by A. C. James
“While you’re here I want you to make yourself at home. All I have is yours…” he said, waving toward the airy expanse of his loft.
“You have quite the collection of books.” I gestured with my fork toward the bookcase, which occupied an entire wall.
“You may borrow anything you like.”
“Really?”
“Of course; I want you to be comfortable. You are a guest in my home.”
“Oh, I don’t think I could ever be comfortable around you.” Shit. I hadn’t meant to say it.
I swallowed.
He always seemed to be looking through me and into the very depths of my soul. But the way he looked at me after my slip suggested he’d like to throw me over his shoulder and take me up to his bed. And at the moment I couldn’t think of anything better. I thought about the man Tessa had flogged at the club. The look on Arie’s face, mixed with my memory, made me picture him turning me over his knee and spanking me. Considering my inability to experience orgasm outside of pleasuring myself—well, other than with Arie—I wondered if it would be different if pleasure were mixed with pain. Arie grazing my neck and the weight of his arms pinning me really made me consider the club and how much I wanted to experiment. Just then Mystic jumped on the bar stool next to Arie before leaping onto the breakfast bar.
“Off the counter, cat.”
Mystic didn’t move. In fact, he simply stared at Arie until he lengthened his fangs and hissed at the cat. The cat bolted off the counter and dashed up the stairs to the bedroom.
“Did you have to do that?”
Arie grinned. “Would you prefer I spray him with water? I’m sure he’d like that a lot less.”
I rolled my eyes and forked another piece of pork. “So what is your connection to Katarina?”
Again, his face looked vulnerable and haunted. “I turned her. She was my consort many years ago. I’m sorry I’ve brought you into this.”
“Is that why she wants to kill me?”
“I imagine she’s been watching my visits to you at the coffee shop. And your aura is hard to miss. Her immature mind is filled with resentment and jealousy.”
“So what are we going to do?”
“I am going to protect you.”
The thought of him keeping me safe felt comforting. Before I thought it through, I leaned forward and pressed a dry kiss to his lips. His mouth opened with a rush of warm breath that comingled with mine. I ran my hands up his arms and across his shoulders to rest at the nape of his neck. His tongue swept the inside of my mouth as if searching for a momentary escape from his tormented past. He jerked his mouth away from mine.
“You should get some rest.”
I nodded. “I think I’ll read a little before bed.”
Arie rose and started clearing our plates.
“Can I help you clean up?”
Arie smiled. “Go relax. I’ve got this.”
I walked over to the bookcase and pulled one of the books from the shelf. I curled up with it on the sofa. It made me angry that whatever his experience had been with Katarina affected our relationship now. I hated her. I didn’t even know her and I hated her. I tried to focus on the book instead. My eyes felt heavy and the letters blurred on the page as I began to lose focus. The loft faded as I drifted down into a restless sleep.
Chapter 9
It was February 24, 1711, but how I knew that I couldn’t be sure. Let me bewail my harsh fate. And lament my lost freedom! May sorrow break the bonds of my torment, for mercy’s sake. The haunting voice singing the soprano aria Lascia ch'io pianga filled the Queen’s Theatre in London’s Haymarket. How I understood the Italian lyrics which ran through my mind in English or knew where I was, I hadn’t a clue.
But the dramatic melody filled me with infinite sadness. Only it wasn’t me. It was someone else, and I didn’t know how or why. My visions had never happened quite like this. And Arie had taken me to Rinaldo, the Italian opera written by George Frideric Handel for the London stage. Excitement filled the premiere night that prominent members of society flocked to hear. The opera told an epic love story of battle and redemption during the First Crusade that was inspired by the poem. Boredom pressed down on me, suffocating me. Only I was not the one who was bored. I was trapped inside their body.
“Katarina, ‘Jerusalem Delivered’ is one of my favorite poems. Tasso’s poem portrays an emotional battle of characters torn between the motivations that drive their heart’s desire and the duties that obligate them,” Arie said as a way of explaining.
