Chapter I: Angelan

Lady Sarista
Copyright © Stephanie Pui-Mun Law 1999.
Used with permission.

Lucy, who hadn't Venetia's hatred for strigoïs, remained at home that Venetia had secured against both strigoïs and humans, while, during the night, Beth-Lynn and Venetia hunted down the strigoïs. Venetia's power of dhampyr was rather useful and the two girls became quickly well-known in the strigoï society. Venetia wasn't unknown before, but now, the strigoïs found it worse and they either hated them or feared them - sometimes both. The girls' weapon was the stake, even if sometimes Venetia had a crossbow.
During one fight, Beth-Lynn received some help from a handsome stranger. Venetia was busy fighting against two strigoïs, so she couldn't see the young man, but Beth-Lynn was delighted; when her eyes first met the stranger's eyes, she felt a connection between them. At the end of the fight, the young man disappeared and Venetia had only Beth-Lynn's word on his existence. The scene happened quite a lot, but each time, Venetia couldn't see the young man for she had too many adversaries in the same time. After two weeks of this little game, Venetia became more than suspicious. When Beth-Lynn heard her grumbling something probably not nice about him, she protested. The dhampyr retorted with a dark glance.
"Are you always angry, sarcastic or scathing, Viny?" sighed Beth-Lynn with a half-smile.
"Why, yes, of course!" answered Venetia without missing a beat.
"And what's the reason of such a joyful mood?"
"Then you will have a nice surprise the day I won't be like that."
"Oh! And when will this happy day happen?"
"Huh? Oh... err... a day where I won't be sarcastic, angry nor scathing?"
"Yes."
"At least, I can be ironical, can't I?" pleaded Venetia.
"No, you can't," said firmly Beth-Lynn.
"You're harsh with me," complained Venetia. "Alright, alright, I think I have your answer now."
"So, when?" asked Beth-Lynn eagerly.
"Never," shrugged Venetia.
"Why?" whimpered her friend theatrically.
"Well, you're asking me the impossible!" retorted Venetia, grinning evilly.
Beth-Lynn stared helplessly at her, then laughed heartily.
Venetia hadn't given up the idea to see who was the mysterious stranger. She didn't like for people to hide their identity and, especially, she didn't like the way this stranger was hiding from her. She was ready for the next fight and, the last strigoï was scarcely dead that Venetia left running, following the tracks of the stranger. A moment stunned, Beth-Lynn followed her eagerly, certainly quite weary too by this dissimulation. When he realised he was caught, the young man stopped and turned toward them, a deep sadness in his eyes.
At first, Venetia said nothing, but her gaze took an adamantine light.
"Why did you flee like that?" asked Beth-Lynn, breathless.
He remained silent and Venetia added with contempt:
"You can speak, siscoï, I won't kill you - not now."
"What are you saying, Viny? He is not a strigoï, is he?"
Her eyes were pleading, but the stranger didn't utter a word.
"Did someone cut off your tongue?" asked Venetia ironically.
"My name's Angelan," he finally said.
Angelan was a strigoï, true, but he was so handsome and so gentle that even Venetia was disarmed. He had helped them - that is, he had helped Beth-Lynn - more than once and she couldn't kill him for that. Understanding Venetia's silence like an agreement, Beth-Lynn followed her inclination and forgot everything in Angelan's eyes - the mission she had chosen, the terror she had become... - that is, she forgot it for Angelan.
For a time, Venetia continued alone her avenging mission, hoping desperately to keep the strigoïs away from Lucy, while Beth-Lynn spent more and more time with Angelan. The strigoï society knew it almost at once and Angelan's reputation among his brothers became worse; Venetia had only to stay near Beth-Lynn and Angelan to meet her preys for the night, especially that there was a cemetery behind Angelan's house. She seemed to accept rather well Beth-Lynn's love for Angelan - and Angelan's for Beth-Lynn - for Angelan was really not behaving like a strigoï: if he could help Venetia against his brothers of the night, he did it - and he had already proved his efficiency more than once.
