Grief For Heart: The Vincent Du Maurier Series, Book 4

by K. P. Ambroziak

  Finn didn’t feel his body rise, his weight drop to nothing, as he traveled up with the vampire, hovering over the ice floe as though gravity were merely an idea.

  The vampire roared with laughter, his skin taut with arousal, his teeth bent on the final bite. This was it. This was going to be the boy’s last effort, for surely he’s mine now, the vampire thought.

  As the young hunter continued to push his weight into the hard body before him, he thought of his father. The man had taught him to kill with an elegant hand. “We are not brutish people,” his father had said. “All life is precious. Do you see that, son?” Finn had seen it, but he hadn’t believed it. He longed to kill something without remorse, to take life into his hands and crush it for the pure pleasure of doing so. That desire bubbled in him and the vampire sensed it. He acknowledged him in kind, seeing the true face of man.

  That was it. That was the moment the vampire’s humanity came to light, set down before him, splayed out in the form of the young hunter. A reincarnation from his god, Finn was he.

  “Stop,” the vampire said. “No more.”

  He broke the spell, and dropped to the ice, landing square on his feet. He pushed the boy off him with a force too powerful to temper. Finn flew through the air, into the water, sinking as soon as he crashed. The vampire smelled the blood on the foam, his quarry’s head cracked on the floe like an egg on a rim.

  The vampire saw black, as he dove down into the foamy sea, doomed if he couldn’t retrieve his only means to survive. He bargained with his deity, promising to treat his quarry with more care if the god would help him find the young hunter. The vampire felt for him there in the darkness as he sank to seize his prize a second time. Luckily for him, his god proved a forgiving one.

  * * *

  Saba walked along the stream that edged the forest. She was loaded down with a basket of fish, slung on her back. She refused Freyit’s offer to hunt large game that morning, opting to stand on the shore and wet her line in the bay.

  She’d always been lucky at the catch, providing food for her family from the time she was half the size she was then. I was lucky to have a capable daughter, one skilled in ways the rest of us weren’t. Her older sisters lived independently, their partners able to hunt for them. But Saba continued to feed Netta and I and her younger siblings, even as we tended a garden and Netta spun yarn to trade at the market. It was rare we relied on others, though once upon a time both Gerenios and Freyit saw to my family’s alimentary needs. I was quite unskilled with the bow, the line, and the dart, never having been taught to hunt. But my Saba was masterful at many things, which I think was one of the reasons her ancestors’ world called to her. She had a taste for blood, of that I was certain.

  “May I walk with you?” Peter asked.

  He snuck up on her, snatching the basket of fish off her shoulder. She cussed, as he spun her around with his speed. “Give it back,” she said, spitting with a curse.

  “Do not be so vulgar, little lamb,” Peter said. “You’re not made for such profanity.”

  “I’m made for a lot of vulgar things, you should know.”

  He smiled, showing his fangs. She’d grown so used to them, she only got a thrill when he unleashed his irons. Those rocked her in ways she couldn’t explain.

  “Ah, Saba, I must speak frankly with you.”

  She stopped in her tracks, and pulled a hand up to her hip, cocking one leg in front of the other, her longbow strapped to her shoulder, her fishing line tucked on her back. Peter loved that pose most of all. She stood tall, like the Roman goddess of the hunt, his very own Diana.

  “What?”

  She often spoke abrasively to the vampire, though her feelings for him were tender. Because she didn’t understand them, they manifested as ire—another trait inherited from her great-great-grandmother.

  “Gentle, little lamb.” He reached out and caressed her cheek, his hand trembling at the silk of her skin. “Let’s sit for a moment and live here for eternity.”

  “I have to get back.”

  “You have time.”

  “Dag is waiting.”

  “He’s not going anywhere, I promise.”

  She huffed, and bent her gangly legs to squat on a mound next to the stream. She waited, biting her bottom lip. She played it tough but was truly terrified at the confession to come. She feared his abandonment, his break in their communion.

