Hanerisu’s new master was dressed in black. Black suit, black shirt, black shoes. His clothes were not designed for the desert, but he didn’t seem overheated. He also wore a pair of mirror shades that he did not remove as he sat down opposite Hanerisu, who had been sitting in his study, reading, and picked up one of the Palace’s ‘Welcome’ leaflets from the coffee table to read himself.

Hanerisu ignored him; he had gained a good enough look at him when he came in. The man was young and thin, with very pale skin and black hair cut too short to tell if it was curly or straight. He was probably attractive, by human standards.

The man put the leaflet back down and studied Hanerisu, waiting in vain for his presence to be acknowledged. “You know what I’d like?” He spoke American-Spanish, another language Hanerisu understood but chose not to speak.

Hanerisu looked at him but said nothing.

“I’d like something to eat,” the man continued, unperturbed. “Come on, I could do with some company.”

Hanerisu wanted to sigh, but that could easily provoke violence, he put his book down, stood up, and began to tie up his hair. The man sat back in his chair, watching Hanerisu, fascinated by his hair, and the skill with which he fastened it.

“My name’s Noah,” there was no response. “Yours is…Hana, Haner…issu?”

More silence. Noah sighed, disappointed. He levered himself out of the armchair, walked to the door, and, after passing his key card over the lock walked out into the corridor, gesturing for Hanerisu to follow him.

The Palace was large and labyrinthine. Hanerisu, being one of the lower priced Keys, was accommodated on one of the Palace’s lower levels. It was a long walk through many corridors to get to the banqueting hall; they walked in silence, Hanerisu a respectful distance behind his new master.

The Palace served clients from time zones all over the world and the solar system, so the Palace’s facilities were open 24 hours a day, and never seemed empty. Hanerisu rarely got to leave his suite, so it was hard for him to remain apathetic to his surroundings.

The banqueting hall was huge, with a high stained glass ceiling and many levels of seating. Statues, tropical plants and water flowing in artificial streams to several pools full of exotic fish broke up the vast area, and provided privacy for the diners. Artificial birds of paradise and small jungle cats completed the effect of fecundity and wealth, in harsh contrast to the desert outside the Palace. The hall was staffed by ex supermodels and soap stars, many disgruntled at playing second billing to the Keys, but all paid enough to make working at the Palace more attractive than their previous professions.

Noah showed his key card to the waiter and they were shown to one of the lower level tables, a bit too close to the walkway to be totally private.

“You get what you pay for, huh?” said Noah, still trying to engage Hanerisu in conversation, “still, you’re not a disappointment at all.” He smiled at Hanerisu as if expecting a response for his compliment. When none was forthcoming Noah sighed again and turned his attention to the menu screen, scrolling through the options at a speed that would have been difficult for a normal person to follow. He had yet to remove his shades.

Hanerisu did not bother to look at the menu, he knew what he would order if he was given the choice. He had noticed Noah’s reading speed and assumed, with out really thinking about it, that it must be due to an artificial enhancement of some kind. Hanerisu hoped his new master was not too much mechanical, at least not anywhere he would be expected to touch. Some cyborgs didn’t know their own strength, and had forgotten about human fragility.

Instead of paying attention to his master, Hanerisu surreptitiously observed the other Keys; he had seen enough masters in his seven years at the Palace for them to hold no interest for him, but he rarely saw other Keys. His own history being so unique, he was curious about the others and how they came to reside at the Palace, but so far he had never had a chance to talk to one.

They were all stunning to look at, which came as no real surprise to Hanerisu, the Palace’s own propaganda and Kekkon’s occasional comments had told him as much. What did surprise him was that he was one of the more normal, by human standards, looking Keys. Lots of the boys he saw had been engineered to express unnaturally long limbs and razor-blade cheek bones; or characteristics that were feline, tabby-cat hair and eyes a shade of emerald no cat had naturally possessed; or complex patterns of scales. And these, thought Hanerisu, were the more normal ones. The ones designed to be tortured, to withstand any abuse thought up by those who could afford to use them, wouldn’t be dining out. Or if they were there would be nothing to their outward appearance to suggest how far from the human norm they really were, just like Hanerisu himself really.

Noah rapped his knuckles on the table in front of Hanerisu, making him jump a little. Noah grinned, obviously pleased to have finally gained a reaction from his Key. “I said what do you want to eat, and if you don’t talk to me you won’t get anything. I know you can talk, and that you understand me, they’d have told me at reception if you couldn’t.”

Hanerisu considered his master’s words, he was hungry, and he felt hunger as acutely as he felt pain. He gave in and told Noah the codes for what he wanted.

