His words, made audible by the force of his thought, cut through the wind. “Please do not feel we’re making light of this, Two. It is just that we are both excited nearly beyond containment. We cannot help being joyful. We know very well what you are soon to experience.”
Two, who felt that the closest Theroen might approach to “excitement beyond containment” was mild enthusiasm, remained skeptical. She was not offended, though. Quite the contrary, Theroen’s games with Melissa helped to ease her mood. These beings had been doing this thing for hundreds of years. If they could take it so lightly, perhaps their words about the effect of the blood was true.
* * *
They covered the fifty miles to the small town in less than half an hour, came to a stop in the parking lot of a small park just outside of its boundaries, shut off their engines, got out of the cars. Melissa was giggling like a little girl, perched on the hood of her BMW, looking at the two of them.
“I love this century! We don’t do that nearly enough, Theroen.”
For his part, Theroen was smiling broadly. He nodded.
“I don’t know how the hell you guys do it.” Two was also smiling. She felt out of breath. “I couldn’t see a thing.”
“You will continue to change as the blood works on you body, Two. In a few decades, you may be able to drive like Melissa.”
“No one drives like me!” Melissa laughed, leapt to her feet, twirled circles on the road in the moonlight, staring upward at the stars.
“Well, perhaps not exactly like Melissa,” Theroen conceded.
“I’m thirsty. Who’s going first, here? Two? Theroen?”
“What about you, Melissa?” Two questioned.
“Nah. I’ll wait and go into Manhattan. I might take an appetizer up here, but what I really want is to find some cute little sixteen year old thing with big boobs and too much makeup. I’m going to get her all drunk and seduce her.” Melissa’s smile had a wicked edge to it. Two looked at her, eyebrows raised. Melissa laughed at the expression.
“What? All vampires have to be like mister ‘no, heterosexual food only, please’ over there? I’m equal opportunity, bed and blood. Whatever strikes my fancy.”
Theroen put a hand to his brow and shook his head, but Two could see humor warring with, and eventually winning out over, the look of disapproval he was attempting
“I guess I’ll go first.” Two sighed. Theroen touched her cheek lightly, smiled, turned and began to walk down the road. Two fell in next to him, Melissa next to her. They moved toward the town, and the unsuspecting humans who slept there.
* * *
“This reminds me of my first time,” said Melissa as they walked. “I mean... not with a guy but, you know, like drinking blood and everything. After Abraham made me, he sent me out with Theroen, and said he could teach me everything I needed to know.”
“I am more your patron, in most ways, than that ancient...” Theroen began. Melissa interrupted him.
“We know how you feel about Abraham, Theroen. Shut up and let me tell my story!”
Two laughed. The expression on Theroen’s face was typical of an older brother. Exasperated, and yet she saw a great deal of love there as well.
“As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, Theroen took me to the city, took me to a brownstone. Hmmm... maybe I should start at the beginning?”
“Will it lessen the deluge of words you no doubt have prepared, if you structure your thoughts first, I wonder?” Theroen’s voice was wistful as he looked up at the stars. Two laughed, then clapped a hand over her mouth, looking at Melissa with bright eyes.
“You’re no better than he is.” Melissa tossed her hair playfully. “Fine, fine. If you don’t want to hear my story, we’ll just walk in silence. Or maybe Theroen could think of something more structured. Accounting, or law, or something.”
“I want to hear the story, Melissa. Honestly.” Two tried to look apologetic, succeeded only in half-stifling another burst of laughter.
“I don’t know how Abraham found me. Neither does Theroen. Or if he does, he won’t tell me. I don’t know why he made me what I am. I was twenty-three, working in the garment district. I made clothes. I was a seamstress. It was eighteen-seventy-two, and they paid me two dollars a week. Can you believe that?”
“A week?”
“A week. I lived in that dirty, rat-infested pile of bricks in Brooklyn, and I worked for two dollars a week in Manhattan. My whole family worked there, except my father. He died when I was just a little girl.
“When I said I loved this century, I meant it. It’s so clean now! Even Manhattan. Even the dirty parts. The streets aren’t filled with mud and manure. I can drive my pretty little car wherever I want to go. I can buy perfume and beautiful clothes and, if I want, I can walk around in nothing but a bikini, and no one will even say anything. Girls do it in the summer all the time.”
Two found it fascinating, this new take on what seemed such mundane aspects of life. She realized that even given her love of art, she had remained wholly grounded in her twenty-first century world. Melissa was not of this time, and her amazement at things Two had always taken for granted was refreshing.
“One evening as I left the building, there was Theroen, standing in front of me. He said that my presence was urgently requested by a great lord, and beckoned toward a carriage. Even then, he had a taste for fast vehicles. There were six huge horses tied to that carriage, each of them worth more than I would ever earn in my life. Big wheels with wooden padding on the axles to remove some of the shock.
