William (10 page)

“W-what else?” I stammered, though in truth I
couldn’t have been more stunned by his sudden show of passion.

Merrick’s lips parted, but for a moment he
only stared, his gold and copper eyes wide in disbelief. “I’m
sorry,” he said at last, and shook his head as if he were still
beyond words. “I never imagined you would see it that way. But I
realize I was out of touch in more ways than I knew.”

“It’s just that you fought it so hard,” I
said quietly. “And I hear you have your reasons, but I don’t know
your demons. Or your memories. Or even the old habits you speak
of.”

Merrick stared at me in silence. Then,
glancing at the others on the balcony, he reluctantly let go of my
hand. “Of course you don’t,” he murmured, and for one unbearable
instant, his face was so fully possessed by sadness it seemed fit
to crumble into a thousand pieces. But then he shook his head and
raised his eyes to mine again with that stoic certainty he adopted
so well. “William, I have no excuse. I was already out of my mind
when I met you. But I swear to you I have wanted this since the
moment you fell down in the mud at my feet.” He paused. “Perhaps
the moment you stood upright, if I’m to be entirely honest about
it.”

A puff of laughter escaped me, though I was
just climbing out of that well of feelings I couldn’t seem to
drain. “Right,” I said. “Well, then I wager it was actually after I
had a bath.”

Merrick smiled gently. “You’re wrong.”

“I must seem like a child to you,” I said
with a sigh, leaning back in my chair. “Always asking for
comfort.”

“No, you don’t seem like a child. I’m quite
aware of how I’ve taxed your patience, not to mention your
curiosity.”

That did make me feel better, although I
remained doubtful that a two-and-a-half-century-old man would not
occasionally tire of my—well, exuberance. But never mind that. “I’m
sorry I interrupted you,” I said. “You were saying this life is
ruled by thirst.”

“How simply you put it!” Merrick laughed
softly. “You’re already much better at this than I ever was.” In
fact, my words did seem to relax him. “Yes. And that is no
exaggeration.” As if he’d ever exaggerated in his life. “The way
you reacted to the girl’s wrist is just a hint of what you’ll feel
in the real depths of the night, when your thirst is demanding. But
it is always with you, like a…” he stopped himself, hesitating.
“Like another being within you. Another animal all its own. And it
will make its own demands, exert its own will upon you, and there
will be times when you’ll feel you can do nothing but submit to it.
Do you understand?”

“Yes.” I grimaced, ambivalent. “Maybe?”

Merrick smiled slightly. Despite his
seriousness, the good cheer of the evening had returned, and the
conversation had regained a much more pleasant atmosphere. “You
will. I’m only warning you now, so that you’re not entirely taken
by it, when it happens.”

“Just a moment.” I backtracked slightly. “Do
you mean I’ll be more out of my head than that? How am I supposed
to keep my wits about me?”

“You won’t be out of your wits. Quite the
contrary. But once you set your sights on someone—once your thirst
sets your sights on someone—you will find it almost impossible to
resist.”

“So I must carefully set my sights?”

“That’s not exactly how it works,” Merrick
said reluctantly.

“How the Hell does it work?” I laughed,
feeling like I was stumbling over the rules of some complicated new
card game.

“Your feelings. Your emotions. Once the night
settles in, everything you feel will be tied to your thirst.
Affection might arouse it. Attraction might arouse it. Admiration.
And one will feed the other, back and forth, until you’re at their
mercy.”

“Hmm.” I pursed my lips thoughtfully. “I must
say it’s a bit difficult to imagine. I really lost my mind for a
moment when she reached over me like that. Surely you didn’t feel
that way every time you saw me before tonight.”

Merrick arched a brow and fixed me with a
look, and damned if goose bumps didn’t rise on my arms. “William,”
he said, and said it so weightily, so meaningfully, that it was
more than enough of an answer. But still he went on, sliding his
hand close to mine on the table. “I wanted you so badly,” he
murmured, “there were moments, when you were pressed against me,
when I was afraid I’d lose myself and devour you whole.”

