Memories of Envy

by Barb Hendee

  “With friends,” she said.

  Something was wrong. He could see it in her face. She didn’t want to look at him. In some of the first nights he remembered coming here, she had held him and rocked him and wept in the nook of his neck. She’d begged him to come back to her. She had run to him whenever he jumped in through the window, clinging to him, so glad to see him.

  She did not run to him anymore. She did not hold him or weep into his neck.

  Dropping her cloak on the bed, she showed him the piece of paper.

  “Philip . . . ,” she began. “If you come tomorrow, I will not be here.”

  He stiffened.

  “This is a letter from my sister Amélie,” she went on. “She and Juliette miss me, and I miss them. I’m going home to Nantes for a little while.” She held up one hand. “Not long; just a few months.”

  “No.”

  He stood up.

  He didn’t like the quality of her voice, the way she was trying to put him at ease.

  She tried to smile. “You remember Amélie, don’t you? She adored you. She could not wait to have you for her brother.”

  That was something else she’d told him, that they had planned to go to a church together and have a ceremony that would bind them. His body remembered certain actions, such as how to ride a horse and use a sword. But he didn’t remember events or plans, and he didn’t remember Amélie.

  “No,” he repeated.

  He didn’t want her in Nantes. He wanted her here.

  Her smile vanished, and her dark eyes glinted in the candle-light.

  “You never stopped me from visiting my sisters before,” she said. “You were always glad for me to see them because it made me happy.”

  He didn’t understand this, and he moved closer.

  “Don’t!” she snapped. “You’re filthy, and you stink.”

  He flinched, staring at her. She’d never spoken to him like that before. Almost instantly, her expression melted to regret and she came to him.

  “Forgive me. I didn’t mean that.”

  But she couldn’t take the words back. With a sobbing sound, she turned away and clutched a miniature painting from the top of a chest near the bed, holding it against her stomach. He’d seen it many times. It depicted a handsome man wearing a black overcoat and white cravat. His smooth red-brown hair was pulled back at the nape of his neck.

  Touching this painting always made Maggie sad.

  She looked up at him and didn’t even try to hide her revulsion.

  Why was she looking at him like that?

  He stepped over to a large mirror atop her dressing table, trying to see himself as she did. His hair was snarled. His soiled shirt was open, and dried red flakes from a kill he’d made last night still clung to his chest. He raised his lips, and his mouth curved into a snarl.

  He didn’t like what he saw in the mirror, and he didn’t like the reflection in Maggie’s eyes.

  “I’m tired,” she said suddenly. “I want to sleep.”

  He cocked his head in confusion. The bed was only a few feet away. “Then sleep.”

  “No.” Her delicate jaw tightened. “I mean I would like you to go so that I can sleep.”

  She wanted him to leave? She’d never wanted that before.

  “Swear you won’t go to Nantes,” he said.

  She turned on him. “Just leave, Philip! I promise I won’t be away for long, but I need to be with my sisters. I need to be away from this house. I need to be away from you!”

  At this, he snarled openly, making a sound he’d never aimed toward Maggie. Why was she doing this? Why wasn’t she holding him and begging him to come back to her?

  “Go!” she shouted, pointing at the window.

  He whirled and jumped up onto the sill, dropping one arm down the trellis and then descending rapidly to the yard below.

  Kayli, his bay mare, was tied to a tree, and he strode toward her, grabbing her reins. Then he stopped.

  His hand was shaking. Maggie hadn’t wanted him in her room. She’d shouted at him. She’d said she would be gone by tomorrow night. Something in her eyes frightened him. She wanted to go away.

  In recent weeks, flashes of memories had been returning to him, of his maker, Angelo, holding him down, biting his neck, and then feeding Philip blood from his wrist. These came in bits and pieces at unwanted moments, but Philip was beginning to realize what they meant.

  He looked back at Maggie’s window.

  He couldn’t stand the way she’d looked at him tonight, and he couldn’t stand the thought of her leaving, even for a few months . . . if it was only a few months. Worse, he’d heard in her voice how much she wanted to be with these sisters, these people who were not him.

  She should want to be with him.

  The thought made him angry.

  He turned and jogged back to the house, grabbing the trellis and swinging himself up. Near the top, he launched himself up onto the windowsill. Maggie was just removing her dress, wearing only the white shift beneath.

  When she looked over at him, he saw something new reflect back at him: fear.

  Maggie had never been afraid of him.

  She dropped her dress and bolted for the bedroom door. He jumped down and caught her before she’d taken three steps, grabbing her arm and jerking her back.

  “Philip, don’t!” she cried, swinging at him with her fist, hitting him in the face.

  He caught her wrist and then used his weight to drop them both to the floor, pinning her with his shoulders. She fought and pushed against him, screaming at him to stop, but he barely heard her.

  He existed to hunt and to feed, but never once had even considered feeding on Maggie. She was the only thing that brought him comfort or eased his mind. Now he could see the pulse at the base of her throat, and he bit down into her skin.

  He could still smell her perfume.

