Chapter 20: Ballroom

It was like stepping into an old, American jazz bar in the ballroom. The dim light illuminated the wooden panels, the lacquered wooden floor boards and by the bar the brass glass holders shone like gold. The air was thick with cigarette smoke, and in the corner, an old-fashioned jukebox played a loud jazz song. Not the modern fusion style but the good, old New Orleans style.

On the dance floor, Rachel was giving Alexander a lesson, Agribel was off with Patrick and Eli showed extraordinary grace as she moved and turned Zacharias with what seemed only her will. Although blind, she seemed to have a good hang on this.

A long table stood along the wall with plates, glasses and such, scattered, half-full of different liquors and dishes served on silver trays. However, a strange object on the table would have caught any person off guard and told them, that this was no ordinary party.

The body of a man lay sprawled at the end of the table. It seemed that his body had even been prepared for this horrid use. A sharp knife had cut open the most of his belly from below the ribs and to his groin, and on his arms and legs, on his chest, face and feet, syringes had been stuck in, drawing what blood they could and fixed to the skin with tape. Most innards had been removed except from liver and kidneys. The open hole was then covered with a thin film of plastic allowing blood from all wounds to trickle down into it, like a huge bowl. There were two bottles of cheap but good cognac beside the body along with a bottle of red wine.

It was like a dish, full served on the table. The man even had an apple in his mouth, and his eyes were not glazed over yet, meaning that he had died very, very recently. Few spatters of blood on the walls and floors were the only traces to be found so far of the brutal murder.

Paris stood beside the body running a long finger around the edge of the opened flesh, now and then scraping some of it onto a finger and moistening her already bloody red lips, like tasting canapés or snacks.

The other young Darklighters moved to the body as the song ended and their dance stopped. A new song drifted onto the air waves, and with grins and smiles they began unplugging the syringes and pouring their content either into glasses and diluted it with the wine or cognac, or straight into their mouth, laughing if the spray got out of control and smeared their faces.

Gabriel had fetched a ladle and as Marek opened the cognac bottles and began pouring some of it into the home-made punch bowl, Gabriel stirred the soup. One ladle-full each as they begun. Blood splattered everywhere and they laughed over the sound of the music. Agribel had attached herself to the neck of the dead corpse and was literally feeding on the flesh. As they drank the blood, the dark angels went on to devouring the corpse. Patrick transformed into a hyena and with his laughing cries, he jumped the table where Eli had laid down with a glass of red wine and blood, clearly intoxicated as she never really drank alcohol. He took the other side of the neck, and Agribel could not help laughing, joking that she never thought Patrick would invite her out like that (since feeding on a corpse is like asking someone out, according to the dark angels).

It was like when you know you are being watched and you cannot really see who it is, but you know something's definitely not right, and you slowly realize that you have not got your back covered.

Gabriel knew because he felt the usual tug in his stomach and spun around to see Matthew in the door way to the ball room. At his hand he had Rose with her sad eyes lodged on the corpse, and Shade beside him, clearly affected by the smell of the dead body but not for one second intending to leave his lord.

Gabriel sighed and turned away from the crowd as he walked across the room. Marek followed quietly in his footsteps and turned down the volume of the jukebox before returning to the meal.

"I thought I'd told you that you were only permitted to throw this party if Rose was welcome too," Matthew said, his voice never noting either despondence or anger, just a statement.

"I know." Gabriel wrung his hands behind his back. "We've, uhm, we've got some spare things on a tray, I can fetch those..."

"Nooo," Rose's tiny voice hit him harder than he had expected. She glared up at him with dark eyes. Gabriel looked away from her and to Matthew, knowing that he could not do or say anything, or they'd have to stop the fun. "Daddy, I wanna play." She tugged at his hand like an impatient child.

She was impatient. And she was a child.

Matthew raised an eyebrow at Gabriel. "You hear that?" he asked. Gabriel rolled his eyes before nodding.

"Alright, Rose, you just go and have fun," he said finally and Rose skipped off towards the corpse. "But don't get in the way!" Gabriel called over his shoulder before he looked back at Matthew.

"You ought to take some more care and responsibility for your sister," he said darkly.

"She's not my sister, father, and you know that," Gabriel sneered. A tick made Matthew's eyes narrow less than a millimeter.

"She's still my daughter," he hissed.

"Your doll," Gabriel mocked, which sent his father's expression near the brink of being emotionally affected.

"My office. Five minutes," he said before turning on his heel and leaving the room without further words. Gabriel rolled his eyes again but swallowed hard before glancing over his shoulder at the party. Rose had seemingly overheard it all and sat now at the other end of the table bent over the remains of the innards, her face smeared in blood and her lips split in a smile as she watched Gabriel walk out of the door.