“To become an immortal by choice, you have to take a risk. It requires a specific personality type. You need at once to have the ability to live forever incarnate, without transmigration. That makes you responsible for the long-term survival of this planet, its ecology, human species. And yet, you require a death-wish, because the methods we traditionally use are brutal. You must detach from the goriness sufficient to accept addiction to high grade blood as sustenance. Although we now use rather more clinical means, this feral nature and a refinement of it are still the overwhelming personality of what we become. We must ensure that it does not cause craziness. Perhaps we are all a little crazy. There are methods; strategies by which we are adept to cope with our inevitable foci. Most who are embraced cannot and over the centuries this becomes evident. They either kill themselves or we others do, often at their own request, often without their consent. Our courteousness is of course a major aspect of our elite society.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because in a world of infinite possibility, you are one of few with such potential. We offer you a few more human years before we make the decision.”
“We?”
“Yourself and the community whom I represent on this occasion. We have observed you for a long time.”
“You control and use the state, the system. Its workers; police, government, those are your agents. All the times I have been stalked, my apartments broken into, that was your group?”
“And now that you know, you surely take comfort in knowing.”
“You are Royals, why choose me?”
“You surely know yourself to belong to one of the thirteen bloodlines. You do indeed stand out, even among and despite your own family.”
He was right. About everything. I accepted it.
“Most of us are elders and yet still in our physical prime. We prefer it that way. It requires several decades of the Human experience to become what is necessary. You are fortunate that you have reached that stage early. The rigours of your life are of concern to us. We can help you with that. You will of course progress rapidly to an appropriate position in both societies. Each of us is a nexus with that regard. However there is a trade-off. You work for us. And in exchange, we will ensure your security. There is only one rule, you already know it I am sure.”
“Do not disrupt the harmony.”
“We live during an enlightened time during which it is possible for us to tell and sometimes even show the mortals directly, what we are. They simply cannot believe it to be real, and so we are protected. Military action has recently been invoked to secure us where a small enclave of our society stepped out of line. You understand the extent to which I am explaining this.”
“Totally. I am reclusive and I simply intend to make amazing music, art and works of great literature.”
“You shall have time to do so. And for your other pleasures also. We will assign you tasks of which you will be capable. Assured discretion is our way.”
I sighed. I let out a lifetime, nearly forty years of tension. As I inhaled again I breathed in his air. Already I was changing.
“Then we shall meet again.”
“Don’t make it too long.”
“Prepare your involvements, assets and emotional well-being. We need you balanced and comfortable, ready for the transition.”
I knew what he meant. Sort my life out so it would be easier for me to disappear from mortal culture without freaking anyone out or making problems.
“How old are you?”
“Would you ask a lady of her age?”
“Only if she looked underage.”
He laughed. “You will find our society to have somewhat different ethics. Most of us are much older than this modern age which we have taken care to engineer. Our secrets are beyond the mortal schooling. We will educate you. There are those amongst us who you will find to be appealing company.”
Then he was invisible. I don’t know how he does that, travels by telepathy or makes his body transparent or by some other artful and supernatural science. Perhaps simply he solidifies his body into time and matter as and where he needs to simply by thinking it to be that way.
For me this was the first conclusive proof I had that vampires exist. I had dedicated my life to becoming what I have, to luring one of them in such a way there would be a mutual respect of friendship. I had been sincere in my life path. Even when I turned away from it, I had done so as to seduce their attention and prepare myself to return. Experiences of life before I became something other.
It was not long before he returned. He brought one of the Brides. By gothic tradition that is the word they use to describe any female consort whose duty is to turn and school a fledgling. She was foreign, I truly cannot tell from where. The name of it as a nation and a people no longer exists in the modern world. She was, and she became, everything to me.
For my whole life it was she who had fallen in love with me as a child, steered events of my life, her energy so powerful and yet liberating that I had walked its path until now, as our eyes connected - it was for the third time and this time, recognition rather than a suspicion of her super nature. I had seen her looking through the eyes of others during moments of our intimacy, others who had fallen by the wayside. Neither of us blinked until our mouths pressed together; the longest deepest kiss I shall ever know. It continues, it will continue endlessly as long as either of us remain aware.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because in a world of infinite possibility, you are one of few with such potential. We offer you a few more human years before we make the decision.”
“We?”
“Yourself and the community whom I represent on this occasion. We have observed you for a long time.”
“You control and use the state, the system. Its workers; police, government, those are your agents. All the times I have been stalked, my apartments broken into, that was your group?”
“And now that you know, you surely take comfort in knowing.”
“You are Royals, why choose me?”
“You surely know yourself to belong to one of the thirteen bloodlines. You do indeed stand out, even among and despite your own family.”
