“Silvus told me that Rosie helped you remember a little of our lives together.” Silvus didn’t want me to remember, but Rayner looked excited. “How was that? It was a little of Bertie, he said. I hope I didn’t come off too badly.”
He almost seemed nervous that I would remember how dismayed he was that Bertie was a boy. The idea that anything could make Rayner nervous! “You were fine,” I said.
“We have so many other places to go, but I hope I can bring you to San Francisco soon, to your last home. Most of Bertie’s library was there and there’s a reading nook with a big window that overlooks the garden.”
It was obvious that Silvus would not tell Rayner about the memory he didn’t want me to recall. I must have done something really terrible.
But from what I’d heard of Rayner, he’d done some terrible things himself.
Right now, that hardly seemed possible. He was telling me about the house in San Francisco and suggesting we might live there when all this was over, and he seemed full of plans for our future together. Then, the music started up and he caught my hands in his. “Let’s go. Before the floor is too crowded.”
“Where are the others?” I asked.
“They’ll be here soon.”
The first song was an instrumental, a Celtic reel that had made its way through the Appalachians, Rayner said, and then they played a song called The Tennessee Stud, a man singing with Alice harmonizing. Alice had the stage presence of a much older person. The whole band was like that, and they played as well as I could imagine, although I didn’t know any of this music. Once in a while we snuck in a few songs on a radio at the edge of town, but the only stations we could pick up was a country one with a lot of songs about America and trucks, and a pop station that had my friend Samantha waiting with bated breath to hear anything involving Harry Styles, whom she had a crush on although she didn’t even know what he looked like. We just knew he was British and named Harry, and that seemed romantic enough, because we had secretly passed around Harry Potter books.
This music seemed like a real mixture of songs, and the vampires took turns, calling up different people to sing or play different instruments. Violin, guitar, bass and mandolin formed the backbone. They sang songs about murder and slavery and death and girls and horses, while the room filled with swirling skirts and stomping feet.
I was passed from Rayner to Silvus, who appeared from upstairs, looking like he might have just woken up from a nap.
“It’s a good time, isn’t it?” Silvus asked me during his turn. “These are a lot like the dances we used to attend in England. They got very rowdy. The movies never get it right. Or maybe it was just us. Vampires really know how to party like every day is their last. I’m not sure why that is.”
“I feel like these dances haven’t changed in a hundred years,” I said.
“No, indeed. There are a few seventy year old songs in the repertoire. You know, for the kids.” He smiled.
“I like it,” I said. “It makes me feel like nothing really ever dies.”
“I don’t think it ever really does, dearest.”
“I’m cutting in,” Jie said, tapping Silvus on the shoulder.
“Did you get it sorted?” Silvus asked.
“Yep.” Jie took my hand as Thom came up behind him, trying to take my other. Jie smacked him. “Wait your turn, kid.”
“What is sorted?”
“Plane tickets,” he said. “We’re going to find your lost life. We told you we’d get it all figured out, and we’re well on our way to breaking your curse.”
“I’ve never been on a plane!”
“Brace yourself. We’re going to Hawaii.”
“I’m going to get in some surfing,” Thom said. “Vampires go Hawaiian. See, I told you we ought to go to the beach.”
“Hell yeah. We’re going to get up early, find your bones, and then spend the rest of the vacation chilling out.”
“I hope you have bones somewhere,” Thom said. “Did they bury the dead in Hawaii in sixteen-something?”
Jie shrugged. “I’m just glad we get to go somewhere that’s actually a vacation. Now, back off.” He steered me away from Thom. “This is my first proper dance with you in a long time. It’s nice to have you girl-size again. Bertie was almost as tall as I am and he wanted to lead.”
“I suppose he probably knew how to dance though,” I said, stepping on his feet as I tried to follow what he was doing.
“I don’t care about that.” Jie held me close. I put my head against his chest and heard him take a deep, contented breath. His hand started at my waist and then found its way to my shoulder blade, which was outside the tiny sleeve of the dress. “It just feels right.”
