The Victorian Vampire: Chapter One: Introduction03:05 Dec 23 2005
Times Read: 502
The Victorian Vampire
By: Kagome Itoshime
Chapter One: Introduction
She sat there in her night dress, her knees together and feet apart on the top most step of the back porch of the shabby cottage home in 1692 Salem. She, a teenage angel with long blond hair that ghosted her shoulders and bright green eyes that shown the brightest of emeralds. The waxing moon shown bright on the black canvas of the night sky as the green eyes watched the moon with attentiveness. Her pale skin was aglow as if she herself were the moon glowing up high in the night sky. She thought about the hope, the belief that one day she may be able to escape the life of her grandparents home.
Anita stared high up at the moon, watching as the clouds threatened to devour it. Eventually, they did.
As the grey clouds slowly covered the sliver moon, her grandmother yelled for her company in the kitchen. She walked slowly as the translucent night dress softly caressed her baby-soft skinned body; by looking, it was obvious that her under garments were the least visible through the light weight night dress.
As she entered the kitchen doorway, her grandmother stood at the sink and washed the supper dishes.
"Yes Grandmother?" Anita asked as she slowly walked closer to her mother's mother, the woman who has been her guardian sense she was only eight years of age.
"Dear, why are you so blue? You have been quiet, as if thinking deeply, and loaning out everyone in this house. Why?" the elderly woman asked sympathetically as she halted her efforts of the dishes.
"Grandmother, I'm not sad at all. And when I am alone, I am not thinking, just looking." the young girl whispered, sounding somewhat detached from the moment.
"Please don't tell me this is related to the sudden upbringing of the happenings of your mother and father's deaths. All the words about are lies. They were not witches or vampires taken by the devil for freedom." Tears came to the elder woman's eyes as she spoke of her daughter and son-in-law, who were now seven years dead.
"Grandmother! Please! Don't upset yourself! This mood of mine, it is unrelated to the lies about my mother and father! I want to know the meaning of life! The reason why we are all her and suffer the ways we do!" Tears slowly filled the young girl's eyes as she cried out the very thoughts that she had been having over the last fortnight. "I know my parents were not witches or vampires! They were wonderful! Nice, beautiful and caring people!" the young girl yelled passionately at her grandmother.
"Ann, I know! You really have no need to tell me how my daughter was! I know she was wonderful! I raised her!" the elder woman cried of guilt for yelling at her only grandchild.
"I'm going to bed! Leave me alone!" Anita yelled as she ran down the short hallway to her bed chamber, slamming the hollow wooden door behind her, crying the whole time.
She ran over to her bed, an almost royal looking canopy and frame that held a large, full size cot, large enough for two people to sleep comfortably upon. She threw herself down upon the soft goose feather comforter and cried all her hearts tears onto her pillow.
Then she stopped. Her echoed cries died away from her chamber and she lay still, all her hearts desire still concentrated on her wish to be free. But she knew she could never have it.
But what was this feeling? Could someone really be watching her as she lay upon her bed crying? Yes, but this presence was not that of her grandmothers, a somewhat foreboding stranger that was new to her senses.
Tears began to fill her eyes once more. Her half open window with the black curtains, which lay still, eerily unmoved.
Was there really a foreboding presence lurking about the yard? Or wheat field perhaps? She lay still once more, fearful as to the happenings if she moved.
She lay one her bed crying softly as the wind blew gently through the open window, the curtains swaying. Then, as if she could see the other presence, she sat up on her bed and rose slowly.
As she walked closer to the window, she saw a shadowy figure just sight able by the moonlight. He was like a beckoned figure, almost as if he were drawing her closer, making her want to crawl through the half open window and follow him through the night. But she knew she could not. It would never be allowed by her grandparents.
But the shadowy man suddenly raised his hand to her, as if calling for her company silently.
'Come my dear. Join me...' was the silky, calm, becoming voice that filled the young girl's thoughts. The next she could tell, she was almost to him, standing in the middle of her grandparent's wheat field.
'Thank you for coming to me.' said the man, whom now Anita could tell was a fairly tall, brown haired boy who could be no older then twenty-five. As he spoke, his lips never moved. It was almost like he spoke to her right through her mind. Like magic, he told her to grab hold of her hand and walk together into the dark woods.
After awhile, at which she could tell by the position of the moon in the sky, she looked behind to their trail on the forest floor and up to where her cabin home had been, but could no longer be seen.
