The Heart's Ashes

by A. M. Hudson

  “So?” I rolled onto my knees and crawled to the end of the bed, watching his secret smile sneak across his lips while he obviously read my thoughts. “They can talk to Emily and Mike while we—”

  “Stop it.” I saw only a shift of his weight from one foot to the other, his hands falling away from his buttons before I squealed, falling backward on the bed under his weight—his fingers digging into my ribs, forcing me in to fits of giggles.

  “David!” I squealed, wriggling underneath him. “Please? Stop it!”

  “Stop being so sexy, and I’ll stop tickling.”

  “No!” I took a breath and squealed again, jerking like an eel out of water. “Stop it, or I’ll wet myself.”

  “No you won’t—liar.” He laughed, but stopped anyway, pinning my hands to the bed beside my face, his breath heavy through smiling lips.

  I felt the warmth that laughing brought simmer over me, and looked up into those knowing eyes. “You don’t play fair. You’re stronger than me.”

  “Ha!” he scoffed. “And how is it that you are playing fair, laying on the bed, looking at me like that, then asking me to do less than honourable things to you?”

  “I didn’t ask you to do those things, David.” I smiled, pushing up on one elbow as he backed slightly away. “I only thought of them.”

  “Precisely. And right now, your thoughts are as clear as day, Miss Ara-Rose, and I fear I am not strong enough to endure them.”

  With a wry smile, I flipped him onto his back; he crashed down with a jolt, and I landed on top of him, my hair in his face, my legs on either side of his hips. “Clearly, David, since you resist my charms every time, you are stronger than me.”

  He shook his head, sweeping my hair back over my arm, out of his face. “I’m not, my love.”

  “Then, let’s—”

  “Not tonight.”

  “Er!” I grumbled. “See, you are stronger than me, and faster and so damn sexy it’s making it hard to breathe.”

  “All the better to subdue you with, my prey.”

  “Ha-ha. Funny.” Not. But I felt like his prey, being left without a choice and all.

  He smiled. “You’d make a lovely meal.”

  I slapped his hand away from my throat. “Don’t even think about it. I’ve spent all day making that damn turkey. Vampire or not, you’re eating it!”

  “I plan to eat the turkey—just not the one in the oven.”

  A small smile moved my lip. “Are saying I’m a ridiculous-looking bird?”

  “No, merely ridiculous.”

  “Oh, bring out the niceties. Merry Christmas to you, too.”

  “You know I’m kidding.” He wrapped firm fingers on my hips and shifted me up an inch so my hip join no longer dug into his zipper.

  “That wasn’t my zipper.”

  Hu! My mouth fell open. “So how come you can read my mind so easily today?”

  He smiled, his sharp fangs showing. “When you get hot like this—” he nodded at my unusual position, “—I can read them like they’re written in bold print.”

  “Really.” I leaned down, brushing my lips past his before whispering in his ear, “How do you know I’m all hot?”

  “Because—” he smiled playfully, “—I can...sense it.”

  “Sense it?” I sat back a little.

  David shifted his hips under me again, moving me so I sat a little further down—right on top of his....zipper this time. “Yes, and it’s very hard for me to refuse you when you get hot like this. I can taste your…warmth when I breathe you in.”

  Gulp. “Is that—a good thing?”

  He laughed, his face breaking into a wide grin. “Not really. Not when I’m trying not to do naughty things to you. But I like it.” His shoulders lifted with his breath. “You smell good. You taste good.”

  “How can you taste it?”

  “It’s like—” David rolled me onto my back and laid his body alongside mine, his head propped up by his hand; “It’s like when there’s a bunch of frangipanis sitting on a table in a vase; when you walk past, there’s a sweet layer of perfume over your tongue. Don’t you ever get that?”

  “Actually, I do, now you mention it. Kind of like the rain, too—how it has a sugary taste when you breathe it in.”

  “Yes, exactly.”

  “So? What do I taste like then?” I said as the breath rose up hot in my throat from my stomach.

