"Edward, are you there? Unlatch the shutter and walk with me. I travelled here by foot, and alone."

At the sound of that hushed yet forceful voice, he drew back the pin on the shutters and flung them open to reveal his love, Marantha, standing at the sill. Her hair shone copper in the fading sunset. His usually solemn face broke into a smile and words, words he itched to scrawl down, ran through his mind. Oh, how fair she was! So proud, like a statue of a goddess, lovely yet arresting. Her full lips twitched into a crooked, cynical half-smile, one he could barely see as her face was shadowed by the hood of her cloak. She did not say another word. She did not have to.

Edward leaned out the window, holding fast to the sill, and kissed her forehead. Her skin felt smooth and cool under his lips. Then he smiled at her and drew back long enough to take his cloak from behind the door and tie back his long dark hair with a scrap of ribbon, and stepped outside to join her.

Once outside they began to walk down the dirt road and past the Brackley's land where the girl, Susanna, lived. Then they turned down a beaten path, not one leading to a road, but one twisting through the nearby woods. The trees seemed to close in on them as they entered it, the branches like arms enfolding them in a choking embrace.

"Careful, now, Edward, for the moon is full, and vampires roam," Marantha said, and laughed. Edward looked over at her with some unease, wondering if that contained any grain of truth. Marantha loved to tease, but somehow this did not seem appropriate even for her. It seemed to be an unspoken rule in the town never to kid about the blood-sucking, sun-fearing demons that roamed the night. Old women spun legends of horror and magic about these beings. The town was in a frenzy of vampire paranoia, rumors flew and stories grew bigger and more elaborate the more they were retold. Some said they could only be killed by the light of day, others said a stake in the heart would do it, still others claimed they were immortal beings who shyed from garlic and holy water. Some believed more than one theory. Both Marantha and Edward had heard of the two men lost in the woods last autumn and never found, or the Crescent child found dead and drained of blood. He thought on this, and they walked silently until the sun was all the way down and the shadows took over the forest. Then Marantha stopped.

Something happened to the air then. It grew somehow heavier and colder in a matter of seconds. The noises, chirping birds, rustling wind, and cracking branches, ceased. He turned to her, but her face was almost invisible to him. She stood in a shadow that veiled her in a sheath of darkness. There was no longer any sunlight and the sky was fully velvet-black. Sparse moonlight illuminated the forest and cast it into a cold light, shining like weak spotlights in places where there were no branches to filter it.

After a few moments of stillness, Edward's uneasiness overcame him. His eyes searched the black void where her face had been before the night swallowed it up. "Marantha?" he managed. "Why are you standing there like that? What's wrong?"

She tossed her head, allowing a sliver of moonlight to reveal her face. Her face... her face was contorted into a hideous mask of evil, all fangs and glowing eyes. He gasped and stepped back but her pale hand shot out from under the cloak and grabbed his forearm with inhuman strength. She had always been strong for her petite size, but this was ridiculous. She spoke then, in a gravely, ancient voice that was not hers.

"You are mine, you were always mine. I am not the same woman you love... I am more. You can be like me and stay with me, or I can take you. Choose."

Edward could only gape at her. What was she asking him to do? This was all like some insane nightmare, where the girl of his dreams had morphed into a night-demon that wanted to destroy his very soul. Her yellowed eyes and carnivorous teeth looked like a wolf's. Could she be one of them, the feared vampire race that she had laughed about only a moment before? And if so, where was she going to "take him"? Her voice was stronger and more forceful than it had ever been. The way it sometimes got when she was upset and hadn't gotten her way, quiet and deadly, her this-is-your-last-chance voice. It scared him. She wanted something - she wanted him - and she intended to take it.

Her strong hand, like a vice on his shoulder, startled him enough to make him gasp. His breath was needled ice in his lungs.

"I changed but yesterday, Edward. I went walking at sunset, in these woods," she said softly, with maddening calm, "and a creature attacked me. It was great and fierce, as big as a bear but with the skin of a dried fish. I slipped down a ravine and cut my arm trying to escape it, and it jumped after me but must have struck some rock or tree, for it lay next to me when I awoke. Its blood pooled around it, around me, and seeped into my wound. I changed somehow... I can change you, too. I know you love me and I know you would do anything for me..."

"Marantha," Edward begged, "don't make me choose between my life and my love. Can I not see you just as much?"