My whole body tightened, and I shivered as
his words brought memories of our most intimate moments cascading
through me. Adding fuel to the fire was the knowledge that our
nights together would be different now that he was no longer afraid
of killing me. Strangely, my teeth were tingling at the thought,
and I had the distinct urge to take his hand and bite it.
Swallowing the wave of lust that had overwhelmed me for a moment, I
found refuge in another question. "Will I still thirst for you,
then?" I asked, "Whenever I feel affection toward you?"

Merrick was not always easy to read, but
there was the odd unguarded moment when I could look into his eyes
and have no doubt about his feelings. This was one of those
moments: the pleasure and desire in his eyes was dark and
exquisite. "Yes," he said. "At times you will."

"And can I drink your blood?" It wasn't just
my teeth. For a moment, my whole body buzzed with a hot, glittering
anticipation, which only deepened as I watched Merrick's amber gaze
move to my lips as if he was intrigued by the words they spoke.

"You can drink of me whenever you like," he
said softly, wrapping his fingers around his glass again. The rare
sight of his strong, elegant hands without their gloves always
delighted me, and now their naked beauty was almost unbearable.

"Would that sustain me?" I asked, after
taking a breath to calm my senses. We had all night, after all.
Yes. Steady on, for God’s sake. "Drinking your blood?"

Merrick shook his head. "It is too potent,
and tires the senses; not unlike liquor. And it does not dull the
real thirst."

The real thirst. Yes, now we were getting to
the meat of it. Funny—though I knew I had spent many long hours
worrying in agony over this, presently it did not seem all that
troubling. Indeed it appeared that nothing in the world could
dampen my spirits, not even the darkest prospect imaginable. Or,
what I had previously taken to be a dark prospect. I was not
altogether sure how I felt about it now, other than curious, and
perhaps something more intent than that. Perhaps.

"You once told me you drank animals from time
to time," I said, keeping my voice very soft, though the clamor of
the busy street below and the chatter of the other men gave us an
abundance of privacy. "Does that sustain you?"

Slowly, Merrick shook his head again. "It
does for a time, and it is better than nothing, for keeping one's
faculties in order. But you will gradually weaken, and again, it
does not dull the real thirst. Nothing does."

"I suspected as much." I worked my lower lip
gently between my teeth, testing their sharpness. They still felt
the same to me, only they buzzed pleasantly at the slightest
contact. "I could think of no other reason why you would live a
life you found so shameful, but that you had no choice."

Merrick lifted his eyebrows slightly. "Did it
not occur to you that I might simply be too weak to resist
temptation?"

"No, that did not occur to me."

"Your faith in me defies reason."

"So you say, but you've never made a reasoned
argument for that position."

Merrick laughed suddenly, revealing his
perfect white teeth.

"Faith," I repeated, smiling and taking up my
glass again. "Faith implies a lack of evidence."

"I shall have to mind my diction better, with
a companion so well versed in debate."

Finally I took a drink of wine, and nearly
choked. It was so good. The liquid hit my tongue like a strange
caress, and I felt a shiver as it slid down my throat. "Good God,"
I murmured, staring at the glass. "I was going to say how nice it
was that I could still enjoy a drink. No wonder you were always
having tea."

"It was all I could do.” He shook his head,
looking down on the street with an expression between bemusement
and astonishment. “You can’t imagine how glad I am to have you here
with me like this."

I looked from the wine to him, my heart
swelling. "The pleasure is entirely mine, Merrick."

"You would be mad to think so." Merrick
stretched out one of his legs beneath the table, pressing his knee
against mine.

Yes, I was in high spirits, and it was surely
no coincidence that I felt closer to him than I had ever felt
before. Whatever lay ahead, we were creatures of a kind, now. I was
his companion, bound to him more surely than those old papers of
indenture had ever bound me, and nothing could come between us now.
Even death had become a distant abstraction.