  “Creamy vanilla.” David slid his finger down my black satin dress and lifted it at the front, revealing my thighs. “See? You’re getting hotter—the taste is getting sweeter.”

  My chest sunk with each breath I drew, everything in my room fading to white fog around me as he moved his finger to the side of my cotton underwear, lifting them slightly, cooling my skin where he’d never touched before.

  Oh, my God! I wrung my fingers into my hair and parted my legs at the knees, unable to look at the smug grin I knew he was wearing.

  Do it—please, you’re driving me crazy, just do it.

  “Do what, Ara?” he spoke in a low, hypnotic voice.

  “Touch me.” I closed my eyes tighter as his finger drew a slow, curved line, further under the cover of my delicates, staying safely on the outskirts of the forbidden.

  “Touch you where?”

  “Inside,” I whispered so low it was almost nothing.

  “Ara?” He leaned close, his breath in my ear, so warm.

  “What?” My pathetic squeak of a voice quivered.

  “They’re here.” His touch came away as he pulled my dress down and stood up.

  “Hu!” I breathed heavily, covering my eyes with the balls of my palms. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

  “Come on.” David reached his hand out.

  “No. I need a moment. Please?” I kept my face covered, letting my knees fall together.

  “Okay, but, don’t be too long. Your dad will think I did something nasty to you.” David sauntered off, laughing to himself.

  I’m going to kill him. I’m officially going to kill him!

  Still shaking, I stumbled out to greet Dad and Vicki.

  “Ara?” Dad stopped mid-pass as he handed David his coat. “Everything okay?”

  “Sure, Dad. It’s great. Merry Christmas.” I smiled and kissed his cheek.

  Dinner was perfect; the first and last Christmas with all the people I love, and after I said goodbye to Dad and Vicki, I sat by the piano, waiting for David to come out of the shower—probably a cold one.

  “That’s my favourite Christmas song.” Mike rested his elbows on the piano top.

  “Silent night?” I said; he nodded. “I didn’t know that.”

  “I’m a man of mystery,” he said playfully.

  I sighed. “You wanna play a duet?”

  “Maybe…if you ask me with even a tiny hint of enthusiasm.” He sat beside me. “What’s up, baby? You were really distant at dinner tonight. Turkey was good, but you—”

  “I know.” I dropped my head to one side. “I’m okay, really.”

  Mike took over the right hand of the song, while I played the left. “I know you, Ara. You can’t lie to me—something’s up. What is it?”

  My hands fell into my lap, the lovely, ringing C chord stopping dead, the warmth of the song dying with it. “I’m going to miss them, Mike. Mum and Dad. I hadn’t realised that until I saw them tonight.”

  He reached for my wrist and spun the small pink and white pearl bracelet around a few times—the one he and Emily gave me for Christmas. “Are you scared? That the vampires might catch you?”

  I nodded, lifting one shoulder.

  “Ara, baby.” Mike cupped my chin, shaking his head. “I’ll protect you. I’ll be your guard—for the rest of forever. I’ll never let them hurt you. I promise.”

  “You know?” I said, letting my head fall against his shoulder. “I actually believe you. And for what it’s worth, that does make me feel a little better.”

  “Happy to help.” Mike squeezed his arm around m
e.

  Another pair of cool arms came up from behind. “I want to hear a happy song,” Emily trilled. “Can you teach me to play something Christmassy?”

  “Sure.” I shuffled over and Mike moved off the stool, landing on the couch. “Okay, place your pinkie on the C, your middle finger on the E, and your thumb on the G.”

  Emily sat still, frozen almost, with her hands in her lap, her eyes on the keys.

  “Em? What is it?”

  “She’s listening,” Mike noted, sitting forward.

  “To what?”

  “David,” he stated.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can hear him.” She shook off her trance then and smiled at me, her eyes dark and round.

  “Hear him?” I wanted to jump up and stomp my feet. “Hear his thoughts?”

  “Kind of,” she said, sinking one shoulder.

