by Aubrey Brown
George! George!
I am here, my lord! I have been riding on horseback since this morning, and have yet to locate your mistress. I am sorry, sir. I owe you so much…
Gabriel followed the sound of George’s voice and materialized as mist by his side within a few minutes.
Gabriel found George riding horseback, hell-bent for London.
Gabriel grabbed George’s shoulder and was able to transport himself and the beast to the heart of London. George was bent over sick in the corner between two buildings. The transport of a mortal by way of vampire was sickening to humans.
“Are you well, George?” Gabriel was intensely alert trying to feel for Emma.
“I will be, my lord,” George stated.
After a moment, he righted himself, and they began to walk.
“I don’t think they have made it this far, my lord. We should inquire as to whom Emma’s father is. He may have an idea of where our lady is,” George suggested.
“Indeed, George. Thank you for helping me in this endeavor,” he replied.
“Pleasantries aside, my lord, I owe you a life debt, for without you, I would have died on that battlefield. May I speak freely, sir?”
“You need not ask me, George, and you do not owe me a damn thing. I saved your life. It was the right thing to do. I was fighting exactly alongside you,” he replied gruffly.
“You saved many men that night, my lord. That is why you gained the title of earl. The Queen was indeed pleased,” George answered.
“That infernal title, all the wealth in the world and still everyone is concerned with titles. I hope to live a few more decades and then pass the title onto James.”
They walked briskly to a gambling hell on Fleet Street. The men here were drunk and bigger gossipers than their wives.
* * * *
The Duke of Greensburg’s estate
Emma felt her body being moved from the carriage and flung over a bulky shoulder. She moaned in protest, but could not open her eyes. She was beyond any pain she had ever felt in her life. Images of the children and Gabriel flashed through her mind. She prayed that whoever took her left the family alone. She felt tears slide down her face at the thought of never seeing them again. She loved them so dearly that she thanked God she met them at all. Whatever trials that awaited her, she would remember that she had once glimpsed Heaven.
She felt her body being lowered into a chair, and then bound. She was too weak to speak, so she let the exhaustion overtake her.
Chapter Nine
Fleet Street
Gabriel sat down in a chair and felt around the room for random thoughts and feelings. The room was very loud with verbal chatter as well as mental. George brought them both a glass of wine, that he held in his hand, and Gabriel ignored. The room was very loud, and the stench of alcohol and tobacco was overpowering. It had been a very long time since Gabriel had been in an establishment such as this. His prenatural powers were being flooded with too many thoughts and too many smells.
Emma slowly opened her eyes to a room that was filled with darkness. She moaned as she felt the pain radiating from her head. She tried to move her feet, but she was tied to a chair. She tried to look around the room, but her vision was terrible.
“I see you are awake, Emma?”
She knew that awful, scratchy voice. It was attached to the most hideous man God had ever created. She looked to where the voice seemed to be coming from. She saw a spark light the air with fire, and cigar smoke started swirling around a very pudgy and grotesque face. Emma had nightmares of that face. This man was His Grace the Duke of Greensburg, her jilted intended. She moaned in recognition and saw him smiling as he smoked his fat cigar.
Trying to keep her sickness at bay, she said, “I see you have found me, Your Grace.”
“I have indeed, Emma, and now I will teach you what it means to be my wife and your place within our marriage.”
He stood and walked slowly over to where she was tied down. Emma jolted in her seat when his knees bumped against her chair.
“I see the men I hired already beat you into submission. No matter, I will enjoy seeing you bruise in places only I can see.”
Emma felt her spine stiffen as he raised his hand. She felt the sting across her face as if he slashed her with a knife.
Her lips began to trickle blood onto her chin, but she held her screams at bay. She knew that he derived pleasure from seeing her weak and hearing her beg.
The duke firmed his lips and tipped her chair over onto the floor, hitting the side of her head upon the hard wood. He kicked her side, and she felt pain come from her lungs and a sickening crunch. She was barely able to breathe, but yet again she kept silent. The pain was intense. She felt as if she may faint once more. She closed her eyes as she felt pulsing shards roll through her head.
He beat her relentlessly, to the point of which the chair was broken into pieces, and she was near death. She began to moan, and the duke proceeded to chuckle. He had finally gotten the reaction he sought.
“You are just as your maid, Lily. She, too, eventually screamed!”
Before she fainted her mind shrieked, Gabriel!
* * * *
Gabriel heard Emma cry out his name. Without hesitation, he followed the scream into the night, with George at his side. They disappeared from the gambling hell without a care for who saw them. He materialized in front of a grand home that was devoid of any light. He stalked the outside of the residence, realizing he could not enter without being invited. George, knowing the problem, stalked up the stairs and banged upon the door.
When it was flung open by another butler, George announced, “I know you have her in there! I know you have her in there!”
He was shouting to the Heavens, and the man grabbed George by the lapels and forced him inside.
You may enter, my lord.
Gabriel smiled at the old man. He was brilliant. He was able to materialize into the home and dispatch the butler.
