Blood Sacrifice

by By Rick R. Reed

  Behind her the sky is a mass of darkening purple clouds, as dusk winds down into night.

  They’re inside now, willing me to come in. Elise can see them, coming down the stairs, dressed for the evening, their eyes locked on the front door, knowing she is out there, knowing she is tormented. Elise doesn’t shiver in terror at the thought of them. She knows they won’t hurt her, that she is beyond the reach of their flesh-shredding fangs, their hungry, sucking mouths. For some reason—maybe her art—maybe simply because Maria likes the feel of her and the taste of her skin, she has been elevated to a place of safety and protection.

  But they will hurt someone tonight. That’s the reality. There is someone out there, a stranger, who will get hurt, who will have his or her blood sacrificed to feed them. Perhaps the twelve-year-old black boy she has seen on Greenview, the skinny one in baggy pants and a hooded oversized sweatshirt, who relentlessly rides a kid’s bike, far too small for him, up and down the street, stopping only to ask what time it is, or when a stranger calls down from a window. He’s making a living, just like Elise. He’s all alone, just like she is. He wouldn’t be missed, except maybe for a moment, by those who depend on him for their daily fix of whatever potion he sells. It’s no wonder he keeps the hood of his sweatshirt up at all times, cauling his face, hiding it in shadow. Or perhaps they will take Betty, the old streetwalker Elise has spoken to on occasion. Overweight, well past forty, with missing teeth and too-dry dyed red hair, she is no longer a hot commodity and has trouble even finding someone to heed her bargain rate of five bucks for a blow job in an alley behind the liquor store. She certainly wouldn’t be missed. Nor would the man on the corner, a young guy, too robust and handsome to be begging, but who daily stands there exhorting strangers to give him a quarter, a dollar, so he can get back to the south side on the el. No one—not even anyone on the south side—would be looking for him.

  But whether they’re missed or not isn’t the point. They’re alive. They have every right to go on living, and these people inside have no right to take it away.

  She turns, looks longingly at the ebb and flow of the traffic rushing by on Sheridan Road. She’s frozen. The rational part of her—the part that tells her the people inside this house are insane, homicidal, or worse, what they say they are—prods her to flee. But that part isn’t strong enough to inspire her to move more than this half turn that places her back to the door. She has no choice. Logic tells her to stay away; the danger is real. But her emotions, an artist’s curse and blessing, cause her to place her hand on the doorknob and turn. Somewhere she has read that the artistic temperament is not a temperament at all, but just another form of insanity, a way to escape the real world and hide behind the imaginary, creating an alternate existence that could never satisfy, and that as they get older, artists just become more and more insane.

  Even as she’s thinking this, she’s wondering about the forbidden fruit for which she longs so irrationally. Fuck it. She pushes the door open, hungry for the fruit, all the more tempting because it is forbidden…and starving for something as simple as the feel of a lover’s arms. She slips inside, a whisper, shutting the heavy door behind her. The door closes almost of its own accord, the heavy oak swinging back silently, as if the house itself is unbalanced, so that gravity pulls the doors shut (like a trap after the prey has entered). Her heart pounds; her stomach is in knots. These responses are not because she’s afraid, but because she now has the prospect of Maria close at hand.

  She can’t wait to see her.

  Inside the foyer, it is quiet. Elise moves silently across the marble tiled floor, heading for the gallery. Her hands tremble and blood rushes in her ears. Funny, how it all comes down to blood rushing.

  She pauses outside the tall archway opening into the gallery, standing breathlessly outside the arch, back to the wall. Go inside, she tells herself, forcing one foot in front of the other. She closes her eyes, gingerly feeling her way, not sure what she’s afraid of seeing.

  She stops. She opens her eyes.

  A hundred, no a thousand, candles glimmer, casting flickering illumination on the sculptures, paintings, and drawings. The shadows and warm yellow light bring the pieces alive. The paintings shimmer, and the sculptures moves: a gesture, a leap, a twirl caught in periphery. Elise is still in the light, her senses for a moment quiet, absorbing.

