The II AM Trilogy Collection Read online

  “But it wasn’t.”

  “No. And looking back on it now, it is obvious. Her entire demeanor changed after that night. She knew that the end was coming, and she hid that knowledge to protect me. Ah, Two, I loved her. I loved her as I love you, but I am so angry with her, to this very day. Furious. Why did she not explain? Combined, prepared, we might have prevented it. There might have been some other alternative.”

  “Sometimes people, even people who have been alive for hundreds of years, make mistakes, Theroen.”

  Theroen nodded. “Indeed. It is not the mistake that frustrates me. I have only grief for that. It is the knowledge that, if she were here right now and presented the same choices, she would come to the same decisions. She would make the same mistake.”

  “But she’s not here, now. Something happened, Theroen.”

  “Isaac happened.”

  “Isaac?”

  “There were other vampires in London during the seventeenth century. Naomi and I did not know, because Lisette had never explained it to us, but there are rules among vampires. Laws. Lisette was breaking them, and by extension, so were we.”

  “Normally, fledglings are in great danger if separated from their masters for any extended period of time. Even now, this is sometimes a problem. Rival vampires are likely to attempt to make an example of them. I was tolerated in my separation from Abraham in part because his power was so immense even then that there was concern over what his reaction might be, and in part because of my lineage. Eresh-Chen, first child in a line of first children, dating back to she who was the source of all vampires.

  “Traipsing around with Lisette and Naomi, two vampires not of my bloodline who had, it seemed, stolen me from my sire … this was not acceptable. Eventually, disapproval became dislike, and dislike became hate. Isaac used this hate in an attempt to further his own political position among the local vampires. He made an example of Lisette in a bid for power.”

  Two looked out at the road ahead. Theroen was not driving at his normal reckless speed, as the road did not have his full attention, but they still drew near to the mansion. “Finish the story, Theroen? I want to know how it ends.”

  Theroen nodded. “There is little left to tell, to be honest. Six more months of happiness – forced, on Lisette’s part – before it all ended. I said before that I had never really had call to become a man, in the forty years I spent with Lisette. I made up for that in one night. In one instant.

  “When Isaac kicked the door to our apartment in, Lisette did not even flinch. She did not even look up, just continued to stare into the fire. I looked into her eyes and I saw great sadness there, and great fear. I also saw acceptance, and understood that Lisette knew that her death had arrived. In that moment, Two, I aged those forty years.”

  * * *

  Theroen was on his feet, startled. The door to the apartment had been blown inward, shattered and destroyed. The hulking silhouette in the shadowy entrance did not move, only stared, pale blue eyes shining out at them. Lisette closed her eyes for a moment, touched a hand to her forehead, and turned her head to the door.

  “Isaac.”

  “Lisette.” The vampire took a step forward, into the light, and surveyed them. He looked for all the world like a Viking in Englishman’s clothing. Tall, well over six feet, with long blonde hair and a heavy blonde beard, Isaac’s vampire nature only added to his already formidable presence. He looked at them with an air that seemed almost detached. There was certainly no fear in him.

  “I knew it would be you.”

  “Ah. Who else? It is time to pay for your transgressions, Lisette. You must answer for what you’ve done, for thieving away the Eresh-Chen from his master. We will not stand for it any longer. You will release them, and come with me for judgment.”

  Lisette shook her head. “I know your judgment already.”

  “That may be. You will come with me regardless. Your fledglings may leave. The one you stole from Abraham will have his own judgment to face. The other will be … watched with great interest.”

  Theroen took a step forward, meeting the eyes of the vampire in the doorway. “We go nowhere without Lisette.”

  “Theroen …” Lisette’s voice was a whisper, the sadness behind it immeasurable.

  “Mind your tongue, priest, lest you find it removed from your mouth.”

  “You have no right—”

  “Fledgling, do you know the concept of seniority? I have lived for more than a thousand years. I have every right, if for no other reason than it will bring me pleasure to see this one punished for her crimes.”