I shut my eyes. It was true. It did feel right.
Ulf came up to us as we parted and bowed to me. “It does my heart good to see you two dance together. I will always remember that charming little dance that you did for us in London.”
“Was Li Mei able to dance? With bound feet?”
Jie nodded. “You could walk and dance. Just not forever. My mother worked pretty hard with bound feet. Although she’d let hers out some.”
“We were trying to persuade Lady Kestrel to come down out of retirement to heal your feet—and your lungs—but she was a stubborn character,” Ulf said. “And then your death came far too soon. The air in London certainly couldn’t have helped. But I think, if the happiness matters more than the years, you lived well. You were one of my favorites, child. I’m glad to see you again.”
The old vampire did seem so genuinely warm. I believed that he wasn’t just being polite.
“I hadn’t thought that Li Mei had a very happy life,” I said. “I’m glad I wasn’t just homesick and lonely.”
“No, no,” Jie said. “You loved vampire parties. I think you were pretty happy most of the time, especially once your English was good enough for reading. It was just…complicated. I don’t want to try and explain how you felt. Maybe you’ll remember it someday.”
I wonder if I could focus on remembering Li Mei’s life. Is that the life Silvus doesn’t want me to remember? No, I think that ‘his’ Meg is the one where something happened.
“I hope so,” I said. “It was very hard to get used to this at first. The way you all remember me in different lives. But…when I remembered Bertie last night, well, I feel like I understand everything a little more.”
“I wish you remembered everything like we do,” Jie said. “The bad and the good. I know that a lot of wizards think you shouldn’t remember your past lives because the past is past, but I wouldn’t want to forget. You’ve shared so many years with us. It isn’t fair to feel like a kid, is it?”
“I should be a wise old woman by now, huh? But would you like that? I think that the other guys enjoy my innocence.”
“Well…I don’t need an innocent girl to have a good time,” Jie said. “I like knowing your body…and you knowing mine. Anyway, innocence never lasts long. I won’t miss it if it means I never have to say goodbye to you.”
I pressed against him. My barriers were melting away. When I was with Jie, I felt that being a vampire was the only choice I could make. He had a level-headed quality about him that was very reassuring, and when he gazed at me as we danced, I saw kindness and wit in his dark eyes. I still had a feeling he was thinking of Li Mei as much as he was thinking of Alissa, but I was starting to mind that a little less.
When I had danced with all of the clan, Ulf swung me into a dance.
“I’m so glad to see you once more,” he said. “How I worry about Rayner and Silvus without you around.”
“Just them?”
He laughed. “No, I don’t worry about the other two. You see it, don’t you?”
“I do.” I smiled too, feeling like we shared a secret. It wasn’t really a secret, exactly. But I guess it was what you called ‘gossip’, which we were not supposed to do in the village.
Then I met Dmitry, a tall blonde Russian vampire who a
lso waxed poetic about Li Mei and her charms. Thom and Jie danced with each other while Rayner and Silvus watched on the sidelines, drinking and probably gossiping themselves. Rayner grabbed me back for the waltz. By this time, I could hardly breathe for dancing and I was dizzy with all the stories of people I used to be. How could I ever figure out who Alissa was with all these other people crowding my head?
Alice had been playing the fiddle beautifully early in the night, but now she had been replaced by a man, and I didn’t see her anywhere.
Maybe it was because I was haunted by my sisters. Maybe it was because no matter how happy I was, how lost in the moment, a part of me was still wandering a dark forest of despair, searching for Carrie and Joan. Wanting to see their faces and hug them to me and promise them I would keep them safe.
I felt protective of Alice, even if she was a hundred and ten. I have to make sure I treat her like an older woman, I thought, out of respect. But she looked so vulnerable.
I peered outside in the garden. I saw two vampires and their thralls out there, hiding in secluded spots of the walled garden, biting pale necks in the cool night.
