as someone loved him for what he truly was and not for power or promises of glory.



By then of course his precious Neferuaten was in her grave and four of the six daughters she had borne him along with her. He was glad. She would have wept to see what had befallen him how easily he had been duped and led astray. The one who had tricked and used him now persuaded him in his misery to yield power to the eldest of his incestuously conceived sons Smenkhare who had been his co-regent since Neferuaten’s death. Akhenaten did so gladly. It was a blessing to give over his power to another. He wanted only to lie down once more beside his young wife and never rise again.



That was not to be. Maat’s curse had followed him across the centuries to this very day. As his Prophet had foretold the barbed kiss he gave King Akhenaten bestowed life unending. He fled from Egypt and took another name wandering in search of Neferuaten’s fresh incarnation. For generation after generation he searched. Each time he found himself thwarted as Maat had promised he would be if his beloved did not truly love him for what he was.



In that time he had worn many names and many guises as had his nemesis. Since 1893 he had been Jabez Everman an art dealer and multimillionaire. And in this life his foe the Great Prophet of Atum Re wore the guise of a powerful businessman who went by the name of Khaled Zelarin.



At the Manchester Apollo this evening Neferuaten danced before him again in the latest of her numerous guises. In 1999 ‘she’ was Rayne Wylde lead singer and songwriter of a rock’n’roll band named Whipsnade.



DANNY



Fifteen year old Daniel Weston had never been to a gig before tonight. He supposed that had it been entirely down to him he would not have come to this one either but Daniel had been given his orders and if there was one thing that he was utterly proficient at it was following orders. Doing as he was told and not asking questions had kept him alive thus far. Keeping his mouth shut and his nose clean generally meant that he got food and pocket money and a room to himself and he very rarely got a good hiding. After the first time he always made sure that he moved fast enough to stay out of trouble.



Having a pretty face helped. The boss liked a pretty face almost as much as he liked obedience. Back home Daniel had just been one of too many grubby demanding mouths to be fed and silenced. Possessing neither the power of the oldest nor the cuteness-quotient of the baby of the family he found himself kicked from pillar to post on too many occasions. After finding himself relegated to punch-bag for yet another of his mum’s regrettable boyfriends Danny took to his heels and headed for the streets.



Blond curls and big blue eyes made him popular down the back alleys around Old Compton Street and Soho. It also brought him to the attention of the Boss. Mister Zelarin ran a club on the seedy fringes of the theatre district and it was there that Danny Weston learned the finer arts of personal service. At Flesh for Favours he discovered the darkest of truths. There was truly nothing under the sun that money could not buy.



And Mister Zelarin had bought and paid for Daniel Weston long ago.



At the club he heard all kinds of music. Largely what was played depended upon the client but he was familiar with Whipsnade. The band had released a video earlier in the year that was popular with certain of Flesh for Favours’ clientele. In it the singer – a skinny huge-eyed ashen-faced creature dressed in a ripped shirt and tight black bootleg jeans – was chased through the underground by two black panthers. When the animals cornered him finally in a broken elevator car they transformed into black-skinned men in animal masks and began to rip off his clothes as the elevator doors closed slowly.



In an extended version of the video which the club had somehow acquired (rumour had it that that the director was a member but Danny had never seen him if this was true) the singer a guy named Wylde was violently assaulted by both men. He had seen the film twice now. Even pressed up against the front of the stage as close as it was possible to be with about two thousand people pushed up close and personal behind him Daniel could not swear that this was the same guy. He was charismatic that was for sure and good to look at in a wasted sort of way but Danny could not believe that someone in Rayne Wylde’s position would allow something like that to happen to him purely for the sake of his art.



Daniel had seen plenty of porn in his time. He had even taken part in it and the scene in the extended video for Animorous had not been staged in any way. The man in the elevator had been fucked anally and orally and the camera had uncritically observed every last minute of his humiliation. The only reason Daniel could imagine for his allowing its release was that Wylde had not only instigated the assault but also actually ‘enjoyed’ it.



