Ilona stood glowering at Charlotte. “Charming. If that’s the way she feels, she can go to hell.”
“Wait -” Charlotte began helplessly, but in the face of Violette’s revulsion and Ilona’s rage, she knew there was no point in arguing.
Ilona leaned down and touched Violette’s hand. “And if they transform you into a vampire, you will go to hell, of course.”
“Stop it!” Charlotte cried. “Get out!”
Karl’s daughter picked up her hat, smiled sweetly, and vanished.
The moment she went, Violette seemed to lose all her strength and slumped over, clinging to Charlotte’s hands. Stefan, giving Charlotte a resigned look, carried Violette into the bedroom - the room where Charlotte had talked to Karl, just before he, Stefan and Pierre had transformed her; their last conversation and last embrace as human and vampire.
Charlotte sat at the polished Italian dining table with her head in her hands, thinking, What are we going to do? I wanted this to take place gently, with love.
Stefan came back, pulling the door to behind him.
“How is she?” Charlotte asked.
“Asleep. Passed out,” said Stefan. “Lord, she is beautiful. Just like Snow White. I would love to wake her, a prince with a difference.”
“Make her spit out the poisoned apple and come back to life,” Charlotte murmured. “What can we do now? Could just the two of us -?”
He sat beside her and placed his hand over hers. Through everything, Niklas sat like a mannequin, a faint frown shadowing his crystal-gold eyes. That was all the emotion he ever showed, an indistinct echo of Stefan’s.
“I won’t risk it. Without enough energy to take her into the Crystal Ring, she’d die. We’ll find someone else - if you still want to go through with it.”
Pain settled around her throat. “I can’t go back.”
“There is Pierre, if you could stand him, or one or two others I could ask, though it may take time to find them.”
“I wonder if Andreas would agree?”
“He wouldn’t want to displease Karl.” They were silent for a minute, then Stefan said, “Why are you crying?”
“I don’t know,” Charlotte said. “It’s ridiculous.”
“Tell me.”
She took a quick, sobbing breath. “Karl never had this burning desire to make me a vampire, as I have for Violette. It didn’t possess him so strongly that it nearly killed him. He didn’t take me away and simply do it. It wasn’t a burning light!”
“Charlotte...”
“And I’m crying because he’s not here now. Because he wouldn’t help me, wouldn’t see...”
“Charlotte, try to understand him. What you’re doing to Violette is what he did to Ilona! And he thinks you’ll live to regret it, as he did. Then, next time the desire comes to transform someone, you’ll fight it and it will be agony, whatever your decision. How can you say he didn’t burn? You were there. You know everything he felt and the anguish he endured. You know.”
“Yes. I know.” She let her head drop. The tears eased their hold. “Why are you so good to me?”
“Why not? It’s easy to be kind. It’s especially easy with you, because you respond so sweetly. Besides, it gives me pleasure.” Stefan leaned over, lifted her chin, and kissed her lips; the kiss of a lover and friend, such a rare combination, electrifying and soothing all at once.
“I could fall in love with you, Stefan,” she said.
“I am in love with you, Charlotte.”
“No, you’re not. You only love yourself.”
“And Niklas!” he said indignantly.
“As I said; yourself. But then, I seem to fall in love with almost anyone.”
“Oh, now I am insulted,” Stefan said lightly.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean...”
“Oh, don’t apologise. I know you think the world of me.”
Charlotte laughed. “Well, I do.” They kissed again, and the kiss was delicious, lingering, poignant because they both knew it would never go any further. Stefan’s lips slid down to her neck and she thought he would bite her... but he only planted a kiss on her collarbone, and pulled back.
“It’s easy for us to love each other, because we will never cause each other pain,” he said. For once he was serious, even sad. “You’ll never make demands on me, because there is nothing you really want of me. And I will never tear your heart to pieces, because only Karl has that power. Hasn’t he?”
“Only Karl,” she agreed.
Stefan went to his twin, stood behind him and stroked his blond hair. Niklas looked ahead with a slight smile: a porcelain doll. “It’s Niklas I feel sorry for. He can never share the pleasures of helping friends or kissing lovers.”
