No answer.
There was no mistake, this was the address Scorzo had provided. However, the house gave the impression of being deserted. Had he somehow fooled me? Was this nothing more than a treacherous pursuit of funds, a sham? If it was, I feared Scorzo would meet a very different deal at the end of the bargain. Considering my new social status, he must have assumed I would send his fee without paying a visit... Well, here I was.
“Damn you, Scorzo!” I said under my breath.
“Scorzo, signore?” A boy ran from the street to where I stood. “You're looking for the lawyer?”
I knelt before him without hesitation and held his arms. “I am. What can you tell me of him?”
With a blank stare, the boy's eyes landed on my own. He raised his shoulders and shaking his head he said, “He's not home.”
I pursed my lips and ran my hand over my mouth and chin, trying hard not to roar at the feeble boy.
“That wretched man is over there!” a woman said. She pulled the child's arm, moved him away from me, and pointed to a house down the street. “He's always there, with his mistress.”
“Thank you,” I said as I handed her a few gold coins.
I reached the street's end and stumbled upon the somber decadent building. With darkened stone walls drenched in mold and wooden beams that faced corruption, it would appear as desolate as the other. But it did not take me long to realize something strange brewed inside.
Screams led me to the upper floor of the wretched house. With no time to waste, I sank my claws on the wall and climbed my way to the first window in my reach.
“You will do as I say, you little whore!” He seized her shoulder and pinned her to the floor with reddened hands, knuckles whitened by his grip. “Or I will send you back to that dungeon, you filthy ingrate! Is that what you want?”
“I would rather rot in that dungeon, you hideous pig!” The woman got on her knees and spat at his breeches.
With a grin of fury, he grabbed her by the locks of tousled auburn hair and jerked the woman's head back revealing her face. And her spiteful hazel eyes landed on him, simmering in hatred.
“When he comes, I will tell him everything!” Tears rolled down her cheeks. “How you lured me to this hideous place and kidnapped me... You monster! You took me away from my dying mother! I was a child! You will pay for this, Scorzo!”
Her words aroused his putrid laughter.
Valentina... It was her!
“He'll never come... But if he does, you will do no such thing or I promise you those will be your last words!” he said tugging hard at Valentina's hair. “Besides, who's going to believe a wretched thief, a liar, and a whore?”
His laughter filled with scorn as he pulled her head close to his manhood.
I had seen enough. That devious fiend had to be stopped. Nothing would please me more than to hear him beg for mercy, but before I intervened, Valentina's mouth opened wide, and she sank her teeth on him so tight that Scorzo released her from his grip amidst loud groaning screams of pain.
“Maledetta puttana!”
Scorzo's stumbled towards her once more and his fist landed on her face, knocking her unconscious that very instant.
Amidst the sudden silence, I clapped my hands in a slow, paused beat.
The sound stopped him from tearing the rest of her tattered clothes off. With widened eyes, he turned.
“So this is your expensive work?” I mused, standing already inside, by the window. “I'm sorry to say, I'm not impressed.”
“Y—You... How did you—?” His quivering lips scarcely formulated words.
“I thought you were shrewd, but you have disappointed me Scorzo.” I paced around him, gazing at my prey in his last minutes of life.
With a gaping mouth, he followed my movements.
“But she’s—she's here, and alive!” he said. “I've cared for her all this time!”
I stopped before him.
“I know what you did,” I hissed, revealing my fangs for a second. “But what I cannot understand is this: you lured Marietta to that wretched island, and you left her there to die! Why did you do it?”
The thought leaped out of his feeble brain into my vampiric mind.
“Money.”
“Money?” I said and his eyes went blank with terror. “What money?”
“Rinaldo Bianchi was a prosperous man,” he mumbled, coerced by my vampiric persuasion. “This house was filled with riches!”
This was Bianchi's house? Whatever wealth it once held, Scorzo had already wasted.
“So that's why you left Venice in such a hurry,” I mused, thinking back on our last meeting.
Scorzo flaunted a nervous grin. “Here's the girl,” he said as his quivering hand waved above her. “Take her. The mother died soon after she reached Rome... Rinaldo's dead as well.”
“You wanted her orphaned...” I said. “Oh, and I know he's dead. His severed head rolled before my eyes.”
His heart pumped blood as fast as it could endure. Good. I wanted him to reach the heights of fear itself before the final moment came.
Kneeling before him, I narrowed my eyes and studied his panting breath.
“There is one thing you've failed to learn after such a long career in deceit, and it is this,” I whispered. “Never. Cheat. The Devil.”
In one quick move, I seized his neck and pulled him close. Scorzo swallowed his last scream and my sharp fangs were the last thing his filthy eyes ever saw.
The rhythmic waves crashing on the beach soothed my racing mind. The villa itself was filled with many comforts and luxuries, but the breathtaking view remained its highlight.
These rushing waters I remembered tinged with a rich shade of blue, but they were darkened by the evening. The soft chant of seagulls enveloped my senses as for once, I found true contentment in the fruit of my lethal vampiric instincts.
Scorzo's vicious nature could only compare to my own. However, part of me wanted to believe that my actions differed from his, in that I was compelled by my unnatural thirst to kill.