Watching his sinuous gravel-voiced performance on stage all Daniel could think of was the way that those two muscular rapists had used him. As his mouth enfolded the microphone seductively Daniel saw those same sulky lips – cut and bleeding – forced down around a massive black cock as he struggled to push himself away. When Wylde sank to his knees on stage then slumped forward as if praying groaning the lyrics to that same track Daniel’s mind filled with the close-up image of his tight jeans ripped urgently down to mid-thigh. He saw the singer semi-naked as his two attackers knelt with him and bucked their way simultaneously into his thrashing body.



Before the show was halfway through Danny had a raging hard-on that would not quit.



RAYNE



Rayne first noticed the boy in the front row during ‘She’s Got Stars To Walk On’. The ballad gave him the chance for a breather after the asphyxiating pace of the opening numbers. ‘She’s Got Stars….’ was a personal favourite with all the band members. It looked likely to be the new single if Matty Greening Whipsnade’s long-time manager could persuade the record company that it was right for the times.



He curled almost lazily atop one of the monitors and crooned huskily into the mic watching the tiny blond boy through lowered eyelashes. At first Rayne had been unsure of the youngster’s gender a factor that never failed to turn him on. One thing was certain the kid had a strikingly beautiful face utterly emotive and alluring. His eyes were long-lashed and pale the colour of blue topaz in the moonlight rarely blinking even in the dry-ice and the flickering shafts of multi-hued electronic lightning. The hands that occasionally pushed back the soft golden curls of his shoulder-length mane from his face and neck were long-boned and artistic the fingers delicate and the knuckles and wrists prominent. When he tilted back his head to catch a draught of cooler air wafting down from the stage the bob of his Adam’s apple gave him away.



Rayne caught himself wondering what the kid’s body was like under the glittering skinny-rib top and faded jeans that he wore and how it would feel to lose himself in the tumble of his unruly hair. He looked very young but when his wandering gaze lifted and met Rayne’s unblinking stare it did not pull away. In fact the kid just smiled as if he had a secret.



DANNY



Daniel had been wondering if he would get away with sliding his hand inside his pants and slowly bringing himself off. What with all the screaming and hysteria going on down here one small climax was hardly going to make a world of difference! It was not as easy as he had imagined. For one thing he was pressed up against the stage as tightly as a pilchard in a packed tin. He could not even lower his arms let alone jerk off. When the band finally slowed the relentless pace of the opening numbers and consented to play a gentler track he managed to get enough space to push his hands into his pockets.



It was about this moment that Rayne Wylde sauntered languidly towards one of the monitors at the edge of the stage and sank down on it. Sitting with his legs half crossed and one foot tucked underneath him he surveyed the audience almost playfully as he began to croon the lyrics. Automatically they sang along and Daniel experienced a curious sense of isolation. He could feel his throbbing cock through the lining of his pocket and as his fingers curled around the top three inches of his erection it felt as though he was the only person in the whole auditorium. No one else was real.



No… not quite… it was at this moment that Rayne Wylde’s huge pale knowing eyes settled upon his face and rested there in solemn contemplation. This close to him Daniel could see the beads of perspiration on his tip-tilted nose and the quiver of his long black eyelashes beneath the tattered raven’s wing of his sweat-damp sable hair. His gaze was the colour of some green herbal liqueur Danny had once tasted at Christmas translucent as crushed ice in Roses lime cordial. Wylde licked his lips very slowly between lines. He had a petulant teasing mouth like some stroppy adolescent choirboy. Danny wondered distractedly how that would feel wrapped around his hot hard cock.



A smile of purest ecstasy parted his lips as he felt the first spurt of hot wet relief under his thumb. He kept on rubbing harder and faster and closed his eyes as his slender body trembled from the force of his orgasm. So it was that he did not see the amused knowing smile that the singer bestowed on him in return.



RAYNE



The pass for the after-show party had been a moment’s impulsive gesture on Rayne’s part. The entire entourage of the band was issued with them on all dates. It was a perk – one of many – to touring with a rock group of Whipsnade’s calibre. Things had not always been so comfortable. Little more than five years ago – as Rayne recalled all too vividly – they had travelled the country in a defective off-white transit van for seven miserable weeks. Back then the crew consisted of Matt their crazy teenaged manager and a single solitary Roadie called Derrick. Derrick smoked pot compulsively and told endless back-to-back tales of his days in the seventies hauling cable for Black Sabbath. Since he was the only qualified driver in their small entourage they could hardly leave him in a lay-by at the first opportunity! So they careered unsteadily from one gig to another up and down the M1 whilst bits fell off the van – a perpetual hard-shoulder memorial to their passing.



