Blood Rites (7 page)

“You’re not that to me,” he said so softly she knew he had never considered her that way. >

“No, I am your lover, your almost human lover, and no bloody birth into immortality, no ritual bonding with the family, can change that, not until I have the courage to accept what I have become. I see it clearly now. I understand. In all those years at home I would hear ‘No, Helen’ and ‘Thank you, Helen. You’re so good to us, Helen.’ And then I became ill and crippled and all the restraints that society orders broke down. I could be independent because no man would ever want to make me his possession. I could try to be famous because I would die young. Then you came and said I could be immortal. I understand this. What I am accepts this. But I wasn’t raised to be powerful. Women never are.”

Helen paused before asking, “Stephen, what would happen if I did not live on human life?”

“In time you would forget what it is like to be human.”

“Is that so wrong?”

“My father survives that way. One of our women does also. I understand her decision but I think she has lost too much. People are more than food to us. They are the texture of our lives.”

“And we’re their fantasies,” Helen said softly, then added, “I’m still partly human. I might not suffer any loss.”

“Even my father can walk among men when he must,” he said evenly. He dared not hint what vow he wanted. Her choice must be her own.

She held out her hand and, for the first time, showed him the pale patch of skin on her palm. “If I lose my eyes, what color will they be when they grow back?”

When he didn’t reply, she added, “And if I am ever damaged inside, will I lose the human ability you all need so much?‘’

“You could have children and raise them here.”

“No, Stephen. If I don’t go with you soon, our cycles of work and exile will never merge completely. We’ll face an eternity of good-byes.” She smiled sadly and reached for his hand, then spoke slowly in his language trying to inflect each syllable as precisely as the shape of her mouth and throat would allow, “You are my chosen, the one who will be father to my children,” then added in English, “my husband, for as long as you desire it.”

She sensed the tension draining from him as she made this vow, replaced by an old sorrow. There were no words in his language to describe all of her future with him. “You are my chosen,” he began in the Austra feminine inflection, “who will be mother to my children.” And added in English, “My wife, for as long as you desire it.”

“When we leave, take me to a place where there are no people to distract me and remind me of my past. I want to paint the trees and the mountains and the sky the way a deer sees them.”

All the Austra family felt this call to throw off the sham of humanity. To run. To hunt. He hadn’t expected to see the need surface in Helen yet.

Helen sensed his thoughts. “It’s not need; just desire to discover exactly what I am. Then you can be my teacher again. But first you must give me a little time to be nineteen and healthy and almost human; to make a fool out of myself with Philippe or Alex, with anyone I wish. And to become famous. After I die, I want everyone to remember my name.”

He shook his head. “That isn’t wise, Helen. Unlike the rest of our kind, you have a past—a real one—and it could endanger you.”

“We’ll destroy all my photographs and break all but the closest ties. Then I’ll be no different than Denys or Laurie. You see, I want my family to inherit my estate. Fame will be my gift to them.” She imitated his frequent pragmatic tone, “Works of dead artists are worth more, yes?”

He could hardly deny her this brief moment of recognition, especially since she would never have another like it again. So he ignored his uneasiness and asked, “Can you be ready for your first major show in nine months?”

Understanding what he really asked, she considered her response before answering confidently. “Six. Six, and then it will be over.”

II

The next morning Hillary stripped off her nightshirt and angled her wall mirror so she could study her body. She looked at it, front and back, with a complete lack of any emotion other than detached loathing. Then she put on her baggy clothes, picked up a pin, and moved her face in closer to the mirror. As she stared at her eyes, she thought of her mother and scratched the pin again and again over one cheek until the scratch bled. Satisfied, she took an apple from the table and headed toward school. Though she tried not to think of how she’d stared at her body in the mirror, her mind kept returning to it. She hoped that whatever unknown need had created that moment of curiosity would never surface again.