“It still bounced and jostled something awful, but he drove it like a madman anyway. Oh, of course I went. There was no doubt that he did represent some wealthy lord. The carriage alone proved it. And when the rich beckon, well... it was always wise to follow.
“I was totally unaware of what was going on right up until he put his fangs into me.”
She looked at Two and shook her head, her smile sad. “It was pretty disgusting, but it didn’t stop me from, you know... like right then and there.”
Two nodded, glanced up at Theroen, her face coloring slightly. Theroen seemed absorbed in contemplating the moon.
“He drained me all the way, and then gave me some of his blood. I didn’t wake up like you did, though. No, his blood was... it hurt me. Really badly, actually, even though he gave it in three or four doses. I remember I was screaming, and then it was dark, and then it was four days later, and I don’t remember any of them.”
Melissa’s voice, normally so happy, now trembled.
“I can’t even feel her!” She cried, then bit her lip in frustration. “I only know she’s there because Theroen tells me about her, and because sometimes I wake up and I know it’s been more than one day. I’ll wake up in new clothes. I’ll wake up and find horrible pictures spread out on the bed. She likes terrible things. Things with needles and knives and hooks. I’m only glad I can’t remember how she eats. I don’t want to know.”
“She is not a part of you, Melissa.” Theroen’s voice was soothing. He was still looking at the moon.
“Really, Theroen? She cut me, the other day. She cut me from the back of my wrist up to my shoulder, half an inch deep, and then... went back. Let me in. I woke up all of a sudden, standing outside in the woods, with my whole arm feeling like it was on fire, pouring blood. Poor Tori was having conniptions. I don’t know what I was being punished for.
“She hates me. She hates me because she can’t escape from me, and if she can’t escape from me, then she must be a part of me.”
Theroen was quiet. He turned away from the moon, looked down at the road. He seemed to have no answer to this.
Two spoke up. “If she’s a part of you, Melissa, she’s a part that was supposed to be buried. Abraham’s blood woke her up, but she’s not a part of you that was ever supposed to... to function. She’s like a set of wisdom teeth that never come in, but never need to be pulled, except Abraham pushed them forward. She’s like a benign tu
mor, except Abraham made it malignant. You see?
“We’ve all got parts of us that are dormant. They don’t affect us, even subconsciously. But I guess the right shock can wake them up. But she’s not a part of you, she’s a wrongful addition. You were already complete to begin with.”
Melissa seemed to take some consolation in this. She stopped, hugged Two, and kissed her cheek. “Thanks. I thought I was supposed to be tagging along to comfort you!”
Two smiled. “You are. Glad I could return the favor.”
* * *
The trio crested a hill, stopped for a moment, looked down upon the town below them. Melissa turned to Two.
“I swear to God, I don’t know why Abraham makes us live so far outside of the city. Look at this. It’s eleven o’clock and almost every light in the town is out!”
Two shrugged. Behind her, Theroen laughed.
“That is precisely why he has us live so far outside of the city, Melissa. It allows us some privacy, away from prying eyes. We lived in Manhattan during the first century we spent here, and it caused us nothing but trouble. I personally had to dispatch four intrepid vampire hunters, and one priest.”
“Priest.” Two looked up at him. “You never finished telling me about how you became a vampire, Theroen.”
“Did you tell her about Father Leopold?” Melissa laughed, peals of silver in the night.
“Father Leopold.” Theroen’s voice held a smile as well. “No, I don’t believe we reached that point in the story. Father Leopold is almost personally responsible for my vampirism. I say almost because modern science and psychology have helped me to understand that his actions were probably not entirely under his control.
Two looked at Theroen, head tilted, saying nothing. Melissa sat down on the curb under a streetlight, leaned back on her arms, stretched.
“We have time, Theroen,” she said.
“Are you that anxious to hear it again, Melissa? I recall -- only a few years ago -- you shouting something along the lines of ‘forget that dead pope’ at me.”
“That’s only because you were in one of your theological phases, with all the questioning about God and all that crap. I was tired of it.” Melissa’s teeth gleamed, her smile having returned from its earlier departure.
“Ah. Yes. God and all that crap. Exactly what I was obsessed with at the time Abraham brought me into darkness.”
“He talks like some Goth poet wannabe. Have you heard him talk about sex?” Melissa’s tone was conspiratorial, but Two knew Theroen had heard it, despite appearing not to notice. She covered a smile with her hand.
“Father Leopold had one outstanding flaw which put him somewhat at odds with the church, though he had gone to great pains to make sure the church was unaware of it. I would likely have been his undoing, if not for my encounter with Abraham. Father Leopold, it turns out, was very fond of young men with a fervent belief in God.”
“Oh, no...” Two was smiling, shaking her head.
