"Remember."

The priest cried out as the night came back to him.  The vampire
Lucius, the confession, the reprieve.  The fear and horror he had
felt swamped him, a whole night's emotions in a single, stunning
instant.  His hands shook on the book in his lap as he remembered
the pain of the vampire, grieving for a daughter--a lover--long
gone.  

He looked up and knew it to be her.  It was Gwynedd, the other
vampire.  Were it not for her eyes and her unnatural stillness, she
would look like any well-brought up teenage girl.  She wore a long,
loose, light green dress than matched the color of her eyes.  Her
long blond hair was unbound and reflected and glowed with the dim
firelight in the room.  Like the vampire had said, she shone like
the sun.  A star was captured behind her eyes, trying to escape.

"I can see you know who I am," she said.  "That is good."

She spoke with the precise, formal intonation of someone for whom
English is not the native language.  Her voice had a soft lilt,
almost Irish- or Scottish-sounding.  It was soft but held an edge of
menace.

"What can I do for you?" he asked, consciously trying to still his
quivering hands.

"Lucius came to see you.  I heard what he told you," she said, still
standing perfectly still.  "Never once has he mentioned my name to
anyone else."  

She suddenly was across the room and seated in the leather armchair
next to his.  She sat as if she had always been in the chair before
the fire.  Only the settling of her dress around her ankles
indicated that she had moved.

"After more than fifteen hundred years, his shame was over-powered
by his guilt," she said, staring into the flickering fire.  "It was
interesting to hear his view of it."

"Isn't that what happened?" the priest asked.

"In a way," she said and turned her eyes to him.  "Lucius has always
had a selective memory."  

At first, he thought the fire was reflected in her eyes.  Then he
noticed that the color was wrong; it was too gold and not enough
orange.  Her eyes had changed color, as the other vampire's had. 
Was she here to kill him, then?  Was she here to finish what the
other vampire had left undone?

"I am not here to bring you death," she said, as if she read his
thoughts.  "I am as old as Lucius, but I spend less time among
mortals.  I do not put on a mask of mortality when it is not
required.  You know what I am; I need not hide."

As she spoke, he could see the glinting of long canines behind her
lips.  Her skin seemed paler as well, as if she had cast off a
glamour.  She no longer looked like a teenager at all, but some sort
of ancient alien being...which, after all, she was.

"Why are you here?" he asked the creature before him.

"To tell you my side of the story, of course," she said, a slight
smile flickering across her lips.  "Lucius told his tale; I wish to
tell mine."

She gazed at him as if she were waiting for something...permission,
perhaps.  He had no doubt he could be made to listen-the other
vampire had done that with his threats-but she seemed to _want_ him
to hear her tale.  And, even knowing that he could be killed for it,
or never remember it after this one night, he discovered that he
wanted to know.

She nodded her head, again anticipating his thoughts.  The vampire
turned her eyes to the fire and lost herself in the contemplation of
the flames.  She did not move-her eyes never blinked or flickered,
she made no nervous, fidgety movements.  She was a statue.  When she
finally spoke, it was unexpected.  

"I had sensed him outside of my home for hours.  I could not tell
you how I knew he was there then any more that I could now.  His
presence was simply obvious to me," she said, only her lips moving
in her uncanny stillness.  "I do not know why I waited for so long
to come out.  Perhaps I was afraid.  

"I had known no others of my kind save my ancient master.  He had
been a good, kind man, but he had warned me that not all of our kind
were such.  There was another, his brother, who was as evil as my
master had been good.  This other vampire had worshipped death and
pain, and my master showed me his face through his blood, that I
would know him if I ever encountered him.  I did not know if this
vampire who lay in wait for me was this evil one.    

"But I grew hungry and bored underground.  I had not fed for several
nights, being too busy with healing peasants to take time out to
feed.  I finally decided to leave, regardless of who I would face. 
In any case, I sensed no evil, no harm from the one above-only
curiosity.

"This decision made, I put on my cloak and was in the clearing in
the time it would take a mortal to blink.  I closed the door behind
me and turned to where the other presence was.  

"'Well,' I called out, 'have you sat out there long enough?  I will
hunt; do you wish to join me?'
 
"When there was no response, I wondered if he had understood me.  I
had used the Latin that I had learned from my master, as it was the
common language of that time.  It was unlikely that he would know my
language, unless he were one of my people.  Even then, fewer spoke
it each year, and even the peasants' speech was laced with Latin.

"I was about to call out again when he stepped into the clearing. 
He was a tall man, taller than I, unusual for the Roman that his
face and bearing showed him to be.  He was dressed in Celtic wool
trousers and tunic; that was unusual as well.  His eyes were a pale
blue and betrayed his every emotion.  He feared me, but was not
accustomed to that sensation.  I judged him to be a warrior rather
than a noble.  It was not the face I had seen in my master's blood.  

