Moonlight (6 page)

Effortlessly, Navarre vaulted onto one of the fallen stones.
He had donned the black cape, and it swirled around his ankles like thick
smoke.

“No more sacrifices,” he shouted, and his voice echoed and
re-echoed in the stillness of the night.

A murmur swept through the crowd. He heard the priests
whispering together, wondering what had happened to Shaylyn, wondering what
great wrong had wrought the destruction of the temple.

“Shaylyn has abandoned you,” Navarre said, his voice
rumbling like thunder. “And I have come to take her place.” He fixed the
priests with a hard stare. “No more will you sacrifice living flesh. Do so, and
I will return, and my vengeance will be terrible to see.”

The priests stared at him, their faces as gray as their
robes. Slowly, they bowed their heads, their voices lifting as one. “It shall
be as you say.”

“Ahijah.”

The guard stepped forward.

“From this night forward, this man shall be chief advisor to
his Eminence.” Navarre turned his gaze on the leader of the Kenn. “You will
heed Ahijah’s words as you would heed my own. He is to have a house of his own,
land of his own. No harm is to come to him.”

The leader of the Kenn lifted his head in defiance. A faint
smile touched Navarre’s lips as he let the full force of his gaze rest on the
man’s face.

“It shall be as you wish,” his Eminence said, and then, to
the astonishment of everyone present, the leader of the Kenn knelt before
Navarre.

“The woman, Katlaina,” Navarre said. “She shall be returned
to her own people, and her child with her.”

“I will see to it personally,” his Eminence vowed.

Navarre acknowledged the man’s promise with a slight nod and
then, moving too fast for mere mortal to see, he vanished into the shadows of
the night.

He ran tirelessly, effortlessly, soundlessly, the cloak
billowing behind him like Satan’s breath. Driven by fear, by a sense of
exultation that made no sense, he fled through the darkness, until the land of
Kenn was far behind him.

And still he ran, his senses reeling, filling with the
scents and sounds of the night. Only when he sensed the coming of dawn did his
footsteps slow. A part of his mind wondered how he knew that dawn was
approaching; another part warned him to find a place where he could pass the
daylight hours.

He sought shelter in a copse of trees, digging his way deep
into the earth where the sun couldn’t find him.

Lying there, waiting for the darkness of oblivion to
overtake him, he thought of the man he had killed, of the superhuman strength
he now possessed. What had he become? He didn’t breathe, but he had life. He
cast no shadow, no reflection, but his body still had mass and substance. The
sun was his enemy…

He closed his eyes, and Katlaina’s image rose up to haunt
him, her face distorted with fear, her eyes wide with fright.

There’s death in your eyes, Navarre
, she had said.
Death. It came to claim him in waves of darkness, enfolding him, stealing his
thoughts, his consciousness. He fought it, still afraid to surrender to the
darkness, but it overpowered him, dragging him down, down, into an endless sea
of nothingness…

* * * * *

He woke at dusk, emerging from the bowels of the earth like
a moth from a cocoon.

He shook the dirt from his clothing, combed his fingers
through his hair, and walked out of the woods to the road beyond.

Ahead, he could see the conical shapes of thatched roofs. He
needed food. A bath. A change of clothes.

Feeling stronger with each passing moment, he headed for the
village.

The townspeople eyed him warily. He was a stranger in a
place visited by few outsiders. Some nodded at him, others drew away. An old
woman dressed in black made the sign of the cross when he passed by.

He paused at the entrance to a small inn, drawn by the smell
of roasting meat. A young woman stood in the doorway. She wore a long red skirt
and a white peasant blouse embroidered with flowers. A riot of red-gold curls
peeked out of a dark blue kerchief.

“Good evening, sir.” Her dark brown eyes moved over him,
obviously puzzled by his attire, or lack of it.

“Good evening.” His nostrils flared as he caught the scent
of meat and fish. “I’m hungry.”

“Come in,” she invited. “Mama is just serving dinner.”

“Thank you.”

He followed her inside, sat at the table she indicated.

“What would you like to eat?” the girl asked.

“Venison, if you have it.”

“And to drink?”

He stared at her, confused. Save for the wine the priests
had given him the night he was to be sacrificed, he had never had anything to
drink other than water.

