by Damian Serbu
The Vampire's Angel
Copyright © 2009 by Damian Serbu
Dedication
Part I: Letters
Part II:The Dawn of Revolution
Part III: The Vampire
Part IV: Intensification
Part V: Storming the Bastille
Part VI: Stagnation
Part VII: Intro the Quagmire
Part VIII: The Fall
Part IX: Resurrection
Part X: I Know the One My Heart Loves
XI: Conversion
XII: The Stone Removed
About the Author
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The Vampire's Angel
by
Damian Serbu
Copyright © 2009 by Damian Serbu
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Parts of this work are fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, or events is entirely coincidental.
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For Paul My Love, My Life, My Inspiration
The Vampire's Angel
by
Damian Serbu
Part I: Letters
Catherine's Letter
Paris, France 19 April 1805
My dearest Xavier,
I already miss you, though you scarcely left a few days ago. Please know that I love you as much as I ever did, that you mean more to me than anything on this earth. I know that you want me to restrain my doting, but that will never end! An elder sister has eternal obligations to her youngest brother.
I write to thank you for reviewing everything with me once again. I realize that you and I return to the memories of the last few years too often, but in some strange way it helps soothe my heart to speak of it. Time has deadened the wounds and dulled some of the excitement, but the pain will never pass entirely. Nor can I ever forget the mortality—and immortality—which confronted us. I especially appreciate that you told me the complete story this time. Your perspective answered so many mysteries for me!
I have never felt better in my life or been so excited. I really did put our past to rest when you left. I think that I came to terms with it. I do not mean to make my situation sound remarkable, because this is probably the path that so many of us followed after the Revolution. It took time and Napoleon’s firm control to wash away the chaos and bring peace.
I hesitate to mention this, but I think that I will enclose the whole thing for your viewing, so you cannot hide! After you left, I wrote down the entire saga, everything that I could remember, from my perspective and yours. I suppose that this allowed me to accept it. I tried to see it from afar, as if I had not participated in the drama. Reading it with this detachment makes the unexplained and often unbelievable forces that came into our lives all the more remarkable.
Which leads to my next point. Now that I have finished this beast of a manuscript, I have no idea what to do with it. I certainly can’t publish it because of the embarrassingly personal content. I decided, therefore, to send it to you. I wonder if it will help you to read it? Do you want to add to it? It can become our private family diary.
I know it sounds strange, but I wrote in third person. I can see you smirking already, analyzing me in a thousand ways and mocking me as well. I sought detachment, some objective view of each episode. If you contribute to this, will you please follow this format? (Yes, I still like to control what you do.)
One last thing: I found it surprising when I finished that so much focused on you, that the story revolved around you. It concerned me at first, but it did make sense. From the day you were born, Xavier, you were the heart of the Saint-Laurents. We all loved you dearly and worked first and foremost to protect you. In the end, what other perspective could serve the purpose of seeing all of this? So I hope you do not mind being my main character.
Let me know your thoughts when you have finished, and don’t forget to visit your aging sister frequently as you sail around the globe. With all of my love and affection, Catherine
Xavier's Reply
New Orleans, Louisiana 29 May 1805
Darling Catherine,
You absolutely astound me! Only you would commit all of this to paper, but I must admit that I enjoyed reading it. I found it exhilaratingly and excruciatingly accurate as I relived the passion of every moment. I wept again, and I laughed with joy. I started anew each time those events otherwise relegated to folklore burst into our lives. As you stated, time did deaden the pain but I think a morsel will always remain with me.
I see no need to thank me incessantly for visiting because I cherish our time together as much as you. And, like you, this last time meant more than usual. I am more at peace with the past than ever before.
As you requested, I added to the manuscript where my experiences and memory filled in portions unknown or forgotten by you. I hope that this helps, and of course I obeyed and wrote in third person as if I had nothing to do with the whole affair. I enlisted Thomas’s aid as well, though it was difficult to keep him inside and focused on writing. He of course knew much more about immortality than either of us.
I will come for another dose of doting before you know it. With the greatest of devotion, I remain your ever loving brother, Xavier
Part II: The Dawn of Revolution
Thomas: Angel Sighting
15 May 1789 Early evening
THE NIGHT AT last darkened as Thomas wandered the streets. The city fascinated him, and he felt unrest as he watched and listened to the people he passed. Though many Parisians shunned the wealthy, Thomas came in and out of any crowd that he chose with little resistance, commanding people with his presence. And, when his personality failed to assuage someone, his American citizenship placated them. They wanted democracy, so they revered him for coming from a land that had already tossed out a king. Then, too, he could walk among the wealthy and powerful because he had all the money he needed.
