"Why would I refuse it?"
I closed my eyes. "You didn't want to live at all, only a short while ago. "
She nodded. "I suffered this illness for the sake of my family. The weakness, the dizziness, the sick feeling in my stomach - all of it. Now that they're gone, I see no reason to go on suffering, when only death awaits me at its end. But if I could be well, if I could be cured, and. . . and if I could be with you. . . " She nodded firmly. "I would not refuse the cure. "
"You very well might," I said. "But that's for later. Later, 'Beta. If you refuse the cure, you must stay with me until your mortal life ends. And if you take it, you must stay with me forever, for that is how long you will live. "
She lifted her head, her eyes not quite believing, and with a trembling hand, she brushed the hair from my forehead. "Does that mean you've decided not to end your own life?"
"If I can share it with you, Elisabeta, perhaps it might be worth going on. "
Tears filled her eyes as she threaded her fingers in my hair.
"I've known you only a few short hours, my prince. And I cannot fathom why a man as glorious as you would want a peasant girl to make you such a promise. But I tell you now, I do make it. I will stay with you, for all my days, be they few or be they countless. And I make that promise without any need for your secrets. I make that promise freely. You owe me nothing in return. No secrets, no cures. It's a promise you cannot buy. "
My heart swelled. It made no sense, I know, for I barely knew the girl, and yet I felt, for the first time in my memory, something warm filling my body besides the freshly drawn blood of a living being. It might have been hope. It might have even been. . . love.
"I'll tell you the cure, Elisabeta. When I wake. "
"Then sleep, my prince. Sleep and I will do the same. "
And so I slept. And she did, too, I believe. It was peaceful, and I was more content than I had ever been. But I worried, deep inside my mind. I feared what her reaction would be when I told her the truth.
That in order to live much longer, she must accept the dark gift that had been forced upon me by a demon who wanted an immortal slave in a time near the dawn of history.
What would she do when I told her what I was? Would she believe me? Would she flee from me in horror and disgust? Or would she embrace me still?
I slept. I slept like the dead. And yet I remained, somehow, impossibly, aware of what went on without my body. I knew when someone entered the cave, a man, who called her name in a voice that was impatient.
"Elisabeta! What do you think you're doing there! By the Gods, girl, who is that man?"
I felt my beloved stir, and tug herself from my arms. "It's not what you think, Uncle. I. . . I nearly fell from the cliffs, and the prince saved my life. He was injured in the effort, and I only -"
"The prince?" The man's voice conveyed both surprise and fear. "Move aside. Let me have a look at him. "
And I felt the man's breath on my face, his hand, rough with calluses, on my chest as he felt for signs of life.
"He asked me to stay with him until he wakes. "
"Oh, he won't be waking, girl. He's dead. The prince is dead, God help us all. "
Chapter Eight
Elisabeta wept. I felt her pain washing through me and I heard her tears, every one of them, as they spilled to the stone floor, and onto my body. "He cannot be dead," she cried. "He cannot be. "
"Stop. Don't act that way. Lord above us, what will the villagers think?"
"I don't care!" she cried. "I don't care!"
God, why did the old fool have to come? She would have rested by my side until I woke at sundown.
She would have been all right. But now -
"Where are you going, girl? What do you think you're about?"
She called back, from somewhere farther away. "If he's gone, then I'm going with him. I don't want to live!"
If the bastard let her fling herself from those cliffs, I vowed in helpless silence and impotent rage, I would kill him when I woke. I would!
I heard his footsteps pounding on the stone, and then I heard no more. And with her absence, the day sleep closed in and claimed the consciousness to which I had clung.
I knew no more until nightfall, when energy and life seeped back into me as it did at sunset every night.
My veins sang, my skin tingled, my lungs filled with their first breath in many hours, and my eyes opened.
She lay across my chest, weeping. "Why? Oh, cruel fate, why? Why did you give me hope only to tear it away from me again? Why did you give me love only to replace it with pain deeper than any I'd felt before. Why?"
