The studio was a small space, maybe all of two hundred square feet. But it was not as overdone as his home. It was empty save for a green tufted couch, and three walls of overflowing bookcases. The shelves were stacked at least three books deep.
"Were you expecting sigils on the floor and blood dripping from the walls?" he asked.
"Yeah, kinda," I admitted, handing him the bag of mushrooms.
"There's still a place for that primitive shit. But I have a bit more finesse than that these days. So, what kind of information are you after?"
Sucking in a deep breath, I looked around his space before glancing back at him.
"Enthrallment."
One of Arick's brows rose. "Since when does your kind give a fuck about the vampires?" he asked.
Arick was someone who had a pulse on all things in our world. He would hear the news sooner or later.
"Since I stole a thrall from one," I admitted.
Arick was not someone who got surprised easily. So what crossed his face was amusement when I told him. His lips twitched. His eyes brightened.
"Well," he said, shaking his head. "How's the migraine?" he asked, dropping down onto the sofa.
"What?"
"From all the fucking screaming," he said.
"I got her to stop that. For the moment."
"Yeah," he said, shaking his baggie of shrooms. "I bet you found a way. And, what, you want to know how to break a thrall free?"
"Pretty much."
"Why?" he asked, shrugging. "They don't get forced into what they do. They make the choice willingly."
"He was killing her," I told him. "She was wasting away."
"That's his right, isn't it? They kill them all in the end. They just get to choose when the end is."
"It's different. The situation was different. He was this wrinkly-balled fucker who—"
"Davor?" Arick asked, interest piquing.
"Fuck if I know."
"Don't know a lot of old vampires," he said. "Davor has been around for a while. Last time I saw him, he had two thralls he was leading around on chains."
"Were they thin and transparent?" I asked, anger giving my words an edge.
"Come to think of it," he agreed. "So, you stole a thrall," he said. "And you don't plan to give her back."
"That about sums it up."
"You're one fucked demon, Drex," he said, letting out a whistle as he rose from his couch, walking over toward his bookshelves. He walked his fingers over the spines, mumbling to himself, then finally pulling out an old, dusty book with yellowed edges and a partially ripped material spine. "There's nothing I can do for you when it comes to dealing with the war you likely just started. But there is some anecdotal evidence of breaking enthrallment in the past."
"Anecdotal?"
"Based on journal entries of a once Elsabeth Flannery," he told me, waving the book. "Her sister was enthralled by some vampires about a hundred and twenty years back. But the girls were daughters of a local pastor who knew a thing or two about otherworldly things."
"What'd they do?"
"They tried a great many things," he said, running his fingertips with their chipped black polish down several pages. Almost as if he was reading them that quickly. I wanted to say it was impossible. But Arick had made many impossible things possible before.
"Such as?"
"They prayed over her. They baptized her. They married her off to her ex-beau, thinking the ties of godly matrimony might break the evil ties with the vampire. They didn't," Arick told me.
"How'd they keep her from going insane through all this?"
"Who said she didn't go insane?" he asked, brow arching. "They finally did break the connection, though, after nearly six months of dealing with her unending screaming and psychosis."
"How?"
"They planned a trip. Traveling only by day, making sure they made it to churches before sundown to sleep, keeping her safe from the masters who pursued her."
"And?"
"And that's it. They took her far enough that the enthrallment grew thin and snapped."
"So, you think I could just travel with her?" I asked.
"You'd have to do it quickly. The pain won't go away," he told me. "Eventually, her body will acclimate to the drugs, and the pain will return. Then the screaming will return again. I don't imagine you'd have an easy time transporting a woman shrieking in pain across several states to break the enthrallment. And there is only so many drugs the feeble human body can take," he said, putting the journal under his arm as he went back to the couch.
And I couldn't travel by plane with a pocket full of illicit drugs.
We'd have to travel far and fast on the only mode of transportation available to me at the moment.
My bike.
I'd traveled long distances on it before. I was used to it. Nova? She would be in for a sore ass and thighs for a while.
But it would get her free.
That was what she wanted.
It would be worth it for her.
I had enough cash stashed and accessible to get us by. But since I couldn't go back to the house to collect more, or any of my shit, I was going to need to rely on the hospitality of some of the biker clubs I'd gotten to know through the years on the way across the country.
It was not going to be a pleasant trip on any front. But I could make it happen. That was what mattered.
"I appreciate the information, Arick," I said, nodding.
"Oh, it is never for free," he said, opening the baggy of mushrooms and taking a sniff. I don't know if the bastard picked up on some magical scent or some shit, because the fucker groaned. And I knew for a fact that there was nothing to groan about when it came to the smell of fucking mushrooms. "If you need any supplies for your trip," he said, waving toward his house.
"What would I owe you for that?" I asked, smirking.
"I think I'd like the story," he said, waving toward his bookshelves. "For my collection," he added. "Should you manage a nearly impossible feat, I would like the tell-all story."
"Not great with the storytelling, Arick," I said, shaking my head.
"The girl then. I imagine she has many stories to tell," he added, smiling. "This woman worth going to war over. Worth risking your family for."
I hadn't thought about it like that.
If I were being honest, I hadn't given it much thought at all.
That wasn't who I was, a thinker.
That was why Ace was in charge, not me.
He thought.
I did shit.
But Arick wasn't wrong. Those were the things I was risking. A never-ending war. And losing the only beings I'd been close to for too many years to count.
For her.
A woman I didn't know.
A woman I'd only barely laid eyes on before I'd made my decision.
It made no sense.
But there was no going back now, it seemed.
"If I can't come back here, how will you ever get your story?" I asked.
"I have my ways," he said, giving me a smirk as he wrote something in the air with his fingers. And not a moment later, the door to my side opened, and the two women from the den came in.