“But he never feels pain, either, does he?”
“Is that good? It only means he can never understand.” Stefan seemed far away, and for a moment sorrow burned from him like a white sword. Then he was himself again. “Why don’t you go and look at Snow White?”
Charlotte went into the bedroom and sat on the bed. Violette lay with her head on one side, her bare left arm an ivory curve against the covers. She was awake. Her eyes glistened darkly under not-quite-closed lids.
“I’m sorry, Violette,” Charlotte whispered. “I’ve made such a mess of this. I never meant to frighten or force you, but I couldn’t see any other way. I don’t know how to explain!”
Violette half-turned her head to look at her. Her voice was languid and hoarse, as if she barely had strength to speak. “It’s all right, Charlotte. I know. I always knew this was going to happen. I was born with this curse... What use is it to fight?”
“You make it sound so negative, so evil.”
“But that’s what I am. I can’t resist my own nature.”
“You are not evil!”
“According to the Church, the tiniest unrepented sin may condemn us to hell. What does it mean then, to lie willingly in the arms of a vampire while I wait to be taken into your ranks?”
Charlotte gripped her arm in frustration. “But if there’s no God - if mortals can be as bad as we are - oh, I don’t know what to say, because you’re right! There are no excuses. We have nothing to commend us. What I intend to do to you is wrong. But tell me you don’t want it, that you’d rather sit crippled in a wheelchair, or give up and die, and I’ll let you go.”
Violette only sighed. “It doesn’t work that way,” she said tiredly. “My intellect rejects you, but my instinct says I have no choice. It’s nothing to do with dancing or cheating illness. It’s something quite separate... I don’t understand. Perhaps it’s the wine and opium. I won’t fight you... but I’m still frightened, Charlotte.”
“Don’t be.” She kissed Violette’s limp hand. She preferred it when Violette fought; this bleak acceptance of the inevitable was ghastly.
“But I’m terrified.” Violette took a short, dry breath. “I’m so damned terrified I could die.”
Voices from the outer room. Charlotte sensed another vampire and thought Karl! - even as she knew it was not him. Giving Violette’s hand a squeeze, she went into the drawing room and was astonished to see Katerina there, majestic in white fur.
Seeing Charlotte, she gave a start. “My dear, I didn’t expect to find you here. But of course, I should have realised.”
“Should you?”
“Karl told me of your intention to bring Violette into our circle.” Katerina looked at the bedroom door. “She’s in there, is she? Still human.”
Charlotte was incensed by her arrival, her patronising omniscience. Stefan was unperturbed. “We had a little trouble with Ilona,” he said ruefully.
“How astonishing.” Katerina let her fur coat slide into his hands. “If ever you did not, that would be news.”
“What do you want?” said Charlotte. “Did Karl send you?”
Katerina gave her a cool look that became suddenly conciliatory. “I don’t blame you for snapping at me, but must we stay on bad terms? He sent me, but not
about Violette.”
“Why, then?”
“He wants to see Stefan. It’s not urgent.” Her voice was quiet and Charlotte noted a difference in her demeanour. She was less regal and condescending, more vulnerable. She sat down, folding her arms on the table and looking up at Charlotte. “All the same, hasn’t it occurred to you that Karl might be right? It’s a terrible, momentous thing to end a human’s life like this.”
“Do you think I don’t know that?” Typical that she’d take Karl’s side! “I’ve been through it all. Did you and Andreas plead for Karl’s life when Kristian decided to make him a vampire? He didn’t ask for it, either. Well, did you?”
“No,” said Katerina.
Charlotte was struck by the openness of her admission. Why had she changed? “No, you helped. Why?”
Katerina’s full deep-pink lips parted. She seemed taken off-guard. “Kristian was a hard master to disobey.”
“And the rest! Don’t tell me Karl’s beauty played no part, that you didn’t want to see such beauty live forever. You couldn’t care less for his human life!