Noah looked pleased, even if all he had gained was a string of digits and numbers. He keyed them into the menu along with his own order, remembering the codes Hanerisu had given him without having to ask for them to be repeated.

After a quarter of an hour spent in silence a waiter bought them their food. They ate in silence. Noah had an extra raw steak that he tore into as if he hadn’t eaten in days and Hanerisu had vegetable tempura. It didn’t matter what Hanerisu ate, he never put on any extra weight, but he refused to eat anything that came from a living creature.

When he had finished the steak Noah ordered himself another, not bothering to ask Hanerisu, who was less than half way through his own meal, if he wanted anything. In fact, since the bloody steak had been placed in front of him, he had ignored Hanerisu completely. Waiting for his second steak he watched Hanerisu while he ate, as if there was something wonderful and rare occurring in front of him. Hanerisu was used to being observed, to having people possess him with their gaze, so it didn’t bother him. He ignored Noah and continued to eat as if he were alone.

When they had both finished eating they returned to Hanerisu’s suite. They stood in the study, awkwardly silent, at least on Noah’s part. He fidgeted while Hanerisu wondered if he could get away with returning to his book. After a brief internal debate Noah spoke:

“You’d better take me to the bedroom then, that’s what we’re both here for after all.”

He didn’t seem happy with the way things had turned out; maybe he had been expecting more enthusiasm on the part of his purchase.

Then he should have paid for a better Key, thought Hanerisu, a little smugly. He always derived some small satisfaction from giving his masters a miserable time. In his opinion anyone paying for a sex-slave deserved whatever they got.

Hanerisu walked through the third room and into the bedroom with Noah following him. Noah paused at the entrance, holding onto the doorframe with both hands as if afraid of falling. He took in the low ceiling, black on black on black decor and fog machine with an expression of disgust on his face.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” said Noah, shaking his head. “You really sleep in there? People actually want to have sex in there? Couldn’t we use this room?” He gestured behind himself with a tilt of his head.

Hanerisu stood with his arms folded, waiting for an actual demand. He wasn’t going to volunteer the fact that he didn’t use the bedroom when he was on his own. He didn’t want to be with his master in the third room either because that was the only place that felt like his, where he slept and spent time with Kekkon.

Noah sighed, stooped, stepped into the room, grabbed Hanerisu by the arm and pulled him back into the third room, where he straightened up again.

“I suppose it’s stating the obvious to say that you don’t actually want to do this, isn’t it?” Noah said, sighing again. He took his shades off, rubbing at his scrunched up eyes. When he opened them Hanerisu saw that his hazel irises where shot through with splinters of blood red.

“Kyuuketsuki!” He hissed, surprising himself, and Noah.

“Not quite,” he replied once he was over the shock of Hanerisu’s outburst. “I’m only . . . ha-fume-do? Half turned, and if I wanted human blood I wouldn’t be stupid enough to bite someone who was being monitored, would I? Though I was assured at reception that they only took basic visuals. I wouldn’t get past any kind of medical scan. And you’re not going to tell on me, are you!” He grinned, revealing his canines, which were partially extended, though still conceivably within the human norm.

“Akuma fuzen.” Sneered Hanerisu. The Shiroi Council had been doing their best over the centuries to wipe these vermin out, they sometimes acted as go-betweens for Akuma who would be too easily noticed in the Central Plain, and caused plenty of death and suffering on their own. He had exterminated plenty in the time before his fall.

“I’m no demon, imperfect or otherwise, you don’t know anything about me.” He shook his head, dismissing the subject. He folded up his shades and put them into his jacket pocket. “And I don’t know anything about you either, although I’m beginning to suspect.”

He walked behind Hanerisu and pushed him forward so he had to brace himself against the back of the couch, he brushed Hanerisu’s hair over his shoulders and undid the shoulder fastenings on his tunic, exposing his back.

“I knew it!” He said, and run a hand over Hanerisu’s back. “I thought the old bastard was making it all up, Angels!”

He licked his hand, tentatively, then moaned as he tasted blood. He pushed Hanerisu down on to his knees, knelt behind him and began lapping at the bloody broken wings tattooed on Hanerisu’s back, his arms wrapped around him to hold him in place.

When he had finished feeding he grabbed Hanerisu by the back of the neck, forcing his head down to the floor and his backside up against his crotch.

Hanerisu could feel Noah’s erection straining against the restraint of his trousers. He had accepted the inevitability of this, or something like this, happening since Noah had first walked in. He did nothing to resist or protest, merely submitted to what he could not avoid.

