by S. K. Ryder
Dominic doubled over, clutching his head. “Make it stop,” he hissed. “Make it stop.”
“You can make it stop,” Kambyses murmured. “You know how. Look.”
Dominic did. On the other side of Rue de la Paix, along the outskirts of Gustavia, Silence embraced a young woman about her own size, a tourist out and about on this balmy night. Slack-jawed, the woman stared with unfocused eyes as a blood-drinking fiend burrowed into her neck. No one else paid them any attention.
“She feeds on the life,” Kambyses explained, “As long as you do it often enough, it does not take much for us to survive and maintain control.”
“They live?” Dominic croaked. God help him, in his imagination, he could feel the blood sliding down his gullet already.
“Eventually.” Kambyses’s gaze was locked to Silence and her…prey. She was shaking when she withdrew, the first loss of stoic control Dominic had seen in her. It was obvious the blood affected her as much as it did Dominic, though the aroma of it now riding the velvet night air didn’t seem to faze Kambyses. Silence must be young then, like himself. Only a little stronger. Only a little more in control of her dark impulses.
“Why?” Dominic asked again, his belly churning with hunger. “Why have you done this to me?”
Kambyses lifted one corner of his mouth and gave Silence a small, approving nod.
She acknowledged the gesture by licking the wound clean before pushing the woman into the pedestrian stream. She stumbled away, following her friends with a shout to wait up.
Mesmerized, Dominic stared after her. “She won’t remember?”
“No.”
“And the others here? They must see us.”
“No,” Kambyses said again. “But that is a different matter and of no concern to you. What you tell them with conviction becomes their reality.” With that, he turned to one side and addressed the first person who glanced in their direction, a man who had just closed up a small boutique. “Come here.”
Power hummed in those quiet words. The man, a manager or owner judging by his fine suit, frowned, but did as told and inquired how he could be of aid.
“Relax,” Kambyses said. “Stand a while and enjoy the evening. Everything is ordinary.”
The man nodded and smiled. Put his hands in his pockets and gazed toward the sky. He barely even gasped when Dominic fell onto his throat, those wicked teeth at the ready, and…Dieu, the blood! An elixir finer than any to ever pass his lips. It flowed through his mouth in a warm gush, soaking directly into his heart and soul.
Strange emotions and images flickered at the edges of his awareness. Thoughts that didn’t feel like his. Memories not quite in focus. Sensations in a body that didn’t fit. Not his, he realized, and sank deeper.
The prey’s mind. His for the taking along with the blood.
Dominic went faint with delirium. The next clear thought he had was that the blood had stopped and the thing slithering in his chest—this beast—was outraged. He growled like a wild animal.
Kambyses held him hard by the back of the neck. “Shh,” he whispered in Dominic’s ear, and the horror surfaced again. What had he done?
Not murder, as it turned out. Kambyses had dragged him off the prey in plenty of time. Dominic even cleaned and healed the wound. A smear of blood remained on Monsieur Bélanger’s shirt collar and would no doubt present a mystery to his sister Celeste, with whom he lived temporarily now that his divorce was underway.
Dominic blinked after Monsieur Bélanger as he walked away with a bounce in his step. He had made his daily sales goal with room to spare, and his sister had invited Patrice, her lovely friend, for dinner tonight. Life was good.
How do I know all that? Dominic wondered.
“The blood is only one part of what sustains us, Nico,” Kambyses said, studying Dominic’s befuddled expression. “The mind is the other. Which is why no creature will ever sustain you like a man.”
Or a woman? Dominic wondered, reluctantly fascinated by the idea.
They strolled Gustavia and its environs as Kambyses allowed him to feed from half a dozen more men, but no women. While Dominic still couldn’t stop on his own—and would not be able to for some time yet, according to Kambyses—his reluctance to feed on blood was soon all but gone. Feeding like this truly did soothe the beast. It calmed Dominic to a point where he could think more clearly.
