White Vampire Ch 01

This is a short work of erotic fiction containing furry, or anthropomorphic, characters, which are animals that either demonstrate human intelligence or walk on two legs, for the purposes of these tales. It is a thriving and growing fandom in which creators are prevalent in art and writing especially.

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White Vampire

Chapter One

Jacob set his jaw as he left the inn, pack slung over his shoulder and guns holstered at his hip within easy reach. The chestnut stallion travelled lightly, his black mane braided tightly along the line of his neck so as not to get in the way of his 'hunting', although that was a loose term at best for his line of work. More of a bounty hunter and hired, deadly hand for those who had the coin to spend on his services, Jacob Colton was an equine who skulked through the shadows of life, making few connections with anyone, although he had lived and worked out of the Ruby Tout inn for several months at that point. He would be sorry to leave it behind.

But he had something to take care of first: one last job from the king himself. King Leovold was far too important a figure to be seen in such parts but a letter bearing the king's seal handed over by Alfred the barkeep was not to be ignored. It was even less to be ignored when it came with a pouch of gold and a mission to top all missions secluded away in the letter. For the letter bid him to take care of a canine who was suspected of feasting on citizens and, considering her history, it was hardly a great stretch of the imagination with the evidence laid out before them.

After all, everyone knew of Marchesa, the vampire of the castle. Her family had once been held in high esteem but, tragically, she had fallen prey to the bite of a vampire in her youth. Although life itself had not been taken from her and, truly, she had fought back like a demon, but the bite had sunk deep and there had been nothing to stop her progression into becoming a vampire, the fangs growing in a matter of weeks. There had been no hiding it but anyone shunning the family had met a swift demise, chased from what she considered to be her land (beyond the scope of her family property) with bloodied fangs and claws flashing in the cold of the night. Now, she treated others as beneath her and herself as something of a queen, though there was only one king and queen in the land and she held no true power other than the fear she commanded.

Little did she know that there was fresh strife on the horizon: as if her poor family had not suffered enough. And perhaps Jacob should have turned back as he stood before the castle, the mansion looming with a tower framing each end. There were no lanterns lit at the front of it and the stallion had been admittedly surprised too to find that there was no manner of guard at the gate, which swung open with an obnoxious, eerie creak, allowing him entry into the grounds. The graves too had held no ill-will and no lost souls rose from the dirt to claim him for their own, although he kept a wary eye on them all the same. He wouldn't have wanted to fall prey to a ghoul before he even reached his true target. And he was rather surprised and suitably cautioned that his target seemed completely unaware or unconcerned on his approach.

The double mahogany doors groaned as he pushed them open but he was not striving for quiet, assuming (wrongly) that he would draw her out into the grounds or at least the entrance hall for their battle. For it was coming, undoubtedly so, and he knew it would not be the easiest of battles to win, regardless of the multitude of weapons he had secluded away on the arsenal that was his body.

He was ready. But how 'ready' was Marchesa?

Jacob set his jaw and paced through the halls with the easy, wary gait of a hunter, ears flicking one way and then the other as he remained completely on his guard, unwilling to give even an inch of releasing any iota of tension. He could relax but that would only render him more vulnerable and, well, he thought he had rather a few more years ahead of him, not wanting to fall before one of his opponents just yet. Jacob grimaced. Although, it was rather common in his line of work and he could not forget the danger he was in above all else.

Today was not his day to die.

It was easy to find the ballroom, the grand hall where he warranted he'd find her, the vampire 'queen' of the castle. Every corridor swept in towards it, although it took Jacob longer than most to make his way through the halls, checking behind each and every tapestry and eyeing the plinths, which may have once held statues or flowers, with due trepidation. Everything was a danger.

But the ballroom... He took a deep, steadying breath, although his nerve held as well as it always did. The door lay ajar and the lanterns within her lit, deliberately so.

It was time.

He needed no grand entrance to approach her and there was no note of respect in the tilt of his head or the speed of his stride as he took in the grand hall, the high ceiling begging the eye. He only let his eye rake it once and then a second time, just to be sure, to check for foes higher than he would have otherwise thought to attack, but there was no one at all in the oversized room, a depiction of wealth, besides the white canine on the throne she'd claimed for her very own.