  This quiet doesn’t last long. There, in a corner, warmed by the light of the flames, is Maria. She wears a flowing dress of white lace, no shoes. Her hair is brushed away from her face and her dark eyes drink in the light. Elise could fall into their darkness. The connection between their gazes is electric, the culmination of days of psychic connection. Now, Elise understands why she was so helpless to leave, why the thought of turning away from the door just moments ago was something that just couldn’t happen.

  They don’t speak. Who has need for words? The communication between them is so complete that it makes the words look like crude tools, inelegant and in a different league from this silent connection they share. It’s pure emotion, pure understanding, with no need for definition.

  The walk across the candlelit space seems distorted, longer than it actually is. Desire and anticipation makes their course toward each other something seen through a tunnel, a weird lens, elongating distance.

  Finally, they are in front of one another, close enough to touch, and each pauses to drink in the smell of the other. There is caution; Elise supposes neither of them want to spoil the moment’s perfection, or make a false move. Almost imperceptibly, they raise their hands, stretching.

  Finally, they embrace. Elise fears her heart will explode; the adrenaline has the force of a shot of coke, or crank. Maria’s proximity causes her breath to quicken. She no longer cares about the iciness of Maria’s touch; she wants to devour her. Her mouth finds the silk of Maria’s body, sinking her tongue into yielding flesh.

  Their bodies intertwine, nearly become one. They sink to the floor and hold each other, attuned to their breathing which soon takes up the same rhythm and pace.

  “I knew you would come,” Maria whispers, kissing Elise’s ear.

  Elise feels hot liquid at her eyes but doesn’t want to analyze what’s causing the tears. “I knew I would, too.” Whether the inevitability was a good or bad thing was something she would save for later analysis.

  “Yes.” Maria draws a small pipe from between her breasts. “I’ve been saving this for us, for when we could be together again.” She hands it, along with a silver lighter, to Elise.

  Elise wants to giggle, but reins it in, afraid of spoiling the moment. Yet she eyes the resinous bud in the bowl of the pipe warily; she can’t imagine being in a realm higher than she is now, and wonders if partaking will send her over some edge beyond her imagining.

  Maria grabs her hand and guides the pipe to her lips. “Just a little. It will make things perfect. Trust me.”

  Maria’s dark eyes boring into her own make Elise weak and powerless. Shutting out the thought of where such trust has gotten her so far, she puts the stem to her mouth, lights the bud, and draws in deeply. She imagines the thick, blue-gray smoke inside her, expanding, rolling like a fog through her lungs, tainting and thrilling each of the millions of alveoli clustered there. The smoke smells sweet, with a piquant undertone that makes her think of the incense the priests used to perfume the air at mass when she was a girl. The religious association is not lost on her. She closes her eyes, exhaling slowly, handing the pipe back. Maria’s fingers brush hers as she takes the pipe and even this tiny touch is electric.

  When the marijuana overcomes, Elise feels once more the reality of everything around her melting until into the simple presence of Maria. It is as though the herb has freed her to concentrate on only one thing, and Maria is a huge looming presence, giant, all-encompassing. Elise lies back and pulls Maria on top of her; the weight is light, almost as if she is pulling a comforter over herself. She doesn’t remember them removing their clothes, yet now their bare skins
merge, each part sensitive and hungry for more touch, an addict after the ultimate fix. The slippery touch of Maria’s lips moving down her body, lingering at her nipples, biting gently, enough to break the skin, but not draw much blood, and finally kissing downward, filling her navel with moisture and then moving further, slowly, slowly, until Elise can hardly bear the anticipation.

  Maria nestles herself between Elise’s legs, the dark silk of her hair brushing her thighs, her tongue speaking an ancient and entirely new language, one much more eloquent than words. Elise arches her back and moans and loses track of her own existence. More than bodies come together: their intellects, their souls merge, unite. It is as though this communion of flesh, sensation, and mind is a rite that makes their union permanent.

  This is not a sex act; it’s a marriage.

  After, they are exhausted, panting and sweating in a mass of clothes on the floor, lying in each other’s arms. It takes forever for Elise’s heartbeat to return to normal, for her face to cool, for her to become aware of her surroundings once more.

