Let Lilith guide me, she thought. Don’t fight. Let go…
She was a dark rag tossed on a sea of blue-black waves. Crimson light dripped endlessly down the chasm walls above her.
This realm is made of the fragile energy of thought-waves, so Charlotte says. And every vampire is part of it, so we each leave a vibration, a trace of our existence here. She recalled an analogy made by Charlotte-as-scientist.
“Imagine the Crystal Ring as a cloud chamber. If human thoughts represent water vapour, then vampires are the atomic particles. Chains of bubbles form in our wake to mark our path.”
Raqia flowed inside Violette-Lilith, indivisible from her.
She saw a statuesque man with skin like burnished coal, walking across a parched golden plain. A single African, walking under a vast sky, watched by lionesses… and she knew he was a vampire.
And that was where Rachel was. Africa.
A long journey, but Violette couldn’t turn back. She climbed very high, almost to the Weisskalt, and travelled so fast that she terrified herself. Perhaps, she thought, I could also travel to America in a night…
She found them at dawn, as the sun bleached the hem of night. Insects sang in the grass. She saw a single white tree on the plain, and beneath it Rachel and the African were sitting cross-legged, like travellers sharing stories. They wore loose white garments to deflect the sun. Rachel’s hair was an orange flame against the whiteness.
“Good morning, Rachel,” said Violette.
The woman started as if seeing a ghost; she turned a shade paler, if that were possible. The man looked up as if nothing could surprise him. He was muscular, his skin burnished ebony; he would tower over her if he stood.
“Oh, my God,” said Rachel.
“Not exactly. Try the other side.” Violette knelt, facing them. A snake slithered away from under her knees, rustling through the dry grass. “Won’t you introduce me to your companion?”
Rachel recovered herself and became cool, tense, self-controlled. “Malik, Violette.”
“Malik. I’ve heard of you. You’re one of the immortals who escaped the Weisskalt when Kristian died. One of the few who hasn’t threatened me. Yet.”
She studied his long, sombre face, his velvety eyes. He looked back serenely until she wondered if he spoke English. Then he said, “I have no reason to threaten you, Lilith.” His voice was bass-deep, soothing. “You are no threat to me.”
A hot wind sprang up, stirring grass and leaves. “Am I not? Do you mean that if we fought, you’d win?”
“No,” he said. “I mean that I don’t fear your bite. And you have no desire to attack me.”
She gazed at Malik, trying to perceive what he meant. She realised he spoke the truth. He raised no anger in her whatsoever. Why was he different?
She turned to Rachel. “You’re a long way from home.”
“But Malik isn’t. This continent is his home, the savannah, the desert, the jungle. He hates what we call ‘civilisation’.”
“What about you? Did you come all this way to escape me?”
“At first. I was afraid.”
“Is that why you’re not with the others?”
“What others?”
“Those who are plotting to kill me.”
“I don’t want to kill you,” said Rachel. “I thought if I saw you again, I’d be terrified – but I’m not.”
Rachel had changed, lost her acerbity and remoteness.
“I’m not here to frighten you,” said Violette. “I only came to see what happened to you.”
“You cared, after all?” Rachel’s tension softened. “I thought you were another Kristian, but you’re not. Malik and I are the same. We loathe Kristian and his kind, with their mania for power. I fled here out of fear, but I stayed because I belong here.” She smiled, her mouth as red as her hair. “I love this solitude. The freedom to walk these great plains without fearing any hunter, whether they wield claws or spears.”
“When did you discover this?”
Rachel raised her long fingers to her collarbone. “When you drank my blood. You stopped me dead like a wall and made me see that in making demands on you, I was behaving like Kristian. Don’t you realise, Violette, that you can’t merely feed? You change people.”
“I know,” Violette whispered. “Not always for the better.”
“Nor for the worse.” Rachel leaned forward and kissed Violette full on the mouth. “I’m not your enemy.”
Violette felt a flicker of desire, a poignant echo of Robyn’s presence. Lovely moment.