“I can no longer hear her.” Gabriel stayed for a moment to sense another heartbeat. When it came he heard distinctly two. One was shuddered, the other was wild and out of rhythm. He left George to set the door to rights. As he moved to the room, he heard laughing and moaning. When he was in the room, rage took him over as he saw the scene of a man beating his Emma.
He had the man by the shoulders before he could lay another hand upon her already-still body. He threw the obese man across the room and felt a stab of pleasure as he heard him grunt. Gabriel kneeled at Emma’s side and could feel a fluttering pulse. She was unconscious and bleeding profusely, and for the first time in his life, he could smell the blood, but did not feel hunger, his emotions at her state were much worse.
The man he threw grunted as he sat up. Blind with fury, Gabriel walked over to the man and said with fangs elongated, “Are you the duke?”
When the man stared at Gabriel in terror, unable to answer, he shook him until his front teeth clacked together in affirmation.
“Hear me now, duke, if you ever come near Emma again, I will kill you slowly and painfully,” he stated.
“Gabriel, Gabriel,” Emma whispered.
Gabriel threw the man to the floor and ran over to his Emma.
“I am here, sweet, talk to me,” Gabriel insisted.
George entered the room right behind him, detaining the duke with a booted foot.
“Gabriel, you’re here. I dreamed you would come for me, perhaps I am dreaming now,” she whispered with her lips trembling and bleeding.
Gabriel kept the tears at bay and answered her, “I came for you, never doubt that I would. I am taking you away from here. Back home where you belong. I must first take care of His Grace.”
“Gabriel, please…do not harm him. They will come after you. They may hang you for killing a nobleman. Flee this place and leave. I do not want to see you find your end by a rope or a gun,” she pleaded.
Such bravery, such beauty from this woman, how could he have ever doubte
d her? She was worried for him and his family, even though killing this man would end her nightmare.
“I will not leave you here, do you understand me?” he bellowed.
Gabriel stood and stated, “You are lucky, duke. Hear me now. If you ever seek Emma out, I will bring you a slow death.”
Emma sighed and closed her eyes. Gabriel picked Emma up into his arms and transported the three back to the castle. It took but a few moments, but he sent his thoughts forward. The candles were burning brightly, just as was the metal tub full of warm water.
Gabriel stripped Emma’s sodden clothing from her and vowed she would be protected and taken care of until the end of her time on this earth. When she was naked, he placed her into the tub to wash the blood from her bruised body. He looked at her pulse point and noted it was still weak. Her mouth and face and neck were so swollen he doubted she would be able to drink from him.
George knocked upon the door and brought in her night clothes. Gabriel dressed her and placed her upon the bed.
“Can you do anything for her, my lord?”
“If you are asking whether I will cross her, no, I will not suffer her being the monster I am, to have no choice to live for eternity. We will care for her as if I had no powers at all,” Gabriel firmed.
“She loves you, sir. Perhaps she would want to join you in living death?”
“No, George, we will wait.”
As the hours passed so did Gabriel’s patience. He wanted her to wake. He felt the early sun rise come upon him, but instead of moving below, he crawled into bed with Emma.
I am to sleep with her, George. Please keep the rest of the servants from this room. Only you may enter.
Aye, my lord, it shall be done.
With that reassurance, Gabriel fell into the sleep of his own kind.
When Gabriel awoke the next evening, Emma was still unconscious. He knew in his heart she would sleep for a very long time. She had been beaten and broken. He sat up and focused on her heartbeat. It was still weak, maybe weaker. Gabriel felt fear hit his mind for the first time. Her heart was becoming weaker.
He bit into his wrist and felt his blood flow over his teeth. He then placed his arm over her mouth. Some trickled onto her tongue. He massaged her throat, and hoped she would swallow. After a time, with severe frustration, her body convulsed with shudders that indicated her blood was mixing with his. When she stopped moving, Gabriel sighed. He heard her heart beat back into rhythm. She was still bruised and swollen. However, his blood had healing agents within it that would heal her swiftly.
Gabriel shook his head. He had promised himself he would give her a choice, a choice she never had before.
Chapter Ten
A day later Emma opened her eyes to see Gabriel sitting in the chair beside her bed. It must be nighttime, for the room was dark save for the burning candles.
“Gabriel,” she whispered.
“Emma, you had the whole household worried for you, are you all right?”
“Aye, but how am I here?”
“George and I brought you home. Do you not remember what happened the other evening?”
“I do, however, how are we here if we were in London just last night?”
And for the first time she sat up and felt her face. It was not swollen and her lips were not cut. She moved her body experimentally and felt no pain.
“Gabriel, what has happened? Please tell me how we are here and how I am healed.”
Gabriel had not thought she would notice she was all but healed, but ever his Emma, she was observant.
“You do not want to know, sweet, just be happy you are here and with your family,” Gabriel soothed.
“Gabriel, you know the truth of my life, please tell me how it is possible we are here, and I am healed. You say we are to be a family. There should be no secrets. You must know that I love you no matter what.”
