From Slate to Crimson (13 page)

Bradley Wallace, her fellow teacher, volunteered to take care of her in my stead. The room was one of the few in the Lair whose windows were not boarded up or draped over heavily. Sunlight was good for Amelia; it would weaken our substance enough for the garlic serum to do its job, shortening her recovery time.

I could not sleep at first. When I at last did, my dreams were fitful, and filled with pain. I awoke, shaken, and distantly, down the hallways, I heard Amelia scream.

I ran towards the door, and stopped myself from opening it. I could see the beams of sunlight beneath the crack. If I opened the door, it would have been like a kick to the groin, but all over my body. I was immune to sunlight, but it would have made me severely ill.

I leaned against the wall by the door, listening to her piteous wails. I heard the rattling of the bed as she struggled against the restraints. Once, she managed to shout something coherent, and it broke my heart to hear it.

She screamed for me.

She cried for me.

She begged me to make it stop. She said she changed her mind, that she would rather live addicted than endure this. Then she cursed me, and blamed me for doing what I had done to her.

I doubled over with grief. Amelia’s pain lashed my mind like the whip of penitent flagellates. She was right to blame me, but I had no choice.

It was only the afternoon, and had the sun been setting, I would have broken down the door to feed from her and ease her pain. But I could do nothing about this. And the thought that she might not love me anymore after this was almost too much to bear.

I could do nothing but cry, there in the hallway, as Amelia suffered like few humans had ever suffered.

Hours later, I felt Justin beside me. “She wants this, Master,” he reminded me. “I know you feel like you should stop it, but no matter what she says, no matter how much she curses you, deep in her heart, this was what she wanted. I don’t think she would appreciate it if you stopped it, not when she’s nearly through the worst of it.”

At last…at long last, I felt the pain within Amelia begin to ebb away. The worst of the withdrawal was passing. I could still hear her, but her screams and pleas had subsided to moans and cries. She had very little coherent thought, but this was not unusual. For those few who successfully braved the withdrawal, the pain made them numb in mind and body; some it unbalanced mentally for a time. She would feel the residual pain for the next few days, and for that time swim in a sea of fever dreams and half-heard voices, but she would survive.

When I was certain the sun had gone down to tolerable levels, I relieved Bradley of his duties, which he agreed to with great appreciation. His haggard appearance resembled the way I felt inside, and so he retired quickly to the guest quarters. I went in, and stayed by Amelia’s side until she at last fell asleep.

As mentally exhausted as she was physically, I slept as well. According to Reanon, the chances of her surviving withdrawal had been dismally low, but a month had not yet passed. She had not yet reached the absolute “point of no return.” She made it through. She was alive, and that was all I needed to go on.

* * * *

I awoke and found the bed empty. Alarmed, I went to find her, only to be stopped by Elisa at the door.

“She left about half an hour ago,” she said. “Reanon and I escorted her back home. Reanon said to let her be for now. She needs time to recover.”

“Did Amelia say anything?” I asked.

Elisa shook her head. “No, but she did kiss you goodbye before she left.”

* * * *

Without the benefit of my feeding from her, I knew it would take a full week for Amelia to completely recover from the withdrawal. Bradley managed to cover for her at the school, and I kept my distance.

I came to realize Amelia was right to continue her recovery in her own home; this was a very fragile time for her, and my presence might have interrupted the healing process. However, a kiss was all I had to guess as to whether or not Amelia had discovered whether or not her love for me was real, and so the question lingered within me for the entire time.

I count it as a mixed blessing that this time did not go by slowly. There were many preparations to be made for our cause. These tasks I resigned myself to with a passion over the ensuing nights, lest my thoughts be distracted by Amelia.

Still, the work could not completely drive her from my mind. How could it? A part of me was constantly left in question. Fool that I was; I should never have allowed myself to fall in love with a mortal.

I cared about all our clan, and I grieved at our losses in our ages-old war, but with Amelia, it was different. I cared for her in a way that surpassed even my love for those closest to me. With her body cleared of our toxins, I myself came to wonder if the love she had for me was truly genuine, or just chemical reactions that fooled her body. I began to fear I would lose that love, which had been born of a foolish decision.