  Maria runs her fingers lightly across Elise’s rib cage, then gets up on one elbow to peer down. “Thank you for coming back. I wasn’t sure you would.” She shakes her head. “In fact, I was pretty certain you would not. And that made me think of leaving here. I didn’t know if I could bear the proximity. But you returned.”

  “I don’t know that I ever had a choice.”

  “There’s always a choice.” Maria brushes some of Elise’s hair away from her face. She pauses for a while, staring off into the darkness, the dying embers in the fireplace.

  “What are you thinking about?” Elise takes Maria’s chin and turns her face toward her. “I can tell…something.”

  Maria smiles.

  Elise notices the smile is tentative, and it’s the first time Elise has ever seen the woman lose her confidence and poise, even in this small way. She can tell she’s actually nervous about what she wants to say. “What is it, Maria? What do you want?”

  “I think you know what I want.”

  Elise’s heart thuds. She nods.

  Maria sits up straighter, her lips tighten. She forces herself to look Elise in the eye. “I want you to be with me. To be one of us.”

  Elise turns away. It’s too soon. She hardly knows this woman, and yet feels she knows her better than anyone she’s ever encountered in her life. And what she knows of Maria is also a paradox: terrifying and tempting at the same time. She wants to be careful what she says in return.

  “I don’t know, Maria. I don’t know if I can.” She gives a small, mirthless laugh. “I’m not even sure I believe in you, in what you are. How can I become something that maybe is imagination, fantasy, the byproduct of an unbalanced mind?”

  “You know everything you need to know. I know you believe me when I say we have communicated in a way that transcends human language. You know me instinctively. And, because you’re open to that knowledge, because you can actually absorb it, you can be one of us.” Maria touches Elise’s face. “You can. The question really is: will you? Can you give me that gift? I promise to give you just as much in return. More.”

  As Elise’s head clears, she has the urge to flee once more. This is insane. “So you want me to be one of you? So, so what? So we’ll always be together?”

  “Always.”

  “And it would mean becoming one of you? How would that happen?”

  “It’s a gift I can give you. And one that we do not bestow very freely. The last person to receive that gift was Edward, and that was almost sixty years ago.”

  Elise thinks she hears someone move in the darkness, a sudden rush of air, almost like a sigh. She shivers and peers into the shadows, but sees nothing. She turns back to Maria. “What will happen to me?” She thinks of vampire lore, the Saturday evening “Chiller Theater” double features she watched as a child, Nosferatu, and rivers of blood, bat wings, fangs. “How could it not hurt?”

  “I promise you. I won’t let you experience any pain. I’ll lead you through it slowly, my love. The change will take some time, but you’ll find it painless.”

  “And I’ll have to do what you do to survive?”

  Maria nods, stroking Elise’s cheek. “Your perception of it is at odds with what you’ll feel once you’ve crossed over. You’ll come to see it as a beautiful thing, more satisfying than sex, more fulfilling than anything you’ve ever experienced, that much I can promise.” Maria does not meet Elise’s gaze as she says this. Elise wonders why.

  “The idea revolts me.” Again, Elise’s intellect and emotions war. “I don’t think I could do it. First, I couldn’t kill anyone. I don’t think I could, not even for my own survival. Second, I’d have to consume blood? Just thinking about it makes me sick.” Elise sighs. She wants to please Maria, but doesn’t think she can go as far as Maria wants. Can’t they just be as they are now? Why does she have to become one of them? “Really, Maria, it would make me sick. I can feel the bile rising up now.”

  Maria shakes her head. “It won’t be that way. What you feel now won’t be what you feel…after. You won’t be the same and you’ll experience things in a new way, an exciting way.” Maria pauses to look at the moonlight shining on the floor, turning her head, apparently lost in thought. “I wish I could show you how it would feel. But there’s no other way to experience it besides doing it, besides actually becoming one of us. It’s a kind of heaven.”

  “Why won’t you look at me?” Elise takes Maria’s face in both her hands, framing it, and turns the other woman toward her, forcing her to meet her gaze.

  “Don’t you trust me, Elise? I love you. Can’t you see I only want what’s best for you, to bring you the kind of joy you can’t even imagine now? It won’t be as you think. Nothing you’ve experienced in your life can compare to the joy and pleasure feeding brings.”

