Delcaos (Darkest Night Collection)

by Payne, Rachael A

  Ah how wonderful it is to taste someone young. The beautiful always please me most. Their skin is supple, the blood flows so strongly around their divine frames.

  Oh to be with a young attractive female or male, rippling muscles that quiver with my touch. I worship them, undress them carefully, caress their flesh and gently stroke the hair, how easy it is to control them.

  I liked to keep them, just for the night. Well, sometimes more but I was not like that beast who created me. No, I treated my victims well, I sometimes fed and bathed them. I have even been known to take them to dinner and let them feast well, buy them new clothes. I find they always taste better with a full stomach.

  Lucretia said it was a cruel game that I played on them. She would call me a snob and laugh at me because I could never drink from a dirty human. Perhaps she was right, I can be quite finicky at times. But then again, I do like my games.

  Honestly, I did enjoy tormenting them, the men and women I would find. They would think me the kindest stranger. It excited me to think they believed every word I said when my motives were oh so sinister.

  And yes if I had a hotel room or was boarding somewhere, I would take them there. I would keep them there, lay with their succulent selves and gorge myself upon them. It was always satisfying to leave them clinging to life. They would stare you see. Up at the ceiling or to me if I were hovering over them. The ones that prayed, that entertained me most. I laughed in their faces. How pathetic to think that someone, God, could help them. No one could stop me, I’m too powerful.

  With Lucretia, I became something else, something worse. The games got worse as I grew to greatly hunger for the pleasure of the sadistic torture I could inflict.

  She began to become uncomfortable with what we used to do, the torture and suffering we inflicted on our victims, the disturbing games we played with them or more to the truth, she began to hate the way I would pay more attention to my victims than I did to her. The time I spent with them was so intimate, I took my time and she became jealous. She was madly in love with me after all. Though I never felt such a thing for her, what was she to me but another toy to play games with?

  I treated her badly, I owned her after all, she was mine to do with as I pleased and if she disobeyed me then she would have to be punished.

  And so she too became part of my games. Her disapproval only fuelled me on. We began to fight and argue after I had fed, she began to no longer stay with me but left to hunt on her own. So I began to make her get rid of the bodies, how she detested that! I would make her drag the carcass to some distant place and have her bury it.

  It didn't help that I constantly compared Lucretia to Diana. I would shout ‘You’ll never be as good as her’, just to cause hurt.

  In quieter moments, she would say to me that I was obsessed with Diana’s death, the one death that meant so much to me. But she could never understand the agony and guilt felt from such a loss. She recalled nothing of her mortal life nor the pain or death she had suffered.

  Perhaps I was obsessed. Diana was and had been the only thing I had loved in this world. Nothing or no one else mattered and I treated Lucretia in kind.

  She was becoming increasingly angry with me, with the things I made her do, she became more like my servant than a companion. As the weeks went on I could feel her loathing for me intensify and though I enjoyed our ever increasingly violent ‘discussions’, I began to sense that Lucretia wanted to leave me.

  I couldn't accept that. I didn't love her, at the time I wasn't particularly concerned with her happiness, nor did I care if she was alive or dead. Yet I didn't want her to go. All I needed to do was come up with a way to stop her leaving, some way she would always be reliant on me.

  I made her an addict. Addicted only to me.

  You see vampires’ blood to another vampire tastes exquisite. The older the blood the better. If you ever want another vampire to stay with you, you simply supplement mortal or animal blood for your own.

  The blood of the one that made you can also be quite beneficial, aiding in speeding up recovery from wounds. More useful information my maker gave me.

  Addiction came quickly for Lucretia. It wasn’t long before she no longer went out to hunt. She stayed with me eagerly awaiting the time when I was to feed her.

  She became so good at being addicted that I started to question what I had done. She wanted the blood in ever more increasing quantities. Longer and longer she would drink from me and I would have to physically push her away, sometimes so hard that she hit the wall leaving my arm torn open and her snarling at me from a corner.

  She became violent if I said no to her feeding on me. She would break chairs, smash windows, drawing attention to us so that it threatened to expose what we are.

  She left me with no choice.

  I had to put a stop to it. Well I had to try to lessen her addiction somehow so that she was more controllable. I tried restricting the blood I gave her, I tried locking her away. I found boarding houses with cellars and I would have to barricade her in with items of furniture. Sometimes she would break out and we would fight, she clambering to get away, me desperate to keep her in. Anywhere we stayed was ruined. Any conversation we had turned into a fiery argument. We were just as bad as each other, both of us flinging objects and furniture at one another.

  Despite all this, despite knowing how desperately unhappy Lucretia was, I never once suspected that she would want to leave me nor that there was anyone out there who would take her from me.

  Lucretia had changed much in the years we had been together. Her hair no longer shone in the moonlight, now it clung to her ever paler skin looking frayed and unkempt. Her eyes were empty wells sat amongst red clouds. Her skin tightly pulled around her bones, every corner was sharp like rocks in the sea.

  She couldn't leave me though, not now. I was all she knew. In so many years we had not encountered another vampire. It was me or be alone, and Lucretia could not stand to be alone. I had found me the perfect partner, or so I thought.

