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Thispart of my vampire serial was first posted chapter by chapter in March 2002; asfor the first two stories, it was greatly revised for the print run in 2004,especially since by 2004 the series had stretched to five parts instead ofthree. The title changed, as didthe focus of the story. In fact,this is the story that changed the most in the printed version. Among otherchanges, the featured monster was more fully fleshed out, and became arecurring character in the rest of the series. Here is a copy of the originalonline version.
Theoriginal intro read: ÒThe latest installment in the continuing adventures ofMichael and Tadeus is complete. Almost a year after his transformation into avampire, there's one thing Michael would like to do, and it's GOING HOMEÓ
Thereare still printed copies available, with fun covers and tiny graphics inside:see the homepage for purchase details.
Michaelwas sprawled over a night guard on the grass beside the Rhine River in Basel.Ominous recycled trash, mounted as spectacular contraptions and statues, stoodaround him, concealing the vampire and his meal from the sodium glow ofstreetlights. It was almost midnight, still early for a bustling industrialtown, but the cold kept people at home. As he slobbered voraciously, he couldsee the face of the immobilized victim and felt an overwhelming sense ofdeja-vu. Didnt he eat from this guard before?
Michael was holding his victimlike an experienced wrestler pins his adversary in the ring; with one roughbite of his dull teeth, he ripped the flesh away from the jugular and gave into the warm and comforting taste of the flowing liquid of life. His victim,nailed to the ground by the hunger-driven vampire, emitted bubbly sounds asgargling blood filled the throat and mouth. Like a cauldron of boiling blood,drops spattered around the rim, drizzling his face with sanguine freckles. Witheach messy slurp, Michael grew more confident, forgetting he had ever knownextreme starvation. His full gullet justified the killing, transformed intomusic the melodic gurgling of his panicked victims sobs and cries.
The guard rattled with one lastburst of energy, and then blood leaked from his neck like an open faucet, nopulses to send jets flying out of the throat like a fountain.
Michael sniffled, the warm mealmaking his nose run. He straightened up, wiping the blood on his hands onto histailored white shirt. He heard soft footsteps rustling in front of him andlooked around, wiping his runny nose, inadvertently streaking his face withblood at the same time. He was no longer beside the Rhine; in front of him rosethe large hill that gave its name to Montreal, his hometown. At the foot of themountain, a glorious verdigris angel with two lions stared down at him. Therusty companions that replaced the Rhine-side statues offered no protectionfrom the impassive copper gaze of the angel and its leonine jury.
Dripping with blood, Michaelstumbled back, wondering what kind of magic carried him home, from oneCarnac-like alignment of recycled trash to another artists recycled trash inMontreal. The sun was coming down, the mysterious teleportation respecting thetime zones. He was in a courtyard, his makeshift knights and him surrounded bya metal fence; the only opening lay in the direction of the angel, and Michaelwas unable to sustain its unceasing examination. His fear paralyzed him. He wasgoing to be petrified all night, he panicked, until in the morning the aloofjudges of his conscience would watch him burn in the rising sun. The sky wasgrowing darker, and suddenly above the angel a bright white cross lit up.Michael fell and whimpered, seized by an overwhelming despair. And he woke upin his room in Perigueux, his hands clasped like talons over the blankets,choking on mucus from crying so hard. It was two days before the firstanniversary of his transformation into a vampire, and he was not taking itwell.
The nightmares upset his entireworld. He looked around him for the reassuring presence of familiar objects:the radio, the laptop and printer, his second-hand typewriter, and heaps ofengaging mystery and spy novels and stories that were rejected by at leastthree publishers each. He looked at the dog-eared volume beside his table,Mesmerism: Method and Practice, wishing at least one thing would work to makehis life easier.
He was depressed, stuck with aself-inflicted wound and a mute half-life. His bouts of anxiety had grownstronger since his adventure in Switzerland with Tadeus, where he had beenforced to take his first and only full meal as a vampire. He despised theamoral beast he had become, the creature that, in the space of a few voluptuousgulps, could overcome his reluctance to drink blood and nearly drain a human.With that meal he realised he could never go back to his old life. As theone-year milestone neared, Michaels anxiety climaxed: would his limited dietprovoke a berserker feeding frenzy? He took regular, smaller sips to preventdisaster, but each sacrilegious meal required tiresome discretion. He did notshare Tadeuss talent to charm people, and had to devise his own ways to stealhis precious nourishment: slumbering campers in summer, the occasional passedout drunk. You could call his meat rare. Animals sustained him slightly, thesame way as fast food: it sated immediate hunger, but after an hour his stomachcried for more. He accepted the lingering hunger like a monk depriving himselfof worldly goods.
He had spent several months, afterSwitzerland, in one of the thousand grottoes in the Perigord cliffs, far fromthe more touristy painted caverns of Lascaux and Fonds-de-Gaume, attempting tomeditate on his fate. The summer had been hard on Michael, filled with suicidalthoughts. He had imagined joining the basilisk in its briny grave. It wasconceivable he would not die, and hed be stuck, his feet solidly set in leadand cement, watching his flesh flake off over the years in the undercurrents,fish nibbling at his skin, perhaps hed finish as a soul unable to leave itssea-polished bones. The thought of eternal rotting kept him firmly rooted onland. His lacerated neck was a constant reminder of the time he bludgeonedhimself to end it all: his actions completed his transformation as a vampire:He certainly did not want to know what came after a second death.
Before going crazy from thegrottos evenness of temperature, darkness and hunger, he returned to his den inPerigueux. Recalling the faces contorted in terror of the basilisks victims, hehad concluded that his level of damnation was relatively benign, if he couldget over the blood thing. Despite the nightmares, he was resolved to put apositive spin on his situation. Except hed expect a vampire who had glimpsedfabulous mysteries and had to wrestle with the darkness in his soul to be ableto write at least one story that would sell.
After a year, Michael was startingto call the town, with its yellowed buildings, its meandering river, its chalkycliffs and woods, home. Paying the rent was not a problem, thanks to moneyTadeus had given him. The landlord had adopted him as the disfigured writerliving upstairs, and other lodgers encouraged him whenever they saw him pick uphis rejection letters. He felt like an outsider every time someone was friendlyto him, conscious of how often he roamed in dark alleys for food.
And yet, out in the streets,preparations for the annual torchlight parade were underway, beckoning to him.Michael, still shaky from his dream, stared at the mess littered around himcarcasses of unfinished chapters, abandoned revisions piled as scrap paper forthe next story, diskettes with half-boiled plots. It was time he called theplace home for real. Gathering his courage, he pulled his coat on, wrapped thescarf around his offensive scar, and joined the revels outside.
Over thenext few months, Michael learned to relax. His resolve to come out of isolationbuoyed his spirits. His neighbours, by now accustomed to his unsightlymutilation, helped by calling editors for him. His writing lessened the gorydreams that still plagued him. He was getting used to the routine of rejectionletters, trying to dismiss them as the milestones of every developing novelist.Maybe if he wrote about vampires instead of spies, hed get somewhere, but heworried he might reveal too much for his safety.
