“So this is where you’ve been coming every night,” he said, his tone becoming serious.
“Yeah, it’s just a good place to think.”
“I’m sorry I disrupted your thoughts. The house feels empty when you aren’t there. I hope you’re not mad.” Gavin, it turned out, didn’t like to be left alone. This creature of the night, this supposed monster that had done unspeakable things had quite a bad case of separation anxiety, also known as Blood Bond Syndrome. Holly had diagnosed it and said the only cure was time. Usually by the end of the transformative year, when a maker’s new creation had become full blooded, the blood bond would settle into a more composed state, but never really go away. “You shouldn’t be out here alone, Rachel. Anything could happen.”
“Gavin, we’re immortal,” I said, trying to reason with him.
“Immortal, not invincible.” Gavin leaned forward slightly, crossing his arms over his chest and running them up and down his biceps in a fit of anxiety. I had seen this a lot lately. Sometimes being away from me, even for short periods of time, seemed to induce panic. “Anything could happen to you. I don’t like you coming out here without me. Please don’t be mad, I’m just trying to protect you.”
“Mad? I’m not mad. And I’m still here so you are protecting me. You’ve been a great protector,” I said, looping my arm through his. “You doing alright?”
“Now that I’m with you,” he said, slipping his arms around my neck and brining the top of my head to his lips.
“You need to learn to be on your own sometimes though Gavin. We’re going to live forever so at some point we’ll have to spend some time apart.”
Although I hadn’t said anything intentionally hurtful he dropped his head looking wounded. “I know,” he said, “but I don’t like to think about that. Not yet, it’s too soon.”
I didn’t say anything more, simply giving him a reassuring smile as I took his hand. We walked on in silence making our way back through the woods in the direction of our little home. I took in a breath of the sweet salty air enjoying the comfortable silence between us, the kind that usually takes years to develop. In the short time we had been together our bond had grown so deep it felt like nothing would ever break it. We had spent hours talking as he told me all about his violent past and how much he regretted the things he’d done. Before he had run across me that night in the woods he had suffered greatly. He had killed uncontrollably and lived with the guilt and remorse of doing so. The night we met he was deep into the process of trying to kill himself. He was attempting suicide by starvation and had been wandering for weeks hoping to die. In the state he was in that night I was lucky he hadn’t drained me. I had stumbled into the night myself, the effects of a psychiatric drug cocktail and depression sending me wandering into the woods. He had come across me as I lay bleeding from an injury and I would have been an easy kill, but he told me that as his eyes darkened and fangs emerged that instead of reacting as if I’d seen a monster I had instead reached for him and held him.
Gavin had recounted this for me many times and each time his voice would break as he pulled me close to him, telling me how I was the only one who knew him as something other than the animal he had become. It was the first time in over fifty years that he felt even remotely human, and he was sure he needed me in his life to keep feeling that way. He decided that night, that until he could turn me, he would watch over me, and he had. For five years he sat under my window, sometimes as himself, sometimes shifting into his other form, a crow, so that he wouldn’t be noticed.
“I knew how badly you were suffering,” he had told me. “I needed to stop it. I felt the sadness in you once I’d had your blood and I couldn’t let it go on any longer. I tried everything to get Angus to agree to turn you. He wouldn’t hear of it. Finally I figured out that you weren’t actually hallucinating at all, and when I proved to him you had special abilities he agreed to turn you in secret. It wouldn’t have mattered though. I was going to turn you anyway and take you away if I had to. You saved me, and I was going to save you back, even if they hunted me down and staked me for it. I’d end your misery and take whatever consequences that came with that. I love you so much, Rachel. You’ll never know how much. Not even if we live to be thousands of years old will you ever know how much I truly and deeply love you. I’d do anything to protect you. I’d give my life for you in a heartbeat. The only thing in existence that matters is you.”
I once told him I’d do the same, that I’d give my life for him. His hands had trembled upon hearing it, as if I’d come under some real threat and he said, “I would never allow that Rachel. Living in a world without you would be death for me. I’d never survive it, I would die, so if a day ever comes where you can save me or yourself you must always choose yourself. With you gone I’m dead anyway.” Although I never doubted his love or loyalty I wasn’t sure if it was true devotion talking, or the effects of the blood bond. Holly had said BBS could do strange things to some makers. Only time would tell.
Gavin had lived a long time, certainly not as long as other vampires as he was about eighty years old, but long enough to have some interesting stories to tell. I listened for hours as he told me about his life and the things he’d seen. He seemed to know everything about me however, but was always thoroughly fascinated every time I told him about my life, especially the period of time before he began watching me. He especially loved to hear stories about when I was a child. His eyes would light up and I’d see his wide and beautiful smile cross his face as I recounted something silly, like how I got a little yellow typewriter for Christmas one year, or how I used to look for little fish in the brook and always fall in, soaking myself in the process.
