Thralls

Title: Thralls, chapter 30

A/N: if you'd like to dialog with me about this story email me. Your email addys are hidden! I can't email you! I am looking for a conclusion of the fic( t is up to 95 chapters now)...and would be helped by ideas...thoughts, etc...Thanks!
neichan22@gmail.com

chapter 30...

Dr. Maggie Walsh hung up the phone and glared at it. If she wasn't so good, so practiced at self control, she might have given in to the urge to break the offending deliverer of bad news. Might have beat and obliterated the phone on her desk. Taught it who was boss. She smiled at the image.

The stupid vampire she had just released, who her surveillance team had lost track of, had been located. In LA. Not the venue she had intended to have him inhabit. To make matters worse he had apparently had a tie of some sort with her first choice of vampire to en-thrall. Angelus. They were residing in the same location. With around ten other persons, demons, vampires, other low-lifes.

The only good news that had come to her, both Angelus' thralls and Spike's thralls had been seen alive, though only from a distance with high power spy lenses. That was unexpected in light of the confirmation from the east coast, that two of the thralls had been found dead, three had not been seen again and might be alive or dead, and only one was confirmed alive. Anya. She had survived according to numerous reports.

Why then, had all of Angelus' thralls lived through their initiation? It was very important that she find out. And just as importantly, why had Spike's? What factor had kept them from death? And what had prevented them from contacting her? She had not managed to seize another vampire of sufficient age and power to chance making another attempt with new thralls. But she was gathering all relevant information in the off chance that the opportunity might be just around the corner.

The tracking devices had not worked. The chips were made for short distances and required the use of non-portable equipment kept in her laboratory. Spike was supposed to have remained near enough to the Initiative to be tracked by the base computers. That, due to the incompetence of her military help, had not happened.

But, she was working on how to retrieve the subjects. When she had put together the necessary plan and personnel, and the chance appeared, Spike would be returning to Sunnydale. And to her sphere of greater influence. Where she could watch him. Vampires were such territorial creatures. Angel would be throwing Spike out soon, and Maggie Walsh would have someone there to pick him up and bring him back where he belonged. She was sure she did not have long to wait.

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Angel gestured Doyle to a chair nearer to the one he chose for himself. The other Irishman sat, avoiding eye contact. Angel merely watched him, and waited for a time. Then, when it became apparent that Doyle was too confused and distressed to speak up first, Angel began the conversation. He folded his hands together to control the urge he felt to touch the other man. Right now it would likely make Doyle flee, rather than be a comfort to him.

"Doyle. I know we need to talk, to clear the air over what ever is troubling you. Can't you tell me what it is? Must I guess at the nature of your trouble?" Angel asked, keeping his voice quiet, not allowing the tone of command into it. The command voice was the last thing he needed here. It would serve no purpose, if he was right about this, to use it on Doyle.

"I tried to tell you. When we were talking before, I wasn't sure then...." Doyle said after a long minute of silence. "It isn't easy to say. Then today...." He stopped. Angel waited. Finally prompting the other.

"When you stayed outside my rooms? When Spike found you?" He asked. Waiting to see if the other man would confirm the truth or deny it. Doyle froze. His eyes flicking all around the room, everywhere but at the vampire's face.

Doyle colored, the rush of blood stark in contrast to his unnatural paleness, like splotches of crimson splashed onto his cheeks by a careless hand. He nodded his head. "Yes. I was outside your room, when you... when Xander...when..." He croaked over the words, clearly humiliated with even this much of a confession. "I am sorry about that. I know I had no right..."

"Don't worry over it." Angel said to him. If Doyle could hardly deal with this much of an admission, how could he handle the rest? Which for him, would be far worse. Angel forced himself to take one small step at a time. Not to tell Doyle all of what he suspected. "But do tell me what is wrong."

"I am experiencing a compulsion to obey you." Doyle said. He had said that much without choking on it. Angel nodded encouragingly.

"I do know that much." He said, softly, leaning forward, then back when he saw how that motion made Doyle freeze in place. Like a trapped animal preparing to run.

"It is worse. I also...I feel...I have this...I..uh...need..." The half demon stuttered, faltering to a stop before revealing what the vampire needed to know. Was impatient to hear outloud.

"Just say it." Angel told him. "Once you say it, it will be easier to talk about the rest." Doyle lifted one hand to run through his dark hair.

"Ineedtobenearyou." Doyle blurted out, just when Angel had decided the other demon was not going to answer after all. Even as he was opening his mouth to find the words to make it alright for the other to say what was needed. He sighed his relief to be given the unexpected opening.

"OK. Why? What do you think it means?" He had to be careful here, not to let Doyle backpedal, to keep him talking without making him admit the entirety of his need too soon.

Doyle shook his head. Spoke to the cushions, not to Angel. "I am afraid to say. I am not a vampire. I am not of your blood in any way shape or form. We are not even the same species.... There is no reason for me to be wondering, thinking and obsessing over wanting to drink from you. Take your blood. When I see them....drinking from you, drinking your blood...It is driving me mad. I want to knock them away from you, horde it for myself. I don't know what is wrong with me, Angel. But it is getting worse. Very fast. I have no control over it. I am on the verge of attacking you. Just sitting here is taking most of the control I have left."