Before he realized it, it was lateOctober and he was trying to sell horror stories. The leaves had fallen out oftrees, and condensation was forming in the chill air. He was getting ready totype another hopeful chapter when someone knocked at the door. Who could becalling on him at this time?
The word visitor is relativelyneutral in connotation, but these visitors twisted the word into a semanticalpirouette: two large men, their width indicating their enthusiasm forbodybuilding, were blocking the entryway. One asked him, moving his lips solittle that Michael had to guess from which man the voice came from, if he knewTadeus. Michaels hesitation proved his loss: they knocked him down. Two blowsto the head later, while he was too dizzy to react, Michael was picked up andcarried down the stairs.
Michael was squeezed in the backof a Renaud, between the two heaps of muscle who kidnapped him. Sitting in themiddle, he had an unobstructed view of the road as the driver followed thewinding Isle River. Seeing where he was headed did not calm him, but at leasthe was not carsick. After about ten minutes, the car veered onto a small woodsyroad, barely wide enough for a second car. They finally reached a clearing withsmall farm cottages, the kind that in summer transforms into bed andbreakfasts. They were humble things, stone walls and a thatched roof. Smallgardens hugged the walls. In the bluish glow of the full moon, the villageseemed ghostly.
The driver pulled into one of thedriveways. Michael was elbowed out of the car and into the house. He was led tothe back of the house, where one of the two men rasped at a door. As theywaited, Michael looked around him. The walls were bare and whitewashed. Thehouse smelled of earth, as if impregnated over the decades with the odour of asoil floor. A soft click broke the silence and the door opened. Michael waspushed inside. One side of the room was bathed in the cool glow of the moon. Onthe other side, a fire kept the room warm. Water was steaming out of a kettlehanging above the flames. Propped on a sofa, a pale woman was soaking her handsin a brass bowl. Michael could guess the shapes of an old sofa and armchairset, and a small coffee table. Flowerpots crowded the space around the seats,and a loamy scent permeated the air: Michael the room was a greenhouse.
Michael was pushed across the roomto the woman soaking her hands. She was unusually pale, as white as themoonlight. The sofa was positioned so that she glowed in the moonshine, herlong hair flowing down like a stream of fine white grass. She was so white, themoonlight seemed to envelope her in a white aura against the darkness of the roomand the window. The liquid in her bowl was dark, like a rheumatism bath.Definitely not blood: Michael would have recognized the alkaline smell. Thealbino woman put the bowl aside and dried her hands in a towel. When she moved,she sent an air current across the room, loaded with green smells cedar andthyme, thought Michael, and something flowery, like the peonies his mother usedto grow, or the water lilies at the botanical garden.
Despite the darkness, Michaelsensed her piercing eyes judging his mettle. Though she looked fragile, Michaelfeared her more than the two men who pummeled him without any qualms. Somethingwild shone in her eyes.
Hello Michael, she said. Her wispyvoice was as fragile as her appearance. Michael was striving to place its accent,but her reedy voice distracted from her pronunciation. I am Delphine, sheadded. I need your help. I know you are the youngest son of Tadeus, but youdont share his selfishness or cruelty. Again the name of the old vampire who,up until now, consistently disrupted Michaels life: this was not a good sign.The albino woman got up and swayed up to her guest. She was exquisitelybeautiful and delicate. She looked tired. A herbal smell surrounded her likeshe was breathing and sweating a lifetime of tonic potions. She studied Michaeleye to eye. Her gaze was deep and the colour of grass in summer. Michael turnedhis eyes away from the uncanny depth of her stare. I will help you in exchange,she announced. She unwrapped the scarf to reveal Michaels scarred throat,letting him guess how she meant to help him, but the presence of her twobodyguards undermined her suggestion of a true co-operation.
She waved almost imperceptibly,and the two guards exited the room. She invited Michael to sit down. She wiltedtiredly into the sofa pillows, a summer breeze wafting from her velvet dress asshe dropped. She pointed at the plants around the room. I can nurture any plantto bloom out of season. Bu these do not have much special value, she dismissed,before continuing. I require someone's help to deliver one unique specimen toAmerica.
Michael was wary: you dont kidnapa vampire or even someone acquainted with a bored and proud vampire - just toask a favour. Michael thought he was caught in a drug ring, that he was goingto deliver a new breed of poppy flower or marijuana or coke plant. The customspapers are ready. In compensation for your effort, I will give you a voice anda face. If she thought he couldnt refuse, she was wrong: he didnt mind thescarf and the wound. He did, however, mind being used as a punching ball bysteroid-laden goons. But she had decided for him, and her two muscled friendswould make sure he accepted. The albino botanist seemed to think very highly ofMichaels strength, and the nagging question popped up again in his mind: whyhim?
Michael signified his refusal byshaking his head in an emphatic No. Paying no heed, his interlocutor settledthe matter by gently striking a silver chime, ringing for her men. Michael wasdragged to a trap door in the floor and down into a cellar dug under the house.
Whateverassurances the albino botanist had offered, Michael was racked with seriousdoubts. He was held for two days in the dark cellar. When the overhead trapdoor finally opened, DelphineÕs minders pulled him out and pushed him outsideto the car. They forced Michael to swallow a decoction Delphine had handedthem. He lost consciousness a few minutes later.
He awoke in a clinic, lying on astiff table covered in crispy sterilized cloth. On a cart next to him he saw aline of surgical clamps and scalpels. The albino woman was speaking with thesurgeon, but everything was too fuzzy for Michael to understand their words. Inthe blue and green world of the room, Michael guessed the surgeon hadapproached and was drawing lines on his neck.
The surgeon gave time for effectof DelphineÕs potion to lift before he let a nurse administer local and generalanesthetic on Michael. Michael floated down in bouncy clouds, trying in vain tograb a hold on solid ground and leave. His eyelids heavy, he was soon unable tocatch the surgeonÕs movements around him. Through an otherworldly painlessness,the helpless vampire soon felt prodding and piercing, and what seemed likemile-long pulling and stretching. There was a heavy pressure on his chest, andsuddenly he was not breathing anymore. Then he realized air was coming in, butthrough a hole in his chest. He fainted when it sank in that his neck was wideopen.
When Michael's thoughts finallyregained coherency, ghostly stretching and cutting sensations haunted his nerveends. The pain inflicted while under anaesthetic was released in throbbingpulses. Near his collarbone, he could feel the tube through which he wasbreathing. He heard the air as it rushed through the curved cylinder. A handtouched his arm, and a voice spoke words he could not decipher through hismindÕs fog. His wrist was raw: probably serum, or a blood transfusion, in hisspecial case. As the effect of the anaesthetic lifted, his limbs reappeared oneby one in his mental map. Michael felt bandages tightened over his jaw andneck. His throat ached from the stitches stretching reconstructed vocal cordsand from the quilt of reconstructed skin around his neck.
He slept a lot over the next fewdays, tranquillised. The paraphernalia slowly disappeared, until finally hewoke up breathing through his mouth. Delphine was there, the room fragrant withher herbal perfume. She smiled mockingly, waving his passport.