* * * *

Recalling the fateful night of our reunion is both a source of both elation and regret for me. I will forever question my actions; I wish I could have changed them, yet I suppose if I had that chance, I am unsure if I actually would.

The mole hidden in our midst had revealed himself, as well as our folly. I had suspected he would be one of our clan, and so I limited my mind scans to only my kind. Instead, the one responsible turned out to be human: none other than Bradley Wallace.

Not surprisingly, Lothos had done his job well. Wally had been unaware of his role as an informant. We would never have learned of this had Elisa not needed to return to his home to give back the cell phone she had borrowed from him in order to confirm her arrival to Justin. Wally was one of the few humans in our clan who chose not to live in the safety of our village, and one night, Elisa was with him as he returned home. They had been deep in conversation on the way to the house, and she had been about to return to the Lair when she realized she still had the phone in her hand.

Once she arrived at Wally’s home, she detected the scent of Lothos’ clan through the door. Alarmed, she forced her way into the house and confronted the vampire who had entranced him. This was achieved without a drink, she later learned after subduing and interrogating him; rather, it was a mental feat that few of Lothos’ clan could perform, and so confirmed Justin’s hypothesis.

Though not quite in the manner we surmised, certain members of Lothos’ clan had indeed been honing their mental abilities to undermine us, and Wally had been a tool in this grand experiment. Unfortunately, he remembered nothing of his interrogations with Lothos’ agent, and the agent himself had known little of Lothos’ full plans. All we could do was destroy him.

The full meaning of what I had learned from this incident hit me like a sack of ice to the lowest part of my spine. I had intended to wait a few more days to visit Amelia, but now there was no time. Lothos surely knew through Wally that I had found a consummate host in Amelia, and once Lothos discovered that his mole had been found out, neither Amelia nor I would be safe.

She had left me a week ago, and I had heard nothing from her since then. By now, she would most likely have fully recovered. I could barely contain my excitement at the prospect of seeing her again, regardless of how the visit would end.

Giddy with happiness, I thought of doing a preternatural trick when I rang the bell; perhaps move behind her with our fascinating speed, and startle her, but I thought better of it. She was strong, but sometimes even a week was not enough time to make a full recovery from the trauma of withdrawal.

What would she discover about us, now that she was free of me? The question raced within my mind more strongly as I waited. I could sense her within, but I did not wish to probe deeper. I wanted to hear the verdict from her own lips.

The door opened, and Amelia appeared, dressed in a blue robe. Her hair was unkempt, and her face pallid; she looked as though she had not eaten in a few days, but otherwise, she moved as though she was healthy.

When she saw me, her mouth widened in a familiar grin. Tears welled in her eyes; my vision blurred with my own.

I felt her love.

She nearly fell into my arms. My heart burst as she pressed herself against me, but it was short-lived as I moved my lips to her neck, and my fangs did the rest.

I had
sated my thirst with the common hosts who graced our presence nightly in the sitting room, but their blood, though nourishing, was far from satisfying. It was like switching one’s diet from a full Chinese banquet every night to cold tofu; it kept me alive, but nothing more.

Amelia was life to me. I groaned in rapture, and Amelia choked back what would have been a sharp cry. I pressed her more tightly against me as pleasure subsumed us. Somehow, in the tangle of the drink, we made it inside the house, and into the couch, where I satisfied my thirst.

“I should have known already,” she whispered when we could at last speak. “I should have known. I’m…so sorry.”

“Sorry for what?”

“That I allowed myself to go through that to know how I really felt. It was…like hell…” Her voice lowered into quiet, whispered sobs. “No. Hell would probably not have been so bad. There was so much pain…It didn’t stop!”

Her words deteriorated into miserable sobs. I shushed her and held her close to me, rocking her back and forth in my arms. “It’s okay now, Amelia,” I said. “It’s okay, I promise you. It’s all over. You got what you wanted.”

