My Love Eternal

by Liz Strange

  The power radiating from him was so grotesquely evident I feared it might overtake me, and leave me defenceless to an attack. The waves of power rode through my body, a tingling and uncomfortable pressure starting in my brain. He lifted his thin hand and indicated the chair opposite him at the table.

  “Sit down,” he said, though his lips never moved.

  The next thing I knew I was seated across from him, and my fear intensified, blocking my ability to think clearly. Up close the power was even stronger, its immensity pressing against my body. It slithered over my skin like snails, my revulsion now as great as my fear, but I did not leave. In fact, I forced myself to make eye contact with the man, and when I did, the shock of recognition almost knocked me to the floor.

  He regarded me with luminescent green eyes. They looked out from a face so pale and gaunt it reminded me of photos I had seen of concentration camp victims. His features were unremarkable— long thin nose, high forehead and pointed chin. His corn-yellow hair fell limply to his shoulders. His face was plain, and so completely devoid of expression it was terrifying. Anything could be going on in the mind behind that blank stare. His eyes were dead holes, sucking you in with their emptiness. His long, thin body was splayed casually over the hard, wooden chair, hands like dead fish atop of the table.

  Those skeletal fingers began reaching for me, and inside I cringed at the thought of them touching any part of my body. I could not move. Then, as they slid over my hands, his touch dry and cold, I was shocked with an image so powerful I almost blacked out. There was no transition, and no subtlety to my absorption of his thoughts. It was a blunt, aggressive seizure of my mind, where I was forced to view something with no way of protecting myself.

  I saw a group of men, including the one I was now seated before, gathered around a large rectangular table. All of the men were older and obviously wealthy, judging by the manner in which they were dressed. The table was piled high with food and bottles of wine. I had no frame of reference, but it reminded me of something I had seen in a movie once, about the life of Henry the VIII. It was the same style of dress, and style for the men’s facial hair, as well as the wigs they wore. The room was dark. Only candles and a crackling fire offered any source of light. The faces around me were paunchy and overweight, and in many glimmered the demon of intoxication. Raucous laughter broke out, and goblets were slammed together in merriment, yet the one whose memory I was experiencing did not smile. The others’ laughter rose in a crescendo, the room began to spin… laughter, laughter, footsteps.

  When I became aware once again, I was back in the dingy room and there was only silence. I felt weak, drained. Then, there was a familiar touch to my arm, and I turned my head feebly to find Giovanni at my side. His presence was calming and seemed to be at least partially shielding me from the effects of the other man’s power. His eyes were worried and angry.

  “She’s all right, don’t be melodramatic.” The man had a deep, upper-class English accent. “I was only playing with her.”

  I turned toward the sound of the man’s voice, and found a humourless smile on his thin lips.

  Giovanni’s face was tight with anger when he spoke. “I know about your games all too well.”

  “Oh, Giovanni, why can’t you just let the past be the past? I did not come to argue you with you. In fact, I thought you might have found some peace in your life at last, since you met this enchanting young lady.”

  Giovanni was crazy with anger— the strange man’s words were only egging him on. I had never seen him so furious, so on the verge of losing control. His face was taut. “She is not yours to play with! Do you understand me? Anything that may exist between us is exactly that— between us! And I will not allow any harm to come to her, especially from you! I am not that desperate, frightened fledgling you left all those years ago!” His anger thundered out through his words, attacking the waves of power still stemming from the stranger. I raised my hands to my face, shielding myself from his outburst.

  The man simply stared, his face returning to its previous neutral expression. Then Giovanni’s mask of anger slipped a little, and I witnessed some of the sadness and uncertainty that that been in his eyes for weeks. “And why now? After all this time, why at all? What could you possibly want from me after all these years?”

  The stranger smiled coldly, a look that would have turned a human’s blood to ice. He looked at me pointedly before he answered. “What does it matter now? I think that you have made it very clear you have no interest in discussing anything with me.” His tone was mocking.

