Enchanted Dreams (12 page)

When our glasses were full, he took a sip from his and then absently rotated the goblet in his hand, causing the wine to circle within.

"I was only twenty-four when it happened," he said. "I was hunting, and I had wandered deep into the woods." He watched the wine as it swirled round and round in his glass. "It came from out of nowhere, and to this day I have no idea what it was. At the time I thought it was some kind of a wild animal. But it all happened so fast that my memory is a little fuzzy." He paused, taking another sip of his wine. He took a deep breath before continuing. "I laid there for days, half-dead. The pain was incredible, although I couldn't find any injuries aside from a small bite to my neck. I felt weak, so weak my head throbbed with the slightest movement. I kept thinking I had been poisoned. It was like I could feel it—the poison—working its way through my system. I figured that whatever bit me must have had rabies. And as I lay there, I became more and more convinced that that was what I had. I couldn't get out of the woods. I could hardly move. I was sure I was a dead man."

I listened intently to every detail, literally hanging on to every word. Until that moment, I'm not sure I ever completely believed that any of this was real.

"There was another hunter," Vincent continued after a long, thoughtful silence that I did not want to disrupt, in spite of my eagerness to hear the rest of his story. I could see that it was difficult for him to look back on this part of what happened. "When he discovered me out there, he came rushing toward me to see if he could help." He shook his head. "It was like something took over my body. Something like…instinct. I honestly couldn't stop myself. Somehow I knew that there was only one way I was going to get out of there alive. And I wanted to live!" His eyes seemed to be searching mine for understanding. "I don't know how I managed it. I was incredibly weak, but all of a sudden it seemed like I had the strength of ten men. He didn't give in easily, and I was…inexperienced. I think I took him by surprise mostly." He shuddered at the memory. "It was horrible, and in those first wretched moments I wished I had died out there. I drained him, like an animal, stopping only to vomit in disgust before guzzling down even more. What I managed to keep down revived me enough so that I could make my way home. I recuperated alone, too terrified to go to a doctor. I stayed in bed and got lots of rest, popping Vitamin C every chance I got and looking up rabies and similar diseases in medical journals." He laughed, in spite of his obvious misery. "And as I got better, and was eating regular food and everything, I figured that maybe what happened with that hunter was just a freak, near-death kind of thing, you know." He shook his head and laughed again, but without any real humor. "But in a few days I felt myself growing weaker again. And I felt the craving. I wish there was a better word for it than that. Craving doesn't quite explain it. It's like I'm starving and having withdrawals and being eaten alive from the inside, all at the same time. I really do think I would die if I didn't get it, and although that might not be a bad thing, the poison, or whatever it is that's inside me, won't let that happen."

When he finished, I looked down at my wineglass, unable to meet his eyes. Although I had listened to every word with interest, for some reason I wished he had not told me all of this. We sipped our wine in silence. He did not speak until I looked up and once again met his eyes.

"We will take this as slow or as fast as you want tonight," he told me. "We can make it last all night if you wish." I was both thrilled and terrified by his words.

"Thank you," I tried to say, but my words came out like a croak. I could not seem to locate my voice.

"Come!" He lifted the wineglass from my fingers and once again took my hand firmly in his. "Tell me what I can do to make you feel more at ease. Can I draw you a bath?"

I looked at him in surprise and then, unable to find my voice, simply nodded.

I could not believe this extraordinary turn of events. Not even in my most brazen and imaginative fantasies had I dared dream of such a night as this was turning out to be. Everything was happening in my favor. Yet I was feeling more and more ill at ease.

As I was settling restlessly into the warm, sudsy water of Vincent's bathtub, there came a tap on the bathroom door.

"Yes?"

The door slipped open a few inches. "Would you like more wine?"

"I would, and company, too, if you care to stay," I heard myself responding. The warm water and wine were having their effect.

He closed the lid of the toilet and sat down there.

"How old are you?" I asked him.

"Eighty-five," he said with a smug smile. He looked like a man in his early thirties.

"Still in your prime," I murmured. He laughed.