“Will you be joining us, angel?” one of the women asked, her mouth stained with blood. The other woman she was biting seemed barely conscious, but happy.
“No!” I quickly withdrew back into the house, almost tripping on the doorframe.
Maybe I shouldn’t be searching a house of vampires. I wondered if it was okay, what they were doing out there. My bare arms were tingling with cold.
But I still felt like I should check on Alice. I turned to the stairs instead, after making my way through the maze of dancers.
It was much quieter up here. There was a locked door with the sound of love making behind it, but I didn’t think that could be Alice.
I finally found her—passed out in a bathtub, with a syringe dropped on the rug.
Small as she was, her hands and feet still dangled out of the sides of a small clawfoot tub, and it gave me flashbacks of my mother’s death.
“Alice!” I took her cold hand. “Alice?”
“No…,” she moaned softly.
“I’ll—I’ll get help.”
Her hand gripped my sleeve blindly. “No need. I’m okay.” Her eyes were dazed, her lips bloodless. “Stay with me.”
“What did you take?”
“Faery drugs. I think they might be too strong…oof.” She tried and failed to sit up and instead just curled up sideways into the tub, her frothy party dress puffing around her. “It’s okay—Alissa. It’s okay.”
She didn’t need to explain what she was feeling or what she’d been through. I understood. She was looking for oblivion, trying to escape the pain.
I wrapped my hand around her arm and tried to feel out her condition.
Her energy was very weak. Something strong and toxic was in her veins.
I didn’t have a wand now. My healing magic wasn’t enough to help Mom. But I still tried. You can always try, I thought. You have to.
I remembered Dee telling me when she did my Tarot card reading that I would find a friend. For some reason, I felt like Alice was the friend.
But I had to save her from herself.
I grit my teeth, unwilling to let her go. My magic struggled, untrained and scattered. I tried to focus it in. I tried to pull her back.
You couldn’t even save your own mom.
“No,” I growled, shoving out that memory. “Alice, can you make it through this and be my big sister?”
My magic found company. The magic in a vampire’s own blood grabbed ahold of my power and seemed to tug on it, until I felt a rush of strength go through Alice. She quickly leaned her head over the side of the tub and coughed up a mixture of blood and something that looked like sparkling liquid silver.
“Ohh…” She sank back into the tub and covered her face. “Oh, dear.” She looked at me. “I think you saved my life, Alissa.”
“I tried my best. Your own magic did as much as I did. Were you…trying to…”
“I hardly know,” Alice said wearily. “I don’t think it’s right to kill yourself. All I wanted was to see a little heaven. This faery dust gets me there fast.” She tried to get out of the tub, clearly dizzy.
“You probably need blood,” I said. “I’ll get you some. Hang on.”
“Wait. Don’t leave me quite yet.”
“Okay.” I stopped moving.
“Why did you come help me?”
“I think I just feel like I want to help someone,” I said. “My parents were just killed, and my sisters are lost. We’re trying to save them but we have to go through all these steps first. I’m terrified. I guess I thought, if something does happen…well…I might need someone.” I swallowed. I didn’t want to sound like I thought I could replace my sisters with an adopted replacement.
“Oh, it’s so sad to see you hurting, Bertie,” she said. “You were so kind to me. Your clan was good to me. Never once did you make me feel like anything but a grown woman. But I’m just lonely. It’s been a long time, and I keep trying to fight it on account of everyone being so kind to me. They said it would get easier when I turned a hundred, but it hasn’t.”
“Being alone?”
“The wanting and the needing,” she said. “I’m afraid I might get jealous of you with those four handsome men…”
“But you are…older,” I said. “No one can see past how you look?”
“I’m not sure I want anyone who can,” she said. “But I don’t let them in to begin with. Still, vampires have a pretty strict moral code. No one wants to be seen with a child when the punishment for turning a child is death! But me, I’ve still got a woman’s mind…”
“I guess I knew it would be something like that,” I said. “What about thralls?”
