by Gwynn White
Clarius scoffed. “I cannot die. You saw to that when you poisoned me. You are responsible for this.” He waved his hand toward the bodies. “For all of them.”
“You alone bear responsibility,” she said.
“…And the power their blood gave me,” he finished, shaking out his taut arm muscles which, despite their desiccated appearance, had grown in size and strength since she had last seen him.
Petra scoffed at that. “You look like you will crumble into the dust at any moment.”
Clarius narrowed his eyes at her, the insult getting under that hideous grey skin of his. Then he dropped the wine bottle and began his old pacing ritual, the one that always signaled the slow-building rage that would soon turn into a storm.
“I searched for you for many long months,” he finally said. “I listened for rumors, traveled to many countries. I would have found you eventually. Something in your blood calls to me, slave girl. I can almost taste you from here.” Clarius seemed not to realize he was speaking aloud or that Lucius was still in the room. Her old master stared at her, his body inching toward her even as his hatred for her seemed to hold him back. She had never seen him stare at her with such lust. He had certainly taken his fill of other slave girls a little older than she was through the years. She had always been too young for his tastes, which was unusual for patrician men. Most preferred young boys or girls for their pleasure.
Clarius seemed to shake himself out of his trance when her own stare turned into a scowl.
He matched her expression, then, and when he spoke, it was a demand. “You will tell me how it was done.”
“I owe you nothing,” Petra said.
“Save death,” Lucius added.
“Before this ends, I will extract from you the answers I seek. You will tell me what I want to know, and then you will beg me for death.”
Petra took his threat seriously and thought about whether she should reveal what part her blood played in his immortality. She had no idea if it would put them in more danger or protect them from Clarius’s wrath. She decided not to tell him, but stood at the ready, raising her dagger to Clarius.
“When you die today, Master,” she said with pure disgust, “I will make certain you never come back.”
Lucius rushed ahead, his dagger in hand and a shout of rage erupting from his chest as if he’d held it back for decades. Petra was on his heels as Clarius waited for them. At the last moment, Clarius reached for the dagger at his belt and threw it at him, lodging it deep into his left thigh. Lucius grunted in pain, as Clarius slipped aside with preternatural anticipation.
Petra attacked and Clarius laughed at her clumsy attempt to stab him in the heart. He deftly shifted on his feet to avoid her. Lucius continued his forward thrust and went for Clarius’s abdomen. He blocked him with an elbow and stepped in to punch Lucius in the jaw. Before he could recover, Petra jumped on Clarius’s back and attempted to slice open his neck, but he threw her off. She fell on top of a foul-smelling body propped against the wall. She quickly scrambled off, holding back the urge to vomit.
Clarius spun away and ran off toward the back of the house and down the stairs where the servants’ rooms and kitchen were located. Lucius lumbered after him, limping only slightly from his leg injury, and Petra followed, their soft sandals tapping loudly on the mosaics in the garden.
“Careful,” he said, as they descended the stairs beyond the garden, “there’s a blind corner near the servants’ rooms below.”
They slowed as they approached the kitchen, but it was deserted and smelled of death and rotten food. They moved toward the back, through a long hallway between rows of small house servants’ rooms. As Petra came upon the first room, she noticed a barred door had replaced the original wooden door. She pushed it open and immediately recoiled at the sight of a blackened body crumpled against the far wall. She nearly retched from the sweet, rancid smell of burnt flesh.
Before she could react, Clarius knocked Lucius to the ground behind her and pushed her into the room with the corpse. She fell hard against the bed as Clarius slammed the barred door and slid a bolt across to lock her in.
By the time she was on her feet again, Lucius and Clarius were struggling with a dagger between them, each attempting to wrest it away from the other. She strained against the iron bars, hoping her new strength would bend them. They moved slightly, but not enough to let her squeeze through.