Marchesa looked over her challenger, if he could even be called that. The white canine's fur slicked down smoothly over her body, finely groomed and seeming to glitter with an unearthly light beneath the lit chandelier. Her servants had scaled the walls using a system of pulleys to reach the high, high ceiling of her reception room, which could be repurposed into a ballroom in her castle if she so chose. It had been a long, long time since her family had held a ball or event on such a grand scale, however, and, due to a rather unpopular opinion on her feeding habits, it was unlikely that it would be possible any time soon.

That said, it was not that she did not look like a queen or royalty of olden times in a corset that accentuated rather than concealed her figure, the long, flowing skirt begging the question of just what lay beneath. But Jacob was not a horse that could allow himself the luxury of ogling anyone, much less what he sought to extinguish from the face of the earth, and ostentatiously avoided looking down at her body, although the cold gleam of her eyes was particularly disconcerting. But it allowed him to steady himself, ears pinned flat back against his skull.

One more hunt to be completed. It was the same as any other.

"I have been expecting you, Colton."

His hooves clip-clopped noisily over the wooden floor as he paced, heat seeping through from the fires lit below: a form of under floor heating that was becoming increasingly common in large estates - not that he usually was found to be the sort of horse welcomed into such grand homes. No, Jacob was far more used to his little tent in the woods or simply moving from inn to inn as the work came and went, travels always a heartbeat from his hooves.

"And just why have you been expecting me?" He said, voice rising calmly and levelly, though he was aware that he didn't need to be too loud in order for her to hear him. "I don't generally make a habit of announcing my arrival."

The canine smiled eerily, pulling her lips back from her teeth as if she was trying to show off her fangs. Her eyes shimmered in the dark, pools of yearning that that seemed to want to draw him in, but they were swirling eddies that one could not afford to lose themselves in.

"One like you approaches every few moons and each and every last one of you thinks you may best me."

"I pretend no superiority," Jacob offered, spreading his paws out, though his fingers automatically twitched towards his weapons. "But I am afraid that we simply cannot allow you to continue on with your despicable acts for a single day longer. It is not right, what you do. You could find alternative ways to feed and yet you choose the one that claims the greatest number of lives."

"Oh, the false king. Another message from him?" She wrinkled her nose prettily. "Well, I suppose one cannot be all that surprised that he is still attempting to overthrow me. Yet he is such a coward that he will not come himself and face me, nor send an army."

Throwing her head back, she laughed cruelly, the sound echoing eerily around the ballroom. He pressed his lips together and rocked back on his hooves, waiting for her to be done. He knew how to be patient: he could wait.

"Do you think he believes that even an army will not be able to cast me out? That he has to send colts and pups that skulk in the dark of the night, stealing into my home in futile, worthless attempts? Every last one of you is the same!"

With that, she leapt from her throne, jaws agape to show a flash of fangs, gleaming with saliva in the flickering light from the chandelier, shadows dancing madly across the far walls. He took a step back, setting his stance, and drew a pistol, something that was of better use at close range. It wasn't as if he would have expected to ever be far enough away from her, once the fight had begun, to use the musket or shotgun. And, if she got too close, he would be right down to his hooves and blades, cutting through her just the same as she'd torn down her prey.

It would be a merciful death all the same.

She did not lunge for him immediately, however, the leap perhaps merely a show of strength through which she could intimidate him, although he had seen far worse than a femme fatale vampire before. Her words rolled over him like water over a weathered, worn rock and he set himself up to fight, legs apart for balance even as she stalked him, the she-wolf seeking out her prey. But he was no lamb to be taken to slaughter and it was about time she knew that.

That lesson, however, was about to be sharply learned and not quite for the intended party. Rumbling a deathly sort of chuckle that echoed eerily through the too-still room, brimming over with the memory of life, Marchesa fixed him in her sights, pulling her lips back from her teeth for a cruel hiss that was more akin to a death rattle scraping through lungs that were not of true furry-kind.

"They thought they could conquer me, defeat me! And you shall be cast out like every last one that came before you!"