Later that day, she received a message from Helen asking that she come to the house after school. There she found Helen in her studio, a large canvas mounted on her easel. “I want you to be my subject,” Helen told her, not giving the girl an opportunity to refuse. Then, instead of posing her, Helen sat and talked with Hillary, discussing the girl’s life in the Colony and her plans for the future. Through Hillary’s hesitant answers, Helen glimpsed more of her past. She wanted to dismiss the girl and begin the painting with Hillary’s face as it looked now, all hope and quiet ambition, barely showing the horror of her earlier years, but simple beauty wouldn’t be enough.

Helen wanted her masterpiece.

As they talked, Helen’s mind captured the girl, carefully so as not to startle her. In a moment, Hillary sat, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes closed, her body numb and ordered to stay numb until Helen released her. Helen moved behind the girl, making a small cut on Hillary’s shoulder, drawing out the blood, strengthening the mental bond between them.

One year, the last year should be enough.

But it wasn’t. Helen demanded more, pulling the child through all the years of neglect and abuse until, shaking, sobbing, the girl broke the bond and fainted.

Helen carried Hillary into the great room and put her on the sofa ordering her into a deep healing sleep. Then she sat in a chair across from Hillary and stared at her, re-forming the bond between them as she began to build the portrait in her mind.

The horror Helen had shared vanished. The pain. Even the guilt. What remained was apprehension. Helen didn’t know if she had the skill to paint something so subtle, so terrible, so beautiful.

Helen had never been this obsessed with a single work. Hillary’s painting became as much a test of her new powers as her skill. Sometimes she would sit for an hour staring at the canvas before making a single stroke. Weeks passed while she worked on the large painting, layering Hillary’s life on the canvas until it matched as perfectly as possible the picture in Helen’s mind. When she thought she had finished, she stored the canvas and worked on other projects with the same attention to every small detail.

She stopped only for sleep and food and for those infrequent times when the need for blood and passion forced her down the mountain to surprise a delighted Philippe Dutiel. Now that she had made her decision to leave, Stephen paid little attention to where she spent her nights. As for Helen, she easily rationalized the affair with Philippe. She needed him. When she left here, they would break for good. She told him that, even told him why she would go.

Afterward, they never spoke of it.

I

AustraGlass shut down a week before Christmas. The Colony pensions closed, owners and renters alike going off for a three-week holiday. Hillary left with Jean Savatier’s family to act as a helper for their three little girls but Helen was too busy to notice her absence. The Austra family—the exiles and those who worked elsewhere in the world—came home. Intimate friends of the family—those who shared the Austra secret—came home as well. The Colony became freer; the Austra family more open, allowing Helen a brief, bittersweet glimpse of how their shared world ought to be.

On the night before the winter solstice, the only traditional Austra celebration, Paul and Elizabeth held their holiday reception in the only place large enough to accommodate the crowd—the Austra corporate offices that separated the Colony from the estates. The couple kept Helen close to them as they greeted their guests, reminding her that though it was their party, she was the honored one tonight.

The Austra family provided a brilliant contrast to the often staid evening attire of the human guests. There was Laurence in a wine velvet vest and slacks over a richly draped pale blue satin shirt; William, from Italy, in a chestnut jacket lavishly embroidered with gold. Madeline, ignoring all evening convention, wore a peach riding habit. Stephen had dressed in what seemed Austra ceremonial best—steel grey suede pants and vest and the beaded green shirt Helen liked so well. Helen had dressed more simply—in an embroidered peasant skirt and scoop-necked black top. She had French-braided her hair in a single long plait down her back and the Austra pendant was her own jewelry. It had all the significance of a wedding ring, she thought, and she felt like a bride as she stood beside Stephen, shook strangers’ hands, and hugged family members she had not met before. She was amazed at how, through the often fleeting introductions and the subtle prying questions that accompanied them, she could simply touch a hand and feel such empathy.

“You share a bond with them,” Elizabeth explained to her as they walked outside with Paul later that evening. “Many of them are our lovers. Their blood mingles in all of us, creating a sort of extended family. Do you see?”

“Yes, I see.”

“Why do you look so thoughtful?” Elizabeth asked.

“When I look at you and Paul, I think of how Stephen and I might have been together had I been merely human.”