She looked up when the dagger Clarius had held inches from Lucius’s face clattered across the floor. Clarius dove for it, scooping it up before rolling to the side to stab Lucius in the calf. He cried out from the pain but swung down to punch Clarius in the face. They rolled again, this time with Clarius on top. Lucius quickly began to buckle under Clarius’s superior strength. Clarius turned the dagger downward, bringing it dangerously close to Lucius’s heart.
“Fight him, Lucius. Fight for us!” Petra shouted.
Her words seemed to rally him, and he held Clarius at bay once again.
“So you decided to take my father’s name, slave boy? You don’t have the strength to fight me, Lucipor,” Clarius said, emphasizing his slave name. “I am your master, and I will take her blood before this day is over.”
Lucius glanced away for only a moment, his eyes meeting hers. When he brought his attention back to Clarius, it was too late. Clarius plunged the dagger into Lucius’s chest, the movement excruciatingly slow. Lucius’s scream ripped through Petra as she collapsed into the dirt-strewn floor of her prison. She screamed with him, her voice no more intelligible then an animal’s cry of defeat when the predator delivers the killing blow to his prey.
As she stared at Lucius, watching him struggle with the pain, Clarius’s laugh rang out like a death knell to her ears. He rose slowly to his feet, his eyes still on Lucius, who was gasping for breath. When he finally turned, the look of bloodlust on his face made her recoil.
“As you can see, I’ve already gone through all the servants, the slaves, the travelers on the road to Rome. I’ve been hungry for a long time, girl. Hungry, and waiting for my little Petra to make her way back home to her master.”
Petra winced and backed away from him, trying not to think of the blood smearing the walls, the mosaics, and his blackened face. She forgot it all the moment she locked eyes with Lucius. He shook his head at her, unable to speak for the gasps that wracked his body. The blade’s handle protruded from his chest, and the blade itself lay deep within his breast. How long did he have? Hours? Minutes? What if she didn’t make it to him in time? She had to give him every moment she could. No matter what Clarius did to her, she would always rise again. But Lucius…
Clarius scoffed. “I am the one you have wronged, slave. Beg my forgiveness. Do as I say, and then I may let you live.”
“You say this to a true immortal, Clarius. Something you can never be.”
“What do you mean?” He narrowed his eyes at her, his anger lingering under the surface of his sneer.
She turned her chin up, refusing to answer.
“I seek an immortal’s blood, then.” He frowned at her, thinking. “I need your blood to survive, don’t I, Petra? I’ve worked it out. That’s why that boy looks as fresh as a lily flower, and I… Well, you don’t look at me with quite the same fervor, do you? It wasn’t the poison, after all. It was your blood.”
Petra tried not to give the secret away. She kept her face a mask, but she saw it in his eyes. They both knew the truth now. There was no going back. It seemed like she had lost her last bit of leverage, and as she looked at Lucius, dying and in pain, she nearly gave up hope.
Clarius’s corpse smile was grotesque. “I have you caged, my girl. I have an eternity to drink from you, have I not? I am sure I can find many ways to make you suffer… To make you die and rise again.”
Petra’s heart began to pound, but she did not give in to her fear. She would face him. She would let his black fingers touch her, his blood-stained mouth envelop her. She would force him to save Lucius’s li
fe.
“You don’t know the truth about what you are. About what we are. You need me to give you the answers. Without them, you’ll die.” She took a deep breath and walked to the doorway, steadying her mind and her voice. She held onto the bars and nodded to him, beckoning him closer.
“You lie.”
“Are you willing to take that chance?”
As she wanted, Clarius stepped closer to her. “Chance? I am no longer bound by chance. I am an immortal.”
“No, Clarius, you are not. You are bound to me. Let me out of here or I will kill you.”
He stalked forward, his smile arrogant. He made a grab for her through the bars, and she let him pull her against his body until they were face to face.
“I have you now, slave.”
“No. I have you.”
She began the draw from his heart, pulling with everything she had. The shock in his face almost made her smile, and the feel of his strength pouring into her as she watched the waves of pain flow through him made her feel powerful. It felt good to make him suffer, to see fear at last in his eyes.
