It was a Tuesday, just before midnight, not that it mattered. Monsters of flesh and bone were well known to haunt Chicago’s labyrinthian streets after the sun made its way across the Illinois sky. These were dangerous hours on any night, hours that all but the most foolish, or foolhardy, would gladly have chosen to avoid.

Those compelled to leave the sanctuary of their homes during those foreboding hours did so with a sickening sense of dread. They, better than most, were all too aware of the shadowy threats lurking with malevolent intent along those darkened pathways.

One of those monsters carried the name of Randall Locke. Once an average and functional denizen of the city, Randall had made too many poor choices in his life and perhaps suffered more than his share of bad luck along the way.

Those choices and undesirable turn of events led him to an alley behind one of the many all-night bodegas providing the nocturnal pulse of the city with cigarettes, booze, and fodder for other vices that often lead to another generation of the city's walking nightmares.   

Randall’s transformation into one of these dreaded creatures was the result of a toxic blend of exotic chemicals he’d once used to escape his fear. It was a bitter irony that it was these drugs that ultimately embodied the very horror he’d sought so desperately to avoid.

Now, he was less a man and more a zombie, mindlessly craving with an unquenchable desire the very same poisons that had already destroyed his life. It was an obsession he was no more capable of resisting than an ant following a chemical trail to its fate.

Not that he desired to do harm, but addiction was a powerful master, and drugs required money to obtain. And so he stood in the dark, his shaking hand grasping a weapon that would allow him access to the coin he needed for his next fix, and a momentary relief from his anguished torment.

Inside the store worked Rosa Perez, a woman whose only sin was trying to support her children. Unfortunately for Rosa, her life meant less to him than the paltry stack of bills tucked away in the store's till. Stifling his fear, Randall moved toward the lighted street, ready to destroy another life in order to perpetuate his own slow and painful self-destruction.

But, in the myopic tunnel-vision of his own obsession, he failed to realize the city possessed horrors more powerful and far more malevolent than himself. He did not see her coming, and she made no sound beyond the sucking of the air as she dropped from the rooftops above.

In an instant, she was before him. A dark and beautiful face with even darker eyes. He had his gun in his hand, but was unable to raise it in his own defense. In that instant, she took the weapon and flung it away, laughing with ill-meant mirth as she forced him back into the enveloping darkness.

oo0oo

Randall woke with a start. He had no idea where he was, nor how long he’d been asleep, if indeed what he experienced could be called sleep by any reasonable measure. It was light outside, and the sun’s bright rays blinded him as they poured into the room through a heavy and curtained window. He was not secured, which was a relief, and the room he was inhabiting was far nicer than the rat-infested apartment he called home.

His memories were cloudy, thick and obscured by a fog that was refusing to lift from his mind. And he realized with a shock that he was neither high nor feeling the clawing effects of his addiction. He wondered then if he’d died and been mistakenly allowed into heaven.

But no, a stinging pain in his neck contradicted that. Surely there was no pain in death? Reaching to the source of that irritation, he felt two wounds, just an inch apart, right over his carotid artery. He searched for a mirror, and finding one over the en suite sink, inspected his newly discovered marks. There, on his neck, were two puncture wounds that looked very much like a bite.

The woman’s face rose in his memory, and his mind rebelled at what it so clearly seemed to mean. She had smiled at him, bearing fangs that would have fit perfectly into his wounds. Nausea rose in his gut as terror clenched his heart. What he was remembering was impossible, and he’d have disregarded it completely if he had not been in this strange and unfamiliar place.

He rushed to the door, only to find it locked from the other side. Then to the window, but it was bolted closed, and was anyway set three floors above a cobbled courtyard below. He was not a brave man, and so he accepted that there would be no escaping from there. And then it occurred to him, perhaps he had no need of escape.

The room was pleasant, and for the first time in years, he was not hurting for a fix. He was unharmed, save for the strange wounds in his neck, and was left unrestrained when this woman could easily have left him chained. He was confused and hungry and, more than anything needing a good, stiff drink, or even a simple glass of water.