“Then you would have been born different than you were. Someone less magnetic, less talented. Someone he might have never even noticed,
ouH
And I will tell you something else and it may surprise you—most of our men never have human lovers in the sense that I have Paul.” She affectionately squeezed Paul’s arm. “Of course, they take partners and many have known the truth about them but it isn’t the same as a lasting relationship. Perhaps this is our way of satisfying our maternal instincts.” She smiled, then laughed, brightening the conversation. “Paul certainly needs taking care of.”

“You do?” Helen asked him with a coy smile.

“Elizabeth tells me that I work too hard. That I worry far too much. That I often forget to eat . . .”

“And that sometimes his only exercise comes in bed,” Elizabeth cut in and kissed her embarrassed lover on the cheek. Though Elizabeth tried to sound light, Helen sensed the fear. “We don’t think about our future,” Elizabeth added in a more somber tone. “That is your luxury.”

When they reached the fork in the road that led toward the Colony, Helen stared down the road, then suggested they return to the party.

“We could walk down to the Colony and force Philippe to come back with us?” Elizabeth suggested.

Helen noticed Paul shake his head. “He’s made his choice for tonight,” Helen said. “And I have made mine.”

With a faster pace than Paul’s stiff knee could tolerate, she walked ahead of them toward the tiny colored lights, the soft voices, and the music.

And as she entered through the tall doors of colored glass and saw Stephen already weaving his way through the crowd to meet her, she realized that she really didn’t care whether or not Philippe came.

II

As Helen suspected, Philippe intended to spend the holidays alone, a brooding bitter rival of the family who owned his house, controlled his livelihood, and, when he was honest enough to admit it, had saved his life.

He had received his usual invitations and declined them all. When Paul Stoddard visited the afternoon of the solstice, Philippe let him come inside reluctantly. He didn’t want to speak to anyone except Helen, but he and Paul were old friends and it had been months since they’d seen each other. “Pardon the mess, the maid is absent,” he said with a trace of his old, good-natured humor.

“It doesn’t look any worse than your room did in our pension,” Paul replied, following the remark with an uneasy laugh.

Philippe rinsed out a glass and poured Paul some wine. “We want you to come to the ceremony tonight,” Paul said as he took it.

“We?”

“Elizabeth and I.”

“And Helen?”

“She already asked you, didn’t she?”

“And our monarch, what does he think?”

“Stephen suggested I talk to you,” Paul answered.

“So I did guess right, hmmm? No, I prefer to stay here. Helen will come to me. The Austras survive on their lovers, after all.”

“You fool! You can’t be Stephen’s rival. You’d be better off if you were his friend.”

“Would you be his friend if you had to share Elizabeth with him?”

“Yes,” Paul answered with no hesitation and added, “someday I will share her with someone. My relationship with Elizabeth has lasted because I accept it. Don’t force Helen to choose between you and Stephen. If you do, you’ll lose her.”

“Go home to your lover, Paul. I’ll stay here and wait for mine.”

“She won’t come. Not tonight.”

“I’ll wait and see.”

Paul had set his glass on the kitchen table and turned to go when Philippe grabbed his arm. “I’m sorry, Paul,” he said and added, “Have you ever known me not to make a fool of myself over a beautiful woman?‘’

“Never,” Paul said. He looked at Philippe hopefully. “Is that all this relationship is—you making a fool of yourself again?”

“I wish,” Philippe replied. “But the truth is, for the first time in my life, I think, I’m in love, and as I always expected, I made the worst possible choice. And the fact is, now that I’ve finally attained this miserable state, I intend to wallow in it.”

Philippe did. He waited that night with his doors and windows open, sitting in a chair, staring up at the fires on the mountaintop, hearing the faint music drifting down, a melody perfectly suited to the stars and the cold . . . a throbbing chant in celebration of the Long Night.

As, still upright in his chair, he fell asleep, he thought he heard her voice, felt the brush of her mind in his. But it was only the beginning of a dream—erotic and almost satisfying.