Chapter 1
Fabien and Stefan (Fabien narrates)
Some have said that there are advantages to being a younger son. The older son gets all the land, but the younger son has more freedom. Nothing was more important to me.
My older brother did not understand why I wanted freedom—I didn’t realize it myself at the time.
“Why do you want to go to Paris?” he asked me when, after our father’s death, I applied to him for money. Teasingly, he added, “Do you want to see all the fine ladies of the court?”
This was a standing joke with him, my supposed finicky taste in women. I had reached the age of twenty-two without ever having had a sweetheart of any kind. My sisters teased me about an acquaintance of theirs who (they said) made eyes at me and whose heart they accused me of breaking. Did I think I was so good-looking that I could have any girl I wanted without troubling myself to be polite?
Well: I was good-looking; I did not know why I should deny it. Naturally, I did not say that to my sisters, but I did say that the girl in question was not exactly the reigning beauty of the Loire valley. I would not go so far as to say she was ugly, but surely, I could do better than that?
My sisters went into gales of laughter, and from that day onward, my arrogance was added to my being highly selective as a subject for teasing.
How I longed to get away from them! I wanted to leave and needed to get away from country life, with its few neighbors and its dearth of entertainment. By the time I asked my brother for money, I did not know exactly what I wanted, but I had a fairly good idea of what I did not want.
“Here, take this,” my brother said to me, handing over a small bag in which coins clinked against each other. “It’s not much, I’m afraid. I don’t know why you want to live in Paris when you can live here so much better on so much less. Be sure to call on our cousins in the Marais as soon as you can. The Vicomte is said to be easily offended.” These cousins were the Vicomte d’Amboise, which consisted of an elderly bachelor, and those of his family who lived with him—his widowed niece Louise and her young son.
My sisters wished me good luck on finding a wife suited to those fastidious tastes of mine; and two days later, I set out, with the servant Jacque walking behind me and carrying my things.
Jacque was able to talk with other servants along the road, with the result that by the time we reached Paris, we had a guide to show us the city. It was summertime, and we were glad to stop at an inn on the edge of the city, where they furnished us with water both to drink and to wash off the dust of the road, and then with a simple meal. The proprietor himself served us. He was full of a place called the Café Alexandre, which he had visited for the first time earlier that day. Apparently, it was the newest place to see and be seen. While I was wondering what the word café meant, he asked us if we had ever tasted coffee.
“What is it?” I asked.
“It is the most exquisite drink from the East that tastes like nothing else. It is rich and yet somewhat bitter—but somehow the bitterness adds to rather than detracts from the flavor.” He had bought a small amount, ground, from the Café Alexandre, and he insisted on brewing us some. With the enthusiasm of a true aficionado, he said that if he were looking for new quarters—which he wasn’t—he would look for rooms near the Café Alexandre, so he could have coffee every day.
Jacque and I and our guide, Luc, laughed at the man’s enthusiasm as we walked on into the great city, but in the end, we were so curious that we ended up visiting the Café Alexandre. By the time we got there, night had fallen.
Jacque and Luc soon got into conversation with a waiter. He was clearly giving them directions of some kind.
“He knows of some rooms that might be just what you’re looking for,” Jacque explained.
“Attic rooms,” the waiter said apologetically. “But I understand that may be what the gentleman requires.”
“Admirable,” I said. “But we will have some coffee first.”
We were glad to sit down. I looked around at the café and marveled. First, I marveled at the great number of people who managed to crowd themselves in. All of Paris was like that to me, though—country-bred as I was, I was struck everywhere by the density of the population. The café was also remarkable for its mingling of the classes. I had never seen anything like this before. There were bakers with loaves of bread for sale and apprentices who had no money to pay for a drink and were standing round as if waiting for someone to pay. Up the social scale were master craftsman—printers showing around their latest pamphlets, tailors showing off their latest coats—and then there were lawyers’ clerks and such-like, and the lawyers themselves—I guessed that was what they were by their inkpots and pens and long rolls of parchment, and by the arguments going on around them—and then there were gentlemen, the members of the upper class, in silk suits and stockings and long, curly brown wigs.