Still, the more his mind cleared, the more terrified he became. He wanted to pound on the door, screaming for help, and to find out who was holding him prisoner, but he dared not even do that. The woman he remembered had frightened him more deeply than any thug or dealer he’d ever dealt with, and he had no desire for that door to open if it were she who was waiting on the other side.

oo0oo

Hours later, with the sun now lower in the sky, Randall was feeling the distinctive nausea that signaled his lack of cravings was but a temporary reprieve from his addiction's grasp. He was anxious and fearful as the need for a fix grew in his gut. Soon, the nausea would become worse and would inevitably be followed by wracking pain. He went to the window, wondering again if he might dare the fall to the courtyard. He’d almost decided to try when the hounds appeared on the cobblestone below.

They were large and black, moving with the alert, predatory grace of wolves. He knew then there was no escape from the gilded cage he found himself trapped within. He had almost built the courage to pound on the door when he heard the low thud of a bolt sliding out of its socket. A moment later, the oaken door silently swung open.

Randall stumbled back into the corner with terror clawing at his throat. He didn’t know why that woman filled him with such dread, but it gripped him more powerfully than any emotion he could remember.

To his relief, it was not the woman, but a man who entered his room. He was tall and thick, yet perfectly groomed and wearing what seemed a servant's attire from a time long since past. He entered, pushing a cart before settling in the center of the room.

“Who are you? Why am I here?” Randall demanded.

“I am just a servant,” he responded. “You may call me Jerome, and you are here at the pleasure of the Lady Isabella Santorini, Mistress of this estate. You were flown to this estate in Canada on the Mistress’s private aircraft.”

The name meant nothing to Randall, save that it must have been she who confronted him outside the bodega. “She kidnapped me!” Randall snapped. “And you are going to tell me why!”

The man gazed at him with the deadpan calm of a corpse. “As I said, you are here at her pleasure. She commands you to eat. And then, you are to shower. The Mistress will be displeased to find you smelling of the gutter. There are suitable clothes in the closet.”

Randall made a move toward him, but stopped after a step, sensing that this man was not one it would be wise to provoke. “Look,” he sputtered. “You can’t keep me here.”

Jerome seemed puzzled. “My instructions do not include a requirement to detain you. The door was locked for your safety, but if you wish to leave, no one will stop you. I should caution you, however, that we are many kilometers from any civilization, and the forest is dangerous to travel at night.”

The familiar taste of hopelessness filled Randall’s mouth, and he collapsed on the bed.

“Then what do you want with me?”

“I want you to eat and to shower. The Mistress will see you after she dines.” He lifted the lid from a tray, revealing one of the most appetizing meals Randall had ever been offered. There was a small, roasted hen with rolls and a vegetable medley that smelled wonderful. Randall could not have been more shocked when the man walked out the door.

oo0oo

Several minutes ticked by while Randall sat frozen, his knees tucked in his arms and rocking in near hysteria on the bed. None of this made sense to him. He was a nobody, so why him? But the food was there, and he’d not eaten in almost two days. And it had been years since he was offered a meal as appetizing as the one laid out for him on the cart. Finally, hunger and instinct got the better of his fear, and he devoured the chicken with his bare hands.

Afterward, he took a shower as commanded and found a pair of jeans and a pullover shirt in the closet. He was a gaunt, thin shell of a man, and clothing that should have fit was loose and baggy. But even these were preferable to the filthy clothing he was wearing before. He only wished the sleeves were long enough to cover his needle tracks. They didn’t, but he supposed it didn’t matter. They must have already known he was a junkie.

Once dressed, he had to admit that cleaning up had helped settle his heroin cravings, which made him wonder if there was something in his food that brought him relief. Whatever the cause, he did feel better, and so he was finally confident enough to check the door. True to the servant's word, it was unlocked and opened easily.

The house was huge, reminding Randall more of an amusement park mockery of an ancient hotel rather than a home. It was elegant and gaudy, and filled with what he could only assume were priceless antiques and works of art. In his mind, their value was quickly judged not in their worth in culture or history, but for the small fortune they might bring if he were able to pawn them.

As he wandered that confusing maze of a home, he heard the distant sounds of a woman’s passionate screams echoing through the dim, carpeted corridors. Moving toward the rising mix of feral grunts and guttural moans, Randall found himself on an internal balcony overlooking a great hall. Its arched ceiling was high enough that the many candles below failed to reach its peak.

There, on the carpeted floor, a man was atop that same woman, having sex with her so forcefully that she pushed, thrust by powerful thrust, toward the great stone fireplace that was dominating the room like an altar.

To his horror, he saw that the man was bleeding from his wrists and his chest, dripping a steady bead of bright red blood drops on the woman he assumed must be the Lady Isabella Santorini.

