The Nightlife: Paris (The Nightlife Series) (9 page)

I could barely stop the bleeding to stitch him up.  I
scolded him, but I couldn’t stay angry.  This life was too much for him.

Julian found me wrapping Lucas’s wrist in a bandage.  “You
did quite well with this one.  I have never seen them live this long. 
Remarkable.”  His face held a mirthless grin, a hyena smiling at death.

I knew what had to be done.

I bathed Lucas with fragrant soap and held him tight all
night long, whispering my love in his ears, pouring affection on him for
hours.  He was in heaven.  I bit him over and over and over.  He loved me till
the moment his heart stopped, as did I love him.  It was a far better end than
he would have faced on the streets of Paris as a beggar.  That’s what I told
myself, repeatedly.

* * * *

Chapter 13

Amidst these wretched times, another evil shadowed my
beloved Paris.  It would prove to be the most sinister act of oppression in the
history of mankind – the German persecution of the Jews.  The Boche had already
consumed all the wheat, flour, potatoes, baked goods, petrol, cars, livestock,
and young fit Frenchmen, but then they targeted the Jews and foreign nationals. 
It began early in the occupation, a few months after the invasion.  The streets
buzzed with news of new law.  Jews were now excluded from politics, civil
service, judiciary, military, schools, and all forms of media – journalism,
film, and radio.

“What do they expect them to do?  Clean toilets?  Wipe
German asses for a living?”  I asked Julian, but he didn’t care.  He rarely
concerned himself with anything that did not directly affect him.

Days later came more news about Jews.  They were restricted
to live only in their village or neighborhood of residence and forced to
register their presence.  They had to wear a clearly visible patch identifying
them for all to see, the yellow Star of David.  Landlords across the city began
to evict them.  It suddenly became very unpopular to be Jewish.

I never cared about the Jews before.  They were God-fearing people
like everyone else.  What was the big deal?  So what if they were bankers.  I
didn’t understand.

June, 1941.  Word spread like wildfire – Hitler had turned
on Russia, breaking the Hitler-Stalin pact.  Massive troop movements poured out
of the city.  In a matter of weeks the German soldiers were gone, patrols
reduced to the bare minimum.  The French communists who once praised Hitler and
preached tolerance of the German occupation were now grumbling on the street
corners and blowing up the Nazi cars with home-made bombs.  It suddenly became
very unpopular to be a communist, more so than ever before.

August 1941, the news came over the radio that all foreign
nationals – especially Soviets, Lithuanians, Estonians, and Latvians – had to
register like Jews.  Curfews were enacted city-wide.  It suddenly became very
unpopular to be of Eastern European descent.

I began to suspect that the rumors were true, Hitler was
insane.  How do you predict the actions of a madman?

When I could no longer stand the repression of the Boche,
had reached the limits of my ability to restrain my hate and aggression, I
begged Julian to give me an outlet.  “
S’il
vous plait
Maître
I must go out and hunt.  Will you give me permission?  I am ever your faithful
servant,
Maître,
do
you trust me?”

He looked at me, trying to gauge whether or not I lied.

I pressed my case.  “There are less soldiers now.  The
patrols are mostly
flics
.”
 
French cops
.  I advanced on
him, flexing my lethal claws anxiously.  “I need to kill.  I long to feel their
death in my hands.  They must pay with their lives.”

He stepped back out of reach.  “We wait and see.  We will go
out together.”  I smiled in anticipation.  “But no hunting.  We will watch,
nothing more!”

It was a start.

We spent a month roaming the city, slinking through the
shadows and back alleys, evading the
flics
.  There were few Germans to
be found.  They had battalions of French traitors to do their work.  I learned
to track the Boche by their scent – sausages, sauerkraut, and tobacco.  They
did not smell like Frenchmen.

July 1942, we heard news.  The Nazis were deporting Jews and
foreigners to some secret place, never to be seen again. 
This
time, Julian could not deny my arguments.  “
Le plus on leur bais le cul, le plus ils
nous chient sur la tête
.”  
The more you kiss
their ass, the more they shit on your head
.

“
Je m’en
fous
.” 
Fuck it
. 
“
C’est la fin des haricots!
” 
I have had enough
.  He shrugged and that was it.  The horrid
news had tipped the scale in my favor.

He gave me permission to hunt.  Alone.

“Do not get caught.  If you are caught, I will not save
you.”

I never expected he would.  “I will kill them all or die
trying.”

He watched me closely, evaluating how dangerous I might be
to him, but he knew I served his every command.  He had grown to trust me.