Rachel sat back on her heels and leaned on Malik’s shoulder. They gazed intently at her, pale and dark like chess pieces. Violette was suddenly afraid.
“You two see something that I can’t see for myself. What is it?”
“Darkness and evil are not the same thing,” said Malik. “When you understand, you’ll know more than I can tell you. But you must find the truth for yourself.”
“You’re right.”
“Will you take Malik’s blood, too?” asked Rachel.
Violette studied the tempting skin of his throat, so black it had a blue sheen. His calm eyes held wisdom she couldn’t yet decipher. Dive through the layers of darkness beyond the veil, let in the lovely silver light… Her heart quickened, and she had to look away. “No,” she said.
“Why not?”
“Because Malik does not need to change.”
* * *
Violette had expected to meet an enemy and instead found – dare she think it? – two friends. Or at least, two who didn’t despise her.
She raced northwards through Raqia, not feeling the cold.
Could I have persuaded them to fight with me? I doubt it. They don’t want that, and neither do I. I suppose I could draw an army of adoring followers, throw them against Cesare’s and watch them slaughter each other, as if I were some gloating goddess of war.
That’s why I drive them away – because they’d love me so easily if I let them, and I would destroy them. Cesare and Simon are right about me, and that’s why I must face my enemies alone.
Violette wished she could stay in Africa under the burning sky. Or in the desert, Lilith’s wilderness. Impossible. Chains drew her home. And, she thought, I might have grown to envy Rachel and Malik’s love, another triangle from which I feel excluded.
But why envy anyone, when I despise love and its lies?
She knew that the comfort she’d sought in Robyn was an illusion. Yes, it broke my heart to reject her, but she would never have loved me fully, because her deepest desires are for men.
Violette thought of Charlotte, who was generous with her affections, but who loved Karl more than her own life. She wasn’t sure she could bear to see Charlotte again without seizing her and piercing her divine throat… spending all her frustration on a carnal wave of blood.
Again she pictured Robyn, and Malik’s eyes telling her to follow her instinct. The ache of missing Robyn, struggling to finish the ballet, and fighting Lilith’s thirst, were all one. She changed direction. Magnetic lines drew her like gold threads, westwards above the Atlantic. She felt she could travel forever without rest or blood.
Another night and day before I arrive home, she thought. Two days of rehearsal lost. And my girls will worry…
But the journey would be worth it to catch one glimpse of Robyn’s face.
If only I can find an answer there.
* * *
Robyn felt cool, strong and in control. She told herself the feeling would last, and it did – for a full five minutes after Sebastian had left. Then she broke down.
It was like bereavement. Like falling, this hideous feeling of being gouged hollow, torn to shreds on a cold wind. She curled up, head between her elbows, hands folded on the back of her head. The effort of not crying was agony.
Come back, come back. What are we doing, why must it be like this?
Morning came. The day dragged and died. The night was eternal. And then it all began again.<
br />
Robyn carried on, but her spirit had gone. Alice fussed, the doctor came and went, Harold brought flowers and chocolates and diamonds; nothing mattered. She didn’t want to eat, or talk, or sleep, or think. Somehow she forced herself, but the effort was exhausting.
She thought of Violette.
He’s punishing me for threatening him with Violette. For how long? Oh, Sebastian, come back so I can live again!
One night, three weeks later, she dreamed of the dancer.
She came to Robyn, lily-pale in the moonlight, black hair loose around her shoulders. She wore a floating garment and walked en pointe out of nowhere. She stood looking down at Robyn, then extended her long slender hand to stroke Robyn’s cheekbone.
“Don’t be afraid,” Violette said in the dream. “I want you and your blood so much that I could die… What would you say? Would you die for me too?”
Robyn couldn’t speak. When their eyes met, Violette looked straight into her and saw all her secrets.
“You love someone else, is that it? But they’ve left you in pain.” A spasm crossed her face. “Not in a million years could they love you as I do. When I left I thought the feeling would pass, but it hasn’t. Why didn’t I seize the chance? I can’t bear to see you suffer at the hands of a callous lover… and I could end it, dearest. Make you forget everyone and be mine forever.”