  Life with Lucretia was almost intolerable yet each night we went through the identical arguments and familiar hatred. How I wished to end her and her ungratefulness. I gave her this life, I should be the one to take it away but every time I grabbed her throat in my hand, something stopped me.

  And then one night that opportunity was taken away from me.

  Lucretia left the Parisian hotel room we were staying in whilst I was out hunting, she was gone when I returned. I waited until dawn but she never returned.

  When I awoke the next evening from the chaise lounge, a stranger stood in my room.

  This upstart stood leaning casually, one arm resting on the mantel of the fireplace in pathetic eighteenth century clothing. His olive green velvet frock coat and knee length boots made him look as if he were wearing fancy dress. Golden blond, wavy hair and green eyes were set in his angelic looking face.

  He began playing with his manicured nails. “What do you want?” I asked him.

  He tapped the mantle and walked to the other side of the fireplace before turning to me, one hand behind his back. “She's not coming back. She doesn’t want to.” His accent struck me as strange at first but was quickly forgotten.

  I thought about threatening him, holding him against the wall breaking his bones until he told me where she was, but I tried to remain calm.

  Of all the things I could think of, I asked; “And you are?”

  He seemed surprised by my composure “Gabriel.”

  I nodded, he took a moment to look at me and then left through the door. I rushed to the window to see him leave the hotel and cross the street carrying on to the left. I climbed out of the window and up to the roof not caring if I was seen and I followed this stranger through the night time Parisian streets.

  As I watched him swiftly glide through passersby, my thoughts were raging. Just who did this ‘Gabriel’ think he was? And Lucretia, at lowest ebb he must have found her, my pathetic little child. He must have felt sorry
for her. I can’t imagine what he thought when he saw her, this dishevelled, ragged looking vampire. Her appearance disgusted even me, most would avoid such a being but not this ‘Gabriel’.

  It was quite a long walk to where he was going and he never paused, save to cross over to the other side of the street. Not once did I take my eyes off him. The more time spent looking at him the more my anger grew. I was going to kill him, after he had led me to Lucretia, and I was going to make her watch. There was no life for her without me, no escape. She would find no peace. That was the price she would pay for trying to leave me.

  Finally we came to a lavish hotel and the upstart walked straight through the doors. I stood on the roof of the building opposite planning my next moves. A large road and pavement separated me from the hotel so I was in the perfect place to see the front of the building. I didn’t want to walk into the hotel after him, he could have seen me at any point. I couldn’t follow him into the lift either to see what floor he was stopping on. No, I would have to wait for him to come back out and hope she was with him.

  Waiting, waiting, waiting. I waited an age for it to happen. I saw many come and go. When those doors opened, every time I tensed in anticipation. As the night went on, there was less and less activity as mortals turned to their beds. Still I kept watch.

  By the hour of two the streets were quiet, the hotel doors had ceased their opening and closing ritual for some time.

  But then a taxi appeared and stopped directly in front of the hotel steps. No one got out so that meant someone was getting in, perhaps it would be them.

  I was paused perfectly in statue form, poised and ready to drop down and attack. When she walked out of the door, I couldn’t stop smiling.

  Lucretia was all alone. But this new being must be well off. He had brought for her new clothing and shoes, the expensive kind. Her hair was washed and brushed, I could smell the soap from the rooftop. She carried a single bag that she was preparing to hand over to the taxi driver.

  No sign of ‘Gabriel’, oh well, she would have to do.

  Just as I prepared to leap off of the roof, I felt a tight grasp upon my shoulder. It felt as though a heavy weight was pressing down upon me so much so that it slowed my usually natural quick reaction. I turned around as fast as I could which to a mortal is still exceptionally quick, yet in immortal terms it felt like an age.

  When I saw that smooth, chiselled, stern look of the one I had followed earlier I felt my face drop. How had I missed his approach? Was I so fixated on Lucretia that my senses could not detect him? Impossible. What kind of trick was this?

  He spoke to me as calmly as before “I told you, she isn’t coming back to you. Now leave here.”

  I glanced over my shoulder and down to the waiting taxi. Lucretia stood in the road looking up at me. Now was the time to punish this fool before me and make sure she saw.

  I forced my hand tightly around his throat, snarling as I did so, I would rip his head off and keep it as a trophy and make sure Lucretia would see it every day for the rest of her being.

  But he simply took hold of my wrist with his hand and snapped it backwards. I cried in pain and yet the shock I felt was much more abundant.

  I had never met anyone stronger than myself and this being had broken my bones as if snapping a twig.

  “I have no wish to kill you. Leave now and forget about this.”

  I laughed at him, a hearty chuckle as I cupped my wrist. The idea that he could kill me was amusing. “Give me back what is mine and I’ll let you go.” Hmm, now it seems foolish but at the time I thought I was invincible, a God and his infliction a mere fluke.

  “Oh how noble of you.” He seemed annoyed. “You're kind always places ownership on what cannot be brought.”

  “My kind?”

  “The kind of vampire you are. Selfish, believing you are some type of God, but all you are is weak and pathetic using those around you, torturing them to make yourself feel more powerful than what you are.”