“We have wine,” the girl said. “Or dark ale.”

“Ale,” he decided, reluctant to taste wine again.

“Ale, it is.” She smiled at him in a way that made him
suddenly conscious that she was a woman and he was a man. And then, with a
wink, she turned away and went into the kitchen.

He sat at the table, feeling strangely out of the place as
other people entered the establishment. The sound of their voices, their
laughter, seemed loud in his ears. The combined smell of so many people in such
a small place was overpowering.

A short time later, the girl set a platter and a tankard of
ale before him. The aroma of roast venison and boiled potatoes filled his
nostrils.

The meat was well-done and left the taste of ashes in his
mouth. He took another bite and his stomach recoiled. Afraid he was going to be
ill, he bolted from the room.

“Wait!” He heard the girl cry after him. “You haven’t paid…”

Navarre darted around the corner into the woods beyond.
Dropping to his knees, he began to retch violently.

When the spasm passed, he sat back on his heels, panting
softly.

He heard her footsteps long before she appeared. Rising to
his feet, he wiped his mouth on the hem of his cloak, then turned to face her. “What
do you want?”

“I… Papa sent me to see if you were ill. You ran out so
fast…and didn’t pay…”

He frowned at her. “Pay?”

“For the meal.”

“I don’t understand.”

Her eyes narrowed in disbelief. “I don’t know where you come
from, sir, but here, it is customary to pay for one’s meal.”

He shook his head, the weight of all he didn’t know settling
on his shoulders. “I’m sorry.”

She stared up at him, her expression softening. “Are you
sick?”

“No.”

“You look very pale.” She lifted a hand to his cheek. “Your
skin is cold…”

But her hand was so very warm. The heat of it, of the blood
beneath her skin, burned through him like sunlight.

“I’d better go,” she said, her voice rising. She started to
take her hand from his face, screamed when his fingers closed over hers in a
grip like iron. “Please,” she begged. “Please, don’t…”

“Don’t what?” He held his hand against her cheek.

“I don’t know. Please, let me go.”

Dark rage bubbled up inside him as he saw the fear in her
eyes, felt it in the trembling of her body. Smelled it on her skin. What did
she see, he wondered. What had Katlaina seen when she ran from him in terror?

“You’re afraid of me,” he said, his voice hard and flat. “Why?
I’ve done nothing to you.”

“Please let me go!” She tried to twist out of his grasp,
cried out in pain when he tightened his hold on her wrist.

“Why are you afraid of me?” he demanded.

“Your eyes…they’re red.” She stared up at him, her gaze
trapped by his. “Glowing. Inhuman…” A sob rose in her throat. “Who are you?
What are you?”

He felt the power coalesce within him, felt it in every
fiber of his being. His gaze held hers, his eyes seeing into her thoughts,
imprisoning her mind until she had no will but his.

She stopped fighting him, her body suddenly limp. As if in a
daze, she cocked her head to the side. Her hair fell back, exposing the length
of her neck, the pulse beating there.

He felt the sharpness of his fangs against his tongue, and
then he was bending over her, enfolding her in his arms, hiding her in the
voluminous folds of his cloak. She stood motionless in his embrace, her arms at
her sides, her eyes vacant.

“Forgive me,” he whispered, and then, unable to help
himself, he pierced the vein in her throat, his eyes closing as her life’s
nectar filled his mouth.

Laughter. Dreams. Of a home, a child. The ache of a love
lost. The joy of a love found… He drank in her thoughts as he drank her blood,
heard the pounding of her heart as it sought to beat in rhythm with his own,
hers growing weaker, his growing stronger…

With a cry of self-loathing, he withdrew. She would have
fallen but for his arms around her.

“It will be all right, Joselle,” he said, his voice
soothing, hypnotic. “You will go home now. And you will remember none of this.”

“Home,” she parroted the word without inflection.

“Yes. Go home.”

He gave her a little push, and she stumbled forward. He
watched her walk toward the village, her steps uneven, wondering how he had
known her name, marveling at the power of his mind over hers.

He had so much to learn. About himself. About the world. She
had expected payment for the meal. What sort of payment?

