Prologue: Victor

Most people would never make a monster of their own choosing. Even fewer would choose to do it twice.

Victor liked to think, though, that the form in front of him was not his choice. He was being forced into this second abominable act. If he had known that the first would be so terrible before beginning his journey, he would not be here today.

It was only meant to be an experiment, but one that had turned out to have its own thoughts, and will-and demands. Demands he now had to meet, or risk the lives of other people. Not that he thought of them as he stared at the female body.

What would happen to him if everyone knew? If his father, Henry, or Elizabeth found out, after all that had happened at their home in Geneva-the atrocities done to William and Justine?

Worse, what if the world-the unworthy, stupid, selfish world-saw the flame of knowledge that he had lit, and attempted to replicate his actions?

No-no one would be able to do what he had done. He alone knew the secret. He alone had spent the hours-the years-learning the formula behind artificial life. But what horrors might other, less intelligent men work when he, a genius, had been so foolish?

Foolish to bring his first work to fruition, and foolish to attempt it again.

Victor had had many second thoughts, many sleepless nights wracked with terror as he hurtled toward this point. He felt the effects of those wild, feverish nights driving him half-mad now, a fever burning through his very soul. No-he would not be foolish again. He would stop this madness-!

He lifted the scalpel over the body, suddenly anxious to destroy it.

And yet, something stopped him at the last moment, just before he plunged the blade into his work. Who knew what pain her mate might inflict on the world should Victor destroy her now? The creature had already shown itself more than capable of terror when rejected. And there was no way Victor might stop it on his own. That vile insect was too strong, too fast, too physiologically perfect to defeat hand to hand.

Perhaps, Victor considered, this female still held the key to his peace and salvation. If he did only one extra task … There might still be a way to send the demons of his nightmares away forever.

Victor nodded this time as he prepared the final steps of his task. Yes, they'd go away. The monster had at least kept his own promises, of that he'd seen enough proof.

And hopefully, once out of sight, they'd tear one another apart. They were made for destruction. So let them wreak it on each other.

The scientist bothered only to name himself.

"Victor," he had said with a gesture to his chest, and eventually she repeated it. But it didn't take long before the female creature became distracted with an apple left within her reach on the floor. She caught it between her scarred hands and rolled it between her palms. She'd been easily distracted since coming to life-like a child.

Victor supposed this was what the other might have been like … had he stayed near it at all.

But how could he have lingered? When that horrible thing opened its eyes, moved its twisted black lips, came for him? A lesser mortal might have fainted, prey to the creature's first violent impulses. Victor had done the wiser thing and fled.

And yet, not the wisest thing he might have done. Ah, if he could go back and put an end to the creature while it was still so weak…

As he had done ceaselessly for hours, he observed the childlike monstrosity, perched on the edge of her chair with his fingers to his mouth, his eyes wild with lack of sleep. He knew he had made mistakes. How could he not, after the conversation he had had with the other?

Here, however, watching a full-grown woman learn to giggle for the first time through tangles of long dark hair nearly as wild as the scientist's own, Victor could almost feel redemption at his fingertips.

He rose, drawing the creature's attention, and took a step forward towards this makeshift daughter he had built.

But the moment those eyes fixed on him, Victor shuddered and drew to a halt. He'd tried harder with the eyes, tried to make them less monstrous. But they were still watery and yellow-horrible to look upon. Again, now that he had finished his months of feverish toil, he felt breathless and dizzy with disgust.

It didn't matter that each limb was perfect, that the female should have moved with dazzling grace; the unnatural circumstances of her birth, like the male, had somehow distorted even this. Animation had made them both hellish. Demons with demonic impulses, which were already displayed in the male. This being, this monster, moved like her mate; would she not also grow to think like her mate?

What a fool Victor had been to hope that this destruction might work in his favor.

The creature made a grunt-of inquiry? Distress? Innocent curiosity? Victor ignored it.

In the laboratory, there were many chemicals, many delicate and dangerous items that required a steady hand and extra care. Victor reached out and smashed a container of kerosene on the floor.

As the creature startled at the loud noise, Victor lifted a candle from his desk, closed his eyes only a moment to mourn his mistakes, and hurled the flame into the kerosene.

The poor stupid monster didn't even know enough to cry out yet, to stay away from the fire. Victor counted on that as he fled into the salt-sprayed darkness around the island hovel.

He expected to feel a moment of loss for all of his notes, his years of research. Yet, as the flames grew, he felt only relief. "Never again!" he shouted into the inferno spilling out the open door. "Never again will anyone replicate this horror!"

Then, scalpel still in hand, he turned to face the cold Scottish darkness with the heat of the fire at his back. Let the consequences come, if they must. He would be ready for them.