by Lund, S. E.
"The heart has its reasons that reason knows not of."
Pascal
We take Blue Hill Avenue to Circuit Drive and stop under a streetlamp in the middle of the park. Michel comes around to my side and leans over me while I'm still in my seat and undoes my belt for me.
"Stay close," he says softly. "If anyone approaches us, play it as if you're my blood slave. Act a bit drunk or stoned. That way, you won't have to say anything and if there's a threat, they won't be expecting you to be capable of self-defense. We definitely do not want anyone to know you're an Adept."
He helps me out of the car and a tremor of excitement goes through me at the prospect of being among vampires. We enter the park, and in the darkness, I can see as if through a night vision scope, allowing me to navigate despite the dimness. Ahead, I see only a sea of trees and brush with a faint green glow over the landscape from starlight and ambient light from the city.
We walk on, Michel still holding my arm, and finally, about two hundred feet inside the park, I see two people under a fir tree, facing each other. Neither is a vampire – vampires have a strange color in the dark due to their body temperature. I glance at Michel – he looks like a stone angel in a graveyard, his skin different shades of grey in my night vision, his blue eyes grey, his pupils huge in the darkness.
"Just a couple of druggies exchanging a needle," he says, leaning down close to me, whispering in my ear. "We have to go deeper. Take care with what you say to me. Remember vampire hearing is very acute. Anyone in the park will hear what we say."
He slides his hand down my arm, his fingers threading through mine. We pass the pair and go farther into the park, stopping at a bench beside a path leading to a clearing in the trees.
"Sit here for a while," he says softly.
I sit beside him and he places his arm around me, pulling me closer, turning to face me while his eyes move over the landscape behind me, so we look like a vampire-human couple instead of a pair of Council Agents on a training mission. Of course, we're both.
As I scan the park around us, a question rises in my mind.
"If scientists were able to develop a cure for vampirism, would you take it?" I say, whispering. I look up at his face when he doesn't answer right away.
"There'll be no cure, Eve," he says and looks down at me. "It's not just a disease. You might be able to alter it, but it won't go away."
"No," I say and shake my head. "It is just a disease. It's likely just a set of mutations that are passed through shared blood, like HIV. Maybe some kind of retrovirus that alters your DNA, turning you into a vampire."
"It's not just a mutation," he says firmly.
"I don't believe that religious drivel," I say and sigh. "Remember I'm an atheist."
"Remember I'm a priest."
"Ah, but you left the priesthood."
"Not by choice."
I exhale heavily and close my eyes, trying to feel drugged, but my experience with drugs is pretty minimal.
"So if you could, you'd become a priest again?"
"Without hesitation."
That hurts me. "You don't mind celibacy?"
"I hate it. A priest has to make sacrifices."
"I think celibacy is wrong," I say, wanting to argue with him. "It's unnatural. Humans are meant to be sexual."
"What's natural? Bach is unnatural, if you mean evolutionary development. Humans are unnatural. We don't need to play piano or compose beautiful works of music. We do because we're metaphysical. We create ourselves, we escape our biology, we mold ourselves into what we want to be to reach a higher plane. Celibacy is just one way of exerting control over desire so you can channel it for other purposes."
"Why aren't you celibate now? If you were, you could channel all that desire into accomplishing your mission," I say, trying to be saucy.
"Eve of a thousand questions…" He takes my chin in his hand and leans down and kisses me. "I am celibate," he says, his lips at my ear. "I have been."
My body responds to that revelation, a surge of something going through me. He's celibate?
I pull away and look in his eyes. "I didn't know. I thought you wanted me."
"I do." His face becomes serious once more. "I try to live my life as a priest, even if I'm not officially one. I pray, Eve. I worship. I ask for forgiveness. I'm hoping for redemption."
"What do you have to ask forgiveness for?" I say softly, thinking how God should be asking forgiveness for making him a vampire. He just shakes his head and looks away from me.
"I was very bad, Eve. I have much to atone for."
"That's why you ripped out pages of the manuscript?"
"Part of the reason, yes."
"If there was a God," I say, "and I don't believe there is one, why would he allow people to be killed by vampires? My mother wasn't a sinner. I don't care what anyone says. She was a good person and didn't deserve to die. I didn't deserve to become motherless. You didn't deserve to become a vampire."
"Eve," he says, his voice almost a whisper. "I don't think vampirism has anything to do with hurting humans. We're like collateral damage."
I frown, unable to let the thought go. "What do you mean? God was punishing someone else?"
He nods but doesn't elaborate.
"Who?" I say finally but he shakes his head and looks away. I say nothing. There's no arguing with people on this and I know it.
"Shh," he says and takes my chin in his hand once more. "Just enjoy the night. Quit thinking so much. Besides, you should just drink." He takes one of my hands in his and holds his other wrist out to me. Drink? He must mean that I should pretend to drink his blood like a good blood slave would. I frown and take his wrist and I hold it in front of me, reluctant to go through with the ruse.
I think about blood slaves – humans who drink vampire blood and are addicted to its effect on their neurotransmitters. To me, they're no different from any other addict. To be pitied. But there's something in the whole idea that draws me and I feel just a slight twinge of shame. Like it's illicit, like it's XXX porn, drawing you in, arousing you, but making you feel slightly tarnished afterwards.
