"She has gone to the Latin Quarter;" Marc sighed, presumably to spare Sophie the embarrassment of betraying her turndam.  "There was word of a rogue in the area; it was preying on students of the Sorbonne."

"Dieu," I closed my eyes.  I had been gone less than two months, including travelling time.  I had left a peaceful France.  "Tell me it is not Corbeau, returned."

"Oh, no, Monsieur!" said Sophie hurriedly.  "But Madame feared this rogue might be one of Corbeau's court, on an errand from that monster."

Most of Corbeau's court of fledglings and minions were as evil as their master; this news did not reassure me.

I ordered a fresh team hitched to the carriage, and with Benoit at the reins, drove to the Latin Quarter in search of Genevieve.  I had left Thierry at the chateau as one extra guard there, in case this was a diversion. Princes tend to paranoia; it keeps us alive.

The streets in the Latin Quarter itself were too narrow and twisted for the carriage; I left it in an inn yard while I and Benoit proceeded on foot.

Genevieve had been here; I could smell attar of roses on the evening breeze.  Even with the situation as it was, I could not help smiling.  That scent would always mean her to me.

The narrow cobblestone alleys, dark to human eyes, were devoid of life to my sight.  The bulk of the Sorbonne, even then an ancient institution of learning, loomed on my right; the many Latin schools after which this section of Paris was named were dotted around it like so many offspring.

Gray, damp stone; on the streets and on the buildings. The occasional torch burned fitfully in a cresset on a wall.  Mortals would have found such sputtering illumination pitiful against the unknown terrors of a Paris night; to me, the flames were almost painfully blinding.  I narrowed my eyes to block out as much of the light as possible as I searched for my wife.

The ring of steel alerted me.  I knew the sound of a sword being drawn from a sheath; I'd done it often enough. An inarticulate cry, quickly silenced and followed by... ah, Dieu, the unmistakable sound of a head being parted from its body and falling to the cobbles...I started to run, dignity be damned.  Of course, if it had been her head, I would be too late, but I ran all the same...

Nearly skidding around a corner, boots slipping for an infinitesimal eternity on cobblestones slick with dampness and dog turds, throat dry, sword already out of its sheath, faithful  Benoit only a step behind, crossbow cocked and loaded...

"Good evening, cherie," said Genevieve, as if she met me in blood drenched alleys every night.  She reached down and picked up the head lying on the stones near her feet, holding it by the straggly hair.  "Meet Thibald Durand.  He would bow, but he seems to be somewhat incapacitated."

I wanted, quite fiercely, to take her in my arms, hold her tightly, kiss her soundly, and reassure myself that she was unharmed.  That was a silly, very human reaction... I could see that she was fine; but I’d been frightened for her.

I also wanted, with a passion that slightly alarmed me, to unbuckle my sword belt and use the folded length of it to warm her derriere for her; much as Armand had occasionally had cause to warm mine.  I’d always found the experience highly educational. And, remembering how it had felt, I had never struck a fledgling of my own.  Yet.

Fortunately, as I struggled against both desires, my sense of humour reasserted itself.  I made a bow to the bloodied head my wife held in her hand.

“Monsieur Durand,” I said.  “I would say it was a pleasure, but you seem to have run afoul of my wife.”

Genevieve laughed and dropped the foul object in her hand. It bounced once and then lay, its vacant eyes searching the dark sky for an answer.

“He was one of Corbeau’s get,” Genevieve said, although I had not asked her for an explanation. “He was attempting to set up a nest here in Paris; to establish a home that he could invite that rogue back into. I thought it best to prevent this from happening.  Was I wrong?”

I shook my head.  “Rash, perhaps,” I replied, “to confront him on your own.”

“I had Gardiens with me,” she replied.

“Where are they now?”

“They spread out, to look for other members of the nest,” she answered.

I nodded; it was what I would have ordered.  “Handled like a true Prince, cherie,” I said.  “Now, help me get M. Durand into the carriage; we cannot leave a beheaded corpse in the streets.”

Benoit came forward to assist; and Thibald Durand was wrapped in an old lap robe and bundled like so much extra baggage onto the top of the carriage.  The Nameless Ones amongst the Gardiens would ensure that the corpse was left out for the sun to turn to ash in the morning.

Despite my moment of fear and exasperation, I was pleased with Genevieve.  She had handled a difficult and potentially dangerous situation with alacrity and aplomb; her sang froid amused me.  I had chosen well; I had known this ever since the night she had accidentally hit me in the stomach with a poker.

