Milton Crockett was sweating in earnest now. “I understand Robby’s and Lee’s actions might have caused harm. But you know
I
would never let that happen, Master. You know that I would sacrifice anything to be here.”
“Even your family?”
Or your mistress?
asked the silent Master.
Sorin dismissed the other lawyer, Mr. Harris, whose skin had gone very pale. Perhaps he realized his possible future, as well, if he was not careful.
“You would exchange blood with one of the Groupies to become a permanent part of us?” Sorin asked, knowing that, in spite of his marital infidelities, Mr. Crockett fancied himself a “family man” and this was the reason he had never become more than a human Servant. “You would give your soul?”
In the Master’s cloud, Sorin detected the hint of fangs, of a terrible virtue not even
he
could look upon directly.
Mr. Crockett hesitated, still too attached to his humanity, and that was all the answer Sorin and the Master required.
Like the gaping jaw of a god, the cloud descended around the Servant’s head. His eyes bulged as he suffered a glimpse of pure terror. Knowing that paradise was about to be washed from his memory, Mr. Crockett’s lips opened in a scream that never came to be.
One fraction of a second later, it was over.
The lawyer crumbled to the ground. Efficaciously, Sorin enlisted Groupies to prepare the mind-wiped man for return Above. There, Mr. Harris would be his keeper, making certain Milton Crockett adjusted to life as it used to be.
Although the mind wipe had taken his memories of the Underground, it had at least left him his soul. And Sorin knew Mr. Crockett had come out the loser.
Task completed, the vampire rested near the waterfall once again, in no mood to summon Vashti, even if she was casting seductive glances at him from a satin bed where three other Groupies painted blood pictures over each other with fine-haired brushes. Nearby, two Elites, whose money ensured the success of the Underground, languished. They wore no clothing, save for the jewels pasted on the female’s skin. They were smoking from a hookah pipe, the concoction laced with blood to add flavor.
Jesse Shane,
Sorin thought, running his gaze over the blond film legend’s sleek muscles. The actor would be released in fifteen years. The other cocoa-skinned vampire, Tamsin Greene, was their newest Elite, born almost a month ago, transformed from a superstar singer/actress to a myth. Robby Pennybaker, the child actor who had caused such a disturbance, had been an Elite, as well.
Excepting Robby, the Elites found the Underground to be the answer to eternal fame. They had literally sold their souls for the Master’s edification, sacrificing them so they could receive Dr. Eternity’s treatment.
First, at the height of their careers, they staged their own sensational murders—ones that would guarantee infamy. Yet they were not truly succumbing to death. Far from it. Dr. Eternity exchanged blood with them, then continued to infuse them with his fluids each month since the Elite were not true children like Sorin, who had been gifted with merely one bite. Continual maintenance kept the emotionally unstable Elite under the Master’s control, making them inferior in Sorin’s mind.
After the initial stage of treatment, the Elite stayed Underground for years and years, knowing that Above, fans mourned their memory, wishing for them to return while worshipping their pop-culture images, keeping their legends alive. Just when public hunger reached a climax, the Elite underwent Dr. Eternity’s final magic, a surgery that shaped him into “another” celebrity, a new creation with a different stage name, a budding star who would claim an eerie resemblance to his true self. The Elite was then released back Above to use his enhanced, naturally magnetic life force in a fresh career. In the end, he would build on his old talents while enjoying the new.
Hollywood was full of Elites, “the new so-and-so,” “the next him-or-her.” In fact, one of their earliest clients had recently been released Above a second time in anticipation of another chance at fortune and glory. She had returned Underground when the public began to notice her chronic youthfulness, and that was the cue for Sorin to arrange another death. Her second passing had been of a milder form since the first had already set the proverbial stage for her legend to be established, and she was now continuing a prosperous career.
The Underground was where a star’s drug addictions became blood addictions. It was where they gave up their human entourages for the haremlike conditions of massages and Turkish baths, pampering, bodies frozen in perfection. The Underground even used Servant psychiatrists to fulfill the Elite’s never-ending emotional crises.
It was heaven for so many of them.
Sorin breathed the incensed air, the languid pace of lovemaking behind the veiled curtains of silken beds, the laughter of Elites and Groupies drinking blood from golden cups, feasting on kisses and bites.
His Underground. A pleasure to die for.
In the meantime, the Master was reveling under the water’s spray again, as if cleansing himself, allowing the liquid to separate the wisps of his disguise in masochistic ecstasy.
Mr. Crockett only proved that, to save ourselves, we must neutralize Limpet and Associates,
Sorin tacitly said to his father.
Even if we are not certain they are connected with another master.
No!
Sorin narrowed his eyes at the Master’s ferocity.