My shirt was wet with her tears. I felt their warmth on my skin. And only then did I realize we were no longer in the cave. We were in my so-called father's private chapel.
I lay on a bier surrounded by candles. No coffin. No flowers, not yet. Had the king been told of my condition I'd have no doubt been safe in my own rooms by now, awaiting my nightly resurrection - he'd seen me in a deathlike slumber before, and knew I would return. How he explained it to himself, I know not. I only know he loved me as a son and trusted me.
But since I was here, he must still be away, on the secretive journey he'd undertaken a day earlier.
She was here, though. My beloved Elisabeta. And I couldn't bear to see her cry. I lifted my hand and stroked her hair.
She shot up from where she'd lain upon my chest, gazing down at me with eyes wider than the moon. "
Prin meu? My prince?"
"Do not weep, child. I'm not dead. I was. . . I was only sleeping. "
"You were cold!"
I nodded, gathering my wits about me, sitting up slowly. "Don't be afraid. This. . . Elisabeta, this is part of the secret I promised to share with you. " I lowered my head, cursing myself for a fool. Was I truly about to trust this stranger with my life?
Yes. I was - she was no stranger and I knew it by then. "By day I rest, and in my rest, I seem to all the world like a dead man. But I am not. "
"Then. . . what are you?"
"A man. A lonely man, who will live forever. A prince in need of a princess, Elisabeta. I am immortal. I am. . . "
"Undead," she whispered.
Chapter Nine
The horror in her eyes was like a blade to my heart as she stumbled backward, away from me. One hand pressed to her heart, but she moved it all at once, to press her fingertips to her throat, where I had tasted her.
"You. . . you. . . "
"I am the same man you met last night. No more. No less. You have nothing to fear from me, Elisabeta. "
"Nothing to fear? How can you say that?" She stared at the polished onyx floor as she backed away from me. Her feet, bare last night, were clad in thin slippers now, worn, their color faded. The dress she wore was different, as well, a dark purple linen garment, beneath a threadbare black cloak with a hood that hung from her shoulders. "You are a demon. A monster. "
I flinched and told myself not to let the words hurt me. She didn't understand. She was afraid. "I am no monster. I'm a man, I tell you. " I swung my legs from the bier, let them hang over the side. "Won't you listen to me? Let me explain?"
She brought her head up, fixing her gleaming black eyes on mine. "You told me you knew a cure for the ailment that is killing me. What could be more monstrous than to lie to me about my very life? My very. . . death?" She shuddered on the final word.
"You didn't have any fear of death last night, Elisabeta. What's changed?"
"You gave me hope. False hope. "
She whirled to run from the small, stone chapel, but by then my strength was with me again, every injury from the day before healed, and the power of the night surging in my veins.
I lunged after her, moving faster than her eyes could have hoped to follow. To her, it seemed I simply appeared in front of her to block her escape. And even as she tried to stop shor
t, and fell instead, against my chest, I caught her shoulders and held her tight. She tugged against me and shrieked, "Let me go!"
"It wasn't false hope. I can help you. I can save you. " I shook her. "Do you hear me? I can!"
Her struggles ceased. She stared up at me with huge eyes, finally, it seemed, hearing my words. Pale and frightened, close to fainting, I guessed, from the excitement, she searched my face and whispered,
"How?"
"Then you're ready to listen to me? Finally?"
She blinked twice, and after a moment, nodded. "I'll listen. I suppose if you intended to kill me you could have done so last night. "
"I could. But I would not rob the world of such a gift. " I looked around the chapel. "Does anyone know you're here?"
"No, I -" She bit her lip as if she regretted the admission, but then seeing no need of pretense, she went on. "I snuck in. I. . . I wanted to see you. They said you were dead. "
"But you know now that I was only sleeping, as we all must by day. By night, my energy is boundless. "
Her brows bent together. "I am much the same - though my energy is never boundless, it is greater at night. "
"Oh, Elisabeta, we are more the same than you could begin to imagine. Come, let us leave this place and go where we can talk comfortably. " I took her arm, but she resisted. I looked again into her eyes.
