Status: Sorry! Sorry! Sorry!
Chasing the Night
Quatre
Many years later I learned that I wasn't actually asleep, at least not technically. When humans sleep their pulse slows and their blood pressure decreases. In deep sleep they become paralyzed; completely vulnerable to any malevolent presence. Another thing common in a human's sleep is the presence of dreams. I haven't dreamed in over 600 years. No, I wasn't asleep. My exhausted mind had drifted into a veil of my subconscious. Or the venom had caused my mind to hallucinate. I'm still not quite sure what actually caused my 'vision', for lack of a better word.
This hallucination became the first memory of my new life. I was a little girl, maybe five years old. My red hair was down and shone in the bright yellow sunlight. I was wearing a pale yellow dress that looked almost white in the sun's ray. I was in the same meadow, only the grass looked taller; or I was just smaller. A light breeze blew through the clearing, causing the green grass to brush against my still pale skin. My feet were bare and it must have rained recently because the soil was moist beneath my feet. I assumed it was mid-summer for the sun's heat was an unwelcome guest on my pale skin.
My younger self was skipping playfully through the tall blades of grass. As I danced my dress twirled in small circles. This continued for about a minute before my small self suddenly stopped. Standing in the distance, in the same spot where I was attacked, was a man. His clothes were eloquent; his doublet was a dark blue and made of rich linen. His pants were a shade lighter and he wore knee-high boots that were made of black leather. His raven hair reached down his back and was tied in a loose ponytail. His face was pale, but not a natural pale color like mine. The color wasn't the only strange thing about his skin. The sunshine seemed to be reflecting off his skin, creating small diamonds that sparkled like the stars in the sky. I couldn't decide if he was beautiful because of his features or because everything in my vision, from the dirt-covered-feet to the annoying flies swarming around my face, was beautiful.
I stood there staring at him for a few slow minutes. Then the sunlight started to fade and my younger-self's vision started blur around the edges. Blackness crept into my sight and the last thing I saw was the man lift his hand and give a slow, soft wave. My sight went black and remained that way for an uncertain about of time. When I finally opened my eyes I was no longer in the meadow. At first I thought I was back at Castlenaud but the ceiling I was looking at was too low of an arch and the stone was a white color instead of my home's old rusty color. I was laying on a large bed still in my brown dirty clothes. My arms and legs felt heavy and there was a foreign itch in the back of my throat.
The room was large and rectangular. In front of the bed was a large fireplace centered in the wall. The flames threw ghostly shadows against the stone walls. The only window allowed the night sky to leak into the room. I pushed myself up off the bed; uncertain. Only then did I notice the man sitting in a chair by the corner. It was the same man from my vision. Only now he was dressed in white. "It's about time. I was starting to worry." His voice was sophisticated and had a soft accent that I couldn't place. Now that I saw him in person rather than in my hallucination I decided the man was actually quite handsome but in a unique way. His face didn't look a day over thirty but his eyes, gray with a slight hint of blue, were much older. His eyes had seen things it would multiple lifetimes to recite. An aura of confidence and authority seemed to surround him. The only visual flaw in his appearance was done so by the firelight, which caused his pale skin to look an almost sickly color.
I was confused, but not by the situation but by my own reaction to the situation. Or lack of a reaction. Normally if I was in a room alone with a strange man I would run directly for the door, but now, in that room with that man, I felt no fear or anxiety. I felt comfortable sitting on the bed in my dirty clothes with my matted hair in a room with a man I never met before. The unpleasant thing about the situation was the growing itch in the throat. I would have been fine with just sitting there in silence for all eternity but my curiosity got the best of me. "Who are you?" My voice was even and held a new sense of confidence. The man leaned forward in the chair; causing the flickering light to move across new areas on his face. His mouth stretched into wide smile. "My name is Aro."
The name meant nothing to me; I never heard it before in my life. I remained silent; waiting patiently for him to explain. And explained he did. He answered the easiest question first, our current location. According to him the house we resided in was on the western edge of Paris. After saving me from my attackers he used my horse to make the three day ride to Paris, with me unconscious. I wasn't sure how Aro managed to explain the rest to me so it made sense but somehow he did. If we had the same conversation a few days after my transformation I would be able to recite the entire thing but by that time my senses were running wild. My attention was completely divided between the man named Aro, the smell of wine and burnt wood, the sound of passing horses, the multiple colors woven into the rug on the floor, the nest of spiders settled in the far corner by the door, and the ever-growing itch in my throat.
The attack by the thieves had left me unconscious and badly wounded, with major bleeding to my head. Aro said he had no choice but to change me; it was either change me or let me die, something he said he was unwilling to do. He explained that he was a vampire and that, now, I was too. That the itch in my back of my throat was thirst; thirst for blood. As a kid I heard stories about creatures of the damned killing travelers and other unfortunate people in the night. My mother always said they were just ghost stories to frighten young children. She was wrong; as usual.
My first kill was a fifty-something man who had passed out drunk in a darken alley in the center of Paris. I could taste the alcohol in his warm blood as it travel down my throat. It was messier then I expected. In my haste to put an end to the itch, I ignored the fact that I was getting blood all over my clothes. The itch was replaced with a uncontrollable hyperactivity and my bloody, dirty clothes with a loose fitting grass green dress.
