jtassinaro

Okey dokey, so here is a little piece I wrote bout vamps and the such. It's the second chapter of a book, it's just shy of 4,000 words. It has a few curses which I starred out, b/c I wasn't sure if this sight does it automatically for you. If it doesn't and I missed one, my apologies.

Like I said it's Chap 2, so a little background: Chap 1 the main character gets attacked by a vamp and passes out at the end of the chap.

Crits and Comments are very much welcomed!

So, here 'tis. Enjoy, I hope.

PS it's in two posts b/c it was too many characters


I wavered in and out of consciousness. Sometimes with great effort I managed to open my eyes and make out the blurry outline of faces above mine. Questions would quickly flood my mind but as soon as they came they left and sleep would overtake me again.

Other times I would awaken to torturous pain. It felt like somebody was taking a hot poker and was swirling it around inside my body. There was something sharp in all my bones trying to dig its way free. My skin itched all over. I tried to move my arms and legs but couldn’t. I could hear metal snapping and someone screaming, maybe it was me, I wasn‘t sure. My hearing would become hypersensitive and the noise was deafening. I’d open my eyes to a blinding light, and quickly shut them again. Then all at once everything would calm, and I’d sink back into merciful blackness.


When I finally regained full consciousness, I was laying on something soft. Slowly I opened my eyes, to stare at the top of a canopy bed. I propped myself up on my elbows expecting a head rush, there was none. Where was I? How did I get here? Slowly memories seeped back into my brain. I had been bitten by that… that… thing. Unthinkingly my hand flew to my teeth. They were still square and flat. I slid my hand down to where I’d been bitten, there was nothing. Had I dreamt everything? Where was I and how had I gotten here?

Somebody or something had found me in the woods, and now I was here. Wherever here was.

I sat up in the bed and looked around. The bed I was in was made up with expensive linens. It was now that I realized that I was laying in silk sheets and they felt so smooth against my naked body. I’d never felt silk like this, every cell of my skin tingled and vibrated as the luxurious material slid over me. I pushed the covers aside and swung my feet over the edge of the bed.

Cautiously I stood up, unsure of how steady I’d be on my feet. To my complete surprise I felt unusually clear headed. My feet immediately sunk into a lavish, plush carpet. There was a black silk robe on hook next to the head of my bed. I quickly put it on, letting out a sigh of pleasure as the luxurious material was once again bathing my skin. I continued to look around the room. Merlot colored walls led up to a white ceiling.

On the wall in front of me there was a large black drape. I walked over to it and pulled it back, immediately shutting my eyes, and lowering my head against the blinding light that streamed into the window. I dropped the shade and opened my eyes again. What the hell was that I thought. It felt like they had a million spot lights trained on that one window.

I continued exploring the room. There were paintings on the wall. Most of them gothic in nature. The one closest to me was of what looked like a furry gargoyle sitting on top of a woman dressed in a white linen nightgown. The woman was either dead or unconscious. The bottom of her torso and her legs were on a bed while the rest of her body dangled lifelessly off of it. The gargoyle sat in the area of woman’s navel with an expressionless stare on its face.

There was a crystal chandelier hanging in the center of the ceiling. Looking at it, I realized it wasn’t turned on, yet the room was fully lit. How that was possible I wasn’t sure. There was no light coming into the room from any windows, no candles on the wall, no source of light anywhere. Why wasn’t it pitch black? I went over to look at the fireplace. It was a beautiful white marble and stone fireplace with a gold grate. To the left of the fireplace was a door that led into a bathroom.

On one of the walls there was a closet and mahogany dresser, both of which were empty. Above the dresser was another painting. This one had a ruby red background and a golden phoenix with wispy golden rays emanating from it. Below it read, “Out of the ashes of death I rise.” Fitting I suppose.

There was a mahogany night stand that matched the dresser on one side of the bed. On the other side was a full length mirror, its border the same mahogany as the dresser and night stand. I walked over to it and my entire body broke out in goose bumps when I saw my reflection. My skin was flawless, void of any scars and even the freckles that once covered my arms. No wait, the birth marks on my neck were still there. They were two dark, large freckles about three centimeters apart right above my carotid artery. As I stood there trying to sort through everything there was a knock at the door

“Elizabeth, may I come in?” a gruff but gentle voice asked from the other side of the door. The voice was somehow calming and soothing and put me at ease right away.

“Yes you may come in,” I said uncertainly, for all I knew I could be inviting in my executioner. The door opened and a man who looked to be in his late forties with salt and pepper hair walked in. He wore black dress pants and a black V-neck sweater. He was tall with a muscular physique and strong facial features. He walked into the room and stopped about five feet in front of me.

