DEZI

"What are you going to do?" the boy asked, looking at them from behind his glasses with wide and curious eyes. There were no traces of fear or even amazement that they might wish to bring him here into the darkness where there were no witnesses--there was only a kind of serene acceptance that what was meant to be would be. It was a kind of "come what may" attitude that, oddly enough, grated on her nerves like fingernails over a chalkboard. What the hell kind of mental problems did this boy have? It was very disconcerting to be looked at like that.

"What do you want us to do?" Chris asked, there was only mild-curiosity in his voice. It seemed that he had regained his usual equilibrium and spirit and had perhaps borrowed just a touch from Lianndra. She thought she recognized some of the mannerisms and a definite accent on the words.

There is nothing wrong with accepting strength from another, stronger person. If that other person is willing to give it, there is nothing wrong with receiving strength, as long as it was not used for wrong, or to blacken ones own soul.

She had long since accepted that the things that they did were wrong, but were not evil. It was the same as hunters killing animals for food, only in this case it was blood that was taken and the animal in question was human.

They needed the blood to survive and there were plenty of times that she had left her victims alive, and the ones that she had killed were mostly evil men and women that were blights upon the face of the earth anyway. She had once thought of herself as God’s cleansing tool, wiping the earth clean of those that had no place on it.

So when Sebastian spoke, he said things that she had not expected. "I know what you are and why you are here, and that’s all right. It is my time, and I accept that," he said simply. "You are creatures that obey your inner natures, and that is good. Please, take me and be welcome."

Chris was surprised. "What do you mean?"

The other boy smiled a wide and happy smile, as if he had suddenly understood something that had puzzled him before. "Please, take me and be welcome, it is my time, I understand. I don’t want to hurt anyone anymore, I realize that it is wrong and I shouldn’t do it. You are the only ones that can stop me, and I want you too. Please."

Never one to reject an offer that was made freely, Dezi tightened her grip on Sebastian’s arm and pulled him closer to her. She felt her fangs tighten in the strange way that meant she was about to take blood, and the Hunger vibrated along her nerves in sudden awareness.

She lifted his arm and slid back his shirtsleeve, revealing a clear expanse of skin. With precise movements she latched onto the vein in his wrist, her fangs piercing the flesh easily. She listened to his sighs and moans of pleasure with half an ear. Some people liked to watch TV while they ate, she liked to listen to the sounds her victims made. She listened, could hear the pounding that was his heart, the way his heart speeded up to compensate for the loss of blood, Feeding her faster.

This was all that she had ever wanted in the world: a willing victim and a lover by her side. She could feel Chris Feeding on the other side of Sebastian, could hear the half-formed thoughts that flowed through his mind faster than she could Read them. Mostly she could feel the happiness in him that Feeding brought, but still she could Feel the uneasiness he felt at the way Sebastian had given himself to them so freely. How had the boy known what they were?

At any other moment she might have worried herself about such a thing, but for right this moment she was happy to let things stand as they were. This was what life was all about: finding the vein on her first attempt, the feel of her fangs in another’s flesh and the taste of blood as it rushed its way inside of her.

She was thankful for this blessing; she had been feeling a little parched with Hunger. She was also thankful for the fact that she drank blood up and through her fangs instead of simply swallowing it like a drowning man does water. The whole thing would have been so much messier if she had had to suck the blood with her mouth, she would probably get blood all over the place, not to mention the worry that the holes in his vein would seal themselves up. They were only tiny little pinpricks after all, barely large enough to be called mosquito bites that had been picked at.

She sighed in contentment and tried to wipe away all memories of the Hunger that had torn through her. All she wanted to feel was this, this warmth and life that filled her until she felt as if she could do anything, even brave the blazing inferno that was called the sun without any harm. This was what life was all about.

CHRISTINE

She could barely make out their forms, but what she saw was terrible. They were drinking his blood, she could tell by the way his aura lay like a dying thing, thin streamlets of it being sucked off into their auras. They were draining him of life.