  At this Lisette stirred, anger flashing in her eyes. “Crimes? Against whom? I swore no allegiance to your covenant, Isaac, nor that of any other. I am bound by no rules but my own. Your seniority matters not to me, nor does Abraham’s, nor does Edward’s. Eresh herself might give me orders and I would disobey as I see fit. I will not live by rules penned by the dead. I will not!”

  Isaac seemed unruffled by this. His expression was amused, detached, a man only passingly interested in what he was hearing.

  “You’ve made that obvious, Lisette. I would not be here otherwise.”

  “No. And you … you live by rules written by dead vampires who could not have foreseen these times. The old ones are all dead, Isaac, or so disinterested in our affairs that they might as well be. Why do you cling still to their words? Why hold yourself to their useless laws?”

  “Sin challas est mura. Si mura vallas etruars.” Isaac seemed to be reciting, as if the sentences had been drilled into him.

  “I have read the scrolls, Isaac. Without law there is chaos. With chaos comes destruction. It is due to weaklings like yourself that those words hold true.”

  For the first time, her words seemed to have an effect on Isaac. He turned to Lisette, gaze smoldering, a sneer on his lips.

  “Weaklings …”

  “Mark this, Isaac. You will be undone. You will know fear, and you will remember, in those moments before the eternal sleep, what I have said to you. You will know your weakness, and you will die in shame. That is your curse.”

  “I have been cursed by many, Lisette, in my years. Someday, perhaps, I will die. When I go down that black hallway, I will take pleasure in knowing that you went first.”

  Isaac moved forward swiftly, grinning, eyes aflame. Naomi shrieked something incoherent, and Theroen leapt out in front of the charging vampire, grappled with him, and was appalled at the strength in those arms. It was like wrestling iron. Lisette screamed his name, the word a desperate plea. Isaac made some noise that was halfway between a laugh and a snarl, grabbed for Theroen’s hair, and by it threw him across the room. The back of Theroen’s head collided with the marble slabs of the fireplace with a flat, harsh cracking noise, and he felt himself moving as though slipping slowly down an incline.

  He heard more screams now, Lisette’s, over and over, calling his name. Had Naomi’s voice joined in with hers? Theroen couldn’t tell. It seemed difficult to think. Difficult to breathe. There was the clink of chains, but it was all so dim, so quiet, so distant. Could he hear other footsteps? He thought perhaps the room was flooding with vampires, disciples who had been waiting only for a command from Isaac.

  Theroen wanted to move, wanted to help his beloved, but he could not seem to gain control of his limbs, and everything had grown so dark. He slipped into this world of darkness, where nothing seemed to matter, and everything felt safe.

  * * *

  The blow would have shattered a mortal man’s skull and sprayed its interior contents out across the marble. Theroen, no longer a mortal man, was left with nothing more than an hour of unconsciousness and a splitting headache upon awakening. An hour, though, was too much time. Too much time by far.

  Lisette was gone. Naomi was gone. The apartment was dark, empty, abandoned; little more than shattered furniture and scrape marks against the walls were left to tell the story of what had happened. Theroen fled from it, stumbling through the pa
in in his head out into the night, into darkness. There was no sign of the other vampires, no clue to where they had gone.

  Theroen shut his eyes, trying to concentrate through the throbbing, trying to feel Lisette’s presence, as she had taught him to do. There was nothing for him, nothing but the echo of her words, over and over again, in time with the waves of pain and nausea. Darkness, my love. All I see for us is darkness.

  Sick, frightened and helpless, Theroen felt his legs buckle, felt the hard cobblestones cut his knees, felt hot tears scald his face. He put his hands there, covering his eyes, and knelt in penitence, praying for salvation to a God in whom he no longer truly believed.