There was no further attempt on Corbeau’s part to establish a new base in France; not for a very long time.  Genevieve and I were able to settle down and rule France’s vampires in relative peace.

We quarrelled; it was not an idyll.  She had a sharp tongue and an icy
temper; I could be stubborn.  Yes, even I.

For vampires, we were very human.  But we loved each other; the quarrelsalways ended in passionate love making in that big black bed and the chateau would ring with our joint laughter.

There would come a night when there was no more laughter.

The century had turned.

Genevieve and I had been out visiting; we were an old married couple now and welcome among some social circles.  Jared was driving the carriage; and we were snuggled in the back with the privacy curtains drawn, enjoying a peaceful night...

I heard the horses neigh as Jared’s voice told them to whoa. I could smell smoke.  Genevieve was already pulling the curtains apart, trying to see what was going on.  I tried not to envision the chateau, which we must be near if not actually arrived, in flames.

Not quite.  The castle itself seemed untouched, but some of the vineyards and two of the outbuildings were well alight.  I barely heard Genevieve’s voice calling “Claude!” as I leapt from the carriage and ran to my home.

Thierry and Sophie met me halfway up the drive.  The other Gardiens were attempting to douse the fire, along with volunteers from nearby houses and other chateaus.  Fire was everyone’s nightmare.  The flames were already dying under the concerted efforts of the rescuers.

“It was Corbeau,” Thierry said, before I could speak.  Sophie dropped a curtsey behind him; I felt rather than heard Genevieve come up behind me.

“Corbeau, here?” I looked around at the devastation.

“He set the fires when he could not gain entrance to the chateau, Monsieur,” said Sophie, who had greatly gained in boldness over the years since she had been turned.

“Gerard is dead,” said Thierry, heavily.

Gerard was one of my fledglings.  To lose one is like losing a son.  Ah, Dieu, poor boy; he had been young, for a vampire, too young to die the True Death.

“How?” I asked, as Genevieve put a hand on my arm in sympathy.  She had liked Gerard.

“He tried to stop Corbeau,” said Thierry.  “We all did of course, but that devil cannot die... even with a crossbow bolt in him, he still escaped.”

A crossbow is a chancy weapon except in the hands of an expert, when used against a vampire. Unless the bolt entered the heart or severed the spinal column, it was not fatal. I was not surprised that Corbeau had not been felled.  But poor Gerard had paid a steep price.

We heal quickly from wounds that would severely incapacitate a mortal.  But not even a Prince can recover from a severed head.

Marc, covered with soot and ash, reeking of smoke, reported.  The grounds had been thoroughly searched.  Corbeau, the fox, had once more gone to earth, after wounding me more deeply than ever before.

He had been here, at my home. My _home_.  Seeking entry.  It was only a matter of time until he found it.  The stoutest castle has a weak link somewhere, and Corbeau would find it.

Genevieve was in danger.  My Gardiens were in danger.  France was in danger.  The monster had to be stopped, one and for all.

There had been many attempts to kill him; I knew I would not succeed if I tried.  There was only one other thing I could try.

He had been trying to get into my _home_.  I had to do it.

________________


I rode alone.  The Gardiens had objected, but I was their Prince, and had commanded them to be elsewhere.  Even my faithful shadow Benoit was not with me.  I was older and wilier than my vampire "son" and had easily left Benoit behind.


Leaving the chateau had been... difficult.  Genevieve, sensing that something was in the wind, hadn't wanted me to go.  I had told her she must stay in the chateau to protect it; that both of us could not go out this night.  I hadn't wanted to leave her there, fearing for me, uncertain of what I was planning.  But I couldn't tell her.

Not now, at least.  I left her a note, in a place she would not think to look immediately.

I hated myself for keeping secrets from my wife.  The last hundred years had been... bliss.  I had never expected to love, and certainly not as deeply and completely as I loved Genevieve.  I was happy, and happiness is a rare emotion for us.  Nearly non existent in Princes.  And I was about to surrender that happiness- my own, and Genevieve's.  I knew she loved me as much as I loved her.  Depended on me.  And I was about to destroy all that, all that we'd had for the last century.

Out of love.


___________

Two more Gardiens had died trying to remove Corbeau from power until I had forbidden them to approach the rogue.  I had sat studying the problem, night after night, occasionally forgetting to go to bed on time and having to be carried up and tucked in beside the unaware Genevieve by one of the non  vampire Gardiens.  (After my loving wife gave me a tongue lashing for this,
I tried not to do it anymore.)

Now I finally had a plan. It was a terrible plan, but it should work and grant France some peace from this rogue and his plague court.  It only had one drawback.