“You are going to release me from this room, or I will kill you.”
“Never.”
Petra drew harder, until his arm fell away from hers, until his knees buckled. What she would never reveal is that his power and his strength were overwhelming her. He was far stronger than any human. Stronger than Lucius. Much stronger than Petra herself. She could only assume he gained that strength from all the lives he had taken, from all the blood he had drunk. She knew beyond a doubt that she wouldn’t be able to kill him. Even now, her draw was weakening. She had to hurry.
“Let me out!”
He began to fiddle with the lock, his eyes wide, his pain intensifying. And then she was free. When the bars swung open, it broke her draw. So she slipped past Clarius and fell before Lucius.
“Go, Petra. Run!” Lucius said.
She sliced open her vein with the blade protruding from his chest. “No. I won’t leave you. Now drink.” Petra pressed her wrist to Lucius’s mouth as she turned back to Clarius. It was all she could think to do to give him more time—maybe enough time to survive this day.
“Clarius,” she said, evenly. “I offer you a proposition. Come to me once a year and no more. I will give you my blood in exchange for Lucius’s life and a lasting peace between us.” She hated saying the words. Hated that he existed. But she knew that neither of them could defeat him. So there was only one play left: surrender.
“You would offer yourself to me freely for that boy’s life?”
“Yes.”
Lucius pulled away from her wrist. “No, Petra. I won’t allow it.”
“It isn’t your choice, Lucius.” She hoped her tone would quiet him but he tried to rise, to pull at her arm.
“No—”
“Do you accept, Clarius?” Petra shouted, cutting off Lucius.
Clarius appeared to consider this. “You would… let me drink from you?” He narrowed his eyes at her even as he licked his lips. “I will kill you, you understand?”
“Yes.” Her voice betrayed no fear, but she couldn’t stop the revulsion from touching her eyes, disgusted by the mere thought of him taking any part of her—this murderer, this monster—into himself. She turned away, closing her eyes, feeling as though she were bargaining with Charon himself. Perhaps she was. If Clarius accepted, he would be the one carrying her to death; not just once, but every year for as long as she existed. She looked at Lucius’s prone body as he slipped into unconsciousness. All Clarius had to do was leave her in this cell to watch Lucius slowly die without her life-giving blood. She had to tread carefully.
The expression on Clarius’s face was one of anticipation, of longing. He looked at her as if she were his salvation and his next meal. It sickened her. At the same time, she understood why. She had felt this same madness, this rush of pleasure and pain. No other creatures on Earth had experienced a hunger like this. For other animals and humans, there was an instinct whispering to them that they must survive at all costs. But for her… and for Lucius and Clarius, they knew that they would wake again. There was a heady feeling in that sure knowledge for her. There was also a terror unlike any other as well. What if, as the years passed into decades and centuries, they did not want to go on living? Would they have the courage to end it all? Would they ever learn how it could be done?
She shook her head of her morbid thoughts and found that Clarius was staring at her.
“What of Silvipor? You will make him into what we are.” It wasn’t a question.
“You kept him alive?” she asked, eyebrows raised. That he would slaughter so many yet spare an insignificant slave said much to her about how much Clarius still valued him after all this time.
“I sent him away so I wouldn’t kill him too. I want you to turn him into an immortal. I need someone loyal to do my bidding. Someone who will keep our secrets.”
With begrudging acknowledgment, Petra realized he was right. She already knew Silvipor to be loyal to Clarius. The only reason that the master hadn’t beat Silvipor as he did the rest of them was because he was his puppet among the slaves. The two had grown up together, and Master Clarius had always harbored a soft spot for Silvipor—likely because he dwarfed Clarius in size and fighting skill. Yet he had never opposed Clarius, and he always went along with the master’s cruel pranks and punishments against the other slaves. As distasteful as it was to her, it seemed prudent to turn Silvipor rather than a stranger. At the least, Silvipor would keep his master’s secrets and remain loyal.
