Driven by a new, cold fury, I pulled away from him, jumped up on my feet in a split second, and appropriated his sword. He realized his mistake too late and attempted to get up, but his own weapon that I pierced through him nailed him to the ground. He stiffened and stared at me with an awful screeching howl which induced new cries from the poor girl cowering in the corner. In the commotion, I had completely forgotten about her.
I drew the sword from his chest, stabbed him twice and then a third time until his smoldering body started the process of reverse transformation. I picked up Doimar and, driven by an odd impulse, carved RVH on his now human chest, perhaps as a warning to the other lycans, a symbol that would become one of my distinctive features in the following years of war. Finally, wounded and exhausted, I carried his body on my shoulder, descended the stairs and went out into the street. I placed the corpse askew on the saddle and headed for Madame Lescaut's House to offer my blood tribute in memory of Monique.
I unloaded the body at the entrance of the House and left quickly, in need of a cure with no one able to give it to me, as it would happen, for that matter, so many other times.
Some hours later, I heard knocking on my door, something that had never occurred since I had been living there. I remained still on my bed, confused, but soon the knocking repeated and I heard Isabelle's voice calling me. I got up and opened the door to let her in, walking in the dark with no difficulty. She hugged me, provoking a strangled groan from me because of the wounds, and she kissed my face, my hands, and my forehead without giving me the time to recover from the surprise.
"Thank you, thank you, thank you..." she kept repeating like a robot. I freed myself from her and closed the door, pulling her inside the apartment by her arm. As I lit the candelabrum, she noticed my pitiful condition, lifted her hands to her face, and forced me to lie down, deaf to my protests.
"How did you find me?" I asked her as soon as she allowed me to speak.
"I followed you one night, forgive me. I wanted to see where you live even though I never had the courage to knock on your door. Let me... let me take care of you; tell me what can I do. That horrible monster hurt you..."
"There's nothing you can do, it's just a scratch. It hurts, but it will heal, it's just a matter of time. He's worse."
"Drink. Drink from me. Aren't you thirsty?"
Yes, I really was, but I declined. Luckily, I had fed the day before. I could resist until the next day though it wouldn’t be pleasant. Her offer caught me by surprised and, at the same time, tempted me, although I hesitated.
"I can tolerate it, Isabelle."
"You’ve already endured so much. Come on, drink."
She leaned over me, exposing her throat and I gave in, feeling much better and much stronger immediately, being careful to stop before weakening her.
"Thank you," I told her; she smiled at me and laid down by my side, minding not to touch the wounds on my stomach, three long scratches which were not so deep. Fortunately, at that time lycans didn't know the strategic ploys they do today, nor did they have the technical skills to implement them. Today, however, even their scratches are potentially lethal as they have the foresight to immerse their hands in the same poison that make up their saliva, distilled through a complex chemical process that makes it even more toxic, like the wounds inflicted on me the night I took refuge at the Andrews. These gashes which I had received would have led to my death if the effects were not reversed first by the use of fire and then with an antidote that had to be administered by my companions.
Instead, wounds like the ones I just received provoked an intense weakness and burning sensation for only a few weeks, especially during the nights of a full moon, but would eventually heal with no serious consequences.
Isabelle's presence comforted me even if I missed Monique even more strongly: I couldn't think about one of them without remembering the other. Dawn was approaching though, and I couldn't allow her to stay. I feel threatened if someone stayed in the same place where I was resting.
"I'd like for you to come back tomorrow, but now I must be alone."
"Can I come back? Really?" There was too much hope in her voice and in her thoughts. Even someone as selfish and lonely as I realized it, prompting me to want to please her.
"Can you go back home alone? I'm afraid I'm not able to accompany you tonight."
A bitter smile curled in the corners of her mouth. "Raist, I've been alone since I was ten... Having someone who cares about me is a gift that I rarely receive. I'll be back tomorrow and you can drink from me again. I'll bring bandages to dress you, ok?"