I rode (a horse could occasionally be found that could be persuaded to carry a vampire; they were rare, these animals, and usually only a Prince owned one) alone and unprotected to where I knew, from my reports and reconnaissance, I would find Corbeau that night.

He was easy enough to find.  I had only to look for murdered children and other innocents.  Corbeau was strong, yet he preyed on the weak and defenceless.  I knew better than to consider the other man a coward, though.  Rather, he was a rat; and rats fight when cornered.

Could you negotiate with a rat?

Even a handsome one?

I knew the origin story of vampires; something few vampires actually did know.  Armand had told me, long ago.  Vampires had originally been demons.  A demon possessed a living being and turned them into a vampire.  Somewhere, somehow, these demons had passed on the vampire traits without the extra demon traits by sharing blood with humans and now the bloodlines had become watered down.  Tame demons, modern vampires,without the hellish powers but still inhumanly strong.

Etienne Corbeau was a throwback.  He enjoyed rape, torture, and killing slowly by degrees.  His powers seemed somehow enhanced by these practices  he had eluded capture now for at least three centuries, and had killed many other vampires, some of them powerful in their own rights. Including Armand and Darius of Italy.

I had no doubt at all that Corbeau would and could kill me; without mercy.

Ah, bien, we all have to die sometime, non?

I dismounted some distance from my destination and let the horse go free.  It galloped, glad to be rid of the dead thing from its back. I walked into the abandoned house Corbeau was using as a base camp here on the ragged outskirts of Paris.  The various nestlings were so startled by a Prince just walking in unannounced and unaccompanied that they did not challenge me or try to stop me.

The monster himself appeared silently from a back room.  Tall, black-haired, blue-eyed; as handsome as a godling.  And as wicked as one.

“Prince Claude,” said Etienne Corbeau, with a bow.  “What an unexpected pleasure.  I heard no fanfare; I did not know royalty was coming to call.”

“Forgive me, Corbeau,” I replied evenly.  “I thought perhaps you would not mind if I simply invited myself in.”  I had not needed an invitation; this was no longer a dwelling place of anything except vermin.

“And do you really believe I will allow you to walk out as freely as you entered?  Even your sire was not such a fool.”

I raised my arms up from my side to show that I was completely unarmed.  “I have come to negotiate.”

A sneer marred Corbeau’s handsome face.  “Do not think to exile me again, de Monet,” he said, abandoning the false politeness.  “You cannot banish every one of my followers; I can make more wherever I go and have them invite me back into France.”

I shook my head.  “No,” I said. “I do not repeat futile gestures.  I will not exile you.  I hope to make you see reason and leave France of your own accord.”

Corbeau had not expected that. He stared blankly at Claude for a moment, then threw back his head and laughed.  “You cannot appeal to my noble nature, Prince,” he said.  “Nor persuade me of the error of my ways.  France is mine; it is you who should leave.  You and that frozen princess of yours.”

Not a flicker of emotion crossed my face at this insult to Genevieve, though my heart burned.

“You cannot exile a Prince,” I said calmly.

“But I can kill one.  As your sire discovered.”

I shrugged.  “We all will die, Corbeau.  Even you.”

“But not tonight, Prince de Monet.”  Corbeau leapt and seized me; apparently either not noticing or not caring that I did not fight back or struggle.  His fangs sank into my throat, tearing the undead flesh, his tongue lapping my blood..

To drink from a human was for strength and refreshment, also sexual pleasure.  To drink from a vampire... ah.  That was power.  And something like incest.  But another vampire’s blood would give the vampire who drank it knowledge and more... it could convey something to the drinker.  Secrets.

And to drink the blood of a Prince...

Corbeau threw back his head and laughed, wiping my blood from his mouth.  “Ah,” he said, exultant.  “I never thought I would taste royal blood.”

“You killed Armand.”

“Graydon did it for me, I’m afraid,” Corbeau replied, giving a nod to one of his minions.  “And so quickly that the blood was wasted.  I will not make that mistake again.”

“So you are not going to kill me?”

“I am not going to let you die quickly, Prince,” Corbeau replied.  “There are ways to kill a vampire slowly.  Graydon, get the silver chains.”

I did not resist as I was chained, although the silver hurt worse than anything I had ever experienced.

Some vampires had no reaction to silver; it was as iron or gold to them.  I envied them.  The manacles did not even have to be tight to cause me agony as I was chained to a wall.  Stains on this wall and the floor told me this area had been used for torture previously.  I could almost hear the screams.