Their gleaming, bright auras shimmered with bits of his, then sucked those pieces up so that they disappeared without a trace. It made her think of a drop of blue being introduced into a pool of red, being absorbed into the whole, disappearing without a trace, never to be seen again.

Even as she watched, his aura flickered like a TV set about to breakdown. She had to do something before it was too late. But what could she do?

Quickly, before she could change her mind, she started muttering a quick spell; the more she said, the louder the words reverberated in her mind. Even though she never spoke above a whisper, it seemed as though those words carried all of the weight of the world upon them.

The air rippled outward from where she stood toward them. The force that she had conjured hit them with a terrible strength that she hadn’t really counted on.

She watched as the three of them froze in the blast of what was almost a light. It flared around them, raw power sent straight at them in one giant wave that had gathered both speed and force as it traveled the intervening distance.

She saw the girl and the boy first, their faces frozen in shock, their eyes wide and bright, as if someone had lit a flashlight behind their eyeballs. Their mouths were locked onto Sebastian’s wrists; their faces around them suddenly ethereally pale in that light.

She felt like a voyeur for a moment, as if she had been caught watching a couple in a moment of extreme passion. Only instead of simply watching, she had interrupted. And they weren’t having sex with him--they had literally been eating him alive.

Their hair seemed suddenly to be two colors. There were the natural colors, brown and gold, then there were the other colors, pale white-blond, like moonbeams around their heads. Or perhaps it was the other way around. Perhaps she was only now seeing the true color? Well, whatever it was, she was shocked when Sebastian’s face was revealed. The awkward planes of his face were wrought with ecstasy, as if he had finally found what he had always been searching for. Then, under the light of her magic, that look of pleasure-fulfilled was replaced with a dark and terrible black rage… directed toward her.

She suddenly felt that perhaps she had made a slight error and had butted in where she did not belong. But, as her grandmother always said, "Once you enter a room, you can’t just back out again after you’ve been seen. You just have to rough it."

So there was only one thing she could do. She had to rough it.

"What the hell?" the incredibly handsome boy exclaimed suddenly, releasing Sebastian’s arm as if it had burned him.

Christine bit her lip hard to keep herself from bursting into hysterical laughter. There was something about the whole situation that she found terribly amusing. It was either that or run screaming from all the monsters she suddenly found around herself.

"Who the hell are you and what did you do to us?" the boy asked, turning dark eyes on her. They were like smoky-brown reflections of a tarnished soul, the tattered and torn remnants of a kind of inborn respectability still clinging to it.

The double-imposed image had disappeared and the girl and the boy were back to their more earthly forms, for which she was glad. When they had been all white and wraith-like, she had had the thought that perhaps they were angels fallen from heaven to earth. Now they were just two incredibly beautiful teenagers, which was almost as disconcerting an image.

Sometimes she cursed the gifts that God had granted her--Second Sight was not all it was cracked up to be. She really didn’t like being able to See the bad things that rested in peoples’ souls, she wished that she could be like mundanes and see only the things that she wanted to see.

The price of magic was being able to See more than you wanted to and at the worst times. She couldn’t start a relationship with a boy, or just a friend, without having to worry about what she might See at the worst possible moment. Like with her last boyfriend.

She had Seen the fact that he would cheat on her with Marian Palmer, the most skanky-assed, slutty bitch in the entire school. It had been enough to make her sick, especially since she knew that Marian had a hidden case of herpes that she wouldn’t know about for at least two weeks and that they were in an incredibly virulent form. It made her glad she was a maiden and hadn’t intended to lose her virginity to Sean Denton. It also made her curse her gift, a gift that had ruined her chances for happiness with him or with anyone else.

There was something about being a witch that was a little offsetting when one was trying to form a relationship. It was like seeing clearly through murky water when no one else you knew could. Being different was no fun, but she had finally found a couple of people that were even stranger than she was.

She moved in closer, watching the way their eyes moved to follow her with a kind of predatory hunger, as if they would eat her if they ever had the chance.