He was right. About everything. I accepted it.
“Most of us are elders and yet still in our physical prime. We prefer it that way. It requires several decades of the Human experience to become what is necessary. You are fortunate that you have reached that stage early. The rigours of your life are of concern to us. We can help you with that. You will of course progress rapidly to an appropriate position in both societies. Each of us is a nexus with that regard. However there is a trade-off. You work for us. And in exchange, we will ensure your security. There is only one rule, you already know it I am sure.”
“Do not disrupt the harmony.”
“We live during an enlightened time during which it is possible for us to tell and sometimes even show the mortals directly, what we are. They simply cannot believe it to be real, and so we are protected. Military action has recently been invoked to secure us where a small enclave of our society stepped out of line. You understand the extent to which I am explaining this.”
“Totally. I am reclusive and I simply intend to make amazing music, art and works of great literature.”
“You shall have time to do so. And for your other pleasures also. We will assign you tasks of which you will be capable. Assured discretion is our way.”
I sighed. I let out a lifetime, nearly forty years of tension. As I inhaled again I breathed in his air. Already I was changing.
“Then we shall meet again.”
“Don’t make it too long.”
“Prepare your involvements, assets and emotional well-being. We need you balanced and comfortable, ready for the transition.”
I knew what he meant. Sort my life out so it would be easier for me to disappear from mortal culture without freaking anyone out or making problems.
“How old are you?”
“Would you ask a lady of her age?”
“Only if she looked underage.”
He laughed. “You will find our society to have somewhat different ethics. Most of us are much older than this modern age which we have taken care to engineer. Our secrets are beyond the mortal schooling. We will educate you. There are those amongst us who you will find to be appealing company.”
Then he was invisible. I don’t know how he does that, travels by telepathy or makes his body transparent or by some other artful and supernatural science. Perhaps simply he solidifies his body into time and matter as and where he needs to simply by thinking it to be that way.
For me this was the first conclusive proof I had that vampires exist. I had dedicated my life to becoming what I have, to luring one of them in such a way there would be a mutual respect of friendship. I had been sincere in my life path. Even when I turned away from it, I had done so as to seduce their attention and prepare myself to return. Experiences of life before I became something other.
It was not long before he returned. He brought one of the Brides. By gothic tradition that is the word they use to describe any female consort whose duty is to turn and school a fledgling. She was foreign, I truly cannot tell from where. The name of it as a nation and a people no longer exists in the modern world. She was, and she became, everything to me.
For my whole life it was she who had fallen in love with me as a child, steered events of my life, her energy so powerful and yet liberating that I had walked its path until now, as our eyes connected - it was for the third time and this time, recognition rather than a suspicion of her super nature. I had seen her looking through the eyes of others during moments of our intimacy, others who had fallen by the wayside. Neither of us blinked until our mouths pressed together; the longest deepest kiss I shall ever know. It continues, it will continue endlessly as long as either of us remain aware.
postscript
It took ten minutes to write this. I changed two typo's. As I copy-block-quote from my notepad to the blog, words I spell habitually with 's' are highlighted to require a 'z' instead. When I spell them that way in the notepad it highlights them as wrong. My intercourse with language has flexibility now I am published and have authority to spell it any damn way I desire.
Occasionally I write something vampirey and with regret the furthest I ever got, three or four chapters into a google+ group; I deleted in a moment of foolishness. A desire to be purified of such darkness mixed with the theme. I deleted it recognizing that the readership were average age below and approaching the age of consent, and while I had been trying to do something worthy of a genre done so many times already, was taking it to places even I as a mature adult found in places too dark to cope with. There are some lines even a vampire-writer won't cross. Thus that manuscript became an intimate moment shared between a handful of people, lives only in our memory.
Occasionally I write something vampirey and with regret the furthest I ever got, three or four chapters into a google+ group; I deleted in a moment of foolishness. A desire to be purified of such darkness mixed with the theme. I deleted it recognizing that the readership were average age below and approaching the age of consent, and while I had been trying to do something worthy of a genre done so many times already, was taking it to places even I as a mature adult found in places too dark to cope with. There are some lines even a vampire-writer won't cross. Thus that manuscript became an intimate moment shared between a handful of people, lives only in our memory.
As I face my own impending death I understand that intimacy and the event of destruction of my own art to be a preparation toward inevitable. I laugh now because it really does not matter. I have chosen to detach.
Perhaps I will return to this one and write a chapter one to go along with this preface. There is nothing new not even in the style, but I have to pay it lip-service because of who and what I am. This means more to some than others.
Perhaps I will return to this one and write a chapter one to go along with this preface. There is nothing new not even in the style, but I have to pay it lip-service because of who and what I am. This means more to some than others.
And so it is done.
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