Then, after a while, Beth-Lynn came back with Venetia and the hunts were more frequent, for they were three hunters now. The strigoïs' behaviour toward Angelan - he was a renegade for them - probably decided Venetia to trust Angelan at least enough to allow him to fight with them. The schedule of the nights was quite the same every night: while Beth-Lynn and Angelan spent a moment together, Venetia was hunting in the cemetery; then, around midnight, the three of them - or sometimes, only Venetia and Beth-Lynn - left Angelan's house to hunt a bit further.

But then, little Lucy reached the age of sixteen. Till then she had stayed obediently at home, sleeping during the nights like every normal person, perhaps reading late in the night, but nothing more. Suddenly, she became very curious about Venetia's activities during the night. She knew her sister wasn't home, since she slept late in the morning and Venetia wasn't someone who liked to stay lazily in bed. Of course she knew too about the hate she had for strigoïs, but she decided it was time for her to know a bit more about the subject.
She asked discreetly some questions and received no answer from Venetia and a warning from Beth-Lynn. Lucy soon discovered why: Beth-Lynn had the same taste as Venetia for night expeditions. Her friendship with Venetia was now placed under another light. It was so mysterious that Lucy felt irresistibly enticed by it. She was a dhampyr, like her sister, so she had nothing to fear, she thought naively. Thus, Lucy ended by following Venetia in the night, one of those quiet nights where Venetia was staying around Beth-Lynn and Angelan in order to protect them from strigoïs a bit too "affectionate" for their own sake. When Lucy saw Angelan, it was love at first sight. She froze on the spot, breathless, having the impression either her heart was beating so loudly and so wildly that everybody should hear it or that it had stopped to beat. She felt ready to die, persuaded that a sharp arrow had struck her deeply in the heart. But then, she realised that Beth-Lynn and Angelan were in love with each other and she bit her lower lip so that she wouldn't cry, even if her heart was bleeding.
The very morning after that, Venetia seemed to know why her sister was so sad and looked so defeated.
"You saw Angelan last night, didn't you?" she said casually.
It was a tone so casual that Lucy felt it almost painful.
"Yes, I did," she answered, trying to sound detached. "They look quite happy, don't they?"
Venetia knew Lucy knew that Angelan was a strigoï, for Lucy was a dhampyr too.
"Quite the perfect couple, I would say," she concluded ironically.
She left on those words and Lucy remained alone, understanding perfectly what her sister meant.
The following night, Venetia brought her sister with her, so Lucy would really meet Angelan. The effect was not the one Venetia had expected: even if Angelan's eyes were always following Beth-Lynn, he was so kind naturally that Lucy was definitively lost. She hid her pain, feeling envious, but not jealous of Beth-Lynn.
Lucy got used to come with Venetia; while Beth-Lynn was with Angelan, Lucy was following her sister, but when Beth-Lynn left her strigoï to become back the huntress, then Lucy was spending ten or fifteen minutes with Angelan before going home. These moments were both joy and torture for Lucy, but she never let Angelan know it.
Then Beth-Lynn seemed to awake from a long sleep and she realised who was Angelan: a strigoï. And she was a strigoï huntress, like Venetia. So, torn between her love for the handsome strigoï and her hate for his kind, Beth-Lynn began to go away a bit from Angelan, but she was so clumsy in this situation where she was ill at ease that everybody noticed it from the first night. Venetia threw a dark glance to Beth-Lynn, muttered something under her breath and disappeared in the night. Beth-Lynn, embarrassed, mumbled something too and followed Venetia quickly, while Angelan's broad shoulders fell heavily and his eyes filled with sadness. This night, Lucy stayed longer with the strigoï, trying to console him, even if he barely acknowledged her presence.

The catastrophe had to come. Venetia was already hunting and Lucy was about to knock at Angelan's door when she heard Beth-Lynn's last words:
"It's the only way. I... we can't stay longer like this. Say it and you'll see me again."
Only the silence answered, then the broken voice of Angelan said:
"How can you ask such things of me when you still love me? Will you dare to deny it too?"
"God, Angelan, don't you see there's no way forward for us?" shouted Beth-Lynn.
Again, the silence.
"Say you don't love me," she continued, almost imploring, "and I'll stay."
Silence. Beth-Lynn understood and put her hand on the door's handle.
"Beth-Lynn, take your stake in your hand," commanded Angelan.