For what reason? Limpet could be the beginning of the end.
You know why.
The Master traveled nearer, bringing a chill with him.
We cannot afford to show our hand to the world before we’re sure. And attacking before they do would make us vulnerable. We can’t give up the protection of secrecy, Sorin. We need proof—and we need to draw them to
us.
Otherwise, the same thing will happen as it did the first time, when, clueless, I was flushed out.
The younger vampire tried to restrain himself, but he could not. Images of the Master’s most recent behavior—which included spending hours in front of the television watching Eva Claremont movies—disturbed him.
The Master grew colder.
I worry, Father,
Sorin said, thinking again about how the elder had always sought human affection, had always searched to replenish the soul he had lost so long ago. In the 1980s, he had developed a fascination for Eva Claremont, favoring her films and collecting her photos. The pattern had gone beyond his usual adoration of the Elite crowd, and it had even led to the troubles they were experiencing now.
I worry about this obsession you have,
Sorin thought.
I worry about your activities
—
Silence!
At that point, Sorin blocked off the Awareness between them. He knew it would show his father how strongly he felt more than any words. In the past, the Master had allowed his predilection for Eva, the blond screen goddess, to cloud his judgment. Sorin did not wish this to happen again.
The older vampire grew angry, his cloud hissing actual, soft words. “Have you thought about the ways Eva’s daughter might be able to lead us to our enemy, if one indeed exists?”
Yes. Sorin had thought about it night after night.
He turned his Awareness back on.
I have thought of everything possible.
Then allow our players to do the work Above, Sorin. Let us trust the spy work again.
Sorin did not respond. Instead, he glanced up at the ever-shifting cloud, attempting to find his beloved father in the mist.
I
F
the night was slightly chilled, or even mild, Benedikte did not notice. These past months (or perhaps they were years?) had blended into a thick, ever-sifting fog, a murk that held no sense of time, place…identity.
He entered the forest, overtaken with such drunkenness that he did not heed anything save the aftermath of the kills he had impulsively enjoyed last hour. Blood still painted his tongue with the taste of a heavy, piquant honey, a hint of an elemental ingredient that yet escaped him, bite after bite.
The family he had taken unawares—mere sustenance—would not be discovered until morning at the earliest, when they would fail to creak open the door of their thatched cottage, fail to greet the sunlight and harvest the gains from their farmland. Perhaps it would take more than a few days for the neighbors from the nearby village to sniff out the carnage and raise the alarm so as to gather in their fortified church and barricade themselves from danger.
By then it would be futile. Yes, they would cry that a vampire epidemic had descended upon them, yet Benedikte would be long away, hunting for his next meal in another unsuspecting community, whether it be across the mountains or southward to more exotic lands already visited—
anywhere
that would satisfy his appetites.
Yet tonight, before leaving altogether, he was compelled to follow a trail. He had caught scent of this particular human, prey that fascinated him, weeks ago. He had been tracking the man from village to village, assessing, worshipping him from afar, fantasizing that his blood would be the answer to the unnamed recent hunger Benedikte felt for more than food….
Yawning night enveloped the vampire as he threaded deeper into the mist-hushed cove of trees, up the gentle slope of a mountain. His sturdy jackboots, once stolen from an unfortunate western adventurer—English, perhaps?—crushed the fallen beech leaves. Quite near, he could sense the trickle of a stream, the crackling stench of a fire. Most of all, he could all but feel the warm skin and pulse of the human.
Drawing closer to the mortal aroma, Benedikte’s own skin absorbed the prey’s heartbeat, just as it did every time the vampire lurked near this man. Once again stunned by the awakened sensation—none of his food allowed him such a pleasure as this—he halted, clutching his belly. This echo of what Benedikte remembered to be life wrenched his stomach into painful knots of estrangement.
It had been so long…. How many years
had
passed since he had taken the blood oath? More than two centuries now? And how long since he had abandoned Tereza for these exquisite compulsions that had changed him from the rough, yet moral and Godly husband he had once been, to this: a lost creature who wandered the earth, glutting on blood and sin while searching for a way to alter the pattern of his nights, to feel alive once more?
And how long since Tereza had passed out of this world to leave him behind, never to allow him the opportunity to finally conquer his shame at his new appetites, to leave the shadows outside their home and approach her, to invite her to exchange with him and ease his sorrows?
Benedikte leaned against the bole of a tree, adapting to the wonderful shock of connecting with this human. Over the gloom, a wolf keened while moonlight drifted down through the branches, blading the ground with faint light.
Slowly, the pulse of the mortal insinuated itself into Benedikte’s very veins. He followed the call of it, the thud enrapturing him, guiding him to a clearing in which a man sitting on a log held his hands out to a fire.