This evening was calm, with no one shouting or rioting. Thomas would venture to the saloons a little later to find some companionship, but for now he watched the common people. Searching for the right person for tonight’s entertainment, he headed from his flat along the Seine toward the Bastille. He sought the poor this evening, not the stuffy rich who bored him even in their nastiness. The Parisian destitute, on the edge of starvation, offered new excitement. As he sauntered along, avoiding the puddles and dirt, he noticed that people he passed stared at him and he smiled, because he knew that he cut a dashing figure. Tonight he wore his favorite color, all black, which one person recently told him attracted people because it shunned contemporary fashion, which encouraged bright tones on men. And he knew that his chiseled body also brought the glances. Many a woman and man had commented on his physique and complexion, which sported a constant tan. His long, black hair gave him, in the words of his dearest friend Anthony, a hair presence.
He turned onto Rue St. Louis and headed north. The houses here were dingier, the streets narrower, and the people dirtier. He traveled well into a residential area an
d found a secluded corner, the perfect place to watch for tonight’s prey.
A few workers stumbled by, already drunk and searching for their homes. Then some children frolicked by with a group of women. Still nothing tempted him. Then a soldier sauntered through the streets and stared at him, a dark figure in a corner. This was more to Thomas’s liking, but he saw goodness in the soldier’s face. He would not tempt fate with this one. The young man brushed a lock of blond hair out of his eye and passed slowly. Thomas watched and marveled at his beautiful backside as he faded into the night.
And then Thomas nearly lost his breath when he turned and looked the other way.
Had God sent an angel?
This man had short brown hair, piercing hazel eyes, and soft skin. He had defined musculature—but not too defined, just slightly toned— that Thomas loved.
The gentleman passed and Thomas fell in behind, studying him further. The stranger remained oblivious to his follower.
A priest. Thomas shook his head. How on earth did this godlike creature end up serving that vile Catholic Church? He disdained Christianity and all of its judgments, particularly despising missionaries, whom he had encountered all too often in America.
Yet he followed anyway, hiding among the buildings and trailing so quietly that the curé never suspected that a man behind him was studying the angles of his body beneath the black robe.
As they passed a narrow street, the priest suddenly turned and peered toward the cramped passage, then dashed down it.
Thomas rushed to the corner and stuck his head around. He was close enough to hear the abbé’s divine voice.
“Can I help you?” the priest asked. “What is it?” He knelt before a young girl, perhaps no more than four, and placed his hand on her shoulder. She sobbed and slumped against the priest, who wrapped his arms around her. “Talk to me. You’re safe. What can I do?”
Her breathing finally slowed. “I’m lost.”
“What’s your name, dear?”
“Delphine,” she whispered.
“Well, Delphine, we’ll find your home. Can you provide a few clues?”
Thomas listened as the priest softly quizzed her. She relaxed as the conversation continued and giggled as the curé joked with her, moving down the long alley with her, talking to her the entire way, until he stooped and picked her up as they continued chatting.
“Do you think we’re close?” he asked.
“I think so.” She looked around, clinging to him.
“Ah! Delphine!” A woman ran toward them and the priest put the girl on the ground, who ran and collapsed into the woman’s arms. “Mama,” she said. “I’ve looked everywhere for you,” her mother replied. “What did I tell you about wandering away? We have just moved, after all. You’ll get lost in this big city.” Then she crossed herself. “Abbé, God intervened yet again to save my daughter.”
“Merely one of his servants, Madame.” The sound of his resonant voice sent waves of passion through Thomas.
“How can I repay you?” she asked.
“You don’t owe anyone anything,” the priest said as he turned to Delphine. “And you, little one, you must be careful in Paris. You can get lost easily, so stay close to your mother.”
She giggled as he tickled her stomach. “I will, abbé.”
Then they left and, abruptly, the priest turned and his eyes widened when he saw Thomas. He paused.
“Monsieur, pardon me, I didn’t see you.”
“And I didn’t mean to startle you, Father. Good evening.” They gazed at each other for more than a moment.
“No harm. Good evening, sir.” The priest nodded politely and walked away.
Too good to be true. Thomas stalked the priest as he turned the corner and entered the gate of a small church. There Thomas leaned against a building, breathing heavily. This entire episode aroused a passion in him that he had to satisfy. He wanted to stand outside the church and wait for the priest, or even knock on the door and talk to him again, but he was too unsettled. He remembered an establishment nearby that would serve this purpose well. He raced to it, slammed through the doors, and sat down before he fell, where instantly a young man of about eighteen years approached him.