She pressed herself closer to me. God, how I missed her scent! She now looked wild and unkempt, but possessed a sensuality of her own. She enticed me before, and now she enflamed me. There was only a robe between us, the left collar of which she let fall to her shoulder, exposing her delicate skin from where I had fed. It reeked of fresh blood.

“Do it to me again, Talante,” Amelia entreated. “It’s okay now; I love you. I know it. Even after that nightmare, I thought only about you. I couldn’t
help
but think about you. Please…love me again.”

My will broke, and I gave in to her. With little effort, I nearly tore her robe in half and bathed her in kisses, drinking from small scratches on my way down. I was frantic with my hunger for her body and her blood, and she pressed me upon her…and once we stumbled into her bedroom, into her. I fed even more deeply than before, her blood a sweet seasoning to the flavor of our lovemaking, sating my resurgent hunger as her body sated our shared intimate desire.

It was early evening when I arrived; exhaustion claimed us in the early morning.

“I’m so happy,” Amelia purred. I felt her arms slide about me, and her soft breasts press against my chest. Every blanket and sheet had been pushed unceremoniously to the floor in our ardent passions, even the fitted sheet, leaving us exposed upon a bare mattress, her warm body against mine.

My own skin was now heated by her blood. Her breath tickled my chest as she heaved a sigh of utter and complete contentment. “You’ve made me so glad to be alive, Talante.”

“Your happiness makes me happy.” I smiled a wide, genuine smile, giddy from her love for me and the love I felt in my innermost being. She looked much healthier than before, considering how much blood I had taken. I ran my fingers through her midnight-colored hair.

“Amelia?” I whispered.

“Yes?” Her soft, lilting voice sent a shock through my nerves and emboldened me.

“I love you.”

With those words, I tore the last wall of my folly. I should not have given in to her blood so easily that night; I should have run away; I should have resisted the lure from the first time I caught her scent, but wishes are all they are, and only what they are, no more, no less.

I was truly, deeply in love with her. And I could no longer hide it.

I felt her tears flow onto my chest, felt her joy fill the dark room with the light of a million suns. She looked at me, her gray eyes soft and moist with tears, and she was the most beautiful mortal in the world.

“I’ve been waiting for you to say that,” she whispered, and trailed a line of kisses up my chest and neck, to my lips.

“And yet, there is something I must tell you,” I said, making time to speak the words between her kisses.

She paused. I felt a sense of dread begin in her. She knew that what I had to say would be something she would not like.

“Lothos knows about us,” I said. “He knows about
you
, and what you are to me.”

“But…how?” Her eyes went wide with alarm at what this signified.

I explained to her the sequence of events involving Wally, and what my children had learned over the past week.

“I don’t believe it,” she said after I finished. “Wally…working for Lothos?”

“He had no idea he was being controlled,” I assured her. “They charmed him somehow, and buried it so deeply, even we could not tell. But there is nothing to worry about; we killed the one controlling him. He was traumatized from the experience, but Reanon says he will recover.

“But there’s no telling how long the agent we found held Mr. Wallace in thrall, or how much he knows. He had only been with us for a little over a year, and so he had no access to a lot of our more sensitive information…yet. This agent might have been starting small, so that there was less of a chance he would be suspected. And if Mr. Wallace gained our trust, he would have been privy to some of our inner workings.

“I think this was what the agent was after. And most certainly, he knew about us. Mr. Wallace knew about our closeness; he sat with you during the withdrawal. He has seen us together. He knows enough for Lothos to know.”

“So what are you saying?” Amelia’s fear rose within her. “Am I going to be hunted by those monsters that attacked you in the club? Will you have to spend your every waking moment to protect me? Will you make me forget, so that I go through the fire, only to lose you?”

“No,” I said, completely resolute. “Never.”

“Then what will you do?” She laid her head back down upon my chest, tracing a circle with her finger above my heart. “Does your little preternatural repertoire give you the power to make this situation right?”

