The Anatomy of Vampires: Volume 1

by Alistair Vlain

  The corners of my eyes pricked, and I clenched my jaw, swallowing back a few tears. I needed to remember my mission and not let the emotions muddy what I was there to accomplish.

  “Right,” I mustered stoically. Clearing my throat, I swung one leg over the other and proceeded with my pen gripped tightly in my hand. The new lump in my throat made it hard to talk. “I would like to return to the topic of Law One, if I may.” The Vampire nodded politely for me to continue. “This, the most important law of magic society, makes it impossible for your kind to hunt, does it not?”

  “Yes. You are correct. Another assertion of Law One means none of Occult kind, be it Elves, Witches, Phasers, or…Vampires, are allowed to set even a single toe over the designated Occult City borders. Results of being caught, especially for our kind, are most lethal. Burned to a crisp at midday.”

  I shuddered, furiously dashing my pen across the paper. “And what sort of physical results does this harbor? I mean, the effects of not being able to regularly feed on mortal blood.”

  He smiled again and mirrored my action, crossing one leg over the other. “You are brave to approach me and ask these questions. Aren’t you concerned a topic this morose could whet my appetite?”

  “It has crossed my mind, yes,” I admitted flatly, but I was no longer concerned. After swapping stories, I considered this man more or less an acquaintance. I knew he was only speaking ironically and for his own amusement. I offered a confident grin up at him and again, he nodded in response.

  “The feeling is a gruesome one. Even my human memories do not contain a situation to which I could effectively compare this. It is something like starvation. However, no.” He closed his eyes and shook his head, deep lines forming along his brow as his own pain bubbled to the surface. “No, it is much different. Much worse. It is like swallowing bags of sand, and somehow surviving. You are forced alive, but you in your entirety are dry and burning from the inside. There is no water around you, and even if there were, no amount of it could cool the incineration turning your insides to ash. Yet you live on. An eternity of hell fire. Killing one after another after another, and though you feel compassion and regret in doing so, it is in your will to survive. Death and evilness are forced down your throat, just like the blood. Law One makes this life—if you even want to call it a life—nearly impossible.

  “Once in a while, the Wizards take pity on us and round up groups of the Earth’s heathens and bottom dwellers, and throw us a meal. Of course, I am speaking about the drug lords and whores who pollute cities. People who would never be missed. The Regime captures them and delivers them upon the doorsteps of various Occult cities. But this is a rarity, and they advertise their actions as a humanitarian effort, so they maintain even the most liberal followers. But I find their efforts unnecessary. Nothing in this world could ever overthrow them. They are too powerful. Popularity seems oddly irrelevant.” He turned his focus out the window, again. This time, a new bitterness appeared behind his dark lashes.

  The tip of my pen moved so quickly, my notepad nearly caught fire. “So, you would say the Regime is tyrannical and Law One is the direct cause of your suffering?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “But something you said strikes me. Most people would never believe you feel compassionate for killing and feeding. Society, or those who believe in your existence, view your kind as ruthless and dangerous—bloodthirsty and emotionless.”

  “Dangerous, yes. Ruthless, well, perhaps sometimes. Some of us are ruthless. But do not forget so quickly what we used to be. You. There is a parallel between you and I, my friend. Our humanity. We do preserve our emotion. Our memories. Some of us become hungry with power and vanity, and those are the ruthless killers. But they are no different than the fiends existing in your world. Am I correct?”

  “Yes,” I breathed. “Yes, of course.”

  I did not realize it then, or maybe I did, but the Vampire from the train bestowed upon me the greatest gift I could have hoped to find that evening. Understanding. Acceptance. The revelation he and I were more similar than I could have ever imagined. His society was oppressed, starved, and in poverty, just like many societies of the world I lived in.