  I went for him, lunging towards his middle I wrapped my arms around him in an attempt to run him off the roof. But we moved not an inch. It was like running into a wall of stone behind a wall of steel.

  He forced his knee into my stomach area and I slid down. He took a step away from me and then returned with his boot coming towards my face. I felt it hit me and then the slate of the roof connected with my head.

  A stamp to my skull and I began to feel the warm blood pour from an open wound.

  Then he bent over me and softly spoke into my ear, “I abhor violence, but if you get up, if you follow us, I won't hesitate to kill you.”

  Anger fuelled me, my burnt pride raised me from the ground. Blood trickled into my eye as this fiend waltzed away from me and towards my Lucretia.

  Snarling and roaring I charged at full pace. Hate and rage boiling my blood, I felt the heat as it seeped out of my wound.

  I would kill him even if I had to throw myself off of a building to do so.

  However, that was not to be. Where his powers came from, I do not know. He simply turned towards me when it was too late for me to stop and grabbed hold of me by the throat. So strong was the grip that I could feel his fingers pressing deep into my flesh.

  He turned me so that I was now dangling over the edge of the roof. I felt myself scramble against him trying to free myself and reaching out with my feet to touch the roof. In that moment, I knew panic and fear as a vampire for the first time.

  And then came the cry of ‘Gabriel’ in a sweet voice from below. And I knew it then, from the tone. How she cried his name, she was already in love with him. After only two nights, she had fallen in love with him.

  And it disgusted me. Her stupidity, her naivety and how she could so easily forget me brought on a sickness in me that I had never felt before but have felt every day since that moment. The betrayal uttered in that single word crushed my heart. My world was forever altered, I was no longer safe.

  But what should I have expected? After all the terrible things I’d done to her, this was what I deserved. Thinking back it was no surprise that she could fall so easily for one that gave her an ounce of kindness. Yet at the time it felt as though the world was crumbling in front of my eyes, a lifetime of routine and security shattered.

  He studied my face, his eyes reading every line. “You won't give up, will you?”

  My stupidity won out. “She is MINE!” I hissed at him. For a moment, he looked away, and just for a moment he appeared disappointed, maybe even sorry for me.

  “You could have been something more.” His voice was angry, as if he was blaming me for his actions.

  He stepped forward, lifting me higher and my feet were no longer dangling close to the edge of the roof. The strength of this creature was remarkable, I can say that now, at the time I could only explain it away by saying that I hadn’t fed that evening. I could not conceive that there was one stronger than me. How naive of me.

  Still I struggled against him, trying desperately to pry his fingers away from my throat. And he stared deep into my eyes with some kind of sorrow.

  His pity made me nauseous.

  The seconds seemed to drag as he continued to look intently at me. I could feel a gentle breeze brush over my face and lightly waft the scent of Lucretia’s rose fragranced soap into my head. Then I closed my eyes. I don't know why, but I did.

  I felt a sensation of slow falling. Wind blew upwards and I fell back, cradled by the separating air. I was falling forever, or so it seemed. Just as Lucifer must have done. This was what it felt like to be a falling angel.

  And I'm not sure, but I think I felt myself laughing. I remember opening my eyes and seeing the side of the building, seeing myself fall in the windows. I recall thinking ‘is anyone watching this?’, ‘what will they think when I get back up after I hit the pavement?’

  But I didn't get back up. The feeling of falling so far, so fast onto solid concrete below is one that I have never been able to describe aptly. What words can d
epict it?

  All of a sudden I was no longer descending. All at once I could no longer hear or see clearly. My limbs became foreign to me, movement was out of the question.

  My insides felt as though someone were tearing daggers through every fibre, every nerve, every muscle. And the blood. I felt it seep from many wounds. Warm and thick it lathered onto the pavement soaking myself as well. It was in my throat, slowly choking me.

  I heard muffled footsteps come towards me and once again I closed my eyes. That smell of roses, Lucretia was close to me.

  “I told you he would never let me leave.”

  “Let's go.”

  Footsteps moving away, a car door shutting and engine rumbling. They had gone. They must have assumed I was dead.

  And that was the last I heard from them.

  A ringing sound crashed through my head, blackness took me.

  When I awoke, I was in a morgue. Not even the stench of decaying flesh could overpower the pain I felt. I didn't know how long I had been there, not long enough for all of my bones to heal. I rolled myself off the table and dragged my broken body across the stone floor. The only lucky thing was that it was night and no one was around to see my miraculous resurrection.

  It took weeks for me to be able to walk properly again. I hid in sewers like a common rodent, feeding on what I could, all the scum of the Parisian nightlife, until I was well enough to travel back to my homeland of Russia.

  And I have never recovered fully. My body has healed but I am not the same vampire I once was.

  I am too scared to stay in the city, or any city for fear I may meet him again. I am certain he thought me dead and I doubt he wouldn't hesitate to destroy me if we met again. I now reside in an abandoned manor deep in the forest, far away from mortals and immortals, only the vermin and insects keep me company now.

  I heard that Lucretia is no longer with him, that she resides in Paris but that is all I know. I don't believe she knows I still exist and I have no will to find her yet.