“What about my mother and sisters?” he asked in the early morning hours as St. Barth’s limited nightlife petered into complete tropical silence. “Did I—?”
“They know nothing of your destiny and never will,” Kambyses assured him. For once, Kambyses didn’t sound like he was distracted by things only he could hear and see.
“But my father? What do they think happened?” Anguish again. Flashes of blood-soaked memories. Dominic couldn’t even comprehend the state his mother must be in. He almost demanded to see her, but those same memories stopped him. How could he face her after what he had done?
Kambyses searched his face. Reached to cup his cheek in one hand. “They are not your concern anymore, Nico. I am your family now. Let them go.”
This time, Dominic growled on purpose. “Impossible.”
With a careless shrug, Kambyses released him, reclaimed by his own reality, tuning out all further questions and demands for explanations.
Silence said even less. Dominic had yet to hear her voice. Disdainful looks were the limit of conversation he received from her. Even her sorrow had ebbed.
“You forced your vile blood on me. Tell me why,” he demanded.
She turned away.
He tried to spin her around to face him. In response, she executed a maneuver that would have laid him out flat in the street if he didn’t have years of training with which to counter it. He slipped away with a speed and ease that startled him right along with her. For a few seconds, their eyes locked, assessing. Then, her jaw hardened. This time when she strode away, he didn’t stop her.
“Why won’t she speak to me?” he wondered, and was surprised when Kambyses actually answered.
“She has her reasons. Perhaps you will understand them one night.”
But not this night, for that was the last anyone said to Dominic before sunrise.
On Apokryphos, he retreated to the darkened cabin long before he heard the sun’s roar. His mind spun more slowly now, but still roiled with all he had learned. He grew desperate to find a way out. To wake up.
A solution didn’t occur to him until several nights later when he realized this would be the first night Jeovana Sebastini was on the island. He had to see her—this glimmer of joy from his true life. Had to. With her help, he had no doubt he would find his way to who he used to be. Not saying a word to his captors, he let them take him to shore again, where he became the model student, following every instruction and doing all he could to keep control of his gruesome appetites.
His opportunity came only three hours later, when Silence was immersed in a feeding and Kambyses found the temptation of a lone cyclist great enough to set aside his constant vigilance of Dominic.
The moment Kambyses gave himself to the blood with a soft sigh, Dominic used every ounce of his supernatural strength to speed away. He blurred down wide roads and narrow alleys, through shrubbery, across hills, past homes, and along beaches. Every kilometer or so, he froze in place to scan the night for sounds and movements. Only when he was certain he wasn’t being followed did he make his way to the resort Jeovana favored.
He was well acquainted with the villa she always reserved. There would be no special security consideration here as there would have been in other parts of the world. Not on this island. Here, the world’s glitterati came to play in relative anonymity. Dominic hopped over a low white-picket fence with ease, then made his way along the winding jungle footpaths crisscrossing the property.
The desperate and mournful strains of the Violetta Aria floated through the quiet night, and his heart quickened as the music pulled him forward.
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She was here.
Jeovana Sebastini’s public persona was the ultra-modern celebrity jet-setter. Privately, she adored nothing more than relaxing with a glass of wine and the music of La Traviata. It was a side of her few ever saw.
He slowed as he approached the wide-open back doors. The living room inside with its clean, Caribbean-chic decor vanished in the presence of its sole occupant. Jeovana reclined against the thick pillows of the sofa like a beautiful jewel in a bed of white velvet.
Dieu, she was even more beautiful than he remembered. Her flawless face with those bold lines that still managed to be feminine. The rich mass of her hair, flowing over her shoulder like fire-touched chocolate. The beguiling floral sweetness of her scent. And the enormous Mediterranean-black eyes that widened with surprise when she raised her head to see him standing before her.
“Innamorato,” she whispered.
Magic, the sound of her voice, straight out of the happiest days of his life. Reality. His reality. His soul filled with relief. “Chérie.”