“Hello Elizabeth, I am Dagref LaCassin. Welcome to my home.” His sky Blue eyes bore into the back of my skull, I had to look away. “I know you must be feeling very confused right now.” He paused and when I made no effort to respond he continued, “Mortals usually believe that vampires are a myth.” Well duh. Was this man really trying to convince me not only that vampires were real, but that he was one?

“What did you do to me?”

He seemed to ignore my question and kept talking as he walked over to the fireplace, “We are not the blood thirsty killers that you read about in books and see in movies. We kill only what we need to survive.”

I turned and studied myself in the mirror again. Not blood thirsty killers? That guy who broke into my house seemed pretty bloodthirsty.

“We do not turn many mortals anymore, it is a true honor.”

This crap had gone far enough. “Look, I’m not interested in joining an occult. I just want to go home.”

“I know this is difficult to understand but vampires do exist.” Dagref went and sat on the bed. “We have been around for the better part of a thousand years but that you shall learn in due time.”

I didn’t want to hear this anymore, I wanted answers, “How long have I been here?”

“You have been here one week today.”

A week? Mark must be going crazy. Mark. I’d forgotten all about him. “I have to use your phone, I need to call my fiancé.”

“That won‘t be necessary.”

“No, but it really is.”

“He thinks you’re dead. We staged your death.”

“You what?! Staged my death, how?”

“Let’s just say we left evidence that would prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that you died that night. We thought only of your poor, mourning family. This way none of them will have to live out the rest of their days wondering.”

“How dare you? What gives you the right?” My head started to spin and I became light headed. I went and sat back on the bed. Who was he to play God? Everybody thought I was dead. No, this wasn’t right. It was a dream, an extremely bad dream. I’d wake up any second and tell Mark about it, and he’ll laugh and kiss me, and everything will be as it should.

“You do not realize how lucky you are to be alive.” Dagref’s words broke my thoughts.

“I’m sorry I must be hallucinating. I thought I just heard you say that I was lucky.” Dagref spoke after this, but I didn’t pay attention. My mind was reeling now and I felt nauseas. The truth was, even though I didn’t believe in vampires, I always found the whole vampire myth interesting. My parents used to joke that I was a vampire in a past life because I was always up late at night and slept all day, plus the two birthmarks on my neck.

“Dagref?” A different voice broke my thoughts this time. I looked toward the man staning in the doorway. He was tall with spiked, jet black hair. A black tee shirt was pulled tight over his muscular arms and chest, and he wore dark wash denim jeans that looked like they had been painted on. His skin was cream colored, and his deep set eyes sparkled like sky blue diamonds. He had a straight nose, high defined cheek bones and a strong jaw line. I averted my eyes when I realized I was gawking.

“Elizabeth, this is Tanis. He’s your sire. He’ll be showing you around.” Dagref walked towards Tanis. “I have some things to attend to but I‘ll be back later,” he said now speaking to Tanis. With that last sentence Dagref left me alone in the room with Tanis.

“Here Blaze, these are for you,” he said holding out a pile of clothes.

“My name is Elizabeth.”

“No, I don’t like that. I’ll call you Blaze. Like I said these are for you.” He walked over shoved the pile of clothes he carried towards me. “Go put something on. Then you and I are going to talk.”

I was beginning to like him less and less. I grabbed the clothes without saying a word and went into the bathroom.

I stepped into the bathroom, closed the door. It was a long narrow bathroom. A double sink was on the right side of the room. Naked light bulbs sat above a mirror than ran the length of the sink. The counter top was black marble with white swirls going through it. All the fixtures where brushed silver. A waist high wall made of the same black tile as the floor stood on the side of the toilet. On the left wall were brushed silver towel racks that held thick crimson towels. There was also a full length mirror. The claw foot bathtub was against the far wall. The tub was also black with sliver fixtures.

I set the pile of clothes on the sink and let the satin robe slide off my body and onto the floor. I starred in the mirror at my body. Everything was gone save for the birthmarks. Every freckle, every scar, even the tattoo on my hip was gone. It was like my body was wiped clean of my old life and now I had a clean slate for the life I was about to begin. My skin which was usually more olive tone was now cream colored. My arms, legs and abdominal muscles were all toned as if I worked out everyday. I actually looked pretty good for someone who had almost died and then been comatose for a week. The only thing that remained the same was my shoulder length auburn hair, which I now realized was my namesake from Tanis. Although I don’t know why. My hair was reddish, it wasn’t blazing red by any means.

