I met a woman; she had a mouth like yours,
She knew your life, she knew your devils and your deeds,
And she said, "Go to him, stay with him if you can,
But be prepared to bleed."
- Joni Mitchell, "A Case of You."
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Hannah dreams of windows.
Endless corridors of windows, sliding open and shut like the rise and fall of a woman's chest. Some are clouded with frost, or scratched with age. Some are clear and thin, but rattle, shuddering beneath invisible blows. They grind and squeak as they open, but the sound of each window closing is like a whisper, the whimper of a woman's dying breath.
Then the windows are gone, and there is only the memory of windows, the windows of memory, and the corridor, long and endlessly dark.
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It started with him, just as it ended with him.
He pressed her down against rawhide, rough against her skin, barely leather by today's standards. He pressed her down against earth, hard and cold.
His teeth on her throat blended and mingled with the feeling of his hands on her arms and his body above hers.
Now, when they make love, it is on silken sheets. There are hands on her feverish skin, and his weight on top of her, but there are no teeth. When he moves his mouth over her body, his lips dart quickly from her jaw to her collarbone, avoiding the soft flesh in between.
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Once, she was a priestess.
All her life, she had known the goddess, and had gone into Her service with joy. She had been a girl then; how could she have known what such service would mean, what she would have to give up? She couldn't, didn't, not until she met the stranger.
She had kissed him. She had loved him. It was forbidden.
It was forbidden, but she thought that the goddess would forgive her for her transgression. After all, had She not loved Her husband? Loved him enough to call him back from death, loved him enough to lie with him and conceive a child before death called him back again?
She had let him bite her, let him take her blood. It had excited her. And perhaps all had not been forgiven because, after that, the woman came.
Remember, the woman said. Remember... how he kills you.
Hannah remembers.
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Once, she was a warrior.
She was tall and beautiful and strong, like a tree. She was fierce like a tiger. Her voice was like the cold wind. Her mind was clever; her heart was unforgiving.
Men both feared and admired her. She had no use for them, any of them. Until he came.
He made her feel weak.
She hated him for it. She loved him for it. In the end, she bled for it.
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Once, she was a Buddhist.
She believed in the teachings of the Buddha, and she followed the path set down by him. Life is suffering, and she had been told this since she was a child. There is death, and disease, and pain, so she was not surprised when the stranger came. She did not know his face, but she knew the darkness in his eyes, and knew that he would be the cause of her suffering.
He killed her. She did not know why. The hand on her arm and the one at the back of her head were surprisingly gentle, but their grip was impossible to break. She didn't even try, remaining passive as he rested his mouth, his teeth, against her throat.
Life is suffering. Suffering is caused by desire. The cessation of suffering is attained through the cessation of desire. She was dismayed to find that, while she could keep herself from struggling against the teasing pain of his fangs in her neck, she could not escape the pleasure that came with that pain, or the way her back bowed and her body twisted with desire, unconscious and unspoken.
She was silent when she died.
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Once, she was a socialite.
Life was... fun. Her gowns were always of the latest mode, and she was much in demand as a partner at all of the balls and parties. Her dearest friend, Chelsea, was never far, laughing and teasing with mirth in her bright green eyes. Sometimes, she worried because she knew that she was expected to make a match, and soon, but there was no one she wanted. Then she met him, and she finally knew what wanting was.
Part of her knew that it wasn't him who trapped her in the hansom cab, pinning her against the stained and worn leather of the seat. Part of her didn't care.
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Hannah dreams of windows, and waits.
At first, she isn't sure what she's waiting for. She has Thierry; she can no longer be waiting for him. Then she realizes that it isn't him she's waiting for, but what comes after. What has always come after, time and time again.
And time and time and time and time and time...
When she asks Thierry to hold her down, his eyes go dark, soft and sad as they had been before he knew her. She doesn't ask again, but there is a secret longing, weighing heavy in her blood, unfulfilled in this lifetime. She doesn't know how to shake it.
And Thierry doesn't know how to tell her that when he refuses, it's not reluctance that guides his decision, but the pricking of his teeth against the inside of his lip, sharp enough to make him bleed. He bleeds so that she won't, and wonders with each passing day how good his self-control really is.
Hannah waits.
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Disclaimer: The characters and concepts of Soulmate and the Night World series belong to L.J. Smith, not me.