Forbidden (BoyxBoy)

Chapter XXII: Babylon

Alaric.

The green light on my answering machine flickered. Another phone call. No doubt from Jason. I felt immense guilt ignoring him. Each time I glanced at the telephone and saw his number flashing, begging to be answered, I was overwhelmed by warmth and guilt and confusion. Because I wanted to hear his voice, I wanted to picture his bright smile on the other end of the phone, I wanted to imagine the look in his hazel eyes as we spoke. But I was also overwhelmed by the reality of who he was. What he was.

Jason, my Jason, was a werewolf.

I let it sink in for the hundredth time in 48 hours. It had been an entire weekend and I still had not acclimated to the facts. He was a werewolf. I was a vampire.

It was a predicament. No, it was a tragedy.

I found myself in the same position I'd spent the last two days occupying: sitting on my arm chair, the apartment around me a scatterbrained mess, a glass of red wine in my hand. I felt as though I had fallen head first into a vat of numbness and shock. Of fear and confusion. Because Jason, my Jason, was a werewolf - and although he could not possibly know that I knew what he was, I did. I knew it all too well.

Involuntarily, I reached up and touched the long, thin, scar running down my neck. The scar that Captain Leisl Krämer had given me all those years ago in Neuengamme. It was a permanent reminder, carved into my flesh with mountain ash, of what werewolves had done to me. To the people I loved.

The second world war had been an awful time in the supernatural world. We had been massacred, tortured, experimented on, turned against each other. Krämer and her team had killed three members of my coven, and many more of our allies. Werewolves had shot at and maimed and ripped apart vampires on the western front, forcing us into hiding as we mourned our brethren. My kind certainly had not been innocent, but that logic did not ease the nausea swelling within me as I thought of Krämer.

I wanted so badly to not hold Krämer's cruelty against Jason and his kind. But it was hard not to. I so vividly remembered those weeks I spent in her dungeon laboratory: every burn, every cut, every cruel taunt. And I remembered those eyes - so piercing and wild and ruthless.

And, once again, I thought of Jason.

Jason, my Jason, was a werewolf.

Was he mine? How could I reconcile the feelings for him echoing through my empty veins and the trauma carved into my psyche? I could not decipher whether the nausea I felt was PTSD or self disgust.

I gulped down the remaining wine in my glass, contained the urge to retch, and stood up. I decided then, however reluctant I was, to listen to whatever Jason had left me.

I walked over to the telephone and, taking in a steadying breath, dialled voice mail.

Ring. Ring. Ring. Click.

"You have two new messages. First message, from: Jason Bishop. Received at 4:03 pm."

"Hey... Alaric. I was, um, just wondering if you're okay. I missed you in English today, and History. So, yeah. I, uh, think we should talk. I need to explain some stuff about Friday night so... just, um, call me back okay? Goodbye, Alaric."

His voice was slightly shaking, filled with uncertainty and fear. It was not the quietly confident Jason I had grown to care for on the other end of the line. It was not the easily-contented, open man that walked amongst my daydreams. At the sound of the gentle concern and paranoia in his voice, I felt instantly idiotic for ever linking him to Krämer, even if it had been subconscious.