At the start of this, the final chapter, I want to thank all of you who have read this story from the start to the finish, waiting patiently for the fairly erratic updates.
Apart from that, I'd like to thank all the people who reviewed, especially those who faithfully reviewed each chapter as it was posted. Every review, every comment and criticism was read and appreciated by me, (and my beta-er - though I forced him to read the reviews, so I don't think he really appreciated them) - and to think I nearly let this story stagnate on my PC (It was written in about three weeks in October 2003).
And now for the story; you've all waited long enough for this, the end of the Vampire Remus, and so, without any more delays, here it is:
Enjoy.
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Alexander moved carefully around the dust, gazing contemptuously at his brother.
"Francis," he said, making a curt motion with his hand. "Wake up the Vampire Lord."
"I might raise your brother instead," Francis said, but Alexander waved his hand again in a curtailed sweep, indicating silence.
"Do you think I can't handle a vampire bloodless for around two thousand years? Do you think he can match me? Raise away, Francis. Let us see what happens."
"I can but try," said Francis, and he furrowed his brow, concentrating.
Alexander laughed humourlessly. "What is that line from that children's movie, Francis? Ah yes. 'Do, or do not. There is no try.'"
Nathaniel laughed and backed away theatrically, simulating an explosion with his hands. Alexander smiled thinly, but also took a step back as he saw the artefact glowing.
Suddenly, a blazing light filled the chamber.
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After a minute or two, Remus came out of his reverie and began again, smoothly picking up from where he had left.
"I headed around aimlessly, but roughly following the Seine and it was with no little surprise that, about a year later, I saw my first large body of water near the city now known as Le Havre, then a little village. It was the English Channel.
"Though all curiosity had been damped out in my new self, I knew I wanted to see what lay on the other side, and so I stowed away on a boat. It was really slow, as all boats were then, and by the time it docked at Brighton, the ship was devoid of rats, and a few of the other passengers felt light headed due to anaemia. I spent the trip locked up in my room, claiming a mysterious disease.
"England in those days was a gloomy country. It was lush, green and verdant, of course, but the sack by William of Hastings had reduced it to a state of despondent foreboding. I made my way to London, and it took me about another half-year to do so, as I was taking my own time and thoroughly terrorizing the people in the towns now known as Eastbourne, Dover and Canterbury. The distance was hardly fifty miles as the cow flies, but I took the scenic route along the coast.
"In London, I decided that I wanted an identity; that I wanted to be known. In a spit of mischief which was something my old self probably orchestrated, I spread rumours around town that one of the kings' chief Barons had had a son, who was afflicted by a mysterious malady that made him unable to stand the light of day. This son was to be me, of course."
James interrupted. "Weren't you a bit too old to be a newborn son?" he asked. Remus gave a wraith-like smile.
"I was immortal;" Remus said, "time meant nothing to me. For the next twenty years I lounged around the outskirts of London, never venturing too close to the palace in case my face should be seen and remembered. In this time, I learnt to play the violin and the flute, as well as practising jousting and sword fighting. After the twenty years, I carefully killed off the Baron and his family, and appeared on the scene as the sick son, who had survived the sickness befalling his family, perhaps because of his own illness.
"People's memories were refreshed, and I was chosen as the new Baron. I think most of the people plotting against my 'father' doubted I would last the year, and they left me alone. I would have killed them if they had tried to kill me, of course, but I much preferred eating without tasting poison in my food.
"Figuratively speaking, of course. I don't eat, as I hope to dear God you've realised. It would be most disconcerting if I finish my whole narrative to be greeted with three blank stares, and James saying; 'D-uh.. ..Vampire?'
"The period I spent as Baron lasted five years, and eventually I sickened of the endless political intrigues and petty backstabbing. I created a fire one night, and left the castle. It was assumed that the poor Baron was dead in the fire, and I was free to go. By this time, I was curious to see whether any vampires existed outside my coven. My coven had two members that had seen the Creator of all other vampires, and I wondered if any other covens could lay such a grand claim. London, even though a big city, had no vampires, but I was sure I would find vampires in big cities, not little fishing villages, and with this in mind, I made my way to Edinburgh.