“I wonder if I were to tell you that you would still love me. Perhaps the truth of my life will send you running off into the dead of night never to return.”
“What are you saying, Gabriel?”
“I am not human, Emma. I am immortal, do you understand what that means?” he asked.
“You are saying…” She stopped with a puzzled look upon her face.
“I drink human blood to survive. I cannot die by human illness. I was born two hundred years ago,” he reaffirmed.
She stared at him in sudden understanding. “You are a vampire.”
He firmed his lips and grunted, “Aye.”
Emma had read lore when she was a small child about the undead that walked the earth feasting on the blood of the living.
“You survive on human blood?”
He gave her a curt nod. His body stance spoke of tension waiting for her to come to a conclusion.
“How had you come to this affliction, Gabriel?”
“In the year of 1620 a woman of nobility took me to her bed. I was turning five and thirty, and my father was demanding that I marry. We were not titled, and he felt our extreme wealth would attract a daughter of a nobleman. So I went on a drunken rampage of spirits, and gambling. She came upon me in a moment of weakness, and I was angry that my father wanted me to marry a woman who was a stranger, so I took her to bed, and then I awoke in a pine box below the ground. I was hungry and desperate for blood. I was alone, so I fled to England from Ireland. A while later I joined her Queen’s army in war. I saved many a young man’s life, and the King rewarded me with this infernal title. The rest you know, Emma.”
He fell silent, and Emma’s heart broke for him. He never asked for this, just as she never asked to be born to a baron, who would bargain her for a higher title and money. She grasped his hand, and he gaped at her.
“Gabriel, you never asked for this, just as I never asked to be married to a man who wanted to beat me for his pleasure and then eventually kill me. I love you, Gabriel, no matter your trials, we will see to them together.”
“You are not of this world, Emma. You cannot mean you still want me after I have told you I am a vampire, and that I feast on human blood.”
“You saved me, Gabriel, and it sounds as if you need some saving as well. You say you were five and thirty when you became undead? You do not look a day over thirty.”
“It is a side effect of the healing agents within my blood. I have looked thus since I was crossed.”
Emma held dawning horror in her eyes. She would continue to age, and he would not. Furthermore, another thought came to her. She was healed by his blood, which meant she must have drunk from him. Funnily enough the idea was not at all repulsive. This was Gabriel, her lover, her life.
“I will age as you stay young,” she stated.
“Indeed, but we will be together as you and I wish, we will raise the children as our own and revel in the time we do have,” he said.
She shook her head and grasped his shoulders. “No, Gabriel. I will age, and you will not. I will eventually die, while you live.”
“I will not let you suffer as I have. I am a monster, Emma. I am, at this moment trying to decide if you’re staying, here is what is best for you, but I cannot seem to give you up.”
“Gabriel…”
“This discussion is at an end.”
He disappeared into the air, and Emma was shocked for a moment and then angry. He left the room, just left without any further discussion.
* * * *
As the days passed Gabriel avoided the issue of crossing Emma. She did not realize what she was asking. She was blinded by love and the appeal of the undead. If he crossed her, she may not be able to adjust to life as a vampire. It was the only way.
He made love to her late at night and fled to his chamber just before sunrise. He reveled in her sweetness and light. Gabriel was worried she would lose all of her qualities if she lived as he did.
Emma was frustrated. Her lover and partner refused to speak of the issue. He was acting completely unreasonable. She wanted to share eternity with him. Did he not
understand that?
She taught the children and slept with her employer at night. She felt a fallen woman in love with a man whom she could not reach.
Emma began to feel sick again. This time the headaches would simply not go away. The days passed into weeks, and she lost weight. Her clothing no longer fit her slender frame. Gabriel felt severe concern for Emma. She was very ill.
He brought a physician to see her, and he had no answers. He left a tonic for her consumption and recommended rest. With Emma resting in her room, Gabriel walked to his office in anger. In the two hundred years, he had been walking this earth medical science had yet to find an answer for illness.
“My lord, I have your drink,” George interrupted.
“Thank you, George.” He sipped the blood and felt the warmth fill his veins.
“I see our lady is still ill and becoming more unwell.”
“Do not tell me I should cross her again. I will not have her live the life of a monster. She is too delightful, with joy and love.”
“May I speak freely, my lord?”
“Aye, you may.”
“Would you prefer to watch her die in pain than to live a life of the same joy and happiness you find within her? Do you not feel you are the identical person you were when you were changed? You have saved countless lives. You are acting like a father to James and Rose, even when you protested their coming to live with you. Our mistress is dying, my lord. Even I do not need powers of the undead to see she will perish soon. Her headaches persist. She suffers from not being able to eat. I fear if she dies now, you will regret your decision later. Let her have what she craves most, eternity with her soul mate.”
Gabriel took in what George was saying and felt tears slide down his face. For the first time in centuries, he felt less a monster and more a man in love. Could he watch Emma die? Could he live without her? She seemed to want to spend her life with him as he was. The children loved her, he loved her, and it was clear the servants loved her. His heart, long ago dead, began to shake inside of his chest at the thought of her dying.