  Oh, hell-to-the-no! This is caps-lock, exclamation-level unfair. “I—H...How?”

  “It’s not like I can hear his actual thoughts, but, sometimes, I can like, feel them.”

  “What the hell? Emily, what do you mean?”

  “It’s—” she looked to Mike, awkward. “It’s like I can tell what he’s thinking, from what he’s feeling.”

  My mouth hung open, dry. I snapped it shut. “Well, what...what’s he feeling now?”

  Emily, with lips pressed into a fine line, looked at Mike again. “Let’s just play a song.”

  “No. Em, please?” I grabbed her arm. “What’s wrong with him?”

  “Nothing.” She shrugged, then smiled to herself. “He’s just—suffering.”

  “What? Suffering?” I jumped up. “Where is he?”

  “Not like that, Ara. He’s okay. He’s just feeling—” She laughed then and looked away.

  “What?”

  “Never mind. Just leave him be.” She grabbed my hand as I edged away. “Just leave him alone—trust me.”

  Mike stood up and walked toward my room.

  “Well, how come he can go?”

  “’Cause he’s a guy—it’s a guy thing.”

  A guy thing? “Is this about sex?”

  “Sex?” Emily doubled back. “No. Nothing to do with it, why?”

  “Then why is he suffering?”

  “Ara, just shut up and teach me a song.” She rolled her eyes, placing her fingers on the keys. “He’s fine. I promise.”

  By the glow of a candle, with the gentle twinkling of Christmas lights reflecting off the bay window, I sat looking out at the blackness that was the frozen lake in the daylight, absently tracing a nail over the frosted glass chessboard in front of me. When a pair of intense green eyes stole my gaze from my own reflection, I looked up and smiled at my vampire, moving my foot off the opposite chair so he could sit down.

  “I have something for you,” he said.

  “But you already gave me my Christmas present.” I clutched the silver locket—the one I opened early this morning, when David woke me from a restful dream and placed a small green box with a red bow in my hands.

  The locket is back where it belongs now, safely against my chest.

  David held back a mischievous smile. “It’s something else—something that’s been missing from your life for too long.” He lifted his hand from his pocket, and something clinked on the glass board in front of me. “It’s time this found its way home again.”

  There, among the white and black pieces to a game of strategy, sat the knight—the black knight that was lost before the box had been opened.

  “You? This was from you?” My eyes widened; I picked up the small, wooden piece.

  “It was a message.” David’s eyes focused on my fingers as I twirled the knight around.

  “A message? That you were missing?” I asked.

  He nodded.

  “But it’s wrong, David—that’s not what’s been missing.” I put the knight down. “You’re not a piece in a game—you’re everything, you’re the whole world. That’s what’s been missing—not some cheaply-carved, wooden representation.”

  “It was a metaphor.”

  “It was poor one. Especially since, if you were a chess piece, you wouldn’t be the black knight.”

  “Then, which piece am I?” he asked leadingly.

  “Maybe you’re not a piece at all?”

  “If you had to choose?” He grinned, his eyes glistening.

  I shook my head, looking at the board. “The king,” I said, and picked it up.

  “Why the white king?” He took it from my hand and studied it. “I’m a vampire—a killer. I’m not good, Ara.”

  “You have a good heart, David, full of integrity. And it’s moral strength that makes a king good or bad, not the deaths that occur at his hands.”

  “So, now I’m moral, am I?” he asked in a light tone, resting the king back on the board.

  “You always were. You just didn’t know it.”

  “Hm,” he mused, “you don’t know me very well, then.”

  “I know you better than you might think.”

  “To make that statement shows how little you know.” He stood half way, remaining a little crouched as he dragged the chair to sit closer to me. “I like that you think kindly of me, though—it makes me feel like less of a monster.”

  “Do you really believe that? That you’re a monster?”

