by Claire Cray
I could no longer stand it. “I’m afraid I disturbed your sleep last night, sir.”
“Not at all,” he replied calmly.
I shut my mouth. There was nothing more to say, I supposed. That would have to do it.
We went into a little valley, then up the other side. The terrain became difficult. I could see no path. I watched Merrick’s sure feet, his confident movements beneath his cloak. “Are there more like you, Master Merrick?”
He always paused before answering my questions on this matter. “Yes.”
“Do you know them?”
“Yes. But not here.”
“Are they kind people?”
“I wouldn’t say so.”
“Ah.” So he was the benevolent one.
“When you lose mortality,” he said, “You gain strength and lose consequence. It does not bring out the best in anyone.”
“You can’t die at all?” I asked, intrigued.
“Not easily.”
I kept following him. I was thinking I would have had it figured out, if not for one thing that didn’t make sense. And it didn’t seem right to just come out and ask him. Do you drink blood, sir? No. That didn’t seem altogether polite. “Does it affect you when the moon is full?”
He glanced at me, or his hood did. “No more than it affects you, I’m sure.”
I let it go for awhile.
After an hour walking through the woods, we reached the stream. Merrick advised we sit for a rest, and I joined him on a pleasant little knoll.
Sitting there with him, the warm breeze rustling through the leaves above us, it suddenly occurred to me that I was quite content.
I thought back on that first morning when the carriage had left the city like a chariot bound for Hell.
I recalled the moment I first saw Merrick, his frightening wraith-like form looming by the side of the road. It had seemed I was descending into a dark and terrible trial to repent for my carelessness.
But now…
“What has happened to your books, William?” Merrick asked, interrupting my thoughts.
“I suppose they’ve been sold off, if my mother didn’t get to them.” Or discarded. But I wasn’t about to imagine that.
“Where they of value?”
“They’d fetch a modest sum all together.”
Merrick sat very still, as always, and it was impossible to know where he was looking or what his expression was through veil behind the hood. “You must miss the city.”
“No, sir,” I said slowly. “Curiously, I don’t.” I looked up at the leaves, frowning thoughtfully. “I miss the book shops, I suppose.” But Merrick had books – some of the finest books I’d ever seen, in fact. “Not the shops,” I mused. “So much as the foraging.”
He nodded slightly.
“But you’ve a fine collection of books, yourself,” I said, and smiled. “And there’s no lack of foraging.”
There was a slight pause, and then Merrick asked, “Are you touched, William?”
He may as well have slapped my mouth, for my smile was struck down at once.
Here came the reckoning. This was it. Merrick was going to call out my ill behavior, my unseemly demonstrations of misplaced passion. It had to happen eventually, I knew. I lowered my face, ashamed.
“William,” Merrick said with surprise in his voice. “I mean no offense. Merely that…”
I stared at the ground, a hole in my chest.
Yes, I was touched. I was ill. I was diseased with desires I could not control, and they were set on ruining me. Remembering my arms about him that morning, I felt I might actually be ill. I dimly hoped I would make it to the creek if my breakfast came up.
His leather glove brushed my hair from my temple, making me jump.
“William,” he said, his voice gentle with concern. “Forgive me. I meant to remark on your affable company, your openness to me despite my ghastliness.” He smoothed my hair tenderly before he placed his hands in his lap again. “No sane young man would be so warm with an old ghoul. And so it’s my good fortune if you are mad enough to accept my company.” He rose to his feet. “Are you rested?”
I took to my feet, speechless. My heart was still trembling from the terrible dread I’d felt when I thought Merrick was going to address my perversions, but I was distracted by what he had said instead.
Ghastliness? Old ghoul?
Had he not seen a mirror lately? I nearly asked him, but then realized the last thing I needed to do was bring up how I admired his features!
God’s sakes.
I wasn’t even fighting it anymore.
When he touched me like that, even with just his gloved fingers on my head, it felt like every molecule in my body was drawn to the point of contact.
Was it loneliness? Was I lonely? Was that made me want to press against his broad chest and breathe in the warm, male scent of him? Was it loneliness that made me dream of his lips on my skin?
Merrick turned back to me, and I realized I’d fallen several paces behind. “Are you all right, William?”
“Yes, sir. Pardon me.”
He waited for me to catch up. “Are you unwell? You’re flushed.”
“No, sir.” Lord, I could feel it. I was flaming red. “It must be the air I’m unaccustomed to.”
His dark hood stayed fixed on me for a moment.
I fumbled. “Don’t you suppose that um…living in the city all that time, the lack of fresh air and all…maybe when a man gets out into nature, he feels so much more for the first time, say…that is, his body might experience a whole new spectrum of…”
Oh, for the love of... That wasn’t where I’d meant to head. “That is,” I tried again. “Of taste, and scent…senses, little parts of his body he’s never used, suddenly waking up, now that there’s something to stimulate them…”
I cursed myself silently.
“I think you’re right,” Merrick said simply, and turned away to continue on.
I grabbed my own face, scowling fiercely before I shook my limbs out and rushed to catch up to him.
