I watched Dark Shadows last night (the movie) so I decided to write this - I don't think anyone else has yet, and I have to say I was surprised x I have never seen the TV show, so any similarities are by complete coincidence. I own absolutely nothing! Please read and review x
Her first life had been as Angelique Bouchard. She had been brought up as a servant and a witch in a time where servants were the second class and witches were hunted and brutally killed.
It was not the nicest time to grow up in and she had not been sheltered from any of it. She had been shown exactly what to expect from the upper classes, how they would treat her, but she had also been taught how to defend herself, how to make them pay.
Her parents had died when she was ten and she'd gone to live with the Collins family, taken in as one of their maids. She still practiced her witchcraft, behind locked doors and in hidden rooms, and spied on the Collins' young son, who was the same age as she and had something about him that drew her to him.
It wasn't long before she was infatuated, obsessed.
And an obsession is a very dangerous thing for a witch.
Barnabas had refused to tell her he loved her, that he wanted her. She had killed his parents in revenge - as her own mother had once taught her, hurt them before they can hurt you, even though he'd already hurt her.
Barnabas had looked ready to murder her.
Josette walked off the cliff, as if by magic. And Barnabas had suspected her, falling to his death after his love.
Angelique couldn't allow that - not now, not ever. He hadn't told her he loved her yet.
She had turned him into a vampire, and knew that, right now at least, he would be less receptive to declarations of love. A mob had locked him in a box. She would leave him there for a few years and then let him out once he'd become more rational.
A few years in a box wouldn't hurt anybody.
She cursed the Collins, still needing her revenge now that she had their son.
She had used an aging spell in the next few years, faking her pregnancy and creating the image of a husband so as not to be scorned by the town - that wouldn't help her plan at all. Her husband was rich and when he died she had inherited a nice sum of money, despite being considered a servant.
She had called the daughter that had never existed Angelica.
When Angelica was eighteen her mother passed away - or at least she stopped using her aging spell and took on Angelica full time, rather than using glamour spells and illusion spells so that mother and daughter could appear at the same time.
It had been interesting to see how the times changed, how fashion changed, how buildings changed, how people changed.
Only they didn't really. people stayed the same, all jealousy and hatred and things like love.
Everything that had gone away with Barnabas.
In that life she had married at twenty one, to a lovely man named Jonathon, had had a string of lovers on the side and a daughter.
She'd named her daughter Amelia and died when Amelia was thirty nine.
Amelia enjoyed seeing the turn of the decade, even if had half been her, half been Angelica.
It was something she hadn't seen before. And considering what she was she had seen an awful lot of things, most of them considered horrific by the mortals that populated the world and slaughtered her brethren like animals.
Luckily, this life the witch hunts seemed to be slowing down, she could be slightly less cautious about her magic, and people were starting to live longer so she would probably be holding the dual glamour's up - not that it took much effort.
It was just very irritating.
She missed Barnabas. It had been so long and she considered letting him out of the coffin, after all it was a cruel and unusual punishment for a vampire and she wanted him to love her, not spend the rest of eternity aggravated with her.
The fashions as Amelia were slightly less restrictive. She had accumulated enough money that she was no longer a maid, or a servant at all, instead starting to buy out some of the Collins shipping trades. She had even married an actual man, the last of his family line and when he had died under mysterious conditions a month or so later she had inherited all of his money.
Her fourth life had been as Araminta, a name she had despised choosing but that was so popular she couldn't really avoid it. Anyway, it grew on her. Eventually.
This life she knew that she would live an extraordinarily long time - she was fed up of having to pretend to die.
The fashions were changing again, even more strangely. Women had the vote - something she had never considered having before, and could even have children on their own, even if it wasn't well respected.
All sorts of strange things were being imported from overseas, foods and materials, new ways of doing things, new ideas. There were books and plays and songs, new types of people and new ways of thinking.
In comparison to what she remembered of her childhood, this were extraordinarily free. You could do far more things, even as a woman.
You were free to be whoever you wanted to be, particularly if you weren't wealthy. The lower class were free to do almost anything they wished.
It was the kind of freedom she enjoyed and Araminta was rather ill all of the time, considering how often Angelique spent in her glamour's, impersonating someone less wealthy.
He daughter that time had been named Angela.
It had been one hundred and fifty years since Barnabas had been locked in his coffin.
Soon, she thought.
She quite liked Angela. Angela was sassy, blonde.
She hadn't been blonde before.
By the time she was 'sixteen' everyone was calling her Angie.
In this time all people wore was leather, leather and that strange thing people called PVC, and they wore bright enough colours to be seen from miles away.
They ate junk food and got fat and then wriggled into skin-tight catsuits. But people were still the same. They were greedy and ignorant and stupid.
And none of them were Barnabas.
The year 2000. That was when she decided she'd let Barnabas out. A new century, a new start - for both of them.
At this time Angel Bay ruled over Collins port. They controlled most of the trades, leaving the Collins family with barely more than a few shipping boats, most of the family lines wiped out in tragic accidents and fatal sea trips.
Angie quite liked this life in general. Women weren't nearly as oppressed as they had been. Fashions were fun and suited to her tastes, and even better suited to what she liked to do for fun.
Food was rich and tasty and not at all expensive.
Electricity was doing marvellous things, even if she didn't always remember she had it and went to light the candles with a snap of her fingers. She had almost set her office on fire a fair few times.
Yes, she decided. She was going to like being Angie.
Maybe this time round she'd marry a tycoon. That would be fun.
And maybe this time she couldn't give herself a name beginning with A. She was starting to get a bit bored after one hundred and ninety four years.