The words shocked Michael back toreality. He was dizzy as much from the rarified air passing through his swollenthroat as from his distressed awakening. He didnÕt know how she got hispassport, but now that she knew his real name and address, she had no troublefinding his parents. The Machiavellian botanist had Michael cornered: with hisparents waiting – and apparently calling Delphine every other day to enquireabout his state – he had no choice but to leave Perigueux.
The albino woman spent the nextfew days explaining MichaelÕs task. He was to be her bodyguard until theyreached America, and he was going to carry the box with the precious plant. Sheshowed him the papers he had to show at customs. Airport officials being moresuspicious after the terrorist attacks in the United States, the papers atleast looked genuine. Delphine made Michael sign the papers – all in his name –and explained she would join him aboard the plane. An alarm bell rang inMichaelÕs head: he would get caught trafficking a new drug plant, and themanipulative woman would watch from a safe and innocent distance. Delphine hadplanned every detail of this mission, and Michael wondered why she picked avampire when she already had two goons in her employ.
His answer came quickly enoughwhen she described her persecutor. Tall, German, red haired and freckled, anight owl who charmed ladies for blood. Michael recognised the nightmare thatmessed up his life: Tadeus. If this vicious dynamo had set his thoughts oncapturing Delphine, she definitely needed another vampire for protection.Michael wondered, though, if he was the right man for the job. Now why wouldTadeus pursue an anaemic botanist?
That same November night they leftfor Paris. The wooden box for the plant appeared in DelphineÕs arms as theypacked. Michael was surprised at how small the container was: small enough tofit in a carry-on bag. Michael was squeezed in the back of the Renault with thetwo guards. They stopped in Perigueux so Michael could pick up his belongings.One of Delphine's men helped him pack, and while he was busy pulling clothingfrom the wardrobe, Michael surreptitiously inserted his set of fake IDs betweenmanuscripts. He was expecting a long life, and would need another identity whentime came to conceal his agelessness. As he picked up his laptop and preferredmanuscripts, he noticed someone in the street waving to get his attention.Tadeus! Michael frowned, zealously switching to defensive mode. Stung once byTadeus, he wholly intended to prevent Tadeus from reaching this victim, nomatter how she had forced the responsibility on him.
Before Michael could react, one ofthe goons noticed Tadeus. He grabbed the stuff in MichaelÕs arms and stuffed itinto a carry-on. With Tadeus looming so closely, MichaelÕs stress reachedcosmic levels. He had no idea how to fight the much older and experiencedvampire, should Tadeus decide to attack. All the way to Paris, Michael couldfeel Tadeus following them.
The Renault reached the capitaljust before daylight, and drove straight to Charles de Gaulle airport. Thedriver dropped Michael, Delphine and one guard at the terminal and left.Delphine was hugging the woodenbox tightly. Michael was amused by the fact that he was escorted by the guard:the bodyguard being watched. But Tadeus was still around, and he remainedalert. They found a quiet place far from the windows, behind a row of pottedplants. Michael tried staying awake, but the brightness tired him and hedrifted off to sleep, covered by his coat and scarf.
Michael was awoken by the guardhanding him DelphineÕs box. It was boarding time, and they were going to belate. It was the middle of the afternoon, and Michael needed all his strengthto make it to the gate. He had his scarf and hat on against the sun, and rushedas the last call was placed for his flight. He could still sense Tadeus nearby,and was hoping that Tadeus was asleep, did not buy a ticket for the sameflight. The guard went on board with Michael, but thankfully had taken a seatfar from Michael. Michael didnÕt spot Delphine as he walked down the aisle. Shewas perhaps seated in first class, though he couldn't understand the logic ofprotecting a person who sits too far for him to see anything. He put the boxinside his carry-n bag, and shoved them in the overhead compartment. He closedthe window and buried himself under a blanket.
Michael decided he could not beheld responsible for the separate seating arrangements Delphine had chosen, andcuddled for a long nap. Suddenly he was stirred from his rest by DelphineÕsguard. He unfastened Michael's seatbelt and dragged the sleepy vampire off theplane just as the hostess was closing the doors. Michael barely had enough timeto grab his scarf and coat. Running down the tarmac, Michael saw a familiarfigure dressed against the sun, carrying an equally familiar wooden box.
Michael and his guardian chasedTadeus into the underground parking, and jumped back just in time to avoid theold vampire driving away in a blue Ford Ka. DelphineÕs minder swore and throughgrinded teeth he ordered Michael into an idling car. ÒDelphine says you cantrace a vampire: do your magic. We need to recuperate the plant before hedestroys it.Ó The guard slid over the hood to the driverÕs side. By the timethe outraged owner dropped the luggage he was unloading and ran to the front ofthe car, the car was in gear and zipping away.
Tadeus wasnÕt that far ahead, butMichael was no expert at tracking. He needed enormous concentration to figureout the direction his creator had taken. He was going northward, to theChannel. Michael, recollecting a hectic drive to drown a basilisk, guessed thatTadeus made a habit of dropping tricky problems off BrittanyÕs coast. Michaelremembered the way, and it helped him give directions to the angry driver. Theguard was completely focused on recuperating the box, but Michael was relaxing,confident that he knew TadeusÕs destination.
The goon, eyes peeled for the blueKa, passed cars right and left. The chase lasted several hours, and as the sunset, Michael was growing more comfortable, and more certain of his perceptions.Tadeus was still in front of them, and the distance was shrinking fast. It feltto Michael as if they were heading for a head on collision with Tadeus. Then,just as he realised what that meant, Michael spotted Tadeus in his blue Forddrive back in the opposite lane, toward Paris. By the time Michael and theguard made it to the right lane, found an exit and started their way back toParis, Tadeus had distanced them thoroughly. Only MichaelÕs intuition confirmedtheir target was not spiralling around again.
By night time, they had Paris insight, Montparnasse and the Eiffel tower illuminated over a wavy sea of dark zincrooftops. They were about to drive around the capital but Michael stopped theguard: Tadeus had stopped in the capital. They drove around town on thePériphérique, the circling highway separating Paris from its suburbs. WhenMichael felt Tadeus was closest, they took the next exit into the city oflights and soon found themselves out of the open areas, zigzagging throughnarrow streets intersecting like myriads of superimposed stars. They droveslowly, trying to sense TadeusÕs whereabouts. Michael led them though thelabyrinthine alleys of The city was well lit, the streets unobstructed, butthey didn't see Tadeus's car or Tadeus, and Michael could not pinpoint Tadeuswith precision. They kept driving, stopping here and there to ask if people hadseen a man walking with a suspect carry-on bag.
Michael rapidly got the impressionhe was observed. Looking around discretely, he realised that Tadeus had beenfollowing for a while, trying to get MichaelÕs attention. Desperate for theguardian not to notice Tadeus was so unexpectedly close, Michael was thinkingfast, deciding where his loyalties lay. His job was to protect Delphine. Bynow, she was in America and Tadeus was in Paris. Job well done: so why was hechasing with DelphineÕs minder after a plant – possibly a dangerous thing toexport – that he cared little about? Tadeus was gesturing insistently, butMichael wasn't sure he wished to get embroiled in another unbelievableadventure. Tadeus, growing impatient, sidled up to his pursuers and quicklycharmed the guard. Under TadeusÕs influence and without realizing their quarywas next to them, the guard proposed that they split to cover more ground.