  Peter took a seat beside her, stretching his legs out before him. He’d placed her basket a few feet away, the smell of the fish overpowering hers. “I love you, you know I do.”

  She looked away, a lump growing in her throat. She knew it, she’d known it for a long while. But she also believed they were too different for love to matter.

  “Do you recall our first meeting,” he said. “Up in your father’s tower?”

  She rolled her eyes, and crossed her arms over her chest.

  “Of course you do,” he said. “But I’m not asking if you remember the details, like what we said to one another or how our hands touched when I spread the atlas before you. I’m not even asking if you recall how your father stood between us, his guard up against me. I’d come in with an agenda, I admit it. But nothing he did could temper the swell in my heart.”

  Saba’s hands gripped her elbows, her throat tightening as emotion rushed through her.

  “Do you remember the other thing,” he said. “The secret thing. The thing that happened between you and I?”

  She did recall it with a ferocity she couldn’t tame. Of course she remembered it. It was like being turned inside out, being reborn, being set on fire. Her voice faltered and she cleared her throat to begin again. “We exchanged worlds,” she said.

  “Yes, we did.” Peter raised a hand to caress her back, drawing his fingers up and down, causing her whole body to tremble. “But it wasn’t something you understood then, was it?”

  She shook her head, dropping her chin to the side, bringing her forehead close to his. Their lips were inches apart and she swelled at the strain of resisting contact.

  “Do you understand it now, little lamb.”

  His voice was so small, so close to her ear, I could barely make out his words. But I tuned in with more precision, Evelina having warned me I must not let this conversation pass me by. “Peter has something to tell her that she will not be able to reiterate to you,” she’d said. “She won’t understand, but you must. For her sake, you must.”

  Saba moved closer to Peter, his draw too much to bear. She raised a hand to his chest, touching his heart. “Take me,” she whispered, unaware of what she asked. “Make me like you, here, now.” Her words were broken, her sounds nothing but mumbles.

  “No, little lamb. Not like this. I need you to understand.”

  She pushed off him, standing anew. “I must go.”

  “Saba, this conversation is important.” Peter stood up, pinning himself against her. His aggression bent to match hers, as she puffed up her chest, and pushed him off her. “No,” he growled, grabbing her wrist as she spun away. He had a hold on her and she fought to free herself. “I don’t want to be forceful, but you leave me no choice.”

  “I don’t want to hear this.” Her voice was steeped in anger. Out of character, she sounded a little like Evelina.

  “You must.”

  She sighed and kicked the rock at her toe.

  “Look at me.” Peter went into himself, digging up that vampire charm that could win him any heart. I admit I was surprised at his stooping, but after hearing what he had to say I realized he’d no choice.

  Saba gave in, pulling her body close to his once again.

  “What did you see in my world?” His voice was low, but not soft. He spoke firmly, with purpose and a touch of fear.

  “I saw myself.”

  “Tell me what that means.”

  “I don’t know exactly.”

  “You do.” He touched the strand of hair that blew across her face, tucking it behind her ear. “Tell me.”
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br />   She studied him, inching closer, desperate to plant her mouth on his. Her lips parted, and she swayed where she stood, their first kiss a moment away.

  “Tell me,” he whispered, the strain in his voice a match to the stiffness in his body. “Tell me who you saw.”

  “I saw you, bleeding in the street. You were choking, crying out for help. I hovered over you before I sank down next to you and kissed you just as I’m going to kiss you now,” she said.

  She moved in on him, her lips a breath away. Then she sank into the vampire, drawn up into his magic, his mouth open for her, wet for her, warm for her. Their kiss did it, sealing their fate, his past threaded with her future.

  She broke the embrace too soon, pulling herself from him to search his eyes, the truth living in them. “I am … I was … how can it be?”

  “Mistress,” he whispered. “You’ve come home.”

  The two fell on each other then, their limbs belonging to one body, their souls soldered together, their spirits locked in an endless embrace.