“Does it resonate with your current affliction?” I asked in a scathing tone that was not my own. I planted my hand on his leg, running it up his thigh to grab his cock. I needed a distraction from listening to this drivel.
Arie removed my hand. “In a manner of speaking, but at least it provides an evening of distraction from your grating manner. I remember the call for the First Crusade and the persecutions of the Jews in infinite detail.”
“It is not becoming to betray your age.”
Arie scowled.
When I spoke, my voice sounded higher-pitched. My words, thoughts, and movements were not my own. Positioned in a prominent seat in the cavernous opera house I saw Queen Anne, popular among her subjects, in attendance. I must have known it because Katarina knew it and I was occupying her mind or body. It had to be Katarina. My thoughts and hers were a confusing swirl.
Arie smiled when he saw the queen listening with rapt attention to the beautiful voice accompanied by orchestra music. Members of the Kit-Cat club occupied leading seats. There had been an announcement that they had given money to the dramatist and architect Sir John Vanbrugh raised through subscription. For one hundred pounds, every subscriber, for all his life, would be admitted to the theatre without payment for his entrance. All of this flitted through the mind that I occupied. A mind that felt unstable and cold. She was positively bored by all this and I couldn’t understand why. She wanted to fuck him right here in the opera box. A thought drifted through and I wondered whether he’d enjoy the bloody surprise.
Bloody surprise?
I picked at the gold fabric of the open bodice-front gown that covered my hoop petticoat. I thought that I wore the most recent fashion to grace the streets of London beautifully. An ornamental stomacher covered the bodice with silk satin and gold metallic-laced thread in a decorative appliqué.
Arie admired the display of my ample bosom above a low neckline which an elaborate broach drew his attention to. Gently touching my head, I discovered an elegant high lace cap graced my head while my hair was piled up high in front of it, adorned with a wire frame covered with lace and ribbons. Arie must have spent a small fortune on it, because lace was very expensive. Spending Arie’s money pleased me chiefly because my extravagance annoyed him.
Being trapped in her body made me feel cold and lost like her—I didn’t like it.
Arie clung to the edge of his seat, captivated by the music being performed on stage when he should be paying attention to me. His attention drew away from it as I continued to fidget with the material of my gown and wriggle in my seat. A frown formed on his lips and he glanced over at me in irritation.
“Your blatant lack of appreciation for the artistry of the opera is appalling. You’re bound to ruin your gown picking at the threads. The cost would matter not if you found joy in more than drinking blood.”
I gave him a wink and folded my hands primly in my lap. The opera singing droned on and on, making me feel restless. Placing my hand on Arie’s leg again, I moved it up to cup his balls. He sighed when I gave them a squeeze but didn’t move to stop me. I felt turned on, awkward, and out of control as she groped Arie in the opera box. With discreet grace I lowered myself to the floor, looking up at him with mock demureness through thick lashes.
Arie looked down at my breasts, which almost spilled over my corset, and closed his eyes. I pressed my breasts into his lap as I released his cock from his pants. Stroking my hand up and down his length, his
cock sprang into the air. I rubbed my thumb across the tip where pre-cum glistened. When I put my thumb in my mouth to taste his arousal, I could hear his sharp inhalation. I looked up. He had opened his eyes and was watching me as I teased him before sucking his cock.
But first I’d work his balls. He liked that. I put one of them in my mouth, swishing it around with my tongue, and then switched to the other one. I stroked his thighs with my hands. He’d started breathing hard but feigned interest in the opera so no one would notice me taking his balls in my mouth. I flicked them with my tongue and warmed them in my mouth. Using my tongue to move them around, my lips enveloped his sack, up to the root of his cock. My hands began to stroke his length.
“Katarina…” He didn’t seem capable of saying anything else.
Now I really hated being here and wanted out of her mind, out of her body. I didn’t want to do this or see this anymore. Yet I loved hearing my name murmured in pleasure. And her thoughts smothered my own.