The Boardwalk in Manchester was one of the better classes of dog’s-toilet venues they had played on that tour. In addition to the open sewers they called lavatories they had a solid and well-acknowledged reputation as a breaking ground for promising young bands. It had been there that Kris Spedding from SOLD an ex-session guitarist and A&R man finally saw them play live. SOLD was a fledgling concern – Whipsnade was to be only their second band – but Kris signed them on the spot. Whipsnade never looked back. They had the freedom with SOLD to make the music they wanted in the way they wanted to make it.



The rest – as they say – was history.



In spite of the occasional disagreement about releases the relationship with SOLD had been a good one. It had produced three best-selling albums (the last two of which had hit the top of the charts) and no less than eleven well regarded singles. SOLD’s offices moved to fashionable Notting Hill Gate in 1996 and now employed fifty people and eighteen decent bands. Whipsnade were the best of those eighteen bands by a long way. Although not perhaps at the very pinnacle of the rock tree they were pretty damned close and tonight Rayne figured they owed the Boardwalk some recognition for that break five years earlier.

He had been increasingly smug when Jon Brite one of their current handful of highly-trained road crew members returned to report that the blond haired boy from the front row had accepted the AAA-pass. Rayne never questioned whether the boy would guess at the connotations of such a gift. He had just watched the kid wank himself off in front of three and a half thousand people after all. There were groupies at every show these days and ‘everyone’ knew what went on at Whipsnade’s parties!



DANNY



Outside the Apollo blinking in the sodium glare of the streetlights Danny gazed in bewilderment at the laminated pass in his hand. This task was turning out to be almost too easy. He experienced the first sense of trepidation as the crowds pushed and jostled past him laughing and talking excitedly among themselves discussing the show and the new songs and what they were going to do with the rest of their night. They were normal kids going about their normal day to day lives. Daniel suddenly envied them.



He felt numb. Tonight he was going to follow orders and that meant going to this party and making damned sure that Rayne Wylde noticed him. The rest was up to him. His instructions had been fluid. Mister Zelarin knew that he was good at his job. The boss was not concerned that he would fluff his lines but that was a part of the problem. His job was sex that was what he was best at. In his time Danny had been bait in any number of carefully plotted honey traps. He had closed his eyes and spread his legs for politicians and movie stars sadists and masochists alike.



Danny knew that he was one of the lucky ones. He was valuable right now a precious commodity. But he was getting older and before too long his place in the panoply of Zelarin’s golden boys would fall to someone younger and more innocent-looking. By that time he knew he’d better have proved his worth in other ways. He knew how those less fortunate ended up. There was an incinerator in the basement of Flesh for Favours that burned up more than just the domestic rubbish. And some of the games the club’s customers played went ‘beyond’ violent fantasies. Zelarin picked his boys from the street. Few people would miss them if they vanished for good and by the time those people made others listen it was often too late.



No Danny appreciated how fortunate he was to be blessed with a pretty face and boyish complexion. It made his life much easier. He knew that there were worse things out there than Black-Panther men with large cocks. Danny had slaked more than just the hunger for sex in his short career and he had watched other boys feed that lust with their lives.



It did not pay to cross Khaled Zelarin.



JABEZ



Outside the theatre where the air was refreshingly chill after the stifling atmosphere within a solitary tall pale figure watched the black stretch Mercedes parked behind the squat ugly building on the edge of Manchester’s urban heartland. He had slipped away from the show as the encore began. It was not the first time he had observed Whipsnade’s performance on this tour and he was even beginning to recognise some of the pieces they played. Not to ‘like’ them exactly but at least he could tell them apart now. Had it not been for their dramatic and beautiful composer he would not have made such an effort but he could not more stay away from Rayne Wylde than a moth could steer clear of a burning light bulb.



It had been hundreds of years since he felt this way. Neferuaten’s previous reincarnation had been easier to approach. Michael Welton had been young and tractable effortlessly influenced and bedazzled. His naivete was his ultimate undoing. In the bustle and pleasure of Britain after the Second World War when everyone was dizzy with relief that the carnage was over he stepped almost innocently into Khaled Zelarin’s path and was found with his throat ripped out under Battersea Bridge.