  The truth defied logic, spurned reason, challenged space and time. My daughter was the reincarnation of Peter’s maker, my Saba his Galla.

  * * *

  I apprised Evelina of my discovery, though she already knew.

  “Peter confessed once he was certain,” she said.

  “How did he learn this bit of certainty?”

  “Our ways are not yours. You wouldn’t understand.”

  I refused to say what I was thinking but she read it on my face, nevertheless.

  “If anyone knows our lives defy logic, it’s you.” Evelina paced the studio just as Vincent had done long ago. She was a miniature version of him, her robe dancing at the edge of her boots, swishing each time she turned to begin again.

  “I don’t see it. This can’t be.” My voice was laced with the whine I felt in my body. I couldn’t bear the thought of my Saba not being mine.

  “Don’t be foolish, boy.” She snapped me from my petulance with the fling of her voice. “This isn’t about you.”

  “I know, mormor.” I wanted to cry. To race through the colony. To pull Saba up into my arms like the little girl she once was. I couldn’t say why it shattered me so to know she was another come back through time.

  “It’s not something to shirk from,” Evelina said. “It means more than we can understand.”

  She was thinking of Vincent. I could see it on her face. The more she tried to temper her excitement, the more it bled through. She couldn’t hide her passion from me, it’s mine too. The thought of Galla being reborn as Saba, recalling the most significant moments of her past life, remembering those she loved most of all, meant that he too could return and do the same.

  “Don’t judge me, Dagur.” She flew to my side and pressed her hand to my heart, searching my eyes, and my will, pulling me apart with her mind. She wanted to see if I knew the truth, if Vincent had already returned.

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “I can’t be sure, but he’d come for you, wouldn’t he?”

  “Yes,” she said. “He’d come.”

  “I haven’t spoken to Saba yet. I don’t know how to tell her I was eavesdropping.”

  “She’s still your child. Until she picks a mate, she’s under your rule.”

  “Picks a mate?” I couldn’t hide my shock. “It’s obviously Peter.”

  Evelina sent chills down my spine with the look she gave me, her ire tossed across the room with a single glance. “Saba doesn’t belong to Peter.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “He does.”

  She said no more and I was left to wonder.

  “Make the choice for you daughter,” she said. “She needs to begin her own line.”

  I bit my lip, unwilling to contradict her. I wasn’t frightened of her as much as I was fearful of stirring up unwelcomed wrath.

  “May I speak with her about this myself?”

  Evelina shrugged. “You may.”

  “I just think it’s better if I explain it to her. I don’t think she means to go against our wishes—mine and Netta’s—but she has a mind of her own.”

  “She does. So you must put her straight.”

  “And Peter?”

  “Let me deal with the priest.” She used Vincent’s term out of spite. She wasn’t happy with her old mentor. “Peter knows what’s best for him.”

  I nodded in agreement, certain she meant only she knew best. Evelina had grown cantankerous over the years. We all needed her hero to return to soften her once again.

  “Stop it,” she said. “Leave him out of this.”

  Like Vincent, she didn’t want me thinking of her counterpart. I couldn’t help myself most times. He’s always been bigger than me.

  “Tell me what’s being done about this ailment,” she said, drawing close to me, guiding me to the stool christened by Vincent. She preferred me sitting when she fed.

  “There’s nothing to tell.”

  She swooped down, and caressed my cheek, our dance commencing.

  “The nosebleeds have stopped,” I said. “And the rash is gone. Freyit found a cure in the bog, something that smells terrible but seems to do the trick.” I smiled but she didn’t look up from my shoulder.

  I went on about it as she fed, thinking she was listening with one ear, until she stood up and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. She looked at me intently before dropping her face next to mine, her mouth reeking of my blood. She leaned in and kissed me, planting her lips flat on mine. She barely parted them, pressing her mouth against mine, as she drew her tongue across it. She held me for a moment, her hand gently caressing the back of my shorn head. When she pulled away, she let out a breath and spoke with a dreamy voice. “He’s not in you,” she said. “Not yet anyhow. Perhaps at your first death, we will usher him in together.”