He glanced down at the stained cloth of gold trousers he
wore. He needed clean raiment. Boots. Where did one find such things? Food and
clothing had been provided for him since birth.

Food… He grimaced as he recalled the taste of the meat he
had consumed earlier. The memory of eating cooked animal flesh sickened him as
the thought of partaking of blood would have sickened him only days ago.

Shaylyn. He had to find her, force her to tell him what he
had become. But how? Where did one look for a goddess?

Wrapping his cloak around him, he began to walk east, away
from Katlaina, away from the rising sun.

Blood. The need for it, the hunger, the passion, burned
within Navarre, haunting him, tormenting him. Like a beast gone mad, he
hungered for the taste of it even as he abhorred the unearthly need, the
unending desire.

He tried to ignore it. He avoided towns and people, living
like some outcast on the edges of humanity, but the hunger was excruciating and
he lacked the strength to fight it, to endure it.

He hunted the back streets and byways, taking his sustenance
from the sick, the dying. Some deep instinct warned him not to feed off the
dead. His existence filled him with self-loathing, yet he continued to hunt,
unable to resist the relentless thirst.

Six months passed. Miles passed. The moon was his sun, and
he explored the world in her pale silver light. He saw mountains and valleys,
herds of cattle and horses, flocks of sheep and goats, villages large and
small.

He learned to shut his mind to the constant barrage of
sounds that assaulted his ears. He tested the extent of his abilities, and for
a while he was heady with power. He had the strength of a hundred men, the
ability to transform into a dark mist, or into a wolf, to shield his presence from
mortal eyes. He could, with a glance, bend another’s will to his own.

In time, and with great effort, he learned to control the
hunger that was ever present. He wasn’t immune to pain, but his body had the
power to heal itself. A minor cut healed in minutes, severe injuries healed
overnight.

He learned that he could feed off the blood of animals,
though it was not as strengthening, or satisfying, as the blood of mortals.

In the beginning, filled with power and anger, he killed
many of those he fed upon, feeding off their fear as he fed off their blood,
until he had lost every shred of humanity, until he was truly a monster, until
he became a creature so vile he could stand it no longer. Overcome with guilt
and regret, he vowed never again to kill for the sake of killing, never to take
a life except to defend his own.

By day, he slept in the bowels of the earth, wondering, on
occasion, why she didn’t vomit him up, for it was there, resting deep in the
ground just before the darkness swept him away, that he was most aware of the
vast gulf between himself and humanity. His was a life against nature. Unclean,
he thought, he felt unclean, defiled by the life he led.

He had searched for Shaylyn in every village and town, but
she seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth, and, day by day, his
hope of finding his way back to mortality grew fainter.

He was lonely. So lonely. He thought often of Katlaina, of
the son she had born. Had she returned to Grenalde? Did she ever think of him?
His son would be crawling now. Soon he would be walking, talking. Would she
tell the boy about his father when he was old enough to understand?

With a sigh, Navarre shook his melancholy thoughts from his
mind. He had not fed in two days and the hunger was growing stronger, more insistent.

He smelled the village long before he saw it, his nostrils
filling with a miasma of odors that meant people. Smoke and sweat, the
fragrance of perfume and hard-milled soap, the sickening scent of roasting
meat, the pungent odor of human and animal waste.

As he drew nearer, he saw that it was a large village.
Flocks of sheep and goats grazed on the hillsides. He heard the lowing of
cattle, the rustle of feathers as chickens bedded down for the night, the
warning bark of a dog, a child’s laughter, a woman’s tears.

Ordinary sounds, he mused. The sounds of life, the kind of
life that was forever lost to him unless he found Shaylyn.

Lamplight glowed yellow in the windows of the cottages he
passed as he made his way toward the center of the village. He paused outside
one of the cottages, listening to the clatter of pots and pans as a fair-haired
woman prepared the evening meal. He heard the high-pitched laughter of a little
girl, the deeper, answering laughter of her father.

Pain twisted through Navarre’s heart as he caught sight of
the family gathered around the kitchen table. They bowed their heads, and he
heard the father offer a prayer of thanksgiving for the food they were about to
eat, for the roof over their heads, for the peace and plenty they enjoyed.