"You felt something for me last night, 'Beta. Now you feel only fear. Which of the two is more real?
Which do you trust?"
Chapter Ten
She never answered the question, but she came with me. I led her through the stone chapel to a small door in the back.
"What of the servants who placed you here?" she asked. "If they return to check on you, they'll be shocked to find you gone. "
"They will not return to check on me. They've heard too many rumors. They fear me. "
She lowered her head as we exited and moved through the night. I led her to the meadow, where my stallion grazed alone.
"He grazes by night?" she whispered. "While the others are all penned up in their stalls?"
"By my command. If I'm about by night, it's logical my mount should be, as well. "
"It only stirs more gossip," she told me.
"My very existence stirs gossip," I said with a sigh. "I should leave this place. "
"Why haven't you?"
I sent a thought to my horse, and whispered, "Come, Soare. " He swung his head toward me, shook his mane, then galloped across the meadow, stopping beside me. I leapt upon his back, and reached down for her.
"Soare," she repeated. "Sun. A strange name for a horse as black as midnight. "
"Not so strange to me. " I took her hand and pulled her up, settling her in front of me.
"No stranger, I suppose, than a horse who wears no saddle, bears no reins. "
"I don't need them to direct him. "
"He seems, almost, to hear your thoughts. "
"He does. You can, too. " I gazed down at her as Soare carried us away, and I thought, You are beautiful, Elisabeta.
She gasped and stared up at me in surprise.
"You see? It's not all bad, being as I am. "
"Then it's true. You are what they say you are? Undead? Vampyre? "
"That's what some call what I am. But it tells you nothing about what I truly am, 'Beta. It tells you nothing about me, " I said, thudding a fist to my heart.
"Then tell me. Tell me about you, my prince. Tell me why you stay here, when you are so very unhappy, and when the villagers speak of you only in fear-filled whispers. Tell me that above all else. "
I nodded, and guided Soare with my thoughts, to take us over the twisting path through the forest. "I came here because it was once my homeland. I truly am a prince of this place, you see. But the gossips have one bit right. The king is not my father. I am, in fact, one of his forebears. "
"It's beyond belief. "
I nodded. It was, to most. "I used my powers and my strength to convince the king that I was his son, when in truth his son died in battle several years before my arrival. "
"How could you convince the king to believe such a thing?"
The way her body rested against mine gave me a feeling of warmth I had seldom known, and I relished it. She wasn't afraid. Not yet. "I can. . . control the thoughts and minds of many. "
She lifted her gaze. "Mine?"
"I've no wish to try, 'Beta. Never fear. "
She smiled. "Go on with your story. "
I nodded and went on. "You see, there is a woman. An immortal, like me, who has certain gifts of. . . prophecy. Necromancy. Divination. "
"What is her name?"
"Rhianikki. Or it was. She changes it from time to time. She was a princess and priestess of Egypt. One who accepted the gift when I offered it to her. "
"So you're here because of a woman. "
"Because of what that woman told me. What she saw in my future. She told me I would find my soul's true love, here in this place. That's why I've stayed. But until I saw you, on the cliffs last night, I had given up hope. "
Her face went as still as stone. "You mean. . . you believe it's me?"
Chapter Eleven
"I'm going to let you be the judge of that," I told her. "Once you've heard my story. "
I bade Soarse halt, then slid from the stallion's back, and helped Elisabeta to the ground, as well. We were in a tiny wildflower-strewn clearing, surrounded by trees on three sides, and the river on the fourth.
A deer stood nearby, nibbling red clover blossoms, unafraid.
"I was ill as you are now, weak and growing weaker. I was thirty years old, at the time. And one night I was simply taken from my bed by a man as strong as ten men should have been. He took me to his home, a crumbling ruin of a castle, and there he. . . well, he made me into what he was. "
She stood looking up at me, her hands still resting on my shoulders. "How?"