“It’s true. I loved him. We all did. Kristian fed us the idea that vampires were meant to be solitary creatures with only one attachment: Kristian himself. Easy to believe, when you first pass through the veil. Suddenly humans seem a world apart, and it’s difficult to feel for anyone when your strongest emotion is a craving for blood. You feel cold, isolated, afraid, and Kristian is the only one you can turn to.”
Charlotte thought, This is the first time she’s actually talked to me! Disarmed, she said more gently. “Was that how it felt for you?”
“At the beginning. I had been very religious. I was sincere in my faith, so I was sincere and passionate in my devotion to Kristian. But, with being the devout acolyte Kristian demanded, there came terrible pain. The truth is, we need companionship. We are not austere creatures like monks. We are profligate with our passions, we crave affection just like the humans we once were, if not more so. In other words, to comply with Kristian’s image of a vampire is a lie. That’s why Andreas and I turned away from him. He demanded the impossible. That’s why he lost almost everyone in the end. How could he expect me to look on the beauty of Andreas and Karl, and not want to touch them and love them?”
“Why did he choose people who were bound to let him down?”
“He was the world’s worst judge of character. Don’t you agree, Stefan?”
“Thank heaven,” Stefan said with a grin.
“He saw what he thought he could make us, not who we really were.” Katerina’s gaze drifted into the distance. “Karl was a soft silent creature; a cat, keeping to the edges of the room, observing without being observed. You catch a glimpse of him in the shadows; his dark brows indented over his lovely eyes, a shine of red fire on his hair, the faintest smile on his lips. All the rest is darkness; but his face, you would die for. Kristian was fooled; he imagined that because Karl stays in the shadows and says little that he is not strong, not dangerous.”
“You don’t have to tell me this,” said Charlotte. “I know him.”
“I’m simply describing him; isn’t this the man, the vampire, we both know? But your reaction proves my point! You can’t bear the thought of sharing him. I don’t condemn you, because I’m guilty too. He makes us both possessive, because neither of us can possess him.”
A strange calmness washed over Charlotte. At last she felt able to talk to Katerina. The war between them was over, although neither had won. Charlotte said, “I lost almost everything I had for him, and my soul is damned - by the laws of common decency, if not by God Himself. Yet I still think I’m the luckiest creature in the world. But I never stop paying. Every moment we’re apart is... agony.”
Katerina looked candidly at her. “I had no idea you felt such pain. I’ve never suffered to that degree over anyone. It sounds nightmarish.”
“It can be. But it’s worth anything to be with Karl. Or was, if he will ever speak to me again.”
“How can you have anything left for Violette?”
“Precisely because she’s the only being with the power to stop me thinking about him.”
Katerina gave a disapproving huff. “Dangerous to give others such a hold on you. Love them, by all means, but don’t let love kill you. The way to survive is to need no one; then no one can hurt you.”
“Oh, that’s a fine principle, that goes all to pieces when a certain person intrudes on your life. I tried to convince myself I could exist without Karl, and I can. Exist - not live.”
“Then why risk it, for the sake of this woman?” Katerina asked softly.
“I have no idea,” said Charlotte, bowing her head.
Katerina came to her and stroked her arms. “I’ll help you transform her.”
Charlotte was astonished. “Why?”
“Because she’s important to you. Sometimes the only way to release an obsession is by pursuing it to the ultimate degree.”
“But Karl...”
“What made you think I’m bound by his ideas of right and wrong?” Katerina smiled with real warmth. Sadness, too. “I’m sorry I’ve been such a harpy, Charlotte; can I begin to make it up to you? Go in to her.”
* * *
The bedroom was dark, but Charlotte saw subtle shades of gold, crimson and brown in the shadows. In contrast, Violette was a creature of moonlight, stark black and white. Diffuse light from the main room lay across her creamy arms and ice-maiden face.
Charlotte leaned over her, gently tracing the contours of her body. Knowing the time was here at last, her thirst was so powerful that she shook with the effort of holding back. She pushed her hands under the dancer’s hair, felt the silken weight across her hands. Violette stirred, frowning.