The light hushed over the brown hair flowing just past his shoulders. His bearing was that of perhaps a Magyar, one of many Hungarian conquerors who had stolen this land and called it their own. Yet the human wore clothing that contradicted this assumption of superiority: a longer coat hewn of coarse fabric, perhaps a Moldavian weave; breeches; low-heeled, practical shoes.
Though the fire’s flames repulsed the vampire, this male still drew him.
Benedikte had first discovered him entertaining a small crowd on the outskirts of Cluj, where he had been made to flee when an old woman cried out in fear at the sight of the fire he had conjured from air.
“Sorcerer!” she had branded him while men chased him and his baskets of tricks into a copse of trees.
A magician. A being who proved that what the eye saw was not always what existed in reality.
Benedikte, who had served as an audience for a collection of performers during his wanderings, was enthralled by this man’s kind. How this variety of person lived another identity onstage or how they fooled the eye with costumed playacting enchanted him. In truth, the vampire craved the same magical escape from himself, some nights.
All nights.
After this sorcerer had been driven from Cluj and before certain attack from the community could follow, Benedikte had stalked the male: through the woods where he had sheltered himself to avoid detection, on the fringes of towns where he earned his meals. All the while, the vampire had remained spellbound by what the human had done with the fire—controlling it. The audiences had been utterly transfixed, and Benedikte so wished to hold that same power in his own hands. Perhaps he could absorb this sorcerer’s secrets, just as he had taken in centuries’ worth of education during his wanderings.
In the dark of shadow, Benedikte carefully breathed, softly and undetectably, as he watched the human. More than anything, he wished to find another being who would not turn away from him once they discovered what magic
he
held, as well. Long ago, his brothers had all scattered to the winds, pursuing their own lusts, though their blood vow assured they would come together if their maker ever summoned them.
Now, while the fire sparked, the sorcerer stiffened, as if sensing Benedikte. Quickly, he turned about to discover the vampire waiting under the black of the branches. On the human’s lap, a cat arched to a feral stand, hissing, baring its teeth.
With one hand, the man reached into his far coat pocket. With the other, he lay a vigilant palm upon the feline, restraining the animal while awaiting Benedikte’s reason for approaching.
“Good evening,” the vampire said in his mother tongue. He had learned many languages during his travels, but these were the words that would always come first to him. “I am sorry to intrude, but I was seeking light in this darkness. I mean you no harm.”
Stepping into the glow, Benedikte compelled the human to accept him.
The sorcerer narrowed his eyes, his clear gaze taking in this stranger’s refusal to don a periwig as fashion dictated. Scanning the rest of Benedikte, the man assessed the vampire’s simple
justau-corps
, which covered a linen waistcoat, and the cravat he favored, all of which spoke of modest means and a genuine apathy for the style of the day.
“Do you hail from a nearby village?” the sorcerer asked, his tone uneasy, though it did not cover an accent tinged with educated refinement.
“I am not from any village.”
Finally, the sorcerer succumbed to Benedikte’s mind grasp. His heartbeat calmed, yet only slightly. He stood rigidly, gesturing for Benedikte to sit on a stone that rested on the opposite side of the fire. The cat watched the vampire, green eyes wide. Its tail whipped around, as if readying itself to strike if necessary.
“I am Benedikte of Wallachia.” Bowing, he awaited the male’s name, his body livened by the delightful rhythm of the human’s heartbeat.
“Sorin, the son of Ion. I regret there is no food for me to share in companionship.”
Smiling, Benedikte rested on the stone, then arranged his coat comfortably. He knew his skin was flush with his last meal, creating a mortal complexion. As well, he was expert at controlling his natural urges regarding a human. He could subsist on a meal for weeks, though, as of late, he longed for a treat other than blood, something he could not name….
As Benedikte’s need quickened, the cat reacted, standing on its two rear feet, claws swiping the air.
Sorin kept hold of the creature. “She is addled this night.”
Benedikte had witnessed the cat during one show. It had been docile enough, yet he recalled the animal balancing on two legs even then. The sight of a dancing feline had struck him as enchantingly human.
“This is a most astounding creature,” he said.
“Yes.” Sorin arose, tucking the cat into a lidded basket, latching it, then moving to yet another.
When he opened it, he searched among the contents, extracting a piece of cloth, a long pipelike musical instrument, then—
The flash of a crucifix blinded Benedikte. He reared back, hand uplifted to block the sight.
Forgive me, Father, please, forgive me for what I’ve become,
he thought, unable to take his eyes away, struck with a horrific despair so profound that he could not move.
I am nothing, nothing at all….
Sorin tucked the silver object back into the basket, saving Benedikte from further anguish. He breathed easier, though the air pierced his lungs in the aftermath.