“Do it,” Robyn tried to say, unsure whether she’d actually spoken. “Take away the pain.”
* * *
Nothing ever changes, thought Violette, looking at Robyn’s beloved face, her lustrous brown hair spread on the pillow, the lace collar of her nightdress cupping her chin. I still love her. She’s like the only house in a wilderness, the only fire in winter.
But I can’t do it. I want her to stay as she is, whole and warm, not broken by Lilith’s savage caress.
Violette trembled, wishing she hadn’t come after all.
I love you but I can never have you.
Any more than Charlotte could have me, or Karl could have Charlotte, without turning us into monsters. If Robyn became a vampire she’d no longer be herself, but as my human lover she’d go mad and die… So I must leave her. Even if some dastard breaks her heart, she must heal in her own way, live her natural life…
But love and desire drew her to Robyn’s drowsy, sweet warmth. Lilith’s fingertips touched the lace collar, and Lilith whispered, Why hesitate? Just take her. She needs it.
* * *
The night Sebastian finally surrendered and went to Robyn, he found someone there before him.
From the darkness of the bathroom, with the door ajar, he saw Violette by Robyn’s bed. He watched from a dark lake of disbelief. Knowing, now, that he should have taken Robyn’s warning seriously.
The dancer wore a smoky lavender dress with ragged points falling to her ankles, long wide sleeves, a design of poppies sewn in darkly shining plum beads. She looked exquisite. Sebastian desired her, hated her.
She appeared not to sense his presence. He saw subtle power coiled inside her: an unpredictable, chaotic power like that of a snake, a storm, a scorpion.
Something familiar.
“Forget everyone and be mine forever,” she was saying. Seeing her rapt face, her seashell hand gliding over Robyn, Sebastian was overwhelmed by jealousy. Not since his human wife Mary betrayed him had he experienced such profound emotion.
And Robyn, although her eyes were glazed with sleep, whispered, “Do it. Take away the pain.”
Violette’s hand hovered on Robyn’s throat. Any moment now she would pull down the collar and see the pin-prick scars of another vampire’s fangs.
She’s mine, Sebastian thought grimly.
He was poised to seize Violette and drag her away, when she looked up, eyes wide, all hair-trigger alertness like a bird. Not staring at him, though, but at an alcove to the right of the bathroom. He felt the flicker of a presence there.
Another vampire?
Anger transformed Violette’s face. She turned, vanished in a dusting of mauve stars. The other presence also dissipated, leaving Sebastian to wonder if it had been real. But, he thought, something scared her off, and it was not me.
Sebastian crossed the bedroom to Robyn, who only sighed and turned over. She was asleep. She’d seen nothing.
Then he sprang into the Crystal Ring after Violette.
In a labyrinth of tilted walls and weird perspectives, he couldn’t see her at first. Again he glimpsed another vampire above him, but it was faint, a mirage. As he climbed to a higher level, he caught sight of her: a black thread against the flank of a cloud-hill. She was fast! Sebastian ran like a cheetah to catch up, clawed feet slipping in the strange substance of the Ring as if in liquid ice. Growing closer, he saw how beautiful she was, even in her altered form. Serpentine yet feminine, gloved in black leather and jewels that threw sparks of red, purple, silver.
And there was someone else following her, a greyish figure some distance ahead of him.
Intent on Violette, Sebastian experienced a shift of perception and thought suddenly, I know her!
Samael and Lilith… the Devil and his bride. Deep in his subconscious, inky sediment stirred and took on amorphous shapes against a swirling bank of smoke and fire. Serpents dancing to a drumbeat.
His memories were impossible: unclear and nebulous, funnelling backwards long before his birth as if his life had no definite beginning.
I’ve always been here. And so has she.
I know her.
Robyn forgotten, he soared after her. Violette didn’t look back at him, nor at the greyish figure between them. Eventually, though, she appeared to tire. She dropped out of the Crystal Ring over Canada, and Sebastian followed to find himself in a pine forest. Snow lay thick on the ground and trees. The world was luminous and bitterly cold.
