Conversion Book Three: 'Til Death

by S. C. Stephens

  Wading through a sea of eager toddlers and a hungry dog, he laughed as he walked out of the living room into the kitchen. I stayed where I was on the couch, smiling as I listened to a family that I could hear, but no longer see. With my blood sense though, I knew exactly where they were. That was such a comfort to me, knowing exactly where my children were. I couldn’t imagine not knowing their location at every point of my day. I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving their sight and not knowing, with every fiber of who I was, where they were. I think I would worry myself into insanity if that were the case. Honestly, I didn’t know how human mothers did it. They sort of amazed me.

  Listening to my husband pop open the fridge, I heard my children start to play with the magnets on it. As Teren grabbed the pitcher of plasma in there, he helped them start to spell words, calling out different letters so they could arrange the shapes into the words that they used most often – mom, dad, dog…blood.

  I smiled and shook my head when he spelled out that one for them. That probably wouldn’t be in a normal three-year-olds vocabulary, but it was one of the first words they’d said, right after Dadda, actually. They could even say it in Russian, along with a few other simple phrases. Teren was teaching them as they grew, so I was starting to finally pick up a few things too. I liked that soon I’d be privy to the private conversations he sometimes had with his family. I hated being kept in the dark, even if it was unintentional.

  As he warmed it in the microwave, he sped away to get the dog some food. He was back before the fifteen seconds had gone off on the timer. Nika giggled at the display. “Again, Daddy.” Teren chuckled, and I heard him place a kiss on her. The kids loved the blurred visual of us moving fast. They could do it too, in very short bursts, but it generally led to one or both injuring themselves, so Teren and I tried to dissuade them from doing it. Plus, that was something they could absolutely not do around humans. We drilled that into them constantly.

  In fact, just after I thought it, Teren reminded them that that was something that only happened at home with family. They both automatically replied with, “Okay, Daddy,” as Teren set the blood for another warming cycle.

  Smelling the warmth of that blood drifting out to me, I inhaled it deeply, my smile a satisfied one. My stomach, less satisfied, even after the chicken and vegetables the kids and I had eaten earlier, rumbled loudly. Everyone in the kitchen laughed, clearly having heard it.

  “Mommy’s noisy,” Julian gigged.

  Sighing at my super hearing family, I stood and shuffled off to the kitchen, stretching languidly with each step. Teren smiled at me as I stepped through the archway into the room. “Yes, Julian, she sure is.”

  He raised his eyebrows suggestively, and I bit my lip, knowing he was not talking about what Julian thought he was talking about. Being that there were impressionable little vampires in the room, I couldn’t even smack him for his dirty talk. Flushing slightly, I settled with discreetly pinching his butt.

  “Am not,” I muttered as I kissed his neck.

  The kids clamored around our legs as Teren tested the blood then poured some into two sippy cups. “Are too,” he muttered back, adding, “and it drives me crazy.”

  Blushing even more, I pinched him a little harder.

  He chuckled but didn’t act like I was hurting him in any way. Nika looked up at him, her dark brown eyes a mirror image of mine. “What’s cr..a..zy?”

  Teren laughed softly as he handed her a bright pink cup. “Nothing, sweetheart. Drink up, it’s almost bedtime.”

  She grabbed the cup and swished it back eagerly. Teren handed a light blue one to an also eager Julian and the both of them were silent for a moment as they enjoyed their dessert. Teren made tall glasses for us and we clinked romantically before tipping them back as well.

  The smell hit me first – heavenly, heady, life-giving. Then the taste – sweeter than you’d think, like candy, but with an interesting tang to it. The vampire in me growled in contentment, a similar noise echoing from Teren. Pausing in my drink, I watched him. His fangs had dropped down and noticing me staring, he took a second to flick his tongue over one. It was unbelievably hot. I had to look away.

  Glancing down at our kids, I watched their little fanged faces. Julian smiled around his cup as he looked up at me, his fangs tiny, little more than slightly elongated and sharpened canines.

  Smiling, I looked over at the carbon copy of me. Her hair was still lighter than my current dark shade, but my mom assured me that Nika’s sandy brown hair was exactly the color mine had been at her age. She smiled up at me too. Opening her mouth with a long “aw” sound, I could see the red of blood on her tongue and her small, dainty fangs.

  It had surprised me, but their fangs had been the first teeth to come in, and they’d come in as a matched set, both breaking through the skin at the same time. For a couple of months, they’d both sort of looked like they had serpentine mouths. It had been pretty humorous and I’d often wished I’d been able to take a picture of it. But, until the other teeth had dropped down around them, it had just been too obvious what they were.

  I grabbed their cups as they finished them, rinsing them out and putting them in the dishwasher. Teren kissed my neck. His still extended fangs grazed the tender surface, making a shiver run down my spine that had nothing to do with the chill of his lips.

  Giving him a warning glance to behave himself, I watched him chuckle at me and slip his teeth away. My exceedingly normal looking husband then scooped a child in each arm, plopping them over his shoulders. They laughed at first, then started to squirm in protest when they realized that he was getting them ready for bed. I kissed each pouting face before he shuffled off with them.