As soon as Tadeus was alone withMichael, he blurted out: ÒIÕvestill got the box and the plant: You have to help me bring it where itbelongs.Ó Michael stared at the domineering vampire with a puzzled frown. ÒIt'sgoing to pick up a fight. I need you to prevent it from escaping,Ó continuedTadeus. He pointed Michael the way, clutching DelphineÕs box securely shut.Michael sighed. Here we go again, he thought, envisaging a long drive to theChannel to drop the unwanted plant in the sea. No wonder one spot of the oceanhad so unnerved Michael: Tadeus must have been throwing unwanted stuff in thatspot for ages, the collective despair of various drowned and downed adversariesresounding in the minds of sensitive people.
Michael was surprised when theykept walking instead of taking a car. Tadeus dragged his companion the oppositeway he had sent the guard. They walked west toward an isolated skyscraper.Michael was following the other vampire by the sound of his footsteps: his eyeswere all for the famed city. He was surprised how recent the buildings seemed,as if after the Revolution Napoleon had ordered the capital to cast away allremnants of the past and wear a newer, modern dress, fit for a the seat of thenew Republique. The industrial age adorned Paris with forged iron and a newurban plan: the ornate curves of Art Nouveau and mysterious late twentiethcentury follies squeezed together with street lamps, traffic lights, andsidewalk gas pumps. Open spaces were paved, giving an impression of anengineered void of nature. The leafless autumn trees contributed to thatfeeling. The buildings were low, but a few office towers and the gaudilylighted Eiffel tower helped Michael orient himself. The mess of streets,blissful strangers to the right angles Michael grew up in, piled up in a mazeof pie wedges.
Paris was surrounded by aroundabout called the Peripherique. Beyond the Peripherique lay the suburbs,the airports, and large forested parks. The biggest among these wooded parkswas the infamous Bois-de-Boulogne, toward which Tadeus was heading. Where thestreets of Paris had been well lit to secure tourists and little-sleepingParisians, the densely packed trees were a not-so-secret meeting place forone-night stands and illicit adventures. As they pressed along the parkÕsautumn paths, Michael noticed a glint in TadeusÕs eyes. He detected aliveliness in his companionÕs voice, a touch of excitement. The guy was high onadrenaline! This bored, centuries-old vampire was so desperate for action thateven getting rid of a plant excited him. Michael hoped the man would not gethooked on that kind of rush: he was enough of a problem without going arounddeliberately provokingÉ oh, wait. He was deliberately planning his excitement.ThatÕs how Michael had become a vampire.
Tadeus was quiet until he wascertain no one was near enough to overhear. ÒSheÕs been recalled,Ó he started.Michael wondered whether Tadeus was speaking about the plant or Delphine. ÒButshe doesnÕt want to let go of life.Ó Tadeus was speaking about Delphine, thoughhe was pointing at the box. For Michael it was perfectly reasonable that shewould want to preserve her life. ÒHer people want her back. Real bad.Ó Michaeltried to imagine what kind of clique could force an experienced vampire to huntdown a woman for them. Then he tried imagining the faces on this fearless clanwhen Tadeus brought them a simple box with a little plant inside, and regrettedembarking with Tadeus.
ÒWhy did you steal the plant,Ócroaked Michael, his inflamed throat wheezing from the brisk pace. ÒWhat haveyou got against Delphine, and why am I mixed in this?Ó
Tadeus was stunned for a second,then turned to Michael as if he were an extraterrestrial. ÒYes, it talks,ÓMichael acknowledged. ÒNow look where youÕre going before you bump intosomething.Ó
Tadeus stood in silence, thenshook himself into action again. He crouched on the ground and looked up,waiting for something to happen in the dry, leafless branches intertwiningabove their heads.
Nothing happened.
Tadeus got annoyed. Mutteringunder his breath about reliability and acquitted tasks, he took the box andhanded it to Michael. ÒWeÕre lucky itÕs cold. When I open the box, hold theplant down to the ground until it freezes and stops moving.Ó Michael was surehis companion had gone crazy. Then Tadeus opened the box. A white flowerdropped out and – to MichaelÕs astounded surprise – started slithering awaylike an animated mandrake root. Michael recovered quickly from his astonishmentwhen Tadeus jumped to grab the stem. He helped his friend, the plant twistingferociously in their hands. An unmistakable scent emanated from the plant: itwas DelphineÕs perfume. Then the plant started changing shapes. First it grewthorns, then thorny limbs, scratching and whipping. The plant lashed outviolently, growing harder thorns and coiling prickly branches around hercaptors like a boa. The cold was not sapping her energy fast enough. Michaelsuccumbed from lack of air.
The two vampires woke up bleedingand alone. They counted themselves lucky it was still dark. The eastern sky wasgrowing pale, though. The vampires were in bad shape, and weak from the fightand the loss of blood. Tadeus, who knew the town, ran out of the wood and backacross the Peripherique. Michael limped not far behind. Scurrying down thequiet pre-dawn Champs Elyses, Michael realised Tadeus had indeed caughtDelphine; Delphine who not only smelled of flowers but was plant herself.
Tadeus andMichael, sore with wounds and contusions, hobbled back to the city centre,carrying the empty box. Michael imposed a detour to retrieve his bag ofmanuscripts and papers from the stolen car. Then Tadeus walked east, crossingthe Seine river just after the Ile de France and walking away from the shore.As the sky was brightening up over the low, white-grey houses, Tadeus stoppedat the entrance of a forested park. The gate solemnly announced the famous PreLachaise cemetery. Tadeus helped Michael over the wall, exhorting him tohasten. Athenian mausoleums and weeping statues, their numbers so vast theyseemed to spill over the paths, forced a winding course. Fighting for living space,trees rooted between the tombs had wrinkled the sea of monuments to the dead.Feral cats roamed everywhere, finding shelter and food in the nooks andcrannies of the elaborate graves. Tadeus was scanning for something or someone,and seemed to get frustrated he couldnt catch up with the thing or person hewas seeking. The sky was paler, more blue than black, and birds were chirping.Tadeus, knowing the cemetery would soon be too full of tourists to provide asafe hiding place, gave up and led Michael toward the gates. Michael was deadtired, and would have simply curled up in an alcove, or in the cavern-likeossuary. He let Tadeus pilot him through the cemetery.
Tadeus!
The name resounded among meowingcats. Michael and Tadeus swiftly turned toward the voice.
