The World Will Stain Us

Feldmann

How nice it was, CC thought, to be back in the States.

Not to get him wrong―he loved the UK, he loved getting to travel with the guys, to see the world in ways he had never thought he'd be able to―but at the end of the day (or night, in their case―gods, being a vampire was still so weird), coming home to L.A., his familiar city of sun and scandal and sorcery, was far preferable to crashing in a hotel room halfway across the world. Hostile as the city may be for his kind, it was home―and that wouldn't change.

His kind. CC suppressed a shudder as he thought those words. It would never fail to be unnerving, he thought, to think of himself that way―separate, supernatural, unholy, a creature of human nightmares and mythology.

He didn't understand, some days, how his boyfriends had lived with it all this time.

Andy―who'd been in the company of the others since his turning, who'd known nothing but their love and support in his forty years of being a vampire, who shouldered the burden of immortality with a brave face, though CC had spent many a night recently cuddling with him when his eyes went vacant and many a sleeping day holding him through his nightmares.

Jake―a century old give or take a couple of decades, and somehow still as lively and caring and funny as CC supposed he'd ever been. He loved Jake for that, the relentless kindness and loyalty, but it escaped him how he'd managed to hold onto it in the face of a world that didn't acknowledge the existence of the supernatural except to demonize it.

Jinxx―two hundred and forty years old (at least according to Andy's last estimate―he'd mentioned how Jinxx had stopped counting ages ago, though they still celebrated his birthday every year), shy, quiet, reserved, but with a worldview damaged only by the remnants of the time he'd been raised in. How he could be so collected, so sure of himself, when immortality and the scorn of the human race must have chased him through the centuries, CC would never understand.

CC still marveled at his boyfriends' immense, quiet internal strength for enduring all of that.

Not that the supernatural side of the city wasn't fascinating. Far from it―everything he'd seen so far had been at least intriguing and at most downright awe-inspiring. CC was amazed so much of L.A.'s population, celebrity and not, was part of what Jinxx had referred to as the "shadow world." Warlocks and faeries and werewolves and vampires and a whole host of subspecies and otherworldly creatures swarmed the streets of his city―and now, CC could see it all, the limitations of his human knowledge and human senses stripped away by his turning―which was months ago now, he realized.

It seemed everywhere he turned (well, except the studio, where the staff was entirely human except for one faerie engineer who kept her pointed ears mostly hidden behind her hair) recently, there was a new supernatural revelation waiting for him. It wasn't a bad thing―CC enjoyed learning about the shadow world he was now a part of (even if it did unnerve him a little bit to find out some of his favorite rockstars weren't human at all), and his boyfriends were more than willing to share the information. Jake and Jinxx specifically seemed most animated about it; Andy usually spent those conversations more draped across CC demanding attention than contributing facts. He supposed there was no better way to learn about it all than through the people he loved most.

Some of the less pleasant experiences learning about and interacting with the shadow world, however, happened at the parties they were still constantly attending. They could be found anywhere in the city on any given night―bars, clubs, parties, anywhere there was alcohol and the promise of a good time. It was here that the darker side of the shadow world came out, the predators they became when the night and the alcohol let precautions fall away. As a fledgling, his boyfriends had explained, CC was vulnerable in that sort of crowd―and he'd already had a couple of close calls. Jake had rescued him from an exchange with a too-drunk werewolf who had apparently been half-flirting with and half-ready to fight him; Andy had served as a living distraction when CC couldn't look away from a small crowd of sirens. (CC's memory of that particular night was oddly distorted. Andy had explained the next day, in between lazy kisses, that that was the effect of sirens if you survived an encounter with them―some side effect of their magic.)