She sniffed, catching some elusive odor on the breeze that hadn’t been there before. She knew automatically that it wasn’t a physical odor, but a mental "scent." It made her think of the woods in spring, wild and full of life and promise, yet at the same time full of danger. It made her feel as though some great beast were hanging over her head ready to pounce and she hadn’t quite pinpointed its location with her eyes.

"More to the point, who and what are you?" she asked, a tiny quiver she hoped they didn’t notice moving through her voice like wind through the trees.

The girl looked at her for one long moment, her perfect left eyebrow raised in question, then she suddenly began to laugh. "A witch! We come out to get a snack and we get picked up by a witch! There was about as much chance of this happening as of us getting abducted by a flying saucer."

Christine shivered deep in her bones, suddenly feeling as if her magic were as thick and strong as cobwebs; this girl could tear through them as if they were nothing. The only thing that was keeping her caught was the fact that she wanted to be… for now.

CHRIS

He felt as though someone had wrapped bits of string tight around him, holding him in place. He stretched slightly, feeling the way the bindings flexed and followed the movements he made. He knew that if he really wanted he could tear his way free at any time. He also knew that if he had been entirely human, the bindings would have held him tight in place, as they were doing to Sebastian, who looked as if he could barely even breathe.

It was pretty amazing--a real, live witch.

"Do you ride a broom and everything?" he couldn’t help asking, a little embarrassed when he heard himself sounding so much like a little kid. Still, the curiosity was eating him alive. He just had to know everything there was to know. How often was he going to have a real, live witch right in front of him?

In the back of his mind there was also the dark curiosity that wondered if her blood would taste differently from a normal human’s. He had a feeling that her blood would be sweet. He wanted to try it.

The girl looked at him as if he were nuts. "Huh? Ride a broom? Why would I want to do that? It seems like it would be really uncomfortable," there was a distant note to her voice as she stared at him intently, as if he were all of her worst nightmares come to life.

Trying one of the tricks Dezi had taught him, he squinted his eyes slightly and focused. Suddenly the girl stood out with incredible clarity, as though he had stuck a magnifying glass up in front of her.

He could count the pores in her face, the freckles on her nose. He could see each individual strand of hair. There was a glowing blue light that surrounded her, pulsing. He listened closely to a sound beyond mortal ears and knew that the light was pulsing along with her heartbeat. Thu-thump, thu-thumpity thump thump, thump thump thump t-t-t-t-t-thump.

He blinked his eyes and tore his attention away. Without even knowing he had been doing it, he had been speeding up her heartbeat. If he had kept at it he might have caused her to have a heart attack. It was pretty amazing and weird, something that might come in handy in the future, but that he didn’t want to have happen to her before he got some answers to his questions.

That was another thing that had started to dawn on him: as a vampire, time seemed more filled than when he was mortal. A minute was more like an hour, as though his suddenly lengthened life also meant that he would be able to fill every minute to the fullest. If he wanted, he thought that he could make a second last an eternity. It was weird, about as strange as witches and vampires, which he hadn’t believed in just this time last year.

He sighed and looked at Dezi, his mentor and lover, the answer to all the questions he might ever have. She stood there, straight and beautiful, a serene queen of the night, looking as though she owned the whole world. Her eyes reflected the night back at him, like some wild thing. She was beautiful and untamed, like an animal or something, graceful in both movement and form.

She caught him looking at her, probably with some dumb cow-eyed look on his face, and smiled that smile he loved. Everything in the world disappeared. There was only her.

She was gloriously beautiful, an otherworldly creature sent to earth to tempt him into doing things that he shouldn’t and would never have dreamed of doing before. His mind filled with tinkling bells and the sound of poetry he had heard in an English class, poetry that he hadn’t even known he had heard, much less remembered.

of cloudless climes and starry skies;

and all that’s best of dark and bright

meet in her aspect and her eyes:

Thus mellow’d to that tender light

which heaven to gaudy day denies.