At least I hunted amongst those I considered at my level; a comforting thought, all in all, though it scarcely made any justice to my unaccountable evil.
Inside, Valentina lay on the bed, wrapped in a pleasant dream.
“Am I now the hero?” I mused. “Have I made amends... atoned for my sins?”
“It's you...” Her voice, delicate and sweet, spoke behind me.
I turned and gave her half a smile. “You remember me?”
Though twenty years had passed, my vampire eyes still cherished her as the young girl I had met at Tre Fontane, sitting by the central fountain, holding the tattered piece of brocade in which she sold her jewels. The same gleam of innocence shone in her eyes, no matter how crude the last years of her life might have been.
“I could never forget you,” she mused and her large dreamy eyes studied my face with fascination. “You look exactly the same as you did twenty years ago... How can that be?”
I shrugged and remained silent while I leaned against the balcony's balustrade.
“I knew you would come,” Valentina said, failing to repress a smile as gusts of cool wind played with her hair.
“And what gave you such certainty?” I wanted to know.
“You promised,” she said with genuine belief. “You vowed you would see me happy.”
Her last words melted my dark heart. I opened my arms and welcomed her in a warming hold. And true tears of happiness loomed in my eyes as for once, I triumphed over my wretched nature.
“I will never fail you again,” I whispered as her face sank in my chest, both of us weeping at the loss of our own, forever joined by our sorrow.
“I will always care for you, Valentina... I promise.”
23
My Most Beloved View
The journey back home was an endless ordeal. Winter struck in heavy blows and delayed my travels even more. But not so much that I would not pursue them by paying off the
right people and securing transport no matter how frightful the weather conditions.
My heart was at peace. The villa, a few miles outside of Rome, I left in the hands of Valentina, as well as enough money to provide her a leisurely lifestyle. After years of suffering that damned man's abuse, I only hoped it would lighten the burden of the wretched memories that might haunt her forever.
With every intent on fulfilling my vow to procure Valentina's well-being, I gave her an address, should she need to find me. And thus, my part was played. I became that hero I had yearned to incarnate for such a long time... Arlecchino's schemes for once did not end up in trouble.
Through misty gray waters, the vessel reached my most beloved view. The palazzo's water gates were open—perhaps I was expected?
My hurried steps echoed in the courtyard. Such bliss filled my spirit that I could wait no longer before it burst out of my chest. I wanted to share the good news with both of them; but mostly with her, because she knew how much I had struggled to attain deliverance from the endless tragedies that crowded my mortal life.
I glided my hand over the marble rail on my way up to the piano nobile floor, where I was certain to find them. And though my journey's many hindrances had caused me great exhaustion, I set it all aside. My heart was racing with excitement, anticipating their precious company.
As I arrived at the top of the stairway, however, I came to an abrupt stop.
Something was brewing inside me as I had scarcely experienced before. I could not pinpoint it, but whatever it was, it sharpened my vampiric senses.
With narrowed eyes, I studied my surroundings, not knowing what caused such a state of alertness in my being. And then, I knew... What seemed strange to me was the absolute stillness in the rooms. I did not pick up any presence in them either.
My fingers reached for the parlor's doors. The old hinges creaked as I slowly pushed them open.
The minute I stepped inside the room, my mouth went dry and a piercing blow of pain stabbed my stomach. It was the fragrance suspended in the air what caused me such affliction; the faint scent of roses and bergamot entwined with the penetrating aroma of blood.
A thousand racing thoughts crossed my preternatural mind as I took yet another step in the harrowing room.
Before me, the quadrifora's light drapes waved an ethereal dance with the nautical air filtering through the broken window panes. Shattered pieces of glass laid scattered on the carpeted floor. A trail of larger shreds lured my path behind the hearth's armchair; but these, unlike the others, were tinged in crimson red.
The scent of blood grew deeper and more penetrating as I moved closer… its unstoppable spell overwhelmed my senses.
I steadied myself gripping the back of the chair, and closing my eyes, I covered my mouth with my hand—not appalled, but compelled by the room's luscious fragrance. This sacred perfume bemused me beyond control.
One deep breath and I pulled the reins on the whims of my bloodlust. At this stage of my vampiric existence, the hunger was easy enough to restrain, but it was not so with what my eyes now beheld.
Struck by the appalling vision laid before me, my heart froze.
“No,” I mused. “Oh no, no...” My knees failed me and slammed on the floor. With quivering hands, I stopped myself from completely falling. For a moment, I stopped breathing.
Unwilling to believe it, my hand went to his face—cold and stiff—as with horror I gazed at the wide slash on his neck, from one side to another, drawing the eeriest smile through which the blood had poured and now only left stains as a reminder of its lethal path.
“Dristan?” I mumbled with a broken voice and eyes full of tears.
His eyes, wide open, were already vacant, with enlarged dark pupils that left little room for his irises... their hazel shade, washed away forever.
All shred of color had vanished from his skin, leaving the shell of what had once been a man, white and hardened as marble; his every blood vessel deprived of its prodigious blood. However, there was none spilled around him, but that which stained his clothes and the shattered glass, and that seemed strange. But my grieving mind could not fathom this tragic scene in its entirety, and wanting to deny the undeniable, I reached for his hand.
