by P. N. Elrod
That was better. I resumed my walk toward the house.
Now I would have to try to assume a detachment from the experience. A doctor must do much the same thing to allow him to proceed with the more unpleasant aspects of his art when they became necessary. If Beldon could do it, then I would, too.
In my mind’s eye, I placed myself back in the ground once more. Without fear to obscure things, I was able to form a clear picture of that awful time—if one may make a picture from absolute darkness. Between the onset of panic and my sudden roll off the heaped earth, I found it. There had been a blank instant when I felt as though I were falling.
No . . . that wasn’t quite it. Close. It was more like floating in water; except that didn’t really describe it, either. A bit of both, perhaps? The result was that I had ceased to be trapped in my coffin and somehow came to rest on the ground some six feet above it.
The line from Revelation about the sea giving up its dead recalled itself to me, and I toyed with the thought that that great and terrible prophecy had come to pass in some way. Only toyed, mind you. To assume that I alone had been singled out in such a manner struck me as being the height of folly-filled arrogance.
My recollections of other passages of the Bible and how they related to my situation were not very encouraging. There were some firm laws against the drinking of blood, at least in the Old Testament, and some mention made of it in the New. Well, I could let myself starve in an effort to deny the necessities of my changed nature, or I could yield to its demands and, like many another poor sinner, ask God to forgive me and hope for the best.
Moral questions at rest for the moment, I returned to my original puzzle of how I’d escaped the grave. Reason dictated that answers lay in some other direction than divine intervention, most likely within myself.
If Nora had been able to survive a sword thrust into her heart, what other seeming miracles might she have been capable of carrying out? In this light, my physical rising from the grave could be . . .
I paused in my tracks, feeling a hot burst of excitement within. Would I be able to repeat that escape?
I did not know.
And I was too apprehensive to even consider an attempt to try. Also, too hungry.
Intuition and appetite, having taken temporary precedence over reason, told me that I had no time to spare for experimentation, fascinating as it might prove to be.
Get moving and keep moving.
It was a great relief to me when the high white walls of my home loomed into sight amid the trees. It was a great hardship not to rush straight up and start hammering on the front door. Before undergoing any happy reunion, I would most definitely have to feed myself first. I couldn’t possibly face the many questions and tide of emotions to come in my present state. Nor did I wish to suddenly acquaint them with the peculiar dietary needs my change required. One shock at a time.
How I was to satisfy those needs gradually became apparent as I walked around to the back of the grounds. The two points on my upper jaw where my canine teeth emerged felt decidedly odd. Exploring the area with my tongue and finally my fingers, I learned that these teeth were longer than before. Nothing strange there; I’d seen Nora in the same condition often enough. Experiencing it for myself induced a mixture of anticipation and dread, not unlike losing one’s virginity. I couldn’t help but compare it to that first night with Nora, for though I was certain of having an extraordinary time, I had misgivings about botching things.
But whatever might lie ahead, this involuntary alteration of my teeth was—in its unique way—indisputably pleasurable.
I skirted the house and minor outbuildings and headed for the stables. Chores done and their own stomachs filled, the lads had long since retired to their quarters above. Some were well asleep, others still settling in for the night. I felt both wonderment and charm that I could hear them, for like my eyes, my ears had likewise undergone a tremendous improvement over their original condition.
One bedtime conversation persisted; the two speakers were also the youngest, the only ones with enough energy left at the end of a long day to put off their slumbers a little longer. Their talk was filled with speculation on how long the rebellion could last and whether or not they’d have a chance to join up with Howe’s men before it ended. They certainly stretched my patience before exhausting the subject to begin drifting off to their dreams of soldiering.
My belly ached painfully over the delay, but the pauses between comments began to lengthen, and finally went unbroken. I gave them another quarter hour, then eased through the door for a cautious look around.
The first members of the household to greet me were our dogs. We had an even half-dozen hunting hounds that slept where they pleased. Two of them favored the stables year round, probably because of the vermin there. The smallest was a talented rat catcher. He now bounced to his feet and joyfully rushed me. His brother roused and followed and the two of them knocked me right over and halfway out the door again. I was buried under wet tongues, stub-clawed feet, and small whines of eager welcome. They ignored my hushed pleas for silence. I gave up and let them have their way Though terribly distracted by hunger, this was a homecoming to cherish. They, with their own heightened senses, could discover no evil fault within me. I found that reassuring. Perhaps the rest of the family would follow their example.
The dogs eventually calmed down to go sniffing about the yard, and I reentered the stable on tiptoes, listening for signs of disturbance from the lads above. Nothing but the occasional snore. Good.
The first stall I came to was Rolly’s. God, but it was good to see him again. He seemed to think the same as I moved inside and patted him down. He bobbed his head and exhaled a warm blast of breath into my face. I ran a hand along the sleek line of his neck, taking in his scent as well, then stopped. Through the great curved wall of his chest I could hear the very beating of his heart.