  A lack of human blood poses some very serious threats to a Vampire body. He explained the feelings of being burned from the inside out, but let us not forget these physical and scientific occurrences are the direct consequence of the lack of life and vitality. Dying organs. Brittle hair and yellowed teeth. Decaying bones. It is something similar to the process of aging in mortals, though faster. For you see, Vampires are none other than human beings literally drained of life. They are human corpses, animated by a dark and ancient magic and they are kept animated by regularly refilling themselves with that which was taken from them—life.

  Unlike our sustenance, going straight through our digestive systems and being converted into energy, blood to a Vampire is absorbed almost immediately by their bodies and sent to their deadened circulatory systems. This reanimates their heart, pumping the stolen blood out through their veins and arteries, so they are, for lack of a better term, kept alive. In order to sustain themselves, killing is something absolutely mandatory and should be done without discretion. As we harvest sustenance, so should they. It is not good, nor evil.

  It simply is.

  Law One makes it nearly impossible, and so many of them are kept weak and vulnerable, feeding on rats and wandering deer. Though animal blood will keep them alive, barely, it is not by the same level of comfort deemed necessary to live a remotely happy existence. Put most bluntly, Law One is weakening the Vampire kind.

  Chapter Two

  The Daily Death of A Vampire

  “Reborn with the dying of each day, spring forth into the night and with the kiss of darkness, live eternally in the shadows.”

  ~ Order of the Parliament

  The daily death of a Vampire tends to be a sensitive topic and should be approached with caution by any reader, and most especially the squeamish. The information contained in these next pages is taken from memories painful for me to recall, but for the purpose of the truth I will do so, objectively.

  The nights leading up to my wife’s capture by the Regime were by far the scariest I’d endured in my lifetime. Sleep was a thing of the past and I did my best to elude her, racing through alleys at night and hiding out in brothels and pubs. I’m sure some sort of marital joke is in order here, but this is no laughing matter.

  With every stale breath she took, she endeavored to kill me. And the only things keeping me alive were the diversions that threw themselves between us. For any time she was on my trail, another nearby human’s scent easily caught her attention. The thing about newly created monsters is they are the most dangerous, but in turn, the easiest to escape. Anything with a pulse calls to them. Luckily, I was able to evade death in the evenings. But her wanting to slaughter me wasn’t what caused me the most pain.

  Mornings were actually the most terrifying, I think, for both of us. When I was a child, I’d read the fairytales of Dracula and Nosferatu. I was well versed with what vexed the likes of the undead. Garlic. Crucifixes. And most famously, the sun. Perhaps the first two of the aforementioned list were only fallacies, but the danger of the sun was something most real. I knew it upon my venturing home, one early dawn. It must have been around five o’clock as I approached my house. The pastel fingers of sunrise were just barely clawing their way over the hills and treetops, looming in black silhouettes against the faint light. The only thing that armed me was some dampened twig I’d plucked from the ground. I never said I was a skilled defender.

  Curious sounds of blubbering and wailing rattled the very foundation of my home as I drew nearer. I recognized the crying, clearly coming from my wife. The windows were closed, but through the glass I could see her little form, balled on the rug in the center of the foyer. Her hands were curled into fists, grabbing at silvery-blonde heaps of her hair. Did she lament for trying to kill me? Did she wallow in self-p
ity for what she had become? I took a step nearer when my boot crunched over a thicket of dried shrubbery, and I froze. Her face snapped up immediately in the direction of the sound I made and my heart leapt into my throat.

  Holding my breath, I dared not move. My gaze stayed wide and unwavering on what I could see of her through the glass. In the time it took to blink, she shot to her feet and sped so fast to the window’s sill, I jumped, taking a single step backward. My heart slid into my throat. She looked ghostly, her face white and sunken, her eyes dark and demonic. I knew she saw me, so the first thing I could think of was to try and reason with her.

  “S-sweetheart,” I stammered like a fool, instantly dropping the twig, but lifting my hands as some pathetic barricade between her and I. “You don’t want to do this. S-stay in the house. Please. I will not come any closer. I know how difficult this must be for you.”