I looked through the pile of clothes, a few different style sweaters, a couple dress pants, some socks and underwear. Every thing was black. I put on a pair black pants and chose a cowl neck three quarter sleeve sweater. The fabric had some give to it and was form fitting, just the way I liked it. The panites were bikini cut, and I preffered thongs. Beggers can't be choosers I guess.

I looked at myself again in the mirror and it finally struck me that I had a reflection. Vampires weren’t supposed to have reflections according to folklore.

“You all right in there?” Tanis asked from the other side of the door.
I opened the door then stood back in front of the mirror and asked, “If I’m a vampire why do I have a reflection?”

Tanis came and stood beside me looking into the mirror also. “It’s a common fallacy. What movies or books have you read about vampires.”

“Huh?”

He let out an exasperated sigh and then repeated the sentence excruciatingly slow, like I was handicapped.

“Nothing really.” I lied, so what. Let him tell me what I needed to know. I wasn’t much in the mood for games.

“Blaze, Blaze, Blaze,” he said shaking his head. “Come here. Come here.” The second time he said it in that high pitched voice that a person uses when speaking to a dog to make something bad sound exciting. Like, “Come on Fito, we’re going to the vet. Come on.” I was not expecting this to be fun.

“Okay, so yes, we have a reflection. No we can’t eat solid food. Yes we can still drink other liquids besides blood. Yes we have a heart beat and occasionally breathe. Umm, anything else you wanna know? I think that covers all the bases?”

I sat there staring at him with my mouth open. That covered all the bases? Was there anything else I wanted to know? Yea, like why am I here? Why didn’t you just leave me in the woods and let the cops find me? What the hell did you do to me that made all my freckles disappear? Why did you stage my death? When can I go home? He was acting as if this was some common thing that I should have been more aware of. I was so angry I was beyond speech.

He must have picked up on it, “Okay um, you know what, I’m going to leave you here to get… you know, acclimated to your surroundings and I’ll be back later.” He got up making wide, what the hell is wrong with her eyes, and started toward the door.

“Wait.” I wasn’t trying to hide the annoyance in my voice. I heard him breathe heavy and his whole body slumped. “Hey this isn’t my fault, you’re the one who sired me. If you weren’t up for all this you could have left me in the woods.”

He turned around and grabbed my wrist, “If I’d known you were going to be this big a pain in the ass I would have. Now come on.” I was speechless so I just gave him the most scathing, incredulous look I could manage.

He started to guide me toward the door, “Where are we going?”

“I can’t deal with females. I’m handing you over to someone else.”

“You are an unbelievable, cocky, arrogant, a******,” I said as I wrenched my wrist out of his grip.

“Aww, thanks Blaze.”

“*** you.” Now I’m not usually one for cursing, but when I’m mad the F-bombs fly. I say it without thinking really. “I don’t know where the hell I am, or what happened to me, and you’re having trouble dealing. Oh, boo-f******-hoo for you.”

Tanis looked me up and down. “You kiss your mom with that mouth?” I cocked my head to the side and gave him a smile, but it wasn’t a friendly one.

“Okay, sit down Blaze,” he said in a sigh of defeat. Point for me.
We walked back over to the bed and sat. I sat as far from him as possible. I didn’t trust myself to sit closer to him, I still wanted to deck him. “Ask away.”

There was no easy way to transition into the conversation, so I didn‘t try. “Did you kill Valcor?” I’m not completely sure why I asked that question first.

Tanis’s face dropped, “No. We were Valcor’s bodyguard.”

“We?”

“Well, there was two of us that night.” He got up and started pacing the floor. “He said he was going off to feed.” He stopped in front of the empty fireplace and stared down at it, “He was gone way longer than usual. We decided to go looking for him. By the time we realized something was wrong, it was too late, Roman‘s men had already killed him. We were trying to find them when we found you.”

“Who’s Roman?”

“Valcor was Dagref’s son. Roman is Dagref’s other son.”

“Why was Roman after his own brother?” This was beginning to sound like a bad soap opera.

“To make a long story short, Roman left the coven many years ago. He said that Dagref favored Valcor over him, and he swore retribution against them both.”

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jtassinaro

“How did you stage my death?”

Tanis looked at me funny, I guess the subject change was too abrupt for him. I didn’t care, I’d gotten the answers I needed and was on to my next question. He came back over to the bed.

“When we found you, you were barely conscious, I don’t know how you weren’t dead.”

“From all the blood loss?”

“No.” He sighed again. It was staring to grate on my nerves “Okay, when vampires bite people, they die. Immediately.”