Marantha grinned. "Do you not listen to the old wives' tales? I cannot face the sun, or I shall burn. If you love me, surrender to me. Roam with me. We can live together, hunt together... I know you do not really want to leave me, do you?"

Even as she said these words he felt a tightening in his head, a burning inside his skull, and a sudden compulsion to do as she wished. Die for her? No matter. He would do anything. His thoughts floated and he began to babble incoherently as she somehow worked her way into his mind. His legs weakened and he slumped to the ground, sitting dazedly in a small patch of weeds and dried leaves. He could not move. He could not choose. He stared up at her, unable to speak, not wanting to betray her but not wanting to die.

She glared down at his weakened form and spat with contempt. "I will choose for you, then. You call yourself a man? You never were." She leaned towards him, as if to kiss him, but at the last instant her mouth widened and he felt a slight pinch as her kiss of death drained his life. The world faded to black. He closed his eyes and welcomed it.

Opening his journal, he reached into his pocket for a quill, but remembered he had no ink. No matter. Improvising, he stuck it's tip into the moist earth and began to write in mud. Carefully scrawling the date at the top of the page, he jotted down a poem.

May 12, 1592
And who does bemoan this God-given curse
Be it the gentle woman, mother Eve?
For much pain has she to bear
Swelling with seed, and suffer through birth
And she grows old to watch her children leave
Or does our father, Adam, pay the price?
Toiling among the hardened clay and weeds
to produce a crop resembling all but rock.
Truly, it is all humans who were punished for our deed
and our discipline? To feel,
for to wrong and know that we have wronged
evokes such guilt and sorrow
and to love and know that we have lost
calls forth an emptiness called need
leaving us wooden and hollow.

A rustling made him instinctively snap the little book shut and look up. He started to stand but his limbs seemed to be locked in place. As the rustling grew louder, closer, his feeling of unease blossomed into full-flowered panic. What is that?, he wondered. He twisted his neck to look behind him but an object, large, heavy and cold, struck him and knocked him face-first into the leaves. It rolled over him and landed with a solid thump beside him. Before he could even raise his head to look at it, a soft, cold hand began to stroke his neck. He froze. It played up and down the side of his throat and around the curve of his skull; strong fingers slipped through his hair and tightened, yanking his head up out of the dirt by the hair. It twisted his skull up and to the left, allowing him to stare straight into the face of a young dead boy, streaked with blood and grime. The shadows made the boy's still-open eyes appear to flicker for a moment and he screamed.

"This is Alphonse Lafontaine, my new friend," Marantha's voice informed him sweetly. "He was my servant. He's such a nice boy... would you like a taste?" She let go of his head and it flopped to the ground. He was grateful not to have to look at Alphonse's empty stare. The boy seemed to be only seventeen or eighteen, not much older than Marantha herself. The shocked and slack-jawed look he would wear for all eternity on his face was an indication he had died in fear.

He pulled himself up, joints snapping in his back, careful not to look at Marantha's playtoy. Clearing his throat, he said, "Why did you choose him? What made him special?"

She laughed. "No men are 'special' to me. You should know that by now, at least. I used to make merry with Alphonse, even before I met you. We were something like bedfellows." She leaned over Alphonse's tattered body, dressed in plain servingsman's clothes, and stroked his blond tangled locks. "Oh sweet Alphonse," she sighed, mimicking a young girl in love, "how handsome you look now! What a future you imagined, and what future do you have?"

"How many others have you killed?" Edward asked slowly, staring at her.

"I have not been changed very long, dear, so only three or four," she said. "It is not as if I am doing this for my own amusement. It's essential to our survival. That's why I brought this dearie back to you."

"You want me to drink that?"

"It is not that bad, Edward," she said benignly. "What do you think you'll live off of, rats?"

He jumped up, shaking his head. "I can't... I can't," he said. "How can I hurt someone?" He backed away from her, away from the murderous angel stroking her victim, then turned and ran up the slope of the ravine and back onto the path. He started to run back in the direction of his home. It wasn't very far, he could make it. But he heard her behind him, running faster, catching up, almost upon him. She tackled him and pulled him to the ground, rolled on top of him and snarled into his face. "Show me, then! Show me, coward, eat a rat and I'll be sated. Show me!"

"I will," he squeaked. "Just... just get off and I will." She eased off of his chest and he started to breathe a sigh of relief.