“Monsieur, you look unwell. Can I assist you?”
This one wasted little time. And though he desperately needed a bath, he was otherwise attractive enough.
“What are you offering?” Thomas asked with a slight smirk.
“Come, I’ll show you.” He grabbed Thomas’s hand and pulled him up a stairway and into a dimly lit room. “I assume you know that this will cost you, and that I don’t play the passive role.”
“Quite the entrepreneur. I can pay what you charge.” Thomas closed the door and embraced the youth as he kissed him passionately. With great speed, he threw the youngster onto the bed and tore off their clothes.
“Slow down, monsieur,” the young man pleaded.
Thomas did so, then kissed the back of the boy’s neck. Slowly, his fangs descended and he softly pricked the dirty skin to taste the blood before he took this further.
“Do you enjoy biting?” the boy asked.
“Only momentarily,” Thomas replied before he plunged his fangs into the vein.
As the hot liquid flowed across his lips, images of the boy’s life saturated Thomas’s mind. The vision confirmed what Thomas had already ascertained. The young man prostituted himself part-time and was a useless degenerate who attacked and robbed innocent people. He assaulted children, including his brother, merely for sport. Ah, yes. And of course he had already killed. The world did not need him, though he satisfied both of Thomas’s current needs.
He grabbed the young man’s hair and kissed him violently then rolled him over, against his will. He struggled for the first time but Thomas held him tightly.
“I told you,” he said, “I don’t—“
Thomas clamped his hand over the victim’s mouth to muffle his cries. He thrust inside of him and pounded. The young man wriggled and squirmed, crying in pain, but nothing stopped Thomas until he had finished, his tension released as he exploded inside.
Sated, he released the lad, who pushed him off, cursing. “I told you, and I warned you, you ass.” He scrambled off the bed and snatched a knife from under the mattress and in his nakedness came toward Thomas.
When the youth tried to stab him, Thomas grabbed his wrist and squeezed hard until the blade dropped to the floor. He pulled the young man toward him and stared into his eyes, the young man’s expression now terrified.
“You can’t win. You won’t haunt this city anymore. Go peacefully.”
Thomas bent the boy’s head to the side, exposing his neck, and plunged his fangs into the flesh again. He drained him until the youth’s heart stopped and then he consumed the blood as the dreadful life beneath his lips passed again through his mind.
Thomas kissed the puncture wounds to heal them and flung the corpse to the floor before dressing, loving that a city this size meant no one questioned yet another death. He brushed his clothing off, sexually satisfied and fed, before he hurried down the stairs and out the door without anyone noticing. The night breeze felt good on his skin, and total darkness surrounded him as he continued walking through Paris, taking in its vibrancy.
Catherine: Background Politics
15 May 1789 Mid-evening
AS CATHERINE WAITED, she thought about how nothing in her thirty-one years had ever excited her so much as the past few months’ political events had. True, famine and unrest accompanied the changes in Paris, but she relished anything new or intriguing. She had heard all too often from most of the men in her life that a proper woman of her noble stature should not speak of revolutionary ideas about liberty, equality, and egalité. Her oldest brother, Michel, had said recently that her fierce independence and refusal to marry gave people pause. She responded to all of them that such decorum bored her and they could either accept her passion or leave her presence. She was not about to miss the e
xcitement of what was going on in France because of her sex. She had even considered converting their family home into a salon, where anyone could come and talk about the revolution and politics freely.
“Abbé,” she exclaimed as she jumped out of her chair. “You’re late, and it’s already dark. But come here, I’ve a lot to tell you.”
Xavier smiled as he walked into the room. She saw her brother almost every day but never stopped marveling at his beauty. He had the face of an angel, his dark hair and hazel eyes sparkled, and the garb of a priest added a forbidden allure to his demeanor. Her friends often lamented his entering the priesthood because they wanted a chance to marry Xavier Saint-Laurent. Catherine, however, suspected that his sexual longings required something else.
“Oh, stop it. Would you please just call me Xavier? I can’t be your abbé, I know too much about your sins.” Xavier held his cross to his chest as he leaned over and kissed her cheek. Then he sat opposite her and smiled again. “I see that the unrest of Paris excites you? Those blue eyes are blazing with intensity this evening.”
“Of course. This is the dawn of a new era in France. Women may be able to vote. Did you see the riot this morning?”
“I heard about it. People protest the famine. They won’t starve quietly.”
Catherine listened thoughtfully. Regardless of the topic, he always worried first about how it affected others, especially the poor. She sighed. He fretted too much, consumed with anxiety and seldom able to relax or enjoy himself.