"Edinburgh was a delightful little town then, although I didn't notice it as such. The streets were narrow and twisting, the men all smiling, ruddy-faced Scots, and the women broad-boned but still dainty.
"It took only a few days for me to pick the vernacular, the same way I had learnt English; we vampires are good at this sort of learning. After I had learnt the various idiosyncrasies of the Scottish language, I began to search for vampires.
"It did not take all that long, for these vampires were not taught by Ancients, as I was. Their methods were flawed; their kills were left in the streets. My coven had taught me to never leave a body where it could be discovered, and in Paris, and around it, we could feed without anyone being the wiser. In this Edinburgh, however, people locked their doors at night, and hordes of men armed with axes and blazing torches scoured any house without at least one torch providing light. No one was sure what a vampire was, but they referred to my brethren as 'haints' and the like, and knew us to be unnatural creatures.
"It was an easy matter for my eyes to see the light footmarks that a vampire leaves. I followed them as soon as I ascertained I was not being watched, because my running speed at that time could still be seen by humans. With some surprise I noticed that all three sets of footprints seemed to disappear, and reappear several hundred yards down the street. At every point where one of these sets of footprints appeared and disappeared, there a faint smell of sulphur. The other disappearing set had no such marks, except that right before they disappeared, a small marking came, such as that of clawed feet. The third set of footmarks disappeared at smaller intervals, and my eyes could see the pressure applied to each foot before the disappearance, indicating that the vampire jumped the distance. Each of the jumping vampire's footprints was accompanied by a stink so strong it boggled my mind as to why the humans did not pick it up and follow the vampires back to their lair.
"I followed the footprints, although this was no easy task because they disappeared so frequently. It was perhaps the only reason why these vampires, despite making so many blunders and careless mistakes, remained uncaught. Eventually, I found that they led to a fairly large and well kept house. Inside, I could see a portly old mortal roaming around with a candle in his hand. This surprised even me, as I could not conceive of a trio of vampires having a mortal vassal, and certainly not one so old. The vampires themselves were out feeding, and so I sneaked into the house through a window to wait.
"Upon examining the house I discovered a room with the door barred. I went outside, and around the back to the room. I could make out some children's toys, and a small bed. I studied the window to the room and noticed some scratch marks on it, caused by feet slipping over the sill. A human could not have left such deep marks, but a young vampire, unsure of his strength, could easily have done so. I opened the window – it gave was easily enough, indicating regular use – and I climbed in. A short search showed a trapdoor under the bed, which I opened up and went through.
"There was a small opening, barely tall enough for me to stand in. It led to a room which was situated under the garden, and was therefore cracked with seepage and made of earth. In the room were three coffins, a full length mirror, as well as a few personal effects, which I did not look at, for at that moment I heard voices. I crouched behind the mirror, and saw a quick glimpse of the three as they walked into the room before I whisked my head behind the mirror.
"One was a decrepit looking man who looked as though he bathed regularly in sewer water. The other two were blue skinned and yellow eyed. One was a woman with reddish hair, and the other was extremely thin, and had pointed ears. I had never seen human, mutant, or vampire such as those two before, and for a moment I wondered whether they were of Earth or not. When the blue man spoke, I became further convinced he was alien.
" 'Vat iz zis, muzzer?' he asked, and for a moment I had no idea that he was speaking English. 'Ze villayjers, zey weel zoon feynd us if yor ztinking ashociate zoes noth bathze zoon.'" Seeing the expression on Madeline's face, Remus added:
"I know you didn't get that, Madeline, so I'll say everything the blue man said in normal English from now on. The other two need no translation since they spoke normally anyway, even though the woman was his mother, as I found out later.
" 'Silence,' the woman said. She had a husky voice which made you stop and listen to her. The other man scratched some part of his anatomy. Thankfully, I wasn't seeing any of this, but my vampire hearing made sure I heard even that.
