Corrupting Alicia

by Tsoukalas, Evan

  She nodded her head slowly, and I extended my mind into the suite. Through the heavy door, I could see Alicia pacing the living room floor. She was a little pissed that we had taken so long, and she was hungry. Pulling my mind back, I opened the door with a simple mental gesture and stepped into the suite. Her incredible smell greeted me, a fascinating combination of mortal and manufactured scent that had my head spinning.

  Gisele let go of my arm but stayed at my side, and we walked down the hallway silently. Alicia had her back to us. She was so beautiful, dressed in a men’s black, button-down shirt and sleek, black jeans that molded to her figure and showed off her perfect body. Long, mile-long legs, firm, muscular thighs and a tight backside. Shaking my head to clear some of the fuzz away, I cleared my throat.

  Alicia stiffened and then whirled around, her hand shooting to her mouth to partially stifle a gasp. Her eyes immediately found mine, and I could see anger battling with exhilaration at my arrival. She looked as if she might rush me, and then she saw Gisele, stopping dead.

  Please excuse the poor choice of words...

  To ease the situation, I made a big show of moving forward, my arms wide. "Hey, kid," I whispered softly, wrapping my arms around her. She returned the embrace, but I could feel her eyes on Gisele as I breathed in the scent of her hair, which smelled like pears. As I savored the scent, I could see Gisele's reaction in my mind, and she was decidedly neutral. I mentally made a note to thank her for that later. No need, love, she answered softly.

  As I pulled away reluctantly, I wanted furiously to pick Alicia up in my arms and sweep her into the bedroom, but that was not really an option, now was it? Instead, I smiled my best smile and turned so that I could see them both. "Alicia, meet Gisele." As I spoke, I extended my arm to Gisele, beckoning for her to draw closer.

  I watched Alicia carefully as she marshaled herself and extended her hand. "Nice to meet you," she stammered, her voice cracking.

  Gisele flashed a kind smile and offered her own hand. "It is unexpected you actually mean that," she offered, her voice sweet and gentle.

  "Surprising for me, too," Alicia murmured, blushing. Gisele laughed, a soothing, liquid sound. "I mean-I...uhh," Alicia stumbled, unable to correctly piece her thoughts together.

  "I know what you meant," Gisele replied, covering Alicia's awkwardness. I felt my love for Gisele gather up into a ball in my throat, and I swallowed hard to get around it. By the time I had forced it back down into my chest, Gisele was looking at me, unsure how to proceed.

  Well, I was the orchestrator of these events, so I should probably do more than stand there, smiling like a moron at the two most beautiful women I have ever known. "Ready?" I asked Alicia, but she was slow to bring her eyes to me.

  "Ready for what?" she asked absently, looking back at Gisele.

  "I promised I’d take you out, didn't I?" I asked patiently, realizing that she needed time to adjust to Gisele's presence.

  Gisele was much closer to what Alicia expected a vampire to look like. Alicia nodded slowly, but I could tell something was bothering her. "What is it?"

  "Nothing," she said dismissively, but I wasn’t convinced.

  "Alicia, speak your mind. Gisele will not harm you." That it was even necessary to make such a statement eroded a bit of my patience. Alicia was quiet for a few moments, reflecting on my promise.

  "We can go out if you want, but I'd rather stay here and talk with you both. That is, if you don't mind." Of course. She was curious about Gisele in the same way she had been curious when first meeting me. I missed that one. Damn. Instead of drooling over her like a teenager, I should have been paying attention. Warning number two.

  Looking to Gisele, I raised my shoulders lightly, seeking her permission. She nodded once, and then went to the sofa and sat down. "Okay, no problem," I stated, gesturing for Alicia to sit down. Haltingly, she approached the sofa but did not sit. Instead, she stood in front of Gisele. I was fascinated by their interaction, and more than a little aroused; thoughts of having the both of them in bed with me sprung to mind before I could shove them away.

  I have mentioned that I can be a complete ass sometimes, right?