You come to the catacombs withoutpaying me a visit! The friendly accusation came from a short man in his earlyforties, speaking an impeccable French. He approached, smiling warmly. Paleblue eyes shone like the dawn sky, only the abundant line of dark hairseparating the eyes from their celestial sister. He wore a long raglan coat,the kind that has been a staple in mens dressing since the late 1940s. Anothervampire, rang Michaels internal alarm, though the sensation was completelydifferent from the one Tadeus emitted. The Frenchman cradled a purring cat, andseveral others cats had congregated around him, as of expecting a treat. Henodded in greeting as Tadeus introduced him to Michael. No American-stylehandshake, and Michael was left with his hand hanging in the air. Michael, thisis Clovis. Ive known him even before I became a vampire. Michael tried toimagine the weight of centuries resting on these twos shoulders. He, still achild in his vampire life, only managed to grasp their long lives as arespectable amount of experience. Clovis examined Michael for a few secondsbefore asking: Your youngest son? The relation for Michael resembled cat andmouse rather than father and son, and he was surprised to hear a vampire callit that way. Especially one who knew Tadeus, and had surely seen hisself-centeredness first hand. Tadeus asked about a woman and Clovis sighed. Shehasnt risen. Though you were very fond of her, Ive never seen you at her grave,he accused Tadeus. In response, Tadeus stammered and changed the subject.
Im sorry to impose without notice.We need a place for the day. I thought you might help us? To his greatdisbelief, Michael heard deference in Tadeuss voice. Perhaps Clovis was hisfather, Michaels vampiric grandfather. Michael felt dwarfed by these two mensshared history, and waited in silence.
Clovis led the way. The threevampires rushed out of the cemetery, walking as briskly at Michael and Tadeuscould sustain with their wounds. As the sun was coming up, the city lost itslustre, revealing dirt and litter. Some streets had water running down gutters,remnants of a time before underground sewage. Janitors dressed in green werefilling the streets, sweeping up for a new day of littering. Less than aquarter of an hour later, they reached a slightly slanting two-story house astones throw from the tiny, fort-like Ile Saint-Louis.
The inside was luxuriouslydecorated, nothing like the exterior, where the eroding masonry and thepockmarked zinc roof betrayed the age of the house. Art nouveau everywhere:bubbly, colored glass vases, sculpted oak furniture. The furniture and objectswere few, with their pre-war rationing solidity, crowded the narrow house.Clovis showed them to a guest room on the second floor, drawing heavy velvetcurtains. He pulled giant square pillows and blankets from a cupboard loomingat the top of the steep staircase, and improvised a second bed with them.Michael, drained from the long drive and from running the whole night, wasasleep before Clovis had exited the room.
The next evening, Clovis brusquelydropped a newspaper on the table when Tadeus and Michael climbed down thestairs. People had been attacked last night, covered in bloody gashes, drainedof their blood and left for dead. I was inclined to think it was you two,freshly arrived in town, said Clovis, except you have similar wounds, and italso happened in during the day. It was clear from his stern countenance thathe felt disapproved of this kind of openly vampiric display. It made sense: hewanted to avoid a vampire hunt. What catastrophe have you dragged with you thistime? he accused. Michael had to contain a giggle: the description fit hiscompanion to a T. Tadeus faltered an excuse, and asked Michael to get ready fora hunt. Clovis poured glasses of bottled blood, and Michael understood theywere not going to look for food.
Tadeus grabbed the newspaper onthe way out and scanned it: most of the night-time attacks had centred on theBois-de-Boulogne. Based on what Clovis had heard, the daytime attacks had notspread far out of the park. Either the plant preferred the company of trees, orshe considered the infamous wood a good cover and a meal ticket. Michael wasworried that the plant had become a vampire by drinking their blood, but Tadeusreassured him: a transformation required a longer gestation period as well asdeath of the carrier.
They watched carefully for theslightest disturbance between the trees. They crossed the park back and forth,their breath pluming in the cool air. Without clouds, the sky did not reflectback the city lights into the dark woods. Through the leafless branches, officetowers and illuminated domes and spires served not so much as points ofreference, but as lights against which to spot moving silhouettes.
Their patience bore fruit: a shoutresounded through the park. Michael and Tadeus ran, arriving just in time tosee a pale figure flee from the scene. The glowing whiteness and the long hairwere unmistakably Delphines. Tadeus gave pursuit, while Michael tended to hervictim, stopping the blood flow from the deeper gashes until someone came alongto call the ambulance. Michael then hurried after Tadeus, quickly reaching theSeine. Michael glanced left and right, spotting two figures further north runningback into the wood. If they continued in a straight line, theyd be runningstraight to the Champs lyss. If she was desperate, Delphine might jump on thecrowds of tourists for blood. To prevent such a disaster Michael pushed himselfhard, fighting cramps to catch up before they exited the wood on the otherside. Michael also wanted to avoid capturing Delphine in the open: she mighthave them arrested and accused of harassing a defenceless woman.
Gasping for air and deafened byhis racing heart, Michael finally got lucky and found Tadeus strugglingDelphine. Still sore from the previous night, Michael looked around for aweapon. He noticed a garbage can with a lid. He grabbed it to use as a shield.He rushed head first to Tadeuss aid, and suddenly jerked back as the lidremained firmly stuck on the bin: it had been chained up as a measure againstterrorist bombs. He quickly pulled off his coat and ran with his coat stretchedout, aiming to help his friend by blinding Delphine. She was no longercompletely in human shape, thorny branches coiling like boas around herassailant. Tadeus was holding up, but just barely. Michael was not much help:more branches grew from her sides to wrestle him. In the end, Delphine slippedfrom them again, running to the nearest woody area. Shouldering each other,Tadeus and Michael hobbled after her. They soon fell, bleeding profusely on thecold sod of the Passy cemetery.
Michaelwas lying on the ground when three raspy baritones echoed in his mind, seemingto emanate from an atmosphere that wrapped him, full with the smell of wet treebark and decaying leaves. The words were jumbled in harmony, all three voicesspeaking at the same time; and yet, Michael registered each scolding phrase inthe slow motion of his dream. At the same time, rooty outgrowths rocked Michaelin his sleep.
Dead men. You are out of Naturescycle. Your corpse is not feeding us.
You must bring the plant back toher roots. She was taken from our bower. You are strong enough to help.
She is of the woods. She mustreturn.
Then the voices faded like thewind of a pipe organ, and the roots retreated back into the ground. In thestillness of a dreamless sleep, Michael realised that the summer smell of thewood was gone. He opened his eyes and stood up, surprised that his wounds werenot as bad as he expected. Tadeus was getting up beside him. Stupid treespirit, he muttered, cant understand she doesnt want to go back. The groundaround the two vampires was overturned, as if something had been pulled out, orgrown in, or both. Tadeus, tapping the earth from his clothing, explained hehad been charged by the tree spirit to bring back a nymph. She had beensummoned by humans several years ago and had disappeared since. After tastingthe rich life of humans, its hard to return to still life, with flowers. Hewaited a second for Michael to smile at the painterly pun, in vain.
Michael suggested they summonDelphine with the same ritual. Tadeus stared at his profuse cuts; he didntthink it would work with all the blood she had guzzled, but agreed to try.Michael had to rely on Tadeuss knowledge of secret societies and impressivelist of contacts. They found a telephone cabin, and Tadeus spent the rest ofthe night making calls, asking strange questions to complete strangers and oldacquaintances: answers were judged by how forcefully the speaker denied anyinvolvement with summoning plant elementals. By the end of the night, he had alist of five names. It was time to find shelter, and Tadeus decided to return toClovis and run the names by him. Clovis would surely have heard rumours duringhis decades of Paris nightlife.