  She sobbed and pushed at him until she grew weak, and his actions turned from memory to pure instinct. He knew what to do. Her heart slowed. It almost stopped, and he tore open his own wrist, pressing it into her mouth.

  When she latched onto him, draining him back, he was surprised by how much it hurt, but he didn’t pull away. He let her drink until he began to feel weakened himself. Her eyelids fluttered, and she fell dormant.

  He knew she would.

  Disengaging his wrist from her mouth, he picked her up, moving her to the bed. She would sleep for hours. Again, he didn’t know how he knew this, only that he was right.

  The miniature was on the dressing table now, and he walked over to pick it up, studying the face.

  Moving to the wardrobe, he found shirts and boots that seemed familiar. He saw water in a basin. He washed his face and chest and put on a clean shirt. Then he wet his hair down and used Maggie’s comb to try to work out some of the tangles.

  He would look different when she woke up. From now on, he would try to look like the man in the picture.

  An hour before dawn, he closed the shutters tightly and lit another candle.

  “What did you do?” Maggie whispered from the bed. “I can’t feel my heart.”

  She was awake, watching him.

  He didn’t answer. In truth, he did not know what he’d done or why, only that he wanted her to look at him as she had before, with longing.

  He remained at Maggie’s side for the next few years.

  After he turned her, she had mourned for several nights, curled up in a ball, hating the change in herself and blaming him.

  Then she began to adjust, becoming a vampire.

  A small voice told him that he should stay and teach her what she needed to know. The first few weeks were full of hope and relief. She didn’t look at him with revulsion.

  But after a while, he began to feel that something else was wrong.

  She did not go to Nantes. She never shouted at him or called him “filthy” or told him to leave, but she also didn’t touch him or hold him or speak of how they had once loved each other.<
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  He taught her how to hunt and was pleased when he learned that her gift was the same as his own.

  Maggie had been alluring before, and she was alluring now. Much more so.

  She glittered.

  Victims fell into her lap.

  He liked hunting with her. But he kept waiting for her to reach out to him, to tell him that she was happy they were the same now, that everything would go back to the way it was when she loved him.

  She never did.

  Yet, he remained convinced he’d done the correct thing. What else could he have done?

  “Tell me again about how I was before,” he asked one night, “about how I made my father so angry by promising to go to the church with you.”

  Not in the mood for an elaborate hunt, they were walking in a small village, looking for possible prey who had stumbled off alone.

  To his shock, Maggie shrugged her smooth shoulders.

  “I’m sorry, Philip,” she said. “I still remember everything from before, but it’s like looking at someone else’s life.”

  He stopped walking.

  “What do you mean? Tell me how we were before.”

  She wore most of her hair down loose tonight, with only a few sections pinned up. She was pale and lovely, and her dark eyes seemed hard. She shook her head. “I can’t tell you. When I think of you then, I see only some softhearted mortal I’d want to feed on.” Moving back beside him, she added, “But I like the way you are now.”

  His chest felt tight, and he started walking again, not wanting her to see his face. He had not succeeded in building a bridge to close the gap between them.

  Instead, he’d broken it.

  chapter 11

  Simone clawed with her thoughts as Philip jerked away. “Wait!” she cried.

  She wanted to hold on; she wanted to see more.

  “That’s enough,” he rasped, leaning over the steering wheel. “I never should have . . .”

  He didn’t finish the sentence, and he looked so stricken, she fought to gain control of herself, realizing that while lost in his memories, she’d stopped projecting her gift. She turned it back on, letting it flow into him, clouding his mind and helping him focus on something else.

  But on the inside, she was singing. She’d been right.

  This was fate.

  Philip had turned Maggie, and Maggie had turned Simone, so she shared his blood. Whatever love he and Maggie shared had not crossed the boundaries of death—or undeath. It had been lost the night he turned her.

  From that point on, events had been rushing forward to this moment in time.

  From him to Simone.

  She loved him for exactly who he was and what he was. She had no past comparisons and no illusions.

  All the pointless, monotonous nights she’d drifted through in clubs and theaters and lounges only made her value what she saw now.

  A line of fate that stretched back almost two hundred years.

  It had taken far too long, but it all made sense.

  And they were finally together.

  As her gift flowed around him, the tight lines of his face eased. After a moment, he reached down and started the car.

  She’d never been so happy.

  Philip and Simone didn’t get back to her house until an hour before dawn.

  When they walked in from the garage, he felt numb, like a stranger to himself.

  Her lovely face was glowing, her dress was ruined, and she seemed euphoric, nearly dancing ahead of him into the living room.

  “There’s another bathroom through the kitchen,” she said, pointing. “You can use it to clean up.” She looked down at herself. “I’m a mess.” She smiled. “I’ll be myself again soon. We can sleep out the day and go out tonight. We’ll go south this time, to Colorado Springs or Castle Rock.”

  She stepped closer, whispering up to him, “You can show me more. I’ll do anything you want.” She headed toward the stairs. “Pretend this is your home.”

  As soon as she was gone, her gift began to fade.

  Then it vanished altogether.