  My heart raced as Gisele regarded me with a distinctly female look, eyebrows arched. Her mouth twitched, and I could hear her mental sigh, the word “men” blaring at me from her mind. Embarrassment colored my face, even though I could tell that she was not entirely against the idea. As she rolled her eyes in response to my thoughts, I also realized that the Raiders had a better chance of winning back-to-back-to-back Superbowls. A 'wouldn't that just make your day' smile flashed on her face, or rather, I guess that on her face it would be a ‘would that not just make your day’ smile. Either way, I had to look away.

  "You look like a vampire,” Alicia spoke, eyes wide as if someone else had used her vocal cords to form the words. Her voice was less than a whisper, and a flush spread slowly on her face. The vampires in the room could hear her heart pounding, her blood singing its singular song.

  Gisele smiled again, beginning to relax. Alicia sat down on the couch, drawing one leg up beneath her and resting the other one over the ankle, a gesture that reminded me of Gisele, who often sat that way. She put her left arm on the back of the sofa to make it easier to look at Gisele, who watched her graceful movements but glanced up at me once or twice to see my expression.

  I was probably smiling like an idiot.

  When Gisele's mind laughingly informed me that I was correct in that assumption, I quickly forced a scowl that made her laugh out loud with delight. With mixed feelings, Alicia watched the silent communication pass between us.

  "So, Alicia. You have questions for me, yes?" Gisele queried, tossing her hair to one side with a flick of her head. Her long, graceful neck winked at me for a moment, and her perfect little ear beckoned with tempting volume.

  "Yes, but please understand that I don't mean to offend you with any of them. If I do, then I’m sorry."

  "You are not at all likely to offend me, Alicia, but I appreciate your courtesy," Gisele returned immediately. "Ask what is on your mind."

  "How old are you?" Alicia asked after only a moment's hesitation.

  "A little more than five thousand one hundred years old," Gisele answered steadily. Alicia gasped. "That is hard for you to comprehend, is it not?" Alicia nodded slowly, her mind a buzzing jumble of thoughts. "I am not surprised. Perhaps this will help give you a context. I was alive before they built the first pyramid in what is now Egypt."

  Alicia was pretty much struck dumb by that revelation, and I could feel her mind working furiously to assimilate it. Gisele also noticed this, and she continued. "I was Made more than eleven hundred years after the Flood."

  "The Flood," Alicia repeated, her words almost a chant. She had a far-off look in her eyes. She was roughly calculating time passage, and I could see that it did not add up for her.

  "Yes."

  "My ancient history isn’t the greatest, but wouldn't that put the creation of man somewhere around 7500 B.C.?"

  Gisele's eyes went wide. "You believe in Creation?"

  Alicia shook her head. "Not per se, but I lean more toward it than evolution."

  "Why is that?" Gisele inquired, her interest ramping up. I watched all this with a combination of awe and nervousness that rendered me mute. My inability to speak did not bother me much; I didn't want to interrupt anything, and I wasn't sure that I could add anything fruitful to the conversation anyway.

  Alicia shrugged. "I don't like the idea that I came from the sludge at the bottom of some pond."

  Gisele nodded. "We mark the coming of mortals at around 8000 B.C., and our history provides that there is indeed a God." For some reason, I was glad Gisele did not mention her firsthand knowledge of the existence of God, given to her by an encounter with a legion of angels that I’m certain she would much rather forget.

  "Recorded history?" Alicia gasped with wonder. Gisele nodded, and Alicia whispered, "That's amazing." Then she turned
to me. "Did you know this?" Her tone was not so much an accusation as genuine curiosity. I inclined my head in response. It was obvious that I was uncomfortable relaying too much of our history, and I could tell she was stunned that Gisele had no such compunction.

  "Didn't some Indian scholar just release a book stating conclusive evidence that Indian civilization is 12,000 years old?"

  Gisele was stunned anew. "You are referring to Sidharth and the Rig Veda?"

  "I guess. I just remember seeing something on the web," Alicia admitted, her posture rigid and leaned toward Gisele. She was nearly hanging on Gisele's every word.