Sitting there with his wrist at my lips, his arm around me, other vampires watching us, does something to me that surprises even me. I feel aroused. My body warms at the thought of this intimate act – drinking his blood. I remember how Michel felt when he drank the woman's blood in my shared memory with him. It was so erotic, that connection he felt when he drank, like the joining of two bodies in sex. I kiss his wrist, and then open my mouth, my tongue on his skin and he gasps.
I turn my face up to him.
"What are you doing to me?" I whisper.
"Nothing," he says, his voice breathless. "That's all you."
Then, a strange warmth floods through me and I know I'm channeling him, his emotions. He feels for me, tenderness, ownership – as if I am so valuable, he'll do anything to protect me.
It's then I realize something not in the papers and books I read about vampires. They're humans whose lives were taken from them, usually against their will, and were forced to become killers to survive, their humanity slowly slipping away because of their hunter nature and need for human blood, slowly losing all emotions unless they maintain contact with us through feeding. It is a curse and in that moment, my heart feels as if it's expanding, growing bigger, admitting vampires back into my category of 'human'.
They really are damned – not by a god as Michel thinks, but by a strange quirk of evolution. Now, instead of wanting to find a drug to poison them, kill them all as I once dreamed of in my fantasies of vengeance, I turn my thoughts to a cure. I wonder if a cure is even possible, but I'm certain that vampirism is some genetic mutation in a virus or other infectious agent that evolved thousands of years ago.
"If vampirism is a genetic mutation or set of mutations, there's always gene therapy. How wonderful would that be – to cure vampirism?" I say, looking in his eyes. "To give you back your life? You could be a priest."
&
nbsp; "You're wrong," he whispers. "But I love your mind."
I smile, my eyes closed, unwilling to be drawn back to the real world. The drowsy warmth I feel builds, the desire in me building along with it, but I'm helpless to stop it. I don't want to stop it. It's so pleasant here, I let myself just drift on this strange cloud of warmth that seems to go on and on.
Then, it breaks and I startle back to the present. Michel turns his body to me and our eyes meet.
"We're not alone," he whispers as he bends down to me, his lips touching my ear. "Remember what I said."
I instantly become alert.
Michel turns away from me slightly, but I keep facing him. Someone has joined us and is standing close. I can sense him.
A vampire.
"I like her blood type," the vampire says, his voice deep and smooth. "B positive. Mostly Irish but some Welsh. I could smell her across the park. Is she temporary or permanent?"
Michel stands and brings me around in front of him, his arms around me, one across my shoulders, the other still holding my hand. He's tall enough so that his chin rests on the top of my head.
"Permanent."
I keep my eyes closed and lean back against Michel, the back of my head against his chest. I try to act drugged as if I'm his blood slave, and it isn't hard to do. I know he's doing something to my mind to ensure I don't panic and I'm glad.
I peer at the vampire through my eyelashes. He's older, with grey hair and that strange grey skin in the darkness. His lips look almost blue, and his mouth's slightly open, revealing sharp canines. He's in hunter mode.
"You couldn't beat me," Michel says flatly, as if answering an unspoken challenge. "Don't even think of trying."
A surge of adrenaline goes through me and Michel squeezes me as if to calm me. Soon enough, I relax and my heart rate slows once more.
"Don't worry," the vampire says. "I'm not interested in fighting."
Michel doesn't say anything but he does relax his arms around me just a bit.
"She's new," the vampire says. "I heard your conversation and she sounds as if she isn't really your property just yet. That's why I came over. You'll have lots of fun with this one. A real challenge."
"That she most definitely is," Michel says in reply but his voice is brusque and not inviting of any further conversation.
Then the vampire turns and is gone, moving so fast he would have blended into the shadows to a normal mortal, but with my night vision, I can follow him. He's off looking for someone to feed on – some poor blood whore in need of money or a fix of vampire blood.
"You did well, Eve. Congratulations," he says and squeezes me. It feels so good, so comforting. I truly feel safe with him. "You survived your first encounter with a vampire in the field."
He takes my hand and pulls me deeper into the trees. Ahead in the moonlight, I see the same vampire with a woman in his arms.
"That was fast," I say.
"Shh," Michel says. "He can hear you."
We watch as the couple embraces for a few moments and then part, the blood whore going off in the other direction from the vampire. It's a straight exchange – blood for money.
Nothing different from prostitution and it makes me very sad with a sense of moral outrage that women are so vulnerable. Emotion fills me – grief that so many women are compromised, being so poor or addicted, or even just with tragic pasts, that compel them to sell themselves as prostitutes, either for sex or blood.
Michel squeezes my hand. "The oldest profession."
When I think of them, my stomach clenches. Suddenly, I'm fearful because I'm afraid of how easy it would be for me to just lose myself in Michel, become his blood slave as well as his servant. How easily I could become one of these women, desperate, selling myself for it, willing to do anything to get it.
"It's disgusting."
"Why so hostile?"
"I don't like exploitation," I say, suddenly angry.