"I don't want to frighten you with such -"
"How?" she asked again.
Yes. She needed to know, all of it. "He sank his teeth into my neck, right here. " I touched her neck. "It wasn't painful, as you know. But he didn't merely taste me in passion, as I did with you last night. He drank from me until I was all but drained. And then he made me drink from him. And I did. "
A soft gasp was her only reaction.
"When it was done, I slept as if dead. I thought myself to be dead as I drifted into that slumber, for it was far deeper than any sleep I had ever known. And when I woke. . . I was changed. "
Her face was pale in the darkness. She seemed afraid and yet eager to hear all I had to tell her.
"Changed in what ways? Did you feel differently? Look differently?"
I nodded. "My senses were heightened to a point where it was nearly unbearable at first. Every touch was magnified a thousand times, and more so with every year I live. Be it pain. . . or pleasure. "
"Oh. " She averted her eyes.
"My hearing was acute. My eyesight, like an eagle's. My weakness - gone and replaced by a strength such as no human being has ever known. I can run too fast to be seen by mortal eyes. I can leap, to the top of this tree if I wish it. I can listen to the thoughts of humans, and other immortals, as well, and speak to them and. . . there's so much, 'Beta. So much. I'm immortal, ever young, ever strong. "
She nodded slowly, turning to pace away from me, and then sitting in the grasses and flowers. I moved to sit beside her. "You make it all sound wonderful. "
"It is. . . or, it could be. "
"Then why had you decided to take your own life last night?"
I looked at her sharply. "You are too insightful for me," I told her. "But you're correct, there are. . . drawbacks to living this life. I can never see the sun again. It would burn me to cinders. "
"Then. . . you can die?"
"Everything can die. I think in time, ev
erything does. I can die, from the sunlight, or by fire. An open flame is a dangerous thing to a man like me. A cut, even a minor one, could cause me to bleed to death.
And pain for me is. . . it's excruciating. "
"I see. "
"But worse than all of those things is the loneliness. When you live so long, Elisabeta, everything you know dies before you. Kingdoms come and go. Ways of life, entire civilizations pass out of existence, and yet, you go on. "
"Searching," she whispered. "For someone to share it with. "
"Yes. Exactly that. "
Chapter Twelve
"How old are you," she whispered.
I lowered my head. "I have lived more than four thousand years. "
She blinked and nodded slowly. "And what about. . . what about what they say about you. That you have to drink the blood of virgins to survive?"
I met her eyes, smiling slightly. "Living blood. Be it that of virgins or sheep. And I don't need to kill in order to feed, little 'Beta. I tasted of your blood last night - only a sip. And yet you live. "
She lowered her eyes from mine. "It was a sensation I. . . I never. . . "
"I know. I felt it, too. " I stroked her golden hair, remembering, my blood heating, my hunger growing.
"Is it always like that?"
"No. At first I didn't know why the sensations of blood sharing were so exaggerated with you. But I think I understand now. "
"Then make me understand. "
I nodded. "Most humans cannot become what I am, Elisabeta. Only a select few. It's something about the blood, something different, and unique. Among my kind we call those unique ones The Chosen. We sense them, are drawn to them inexplicably and irresistibly. There is a powerful attraction between the Undead and The Chosen. "
"On both sides?"
"Yes," I whispered, my fingertips stroking her cheek.
"And what of my illness? We share that, as well?"
I nodded. "The Chosen always grow weak and sick. They die young unless they are changed. For you, death is near - few months, perhaps weeks away. I don't want to let it take you. "
"I don't know," she whispered. "I don't know if I can bear to live a life such as you've described to me. I don't know if I can. . . "
"Let me show you how it can be, between us. Let me show you, Elisabeta. Only then can you decide. "
"I. . . " She looked up at me, afraid and yet curious, and aching for something she did not understand.
"Let me make love to you, 'Beta. "
"I want that so much. But - you won't change me?"