He stood, transfixed and appalled, but also consumed with a lewd arousal at the scene below. The Lady, whose complexion seemed a deathly gray the night before, now glowed with life, and her eyes, which had been black as night, were glowing with pale blue light and filled with an animalistic lust he’d never seen in a woman. Her large boobs were bouncing with each of the man’s thrusts while trails of blood slowly flowed down between them.

It was then that the woman’s gaze shifted and fixated on Randall. Her mouth opened in what he could only describe as a predatory grin while long fangs gleamed in pearly whiteness in the candlelight. Taking the man by the throat, she pulled him to her and sank those fangs into his neck.

The effect was immediate. The man stiffened, growling with a deep and powerful lust as he rammed himself into her hard enough the make her body jerk. And then they both roiled in a mutual orgasm that went through them like a chain reaction.

That went on for an inhumanly long amount of time before the man collapsed, limp and motionless, onto the Mistress's prone body. Despite his size, the Lady rolled him off without effort and, gazing at Randall, laughed in exaggerated mirth.

“Well, it seems the rat has slipped his cage. Come, Rat, sit with me. We have much to talk about.” The Mistress rose with inhuman grace, standing nude, with blood dripping slowly from her face and hands. More of the man’s thick essence was spattered over her breast, running between them in a thin rivulet until it collected in the rich thatch of black pubic hair over her sex.

Randall was more deeply terrified than he’d been in a lifetime filled with fear. He wanted to run, but the iron in her voice carried such authority he didn’t dare disobey. Slowly, he made his way down the steps as she gathered a thin, black lace robe from an ornate hook on the wall.   

It was then that he noticed one more impossibility to add to the rest. The blood on her skin was evaporating before his eyes! It was as if it was being absorbed into her skin until, by the time he reached the bottom of the stairs, it was all but gone. Before him stood what appeared to be the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. She was about five-foot-three, with large breasts and a waist that tapered in feminine perfection to hips that were beautifully proportioned to her body.

She was mesmerizing, appearing as perhaps twenty years old with the perfection of an AI image come to life. When she slipped the robe over her body, it only enhanced her allure without actually covering her nudity at all. Raising a hand for him to wait, she picked up a wooden-handled bell and rang it twice.

Two men immediately appeared, and she gestured towards the man on the floor. “Gather him up and give him a transfusion. I took more from him than I expected, so make sure he is well fed when he wakes.”

Silently and with great haste, the men lifted the unconscious man and removed him from the room.

“I thought you killed him,” Randall managed to say as the door closed behind them.

The Mistress laughed. “Of course not. He’s a pet, and much too valuable to be wasted on something as transitory as an orgasm. Besides, disposing of a body these days is a complicated affair. Your law enforcement gets far too interested when too many bodies start floating down the rivers. Now, back in the day, I could drop them where they died and no one dared say a word.”

By now, she was standing near enough to Randel that he could see she was more than human, and probably less than alive.

“Is that what I am to you? A pet?”

The Mistress scoffed. “You certainly have a high opinion of yourself. No, you aren’t a pet, but that is why we are having this conversation. You see, you are nothing but a lab rat, and I’m going to use you for an experiment.”

The way she said it sent a bolt of fear through Randall, and he backed away as she approached. Somehow, though, he couldn’t quite process the danger he was in, not with the sight of this petite beauty in front of him. Even then, as she spoke of experiments and him being a lab rat, her bearing was seductive, and her walk, with her hips swaying with each step, was that of a woman with nothing more harmful on her mind than a moment of carnal passion.

He was becoming confused, even beguiled, and stopped moving away as she closed the distance between them. When she did, she took his hand and placed it on her breast.

Randall felt her firm boob fill his hand and squeezed it gently, even daring to rub his thumb over her distended nipple.

To his surprise, she cooed softly at his touch, as if savoring the sensation while he fondled her.

“How do I feel to you?” she asked without removing his hand. “Do I feel soft and warm, like any other woman?”

“Yes, you do. You feel like a woman should.”

With that, Isabella smirked and turned away, sitting in one of four ornate chairs arranged around a square coffee table. When Randall didn’t follow, she gestured to the one on the other side of the table. Then she pulled a cigarette from a wooden box and lit it with a candle. “Care for one?” she asked.

“Yes, I could use one right about now.”

