Mercy's Destiny: Montgomery's Vampires Trilogy (Book #3) (Montgomery's Vampires Series) (15 page)

“Are you okay?” Sebastian asked. “You’re looking a little peaked.”

“Oh, don’t worry about me. I’m fine. Although . . .”

“Yes?”

“I am a mite hungry,” I admitted. “The Nolans were far from generous with their feeding times.”

“I really do despise those people,” Sebastian declared with a scowl. “I’ll pull off as soon as I see a sign for something to eat.”

“Uh . . .” I raised my hand at my sides:
I got nothing.
  

“My treat, of course,” he said. “I can see that you don’t have shoes, so I didn’t expect you to have money.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I appreciate it. I’m starving.”

“No problem.” Getting back to the original topic, my grandfather said, “There are a few reasons why I never revealed myself to you and Tilly. The first reason was that I’d made a deal with the Nolans. The second reason was that I was trying to avoid getting you, your mother, and Tilly involved in all this Partial-vampire-Nolan business. I was hoping to spare you the danger and the aggravation. As you’ve probably gathered, once you let vampires into your world, life becomes a whole lot more complicated.”

“You can say that again,” I chuckled.

“The last reason is more practical. I was supposed to be about eighteen when Tilly and I met in 1974. She knew naught about what I was, and if I had gone to see in her in recent years, I should have been in my mid-fifties. And obviously . . .” Sebastian shrugged.

“She died, you know,” I told him.

“I know,” he said. “I went to the funeral.”

“You did?”

“Yes, but I was careful that I went unnoticed. I didn’t stay long. I visit your mother’s grave every so often, too. And I went to your Dewhurst graduation. Again, I didn’t stay long, but I went.”

“I had no idea,” I said. “I’m touched, Sebastian.”

He asked, “And I’m hoping that now you know about me, you’ll let me be in your life more?”

“I’d like that very much,” I smiled. “I didn’t have any family left after Grams died. It would be nice to have some family again. Except the Nolans. They can stay away.”

Sebastian laughed. “What did they do with you while you were there? Sorry I couldn’t break you out sooner. I was planning on getting you out right away, but when that giant ape wasn’t standing guard at your door, the Nolans had company.”

“Medical types?” I asked.

“Yes. How did you know?”

“They want to use my blood to hurt vampires.” I hung my head. “And they got some of it. I tried to resist, but it was three against one.”

“You mustn’t blame yourself, Granddaughter.” It was
so weird
, having somebody who looked like he could still be in high school call me Granddaughter.

“What do you think will happen?” I asked.

“I honestly don’t know. But perhaps you can alert some of your powerful vampire friends. I’m afraid I can’t offer assistance in that department. I don’t operate within a network. I’ve been on my own for many centuries.”

“Do I have more family out there? Did you, uh . . . ?” What was the polite way to say
knock up any more women
?

Sebastian knew what I was getting at. “No, Tilly was the only one. It wasn’t intended, which I’m sure you’ve gathered. I fell in love with her while keeping tabs on Richard. But I don’t regret what happened. I really did adore Tilly, and you and your mother were created from the union that I’d had with her. Of course, I do wish that things could have turned out better . . .”

It made me sad, how lonely Sebastian seemed—all those centuries on his own. “I’m glad you’ve found me,” I said. “I’m looking forward to getting to know more about you.”

“Me too.” He pointed towards an exit. “You good with hamburgers?”

“Sebastian, I’m so flippin’ hungry that I’d be good with road kill right now!”

My grandfather laughed. “I suspected that you were a bit of a dramatic.”

I didn’t want to be greedy, since Sebastian was paying, so I ordered a plain hamburger. Sebastian made my hamburger a cheeseburger, and tacked on fries and a milkshake, “just in case” I was hungry for more. I ate it all.