"You won't become one, Eve. I'd never let you."
"I'm really going to have to figure out how to create mental blocks."
He sighs. "I thought you liked our connection," he says softly. "It's what we vampires do. It's as natural to us as breathing. Just remember that I can't compel you. I can't force you to do anything against your will. You have to choose to be my pet."
"I want to leave," I say, sadness filling me. I wrap my arms around myself.
"We're not done here."
But he follows me, not speaking. When we arrive at the car, he opens the door for me and I get in, buckling my own seatbelt. Once we're driving and I know no one can hear me, I speak.
"Tell me how I can block you out," I say.
"No," he says after a hesitation, his voice soft. "Until this thing between us is settled, I need complete access to you so I can be certain. But one day, after it is, you can find your own blocks. I can't tell you what they'll be."
We drive for a moment in silence.
"Eve," he says and his voice is firm. "I need to know how you are without you screening things, keeping things from me. I need to know what you're feeling so I can judge if you can do the job. If you can do 'us'."
I stare out the window at the darkened streets. As much as I want him, I don't know if I can do 'us' – at least, not in the way I think it's going to be.
"Can you take me home?" I say, emotion filling me. "I don't feel well enough to work any longer."
He says nothing, taking the highway to get back to my apartment, the rest of the trip passing in silence. When he stops the car in front of my building, I go to the front entrance without saying anything to him. I'm seriously freaked about this power he has over me – the power he wants over me and the way it appeals to something deep inside of me.
"Eve," he says and stops me, taking my arm. "Don't be mad at me. I have to do this. I have to know if you're strong enough. If you can handle this world."
"Well?" I say, and try to slip my arm out of his. "Can I?"
He doesn't say anything for a moment, then shakes his head slowly.
"I honestly don't know yet. I only know I want you to be able to do it."
I look away from his too-intense gaze, those bluest of blue eyes seeming hurt by my response.
"I'm sorry." I'm suddenly feeling too tired from it all. "You have to understand how strange this all is." I struggle to find the right words, avoiding his eyes. "Being able to join minds with someone? It's wonderful and scary. I'm afraid that everything between us is leading me down a path I'll come to regret."
"I know," he says and nods. "We have to trust each other completely. This connection between us – it builds trust. You must trust me with your life. I must trust you with mine." He touches my cheek. "We could kill each other so easily."
We could kill each other. He could catch me unawares and just drink me dry. I could have the stake in his heart in a second. Can I trust him? He's done nothing to raise suspicions in me. He even let me temporarily kill him so that I knew how. The look of concern on his face arouses something in me. Is it fear? Desire? Or is it both?
He removes his hand and stands there on the next step and our eyes are on the level, his face just a few inches from mine and he's so beautiful but I don't know how I feel any longer. The only thing I know for sure is that I want him so much, I'm afraid that I'll do anything to have him.
"Shall I come in?" he asks softly.
"I need to be alone tonight," I say and it's the truth. I need to be away from him for a few hours so I can sort through these emotions.
"I'm going away tomorrow," he says.
"I'm so sad."
He takes my hand and I know it's because he wants to know my sadness.
"I can make you feel better," he says, his voice breathless and his blue eyes narrow. That lopsided grin starts and I close my eyes and can't help but smile in response. He makes that throat sound and takes my head in his hands and kisses my cheeks, one after the other, his tongue touching my skin. I know his thoughts and he wants to touch my
skin with his tongue everywhere … I'm helpless to deny him.
"Eve," he says, his voice solemn. "I want you to stay at my house while I'm gone. You'll be safer there."
I start to protest. "My cats…"
"My servants will take care of them."
I don't want to leave my little apartment, but then I remember my pledge to just obey and I bite back a question, a reason to stay in my own flat.
"OK," I say. "If you want."
"I want." He kisses me. "If you don't, I'll worry about you the entire time I'm away and won't be able to concentrate. We'll go there now. I can send someone over tomorrow to get your things."
"Can't we stop now?"
"No," he says and puts a finger on my lips.
I comply and follow him back into the car.
Chapter 21
"There is no remedy for love but to love more."
Thoreau.
We drive out to Cambridge and enter a garage connected to the house. Michel stops and talks to one of his staff, a dark-haired vampire with sharp black eyes and a Hercule Poirot moustache. The man eyes me from under a disapproving frown.
I expect him to take my coat, but Michel seems impatient to take me upstairs to the second floor, where we enter a large bedroom. Against one wall is a huge four-poster bed with a canopy that looks like something out of Buckingham Palace. Michel kicks the door closed and presses me against the wall, pinning my body with his hips, one hand holding mine over my head, his other arm on the wall beside me. I feel his desire for me and it sends a jolt of lust through me.
"I want you, Eve," he says, his voice breathless. "When you had my wrist in your mouth in the park, I thought I'd lose control right there and ravish you."
That sends a wave of desire through me that makes me dizzy.
"You like the thought of me being your pet, being addicted to your blood?" I say, strangely breathy at the thought myself. "I wouldn't want to be addicted to your blood." But even as I say it, the thought does something upsetting to me – it excites me completely.
"You just can't lie very well," he says, staring down into my eyes.