Ray is not home when I get there. Our residence is new, obviously, since my original house blew up with Yaksha inside. Our modern mansion in the woods is not far from the old house. It has many electronic conveniences, a view of the ocean, and heavy drapes to block out the midday sun. More than any other vampire I have known, Ray is the most excruciatingly sensitive to the sun. He is made like a Bram Stoker model vampire out of old legends. Many things about his new existence trouble him. He misses his school friends, his old girlfriend, and especially his father. But I can give him none of these things-certainly not his father, since it was I who killed the man. I can only give him my love, which I dreamed would be enough.
I am only in the house two minutes before I am back in my car looking for him. Dawn is an hour away.
I find him sitting on his ex-lover's porch, but Pat McQueen is unaware of his nearness. Along with her parents, she is sleeping inside. I know she thinks Ray perished in the blast that supposedly took my life, too. He sits with his head buried in his knees and doesn't even bother to look up as I approach. I let out a sigh.
"What if I was a cop?" I ask.
He looks up, his melancholy consuming his beauty. Yet my heart aches to see him again; it has ached ever since he entered my life, both the physical heart and the emotional one. Radha, Krishna's friend, once told me that longing is older than love, and that one cannot exist without the other. Her name, in fact, meant longing, and Krishna's meant love. But I never saw how their relationship tortured them the way my passion for Ray does me. I have given him the kingdom of eternal night, and all he wants to do is take a walk under the sun. I note his weakness, his hunger. Six weeks and I am still forcing him to feed, even though we don't harm or kill our meals. He doesn't look happy to see me, and that saddens me more.
"If you were a cop," he says, "I could easily disarm you."
"And create a scene doing it."
He nods to the blood on my top. "It looks as if you have created a scene or two tonight" When I don't respond, he adds, "How was Los Angeles?"
"I'll tell you back at the house." I turn. "Come."
"No."
I stop, glance back over my shoulder. "The sun will be up soon."
"I don't care."
"You will when you see it." He doesn't answer me. I go and sit beside him, put my arm around his shoul?der. "Is it Pat? You can talk to her, you know, if you must. I just think it's a bad idea."
He shakes his head. "I cannot talk to her."
"Then what are you doing here?"
He stares at me. "I come here because I have nowhere else to grieve."
"Ray."
"I mean, I don't know where my father's buried." He turns away and shrugs. "It doesn't matter. It's all gone."
I take his hand; he barely lets me. "I can take you to where I buried your father. But it's just a hole in the ground, covered over. It will not help you."
He looks up at the stars. "Do you think there are vampires on other planets?"
"I don't know. Maybe. In some distant galaxy there might be a whole planet filled with vampires. This planet almost was."
He nods. "Except for Krishna."
"Yes. Except for him."
He continues to stare at the sky. "If there were such a planet, where there were only vampires, it would not survive long. They would destroy one another." He looks at me. "Do I do that to you? Destroy you?"
I shake my head sadly. "No. You give me a great deal. I just wish I knew what to give you in return, to help you forget."
He smiles gently. "I don't want to forget, Sita. And maybe that is my problem." He pauses. "Take me to his grave. We won't stay long."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
I stand, offer him my hand. "Very well."
We drive into the woods. I lead him through the trees. I remember the spot where I buried P.I. Michael Riley, of course-I remember everything. Also, I smell the faint fumes of his decaying body as they seep up from beneath six feet of earth. I fear Ray smells them as well. The life of a vampire is a life of many corpses; they do not invoke in me the strong emotions they do in most humans. Ray drops to his knees as we reach the spot, and I retreat a few dozen feet because I want him to be alone with his emotions-a caldron of sorrows. I am still too weak to let them wash over me. Or else I am too guilty. I hear Ray weep dry tears on a missing tombstone.
My two most recent wounds have completely healed, but my chest continues to burn. I remember the night Ray pulled the stake from my heart while my house burned nearby. Barely conscious, I didn't know if I would live or die, and for the next three days Ray didn't, either. Because even though my wound closed quickly, I remained unconscious. All that time I had die most extraordinary dream.
I was in a starship flying through space. Ray was beside me and our destination was the Pleiades star cluster, the Seven Sisters, as it is often called by astronomers. Outside our forward portals, we could see the blue-white stars growing steadily in size and brilliance, and although our journey was long, we were filled with excitement the whole time. Because we knew we were finally returning home to where we belonged, where we weren't vampires, but angels of light who lived on the radiance of the stars alone. The dream was painful to awaken from, and I still pray each time I lie down to sleep that it will return. The color of the stars reminded me of Krishna's eyes.
Ray spills his grief quickly. We are back in the car and headed for home as the eastern sky begins to lighten. My lover sits silently beside me, staring at nothing, and my own dark thoughts keep my lips closed. My energy is at a low, but I know I mustn't rest, not until I have formulated a plan to stop the black plague spreading six hundred miles south of us. He of the wicked eyes will make more vampires the next night, I know. Replacements for the ones I destroyed. And they in turn will make their own. Each day, each hour, is crucial. The human race is in danger. Krishna, I pray, give me the strength to destroy this enemy. Give me the strength not to destroy myself.
As Ray lies down to rest, I let him drink from my veins, a little, enough to get him through the day. Even that mouthful drains me more. Yet I do not lie down beside him as he closes his eyes to sleep. Let him dream of his father, I think. I will tell him of Los Angeles later.
I visit my friend Seymour Dorsten. Twice I have seen him since I destroyed the AIDS virus in his blood with a few drops of mine. His health is greatly improved. He has a girlfriend now and I tell him I am jealous, but he doesn't believe me. I climb in his window and wake him by shoving him off his bed and onto the floor. He grins as his head contacts the hard wood with a loud thud. Only my Seymour would welcome such treatment.