Sebastian made an admiring comment about how much food I could put away and I nearly revealed that I was eating for two. It didn’t seem fair, though, that anyone else should get to know the news of my pregnancy before Robert did (other than my psychotic captors, that is), so I remained tight-lipped. I would tell Sebastian and everyone else when the time was right. Though it would be tough, keeping the secret from Liz. Hopefully Robert would be found soon, so I wouldn’t have to keep the secret long.

Once I’d stowed the wrappers, Sebastian asked, “Would you like me to answer your final question? About my origins?”

I nodded enthusiastically. “Uh, yah!”

“It’s a long one. You sure you aren’t too tired?” he said with a sideways glance.

“I promise you. I’m wide awake.” I couldn’t envision falling asleep ever again, actually.

15

“I was ten years old when the change took place,” said Sebastian. “The year was 952AD.”

“Geez, so you’re . . .” I paused to do the calculation. “You’re a thousand sixty-one.”

“Well, I’m technically a thousand
seventy-one
, if you also factor in the ten years that I’d already aged when I was changed over.”

I chuckled. “Right. Sorry. I’m used to dealing with vampires, who usually state their ‘true’ age as the date they changed over.”

“Once you hit my age, Mercy, ten years is nothing,” he smiled.

“So, wait a minute. If you only age a year for every hundred twenty you’ve been alive, then that means—”

“Yes, I was a ten-year-old boy for over a century. Give or take.” He winked. “If that’s what you were going to say.”

It wasn’t, but that was . . .
crazy
. “Criminy! So, if you keep aging at this rate, you won’t die for—”

“I try not thinking about,” Sebastian said with gently. “But, assuming that I’m not killed, we’re talking about thousands of years. Imagine what the world will be like by that time.”

I asked, “So you can be killed?”

“Yes, just like you can. I don’t have the same immunities that the vampires do.”

“You must be extremely careful,” I commented.

“Yes, very,” he said. “A few of our kind have died off because of accidents. But we’re immune to disease.”

“That must be great, never getting sick. I’m sorry for the interruption—I know it’s probably getting annoying. There’s just so much I want to know.”

“No worries,” Sebastian assured me. “We’ve got plenty of time to catch up.”

“You were saying about how you came to be?”

Sebastian was quiet for a moment. “Before I continue on, I should mention that I heard much of this story via other villagers.”

“Alright,” I acknowledged. “So, you’re saying it’s embellished?”

“I wouldn’t say embellished, exactly. It seems to be true in its entirety. It’s more like legend, you could say.”

“Got it. I won’t assume you’re a liar, then,” I teased.

“That’s a relief,” my grandfather teased back before continuing. “When I was a boy, a beautiful girl named Violetta lived in the village. But she wasn’t only beautiful, Mercy; she was kind, loving, and intelligent—the ideal woman for any man, I should say.”

“Sounds like you had a crush on her. Did you know her personally?”

Sebastian nodded. “I did. She sometimes watched over my cousins and me—babysat us. Her parents had an orchard, and she’d bring fruit for us as a treat, if we were good. But we were always good for Violetta, because we loved her. She was very sweet.” He smiled at the memory. “Violetta was seventeen when Luther came to our tiny Italian village. She was instantly smitten. Luther was about a decade older than Violetta—so we believed—in his late twenties. But that wasn’t uncommon for the day, for a wealthy older man to take a younger woman as his lover.”

“Lucky guys,” I said dryly.

“Oh, no, it wasn’t an unsavory courtship, if that’s the idea I’ve given you. There is no doubt that Luther loved Violetta.”

“So, he wasn’t just a creepy older dude preying on a teenager?” I said tactlessly. I hoped Sebastian didn’t think I thought the same thing about his association with Grams. In truth, when it came to their association, I didn’t know
what
to think. I was going to wait to hear the whole story before making up my mind. The man had saved my life, so I felt I owed him that minor courtesy.

“Not in the slightest,” Sebastian said. “Perhaps the situation would have ended better for the whole village had Luther
not
loved Violetta so much.”

“This does not sound like a happy fairytale ending kind of story,” I said.