I removed his balls from my mouth and licked his shaft with my tongue. Starting at the root, I worked my way up the sensitive underside of his cock, right under the head. I gave that area of his flesh some licks, and then teased him a bit with some long slow licks up and down his shaft. Finally, I put my lips around the whole head of his cock and began to suck him off. Cupping his balls in my hand, I slowly lowered my mouth, taking his entire length deep inside. As I bobbed my head up and down on his cock, he grabbed my shoulders and his breathing became heavier. He thrust his hips up and his cock went even deeper in my mouth. I stroked the root of his cock with my hands as I moved up his length and swirled my tongue around the head.
I swished his cock inside my cheeks and took him as deep as I could again. I was buried in his lap, his cock inside my mouth, his thighs pressed against my head, and my nose was in his lap. I could feel my eyelashes brush against his hair. I sucked him harder and faster until I felt his erection flex before the salty explosion in my mouth. I swallowed before inconspicuously returning to my seat.
His breathing slowed as he readjusted himself before returning his focus to the opera. Finally the performance concluded, and I rose as I looked to exit the crowded theatre. I wanted to drink their blood, all these people with their frail hearts. Arie followed unenthusiastically on my heels. I could feel him slip away even after I’d swallowed him whole.
Reaching the street, he hailed a horse-drawn hackney coach to take us home. The horse’s hoofs clacked across the cobblestone street. We passed through the noise and throngs of people that surrounded us. The ramshackle part of town had become honeycombed with collections of what were intended to be temporary dwellings. They were quickly becoming more permanent ones. Those that had been displaced by the Great Fire lived within them.
The knowledge, from my vantage point behind Katarina’s eyes, felt strange. I’d never had a vision draw me into someone else. I had only watched as an invisible bystander. It felt foreign, alien, and intrusive. I wanted it to end but didn’t know how to stop it. All I could do was wait it out. That’s what I had to do during all my other visions. Watching her suck his cock had made me sick.
The carriage continued forward and we sat in strained silence. Weighty, pendulous shop signs protruded from store fronts on thick bars made of iron. The signs shifted as we passed beneath them. I watched patrons buy wares at negotiated prices. The smell of wet horses and waste that wafted through the soggy London air repulsed me. An astounding amount of filth sloshed the cobblestone streets. The heavy metal wheels of our carriage splashed through puddles, slopping the disgusting muck on those walking on foot below. The carriage came to a more attractive area and we turned onto a board street north of St. James palace. Here the hackney stopped in front of an elegant home, where Arie and I resided.
Arie helped me down from the carriage and led the climb up a few steps in front of our abode. He entered a foyer with a high ceiling and I followed behind. No sooner had we stepped inside then Arie removed his full-bottomed wig of exaggerated proportion and set his sword aside.
An odd aroma, comingled with flowers and Hungary Water that Arie had saved from years ago and given to me as a gift, emanated from the withdrawing room. He rarely frequented that part of the house. Arie practically lived in the library, where he conducted most of his tedious affairs. The withdrawing room he gave to me to use for my specific purposes. I spent most of my time and took my tea within these quarters, so separate had our lives become. I couldn’t wait to see the look on his face when he discovered what I’d been up to.
Arie slid the doors to the withdrawing room open to reveal the cause for the sickening fragrance that filled my nostrils. The scene that emerged was a harrowing image of bloodied bodies tossed about. Some pitched in unnatural positions, strewn carelessly on the divan, while others lay in pools of blood on the floor. Nausea swept over me, mixed with a feeling of smugness that must have come from Katarina.
Stepping over an unanimated corpse Arie entered the room, which was littered with bodies in varying degrees of decomposition. Flies buzzed around the massacre, its rank smell tinged with sweetness. It smelled like rotting meat sprinkled with cheap perfume. My thoughts of horror were overridden by Katarina’s thoughts of glee and I was trapped as an unwilling invader in her body.
I had tried to cover up the stench with several vases filled with flowers and the Hungary Water perfume that I poured on the clothes of my prey. Suddenly, I heard a wheezing breath. Arie walked a few paces further into the horrific scene. He discovered by a window a servant who lay dying. As he struggled for air, I saw distinct puncture wounds on his neck.
