Now Comes the Night

by P. G. Forte

  Armand sighed. What was it she wanted him to say? “Probably he can’t break things off, even if he did want to. At this point, he’s probably addicted, n’est-ce pas?”

  “Addicted to what?” She stared wide-eyed at him.

  “To your venom, of course.”

  “My venom?”

  “Well, not just yours, perhaps, but you’ve had him to yourself for several months now and you’ve made it clear no one else was to touch him, so even if he was unhappy, how could he break up with you now? Where would that leave him? Who would he get his…his fix from, if not you?”

  “That’s not possible,” Julie said faintly.

  “I’m sure there are other factors as well,” Armand added gently. “Emotional factors. I certainly don’t mean to suggest he doesn’t care for you. How could he not, after all?” He smiled with that last sentence, hoping to ease her pain. She seemed not to notice.

  “You’re saying…I’m no good for him.”

  Armand shrugged. “You can put it that way, if you’d like, but it’s obvious Brennan is no good for you either. Why, even Damian agrees with me on that point.” Armand wasn’t sure what the connection was between Julie and Damian, but he knew she respected the older vampire’s opinion, and he wasn’t above using that to make his point.

  “You’re making that up,” Julie protested. “Damian would never say something like that. He likes Brennan. I can tell.”

  “Oui. Of course he likes him, chérie. We all like Brennan. I can name you a half-dozen people who were quite put out when you staked your claim on him and forced the rest of us to keep our distance.”

  An angry flush colored Julie’s cheeks. “That’s not what I meant and you know it. He likes him as a…as a person.”

  Armand smiled in disbelief. “Now, on that I’m afraid we must agree to disagree. I doubt Damian even thinks of Brennan as being a person. If he does, it would be the first time since I’ve known him that he felt that way about anyone mortal.”

  “Why are you being so disagreeable today?’ Julie asked hotly. “You sound like Marc—although not even he would say something that obnoxious. Besides, you don’t know anything about Damian or…or how he feels.”

  “I’m not trying to be disagreeable.” Nor was he particularly happy to be told he reminded her of her brother. Quelle merveille! He was just trying to force her to face facts. She was a vampire now. She needed to let go of her attachment to being human. For her own good, and yes, damn it, for his as well. “You’re right. I don’t know what your experience with Damian has been, but the Damian I know is a terrible snob who generally wants nothing at all to do with humans beyond the satisfying of a few urges.”

  An unhappy look washed over Julie’s features before she ducked her head once again. Armand silently cursed himself. Too late it occurred to him that it was likely Julie had known Damian when she was still human, still mortal, still little more than a food source herself. In the days before Conrad—for reasons no one understood, reasons he seemed uncharacteristically reluctant to divulge—took it into his head to turn her.

  Why had Conrad done it? Not that Armand wasn’t profoundly grateful he had, but still one had to wonder. He was struck suddenly by a terrible sense of déjà vu, and an equally terrible question. Had Julie even wanted to be turned?

  He shouldn’t even be asking the question. Were Conrad to ever learn of Armand’s doubts, he’d be furious with him. Yet, it wasn’t the first time Armand had wondered such a thing.

  Hadn’t he seen this same unhappiness on the face of another newly turned vampire? Hadn’t he seen the same shimmer of tears, the same pleading look in a pair of eerily similar dark eyes, heard the same throbbing tones of regret and despair. “Let me go, Armand, please. I can’t stay here…”

  Forty years lay between the two events yet, then as now, he could imagine only the one, unthinkable cause for all the grief to which he was witness. Conrad. It had to be his fault. It had to be. Didn’t it?

  Once again, he was so torn between feelings of anger and sympathy, outrage and betrayal, he could hardly think straight. Two girls, both so young, both so similar in appearance. Was this a heretofore unnoticed weakness, a flaw in Conrad’s soul? Was it possible he had rushed their decision to become Vampire or, perhaps, not even given them a chance to make up their minds at all? Could he have pushed them into something they weren’t completely ready for? Or, even worse, into something they would never have chosen for themselves? Maybe that was why Julie felt such a strong connection to Brennan—another human with no desire to be anything else.

