Forever Young The Beginning (42 page)

In Scotland introductions were made
and the family was pleased to meet Anna and Celeste. Ian filled
everyone in on Celeste’s background the first evening, omitting any
reference to vampires. No one in the family but Angus knew about
that.

Anna was asked to tell how she met Ian
and she related the whole incident of him appearing at dusk to help
repair the carriage and right on through the shooting of the two
highwaymen.

The visit was spent with Anna and
Celeste being introduced to many of Ian’s’ friends and there were
several delightful evenings of merrymaking what with Ian playing
the violin and Celeste’s singing.

After the first evening Anna was
especially intense with her lovemaking. Afterward Ian said “Anna, I
will play that fiddle after supper every night from now on if you
like it this much.” She pillowed her head on his breast afterward
and began to cry tears of happiness. He stroked her hair and kissed
her forehead and just held her until she quit crying. “I’m so happy
Ian, and I do so love your family and friends. Coming with you has
been one of the best times of my life. Thank you for asking
me.”

Celeste sang in the church the next
day, and like in Amsterdam everyone was spellbound by her clear
angelic voice. People came to her when the service was over and
said they had wept. All too soon the visit ended and emotional
farewells were said all around.

They sailed to Dover. From there they
took a packet boat across on a nice day and within five more days
were in Paris.

Anna was going to leave early for
Lausanne so they picked up Celeste and went to Marie and Henri’s
place, bathing and changing out of their travel clothes. They
decided to just let Celeste determine the course of their last day
together.

At a sidewalk café, Ian suddenly felt
a cold prickling at the base of his neck. Casually he looked about,
his sun glasses hiding the subject of his gaze. He froze when he
spied a man with an artificial foot clomping along. The man had
just passed their table. Ian felt a deep chill that went to his
very soul, replaced by a cold hatred. His mind flashed back to that
horrible night when he had lost Cosette in the fire at the
Francoise chateau. Only too well he recalled that he had cut the
foot off of a big vampire, and had seen him limp and leap,
screaming through the fire to escape.

Turning to Anna and Celeste
he said “I’m very sorry, but I just recalled that I need to see
someone at the
Banque de
Lafayette
. Could you both please excuse me?
I promise to meet you both at Caryn’s house in an hour or two. Is
that all right with both of you?”

Anna nodded and Celeste tipped her
head to one side and said “We can meet you there Ian. I have
something from my studies that I want to ask Anna
about.”

He kissed Anna warmly and then as he
kissed Celeste’s forehead he slipped his hand around to the back of
her neck and lightly pulled on a few hairs at the base of her
skull. She nodded her understanding and said “Come Anna, I want to
show you now.”

They left and Ian trotted across the
broad street to follow his subject from the other side. The vampire
had on a broad-brimmed hat, gloves, and a lightweight coat with an
extra high collar. They walked nearly three-fourths of a mile
before he turned down a street that led to a posh district. He went
three blocks, and then turned into a gray stucco three-story
building. Ian noted the address and continued to walk along the
opposite side of the street as if he had a destination further
along. Never turning his head toward the house once he walked past,
feeling a prickling on the back of his neck briefly. There was
either more than one vampire in that building, or the one he
followed had looked back one time to see if he had himself been
followed. Ian took a bank document from his pocket and made as if
he was examining it as he walked. He felt another prickling and he
looked at a door across the street and stepped closer to read the
numbers and made a show of reading the document in his hand as if
he was searching for an address. The prickling stopped quickly
then. Ian felt that there was more than one vampire in the
building, and that they were quite observant of people in their
vicinity.

He would have to return some
night and explore this place in depth. Tonight was out of the
question because Anna was leaving in the morning. He settled into a
mood of cold hatred; one of deadly resolve.
If that is a coven, I won’t leave one of them in that house
alive.

Back at Caryn’s place he found that
she had come home early, so they visited until nearly bed
time.

They left then, Ian promising to
return for Celeste tomorrow after seeing Anna off. That night Anna
was passionate beyond anything Ian had ever experienced with her.
She clung to him all night and awoke to make love three more times
before dawn.

The dreaded time came for parting and
Anna promised to come to the Chateau that summer. She got a
commitment from Ian to come to Nice when she came through to see
her Uncle Jacques. Both agreed to use the bank’s courier service to
communicate. They kissed long and passionately before she got into
her carriage. She leaned out the window and waved to him once after
it pulled away.

He picked up Celeste for the day,
wanting to take another boat ride to which she happily agreed. They
took a longer excursion this time which would leave Paris and would
return in midafternoon. Celeste was happy, humming a tune that he
didn’t know. They chatted about her studies and her voice lessons
and she mentioned that she had met Alyssa. Ian said nothing. She
said that Alyssa wanted Celeste to introduce her to Ian when he was
in town sometime. Ian was puzzled for a few seconds, and then he
remembered that Marie had introduced him using a different name so
Alyssa didn’t know his real name. He thought it was best to leave
well enough alone, not needing the complications of an ex-lover
added to his relationship with Anna.

Celeste said “Alyssa spoke of a man
she knew named Adam. She looked kind of … different when she spoke
of him. I think she loves this Adam, Ian. She works too hard and
she has met a man that she likes. It seems that he comes to her
place of work a lot to see her. She said that he always brings her
flowers or a gift.”

“
Well it may be that she
will take up with this fellow now and forget about
Adam.”

“
I don’t know, Ian. She
looks dreamy and kind of far away when she talks about Adam. I
think she met him in Marseille. She doesn’t look that way when she
speaks of this other man. I think that her head is turned too
easily by a man’s attention though. She’s impulsive that way it
seems.”

