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“Adam? Your brother?” William asked in hushed disgust. I nodded woodenly, wherever my heart had been was now full of a void, a void rapidly filling with anguish, frigid and dark. I swallowed the building scream in my throat, my limbs twitching to tear something apart. “Fuck… I–I’m so sorry.”
“Mother and Father. If they knew he was alive—”
“You can never see your family again, Rose.” My face still in his hands, William’s white eyes were level with mine, boring into me. “Your mother cannot know you or Adam are alive.”
“Are we even alive?” I whispered through tears, spiraling. “If they knew what Adam did... how could he?”
“I want you to know they were satisfied with the excuse I gave them, but heartbroken. You can not go back, Rosemary. Massachusetts is off limits until they are dead.” I focused on him, tried to remain rooted but it felt I may blow away at any moment with the slightest breeze.
“Where are we?” I managed to ask. If Massachusetts was off limits, where had he taken me?
“Ohio. After I fed you my blood, I needed to move you somewhere remote quickly. We had to travel in mortal fashion; it took days.” Days. I’d been out for days.
I shouted in a rage, ripping his arm from his torso with a loud crack. Slinging it across the room without looking at it for fear that I may vomit, I kept my eyes locked on William. He was bewildered, fighting a hiss as he crumpled under the pain. “Why did you do that?”
“I hate you! I hate you, William! You abandoned me, you promised you wouldn’t leave me and you left! You left and she came! She had been stalking us for months, she had been stalking us for months!” I wailed, falling to my knees under the weight of it all. I buried my face into my hands, trying to hold myself together.
“She had been waiting for that opportunity and you gave it to her. I can’t stand to look at you, I never want to see you again.” Without another look, I ran from the cabin out into the bright sunlight of late summer. The beams of light glared in my vision, pressure building in my head once more. I shook it off, running. Just running.
***
I ran like that for ages until the sun had set and the air turned cool. I felt like I could run forever, my limbs never tiring, never out of breath. It was brisk, exhilarating. Running as a vampyre was like flying, the world whirring by me, melding together.
At some point I’d come across a small inn in a little village. I begged the owners to exchange a night’s stay for a helping hand, claiming to have been attacked on the way to Boston and losing much of my fare and possessions. They didn’t seem to care much, just happy to have the load lightened.
I helped them clean, attended to the other two guests staying in the place, and helped cook a simple dinner. The entire time I could only focus on the glugging of their hearts, the smell of their life giving essence under their skin. It was at times overwhelming, having to hold myself back from tearing into them.
The night grew later, and they finally allowed me to retire to a small, sparsely decorated room. I was grateful to finally be able to breathe without my first reaction being to kill someone. I opened the small window, the summer night air wafting in was heavenly. Crickets chirped happily outside, bullfrogs croaked in a nearby creek.
On the vanity sat a wash basin which I used to wash my hands and face as if to bring clarity to my thoughts, which buzzed noisily. Letting the warm water cascade down my body, I bent to clean the mud from my leg, surprised to find no soreness from the run this afternoon. The only pain that lingered in my body was the headache from the sun and the burning in my throat.
I didn’t shiver in the chill of the evening air, naked and wet. Looking in the mirror, it was clear my body showed no signs of the trauma it endured, smooth and without scarring. The lack of physical evidence was jarring, and I couldn’t help but wonder for a moment if it had all been a dream.
The idea of being a vampyre was almost too much. It seemed my mind begged for any other answer, as to protect myself from everything.
I was dead, and yet I was not. I was in control of myself, and yet wholly not. I washed down my arm, scrubbing the filth from my skin that was no longer there, still feeling unclean. The glinting emerald caught my eye.
The mere sight of it broke the dam and I could no longer hold back my sobs. It didn’t seem fair. I had to mourn too much; my child, my life, my family.
Clean and tucked under the brown quilt, I stared at the ceiling focusing on the way my throat dried. It was no different than if a human had a cold, scratchy and hot, and yet I knew it could be so much worse. I didn’t want to kill anyone; it didn’t seem fair tothem. I exhaled through my nose, trying to block out the sounds of breathing and hearts beating. It was a trance, the thumping and rushing. All that blood, rich and warm. Something pinched in my gums, poking down into my lip.
“Rose,” a voice said from the window. I sat up quickly, a terrifying sound I wasn’t fully in control of leaving my throat. “What are you doing?” William asked just low enough for me to hear. He crossed the room to kneel beside me. I glared, my veins running hot with rage.
“I am getting away from you, William. Leave.” I snapped. His eyes were pained, tears pooling inside of them; they were dark green again, and his face was not as sickly as before. No more shadows were carved under his eyes, his full lips rosy. I knew what that meant.
“Please, my love. I love you, let me prove to you how much I need you, let us leave.” He reached out his hand for mine. Looking at his slender fingers, one adorned with a golden band, the snake of betrayal slithered up my spine and into my belly, curling up, ready to strike. Was he only looking for a companion all this time? Did he even care that this was a damnation?
“No.” My voice was frosty.
“Why not?”
“I told you, what you did is inexcusable. You took a choice away from me, and I cannot forgive that.”
“Rosemary, listen to me.Ifelt I had no choice. I want to be with you as long as I live. Don't you understand that? I know in my heart of hearts we are it,this,” William gestured in between us before taking my hand in his, “Thisis so much bigger than you think.”
His voice cracked with raw emotion, “I do not know how I existed before you, and it is not an option to exist without you.” He kissed my hands lightly. My brow pinched, he was a convincing liar, that was a lesson already learned.
“I didn’t do this for companionship, no! I've been a vampyre since1570, Rose. I have had plenty of company. Hell, I Changed Horris for his friendship only with his consent,” he laughed lightly. “There is something about you and I, something I have not had before. It is immeasurable, incurable. I have never needed anyone like I need you.”