My very first night out alone, I visited the mansion.  I
found my father’s house furnished but vacant.  I wondered what became of him
and Agnes.  I made a point to pass through the neighborhood at least once a
week.  Each time I passed, the house was dark, unoccupied, much the same as my
empty life.  I had become something wholly different and immeasurably wicked
compared to the woman I once was.

For the first time since Julian claimed me, I accepted the
constraints of this life.  I loved my freedom, the adrenaline rush of the hunt,
slinking across the rooftops, scenting out my prey.  They were recognizable by
smell alone – gunmetal, starched uniforms, foreign cigarettes, overpowering aftershave,
foot powder, and the distinctive body odors from their strange diet.  I focused
all my hatred, all my frustration, every ounce of aggression into the hunt of
the Boche vultures.  Though I was brutal, merciless, I always felt better
afterwards.  In a world of constant repression and domination, these few
moments were my small rebellion.

I truly enjoyed the excursions when I encountered Gestapo
officials, a rare find.  The Gestapo Nazis were a subspecies of German evil
responsible for unspeakable horrors committed against my countrymen.  I could
almost pick them out by the darkness of their auras.  I took great pleasure in
the mutilation and slaughter of these men.  They died painfully.

On one occasion I brought one home, a fortyish blond-haired,
blue-eyed Aryan.  He confessed to no less than seventeen murders during the two
nights I let him live.  Seventeen French men and women died after he tortured
them for information.  He also admitted the Jews and foreigners had been taken
to concentration camps at Auschwitz.  After I broke his legs he screamed the
truth, he suspected they were killing people in the camps.  I grew tired of his
noise and disemboweled him.  The soft belly is the most vulnerable area, no
bones to protect all those fleshy organs.  I had learned this in the streets –
men cannot fire their guns when their intestines are falling out.

Julian watched me closely.  I sensed his concern.  But he
was also proud, like a man with an attack dog on a leash.  He held a small fear
his dog might turn on him, but mostly he enjoyed my brutality.  His dog always
obeyed its master.

* * * *

In tracking the Germans, I learned there were certain areas
of the city more heavily targeted for persecution by the Nazis – the Jewish
neighborhoods.  I focused on these areas for hunting.  As I slaughtered the Boche,
I justified my acts with the idea I could somehow make a difference.  I was a
résistance
of one, but I
killed many.

My rationalizations were soon shattered.

One night I arrived at one of the seedier Jewish ghettos,
the Maraise.  I crouched on the rooftops and listened to people shuttered tight
inside their tiny apartments arguing.  The women and children cried, because the
Nazis had deported one hundred sixty-five Jewish students from the school. 
People whispered rumors that these deportations were not to work camps.  The
filthy Boche had sent their children to death camps.  Few believed the rumors, such
crimes were surely too monstrous to be true.  But I knew the children would not
return. 

My rebellion saved no one.  I had achieved my vengeance
while satisfying my hunger.

I watched from the rooftops as officials raided the Maraise,
rousting Jews from their homes to be hauled out into trucks.  I had heard of
this, but never seen it.  I found the truth staggering.  It was not Germans,
but their Vichy lapdogs.  I struggled to accept the evidence of this treachery
– French aiding the Boche against their own countrymen.

It made me sick to my stomach.  I snuck into one of the
buildings.  I felt an overpowering need to do something, anything.  As I
silently snapped the neck of a filthy traitor, I was confronted by a terrified
little old man.  He wore the patch on his coat, the yellow Star of David.  He
had been hiding behind a false wall panel, watching my stealthy retribution.

“You must not fight them!  It’s only worse when you fight
them.  Violence begets violence!  They will kill us all for your
résistance!
”  He spat out the
last word in contempt.  Disgusting
résistance
.

His reaction was common among the Jews and many others in
Paris.  I smiled at him, my heart aching with sadness.  “It matters not.  I
cannot change your fate, Monsieur.  I am sorry, but that is not why I am here.”

“Then why are you doing this?  We all pay the price for your
foolishness!”  He was genuinely upset that I had killed this man of authority.

“You poor thing.  You wear the mark.”  I pointed at his
yellow star.  “Have you not heard?  Hitler will kill you all if he has his
way.  There is little I can do for you.”  I wished I could do more.

“Then why are you doing this?”  He pleaded with me.

“I am only here for my pound of flesh.”  I smiled with all
my teeth and he finally saw me for what I was.  A killer.

