AN: Hello everyone. Welcome to the next chapter of The Portrait. If anyone has any suggestions for plot or new character ideas please let me know.

Disclaimer: I don't own Moonlight or any of its characters. The only characters that belong to me are Michelle and James and various other OCs. Warnings: adult situations/language, death, possible OOC (out of characterness)

Warnings: Adult situations/language, death, OOC (out of characterness)

Recap:

The Portrait, according to legend, originally was a portrait of the Goddess of Ghosts and the Supernatural: Hecate. One of her most devoted worshipers painted this after having a vision of her; as seeing his devotion, Hecate bound herself to human form using the rendition of his painting. She became his lover, but it came at a great cost. Loving the one who created darkness made him a part of the darkness himself. The man drank some of Hecate's blood and as such began to crave blood himself, he was the first vampire. However, the Goddess, upon seeing the carnage he laid to the village around him, fled in despair from his blood soaked form. It is said that the Goddess would visit the vampire once every century to see if he had changed his ways. Once every century he would up-date the painting, to represent the current time. However, one day, she stopped coming to see him and the portrait was never updated again...

Josef snorted, that was a waste of time. He yawned and looked out the window, it was dawn, he was tired. His freezer sounded nice. Stripping down to his boxers he slid into his fridge and shut the lid...

Start:

"Josef..." The voice that whispered his name was no more then a breath against his ear, but he knew who it was. Josef was lying in a large bed, his body resting against one that was much softer. He shifted, pushing himself up onto his elbows and found himself looking down at the woman from his previous dream. She was bare beneath him, they had obviously just finished making love, Josef could still feel himself inside of her. The warmth of her body made him tremble; he looked down into her face, trying to know why it was so familiar to him.

Her lips were soft and almost perfectly full; pale skin, dark brown eyes and hair that was softly curled. The curls were falling limp, he noted, the light sheen of sweat that covered her skin glinted in the pale light of the candles on the floor around the bed. She was smiling up at him. Slowly she reached up and pressed her wrist against his lips; "Still hungry?"

Just the brush of her flesh against his lips was enough to distract him; "In more ways then one..." and he pressed his hips roughly against hers to exaggerate his point. He opened his mouth and kissed the soft skin of her wrist before sinking his fangs in. She never looked away from his face and he could see in her eyes that she was enjoying this just as much as she was. Josef closed his eyes, trying to remember what it was he was going to ask her, it was important. He had to know... he had to know...? Josef lifted his mouth from her wrist and pulled out of her; as he opened his eyes to look down at her he whispered; "Who are you?"

But the bed was empty beneath him. He looked around, the room was dark, very dark, the candles that had been glowing behind them as they made love had burned down and gone out. As he looked around the dark room he remembered how she was so familiar; she looked like Michelle. Michelle was the girl he and Mick were looking for; the girl who had been kidnapped. Suddenly, a soft whimper echoed from beyond the door to the bedroom. Josef reached out to the floor, finding his pants and shirt. He pulled them on, not bothering to button his shirt. The voice whimpered again and Josef called out into the darkness, saying the only name he could think of as he approached the door; "Michelle?"

"No."

The voice that replied was not the voice of a woman, but that of a man. Josef opened the door and saw and horrifying scene before him. He found himself outside, looking out at what reminded him of Grecian temples. The woman who looked like Michelle sat, leaning against the base of one of the pillars, her wrists slashed horribly so that her pale skin was almost perfectly white. She was wearing an Greek-style dress heavily embroidered with silver threads, gold and silver decorated her neck, arms and ankles; she was barefoot. Josef wanted to run, but somehow he found himself moving at an slow pace towards where she sat. As he got closer he saw that her blood was draining into two small bowls on either side of her. Another man walked up to her and lifted one of the bowls, he replaced it with another and took the bowl over to what Josef saw was an large slab of stone. The man mixed the blood with the paints beside the slab and lifted a brush to the stone. As he painted he lifted his head to look at Michelle; Josef saw that he was a vampire. The vampire smiled at Michelle; "Don't worry. Soon I will be finished, and you will be able to reincarnate yourself."

Michelle nodded; "Hurry... Hurry Iakob. I am..." Her voice trailed off as she turned to look at Josef. When their eyes locked Josef's own eyes flew open and he found himself staring at the lid of his fridge.

Michelle opened her eyes; that had been a crazy dream... she had been sitting, bleeding out into bowls as a vampire that looked like James had mixed the blood with paint and painted her. When suddenly, there was another man there. He looked so shocked and afraid... A noise nearby made her jump. She looked around and saw James enter the room, he had clothes draped over one arm and his free hand held a tray of food. James set both of these on the floor beside the lawn chair she was tied to, he then untied her arms; "I'm sorry you have to go through this. Once we restore your memories we will exact revenge against the Duvalls my goddess..."

With that James left her alone to get dressed and eat. This had been the patter for the days she had been kidnapped, five times a day he would come in and untie her to let her use the bathroom, give her new clothes or food. Other times he would come in and talk to her about a woman named Hecate and how she would soon understand everything. Clearly, James really loved Hecate. Michelle knew he'd confused her with that woman and she'd read enough books and seen enough movies to know that when your kidnapper suffers a psychotic break like this it doesn't end well for the victim. She knew that unless she got out soon, he would kill her, drink her blood and kill her. Little did she know that the truth was far different from her fears...

Mick looked up as Beth let her self into his appartment; "Hey."

"Hey." She replied with a smile as she walked over and sat on the edge of his desk; "Did you find Michelle?"

"Not yet, none of my contacts have come through... its as though she really did just vanish. Have you found anything on the painting?"

"Yes." Beth said, pulling out a stack of sheets; "There are a lot of legends about this painting, but the most interesting one I found concerns vampires." She handed him the sheet and as Mick read it his eyebrows furrowed in concentration. The sheet was an adaption of the web-page that Josef had read; "Do you think this could have some fact?" Beth asked.

"I don't know." Mick said, "In truth, I don't know of anyone who knows the origin of vampires. Maybe we can ask Josef."

Beth nodded; "Sounds good." She leaned over and pecked Mick on the cheek; "Don't worry, I'm sure you'll rescue this girl."

"I hope so..." Mick replied, grabbing his coat. The two of them walked out the door and headed to Josef's.

End of another chapter... :) I hope it was good! Now I just have to plan how I connect all of this before I do another chapter, so hopefully I will update again at the end of the week. Until then, REMEMBER: reviews=love and my happiness! :D