"One shade the more, one ray the less,

had half impair’d the nameless grace

which waves in every raven tress,

or softly lightens o’er her face;

where thoughts serenely sweet express

how pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

"And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,

so soft, so calm, yet eloquent,

the smiles that win, the tints that glow,

but tell of days in goodness spent,

a mind at peace with all below,

a heart whose love is innocent!"

She was like a poem, beautiful and full of double meaning. She wasn’t like the night, she was the night, everything special that had ever existed in it, or ever would.

He felt a hand about his heart. He really did love her; something he had never thought would happen to him while he had been a living boy. Never in all of his deepest dreams had he ever thought that truelove was possible. It had always been just a fairytale that adults talked about in hushed and reverent voices, when they weren’t yelling it to the world, of course. Yet here he was, and he knew that he really did love her with his whole and entire heart.

It was hard to imagine that if events had been different he never would have met her, this wonderful girl, no, woman, who was everything to him. She was his life and his heart and his hope for the future all rolled into one. She was just one terrific being, and he was utterly terrified that like the night she would fade away with the morning, leaving him all alone with his soul burnt to a crisp.

He felt an urge to grab her and hold her tightly to him. Love was like that, it was wonderful and terrible at the same time, and sadly he knew that he would have traded it for nothing in the world. He sighed again, his eyes drowning in the fiery light reflected from the very depths of her soul.

DEZI

She turned her attention back to the witch girl, silently commanding Chris to wake up from whatever self-woven spell he had fallen under. "So, what did you think you were doing, eh?" she asked the girl, her voice perhaps a tad sharper than she had intended.

The girl flinched. "I saw you guys eating him. I just knew that I had to stop you before it was too late."

Dezi laughed low and deep in her throat. "What are you talking about? Just ask him yourself, he wanted it, he begged for it."

She felt the boy nodding his head fervently beside her, like one of those toy birds that bob their heads into shot glasses in bars.

"Why would he want you guys to do something like that to him?" the girl asked, her eyes intent as she tried to keep the fear out of her voice.

Dezi felt another purring laugh welling up in her throat. Sometimes she just felt so wicked, it was something that came up whenever she was around a self-righteous person, like this girl. It was either that or feel jealous that someone could ever imagine themselves to be so pure that they could throw stones at some else’s glass house. She hadn’t been like that since she had been a real girl, then it had been torn away from her along with her freedom when she was pressed into service.

Sometimes Dezi wished that the world would just go fuck itself, as if she really needed to contend with a bitchy brat like this, a girl that would throw a spell without even really being sure that it would work.

With a mental grimace, she reached out with her mind, seeking the help that she knew she would need. ~lianndra?~ she asked, not sure if he would even answer her. There were times when he was as petulant as any child, deigning to pretend that he was still mortal with an entirely mortal mind and abilities.

She was relieved when she felt his "presence" drift into her mind like a dark cloud, not wanting to intrude, but willing to take over and fight her battles if there were an emergency.

~yes?~ There was a droll tone to that voice, as if he were thinking that perhaps he was too old for this sort of thing. She felt as though he were right next to her, could almost see his small figure out of the corner of her eye, leaning against the brick wall with that elegantly relaxed look that always made her feel like slapping him, that slightly smirky twist to his lips.

~we’ve run across a witch,~ she said, ~do you want to take a look at her? we haven’t had a witch for a pet in a long time, and she looks pretty healthy to me. do you think she would make good breeding stock? just imagine, a whole entire strain of witches to feed from. it makes my mouth water just to think about it.~

He chuckled in her mind. ~hedonist, all you ever think of is yourself. move over a little bit and let me use your eyes.~

She "moved" over and felt him seep into her mind like a huge being compressing itself down to fit into a small space. He barely brushed her mind, but she shivered; he was so strong and large. If he wanted, he could drink her up and leave her defenseless, an empty husk with nobody home.