  He stood looking around the living room. Bits and pieces of the night were coming back to him, along with an unfamiliar feeling in the pit of his stomach.

  Had he really shown her the raw emotions of the night he turned Maggie?

  He was sated, full of blood and life and the sweet taste of his victims’ terror. But without Simone’s gift, his head was beginning to clear.

  She wanted to go out again tonight?

  After living for months with Wade and Eleisha, going hunting only when necessary, the idea of going out again tonight struck him as . . . incorrect. He walked through the cold, sterile furniture of Simone’s main room, studying the sculptures and glass tables.

  There was no television.

  There were no wooden shelves pushed up against the walls.

  There were no movies to watch, no cards to play, no books to be read aloud.

  What did she do here when she wasn’t hunting? He looked down at a tightly stretched leather couch, thinking perhaps no one had ever sat upon it. Upstairs, he heard the shower running.

  Simone didn’t live in this house. Not really. She went out at night. She went to clubs. She hunted. She played her games with mortal lovers.

  His head grew clearer, and the feeling in his stomach turned into a knot.

  He’d left Eleisha at a hotel alone all night, and he hadn’t even called her. He’d left his phone behind in his coat pocket, lying on the floor. How could he have done that?

  But he knew. He’d done it because he’d wanted to, because watching Simone’s memories of feeding had driven him to the edge.

  Maybe he had even lied to Eleisha about his reasons for coming here.

  Maybe he’d lied to himself.

  He must have known from the moment Simone sat down at the Mercury Cafe that she’d never be able to exist inside a community at the underground. She was no frightened, lost vampire looking for protection and help and the company of her own kind. She was a killer and a player, and she’d probably laugh out loud at Eleisha’s four laws.

  He’d wanted to come here alone. He had envied Simone, and he wanted a taste of her existence.

  In turn, he’d given her a taste of his—or what it once had been.

  But now . . . now the reality of his actions and the possible repercussions were beginning to sink in.

  He strode fast through the kitchen into a bathroom and looked in the mirror. His shirt was soaked and crusted with blood. Red, drying flakes covered his face and the right side of his hair.

  He stared at himself, and he remembered looking at himself in Maggie’s mirror in 1821 like it had been yesterday.

  He didn’t want to be this anymore.

  He wanted to go home to the underground.

  Looking around in panic, he wasn’t sure what to do. He didn’t have any other clothes, and he couldn’t go back to the hotel like this. And what would he say when he got there?

  The water upstairs stopped running.

  He looked back into the mirror. He’d left Eleisha alone for two nights.

  With a single jerk, he pulled his shirt over his head and turned on the hot water at the sink. Rapidly, he scrubbed his face and hair and chest until he was clean, and then he dried off with a towel. He took the shirt with him when he left the bathroom, thinking he could stuff it into a Dumpster once he got outside.

  Out in the living room, he found the sheathed machete where he’d dropped it the night before. He hooked it to his belt and then pulled on his long coat, buttoning it all the way to his throat.

  Simone was coming down the stairs in a satin bathrobe.

  “Philip?” she said. “What are you doing?”

  She was so lovely dressed in silk, like a porcelain doll.

  He took a step back. “I have to go.”

  “What?” Her eyes grew wide.

  She began to let her gift engulf him, but his head was clear now, and he didn’t want
to feel hazy anymore.

  Not noticing the lack of effect, she suddenly nodded. “Oh, you’re going to tell her, aren’t you? That you’re not going back to Portland? I know you want to get it over with, but just wait until tonight. The sun will be up too soon. You can tell her tonight, and then you and I can go hunting.”

  “No, I’m going home.” He took another step back, shaking his head. “Eleisha and I were wrong to come here.”

  As he moved toward the door, her expression tightened with shock. “Home? You are home.”

  He kept moving.

  “Philip!”

  But by the time she called his name, he was outside, running down the street.

  Eleisha was sitting on the floor again with her arms around her knees.

  Hours had passed. Seamus had not arrived. Dawn was coming.

  She shouldn’t have waited. She shouldn’t have followed Wade’s advice. She should have gone out looking for Philip, and now it was too late. She’d have to wait until tonight.

  Dim gray from the sky came in through the windows, casting long shadows on the walls, making the furniture appear cold, almost menacing.

  She pressed her forehead into her knees. She was alone.

  No one knew better than Eleisha that vampires could die—truly die and float away like dust drifting on the air.

  Edward . . . William . . . Maggie . . . Robert.

  Her chest constricted when she let herself even imagine tomorrow without Philip. The sky seemed even lighter, but she wouldn’t go into the bedroom, not without him. Where was he? And what of Simone?

  With her eyes closed, Eleisha saw Robert’s hawklike face staring back at her. She’d promised him that she’d teach the laws.

  She’d promised.

  And now she was sitting here in the dim light before dawn, helpless, useless, and frozen with fear.

  A scraping sound made her look back up.

  The hotel room door opened, and Philip nearly stumbled inside. He looked down at her. His hair was wet, but he seemed unhurt.

  She jumped to her feet, sick with relief, a hundred questions passing through her mind.

  “Philip.”