"Is it true that vampires live forever?" I asked.

"Whatever it is that I am, I don't believe I'm going to live forever. I seem to age much more slowly than other people, but I'm certain I have aged in the last sixty years."

"I wonder what you would look like right now if this had never happened to you."

"Probably I'd be dead," he said. "Or worse—bald and on Viagra."

I laughed. Then I shook my head. It was impossible to imagine Vincent like that. "This suits you better," I told him.

My bubbles were slowly shrinking away, causing me to feel self-conscious. With his usual perceptiveness, Vincent stood up to leave. "You finish and I'll see you out there."

I was strangely calm, in light of everything. My excitement was tempered by a sobering dread of certain things to come, and I wondered how I would manage. But it was what I wanted, and I would not waver. As I slipped into the oversized bathrobe that Vincent had so thoughtfully set out for me, I knew this would be the defining night of my life.

Vincent was waiting for me on a lavish, king-size bed. I couldn't help smiling to see him there, wearing nothing but a robe himself. I did not feel beautiful but I did feel desired, and I suppose I was, if you looked at it in a certain light.

He immediately drew me into his arms when I approached him. I struggled to maintain control over my growing excitement, only too aware that as I became more impassioned my heart rate would increase. I certainly didn't want to push Vincent over the top just yet. But even this chilling inducement couldn't seem to slow my thrashing heart. It was beating so vigorously that I could actually feel the blood rushing through my veins. And I saw the gleam of awakened hunger in Vincent's eyes. I knew he would need to quench his first, undeniable need before anything else. But for the moment, he merely kissed and licked my lips, then moved on to my face and chin, spreading deliciously wet and lingering kisses all over my feverish flesh. I could feel my blood quickening, and I knew the artery in my throat must be pulsing with life. I felt his lips and tongue right there on the spot, lightly tickling it. His breath was hot, scorching a trail along the length of my neck. I felt the pointed edge of a rigid tooth; it brushed lightly across my skin, once, twice, thrice. I arched my neck for him and braced myself, clutching his shoulders with trembling fingers.

The fangs of a vampire are as sharp as a surgeon's scalpel, so you hardly even feel it when they first break the skin. But as they settle into the vein there is a distinct awareness of a terrible intrusion, accompanied by a heavy, unsettling discomfort. A small cry is automatically released from your lips, like a rush of air. It's a cry of surprise, mingled with confusion over what just occurred, and added to that is the wonder that it is so absolutely bearable. But then, as you feel the blood being drawn from your body, you are suddenly struck with a kind of alarm. And there is uncertainty, too. Is this even really happening? And instinctively you know not to move—not while those razor-sharp fangs are still engaged.

I had come to believe that, in his first feeding, Vincent consumed only enough blood to leave his victim weakened, but not yet in shock. There appeared to be a certain dwindling of the spirit brought on by the loss of blood, along with a kind of lingering disbelief—both of which must have contributed to the docility, and even enthusiasm, after the fact.
Whatever just happened,
the victim reasons,
I'm still here and I feel incredible
. Now I was experiencing it firsthand.

When Vincent disengaged himself from my neck and rose up over me to gasp for air, I stared up in awe to see my blood still glistening on his teeth. It was quite an incredible moment for me. His beauty and omnipotence suddenly overwhelmed me. It was as if I were watching my own lifeblood working miracles within him. It was a peculiar feeling indeed.

As for me, I felt light-headed and deceptively invincible. Yet I knew I had merely passed into an altered mental state brought about by loss of blood. I was hovering precariously near, but not yet at, the point of physical shock. Oh, but I never felt so alive! Part of it was no doubt the combined thrill and horror of the event. And, of course, the biggest part of it was Vincent himself.

How can I explain those first moments?

When I was a child, I recall feeling something like what I experienced with Vincent, although on a much smaller scale. It was something that would come over me when I was very sick, usually when I had a very high fever. As the fever was building, I would sometimes get the sense that I was outside of myself, and it would seem to me that time suddenly stood still. It's not easy to describe, but when it happens, all your pain subsides and your worries dissolve in a hazy fog of well-being. Consciousness becomes awareness and nothing else. It's as if you can suddenly hear your insides at work as they throb and pulse out a rhythm that calls to mind dreams not yet realized. It's a kind of euphoria that rushes toward you like the ground when you fall, only to meet you in the end like a loving embrace.