  No. It can’t be. Conrad would never have done such a thing. I know he wouldn’t…would he?

  Armand did not want to believe it, no more than he’d wanted to believe it forty years earlier, but it was hard to argue with the evidence his own eyes supplied. Once would have been bad enough, even marginally understandable, given the extenuating circumstances that had existed at the time, but twice? Non. That he could not forgive. That would be inexcusable!

  For years, since practically the night they’d met in fact, Conrad had been Armand’s hero—no, he’d been more than that. He’d been the center of Armand’s personal universe, everything Armand aspired to become. It was still almost inconceivable to him that Conrad would behave in such a fashion, that he could do things that ran counter to everything he had ever claimed to stand for. Yet, as much as Armand longed to deny it, as much as it sickened him to even think it, what other explanation could there be? What else would explain the secrecy surrounding Julie and Marc’s turning, or Conrad’s odd treatment of the twins? Not to mention the guilt, the hints of anguish Armand had so often seen on Conrad’s face when he gazed at one of them—that look that said he’d done something wrong and knew it.

  “Listen,” Armand said softly, resisting the urge to take Julie in his arms and offer comfort of a more physical nature. “I know how persuasive Conrad can be at times, how difficult it can be to resist his charm, especially when he wants something from you. I know how it is to wish to give him everything, how impossible it is, in some moments, to even recognize that point where your own desires leave off and his begin.” He shook his head and added, “This change we all have been through…sometimes it’s not quite what we expect. I know Conrad has probably urged you not to indulge in regrets, chérie, but, trust me, you would not be the first of us to have had second thoughts. It’s all right to admit it.”

  “Oh, Armand.” The stricken expression on Julie’s face caused Armand’s heart to sink. Then she reached over and laid a gentle hand upon his arm. “I had no idea. I’m so very sorry.”

  “Sorry?” Armand studied her expression more closely. Was that pity that seemed to fill her beautiful eyes? “For what? None of this is your fault. I’m sure you’ve done nothing you need feel sorry about.”

  “No, I-I know that. I mean, how could it be? I hadn’t even been born yet. It’s just…it sounds so awful. Is that really how it was for you? What was Conrad thinking to do that to you?”

  Armand frowned in confusion. “You think I’m talking about myself?”

  Julie nodded. “Well, sure. Aren’t you?”

  “No. No, not at all. Conrad would never—” He stopped in midsentence, too confused to continue. If he was that certain Conrad would not behave in such a manner…then he had no idea what he was talking about in the first place.

  Julie eyed him curiously. “So who are we talking about?”

  “I thought… Was that not what your experience with him was like?”

  “Me?” Julie’s face flooded with color. She snatched back her hand in a hurry. “Me and…and Conrad? No! Never. I can’t even… God, how could you think something like that?”

  “I don’t know. You just seemed so sad when we spoke of it.” Armand shrugged. “What else was I to think?”

  “I don’t know. But don’t think that! That’s just…that’s just wrong.”

  “Oui. It would be very wrong. But, all the same…are you sure? You ar
en’t the first person I’ve known to have had that same look about them.”

  “Oh, really?” Julie’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Well, I don’t know anything about this look you’re talking about and, frankly, I don’t care. Deny it all you want, but I think you were talking about yourself. And I think now you’re just…just trying to pretend it was someone else to make yourself feel better. Were you very much in love with him? Did he hurt you? No, wait, don’t answer that. Forget I asked. I don’t think I want to know.”

  “Was I in love?” Armand laughed. “Ah, mais oui. I was madly in love, but it was the idea of being a vampire with which I was enamored.” He smiled, remembering his youthful enthusiasm. “Poor Conrad. You’re right. I must be misjudging him. Ah, but what a nuisance I must have been to him back then. It’s truly a wonder he didn’t hurt me. I pestered him for weeks to turn me. From the first moment I realized what he was, I never left him alone. But he’d always say no. He kept insisting he was through with such things, that he’d never sire another vampire.”