He had no breath.

He climbed to his feet again and started to amble in the general direction of his property, aware of her proximity to him. He didn't even have to go inside for he spotted a rodent near the steps leading to the porch. With uncharacteristic speed that surprised him, he darted and grabbed it. Supposing he would have to make an incision somewhere, he stroked his thumb along the wriggling rat's neck, gathering nerve, then pressed hard. The flesh gave and blood welled up almost immediately. The rat squeaked and thrashed wildly in terror. He brought it to his lips and glanced up at Marantha, about to drink, when she snatched it away from him and threw it to the ground.

"Don't drink that!" she hissed. 'It's infected with the plague! Can you not smell it?" And, now that she had called attention to it, he noticed a strange smell emanating from the rat. Like rotting meat. "If you drink that, you will contract it as well. We can die from it, too; losing humanity does not mean we escape disease. Now go to the well and wash your hands right away," she instructed. Then she turned and stalked away.

He looked down at his hands, his fingers dripping blood, and gagged. The Plague! He'd escaped it so far, and now it was touching him! He raced to the well between his land and the Brackleys' and drew a bucket. It was biting cold, but he doused his hands and face anyway.

"Edward?" inquired a smooth sweet voice. "Are you all right?"

He looked up in surprise to see Susanna Brackley, his next door neighbor. She was all of nine years old, with long brown hair and big, trusting eyes. They glittered in the moonlight like onyxes.

"What are you doing out at night, Susanna? Go back in, it is cold and unsafe. Vampires roam."

The girl laughed. "Mother sent me out to draw water for her jug. She likes fresh water nearby in case she gets thirsty. There are no vampires, silly Eddie. When are you going to come for tea with me?"

He forced a smile. "Mayhap a later date."

"But we're leaving for London tomorrow. We're going to visit Aunty Chettle and Cousin Anders."

"Listen, go in. It is not safe, do you understand? Good night. Keep safe and I'll be off... tell your mother good day when she wakes." He hurried away before she could say more. He liked that little girl, her enthusiasm and friendliness never failing to brighten him, but now he knew that there really was danger nearby.

Marantha scorned him for feeding off only rabbits and small animals, as he hunted now, trodding through the underbrush in search of a snack. It just wasn't right to eat humans, no matter how necessary it might be.

He stumbled back to his home, his home that he had been afraid to set foot in for fear that he would hurt someone, a servant, anyone. Since his family had been one of the wealthiest in Wickingham, they had also been the best-fed, and their large waste heap was food for many a rat. He slipped behind the garbage heap and saw one nibbling the remainders of a scone. It froze, not knowing what danger lurked but sensing something strange in the night air, and Eddie pounced and grabbed it. He used his thumbnail to make an incision and drank quickly.

A cracking of branches behind him made him drop the rat and stand still.

Susanna appeared beside him. "Eddie," she said softly, "Mother's dead. Daddy had to take her to God, and now he's gone too." A tear rolled down her innocent face and her voice cracked. "I do not know why she died, Eddie!!"

"Oh Susanna," he said, bending to embrace her. A strange smell made him stop short. Somewhat familiar... the smell of rotting meat. The smell of the plague. He jumped away from her, walking back a few steps, and she continued to hold out her arms for him.

"Eddiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiie!" she wailed. "Hold me, I am so scared, I'm dying, Eddie!" She toddled towards him, arms still stiffly outstretched, face shining with tears. She looked like a ghost girl. Edward turned and ran, clearing the waste heap, the woodpile, his house, Susanna's house. The moon slipped behind the clouds as he darted into the forest. He fell to his knees upon meeting the slope of the ravine and let himself fall to the bottom. There he lay. The leaves were his mattress, his arm his pillow; he stumbled into sleep and dreamt of Susanna, Susanna with her arms outstretched and a gaping skull for a face.

"Edward," she cooed coquettishly, "I need a pretty new dress. Besides, we shall have fun. We can see a play, buy some goods..." she licked her lips "and meet people."

Edward, of course, complied. This was not just his usual standard show of weakness and lack of control, however. He knew that Susanna's aunt and cousin, the Chettles, lived in London. He could not help but wonder if they had the Plague too; if, by accidentally contaminating Susanna's water, he had killed her entire family. He hoped not. He still needed to see for himself, though, so the next evening they took one of his carriages and travelled the twenty miles to London. Even though they were his carriages, he still felt as if he were stealing from his own stable.