What would you give to find the ultimate bliss? Is there any price too high?

Vincent was opening my robe, and he spread his hands over my skin tenderly. I had never been touched that way before. My body seemed to curve toward him instinctively, eagerly meeting his touch like steel turns toward a magnet. I shuddered with exquisite desire. My every molecule seemed to be swelling with pleasure.

Vincent was taking great pains to go slowly with me, and I adored him all the more for that. I could see that he was highly aroused, and that he was fully focused on our lovemaking now that his first, inexorable need had been satiated. But my passion was quickly exceeding his. My arms reached out for him and, with a strength I had not realized I possessed, I pulled him to me and held him there fiercely. He acquiesced, chuckling. I clung to him, trembling slightly when I felt his rigid arousal brush against me. Instinctively my hips bucked upward and moved against his hardness. He groaned. But why was he delaying for so long?

Sensing my impatience, he spread apart my legs and moved in between, but he moved too slowly, maddeningly slowly, kissing and stroking me leisurely as he went until I thought I would surely be driven insane before ever realizing the pleasure I had so long awaited. And even when he was finally settled snugly between my legs he lingered still, simply holding himself right there at my entrance as if he were waiting for an invitation. Instinctively I wound my legs around him. I could feel him pressing restlessly against my barrier, and I saw that he was struggling for control as he looked down into my face. His eyes blazed dangerously but I stared brazenly back, wide-eyed and transfixed, like an animal in a trap. His eyes held mine as he pushed himself all the way into my body and I—my entire being—was awakened from head to toe. The pleasure was almost unendurable. I had waited so long to experience it, but now I was glad I had waited. I was pleased that this would forever remain my first, and perhaps only, impression of love.

I was overwrought with sensation, and Vincent's repeated filling and stretching of me brought me over the top. I felt the need to move all of a sudden and I did so, grinding and thrashing my hips against him like I had seen those other women do but without fully understanding why. Something was welling up inside me, building and growing. It seemed to have control over my actions and, trusting the instinct, I allowed it to lead me where it would. Vincent continued to move within me, but I could tell that he was holding back and allowing me to take the lead, also trusting in whatever force was driving me. I clung to him as I bucked my hips wildly against him. The pleasure just kept building and building until I thought it would burst. And that's exactly what it did, suddenly releasing an enormous wave that flooded my insides and then exploded into a million tiny sensations. I cried out, oblivious to everything but the pleasure. But it subsided far too quickly, and I cried out again, this time in protest.

"No, please, don't stop!" I objected.

"Shhh," murmured Vincent in my ear. "I won't stop." But in the very next instant he, too, let out a tremendous yell, and I felt another wave of satisfaction in the knowledge that I had given him pleasure.

I nearly lost myself in that moment. And truthfully, if I had, I would not have felt I had lost anything at all. But Vincent's words suddenly came to my mind, from when he had been dying in the woods, and thought to himself, "I want to live!"

"I want," I began.

"What do you want, darling?" he asked, so tenderly I thought I might have died already, after all.

"I want…more. I want…all!" There was so much I wanted to experience of life before I died.

Vincent tried to quiet me and I had a strong temptation to just lie back passively and enjoy whatever came, but somehow I found the strength to sit up and carry on. I was determined to finish what I had started. I saw that Vincent was still hard, and I was pleased. I pressed my hands forcefully against his chest.

"I want to look at you," I said, pushing him backward. He acquiesced eagerly, lying back on the bed and spreading out before me.

"Mmm," I murmured happily, feasting first my eyes and then my hands over his body. Next came my lips and tongue. I was determined to cover every inch of him. He was lean and hard. I worked my way down slowly, languishingly, leaving lots of tiny, feathery kisses over his chest and belly before reaching his hips. He was still raging hard.