One of these gentlemen caught my eye with his, which was bluer than any eye I had ever seen before. This blue-eyed man held my gaze for some moments, long enough to signal to me that his glance was not an accident. He was perhaps the finest gentleman there, judging by the white lace that overflowed his bright blue vest. This lace was of a quality I had never seen before, and it was as clean and fresh as if he had just put it on for the first time. What was even more remarkable was that his skin was as white as his lace—a smooth porcelain like complexion, as beautiful as it was strange. As he held my gaze with his eyes, which grew more intensely blue every moment, I began to feel embarrassed—yet it was a pleasurable sort of embarrassment. I did not look away. I was confused but somehow thrilled as well. These were the sort of looks that I had seen men and women exchange. And with that thought I realized what the most remarkable thing of all was: there were no women in the café.
Was this the paradise I had come to Paris unknowingly seeking?
I suddenly became very tired. It took too much effort to go on gazing into those unearthly eyes. Jacque and I left the café and crossed the street, and just around the corner we found the sign of the mortar and pestle that marked an apothecary’s business. The apothecary himself was just closing shop, and when he was done, he showed us upstairs to the rooms.
They truly were nothing more than an attic, fairly large but entirely unpainted, and unadorned in every way. There was a bed and a table and two chairs, and aside from a cupboard and a washstand, that was all the furniture. For Jacque there was a minute room that doubled as a broom closet. I stepped across my own room and looked out of a dormer window. All was black in the night, but since there was no traffic abroad at that hour, I could hear people at the café, around the corner. I heard a strange, far-away sound of music and clinking glasses and laughter.
Was I happy I had come to live as a poor man in Paris? I could not have expressed how happy I was.
There were no curtains on the windows, so I awoke in the morning with the sun. Leaving Jacque asleep, I went down the stairs and into the street, seeing it for the first time. Few people were abroad at that hour, and the shops were all closed. However, the Café Alexandre was open. I went in gladly and asked a waiter what time they had opened. He told me that the café never closed. As soon as the last stragglers of the night had gone home, the first of the men taking their wares to market arrived, wanting coffee and a shot of brandy to go with it. Could he get some brandy for me?
I declined and said I wanted only coffee and rolls. A hungry young man of twenty-two can eat rolls almost without number, so while I ate, I had plenty of time to observe the life of the café. Men came in and discussed the news of the day. I heard “the king” mentioned several times, and the name of his present mistress, and I caught mention of a duel to take place in the Bois de Boulogne, of various tennis matches, and of the latest opera to be put on. I listened to everything with great interest, but what I was really doing there was waiting for my gentleman of the blue eyes and immaculate lace. I sat most of the day waiting in the café for him, getting up to take a stroll round the streets and to see that Jacque was provisioning us properly.
Our guide from yesterday turned up—the one who sowed us first the Café Alexandre and then the rooms I was letting. For a few sous he showed me some of the sights of Paris. Despite my exhaustion of yesterday, we walked as far as the Ile de la Cité to see the Cathedral of Nôtre Dame, and to climb the bell tower to see the city of Paris laid out before us. It is hard to describe how I, a farm boy who had never seen anything higher than the roof of the parish church, felt when I saw the full magnificence of Paris.
When we got back to the café, I paid and dismissed my guide, and, giving up for today on my gentleman in blue, I was ready to climb the stairs to my attic. The sun had gone down about an hour ago, though, and I thought I would have a brandy before going home. I turned to look for a waiter, and there he was, wearing the same blue breeches and vest, the same lavender coat, the long brown wig, and the lace at his neck that was as white as the first snow. And he was looking at me with those bright blue eyes. Staring, really. Not to be intimidated, I stared back. Finally, he smiled. With one hand, he indicated a table with a chessboard set up upon it. I took a chair and we sat down opposite each other.
“I am a habitué here. You are the guest and must take the white” were the first words he ever said to me.