* * * *

Chapter 14

June 6th, 1944.  After four years of hell, degradation,
suffering, and death at the hands of the Nazis, Allied forces invaded the shores
of Normandy.

The beginning of the end.

“
En fin,
”
was the collective sigh of an entire nation as the Allies flooded our shores
and beat the Germans back from west to east.  They gained ground incrementally
day by day.  I hummed with excitement.  The whole city felt the turning of the
tide.  We just had to wait a little longer.  Even Julian smiled at the news. 
He rarely left the townhouse, preferring to pass his time with the bloodslaves.

In one of my many forays into the city, I happened upon the
Mansion, lit from within.  I stopped to investigate.  I saw him, my father,
through an upper floor window.  Alive and well, though slightly gaunt, his hair
had begun to grey at the temples.  The light shone brightly in Père’s eyes as he
sat at his desk in the massive study lined with bookshelves.  I wanted so badly
to go to him.

But what would I say?  How could I explain my absence for
the past four years?  How could I explain the clothes I wore – the wrappings of
a whore, my hunting outfit?  My courage fled.

I passed the Mansion each night thereafter, and found him
frequently.  I wondered of the Château and the vineyards and Tante Agnes. 
Suffering my questions in silence, I sat across the street and watched him for
hours.

I now hunted with a smile.  The Germans moved with fear and
uncertainty in their stride, the knowledge of their impending doom written on
their faces.  Gone was the pompous arrogance of entitlement and dominance that
had characterized their reign.

The nightly news of the advancing Allied forces strengthened
my confidence.  I resolved to visit Père.  He appeared to be living in the
Mansion now.  My head filled with visions of Paris before the war, a time when
I could visit my family as though nothing had ever happened.  Pure fantasy, but
it held my courage as I walked right in the front door of the Mansion.

“Ah la
vache!”
  He gasped, the color draining from his face.  “Where have
you been?  Is it really you?”  He embraced me, eyes shining with tears.

His joy rendered me speechless.  I couldn’t ruin the moment
with lies.  I clutched him to me, feeling his wonderful warmth, absorbing the
unconditional love I had gone so long without.  He held me tightly, kissing my
cheeks, just like I remembered him.

“I have spent countless hours and much money investigating rumors
you were still alive.  They told me to give up, to move on.  But there were
people who had seen you as recently as last winter.  I knew you were still
alive.  I knew it.”  He stroked my hair, reassuring himself I was real.

“But I didn’t believe the lies.  One woman said you were a
prostitute.”  He shook his head.  “It matters not, we are together.  All is right
in the world.  The Allies will be here soon to help the
résistance
.  Paris will be
ours again.”

“
Oui
,
I love you, Père, I have always loved you.  That will never change.”

He started to look at me closely, really looked at me.  Suspicion
flared in his aura.  “Why, Michelle?  Why have you not contacted me?  Where
have you been?”

“In time I will explain.  It’s difficult right now.  Please
be patient with me, Père.”  I pressed him close, hiding from his gaze,
relishing his warm arms around me.  He seemed happy to just hold me.  “And what
of Agnes?  How is she?  How are things at the Château?”

He pushed me back to stare at me, face-to-face.  He looked
stricken.  I saw the answer in his eyes.  “You did not know?  She’s gone. 
There was an accident on the way to Orleans.  I sent word to you.  I wrote many
times.”

I looked away.  So much loss and pain.  My world could never
recapture my past.  Julian would not allow it.  Père saw my tears of blood, the
red stripes down my face.

“
Zut alors!
 
What’s wrong with you?  Are you hurt?”

I wiped my face away quickly, remembering myself.  The
moment I longed for could never be.  I had to leave.  I did not belong in this
place.  I did not deserve Père’s love and attention.

“I did not know.  We were to meet in Orleans, but the trains
were down …”

“
Oui mon
amour
.  I spoke with Jean-Luc, he explained.”  He looked in my eyes,
and I felt his fascination with me.  My gaze enraptured him.  “If you had
received my letters you would know I sold the Château a year ago.  I couldn’t
bear to continue the work of the vineyards knowing you were missing.”  He spoke
in a monotone, belying the depth of his enchantment.  I stepped back and he
stepped forward, following me.

“Listen, Père, I cannot stay.  I am well.  I have been here
all along.  You need not concern yourself.  You understand?”

He nodded.  “
Oui
. 
Everything is fine now that you’re here.  You can stay with me.  Everything is
fine.  This will be your home now.”