Gavin squeezed my hand as we walked, enjoying the peace that always seemed to surround Soldiers Cove under darkness. Tiny breezes rustled the trees every few moments and leaves fell to the ground all around us as the fall was beginning to settle in. Soon winter would come again, my first full one as a vampire, and I looked forward to it now, seeing as how feeling temperature was not an issue anymore. I planned to spend a lot of time sitting in the snow under the stars. The peace was disrupted a moment later by a sound, one only I could pick up, off in the distance.
“What are you hearing?” Gavin asked seeing my ears pick up.
“It sounds like a wounded animal.”
“We should have a look.” To say Gavin had an affinity for animals would be an understatement. He had a way of communicating with them through images and feelings. There was even one cow in particular on his parent’s dairy farm that seemed to have a crush on him. Every time he went into the barn she would practically break her neck while stretching it out to get him to pet her. If an animal was in trouble you could bet Gavin wanted to see what was going on.
We kept walking, deeper and deeper into the woods until finally Gavin heard it too. The smell of blood was strong and his brow drew down into a hard line with worry. Then we saw her. A little golden lab trapped by a snare. She was struggling, and the more she struggled the deeper the wire was digging into her hind leg, turning it into a mass of bunched up tissue. It would be almost to the bone soon.
“Oh no,” Gavin said. He snapped the snare from the tree and tried to loosen it but every which way he tried just made it worse. The little dog yelped in pain and Gavin winced as if he’d felt it himself. “If I put my finger in there I’ll just make it worse. We have to get her home so I can cut this off. We’ll have to call Holly too.” He picked up the poor little thing and carried her, cooing to her all the way home to keep her calm. “Shhh, it’s alright. We’re gonna fix it.”
Chapter Two
“It’s a good thing you called me,” Holly said. “Definitely need to stitch that up.” She took out her kit and began repairing the dog’s leg as Gavin sat with her head in his lap, stroking her. “She’ll be alright.”
“We’ll have to find out who owns her,” I said.
“Nobody owns her, she’s a stray. Right Maggie?” Gavin an
d this dog had apparently been having a silent conversation.
“How do you know her name is Maggie?” I asked.
“That’s just what I named her.”
“So we’re keeping her?”
“Yeah.” Gavin was smiling down at her like she was the prettiest thing he’d ever seen, which made me both jealous, and love him a little more at the same time. “Unless there’s some reason you don’t want to.”
I couldn’t very well say no. “We can I guess. Gizzy won’t be happy. And she better not shed or chew anything.” The cat was already eyeing the dog with typical feline suspicion from under the kitchen table.
“I’ll handle Gizzy, and she’s not a chewer.”
“Looks like you two have a practice baby,” Holly said. “Oh I’m glad you called because I wanted to invite you to dinner with Mom and Dad tomorrow night. We gotta break in that kitchen sooner or later. Oh, and Alexander is coming too.”
“Alexander?” Gavin said.
“Yeah, Mom and Dad have offered him a turning and he’s accepted.”
“He’s docile enough,” Gavin said stroking the little dog’s ears. “He’s a good choice. What do you think babe?”
“Sounds good,” I said. I had met Gavin’s younger brother a few times and liked the young man. I was sure he’d have a much easier time accepting his turning then I had mine. To be asked to dinner by a vampire is a rare thing. Not being full blooded yet meant I was still eating human food every other day or so. Gavin ate maybe twice a week since he was so much older than I was. Holly and her parents were over four hundred years old and so eating is infrequent for them, perhaps once a month.
“Oh and Rachel, there’s something in my jacket pocket for you too. Angus dropped by and asked me to give it to you, he stopped here but you guys weren’t home.”
“Thanks,” I said grabbing her jacket which she had slung over the chair. I reached inside finding an envelope with my name written on it. I knew what it was. The only time the council permits a human life to be taken is in the event of self defense, to protect someone else, or when special permission to do a kindness to someone who is dying is granted.
My Aunt Sarah was dying. I’d spent a lot of time with her and it was killing me to watch her dignity go down the drain.
“It’s the decision,” I said. My hands were shaking. The envelope felt cold and sharp in my hands. I wanted it to be a yes, but a yes meant I’d have to kill her. I had killed before but I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about doing it to Aunt Sarah. She was my last living relative, the last link to my ever departing humanity. I opened it slowly and took the official certificate out. It was a yes.
“They said yes,” I said.
“Of course they did. You already know what my vote was, and everyone on that council owes you. It’s the least they could do,” said Gavin. That was his way of saying I saved them and all of us from a rein of revenants (zombie vampires) taking over and killing us all by using the gifts I’d been given. When I was human I didn’t feel the voices had been much of a gift. That was before I found out they were real thoughts and conversations. I was shaking.
“Rachel, don’t worry. I’ll be right there with you,” Gavin said.
“I know,” I turned away and looked out the kitchen window so they wouldn’t see me tearing up.