The night they arrived, Marantha insisted on seeing the sights of the town. The Rose theatre was nearby, so after finding a stable to leave the carriage at, they went on foot. Of course, this was all Marantha's doing. Edward never would have walked without protection through the "bad" part of London, full of drunks, theives and young troublemakers. But he knew Marantha was hungry.

They walked through an alley that reeked with a stench of waste and of hunger. She breathed in, savouring the scent of human suffering, and he glaced at her. The sight of her face, her ethereal appearance that was so out of place in the slums of the city, evoked some dark emotion in him. His feelings towards her had evolved into something poisonous, something that never should be felt. It was new, and frightening. He still loved her, and he knew not even a thousand years could erase that. But he resented her for making him into this monster, taking away simultaneously his freedom and his peace of mind. He was forced to kill, and to watch murders. He never slept for more than four hours at a stretch and was always in danger of waking to the noonday sun. But he knew what had to be done, for God had spoken to him in a dream. The messenger, a young girl with dark hair and eyes, told him that Marantha needed to pay for her sins. He was a god-fearing man, a Catholic to the core. Murder was wrong and Marantha loved it. He wanted to send her to God, but could not bear to hurt her.

The most horrible part about these dreams was that the girl was Susanna. Her face was covered in sores, her bones were visible through the skin, but she retained some quixotic, innocuous beauty in her decomposed state. In every dream Edward tried to apologize. He was sorry for killing her. But every time he pleaded, she left. After waking from these dreams he felt not saved but damned. The angel had given him the answer but refused to save him.

"Eddie," Marantha whispered at his side. "There's one. Wait here while I get him."

She gestured towards a stumbling drunk that had just been kicked out of a tavern. He weaved back and forth before tripping over a crate in the middle of the alley and landing on a homeless man. The drunk apologized profusely. Then he got up, dusted himself off, and attempted to walk in a straight line. He was bearded and grungy, foul-smelling, and looked like he had not changed clothing in a week. Marantha obviously thought he was perfect.

She tore her already-tattered skirt so it showed off one bare, pale thigh. Then she casually strutted into the middle of the drunk's line of vision.

"Hello, dearie," called the drunk. He waved.

Marantha wiggled her fingers at him and smiled teasingly.

The drunk floundered up to her, a toothy smile stretching his bearded face. "Pretty lass, aren't ye?" he said. "Would ye like to accompany me on a royal tour to the castle of our Queen? I've been appointed on a special mission. She's going to give us some ham. Would you like some ham, lass?"

"I do not like ham," she said. "I'd rather have something fresher."

The drunk was confused. "Aye," he stuttered, "you could eat a chicken."

The two of them ignored Edward. Marantha was trying to entice the drunk, trap him like a Venus flytrap, and the drunk was just trying to make a new friend. Edward was watching them closely, this goddess and this scum, when something alerted him to the drunk's identity. The dark eyes and hair tipped him off right away. It was Anders Chettle, Susanna's cousin. He breathed a sigh of relief. Alive. Susanna hadn't infected them. He hadn't killed anyone.

"Me mummy's dead, eh," said Anders. "Me house is empty..." He winked suggestively.

So Anne Chettle was dead. The plague had struck again, and Edward as its instrument. He was consumed with grief, over Susanna, over the humans he had tried so hard not to harm. It was so obvious too, the smell emanating off Anders, that all-too-noticable smell of rotting meat. Why Marantha did not sense it was a mystery to him. The point was that she didn't.

"Don't drink that!" she had hissed.

If Marantha touched Anders, if she drank any of his blood, she would get the plague. She would die. And he wouldn't have to do a thing. Her words echoed through his mind.

"It's infected with the plague! Can you not smell it?"

He wasn't going to be the one to warn her. He could simply sit and watch.

"Err, I suppose Billy over there is rather fresh as well, if you like humans that is," Anders advised Marantha doubtfully, gesturing behind him to the homeless man he had fallen on.

She smiled again. "I'd rather have you." Her arms shot out and grabbed his neck in a vice grip, long fingernails breaking the skin of his neck and allowing rivulets of blood to trickle down his neck and stain his shirt. Anders took a moment to register this. Then he let out a hoarse, loud scream and began to thrash in her arms, weakly beating at her with flopping hands. Edward imagined that he hadn't eaten for days. He didn't move to intervene.