Noah tore away the last of Hanerisu’s clothing, fumbled with the openings of his own clothes until he had freed his erection. He spat on his hand and used that to lubricate himself before thrusting into Hanerisu’s passive body.

It hurt. It was agony, like every time before when he had felt himself being torn by the violent penetration of a brutal or inconsiderate or inexperienced man. But he stayed silent, he stayed still, he would not let him know how much he was hurting him.

He knew from experience that no one would help him, that he would have to be half dead before the Palace would intervene, and that even if Kekkon knew what was going on he couldn’t risk interfering. He knew he was totally, utterly alone.

When he had finished, Noah let go of him, withdrew, and, after refastening his trousers, crawled away to collapse, exhausted, onto a nearby pile of floor cushions.

Hanerisu didn’t bother to move from where it had happened. He fell over sideways, then curled up into a foetal ball, wrapping his hair around him like a silk worm’s cocoon.

A little while later Hanerisu heard Noah get up and walk through the bedroom and into the bathroom, once the bathroom door was closed he heard nothing. When he came back Noah walked over to him and covered him with a blanket he must have taken from the bedroom. Hanerisu didn’t move.

“I really hurt you didn’t I?” He heard Noah ask. It sounded like he was kneeling or sitting next to him. He felt what must have been intended as a comforting hand placed on his shoulder, he didn’t even flinch.

“I’m sorry, I truly am, and I know you won’t believe me, and even if you did it wouldn’t mean anything anyway, but I am.”

Noah squeezed his shoulder a little harder to emphasize his words. It must have been disconcerting for him, talking to someone practically mummified in his own hair, but he could hardly blame Hanerisu for wanting to hide.

“It was the blood,” Noah continued. “Human, or more than human, I suppose, blood, has this effect on me, on my kind.” His frown deepened. “It makes us do things like this. I haven’t eaten anything higher up the food chain than a cow in over half a century. I don’t even know if you can call that feeding, there wasn’t really any blood there, was there? Anyway I’m sorry, won’t you please come out from there so I can make sure you’re ok? I brought the first aid kit from the bathroom, please? And afterwards I really think I should talk to you, tell you about myself, try to explain.”

Hanerisu obeyed without really thinking, too hurt and too tired to do otherwise. He bundled his hair up out of the way, and stood, wrapping himself in the blanket as he did so.

“Maybe you’d rather take care of yourself?” Noah said, holding out the first aid kit, not getting up from where he sat cross-legged on the floor.

Hanerisu took the box and walked slowly and carefully back through the bedroom and into the bathroom. The door wouldn’t lock for him, but he doubted Noah would try to follow him. The first aid kit contained a tube of gel that promoted healing while killing off infection and numbing pain. According to Kekkon the Palace purchased it by the ton load. After washing and drying himself, he applied a generous amount of the gel so that the pain was dulled to a bearable level. The amount he used would have produced numbness in anyone else, but Hanerisu had found his tissues could not absorb enough to kill of the amount of pain he usually felt.

He left the bathroom and in the bedroom got himself a new tunic to wear, and retied his hair more neatly.

Hanerisu walked back into the third room to find Noah again sitting on the floor cushions, but he had separated the pile, making a place for Hanerisu to sit opposite him. In front of that place Noah had set a tray of tea things. They were arranged inexpertly, but he had made a pretty good effort to get it right. Noah himself had a mug of coffee and the pot sitting on the floor near at hand.

“I assumed you’d want tea,” said Noah, when he saw Hanerisu walk into the room. “All the tea things were at the front of the cupboard, if you want anything to eat . . . ?”

Hanerisu shook his head, once, a big concession on his part, but then no one but Kekkon had ever made him tea before. He was appalled with himself for being so easily moved by such a small gesture from a man who had just brutally raped him. But then none of the ones before that he could remember had been this genuinely concerned for his welfare afterwards.

He sat down and poured himself some tea; Noah smiled, relived, when he did so.

Noah drank a mouthful of coffee before speaking again: “I guess I should tell you about myself now.”

I was born a long time ago, towards the end of the nineteenth century, somewhere in eastern Europe. My parents were peasant farmers and I had a lot of brothers and sisters, although I couldn’t even tell you their names now.

I must have been roughly eleven when I was . . . ‘collected’ by my vampire. He picked me up in the middle of the night, of course, when I was asleep, so I don’t really know what happened. He told me that my parents sold me to him, and I believed him for a long time. Now, I don’t know. I don’t remember a lot about my life before Lucien. That’s the name he’s going by now, although he’s had many others.