Only the Undead could have perpetrated such a brutal slaying. Jabez kept vigil by his graveside for seven nights until he rose. It was in despair that he hammered the stake into Michael’s body to save him from further torment. Until the dawn he held his lover’s corpse in his tight embrace vowing that next time he would be more careful.



He had begun to give up hope when in 1968 Raymonde James Wilde was born. Jabez was aware of the moment as he had been aware of all Neferuaten’s incarnations but it took him over twenty years to find the source of his new hope. Jabez had travelled the world in search of his beloved only to find the singer on TV in a bar in Budapest. Even over the distorted airwaves he knew that this was the one. Another boy snake-hipped and beautiful as his virgin queen had been when she first came to him. From that moment he had dedicated his life to Rayne’s protection.



Getting close to him was harder than he had ever imagined however. Whipsnade went everywhere in the midst of a press-pack and surrounded by professional security. For some years now he had watched his beloved from afar wondering if – in fact – that was not the safest thing for Rayne Wylde.



As the band and their manager tumbled out of the back of the venue rumbled and sweat-damp still from their performance a few hard-core fans were already waiting outside. They were rewarded with pictures and a few words before the five young men were hustled into the back of the limo and it growled away into the night.



Jabez let his corporeal form melt silently into mist unobserved by the crowds now spilling out onto the darkened streets and drifted after it.



RAYNE



Within the safety of the car Rayne let himself gradually wind down. It always took a little while after a good gig to recover his equilibrium. Behind the smoked bullet-proof glass of the Mercedes’ windows he slumped into a supple black leather seat and closed his eyes lulled by the motion of the luxurious car as it sped away from the seething crowds around the Apollo theatre. Suspension this good was another of the benefits of Whipsnade’s success. Like the little pick-me-up Matty passed across to him tapping him on the knee as he handed over the small round mirror and the ebony cigarette holder.



Rayne held the mirror steady as his friend and manager trickled the twin lines of pure white heaven onto the glass out of the twist of foil produced from within his jacket. The younger man used his AMEX Platinum Card to cut and divide the bands of coke. Juggling the holder between his index and forefingers Rayne put one end into his right nostril and covered the left with his thumb to snort the first line cleanly switching the slender tube to the other nostril to inhale the second.



The buzz never let him down. That was another miracle of Whipsnade’s success. Since they had become a household name the quality of the cocaine they scored had improved in leaps and bounds. A satisfied smile engaged his full lips as he handed the glass across to Ciaran Hart and Matt repeated the routine. From the opposite seat young Court’ frowned at him reproachfully but Rayne was in no mood to argue with his guitarist tonight over the pros and cons of his habit. Life was rarely this good and just for now Rayne Wylde wanted to enjoy it.



The Boardwalk was an eccentric place that in and of itself appealed to his sense of the bizarre. Its situation within the shell of the old school hall lent it a cool lofty church-like atmosphere alien to many similar sized venues. The capacity was only around four hundred and forty thanks to fire regulations but even full the place had never seemed oppressive. It had many entrances and exits which was another reason why he selected it for the party. Whipsnade were able to slip into the building unobtrusively via a back door whilst their guests were still coming in from the street.



Within the main body of the club over the stage where Kris had first watched them play there was a mezzanine level which ran around three walls. The balcony overlooked the dancefloor below and was reached by a staircase from the entrance hall and another smaller flight of steps from behind the stage itself. Because of this it was rarely full since those who were not regulars at the club (and even some that were) did not know how to reach it. In addition due to the height of the gantry the view of the stage was not a clear one so it was less popular with those who wanted to see the bands perform.



Thanks to the inaccessibility of the mezzanine Rayne had it all to himself for quite some time after Whipsnade’s arrival and so was able to watch as his guests flooded in. Some were friends but not all. A few were journalists. A handful were pluggers for the record company. More than a handful were hangers on invited by the crew. In their midst he picked out the boy from the Apollo crowd as he stepped through from the bar area with a glass in his hand and made his way to a secluded table in the corner opposite Rayne’s perch.



Again the sheer simple beauty of the blond kid took his breath away. Not since his teens had he wanted someone this badly and he lusted after the boy from the front row of the Apollo with a passion that left him dizzy.



