For the longest time I lived my life in the same way as all the others of my kind. Killing, feeding, unfeeling. Empty. I knew somehow that it was not the way I had been created. I have always known that I was made different, but it has taken me eons to understand just how different I am.

What revelation was that?

A flash of blue. Simple as that. A fleeting smile in an otherwise somber face. A flash of eyes bluer than anything I'd ever seen before. Eyes that seemed to bear the full weight of all the sorrow I've ever inflicted in my entire, endless lifetime. I looked once into his eyes, and I drowned in them. From then on, I was his. I fought it, I denied it, I cursed it . . . and in the end I accepted it, because I had no other choice. Because I was different.

I was made to love.

And I loved him.

But he never loved me back.

I tried so hard . . . a casual touch, a brush, a gentle teasing . . . nothing mattered. Nothing pierced that stony exterior, or if it did, it let out only anger. But I kept on trying, because I had no choice. No choice at all. I've discovered that love does that to people, not that I really consider myself to be a person.

I learned a lot of things during that time.

For example, I learned I could cry. Painfully, one tear at a time, but I did it. Endlessly, it feels like. I cannot count how many nights I cried to myself until my master came and touched me and sent me back into soft, merciful darkness.

I didn't know then what I know now.

If I had, it wouldn't have made a difference.

But I probably would have cried more, and tried harder.

Even I cannot stop the aging process in a human, save by making them one of my kind. And that was something he would never let me do.

So he died, while I watched, day by day, year by year, moment by moment. And I could not tear my eyes away.

I don't know how long it's been now. The new and poignant emotions I had discovered had been torn from my soul by pain. I still don't understand why I was made this way. Why was I, alone among all my kind, allowed to love? Why? It makes no sense! Was it some kind of experiment? Was it just a whim of my master's, or of Lord Ruby Eye's? Does it even make a difference, now? He is dead and I am dead with him, no matter what it may look like. I function; that is all. All there is inside me is emptiness . . . and the memory of blue eyes.