The social drawbacks of an institution like Cambridge became apparent from the start, as I realized that the majority of my activities precluded the presence of women. There were dinners and parties of all kinds, but for tutors and students only. Not once, but many times Nora and I discussed the utter unfairness of such ridiculous social segregation.
Yes, we did find time to talk. One can occupy oneself with lovemaking for only so long before requiring rest. During these pauses I discovered that Nora had a mind that was more than equal to her beauty. We found much common ground between
us regarding people and politics, history and literature. Nora was very well read and, though officially barred from the many volumes in the university library, she somehow managed to gain access to them in pursuit of her own literary amusements, I assumed that one of her other courtiers assisted her in this.
"If it weren't for books I think I would become quite mad," she confessed once while paging through a rare copy I'd gleaned from a bookseller and presented to her as a gift for her little library. She had a passion for history, and a particular interest in biographies. This one was about the lives of various European monarchs.
"You are the sanest person I've ever met," I said. "Why ever should you go mad?"
"Why should any of us?" she countered, which was hardly an answer. Perhaps I was expected to supply one.
"My father thinks it's in the blood."
"He's probably correct," she said absently. She knew all about Mother's side of the family by now.
"Are you worried you might be risking yourself with me?" I asked this in light of her sensual preferences. "Courting the possibility of taking on madness whenever you drink from me?"
She looked surprised, then laughed. "Oh, my dear, hardly that. I was only agreeing with your father's opinion regarding one's natural inheritances such as hair or eye color. In regard to myself, I only meant if I did not have such friends as these"- she gestured at her shelf of books-"my life would become unbearably tedious. You have no idea how heavy an empty hour can be. I do. I once endured years of them, years of grinding ignorance and boredom muddled together with contempt and jealously for that which I could not understand." There was no pain in her tone, though, only gloomy regret.
"How old were you?"
Her smile returned. "I was not old, Jonathan. I was young; very, very young."
I'd never asked her age, but by even the most generous estimate, she could not have been more than four and twenty, if that much. "I see. And now you are very, very old."
"Yes," she said lightly. "I'm positively ancient."
I fell in with her humor. "But you magically preserve yourself by drinking my blood."
"Of course."
"And that of others like Tony Warburton?"
Her eyes came up, on guard against any suggestion of jealousy from me. There was none, only curiosity. "Yes. I have to, you see. There's not enough in you alone to sustain me."
"You talk as though you live upon it," I said seriously.
"I do."
There followed a long silence from me as I sought to understand her meaning. "You're not joking, are you?"
She rested her chin on her hand, watching me carefully. "No."
"You must be." My voice had gone up a little. A small breath of unease curled against my spine like a draft.
"Believe what you will."
She was not joking. I knew it then. "How can you? I mean, how is it possible?"
Nora shrugged. "It's how it is with me. Accept it."
"Surely you know. Were you born like this? Did your mother nurse you on milk... or blood?" My unease was roughly swept aside by something else, something more solid than the air but just as invisible. Darker. Colder. It crept beneath my skin, oozed along my muscles, squeezed my lungs, chilled my racing heart.
Her secret, like a curtain hanging between us that I had previously-purposely-ignored, was torn away in that rush. I caught my first glimpse of what lay beyond. The understanding 1 thought I wanted burst upon my brain.
I suddenly knew, knew why there were so many handsome, healthy young men around her, why they came, why she required their silence...
And I was one of them.
Her favorite.
Oh, dear God...
She fixed her eyes on me. "Jonathan, it really doesn't matter."
My mind swooped like a bird struck by an unexpected rush of wind. I found myself struggling to fight it.
"It really doesn't matter," she repeated. Her voice was firm and clear and more forceful than normal. It coursed through my ears, my thoughts, my body. Nothing else was important. Not my new knowledge. Not my fear. Not even myself.
I abruptly gave up the struggle with a shrug of indifference.
"No. I suppose it doesn't." My voice was normal once more, but at the same time it sounded as though someone else were using it.
"There's no need to be afraid. You'll feel better if you don't think about it."
A faint smile came up like smoke across my face.
She watched me for some minutes. Only gradually did the concern leave her expression and posture.
"Good. Now there's something that I would very much like to show you...." She eased my arms around her body, placing them there as one might pose the limbs of a puppet. I had no resistance. None was needed.
I loved her. Trusted her. Wanted her.
My arms soon found their strength again and pulled her close on their own.
Packets of letters from home soon found their way to me. They were months out of date, but eagerly welcomed. I always read the last one first to be certain that all was well before putting them in proper order.
