The Dreaming Of Lost Souls She dreamed of a vampire lover. She dressed in black, wore make-up so pale she glowed, painted her lips blood-red. She shunned the church and garlic, kept her window open through the night, let herself chill until the blood ran slow and deep beneath her skin and she could almost believe her heart did not beat. Her gaze lingered on the throats of others and she longed for the day when she could sink her sharp, sharp fangs into their too-warm flesh and drink them dry. She was afraid of fire and she never, ever, went out in the sun. It was Los Angeles. It didn't take too long before someone obliged her. He cornered her behind a night-club, grabbed her arm with inhuman strength, flashed vampire-face and fang at her. Her heart beat rapidly, high in her throat, but her voice was calm as she said, 'I've been waiting for you.' Her words, her calm, intrigued him so he did not bite her and leave her to die and re-waken as revenant, to wander lost and alone. Instead he gave her the siring blood and drained her and when she woke, newly-dead, he was waiting by her side. She hungered and he gave her her first kill, a teenager snatched from the street, and after she had eaten, he held her down, pinned her, ravished her, and the blood coursing through her cold veins warmed her so she met him in ferocity, drove back into him, matched him bite for bite, so that when they were done (sated and throbbing with the joy of unlife) neither could be sure who was master. She slept in the day, curled up cold beside her vampire lover, and she dreamed only of blood. * * * * * She was restless. Longing drove her in death as much as it had in life. She longed for blood and took it, longed for death and made it, longed for fear and bred it. He was besotted with her, stalked at her side, gave her shy gifts of the young and the beautiful so she could slake herself with their warmth. They began to garner a reputation. The revenants came, drifting in from the dark to their side, wanting the protection of power. They took them in, gave them a home, made them pay a price in blood. She made her own children, too, the especially beautiful, gave them the siring blood and waited for them to wake, fed them and took them, until they submitted to her power and called her master. She had everything she had ever wanted, blood and sex and death and power, and yet still she was restless. She hungered and was sated and hungered again. She longed and did not know what she longed for. She slept in death in the daytime, surrounded by the children of her blood, and she dreamed of a longing fulfilled. When she woke in the night, she could never remember her dreams. * * * * * One morning he didn't come back. She stormed, raged, wanted him, was trapped by the daylight. When night fell she took her fury onto the streets, dark and fell with desire, and Los Angeles paid the price of her rage in blood and death. She stalked through the night, a shadow of death, but she could not find her sire. Morning drove her back to her lair alone, her rage incandescent and she snarled at her children and the revenants. The more intelligent stayed far away from her, huddled in dark corners. The ones who strayed close, through stupidity or with the thought to comfort her, she tore into pieces. She tracked down a Kandros demon that night, and the demon told her that her sire had joined the ranks of the untimely dead. Her howl split the night and the Kandros had the good sense to flee from her. Wild, driven, she gathered her children and they stalked the night, painted it red with blood, let death whisper from them to consume those foolish enough to walk the streets after dark. She killed and she questioned to try and find the one who had murdered her sire. The answer came, unexpectedly, not from one from the street but from a visitor. The woman came into her lair, a violation that would have earned her death, except she was so hung around with holy symbols and spells of protection that the vampire could not get close. 'My name is Lilah Morgan,' the woman announced. 'I'm from Wolfram & Hart. I'm sure you're familiar with us.' She nodded. Every one of the damned knew about Wolfram & Hart. Lilah smiled, a sweet smile that froze the blood. 'We noticed you've been killing a lot of people,' she said. 'I understand you've been trying to find who destroyed one of your fellow vampires.' 'My sire,' she whispered. 'Ah,' Lilah's exclamation was delicate. 'We didn't know that.' Her voice resumed its briskness. 'What we do know, however, is that we have a mutual enemy. There is someone who has been - interfering - with our business for some time. He is also the one who has slain your sire.' She growled, low in her throat, flashed face and fang. 'What's his name?' Lilah inclined her head. 'What will you do if I tell you?' she asked. 'Kill him,' she replied. 'How many exotic details do you want because, believe me, it is going to be slow and painful.' 'You are a vicious thing, aren't you?' said Lilah. She grinned. 'Let's just say you caught me on a bad day.' 'His name is Angel,' said Lilah and handed over a business card. She glanced down and saw a blobby picture that might have been a malformed butterfly and, more importantly, an address. 'I can't use this,' she said. 'It's a business address. I can't track him during the day. A little problem with sunlight, remember.' She snarled the last sentence. 'Oh, that's not a problem,' said Lilah, smiling. 'He works at night. Angel, you see, is a vampire.' 'A vampire with a business card?' she replied. 'How interesting. I shall enjoy this.' Her smile was slow, malevolent, and Lilah paled. 'When?' Lilah asked. 'Tonight,' she replied. She slept that day and her dreams were sweet with revenge. * * * * * She walked in through the door, unhindered by the lack of invitation. She kept her gleeful laughter tucked inside, amazed at the stupidity of a vampire who would run a business. Wasn't he aware that it made it a public place, a place where even the undead could enter? The girl at the desk looked up as she entered, raised an eyebrow in question, began some spiel she barely listened to. She watched, instead, the slow pulse of blood in the throat of the warm and she wanted it. She realised the girl had stopped, was watching her with a puzzled frown. 'I want to see Angel,' she said, kept her voice sweet. 'Can I tell him what your business is?' asked the girl. She went to respond, stopped as someone clad in black appeared from the back office. 'Cordy, get out of here,' he said. She looked at him, saw that his blood pooled still and cold in his dead body, and she opened her mouth and screamed. Her children came, her revenants, through door and window, exploding inwards so the room filled with a hurricane of glass. The warm girl screamed, cowered, was joined by a warm man who appeared from the office, but she barely noticed either of them. She had eyes only for Angel. He fought well, hard, slaughtering her children, but it wasn't this that filled her attention. She gaped, instead, startled, when she realised he was ensoulled. 'He has a soul,' she whispered and longing sang within her. ~No,~ the demon within her woke, snarling. ~You're mine. All mine. You don't need a soul.~ She turned on her demon, screaming inside her head, and the force of her will was so strong that it cowered back. 'I wanted this,' she whispered. 'My soul wanted this. My soul wanted to be vampire and you took it away from me.' The demon howled at her, tore into her mind, tried to rip the longing from her. It owned her body and it did not want to share her with a soul. But she remembered now what she was longing for, had longed for always, for the cold embrace of death warmed only by the flickering of a soul that loved the darkness, and she shrugged the demon aside. 'Angel,' she whispered and turned back to the one who had what she wanted, knew what she wanted, could gain her what she wanted, and she reached out desperately for him. She barely had time to register surprise as he swept a stake through her heart. 'Angel,' she whispered again, and then blew away into dust. * * * * * She hangs in chains, whipped, beaten, subject to torments eternal. Soul and body both, she writhes within the darkness, bleeding and burning and never allowed to escape. Only sometimes, when she lets her mind slip away, can she dream of something that makes, for a small moment, Hell cease to exist. She dreams of an Angel lover. The End Note: The first 2 paragraphs of this story have a stylistic (if inadvertant) resemblance to a story by Nancy Holder called Blood Gothic. If anyone is offended, don't be - I wasn't even aware of the story until after I'd posted this on the discussion list. But it is a good story and worth reading if you can get a copy. Amanda wolf@ozdocs.net.au Worried you can't get published? The worst lines in published works - a series. "Only in the music of his screams would the squatting toad of hatred be banished from her mind."