For the rest of the morning, we gathered mushrooms that grew under great sheets of bark. Merrick cautioned me never to eat a mushroom I didn’t know, or any plant, for that matter. He shared a few terrible poisoning cases he’d witnessed for good measure. As if that were necessary – a city boy like me would never eat anything in the woods without specific instructions!
“Were you an apothecary before you stopped being human, sir?”
“No.”
“When did you start?”
“Soon after.”
“You’ve been doing this for two and a half centuries, then?”
He nodded. We were heading back to the cottage now.
“You’re still interested in it?”
“I have not done it continuously.”
I looked at him curiously. “Oh? Did you try other trades? What else did you do?”
“I do not generally work. I do what pleases me.”
“How is it that after two and a half centuries alive you end up in a stone cottage in the woods outside an American colony?”
“I wanted to be alone.”
And yet he’d gotten himself an apprentice? I left off questioning to puzzle over this, having still too many inquiries to choose the next one for that moment.
I did the usual chores when we returned, and took my usual bath. I was reading at the table when Merrick excused himself to go into the cave.
“How big is the cave, sir?” I asked as he passed the table.
“It’s quite large.” Merrick said. “And it joins a network with several exits. I will show you some time in the future.”
No hurry. Not that I wasn’t curious, but it was rather creepy. I watched Merrick disappear.
Merrick came up after I’d gone to bed. I was having a bit of trouble getting to sleep, too busy worrying about staying on my side of the mattress. It was not the most restful night, all in all.
Chapter 11
Day after day, I tried to cure myself of my feelings for Merrick.
But each day, he was the same kind and gentle host, the same patient teacher with the same smooth, magnetic voice. I was drawn to him. It didn’t matter that he still wore his hood most of the time. I wanted to curl up in it, nestle my face in the neck of it and play with the folds.
What the hell. I was smitten. Smitten.
And then on occasion he would remove his robe and I would see his perfect face, and each time my eyes wandered to his well-shaped shoulders and I would remember how his muscles had felt in my grip and be overwhelmed by a terrifying certainty that it had not been a dream, that night when he’d touched me. But then I would be distracted again by his calm and brilliant eyes, and the surprising smile that came without warning, and the soft, pale pink lips.
And then he would lie in bed beside me and I would suffer. How I suffered! I was suffering!
And so it truly seemed like a merciful act of God when one night, while Merrick worked quietly in the main room and I lay struggling to sleep, a young woman came calling with an unusual plea.
“Master Merrick,” she implored in hushed tones, her voice wearied and distorted by tears. “I cannot go on this way. I beg you.”
“I’ve told you before, Jessica,” Merrick said, his tone as stern as I had ever heard it. “I will not entertain such notions.”
I nearly tuned her out. It wasn’t the first time I’d heard a villager ask Merrick for a love potion. He always refused, and scolded them for thinking he’d do otherwise.
“No, sir,” she wailed softly, and began to cry. “I know you won’t make him love me. But I know you can cure me of this terrible desire! Mary Blackson told me you gave her mother a tonic that stopped her from lusting for the – ”
I was suddenly wide-awake and attentive.
Merrick had interrupted the girl to scold her for her gossip and for believing talk of magical tonics. He then lectured her on the inevitability of heartache. “It is a fact of life, as any other sorrow. You must bear it, as we all must.”
“Sir, I cannot! I cannot go on!”
They went on like this for some time, until at last Merrick calmed her tears by agreeing to give her a tincture to help her through her troubles.
She was beside herself with gratitude. Through her tears, she asked what it was made of.
I strained to hear the ingredients he quietly listed, then repeated them in my mind as I lay there. I even put them into a little melody to help myself remember. Lavender, wormwood and thyme. Lavender, wormwood and thyme. Lavender, wormwood and thyme…
I held no illusions that I would be able to recreate one of Merrick’s concoctions with any accuracy. But wasn’t there a chance that the ingredients could produce at least some of the desired effect? After weeks of feeling alarmed and helpless under the onslaught of these sudden desires, the thought of being able to show some resistance was a small comfort. And perhaps the brew would trick my mind and body into curing itself, like when my mum used to give me a bit of sugar water to stop the pain of a skinned knee.
All right, so I was desperate. I knew it. But what did I have to lose by a small, earnest attempt at preserving my pride?
The next night, as soon as Merrick went into the cave, I got up and went to the kitchen.
Lavender, wormwood and thyme. I found the first two clearly labeled, but the fourth and most common herb of the bunch escaped me. I had to look over the bundles hanging and all the loose leaves and coarse grounds in jars before I recognized what I needed.
Mixed in roughly equal parts, he’d said. I set water to boil and prepared the herbs in my teacup.
As I sat at the table to down my brew, I indulged in a bit of self-pity. How things changed, indeed. If I’d been in the city at that moment…
Oh, what was the point in thinking that way anymore? I wasn’t in the city. I was in a stone cottage at the mouth of a cave, apprenticed to some kind of otherworldly creature, sharing his bed and lusting for his body. I was drinking a bitter tea at a wooden table in a symbolic attempt to purge myself of the multitude of fantasies that had been plaguing me for weeks. I was imagining Merrick’s hands on me, my hands on him, his smooth skin against my lips, his breath on my stomach, his fingertips trailing up my thigh, his…
I downed the last of the tea in a large swallow and set the cup down hard. Then I quickly cleared the evidence, leaving the kitchen as I’d found it.