  “And what is that you would have us discuss? How you took my human life away from me? How you caused me to kill an innocent girl, a girl who I thought myself to be in love with at the time? How you left me without explaining anything about what we are, the dangers, our needs, powers? Did you really think you owed me nothing after forcing this existence on me?”

  “I gave you the gift of eternal life, my dear boy. What more could I possibly owe you?” His voice dripped with condescendence, and a nasty sneer spread across his face.

  Giovanni didn’t answer and his silence was even more unnerving than his outburst. The man stood, and I couldn’t believe how tall he was. His pronounced thinness only added to his height, his arms long and gangly, but I knew his appearance was deceptive. His mild, even sickly facade belied the strength I knew he possessed. “The facts are simple, Giovanni. I am here and I am your maker. I would have thought that you would have many things to discuss with me. Haven’t you always wanted to confront me and get your feelings about this out in the open?” His eyes were cold, not a spark of sympathy or sincerity visible in their emerald depths.

  A strange and horrible look passed between the two men, a look that made my body stiffen with fear. Then, before I could even attempt to shield myself, a wave of power struck me with tremendous force. The room went black.

  There was the sensation of falling, though I knew my feet were planted firmly on the ground. I caught a glimpse of myself, corpse-like and dying in the moments before Giovanni brought me over. Then I raced back further still in the trail of memories, flying past unfamiliar people and places, until arriving again at that fateful night. I saw her sweet face and the waves of blond hair. I saw her as clearly as if she were standing before me, exactly as she had been in life.

  I saw her with him in the moment when he had appeared out of the darkness like a phantom, and snatched the unsuspecting girl. I saw the house through his eyes, as he approached. Then as he stepped inside, with the girl limp in his arms from faint, the intensity of the vision doubled in strength. I could feel the power of the memory from both men, the picture of it clear and painfully real in my mind. It clawed its way into my own brain, forever etching every second of that horrible moment in time into my memories. I saw, heard and felt every terrible step in that young girl’s death, from the first touch of his fangs, to her lifeless body dropping to the floor.

  Then, as suddenly as the spell had come, it was gone. I was rocked back to the present, my consciousness slamming back into my weakened body. The men were shouting angrily at each other, their voices shaking the dirty glass in the window with their vehemence. Outside a group of people passed, and I could hear their comments about the intensity of the fight going on inside the building.

  I was shaky, but I forced myself to pull it together. “We need to leave here,” I said. “This may be a quiet part of town, but there are still a few people around, and we don’t need any negative attention. Especially not from anyone who might think to call the police. If this is going to continue, we should head back to the house. We’ve caused enough of a disturbance here tonight.”

  The stranger broke off eye contact with Giovanni at the sound of my voice. He looked at me with hostility and gave me another one of his soulless smiles. I was terribly afraid, and smart enough to know that I should be. He was very powerful and very old. The thoughts that he projected at me were so intense, nothing like what I experienced with Gi
ovanni. I silently wondered if it were because of the nature of the thoughts intensifying their experience. The stranger’s were powerfully angry and vile, but Giovanni more often than not slipped into my mind with feeling of love, and pleasant memories of his past.

  “See now, Giovanni, your lady here knows how to behave reasonably. Why don’t we go to your home, where you can have a nice chat with one of your oldest friends?”

  Giovanni’s face remained impassive, but his eyes revealed the depth of his hatred for the man before him. “You are no friend of mine.” I could feel how desperately he was fighting within himself not to lose control.

  The man sighed. “Giovanni, be sensible. There may never be another opportunity.”

  Giovanni said nothing. He simply stared at the man with bitter contempt. I had never seen him so angry, or so unnerved before. That single night had scarred him so deeply he believed himself incapable of anything good for every night he had existed until we met. He had lived for all that time not only in physical darkness, but also with a darkness within his mind he could never escape. We stood there in silence, the three of us, in our forced and tragic clique. Without those two men’s past, Giovanni and I would never have had our present.