"What?"
"Take it. I know you have one in the small of your back."
"What do you want me to do with it?"
"Well, what does one usually do with a stake when there's a strigoï in the same room?"
"No! I won't do that!"
"If you're leaving me, do it, please, as the last proof of your love for me."
"No! If you want to die, ask Venetia!"
Beth-Lynn fled and Lucy entered silently. Angelan was seated, his head in his hands, sorrow's personification. She came to him and took him in her arms, rocking him gently against her. Almost unconsciously, she forced him to lay his head on her shoulder, so that he had his face nuzzling her neck. She pressed gently his mouth against her throat, but he turned the head - with some difficulties.
"I can't do that, Lucy."
"Go on, Angelan. You won't harm me, I trust you," she coaxed him. "Go on, you need it."
She felt the fangs on her throat and she closed the eyes during the sharp pain. She felt him drinking her blood but she tried to think that he had his lips against her throat, she tried to think of the man, not of the strigoï. Angelan stayed a moment resting his head on Lucy's shoulder then, remembering who she was, he stepped back. He was obviously feeling better.
"Thank you, Lucy. It meant a great deal to me."
"I know, Angelan."
"Lucy, would you..."
"No, Angelan, don't count on me to give you eternal rest," said firmly Lucy, shaking the head. "I didn't give you blood - my blood - to kill you ten seconds after. If you really wanted to die, you'd have drunk my blood to your heart's content and killed me. Then you would have been sure Venetia would have killed you."
"You're not responsible for my misery, Lucy. And I'd have killed myself before, of sorrow. Go home now, Lucy, you don't belong to my darkness..."
"Don't try any foolishness behind my back!" she warned him. "Oh, and don't ask Venetia as Beth-Lynn told you to. It would only be a pretext for Beth-Lynn to reject the fault on someone else because she's too coward to kill you by herself."
Her eyes were as bright as Angelan's, but totally unfocused, and she felt dizzy. She managed somehow to get back home and there, she waited for Venetia's return, sure that her sister would have gone to see Angelan.
Venetia came back after the first sunbeams and she found her little sister asleep in front of the table, head on her crossed arms. Lucy awoke almost immediately. Venetia stared at her a moment and the said:
"You don't need to wear high collars with me, Lucy. I know what happened. There's nothing about you or strigoïs you can hope to hide to me."
Lucy had an embarrassed laugh.
"How's Angelan?"
"Bad. I never thought Beth-Lynn would act like that with him. I didn't leave him before sunrise and I made him promise to be reasonable."
"And what if he isn't?"
"Then he'll learn what can happen to a strigoï disobeying to a dhampyr!" said Venetia fiercely. "That's not something I would advise my enemy to do!"
She fell into an armchair, closed the eyes and sighed.
"God! I'm exhausted. I have three fools to care of!"
"Three?" repeated Lucy, trying to sound unconcerned.
"Don't act the innocent with me, Lucy," Venetia warned her severely, opening one eye. "I don't like this little game and I'm in bad mood today."
Her eyes narrowed as she was staring at her little sister.
"Be careful, Lucy. I don't know if you're right or not in what you're doing, but I won't forbid you to do it. I tried all my life to protect you from strigoïs, perhaps I shouldn't have, but that's what I did. Whatever, be careful; I couldn't stand to lose you. Don't give too much blood each time and don't give it too often. And be careful with humans; if people know you're nourishing the strigoïs, they could kill you."
Lucy was thunderstruck by Venetia's understanding. She threw herself on her older sister's neck.
"I thought you would be mad at me!" she said. "You never stop to surprise me."
Venetia smiled sadly.
"Please be careful," she repeated softly and she left.
Lucy hadn't protested that she only had nourished Angelan, for her sister's words forced her to acknowledge something she had tried to hide to herself: she wasn't going to nourish only Angelan, but all the others she could too. Perhaps there wouldn't be any need to kill them if they were pacific. What was her life - and blood - compared to peace?
Venetia left the house before sunset, quite early comparing to the other days - nights - but Lucy knew why. The elder sister threw a small jar of balm to Lucy.
"It helps for the healing," she merely said, closing the door behind her.