" 'We will not stay much longer here anyway, Kurt,' she continued, 'the old mayor is dying, and after his death, his house will be searched, and our hiding place will most likely be discovered. I have been thinking of going to London for a few years now.'
" 'Exxcellent idea, Raven,' said the second man, speaking for the first time, in a sibilant whisper. His tone made him seem fawning, toadying.
" 'Why can't we go back to Hamburg in the Holy Roman Empire, mother?' he asked, his tone indicating that he had made this point many times in the past, and was rebuffed each time.
Remus paused for a moment to stretch. "Just a little point of information: The Holy Roman Empire at that time comprised of most of Europe, barring France, and included pretty much what is now the whole of Germany and the states around it. Got that? Then let's continue.
" 'The Holy Roman Empire,' spat his mother bitterly, 'The Empire which hated you for the colour of your skin, the Empire that cast me out because I loved a normal man?'
" 'I still like it,' the blue man protested, 'and it's not like you loved father; you just wanted his money.' At this, the woman cursed like a sailor and began a long diatribe on how she was misunderstood by everybody. The smelly man nodded to her every word. After about fifteen minutes, I stood up, and walked out from behind the mirror, standing in front of them.
"They did not notice me as I stood next to the mirror and heard them argue.
"These were weak vampires; the mother was younger than I was, probably in her fifteenth year of Birth. The smelly man was about ten, and the woman's son was not more than a year or two old. A coven of hatchlings.
"I walked silently up to them, skirting the shadows of the small room, but they were only looking at each other. Among other things, Alexander had taught me never to lose sense of my surroundings no matter what I was doing. These vampires, though, had no inkling of ways to protect themselves. Clearly, they had not been taught. At that time, I guessed that someone like Magnus had Made the woman, and left her to fend on her own, and she had Made the other two as companions. I had no idea exactly how right I was.
"I said something to catch their attention, something like, 'How interesting, a coven of hatchlings,' or something as succinct, although I myself was barely past the fledgling stage. The three jerked their heads at me, and then they took completely unexpected counter-manoeuvres.
"The smelly one stuck out a tongue that nearly reached me, standing ten paces away. The woman transformed before my eyes into a wolf and jumped at me, and the blue simply disappeared, leaving a stench of sulphur. I was startled into inaction for a moment by these bizarre happenings, and then I dived onto a coffin.
"An attack as formidable as that should have succeeded, but failed completely due to the incompetence of these ingénues. Well, either that, or the speed with which I threw my self onto the coffin startled them excessively. Anyway, what transpired was that the man who had disappeared, appeared right where I had been standing the moment before, and the others man's tongue hit him in the small of his back. As he went flying, the wolf landed on the tongue. As the blue man crashed into the wall, I took out a small dagger I had with me, and charged it to a bright pink. Then I put the wolf into a half-nelson and with my free arm, put the dagger to its neck and commanded the others to stop.
"After the men had complied, I ordered them to stand on the wall facing the entrance, next to the mirror. Then, hoping it would understand me, I told the wolf to transform back into the woman. When it did so, I pushed the woman to the far side as well.
" 'All I want to do is talk,' I said. I received three angry stares in reply. I tried smiling in what I hoped was an uncaring, debonair sort of way. It didn't work, of course, because I was in my whole 'I-am-the-depression-turned-human' phase. Otherwise, that look, that smile goes naturally for me."
James snorted. Remus replied by flashing an uncaring, yet debonair smile, perfectly executed.
"It's been nearly a thousand years, James," he said, grinning, "I have had plenty of time to perfect it.
"Anyway, they stared at me for a few moments, when finally the woman asked me what I wanted.
" 'To teach you,' I said. 'To give you the ability to stand on your own feet, not flit about from town to town, hoping for drunken wanderers to drink from, so that you can live without the fear of waking in the midmorning with your coffins on fire by the angry mob standing in front of you."
"Why?" asked James, eyebrows slightly furrowed. "You were this emotionless sack of cells. What did you care what happened to three new, anonymous vampires?"