  My wife cocked her head to one side, nothing human coloring her expression, but instead only animalistic instinct. I drew in a deep, slow breath through my nose, waiting for her to lunge through the glass and attack me. What happened next was like nothing I had ever expected.

  Above me, golden streaks of early morning light began to color the sky. And with the coming of the day, my wife shrieked, reeling back and away from the window. Some voice from the back of my mind spoke to me, and I knew just what was happening. It was the light of the day that would fend her off. It was the light of the day that would destroy her. What I didn’t know was just how many times it would destroy her.

  Again, through the glass, I could see her fold up into the ball, but this time shrieks and wails of pain shattered my eardrums. Something was wrong, and despite my own selfish fears, I raced in through our front door to help. She continued to moan and cry, her hair hanging limp in her deathly-white face. I collapsed to my knees and grabbed her up by the shoulders.

  “You’re going to have to talk to me, now,” I told her, “so I can help you. What is happening to you?”

  Her breathing was erratic, and though her entire gaze was still engulfed in black, I could see the shimmer of fear as she looked up at me, her mouth gaping. “Dawn,” she groaned, her voice low and gravelly. It was the first time I’d gotten close enough to see the tips of her new fangs from behind her lips and I’d forgotten how to breathe.

  I held her in my arms, the adrenaline in my system urging me to run every moment I stayed there with her. But I paid incredulous attention to what was becoming of her. In my arms, she shivered. I’d never felt someone quake so violently in my life. I squeezed, only trying to hold her together, less she combust to pieces. She moaned, the sound harrowing and haunting, so I might never forget it and be tortured by it until the day I die. Looking down, I nearly screamed, drizzles of blood pouring down across her alabaster cheeks from the corners of her eyes. Her mouth remained slack, and though she continued to move, I could tell she was dying against me.

  Her body began to shrink, visibly losing mass, and soon all muscle was reduced to paper-thin flesh covering a skeletal body. Her hair grew course and brittle. Soon, I could count every one of her ribs, her bones breaking with even the gentlest grasp, as though they were nothing but sand.

  Finally, her eyes shifting to my face one last time, I watched all light and thought vacate them, and she fell still. Unable to let her go, I wailed with her in my arms for hours. I couldn’t move—couldn’t think, believing she was gone from me forever.

  As the morning grew older, the warm light of the day crept farther and farther into the room. Unsure of the effects of the deadly sunrays, I moved her fragile body from my lap and moved to douse the light by coving the windows with coverlets, coats, and any other thick materials I could find about our house. And then I crawled straight back to her and began my grieving again, rocking her side to side as though she were my baby. For even in her most monstrous hours, she was still mine. And I loved her.

  At long last, I grew weary of mourning and once again, set her down over the cold floor. It was sometime in the late afternoon, but I didn’t make it my business to pay attention too much else. And I still refused to leave the room with her. Spent, I pulled myself up on the sofa, collapsing with my head resting over one of the jade cushions. I laid there for what felt like more hours, and just stared at her corpse. Ghastly, it was, something from my worst nightmare, but I just could not tear my focus from her. Something within me was disbelieving she could be truly gone in such a flash, when just several hours ago lived the promise she would exist forever.

  My eyelids grew heavier, and eventually, they closed. I don’t remember drifting. I only remember floating in the soft blackness, asleep. It must have been some time around seven in the evening I was jolted awake. I blinked heavily, rubbing the sleep away from my eyes, sitting up to see her impossibly looming over me in the deep shadows of the room. Silver moonlight pooled over the dusty floors. I gasped at the ghostly vision of her, the chills rolling wildly under my skin throughout my whole body, believing my grief had surely driven me to madness. She seemed so frail and in dim, murky light, her dress torn, looking improper, scraps of fabric hanging off from the shoulder and hips. Places where material was missing, I could see the pure color of her skin.