Tadeus and Michael walked to thePre Lachaise cemetery where they found Clovis mourning over a small gravestone.He was alone, but cats seated on neighbouring graves seamed to wait with him.The inscription on the stone had eroded, or had perhaps been scratched off onpurpose; the grave was otherwise well tended, free of moss and weeds.
Tadeus fell silent for a minute,his head lowered, before he addressed his old friend, asking for another nightsasylum. Clovis accepted for the sake of their friendship: he made it clear hedid not want to be mixed up with the chaos that surrounded Tadeus. Tadeussdeference did not silcence him for long: soon he was grilling his host withquestions about secret societies, and who did what kind of spells and rituals.Clovis rolled his eyes, bemoaning that he always has to check for these peoplebefore he enters the cemetery. Some of them are still very active, although PreLachaise has become so touristy that they prefer quieter havens.
Clovis remembered one group in thefifties who had experimented with elementals and genies. Tadeus showed the listof suspects to Clovis, but the names were unknown to him. In forty years, thegroup would have recruited new adepts, and older members would have died.Tadeus had his five suspects, and knew what kind of questions to ask when hemet them in person and charmed them into docile cooperation.
The next evening Tadeus and Michaelset out to visit their five potential sources. The first person was a waste oftime. An old man, he was a book collector, very nervous about thieves; he hadno involvement with secret societies except for owning books they would envy.Michael crossed out his name from the list.
The second was closer to the mark.She was too young to have started her collection of tools and books on her own,and had followed in the footsteps of a parent. She was the kind to grow boredof esoterical chatter, and was unable to recall anything her group had done.For her the group provided business contacts. Michael crossed out the name ofthe socialite.
The third would not open the door,sending them packing very rudely: His reaction incriminated him, but Tadeuscould not charm him over the intercom. They left the house, cursing at thedistance technology was creating between people.
The fourth person, a man in histhirties, displayed a wary friendliness when he answered the door. Tadeusneeded a long while before his interlocutor lost his inhibitions. Suchresistance excited the old charmer: only someone trained in magical arts wouldhave been able to resist hypnosis with such strength. Their host was a truebeliever in rituals. He revealed that his druidic cult had gone mainstream,assimilating more popular pagan beliefs in the nineties. He knew almost nothingof the sect before his initiation, but he had heard older members refer to abig event after the Second World War. Anxious to reach the source, Tadeusconvinced the man to introduce them to older members of his group.
The young druid drove them to ahouse in a cite-jardin, one of the garden cities small, gardened residentialstreets accessible through a portico dotting the limit between Paris and itssuburbs. When the door opened, Michael was a guest in a private club wheremembers looked more like bored philosophers and retired professors than stiffbankers and politicians. The walls were lined with books on religion, alchemyand white magic. Michael noticed dark silhouettes around the furniture: nothinghad been shifted in ages, protecting the wall paint from yellowing.
Their host, kept under tightcontrol by Tadeus who was nervous around so many people who knew aboutvampires, led them to a braising fireplace. He introduced them to an old manresting in an armchair. Tadeus quickly dismissed the young adept. Alone withthe old man, he spoke earnestly: he did not try mesmerism on the old mage,hoping to convince the man of the necessity of repeating the ritual.
The old man did indeed recall forhaving been there the night they summoned an elemental. They had tried tocontact spirit guides from the afterlife, but the first spirit to answer hadbeen a wood nymph. They didnt know how to make her disappear once she materialised,and eventually she escaped. The world did not end, nothing bad ensued, andafter a while the group had abandoned their search for the plant woman,imagining she had returned where she belonged. At Tadeuss request, the old manaccepted to show the spell used to summon the elemental. He guided the twocompanions down to the cellar, past two heavy iron doors. The man consulted apile of journals, finally stopping at a page: the nature and result of theritual were summarized, along with a reference for the full incantation. Tadeusand Michael, pulling newspapers from their pockets to support their argument,convinced the old man to reproduce the ritual.
The old mage called two of hisfriends to assist him. They closed the iron doors, bolting them as a measure ofsecurity. The three of them, wrinkled and hunched, drew symbols on the ground,muttering the incantation directly from a book they pulled from the shelves.Michael and Tadeus watched from a corner, crossing their fingers. Tea candleswere lit; powders were sprinkled over them, turning the flames greenish.
Suddenlya sapling sprouted in the middle of the ground. The sapling grew branches, andwhen the old men invoked the power of water, leaves popped open on thebranches. The sapling grew bigger, into a tree, and then still bigger. Thesmell of forest undergrowth, peaty and humid, was spreading in the air.Branches invaded every square inch of the room, pushing in vain on the irondoors, groping blindly for an exit. No thorns, no flowers. Michael and Tadeusguessed who had materialised instead of their flower lady. Their doubts wereconfirmed when they heard a trio of baritones rumble angrily across the cellar.
Thesummoning had not provided the help Michael and Tadeus had hoped for; with theamount of blood Delphine had ingested, she was more than the forest elementalinvoked through the ritual. Under normal circumstances, she could havecontinued lying low as she had done for the past fifty years, hiding withoutfor half a century without causing any harm or panic. If he had not been scaredof waking up one Spring morning to find an angry tree spirit claim his due,Michael would gladly let her go free.
Michael and Tadeus, like twodefeated soldiers, roamed glumly in a city so vast they might miss any hint ofDelphine. They were still nursing painful contusions, makeshift bandagesrubbing against raw wounds from Delphines last attack. The ailing vampirespaced themselves slowly, popping their heads at every turn to make sure thecoast was clear. They kept to narrow alleys spanning the width of outstretchedarms; this way they could only be surprised from two directions. The method supposedDelphine was hunting them down, which was unlikely: she was too busy trying tostay free. Just the same, Michael and Tadeus continued with their carefultechnique: if they could ambush the mad plant from a safe distance, they wouldprobably avoid another painful confrontation with their quarry.
Their meandering path eventuallyled them to the Champs lyss, where the crowds of tourists secured them despitethe risk of staying in an open area. The night was cold, a welcome ice pack onMichael and Tadeuss wounds. The two vampires sat in silent meditation, watchingthe moonset over the Arc de Triomphe as they reconsidered their strategies.Sunrise approached, and they still had no idea how to capture the wild,blood-guzzling sylviad. The two friends got up, numb from the cold, and rubbedtheir hands to activate blood circulation. They ambled back to Cloviss place.On the shores of the Seine River, a cold mist filled the air, and rime whitenedriverside trees and lawn. They arrived at Cloviss place on Ile Saint-Louis inthe early-morning bustle, forced off the streets by the increasing traffic.Little green men were making the city clean again, and cars were filling up atgas pumps built directly into the sidewalk. What I wouldnt give for a quick sipto warm up, Tadeus whispered, eyeing the sweepers. And suddenly the realizationhit them both at the same time: Delphine was a plant, and in winter plants liedormant. If they could stop her eating for a night or two, she would slow downenough for them to catch up. If they had help, they could keep her runninguntil she became an easy catch, completely exhausted and numbed by hypothermia.
