The Blood That Bonds (9 page)

Two sobbed once, got control of herself,
looked again at Melissa.

“
Can I have my
clothes?”

“
Huh? Oh, yeah. Sure.”
Melissa handed them to Two, who pulled them on underneath the
covers.

“
Sorry,” Two said. She
fought against the pain, sat up, forehead rested against her palms,
elbows against her knees.

“
It’s okay. I guess it’s
weird, having some chick you’ve never met staring at you while
you’re all sick and naked and everything.”

Two laughed a little, wiped tears from her
eyes.

“
What kind of drug?”
Melissa asked. There was a faint accent to her voice. Two couldn’t
place it.

Two did not look up. “Can’t you read it?
It’s sort of been on my mind.”

“
I’m not like Theroen. I
mean, I might be someday, but not now. His powers are way beyond
mine. I just pick up things once in a while.”

“
Heroin.”

“
Oh, ouch. That’s not good.
I mean … you know. Pot, E, maybe even a little coke, sure. But
Heroin’s bad shit.”

Two shuddered, looked up at Melissa, eyes
watery.

“
No kidding.” Her voice was
a hoarse whisper.

“
Hey, hey … sorry,” Melissa
said, that expression of concern coming to her features again. “I’m
not trying to be rude. Seriously. I’m a little scatterbrained right
now myself. Always like this when I oversleep, and the girl last
night had
so much
wine in her.”

Two raised her eyebrows, confused.

Melissa rolled her eyes. “And now I’m
rambling. I can’t control it. I’m sorry. Can I do anything to help
you?”

Theroen was right; Two did like Melissa. She
was the polar opposite of the calm, collected vampire who’d brought
Two to this world, but Two liked her just the same. She smiled,
trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice.

“
Unless you’ve got a fix in
that purse, I don’t know if there’s much you can do.”

Melissa shook her head, her expression
almost sad, as if it was indeed a travesty that she was not
carrying the drug.

“
No. Just some makeup and
Kleenex and,” she looked around as if confirming that no one was
listening, “maybe some weed.”

Two laughed, wincing at the pain this
brought. A vampire carrying ganja. Wonders never ceased. Melissa
grinned as well, maybe seeing the humor, maybe just happy to see
Two smile.

“
You can smoke that?” Two
asked.

“
Sure.”

“
And it’s, like, the same
as for a human?”

“
Beats me. It does
something, though. Everything does. What we find palatable, though,
may differ a lot from humans. I think heroin would probably be too
much for me.”

“
When Theroen, uh … started
me, he said that it made him really sick, just getting it from my
blood.”

“
Theroen’s a wuss!” Melissa
laughed. “I mean, I’m sure it did … and if it was that bad for him
I’m sure it’d be awful for me, too. But he’s also pretty picky. He
doesn’t even like it when there’s a little alcohol in the mix. Just
all that serious ‘no, only blood, nothing else’ stuff.”

“
Maybe that’s not such a
bad thing?”

“
Maybe. I don’t know. Does
it matter?”

“
How old are you, Melissa?
How old is Theroen?”

“
Ooh, hmmm,” she mused, “I
don’t know. He might want to tell you that himself.”

“
What about you,
then?”

“
One hundred and forty
eight … and three days. Or twenty-two, depending on how you look at
it.”

“
You don’t look a day over
one-twenty.”

Melissa laughed, and then looked again in
concern as Two doubled over. Hot and cold flashes were running
through her, and she was bathed in a cold sweat.

“
Oh, fuck. I think I’m
going to puke.”

“
Are you sure there’s
nothing I can do?”

“
Theroen’s blood stops it.
I don’t know. Would yours?” Two spoke slowly, through clenched
teeth, trying to fight against the sudden onset of
nausea.

Melissa shrugged. “Beats me. Worth a shot. I
don’t mind. I probably shouldn’t let you just go at my neck or
whatever, though.”

“
Theroen bit his
finger.”