Putting her book aside, she sat up and reached for his hand, her touch soft against his fingers. He let her pull him onto the sofa beside her, right into the sphere of heat radiating off her petite, perfectly sculpted body. She was speaking, but it took an effort to make out her words through the mad pounding of his heart.
Or was that her heart?
Shocked, he shoved the thought out of his mind and wiped at the moisture in his eyes.
“Oh, forgive me, cuore mio. I not give you chance to tell me. But I have been so worried for you,” she said in heavily accented English, pressing a bejeweled and manicured hand to her bosom. An ample, surgically perfected bosom, Dominic recalled, his gaze now riveted there. Still, she spoke, her famously husky voice flowing over him like warm honey, but he no longer heard her words. Ribbons of light pulsed across her chest, and a ruby-red shimmer enveloped her.
“Mon Dieu, non.” He tried to get up, but Jeovana smoothed her hot hand against his face before his rubbery legs could cooperate. When he met her eyes, her plump, glowing lips parted in a small gasp.
“Oh, Dominic, my poor bambino. What happen to you?”
“Nightmares,” he whispered hoarsely. “I am trapped in nightmares.”
“I know. So terrible what happen to your father.”
He shook his head. “Non. It is not real. It cannot be real.”
Jeovana pulled him into her arms. “Shh,” she cooed, rocking him gently. “Shh. Let Jeovana make it go away for a little while.”
With a deep sigh, he relaxed against her and closed his eyes. But there was no drowning out the sloshing thump of her heart or the burning heat of her body. The movements intended to comfort instead sparked a state of undeniable arousal. Finally. A reaction that was familiar and normal. A reaction that was human.
Keeping his eyes closed so he wouldn’t have to see her glowing veins again, Dominic lifted his face to hers. “Make me forget. Oh, please, I beg you, make me forget.”
Her answering kiss seared through him like a living tongue of flame.
The lovemaking that followed had a desperate quality such as he had never known. Every sensation was amplified a hundred-fold, every sound and touch and taste laden with almost incomprehensible nuances. He wallowed in the wonder of it as she moaned in his arms, and he drowned completely when he joined his body to hers.
Climax obliterated what was left of him.
For many minutes afterward, he floated outside himself in a strange complexity of thoughts, memories of things he had never done and places he had never been—dreams and fantasies, some of which even included him. He saw himself smiling and laughing, sun-bronzed and full of seductive mischief. From somewhere deep in his soul, a cry rose to the surface of his awareness.
Know me!
When Dominic opened his eyes, the aria had concluded and only the rustle of the trade winds reached his ears. Never had he felt so satisfied, so whole. So at peace.
Relief burst out of him in a sob. He was free.
“You did it, chérie. You did it. The nightmare is over.”
Jeovana said nothing.
Dominic stirred. Her arm slid from his shoulder to dangle over the edge of the sofa on which he had so inelegantly claimed her. “Jeovana?”
Still nothing.
Sinister dread stole over him, but he moved no more. Not for a long time. If only to put off seeing the irrefutable proof of what he already knew about why he no longer heard her heart—or why blood coated his mouth.
His nightmare had only just begun.
5
The Scent of Fear
He couldn’t move. Cold dark held him captive. Grit scratched his eyes when he opened them. Filled his mouth when he tried to scream.
A grave.
He was buried alive.
In a blind panic, Dominic fought against the packed sand until it loosened and gave way, allowing him to claw toward the surface. There, he hunched and pawed at his face until he could see again, draw breath again. Breath he didn’t need…
The memories rushed in with brutal force. Jeovana. Strong, beautiful Jeovana. A waxen-pale husk with a garish red tear in her neck, sightless eyes still glazed with passion. Snuffed out of existence. Because of him.
Because of what he had become.
Dominic had trembled and wailed over her. But even through the anguish, the beast whispered to him—she was not Jeovana anymore. She was evidence of his crime, his very existence, and therefore could not be.