She nodded. “If you must have a companion, I will turn him a year from now when you come to me again.”
“Why only once a year?”
“We have learned it is all Lucius requires to live without desiccation. That is my bargain, Clarius. No more, no less. Do you accept?”
“You would live here?”
Her laugh was bitter. “In this house of depravity and death? Never.”
Clarius began to shake his head, a sneer marring his blackened face.
She held up her hand. “We would not go far.”
“No, you won’t. I will have you watched. Try to run, and I will track you to the ends of the Earth.”
“Petra, no. Don’t—” Lucius called out to her, his words stopped short by a wracking cough. He rose slowly to a crouched position, his chest heaving from the pain. Blood did not pour from it, and she realized the dagger itself must be stopping the flow from the wound. It was likely keeping him alive as well. If the knife was pulled out, he would likely die even faster from the blood loss. Even now, he looked pale and weak as blood spilled from his mouth to the floor. But, still, he attempted to reach her.
“No, Lucius. Stay there.” Then she withdrew, so that only Clarius could see her face. “What say you, Clarius. Will you accept what I offer or no?”
“Don’t bargain with him, Petra. Better that I should die than you give yourself to him. Please.” The weakness and pleading in Lucius’s voice made her force back tears.
Better that I should, my love… I who can live forever.
“I accept,” Clarius finally said, taking no notice of Lucius’s pleading. “On this day one year from now you will send word, and I will come to you. Agreed?”
“Agreed.” She was the one who brought this monster back to life. He should be food for maggots. Instead, it was her blood that had awakened him. It was she who was solely responsible for keeping her mother’s murderer alive.
Lucius moaned at the sound of her acquiescence, but Clarius ignored him and took her by the wrist, his hideous skin making her step back. He laughed as she backed up against the wall, but he pulled her out into full view of Lucius.
“Don’t make him watch this.”
“Oh, I think he’ll enjoy it,” Clarius said, coaxing her with a gentle voice that unnerved her.
His hand felt rough against her skin. He forced her to kneel with him in front of Lucius, who reached out to her. He had nev
er stopped shaking his head, even as he wheezed and his chest heaved with the pain. Clarius roughly grabbed both of her arms to force her to look at him.
“This is for the murder of my wife and child.”
Then he pulled her to him, and Clarius’s draw began. Petra cried out when his teeth penetrated the delicate skin of her neck. The exquisite pain was a shock, and it moved through her body, her blood, like a venom made of fire. She had no refuge from the pain, nowhere to hide. He drew back the power she had taken from him, drew, it felt, like the very essence of who she was. Then a change began, a cooling in her veins, a release from the torture. The pain began to subside, and it was replaced with a sickening pleasure. To her shame, she began to hope that he would never stop, never let go. Her cries of pain soon turned to moans of pleasure. When her vision clouded over, all Petra glimpsed was the darkness of the bathhouse, and all she remembered was the moment of her last death. The sound of rushing water assaulted her ears, but it was only the beat of her heart in time with Clarius’s.
When he finally released her, she fell to the stone floor, her head lolling to the side. Her vision grew dim but what she saw ripped her heart in half: Lucius was staring at her, a look of pure horror on his face.
She tried to open her mouth to speak, but her body would not move. Clarius leaned over, blocking her last connection to Lucius. He drew near to her ear and whispered as her eyes closed and death began to take hold.
“Now I have had my taste of you, slave girl… and my revenge. When I come to you next, you will beg me to take you again.”
She willed herself to die, then, wanting nothing more than to erase the memory of the pleasure he had wrought inside of her.
9
The Escape
August 13, 1 AD
Petra woke to the sound of rippling water and birds warbling. She felt the cool of the open air. The only thought that came to her was whether her mother was already up at the master’s villa to check on Constantia or if she needed to wake her. Petra rubbed at her eyes and took a deep breath.