Clovis, once they explained how hecould help, was enthusiastic. Like Tadeus, he had his moments of ennui, despitehis devotion to the grave in Pre Lachaise. He also knew when catching someonepublicly sucking blood was a sound self-preserving tactic. Over a warm glass ofhis bottled blood, he phoned several people before going to bed, assuringTadeus and Michael that his friends would track the white plant vampire downand keep her running in daylight. The three of them, plus a few other friendshe had reached, would make sure Delphine could not feed at night. Michael laycontorted on his pillow mattress, contorted to relieve pressure from hisbruises. He had regained optimism, confident that with so many people lending ahand they would capture her. After that, he wouldnt need to live in fear of atree spirit haunting him. He dreamed sweetly. The dream started in Montreal,where he was surrounded with his family. When he started panicking at the riskhe posed for his family, the dream shifted softly to Paris. He rocked on theSeine in a fancy glass-domed boat for the rest of the night, watching the blackwaves flow to the shore.
Michael woke up rested. His goodmood was only reinforced when he heard nothing about sanguinary attacks on thenews. On television, reports mentioned a wave of attempted attacks staved offby heroic passers-by: Cloviss friends had worked efficiently. Reports on allchannels were invariably titled Rare fever of atavism and A town of anonymousheroes. The best news was the weather, supposed to reach freezing temperatures:it would only help slow down the renegade plant elemental. Clovis called morepeople while Tadeus and Michael helped themselves to cups of mulled blood. HowClovis, so worried about keeping a low profile, could organise a method ofbottling blood supplies was beyond Michaels understanding, but he knew betterthan to ask questions. He was full, and happy to be spared the hunt. When theywere done with their drinks, Clovis was ready too. With the help of Clovisssentinels they would keep Delphine running, unfed and freezing, until shedropped. Cloviss mobile kept humming, and Clovis like an army general kepttrack of his troops positions and re-directed them as necessary. Michael andTadeus were part of a living fishing net, reacting at every piece ofinformation to close in on their fish.
Listening to Cloviss mutedconversations, Michael had the impression of thousands of hands under Clovisscommand. Within a day, Cloviss patrols had tracked down, among an endless listof warm or crowded places, a desperate and hungry creature. They rescuedDelphines victims before she fed and sped out of her grasp, and from their safedistance cornering the plant and waiting until she would lack the energy tofight back. Michael shivered at the kind of organization and unquestioningobedience required for such a chase. Michael reeled at the thought of how many peoplewere involved in this operation: would this kind of network be at his reachwhen he grew old, or was Clovis an exceptionally respected godfather to a mobof thugs? Clovis had unfolded his entire network for this plant who threatenedthe peace of vampires by publicly hunting for blood. Michael, grateful helearned the lesson as a spectator and not as the object of the vampires wrath,promised himself to always feed discretely. If he ever accidentally encroachedon another vampires territory, he didnt want the vampire to know.
As dawn approached, Clovisco-ordinated the changing of the guard. The day team took over flawlessly, andthe net kept closing around Delphine while the vampires and their unseencompanions returned to their warm beds for some rest.
The nextevening, Cloviss cellular phone was full of messages: Delphine had weakened andwas ripe for the picking. Dressed warmly for the chilly November night, thethree vampires proceeded north, guide by Clovis on the phone with his sentinels.They stopped at the imposing white rectangle of the Gare du Nord, whereDelphine was trapped. Small groups of young men were loafing on sidewalkrailings around the train station. They looked like hip young men dressed for anight out, decked in the new black, leather-chic clothes, a style that allowedthem past the dress code of any popular disco or club. Even in groups theyaroused little attention: they were young professionals out on the town, exceptthat they all made eye contact when Clovis arrived, and several had cellularphones in their hands. Clovis walked up to one group at the front entrance ofthe station. The day shift people were easily spotted in the group: they lookedmore tired than the others. One young man wore, inside the collar, a goldpendant shaped like a long sharp tooth. In the dim lighting, Michael saw thatone youth, about 20 years old, had small cuts visible on his wrist. Suddenlyalarmed, Michael observed the other mens necks and arms: every member of thegroup had discrete markings, tiny pinholes and cat scratches.
Michael didnt have the time to lethis conclusions sink in. Clovis and his troops had decided to make a movebefore their target warmed up too much and regained strength. All exits andplatforms were watched. Clovis sent one young man running around the station,and when he came back, steaming from the exercise, he ran into the station,piloted toward Delphines hideout by his fellow cellphone spies. The young man,warm like a hot coffee, was the bait. Instead of capturing her in public andrisking a police intervention, they would bait her to a quiet place.
Michael felt a nagging doubt rackhis mind. These people, this army ready to deploy at the slightest word oftheir leader, offering their blood to their guru, and excited at the thought ofprotecting their territory, how will they react when they captured the personwho threatened their idyllic gothic paradise? What if the vampires in waiting,tired of killing time until papa decided to transform them, drank her sap,loaded with the vampire blood of Tadeus and Michael?
When the jogger, trailed byDelphine, came rushing out of the train station, Michael knew he had to actfast to prevent an unfortunate accident. He followed the pack behind Delphine,trying to overcome them and catch up to protect Delphine and call the treespirit, but his bruises where still aching and slowing his down. Michael, likeTadeus, trailed behind, neither of them as fit as Cloviss young men. The taskof capturing a runaway plant had taken such an overwhelming amplitude thatMichael had no idea what to do next.
He noticed a bicycle chained to apost. Michael stopped Tadeus. His companion was visibly troubled too by theturn of events, no doubt wondering how the tree elemental would treat hisvampire knights if Delphine accidentally died. Together they managed to forcethe lock. Michael jumped on, breathing in a heavy rasp through the inflamedthroat. He pedaled past Cloviss men, grabbed Delphine. She was, compared to theflower he had carried in the box, much heavier than he expected, and he almostlost his balance. But he managed to keep pedalling, past the jogger.
He cycled madly toward the closestwooded area he knew about, east toward the Pre Lachaise cemetery, and reachedthe walls of the cemetery with several minutes advance. He climbed over thewall, wheezing, pulling Delphine behind him, who was too feeble to lash outagainst him. He called out the tree spirit, hoping the elemental could perceivehis exhausted wheeze. Ho! Hey! Shes here! Never mind a proper summon: he hadalready ripped the shreds the summoning ritual he had confiscated from thedruids. Michael could hear the joggers footsteps getting close, and a faintthrong of running feet behind him. Michael clutched Delphine in his arms andzigzagged between hungry cats, dark mausoleums and quiet statues. More thanfifty young vampire wannabes were jumping over the wall and trying to catch up.
