*sob* Short chapter is short. I'm SORRY!

"Hello? Hey, are you awake?"

I awoke with a start, hands scrabbling at my neck where the last sensation had been before I'd passed out. There was a bandage there, and it was stiff as I turned my head. A girl with bright teal hair was staring at me from where I was laying on a sofa.

"He was real rough on you, Ichigo. I told him he should've been a little nicer, you've got a pretty face." She giggled. "Are you hungry? Shiro made me go get food in case you woke up hungry. Most wake up with the munchies after being bitten."

I sat up, still rubbing at my neck. "Bitten?"

"Yeah," she replied cheerily. "Oh— I'm Nel by the way. Usually after people are bitten they're low on iron, so they crave lots of food with iron in them. I thought you would be hungry."

"Uh, thanks for the consideration, but I'm not that hungry," I rubbed at a sore spot on my forehead. "What happened to me? And what is this business about being bitten?"

"Oh, we're vampires."

I nearly choked on my own spit.

She said it so casually, as if it was the most normal thing in the entire world. Her big olive eyes blinked at me, and then she tackled me with a hug. "I'm so glad Shiro found somebody. I've been waiting for him to settle down after all those decades of just snacking off people."

"Wh-what?"

"You're not scaring the kid, are you?" came an all too familiar voice.

Shiro stood in the doorway of the apartment, arms crossed lazily over his chest.

"Of course not!" Nel whined. "I was just trying to explain things to him!"

Shiro's gold eyes hardened, and then his gaze swept over me. "Sorry I'm late. There was some trouble downtown with the Espada."

"Espada?"

Shiro walked over to us and sat down in one of the armchairs. "They're a group of vamps that believe in completely killing and consuming the victims. Us being soulless creatures, by killing the person you can also absorb their soul. It's a very satisfying feeling. We don't do that though."

"Are they like a gang or something?" I was still having a little bit of a hard believing what he was saying was true.

"Kind of," he muttered. "They're dangerous, and every once in a while one of them strays into our hunting grounds and I have to keep them in line. That's what happened earlier."

I swallowed back the lump in my throat. "What happened to me earlier?"

"I fed off you," he said in a clear monotone voice. "You're marked now, with that bite. If any of the Espada come near you they'll know you belong to me."

"Belong to you? I'm not a possession."

He shrugged. "It's basically just a figure of speech. I've claimed you, which means you're my vassal. I feed off of you whenever I wish. You've been bound to me kid, the second I bit you."

"That's ridiculous," I said with a start, standing from my seat. "You can't make me do anything." I started to make my way to the door.

"The bond only allows you a twenty foot radius of a leash unless I let you go any farther." He stated, and I froze at the door.

"You're a liar," I muttered. "This is all just ridiculous, some stupid lie to see if I could be fooled or not. Well guess what? You didn't fool me. This is some big hoax—"

"Really?" Shiro was suddenly standing right in front of me, eyes so dark I could see myself in them. His voice had taken on a new tone, low and husky and possibly angry. "You don't believe us?"

Then he bit me.

This time it was on the opposite side of my neck, and I gasped. The pleasure struck me so hard I swear I couldn't breathe. I moaned under my breath and reached up to tangle my hands in his hair once again, begging and pleading against my own conscious will for more. It was almost better than sex, and it had a very similar feeling to it only it was far more potent. The pleasure was much stronger than the first bite, and it was starting to consume me.

I couldn't feel any pain. Nothing. My body was on fire and that something in his bite was ripping through my veins at lightning speed.

He let go, and I fell to my knees, weak. The after affect was also similar to the feeling post-orgasm; sated and jelly like.

Shiro leaned in and kissed me, my own blood mixed in with it. I rested my head against his knees and he picked me up from underneath my arms, dragging me over to the couch again.

"Believe me now?" he asked, rubbing as the bloody corners of his lips.

I muttered something under my breath, and brought a hand to my forehead. "What happens if you quit biting me?"

"You'll go through withdrawal, similar to a withdrawal from drugs."

I clenched my teeth. "Alright. That sounds great."

Nel looked sad. "He needs blood, Shi. That was really stupid of you. Of all of the things you could've done, this is one you choose? He was already trying to recover."

"Sorry," he muttered, sounding not the least bit apologetic. "Couldn't help myself."

Nel handed me a bag of fast food. "Here, eat. You'll need to get your strength up before we out to meet the Espada."

"What?"

"Oh, didn't he tell you? He wanted to introduce you."

"Nel used to be a part of the Espada, but I met her the day she fled. Literally ran right into me. We've been working together ever since."

I scratched absently at the bandages on my throat.

"Stop touching them," Nel scolded. "They'll fester."

I dropped my hands into my lap, looking out the window of the car to see us driving into what looked like a very dangerous neighborhood. Everything was dirty, and there wasn't anyone on the streets. Graffiti covered all of the walls of the run down rusty old buildings that lined the street.

"Where do they stay?" I was trying to keep my voice strong, but it wasn't working as well as I'd wanted it to.

"In an abandoned warehouse," Shiro answered from the driver's seat. "Don't be scared, they can't touch you. You've got my scent all over you; they wouldn't even want to touch you."

I swallowed back the lump in my throat. "Why are you introducing me to them?"

He went quiet.

"There's a little quarrel going on between them," Nel answered. "He just wants to show them that he's finally found a vassal."

"So, what? Is it a competition or something?"

"No…" Nel drawled. "If you have a vassal you're considered stronger than most vamps. He just wants to show you to them so they'll stop messing around on our hunting grounds."

It sounded like a hell of a lot more of a risk than they let on.