  I was too stunned to smile. Her gesture wasn’t erotic, but it made me uneasy. I didn’t want to die, but she’d yet to comprehend why I didn’t want to become her novice, either.

  “Your reasons escape me,” she said. “I couldn’t wait to become his.”

  “You wanted to be similar to the one you loved, I get that completely. But Netta is my soul mate.”

  “She’s a fine wife, my boy, but she’s not otherworldly like you. You’re from my line, and there’s greatness here. Look at Saba.”

  “That’s the point. Look at Saba, mormor.” I tested the waters, knowing she was settling into her high. She’d be in a fine mood for a time. “She wants to be like the one she loves.”

  Evelina gave me the winsome smile she thought only belonged to Peter, the smile all of my children inherited. “Saba will not be made a vampire.”

  I opened my mouth to speak, but she silenced me.

  “Hear this,” she said, “the god whose plan this is, the one who sacrificed himself for us, wouldn’t take kindly to my shunning his gift. If I allow Saba to become like us, before her time, I will be spurning my master. And that I will not do.”

  “I understand your logic, but what would Vincent do?”

  The corners of her mouth twitched. She found my question bothersome, if not insolent. “Vincent would cherish her blood, as I do.”

  I couldn’t argue with that. My Saba’s blood was worth more to my kin, for if she spilled her offering, there would be repercussions. Evelina didn’t fail to remind me that they lived by our grace, as we did theirs.

  “Peter knows he’s not to tempt her further,” she said. “If he gets out of line, he and I will leave.”

  “And go where?”

  She smiled. “You are my only kin, but you’re no longer the lone source of blood.”

  “What can you mean?”

  No one had told me there were others.

  “Netta’s line,” she said.

  “But … I …”

  “I was waiting to tell you. Veor discovered the tribe on one of his expeditions. If Peter and I don’t see eye to eye on this, he and I shall pay a visit to those across
the sea.”

  “But our world here is perfect.” I didn’t mean for my change in pitch to betray my hysteria, but my voice cracked. “Why do we need others?”

  She gave me a knowing look before shaking her head with a smile. “Ever the protector, my boy. You are your mother’s son.”

  We never talked of Béa, but every now and then Evelina would refer to her as if she still walked the earth. If reincarnation were truly possible, I hoped to see her rise again in the twinkling of my kin’s eye.

  “We must form an alliance at some point. They too live among Hematopes. We can’t know how their society thrives, if they have laws as we do.”

  “Are there others …” She read me.

  “The vampires are all gone. Only the four of us remain. For now, I’d like to keep it that way. At least until his return.”

  She didn’t need to harp on him, I knew whose return she awaited.

  “There’s enough of us to feed as it is,” she said.

  “Another reason why I should stay as I am.”

  She scoffed. “Nothing will win you that argument. My offer stands, even as the last breath rolls off your tongue. I don’t want to know what life is without you.”

  I blushed. One didn’t often receive praise from Evelina. I’d always known I was special to her, but our connection had always been soldered with the resin that kept us both dreaming together. If Vincent hadn’t chosen me to carry his line forward, I’m not sure she’d have wanted me to be her novice.

  “We will take care of this, the priest and I. But you, my boy, must see to that daughter of yours. She’s too beautiful to be without a match. There’s got to be at least one colonist to give her a rise. If not, I’ll sway her heart for her.”

  I shook my head, but promised her Netta and I would deal with it.

  “Before too long. This reincarnation business can’t get out of hand. For all our sakes, Saba and Galla must find harmony as they are, not in blood. Do you see, Dagur?”

  “I do.”

  She came forward and put her hand on my chest, then she brought her head to it and laid that against me too. She stayed as still as a stone, breathing in sync with me for several breaths, then she tore herself away and flew out the door as if she’d gone with the wind.