  My pulse was swift, and I do not recall breathing as I waited for her to strike, but ever so gently, I felt her cold grip wrap around my wrist. The action was gentle and did something to relax me. I released the breath I’d been holding. She hushed me and knelt before me on the sofa, her eyes blue, her face…human. I struggled to believe what I was seeing. I watched her reach to one of the corner tables to turn on the gas of one of the lights. My focus shifted for only a moment as I watched the little flame come to life from behind the glass, illuminating the severe angles of a face I knew so well, but then, did not know at all.

  “Darling,” she whispered, her full lips quirking with the hint of a small smile. I never wanted it to disappear from her face.

  I leaned forward, touching my palm to her marble cheek, her blue irises shifting instantly to black. My wrist—my pulse had gotten too close. I did not retract, however. Not immediately. I was too fascinated with what she had become. “Sorry,” I muttered, finally.

  She shook her head. “I won’t hurt you,” she spoke gently. “I’ve already fed this evening. Multiple times.” She even chuckled and the sound was positively musical. It ran circles around my head and I felt a wonderful warmth spread through my center. For the first time in days, I felt myself smile.

  “How are you before me when I watched you die in my arms only hours ago?” I asked, blinking hard to ensure I was truly awake. The bridge of my nose stung as my eyes started to water. She was there. But something about her still seemed ghostly, like she’d disappear any moment. The walls of the room felt like they were closing in on the two of us. The periwinkle-patterned wallpaper, torn and warped in several places, was alien to me. The art scattered across the walls, pieces I was all too familiar with because we had collected them together, felt like they didn’t belong to me at all. She didn’t belong to me, anymore. The night had taken possession of her.

  To my dismay, her smile disappeared and every corner of her face fell. “I suppose it is something to do with this curse. I don’t know how to fend it off. It comes each morning—the worst pain I’ve ever experienced in my life. I cannot even describe it, other than telling you I literally die with the coming of the sun.” Her eyes lifted to mine again.

  I pulled myself forward, my knees hitting the floor. This was the first time since she’d changed that she spoke to me like she was still a person. This was the first time we’d been so close and she hadn’t tried to kill me. Her voice, though now ethereal and strange, was reminiscent of who my wife used to be. I took either side of her face in my palms and watched her sigh, her eyes rolling back with her positive ecstasy.

  “You are so warm,” she groaned.

  I leaned in, wanted to feel her lips on mine again, but her eyelids flashed open, and before I realized it, she’d shot
up and away from me.

  In an instant, she was on the other side of the room, her back pinned to the wall, her claws digging deeply into the wood, her breathing ragged again. “I wouldn’t,” she warned. “Not so soon. Or I promise, you will die.” Her fangs glistened in the dim light, and her lips parted. I deducted it was so she did not have to smell me. It was so difficult for her.

  I simply nodded, and with my palms raised to her, I sat back onto the sofa again. Out of fear, or perhaps desperation, neither of us broke our stare from one another. The tension filling the room around us was thick enough to swim in. Crossing one leg over the other, I continued to regard her with new fascination, a million questions buzzing at my temples. “Do you…dream?”

  I could see her jaw muscles grow tense. She ground her teeth, her gaze growing darker and more violent by the second. Was she recalling something about her hours during the daylight? Her nails dug deeper into the wood paneling. She merely shook her head in a deliberate sort of no.

  “Fine,” I agreed and thought of my next question. “Where do you go? When you…die?” The words came out breathlessly. Perhaps I shouldn’t have asked, for again the blood tears rolled from her eyes, staining her pearly cheeks.

  A few silent moments passed, as we stayed frozen, both afraid to move. Both afraid, even to breathe. “I only recall…pain,” she finally whispered. “Surrounding darkness. And…burning.”

  “I see,” I nodded again, and finally released her from my gaze, dropping it to the floor. “I will not question you any further.”

  “Thank you,” she said.

  I did not say anything more, but nodded again, thoughtfully running my tongue across my lower lip. So many other questions. Perhaps I would need to go elsewhere to find the answers.

  “I miss you,” she said finally, forcing me to look at her again.