Lying in bed again, I felt quite cheerful. My heart was even beating a little faster from excitement.
Chapter 12
“William.”
When I opened my eyes, things looked rather strange. The trinkets above me seemed out of perspective, their edges very clear, and when I looked at one, the others seemed to shift as though they were breathing.
Merrick’s hand covered my forehead. “You are ill,” he said, a mixture of surprise and concern in his voice. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“I’m not ill,” I rasped. My throat was very dry. I tried to lick my lips, and found my tongue dry as well. My heart was fluttering. There was a faint green tint to the ceiling.
“Look at me.”
I turned my eyes to Merrick and cringed. His golden eyes seemed too large for his face, and his mouth was pulsing strangely. “Oh, sir, you look very strange,” I moaned, trying to cover my eyes and finding it very difficult to lift my hand. I took a sharp breath, feeling smothered.
Merrick pressed his fingers to my throat, my heart, and my stomach. “Are you in pain?”
“No.”
He squeezed my fingers. “Can you feel this?”
“Yes, sir, but I cannot quite move.”
He slipped his arms beneath my knees and shoulders and lifted from the bed, which made me feel as though my brain was spilling out of the top of my head. I moaned fearfully as my vision rolled into gray and came back again.
He stiffened, stopping in the doorway. “What is that on your breath?”
I was too nauseated to speak, but my eyes flew open when he pressed his lips to mine and slipped his tongue along the inner edge of my mouth.
His grip tightened where he held me, and he carried me swiftly to the main room where he deposited me on the chair.
“What did you ingest?” he demanded.
“Only a bit of tea, sir,” I croaked, the whole room breathing around me now. “I must say, I feel very wrong…”
The kettle, in particular, was looking at me with in a very sinister manner, and the pot seemed to be on his side. I narrowed my eyes at them, trying to figure out what they were up to.
“What did you use?”
What was it again? “Er…thyme. I know that much…” How could I be bothered with such questions? I had to keep my eye on that kettle and his lackey. To make matters worse, I could not decide whether the stones of the chimney were with me or against me.
He growled something under his breath and turned away. A moment later, it seemed, he held a cup to my lips. “Drink this. Quickly.”
I obeyed, but gagged as it hit my throat. The drink spilled out of my mouth and I coughed violently, doubling over.
He hissed something I did not understand – it sounded like a curse – and went back to the kitchen. I heard a commotion of jars clinking and hitting the table. “Is this what you used?” he asked, suddenly before me again.
I managed to focus on the jar of thyme leaves, swaying in my chair to keep up with the undulating floor and the spinning walls, and nodded as well as I could.
Merrick slammed the jar onto the table, muttering in a language I’d never heard before. A moment later I felt myself carried in his arms again.
“You have poisoned yourself,” Merrick said gruffly. “And I must bleed you.”
“How stupid of me,” I remarked, seeing some very interesting patterns now and beginning, absurdly, to laugh. “Sir, that kettle is no threat at all.”
“Forgive me for what I am about to
do.”
That was truly funny, wasn’t it? “I forgive you, sir,” I giggled as strange, ticklish twitches went through my limbs.
Lord, I had done it this time. This time, I had done it!
“I have become an idiot, Master Merrick!” I declared, quite happy to have reached a conclusion.
Things were dark now, and the air had cooled. It felt good against my feverish skin. Was I lying down now? Where? It was not a bed. I decided to investigate at some point in the future, when it wasn’t so hard to be conscious.
I barely noticed as Merrick lifted my uncooperative hand to his mouth, but it drew my attention when he sealed his lips to my wrist.
There was a flash of pain, and then a thundering in my ears.
It wasn’t clear how long had passed before clarity returned in a snap and I saw what he was doing.
Frozen on my back, I watched the gory spectacle, and as my mind became clearer I felt sure I was having a fever dream.
For there was no conceivable way that Merrick was really be kneeling at my side in the candlelit cave, holding my wrist to his lips over a wooden pail, sucking and spitting such an alarming quantity of blood that I…
“Merrick,” I whispered, terrified.
His free hand spread over my stomach and stroked me there, reassuring. His eyes were closed.
My vision began to blacken at the edges, and I thought of my previous speculations regarding my gentle master’s nature, or at least the one I had dismissed on account of logistics. For, I had been sure, Merrick was not a vampire. I had been sure there could not be enough blood for a vampire to drink in these sparsely populated parts.
But here he was, extracting my blood with his mouth, having opened my vein with his sharp teeth in his candlelit cave, and it seemed clear that…
“It’s so much, sir…” I whimpered as I myself falling backwards. My fingers flexed and found his cheek, trying and failing to push him away. I was growing weaker, tumbling faster and faster into darkness, and he looked farther and farther away. My eyelids fluttered as I sank down through the earth and into oblivion.
