“Such a lovely liar, truly a marvelous morsel
of mortality,” the sheriff murmured as if talking to himself as he carried her
further into his house, and up one flight of stairs.
Kendra’s heart pounded so loudly that he must hear it. Was she about to become dinner? Every instinct in her being screamed
for her to flee and fight, to leap out of his arms and run, but she knew it
would be pointless. He was far
faster and far stronger than she.
Rigidly, she kept herself still in his arms.
“Not a pox or even a louse upon you. How lack you the stench of the living? I find even with my keen nose hardly a
scent about your person. Strange
creature,” he pushed a door open with his foot, “soon I will know you. I will drink all your secrets, and
savor even the least of them.”
The sheriff hesitated as he lowered her onto something
deliciously soft. Had he
reconsidered? She relaxed and kept
her breathing slow and regular, though her heart still hammered wildly. He must know that she was awake.
As if in confirmation, he whispered, “It’s no good, you know.”
The bed lowered as he sat on it next to her. “Open your eyes, Mysterious One, for
your heart beats too wildly to permit the sleep you now feign.”
Kendra opened her eyes.
“This play that we have pulled about our shoulders like a warm
and familiar cape now has slipped awry,” he said lightly, but his what followed
sounded very grim. “Your next act
bears with it the mark of your destiny.”
What?
Kendra peered at his shadowy form.
The room was unlit except for the weak moonlight that fell through the
window. If she were about to die,
then she wanted to get a few things straight. As long-lived as the sheriff had hinted he was, he might
have a good sense of how many of his kind existed. He wouldn’t know about the mysterious extinction force on
Matt’s graph of course, but he might be able to confirm her theory about the plateau
in his population. It was nearing
its end even as they sat there.
“Must we continue this play of ours in the dark,” she framed
the question slowly, trying to sound Shakespearean, “or have you a lamp?”
She heard her vampire host move downstairs to the sitting
room, but he moved so fast that she did not believe her ears until her eyes
confirmed that he had returned in a second with both a lit lamp and a burning
candle. Kendra sat up and pushed
herself back against the headboard.
The vampire resumed his seat on the bed.
She saw that he was indeed handsome, but his eyes held no
feeling, and without the music of his voice to light his expression, his face
frightened her. As she held the gaze
of the creature who could easily kill her, Kendra decided to tell him what
truths she could.
“My name is Kendra.
I am a…scholar. I have
learned that the population of your kind has decreased in this century. I have supposed that this is due
to…vampires,” she hesitated, not sure that she should use the word, but the
sheriff nodded for her to continue, “being rounded up and executed with the
witches.”
The sheriff paused to consider Kendra. “Why should you concern yourself with
our population?”
“I knew nothing of vampires until recently, when a few of you
showed an interest in my research.
Once I learned that you do exist, I naturally turned some of my
attention to your kind.”
“What did you study that drew the attention of my kind?”
Kendra exhaled.
She had anticipated this question as soon as she’d begun to speak, but
had been unable to prepare an answer.
He bent forward a few inches, closer to her neck.
“The stars,” she blurted, pleased that she’d struck upon the
explanation that happened to be the closest to truth that his time would allow.
“You study the stars,” he sounded disappointed and angry as he
whirled and stood to stride across the room. “My people betrayed our greatest secret to some upstart
teller of fortunes?!” he snarled from a corner.
“No!” she shouted back, feeling just as offended as he
sounded. “Haven’t you…Have you not
heard of Copernicus?”
“Poland, now the Commonwealth of wheat.” He sounded bitter. Kendra had no idea of what to say, so
she waited. At least he hadn’t snarled.
The sheriff sighed, and in that moment he looked
so…vulnerable, despite his tremendous strength she could think of no word to
better suit his appearance. With
shock, Kendra felt her tired body respond. She longed to lie down with him in her arms.
“I apologize.
Stefan Bathory, Prince of Transylvania, King of Poland, and Archduke of
Lithuania, was one of my kind, and my good friend.” The sheriff lifted his face, which he had buried in his
hands, to look at Kendra. “He did
not truly know death until those free-thinking butchers performed an autopsy,
the first in Eastern Europe--bah!”
He sprang across the room, angry again. “Can you not see what harm mortal
thought has done us? What greater
harm will you next concoct? Why
not cut my heart from my body now, and call it done?” As he walked toward Kendra, he pulled his shirt open, and
bared his perfect chest.
As if compelled, she laid her palm on its cool surface, and
felt him tremble. “Might I know
your given name?” she asked softly.
“Would you know the name I was given at birth, or the name I
chose when I crossed into the Land of Night?”
“Both,” she said, hardly daring to breathe.
“Aurelius,” he said, “ and Alexander.”
“Thank you,” she whispered.
Alexander placed his hands on the bed next to Kendra’s hips
and leaned forward slowly until his face was inches from hers. His eyes had filled with an emotion
Kendra could not read, but they seemed much warmer, more human, than they had.
“You are most welcome.”
Kendra clearly heard the words, but was not certain that
Alexander had actually spoken them.
Before she could figure it out, he kissed her.