  At the stairs I heard, “No, nigh-nigh, Daddy,” from Nika, and, “I want Mommy,” from Julian.

  Calmly, Teren replied with, “If you two are really good, I’ll tell you stories.”

  They instantly quieted. “Mommy and Daddy stories?” Nika asked.

  I heard Teren set them down upstairs, heard their soft feet scramble to find their pajamas. “Yep, Mommy and Daddy stories.”

  I finished cleaning up the remnants of the day in the kitchen, then lickety-split cleaned up the rest of the house. Picking up broken crayons, missing puzzles pieces, and small piles of goldfish crackers was quick work when you could move at nearly the speed of light.

  As I was putting the tricycle back outside for the hundredth time, I heard Teren trying to convince the kids that brushing their teeth was fun. Laughing at his attempt, I slowly made my way upstairs. By the time I got to the bathroom, he’d convinced Nika to give it a try. Julian had clamped his mouth shut though. They didn’t like the brushes sweeping across their sensitive fangs. I understood. Even retracted, they were just more attuned to vibrations and movements than the teeth around them.

  Shaking my head at Julian, I squatted in front of him. “I know it feels weird, honey, but it’s important.” Raising an eyebrow, I very seriously added, “You wouldn’t want your fangs to fall out, would you?”

  His little eyes opening wide, his mouth soon followed suit. Teren gave me a wry smile as I scrubbed Julian’s teeth to a pearly white.

  As soon as we were done, they stormed off to their room. Since birth they’d shared one, at the far end of the hall from ours. We’d talked about splitting them up, but they preferred to be together for now and we let them. We were pretty sure that they would let us know when they were ready for their independence from each other. And surely, by puberty, they would want independence from each other.

  Following them, we entered their jungle playland room. While I’d been recovering at the ranch after having them, Teren’s mother and grandmother had snuck over here and decorated the place. And while I loathed painting, and had no artistic abilities whatsoever, those vampiric girls were quite incredible at it. They had painted the room like it was a work of art: light green rolling hills, blue sky with fluffy white clouds, huge trees with branches that extended from one corner to an
other. And living in the world they’d created, was just about every jungle animal you could imagine – elephants, tigers, and the kids’ favorite, monkeys. It was perfect and amazing, and that was just the walls. They’d completed the look with toys, curtains, bedding, lamps, play rugs - everything you could ask for to give your child a dream bedroom.

  I was seriously considering telling Alanna and Imogen to forsake the family business and go into interior decorating.

  Teren settled on the floor with them as they begged for which tales they wanted to hear. Teren loved to tell them bedtime stories and he usually told them things that had actually happened to us. Of course, he would turn our scarier stories into fairy tales, so they wouldn’t give the children nightmares - the evil troll stealing the valiant prince and the brave princess, the jealous monster putting the princess into a deep sleep, and the prince awakening her with a kiss. But the family stories he told just as they’d happened. And the twins’ favorite story was one that I sort of wished he’d never told them. It was kind of an embarrassing moment for me. But Teren had a thing for the memory, and repeated it often.

  “Five years ago, on a beautiful, sunny spring day, I met the most beautiful creature on earth. She had the longest, prettiest, dark brown hair. It glowed in the sunshine, like she was an angel. Her beauty stole my breath. I’d never seen someone who looked so…perfect. Her eyes were a warm, deep brown and as our gazes locked on that busy sidewalk, it took me exactly one second to fall madly in love with her.”

  He paused dramatically, and the twins, already knowing what was coming, started giggling. I contained a sigh. “Then…one second later, she smashed right into me, pouring her boiling hot coffee down the front of my shirt.”

  A chorus of laughter went around the room and I rolled my eyes and shook my head at my husband. He laughed with the twins as they sat on either side of his lap, all of them thoroughly enjoying the story that he’d told them umpteen times before – the story of how we’d first met.

  He glanced at me, leaning on the doorframe with my arms crossed over my chest, and smiled. It was one of those half-smiles that spoke volumes of how much he adored me, regardless of his never-ending teasing about our first encounter. I gave him a twisted smile, feigning displeasure. He grinned even wider, seeing right through it. He knew I loved the image of him sitting with our children, sharing our history with them. And with our sometimes terrifying history, my moment of clumsiness was a preferable thing for him to share with them. Some stories just couldn’t be watered down into fairy tales.

  Nika’s little hands came up to clutch his face, bringing his attention back to her, where she preferred it. She was Daddy’s little girl, down to the core, and she had him wrapped around her finger so tight, I didn’t know how they’d ever separate. Her shoulder-length hair shifted around her as she leaned up and gave him a quick kiss on the nose. “Then what, Daddy?”

  Teren laughed and nuzzled his face in hers, the scruff of his stubble making her giggle and flinch away from him. On his other leg, Julian clapped his hands together. “More, Daddy!”