“I’m sure you could,” she replied while handing him the one she’d just lit. “Don’t worry about germs. I don’t have any because I’m dead.”

The look on Randall’s face as that sank in amused her, and she grinned as she lit another. Taking a deep draw, she sat back and crossed her bare legs.

“What you are seeing now is a lie, an illusion created by the living blood I took from my pet. My natural form is that corpse-like figure you saw last night.”

He was as fascinated as he was revolted. It was unbelievable, yet he couldn’t deny what he’d already seen. Perhaps he’d have been even more terrified if she hadn’t been so alluringly conversational. As she was, he managed to stay in his chair rather than run for the door.

“What the hell are you?” he finally managed to ask.

Isabella shrugged. “I couldn’t possibly explain it, especially to a mortal. But, I’m curious, how old would you say I am?”

Randall let his gaze wander over her, appreciating her undeniably youthful beauty. In every way, she seemed a healthy young woman, except in her eyes. That unearthly glow was gone now and had been ever since she had that orgasm, but there was still something there underneath those icy blue orbs. They were things Randall recognized from looking into his own eyes when he dared to look in a mirror. Pain, heartbreak, and hopelessness, and he wondered what she had gone through that had such an effect on her.

“Early twenties,” maybe,” he responded.

“As I told you, it’s all an illusion. I’m over five hundred years old; I died at nineteen. And yet, here I remain, unchanged as long as I have living blood to rejuvenate my flesh.”

“How is that even possible?”

“I don’t believe any of us could answer that. It shouldn’t be, according to your science. But here I am.”

“There are more of you?”

“Of course. I know of at least three hundred of us who’ve survived to be ancient. Some are much older than I. And there are probably thousands of younglings being created and subsequently destroyed before their power truly manifests.

“Mortals like you call us Nosferatu, Strigoi, Dhampir, and many other names. Today, we are called Vampires, but what that really means may have nothing at all to do with what we are. Frankly, none of us knows, nor can we explain why it works.

“I can only tell you what happened to me, “ she continued. “I was born in 1478, and I died nineteen years later, in 1497, or at least, I should have. I had tuberculosis, and in those days, there was no cure for that. Not that my father didn’t try. He contacted every doctor and every charlatan in Naples, but none of them could do anything to help me.

“Eventually, his desperation got the best of him. He began contacting self-proclaimed witches and others who claimed to have mastered the dark arts. Of course, none of that worked either. I was on my deathbed, and my father was out of options.”

“But you didn’t die? Or, maybe you did, but that wasn’t the end. What happened then?”

Isabella nodded. “You are right. Had I expired, that would have been the end. The Dark Gift cannot be granted to a corpse. But that night, a man appeared at our door. He told my father he could save me if he was paid a virtual king's ransom. Father agreed and granted him much of our family lands to provide him a safe place to rest. And in return, he came to me and drained my blood through a bite. Then, he slit his wrist and fed me his. That’s how it’s done.

“It took a full day with me resting in a feverish state for the transformation to complete. But, I emerged on the following evening as you see me now. And so I have remained ever since.”

“What an incredible gift. True immortality.” Randall was in awe. He could not deny what he’d seen, and couldn’t help but envy her for possessing it.

Isabella was far less impressed. “Is it?” she asked while crushing out her cigarette. “I died that day, or she did. I’m not even sure I’m still her. And that brings me to why you are here.

"You mortals, with your pathetically short lives, know death is inevitable. You can’t escape it, yet you continue to hold onto life no matter how it makes you suffer. You, my little Rat, are the perfect example of that.”

Isabella leaned forward, her friendly, alluring face replaced by one of deep anger. “You suffer every day, chasing your addictions and destroying yourself with every dose. And even should you beat it, you are still going to die. Whether it’s tomorrow or in thirty years, death is coming for you. But you, like my father, are willing to do anything to avoid allowing its peace to take you.

“With every century, I’ve hated him more and more for doing this to me. I feel nothing but hate and rage unless I steal it from a mortal's blood. Even that incredible orgasm I experienced with my pet was only possible because I bit him when he was aroused.

"I’m just a parasite, sucking the ability to feel from the living, and trust me, taking happiness or joy from a mortal I’m draining of blood never happens! All I’m ever able to feel is anger.

“I may look human to you now, but tomorrow night, I’ll just be a cold, walking corpse. And I want to know why my father couldn’t let me go. It was a curiosity for ages. Now, it’s my obsession. And you, with your emotional complexity, your living with fear like a companion, and all the pain that goes along with it, still refuse to die. I need to know why. And you are going to show me.”