At that precise moment the kid set his glass down on the table and looked up around the balcony over his head with a quiet self-possessed curiosity. As his eyes swept along the rails they met and locked with Rayne’s. A smile as knowing and unexpected as it was welcome left the singer with a song in his heart and a sizeable bulge in his pants.



DANNY



The Whipsnade entourage had gathered around a group of tables on the balcony when Danny reached the upper level of the club. Watching the band members and their circle chatting and drinking as if nothing was more normal Danny felt briefly like an outsider again. It was as if he was back at school anxiously skirting around the older more popular boys and their friends. It took him back to a time he thought he had left behind when he joined Zelarin’s coterie. These days he was above such things. Now he could look back at the behaviour of his peers from the classroom and laugh at the naivete of their posturing and posing.



At a nod from Rayne he was admitted to their group without question. A lanky expensively dressed young man with waist-length hair in every colour of blond from the darkest honey through to nearly white leaned across the table and pushed a bottle of champagne in his direction. With no glasses or cups in sight Danny hesitated only briefly before picking up the magnum and swilling the contents from the neck. There was a ripple of appreciative applause as he set it down again meeting their eyes defiantly. He noted some smiles a couple of head-shakes. Finally his gaze met the ice and lime stare of the object of his fascination the reason he was here tonight. Rayne Wylde rolled his eyes dramatically and turned away lighting a cigarette.



He was very beautiful even up close. Danny had seen plenty of ‘Beautiful People’ in his time who did not pass muster without the aid of the make-up artist’s brush or the forgiving soft focus of the photographer’s lens. Wylde possessed an arrogant schoolboyish prettiness enhanced by those huge eyes and long lashes. Sitting here less than a few feet away from his target Daniel was also certain that this ‘was’ the star of the video he had watched in Zelarin’s club all those weeks ago. Rayne barely met anyone’s gaze directly but he was conscious of every glance in his direction Danny was sure of it. He watched the singer to the exclusion of just about everybody else. Each wryly-deprecating smile and shake of the head only convinced him more. The singer did not talk a great deal he listened and he watched his icy lime-green gaze moving from face to face so rapidly that it was hard to follow. Danny made the singer his personal study assimilating his every move and comment.



Rayne tapped his fingers frequently on his lean thigh and Daniel Weston quickly learned that this was a sign that he was bored with the conversation. Not long afterwards his gaze would move on to some new subject or another more intriguing topic of conversation somewhere else. Danny could barely help but think that it would not take him long to asphyxiate on the dearth of intellect in this corner of the room.



The younger man allowed his attention to be diverted ever so briefly by the presence of the long-haired spider-limbed youth in the chair adjacent to his own. Most of the clique surrounding Wylde and his immediate entourage were fawning giggling devotees eager to draw attention to themselves. His neighbour seemed immune to all of this and sipped at a solitary bottle of pilsner yawning occasionally as the hordes fought to win a glance or a smile or an acerbic comment from Rayne. As Danny looked him over properly for the first time he realised that this was Whipsnade’s lead guitarist and Wylde’s co-writer Sean Taylor-Courtney. Daniel thought that Sean could not be very much older than he was himself. He was surprisingly tiny and unprepossessing for a rock-star and spent much of the evening trying to hide behind the fall of his dark-auburn hair only emerging to take another swig from the beer bottle in front of him.



They began to talk almost to fill the space that seemed to exist around them. And that it seemed was the catalyst. Up until this moment Rayne Wylde had been apparently content to ignore him and Danny was at a loss to find a way to get closer to the singer than he was already. He was on the verge of giving up of going back to Zelarin and admitting – oh horror of horrors – that he had met his match that he had found a man who did not automatically want to sleep with him. It chilled his blood to think about telling the Boss that he had been wrong. Zelarin was ‘never’ wrong those who said that he was were invariably carrying out his instructions improperly.



Danny did not want to think too closely about what happened to those unfortunate individuals.



So he drank more champagne talked about guitar music with Sean Courtney and otherwise tried to pretend that he was just a normal kid enjoying the night of his life. He was here in the Boardwalk with Whipsnade one of the UK’s most prominent rock bands. Hell a mere five years ago he would never even have dreamed of this.