Navarre stood on the outside, looking in, yearning for the
life that had been denied him, for the carefree childhood he had never known,
for the father he had never seen.

He had a sudden urge to smash his way into the house, to
tear down the walls, to let them see the horror that he had seen in other eyes
before he robbed them of their lives.

For a moment, he imagined what it would be like. The father
would rush forward to defend his family, but his puny mortal efforts would be
wasted. The woman would cry and beg mercy for her child. And the young girl…
She would look at him through eyes filled with terror…

With a feral growl of self-hatred, he turned away from the
cottage, despising himself for what he had become. He was every man’s enemy,
every child’s nightmare, a soulless aberration who had no right to prey upon
the lives of others—no right except the innate need to survive.

* * * * *

It was on a dark winter night that he was set upon by
thieves. Ordinarily, he would have heard their approach, but on this night, he
was sunk in the depths of despair. He was weary of the life he led. He ached
for Katlaina, longed to spend his days and nights at her side, and yet, no
matter how he wished for a normal life, he knew such a thing could never be.

The thieves were upon him in a trice. Two of them bore him
to the ground and before he could summon his wits, the third stabbed him with a
very long, very sharp, knife.

With a gasp of pain, Navarre tried to fight them off, but
the blood flowing from his wound drained him of strength.

As from far away, he heard them complaining because he had
no money, and then darkness descended upon him. His last conscious thought was
that death had found him at last…

He woke feeling groggy and disoriented. For a moment he lay
where he’d fallen, wondering why he was still alive. Surely the thrust of the
knife should have killed him.

Slowly, he sat up, his hands probing his chest for the
wound. His fingers encountered torn cloth where the blade had pierced his
shirt, but there was no wound in his flesh, so sign that he had been attacked
save his torn and blood-stained shirt.

He stood up, feeling weak and lightheaded. Blood, he
thought, staring at the crimson stain that spread across his shirtfront. He
needed blood.

Staggering slightly, he made his way toward a large pasture
located across the road. He knew somehow that he was far too weak to seek
nourishment from a human source. For now, bovine blood would have to suffice.

He grimaced as he crossed the road and slipped between the
rails of the fence. A placid cow provided the sustenance he needed, and then,
feeling only a little better, he sought a place to pass the night, wondering,
as the darkness settled over him, why he was still alive.

* * * * *

Another six months passed. He had given up all hope of
locating Shaylyn when he found her. Or, to be more accurate, she found him.

He was sitting in the far corner of a small inn, staring out
into the rain-swept night, when a faint movement caught his eye. Startled, he
swung his head around to find her sitting across from him.

“So, my handsome one,” she purred, “we meet again.”

“Shaylyn.” He breathed her name, wondering, as he did so, if
she was real, or merely an illusion.

“You have survived your first year,” she remarked. “So many
do not.”

Leaning forward, he grabbed her by the hand. “Tell me,” he
said. “Tell me what I am.”

“Don’t you know?”

“No. Tell me. I was stabbed in the chest. It was a mortal
wound. Why didn’t I die?”

She laughed softly. “Ah, my handsome Navarre, still so much
to learn. You are already dead.”

“No.” He shook his head, refusing to believe.

“Yes. I told you as much the night I brought you over. Did
you not believe me?”

He shook his head again. “No.”

“You are
vampir
,” she explained. “One of the undead.
You cannot die by being stabbed, my Navarre, because you are already dead. But,
be warned, even the strongest vampires can be killed. A wooden stake through
the heart will kill most of us. Fire and beheading will most certainly destroy
you. Young ones, like yourself, must avoid the sun.”

“Vampire.” He spoke the word slowly. In all the scrolls and
manuscripts he had read, he had never come across the word.

“There have been vampires since the beginning of time,”
Shaylyn said. “I have made and destroyed hundreds of our kind.”

Navarre swallowed the knot of fear that had lodged in his
throat. “And have you come to destroy me?”

“No. I only came to see how my youngest fledgling is doing.”

“I’m lonely,” he confessed, not meeting her gaze. “I long
for…”

“Katlaina.” The word hissed past Shaylyn’s lips. “If you
want the woman, Navarre, why not take her? Use her as you will, then destroy
her.”

