by Sy Walker
Her voice faltered and died, and her eyes stung. She couldn’t help it. No, wait, please, don’t send me away….
Another long pause. “That is true. No, yes, and she has been, and it’s lovely. But...oh Claudia, now you’re being completely silly. It can’t happen. Because...because these things never work out. No, I’m not being dramatic.” Pace, pace, pace. Finally he burst out, “Between your machinations and Imelda’s fit-throwing, I’m getting rather sick of my kin!”
The conversation ended, and she bent back to her work, her heart hammering. What is going on? Half the things he said made no sense at all.
Chapter 4
She was supposed to sing something as she worked. That was the real reason Claudia had sent her. Yohan didn’t need a maid so much as he wanted her song in his ears. It was strange, and beautiful, and awkward, and it gave her a touch of stage fright as she cast around in her head for something to fill the awkward silence after that phone call. But the only one that came to mind hit far too close to home for her these days, and she didn’t even know if he would recognize it. Only when she’d been scrubbing for a good five minutes in silence did she give up, and start in. She didn’t sound anything like Harry Chapin, of course, but she knew the pain behind the song intimately.
“Mr. Tanner was a cleaner from a town in the Midwest,
And of all the cleaning shops around, he made his the best,
But he also was a baritone who sang while hanging clothes.
He practiced scales while pressing tails and sang at local shows.
His friends and neighbors praised the voice that poured out from his throat.
They said that he should use his gift instead of cleaning coats….”
The song’s chorus was a duet, with Harry singing while the character sang the chorus from “Oh Holy Night” in the background.
“Music was his life, It was not his livelihood
And it made him feel so happy, it made him feel so good
And he sang from his heart, and he sang from his soul
He did not know how well he sang, it just made him whole…”
The song spoke in tender terms of the brutality of the music industry, as it crushed the dreams of the music-loving cleaner, who spent most of his savings and all his nerve taking the stage for an audition with a New York music agency at the urging of everyone who knew him. His reward for all his effort and risk was a four-line rejection, and a trip home in defeat. It reminded her so much of the plight of herself and so many others that she almost never sang it in public, for fear of embarrassing herself. Right now, her voice shook a little, but she held the notes.
“He came home to Dayton and was questioned by his friends.
But he smiled and just said nothing, and he never sang again,
Excepting very late at night when the shop was dark and closed,
He sang softly to himself, as he sorted through the clothes….”
A voice rose from somewhere as she started into the last chorus, sounding far off: a gentle baritone, echoing down the hall.
“Fall on your knees
O hear the angels’ voices
O night divine, O night when Christ was born
O night divine, O night, o night divine….”
She managed to finish, and then leaned on the wall next to the bookcase she had been polishing, so moved that she could not speak. And then, though the voice had sounded far off, a hand slid onto her shoulder from behind. She heard Yohan’s voice soft at her ear as he moved up close to her.
“I see now. This is why you weep."
She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to hold it in, but she was shaking. She didn't want to unload on him emotionally. It felt like the most obnoxious, unattractive thing she could do in his presence. But she was crumbling in the face of even a hint of understanding of her plight.
And he did understand. "You scrub walls and sort books while people with half your talent take the spotlight your hard work should have earned you, because they appeal to some current trend and you do not. And all that is permitted to be said about it is, ‘that’s just the industry. That is just the way it is.’”
She nodded, not trusting herself to turn around just yet.
He leaned forward, so that his lips brushed her ear. “Lucinda,” he whispered. “There are other ways to be heard than the narrow path they have set….”
She turned around, staring him in the face, her confusion and anger suddenly crystallizing inside of her despite his soothing closeness. She tried to say something sharp, tried to challenge him. But her anger faded as she stared into those blue eyes. Instead she simply asked, in soft anguish: “Why do you care?”
His jaw dropped. His expression mixed tenderness with shock and grief; now it was he who seemed to be hunting for words and getting nowhere. Finally, he stepped forward, nudging her back against the wall, and took her chin in his hand, pressing his lips against hers softly.
Lucinda froze. He can’t be kissing me. I’m dreaming again. Or he’s drunk, or.... But even as her heart skipped and started to pound, she gave in to that foolish, upwelling warmth inside her, and shyly responded. Tentative at first, almost delicate, wondering at how cool his lips were and how soft. Then as he pushed against her and intensified the kiss, responding with the same hunger, as the warmth inside her roared up into a sharp and demanding heat. Her restraint snapped, and took her doubts with it.
Oh yes. God, yes. Her arms twined around him, and she went up on her toes as he lifted her against him easily. His mouth threatened to smother her--how did he go so long without air? But she didn’t really give a damn about that or anything else besides being close to him. If he wanted her, then there was no point restraining herself. Wonder and delight and desire coursed through her and she knew she had fallen for him hopelessly. And she hadn’t felt anything this good in years.