"Thank you."
"Thank you too. You're one of the few who never treated me like trash. Would you do me a favor?"
"If I can..."
"Light the fire in the fireplace. It's freezing in here and holding you doesn't make it any better."
"Sorry, I should have thought about it. It’s just that it doesn’t make any difference to me. I'll remember it from now on."
When she left my apartment, I laid in my trunk and locked me in, treasuring the invigorating darkness.
A few nights later, still weak, she caught me off guard with an unusual request.
"I want to become like you," she said, her face serious and pale. I couldn't understand the reason why a young healthy girl in the prime of her life, full of health, with her whole life ahead of her wanted to trade her human existence with that of someone like me. I told her about my uncertainty, but she interpreted it as a refusal to have her by my side and got upset. She took her cloak and dashed out the door.
"Wait! I don't mean that I don't want to do it, I just can't understand why you would want to do it."
She stopped, her cheeks stained red. "You are free. Free to go wherever you please with no one telling you what to do, with no fear of anything and anyone. You'll never age, never get sick. I would be stupid not to want such a thing."
"I have no friends, no family and I'll never have any of it. I have to kill people to survive, must escape from the sunlight; I sleep in a sort of coffin. People, with rare exceptions, flee at the mere mention of my race. They'd like to kill me, destroy me by any means. You have always wanted someone who would take care of you, someone who would love you. Do you think that this is the right way to get it? I am just asking you to think about it, Isabelle, this is a decision you can never go back from. You will be dead, do you realize that? Only that you'll continue to walk, to think, to feel... to get hungry."
“Isn't that what life is all about? The only difference between you and me is that your heart no longer beats! Raistan, I thought about it well. I've been thinking about it for months. I know I'm still young now, but what will happen to me in a few years? I will end up being one of the many has-been whores no one will want anymore and I'll have wasted my life waiting for someone to take me away, knowing that it will never happen. If I become like you, I'll have the courage to change my life, no one will be able to stop me! Please, Raistan! As soon as you transform me, I will leave and never bother you, you will never see my face again. You don't have to worry about this, I swear!"
"If that's what you want to do, then my answer is no."
She looked at me with her eyes wide open, not wanting to delude herself about the meaning of my words. I didn't love her, but the idea she would disappear like everyone else always filled me with dismay secretly.
"Why?"
"Because, you stupid little girl, my life without you would be far worse! I'm selfish, what do you think? I think only about what is advantageous to me and, if you leave, I would be alone again and I don't want that to happen. My family and all my human ties are gone, my maker is far away and I don't know when I will see her again; I don't have any friends among my race nor among yours. Do you think it's gratifying? Do you think I went to Madame Lescaut's just for sex? The thing that mattered most to me was being able to talk to someone without hiding my true nature. I was happy with the bond I created with you and Monique! Now she's dead and
you want to leave as soon as you get what you want. I'm not going to transform you at all! I should have read your mind instead of refraining out of respect for you. Now I understand why you're here! You don't care about me at all, I was so stupid to have deluded myself! You were just pursuing your interest. Who cares about vampires, they've got no feelings anyway, right?"
She had stopped crying and was staring at me with eyes full of menace, panting, and with her fists clenched.
"Were you so... so stupid when you were alive or did death destroy your brain?" she hissed, and she didn't even look down when, with a growl, I brought my face closer to hers. She was wearing heels and I couldn't even take in her long, slender body, something that I often did and which satiated me fully. "If you're not even capable of recognizing a girl in love with you when you have her right in front of you, either you're stupid or it pleases you, and I'm quite confident that you're not stupid. I am saying this for you, to free you from any liability! Do you think that I wouldn't? That I never have wanted for you to be the one who would take me away from my shitty life? You have never treated me like a whore, Raistan, so don't start doing it now! I know very well that you don't love me and even if you complain about loneliness in your life, I know that deep down you're fine with it. Therefore, I don't want to be a burden to you. If I have to disappear for your sake, not mine, just yours, I would do it. You just have to ask, even though for me it would be the greatest sacrifice I could do, even worse than losing my life. I love you. How much clearer am I supposed to be?"