Oh, but that was a tantalizing sound. And the smell. More than the ordinary, comforting fetor of stable and horses was here for me. One scent alone caught my full attention, drew me toward it, quelled any feeble protests. Dark and heavy and irresistible, it leached right through his skin and crashed against my spinning brain with the force of a nor’easter. I made hushing, soothing noises to Rolly, telling him to be quiet, then sank to my knees. And he did remain quiet, even as I felt out one of the big surface veins in his foreleg. He didn’t once flinch as I brought my lips to the best spot, then used my teeth to cut through his thick flesh.
It welled up fast and though I swallowed as quickly as possible, some overflowed and dribbled past my chin. I ignored it.
The warmth of Rolly’s living blood washed into me, spreading from my empty belly to saturate my limbs. It was though I were drinking summer sunlight. My flagging strength returned in full, increased, doubled, tripled.
As the aroma was more enticing than any solid food I’d ever had, the taste was a thousand times better—not at all what I’d expected. During our exchanges, Nora’s blood had certainly possessed a unique and erotic quality that enabled me to drink it without the least revulsion, but for all the sensual pleasure imparted, it still tasted like blood. That which I now consumed was wholly different, as was its effect on me. Instead of being engulfed in a blaze of red fire whose heat invariably took me to a supreme climax, I was inundated with the kind of sweet contentment that a starving man must feel when, after years of privation, he at last eats his fill.
I don’t know how much I drank; it must have been quite a lot, perhaps as much as a tall beer flagon, perhaps more, but some inner perception told me when no more was needed. A little blood continued to seep from the wounds I’d made, but I pressed them with my hand until they clotted over. This was very messy, of course, but I’d take care of that soon enough.
Sitting back in the clean straw of the stall, I considered what I’d just done and decided that this sort of feeding was something I
could not only put up with, but actively enjoy. I also considered what it might be like should the time come for me to take some lady to bed. The intuition I’d given free rein to tonight told me that that experience promised to be no less than incredible. As wonderful as it had been to be on the receiving end of Nora’s kisses, how much better might it be to be the one giving the kiss—in this, my changed state?
Well-a-day, as my good cousin Oliver would have said. Perhaps I would eventually find out.
Quitting the stable, I started for the well, but changed my mind. Drawing water would be too noisy, and I didn’t want to rouse anyone until I was presentable again. There was a clear sweet stream not a hundred yards from the house, better to use it, instead. As though spoiling for a footrace, I trotted lightly toward it, my previous exhaustion forgotten.
I startled two rabbits and a bush full of dozing birds along the way The birds squawked and fell into guarded silence, but the rabbits dodged swiftly away into cover. I followed them for the sheer joy of movement. Had it been open ground, I thought I’d have had a chance of catching them, too. I’d never been so fresh and alive before; had Nora also felt this? She’d been so serene and sedate; I wanted to turn Catherine wheels, to leap, to fly to the moon.
I had to settle for kneeling by the stream and cupping up water to wash away the stains of drying blood. Though comfortable enough splashed against my face and neck, it was extremely cold on my hands as I dipped in, biting cruelly as though it were mid-winter. They’d gone blue and were starting to shrivel before I’d finished. On the walk back I had to rub hard to revive feeling in my fingers. Very odd, it seemed, but having suffered an excess of odd experiences in so brief a time, the matter was hardly worth notice.
There were too many other things to consider, the most important being how best to approach my family. Having seen me unquestionably dead and the corpse buried, I had no illusion that their first reaction would be utter terror. There was no way around that one. Hopefully, the joy to follow—once I’d explained things—would more than compensate their initial distress.
I would have to begin with Father and rely on his courage and wisdom to help me deal with the others. But inert as my heart had become, I could feel it shrink at the idea of approaching him. The simple fact was that I was embarrassed about the whole business, for it would involve a lengthy confession on my intimacy with Nora, something I had only dared to confide to my private journal.
Heavens, I hoped that no one had found it and was lightly turning over those pages. Such thoughts as I’d recorded there were for my eyes alone . . . .
Later? I questioned.
Later, that inner voice wearily confirmed.
As for difficulties I might encounter with my family . . . in every possible way I had taken on Nora’s abilities, so I had no doubt that if it came to it I could enforce my will upon them. I could ease their fears, even alter their very thoughts, if necessary.
But this was an abhorrence to me, for it meant that I might momentarily be forced to adopt my mother’s hated precept of “doing it for their own good.”
If it must be, then so be it. I needed them.
Surely they would forgive me even as I’d forgiven Nora. If that happened, well and good, but if not, then I’d learn to live with it somehow. I would gladly ease any fear, but that’s as far as it would go.
They would not be my dancing puppets.
Approaching the side door closest to the stables, I slowed and pondered a new problem: how to get inside my own home. With the times being so uncertain, Father had had heavy bolts fixed to all the doors and ground-floor windows. Despite the warmth of the season these were always locked at night. The heat was no real hardship, since everyone slept on the next floor or in the attic and those windows had no need to be secured. Standing back, I saw that all the ones on this face of the upper story were wide open, even the one to my room. Convenient, but only if I were a bird and able to fly in.
Or float?
I started to dismiss that one, but reconsidered as the idea had a lunatic attractiveness to it. If I could induce myself to that very odd state I’d achieved to escape my grave, even learn to control it . . .