“
You’re quite observant,
young lady. I’m impressed.”

She turned to him and fastened her
eyes on his. “My gift has left me.”

“
I know. It may return some
day. You’re going through a profound change now and your body is
making more adjustments than you can realize.”

“
Yes. Aunt Caryn told me all
about it.”

“
By Heaven, that’s a relief
to me!”

She giggled and squirmed closer to him
and stretching up she pecked him on his cheek and then put her head
against his shoulder.

***

It was near to midnight and the
neighborhood of the vampire house was quiet. Ian watched the place
through keen eyes from his perch on a rooftop across the street. He
had been watching patiently for over an hour, motionless. Seeing no
activity he decided to get closer to be able to possibly hear
something from inside the house. He leaped across the street and
landed on a rooftop adjacent to his target. Then he glided to the
edge of it and soundlessly flitted across the gap to land on top of
the chimney. He stealthily left that perch and like a fly crawled
down a side wall until coming to a window. Using the ornamentation
of the elaborate stucco exterior, he moved from window to window,
gliding like a shadow, soundless, searching patiently. Finishing
one wall all the way down to the first level he merely seemed to
glide up to the rooftop again and re-appear on another wall to
begin methodically to move from one window to the next.

He finally heard voices from inside.
Stopping momentarily then, he moved as close to the window as he
could. He slowly moved his head so that he could peer in. His face
was completely covered by a large black cloth with only two
eye-holes for openings and his clothing was black as well. He
strained to hear what was being said inside.

“
None of us cares, Mauri. If
you want this woman, you can bring her here tomorrow night and have
her.”

“
I’d like to bring her
over.”

“
What if she doesn’t want to
cross over?”

“
She’s infatuated with me.
I’ll convince her.”

“
And if you don’t convince
her, what then?”

“
I
will
convince her, you’ll
see.”

“
Mauritarius you know what
has to happen if you fail to convince her, don’t you?”

“
Well, yes. That would be
too bad. But Paris is full of pretty girls, no? Can I not find
another?”

Laughter then, from maybe six others
Ian guessed.

“
Why don’t you just ask her
when you’re with her?”

“
What if she said no and
then went to tell someone?”

“
Who’d believe
her?”

“
Well, she deserves what she
gets if she refuses me.”

Laughter again, then the sound of
someone walking with a heavy limp

“
What are all of you
laughing at in here?”

“
Mauri wants to bring his
girlfriend over here to ask her to cross over.”

“
Oh?”

“
He hasn’t even asked her
yet or told her about himself.”

“
Well, if she refuses we’ll
all feed from her, so go ahead.”

“
You’ve been short tempered
since you lost your foot and your ear, Emile.”

“
Don’t speak of that to me.
If I ever see the one that did that to me, he’s a dead vampire.
That mud-covered blue-eyed bastard! I still can see his damned
glowing blue eyes! I’m not reluctant to kill any of you if you
think that’s a joke.”

“
I meant nothing by it
Emile.”

“
Then keep your comments to
yourselves.” Then was the sound of someone stumping out of the
room. Ian slipped back up to the rooftop and looked around for the
roof access hatch. Finding it he tried it and found that it was
secured from the inside. Likely it was to keep wind from flipping
it open since no one would try to break into a three story house
from its rooftop. He figured that he might just as well break in
now and have that part done so as not to worry about making noise
when he returned.

He lifted the edge and applied
pressure until he heard wood splintering inside. Opening it he
peered in and then lowered it, waiting to see if there was a
reaction from inside. He sat for some ten minutes, and then he went
down through it to see if he could find a way into the top floor.
It turned out to be a staircase leading to a door at the end of an
upstairs hallway. He glided down the stairs to it and opened it
slightly and peering through, saw no one. It opened and closed
silently which was what he was trying to determine. He would return
tomorrow night to see what developed. They hadn’t mentioned the
name of the poor girl, but that wouldn’t help anyway, would
it?

The next day, Ian again picked up
Celeste at Caryn’s. He hugged Caryn and they spoke as she was
leaving to go to work. Ian noticed that Celeste was carrying a
small ruck sack. She had eaten breakfast and Ian had hunted the
night before and had bagged three rabbits so his four flasks were
full. He asked her what she would like to do that day.

“
I want you to take me
running.”

“
We might ruin your
clothes.”

She patted the ruck sack beside her on
the seat.

He flashed a big smile. “Then we shall
run. I have to get my ruck sack first though.”

Within two hours they were in a
densely wooded area to the northeast of Paris. Ian secured the
horse and carriage in a dense thicket he found with a tiny creek
flowing through it. He left celeste in the carriage and went into
the thicket, waiting until she had called out to him. She saw that
he was wearing only black seaman’s pants secured with a black sash.
A knife was secured in the sash. She wore riding pantaloons, dainty
boots, and a simple loose blouse tucked neatly into her waistband.
He placed his neatly folded clothing next to hers. He then took his
purse and hid it under a really heavy rock nearby saying “Don’t let
me forget that or I’ll have to pay for this rented carriage with
you.”

She giggled at that and climbed from
the carriage onto his back. He bounded away taking a twenty foot
leap to start and quickly accelerated to his best speed. Soon he
was darting this way and that and bounding over lower trees and
obstacles at a blinding rate while Celeste laughed continuously as
they went deeper into the forest. He suddenly leaped high and they
landed on a broad limb some thirty feet above the ground. Swarming
up the trunk to a height of some seventy feet he paused so they
could look around.