Eternal Shadows (5 page)

“Maybe because you like it less you need to give in less?”

She seemed to want to console me. I wondered what my expression looked like. I felt like being sick. “That seems a valid argument.”

“So maybe I can get away with never killing.”

“I will hope that’s true for you. Like I said, the hunt will quell the lust, but only if you give in and go. Ignoring the urges could have dire consequences. If you drive yourself to the edge and fall off, you’ll be even
unhappier with yourself.”

I had a sudden vision of myself on a killing spree, bloody humans cast all about my feet. I didn’t want that. But how did I stop myself? Kill once a month like Millie? I didn’t like that idea, either.

“You’ll especially want to be careful if you take on a feeder. You wouldn’t want to kill him or her accidentally because you let yourself go too long.”

“A feeder?”

One perfectly plucked eyebrow rose up until it practically hit her hairline. “Rhys hasn’t mentioned this to you yet?”

I was suddenly resentful, though I had no way of knowing if I would even like this concept of a feeder. “No, he failed to mention any such thing.”

Millie rose from my bed and held out her hand. “Well then, let’s go for a little walk.”

Chapter Three: Instinct

I stared at her hand like it contained the plague. A plague I had already contracted, but a plague, nonetheless. I got off my bed without her help. “Where are we going?”

She smiled, all sweetness and innocence. “You’ll see.”

Ugh. I stayed right where I was as she turned and headed out the door, my attention drawn to the silver box that contained my father’s ashes. Playing nice with the vampires who had murdered my father and stolen my life was not at the top of my To-Do-List, and while Millie seemed nice enough, all the talk of hunting and killing had squashed what little illusion of normalcy I had almost cooked up for myself.

Unfortunately I also had this damnable natural curiosity. Millie had been just non-threatening enough that I found myself giving into my boredom and inquisitiveness. I grumbled and stomped my way after her, making sure my unhappiness about the entire situation was clear.

Millie just smiled at me and tucked her short blonde hair behind one ear as she glided down the hall. “Is there anything I could tell you to put you more at ease?”

The question came to me instantly. “Did you choose this?”

“Being a vampire?” She didn’t seem all that surprised. “Madge chose it. After she had been turned she approached me and offered the same. I couldn’t imagine life without my sister.”

“So that’s a yes.”

“I suppose it is. Though I admit, I didn’t give myself much time to really think it through. So at the same time, it’s a bit of a no.”

I felt only a bit better. “Is anyone ever given a choice?

“Well, considering the fact that we guard the secret of our existence very closely, the answer to that is, very rarely. If a person was given the choice, then chose against becoming one of us, we would risk exposure.” She had led the way down the second floor hallway and stopped now in front of one of the three guest rooms in my old house. “However, there are exceptions to every rule, and there are humans who know of us and live amongst us.”

She pushed open the door without a sound. When, and why, had they taken care of all the squeaking that went on in this house? I never would have thought vampires had a thing for perfectly oiled hinges.

I had always called this the White Room, seeing as how it had been decorated predominantly in white. All the guestrooms were like that—color themed. The white remained, but it seemed Millie had moved in most fully. A colorful quilt I didn’t recognize had been draped across the bed, and black and white pictures of people I had never seen before adorned the dresser and vanity. Remembering my earlier musing, I crept in and picked up the closest one. Clearly from the twenties, Millie and Madge stood in front of what must have been a skyscraper, dressed in the highest fashion. They wore smiles and kicked up their feet. Interesting. The next frame held something more like what I had expected. A group of people, men and women, ranging in age from the very young—an infant was held by a woman sitting in front—to the elderly. I could see Mille and Madge at the center, their hair long, hanging past their shoulders. Instead of steel buildings, a small country home served as the backdrop. No one smiled.

“My family,” Millie said, looking over my shoulder.

“Why didn’t anyone smile back then?”

She laughed. “We didn’t have the benefit of seeing the picture before it was developed. And we had to stay very still.” Gently, she lifted the frame from my hand and set it back. “I will gladly show you my pictures at another time. Right now, what I want you to see is over here.”

She took my hand and turned me, and the first thing I noticed was the smell.

