I turned back to see Sunaria staring at me, her eyes full of hope. When she saw my expression, her face lit up.
With pride, I studied Jacob, reassured that he’d found a safe haven. He appeared content. Jacob resembled his mother even more now, an uncanny reminder of Annabelle and a painful reminder of his elder brother. He’d grown in height, evidence of being well cared for, and his modest attire was smart. His warm clothes were perfect for another harsh English winter. I felt thankful to the gentleman for taking such good care of him.
Jacob jumped off his chair, approached his mentor, and topped up his cup. His reward was a warm smile. They both resumed their activities.
Fearful that I’d start sobbing with joy, I rejoined Marcus and Sunaria in the alleyway. With my hand on my chest, I tried to steady my nerves. The relief was immense. In a moment, I’d burst into that house and grab him, but first I had to think it through, work out how I’d explain myself to the fresh faced boy who may have forgotten me. Didn’t want to frighten him and push him away.
“Jacob’s the physician’s assistant,” Marcus explained. “His name is Doctor Potts.”
“How did you find him?” I asked.
“The old man made a late night call to a patient,” Marcus continued. “Jacob was with him.”
Sunaria looked harried. “Marcus doesn’t think you should remove him.”
“What? Why?” Disconcerted, I stared back up at the window. “We have servants that can watch over him when I can’t.”
“He’s settled here,” Marcus said.
“This is none of your business,” Sunaria snapped.
“I’ve been searching for him, as well,” Marcus said, sulkily.
Sunaria folded her arms. “Then you know the best place for him is with his father.”
“Wait, wait,” I interrupted. “What’s brought this on?”
“What if the Creda come back?” Marcus asked.
“Get Jacob and let’s go,” Sunaria insisted.
“Jacob is getting an education,” Marcus said.
“He doesn’t need to work. We can take care of him,” Sunaria’s tone rose with her impatience.
I leaned against the wall. “Does the physician have a wife?”
“I haven’t seen anyone other than them,” Marcus said.
“We’ve waited this long,” Sunaria said, panicked. “We’re not leaving him here.”
I tried to shake off the procrastination. My inability to watch over him before had put him in danger and I’d lost him. The thought of making the wrong decision again scared me. Running my fingers through my hair, trying to suppress the nagging doubt, I paced. Enemies of ours, known or unknown, could threaten him. My inability to protect my son during the day would leave him exposed.
There was movement at the window. The curtain was drawn closed.
“He’s right.” I felt panic as I spoke those words, trying to find the truth in them.
“I don’t believe what I’m hearing,” Sunaria sucked in her breath. “You think that this place is safe? Being dragged to sick people’s homes? What if he catches something?”
I hesitated, searching for the right words. “She does have a point.”
“He’s living with a physician,” Marcus said. “He won’t put the boy in harm’s way.”
“How do you know that?” Sunaria asked annoyed. “What if he beats the boy?”
“He looks well cared for.” I glanced back up at the window.
“The old man does appear to have reached a good age,” Marcus said.
“What has that got to do with anything?” Sunaria snapped.
“Well, I was just answering your concern about disease,” he replied. “When he’s old enough for you to explain, he may want to live with you.”
“He will live with me,” I said abruptly.
“I don’t believe we’re even having this discussion.” Sunaria gestured in frustration.
“This day should be glorious . . .” I rubbed my temples, “instead, it’s tortuous.”
“Look, we know where he is now.” Marcus squeezed my shoulder. “Let’s just give this decision some thought.”
I pushed Marcus’ hand off.
“Jacob has found stability,” Marcus continued. “I’m not saying don’t see him. He’s just safer here.”
“If he’s seen at the manor, he could be at risk.” I sighed.
“You’re seriously considering leaving him here?” Sunaria asked me.
My throat tightened, restricting my breathing. I felt sick.
Marcus shoveled his feet.
“We’re leaving him here.” I turned away from them. “It’s decided.”
“Why?” Sunaria said.
“Because this is home.” My voice sounded strange to me. “I want him to have everything that I can’t give him.”
“What can that old man give him that you can’t?” Sunaria’s lips trembled.
“Daylight,” I said.
* * * *
Despite having made my decision, I lingered, staring up at the house.
I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving him. Not even getting the opportunity to hold him was torture. It would be an easy thing to break in, seize Jacob, and whisk him off, go through the motions I’d been planning since I’d first stepped foot in London. Leaving him in the place where I’d found him had not even been an option. Marcus had planted doubt and I hated him for it.
Unaffected by the morning chill, though slightly distracted by a nagging hunger, it dawned on me that I didn’t want to expose Jacob to this life. True love, I realized, was about letting go, freeing those whom we cared most about.
Sunaria had left hours before, too upset to argue anymore, and Marcus had withdrawn soon after, giving me time to think.
Far off, a cockerel announced the morning. If I’d have had the time to find it, I’d have done so, and then rung the bird’s neck. I strolled away, along the winding street, glancing back several times before leaping up onto one of the rooftops. The night seemed blacker and the cold reached into my bones. London’s nightscape was a mass of grey buildings in disarray, the bleakest city. Longing for Spain, I reassured myself that soon I’d return with Jacob. Heavy-hearted, I made my way home.