Lucy took it and spread some on the marks left by Angelan's fangs on her throat. She left later and, on her way, she met two strigoïs.
"Isn't that the one our executioner protects so well?' said the first with a greedy tone.
"I'm Venetia's sister," agreed Lucy, "but I don't think you'll harm me, for I'll give you what you want."
And trustingly, she offered them her throat. The two strigoïs saw Angelan's marks on her neck and, almost clumsily, they drank two little sips each. Lucy continued her way, walking dizzily, but with two new friends.
Angelan was alone when she reached his house. She hid the marks on her throat and entered to greet him. He raised the head when hearing her and replied absent-mindedly.
"Is that a way to greet a friend?" she asked, feigning to be angry.
"I'm sorry," he sighed. "But Beth-Lynn didn't come today... it's the first time..."
She took him silently in her arms, his head against her shoulder. He smelled the blood her collar barely hid and began the transformation into a strigoï despite himself. She felt it and jerked away.
"You... you're afraid of me?" he asked, obviously hurt, reversing the transformation.
"No! No, I'm not... It's just... I can't give you blood tonight, please understand it!"
"I understand it perfectly. I should never have agreed yesterday. I won't drink again your blood."
"Yes, you will. Aren't I your... friend? And I belong heart and soul to my friends. Heart, soul, and blood. My blood is yours."
"Lucy, Lucy!" he said, distraught. "Don't say such things, you're too trusting! Someone could harm you and this someone could perfectly be me."
"Of course not!" she replied casually "For Venetia'll go mad with anger and hate and I pity the poor strigoï she will find on her way that day!"
Despite himself, Angelan smiled.
"You little pixie!" he said.
She smiled back. Despite her weariness, she stayed late this night, seated next to Angelan, sometimes holding his hand to press it in her slim fingers to assure him of her sympathy. Beth-Lynn didn't come and Venetia told Lucy in the morning they had been together all night.
The following nights were pretty much the same. Beth-Lynn didn't appear, not once, and Venetia came back home after sunrise, totally exhausted. She didn't sleep much during the day and not at all during the night. Angelan seemed to have forgotten his desire to die or, at least, under Venetia's adamantine gaze, he played the security card. Lucy didn't change a thing to her new habits. Each evening, she went to Angelan's and offered trustingly her throat to every strigoï she met. Venetia complained sometimes it gave her less work.

One night, Lucy found Angelan totally distressed.
"Angelan?" she said softly. "What happened?"
"It's Beth-Lynn," he answered with a choked voice. "She came tonight. She left five minutes ago."
"Isn't that supposed to make you happy?"
"Well, yes, I guess, but... she said such things..."
Understanding she wouldn't learn much, Lucy took him in her arms and offered him her throat. She hadn't given blood yet that night and it was so much the better, for Angelan forgot himself and drank with large gulps. He was so sad, so defeated, that he didn't see how Lucy swayed when he stepped back. She went back home almost immediately, trusting her sister to be there for Angelan.
Venetia found her in her bed and sat near her. Lucy's face was pale and on her throat, the marks shone like ruby.
"He drank too much, didn't he?"
"Yes. Is that so obvious?"
"For me, yes. Especially when I saw him. I had only to take one look at him to know exactly what happened. He was so ashamed of himself and, in the same time, his eyes were bright as ever. He tried to drown his sorrow with blood."
"I guess you're right," sighed Lucy. "What happened tonight?"
"Beth-Lynn was obnoxious. She almost accused Angelan to be still alive! I had to draw her away, for I thought Angelan would kill her - or collapse weeping."
"What do you do with him each night?" asked Lucy, curious.
"Training," shrugged Venetia. "It forces him to concentrate on something else. Rest tonight, Lucy. I'll explain it to Angelan and if there's still problems, I can offer him my blood."
"It's against all you believe in!"
"I know, Lucy, but Beth-Lynn and you aren't the only ones to hold the unhappy privilege of a bad-chosen love."
She left her sister's bedroom on those words. Lucy understood what she meant: Venetia was engaged to Duncan, the young priest of Chyraz. Even if Chyraz, somehow god of life, didn't see the strigoïs with a good eye since they stole life from others, he was too the god of creation and destroying any being couldn't please him. Duncan wasn't happy at all with Venetia's occupations for the night: she killed a race where they were not many and, most over, she simply killed.
