Counting Stars at Dawn

8: Mating Habits

When the morning sun finally shone, Artemis scrunched up his nose in response to the light. He was still naked under the sheets from last night's events.

Artemis attempted to open his eyes but even this simple motion felt like an impossible task. He laid still, breathing slowly.

"I can't wake up. I feel so tired. Oh so tired." 

"Good morning your highness." Dia entered his room and drew the curtains open. "Your highness?"

She inched closer to Artemis's bed and touched his shoulder. She quickly withdrew her hand as she felt his skin was cold.

"Your majesty, do you feel well?" Dia asked more urgently now as she tried to wake him up.

Artemis couldn't respond no matter how much he wanted to. He felt so sluggish and like he didn't have any energy at all.

"I will cancel your agenda for today, your highness." Dia decided. "You must recover your health. I shall return with some tea."

She bowed on her way out and Artemis managed to roll on his back. He cracked his eyes open a bit, staring at the ceiling. Just what was wrong with him?

Dia tended carefully to Artemis all day, and gradually he started regaining energy. It wasn't until noon when he finally remembered he wasn't wearing clothes and Hades' bitemark was visible. At that point, he hurriedly put on clothes before Dia returned with lunch. He was able to leave his bed around the early evening, and now he was in his potion lab.

Artemis yawned and took a sip of his tea cup as he scribbled onto his potions journal.

"Hello, your majesty." Artemis heard Hades speak inside the room and in his gasp he swallowed too much tea.

He choked on the hot liquid and began coughing rapidly although covering his mouth with his hand to not be heard.

"Oh, shit. I'm sorry I didn't mean to scare you." Hades went over to Artemis and patted his back.

Call Artemis crazy, but he could've sworn he felt an immense amount of relief wash over him when Hades put his hand on his back. A sensation like when you take a deep breath of fresh air after rainfall.

He stopped coughing now and hummed in contentment at the strange relief Hades' hand was giving him.

"Better?" Hades looked at Artemis and withdrew his hand.

"Yeah." Artemis replied as he turned around in his seat.

"Well, how have you been, your majesty?"

"Awful. Today I couldn't move at all, I just managed to a few hours ago."

"Ah, again sorry. That's my bad." Hades made an apologetic smile and shrugged.

Artemis looked confused at him, so he took this as a sign to explain himself.

"Well, last night you know I bit you." Hades looked around the room. "When you get bitten by a vampire, some of your life force is stolen, by me, in this case. Since I got carried away I drained a good amount of your life force, so that's why you felt so tired all day. There's only one way to regain your life force faster, and that's by me staying by your side since the vampire has the ability to recreate the victim's life force. You can pretty much absorb it back."

Artemis nodded and looked at Hades. It was surreal to see the vampire awkwardly looking around the room. Suddenly, Hades sat down next to Artemis on his chair and smiled at him.

"What are you doing?" Artemis leaned away.

"Sorry, I guess I feel kinda bad for sucking the life out of you." Hades chuckled. "I can offer you compensation, if you'd like it."