Upon returning to the fire, the human offered what he had retrieved from the basket. A bottle of wine.
Calmed, Benedikte refused.
The youngster nodded and drank deeply. Though he kept his gaze fixed on Benedikte, Sorin seemed more relaxed now that witchery or burning at the stake had not been mentioned. Superstitious mortals who had seen his sorcery would not take the time to sit before Sorin and converse with him as Benedikte was doing.
“I believe,” the vampire said, attempting to keep his gaze from Sorin’s throat as it worked to swallow the wine, “I read a pamphlet detailing the exploits of a sorcerer with an amazing cat who was run out of several villages in this area. I must say that it amused me.”
“Mmmm.” Relieved even further by another of Benedikte’s smiles, this one testifying to a certain camaraderie and understanding, Sorin saluted with his bottle. “My fame spreads, does it not?”
“May I assume the rancor has not convinced you to refrain from entertaining more villages?”
“You may. I am afraid that it is the only way for me to eat my daily bread for now. Yet…” He lifted his hands and the wine sloshed against the bottle’s sides, singing high and sharp in Benedikte’s ears. “I do suppose it is time for me to cross borders again and take up in another place.”
“May I ask…how is it that you came to be a…sorcerer?” Benedikte leaned forward.
While Sorin licked a drop of wine from his full lower lip, the vampire’s mouth flooded with juices. He silently asked the young man to expose all.
As always, he succeeded.
“On the estate,” Sorin said, blinking slowly, “that is, my childhood home, we employed an old man who kept silent about knowing certain…tricks. Simple yet bewildering. I found him amusing his grandson one day and I wished to know his secrets. Much to my shame, I threatened to reveal him if he refused me, not that I would have actually….” Sorin shook his head, a strand of hair falling over his young cheek. “All the same, he taught me the illusion of conjuring fire, then encouraged me in other, shall we say, pursuits.”
Benedikte tilted his head in query.
Sorin took yet another draw from the bottle. As Benedikte calmed his instincts, he detected details: the temptation of a vein throbbing in the sorcerer’s neck, the broadness of his shoulders, the obvious outline of a pistol under his coat.
Possibly his only defense, Benedikte thought. And it would not be enough, though it seemed to give the boy confidence.
“Other pursuits?” Benedikte prodded.
Leaning his forearms on his thighs, Sorin canted forward, encouraged by wine and the mind grasp. “Do you believe in the possibility of miracles?”
The vampire smiled yet again, knowing he would not show fangs at this stage. Not until he was fully primed to feed. “I do.”
Sorin hesitated, as if deciding whether or not to demonstrate to this stranger how dangerous he could be. Then he, too, smiled.
“The cat,” he said. “She has been improved.”
Without meaning to, Benedikte laughed in surprise. In pure rapture at the memory of the standing, dancing cat.
“I am not jesting.” Sorin motioned to the latched basket. “I cannot explain this fully, but I…I have a gift, the old man told me. I can ‘manipulate,’ he said.”
And so can I,
Benedikte thought, seeing before him a revealed brother, a soul worth clinging to. Joy speared through him, stronger than hunger, thicker than the blood with which he replenished his body.
“How is that?” the vampire whispered. “How do you…manipulate?”
Sorin spilled the information as easily as wine from the bottle. “I do not know. I…I lay a hand on the creature—small creatures, only small—and I think of what I would like them to be.” The human flushed. “It does not always succeed.”
“Have you performed your talents on a human?”
The young man’s gaze went dark, as if the mere notion frightened him. Benedikte knew that Sorin had mused about this possibility, yet had never attempted it.
“This is the reason you hide in the woods,” the vampire said softly. “Because of your great magic.”
Sorin drank again, a trail of wine trickling from the corner of his mouth as he pulled the bottle away. “My family disavowed me. There were whispers among the servants, then fear in my mother’s eyes. I had no choice but to deny the accusations, yet they cast me out. They…abhorred me.”
The fire snapped as Benedikte calculated the distance between him and the ruthless flames.
“Family,” he said, breaking eye contact and staring into the heat. He required the mind grasp no more. “I have not seen my family in…”
Yes, it had to be at least two centuries now. He had no concept of the year nor his whereabouts, but at least he knew this much. He had given life to no progeny and this agonized him most of all. His line was dead. Once, in an attempt to redeem himself and to quell the growing isolation, Benedikte had forced an exchange between himself and a Venetian noblewoman whose countenance recalled his bride, Tereza. She had screamed for hours afterward, and he had been compelled to silence her forever. He had never returned to his own pious wife; he had already become a creature she would have seen as an abomination, and he had ached too much for all the appetites his blood oath awakened to leave them behind for her sake.