"I thought that might be it. So. What shall we do about it?" Angel fought not to show the surge of want he felt crash over him like a wave. It was nearly overwhelming in it's intensity.

"I have to leave." Doyle said, making as if to rise to his feet. Angel used words to stop him, instead of putting a restraining hand on him. If he touched Doyle now, the fragile thread of control still left would be broken too soon.

"You wouldn't get further than the front doors, my friend. Trust me on this. What other options do you see?" Angel said softly, putting all his conviction into his reply.

"There are none. I am going mad, Angel. You will have to kill me soon. Or I will start attacking anyone else who is near you. I can't stand to see them touch you."

"No. You are not going mad. I have heard of this. It has happened before. There is a solution. Perhaps not one you are comfortable contemplating. But one that, if you agree, will work for you, and for me."

"OK." Doyle said. "Tell me."

"Drink from me. Taste my blood. Like the others do." Angel said.

The pulse beat of his own heart almost deafened Doyle. He was sure he had not heard the offer correctly. Angel would never suggest...."What do you mean?"

"Drink my blood. Let us see what will happen before you are pushed to take it for yourself, without asking. I am offering it to you."

"But...there are too many. You can't feed them, and me, too. You can't want this." Desperate, Doyle looked to see the joke, his eyes wandering like a starving man's over the magnificence of the vampire sitting in front of him.

"I can feed all of you, and more. I am not at all what I was before. There has always been a tension between you and I, since the first we met. The recent changes I have experienced, my thralls, and the other vampires, have brought them to the fore, where we are no longer able to ignore and suppress them. We have to deal with these feelings. I am offering you the best solution I can think of. I don't want you to attack me unexpectedly during some inopportune moment because we put this off. Didn't deal with it." Angel explained.

"I can't." Doyle shook his head. "I can't do this. Cordelia won't understand it. She will leave me, Angel. I love her."

"What other choice do you see?" Angel asked. "You can not be with her if this is not taken care of. You know that to be true. You may not be able to be with her even if we do fix this between us. But perhaps. In time you will."

"I...I...There isn't one is there?" Doyle said. "Only to do this or to die."

"No. There isn't. Cordelia will not learn of it from me. I give you my word, Doyle." Angel said. "But, I would suggest telling her. Or breaking it off with her if you can not tell her. It would be kinder."

"I can't lie to her." Doyle said with conviction.

"But, neither can you tell her." Angel said it, even and Doyle thought it.

"No. I can't tell her. Oh, Angel, what the hell am I going to do?"

"Well. Look at it from my point of view. I am the only one who knows that you and she are together." Angel said. "If you tell her that it is over between the two of you, no one else need know."

"I think Gunn might." Doyle broke in then flushed.

"I am the only one who knows for sure, then. Why?" Angel wanted Doyle to think about this. It was important.

"She doesn't want it spread around." Doyle said, and Angel could almost hear the words in Cordelia's voice. Doyle faltered, hung his head. Angel had to say something. To let Doyle know it wasn't him. His princess had done this to another.

"She wants to keep you secret. She has done this before. To Xander. Kept him secret from everyone. Until the secret was forced out, then when others knew, she abandoned him. Now she is doing it with you." Angel left Doyle to think on it for a few minutes. "Now you find yourself in a similar situation. She will not acknowledge you openly. And you.... Ah, Doyle! Your needs are an embarrassment to you. You don't want others to know you have them. But, they are not possible to ignore, these new needs. You have to address them."

"No. I am not embarrassed by them...." Doyle protested, ashamed. He faltered to a stop. "Oh, god. I am. I am sorry...I just want this to go away."

"No need to apologize, my friend. I have been where you are now. More than once. The important thing is, let us not allow the embarrassment you feel to kill you." The smile Angel offered was a small one, yet, so full of understanding, Doyle felt his breath catch in his chest.

"Angel..." He found himself near to tears. The other man rose to his feet. Moved slowly towards him, to his side.

"There is no choice but one. I will tell no one of this. But, they will find out, at some point. We are demons here, vampires and lycanthropes. They will smell the connection between us once you are mine." He shook his head as he came to kneel at Doyle's feet. "We can only hide it for a short time. But, the alternative is for you to die. After you go mad. So. Gain this, or lose everything."

"Why is this happening?" Doyle asked, brokenly, unable to stop the tears that started down his face.

"Because someone thought they had the right to experiment on me, and on my thralls." Angel answered. "Because someone interfered with the order of things." He brought his hand up to the smaller demon's face, cradling his chin.

"I do not want to lose you. This should never have happened, but it has. We must do what we have to, to fix it. Take my blood, Doyle. I offer it to you. I gift it to you. When ever you need it, it is yours. You, I do not make ask me for it, I do not ration it. It is yours. Take it. Please, don't refuse it." Angel bit his hand, sinking fangs deep into the pad of flesh at the base of his thumb, held it out, the blood pooling on top of his skin for an instant, then running to fill the hollow of his cupped palm. "Drink."

"You will own me." Doyle said even as he was reaching for the hand, and the blood, lowering his face to the rich redness that called to him with it's siren song.

"Yes. In a way. But, you will also own me. In a way." Angel said. "Drink."

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