Michael stumbled over a root hehadnt noticed. As he landed, the frozen soil started smelling like peat moss infall, like wet tree bark and rotting leaves. Michael lay on the earth, relievedthe tree spirit had found him before Clovis and his mob, catching his breathwhere he fell. The smell of autumn forest moved away from Michael, a silentcurrent of moist compost and pine needles flowing toward the nymph who wascrawling away. Terror disfigured her face. She stopped, tried scrambled back,only to discover she was surrounded; the young men had caught up. Too week todefend herself on her own, she broke a branch from a nearby tree, which furtherangered the tree spirit. She lashed out against Cloviss army, whipping thebranch so hard she drew blood as they tightened the circle around her. Michaelwanted to help, but the circle was too tight around the desperate plant. Herdespair, for a while anyway, was stronger than the numbness as the cold reachedher limbs and congealed her sap. She was screaming in high, barely audiblepitches. This, thought Michael, is the wailing of grass when you mow the lawn,but amplified a thousandfold. It was abrasive on the nerves, like fingernailsbending backward or a screw driven very slowly through a hand.
Cloviss men tightened the penaround Delphine, bending backwards to avoid the full force of her lashing branch.The tree spirit, like a noxious gas, wrapped itself around the frail woman.Just as the elemental completely absorbed the flower, she rushed against theclosest tombstone and banged her head open against the corners. Her sap gushedout, reddened by her recent feeding. Michael saw between Cloviss army,recognizing in her suicidal despair his own past mistake. The ghostly womanshape shrank as Delphine, crying and dripping with blood and sap, took the formof a plant. The ephemeral flower took root, and her stem and petals witheredinto the ground. Though Michael and the others present could not see the treespirit, they all sensed him sinking where Delphine had melted into the earth.
Then the air was lighter andfresher. Michael no longer felt the oppressive presence of the age-oldelemental. He started running before the young men resolved to teach him tospoil a hunt and voted him a replacement prey.
As Michael fled, Tadeus caught upwith him. Together they hastened to Cloviss house to retrieve Michaels carry-onbag. Tadeus attempted to reassure Michael on his safety. Theyre only kids andthey were caught in the momentum. The phrasing did not pacify his friend, andMichael was intent on leaving Paris as quickly as possible. Tadeus convincedhim to not burn any bridges, and Michael accepted to thank Clovis before heleft.
They returned to the Pre Lachaisecemetery. The cemetery was quiet, and nothing hinted at what had happenedearlier on. They found Clovis meditating alone except for the company of catsover the gravestone of the nameless woman. Tadeus cleared his throat.
Well be leaving soon. We wanted tothank you for everything.
Clovis turned and looked up at thepair. He said nothing, and Tadeus grew uneasy. Michael thought it was a silentreproach until Clovis addressed Tadeus.
You might as well say goodbye toher too. Shes beyond hope, but she still hears us. He saw Michaels face turnpale. She Clovis tried to explain to the young vampire, She was very religious,though her religion and its priests served her very badly. She wanted burial insacred ground. We had to wait several decades, but I jumped on the opportunitywhen this cemetery was opened, and bones from older cemeteries were dug up andtransferred in here. She would have been in the ossuary, but I managed to slipher into an open grave.
Tadeus knelt on the grave andwhispered goodbye, then left with Michael. They had walked out of Pre Lachaise,and were halfway across the city before Tadeus spoke. He stays there so thatshe will not be forgotten. Michael shivered at the thought of spending eternityburied but conscious. He suppressed his questions, feeling he had no right tointrude in the private lives of Tadeus and his old acquaintance.
When they parted ways, Michaelwalked to the airport, using the time to think about his future: he had todecide if he returned home. Michael still had money, a family waiting for himin every flight from France, and an addiction to blood that would strain anynormal relation with his family. On the other side, he had a well-establishedroutine in Perigueux, and his den was a comfortable place for writing. EvenParis had some attraction, with artist squats where he could find support forhis writing. Life in Montreal would be spent dodging his old friends. He didnot want them discovering he was a vampire, and wished even less to expose themto his hunger.
In the end, it was better if hestayed in Europe. He sat in the airport for a long while watching planes takeoff, rehearsing what he would tell his parents. He did not want to make itsound like he was a cold, uncaring son, and even less like he was abloodthirsty, immortal vampire. A calling card in his hands, he was practicinghis best version of the accident really changed me speech, and I love you allbut need some time alone.
The call was a torture. His motherwas crying, his father was shouting. His sister finally took the phone. When hetold her he would not even come for a visit, and wouldnt leave an address ortelephone, she started shouting too. The call felt like a nail planted in hisheart. He hung up, picked up his bag, and went to take the subway. He found therisk of regular feeding in Paris, a city watched by the ancient Clovis and hisarmy, too great. He preferred returning to Perigueux, suddenly glad he hadnthad time to tell his parents much about where he had had lived since theaccident. He liked the provincial atmosphere, and cheered himself up thinkingabout the story he would one day inevitably sell.
He hadnt been away long enough andhis old den was free. All the stories and novels he hadnt managed to collecthad been thrown out, but the most important drafts were in his carry-on baganyway. He had lost Tadeuss book on mesmerism and was about to order a new one,except he realized, after meeting Clovis, that Tadeuss charms were not sharedby every vampire: some of them need to build a different feeding system. Hewould continue feeding as discretely as possible. Maybe he could tame alleycats Michael typed throughout the whole of winter. Unable to train alley catsto come to him for food in exchange for a little pain, he now had fourliver-fed kittens at home. The meals were small, but helped reduce his need forother sources of blood. When the hunger was too great, he traveled across thecountryside to dilute his sampling geographically (and, correspondingly,obscure the fact that someone was regularly pricking the living for blood).Whenever possible he targeted animals. He appreciated the fog that regularlydraped the region: it allowed him to feed off lowing cattle in protectedanonymity. But the trouble of capturing animals, even before the act of feedingitself, was usually so noisy that when he stumbled on a slumbering vagrant or adrunk sleeping off his alcohol, he went for the wrist. But the meals providedby Tadeus and Clovis haunted him: his palate found no delectation in animalblood or blood tainted by anaemia or alcohol.
By late March, his intensivewriting efforts were crowned: he had sold a first story to an Americanmagazine. It was, he was sad to admit, a vampire story. A far cry from thecomplex spy novels he dreamed about, but an encouraging progress nonetheless.He was anxiously waiting for copies of the magazine, checking his post office boxevery evening. Life was turning out nicely despite feeling like he buried hisfamily alive. He had new friends, a new voice to speak with them. And when hegot home one night, slightly sick from a hormone-fed cow, he found he had anewly broken-into door and a new, fragrant and white girlfriend absorbingmonoxide carbon in his bed.
Many sources of information havebeen useful, but the following have proven especially helpful, and I am verygrateful to them:
- Philippe Gauthier, my overseas neighbour, for piloting me through the Paristhat is not in guide books
- Nicolas Chaudun. L ABCdaire de Paris (Paris: Flammarion, 1998, 120 pages)
- Jacques BarozziÕs practical and picture-filled Guide des cimetieres parisiens(Paris: Editions Hervas, 1990. 190 pages)
- Les Quatre saisons du Perigord, by Girard-Lagorce / Reper (Paris: Flammarion,1999. 191 pages)
This version was first postedchapter by chapter in March 2002. © Saskia Latendresse 2002-2006
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