"Well, James," Remus replied, "I needed a coven, since I was unofficially cast out from mine own. And what better coven, than a coven of which I was the master? A coven mine to control, to affect, alter and shape as I saw fit? I was emotionless, James, not stupid. This was a perfect opportunity, and I grabbed it.
"I told them what I told you; that I wanted to be their coven leader, and they accepted it. I was the most powerful one of them anyway, and it was natural that a coven formed by us would have me as the leader. In the few days it took us to leave the town, I found out that the blue man – Kurt, was the son of the blue woman – Raven, and that the smelly man was Raven's friend. Apparently a vampire had come to Raven's bedside nearly seventeen years ago, and had bitten her. Instead of killing her, he had made her a vampire, and then left her to fend for herself without teaching her about the sun, or anything else. When Raven told me this, I was pretty sure I knew the vampire, because the same thing had happened with me, and the vampire who had made me was roaming the world at large.
"What you should know about Raven is that she had no scruples. None at all. Her friend, this Mortimer, used to visit her after she changed, thinking she was sick because she avoided the sun. But, as soon as she figured out how, Raven turned Mortimer into a vampire. Then, when her son was old enough, she turned him as well. To protect herself, you see, because three vampires are a lot safer than one.
"Anyway, we returned to London then, and stayed there for about twenty or so years. We were a coven of mutants, exclusively, and for another twenty years we painted London red. Then we moved to mainland Europe, settling near South-western Germany as Kurt had wanted to. We spent a few years there, a mortal lifetime, with nothing much of note happening, save that Kurt got involved with some cult who used to wear masks, and meet by firelight. It was very chic at that time, I suppose, to join these secret societies, although even now you Americans have this annoying habit of joining all these clubs and organizations for the heck of it. Anyway, Kurt became a 'priest' in the society before his mother put a stop to it.
"We moved on then, mainly to keep Kurt, still naïve after about a hundred years of existence, from joining any of these quasi-religious organizations. We made our way through Austria into Hungary and stopped there. Although we did not know it, our coven's lifetime was nearly at an end.
"We spent a few more years there, all of us drifting apart. Most of the time I used to spend entire weeks exploring the countryside, seeing how long I could stay without drinking blood, pushing myself every night. Why? Well, there was nothing else for me to do, I guess, apart from terrorizing the villagers, which would have led them to our little chalet with pitchforks and torches. I could have talked to the others, but Mortimer was a man no-one with working nostrils would approach, and Kurt was into some kind of religious reformation."
Remus paused, smiling.
"Religion for vampires?" he asked, "I never even dared to think about it, to wonder what God would say about us. But poor Kurt did, and he thought, and he thought, right up to the day he-
"I'm getting ahead of myself here. I was telling you that I did not speak much to the men. I did, however, talk quite a bit with Raven. I don't know what she got out of our conversations, but I learnt how she thought, I learnt duplicity, backstabbing, stealth, cunning, and oh yes, of course: style.
"Now don't get me wrong here, because I seem to be painting Raven a darker shade of blue than she really was. Granted, dishonesty and sneakiness were second nature to her, but she was also a good companion, and amazing in a fight. She was fun to talk to, with her witty cynicism, as long as you were not the butt of her jokes. She had a self-possession and mystique I have not yet seen in an another, and-"
Remus grimaced, and then gave an embarrassed little smile.
"Okay, I can't lie: Raven was more black then white. She would probably have abandoned Kurt he was a baby, if it had meant saving her own life. She had been using me from the beginning to try and get to the vampire who had created her. I did not know about this because I did not know how to read her mind, know her thoughts like a true coven master does. I was never taught these things; they are only passed on from the leader of a coven to his successor, or, if a successor is not chosen because the leader is not retiring, then to the most powerful vampire. This happens in troubled times, er, in case of a sudden demise on the part of the leader. In any case, I did not know how to read her mind, and our coven suffered because of it.