Since I was young, I thought myself to be an excellent chess player, ready to match my skills with the best the capital had to offer. I had often played against my sisters and my brother and beaten them all. However, my father would never take me on—and that should have told me something.
This gentleman checkmated me in two moves. He did not actually laugh at me, but he did smile out of the corner of his mouth. We played another game and this time he checkmated me in three moves.
“Sir, I perceive that I am out of my class,” I said. “I thought myself a good player at home, but I had only my family to play against me, and I see now that what we called chess was very different from the game you play. I am not worthy to play against you, sir.”
It was clear that the gentleman had enjoyed dominating me in game after game. He was pleased by my tribute, however, and he smiled at me now in a more indulgent way. “I suppose you must learn from me, then”; and he proceeded to show me a series of maneuvers. I would have felt foolish except that he so obviously enjoyed instructing me.
A waiter stopped at our table and said, “Milord?”
“Two tankards of ale,” my gentleman—my lord—answered without raising his eyes from the chessboard.
Now, assuredly, I would learn his name.
“If you buy me ale, you must know my name,” I said boldly. “I am Fabien Levesque” I waited.
“Stefan, Baron of Vitré.”
There, it was on the table: if he were an aristocrat, he would have heard the name Levesque. Although I was no better dressed than a tradesman and Stefan was clearly a member of the court, we were both members of the aristocracy. Things between us were now put on a new footing. We could associate openly. We might even visit each other without risking suspicion from anyone. It was a great step forward, and I began to hope that I would see Stefan again even after this night was over.
When our ale arrived, we drank to the health of the king. I drank freely while Stefan sipped. By the time I got to the bottom of my tankard, I could feel my face getting warm—the ale was strong. Notably, however, Stefan’s face remained that uncanny white. I wondered if he were ill.
We lingered over the chessboard long into the night. Other men joined us to watch and to learn from Stefan. I gave up my seat to a man who wanted to play, and Stefan finished him off in a matter of minutes. I couldn’t help observing that Stefan had given me much more leeway—had allowed me to lose much more slowly—as if he had enjoyed my company and wanted to keep it. He beat several other gentlemen. By then it was quite late.
“Come, let me take you back to your rooms,” Stefan said. “Are they far from here?”
“No, just around the corner,” I said.
“Nonetheless, it is pitch dark, and you do not know how dangerous Paris can be at night. My carriage is waiting.” He made a gesture to a servant who was sitting on the sidewalk outside of the café.
I did not want to look like some effeminate coward who could not be trusted to walk around the corner by himself, so I protested.
Stefan ignored my protest and repeated, “You do not know Paris. Come.” He put down his tankard, and I noticed, with considerable surprise, that it was full. Those sips had been pretend: he had drunk nothing.
Stefan brushed the servant cruelly aside and helped me into his carriage himself. He lifted me as easily as if I had been a cat. When he got in, he brushed his knee against mine. An accident, no doubt. However, the carriage was big, and there was no need for him to sit so close to me.
“This is it,” I said when we came to the sign of the mortar and pestle.
“Did the apothecary give you a key?” Stefan asked, and I had to admit I had not thought to ask.
“Here, give me that lantern,” he said to his coachman; and by its light, we picked up dirt clods from the street and threw them at every window we could reach. After a time, my landlord, the apothecary, appeared in his dressing gown, rubbing his eyes.
“Good night, my friend,” said Stefan, and he tipped his hat to me and was gone.
The apothecary had taken Stefan’s measure, so he scolded me very little for waking him up. “I will have a key made for your lordship,” he said.
“I’m not a lord. But I will be obliged.”
I ought to have gone to visit my cousin d’Amboise the next day, but I could not pull myself away from the Café Alexandre. I knew I was making an idiot of myself, but there I stayed, as fixed as if I had had a meeting planned. I played chess. I played cards. I listened to men talk politics, which was all new to me; at first the only name I recognized was that of the king, Louis. At last, as the sun waned, I ordered brandy. What a jackass I had been to suppose that that fine gentleman, Baron Vitré, had nothing better to do with his time than to hang around in a café with an infatuated young man! Didn’t I have more important things to do? I asked myself angrily as I drank another brandy. If he showed up, he would know I had been waiting for him, and the power imbalance between us would weigh even more heavily on his side. I didn’t even know if he had these kinds of feelings for other men. What a young jackass I was!