He’d carried her to the beach, using his hyper senses to avoid detection. From there, he walked into the sea and sat beneath a reef outcropping, holding her close, imagining her still alive as the warm currents animated her limbs against him. His silent tears flowed, his grief—for her and for himself—becoming one with all the world’s oceans.
The sun’s roar had gained an almost physical weight before he left Jeovana in her watery grave and went to meet the only fate he craved. But while his mind was more than willing to sit on the beach and watch the sun rise behind a gathering storm front, his body soon tingled with fear. “This is where you stay,” Dominic told himself through gnashing teeth. “This is what you deserve!”
This was also the last thing he remembered before waking up deep in the sand at the far eastern end of St. Jean Beach. The beast had taken him over yet again, deciding he should survive the same way it had decided he should kill. Dominic plowed his fist into the ground with such fury that sand sprayed in every direction.
“You cannot die by your own hand,” said a sickeningly familiar voice. “Your instincts will not allow it.”
Dominic bolted to his feet. Kambyses coalesced from the shadows, the picture of a serene mystic with his loosely gathered hair, swathed in a cloak and the smoky miasma of incense. As Dominic watched him draw near, he realized for the first time what it was about this vampire that set his teeth on edge. Even Silence was not this quiet. Even she had a heart beating in her chest.
Kambyses did not.
“Instincts?” he snarled, stifling a shiver. “What is this horror you’ve infected me with?”
“My poor young one.” Kambyses reached out to touch his face, but at a low warning growl from Dominic stayed his hand. The flicker of compassion in the mystic’s deep-set eyes drained away. “You must learn in the way children learn best, Nico. Through experience.”
“I am not a child,” he howled. “I am a demon who has murdered the woman I love!” Like a school of skittish fish, his mind shied away from the other murder he had committed.
Voices reached his ears—low conversation, laughter. His nostrils flared to catch the warm scent of humanity in the breeze. A couple strolled along the water’s edge, hand in hand. The urge to race at them—to tap into their blood—was overwhelming. Instead, he screamed, “Run! Run!”
They didn’t even glance in his direction. They didn’t hear him. Nor did they see him. And it wasn’t because he was in a dream.
Dominic rounded on
Kambyses, who watched the humans with the cold and casual interest of a leopard considering a meal. It was his will that kept the prey oblivious to the vampires. Just how powerful was this monster without a heart? What else was he capable of?
“You knew exactly where I went last night and why. Didn’t you?”
The leopard shifted his attention to him, but said nothing, which was all the confirmation Dominic needed. He channeled every ounce of rage exploding through him into a strike meant to kill.
He hit nothing but air.
Kambyses didn’t seem to have moved. Yet, he was a meter farther away now, just out of reach, and then again when Dominic came after him with a furious shout. “You could have stopped me! You could have stopped me, and you didn’t! You let me kill the woman I—”
And just like that, Dominic was wrapped from behind in impossibly powerful arms and lifted just enough so his feet could find no traction on the ground. With a soul-shattering gasp, he fell silent, his whole body shaking.
“You are much too young to know what love is,” Kambyses said against his ear. “Love is not the fleeting moments of passion you so cherish. Love is eternal. And nothing is more eternal than we are.”
“You could have stopped me,” Dominic said again, wheezing now.
“Yes. But you would not have learned what you needed to learn. No mortal lover will ever survive you again.”
“You never told me.”
“It would have made no difference. You refuse to believe anything on my word alone.”
But these words finally penetrated. These words were true.
As Dominic’s anger ebbed into despair, Kambyses loosened his hold. “You are willful like few others, Nico. You trust nothing you can’t see and feel and hear. So this is how it must be.” Kambyses moved around him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “But you are learning very quickly. This pleases me.”
“The cost is too high.”
“Insignificant,” the immortal countered as though discussing the price of turnips instead of lives. “You will understand. Soon.”
“Why?” Dominic tried again. “Why me?”