But despite their reverie, which went on for a long, sweet minute, she started to notice something as he kissed and nuzzled her. His body was so strangely still against hers. Not his hands, sliding up her back and down her arms and through her hair; not his lips, still ravaging hers; not his voice, which had lowered to soft, wordless sounds of delight that matched her own. His body trembled against hers...but it did not pant. He didn’t seem to be drawing breath at all. Her heartbeat pounded against his chest, but his...she couldn’t feel. And his skin stayed cool, warming only where she touched him, where most men would have gone feverish with arousal. Not a drop of sweat on him; no pulse in his lips, or in his neck where her fingers brushed it.
No body heat. No breath. No heartbeat. A bite that gave pleasure but could kill. Three hundred years. Her mind was putting puzzle pieces together that she didn’t want it to; she only wanted to hold him, kiss and be kissed, and...do more….
Suddenly something sharp sliced into the inside of her lower lip; she backed off, startled, holding her mouth. “Ow. Yohan, what--”
He had let her go, and had his face part turned away from her. His shoulders shook; he seemed to brace himself, and then turned so she could see him. His blue eyes didn’t just shine; they glowed, casting a soft light down his pale cheeks and sparkling in his lashes. His beautiful lips were stained darkly with blood--her blood, she realized, as she felt the cut on her lip. And overhanging the lower one, the culprits in her small but telling injury: a pair of fangs, glittering like shards of crystal in the dim light.
Every clue came together at once with terrible clarity: she stared at him, eyes huge, barely able to take more than tiny sips of air. He couldn’t be, but he was: a creature from a legend, now standing a foot away with her blood on his mouth--and her lips still tingling from his kiss.
“Yohan...you’re….”
His face twisted with anguish and he dragged himself away from her, turning away and pressing his hand over his mouth as if he wished he could yank out his fangs and be rid of them. “Don’t look at me!”
Something in her screamed for her to run, but she stayed, transfixed by the
terrible grief and fear on this strange being’s face. He seemed to expect her to flee; he closed his eyes, as if afraid to watch her leave. She saw a tear trickle out from under his lashes as his mouth closed, and the fangs slid out of sight, his lips twisting with dejection and self-disgust.
What happened on the contest night was real. He drank some of my blood. I loved it. And now this. He’s...he’s a vampire.
She held herself still, waiting for this impossible knowledge to sink in somehow. Bits of it did; the conversations with Claudia suddenly had context. His mention of being a widower for centuries. That comment about virgin’s blood. Everything. But mostly what she saw was the strange being in front of her, in pain, alone, facing a hell she knew intimately: rejection. He had made himself vulnerable in reaching out to her, and now….
No.
She touched his cheek, feeling how cool it was, how smooth. He went absolutely still. Her fingertips traced the single tear’s path down his face...and then she leaned forward and brushed it away with her lips.
He shuddered, his head falling back and his chest heaving once. His eyes opened, still shimmering with a blue radiance, like captured moonlight. They were full of astonishment. “You...did not run away….” he whispered breathlessly.
She shook her head, not certain what she could possibly say to even explain herself. All she knew was that the idea of leaving him, here, in these first sweet moments of their being together, was more terrifying and painful than facing what he was. Instead, she slipped her hand up his chest, and then laid her cheek against it. No heartbeat. But he was trembling even harder now, and when she found herself swept up in his arms like she weighed nothing, she wasn’t even that surprised.
Chapter 5
She could barely breathe. He was like an animal now, low growls in his throat and his eyes luminous as he carried her down the hall. She expected to feel his fangs again, but instead there was only the firm grip of his hands around her thighs, his clinging, near-smothering kiss, the moments when he lost restraint and pressed her against the wall to feel the whole length of her body against his. She tried to keep up, even as his lips grew bruising at times, but often she couldn’t caress him so much as hang on for dear life as he bore her away to one of the near rooms.
He pushed the door open with a bang and swept through with her; she saw his music room, piano by a wall of windows and a rack of lesser instruments behind glass on the wall. Shelves and shelves of music, a mirror reflecting the window wall--and one broad, low divan in dark blue velvet, which he headed for even as he nipped and nuzzled her from her jawline to the tops of her breasts. She heard cloth tear, knew her uniform was ruined, and then whimpered as his fingers slipped up her bared back. He lowered her to the divan, angrily yanking away the intervening fabric until she panted up at him wearing just her bra and skirt. He stared down at her, then reached a shaking hand out, gripped the front of her bra--and snapped it, under-wires and all, freeing her breasts and leaving her trembling.
He buried his face in her breasts as he crouched over her, his tongue cool and silky over her skin but his gestures those of a starving man suddenly offered a hearty meal. Little groans mixed with his growls, and he caught one of her nipples in his mouth, his fangs just brushing it before he started sucking. She let out a low, astonished wail, half sitting up, the unfamiliar pleasure coursing through her like electricity. He paused, and then got a little of his self-possession back, chuckling against her skin. Both hands reached down to cup her breasts, and he kneaded and kissed them in earnest, switching his mouth from one to the other when she started getting sore.