"I never was a good coven leader, and I freely admit it. I was much too self-involved, much too introspective, to function ideally as a leader. The only thing I did was teach them, nothing else. I was nothing to them, I did not act a friend who was helping them, nor as a brute who would drum perfection into their heads. They did not fear me. Well, it would probably be more accurate to say that they were not afraid of me. They knew – or came to realise – that I would not control them, or order them about in most situations.
"And surprisingly, it was Kurt who transgressed the boundary first."
Remus paused, cocking his head.
"The Sun is upon us," he said gravely, sweeping out of the chamber. "Come," he added peremptorily. The other three exchanged curious glances before standing up and following him. He led them to the balcony, and they all stood for a few moments, watching the magnificent view from his house, watching light blues piercing the dark night, watching the first streaks of pink and orange ember on the horizon across from them.
"I had hoped to tell you the whole of my story," Remus said, turning to the others. They all turned to look at him as well.
"I had hoped," he continued, turning to look at the sky, "and I admit it was a foolish hope, to want the Sun to stay set long enough that I could tell you the whole of my tale."
Remus paused, walking across the balcony to snag a bougainvillea flower from the plant creeping up the wall.
"There wasn't much to tell, just that the coven broke up after about a hundred and fifty, maybe two hundred years, when both the men died." he said, walking back to them.
"Yeah, there wasn't much to tell; just that I returned to my coven then, older than Katherine had been when she died, that Magnus himself had not come back. That Magnus came back about fifty years later, insane, and attacked Alexander. That he injured me so severely that even Alexander's blood could not heal me completely, and that I went underground to heal my wounds. That I finally awoke in the late Renaissance period. That I went underground in England after two hundred years, because I could not bear the changes. That I came back to France in the First World War, and stayed here since.
"Yeah," he finished softly, looking at the horizon. "Not much to tell."
The sky was lightening rapidly. The mesh of orange, pink and purple had expanded, catching the clouds in whiffs of incandescence. Nearly the whole sky was light blue now.
"Now," Remus said, smiling as he first had in front of Jessica, in that hotel room. The smile made him look young, made him look human. "I going to answer the questions you've all wondered at some time in this narrative: Why did I tell you my history? Why did I not kill you all?" he paused and smiled. "Well, Madeline knows the answer, so technically I'm only asking you, James, and you, Jessica, the questions."
"The answer is not one you'd believe. Both of you." He said, and they noticed that his pale skin was smoking slightly, as the light on the horizon brightened. Sunrise was only heartbeats away.
If you had a heart, anyway.
Remus spoke slowly, but intensely, centring his eyes on Jessica, letting them caress her, the way his hands never would. "I love you, Jessica. I told you my story because I wanted you to know me, the real me. I did not want you to spend the rest of your life thinking that a vampire nearly killed you by seducing you. I wanted you to believe. Do you, Jessica? Do you believe me when I say I love you?"
For a heartbeat, they froze, looking at each other. Then slowly, she nodded. He smiled then.
"I want all of you to remember my story. I want you to understand me, the way you might have, had I been human. I want you all to know that I would never hurt any of you. Especially you, Jessica."
"What – what are you going to do?" asked Madeline, as she saw the first rays of the Sun pierce the atmosphere.
"In the ancient tradition of unrequited lovers, my dear," he said, flashing a smile that belied his words, "I am going to commit suicide."
Smiling, he jumped into the garden, and stood there, arms outstretched, sunning himself. Pale smoke arced lazily from his body as he heard Madeline scream and James' gasp.
Then, as he looked into Jessica's eyes, he sensed her love for him, the way only a vampire could.
Well, at least she loved him. Too bad nothing could ever happen between them.
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Francis lay slumped against the wall, feeling the dent he had made when he had been thrown into it. His head, having no cushion of strong Vampiric hair, was bleeding. Next to him lay Nathaniel, his throat torn open, and his face impossibly white. He had been drained of nearly all his blood in a few seconds by the Immortal Cyclops.
The Immortal Cyclops.
Francis's mind flashed back a few minutes.
