“That old geezer plans on extending the reach of Shinjuku’s vampires to the outside world? No matter how many fellow co-conspirators you might make for yourselves, the people out there aren’t so stupid. They’ll take steps soon enough. Count on vampire eradication becoming an international effort. And every night when they going hunting for prey that isn’t there en masse? Who’s going to play the Pied Piper? You’ve got a pretty chancy situation on your hands here. Does Kikiou know what’s really in your heart?”
“I couldn’t care less about that either.”
“So them’s the breaks, eh? And yet despite not caring, you’ve done all that to Shinjuku.”
“That’s what not giving a damn means.”
“There is that too.”
Princess threw back her head and laughed, showing her white throat.
“What’s so funny?”
“How could I not laugh? Your personality lives up to everything I expected of you. It’s good having a man like you around. Come to think of it, Demon City might be worth keeping around as well.”
“You know—” Setsura stopped and glared at her.
“What?” said Princess, turning her smiling face to him, like a big sister teasing an ornery little brother.
“If you really don’t give a damn, then how about you just up and leave? You coming here is all water under the bridge, but nobody’s going to hold it against you if you leave, so what’s stopping you?”
“I just may do that.”
The Demon Princess gave Setsura a strange look. Setsura said nothing. A frightening glow filled her eyes. “Come along. See the completely changed woman and tear your heart out.”
For the next several minutes, it was as if a demonic miasma had assumed female form, strolling down the hallway.
Setsura found himself in front of a familiar black door. Princess’s bedroom. She went in first. Takako was lying on the same luxurious bed as before.
“Let me ask you this—the real thing?
“See for yourself,” Princess scoffed.
Setsura brushed past her and approached the bed. Based on appearances, this was definitely Takako. The skin revealed by the thin blue nightgown was bluer than blue, almost electric white. He felt for her pulse. It was there, faintly. She had not become a vampire in toto.
He raised her up in his arms. She was as soft as before, and as cold as ice.
“Taking her with you? That’s not why I brought you here.”
Princess raised her right hand in a suggestive manner. A pale arm wrapped around Setsura’s neck like a snake. The sensation couldn’t help but arouse from this usually laidback man a startled response.
“Aki-san.”
Her voice and breath caressed his face. Her eyes glowed red. Her breath smelled of the fresh earth of a grave. Setsura reflexively tried to free himself. Takako’s thin arms proved as immovable as rebar.
“Aki-san. No, Setsura-san. What did you come here for? Did you come here to save me?”
She licked her lips as she spoke, all the more provocative a gesture coming from an otherwise rationally-minded woman.
“I came here to save you,” Setsura quietly answered, neither flustered nor afraid.
“Thank you. But there is nowhere else I wish to go. I’m so tired and cold. Warm me.”
“Well, here I am,” Setsura said. His next words were the last thing anyone would have expected. “Go right ahead.”
He held her in an embrace, as if to nuzzle her cheek.
“No!”
Princess’s cry rang out like a silver bell. Takako pulled back from Setsura, or rather, was torn from his side. Takako struggled, but Princess easily held her at bay with a single hand and stared in the face of her own victim. She had not exhibited such loathing even when the Elder scalded her face.
“No. You shall not take Setsura’s blood. That is—” She interrupted herself with a fierce look of anguish. “Setsura! Why would you allow her to—?”
“Why not?”
“You must flee from her. She must pursue you. You must not bind her hand and foot with your wires and take her out of here. No, you cannot. You must run hither and yon in your attempts to escape while she chases you, while I quench my thirst with her blood. If you do not wish her to become my servant, then kneel and plead. Or beg that I take your blood instead. But instead you bare your throat to her? What are you thinking? No matter. The fun I had in mind is all for naught now. Let us cut to the chase, Setsura.”
The Demon Princess hadn’t finished speaking before a red line bisected her face from the top of her head to her chin. She smiled. As if intimidated by the expression itself, the line disappeared.
She pressed her coral-red lips to the blue veins running down Takako’s exposed neck. Takako arched her head back. An enraptured glow suffused her countenance. An ecstatic gasp escaped her lips.
There was nothing Setsura could do, and Princess knew it as she removed her lips from Takako’s throat. Two threads of blood connected the corners of her mouth with Takako’s skin. Her crimson lips all the redder, the blood dripping from her fangs painted brilliant flowers on her white robe.
Standing there holding Takako’s enervated body in her arms, they created a living sculpture as sublime as it was savage, the Demon Princess in all her glory.
The heroes of old who marched off to pillage and slaughter would have frozen in their tracks at such a sight, struck not by the horror but sheer beauty.
Even the genie in black stood there transfixed, like an artist intoxicated by a glimpse of heaven.
“Just once more,” Princess breathed. Her eyes sparkled. “Take her blood once more and she becomes mine. When that happens, there is nothing you and your friends can do to save her. Does that sit well with you, Setsura? Can you stand there and wait for me to kiss her neck again? Or will you bow and beg? The hour of decision will be delayed no more.”
Princess’s words hummed with a song of victory. Setsura’s answer could speak of nothing but defeat. She focused her blood-red eyes upon his resplendent face, not allowing a speck of his suffering to escape her attention.
Setsura said in a casual and unaffected manner, with not even the twitch of an eyebrow, “I don’t think so.”
“What?”
“Ask you for a favor? Not a chance. And drinking Takako’s blood? That’s out, too.”
“Idiot,” Princess spat out. “What are you prattling on about? Are you aware of the position you are in?”
“Yeah. And I’ve got an offer for you.”
“One you think I would accept?”
“Sure.”
He nodded with complete confidence. The murderous intent in her eyes wavered. There was a human being on this planet that could render her speechless, if only for a moment.
“Release Takako. And in exchange—”
“You’re going to say you’ll offer me your blood instead?”
Setsura didn’t answer for a minute. Then he fixed Princess in his gaze and said, “Bingo.”
Now Princess held her tongue. And then an indescribable expression rose to her face of inhuman beauty. “What schemes do you have up your sleeve?” purred her bloody lips. “No, it doesn’t matter. The time has come when you will voluntarily cast yourself into my embrace. Any final words, Setsura?”
“Nothing springs to mind,” Setsura said.
His blunt impassive answer made up Princess’s mind. Takako crumpled to the ground like a melting waxwork. Princess moved to the bed. She licked the blood from around her mouth and said, “Come to me, Setsura.”
Her white arms reached out to his shadowed visage.