The house was deserted, the servants having gone home hours earlier. I found Sunaria in the lower chambers. She wore a transparent gown, and a plumage of fine, black feathers at the neck and cuffs. Two coffins were pushed up into the corner.
“When did we acquire those?” My uneasiness persisted.
She’d placed candles around the den. Plush blue and gold colored pillows were scattered here and there.
My gaze hovered at eye level. “You’re not planning on sleeping down here, are you?”
“I feel safer down here.” She glanced at the coffin. “And in there.”
“Why?”
“I don’t trust him.”
“Marcus has our best interests at heart.”
Sunaria sat down on the coffin lid.
“What’s gotten into you?” I said.
“He hates you for turning him.”
I frowned. “He understands that I had no choice.”
“He hates me, too.”
“No, he doesn’t.”
“He won’t accept what he is.”
“As I recall, I needed time when you turned me.”
“That’s not the point.”
I struggled to suppress my frustration.
“You understood what it is to be a vampire.” Her tone was brusque.
“You left me buried for days,” I said. “That helped to persuade me.”
Sunaria rose and approached me. “You deserved that.”
I bit my lip and didn’t respond.
She stared off at nothing. “It was my right to do what I wanted to you, and when.”
“It’s 1500, time to realize that progress means change.”
“And what is that supposed to mean?”
“That your old ways . . . No, that your a
ncient ways are redundant.” I gestured my exasperation. “Your ridiculous obsession with myth, for example.”
“What myth?”
“Superstition.”
Sunaria wouldn’t look at me. “You’re angry because you know you should have brought your son home.”
I glanced at the coffin. “You’re not sleeping in there.”
Sunaria pouted.
“What is this really about?” I asked.
“It’s you who hinders us by exposing us to outsiders. You should never have allowed Marcus here.”
“Marcus risked his life for us.”
Her turquoise stare fixed on me. “Ever since you brought him into our home, I’ve been unable to sleep.”
“Be straight with me.”
“You left Jacob in that house.”
“He’s safer there.”
“You must get him tonight,” she demanded. “Start preparing him.”
“For what?”
“Don’t tell me you haven’t considered it?”
“I don’t believe we’re having this conversation.”
“We are superior beings.”
“Are you deliberately provoking me?”
“I’m not ashamed of what I am,” she screamed.
“Neither am I.” My voice was calm, concealing my alarm.
“Do you want me to transform him?”
I grabbed her wrist. “Stay away from my son.”
“Immortality is his birthright.” She dug her nails into me.
“Never speak of this again,” I warned her. “Do you understand?”
“You’re hurting me.”
I loosened my grip. “Sometimes, I don’t think I know you.”
“You’re too caught up in yourself to know anything about me.”
A feather from her cuff came loose and spiraled, and I watched it float to the floor. It appeared as though it had always belonged to the sleeve of that long, black chemise, and had never been ripped from the small body of a dead bird.
“Marcus and I, we’re not like that.” I tried to believe it myself.
“He’s in love with you and so is his sister.”
I wrapped my fingers firmly around her throat. “I love you.”
“He’s obsessed with you, but you don’t see it. Drink from him and you’ll know the truth.”
“I don’t need to.”
She broke away.
I grabbed her. “You and me, this is different.”
“How?” She leaned away.
I spun her around and grasped her arms. “You need me more than I need you.”
Her gown slipped off her left shoulder, exposing her breast.
“I’ll not tolerate this.” I shoved her against the wall. “If you think that burying me in the earth was a fair punishment, then you have no imagination. Your dark soul needs to be restrained.”
“Your soul is blacker.”
“I don’t doubt it, but that too, I’m able to control.”
“You have no power over me.”
I pulled away. “If you want to stay in this house, you’ll obey me.”
Sunaria softened, relenting. “Marcus is upstairs.”
* * * *
Rachel turned the corner and stopped, giving me a questioning look. I was, after all, lingering before her brother’s bedroom door. “What?” I snapped.
“Would you like to join me tonight?” she said softly.
“No.” My hand hesitated on the door handle.
“I’m going to the opera.”
“Why in God’s name would I want to go with you?”
Her face fell.
“Don’t you have something better to do?” I turned the handle and then paused, waiting for her to walk away.
“Are you visiting Marcus?”
I ignored her.
Marcus stirred when I entered. Red stubble was speckled over his jaw and his English complexion was pale. He’d obviously not fed. His appetite, like mine, had dulled with tonight’s events back on Petherton Road.
I ignored his questioning expression, as well as his resistance, and nuzzled into his neck. He tried to shove me away, but I restrained him, pinning his hands down on either side of his head, his strength no match for mine. Marcus jolted when I bit. There was no turning back.