  Then, as though he read my mind, he turned on his heel and with a savage tug of my arm, pulled me along behind him. I was a silent, but not unwilling witness to what was to come. I simply had no say in what was about to unfold.

  The three of us hurtled with lightning speed through the near-empty streets, and across the stretch of hilly countryside separating our home from the main town. Our figures would have been nothing more than blurred shadows across an otherwise unblemished evening sky. Throughout the few minutes it took us to reach the gates, I imagined I could feel the stranger’s spidery fingertips brushing across my bare neck. I suspected if anything other than my own imagination was happening, that he was most likely giving me the illusion of his touch.

  Soon enough, the distance was crossed, and our home stood before us. Something in its presence gave me a new resolve, and some peace of mind.

  Once inside, I stood on surer ground, and some of Giovanni’s tension had also subsided. He was angry, there was no doubt, but a few steps back from the edge of explosion. This was more of the man I knew and loved, a man who was capable of anything. I tried to give him my silent empathy to know that our front was unified, but the negative feelings churning about inside my love clouded our connection. Instead I took his hand, and Giovanni immediately squeezed it without looking my way.

  We entered the sitting room through a door to the immediate right of the front entrance. It was a space that was rarely used, except on the very few occasions we entertained. Even then, it was always about business. For Giovanni it was about making money and securing assets. For me it was about the acquisition of information.

  Right then my only thought was that I didn’t want that man to be in any of the rooms where we spent most of our time. It was as if his very presence would sour the comfort and joy we found there. Giovanni and I sat together on a loveseat, while the stranger took a chair opposite us. He gazed about the room silently, a disapproving expression pinching his corpse-like face.

  The blond man held his skeletal hands in his lap, his posture prim. On his thin slash of a mouth, that icy smile had returned and settled, disturbing me more than I could ever possibly describe. When he turned it toward me, its invisible tentacles reached out, crawling under my skin. It was a terrible thing to experience, and it stayed sealed on his hollow face, all the more awful because I was aware of what kind of person existed behind that smile. Distantly, twelve peals of the bell from the town’s main church rang out.

  The tension in the room was stifling. I didn’t dare say a word. It felt as if the slightest misstep would cause all hell to break loose. At last Giovanni broke the unbearable silence, his voice cold and quiet. “Why have you come here? I will not tolerate anything that could hurt her, or bring suspicion on our life here.”

  The smile did not waiver. “I thought you brought me here to talk, Giovanni, not to give me more of your arrogance and threats.”

  “Threats are the least of what you deserve after what you did to me, and the danger you left me in. This is where we live, and you are intruding here. There is nothing that I could hear from you that would make any difference to me now.”

  “Oh, Giovanni. Still the emotional, little fool, aren’t you? I can’t be bothered with theatrics, my dear boy, so don’t waste them on me. Perhaps they work with your lady friend here, but I really don’t appreciate them at all. Something in that may have once attracted me to you, but not any longer. This is not some kind of pissing contest either! Could you not look a bit past your anger and humility, and consider the possibility that what I have to discuss with you is something worthwhile, necessary to your survival even?” His voice held the tiniest edge of anger.

  The silence was agonising. There was much to talk about, but too much history standing in the way of progress. When at last Giovanni spoke, I lurched forward in my seat, his grip on my leg the only thing stopping me from tumbling to the floor.

  His words slashed into the room with bitter vehemence. “What is that you want? It’s you who made contact with me, and yet you are saying nothing. Why are you here? If you have something to tell me then out with it, otherwise get out of my home.”

  Again the man said nothing, which only infuriated Giovanni more. “How did you find me? How do you know about my life?” he demanded.