Vampires, if you don’t already know, don’t like each other. They have their hunting grounds and they defend them fiercely, although in cities where the food supply is practically limitless you’ll find lots of them living in close proximity to each other, but never together. That’s where my kind come in, their ‘minions’, we act as go-betweens and day-walkers for our vampires.

When a vampire bites a human, but doesn’t drain them, they become half turned. I have some of a vampire’s traits, longevity, regeneration, night-vision, and an unfortunate addiction to blood. I’m also sensitive to sunlight, and silver and garlic cause a nasty allergic reaction, but they don’t kill me the way they would a vampire.

Being allowed to feed on the blood of my vampire would turn me into a fully-fledged vampire too. That happens only rarely. Since vampires are so long lived they don’t need to reproduce often. Normally a minion is kept around for a few decades until their vampire becomes bored of them and then they’re drained.

But that didn’t happen with me, he’s kept me going in this half human state for centuries. He’s had hundreds of other minions since he got me, but he was never attached to any of them the way he is to me. He waited until I was about eighteen to bite me for the first time. Before then he fed me well and made sure I grew up fit and healthy, and attractive. He was molesting me right from the beginning, but didn’t fuck me properly until after he bit me, he said that way I’d always be a virgin for him. At the time I thought he was well within his rights to treat me like that. The world was very different back then, although after seeing this place, perhaps things haven’t changed all that much.

Lucien traded things, drugs, slaves, arms, information, whatever was most profitable at the time, so we moved around a lot. It’s unusual for a vampire to be so restless, it doesn’t go well with their normally territorial natures, plus there are the practical risks involved with travelling. He needed me to be smart to work for him, to keep him safe during the day. He taught me a lot, which is perhaps another reason why he’s kept me for so long.

It was over half a century before it occurred to me to run away. That first time his other minions caught me pretty quickly. We’d just moved to America, after World War Two, and I didn’t know where to go, didn’t even speak the language yet.

The second time, a decade later, I was a lot smarter, and a lot better prepared. I didn’t get caught that time, but I went back to him on my own anyway. We are, effectively, slaves to our vampires; if we’re not bitten regularly we start to age, to die really. The first time I went through the withdrawal it terrified me, I thought it was going to kill me straight away. I confused regaining my mortality for imminent death, so I went back to him. The other times I ran away, and I’ve run away dozens of times since that second time, I got through the withdrawal symptoms ok, but couldn’t handle being mortal, so I went back again and again. Sometimes I could stay away for months, even a whole year once. I’ve aged because of it, I don’t look eighteen anymore. But I always went back in the end, despite his abuse, which got worse every time I went back, because each time confirmed my addiction, and therefore his power over me.

One of the reasons I couldn’t face mortal life away from Lucien was because it meant being alone, with no family, no community, no place in the world. Being with Lucien was the closest I ever came to being loved, and he certainly believes he loves me. With love mortality would be bearable, I could live a normal life and eventually die with someone who loved me. But I’ve been away from the normal, mortal world for so long it seems like an impossibility.

Please don’t think I was expecting to find anything like love here. I’ve been enough of a slave myself to know how ridiculous that idea would be. I’m just hiding out here because it’s the most secure place in this region.

Over the past century or so Lucien has become powerful and well connected enough to start dealing with demons, Akuma as you’d call them; they have no more respect for vampires than your kind do. Its funny, I’ve seen demons, but I never believed what Lucien told me about angels until I saw you. He’s trading in arms again, and other military technology, enough to fuel a system-wide war. The scale of it all scares the shit out of me.

The first time I left the Plain I was born in I knew I could never have a normal life again, never be human again. But I found another option, an Akuma who might take care of me, might even love me. She’s so alien though, so far from human, that I don’t even know if she’s capable of such a thing. Her true form is more than half insect, she has the body of a giant orange centipede with a torso that’s more human looking. I think she’s beautiful, in a way, and she’s incredibly powerful. I’m meeting her tomorrow, to try and make a deal, perhaps being her slave will be better than being Lucien’s.

I suppose what I’m really trying to say to you is I’m sorry, I know what its like to not be free, and to inflict suffering on someone the way it has been inflicted on me is obscene. I’m still human enough to have a sense of morality, even if I haven’t needed it much.

Again I’m sorry. Why don’t you go to sleep now? You look exhausted.

Hanerisu woke up from a dream of chitinous orange plates sliding against each other with a dry rasping sound, and feathery antennae brushing over his face, and seeing something he could happily mistake for love in normally fathomless compound eyes.