It was intoxicating. I wondered how I hadn’t noticed it before. But then again, I hadn’t been near a human since my turning, aside from the woman outside, and I had been far too distracted by all my other cravings to notice if she had smelled as good. I wanted him.

Tall, with broad shoulders that could have easily been twice my own width. He was the very definition of tall, dark, and handsome. Chiseled features accompanied what was clearly an equally chiseled chest beneath a navy blue tee-shirt. My brain short-circuited.

Millie must have sensed my insane need to lunge at him, because she kept her hand securely wrapped around mine. I knew without testing her strength that I wouldn’t be able to get farther than two or three inches.

“This is Brody,” she said. “My feeder.”

“Uh, nice to meet you.” I wasn’t sure what the correct sentiment would be.

He smiled. His teeth were just as damned perfect as everything else. “The pleasure is mine.”

When no one said anything else, I glanced nervously at Millie. She simply looked at me, like she expected me to ask questions. Where the hell had she found this guy, is what I really wanted to ask. She must have pulled him straight off one of those hot guy calendars. However, since that would have been rude, I came up with something else. “How long have you been Millie’s…” I couldn’t say feeder. It sounded way too twisted.

Brody obviously knew what I meant anyway. “About six years. Since I was twenty-one.”

The length of time surprised me. He’d survived living with all these human-eaters for that long? Millie had managed not to lose control for six long years. Or maybe six wasn’t really so long when you lived forever.

Millie released my hand, trusting I wouldn’t go anywhere, and tucked herself against Brody’s side. “I met him at a bookshop,” she said. “And I knew instantly that he was for me.” She looked up at his face, he was a good head taller than her, and that’s when I saw it.

She loved him. And he loved her.

She was in love with her food. And I was getting really confused. I didn’t say anything, just stared at them dumbly.

Chimes rang through the air again as Millie laughed. She did that a lot. “Oh, Kassandra. You look so utterly perplexed. I simply wanted to show you that feeders are not abused slaves. Brody is quite a good friend to me.”

“Uh huh.”

“Would you like to see how it works?”

“I think I can figure that out for myself, thanks.” No way was I watching her bite him. I had a feeling it would seem all too intimate. Already the hand he had placed on her lower back and slowly lowered little by little was making me squirm with discomfort. It was nice—for them. I didn’t need to be witness.

Suddenly Millie unwound herself from him and took both my hands, pulling me back towards the door. “Let’s continue our walk.” She shimmied me back out into the hall, then, without letting go of one of my hands, ducked back inside for a brief moment. I could smell Brody close by again. She returned, and closed the door with a promise to be back later.

The door muffled his scent a bit, and I chased the thoughts of it away. “Do all humans smell like that?”

“Yes, and no. They all smell a bit differently, so do we, but most humans will smell rather appetizing to you.”

“Great.”

“Like all things, it gets easier with time.”

“You love him.” The words slipped out as I thought them. I glanced over at her, trying to gauge whether or not I had said the wrong thing. I had all sorts of new skills now, but I was sure she knew how to use them far better than I did.

But she didn’t attack. Her eyes took on that same bright look they had had when she looked at Brody. “I suppose I do,” she said.

“Will you turn him?”

“It’s been discussed.”

Anything more didn’t feel like my business, so I let it go.

“Your pictures
,” I said, changing the subject. “Was that New York?”

“Mm
hmmm. I was born in eighteen ninety-eight. And it was nineteen twenty-two when I was turned.”

So many things made sense now. “You were a flapper.”

She shook her head, making her hair swing from side to side. “My hair didn’t give me away?”

“I hadn’t really thought about it until now.” I reached up and began fingering my own brown hair, hanging just past my shoulders and lingering near the
bright-side of being manageably wavy. “Does that mean my hair is stuck like this?”

“Goodness, no. Madge and I simply prefer having our hair this way. Though I will warn you, cutting and growing your hair is a bigger challenge as a vampire.”

“Why is that?”

“Well, strictly speaking we aren’t alive. The more full we are with human blood the easier it is to accomplish human things like growing our hair, but even then it takes much longer.”