He had nearly finished channelling his thoughts into the artefact, when he had felt a movement. Alexander saw it too, and motioned for him to stop. He did so, but the statue-like Cyclops, who was standing next to Nathaniel, suddenly came to life in what Francis suspected was a failsafe planted by Nur's consciousness to prevent his own awakening. The Immortal Cyclops, dry for so many years, still had enough strength to grab Nathaniel. Grab him, and drain him nearly dry.
His next move was to throw Francis out of the way with a simple backhand. Then he went after his brother.
As Francis watched, dazed, The Cyclops charged Alexander, and tackled him into the throne behind Nur. He punched Alexander once before Alexander kicked him off and stood up. They circled each other around Nur's body, Alexander warily, and The Cyclops aggressively. He called out Alexander's name, and the anger in the voice carried with it the rage of millennia.
Suddenly, however, The Cyclops paused, and tilted his head, as if listening to a call. He shook his head, shutting out the sound, and resumed his pacing after Alexander.
Then all of a sudden he leapt up, upon Nur's shoulder and swept down, catching Alexander completely unawares. They fought, and it was a fight such as one Francis had never seen before. The two Ancient's fought, grappling, lunging, and even snapping at each other with their canines. Although Alexander was stronger because The Cyclops had spent all those years in a tomb, Nathaniel's blood provided an impetus to The Cyclops's attack, an impetus augmented by his fury. Which was further augmented by drinking after all those years of starvation.
The fight took place in a whirlwind of frenetic punches and kicks, with the occasional break coming when one of the brother's stepped back and launched themselves at the other by kicking off the wall behind them. Alexander's face was smashed from one side, and he was being backed into a corner when The Cyclops stopped again, tilting his head and listening. Then, he looked up at the roof of the dome and blasted a hole through it, with his eye. Then he looked at Alexander, and blasted the beam again, downward, using its force to carry him up.
Nathaniel was nearly dead, Alexander seemed to be incinerated, and Francis was pretty sure that he was wedged so deep inside the wall that he wouldn't be able to get out.
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He felt the first twinges of annoyance seep into him.
Jessica watched in numbed shock as Remus started to smoke. By the time she recovered her wits, she could see strips of his skin wither into ashes. He waved to her languidly as she stretched her arm out to him in the garden below. Suddenly, what was left of his face contorted in shock and horror, as he screamed at them.
"James! Run, get them out of here right now! He's coming!"
"What?"
"The Cyclops is coming for Madeline! Run, get away from here!" screamed Remus, oblivious of the fact that almost all his skin had crumbled to ashes, and the sun was working on his muscles and organs now.
Even as James turned, grabbing Madeline's arm in one hand, and Jessica's arm in the other, a red beam shot through the sky, cleaving through the back of the mansion and coming crashing to a stop only feet away from them. A man dropped from the sky, landing from a hundred foot drop as easily as a human would from a two foot one, and stood there for a second, watching them.
Jessica could later only remember the next few moments as a series of flashes; like hurriedly snapped photographs.
The man was standing across the balcony in one moment. In the next, he was standing next to them. Then he was taking Madeline in his arms. Then James went sprawling across the balcony, hit by a red blast, seemingly from the man's face. There was a movement from the man as he launched into the sky carrying Madeline, and Jessica went flying.
"Madeline." She heard him say.
The force of what he did pitched her over the railing, and into the garden below. She landed across the remains of a fountain and heard a snap; she knew something was broken. Next to her was Remus, raw flesh showing, and smoke still rising from his body. He held out a hand towards her, croaking her name through his burnt mouth. As waves of pain shot through her, she whispered his.
"Remy."
As she saw him, she felt her eyes close. She was passing out under the pain. The last thing she saw as her vision dimmed was Remy's body. And as she faded into the blackness, he seemed to be glowing, but she couldn't be sure.
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Well, that was it, and I hope you liked this final chapter.
Thanks again for reading the story, and although I think I wrapped it up pretty conclusively, if there are any remaining questions or comments, review, and you shall find out. Or, you can always add me on Author Alert (hint hint).
Thanks again, all. It was fun writing this story.
Ciao for now, hope you read my subsequent ones.
A.D.
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