“Can this be true?” I whispered, frightened to hear my own words.
My hand pressed his, then it struck me. There was something inside his fist, buried beneath such a powerful hold as if unwilling to let go. And though drenched in curdling blood, I knew what it was, although I refused to admit it. But as I opened his hand and extracted its contents, no longer could it be ignored.
A string of red-tinged pearls. The sapphire's dimmed glow, enveloped in blood.
Her necklace.
“Alisa?” Drunk in delirious heartache, I called out her name. But I knew well she was long gone.
24
La Serenissima
As I sat on the green velvet-lined chair, the hearth's dying flames blurred.
The question banged against my skull with painful blows that reached no end. And tears loomed in my eyes as with much horror my mind glared at the answer.
A drop of blood tinged one of the necklace's pearls as I held it, and I smudged it under my finger with care.
This necklace had witnessed every precious moment of my lifetime with Alisa. It had marked our first night together, in Paris, when our true journey had begun; it had stayed behind when she had left Venice after my descent into Darkness; it had been there when our paths had entwined once more as I had followed her home, and it was here tonight to see my heart's undoing.
Without saying a word or giving a hint of her choice, she had left me to wander alone the planes of eternity with no hopes of ever laying eyes on her again.
Master Bianchi's words whispered in the darkness.
“Take care of your heart, little one. It is much too pure, and tainted hearts will always claim the advantage over yours.”
The painful reality struck me without mercy. Dristan was dead, and she was gone.
Did she plan this from the very beginning?
Had she fooled me into believing that she truly loved me? Was it all an act, a devious plan concocted in all coldness to gain the freedom she so badly wanted from her restrictive life?
Whatever the reasons, she had what she wanted now. She had taken every last drop of my maker's prodigious blood. And now, free as the wind, Alisa could disappear and build a life of her own wherever she pleased, miles away from my reach.
I could not stand the pain. The mere thought of her using me in such a cruel manner caused me grief beyond repair. But against every hurting heartbeat, I moved out of the seat.
Dristan's blank stare fixed at the stuccoed ceiling; it glared amidst the evening's darkness scattered in the room.
I knew what I had to do.
Guided by the pale luminescence of moonlight, I sailed across the Venetian sea. How my grieving heart managed such a painful crossing, I will never know. His body, wrapped in a shroud, traveled with me across the winter waters. And however grim, his vacant company conveyed me a strange sense of relief as I did not embark alone on this, our last journey.
As soon as we docked, I silenced the ghoulish voices that stirred in my presence. I carried my maker's corpse across the central square until we reached the gravesite.
With tormenting pain, I dug his grave away from all others.
“The void your absence leaves in my life is greater than I could ever fathom...” I mused, not knowing whose loss had hurt me more: my maker’s, whom I had learned to love as a Father, or Alisa’s.
I laid his body on the ground and covered it with dirt. And once the deed was done, I swallowed my misery and returned home.
For days, I confined myself within these walls—my vampiric father's walls—only to wander outside for a drink or two, hoping the evening would come when I would arrive home and discover her skulking in my bedroom, hiding behind the kitchen's doors ready to surprise me, or wandering in the Solarium as
she sang her favorite song, Dido's Lament.
But that day never came, and I knew full well it would not come anytime soon.
I moved away from the chair and its dead hearth. The upcoming dawn announced its nearness with a thin veil of luminosity creeping inside through the windowpanes, as poisonous gas.
I stood before the window and allowed my unnatural eyes one last look at the Grand Canal and its few passing vessels carrying fruits and vegetables as they headed to the market.
La Serenissima would soon open her eyes to a new day, and life would go on as normal.
The glorious morning after the carnival's ball leaped into my mind. Twenty-nine years had passed since, but the softness of her unspoiled skin and its ethereal glow under dawn's first rays of light, I carried with me with immense vividness. And no matter how fondly I held onto this memory, I realized how important it was to discard it from my brain and replace it with the cruelty of her deception.
“I must never forget,” I whispered.
I had learned my lesson. But the heart is a treacherous thing and must never be trusted.
The bitter end of our days together would follow me always wherever I went. It is written in my accursed vampiric soul. And with such ink that it remains impossible to fade over centuries to come.
It is written in blood.
One More Thing
Years passed until I finally decided it was time to leave Venice, and return to the place where I was certain to find comforting arms waiting for me.
My steps led me through cobblestone streets until I found my way to the Luxembourg Garden’s tree-lined promenade. Paris, yes. I needed it more than ever. It was the one remedy to my grieving heart.
By this time, all hopes of coming across Alisa had abandoned me and my sights were set on the healing of my heart’s old wounds.
It was a different age now. The beginning of the eighteenth century carried a wave of change in the air. Words like equality and freedom were tossed around as swiftly as if they were falling feathers. And as I paced enchanted by the cloudy day, enjoying the breeze and mysterious delight of this delicious twilight, someone caught my interest.
Written in Blood: A New Adult Vampire Romance Novella, Part Two. (The Unnatural Brethren Book 1) Page 15