“It certainly isn’t,” Sebastian agreed. “Violetta had been promised to another man, which was also very common for the time. Marriages were often treated more like business deals, in order to keep land and money in the family name. And, because of her exceptional beauty, Violetta had been pledged to a man with a lot of money. She was marrying up, several ranks above her class.”

“That’s so . . .
Bleh!
Unromantic. And awful.”

Sebastian looked over. “You’d be surprised how many cultures
still
employ this tradition.”

“No, Grandfather, I really wouldn’t. After everything I’ve seen since getting mixed up in vampire business, it would take a lot more than that to surprise me.”

“I can believe it,” he said before continuing. “Though Violetta had been promised to another man, she could not help falling in love with Luther. I remember the night he came to our village—and that is only when I saw him, at night. He was very different from local men I’d seen in town. He had a sort of . . .
otherness
about him, which I attributed to him being from a foreign land. It was understandable how Violetta, a small town girl, could have fallen in love with a man so exotic. He spoke differently, dressed differently, and was extremely sophisticated. The men in our village were . . .”

“Unrefined,” I finished.

“Yes, unrefined is a perfect description, Mercy. This is not to say that the men in my village were bad, but when Luther was around they simply could not compete. This did not make Luther popular. Violetta wasn’t the only girl taken by him. But Violetta was the only girl Luther wanted. And Luther, like Violetta, seemed very kind. He treated both peasants and the ill with deference, which was not common for a man of his wealth.”

The way Sebastian described Luther made me think of Robert. I’d always found that so strange about vampires. Though many vampires came from an age regarded as “savage” by modern society, they, in many respects, had behaved a lot more honorably than many humans in our “civilized” times did.

“The courtship between Luther and Violetta did not remain secret for very long. In a village as tiny as ours, how could it? Violetta’s mother, Caterina, who was not so much an evil woman as she was a shrewd one, vehemently opposed their courtship.”

“Because Violetta had been promised to someone else?” I asked.

“There was that, plus Luther being vampire. Of course, nobody actually referred to Luther as
vampire
—I’m not sure anyone in our village even knew what a vampire was. But, like most residents of our village, Caterina was superstitious. But perhaps superstitious is the wrong term. Caterina possessed a sort of . . . magic.”

“Like a witch?” I said.

“Yes,
witch
would be an appropriate term, but we never would have used it back in the day,” Sebastian replied. “But Caterina did do ‘witchy’ things, yes. She was said to be a healer, and she created potions for those who were ailing. And she just
knew
things. She could sense straightaway that something was off about Luther . . . something unnatural. And many villagers found it peculiar that Luther, a stranger, with equally strange clothes and strange accent, would only come out after the sun had set. They did not trust him to begin with, because of his differentness, and now here he was, trying to steal the heart of a young village girl that had already been spoken for by a son of a very prominent family. Despite his kindly ways, Luther was not a welcome man. The villagers wanted him gone.”

“Did Caterina ever confront Luther?”

“I don’t believe she did,” my grandfather replied. “She would have been too afraid. Caterina did like to interfere in Violetta’s life, but you couldn’t begrudge her too much for her meddlesome ways. She was only trying to look out for her daughter.”

I said, “Seems like she was also trying to look out for her family’s property.”

“Undoubtedly,” Sebastian agreed. “Caterina demanded that Violetta stop seeing Luther. But, being a teenaged girl, Violetta denied ever seeing Luther in the first place. She claimed that she hardly knew him.”

“Sounds about right for a seventeen-year-old,” I said.

“Caterina was very wily, however, and she knew better than to believe her daughter’s claim. Unbeknownst to Violetta and Luther, Caterina began to spy on their activities. I suppose her main concern was that Luther was going to deflower Violetta before she had a chance to marry her off. Caterina also worried—and I knew this because I’d overheard her speaking to my mother one day—that Violetta was going to run away due to the increased pressure to marry the other man. Caterina feared for Violetta’s safety, too, since she suspected that Luther was evil.”