No. I shook my head. That was too fanciful and frightening. I was not going to explore that possibility. Besides, there had to be an easier way in. I had only to find it. A ladder would be just the thing. I seemed to recall there being one lying on its side against the house somewhere in the back, or perhaps in the stable. . . .
Going around to the rear of the house, I spied the cellar doors and gave them a hopeful try Bolted. The hinges on the right half were rather free, though. There was enough play between the metal and the wood for me to force my fingers in and give an experimental tug.
For the second time that night I found myself bowled over on my backside. The right half flew up with a sharp crack as the hinge nails slipped from the wood. I’d gotten the balance wrong or miscalculated my own strength. The door slammed down and would have made the devil’s own row if I hadn’t caught it at the last second. My hand was bruised, but nothing worse. Righting myself and cursing with quiet intensity at the pain, I lifted it just enough to get inside.
The place was dank and dark, the latter a surprise. I’d grown so used to being able to see impossibly well at night that I was momentarily nonplussed. Without a candle, I was doomed to blunder my way around any number of hazards like an ordinary man. Lacking the means to make a light, I backed up and loosened the bolt on the doors and pushed on the half with the broken hinges. It made an unhappy scrape that had me wincing at the noise, but the opening provided more than sufficient light. I made my way up to the kitchen without stumbling and breaking my neck.
As it was the custom to keep the fire banked and ready for the next day’s cooking, the kitchen was very warm. I fled through into the main part of the house, for despite my lack of regular breathing, the lingering food smells still managed to penetrate my nose and set my stomach writhing. I briefly thought about returning for a candle, but decided it was unnecessary. From here I could easily find the way to my room.
I took my shoes off before going upstairs and was careful to avoid the spots in the floor that creaked. The silence filling the place seemed to be a listening one. I hated playing the fugitive, but nothing else would have been right. I wasn’t sure what would be, though, having consigned that problem to the nebulous and now fast-approaching future. Doubtless something would work itself out. After all my exertions, my clothes were, as Mrs. Nooth might have said, “in a state.” Confronting my family while so disheveled was not at all desirable, but that had become less important than changing for the sake of my own comfort. Once out of them and free of their attendant reminders of the grave, I’d feel better and more of a mind to think.
I paused and listened on the upper landing, and heard snores from Mother’s room. She must have had laudanum to ease her into sleep. Good. Nothing would wake her for the present. Perhaps others of the household had also partaken. They’d be too sodden to have heard my breaking in.
An easy push on the door and I stood in the familiar security of my own room.
The first impression I got was that it had been given a better than average cleaning by Jericho. My study table was no longer stacked with its clutter of papers and open books. The former were gone and the latter firmly closed and in their case. This angered me. I hadn’t finished with those yet and he knew it . . . .
But he also knew I’d never return to them again. I had died. Oh, my poor friend.
Other details impressed themselves upon me. On the table by the bed someone had placed a burning candle in a small holder within a wide bowl of water. I hadn’t seen this sort of thing since Elizabeth and I had been young children and wanted light to chase away the night terrors.
The bed itself had been turned down as though for my return. Laid out at its foot was the elaborate dressing gown Elizabeth had mad
e me as a gift; on the floor were my slippers.
I recoiled from this otherwise innocuous sight. It was perfectly innocent, until you remembered that the missing occupant was dead and supposedly gone forever. Had they turned my room into some horrid shrine to my memory? It was repellent.
It would change, though. Before the night was out, everything would be changed back. Perhaps not the same as before, but better than this ghastly, grief-filled present.
First things first. I had to get these things off.
Hastily, I stripped from my coat, peeled away shirt and breeches, and scraped free of stockings and underclothes. The air gently flowing in from the window was agreeable to my naked skin. I stretched to let it touch every part of me and combed back my tangled hair with my fingers. Marveling, I saw that the scar on my chest marking where the ball had shattered flesh was much fainter and smaller than before.
My Sunday clothes I left in a pile on the floor, though I removed the silver buckles from the shoes, intending to place them in their usual box in the wardrobe.
The wardrobe, unfortunately, unexpectedly, unhappily, and unreasonably, was quite, quite empty.
I stared like a brainless buffoon, jaw hanging and eyes popping for a ludicrous amount of time until white-hot outrage flooded through me. Couldn’t they have waited just a little while before disbursing my things among themselves and the servants? I could understand the basic need to put me into the ground the same day I’d died, for the weather was far too hot for delays, but it wouldn’t have hurt to let a decent interval pass before performing this other ritual of death.
Slamming the door, careless of the noise, I grabbed up the dressing gown and pulled it on, my movements made stiff by anger. I tried the top drawer of the chest at the foot of the bed. Empty. Not even a dusting of lint remained in the corners. Disgusted, I slammed it shut as well. I had nothing else to wear other than the dressing gown or my grave clothes, and I’d be damned before I put them on again. Fuming, I returned to the wardrobe and checked its drawers. I didn’t think I’d find anything, but I wasn’t thinking at all at this point, being too furious.