“Yea but I thought that’s how you made people vampires, by biting them?” I’d read it a few different ways. For the most part though, I’d read that the victim had to have their blood sucked and then they usually had to suck the blood of the vampire that had bitten them.

“No, that’s another myth. I don’t want to get into the whole history of vampires yet, but basically we are vampires because we carry a deadly disease. When we bite people we transmit the disease killing them instantly.”

“So that’s why Dagref said I was lucky,” I said more to myself than out loud.

“Exactly. Now back to the question at hand. When we found you and saw you still alive and conscious to boot, Reyes thought we should turn you.”
“Reyes was the one with you when you found me.” The memories were coming back now. I vaguely remembered the two voices that talked above me in the woods.

“Yes. So anyway, we went back and forth and finally decided to try to turn you. I gave you some of my blood. You finally lost consciousness, but you kept feeding.” His voice sounded astonished.

“Is that not normal?”

“It’s normal to keep feeding, but not the with intensity and the amount that you were still taking. You were so strong. I had to rip my arm out of your mouth before you drank me dry. Reyes went to get a woman who you could feed on. He brought her back and we gave her to you…”

“Stop.” My stomach started to turn. I stood up and walked over to the fireplace. I had fed on somebody already. I had done it and wasn’t even aware of it.

“What?” Tanis came up behind me.

I looked over my shoulder at him. “You’re not lying to me are you?”

“No,” he said, “I’m not. I wouldn’t lie about this.”
He turned and went back towards the bed as he kept speaking, “Anyway after you fed we planted the girl’s body as yours.”

“Yea but hello, forensic science. They’re going to know it wasn’t my body.”
He turned back to me, “Not if the body is burnt to a crisp.”

My stomach heaved dangerously, I had to grab the mantle of the fireplace to keep myself from stumbling. Dagref had said that they faked my death so that my family didn’t spend the rest of their lives wondering. What about that poor girl’s family? My family was saved some pain but her family was going to have a lifetime of wondering.

“We took her teeth from the ashes and put your teeth there in their place.” I looked over at Tanis. He was laying on his side on the bed, propped up on one elbow, legs crosses at the ankles. His cream skin stood out almost ethereal against the blood red color of the bedding The physical attraction had been instant when I saw him. However, his personality was less than desirable and that had brought down the physical attraction a half notch. I shook my head trying not to think of all the dirty things I wanted to do to him.

“Like what you see Blaze?”

“Don’t try to distract me.”

“Oh I think you’re doing a fine job of that all on your own.”

“Let’s stay on point here. You couldn’t have possibly put my teeth in the… ashes, they’re still in my mouth.”

“You’re a vampire now, they grew back. Your body can heal any wounds. You’re immortal too. The only thing that can kill you is an Erodejen dagger through the heart, or somebody cutting off your head. Okay, so we‘re not so much immortal as we are hard to kill.”

“A what dagger?”

“Erodejen. It’s a vampire made metal. Don’t ask me what’s in it or how it’s made because I couldn’t even begin to tell you. Just know that wounds made with an Erodejen dagger will heal human slow, we use healers to help them heal faster. They also hurt like hell. Most importantly though, if an Erodejen dagger goes through your heart, you’re truly dead.”

“What about sunlight, doesn’t that kill us? Can’t we still bleed to death? What about crosses burning our flesh? What about drowning? How about wooden stakes?”

“All fallacies. Although with the blood, if you lose too much of it you‘ll pass out. Our body can replenish blood loss, but just as when we’re humans, it‘s easier to heal ourselves if we‘re unconscious.”

I knew that far too well. One of my friends had been in a horrible car accident. The doctors had to put her in an induced coma for a week to help her body heal itself.

“As far as drowning, we don’t drown. We don’t really need to breathe. We’re kind of like whales. They can take a big breath and then not have to breathe for like hours.” Lovely, I was being compared to a whale

“So we can walk out in sunlight.”

“Yep, the sun no longer holds its sway over us. Back many years ago it did, but it hasn’t for a good hundred years. We do still sleep during the day though.”

“And the wooden stakes?”

“Hundreds of years ago they worked, but we developed an immunity to them, hence the Erodegen.”

I let go of the mantle and found I was able to stand without feeling wobbly. I started over towards Tanis on the bed. As I walked towards him my body became increasingly sluggish with each step. My fingertips started to go numb. I could feel the numbness crawling up my fingers into my hands up my arms and into my chest. “Tanis.” My voice sounded far away. My eyelids became difficult to keep open. The room began to tilt and spin. I saw Tanis get up and start towards me as my knees gave way, and that was last thing I knew.

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