Aro said I extremely hard to control during the first few months. After about a year and a half I was able to be around a human without immediately killing them. But I still couldn't be around large groups; that would take also five years for me to control myself. During my 'learning' period Aro and I shared an isolated farmhouse a few miles from Paris. A year passed before I started to develop feelings towards him. By the time we moved to Italy, seven years after my death, we were fully 'involved'.
This hallucination became the first memory of my new life. I was a little girl, maybe five years old. My red hair was down and shone in the bright yellow sunlight. I was wearing a pale yellow dress that looked almost white in the sun's ray. I was in the same meadow, only the grass looked taller; or I was just smaller. A light breeze blew through the clearing, causing the green grass to brush against my still pale skin. My feet were bare and it must have rained recently because the soil was moist beneath my feet. I assumed it was mid-summer for the sun's heat was an unwelcome guest on my pale skin.
My younger self was skipping playfully through the tall blades of grass. As I danced my dress twirled in small circles. This continued for about a minute before my small self suddenly stopped. Standing in the distance, in the same spot where I was attacked, was a man. His clothes were eloquent; his doublet was a dark blue and made of rich linen. His pants were a shade lighter and he wore knee-high boots that were made of black leather. His raven hair reached down his back and was tied in a loose ponytail. His face was pale, but not a natural pale color like mine. The color wasn't the only strange thing about his skin. The sunshine seemed to be reflecting off his skin, creating small diamonds that sparkled like the stars in the sky. I couldn't decide if he was beautiful because of his features or because everything in my vision, from the dirt-covered-feet to the annoying flies swarming around my face, was beautiful.
I stood there staring at him for a few slow minutes. Then the sunlight started to fade and my younger-self's vision started blur around the edges. Blackness crept into my sight and the last thing I saw was the man lift his hand and give a slow, soft wave. My sight went black and remained that way for an uncertain about of time. When I finally opened my eyes I was no longer in the meadow. At first I thought I was back at Castlenaud but the ceiling I was looking at was too low of an arch and the stone was a white color instead of my home's old rusty color. I was laying on a large bed still in my brown dirty clothes. My arms and legs felt heavy and there was a foreign itch in the back of my throat.
The room was large and rectangular. In front of the bed was a large fireplace centered in the wall. The flames threw ghostly shadows against the stone walls. The only window allowed the night sky to leak into the room. I pushed myself up off the bed; uncertain. Only then did I notice the man sitting in a chair by the corner. It was the same man from my vision. Only now he was dressed in white. "It's about time. I was starting to worry." His voice was sophisticated and had a soft accent that I couldn't place. Now that I saw him in person rather than in my hallucination I decided the man was actually quite handsome but in a unique way. His face didn't look a day over thirty but his eyes, gray with a slight hint of blue, were much older. His eyes had seen things it would multiple lifetimes to recite. An aura of confidence and authority seemed to surround him. The only visual flaw in his appearance was done so by the firelight, which caused his pale skin to look an almost sickly color.
I was confused, but not by the situation but by my own reaction to the situation. Or lack of a reaction. Normally if I was in a room alone with a strange man I would run directly for the door, but now, in that room with that man, I felt no fear or anxiety. I felt comfortable sitting on the bed in my dirty clothes with my matted hair in a room with a man I never met before. The unpleasant thing about the situation was the growing itch in the throat. I would have been fine with just sitting there in silence for all eternity but my curiosity got the best of me. "Who are you?" My voice was even and held a new sense of confidence. The man leaned forward in the chair; causing the flickering light to move across new areas on his face. His mouth stretched into wide smile. "My name is Aro."
The name meant nothing to me; I never heard it before in my life. I remained silent; waiting patiently for him to explain. And explained he did. He answered the easiest question first, our current location. According to him the house we resided in was on the western edge of Paris. After saving me from my attackers he used my horse to make the three day ride to Paris, with me unconscious. I wasn't sure how Aro managed to explain the rest to me so it made sense but somehow he did. If we had the same conversation a few days after my transformation I would be able to recite the entire thing but by that time my senses were running wild. My attention was completely divided between the man named Aro, the smell of wine and burnt wood, the sound of passing horses, the multiple colors woven into the rug on the floor, the nest of spiders settled in the far corner by the door, and the ever-growing itch in my throat.
The attack by the thieves had left me unconscious and badly wounded, with major bleeding to my head. Aro said he had no choice but to change me; it was either change me or let me die, something he said he was unwilling to do. He explained that he was a vampire and that, now, I was too. That the itch in my back of my throat was thirst; thirst for blood. As a kid I heard stories about creatures of the damned killing travelers and other unfortunate people in the night. My mother always said they were just ghost stories to frighten young children. She was wrong; as usual.
My first kill was a fifty-something man who had passed out drunk in a darken alley in the center of Paris. I could taste the alcohol in his warm blood as it travel down my throat. It was messier then I expected. In my haste to put an end to the itch, I ignored the fact that I was getting blood all over my clothes. The itch was replaced with a uncontrollable hyperactivity and my bloody, dirty clothes with a loose fitting grass green dress.
Aro said I extremely hard to control during the first few months. After about a year and a half I was able to be around a human without immediately killing them. But I still couldn't be around large groups; that would take also five years for me to control myself. During my 'learning' period Aro and I shared an isolated farmhouse a few miles from Paris. A year passed before I started to develop feelings towards him. By the time we moved to Italy, seven years after my death, we were fully 'involved'.
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Sorry it took so long....