“It took five years. I was under his tutelage for that long, from the age of eighteen to twenty-three. I can honestly say I never knew, and never saw it coming. We were closing up the cathedral for the night. It was dark. Empty and warm. I have the suspicion that Leopold may also have been availing himself of some drink that night.” Theroen paused, rolled his eyes. “I assure you, there are few things more surprising in life than an unexpected kiss from a middle-aged priest. One of those things, though, would be the feel of his hand pressing against your groin.”
Melissa exploded into laughter. Theroen coughed, seemed to be holding back laughter of his own. He shook his head. Two grinned, nodded. “I imagine that’s the case.”
“The vampires I know are sexual creatures, barring Abraham, and they don’t necessarily adhere to traditional sexual values.” Theroen glanced at Melissa, who waved at him, still giggling. “This has... opened my eyes significantly. I would not be bothered at all, at this stage of my life, though I can’t claim to have any particular attraction to men of any age. But then? I was horrified. Here was the man who had taken me under his wing, taught me many things about the good book, solidified in me my belief that I wanted to be ordained and helped me see it through...”
“And there he was trying to cop a feel in the middle of a fucking church!” Melissa rolled backwards in the grass, clutching her knees to her chest, laughter renewed. “It’s not that I care, I just... I can picture Theroen’s face. Oh my god, I’m going to die.”
“I was actually so startled that, in my confusion, I asked him if he was hurt. As absurd as it was, my brain had decided that he was perhaps having a stroke or heart attack, and had simply fallen against me.”
Melissa howled laughter at the moon. “Stop it, Theroen! My stomach hurts!”
Her laughter was contagious, and Two found herself joining, although she did not find the scene that Theroen described to be nearly as amusing as Melissa. Funny, sure, but perhaps the age she had lived in had inured her to these things. She had at first expected Theroen’s story to involve religious boys much younger than he had been.
Finally, Melissa’s laughter died down. She lay on the grass, looking up at the night sky, gasping for air and breaking into giggles here and there.
“May I continue?” There was a half-smile on Theroen’s lips.
“Yes, please.” Two looked back to him.
“I’m sorry, Two. Really. I just... I mean, it’s Theroen. Anyone else, it wouldn’t be that funny. You know?”
Two smiled. Nodded. She knew.
“When I was finally able to accept what had happened --- and no one had moved, mind you. We both seemed frozen after I had stepped away -- I shouted something about God’s wrath and stormed from the church. I could hear Father Leopold stammering, shuffling behind me, calling me back, but it was far too late for that. I was in the London streets, the night was still early, and I let the crowd swallow me.”
“I walked for some time without really thinking of anything other than the punishments God would surely hurl down upon Leopold. Plague, a rain of fire and brimstone... something must occur. And yet, the longer I walked, the more I came to realize that this, of course, could not have been some spontaneous conversion on Leopold’s part. He must have been fighting his urges for quite some time before at last giving in, and for all I knew, I was not the first he had approached.
“How was it possible? How could God permit it? How could He let this man, filled with such impurity, become not only His servant, but the head of a large cathedral. It was impossible. Yet it had happened.”
Theroen was looking at the moon again. He smiled.
“Eventually my wandering led me to a graveyard. Chance? Fate? I don’t know. I could not remember the path I had taken to get there, but it mattered little. I sat with my head bowed on a stone bench for some time, until finally I implored God to deliver me from this confusion, and light my path before me.
“God did not answer, but from the darkness beyond the graves a voice whispered to me. Abraham’s voice.”
Two shuddered. Her brief meeting with Abraham was still crystal-clear in her mind. She wondered if it would ever fade.
“Unlikely,” Theroen said. “He has that affect on people. I remember this first meeting with him like it was yesterday.”
“You remember everything like it was yesterday, and stop reading her mind. That’s not fair.” Melissa was sitting up again, leaning her elbows against her knees, chin resting on her palms, grinning at them.
“My apologies, Melissa.”
“You’re just a big showoff! You know Abraham has to be close to people to do it, and you know I can’t do it much at all.”
Theroen shrugged. “It is a gift I am thankful for. I will be curious to see if I have passed it on to Two.”
“He got all the good genes,” Melissa said. “I’d be jealous, but I don’t have to talk to Abraham, so I figure it’s a fair trade.”
“What did Abraham say to you, Theroen?” Two was filled with curiosity
. She could not imagine Theroen, or at least the young priest he had been, willingly accepting the vampire life.
* * *
“If ever your God was listening, little sheep, he has long since gone deaf.”
The voice was no more than a whisper, but it cut through Theroen like a white-hot blade. He sat up, thoughts of Leopold’s actions forgotten, hair on the back of his neck standing on end, adrenaline surging through his veins. The depth of the voice, the malice it contained, was unlike anything Theroen had heard before. He groped at the edge of the bench instinctively, searching desperately for defense against this sudden assault on his courage.
The Blood The Bonds Page 11