“
Non
. 
I cannot be here with you.  I will visit, but I cannot live here, Père.”  I
stepped back and he stepped forward, tracking my every move.  “I cannot explain
now, but I promise I will return when I can.  We are together again.”  I could
barely utter the lie.  It rang false in my own ears.

He looked confused.  My force of will couldn’t break through
his powerful love for me, for the woman I once was, his daughter.  “Nonsense,
you stay with me.  You belong in my home.”  He reached for me.

“What a beautiful thing.  Father and daughter reunited.”

Julian’s voice froze my heart cold.  I spun around out of Père’s
grasp. My master stood in the doorway to the study.  He had that look, his
dreamy hungry look that always preceded violence.

“
Merde!
” 
I hadn’t heard him ascend the stairs.  But I knew what brought him here.  He
had felt my elation at holding my father once again.  I let slip my iron
control on my emotions, and I feared the mistake would cost me dearly.  I threw
up my mental barricade, sealing my mind tightly.

“He knows nothing.  He’s harmless.  Please let him be.  I
beg you.  I am just visiting.  He thought I was dead.”  I blabbered on,
throwing useless words at an implacable creature.

He stepped up and caressed my cheek, a look of resignation
in his eyes.  “Why
ma chérie
?
Why have you disposed of his illusions?  To him you were dead, as you are
to all but me.  There can be no life with them.  They are
cattle
.”

His eyes reflected the truth.  His intentions flowed across
our psychic bond.  Jacques de Mornac presented a problem.  Julian dispatched
all potential problems without pause.

I could kill him.  I could kill him before he kills my
father
.

Then Père stepped in.  “What is all this?  She is my daughter! 
You have no right!”  Walking to his desk, he pulled out the drawer and withdrew
a revolver.

The scent of metallic gun oil permeated the air.

Julian snarled.

I gasped as I attacked the father I loved beyond measure.  I
could not disobey Julian’s command.  My hands moved of their own wicked
volition.  In less than a second, I slashed Père’s throat wide open, my razor
claws tipped red in his blood.

Père stared at me unwittingly.  His mouth moved, but he
couldn’t speak.  He choked on his blood in a futile gasp for breath.  His eyes
filled with confusion and accusation.

My traitorous, bloody hands covered my mouth in horror.  My
blood-covered hands, forever stained with the blood of my father.

His knees buckled and he collapsed.  “
Non, non, non!
”  Screaming in
denial, I caught him as he fell to the floor. 
“
S'il vous plait Dieu me pardonne
.” 
Oh please God, forgive me
.

His eyes found mine.  His gaze held such a deep well of hurt
and betrayal.  His mouth opened again in a speechless accusation.  My vision
turned crimson as I blinked away tears.

Wailing, howling, keening, I cradled him in my arms as the
emerald spark in his eyes winked out.  Like all the men before him who had died
by my hands, he stared off into nothingness.  Something inside me broke, my
last scrap of hope and humanity shattered.  I had maintained sanity through
four years of hell, but I lost it in that instant.  For Julian, forcing me to kill
my father was simply another
lesson
I had to learn.

Without thought of self-preservation or consequence, I laid
my father’s body on the floor and turned on my master.

Vaulting into the air, I landed with my feet on Julian’s
chest and my hands sliced down under his jaw.  Whip fast, I buried razor sharp
claws into the base of his throat.  With strength fueled from madness, my
powerful hands gripped his spine.  Jerk, snap, and a leaping twist through the
air separated his head clean from his body.

His disembodied head bounced off the wall and hardwood
floors of the study, a look of fear and surprise painted on his face forever
more.  I had moved so fast, so unexpectedly, all Julian’s strength and power of
compulsion made no difference.  He never had a chance.  Speed and the element
of surprise was all I had ever needed.  A lesson learned too late for my
father.

Life bled out of Julian in seconds, and with it, the psychic
backlash of his death slammed through our bond and smashed my mind to pieces in
a blinding flash of agony.  All the deeply-rooted connections that governed my
life for four years were torn asunder.

I floated in the quagmire of my broken mind, nothing and no
one to latch onto.  Nothing but pure sorrow, grief, and pain.  I staggered out
into the night, blinded by the hammering in my skull.  Hunger, agony, the
scents of prey all around me, but the pain blotted out my capacity to hunt.  Instinct
took hold.  Daylight was coming.  Need to hide.  I found an abandoned building
with a basement, and hid in the darkest, deepest corner.

I had become a wild thing, feral, a simple predator. 
Michelle was no more.

* * * *