Thus I spoke to myself as I consumed my third large brandy. When it was empty, I sat the glass down and stood up—and the next thing I knew, I was grabbing at the table, and there was a crash as the dishes hit the floor. Everybody looked at me, of course.
“Don’t worry; I’ll take care of it” said a voice in my ear. Stefan’s voice. I turned quickly, and our faces were so close that we could have kissed. For a long moment, neither of us moved. I was staring into the depths of his blue eyes and seeing thoughts and images I had only seen before in my own mind.
The proprietor came forward, and Stefan moved his face away from mine, circled my bicep with his hand, and told the proprietor he would pay for everything. He brought out a gold coin that would have paid for everything many times over. The proprietor smiled and took it, and the café swirled backed into its customary amusements. Stefan was still holding my arm. I was stock still, afraid that if I attempted any move, my knees would buckle.
At last Stefan dropped my arm and moved away. He smiled in a quite ordinary way and said in a quite ordinary voice, “Did you do your duty and visit your cousin today?”
I blushed. “No, I’m afraid Cousin Geoffrey will have to wait one more day.”
“And who is this Cousin Geoffrey? Is he a Chaumont?”
“No, Geoffrey d’Amboise.”
“The vicomte?” Stefan said in surprise. “I know him well. Let us call on him together.”
“You mean tomorrow?”
“I mean tonight. He keeps late hours. Lately he has gotten an idea into his head that he dislikes crowds, so now he sits at home of an evening with no more company than his silly niece. He’s decided that he’s going to read all the books in his library—which is an exceptionally dull one—so he’s probably nodding into a volume of Euclid right now. He’ll be glad to see us.”
We got into Stefan’s carriage, and he held my hand as if this were the most natural thing in the world to do. It was as cold as milk on a winter morning, but I decided I did not care. There had to be an explanation—some rare malady—and Stefan would explain when the time was right. I laid my head on his broad, strong shoulder.
Chapter 2
The transformation of Fabien
Stefan was right: Geoffrey was glad to see us. He sent his niece off to her room, put down his book, and asked the servant to bring cordials. “Stefan never drinks anything, but you—”
“I have come to pay my respects to you, vicomte: I am your cousin Fabien Chaumont, just arrived in Paris.”
“Little Fabien? The last time I saw you, you were—well, let us not go into the number of years that has passed. Suffice it to say you have done a good job of growing up. You were always pleasing to the eye, but now, well, you could get into any sort of trouble you liked.”
I was shocked by his forthright immorality, but I could hardly say it displeased me.
“Yes, that’s what Fabien has come to Paris for—trouble,” said Stefan. “We must steer him in the right direction, mustn’t we?”
“It seems to me that if he’s met you, he’s in sufficient trouble already,” said the baron.
Stefan laughed hugely. He seemed pleased to be cast as someone who would corrupt youth.
The servant came in with a tray of cordials. The baron poured me a tiny glass of what turned out to be elderberry cordial, the same as we made at home.
“Yes, your dear mother sends me a bottle every year,” the baron said when I remarked on this.
From then on, the conversation dealt with all the new marvels of Paris: the opera, the ballet, the musical gatherings, the public dances, and the galleries where you could see fine paintings. Paris was quickly turning into a center for the arts, and the baron, for one, was glad about it.
“So much of the time, the city has been just like the country, only muddier. You’ve done well to come in the summer,” the baron said as he caught me looking at my boots. “This new Paris will have the world flocking to it. It will be a city like no other.”
“There’s already the university,” Stefan said.
“The university! A bunch of drunken, penniless would-be priests who would duel each other to the death for a bottle of cheap red wine! The university has not brought us any glory, and it never will. I don’t hold with priests. I don’t hold with the Church.”
“And our precious Notre Dame de Paris, said to be the finest cathedral in Europe?” Said Stefan.