When Venetia first met Duncan, the fire in the girl's eyes wasn't reassuring at all: the priests of Chyraz mostly saw her as a professional killer and she expected no kindness from one of them. This very night, she was bleeding from a bad wound and she was restraining her cries of pain. When she saw Duncan, she straightened up, refusing to show her weakness. Her stake appeared in her hand almost instantly, but the young priest soothed her:
"Calm down, my lady, I'm not here to fight with you, but to help you."
"None of yours ever helped me!" spitted Venetia. "Why would you begin?"
"Perhaps because you need help," answered calmly Duncan. "Or maybe because you're lovely."
Taken aback by this answer she didn't expected, Venetia remained speechless. Duncan took advantage of her silence to care for her wound and then, he raised his eyes toward her. Troubled, he said softly:
"Your eyes are opened on death..."
"As long as it's not mine, I don't care a bit!" she replied aggressively.
"No, not yours. Mine..."
"What?"
"Your eyes are opened on my death..." he repeated obligingly. "But I don't care a bit, as you said yourself."
After that, Venetia often met Duncan in the night and, each time, the young priest was gentle with her, treating her if she was hurt, teasing her when her mood was dark and, as time passed by, Venetia became less and less defiant with him. They began to meet during the day, under the sunlight, until the day when Duncan declared his passion to her. First shocked - she hadn't the faintest idea of his feelings for her - Venetia realised soon she loved him too. But even so, she refused to stop her nightly hunts.

During two days, Lucy stayed at home, for Angelan had drunk too much of her blood and she needed rest. Venetia told her of Angelan's worry, of Beth-Lynn's sympathy and even of some strigoïs' concern. Lucy marvelled at those news.
"You didn't kill them?"
"They came to me in peace. Your friends are my friends, Lucy, even if they are strigoïs," replied Venetia, visibly hurt.
"I'm sorry, Viny," apologised immediately her sister.
Venetia shrugged. Lucy noticed how dark her eyes were and how tired her face was: she was exhausting herself for the sake of her friends.
"Did Angelan ask for blood?"
"No, he didn't. He's still ashamed for what he did to you."
"Stupid," sneered Lucy.
"Not so," answered Venetia softly.
As she was leaving, Lucy called her back.
"Viny! If it happened to me... what you fear, would you please give me the eternal rest?"
Venetia remained silent.
"Even if in two weeks I tell you to let me become loajnice, don't listen. Do you promise it to me?"
"Yes, Lucy, I swear it to you. Never will you be a strigoaïca, never... if I'm still alive then."
The third night, Lucy went to Angelan's. On her way, three calls rang out at the same time:
"It's her!" shouted a human.
"Lucy! At least!" said a strigoï with relief.
"Lucy," greeted calmly Duncan.
They watched each other with undisguised hatred. Lucy was in the middle of them: two humans, quite obviously hostile, Duncan and a strigoï called Gerkelan.
"You're a strigoaïca!" accused one of the humans.
"The worse," emphasised his friend.
"I'm not a strigoaïca," said Lucy, shaking the head. "I'm a dhampyr, like my sister."
"Your sister is useful to us. You're not," said flatly the first one.
Hearing his menacing tone, Gerkelan moved toward Lucy, ready to protect her. It would have degenerated, hadn't Duncan intervened.
"Lucy, Chyraz bless thee through me," he said softly.
The humans stopped dead.
"Father, I obey to Chyraz," answered Lucy.
One look from the humans to Duncan was enough to assure them he would defend Lucy. They were destabilised for the priest of Chyraz couldn't just stand for a strigoaïca or a friend of the strigoïs! Was thus Lucy right in her acting? Deeply disturbed, they left without a word. Duncan turned to Lucy.
"I didn't see Venetia lastly. Is there a problem?"
He failed to sound unconcerned and Lucy tried to comfort him.
"She's exhausted. I wasn't better myself this week, but now, I'm fine, so I'll help her and she'll have more time."
Duncan agreed silently and left in turn. Gerkelan accompanied Lucy at Angelan's and left her at his door, without asking a single drop of blood.