  * * *

  Theroen was silent, reflecting, lost in his memories. He had recounted this final part of the tale in a voice that was listless, almost dead. Two understood. With pain came emotional detachment. It was a survival instinct, and one with which her days with Darren had made her quite familiar.

  She felt vaguely ill. She knew where all this led. There was no redemption. There was only three hundred and fifty years of darkness, followed by her arrival, which in turn had become the catalyst for events that seemed likely to end with more blood, more death, more despair.

  “Not your fault, Two. Mine. Death and rebirth. With you I can be free, but as with anything else, there is a price I must pay first.”

  “How does this story end, Theroen?”

  “I do not know. It is still ongoing. I can tell you how Lisette’s chapter ended, though not in great detail. I know from Abraham’s network of contacts that Lisette was burned alive, chained to a pillar with brush heaped around her. Of Naomi, I know not. The stories are confused … conflicting. Some said she died with her mistress. Some said she was able to escape, to flee into the night. I desperately hope for the latter, but I hold little faith in it. In either case, I could never bring myself to track down the truth. It would have been painful enough to learn for sure that she was dead, and I fear that the judgment in her eyes, should she be alive, would be even more unbearable.”

  “And what happened to you? To Isaac?”

  “To me? You know the answer there. Lisette was gone. Naomi was gone. Isaac was more powerful than anything I had previously known, save Abraham.

  “And so it was Abraham that I turned to.”

  * * *

  Theroen had not stood in front of the large stone dwelling that housed his father in nearly half a century. He could feel Abraham here and, as ever, that presence disgusted him. The throbbing in his head was distant now; it had faded away to an echo of pain over the course of the lengthy walk. His sire’s mansion loomed before him, Golgotha, the place of death.

  Summing up his courage, Theroen walked up the path to the large double doors, rapped once, twice. There was no answer, but he felt the invitation as if on the breeze. Come in, come in. He opened the doors, stepped into the light that burned not for Abraham, but for appearance. Abraham’s quarters would be without light. There, down the hall where the torches lay dark.

  Theroen stood outside the doors to Abraham’s sanctuary, wondering what he might say to this creature whose evil he had abandoned. Wondering what vengeance might be exacted for this betrayal.

  There was a low chuckle from somewhere beyond the doors, and they swung open before him. All inside was blackness, save the embers of a small fire just inside the doorway. When the voice came, it was from the far end of the hall.

  “And so, the prodigal son returns. Come in, Theroen.”

  “Abraham. Father.” Theroen stepped into the darkness, and the doors shut behind him. The elder vampire laughed again.

  “Oh, and now it’s ‘Father,’ is it? How very delicious. Now that the lover is on the slab, and the dream is over, the fledgling returns to his sire.”

  Theroen felt his heart shudder at this. He shut his eyes for a moment, spoke into the darkness. “She is … dead, then?”

  “Surely she must be, no? Isaac is many things, but a procrastinator he is not.”

  “How much do you know? Could you not have stopped it?”

  “Theroen. You never gave me time to teach you! You never wanted to be my son, not after that moment of weakness in the graveyard, after you were accosted by that idiot Leopold. The scrolls speak of many things, and one of them is this: the affairs of others are their own. Certainly, I could have interfered, but these are not my affairs. Your reluctance to be my son has made it so. What concern is any of this to me?”

  “And so you did nothing.”

  Abraham laughed. “My son, my son … why would I do else? Do we share a bond of love, that I would come from on high to rescue your beloved? No. You have spurned me from the first. Now you come to me with accusations. I am not the guilty party, Theroen. You have not earned the right for such salvation.”

  “But it was in your power to grant, as it is within your power to give me revenge.”

  “Many things are within my power. Light a candle, Theroen.”

  Theroen had no matches, and so used a branch from the fire. The light did little for the room, but he could see Abraham’s face now, the heavy eyebrows overshadowing eyes which gleamed with malefic humor. Abraham looked like a wolf as it gazes upon a herd of sheep. Theroen found he preferred the darkness. Abraham seemed to sense this, and the gleam of his eyes was joined by firelight reflecting from his grin.