Good thing I didn’t have any real plans to cut my hair anytime soon. “So, it’s kind of like the whole body temperature thing? The more blood we drink, the warmer we are?”

“Yes. I’m glad to know Rhys explained at least one thing to you.”

“It was kind of the first thing I noticed,” I admitted, remembering how cold I had been. That memory alone might have proven enough to keep me drinking a steady diet of blood. And then I got curious about something else. “Is Rhys really close to five hundred years old?”

“Yes,” she said, her voice sparkling with amusement. “Do you not believe him?”

“Not exactly, it’s just Madge called him ‘brother’. I was wondering what she meant by that.”

“He’s only our brother in this life. Clearly, we were never human together, but ever since we were turned we’ve been a part of his family.”

“What family?”

“I’ll let Rhys explain that to you.”

I snorted.

“Is something funny?”

“Just the idea that Rhys could explain anything to me.” I spun on my heel and propelled myself down the stairs to the first floor. I had done this very same thing a thousand times—teenage temper and all that—but this time I moved faster than expected. My feet missed the last half-dozen steps and I landed on my butt, knocking my way down to the finely polished wood floor of the front hall.

Millie glided down the steps I had stumbled over and knelt at my side. “Are you all right?”

I was embarrassed as hell. Nothing was worse than falling down the stairs. “Isn’t that a stupid question to ask an immortal?”

She just smiled kindly. “I didn’t mean physically. You’re faster now than you were before.”

“Whatever.” I peeled myself off the floor, surprised at the lack of pain running through my backside. The only thing bruised was my pride. I headed for the kitchen.

We had state-of-the-art everything—a gas stove, flat-top stove, three ovens, one with a rotisserie, and the biggest refrigerator I had ever seen. I loved coming down here in the middle of the night when I couldn’t sleep. I’d spent countless nights on the black and white tiled floor eating chocolate cake, mint ice cream, or anything else I could get my hands on.

I wanted some of that now. Chocolate fixed everything.

Millie’s white flats tapped lightly against the linoleum as she made her way to the island that stood at the center of the room. Folding her arms, she leaned on the black granite counter top.

I went to the giant refrigerator and pulled open the stainless steel door. Amongst the necessities of milk, orange juice, eggs, and butter sat one lone piece of triple chocolate cake. Another of Samantha’s specialties. Almost as good as the brownies.

It didn’t smell as tempting as I remembered. A dark cloud of despair washed over me suddenly. “Do vampires eat food?” I asked, not really wanting to know the answer unless it was yes.

I heard Millie sigh before answering me. “We can. But it doesn’t hold the same pleasure it once did. And our bodies have no real need for it. Most eat in the first months, or even years, but after that they relinquish even that bit of their human past.”

I closed the door and listened to the air hiss out. I wasn’t hungry.

“I know it seems difficult now,” Millie said, “but—”

“Difficult?” I turned to face her. “Difficult? I’d say this is more than difficult! It’s maddening! Ridiculous! Unfair! Unnatural!”

“Kassandra, please don’t—”

Her placating tone made every last nerve I had snap. “Don’t? Don’t what?” I grabbed a bag of chips from the basket on the island and shook it in her face. “Don’t eat chips? I love chips!” I threw the bag at her. “I love cookies and candy and hamburgers and a good turkey dinner, and now what? I can’t have them! And what do I get in return? Blood! Not a fair trade.”

She looked sympathetic, but not nearly enough. “No one ever said it was fair.”

“Then why the hell am I doing this?”

“Because you were chosen.”

“And what if I don’t want to be chosen?”

“It’s too late for that.”

“Well
, that just sucks, doesn’t it?” I slapped the basket of snacks off the counter and headed into the dining room.

A mistake if I ever made one. This was the room where I had tried to warn my father. My breath hitched in my throat. With one simple glance at the high-backed wooden c
hairs that lined the long table dominating the richly decorated room, I thought I would cry.

No way would I let that happen. I translated my tears into more anger.

“Where’s Rhys?”

“He’s busy.” Her voice wasn’t far. She had followed, as I knew she would.

But her answer wasn’t good enough. “Where?” I practically screamed the word.