"Where are we now?" she softly asked as they continued walking, now with somewhat difficulty. After she spoke and gained no response, she began to shiver in the summer breeze, frightened at what may happen next.
After their mysterious man never answered, she stopped walking, and it seemed he stopped in line with her.
'What is the matter?' he asked her in his sweet, silky voice, though without moving his lips once more.
"Why don't you speak to me? You never move your lips when you speak to me! Who are you? Why are you bringing me out to the middle of these woods?" her eyes began to tear as she asked these seemingly pointless questions to the mysterious man, "Are you going to kill me?"
"No." came a strangely rough voice, but still from the mysteriously beautiful man. She was a bit shocked when he replied by moving his lips. They did move as he spoke, she noticed thought, that the top lip never seemed to reveal any upper teeth. "My intentions were never to kill you, but free you."
"Free me?" she asked innocently as if she were still crying on her bed, wishing to be free of her grandparent's home. But before she could clear her mind and thoughts, the man grabbed her by behind the knees and the back, holding her fragile body in his arms; not even without a second thought, he continued walking. "Where are we going?" She was calmer now, yet the tears still stained her freshly wet face as she spoke.
"To my home, you do not mind, do you?" he asked, his voice sounding even more innocent then a normal twenty-five year old. He spoke with an unknown wiseness, like that of an elder man. He looked and sounded as if he had yet to end his maturing stage of life.
"Your home? You live out here?" she asked as they walked, slower now it seemed; by many trees and bushes they passed until a small cabin was visible just yards before the pair.
"Yes I do. But you're the first to know in years." he said kindly as he set the girl back down on her own feet and put his hand on the small rusted doorhandle. "You don't mind not telling anybody, do you?" he asked the fair maiden as she looked into the man's eyes, almost like she were in a trance. But with this lock at which they held, Anita was able to tell that the man had dark brown eyes, so dark they almost looked black.
The space at which they stood upon was illuminated by a flame that sat alight on it's own stand on the left of the door.
"Of course. But why be so secretive? Don't you wish to share your knowledge? Let everybody know about your intellect?" she asked with a shy, almost whisper that suggested she felt uncomfortable in the unknown man's presence.
"There are so many things you don't know about me, but I must say, you shall know these secrets before long. I have many reasons for my seclusion." he told her as he smiled a closed mouth smile that still shown no teeth.
"Do you believe in magical creatures?" Anita asked as the man opened his door for her. His eyes opened wide as he received the question in his mind. Had she found out one of his many secrets? By all saying, anything was totally possible.
"Magical creatures? As in unicorns and fairies?" he asked jokingly as he closed the door. Anita kept walking until she felt the warmth of the fire in the middle of the tiny, shabby shack.
"Of course not silly. I mean vampire and witches. Do you believe that they really exist?" she asked quietly as she sat in the seat that was offered to her by the man; In the firelight, she could now see that he seemed pale. He looked as if he had been ill for weeks.
"Vampire and witches, huh?" he asked in response as he silently laughed at the ironicness of the situation.
He pulled up a molding, broken chair from a dark corner of the shack and set it next to that of Anita's.
"I must say," he pondered as he basked in the warm aura of the fire, "your question seems beyond your years. If I were you, I would not worry about anything like that."
"Mister, please don't dodge the question. Do you or do you not believe in the existence of vampires and witches?" she asked now with a bit more demand and impatience. She still shivered as if she were alone in the woods in the middle of the winter season.
“If you put it in that form of words, then I must be honest and admit that I do in fact believe in vampires and witches." he answered the young girls inquiry honestly as he starred deeply into the fire. "For summer, you know, you're quite cold. Are you ill?" he asked suddenly as he turned to the girl.
While he starred interestingly at the fragile young maiden next to him, he took notice that he could clearly see her personal areas through her night dress.
"I'm not ill, only cold and a bit embarrassed." she shyly whispered out as she shivered once more, and drew her knees tightly to her chest, her heels resting comfortably on the edge of the chair at which she sat upon.
The man brashly stood up, frightening Anita just enough to make her jump; he took no notice. He walked to the closet and opened up to a large, dark room where nothing was visible.
He disappeared within the darkness for a moment before reappearing moments later with an aged petty coat.
"Here, please put this on Anita." he said dryly as he handed the coat to her. She slowly looked up from the fire and reached out for the coat.