Gerkelan had a precise idea in mind. He went straight to the cemetery behind Angelan's. Venetia was there, fighting against two big strigoïs Gerkelan had never seen before. Beth-Lynn was nowhere in sight. The strigoï couldn't help but think bitterly that Venetia did all the work alone. He let her conclude her fight before coming toward her. It was a rule that every strigoï friend of Lucy had learnt very quickly: to never disturb Venetia during her work. It was as dangerous for her as for the strigoï who tried to help her.
"Hello, Gerkelan," she said casually, sending her hair in her back. "What's up?"
He sat on a grave while she stood before him.
"It's Lucy. I mean... it's about Lucy. She invented this story of giving blood only to cover the fact she nourishes Angelan, didn't she?"
"At first, I thought like you. But no. Of course, Lucy's aim is first to nourish Angelan, but she's far too naïve to understand she'll die if she continues so. She can't nourish the whole strigoï community."
"I won't let her give me blood again," said suddenly Gerkelan. "It's not because she's my friend or because I fear you, it's because Angelan's like a mad man... strigoï. Just imagine if she had nourished two of us - or even only one - and that Angelan had an outburst: she wouldn't - couldn't - refuse him her blood and it would kill her."
"Yes, I know," agreed Venetia.
Her calm - almost fatalism - warned Gerkelan; what he had imagined was not a fancy at all, if not, Venetia would have laughed in his face.
"Can I help you?" he asked softly.
"No. But I can help you."
And she offered him her throat, in the same trusting gesture as Lucy. Gerkelan stared at her in wild disbelief.
"Go on, Gerkelan," said Venetia patiently. "We won't spend the night at it, will we? I'd be very sorry if other strigoïs saw me."
So Gerkelan obeyed. Venetia's blood had a taste Lucy's hadn't, quite strong, almost like a strong alcohol, but so much reviving... Gerkelan almost felt drunk.
"Why did you do that, Venetia?" he asked, his eyes shining like stars.
She put her fingers on the marks so that the blood would stop to flow.
"Why, you're Lucy's friend, so I can't kill you, can I? And I can't let you look for blood elsewhere, for I'd be forced to kill you. So, it was the only solution."
Gerkelan remained frozen when Venetia left.

At Angelan's, Lucy was training with the strigoï. She had had the idea of doing the same as Venetia, so that Angelan wouldn't think all the time to Beth-Lynn and her betrayal. At the end, both were thirsty and Lucy, naturally, trustingly, offered her throat to Angelan. She didn't feel anymore the thrill when his lips touched her neck: she had felt so many lips, so many fangs! But Angelan smiled slightly, shook the head and took her left wrist. He lifted it to his lips, never taking his eyes off her and she felt his fangs piercing her skin, but so light was the touch that it was almost like a soft caress. She swallowed back a gasp before letting Angelan know how it affected her heartbeat.
"I think you'll be less hurt this way," he said gently.
"But you have less blood," she objected, still trying to discipline her wild heartbeats.
"It doesn't matter, but you matter."
Lucy remained speechless.
"Why do you care for me, Lucy?" asked suddenly Angelan.
She started.
"You're my friend, Angelan. I'm not used to let my friends fade away."
"You're a dhampyr. You shouldn't be the friend of a strigoï, should you?"
"I guess so, but I met you through Beth-Lynn and, in spite of her current activities, she's not a dhampyr."
"No, but she's alive and I'm not..."
"Stop these silly things! Of course you're alive, but in another way."
"Are there more than one way to be alive?" asked Angelan, intrigued.
"Now, there are," smirked Lucy.
"You really are a pixie, are you not? But I don't want to know who you were exchanged for in your cradle!"
"Probably a gentle little girl, with long blond hair and wide blue eyes, with a sweet, innocent smile... You would have liked her."
"I like you the way you are," retorted Angelan.
"Mm... That's nice," said Lucy in a purr.
"I'm someone nice," remarked the strigoï.
"I know," she replied softly, feeling a pang of anguish.

Text © Azrael 2000 - 2001.
Lady Sarista. Copyright © Stephanie Pui-Mun Law 1999. Used with permission.
Set Gothiquesque, from Moyra/Mystic PC 1998.