  Elise grimaces at the word “feeding,” but feels herself slipping away, beginning to be won over. It’s not about the pleasure of “feeding” or any of that mortality stuff; it’s about Maria and joining with this beautiful, enigmatic woman that she knows, after only a couple of meetings, more intimately and better than she ever known anyone in her life. But she has to continue this dialogue, has to be sure. She asks what she thought earlier. “Why can’t we just continue on as we are now? Isn’t this good enough?”

  Maria smiles and shakes her head. “It’s wonderful, my darling. But we’re not on the same plane. I want you with me forever. I want us to be as one. Your years pass by like weeks for me; soon you will be an old, frail woman, and I’ll still be like this.” She nods. “Don’t you want that? Eternal youth? You’ll always be as radiant as you are right now.”

  Elise whispers, “I don’t know,” but it’s obvious from the sheepish smile and the way she looks teasingly at Maria, like she has a hidden gift for her, that her resolve has all but slipped away. What does she have to cling to in her life anyway?

  Possibility, a small voice answers her. But she drowns it out and lets Maria embrace her.

  “I’m so happy. It will be wonderful. You’ll see. And we can always be together.”

  Elise collapses into her arms, shutting out thought.

  *

  In the darkness, in the deepest shadows of the cavernous room, Terence crouches, as silent and unmoving as the sculptures surrounding him. His face is hot with rage. He feels sick with betrayal.

  How could Maria do this? It is against everything they had ever agreed on, against what others like them, except even older and wiser, have told them is wrong. It is akin to what the humans thought of as murder: an ultimate crime.

  But Terence knows he has never been part of the morality police. The fact this is wrong among their kind isn’t what really bothers him. It’s the betrayal! He feels abandoned, like a child who suddenly realizes he is not his mother’s favorite.

  He bites down on his lower lip so hard he breaks the skin and tastes blood. Blood that is not his own. A memory from just hours ago comes back to him
.

  “Hi. Where are you off to?”

  “I’m on my way home from school.” She eyes him warily and he can see the tiny war going on inside her: the attraction of a young woman tempered by the fear of a little girl. It is up to him to see that the woman takes the upper hand. He knows from experience this is not difficult work.

  “What’s your hurry? Why don’t you stop and talk with me a little.” He smiles. “I’m Terence.”

  She looks up at him from behind a curtain of dark hair, blue eyes peering out from under a black fringe. There is a sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose. Her lips are full. She is not yet beautiful, but she will be. Or would be, Terence thinks.

  He licks the blood away from his lip now and remembers how he convinced her to take a ride on his bike, her schoolmates playing ally to him because she wanted to impress them, roaring off with this stunning older man in front of them all.

  Her blood, inside him, is still warm. He had savored her, keeping her chained in the basement, feeding slowly from her over the past forty-eight hours, watching her weaken, until finally she was drained and her young life winked out. For two days, he luxuriated in her terror, watching her lose her mind with fear and revulsion as he ate her.

  The lives of these monsters weren’t always as romantic and glamorous as Maria portrayed it to Elise.

  It isn’t so much Maria’s misrepresentation that angers him; it’s the fact she is being so duplicitously selective in what she tells her…her…beloved. How dare she! How dare she leave out the most important part of what Elise might lose should she become one of them?

  Terence leaves the room like a chill, hardly discernible. He knows one thing, and this is what enrages him most: he wants Elise for himself.

  *

  “So, you’ll be with me?” Maria searches Elise’s eyes for verification.

  Elise can see, again, how tentative she is, and it charms her. She sees the hope and the fear. It makes her feel that this is a person with feelings, not some horror-movie monster. She nods. “Yes. I think it would make me happy.” Elise pauses. “But what about Terence? What about Edward? Will they be okay with this?” She stops to think for a moment. “Will they even be with us, or will we go off on our own?” Elise realizes it’s this last option she really wants. She doesn’t know until she utters her question, but the idea of being with Maria alone is perfection; being with two men in addition would take a different kind of adjustment. It’s such a huge change; anything to make things simpler would make the transition that much easier. She pictures herself with Maria—a romantic notion—imagining the two of them in some crumbling villa in Greece, surrounded by olive trees and water so blue in the sun it is nearly blinding.