“Notre Dame is a thing of beauty in its own right,” said the baron, and then he changed his subject to the opera. He planned to go tomorrow night, and would we care to go with him?
I had never heard any music in my life beyond the pipes and guitars that the peasants on our estate played on feast days. Before Stefan could answer, I said, “We would love to go with you!”
“They’re putting on a new opera by Lully, called Persée, at the Palais Royal. The king will be there, which means everyone will be there. Shall I meet you in my carriage at—?”
“Call for us at the Café Alexandre,” said Stefan.
As we left, I thought to myself that life in Paris was going to be more magnificent than I had even imagined. Tomorrow night I would hear an opera for the first time—witness the new art of the ballet—perhaps even see the king. As for tonight, I did not even dare look ahead to what would happen when Stefan and I were alone. I was sure it would be the fulfillment of my dreams.
Stefan handed me into his carriage once again with those enormously powerful arms. I must admit I was growing to like it. His strength made me feel delicate and treasured. I wanted to give in to that strength and see where it would take me.
Stefan got in and called out to the coachman to start, and I heard the sound of the whip cracking at the horses.
The Paris night was so dark that Stefan did not bother to close the curtains before he took me in his arms and kissed me.
“What is wrong? Are my lips too cold for you?” he asked a moment later.
That was, indeed, what had made me draw back, despite all my desire for him.
“I have a rare circulatory disease. The blood does not flow properly. Do you wish me not to kiss you?”
“Oh, no, Stefan, I want nothing more in the world than for you to kiss me again and again.”
Which he did, with his strong arms tightening me against him. I have no idea how long the drive was to the apothecary’s, but I know I was surprised when we stopped there. Stefan withdrew his lips from mine. I tried to think what to say so that he would come upstairs with me. I wanted him so much I could hardly speak for confusion.He had a word with his coachman, who drove off into the night; and then I let us into the building.
It was just as dark inside as out, and I had to feel my way up to the attic stairs, with Stefan holding onto my coat tails. Just outside my room was a small table where a candle and a tinderbox always stood. I tried to strike a fire, but my usual skill at this had evaporated along with my nerves. Stefan took the flint and steel from me, and in a moment, the candlewick shone a muddy light. I was embarrassed that I had not bought a beeswax candle, being able to afford only tallow.
Stefan asked me if he were invited in. I looked at him with a confused look on my face and said “Yes” We only needed enough light to show us to the bed. Closing the door, we pulled the curtains closed and then we were alone, as I had wanted to be with Stefan ever since the moment I first saw him. We stood face to face, suddenly leaning forward to kiss me, deeply, passionately, our tongues wrestling with one another he picked me up as if I were light as a feather and carried me over to the bed. He threw me on the bed and then slowly nuzzled up to me growling a bit as he got closer and closer to me. He undressed himself and stood before me. I could tell he was aroused. His body reminded me of a marble statue, even though Stefan was obviously well to do, his body was not soft as a woman’s. No, every muscle was defined, his veins protruding, and his skin as white as the winter snow. “Undress!” he commanded me. I did as I was told, for I had longed and dreamed about an encounter such as this for as long as I could remember.
At once he was at my neck, licking it, smelling it as I heard myself groan with pleasure. Stefan continued making sexual advances along with licking and smelling my neck, which quickly lead to him caressing both of my thighs with his large hands leading higher and higher until they had found their way to my buttocks giving them a slight squeeze. Then using his tongue he licked every inch of my body, returning from time to time, kissing me deep and passionately. At times I experienced various emotions, the feeling of anxiousness, as I had not been intimate with anyone before, man or woman. Feeling such incredible passion, as if I were about to burst out of my own skin and a fear, I could somehow not point my finger on. I had the feeling of being completely under his control, feeling powerless to prevent anything that I might not desire from happening.
I will not try to describe the ecstasy of that night, even though it was all about to change. Stefan took even more pleasure in dominating me than I had guessed he would. I became his possession: before the small hours came, I belonged to him completely. As we lay back on the pillows, resting, Stefan stroked my hair away from my forehead and called me tender names.