Elizabeth's were the longest, with page after page covered with news and the kind of observations she knew would amuse me. She lightly recounted the most mundane events of home, making them interesting; her writing was so clear that I could almost hear her voice in my ear again. I missed her dreadfully.
Father's letters were shorter, but full of affection and pride, which in turn gave me pride in myself as well as a certain humility that I should have such a man's high regard. He'd left many friends behind in England and encouraged me to seekta out to give them his greetings. In this task I was more than a little remiss, for some had died, others lived too far away, and by now I had friends of my own to occupy the days. I did manage to look up one one or two old fellows who remembered him, but having little else in common with them, the visits were awkward. As quickly as common courtesy allowed, I would excuse myself to return to my own haunts.
Jericho had the least to say, curtailed by his own lack of free time and anything to write. This was a comfort, for it meani that the household was still running smoothly. He did state that Elizabeth's silent feud against Mother had eased somewhat She'd made her point with the more alert members of the
congregation that Sunday, but the less sensitive had ignored her bruises or simply disbelieved how she'd gotten them. This small group became part of Mother's new circle of friends. Though Elizabeth held them in contempt, they did divert much of Mother's attention from her.
Mother did not write at all. This was a relief, for it released me from the duty of writing back, and God knows I had nothing to say to the woman. I suppose it was the same for her.
Other notes were enclosed, from friends, from Rapelji, and surprisingly, from Dr. Beldon. He was cordial and warm and polite to the point of fawning. His letters I regarded with distaste, but felt obligated to answer. My replies were brief, and by their brevity, hopefully discouraging to further correspondence. It never worked. I would have felt ashamed, for he was an interesting and intelligent man, but those qualities were undermined by his toad-eating ways, else I might have welcomed his friendship.
My letters home were about my life at Cambridge and the direction of my studies. I wrote of my new friends and of Cousin Oliver, but left out quite a lot on the rest of the family. Doubtless Mother would be reading them and my true opinions of her dearest relativ
es would have turned her apoplectic. These views I confided to a private journal I kept that she would never see. Of Nora, at least in my letters home, I said nothing.
The last months of that year fairly galloped past. Though I did well enough in my studies, they did not hold my interest. Compared to Rapelji's style of tutoring what I worked on now seemed childishly easy. His most valuable lesson to me had been the cultivation of a good memory; this, combined with his frequent drilling of Latin and Greek, stood me through the most difficult of my reading. While other lads often despaired of pounding anything into their heads, I seemed to soak it up like a cleaning rag. This pleased me, for it left more time to devote to Nora. As the days grew shorter with the approach of winter, so did my nights with her lengthen and grow richer.
"This is my birthday," she said one evening in November in the same tone she'd used to comment on the weather.
We were comfortable in her drawing room, idly pushing around a deck of cards. Sea coal snapped in the fireplace; I was warm and pleased to sit back and digest the excellent supper I'd recently shared with Mrs. Poole. Nora had been at the table,
but had not eaten, as was her custom. When her aunt had left us, she'd grown quiet. Perhaps this announcement explained her preoccupation.
I expressed my congratulations and regret that I had no present to offer to mark the event. "I wish you had told me."
"I hardly ever tell anyone. People make such a fuss over it and there's little enough that I want." "There must be something."
"Yes, or else I wouldn't have mentioned it. It's not anything one may buy from a shop. It's something only you are able to give me."
This sounded most promising. "What, then?" She wore a curious look as though appraising me as she had at the Bolyns' party. There was a change in her manner, though. This time her usual cheerful confidence seemed dampened. The quiet affecting her all evening was surely connected with her birthday. Some people take no pleasure from the event and I was surprised to learn that Nora might be one of that number. I took her hand and leaned close. "What is it you want?" A shadow, not really visible on her face, but as a subtle shifting throughout her whole body, came and went. "Nora?"
"Do you trust me?" she abruptly asked. "Yes, of course I do." "Are you afraid of me?" "Nora, really! What an absurd question." "Is it, I wonder." "Tell me what is troubling you."
The shadow vanished and she offered me a smile in its place. She caressed my neck with her fingertips, a familiar gesture by now and one that never failed to excite me. "Nothing, darling Jonathan."
I was inclined to be doubtful. "Are you sure?" She gave no direct answer. "Come upstairs." Well... I'd never yet refused that invitation, and notwithstanding her odd mood, I was not going to begin tonight.
As always with this type of activity, we fed upon one another's enthusiasm, seeking and gaining arousal with each touch and kiss until both of us were ultimately seized with that fever unique to lovemaking. We gave in to it, gladly surrendering our thoughts, our bodies to its heat. Nora laughed as she rode me,
until she dropped forward and suddenly smothered the sound against my throat. I felt the light, sharp prick of her teeth, then I could have laughed, cried, or shouted as though from delirium when she finally pierced the vein and began to drain off the life welling from it.
