The snow was freezing. Freezing my fingers, freezing my nose, and freezing my feet as my darling angel-haired Elise and I travelled slowly along a lonely little winter road. It couldn’t have been much more than ten of the clock at night, but the darkness was absolute. We were walking into the biting wind, so that we were shuffling along with our eyes nearly closed. Snowflakes, like so many little cutout paper stars, clung to and refused to let go of my long black eyelashes and the flushed, peeling apples of my cheeks. I felt them as the painful pricks of innumerable pins. My lips were chapped and sore, and as red as if I had painted them as women do. My garments were black, typical vampire garb, but hidden beneath a blood-red cloak that was lined with the finest fur – a gift from Diego. Quite appropriate a colour, understanding the circumstances. Unconsciously, I ran my tongue over my fang teeth, still as of yet unaccustomed to being a Child of the Night. Oh, I did so long for the sunshine, warm on my face.

Elise and I had left Diego and the other immortals little over three hours ago, but it felt like ever such a long time. I, fed up with the filth and the squalor of his coven, had announced that I would be taking what I possessed, which was little more than the clothes on my back, and that I would be leaving. Elise, reluctant to part with me, her fledgling, had accompanied me in my journey. She’d begged me not to slay Diego (whom you might recall I did plan on destroying), and I’d been too entranced by her pretty blue eyes, so like chips of china, to protest. Yes, I gave in. I did so adore her now. Blood is, after all, thicker than water, darlings.

And now all that I possessed were my garments and her white, slender little hand that was still warm with the kill, securely in mine, our fingers entwined. I could feel the blood running through her fingers and yes, I could feel her heart! It was pumping within her breast in a strong rhythm, and it helped to distract me from the cruel knife-edge of the winter wind. I chanced a look at her delicate porcelain-doll features, framed by her curly yellow hair. Sensing me turn my head, Elise looked me in my eyes, and gave me a wan smile.

“Not long to go, surely, cherub,” she said, squeezing my hand a little tighter.

Soon enough, we did chance upon a quaint little town, half-buried in frosting. Warm firelight shone out of the spun-sugar windows, spilling about over the snow and throwing handfuls of glitter onto the ground. I wondered who the people were inside those residences, and what stories they had to tell me. In one home, I imagined that I saw a family inside, sitting by the fire and listening to a story being told. In another, I imagined an elderly woman tucking herself into scanty bedclothes, wondering whether this winter would be her last. These were, however, flights of fancy. I chose not to hear anything but the crunch of our feet through the snow.

I drifted off in my thoughts until Elise drew my attention to a wooden sign that signified an inn. I nodded, and she then led me gently to its door, which I opened for her. She blew me a kiss and glided in with only a faint swish of her dress-skirts and a small twitch of her lips.

Inside, the inn was lovely and warm, and gorgeously alive with music and the presence of mortals. The music wafted through the air, and I felt a vague sense of comfort in the lilting of the haunted melody of a violin. Many different types of people were crowded in here, all wearing heavy scarves or overcoats to help scare away the cold. Old, weary men sat drinking and reminiscing, I found, as I now read their thoughts; young women with their male friends, or perhaps the women were escorts – they were quite guarded about their thoughts – were laughing and tipping back liquor into red-rimmed mouths. They did not seem to notice our outlandishness, and for that I was glad. It added to the sense of belonging and comfort that had come over me.

We found a rickety wooden table, and I held out an equally rickety wooden chair for Elise, before procuring from the barman a couple of hot, steaming mugs of strong coffee. Of course we couldn’t drink the beverages; it was simply the beautiful pleasure of wrapping our hands around these little vessels of heat, and feeling a contentedness as we did so. Elise sighed happily. I rested my cheek on the fist of my free hand and gazed at her, as I had become wont to do, a lazy smile pulling at the right corner of my mouth. I was entranced by her hair as much as her face; such gorgeous golden curls, growing out of her scalp in waves upon waves of ringlets.

“You are truly an angel,” I said of her. She laughed, a girlish sound, as she adjusted the skirts of her dress.

“The cold has gotten to your head, Viktor,” she threw back at me. “You must thaw.” This time it was I who laughed.

“Perhaps. Are we to travel further this night? I wish to remove myself as far from Diego’s little family as I possibly can.”

Elise didn’t answer. She appeared to sadden.

“Diego,” she said simply. I did not speak. As much as Diego’s coven was held together with a lick and a promise, I had grown to understand that Elise was the most emotional of the members, and the most willing to keep the coven together, despite the fact that she was not created by any of the other vampires.

She’d told me during our walk to this village that she had been born of a crazed vampire. The Dark Gift had driven him to insanity, and he had taken it upon himself to bring into existence whomever he caught and drank from. Elise had destroyed him, with a flaming torch, and scattered the ashes so he would be gone forever. It all painted a horrid picture in my mind. She had said that it took a strong-minded creature to look upon something as hideous and vulgar as a burning, but I knew that she was not created out of love and so she yearned to be adored and accepted. Diego had been the most caring of the coven members, at least to his ladies.

The music changed, becoming a slower, sleepier melody. I was at a loss for further words. We sat in silence for what seemed like hours; we sat until our coffee grew as cold as our hearts. In this time, the inn had quietened, and the raging fire in the hearth was dying a slow death. The shadows, kept so firmly at bay by the courageous fire, had wakened from the deepest corners and now crept towards the two figures sitting clutching their stone-cold cups of coffee, the rims untouched by preternatural lips. Then, quite abruptly, Elise moved her little wooden chair back with barely a sound and stood up, extending her hand to me, her long nails no longer caked with filth, now beautiful and glassy and ladylike.

“Come, my Sweet Prince,” she said, with a tiny, brave smile. “We’ve miles to go before we sleep.”


Fin