“
Sure.” Melissa’s teeth
made a tiny clicking sound, like the noise of a stapler, and she
held her finger out to Two, blood welling up from two tears in the
skin. “Hurry up, before it heals.”

Two looked up at her. “Sorry. This is some
fucked up, bizarre shit.”

“
Live a hundred and fifty
years, and you’ll see things that make this seem pretty tame. Do
it, if you think it’ll help you. I don’t mind.”

Two put her lips on Melissa’s finger and let
the blood roll on to her tongue. The effect of the blood was
immediate, energizing her, and it was all she could do not to clamp
down with her teeth. Melissa seemed to sense this, and grinned.
“Yummy. Vampire blood is awesome. Hard to get, though.”

Two swallowed twice, forced herself to pull
away. Her nausea disappeared, along with the cold sweat and the
chills. Some of the pain remained, still, but it was distant.

“
Better?” Melissa asked,
and Two nodded.

“
Yes. Not perfect, but much
better. Thank you.”

Melissa licked the last few drops of her
blood off her fingers and smiled. “No problem. What’s your
name?”

“
Two.”

“
Like the
number?”

“
Yes, like the
number.”

Melissa laughed and clapped her hands.
“That’s so cool! That’s much better than Jennifer or Betty or
Melissa.”

Two shrugged. “I guess?”

“
People with cool names
never appreciate them. Now then. What you need is a bath. That’ll
take your mind off of this withdrawal stuff until Theroen gets
back, and then I’m sure he’ll know what to do.”

Two crossed her arms, scratched her
shoulders. A bath sounded wonderful.

“
You can use mine. The one
in here sucks. Theroen doesn’t know anything.” Melissa helped her
up. Two stood on shaky legs, looked around, took a
breath.

“
How far is it?”

“
Not far. Can you walk a
bit?”

Two nodded. Melissa went to the door, opened
it, held it for her. In the hallway, the vampire took the lead, and
Two followed.

* * *

The bath was heaven on earth. Giant marble
slabs, green and black and grey patterns tracing themselves out
across what seemed, at first, to be miles of stone. The basin had
to be twelve feet long, three feet deep. Sitting straight up, Two
saw, the water could easily have covered her head. The faucet was
enormous. The water steamed as Melissa turned it on.

“
I like flowers. Do you
like flowers?”

Two had no idea what Melissa meant. She
shrugged. “Sure?”

“
In the bath,
silly.”

“
Oh.” Two honestly didn’t
know. She’d never tried it. “Why not?”

Melissa laughed, took a basket from the
shelf above, dropped hundreds upon hundreds of blossoms into the
bath water. Their fragrance filled the room immediately, cherry
blossoms, rose petals, the sweet smell of citrus.

Melissa lit candles, turned off the lights,
stood in front of Two, unbuttoned her blouse. Two shrugged it off.
Melissa’s blood seemed to have imbued her with a sense of great
calm, and Two found herself unconcerned about being naked in front
of the vampire girl. Melissa, for her part, seemed entirely
unfazed. She helped Two out of the rest of her garments, held her
arm out for balance as Two climbed the steps to the bath and
stepped in. Two descended into the petals, felt the warmth embrace
her, and sighed. Melissa sat on the step, played with the water at
her fingertips, smiled at Two.

“
Good?”

“
Oh, yes.”

Melissa handed her a gigantic sponge, craggy
and twisted and obviously natural, and some sort of perfumed bath
lotion. Two cleaned herself slowly. Melissa chattered, behind her
and to the right, about all sorts of things. New pop music she was
enamored with, the wonderful lights and throbbing beats of the
raves she attended, the new interpretation of Shakespeare running
on Broadway. Her tastes were more varied than anyone Two had met.
She kept the conversation casual.

Eventually, Two was as clean as she was
going to get. She lingered, relaxed, the withdrawal back in some
dark corner, brooding, not yet ready to return. Melissa ran water,
filled a clay jug, ancient glaze cracked along its contours, and
wet Two’s hair. Two leaned back, eyes closed, as Melissa’s fingers
worked shampoo through her blonde curls. It was like a supernatural
visit to a salon, Two reflected, and laughed slightly. Melissa
seemed to catch this thought, and smiled as well.