“Well, sure, I can always seduce any human I want,” she said, and in that moment the spell of her actual face was broken and I stopped seeing her as a girl and started seeing the dangerous predator she actually was. “And I do. But thralls die. I won’t turn ’em. I can’t be a good sire to anyone. I can’t get anyone through it when I’m barely surviving myself. Ulf said I could stay here, but I know he only said that because he felt sorry for me.” She patted my hand. “It’s sweet of you to ask, but why don’t you tell me about your sisters? Maybe—hey, maybe I could help. You saved me from death so I owe you my life.”
“I’m not sure I really saved you from death!”
“Are you going to do something dangerous? I heard something about the Order.” She was struggling to get out of the tub again. I offered her a hand. She was surprisingly strong, but unsteady, and nearly planted one of her dress shoes into the blood she’d just purged. “Ooh…dizzy.”
“Yes. The Order has my sisters. I want to end it.”
The firmness in my own voice surprised me. I thought I just wanted to save my sisters, mostly, but that really wasn’t good enough, was it? Rayner wanted to kill Father Joshua. I didn’t want anyone to grow up there, with hidden books and arranged marriages and bowed heads. Never again.
“I look like a little girl,” Alice said. “Sometimes that has its advantages. Maybe I could sneak in and do whatever you need done.”
“It’s very dangerous,” I said. “You can’t just sneak in.”
“Why not? I’ll be disappointed if you don’t give me something to do. I can stay off the wagon when I have something to get my adrenaline going.”
“They don’t trust strangers there at all,” I said. “It doesn’t matter if you look like a kid. They’ll just realize you’re a vampire.”
“I guess you’re right. Well—if you need me, still…”
“I will. I’m going to get you some blood now. I’m sure you still need it.”
When I tried to take some blood ‘soup’ from the vampire’s table, Ulf saw me. “Are you with Alice?”
“Yeah, she—“
“No need to explain. I know Alice well enough. Come with me.” He brought me to a fridge and ga
ve me a medical pouch of blood. “This is what she needs. Thank you for helping her, Alissa. I earnestly hope you will be able to join the clans. I should not like everyone to say goodbye to you a third time.”
From what I heard of vampires, I expected them all to be cruel, attractive, and powerful, keeping to themselves, warring with other clans when they dared to cross paths. I had learned a lot today. They all seemed capable of killing and debauchery, and maybe they did see humans as pets—in the way of beloved things that die long before they would—but I had not expected how loyal they would be to their own larger family. Nor how much they could dance the night away to banjo music.
I was definitely starting to feel torn. My old life and family still had a powerful hold on me, but…I didn’t want to just be a thrall. I wanted to be a part of a village that actually loved and cared for each other.
“Me too,” I said.
Chapter Nine
Alissa
“It’s not all bad to become a vampire,” Alice said. “And don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. I guess you must have talked to the other thralls yesterday when you were getting dressed. Some of them are desperate to be vampires, but no one likes desperation. They don’t usually last too long. And some of them would rather die.”
“Yes, that’s sort of what Sophie and Rosie said. But…is the blood lust really bad? I can’t imagine looking at people and thinking I want to eat them.”
“You’re not eating them. You’re just drinking their blood. And you don’t even have to kill them. You’re giving them a good time. But you know that.”
“That’s true…” I blushed. After the dance, Jie and Thom took me to bed. We were all pretty tired, so I was spared finding out what Thom was going to do to me, but it was coming. And last night still wasn’t nothing either. It was all over in about five minutes, but it was quite a five minutes. Their hands were everywhere. Jie made love to me while his hand worked Thom’s cock and Thom’s tongue was in my mouth. They slept with their hands brushing each other’s, resting on my shoulder. I knew Rayner and Silvus were also sometimes-lovers, and I could feel the trust between them, but they were both very solitary. They each loved me in their own singular way. Jie and Thom were the opposite. Their love for each other was quiet but infectious. Tonight, they promised me, they would show me everything.
Love Me Madly Page 6