The Story of the Vampire, L (Completed | Featured )

Part 4 - The Wreckage of his Thighs

Then one evening, Dasius reined up on me, stopping their horse, a lithe hunter, a few meters from where I was walking in the field.

"Conquering hero," I said, whipping the grass as I went with a long weed.

"I'm not trying to impress you," he said, affronted.

"Good, not impressed."

The hunter guttered and huffed. I looked at her, and she was looking at me with one silky black eye. I could see my red hair reflected in it.

"Don't like him either, aye hunter?" I asked. "He looks stupid up there. You're so big and he's not much."

"Will you come with me or not? I am not meant to leave you alone."

"Why, where are you going?" I asked, moving to pet the horse. She had long eyelashes, the same black as her coat, which seemed brushed and looked after. She shuddered her wither under my hand, as if shooing away a pest. "You didn't even saddle her. She won't like it if you're going to ride her hard. You are, aren't you?"

"I'm going to Rouen. Laurent has been out too long." He pushed his hair back from his forehead. He'd loosely bound it in a high chignon. Self-consciously, he smoothed his cotton shirt.

"Look at you, the little nursemaid. He goes out all the time. So what if he's gone a few more hours?" I asked, cooing at the hunter.

Dasius paused a moment, looking at the sky. He tilted his head at me, as if I were an imbecile. "Listen, you daft cow. If I've got the hunter, how the hell did he get to Rouen? Are you understanding now?"

"Oh," I said, offering my weed to his horse. She wouldn't take it.

"Oh. That's right. You have been here a month and you think you know everything there is to know."

"No I don't," I said, looking at him finally, hands at my hips. There was a cool breeze, and it made me feel cold.

"You don't know anything at all. Go back to the house. God forbid some ravager find you. I'll be hung up for it. He will blame me though he's the one who's run off."

"What's he gone for?"

"It's none of your business, is it? You're so clever, figure it out. Go back to the house."

"What do you mean, 'ravager'?"

"Miriam, I don't have the time or will to explain everything there is to you right now. If you want me to, and if I have the means, I will come to your bed later and answer all of your questions." His voice sounded measured, calm, focused.

"Sure. That'll be nice," I said. D'accord. Genial.

"Go home."

So I went home, not knowing what a "ravager" was, and huddled in my bed under the covers in case it was something that wanted to hurt me, listening for every bump and whisper through the grass, because it was the first time I had felt very alone since dying. I would never have noticed such aloneness had he not revealed it to me by warning me about it, and it was long hours before I heard him and Laurent coming, and piercing screaming, such that I had never heard before. It was like a fox imitating a human child's voice, long keening screams which chilled me utterly, so that I pushed myself against the wall.

I heard my name, urgently, and "Help me" and heard, "Don't make me do this!" and another voice, which I knew to be Dasius's, crying out in pain, and the fox cry out in response, as if they were the same flesh, deep and vibrating in my bones. I hid. Dasius has never forgiven me for being a vainglorious coward. I heard, "Let me go, I need my child, my baby," keening, whimpers of pain delivered, and it went on for a very long time. And finally, I felt hands taking me up, and the covers being ripped back, hands at my arms, and Dasius gave me a very hard slap across the face.