RAYNE



Rayne was feeling irritable. All night he had been waiting for the pretty blond kid to make a move on him and nothing at all was happening. Now the Coke was wearing off and he was beginning to think that his judgement was slipping and he had played the boy wrong from the very start. Right now the blond was ignoring him completely which ruffled his feathers even more. On the kid’s right Whipsnade’s own child prodigy was busy explaining instrumental progressions from tracks on ‘Silver Line Park’. Court’ was a musical genius which of course Rayne Wylde and Simon Hathaway his drummer and best friend had recognised from the very start. Court’ could play any instrument you put in his hand or sat him in front of. At barely twenty he was a natural musician with a flair for songwriting that occasionally left Rayne breathless. He had a real ear for a melody but separated from his beloved crimson Stratocaster he was like a goldfish stranded outside its bowl.



Rayne could have coped with ‘all’ of his colleague’s prodigious talent unflinchingly had it not been for that last factor. The kid’s inability – damn it his downright ‘refusal’ – to blend in drove the older man to distraction. Music was Court’s whole life and he disapproved utterly of the old rock star clichГ© of sex drugs and booze which had always been a part of Whipsnade’s ethos. Sober Rayne could just about tolerate him – and undeniably Whipsnade needed him – but when Rayne started to get a little bit out of his head as he was tonight their relationship went from merely uncomfortable to downright precipitous.



“’’Ey! Court!” the singer barked now prodding his guitarist hard under the table with the toe of one Cuban boot. “You’re a fuckin’ star mate! Start behavin’ like one. The Chicken doesn’t want a fuckin’ masterclass he wants to get stoned and get laid. Don’t you sweetheart?”



This last comment he addressed directly to the blond boy with a fierce feral grin that showed off small neat white teeth. Court’ scowled through the tangle of his shaggy russet-brown hair at him and the youngster looked quickly from one face to the other his blue eyes wide and innocent. The kid liked Court’ okay which was clear enough from his defensive expression but the awed and astonished look on his pale open features told the singer all that he needed to know. Since this evening at the Apollo as he watched the boy getting off Rayne Wylde had known precisely what he was interested in – and chord progressions had ‘nothing’ to do with it!



He was still staring intently at the boy when Court’ snapped back at him tetchily breaking his concentration and inflaming his temper.



“That’s your trouble Ray! If you can’t fuck it or snort it or mainline it it’s no fucking good to you is it?”



Over on the next small table Ciaran and Matty spluttered with ill-suppressed laughter at this exchange both of them most definitely the worse for wear. Simon’s dark blue eyes flickered anxiously from the pair of them back to Rayne. The singer ignored them all and pushed himself to his feet with ice in his gaze and in his heart. Whipsnade was ‘his’ band and he was damned if he would let anyone take the piss out of him tonight and get away with it.



“’Fuck’ you!” he barked letting the edge in his voice cut through the general hubbub so that a small silence descended around their table. A humourless smile graced his lips at that. There ‘were’ some advantages to a trained singing voice after all. “Fuck the ‘lot’ of you!” he shrilled furiously before storming off in the direction of the back stairs.



JABEZ



A brief pool of light illuminated the blackness of the stairwell when Daniel pushed through the doorway out onto the metal-floored landing. The Vampire had been poised to make his move but he froze in the shadows again whilst the child he recognised as one of Zelarin’s boys figured out that Wylde could not have gone far. Using the handrail as a guide he trotted easily down the aluminium flight. The youngster quickly located the dejected figure of Whipsnade’s songwriter and vocalist. Rayne was sitting on the bottom step his tousled head bent over the ripped knee of his snug-fitting black pants dabbing at the grazed flesh beneath with tentative fingers cursing and sniffing alternately.



Whilst he was still in motion Jabez eased closer still. He could smell the minuscule droplets of Rayne’s blood over the tantalisingly sensual aroma of his hot weary body. As the younger lad came to crouch beside him the Everman breathed in a mingled scent of sweat and smoke and whatever herbal concoction the little whore used on his ragged blond hair. Over all of that the smell of blood set his mouth watering. Whatever was going on here it would not avail him to interrupt now. He had spent over three hundred years evading Zelarin and he would not run the risk that this child might identify him to his former mentor.



