Everlasting Kiss (Everlasting 1)

One thing she did know about vampires was that they were considered young for the first hundred years; anything that survived over five centuries was viewed as ancient. Of course, you could never tell how old vampires were just by looking at them, or how long they had been undead, since they stopped aging once they were turned.

"When were you turned?" She had heard of one female vampire who had worked the Dark Trick on a five-year-old child because she was lonely and wanted a little girl for company. It was said that the little girl aged emotionally, but her body never matured. A cruel fate, Daisy thought, to have an adult mind trapped in a child's body.

Erik draped one arm along the back of the sofa. "You're full of questions tonight, my little flower. Any particular reason?"

"Not really." Sitting back, she folded her arms under her br**sts. "Just curious."

He regarded her through narrowed eyes, as if trying to judge her sincerity, and then he shrugged. "I was turned on my thirtieth birthday." Beyond doubt, it had been a night he would never forget, nor forgive.

"Not a very nice present," Daisy remarked.

"True enough, although it lasted far longer than any of the other gifts I received that night."

Daisy frowned, surprised that he could make jokes about something that had surely turned his whole life upside down. "How did it happen?"

"My wife..."

"You were married?"

"Of course. I was a healthy male in my prime."

"Did you have children?"

"Yes." He looked past her, his voice almost a whisper. "A boy and a girl."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to bring up unhappy memories."

"It was a long time ago." And yet, even all these years later, he could see their faces clearly in his mind, hear the sound of his wife's voice, the laughter of his children.

"But it still hurts," Daisy said quietly.

"Yes."

"Did your wife know you were a warlock?"

"Of course. I couldn't keep a thing like that a secret."

"And she didn't mind?"

"I wasn't a practicing warlock then, hadn't been for years." He had forsaken his magic completely when he married. His mother had never forgiven him for turning his back on his heritage. There were those who practiced the art of magic, and those, like Erik and his mother, who were born to it.

"Go on," Daisy coaxed. "You said you were turned when you were thirty."

"Yes. Abigail, my wife, had given me a surprise party. I think she must have invited everyone in London..."

"You're from England, then?"

"Yes, originally." He had been a wealthy man back then, landed gentry, with a large estate and a dozen servants to do his bidding.

"You don't sound English."

"I lost my accent years ago."

She tried to imagine what Erik would have been like back then. In her mind's eye, she tried to imagine him wearing the clothing of the period, overseeing a large estate, presiding at the dinner table, but she couldn't. It was even more difficult to picture him with a wife and children.

"As I was saying, Abigail had given me a party. I was mingling with our guests in the ballroom after dinner when I saw a woman I didn't recognize. I supposed her to be a friend of Abigail's. I went over to introduce myself..."

He paused a moment, his thoughts turned inward. "Needless to say, she wasn't Abigail's friend, or anyone else's. She persuaded me to take her outside, saying she wanted to see the gardens in the moonlight. Once we were alone..."

He paused again. A muscle throbbed in his cheek. "Once we were alone, she mesmerized me, and then, while I was still in her thrall, she let me see what she really was. I fought her as best I could, but to no avail. Small and petite though she was, she had the strength of twenty grown men. She held me down and drained me to the point of death, and then offered me a choice. I could die, or I could become what she was."

Rising, he began to pace the floor in front of her. "At the time, I didn't fully realize what it meant to be a vampire. I thought all it entailed was drinking a little blood to survive, and I was willing to do that, to do anything, to stay with my family." He laughed, a cold, bitter laugh. "How incredibly foolish I was! I didn't return to the party. I spent the rest of the night trying to come to terms with what had happened. I convinced myself that everything would be all right, that I'd be able to hide what I was from Abigail and my children. I spent the next day buried under a pile of straw in the stables. When I woke that night, I was ravenous."

Daisy stared up at him, afraid to hear the rest.

He stopped in front of the hearth, his hands resting on the mantel. "I could hear the beating of the hearts of those in the house. Servants. Guests who had spent the night. Abigail. My children. I climbed down from the hayloft, my only thought to feed."

"You didn't...?" She imagined him bursting into the house, mad with need, fangs bared, attacking his wife and his children.

Slowly, he turned to face her. "No, but I would have. Instead, I attacked one of the grooms who had come in to feed the horses. The thirst...it was more powerful, more painful, than anything I had expected. He didn't survive. When I came to myself, when I saw what I'd done, I knew I could never face Abigail, never trust myself to be with her or our children. I saddled a horse and left the estate. I never went back."

"Never?"

Erik shook his head. "I sent her a letter, told her I was going to America, that I was sorry..." It had been the hardest thing he had ever done. His only solace had been knowing that he was leaving her and his children well off financially, and that she wasn't entirely alone. Her parents had lived close by, as had his. He knew they would look after his family.

"So, you never saw them again?"

"They never saw me again. I didn't go to America. I couldn't leave them. I stayed out of sight, but I was never far away. I watched my children grow and marry and have children of their own. And when my great-grandchildren were grown and doing well, I left the country." Unwilling to return to his homeland and resurrect unhappy memories, he had never gone back.

"What happened to the vampire who made you?"

"I destroyed her." As though exhausted by the tale, Erik dropped onto a corner of the sofa. It had taken him fifty years to find Iliana. His only regret was that her suffering had been quickly over, while his heartache remained to this day. "I'm curious about something," he said after a time.