For the longest moment, I was silent. For the first time in centuries, I was at a loss for words. I fumbled around for ideas, but there was nothing. I could not think of anything that would keep Lothos at bay. This would be too juicy a prize for him to ignore.

I looked into her beautiful, waiting eyes, and my heart ached. I caressed her cheek, and she smiled. She was the woman I loved, and only now, when I could at last bring myself to confess this to her, Lothos would discover her importance to me.

She was human, and vulnerable even with the gifts my kiss bestowed. Moreover, we would eventually part one day, regardless of whether I could keep her safe or not; a mortal’s life is that of inevitability.

Still, in my long existence, I knew life was full of meetings and partings, some sooner than we would like; even those whom I had sired in ages past had been
dispatched from this world in past times of attrition. But with any human, especially those who share a consummate bond with us, we felt a special pain in their passing.

I had within myself the means by which death’s hand could be stayed, but with Amelia and countless others, I refrained from doing it. Our existence was born of a curse. To don it upon another was to hang an eternal albatross around one’s neck. It was never a decision we took lightly.

But Amelia made it different.

I had never loved another so deeply, so intimately. She had an eager mind, and surprising reserves of courage. She learned to not fear the darkest of beings, or the world in which they lived, and yet, she was vulnerable. She needed me, and as I loved her, I needed her as well.

I suppose even immortals are fools as well.

“How much do you love me, Amelia?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Amelia threw me a skeptical look.

“Humor me, please,” I said. “Would you do anything for me, the way I would for you? Would you go anywhere?”

“Talante, why are you even asking?” Amelia was appalled. “I was the first to say that I loved you. It took you weeks to come clean, after I went through something that nearly killed me! You know I love you!”

“Enough to leave everything behind?” I asked.“Enough to bind your fate with mine?”

“Bind my fate…?” Amelia honestly did not understand. “Talante, what are you asking?”

“I could turn you,” I said.

My voice was low and quiet, and the words sounded alien to me as I framed them.

“What?” Amelia raised herself upon splayed hands, her body tense with disbelief.

“A time of attrition—outright war-–may be coming,” I explained, “coupled with the fact that Lothos most likely knows about you. And as you are now, despite the gifts my drink gives you, you are vulnerable.”

I could not believe I was saying this to her. It was as though I were standing outside myself, watching another persona speak with my lips. “If you become one of us, you will have advantages you won’t have as a human. You would have a fighting chance. And I would train you personally. But I won’t lie to you. If you choose this, it means sacrificing a lot of your life as a human.”

“I thought you wouldn’t turn me,” Amelia said, both bewildered and confused. “Why are you changing your mind all of a sudden?”

“Because I love you.” I gently guided her back down upon me, then took one of her hands, and clasped it together with mine, softly enfolding our fingers.

“The one thing I never told you about being a consummate host is just how deep our bond runs. It is so deep and pervasive that if anything happened to you, it would break me. I risked my well-being, and quite possibly my sanity when I made you mine. And I risked a terrible anguish to see you brave the withdrawal and wrench yourself free of me. If Lothos or any of his clan hurt you, I would never forgive myself. I might even lose my will to live. I made myself more vulnerable than I ever have in all my life. And it’s completely insane, but if I had to make the choice again, I know would do it again.”

I swallowed, and realized the profuse flow of tears from my eyes, and a distant shaking of my arms. For the longest time, Amelia was silent, her face expressionless. I sensed the shock and ensuing turmoil in her heart. My offer had awakened feelings she had long since buried. She had resigned herself to being my lover and confidante, but always mortal, never my equal.

It pained me to shake her so profoundly, and just as soundly it shocked me that I had even offered it. I consciously and deliberately ignored so many of my own principles in doing this, but I was a man in love, and capable of the most tremendously foolish things.

“Talante…” She was a mess of confusion as she struggled to bring the words out. “You have no idea what kind of a position you’re putting me in. I mean, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want it, even at the cost you mentioned, but I don’t know what awaits me in this other life, either. I only know what I’ve seen. You told me once that the thirst is the most powerful thing to try and overcome. What if I can’t?”