  “You will never be like me, Theroen.”

  “No, father.”

  “And yet, some part of me is pleased with your return. A deal, Theroen?”

  “Go on.”

  “Be my fledgling. Be my servant. Be what you were supposed to be when I made you. Remain here with me, or wherever I may choose to go, until such time as you are of age. Perhaps in a handful of centuries, you will be ready. Some fledglings never leave their masters. My blood runs in you, though, and you are powerful … or will be.

  “Now, though? Now you are weak, and in need of a master not so easily dispatched.”

  “What do I receive for this service?”

  “Ah. Yes. The deal. My end of our little … bargain. Remain with me here, Theroen, prove your loyalty, and perhaps I will look more kindly upon you. Perhaps I will see your plight with Isaac in more sympathetic light.”

  “Perhaps? It seems an unbalanced arrangement, father.”

  “I do not think, my son, that you are in a position to make any demands at this time. I will assuage your doubts, however. I am many things, and most of those are evil. Wicked. Hateful. I hold no love for any vampire. I hold no respect for the scrolls, short of how I may use them to my advantage. Isaac and I are bound to come into conflict. I know of his foolish politics. He would oust all competition and gain control of London. I could leave, or simply ignore him, but I could be persuaded to take a more … active interest.

  “Serve me now, Theroen, and when that time comes I will give you not only Isaac’s head, but those of his entire line.”

  Theroen was young, still gripped by mortal concepts like revenge. Still able to hate. He felt this hatred now, burning hot like something molten inside of him.

  “Ah, son, such emotion! Isaac has left you alive. Would you not give him the same courtesy?”

  “There is nothing else left for me, without her, but my hate. Isaac took from me everything I had. I would not.”

  “Then we have a deal?”

  “We do, father.”

  There was a moment of quiet as the two vampires surveyed each other. At last, Abraham turned back to whatever lay on the desk, beyond the reach of the light.

  “Put out the candle. There is a room for you in the west wing. I shall call upon you tomorrow.”

  Theroen, as he would for centuries thereafter, did what he was told.

  * * *

  “And that is all there is, or nearly so. I could tell you lies. I could tell you that I worked for goodness, even in Abraham’s service, but that is hardly true. I’ve done many things that humans would consider evil for Abraham, and I regret very few of them, be
yond bringing Melissa and Tori to him. I held my own goodness close. I would not tarnish Lisette’s memory by returning to my former ways.

  “I was hated, greatly, by some for my continued existence after my transgressions with Lisette. Abraham’s power protected me where hers could not, and in time, my own was more than adequate for the task. Of those vampires left that might be capable of bringing about my destruction, none care enough anymore to bother. The old hate is gone.”

  Two stirred, stretched, felt the rush of air through her fingers. She should be freezing, driving in late November with the top down. The only cold she felt was internal.

  “Isaac?” she asked at last.

  “Isaac. Yes, Isaac died badly. I was present for it, but I found that I took little real pleasure in his destruction. A certain … mortal need for revenge was served, but after that I had before me only endless years as Abraham’s servant.

  “Lisette’s words proved true, though. Isaac knew fear. He knew his weakness, and he died in shame. Abraham had him bound and gagged, hung upside-down, so the blood would go to his head and keep him alive while his skin was flayed from his body and he was unmanned and disemboweled.

  “Abraham brought out his children, his fledglings. Isaac had three of them. And in front of him, while he wept, Abraham cut their heads from their bodies and burned them to ash. I was not sorry. All three had taken part in Lisette’s abduction.

  “At the end, when Abraham removed his gag, Isaac could not even speak coherently. Terror, sorrow, and pain had combined to rob him of his senses. He wept and pleaded, some of the words in the vampire language that Abraham has never allowed me to learn, and Abraham did him a favor and cut his head from his body.”