Beloved roused me from my bed the next evening, chattering like a joyful bird. I tangled my fingers in his blond curls and he promised to dress me up, and promised that we would have our revenge in the fullness of time, why worry now? All things come good given sufficient years, and in that we have so many, there should be no rush to strike. He bundled me into his arms, because I was still shaking, and I held onto the cotton collar of his nightshirt.
He brushed my hair out and curled it loosely as well as he could, still cooing that Dasius would get what he deserved. He dotted red tincture on my lips with the pad of his index finger and dusted my face with pearl powder from a large tin compact, blowing on the large horsehair brush occasionally. When he was finished, he blew softly on my cheek to brush the excess powder away, and fanned me with his hand. I sat still on his vanity, mirror to my back, unused to being touched after so long, unused to dropping my guard, and after a time, when I began to sob under his hands, made emotional by being touched in love, he took me to his bed and curled around me, and I clutched his white shirt again with both hands. "Laurent, you cannot know what it has been like."
"My darling, before you there was no one. I know," he said. He told me stories, all in whispers, and oh how I have loved him, how I have loved him, and there is no peace now in my life that he is gone, none at all.
He whispered to me that he had a master in Rome, tall and pale, who loomed darkly over his life, and he showed me the dimpled places on his neck where he had been bitten as a child. He showed me the rivers of indents on his arms from where he had been repeatedly bled for someone else's hungry mouth. "They cannot have us who are not willing, darling," he said, "believe me I wanted this. From a child, I wanted to be as we are now. But I have paid."
I kissed him above his lips, and he closed his eyes, hand gentle on the small of my back.
"We are in no way alike," he went on. "How callous I was, to welcome my death with both hands open. These days are endless now, and without you, there is no light in my hours."
"You speak beautifully, dear, but you are a liar. There have been countless others."
"None I would keep," he said.
"You keep my brother closer than anyone."
He said nothing to that, propping his arm on a silk pillow and playing with his hair.
I see what is beautiful about him, but we are all of us lovely to look at. We are the product of centuries of careful choosing. I see how his skin blushes pink in the cheeks, and how the hollows of his neck tense when he tells me pretty things. I know that he was made for this, how he is kept living by making us feel as if we are the only ones, while we are near him, and how he lives also on our madness, for when he does leave us out, we ache for him with no equal. It is what he has to offer.
But there is more than that. Tell me of a vampire who has given in more to what he is than Laurent has. Tell me of another vampire who relishes the dance the way he does, who revels in the sensuality and heat of the blood and warm bodies. Tell me of one who doesn't ache for some long ago life, who is not ruled by a time passed away. But when I am with him, I can't linger on anger long. What other arms have I slept in? And though I know that he lives only in the moment, and his words are meaningless because of it, I took comfort in being his only one, as if for the the first time, willing to forget past hurts.
When I woke he was still there, and when I turned in his grasp, I saw the silhouette in the dark, and I felt through my body the vibration of Laurent's protective rumble. I knew that it was Dasius there with a needle and the cold look in his eyes.
"It's for his own good. Whatever remains must be flushed out of the system."
Laurent whispered in the broken, gutteral mix of French and German he used to speak when we were children. Since then he had learned to speak like aristocrats and their upjumped whores. I pressed my face to his chest, unconscious of showing my terror.
"I will see you flushed and shaking under my hand," Laurent said, grumbling in that horrible low tone. "One touch and I could have you begging for me. You act the part of the young gentleman because I allow it. But you are nothing but a scarlet slut begging for the bite, like you always were. Come closer so I can see your face now, boy. Give me the pleasure."
Dasius sputtered and I could hear the tears in his choked throat. It was cruel to draw on his loneliness. He is the loneliest person I know. The betrayal sent me shuddering as if the devil were breathing on my neck. I heard the click clack of metal being set down on wood, and the door closing.
When I drew away, Laurent opened his mouth to speak. I slapped him across the face as hard as I could. Suddenly I felt strongly that my hands belonged around his throat, that my thumbs belonged digging their way into his windpipe and parting, and I shook with the effort it took to control them. My body was warm with the warmth of his body, of his bed, me, who is cold.
He sat still, frozen in a propped position, eyes downcast. The force of my hand had ruptured a vessel near his eye, and its blood ran the length of his nose.
"That is my brother," I said.
"Nicky," he whispered, deadened, "you are so changeable. Control yourself. Must there always be violence?"
I thought of the indentations on his arms, and the dimples on his throat, and I wondered who he was. For the first time, doubt ran through everything. It struck me that for all the time I had known him, he was a stranger, and I determined that I would torment him until I found out his true origins.
"Oh please, please," he begged, "I can hear you. Leave me in peace."
I have never told it to Dasius, but then I knew that Laurent could see into my head.