Just then Holly finished bandaging Maggie’s leg. She gave Gavin instructions on how to care for her, then gave me a hug and left. Gavin laid Maggie down on a pile of old blankets we had put in the corner of the kitchen for her and put his hand on my shoulder. “You’re doing a good thing,” he said. I nodded.
He turned and picked up the bowl of red stained water Holly had been using to clean Maggie and headed through the living room to dump it in the sink in the bathroom. I turned back toward the window to think. My thoughts were interrupted a few seconds later by a crash and the sound of water sloshing everywhere.
Turning around I saw Gavin on his knees in the living room in front of the TV, his hands covering his mouth. I ran to him, almost slipping on the wet floor as I did, and kneeled down to see if he was ok. He looked like he’d seen a ghost.
“Gavin?”
“I didn’t know she had a son,” was all he said.
“What?”
He pointed at the TV, staring in silence. A picture of a beautiful young woman who would have been about eighteen or nineteen filled the screen. The picture was old, probably taken in the mid-eighties. When the photograph faded away a young man took its place.
“It’s been twenty five years since my mother disappeared. We are hoping by putting her picture out there that someone who may have seen something will come forward. She left her job at the coffee shop at about eleven pm and was never seen again. I grew up not knowing if my mother was alive or dead. If she’s alive I want to find her. If not…I’d like to give her the proper burial she deserves.” The rims of his eyes turned red and the camera cut back to the anchor. Gavin’s eyes were red now also.
“Gavin, do you know that woman?” For a long moment he didn’t say anything.
“I did.”
“How?”
“I’m the reason she never came home. I didn’t know she had a son. She never told me that.” He turned to me with tears spilling out of his eyes. His hands shook and he wrung them together as he relived the event in his mind. “I’ve done horrible things, Rachel.”
I took his face in my hands and tried to wipe away his tears but they just kept coming.
“I’m sure it was an accident,” I said. I knew firsthand what it was like to have your vampire instinct take over. I had completely drained the first victim I fed from before I even knew what I was doing.
“You don’t know what I’m capable of,” he choked out, his voice breaking under the weight of his newly exhumed grief. “I’m a monster.”
“Don’t say that. You’re not.”
“I ruined so many lives.”
“Gavin that was a long time ago.”
“What does it matter how long ago it was? That kid grew up without a mother. So many people have suffered because of me.” Suddenly he sprang up from the floor and ran for the door. “I have to get out of here,” he said.
“Wait!” I shouted. Before I knew it he was gone. A moment later a crow flew by the kitchen window and I knew he had shifted. I ran outside. His clothes were in a pile on the ground and I carefully I picked them up, folded them and left them on the chair by the back door and went back inside.
“Looks like Daddy’s gonna be gone for a bit,” I said, reaching out to scratch behind the dogs ears. Maggie let out a soft cry.
Chapter Three
Gavin didn’t come home until late the next afternoon. Maggie had only been with us for one night but she wagged her tail furiously back and forth when he entered the house, already in love with her new master. I came out to the kitchen and watched as he sat himself down next to the nest of blankets and stroked our new girl, placing the little dog’s head in his lap once again, this time more for his comfort than hers.
“I’m sorry I ran out of here like that,” he said not looking me in the eye.
“You have nothing to be sorry for.” I sat next to him and pivoted his head toward mine so he’d have to come face to face with me. “You’re not the same person you were twenty five years ago.”
“I know,” he said, his words ringing hollow. “When do you want to go see your Aunt?” He was changing the subject and I didn’t want to push. Then I realized that in my worry about him I had put her out of my mind completely.
“Shouldn’t put it off I guess.” Gavin nodded and positioned Maggie back down comfortably on the blankets. A few moments later we were in the car.
Crossing the threshold of Aunt Sarah’s little bungalow I couldn’t help but remember the first time I had paid her a visit after being turned. It’s awkward to get someone to invite you into their home when they are used to having you just walk right in, but if you’re a vampire you physically cannot enter a human’s h
ome without an invitation. The nurse of the day was sitting at the kitchen table, about to fill out her paperwork.
“How is she?”
“Well she’s slipping in and out. She’s fast asleep right now, don’t think you’ll get much conversation out of her.”
“That’s ok, I’d just like to sit with her for a while,” I said. “Why don’t you take off early? I’m going to spend the night again.”
“Suit yourself. I’ll be back in the morning.”
“Thanks,” I said. With that she gathered up her papers and we watched as her car exited the driveway. We then made our way to Aunt Sarah’s room where she was sleeping soundly. “I’m going to give her a good dose of morphine first.”
“Of course,” Gavin said. I took a syringe out of the drawer by her bed and filled it half way up, then inserted it into the butterfly the doctor had permanently fixed in her arm. You were always supposed to flush it out with water afterwards, but I didn’t see much point in that now.
The Vampires of Soldiers Cove: One Crow Sorrow Page 2