I put my fangs back in their place and went back to my chair, avoiding meeting her gaze. Sometimes, we males, both vampires and humans, regardless of anything, can be really obtuse.
"I must think about it. I'm not saying I will do it… don't get excited,” - she was starting to jump up and down, clapping her hands, a strange reaction for someone who is facing the real possibility of being killed – “…but I demand that you think about it deeply too. Now go, I am tired and I want to sleep in my trunk, not in a comfortable bed like you, waking up to a birdsong with the sun filtering through the blinds. If the sun filtered through my blinds and caught me asleep on my bed, I can assure you that it wouldn't be as pleasant of an experience for me as it would be for you. Goodnight, Isabelle."
"Goodnight, Raistan."
She looked at me with eyes that expressed a whole rainbow of emotions and left my apartment, gently closing the door behind her. I remained awake to spy on the sleeping city outside my window until dawn, undecided about what to do, wishing Shibeen was here so I could have been able to ask her advice. Even to me, a vampire, the waste of a life at its peak offered to the darkness seemed an unforgivable crime.
***
"Come on, let's go out," I told her the following night when she knocked on my door. It was about two in the morning, she had just finished her work and I was thirsty, very thirsty. The small amounts of blood she had generously given me the past nights had been useful to my recovery, at least in part to my strength, but I felt the need to get serious. Besides that, I wanted my aspiring vampire to fully understand what being a vampire really meant, at least from a practical point of view. Maybe I could succeed in alleviating this romantic inclination that seemed to hover around in her fantasy of my personage.
"Where are we going?"
"Hunting, of course. If you want to become a vampire, you'd better start to learn how to do it."
I took her by her arm and dragged her outside. It was winter, very cold, and she was shaking in her thin mantle. I snorted and gave her mine, remaining in only my shirt and jacket. She was about to protest but then she remembered my absolute indifference to the weather conditions and refrained from objecting further. She just thanked me, thinking, "When I become like him I'll never be cold again, another advantage! And, to think, he wanted me to turn down this great opportunity, no way!"
She knew what she wanted, I had to admit it. Not even the knowledge that she was about to witness a murder had shaken her that much. I was feeling sorry for whom I was about to meet because usually I'm quick and efficient but, that night, I had to be merciless. I had decided that it was my duty to try to dissuade her from taking that step, and I'd devote the entire night to this mission if I had to. If, in the end, she didn't change her mind, I'd have been satisfied with her decision; but, I was careful not to reveal this fact to her.
I walked fast, not as much as I could, but certainly too much for human feet, especially if those feet wore high-heeled boots forced to tread on the frozen and bumpy ground. I saw her stumbling, cursing to herself, but I pretended not to notice and entered the labyrinth of Paris’ avenues, advancing deeply in its bowels where I knew I could find some vagrant waiting for me.
"Come on, I don't have all night. Are you tired?"
"Not at all. Go ahead, I'm fine."
Despite wearing two cloaks, she continued to tremble. I was worried that she would catch pneumonia and started to think that her purpose was just that. If she had gotten ill and had been at death’s door, perhaps I wouldn't have refused to fulfill her wish. I paused, took my jacket off and forced her to put it on too. I was left with only my shirt and I felt like I was in my living room. In fact, my condition had given some advantages.
All of a sudden, I stopped and sniffed the air. I had smelled the typical stench of a dirty human being. She stopped too and clung to my arm, divulging her fear with the force she used to squeeze it.
"Do you want to go?" I asked.