“Destroy her! Are you mad?”

“You cannot live like other men. You can no longer father a
child. If you desire the woman, take her and be done with it. But you must not
tell her what you are. She will hate you for it. If people suspect what you
are, they will hunt you down and destroy you.”

“Why didn’t you just kill me?” Navarre asked bitterly.
Surely that would be better than the life she described, better than the life
he had been living. He stared into her eyes. Sitting there, her hands folded on
the table, she looked human, though he could sense she was not. Vampire. One of
the undead. What did it really mean?

“If you don’t want to take the woman, then leave this place.
Go to the city, Navarre. Find yourself a place to live. Don’t shut yourself
away from mortals. Laugh, my handsome one. Dance. Find a woman to love, and
then, when she begins to age while you remain the same, move on and love again.”

“Is that what you do?”

“Yes. I’ve hunted the world over in my time. I have known
many mortal men. The world is a very big place. There is much to see. Much to
do.” She shrugged. “If living in the city doesn’t appeal, then go find yourself
a small village in the mountains and be a god. The peasants will revere you.
They will build you a place to live, and sacrifice virgins to appease your lust
and your thirst.”

“No!” He shuddered as he imagined Katlaina being brought to
him as a sacrifice.

“Do what you will, then,” Shaylyn said irritably. “Forever
is a long time. You must find a way to fill it.”

“And if I don’t wish to be part of the world?”

“Then bury yourself in the ground, my Navarre.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Dig yourself a hole deep in the earth and go to sleep.”

“What will that solve? I sleep every day.”

“Not the day sleep, but the long sleep. You can take your
rest for a year or a century. But beware, when you wake, you will be too weak
to feed off any but the smallest, most disgusting of creatures.”

“Have you done this?”

“Once, shortly after I was made.” She stared past him, her
thoughts turned inward. “It was like sleeping. I dreamed things, heard things.
Strange things. And when I woke, I realized the things I had heard and seen were
the voice of the earth, changing.”

She looked at him then, the light of desire glowing in her
eyes. “Come, hunt with me, Navarre.”

“No.”

“Still determined to travel alone, I see.” She stood up, a
vision of dark beauty. “Mayhap we will meet again, my handsome one.”

“Wait.” He rose to his feet, a feeling of emptiness coursing
through him as he followed her outside. He hated her for what she had done to
him, but she was the closest thing he had to family now.

“What is it?” she asked impatiently.

He didn’t know how to tell her what he wanted, but she knew.
With a sigh, she drew him into her arms and held him tight.

“It will get easier, Navarre,” she murmured, lightly
stroking his hair. “Don’t shut yourself off from the world. That way lies
madness.”

Shaylyn sighed as she felt his arms steal around her waist.
Shudders racked his body. She should have hated him for being so stubborn, for
refusing to hunt with her, live with her, as she had intended. But she couldn’t
hate him. In spite of all he had been through, there was an air of innocence
about Navarre, a deep inner goodness that she feared would be his undoing.

Murmuring his name, she pressed her lips to his.

For a moment, he clung to her, his arms pulling her up tight
against him. He felt her heated response, knew, in that moment, that he could
take her, then and there. Almost, he surrendered to the temptation of the warm
body pressed intimately to his. But it wasn’t just physical relief he wanted.
No, he wanted the love and caring that went with it.

He wanted Katlaina. Gently, he released his hold on Shaylyn.

“Come,” she said, holding out her hand. “Walk the night with
me.”

“No.” The thought of watching her hunt, of seeing her prey
upon some helpless mortal, draining the helpless creature of blood, filled him
with revulsion.

“Just a walk, Navarre,” she promised.

It was still raining. Thunder rolled across the heavens,
lightning crackled, a chill wind rode the rain.

Shaylyn lifted her face to the sky, laughing softly as the
thick drops washed down her cheeks.

“I’ve always loved winter,” she mused. “The darkness. The
violence of a storm. The power of lightning.”

She was like the storm, he thought. There was lightning in
her eyes, violence in her soul. And yet she was beautiful, even now, with her
hair falling in damp ebony strands down her back. Her gown clung to her,
molding itself to her body, revealing ample curves.