His life flashed before me—Marcus as a simple farm boy, the death of his parents at age fourteen, his inability to maintain their farm, the property being taken away, the loss of his livelihood, Marcus and Rachel’s journey to London, them scouring for food, striving to survive. As though I were there with them, I followed Rachel, Marcus, Lilly, and Ted as they trespassed into Blackfriars.
Beneath me, Marcus relented, softening and letting me in, exposing it all, offering himself as an open book. I rocked against him, exchanging intimacy for knowledge. Swallowing, I continued on, wanting to know every part of him, memorizing his wants, his fears, and devouring his lifelong yearnings, his innermost secrets.
Another visage now of Blackfriars, Marcus’ hope when I’d turned up at their cell door. The rush he’d experienced but suppressed when I’d transformed him.
And I wanted to know more.
I tapped into Marcus’ streaming thoughts, and witnessed him scouring London’s streets, no matter the weather. His passion in looking for Jacob and exultation at finding him, and then taking special care to remember the doctor’s house. Marcus flying across London, wanting to share the news with me, and his troubled ruminations of how we’d keep Jacob safe, and how best to protect him. His fear of the others, as dark eyes stared back at him from the shadows outside Belshazzar’s, wayward vampires new to London. And, finally, his fear of disappointing me, his loyalty and an infatuation with me that verged on obsession.
His fingernails dug into my forearms, holding me against him.
Placing my fingers over the bite, I stemmed the trickle.
“Did you find what you were looking for?” he asked breathlessly.
I wiped my mouth.
“Stay with me tonight.” He clutched my sleeve.
I pulled away and sauntered out.
* * * *
The following night, I returned to Petherton Road.
I wanted my son.
Standing across the street from the doctor’s house, lingering in the alleyway, it felt good to be close to Jacob again. After an hour of just staring, waiting for the opportune moment, the door opened and Jacob appeared, dressed in a woolen coat. The doctor followed him out. Hand in hand, they headed down Petherton Road and took a sharp turn on Flower Avenue. I wanted to sweep Jacob up into my arms.
Savoring every second, I followed them across town, now and again pulling back so as not to arouse suspicion. Jacob’s English accent was flawless. There remained no evidence of his Spanish drawl. I wondered if he had any memory of me. Envious of the doctor, I wanted my son’s hand in mine instead of his.
His mentor showed kindness, slowing his pace so that Jacob could keep up with his master’s strides. After half an hour of walking, they reached a shack, and the doctor disappeared inside. Jacob paused for a moment, and then turned and stared in my direction. Although out of his line of sight, he did appear to detect me, peering in my direction before going inside.
Torn with what to do, I wavered. The sky opened and it poured. Perhaps I’d imagined it—my need for my son to know me so great that my mind believed that he’d sensed me. I turned on my heels and strolled in the opposite way, unable to go through with it. Strange that we can be right next to the ones we love, and yet they still seem like a million miles away.
I headed home.
Although long gone from my own life, I wanted normalcy for Jacob. Putting my own needs aside, I concentrated on his.
My arms ached for him.
Back in Belshazzar’s, standing in the lounge before a roaring fireplace, I lost myself in the orange glow. My clothes were soaked through and clung to my wet skin, making me feel even more miserable. I wasn’t sure how long Sunaria had been standing
behind me.
“I’m going to start a trust fund for him,” I said at last.
In silence, Sunaria undressed me, starting with my drenched shirt. A log slipped in the hearth and sparks sprayed around it.
Naked now, the warmth of the fire reached my bones. She guided me into the drawing room where a hot bath had been prepared and I climbed in.
The water rose high, trickling over the edges. With a glazed stare, I traced the marble mantelpiece. Upon it rested a maple clock, the tick tock of time so sure, so perfect, and so irrevocable.
The only noise in the room harassed me with its relentless progression.
Sunaria climbed in with me, lying between my legs, her fine, red negligee floating to the surface and billowing. I rested my head back onto the edge of the tub, staring up at the ceiling.
“You have nothing to forgive yourself for,” Sunaria whispered.
I burst into tears.
Chapter 48
SNOW FELL, BLANKETING the London skyline in a perfect powdery white.
It felt good to be indoors. The fireplace, pre-lit, warmed the study. An array of books lined the shelves and I stood back to admire them. I’d selected the finest publications, covering many diverse subjects. Such a collection would make any scholar ecstatic. I held on to the hope that Jacob would soon be whiling away the hours in here, and I’d have him all to myself. Thinking back to my own childhood, I remembered my father and the tales he’d tell.
When the right time came, I’d bring Jacob in here. With a deep sigh, I strolled into the adjacent study, this room above all, easily my favorite. I hoped it would become Jacob’s. I’d procured a large oak writing table for him and placed it in the center, taking great pleasure in organizing paper, ink, and a feathered fountain pen, essential items to make him feel at home. Finding one of my ornate letter openers, I placed it near the other items.
Long, sweeping black drapes hung from the tall window. Looking out past them, I viewed the muggy, grey nightscape of London’s skyline. Running my fingers over the mahogany mantelpiece and along the engraved design, I admired the ornate carving that was the room’s focal point, chiseled by one of the city’s finest carpenters.
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