I was determined not to scream, no matter what happened to me in this room.  I would show Corbeau how a Prince died.

They left me hanging in the chains, pondering my fate, for what seemed a long time but was mostly likely only two hours or so.  The shortness of the night was a definite drawback to torturing a vampire, after all.

Corbeau was carrying a long knife.  The blade was silver, that had somehow been honed to an edge.  Normally a silver weapon would have been too soft to be much of a threat; in this case, even a dull silver knife was a deadly instrument.

“First of all,” Corbeau said, and there was no trace of a smile now, not even a sneer, “we must let your dear wife know what has happened to you.  It would be cruel to leave her sitting in that cold chateau, wondering, would it not?”

And his hand, with the knife, lashed out so quickly that even I could not follow the movement; I felt the pain, however, as my left hand was severed at the wrist.  The bleeding stump fell back in its chains as Corbeau caught the hand, smiling once again.

“I am certain that dear Genevieve will recognize this,” Corbeau said, holding up the dripping hand, turning so its gold ring caught the torchlight.  “After all, she placed this ring on that finger.  It should be returned to her.”  He handed the object to Graydon, who nodded and bowed himself out of the room.

I closed my eyes.  Before this night was over, Genevieve would receive that hand, with the ring still in place.  Ah, Dieu; I sent her a prayer that she would have the strength to bear the grief such a message would cause her.  And another that she would not come to my rescue.

“Perhaps she may join us soon,” said Corbeau, apparently reading this last thought.

“You will leave Genevieve alone,” I said, as calmly as I could against the pain and blood loss.  “You will not touch her, you will not harm her in any way, nor can any of your foul servants do so. And once I am dead, you will leave France, never to return.”

Corbeau’s face reflected anger. “You still think to give me orders?” he asked. “You are no longer Prince, de Monet.  I do not have to obey you.”

I almost smiled, but kept my exultation to myself.  I had just pronounced my death curse. Corbeau had, unknowingly, sealed himself in a pact to obey my final commands by drinking my blood.  A Prince’s blood.

The night wore on; endless night for me, as Corbeau was quite inventive in ways to torment a victim to the utmost but keep me still alive–or at least clinging to what passed for life.

I was dying.  Again. Descriptions of torture are both tedious and disturbing; I will not record what happened that night save pain, and more pain.

And, finally, as dawn threatened to turn the sky greyish-pink, the dawn heralding a night I knew I would not see, Corbeau tired of the game.

He came back into the torture chamber carrying a sword.  He let me see it, out of my remaining eye. It was long and sharp.  No silver now; no more torture. I nearly welcomed the sight of it.

“Say your prayers, Prince,” Corbeau said.  “You go to join your sire.”

“I will tell him ‘allo’ for you,” I said, and watched the sword flash.
________________


I had left her a note. I had no doubts that she would find it.

"Genevieve. If you find this letter, know then that I am beyond all hope of
rescue or resurrection.

To be a Prince means sacrifice. Every night, a Prince sacrifices something of
themselves. This is our duty, our burden, our curse. Sometimes the sacrifice
must be the ultimate one.

Know this, my dearest wife. I love you. I have always loved you, and will
always love you; I know what my death will do to you and I regret the pain
you will feel. But my death also wins you peace and freedom from a monster.
I have tried, for two hundred or more years, to rid the world of Etienne
Corbeau. It seems an impossible feat.

Exiling him worked only for a brief respite. What I have done tonight will
permanently bar him from France. I regret only that I cannot take him with
me to that final death. I charge you, my consort and successor, to do your
best to find the means to so rid the world of this creature.

A Prince has powers beyond those of an ordinary vampire. Because we rule
the country, and hold in liege those of our kind within it, it is granted to us to
be able to do certain things. You already know of the power of exile; but that
power can be negated. There is one power than cannot be gainsaid, the power
of the death curse of a Prince.

Should a Prince willingly sacrifice themselves to an enemy, and should that
enemy drink the blood of a Prince, then the Prince, in dying, can curse the
enemy. Permanent exile, and the inability to harm those of the Prince's
bloodline, can be imposed upon the enemy.

It is wisest not to let this power be widely known. That is why I tell you only
now, and charge you to tell no one save your own successor should you ever
deem it necessary. Do so only in dire need. The need seems dire to me, which
is why I have done this.

For you. For all my fledglings, and yours, and those to come. For France.

For love.

I only pray that some day you will forgive me, and remember me with love
rather than grief and bitterness. You will be a good and strong Prince,
Genevieve; I am trusting France to your care.

I love you. Always.

Claude"


The end.



 

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