She stood up and pulled the coat over her arms and shoulders. It was black and reeked with the stench of age, but for some odd reason she seemed to believe that it looked somewhat becoming on her.
"Dance with me?" he asked her as she looked herself up and down, turning around to see how the coat accented her fragile form.
"Huh?" she asked stupidly as she stopped moving and looking about herself to look stupidly into the unknown man's eyes.
He reached out his hand as if formally asking, "Please allow me to have this dance?"
Anita blushed heavily as she shyly reached out her hand and softly laid her fingers on the palm of the man's.
"Please don't be embarrassed. I promise I won't hurt you. I just want to dance." he whispered softly, almost seductively, as he placed his hand on the small of her back and pulled her closer to his body. He then took hold of her hand and placed it upon his own shoulder. With his only free open hand, he held her own free hand in a waltz dance stance.
"Just step with me and count the steps." he softly whispered into Anita's ear as he perfectly stepped to the dance.
"Th- there's no music though." she softly, but obviously stated as they slowly waltzed around the warm fire.
"We can dance to our own music, can't we?" he asked as he stopped dancing and looked deeply into Anita's eyes; he held her tightly as he attempted to understand her current thoughts.
"It's almost morning." Anita said suddenly after three hours of staying locked eye to eye with the man. "I should really be back in my chambers before my grandparents awaken." she told him respectively as she warmed her hands over the fire as the man waited by the door.
After the long walk back to Anita's cottage home, the man held her in a shockingly tight embrace. The strength he accidentally exerted made Anita squeak, and he jumped when he heard that.
"I'm so sorry! Sometimes I forget how strong I am!" he apologetized overzealously as he softly held her.
"It's alright, really." she breathed as she gently rubbed her head on his chest; she still wore his long black petty coat.
"Can I come see you tomorrow night as well?" he asked like an innocent child desperate for attention.
She gently giggled before looking up into the man's eyes. "I suppose you may, but I must be frank and say I really have no idea what your name is." she told him as he reacted utterly shocked.
"I'm sorry!" he apologized happily, "I really thought I had told you my name already!" he cleared his throught proudly before saying, "My name is Phillip Renaldi IV." He bowed respectively as if he were introducing himself to the princess of many worlds.
"Phillip Renaldi." she spoke aloud to herself as she slowly stepped back to her cabin home. When she made it all the way to her window, which was her point of exit, she turned around to look back at the very spot of the wheat field where Mr. Renaldi still stood, perhaps waiting for her to enter her home.
She waved back to him abashidly, and he waved just the same. Anita carefully climbed back through her window and looked out once more at the wheat field, just as she had done earlier that night, but there was no distant sight of the man for her eyes to behold.
Disappointedly, she turned away from the window to absorb up the fair sight of her always clean bed chamber. Her door was still bolted, her bed just the bit ruffled as she had left it, and her dresses... Her dresses?
"What?" she softly spoke aloud to herself as she carefully tip-toed to the now open closet that stood next to her clothing chest. Inside, on a fine-polished wooden hanger hung a beautiful pearl embroidered gown, with a note pinned to the chest with a sewing needle.
"Dearest of Angles," the note read, "I bestow this royally fashioned gown upon you, for you to wear and take care of." The writing of the letter was fairly old English, with the curve at the end of every word. "I please ask," she continued to read, "that you wear this pearl gown to bed tomorrow night. From there, I will come to you, and request your dance in a three piece tuxedo. Great evening to you and best wishes, Phillip Renaldi." concluded the letter with a fancy signature on the bottom.
She read the note over two more times before she set it upon her chest and withdrew the gown from the closet. The flow of the gown as she set it against her body to see the effect on her.
Anita spun around gracefully as she held the gown against her. Then it came to her, like water falling from a high mountain range to a low valley. This beautiful gown was hers.
Quickly, without thinking about one thing more, she slipped off the petty coat, throwing it softly on the floor at the foot of the bed, then slipped out of her translucent night dress, which fell quietly to the floor at her feet. She climbed into the gown and pulled it over herself.
Latching up the back, she starred oddly at her reflection, and the way it gave her a blessed, heavenly look.
The gown length reached her toes, and ghosted the floor. Her angelic blond hair whispered against the pearls on the small of her back, gracing her with an odd, immortal aura.
She spun once. Twice, three times.
The beauty of the frill as she spun, gave her a whole new thought of the gown. This dress was, could never have been, any ordinary piece of clothing.
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