She helped Two from the bath, dried her,
helped her choose perfumes Theroen might like, helped her dress in
a long, flowing gown. Green, like her eyes. It was a bit too long,
but otherwise fit well.

“
He’ll say he prefers
black, if you ask him, but he’s just buying into the whole vampire
thing. You look like a goddess, and he’ll know it.”

Two looked at herself in
the mirror, amazed at the change. White skin, green dress, green
eyes, golden hair. The gown was of an older style,
décolleté
, leaving little
to the imagination, pushing her breasts upward and making them seem
fuller. She looked like a lady at court. Two smiled, giggled like a
little girl, touched her own hair as if not believing. In her
nineteen years, she had never seen herself like this. Two had
always understood that she possessed some level of beauty, and knew
also that the vampirism was enhancing this even more, but still
would never have believed she could look like this.

Behind her stood Melissa, still in her
simple jeans and blouse and yet radiating supernatural beauty as
well. Smiling, she touched Two’s neck, and Two turned. A small,
sweet kiss on the lips, and Melissa peered into her eyes,
beaming.

“
Soon we’ll be sisters! Or
nearly enough. You and Theroen will be together, and we can all
hunt and live and see and do! Won’t it be wonderful?”

Two thought it might, indeed.

* * *

“
I don’t care for all of
this antique crap.”

Melissa’s directness, something Two realized
now was as innate to her as Theroen’s composure was to him, was
sometimes surprising. Two raised her eyebrows.

“
No?”

They were sitting on the back terrace,
looking out at the woods. The moon was huge tonight, reaching the
bloated, red fullness she had seen promised not three nights ago.
It hung low over the sky. The night was still young. Two’s earlier
pain had made the time seem much longer than it had actually
been.

“
No. It’s pointless.
Abraham buys the stuff without any thought, at least that I can
tell. Mostly he doesn’t even do the buying. Theroen does, though
Theroen
detests
a
lot of it. That might be what Abraham has him doing tonight. Or it
might be that he’s retrieving dinner for Abraham. He doesn’t hunt
for himself anymore, you know, just relies on Theroen. Doesn’t even
have to drink more than every once in a while. I think maybe the
little blood he took from you, like you said? That might have woken
up the thirst.”

“
How does Theroen feel
about bringing him victims?”

“
Better than about buying
him stupid furniture.” Melissa’s eyes gleamed. She
grinned.

“
It doesn’t bother him,
then? Picking out a life to take like he was going to the grocery
store?”

Melissa looked at Two, shook her head,
smiling.

“
That’s not how it is … not
for Theroen or even for me. We don’t have to kill, anymore. We
don’t need that much blood. Abraham kills because he likes to,
that’s all.

“
But even if we still had
to … you don’t understand. You were asleep for the only real drink
you’ve ever had. You don’t know how it is yet. You think a couple
of drops from a finger are good? Wait until you’re a full
vampire.”

Two remembered the taste of Melissa’s blood,
of Theroen’s, of her own. It had been sweet on her lips, hot and
powerful. It had left her breathless.

“
You have to kill at the
start. You won’t be able to stop yourself, but you get over it,”
Melissa continued. “Mortals die all the time. That’s what makes
them so beautiful. They get all into their art and their music and
their careers and everything, and then they get old and die. Or
they die young. If we don’t bring them death, something else will,
some other time. We are predators among them. And most of them? In
that last instant before death? Most of them love us.”

Two shook her head, not in disagreement but
confusion. It all seemed deceptively easy. It all seemed so right,
and yet here she was sitting with a young woman talking casually
about the slaughter of human beings.

“
You’re only half. When he
makes you full, Two, these things won’t concern you. Or at least, I
doubt they will. Not past the first kill.”

“
You said we’d be sisters.
Did Theroen make you, then?”

Melissa laughed, not at Two’s ignorance, but
at the idea itself, as if the very thought were absurd.