She'd timed herself to match my own readiness. Somehow, she always seemed to know that exact instant.
A perverse speculation drifted through my mind that this present coupling could not possibly surpass the previous one.
Once more Nora proved me wrong.
Before my body had quite exhausted itself, she hooked a leg
around one of mine and we rolled until I was on top. This was
a change, for usually she would hold to my throat for a much
longer period. A drop of blood from the tiny holes she'd made
d down and splashed on her breast.
"My turn," she whispered, still rocking against me. Her hand came swiftly up and one of her long nails gouged deep into the white flesh of her own throat. She gasped out a brief plea to me, telling me what to do, but it was unnecessary. I closed my mouth over the wound and drank...
Red fire.
So it felt to me as it coursed into my belly and spread out from
there to each limb. It seared my bones, ate outward toward the
corched my skin until Nora and I must both be consumed
Maze. The totality of pleasure I'd known only seconds
ago faded like a candle's flame against the sun. It was too much
to bear, far too much-yet I could not stop.
Nora held fast to me as I had to her that first night, urging me more, to take everything from her. I had no will to do otherwise. I drew on her, partly conscious that the strength I'd freely given her was flowing back into me again. It was sweet and bitter, hot and cold, pleasure and pain, life and death, all tumbled together like autumn leaves caught up in a spinning windstorm. I fell, spiraling helplessly into its vortex, into myself, imo everything and nothing, ultimately whirling down, down, down to seek sweet rest in a wonderful, bottomless silence that had no name.
1 awoke first, sprawled on my back now, light-headed, but
with my lot. Nora lay next to me, one arm on my
chest, her fingers spread wide as though her last act had been
to stroke the hair there. I covered her hand with my own and slothfully considered whether or not it was worth the effort to rise and put out the candles. Some of them had begun to gutter and their flickering, uneven light was a mild annoyance to the satisfied state of my mind and body.
There was a clock on the table across the room. It was well past two. Nora and I had slept for hours. I was strangely wakeful. And hungry. This time the table, except for the clock, was bare That was sufficient to decide me. I'd take care of the candles on my way down to the kitchen.
Turning gently so as to disturb Nora as little as possible, I noticed that her eyes were slightly open.
I smiled into them. "You are truly astonishing," I said softly, bending to kiss her.
She did not respond. Her eyes remained open...and unblinking.
"Nora?"
I gently shook her. Her body was inert in my hands. She's asleep, I told myself, she's only asleep. I shook her until her head lolled from side to side. No...
I reached across for the silver bell by the bedside and rang it, roaring for help. Eternities crawled by before the bedrooa door opened and sleepy-eyed Mrs. Poole worriedly looked I She accurately read from my agonized face that something was wrong and hurried over to Nora's side of the bed. She put a hand to her niece's forehead. My heart was ready to
burst.
"Ah," she said. "Nothing to worry about, young man."
"Nothing to-"
She cut me off and pointed to the mark on Nora's throat, then to my own. "Taken from each other, haven't you?"
"That's all it is. It just puts her into a deep sleep until she
recovers."
The woman must have been blind. "She's not breathing, Mrs
Poole."
"No, she's not, but I told you there's nothing to worry about It's like catalepsy. It'll wear off and she'll wake none the worse Bless your soul, but she should have warned you this woi happen."
I could not bring myself to believe her. Nora was so utterly, damnably still.
Mrs. Poole patted my shoulder in a kindly way. I suddenly realized I was quite naked with only the sheets to cover me; Nora was equally bare. However, Mrs. Poole was unperturbed by this, her concern centered solely upon my agitation. "There now, 1 can see you'll only listen to her word on it. Wait here and I'll fix things right up." She toddled away, her slippers scraping and scuffling as she went along the hall and down the stairs.
Nora remained as she was, eyes open and blind, lips parted, heart... as immobile as stone. I backed away from her, from my fear. Not able to look elsewhere, I clawed haphazardly for my clothes, pulling them on against the
chill that had invaded me. I was nearly dressed when Mrs. Poole returned, carrying a cup of what I first took to be red wine.
"This will do it for certain," she promised, throwing a smile my way. She hovered over Nora, dipped a finger in the cup and wet the girl's lips. "Just a few drops of the life magic..."
"What is it?" I found myself asking.
"Beef blood," she replied. "We had a very fresh joint today and this is what drained off. Cook was saving it for something else, but-"
P N Elrod - Barrett 1 - Red Death Page 16