“You really have made me hungry, Fabien,” he said. “It’s been a long time since I was with someone of your energy, your passion. However, now I must get up and go out to nourish myself.” “Shall I come with you Stefan?” I asked feeling confused. “No, this is something I need to do alone, soon you will join me”, he said. As I thought to myself, there were times when I felt I understood Stefan, and there were many times when his mood would change so quickly from a momentary display of tenderness to outright cruelty, as in this moment. “But, when will I see you again?”, I asked feeling weak and timid and suddenly very aware of my nakedness. “We shall meet again at the café” Perhaps in a day or two, I cannot say for sure,” he said coldly. “Good night Fabien,” he said. “Good night Stefan”. I watched him leave feeling confused and empty. While we were physically exploring each other’s bodies, I felt as if I was his and he were mine, then suddenly everything changed? Perhaps the handsome gentleman I had just met recently at the café, had suddenly lost interest in me, as if I were merely some sort of conquest? The thought of finally having had a physical encounter with another man, and possibly losing him, or rather, him losing interest in me, left me feeling sad and empty inside. I knew I had to return to the café and win him over once again.
The next morning came and my mind once again became fixated on Stefan. All that mattered was to reignite the passion and tenderness we had shared before his sudden departure the night before. I made my way over to the café hoping to see him sitting there, perhaps enjoying a breakfast, and perhaps he would be willing to have me join him. Instead, I arrived not seeing him, thinking perhaps he was trying to avoid me?
I ate my breakfast alone, asking myself, would I ever see him again? I decided, I would return to the café that evening and perhaps I would see him again and that my luck would return to me. Later that evening, I returned to the café to see him seated with another man in the back of the cafe, engaged in a game of chess. I walked over to where he was seated and asked if I could pull up a chair to observe the game. He merely glanced at me and returned his attention to the game, easily defeating his opponent. The man got up to leave and offered me his chair, as I nodded my gratitude to the stranger. “Stefan, I don’t understand why you left so abruptly last night” I said as I watched his expression. He looked at me and glanced away saying “I told you Fabien, I needed to satisfy my hunger” as he appeared to dismiss my question with a simple answer. “Stefan, I have spent the entire day thinking of only one thing, you, thinking I must have done something wrong?” I said practically pleading with him. I hated the fact that he had such a hold over my emotions and hated myself even more for allowing it. “When can we be together as we were last evening, I long for you?” I asked in a suggestive manner. “Well, I am feeling a bit tired” he said indicating he was willing to return to my room at this very moment. He looked at me and grinned. I all at once, felt a tremendous relief, he hadn’t lost interest in me, and we were about to become once more intimate, my last night in fact as a mortal. I was about to learn everything about this handsome and cunning creature. We returned to my room above the apothecary, once again, as before, Stefan asking me if he could enter. I replied with “Yes with pleasure” as we both broke out into laughter. “Will your servant be in?” Stefan asked softly.
“No, I let him go for the evening. He’ll be at some whorehouse, no doubt, drinking watered wine by the quart and disporting himself with the ladies. He’ll stumble in at dawn.”
“Shall we go upstairs, then?” Stefan asked even more softly. We made our way and entered my room. As soon as the door closed, we became as one, into a world of ecstasy and passion. Our bodies clinging together tightly, soft caresses, and deep passionate kisses. We walked over to my bed hand in hand, despite his icy cold touch, the flames of passion had ignited once more. We undressed each other and lay on the bed. Just as our first physical encounter had been, exploring each other’s bodies yet again when suddenly Stefan froze; he stopped talking. He was listening.
Unfortunately, I had heard the same sounds. They came from the bottom of the house, from the front door. I realized that in offering myself to Stefan a second time, I had omitted re-locking the door behind us. So, whoever it was had no difficulty gaining access to the house and only the difficulty of darkness in finding the stairs. Whoever it was stumbling and singing bits of a popular song as he climbed. It was my servant Jacque. Near panic, I told Stefan.