  Teren looked over at his son, and in that instant as I watched them, it was like watching Teren look into a mirror. With pale blue eyes and thick, black hair, like the rest of the Adams group, Julian was so much like Teren that it hurt my heart sometimes. My eyes, being slightly more enhanced than the average human’s, could see the miniscule variations that made Julian distinctly different from his father, but to everyone they met, they were near twins. Or would be one day, when Julian grew into a man.

  But right now, he was his Daddy’s little boy, and he and Teren shared a look that only a father and son can share. As he rubbed Julian’s back, he continued with his tale. “Well, as my chest was burning, the most beautiful woman in the world began to try and clean up the mess with the one lone paper napkin that she had in her hand. It was much too small to do anything, but she had the most adorable look on her face as she tried, so I let her keep feeling like she was helping. It’s always nice to let others feel helpful.”

  He looked up at me and laughed a little. Julian and Nika looked up at me too, giggling. With a wry smile, Teren said, “The woman looked so upset that she’d lost her favorite treat.” He tilted his head at me as the twins giggled and cuddled into his side. Enfolding them both in a hug, he said, “And she looked horribly embarrassed that she’d run into me.”

  Nika peeked up at him lovingly. “What happened next, Daddy?”

  Teren smiled down at her and kissed her head. “You’ve heard this story so many times, you probably know it better than I do. What do you think happened?”

  Nika sat up straight and clasped her hands together, holding them to her chest. “You kissed Mommy!” she exclaimed merrily, sighing a little. I couldn’t help but laugh and shake my head at her. Just a few months shy of being four, and she was already a romantic.

  Teren laughed too and was about to comment, but Julian across from her piped up. “No, Mommy ran away.” Julian smiled, looking happy that he’d remembered the story correctly.

  I raised my eyebrows at Teren, who laughed at my face. “Well, I wouldn’t say she ran away, but, yes, she left in a hurry.”

  I shook my head and looked at the floor, remembering that day. So much had changed after that afternoon. I learned that vampires were real. I fell in love with one and decided to stay with him, regardless of the drawbacks, because he was worth every single one of them. I decided to try and have his children, before it was too late for him to create them. I stayed by his side as he prepared to changeover from a living vampire to a dead one. I even killed for him, to help him complete his conversion and to save us both.

  Then things had settled. We’d had a dreamlike few months, where nearly everything was perfect. We discovered I was pregnant, with twins no less. We got married in an ideal ceremony at his parents’ place, a ranch where the vampires could leave in peace, without fear of being discovered. Teren and I had anxiously been awaiting our new arrivals, when quite unexpectedly – as most tragedies are – I was attacked by that jerk vampire who’d felt slighted. He’d bitten me for no better reason than to hurt Teren, because he’d felt Teren had been inhospitable to him, by not allowing him to “hunt” wherever he wanted.

  That vampire had changed my happy family irrevocably. But I suppose, in a way, since everything had worked out, that strange man had completed our family too, giving us the chance to spend the rest of our unnaturally long lives…together.

  Nika, remembering how the story went now, looked over at me reminiscing by the door and clapped her hands. “Mommy had a magic card for Daddy.”

  I smiled at my daughter’s fanciful imagination and Teren laughed and grinned. “I suppose it was magic, because when I called her, and asked her if I could get her another treat, do you know what she said?”

  Julian piped up, raising his hand in the air, and looking over at me, his pale eyes joyous that he knew the answer. Much like his father, Julian always liked to have the answer. “Yes!” he pronounced.

  Nika giggled. “And, I love you.”

  Teren laughed again and rustled her hair. “No, not yet, sweetheart.”

  Leaning into her, he peeked up at me, his eyes overflowing with warmth and love. “The most beautiful woman I’d ever seen, agreed to meet with me, agreed to have dinner with me, and over time, agreed to marry me.” He smiled widely as he whispered that.

  Nika and Julian, both recognizing the end of Teren’s story, clapped their hands and squealed. “Again, Daddy!” they said at the same time.

  Teren laughed and began shifting children off his lap. “I’ve told you that story at least ten times this week. Aren’t you sick of it?”

  As he set Nika on the floor, she grabbed his hand, shaking her head. “Again, Daddy.”

  Setting Julian beside her, Teren stood up. Julian grabbed his other hand. “Daddy, again!”

  Teren looked up at me. Smiling at him, I walked into the room and placed a loving kiss upon each tiny head. Stand
ing in front of Teren, who now had a child attached to each leg, I whispered, “Go ahead. I’ll just be waiting for you…in bed…minus these.” I pulled at my clothes suggestively.

  Teren groaned and eyed me up and down in a way that made my still beating heart race. He groaned again, hearing it. Shifting his attention to the miniature beings attached to his body, he lightly patted their backs. “Okay, one more and then it’s bedtime.”

  He looked up at me while they squealed and dashed to their side-by-side beds. “Mommy and Daddy need to snuggle.”

  I chuckled at him and gave him a teasingly light kiss. He closed his eyes and his breath was faster when I pulled away. Smiling to myself, I turned my back on him, tucked my pajama-clad children into their covers, washing them in kisses that had them squealing in delight, and then left him to his repeat story telling. I was fairly certain that this time he’d breeze through the story without letting them participate.