Even so it was hard to hold back when he was so close to the object of his desire. Rayne was hurt drunk or drugged he had missed his footing and tumbled down the final few steps in the darkness to land sprawled on the asphalt floor at the bottom of the stairs. Jabez itched to sweep from his hiding place and pick the singer up to gently minister to his wounded knee as the boy was now doing.



The little blond had been visibly irritated when he came down here after the singer but now in such close proximity he was solicitous and attentive as Whipsnade’s glamorous front-man turned his pale face upward helplessly. Searching fingers reached up to touch the boy’s cheek spotting his face with blood and in that moment the lad understood instinctively what it was that he wanted. Tilting his head ever so slightly he let Rayne’s fingers slip into his mouth tasting the salty warmth of his blood tentatively. Jabez closed his eyes and clenched his jaws against the hunger that raged within him.

He was still sucking Rayne’s fingers gently in the darkness when the singer’s other hand came up hesitantly at first running through his pale tangled hair to caress the nape of his neck. He withdrew his fingertips from the boy’s mouth then more insistently Rayne Wylde pulled his companion’s moist lips down onto his kissing him with a savage hunger of his own.



Danny broke the kiss first pulling away to whisper into his mouth “D’you want to go somewhere more private?”



RAYNE



In spite of his resolve to seduce the boy from the front of the Apollo crowd (Daniel… Danny he reminded himself firmly) Rayne found himself surprised by the youngster’s willingness to be with him. He prided himself on his ability to judge a personality and he had already calculated that Danny would be pliable and possibly a little naive. That had been a mite shy of the mark. Already he had figured out that this kid was no pushover. Getting him drunk – or trying to – had not seemed to work and he was beginning to wonder if this endeavour had been worth the effort when Danny followed him down the stairs. The boy’s concern had been a surprise. What he had not bargained for was that Dan would ‘physically’ want him just as much as ‘he’ wanted Dan.



Charley Collister was outside with the Merc when they finally emerged into the cool Mancunian night. Rayne was still limping slightly from his tumble down the stairs which allowed him to lean against Daniel for support one arm draped loosely around the boy’s slim shoulders. His lips still tingled from the ferocity of their recent kiss.



Danny Weston on the other hand seemed impervious to the moment of intimacy faced with their mode of transport back to the Midland Hotel. His hands wandered like a child’s over the gleaming bodywork of Charley’s black stretch Mercedes and he made little sounds of awe and appreciation which clearly charmed big Chaz to the soles of his ox-blood Doc Martens.



“This is amazing!” the kid breathed settling into the supple soft ebony leather of the Merc’s immaculate upholstery. His fingers still wandered over every little feature of the car exploring electric window switches and folding arm rests locating the mini-bar in the back seat quite by accident.



Rayne fished a miniature Stolichnaya from the cache and with some magnanimity said “Help yourself!”



Thumbing an overhead switch he dimmed the interior lights and a tiny portable TV screen descended smoothly from the roof and replayed the night’s gig for them in muted tones. Charley slipped into the driver’s seat and gunned the engine and the Mercedes slipped silently away into the Manchester night.



“I need to make a pick-up Chaz ” Rayne Wylde told his driver in that same languid gravel-toned voice that Danny recognised from the songs. “Just a couple of grams. Nothin’ heavy.”



Charley’s eyes met his sceptically in the rear-view mirror. “I should clear it with Matt Chief.”



“Matthew won’t mind ” Rayne lounged in the back seat still rolling the tiny bottle between his palms. “I’m not over my spending limit ” he added persuasively. “And we don’t play the next gig ‘til Monday.”



Danny glanced at him speculatively he thought. Rayne met the kid’s wide blue eyes and winked reassuringly. Taking a deep breath Daniel said “I’ve got some stuff. Just a little bit if you want to share.”



“We’re not talkin’ blotters ‘ere ” Rayne chuckled at him and unscrewed the cap of his bottle downing the contents in one.



“Coke ” Danny said at once. From the driver’s seat Charley was looking him over again via the mirror. His expression was far from approving. Rayne was less judgmental.



“You are a fuckin’ angel ” he exclaimed wrapping himself around the boy and kissing him again. He was less restrained this time getting his fingers inside Daniel’s cropped t-shirt and snug-fitting jeans even as his warm wet tongue explored the cavern of the boy’s half-open mouth. This time Danny made no attempt to resist his groping hands.



TO BE CONTINUED……