Still, she trusted that he would never do anything like that, not to her. They had an understanding that they had held to for a very long time. It was a little disconcerting to feel him inside her though, to feel the way he stretched her to the limits without even trying. Just the small part of him that had entered her made her feel tight and cramped, as if she were suddenly too small for herself.

Dezi tightened herself into a corner of her mind and sat back to watch what was going to happen. Lianndra was so unpredictable, which was most likely what had attracted her to him in the first place. He was like a bright light that filled the night like a sun, glowing and gleaming and bathing her in an inner radiance. Then there was the fact that he was so fun to be around, most of the time anyway.

CHRISTINE

She blinked hard, trying to look away from that fascinating and compellingly deep gaze. There was something here that was wrong, a voice deep in her mind was urging her too look away, to run, to bolt, to hide and never come out from under her bed again.

Before she could even try to think about struggling, of looking away, those eyes flared and suddenly deepened, as if a black hole had opened and she was being sucked inside.

Those eyes were examining her intently, making her feel as though she were being torn apart piece by piece. Those eyes were unraveling everything that she had ever felt or thought or known, like she was a giant ball of yarn.

They say that the eyes are the windows of the soul, but those eyes weren’t windows, they were X-rays that saw everything. She felt as though every secret that had ever dwelt within her had suddenly been torn away without warning. All of the walls she had ever erected in her mind, they were all gone, and she suddenly felt terribly alone, as well as inconsequential and small. She felt like a speck in a giant universe trillions of times larger than she could ever imagine--a universe that could be rid of her without even a thought or a flinch.

She was caught in the floodgate of those terrible, yet compelling eyes, as if she were a deer mesmerized by the lights of an oncoming car. She absolutely could not look away.

Those eyes were like the night just before the sky went utterly black, that blue that was so dark and velvety, as if you could just reach up and rub it all over your skin. It was the color that painters tried so hard to capture, but that always eluded them. A fantastical color that just slipped through the cracks of the possible into the impossible, a color that didn’t belong in the normal scheme of things, a color that was too beautiful for anyone to ever have the right to even look at.

Those eyes were velvety wells of darkness that urged her to caress it and see if the dark was really so terrible after all. Those eyes were pits that sucked and gurgled like a drain, pulling her into them like a soap bubble caught in the mini-whirlpool of the mind.

She was stripped bare, then minutely examined. Every single action or thought that she had expressed was torn from her grasping fingers and pulled apart, the bits allowed to drop like a child’s toys that were done being played with. She tried to hide the embarrassing things and the things that made her feel ashamed or guilty, but it was no use, those too were taken from her and examined.

She felt as if a giant hand had lifted her up then sliced her apart, taking bits and pieces of her away, pieces that she would never have again. Then, when the examination of everything she had ever done was finished, that giant and incomprehensible mind started in on the things that she had never done, the things that she had wanted to do or even just flickered her thoughts over without trying.

That mind saw everything about her, the beautiful and the ugly, the good and the bad; she was naked before that gaze. It moved over her, holding her up and examining her close, then, just as easily as it had torn her apart, it put her back together again, better than she had been before.

The doubts that had always filled her mind were suddenly gone as if they had never existed, discarded on some trash heap were all of the ideas and emotions she had outgrown but never let go of. She felt as though she had been cleansed, her mind was alive and full as it had never been before. She was beautiful and wonderful; she was something that she had never been, someone that other people might aspire to be, someone good and bright.

That giant mind set her back into her normal groove, then sat back on its haunches like a wolf, watching her intently with a glowing gaze that was no longer a reflection of the night before the blackness seeped in, but a magnetic blue that glowed and illuminated her. She felt herself straightening beneath that gaze, trying to make herself better than she was. She wanted to be the best that she could be. That gaze was something that she wanted to impress, the mind behind it someone that she wanted to show how well made she was. There was just something there that made her want to preen and, well, show off all of her skill.

~well, little one, it seems that dezi was right. you are worth acquiring,~ that voice reverberated through her mind like the voice of God. It was beautiful and flowing, filling her to the very echoing reaches of her mind, then bouncing back.