Our conversation was sparse for awhile as we
drank our wine, and as long as his leg was pressed against mine
like that, I was content to turn my attention to the street below.
The crowd had begun to change as the night settled in and the usual
pedestrians of the evening emerged for their activities. Men came
trickling into from the side streets that led to the docks,
funneling into the taverns, and the gentlewomen on the arms of
their husbands were replaced by ladies attired more purposefully
for darker hours. I watched in fascination as one such woman
attracted a young sailor: He fell in step beside her, leaning close
with some leering remark that she took with a practiced smile. She
let him keep pace with her, and by and by they disappeared around a
dark corner, almost certainly headed for some rented room—she was
dressed just slightly too well for an alleyway encounter, and
besides, the hour was early for that resort.

My attention was then drawn back to the
balcony where we sat. A trio of young men had come up, and they
exchanged a smattering of greetings with the others before settling
in at the table nearest to us. They were all plainly attired and
neatly groomed, and one carried a book that he placed upon the
table. Students, I guessed, perhaps from Harvard. I had always
envied the university life. What a fine thing it would be to study
the days away, gathering at night to discuss philosophical tracts
or economics, all the while smelling so warm and inviting. I found
myself testing my teeth with my tongue again.

"How do you find Boston?"

I blinked at Merrick's voice. I had been
staring at the young men, and was sure he had noticed. "Pardon me,"
I said, shaking my head slightly. "Yes. Boston. Delightful."

"I don't expect we'll stay for long." Merrick
refilled my glass. "A few weeks, perhaps. As I recall, you've long
been keen to travel. Is there anywhere in particular you long to
go?"

Was there! My head had long been filled with
dreams of adventure in exotic lands—I had, after all, once thought
to join a whaling crew. "I have a long list," I replied.

"I imagined as much." Merrick glanced at me
fondly. "That's very good."

"But what about you?" I asked, suddenly
perplexed. "You have been quite content to remain in one place for
all these years, have you not?"

"That," he replied, frowning slightly, "was
an uncommon situation."

"Well." Quite, I thought wryly, but of course
he meant something different. "Uncommon in what way?"

Merrick glanced at me again, and I briefly
worried that I had touched on another stubborn mystery before he
explained. "First, I was alone. If we were to stay in one place,
the two of us, things would become rather troublesome before long."
There was another pause. "It's better to move on before our
activities cause a stir in the community."

"Our activities," I said, underlining the
point without thinking, but the silence that followed made it all
the more clear that he was still not eager to discuss that one
critical matter. The thirst he’d described at length, but not yet
the drinking. Not the killing. Was he holding back because he
wanted me to feel it out for myself, as had always been his habit
as a teacher? Or was he wary of my reaction, as he had been for
those first weeks of our acquaintance, when he had withheld his
true nature from me until, after badgering him endlessly, I had
finally asked him straight?

I pondered the possibilities in his silence.
Perhaps there was a different reason. It could be that the matter
was simply unfit to be discussed on a tavern balcony. Maybe it was
unfit to be discussed at all, as some topics certainly were, at
least in polite company. But I could scarcely see how we could make
it much longer without addressing it plainly, at least once. After
all, we were together now, and surely it would not be long before
the next inevitable event came to pass.

For the moment I relented, deciding I could
summon the manners to at least wait until we were not quartered so
closely with members of the public. "Is it not difficult for you?"
I asked, carefully broaching another topic I had long wondered
about. "Working as a doctor?"

If I was not mistaken, Merrick looked vaguely
apologetic as I let the topic rest. "No, not in general." He seemed
to consider something for a moment, and then he lowered his voice
again. "No more difficult than it is for you to sit here now, in
the company of these people." Another pause. "I gather it is not
overly challenging."

"Not at all." Although, I did realize now
that it was hardly normal for me to be distracted by the scent of
those students whenever I took a deep breath—or to discern the
scent of students in the first place.

"It would be challenging," Merrick said, "if
you were thirsty." I could hear his discomfort in the halting way
he spoke that word. It was unlike him to be awkward, and
unfortunately, I was hardly in a position to put anyone at ease. I
supposed I might try?