“
Was
Luther evil?” I asked.

“I don’t think anyone is absolutely good or absolutely evil, Mercy,” Sebastian stated. “Everyone has the capacity to commit horrific deeds, when provoked in just the right way.”

“Very philosophical,” I said. “And I agree. Most people probably don’t know the nasty things they’re capable of doing—not until a bad situation arises. They may
tell themselves
‘oh, I’d never, ever, ever
do X, Y, or Z,’ but you truly don’t know until you’re in the thick of it.”

“True.”

“Look at me, Sebastian. If somebody had told me that I was going to stab a kidnapper in the neck with a broken piece of light bulb, I never would have believed them. But I tell you what: I was prepared to kill Jason if it meant saving my life. He overpowered me, though.” I shuddered. “If you wouldn’t have come along . . .”

Sebastian reached over and patted my hand. “Don’t worry about it, Granddaughter.”

“Please go on with your story,” I said. I really didn’t want to think about Jason ever again. Even saying his name made my stomach do a somersault, though I was curious if he’d escaped the fire.

“Sure thing. The only time Violetta could sneak away from home to see Luther was during the night, when her family was asleep,” Sebastian said. “Well, Violetta
assumed
she was sneaking away, but her mother was following her in the shadows, spying.”

“Stalker.”

Sebastian chuckled. “On this night in particular—the
fateful night that changed everything
, as they say—Luther asked Violetta to run away with him. Luther knew that he was asking a lot of Violetta, because she would have to leave behind all that she knew. Violetta had never witnessed life outside our tiny village, and Luther wanted to show her the world. As a token of his love, and to establish mutual trust, I presume, Luther presented Violetta with a box. Inside the box were his fangs.”

“No!” I gasped, breaking out in gooseflesh.

Sebastian’s brow crinkled. “Yes. This astonishes you, I see. I don’t know if you’ve heard this, Mercy, but when somebody possesses a vampire’s fangs—”

“They have the power to control them. Yes, I know,” I said, practically shouting. “I know this too well, and I’m kind of in a pickle over it.”

“How do you know about this practice? It’s very unorthodox for a human to be privy to such information. And how are you in a pickle?”

“I tell you what, Grandpa—I’m loving calling you Grandpa, by the way—once you finish your story, I’ll tell you all about my fang-related pickle. Deal?”

“Deal,” he smiled. “
Granddaughter
.”

I prompted, “Okay, so Luther offers Violetta his fangs?”

“Yes, he does, which she accepts. He also then tells her about his true nature, that he is vampire.”

“Does she freak?” I asked.

“Not at all.” Sebastian shook his head. “Violetta would have loved Luther no matter what. Caterina, however, was a different story. Had Caterina not been present for the information Luther told Violetta after presenting her with his strange gift . . . Who knows what would have happened?”

I said, “What did happen?”

“Luther told Violetta that she could make him do whatever she wanted, as long as she possessed his fangs. He, of course, was hoping that this would demonstrate to Violetta just how much he loved and trusted her. And it worked . . . I should say that it
would
have worked, had Caterina not intervened.”

“I’m guessing that this is where things get bad.”

“Oh yes,” Sebastian said. “Very bad. The next night a festival was being held in the town square—it was to celebrate autumn harvest. After receiving the fangs, Violetta told Luther that she was going to announce her departure then. Knowing what a stir this would cause, she told Luther that she would meet him at the edge of the forest that marked the border of the village, so that they could make a fast getaway after her festival announcement. Luther agreed and then they both went on their merry way. This was the last they saw of each other.”

“Oh no. What happened?”

“Caterina happened,” Sebastian said with a grim press of his lips. “The following morning at breakfast, Caterina slipped an herb into her daughter’s porridge that would make her sick enough to miss the festival.”

“That’s really nice, Caterina poisoning her own daughter,” I said with nastiness.

Sebastian nodded. “Violetta was so bedridden that she could not make it out to meet Luther in the forest.”

“Oh no.”