  “And yet, here you are.” Julie gazed at him curiously. “So what happened?”

  “Here we both are,” Armand corrected her. “And your brother, as well. So who’s to say? Obviously, in some matters he’s more flexible than he’d like us to believe. But in my case, I think perhaps I simply wore him down. Or maybe I got lucky. One night, it seemed he just…changed his mind.”

  “You know, Conrad, if you were to turn me, we could go on like this forever,” Armand had suggested hopefully, as they lay sprawled upon the bed in the suite Conrad had rented, not far from the theater where Armand danced. “Would that not be pleasant?”

  Conrad licked lazily at his neck. “Why, Armand, could it be you are trying to tempt me?” His voice, ripe with sated sensuality, sent a shiver through Armand’s frame, along with an ache of remembered pleasure. “I’m afraid your argument misses its mark, mon ami, for I shall be going on in this fashion forever regardless—long after you have outgrown your foolish infatuation with the Night.”

  Armand gasped a little in hurt surprise as his happy mood dissolved. “Ah, merci. How nice for you, eh?” Annoyed, he tried to push Conrad away, but without effect. “Get off me now. You weigh a ton.”

  “Oh, come, don’t pout,” Conrad murmured, staying right where he was. “I know you think you’re disappointed, but I promise you, you’ll be much happier once you’ve put this idea behind you and moved on with your life.”

  “Perhaps I might be allowed to decide for myself what will make me happy?” Armand said as he shoved at him again. “Perhaps I don’t wish to move on. Have you ever considered that?” Except, he did, a little, if he was going to be insulted.

  “Ah, you redheads and your tempers. Is it any wonder I prefer my lovers to be brooding and dark?” Taking Armand’s chin between his fingers Conrad turned his head so that he had to face him. “I shall miss you, of course, mon cher. Never think otherwise. In these few weeks we’ve been together, you’ve brought me more joy than I’ve known in at least a score of years. I’ve enjoyed the time I’ve spent with you very much. But living forever… I fear it is not quite the idyllic existence you seem to think it. Mine is not a fate I would wish on anyone I cared about.”

  “What about what I might wish for? Doesn’t that count at all?”

  “This grows tiresome,” Conrad growled, his voice laced with annoyance. “How many times must I repeat myself? The answer is no. I am done with the siring of vampires. The world is already over-filled with my kind. The sooner we all meet with tragic ends the better.”

  Armand shook his head. He could not accept that—he wouldn’t. “Since there are already too many, what could one more hurt? Why can you not make a single exception? Please, Conrad. I’m begging you.”

  Conrad sighed in response. “What is it about the prospect of this never ending, living death with which I’ve been cursed that so appeals to you? You’ve seen what I am, how I must live. I’ve not kept it from you.”

  “Yes, you’ve been most open about it,” Armand began in what he hoped would be a persuasive tone. “And I do appreciate that. But, I’m growing so old, Conrad, and I—” He broke off, startled and annoyed, when Conrad fell back on the bed shouting with laughter.

  “Old? Oh, my dear, you’re a child! A very silly child at that. And so incredibly young I should be ashamed of myself for dallying with you like this. I should have sent you away after the first night. I can’t think why I did not.”

  “Laugh all you like,” Armand replied with all the dignity he could muster. “But for a dancer I am very old, practically past my prime. Already, more than half the ballerinas with whom I started have been forced into retirement and I myself lost most of last season due to an injury. There is so little time left and it all goes by so quickly. I’m beginning to doubt whether I will ever achieve even half of what I’d once been expected to. With each year that passes now, I know I will lose even more of my strength or my agility until there is nothing left for me to do but teach or choreograph—and watch other dancers go on to reach the heights I’ll have given up on. You talk of sparing me a living death? Then spare me this. For I will die when I can no longer dance.”

  “Stop it!” Conrad’s face had gone dark. He raised himself up on his elbow and glared at Armand. “Do not say such things, do you hear me? You will most certainly not die. Men do not die as easily as that. I know about such matters—more than I hope you need ever have cause to learn.”