"BAAAAAAHHHH!" yelled Anders. His homeless friend Billy woke up, took one look at what was going on, and shuffled out of the alley as fast as he could go.

Marantha lifted the poor man by his neck until he was two feet off the ground. She smiled up into his face, the beautiful grin that had won Edward's heart and poisoned it at the same time. Anders was kicking at her, but his blows failed to even throw her off balance. She squeezed harder and he gasped, his breaths starting to rasp and bubble in his throat, his flailing limbs going slower and blows becoming weaker by the second. She dipped her head towards his neck, lips parted to reveal wolf's fangs. She was still smiling.

Suddenly she stopped. Her nose wrinkled and her eyes closed as she breathed in, obviously sensing something she didn't like. Then she flung Anders away from her and held her hands away from her body in disgust. She had smelled the disease on him. Edward felt a sliver of disappointment.

Her sudden disgust gave Anders the chance he needed. He managed to get up and dive into a trash heap at the side of the alley, pushing debris and old food aside. He came up with a piece of rotted lumber and cracked it in half so that the edge was pointed and sharp. He rushed at her and tackled her to the ground.

"Edward! Get him off me!" she screamed, beating at Anders. She was stronger than he, they both knew it, but in his sudden burst of adrenaline he had her pinned to the cobbledstone pavement, the stake aimed at her heart. She stared straight into Edward's eyes, commanding him silently to get up and pull Anders away. He felt that tightening in his head, the burning inside his skull, and a sudden compulsion to do as she wished. He would do anything... he knew she was once again trying to control his mind and fought it. It was the old familiar feeling of being taken over, the feeling that had invaded him the last time she used it on him. This time he had prepared for it. He used his own powers, the psychic abilities that all vampires have, to push her out. To command himself not to move. He looked away.

Anders went flying as Marantha kicked him, his body hitting the wall. There was a series of cracks as his bones snapped. He landed on the ground, rolling his head from side to side, and blood began to trickle out of his mouth. He moaned and closed his eyes. Edward looked up at Marantha, who was still on the ground. Moving closer, he saw that the stake protruded from her chest. Black blood was welling up around it and seeping into her burgundy dress, making a rapidly growing stain.

She glared at him. In the diminished moonlight her eyes looked black. They held him and he froze on the spot.

"Take it out," she croaked, "take it out so I can heal." When he didn't move, she forced some authority into her voice. "Take it out of me, Edward! Come! Why do you stand there like that?" Her voice faltered as she realized he had no power over him anymore. She just stared. Then her eyes closed and she didn't look so fierce anymore.

"Edward," she whispered, "I love you."

Her eyes flicked open one last time. The ferocity was back, the bloodthirsty murderous god staring at her lost lamb.

As he watched, her body faded to grey. It disintegrated into ashes and the stake clattered to the ground. Edward looked at that spot for a long time, but he didn't see it. The image floating in front of his eyes, like the shape of the sun burned into his retinas, was the stain on her chest. That heart-shaped stain.

As the sun rose in the forest the next morning, no birds sang or chirped in joyous reprise. It was completely silent. Like a graveyard. Something fluttered down to the ground, then another, like dead leaves after winter had killed the trees they grew from. But they weren't leaves. They were sheets of white paper, covered in writing. One by one, they slowly fell, making graceful patterns in the grey dawn air.

Edward sat up in a large maple tree, perched in the fork of two sturdy branches. He tore pages out of his journal and watched them float on the wind. He had been doing it all night, passing the time until the sun came up. The only noise in the forest was of tearing paper.

He looked up only when the glowing sun crested the horizon, the sun he had thought he would never see again. He smiled crookedly at it. His eyes were glazed and did not move, did not see. They were empty.

As the sun's light reached him, he stood up on the branch. He was unafraid now. Nothing, no one, could ever hurt him again. He extended his arms and threw back his head. The sun's rays penetrated his body and a burning sensation swept over him. It was intense, not exactly painful but powerful, and he screamed as his eyes burst into flames. As his body disintegrated and his thoughts lost coherency, the last idea in his mind was that of peace. Finally, peace.

His ashes retained human shape for a split second before the wind scattered them about the forest. The journal fell twenty feet to the ground. As it struck, a lone bird began to sing.