Stefan’s reaction was one I could not have anticipated. He was not discomfited in the least. “Your servant, eh? Tonight, he’ll serve me better than he has ever served you before.”
I could not imagine what Stefan meant by this. Surely Jacque was about to provide the most scandalous of interruptions. I racked my brains for solutions to the problem as Jacque’s footsteps sounded closer and closer. At the same time, I wondered at Stefan’s actions. He had found the tinderbox next to the bed and was kindling a spark and then a fire. A stick from the fireplace smoldered at the end, first red, and then yellow. Did he want Jacque to see us?
No, that was not it at all. It was he who wanted to see Jacque.
“Monsieur, monsieur, I am so sorry to be so late,” Jacque said through the door. “I found the front door unlocked—maybe you have the key? I will go down and lock it.”
With these words, Jacque opened the door to my room. Faced with a tall, powerful, naked stranger who seemed more like an animal about to spring at his prey than a human being, Jacque stopped in his tracks.
“Monsieur?” was all he had time to say before the horror began. I was too afraid to close my eyes to it—I was so afraid of Stefan at this point that I was afraid that I might be his next victim. But I was not the one chosen. Stefan seized Jacque by the shoulders, pulled him close, and bent over him. No, no, this could not be, not Jacque! But as I watched, Stefan pierced Jacque’s neck with those extraordinarily long incisors, and he began to drink Jacque’s blood. Perhaps the greatest horror was that Jacque was still alive—and, still worse, that his terrified eyes caught mine. I read in his gaze the belief that I would do anything to save him, just as he would have done anything to save me.
How could I have looked on as Stefan murdered him? How could I have stood there and watched and done nothing to stop the carnage?
I have thought about this many times over the years, and I still do not understand it myself. I was paralyzed by fear, I felt there was nothing I could do, nor anyone on this earth that could have done anything to prevent this attack. I felt as if I had betrayed my servant, who felt more like a member of the family, my Jacque!
At last, after what seemed like a very long time, the light in Jacque’s eyes dimmed and then went out. My good servant Jacque was dead, and I had watched passively. My lover, Stefan, who had overwhelmed me with pleasure, now overwhelmed me with grief and terror. He turned toward me, and his face was that of an animal still seeking more prey. I shrank into the bedclothes, but that did no good. I had to fight him. His physical dominance, which had appealed to me so much when I was looking forward to being sexually overpowered, now took on a new and threatening aspect. There was no way I could crush this man—who was no ordinary man.
He saw my fear and began to laugh. He was delighted that he had terrified me. For a moment, I thought that my terror alone would afford him sufficient pleasure, but I might as well have expected a wild boar to lose interest in a newborn lamb. I was at his mercy, and I was nothing more than food to Stefan. His appetite for sex was just that, another appetite. He experienced no tenderness, no passion, nothing that made an encounter human.
I crouched in the corner, waiting for him to do whatever he would do. I could not think of a single way to defend myself.
He threw his massive body on mine, crushing me into the mattress, and he put his hands around my neck. Now no other part of my body interested him.
“Are you going to kill me?” I asked faintly.
“Oh, no, not you,” said Stefan: “I have other plans for you.”
His hands grabbed me and tightened on my throat. I noticed that for the first time, his hands were warm.
“What are you going to do to me?” I insisted.
“I am going to make you one of my kind: a creature of the night, a vampire.”
I had never heard the word before and he did not elaborate on the meaning of the word saying only “You will learn over time, but for now” he said menacingly, as Stefan bit into my neck and drew my first blood. He drank for a long time, as I got weaker and weaker. It did not matter very much to me whether I died or lived. I thought I had found love—the love I had unknowingly longed for all my life—and that love had turned to degradation and horror!
Stefan did not kill me, true to his word, I was about to be transformed into the same creature he was, a vampire. “You are very weak now: you must be strengthened, or you will die” as he bit his own wrist till the blood flowed, and then he held his wrist up to my mouth and ordered me to drink. “Our blood combined will make you as I am.”
“Go on, drink. It will not seem unnatural to you now.” He commanded.