She shook her head and let me go, clasping her arms together. I could feel her heartbeat and it was very, very fast. On the other hand, I couldn't hear that of my next victim's, meaning that I wasn't close to him yet. Following his odor, I found him sleeping in a corridor of a dilapidated house, covered with a pile of rags which didn't reveal anything, not his face nor his body. I didn't know whether it was a man or a woman, young or old, and I didn't care. It was blood, warmth, nourishment, and curative: life, in a word.
I looked at Isabelle and saw her so pale from fear that I thought she would faint at any moment, but I wasn’t able to worry about it then. The thirst was driving me crazy. I had to attack. With an abrupt gesture, I grabbed the pile of dirty blankets covering the homeless and threw it aside, causing my soon-to-be victim to wake up in a panic. It was a woman - just as I had hoped, for the purpose of deterrence, since women are more pitiful - and as soon as she saw me, she started to scream. I could have immediately silenced her, but as I said, I wanted to be as ruthless as possible and the cries validated her agony. We were in a horrible neighborhood: if anyone had heard her screaming, no one would have been a hero. They would have just thought about themselves, and that was already expecting too much.
The poor woman tried to get up and run away, still screaming, but I pushed her and she fell back to the ground again. That was when she caught sight of Isabelle, standing there, petrified with horror and fear, and she started to talk to her, begging her, her ageless face streaked with tears and dirt. "Please, please, save me, help me, I haven’t done anything wrong, help me!" She got on her knees and even trudged towards her in that uncomfortable position while I tried to stall as much as possible to the detriment of my companion. Isabelle took some hesitant steps backwards, a look of horror in her ashen face, then turned to me and shouted: "Hurry up, what the hell are you waiting for, kill this scum!"
We exchanged a quick look, then I pounced on the woman and drained her quickly, accompanied by two heartbeats, both frenzy at first, then with completely different rhythms.
Eventually I got up, dried my mouth, and took the road back to my home, followed by Isabelle at a short distance, mute but not to me. What I read in her mind wasn't what I had wanted. Her determination didn’t waver at all. In fact, now that it was over, she felt relief and was confident to be able to do the same. If she felt that now while she was still a human, I couldn't see how she could feel differently once she had transformed into a vampire since we are not among the most sensitive beings in this world.
I also sensed the avalanche of questions with which she wanted to inundate me, but I didn't feel like talking at the moment and wouldn't have answered her.
The weakness coming from wounds inflicted by the lycan did not seem to want to desert me and forced me to slow down my pace, adapting mine to hers. God only knows what Shibeen would have said knowing that I had just killed someone in front of a human. Perhaps if she knew I had done it for a good reason she'd have forgiven me. I suspected, however, that my good intent was rather radically different from hers: she had wanted me and got me with no problem. I was complicating my life with those damn remnants of human feelings still tormenting me.
Suddenly, Isabelle stopped and leaned on my arm, then she took some staggering steps and threw up, doubled over, with her arms clutching her stomach.
"Finally, Isabelle. I was starting to worry about the lack of any reaction from you..."
I didn't have time to finish my sentence. As pale as a sheet, she collapsed on the pavement and laid still. I felt both discomfort and irritated rather than worry. I'd have to carry her on my shoulders and take her home, as if I wasn’t tired enough on my own! I lifted her in my arms and headed towards Madame Lescaut's, much closer than my home. When I arrived and knocked, one of the two bouncers working in the brothel welcomed me. As soon as he noticed the girl, he swelled his muscles and narrowed his eyes in what he hoped was a threatening expression, but he dared not block my way, even though it was not necessary. I placed the girl in his arms, still unconscious, and told him to put her to bed.
"I did nothing to her if you're wondering. She's just exhausted. Tell her I'll see her tomorrow."
"I'm not your messenger...,” he muttered; I smiled at him clearly revealing my fangs, then I turned around and walked away.
When I finally got home, I was so exhausted that I almost fell into my trunk on my stomach without even taking my boots off. I woke up the following night in the same position, unaware of the terrible events waiting for me.
Rising to darkness Page 20