“Shh.” Charlotte bent down, breathing the fragrance of her hair and skin. Faint remains of dusty theatre smells, smoke from the party; lily-of-the valley perfume, the clean sweetness of her skin.
Violette opened her eyes, saw the vampire bending over her.
Charlotte thought she would be afraid, and was ready for a struggle - but the dancer’s eyelids were heavy with laudanum, and she only sighed and whispered, “Charlotte...”
She tipped back her head, revealing her long throat. Charlotte stared, hypnotised, anticipation throbbing and expanding all through her. Then Violette stretched out her arms and put them around Charlotte’s neck. How strong she was! She pulled Charlotte down until they lay face to face, the vampire half over her, vibrating with this moment. She kissed Violette’s cheek, moved downwards to suck the tender flesh of her neck between her teeth; stayed there a moment, telling herself, Don’t do this, don’t... but I must, I can’t wait...
Her fangs lengthened of their own accord, pierced the vein.
The rapturous flood burst into her mouth, a red wave rushing through her. All the time - as if she saw herself from outside -Charlotte was aware that this was horrible, to be drinking blood... and yet too compelling to resist, a dazzling, unholy ecstasy. Violette... ah, God help me, Violette. And she felt the rich fluid running into her own veins, branching through her body until she tingled with bliss. She tasted the sacred magic of all Violette’s creations; Giselle, Odette, Odile, Serpent.
Never had she felt such overwhelming love for Violette, nor such ghastly awareness that its fulfilment was killing her.
Through the crimson dream, someone began pulling at her. Charlotte tried to shrug off the irritation. It became more insistent.
“Gently, Charlotte,” came Stefan’s voice. “She mustn’t die yet.”
Miraculously, Charlotte managed to stop. She let the killing teeth retract, licked clean the wounds she’d made, kissed Violette on the neck and lips. Drowsy now. It was not opium but the blood itself, the satiation of desire.
They carried Violette into the candlelit bower of the main room, where Katerina waited.
“A little more,” said Stefan. He took a mouthful from Violette’s neck, passed her to Katerina, who did the same with
surprising tenderness.
“Drain her now, Charlotte,” said Stefan. “Take her to the edge of death, but no further until we form the circle. Then, just as we enter the Ring, take her life energy.”
Charlotte wrapped the fainting dancer in her arms. Her violent thirst had abated, but still it was luscious to bite down again, to drink more tenderly now.
As she did so, Violette burst into life and began to struggle with incredible strength. Charlotte could barely hold her, as if this were not a dying human but a thrashing white demon, with serpents for limbs, snakes for hair.
Now they were all fighting to hold Violette. And never would Charlotte forget the look on her face; blanched to silver-grey, skin drawn taut against the bones, and horror glaring from her huge blue-black eyes.
“Finish it!” Stefan cried.
God help me, I’ve done this to her -
She went on sucking, felt Violette’s pulse slowing, her heart rolling to a stop. Yet still she fought! And when Charlotte released her in order to seize her hand and form the circle, Violette nearly slipped from her grasp like soap... but the circle held. Stefan gripped Violette’s other hand, with Katerina between him and Charlotte.
Then, as they hung between the world and the Crystal Ring, Charlotte saw Violette’s aura. Spindles of silver and violet and jet... Impossibly lovely.
The aura was Violette’s essence, cool, tantalising, mysterious... and Charlotte must destroy it. She drew the spines of light into herself. The pleasure was heartbreaking... for with the fulfilment of her last need, Violette ceased to exist.
Fear rushed through Charlotte like a storm.
But Katerina was tugging her hand, the room dissolving. By instinct Charlotte released the stolen energies to flow around the circle and back into Violette as they drew her slender body physically into the other-realm.
And there they began to replace her warm, quick, vulnerable life with a hard cold fire that would endure forever.
* * *
Violette found herself lying in a wild garden. A drift of fallen leaves cushioned her. Beneath, she felt wet soil, mould, crawling creatures.
A Dance in Blood Velvet Page 38