She "looked" at the light that that voice brought into her and knew that she would do anything for that mind--it was everything. There was something wonderful and strong about it, as if it could encompass the entire world at will, as if it could crush her beneath its heel like a bug, but didn’t. It saw something in her that she hadn’t known was there, and she wanted it to be proud of her.

~come to me, christine, come and be welcome. go with dezi and chris, they will bring you to me and we shall be together. i will care for you and love you, and you shall have everything that you could ever imagine.~

Dimly she felt tears of wonder and gratitude trickling down her cheeks. Dumbly she nodded her head. That voice was calling her to the place where she belonged. When it spoke her name, it felt like home. Her name was filled with everything that made her who and what she was. For the first time in her life, she felt as if she were understood, as if everything she had ever done, said, or even imagined had been lifted up on a pedestal and allowed to shine as brightly as it could. She didn’t want to disappoint that voice.

She wanted to go to the owner of that voice and be kissed and hugged and welcomed. She wanted to go to that person and be loved. She wanted to be a part of that voice, to be cherished and loved and cared for. She was called, and she would answer.

~yes, i will come,~ her "voice" was exultant, filled with a yearning and a need. She was finally going to go home to where she belonged, to where she would be welcomed for who and what she was rather than what she might someday be.

~come, little one, come to me and i will hold you and you will be made welcome. come, come, come to me, come to me, come… to… me,~ that amazing voice trailed off and she felt the mind leave her.

For a moment she felt like weeping, but she knew she would be reunited with that wondrous being and soon. She also knew that she was stronger than she had been before, that she had been changed and bettered, that she was so much more than she had ever imagined herself to be.

She wiped the tears off her face and looked up at the one she knew to be Dezi.

The other girl was no longer that bright and beautiful thing of moments before--she was still bright and she was still beautiful, but it was different. Her eyes had trickled back to normal, no longer that all-encompassing blue that had swallowed the white as if it had never been.

Christine knew that Dezi was powerful, but she was nothing in comparison to that other mind, that great and bright being that had filled her for such a short time.

Christine swallowed and stood up, not remembering sitting down on the grass. She didn’t even really care that her butt was now damp and that her tights were sticking to her skin; all she knew was that a great thing had happened to her and that all of her dreams and wishes would be fulfilled.

"Are you ready to go?" Dezi asked, looking at her with mild curiosity in her eyes, as if she could care less what Christine decided.

Christine nodded. "Yes, take me with you."

Dezi smiled a wide smile, then turned her face toward Sebastian. "Wait a moment for Chris and me to finish, then we shall leave this place."

Christine nodded, her mind a thousand miles away reliving that wondrous experience. She didn’t even look up when Sebastian gasped in ecstasy and wonder, didn’t hear the faint sounds as Dezi and Chris Fed.

She was in a whole different world, a world where she was no longer alone and unloved, a world where she could be anything that she wanted, a world where she would never have to think about and dread the decision of being the Maiden ever again. It was a world of light and fluttering butterflies that were really thoughts. It was a world where she floated through the air and knew that everything was good because it was good.

LIANNDRA

Gregor murmured in his sleep and sighed, a smile of satisfaction curving his lips. Sometimes Lianndra thought that maybe his victims got more out of the Feed than he did--they certainly seemed happier and more intoxicated with their blood than he was. He even felt a little jealous of them. Maybe getting snacked on really wasn’t so bad, especially when it was done by a vampire.

He pulled back from Gregor, watching the way the smile slid away to be replaced by a slightly petulant frown. Gregor looked as though he was about ready to cry. Maybe being a vampire was better than being a victim.

Lianndra sat up and began to dress again. He really hadn’t wanted to hurt Gregor with some of the things in his gear, so he had just taken the whole rig off. It was well-known that even with the utmost care, accidents were known to happen.

In minutes he was fully dressed and ready to go. Where he was going, he had no idea. Dawn was only a few hours away, so it was obvious that he wasn’t going to be going far. Still, something was calling to him and he just had to answer.