He was right. I was now as thirsty for his blood as he had been for mine, I clutched his wrist ever tighter. Once I had drank enough, I sat there and thought about what I had just done, asking “What is a vampire?”
Stefan said mockingly, “A vampire has the best of life, never needing to work, having nothing to do but go to parties and all these fashionable new amusements, the opera and the ballet, and mixing with the best of society.” Stefan continued to educate me giving me an even greater clarity. That a vampire could change shapes at will into any number of animals, whether it be bat, wolf, or rodent. That a vampire could turn into mist or fog. That there was no longer a need for food or alcohol, in fact, if consumed by the vampire, it might generate extreme nausea. That the tears we shed are not the salt tears of mortals, but rather made of the same substance we needed to consume to survive, blood. That vampires had the ability to levitate, fly through the sky and move incredibly fast, so fast that a mortal’s eye could not detect. That the vampire was free from sickness and death (or rather the traditional death which befell mortals) that the vampire was neither living, nor completely dead, in addition to the word vampire, there were other descriptions such as the undead. And lastly, that vampires were not entirely invincible as immortal beings. That sunlight would disintegrate a vampire. That fire could destroy us, as would a wooden stake through the heart.
“And killing innocent people to stay alive.”
“Jacque? He was nothing. He was a mere servant. There are always more servants to replace him.” He said cruelly.
“I think he was more than a mere servant to his mother,” I said.
“Why are you so sentimental? I expected better of you. You seemed to enjoy the kind of life I lead.”
“Jacque was not simply ‘a mere servant’ to me, either. I knew him all my life,” I said.
Felling enraged, it was at that moment I began to hate and distrust him. I realized he was diabolical, who not only took delight in luring me with his charm and his good looks, but also took great pleasure in destroying me as well as Jacque or anyone he chose to. “I still feel the hunger” Stefan said, as he told me I would soon experience the thrill of the hunt, Stefan said mysteriously. “Come.”
We got dressed and went out into the pitch-black street. I had an idea he would be looking for another victim to satisfy his cravings, however I was under Stefan’s spell, and I would do whatever he told me to do.
Remarkably, we encountered someone right outside my building. No sooner had we left than a man approached us from the darkness carrying a dagger and a lantern. He demanded we hand over all money we had. Stefan’s reaction was not that of any mortal man: he began to laugh uncontrollably, almost doubling over. The thief became enraged and took the dagger and stabbed Stefan in the stomach, and that was when the attacker realized that Stefan really was no mere mortal: he stopped laughing and removed the dagger from the thief’s hand and threw it on the ground, there was no blood coming from where the knife had been thrust. The thief stood there quite motionless, undoubtedly shocked.
“Shall we dine, Fabien?” Stefan asked, and with that he took the thief by the neck with his powerful hands and ripped open the thief’s shirt, lunging towards his neck. I noticed what I had missed before—but how had I missed it? —that Stefan’s incisors were larger than those of any human being. They were more like the fangs of a rabid dog. Baring these large incisors, he bit into the man’s throat. Blood spurted on the dirt below.
In a muffled voice, Stefan commanded me to join him. “Here, bite into his wrist,” he said. I knew I was powerless to resist, although I did not yet understand why, only that he had made me into the same unholy creature as he. I followed his command, for now Stefan was my lover, as well as my maker and master, all my instincts told me to obey. In the time it takes to blink an eye, I had taken the man’s wrist and bit into it. All the while the thief was screaming. In lawless Paris no one cared if you screamed, nor would anyone come to your rescue. We drained every drop of blood from this man, and we left the body propped up against a building as if the corpse were some poor marionette that had had its strings cut.
“How do you feel, Fabien?” Stefan asked. He had hold of the lantern now, and he held it up to my face.
“I feel as if an unquenchable thirst has for the moment been satisfied.” I wiped the blood from my lips with my handkerchief, which I then handed Stefan to use.
Stephan wiped his mouth as if he had just finished a long and sumptuous supper. He spoke quietly, as his sensuality returned. “Shall we go back to your room?”