  "An interesting theory, but as far as our written history states, there were no mortals here in 10,000 B.C."

  "Do you know when the Rig Veda was written?" Alicia asked, her mind settling somewhat. She was slowly getting used to this perception of time.

  Gisele shook her head quickly. "I cannot be certain, but I can tell you it was after 2000 B.C. I was not around to witness it." Gisele's face was suddenly steeped in sadness, an almost wistful quality that came when she thought of how much life she had missed during her long Slumber.

  "Why is that?"

  "I Slumbered, forced to sleep through almost five millennia. I would still Slumber if Jason had not awoken us a few years ago."

  "Us?" Alicia inquired quickly, her eyes wide.

  "Yes. The First-Generation Elders."

  "First Generation of what? Vampires?"

  Gisele thought for a moment, and I could see that she was trying to decide the best way to put it. "We were not the first of our kind, simply the first to be Converted rather than born."

  "Ohh God," Alicia whispered, that thought too hideous to bear. "You can have children?" Gisele seemed to understand why it was so horrible to her.

  "No. We can no longer give birth." Gisele avoided looking at either Alicia or me as she answered, but I could have sworn I saw another hint of wistfulness flicker across her face before she quickly chased it away. Interesting.

  "Thank God," Alicia whispered immediately without thinking of how it might be taken. Of course, it couldn't really be taken any way but exactly as it was meant.

  "I also believe that is truly for the best," Gisele agreed, and it was only because I knew her so well that I heard the soft edge in her tone signifying that while most of her believed that statement, a part of her did not. It was my turn to arch my eyebrows; this was something I hadn’t known. She either thought of it very little or went to great lengths to keep it from me.

  Immediately, I wondered which it was.

  “Really?” Alicia questioned, stunned by Gisele’s answer. “Why?”

  Gisele fixed Alicia with a hard look, as if she had not invited this invasion and was suddenly of the mind to squash the mortal bug like an ant. Alicia recognized the look, swallowing hard as fear mushroomed on her face, her eyes flying to mine in alarm.

  Gisele, I barked sharply, mind to mind, every muscle in my body preparing to react at the slightest hint of violence. This kind of thing was always a problem with Gisele. Her emotions turned on the proverbial dime, faster than fortunes rise and fall in “no limit” Texas Hold ‘em, and she often forgot halfway into a situation why she was even there in the first place.

  Looking back, I should have recognized that her reaction was a foreshadowing of what was to come later, but the picture on a puzzle is always easier to recognize when you have all the pieces assembled in front of you.

  Gisele’s features softened, and she bowed her head for a moment, reining herself in. “This is all very new to me. It takes some getting used to,” she offered softly, bringing her head up slowly, a conciliatory smile on her lips.

  Alicia heard the unspoken apology and nodded mutely, a part of her very afraid to repeat her question. Instead, she chose to let Gisele answer at her own pace.

  “I suppose there are a lot of reasons I feel that way. By nature, revenants are meant to be solitary beings. Dealing with others is never our strong suit and quite often a burden we run from instead of embracing.” Gisele did her best not to look at me as she revealed this tidbit, and even though I was aware of it on some level, my mouth fell open.

  “Also, a child is a weakness that can be exploited by others. With revenants, bad Blood runs deep, if you will pardon the expression, and grudges can be nurtured for centuries. Under these conditions, it is hard enough to watch your own back, never mind a child.” Gisele paused, her gaze very far away. She was somewhere, and wherever that was, whenever that was, the word “pleasant” could not be used to describe it.

  “But mostly,” she continued, breaking herself from her memories with a vigorous shake of her head, “to put such a curse on a child would be too much for even the most callous of us to bear for eternity.”

  Alicia sat in perfect silence, floored by Gisele’s candor, and by the pain hidden in the lines between. As she slowly let out her breath, a near-silent rush of air that sounded like a train whistle to me, I could see the obvious question forming in her mind. I had half a mind to intercept it before she could voice it, but something I cannot quite explain held me in check.

  “But you Convert mortals...” Alicia whispered, the expression on her face testifying that the question had asked itself without her permission.