In one moment, Isabella was sitting in her chair, and then, in a blur of movement, she was on him, holding him down and exposing his neck. Randall didn’t even have time to scream before she sank her fangs into his neck.

Whether the pain lasted for a moment or an eternity, Randall would never know. But its sharp shock passed quickly. What followed felt like an intrusion into his mind, as if he were being violated in a way that shouldn’t be possible. Every thought was open to her, every conflicted emotion that drove him to drugs bubbled to the surface as if it were being boiled like fat from his meat.

Memories he’d long suppressed flipped through his thoughts in rapid fire, as if she were reading him like a book. His entire life, all the pain, heartbreak, and loss were exposed to him in an unending stream of horrific thoughts. He felt like she was ripping his mind apart, desperately searching for an answer he refused to give. And under all of it, he heard her thoughts, screaming in rage.

Why do you hold on! Life has been nothing but pain, and your future holds only more! Why will you not let it go!

He could feel the oblivion she offered. She would end all his pain, his addiction, his suffering, if only he would ask. He could feel the peace it offered, the numbness that he’d sought from drugs was right there, inviting him into its cold embrace, and he wondered, why indeed?

It would be easy now. He had but to say yes, and it would be over like a candle flame snuffed out. No more fire, no more burning…

And, he had no reason to live, anyway.

Yes, she assured him, you have no reason to fight, my little Rat. You have no children to protect, no wife to leave behind. It would be so easy to escape it all and slip into the night. Show me the way! Lead me out of this useless existence!

The temptation was strong, and he could think of no reason to live. He didn’t fear death now, not nearly as much as he feared living. He was sure of that, and he could feel her smiling within his thoughts. It was then that the answer came to him in blunt, uncomplicated clarity.

NO! I don’t need a reason to live, but I won’t die anyway! I won’t because I don’t want to, and that’s all the reason to live I need!

The thought stabbed at her, searing her with its honest truth. Living wasn’t an emotional response; it was a simple choice, and it needed no other reason.

Isabella removed her fangs and spat his blood at him. “That’s it? You choose life out of fucking stubbornness? Even though the only thing you have to look forward to is misery?

The truth of it was crushing. She’d hoped to find an emotion she could steal for herself, but she could do nothing with a choice based on simple will. The undeniable fact of it shook her to her bones, and she grabbed the heavy oak table and flung it into the fireplace so hard that it splintered into the flames.

“You would live in your drug-induced numbness rather than pass into a peaceful death? Then, so be it. I’ll give you the numbness you’ve been seeking for so much of your pathetic life!”

In a rage, she took him again, biting him and draining his life’s blood away. Randall felt it leaving and the cold of death creeping into his limbs. Yet, still, he defied her, refusing to accept the fact that she seemed determined to force on him.

As his last few breaths struggled to come, she stopped and bit her own wrist. Holding it to his mouth, she offered him that unnatural flow.

“Here,” she spat. “This is your drug now. I give you the numbness I feel, and let us see which of us was right.”

oo0oo

Fevered dreams haunted him while he transformed. They were chaotic and might have made him mad if he remembered them at all. But he could not, and they would be the last dreams he would ever have.

He woke more clear-headed than he ever had been. And he felt nothing, save the lingering memories of what it felt to be human. Even that, he knew, would soon be gone. He could feel his mind erasing them with an absolute finality.

He turned his head and could see Isabella lying peacefully next to him. She had woken when he did and was gazing at him with eyes that were now as dark as her soul.  But even as a creature of death, she was still the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen, and his newfound physical perfection tapped that last, fading bit of humanity left within him.

Randall felt himself becoming aroused as desire flared in his gut. Isabella saw this and took his hand, biting him to taste his blood. In seconds, she felt that emotional fire burning within him and fed it back, amplifying its strength.

They did not make love, for he had not felt that emotion in years, so it wasn't one he could share, but he did have lust still burning within him. So, they shared that, passionately and intimately, and for the last time without a mortal host.

Afterward, he was at peace, a peace he’d sought for most of his life. Smiling at her, he caressed her cheek.

“You were wrong, Bella. This isn’t a curse, at least not for me. This is what I’ve been seeking all my life. Perhaps that is something I can share with you. We have forever to embrace it.”