“But I’m hungry!” Will wailed. “I’m so fucking hungry.”
The light in his eyes dulled as he said the words, and his voice took on an involuntary growl. He was more than hungry. It was as Ivan had said, he was starving. There was no time to take time and be careful anymore. Like a newborn fledgling, Will had to be fed.
“Don’t worry, my boy. I will feed you,” Maddox promised, stroking Will’s short hair and finding it very soft and pleasant to the touch. “I think I can make something you’ll enjoy.”
Will sat at the kitchen counter practically vibrating with hunger while Maddox pulled our various ingredients from his private pantry. For the most part he enjoyed live blood, but he did have some stored for emergencies. Every smart vampire did. He worked as fast as he could, knowing that Will had limited time before he went completely mad. Finally, about thirty minutes after Will’s meltdown, he presented him with a dish designed to satisfy any little beast.
“What is it?” Will poked at it.
“It’s blood pudding.”
“Human blood?”
“Yes.”
“Then no. I’m not eating it.”
Maddox opened his mouth to attempt to convince Will, but there was no need.
True to his word, Will did not eat the food. As soon as his inner animal scented it, he fucking ravaged it like the salivating beast he was. One moment he was refusing to touch it, and the next it was filling his mouth. He did not know what was happening. It was as though he did not have full control of himself or his senses.
Maddox watched with a sense of helplessness and wonder as Will not only demolished the entire vessel, but proceeded to take his wolf form right in the middle of the kitchen. It had been an impressive sight the first time. The second time it was even more wonderfully strange to see his boy’s body flowing and twisting in new and what had to be very painful ways, fur flowing from unseen places, muscles expanding, bones knitting and unknitting, his very face being replaced with the dark maw of a beast. It was a swift and terrible thing, and Maddox could not help but be awed and proud.
Wolf Will was larger than the room, which lead to a very awkward situation in which the wolf was essentially trapped between the kitchen island and the kitchen cabinets, a situation he found incredibly unsatisfactory.
The wolf howled and proceeded to destroy every bit of the kitchen. Maddox had never seen a wolf eat a dishwasher before. It was quite a novel experience. Bits of wiring sparked and metal was twisted, water spouted into the air like an impromptu fountain. It was a mess, a glorious, pointless, expensive mess, and like any true force of nature it was absolutely impossible to stop.
It went on until the wolf dropped about five minutes into his rampage and lay naked upon the kitchen floor, shrinking and withering and shedding fury until it was Will all over again. Maddox estimated he'd done tens of thousand dollars in damage in the brief spree. He didn’t care a jot about the money. He cared a great deal about the boy.
“Alright,” Maddox said to himself as he scooped Will up into his arms. “Going to need a bigger cage.”
Will’s brand-new collar was left laying on the kitchen floor amidst the debris, sadly destroyed after barely an hour of being worn. It bobbed along on the little stream being created by the burst dishwasher pipe, occasionally sparking on the metal buckle when it came into contact with the raw current.
It was a mess somewhat of his own making, but Maddox had not had any choice. With Ivan’s small dose of flesh, Will had become a changed creature. There was no going back. Ivan had been right, Will’s feeding on flesh was necessary and inevitable and however squeamish William might be about it when he was his normal human self, it did not change what would inevitably happen.
The hunger was in Will.
The hunger was uncontrollable.
The hunger would consume everything.
Maddox settled Will back into bed, noticing that he seemed to be much stronger this time. The first time he transformed he had been practically killed by it. Now he was just tired. It was getting easier for Will, but it would become infinitely harder for Maddox. He already knew how the next months and perhaps years would be.
These quiet moments of repose would become oases of calm amid a reign of terror that could only be controlled by bars and walls, chains and thicker collars than ever before. The light days of breaking curfew and being spanked like a brat were over. From here on out, Maddox would need to dominate the beast relentlessly and without remorse. He would have to be cruel. He would have to be harsh. And he would have to love Will as Will had never been loved before, with even more ferocity than the beast that dwelled inside him possessed.