She made no ploy at feinting an attack and charged straight for him with a feral cry, her upper body tipping forward as if she was trying to slicken her sense of momentum through the air, although there were no obstacles to hold her back. And she was fast - too fast! Jacob cursed under his breath and leapt, hooves scuffing and scrabbling over the smooth stone, polished to such over many years of many beings passing over it. There was a history to the place but he fully intended to put a stop to it right there and then, ending the bloodbath that had become her wicked little reign.

It was only a shame that one so beautiful had fallen to the vampires. Her white fur ruffled in the breeze created by the passage of her body as she hurled herself past him, only to swoop around with elegant speed and come for a second hit: the true intent of her attack. Jacob only barely got out of the way in time but that was to be expected - at least, that was what he told himself, adrenaline rising and heart hammering furtively in his chest - when he was still learning the ways of his opponent. He licked his lips, willing the pace of his heart to slow, breathing to ease as he thought quickly and calmly. He had to judge her, Marchesa, yes - just like any other. It didn't matter what she'd done, only that it was his job to bring a little more peace to the realm by snuffing out her life.

He just had to get her to reveal her weakness. And, sometimes, that was all too easy with a certain kind of self-loving fur, much less one that had crowned herself queen and ruled as such.

"Too slow," he grunted, ears flicking. "You getting soft in your old age, Marchesa? I thought there were a deal more stories about your might and wisdom, how deadly your strikes are. Or perhaps that is all in the past."

"Foolish colt," she hissed, ears slipping back. "You know nothing."

But his words meant little to her after years upon years of similar taunts and she circled him, eyes stabbing him like a million swords. If looks could have killed, he would have been dead right there and then, but there was a bigger game at play and both of them still held their best hands well enough in reserve.

Patiently, Jacob refused to make the first move, taking in his surroundings - it was always well to do that as one never knew when the environment may change to an advantage or, lord forbid, a disadvantage - as he stepped aside, levelling the pistol. She could run, jump, charge - whatever she pleased. He would be ready for her regardless of what she chose. And, in the end, he didn't even have to twitch his finger towards the trigger in the lure of an attack before she shrieked, an ungodly wail that had never been intended for mortal ears, and flung her body through the air as if it weighed nothing at all.

Unlike their brethren, the demonic blood-sucking monsters, who had gone before (what Marchesa could become, if she completely forsook every sense of what and who she was) the canine did not have the ability to fly or shift into a bat and so she was limited to the ground as her skirts flowed behind her, trailing her progress. Closer and closer, she howled and he fired, the shot ringing through the room with startling clarity. It didn't hit, of course, and her eyes narrowed, anger roiled up to breaking point.

Jacob swallowed a smirk. He nearly had her. Or nearly had her revealing that concealed hand of hers, that was.

Backing off, he swapped to a blade in each paw, the steel glinting wickedly, polished to a deadly point. Marchesa's eyes followed them and he took a breath while her attention was diverted, chest shuddering. Nervous sweat dampened patches beneath his arms but he held his nerve, meeting her eyes the very moment they snapped back up to his.

"Well?" He asked, spreading his arms. "Have you nothing to say?"

Staunchly, she held her ground and said nothing, nostrils flaring ever so slightly. But he didn't need her to reply to do what he needed to do.

"Is that the best you've got?" He snorted, taunting her openly as he spun his blade in the flat of his paw. "I would have expected more than that from a vampire."

Marchesa scoffed and they circled one another, her tail stiff and his quiet and still, not flicking even the once to give away anything of his intentions. He was well-practised in the art of the hunt, it had to be said, and he was hardly about to give anything away when his life, quite literally, lay on the line.

"You are a fool," she said, slowly and quietly. "You think that I am easy prey. Is it because I am a female?"

Jacob raised his eyebrows, though otherwise made no comment. Let her make of that what she would.

"The others mocked me, said that I was not fit to rule a pig sty," she growled, muzzle wrinkling. "I know who sent each and every one of them and it was not always the king. Poor horse, I have many enemies and the very reason that I have survived so long is because I have kept my wits about me and bested every last one of them too."