“You will,” I said. “It’s not impossible. My clan is proof of that.”

“But what if I can’t? You can’t tell me that there have been some vampires who never learned to control their thirst.”

“There have been a few,” I admitted. It was no disparagement. Even after ten millennia, there were some of my children who had not been able to master themselves, but they were much smaller in number than those who could.

“And what happened to them?” Amelia asked.

“Most of them died by their own hand,” I answered grimly. “Others were permanently sequestered; the rest changed sides. Lothos used their torment to seduce them.”

“Is that all?” Amelia asked, revealing my attempt to hold back.

“The others were put down,” I said, my voice hollow in my confession, “to end their torment.”

“Would you do that to me?”

“Only if you wanted it,” I said. “We never killed them outright; they had to ask for it.”

“What are the chances that I wouldn’t be able to master myself?”

I smiled, my fingers absently touching her soft face. “Very slim.”

I felt the tension leave her upon my response, and her smile settled my own apprehension.

“Would I have to call you ‘Master’?” she asked, smiling, much to my delight.

“I will always be whatever you wish to call me,” I said. “I love you too much for you to be so formal.”

“‘Sweetie’, perhaps? Or maybe ‘honey’?”

“Or ‘my love’?” I suggested with a shrug, and then smiled in spite of myself. “You can call me that even as you are now.”

“You scare the hell out of me with what you’re offering, you know,” Amelia said, returning to the primary subject.

“Any step into the unknown is frightening,” I answered. “And this is more frightening than any. But I offer it because I love you. I should never have held back from confessing this to you, but what’s done is done. Besides, becoming one of us would place you on, shall we say, a more level playing field.”

Amelia squeezed her eyes shut. Tears flowed from the corners.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m not making this any easier for you, but I just want you to know all that my offer entails.”

“I know,” Amelia said. “And I don’t blame you. To tell the truth, you
are
making this easier for me. What’s becoming harder to do is saying no.”

Again, she went silent, and laid her head down upon me.

I waited in the silence, broken only by our breathing. I felt Amelia’s warm breaths upon my chest. The choice was now up to her.

“Yes,” she said at last.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure.”

“Are you certain, despite what you will have to give up?”

“
Dammit, Talante!” A fire burned in Amelia’s gray eyes as she pounded my chest. “What are you trying to do to me? I said yes! Do it, before I change my mind again!”

“As you wish,” I said, and shifted myself, turning to where I hovered over her. I drew upon the power of my Jewel, and our surroundings shifted. I felt a brief sensation of falling, despite the fact that there was something solid beneath us, but the texture suddenly changed. In the span of a second, we were in another bed: in
my
bed in my chambers, in the Lair.

“God, Talante!” Amelia breathed, shifting her gaze furtively back and forth. “Tell me when you’re going to do that!”

“I’m sorry,” I said, “but I needed to bring us here, for safety’s sake.”

“Safety?” Amelia’s confusion settled as quickly as it rose, as she recalled everything I told her about the change. “Oh.”

“Yes.” I gave a mental command to any of my children who were nearby to send blood packs and clothing of Amelia’s size from storage with all due haste. I rose off of Amelia and helped her up to a sitting position beside me.

“Are you ready?” I asked.

“How painful will it be, exactly?” For a moment, Amelia dreaded a return to the pain of withdrawal.

“Painful,” I said grimly.

“Like…the withdrawal?”

“Not quite like that,” I said, and I felt her fears subside somewhat. “And it will hurt the most only for the last few minutes, as your body completes the change.”

“If it’s not as bad as what I had to go through with the withdrawal, then I think I can handle it,” Amelia said, managing a timid smile. Then she gasped as she felt my fingers tracing their way down her thigh and towards her sex.

“There is also a way to lessen the pain,” I explained, sensing her confusion.

Amelia trembled, and I watched her skin flush to my gentle touch. “How…does that work?” Her voice was breathy and shuddering from the pleasure I was already inducing.