  “It wasn’t very difficult, believe me, Giovanni. I had existed for a very long time before I crossed your path, and I developed many contacts and resources, not to mention acquiring considerable skills of my own. In my own opinion, you are a somewhat predictable man. There were very few times when I lost all knowledge of your whereabouts, and it never took me long to pick up your trail again. You should be glad your relentless pursuers are not the trackers I am, or you would have perished long ago. Though you may not have known it, I have never been far from you and your escapades. I especially enjoyed the incident in India. What was that… seventy, eighty years ago now? I don’t remember.”

  He then turned abruptly and cast a sharp look at me. “Now you, you were a surprise. I thought he lost all that romantic nonsense long ago, and then he met you. I was shocked that he chose any kind of companion, especially after the first two attempts, but to think that he had fallen in love, I just couldn’t believe it.” He returned the conversation to Giovanni. “You still have a thing for silly, pretty young women.” With those last words a vivid image of Seraphine’s dead body was thrust into my mind.

  The force of the image was a path of agony through my brain. I knew Giovanni received the image as well, because he shifted slightly, but he was much stronger than I, and therefore better able to ward of the psychic attack. Panic took hold of me like hands around my throat. I could barely see and my brain throbbed terribly. Yet when I looked to my side, Giovanni was calm and composed. All the rage vanished from his demeanour, and my weary mind reeled as it tried to understand his reaction. It was confusing, and the stranger’s power was breaking me down.

  Giovanni sat there smug and silent, and the stranger continued his cold, but empty stare. The clock ticked of the minutes like years. The tension in the room itched at my skin. I looked back and forth between the men’s faces, but neither was giving in. When I could stand it no longer I jumped to my feet and let out a savage howl. The sound of my scream filled the room, releasing me slightly from the unbearable pressure and uncertainty.

  The man also stood. He drew his tall, lanky body up until he towered over me, and my screams died in my throat. He pointed his long bony finger at me, outstretched from the hand of Death itself. I felt the full force of his powers unleashed upon me, and I crumpled. I found myself looking up into his face, his thin lips now pulled back in a wicked snarl.

  His teeth were very white and sharp, his fangs fully exposed, and the sight drove terror straight into my hea
rt. “You shut up, you insolent child. I have had just about enough from the both of you. I have been more than patient with Giovanni’s anger, and your inexperience, but enough is enough!”

  I was stunned into silence. Instantly, Giovanni was on his feet, his body angled slightly in front of mine in a protective stance. “No, I think it’s you who doesn’t know whom you’re dealing with. I may not be as old as you are, but you delude yourself about my strength, and you are in our home, and it’s my patience you are trying, not the other way around.” I felt the reassuring touch of Giovanni’s hand against my stomach as I stood up behind him. I pressed into his body as he continued. “If there was actually something to share, you would have revealed it by now. I think you’re on a fishing expedition of some kind. For what purpose, I can only imagine, and the fact that you been following me around for all these years is not intimidating, it’s pathetic. Now get out of here.”

  In a flash the stranger was in Giovanni’s space, but he did not so much as flinch. “I will leave when I am good and ready to leave. I see that you have grown overconfident over the years, in addition to your ridiculous attachment to this girl. You really think that you are any match to my power. If I wanted you— or that girl— destroyed you couldn’t stop me. I can crush everything you have here in the blink of an eye. Why I felt the need to share anything with you is beyond me. I knew it was a mistake to change you the minute it happened. You are too sensitive, to needy to be vampire. Look at this ridiculous arrangement you have here— playing house as if you were human. It’s nauseating and absurd. You are a monster, a killer and nothing else, and making yourself believe anything other than that doesn’t make it real. Dragging another into your mess and denials doesn’t make it real either.”

  “That’s enough.”

  “Enough is it? You think that you impress anyone here? You think you’re so gallant standing up for your woman, is that it? Don’t bother. It’s not me you need to fear. There are far worse things conspiring against the two of you than little old me. It was as a courtesy that I came here, and look how I’m treated? Threatened and insulted! Please. Save your bravado, it’s embarrassing. No woman is worth this much trouble.”