"It seems foolish too to reveal all this to me," Jacob retorted, pleased with how she reeled, just a little bit. "Don't you worry that I'll just go to the king with this information, let him know that you know?"

"No... Because you will never leave my castle!"

And then she was in motion again, cutting across the circle they'd made with the passing of their own bodies, teeth and claws flashing. For she did not solely have fangs at her disposal to fight, although they would have been more than enough for many, and slashed before he could react, shoulder spilling a metallic ribbon of crimson blood.

Jacob gasped and spun away, lunging at her in turn for a return strike, although the canine was too swift for him and just about managed to dance away, a wicked giggle burbling up from her lips. He growled. She was enjoying it! Causing him pain! It was a nuance of the truly evil to enjoy such an act and a testament to his skill that he was not that badly injured, although the scent of blood did set his prey instincts seething, anxiously battling for precedence in the skirmish of fight or flee. But he could only fight and he had to dig deep to win this one if he wanted any hope of surviving.

"What is wrong, little pony?" She crooned. "Am I more than you expected?"

The gunshot fired and she shrieked, spinning away in a flourish of skirt and blisteringly white fur. He blinked, wondering that she had any blood to spill as it splattered the floor, but swiftly pressed his advantage, however tentative and temporary it may have been. But the scent of gun smoke had not even begun to dissipate before she was on him, claws biting as she snapped and snarled for his throat, a white demon in the flesh. With a neigh, Jacob heaved her from him, black mane flying, but she scrambled in midair and landed on her paws, clad in boots that stopped below the knee, still clearly allowing her a full range of motion.

"Try again!"

She darted around and he slashed at her fangs, blade glancing of them as if they were fighting dagger to dagger, up close and personal in the grunt of the death ring. Saliva dripping from the cruelly long fangs and he shuddered inwardly to think of the poison contained within, all of the lives that she had taken without a second thought stretching out and out before him. But it served to harden his resolve and he ignored a second slash to his chest, pain searing through him as he ground his teeth together.

Soon. Soon it would be over and his hunt would be complete. He only had to hang on in the very thick of it for a little while longer.

Marchesa, however, was not giving in so easily and laughed as she flounced away, tail whipping behind her beneath the layers of skirts, flipping up the fabric briefly. His eyes followed it - and then she was on him, a paw twisting into his mane as her fangs flashed for his throat.

But the stallion knew what he was doing too even as a feral whinny of true fear ripped itself from his lips and his blade sunk up into her stomach. It was too low though and, despite the pain it caused her in the sudden judder of her body and twist of her face, it was nowhere near enough to kill a vampire. The crystals set into his weapons were not for show or a lure to thieves but blessed by one with power to allow him to end the life of a vampire - or any supernatural being that had no right to live among furry-kind. At least, he had not yet found one that would not succumb to the blessed crystals, but a vampire was harder to kill and still required a clean shot from said weapon through the heart.

Wrenching herself off his blade, she twisted away and put space between them, although his spirits were bolstered at least to see how her chest rose and fell more swiftly than before, noticeably so: she was getting tired. But that didn't mean she would automatically become easy prey and he forced her back, bodies coming together in a deadly dance over and over again. They didn't get enough space between them for him to, once more, go for his firearms, although he ached to end it, the need for that final blood to be spilt ringing through him with a power that he had never once before felt the true call of.

He had to kill her. It had to end. Breath raking harshly through his lungs, the stallion howled. Too many lives had been lost!

Blood tainted the air as his muscles screamed, forcing his body to act when all it wanted to do was flee. But he could not flee - not when so much harm had already been caused and, oh, it had to end! The roars of so many lives lost curled through his soul and he clenched his jaw against them, ignoring the rip of pain as she tried to force his arm behind his back, her strength beyond anything he had ever found in a ghoul or demon or monster of the fairer sex ever before. He supposed it would do him well to not assume that the females were weaker, oddly detached from the situation at hand as he fought like a wild stallion, forelock flipped out of his eyes, blessedly, by the braids. One had come undone when she'd wrenched at his mane and that was the mane he felt pulling back from his neck but he couldn't afford to pause and tuck it away, making do with the nuisance the best he could.