He’d lost her again. Pulled by her aura, he ran, stumbling in thigh-deep snow. Then he reached a clearing and stopped dead at the edge of the trees.
She was on the far side. In the centre of the clearing stood a human, a big bearded man in thick furs, hat and boots. There was a rifle in his hand, a hound the size of a pony beside him. A few yards away, firelight shone in the windows of a log cabin. No one inside, Sebastian noted. This was a hunter who worked alone.
The man stared at Violette as if his eyes would spring from his head. Where had she come from, in the depths of winter, a delicate, snow-skinned woman in thin layers of silk?
Everything was stark, silvery, pure black on pure white.
“Are you all right, ma’am?” said the hunter. He clasped the gun, as if he’d seen such apparitions before, and had to shoot them. “You’d better come in –”
Violette was already on her way towards him, running lightly over the snow as if on stage. The dog barked, jumped into the air from all fours, and fled. The rifle fell from the man’s hands. She leapt onto him like a cat, burrowing between his furs and beard to feed savagely. The giant could do nothing to stop this slender female from clinging around his neck and draining his life.
Sebastian watched, enraptured. The hound was barking frantically from a safe distance behind him. As the victim sank to his knees – Violette sinking with him, still feeding – Sebastian noticed a third vampire half-hidden among the pines, observing.
Violette dropped the corpse and rose as if dazed, her eyes blank, lips blood-red. As she stood there, the other vampire emerged from the forest.
A cherubic young man in a drab robe; physically unprepossessing, yet charismatic with self-assurance. Someone Sebastian hadn’t seen for seventy years. Cesare.
The dog came back and snuffled at its master’s corpse, whining. Violette ignored the animal. Glaring at Cesare, she asked icily, “What is this? Why are you following me?”
Her eyes were demented. Did Cesare know she was lethal? She must have seen Sebastian by now, but gave no sign of acknowledgement. He wasn’t afraid of her. He felt they were equals. He was furious that she’d dared to near Robyn – but for the present
, he was willing to be entertained by Cesare’s imminent humiliation.
* * *
The witch waited in the snow, purple as dead blood, pale as the Weisskalt, black as oblivion. The dark trees framed her.
Cesare felt as if he were climbing a mountain. She seemed so far away. He felt like a mortal confronting Satan, a tiny child battling a monstrous mother.
He was so terrified that he felt elated. He knew God would protect him.
Cesare had vowed to confront Lilith before he asked his followers to do the same. This was a test he’d set himself: to find and follow her, even when her caprice led her across the Atlantic Ocean. Impossible journey, but he’d done it: proved himself Simon’s equal.
Now all that remained was to confront the Enemy. If he survived, he would claim the right to ask anything of his flock. If he survived.
The presence of the dark vampire puzzled him. A friend of Lilith’s? The face was familiar, but he wasted no time searching his memory because the dark one meant nothing. Only Lilith mattered. She filled Cesare’s world with the wings and claws and writhing hair of his nightmares.
Although Cesare saw Lilith’s beauty, he felt no desire for her. His nature was celibate, like Kristian’s. The human weakness for sex, he believed, had no place in immortal lives.
However, Cesare decided that one day, he would rape her. Not in lust, but as a token of his victory over darkness. That would make the act acceptable in God’s eyes.
“Madame, my name is Cesare,” he said politely. “No doubt you have heard of me.”
“Cesare, the great leader,” she said in a flat tone. He hadn’t expected her to be impressed, and she certainly was not.
“The leader of the holy fight against you,” he said. “Your existence is an affront to vampire-kind. You have harmed my friends. Your acts cannot be forgiven. I come to give you notice that my purpose under God’s will is to rid the Earth of you and your demons.”
I’ve done it, Cesare thought in jubilation. Faced her in the flesh. Now no one can label me a coward! And her friend, whoever he is, shall serve as a witness.
Lilith frowned as if irritated. Shadows encircled her eyes, and her fangs were at full length.
The Dark Blood of Poppies Page 32