  “Ah, oui.” Armand nodded. “No doubt you are correct in what you say. I misspoke, then. I won’t die. I shall merely wish I was dead.”

  Conrad gazed curiously at him. “Tell me, mon ami, is it really that easy for you to give up your humanity? Have you no other hopes or dreams? No wishes for a normal life, perhaps a family some day?”

  “None,” Armand replied. “And if I did, what of it? I would rather regret the loss of my humanity forever than have to regret for the next fifty years the loss of that which I love above all else, the one thing in the world that makes me feel most alive. What is the point of living at all, if you can’t have that?”

  Conrad appeared speechless. His expression bleak, he stared at Armand as though he’d just heard his own doom pronounced. Then he swung himself out of bed, moving so swiftly Armand jumped back in alarm.

  “Get out of here,” he snarled, standing rigid beside the bed, his hands repeatedly clenching and unclenching. “Now.”

  Armand stared at him in dismay. “Conrad, please…”

  “Leave me,” Conrad repeated. “Go now and do not let me see you back here again for at least three days.”

  “Three days? But…why?”

  “Because. Between now and then I want you to think, very hard, about what it is you really want, how much you’re willing to give up, all that you think you will gain from this…this altered life you crave.”

  Armand stared at him, scarcely daring to hope he’d understood. “And…and then?”

  His mouth tight, Conrad nodded. “And then…if, at the end of that time, you are still of the same mind, find me here and I will give you what you desire.”

  “You mean it?” Armand slid quickly out of bed, moving to stand in front of Conrad, trying hard to gauge his mood. “You’re not just saying this to get rid of me, are you? I won’t come back in three days only to find you’ve gone away?”

  Conrad’s eyebrows rose. “Can it be you’re calling me a liar, Armand? Indeed, I would have credited you with having a little more sense than to insult me—especially now, when I’m on the brink of giving in to your very ill-reasoned request.”

  Armand shook his head. “I’m not. Never. I just…thank you. Thank you so much.”

  “No,” Conrad muttered, backing away a step when Armand tried to embrace him. “Don’t you dare try and thank me for this. I’m sure I’m doing you a grave disservice to be even entertaining this idiotic notion of yours.”

  “Well, I don’t,” Armand replied, laughing excitedly and
hugging him anyway. “I think what you’re doing for me is a very great favor—and I shall always love you for that.”

  Conrad sighed. “I wonder.” Holding him at arm’s length, he studied his face for a long moment. “No, Armand, I suspect I am merely being supremely selfish once again. It is indeed unfortunate for you, but you’ve succeeded in reminding me how intolerably long forever can be. Far too long to be spent alone. Why should I not take a companion, after all? Especially one who is so eager for it, so relentless in his pursuit. You almost deserve it, you know.”

  “I will try to be deserving of it,” Armand promised fervently, but if anything, Conrad’s face only grew more grim.

  “Such innocence,” he sighed. Shaking his head, he thrust him away. “Go now, my beautiful little dancer, but please think about what I’ve said. And, if you change your mind—as I sincerely hope, for your sake, you shall—and I do not see you again, please know that I wish you a long and happy life.”

  “I think that’s the most romantic story I’ve ever heard,” Julie sighed when Armand had finished.

  He shrugged. “Oui. It was a very tender moment.”

  “But, dude, you’re totally lying about not having been in love with him. Why, you even told him you were. And, that look on your face as you were remembering…”

  Armand looked at her in surprise. “I never meant to imply I do not love Conrad. I am devoted to him. As are we all, I’m sure. He’s my sire. And I’m certainly not insensible of the great gift he has given me. I owe him my life. I meant only that what we have had between us was never a grand passion—such as I know he’s had with others. We have been companions, just as he said, just as we were always meant to be.”

  He stopped then, smiling at the stricken look on Julie’s face. “But, what is this? There is no need to look so sad, chérie. I assure you, I’ve been quite content. I like to think we both have been. I don’t believe either of us was ever looking for anything more from each other than what we’ve received. Great love does not always lead to great happiness, you know.”