  “There’s no belief or opinion. I am what I am.” He took my hand. “I never wanted you to learn of the things I’ve done, Ara, but when we go to Paris, you will hear things, and I—”

  “David.” I sat on the edge of my chair, tilting my neck up a little to lift his gaze with my eyes. “I don’t care what you’ve done. Really. You could’ve been a lawyer in the past and I wouldn’t hold it against you.” I chuckled once; David didn’t, though, he only scratched his head, narrowing one eye.

  “What?” I sat back. “Was my joke that bad?”

  “Ara, I am a lawyer.”

  I burst out laughing, failing to cover my mouth before the gust of air escaped. “I forgot about that.”

  “How did you know?”

  “Eric told me.”

  David’s smile twitched under his tight lips as I rolled back in my chair and clutched my contracting stomach.

  “So you love me still?”

  As my cackling settled to breathy hiccups, I shook my head. “I love you to pieces, David—even if you’re a blood-hungry lawyer.”

  “Good.” He grabbed my hand and squeezed it tight, as if he owned it. I liked that. “Because you will hear things you won’t like. So just remember that, okay? Just remember that you love me—no matter what.”

  “Okay.” I nodded, breathing out the humour. “No matter what. And you love me—no matter what, right?”

  “Always,” he said with surety.

  “What if I changed a child?” Why did you just say that, you moron!

  David dropped my hand; his expression blackened. “What do you know about that?”

  “Only that it’s against the law.” I shrugged; his reaction said do not elaborate or Eric may lose a limb.

  “How do you know about that?”

  “You should know—didn’t you read everything in my mind that happened while you were away?”

  “Eric told you?”

  “Yes. Didn’t you see the conversation?”

  “No.”

  Thank God. Eric’s safe for another day.

  He leaned back in his chair, his face awash with thought. “I wish I’d paid closer attention now.”

  “Oh, well,” I said casually, “Eric just told me that there were vampires who were children.”

  “And that’s all he told you?”

  I nodded; it wasn’t convincing, but I think even David wanted to avoid the truth.

  “Ara?” He leaned forward, his eyes flooding black; only tiny circles of green remained around the pupils. “Never, ever change a child. I don’t care what your reasons are—don’t ever do it. Do you understand?”

  “Okay.�
� I nodded. “You know I wouldn’t do that, though, right?”

  “I hope not. There is nothing that haunts me more than the memory of those children.” He stared blankly. “I would give any part of myself to find them a path to freedom.”

  “You care?”

  “About my own species?” He looked at me. “Always.”

  “Can they be freed?”

  “It’s an eternal argument, Ara. Some say there are ways to teach them civility, others disagree. But I’m an advocate for their well-being. I fund research and fight—” He cleared his throat. “Fought for their rights, using my position on the council.”

  “So, do you think they’ll ever find a way—to let them out of the dungeons?”

  David looked at me; I knew I’d said too much about what I knew. “Yes. And any being who would think to keep that from them is not worthy of life.”

  “Well, what about the vampires who changed them, what happened to them?”

  David shot up out of his chair and took a few deep, quiet breaths; his fists clenched tightly by his sides. “For your own sake, girl, don’t ever ask me that question again.”

  “Why?”

  He opened his mouth to speak, but closed it, balled his fists tighter and walked away—stiff, from the neck down.

  Whoa, overreaction of the century. I really have to learn not to push him. There’s so much I don’t know about his past. I wonder if he’s right to worry if I’d still love him when I find out the horrors of his inner truths.

  But then, I’m sure mine are far worse.

  The bedroom door slammed behind David and guilt kicked in like a piece of bread stuck down my throat. I just wanted him to tell me about Pepper, himself—about how he sentenced her after she changed a child.

  A part of me wonders if he did that because of his love for the law, his detest for the fate of the Immortal Damned, or a newfound hatred for her, when he discovered her betrayal.

  But the bigger part inside me wonders what he’d do if I broke the law. Would I suffer Pepper’s fate—being sentenced at his hand?

  What scares me the most is that, for all I know about David, I can’t honestly answer that question.

  Right now, I’m really looking forward to this Paris trip. It may give me a unique opportunity to find out once and for all who this David Knight really is.