More fabric ripped; her skirt was gone. She made a small noise of protest, her shyness welling up, but he simply raised his head and stared at her before very deliberately reaching down to caress her thighs. His fingers traced her skin, then started stroking and kneading her through the fabric of her panties. He kept at her breast as he worked, and she whimpered and moaned, hands in his hair, breathless. The doubled sensation mixed inside her body and left her straining and trembling under him, her skin hot, her head spinning, and her voice...ah, yes, that was her voice, begging him to go on, begging him not to stop.
He was no kinder to his own clothes, tearing his shirt with his impatience, buttons flying. His trousers he yanked open and down, destroying their zipper, not seeming to care. He was barely undressed enough for the act when he threw himself over her.
His smooth, cool body pressed her into the divan’s velvet cushions, and she felt him enter. She had expected pain; there was only a little ache, though, drowned out by sweetness--and his reaction as her soft, warm flesh accepted him. He let out a long, anguished moan, eyes widening, body going rigid as he clung to her. He fought for control, his body shaking against hers...and then relaxed slightly, his head tilting down to look at her. His expression was half wild and half tender, like the adoration of a wolf; then his eyes rolled closed and he started to thrust.
Lucinda had never romanticized the idea of her first time. She was too pragmatic. But now, trembling under her first lover, she felt as if her body was afire. Pleasure and need for more pleasure, the growing, uncontrollable tension in her muscles; the way his rough movements felt better and better with every roll of his hips; all of these things were as strange to her as his fangs and the glow of his eyes. And beautiful, so beautiful. She closed her eyes, fingers digging into his shoulders as he pounded away at her. She felt her breath catch and shudder in her throat--and then her back arched as his ferocious movements drove her over the edge.
Her long cries echoed off the walls as he moved fiercely against her, the divan shaking, her body writhing under him as her climax tore through her. Her ecstasy touched off his own within moments. He shuddered violently, and pressed down on her hard enough to drive her into the cushions. His voice rose in a scream of mixed relief and joy...and then trailed off, his tremors stilling.
He sighed contentedly as he gently settled over her. She had just enough strength left to slide a limp arm around him before the world drifted away from her.
“Are you alright?” Yohan’s voice, soft and drowsy, whispered in her ear, and she realized that she had actually fainted. They lay entwined on the divan, he on his back and she curled up against his side with his arms around her. His cool, dry body felt good against her warm one, and she smiled before leaning up to kiss him under the chin. He let out a little sound of relief, and stroked her hair softly.
“I’m...better than fine….” she murmured.
He chuckled, then ventured, “I apologize for your uniform...it has been some centuries since my last time, you see. I fear it left me a little pent up.”
She giggled, and hid a blush in his shoulder. “You’ll have to come up with something for me to wear,” she pointed out lazily, although she had a feeling his shirts wouldn’t be big enough for her to wander around in.
He kissed her forehead. “I’ll manage something.”
As she recovered, he held her, at first quietly. But then, softly and slowly, he began to speak. “I know what you have gone through because I went through it myself.”
She looked up at him in surprise. “You did?”
“Oh yes. Performers and composers alike have suffered some variant on this problem since musical patronage first began.” He nuzzled her hair, idly twining one of her curls around his finger. “I was a less than successful composer in Vienna when I became as I am...three hundred and twelve years ago. My music was unpopular due to its less than traditional nature. I found an audience only in certain quarters, none of which involved wealthy patrons. I was doomed to obscurity, and had to settle for life as a simple copyist working at a conservatory. And I hated it. I spent my days devoted to preserving the work of others, while my own would never be preserved.
“I was...dying when Claudia found me. Plague. It was still common in those days. I would have ended up in a lime-pit if not for her. I had no particular desire for immortality. But I did have a family, and when Claudia offered
a cure which would allow me to continue to support them despite my illness, I agreed to it.”
He smiled thinly. “At the time, it was like a miracle. Yes, I required regular infusions of blood to maintain my health, but my strength returned, and with it my ability to work. Of course, only at night. And at evening and before dawn, I could see my wife, and our two little ones. I think the children suspected something. But they were always happy to see me. And Constanze...I could not have withstood being apart from her.”
He turned his head to stare out the window at the rain. “But time passed, and our children grew and left to make their own ways, and she began to age, while I did not. And never could she see me during the day. A side effect of my surviving that particular illness, Claudia and I explained, but...Constanze was not stupid.
“All that I could do to keep her was to beg my sire for the chance to make my wife like myself. Claudia agreed...but explained to me that I must first let Constanze know what it was that was being offered to her. It is not in our practice to take the unwilling, you see.”
He looked at her, his eyes bright again, and sadness written in every line of his face. “And so one night, I showed her. And I told her the whole truth...and she ran from me.” He blinked rapidly and looked away again. “I followed, for she was so frightened, and I feared her running in the dark. Our garden was as black as a tomb, after all. But the harder I tried to catch up, the more desperately she fled from me.