Quietly he left the bedroom and entered the living room to find Bran curled up on the couch, his right hand close to his mouth, as if he wasn’t quite sure whether to suck his fingers like a child, or act like a man. He looked so innocent lying there, as if he knew nothing of the world.

Ralph was not quite so lucky. There was something sad about his torture-induced simplicity of the mind. There was something in his eyes that said he knew that he was never going to be a regular person again, that he would always be someone’s servant or sex slave, that there was no real future for him. He was too broken to ever be fixed, and he knew it.

Lianndra scanned the room, finally spotting the young werewolf curled in a tight ball under the coffee table, trying to get as much sleep as he could with that terrible fear of rape hanging over his head. Ralph’s mouth was pulled into a tight line and there were two stress-grooves drawn between the middle of his brows as he whimpered a continuous crying yip in his sleep, like an abused animal reliving a nightmare.

Lianndra felt pity as he looked at that once proud young man. He could still see the slight traces of who and what that young man had been. Ralph had not always been like this, once he had been a normal person with a normal life and a strong heritage and an even stronger pride of self. Now he was just a quivering mess.

Walking over to the table, Lianndra sat back on his haunches and looked closely at the young man. He was handsome, like all of the rest of Gregor’s "toys," and had probably been smart before he was repeatedly raped and mentally beaten down. All of the promise that he had once held was wasted here with Gregor, who would use him until he was no longer useful or until he tired of the whole thing, then Ralph would become just another of his rejected playthings.

Lianndra pursed his lips. There wasn’t very much that he could do here. He would have to wait until he could get Ralph home, then perhaps he could do something for him to bring him out of his dream world and back into the real world. He wondered if perhaps it might not be better to just leave Ralph the way he was, but he rejected that thought outright.

He sighed and reached out one small hand, running his forefinger and middle finger over Ralph’s cheek, feeling the way that even in his sleep, the young man quivered and drew back in fear, his whimpering taking on a higher note.

The vampire boy drew back his hand and sat back, crossing his legs and just sitting there in the stillness of the night, listening to Ralph’s whimpering snuffle and Bran’s deep and even breathing. They were two very different people, but they had both been hurt badly and were just taking it differently. They were the same. Shadows of the same broken soul.

He sighed again and lay back, his legs still crossed. He layered his hands on top of his stomach and listened to their heartbeats, music to his ears. Idly, he poked his right fang with his tongue, liking the sharp pain that pinpricked through it.

He wondered what mortal sleep was like. It had been so long since he had experienced it that he couldn’t even remember what it was like. He thought sometimes that he had liked it, but then he would wonder if that were just wistful thinking. Perhaps his daytime catatonia was the way to go. There was only the silence of death and maybe the flickering passage of dreams like ships in the night.

Lianndra closed his eyes and tried to relive his entire life. The first seven years were blurry and faded, but from the moment that he had received the BloodTouch, everything was as clear and focused as crystal. He could remember everything, could draw upon any knowledge that he had even a passing acquaintance with. Mortal memory was so faulty, but only the memory of the undead was pure and unfaded by time.

He could live every single moment of his life over in his mind, as long as he didn’t count those first seven years. Sometimes he thought that maybe he would forget his past life someday. Perhaps he would look back and there would be nothing, just a blank, as if he had sprung into existence fully formed, seven years old forever.

He wondered if perhaps he had been cheated, his mortal life for his immortal life, his cherished memories of childhood for eternity, what a trade.

If he had been Made at an older age, it would be so much easier for him to hold onto his mortal ties. But as it was, he could feel that other life slipping away bit by bit, thieved away in the night, like bubbles of dreams popping one by one.

He sighed again and thought of his mother, her beautifully sculpted face and the way that she had looked at him with such adoration and love in her eyes. Maybe someday he would try to see her in his mind and all he would see would be the horror that had been in her eyes when she had found him so changed and different, no longer her darling little angel. He wouldn’t be able to remember the love he had known, just what came after.

Sometimes life really sucked.