  Without hesitation, Gisele smiled, and it was so far from the reaction I expected that I did a double-take. “Seems like a bit of a paradox, does it not?” Gisele asked, her voice laced with humor. Alicia nodded, her building suspense adding weight to the air around us.

  “It is actually not. When we Convert a mortal, we give them something in return. We give them immorality, freedom from the worry of disease, injury and death. We take the uncertainty out of life, making it easier to concentrate on dealing with the uncertainty of the many things in it. A child born would have no such choice, and it would be a crime of magnificent proportions to bring a being into this world under those circumstances.”

  The vehemence creeping into Gisele’s voice startled her into silence, and Alicia saw immediately that a change of topic was required. She looked at Gisele, opening her mouth to speak and closing it quickly. She thought for a moment, and then finally decided on a different question. "You said your Slumber was forced?" she asked. "Forced by whom?"

  Gisele looked up at me, her expression asking for assistance. My answer was firm and immediate. "Do what you want, Gisele, but I don't think she's ready for this. It's too soon." Gisele nodded in acquiescence.

  Alicia, disappointed and annoyed, snapped, "Don't talk about me as if I'm not sitting here!"

  "Chill out, Alicia!" I ordered sharply. "I wasn't speaking to you, and you know there are things we won't tell you." For the first time, I was angry with her. Though it did not last long, it left me more in control of myself and the situation, confident once more that I knew what I was doing.

  Yes, even revenants can fool themselves.

  "I'm sorry," Alicia replied at once, endearingly biting her lower lip in the nervous gesture that was already beginning to feel familiar in a way I suspected I would never grow tired of, and then she added, "Christian does that all the time; it makes me think of him, and I hate that."

  Pain clamped down on my heart. So much for my being the first male to be different. "Fuck," I muttered softly, bowing my head. "Forgive me, Alicia. I didn't know." Gisele's jaw almost dropped to the floor as she watched my capitulation, and I knew why. I’d never given in to her like that.

  Alicia was up from the couch and standing in front of me before I realized it. I was too busy berating myself, having fallen on my ass after jamming both feet into my mouth. "You didn't know, so there's nothing to forgive. You're nothing like him, and this is my fault. I'm sorry, I overreacted." She placed her arms around me, kissing my forehead tenderly, and then my lips.

  Gisele was clearly dismayed by the spectacle we had become. I could hear her thoughts as clear as a bell. My God, a mortal who takes responsibility for her actions. Who ever would have thought that suc
h a thing existed?

  I almost laughed, even as I wanted to cry out of love for the amazing mortal in my arms. Alicia pressed her lips to mine once more and then drew back. "I'm sorry," she repeated softly, unshed tears glimmering in the corners of her eyes, and then she returned to the couch.

  Alicia shot a knowing, female look at Gisele, and they had some silent communication of their own. Gisele looked from Alicia to me and back again and then laughed out loud to relieve some of the impact from the series of shocks that were coming one right after the other.

  "You are truly priceless, Alicia," Gisele complimented again, getting up from the sofa. She moved toward me slowly, so Alicia would be able to track her progress, and Alicia's eyes were focused tightly on her. I probed Alicia’s mind gently and found no jealousy, merely a slight sadness because she realized that, unlike with her, I was going to be with Gisele forever. She did not begrudge us that, but she wasn't sure she wanted it, either.

  She was an extraordinary creature.

  Gisele locked her arms around me, standing on her tiptoes to press her lips to mine. Her mind melded with mine, and I knew all her thoughts in a rush of information. For the moment, she was happy, truly thankful that she could share this experience with me, and grateful that I trusted her enough to enable this encounter with Alicia, whom she obviously liked more than I ever thought possible. Thank you for opening my eyes, love, she said graciously, her lips lingering.

  Any time, I answered, stroking her cheek with the knuckles of my right hand. She stepped back, looking at me for a moment before returning to the couch. Alicia looked back and forth between us slowly. When Gisele was settled, she patted Alicia on the hand. A very matronly gesture for Gisele, it stunned me anew.