-You sloppy, careless, headstrong fool.-
The weight of his telepathic transference felt like a shout. I wanted to cover my ears, but I stood there and could feel my lips turn upward in a smile. Bending next to his body, Arie placed his hands on each side of the servant’s head. Without haste he snapped the servant’s neck.
Oh god.
Looking around at the destruction I had caused, I saw blood splattered the walls and almost every surface of the once-grand room. Blood smeared the ivory keys of the fortepiano I had insisted upon having but never played. I entered the room from the doorway where I observed his displeasure.
The sound of my gown brushing across the floor drew his attention. He turned to me and grimaced at the self-satisfied smile on my lips. I walked to a vase of flowers, inhaling their fragrance before removing a delicate bloom from one of them. I plucked the petals one by one with a crazed and manic energy, relishing the fight to come. The petals fell to the floor, landing in a pool of blood which now soaked the hem of my gown as I feigned a yawn. This was my latest ploy to start a fight since Arie had begun ignoring me decades ago. In all honesty, I felt surprised he’d let me suck his cock, but then what man could resist that temptation?
I wondered whether I could feel pain if things went terribly wrong between the two of them, trapped as I was in her body or mind.
“Do you like how I’ve decorated?” I asked with a curtsy while smiling at Arie.
Oh god.
She’s completely crazy. I understood now why Arie pulled away sometimes. I looked like her, except for the eyes and highlights. On top of it I had the Sight. I didn’t realize just how nuts she was until now. My thoughts were pulled away to hers. I looked around the room at the decomposing bodies, remembering every moment of torture. It gave me tremendous gratification. And I felt excited that Arie could see what I’d done.
“Thy vile countenance consumes all truth and reason. Leave my sight and never return to it.”
With a gleeful laugh, I spun in a circle. I stopped spinning and crossed the room to stand in front of Arie.
“I barely restrain the compulsion to grab my sword from the foyer and have you meet its length,” he said with eyes maddened by my petulance. “There are so many casualties, so much wasted life. I see now you hold no love, no remorse, and no comprehension. There is not even a fleeting glimpse of the woman I knew in
life before I turned you.”
“I grow weary of this place with its paltry amusement. It holds no charm and I grow sick of your theatre. I want to dance. Won’t you dance with me, Arie?”
I grabbed both his hands in an attempt to force him. Arie pulled his hands from my grasp and stepped backward. I pouted and walked through the blood scattered with flower petals. Then I turned to meet his cool gray eyes, which were filled with resolve. I waited for him to hit her. Maybe if he struck her I would go flying out of her body, jolted from my vision.
Arie regarded me unflinchingly. “Regretfully, I must decline, and you may stay with me no longer.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“I am deadly serious, my dear. You no longer play with a full deck.” Arie said—his blunt remark without ceremony.
“Where shall I go?”
“I care not where you go… So long as it’s far away from here.”
Tears of blood rimmed my eyes. A red drop fell to disappear in the pool of blood at my feet. After more than a century there was nothing more that could be said. No amount of explaining or pleading could ever change the inevitable.
“You can’t mean it.”
“The mental sickness that marked your human existence has escalated to a psychosis. I’ve seen it claim many vampires of weaker mind who tire of eternity. You were my world, my consort, and I mean it with every fiber of my being.”
And with that his eyes softened. His gaze lowered to focus on the fallen petals. When he looked up, he stood alone amongst the rotting corpses. From outside the house I looked back through the window. He walked to the fortepiano, placing his fingers on the blood-stained keys. A melody filled with love, loneliness, and sadness honored the departed that were his audience.
***
Like a ghost I floated out of Katarina and could see her face streaked with bloody tears from where I hovered above. With a jolt I pulled back into my own body feeling disorientated and a little foggy. The sorrowful sounds of opera music woke me from my sleep. The music drifted from below and I remembered where I was. I had never experienced a vision where I had knowledge that clearly belonged to someone else. Its intensity scared me.