"He looked as carefully at me as I did at him.  I smiled at him,
reminding myself to appear unruffled by his presence in my clearing.
 He slowly moved toward me, stopping several feet away.  He peered
so intently at me that, at first, I wondered if he were simple. 
Then, I looked into his softened eyes, and I realized that he found
me beautiful.  I knew not how to react to this knowledge, so I made
a joke.

"'Do I pass inspection?' I asked, laughing.  'You do: it is much
more sensible to wear trousers than a toga, do you not think?'

"He looked down at himself, as if he had no idea what he wore.  He
did not speak, but pulled his cloak around himself.  I was hungry
still, and I could feel the hunger in him, as well.  We would feed
together, I decided.

"Oh, come on," I said, and launched myself into the air.

"He followed me after a few moments.  When I had taken off, I had
not decided where I would feed.  Once I was in the air, however, I
knew where to go.  

"There was a town a day's walk from my clearing, one that housed a
Roman garrison and Roman politicians.  I hated soldiers, Roman ones
especially, the ones who had been the monsters of my people's
stories for so many years.  I would take this Roman vampire to
slaughter the soldiers.  If he would do that with me, then I would
call him my friend.

"When he realized what I meant to do, he told me 'no.'  I laughed at
him and slipped inside the barracks anyway.  If I had to, I would
kill him when I had gorged myself on the blood of these soldiers.

"I fed.  I ripped out their throats but the soldiers died happy. 
They believed me to be a goddess, and I took no pains to disillusion
them.  Blood pooled on the ground, the scent of it intoxicating me,
driving me to kill even after I was sated.  Soon, I could hear the
other vampire feeding as well.  I was relieved; I would not have to
kill him.  

"The twenty soldiers were dead within minutes.  The other vampire
stood stunned, as blood-drunk as if it were his first kill.  I
kicked over the coals of the fire and the straw on the ground caught
fire immediately.  I dragged him after me and we fled into the
fields.  I stayed him in the middle of a snowy field, past the light
of the fire.  My master had died for my careless killings, and I was
now sure to leave no evidence.  When I saw that the fire could not
be stopped, I tugged the drunken vampire into the sky..."

The vampire paused and the priest looked at her.  They had both been
staring into the fire while she spoke.  Her eyes were closed and a
fleeting shadow seemed to cross her face.  When she opened her eyes,
they seemed to shimmer between gold and green like taffeta dresses
he remembered from his youth.  She glanced over to him, then began
her story once more.

"I could have sent him away then, and I did ponder it.  I was
content with my life as a village witch.  The peasants feared me and
that kept me safe.  I missed the company of my own kind, though. 
That must have been why I invited him into my underground home.

"The flight seemed to have cleared his drunkenness, and he looked
approvingly around my large room.  It was furnished with stolen
pieces rescued from buildings that I'd burned to hide kills.  It was
not lush, but I considered the confines of its dirt walls to be my
home.

"I told him my name and he told me his: Lucius.  I had been correct
about him being a Roman.

"We were both caked in blood from our feeding.  I dropped my cloak
to the floor and moved to take his, meaning to put them aside for
cleaning.  Before I knew it, I had removed all of his clothes, as
well as my own.  I pressed my body against him, surprised by my own
desire for him.  He trembled and held me tightly, as hungry for I as
I was for him.  I threw my head back, baring my throat to him, and
after a moment of hesitation, he sank his fangs into my neck.

"I believe Lucius explained to you what that experience is like." 
The priest felt his face grow hot as he remembered the other
vampire's description.  "Yes, you know.  Nothing I ever felt as a
mortal can describe what it felt to have him drink my blood and to
drink his in return.  To _become_ another person...  You cannot even
imagine the intimacy.

"He was untaught in the way we have of lovemaking.  However, as in
mortal sex, brute force can be arousing.  His memories were violent
and confused, each tumbling into the next, with only a moment spent
on each one.  I caught only brief images at first: being whipped,
running a sword through a fallen foe, standing in a bright hall,
sobbing in a strange tomb. 

"That night and day, I taught him how to control the flow of his
thoughts and memories.  At first, he was not as good at it as he
thought, but I did not reveal that.  Immortal, as well as mortal
men, have their pride, and for some reason, I did not want to injure
his.  Maybe I was glad to have a friend after so long.  Perhaps I
was afraid he would leave.

"But he did not go and after a few years, we were more than friends.
 I loved him, and he loved me in return.  He planted roses for me,
white ones that he said looked like me in moonlight.  I taught him
all I knew, hiding no knowledge from him.  We lived as husband and
wife, though there were no gods or laws to witness our union.

"We were happy there, but after twenty years, the mortals began to
fear us more than was safe.  They had noted our failure to age, and
our lack of food or children.  It was time for us to move on.

"We did.  Our travels took us to many places that I had never been. 
Lucius had traveled widely, and I had seen the world through his
blood, but it was completely different to experience it for myself. 
I was used to small towns and few mortals, all speaking the same
tongue.  However, we journeyed to cities, teeming with chattering
people, all intent on their business, ignoring us unless they though
that we had money or valuables to give them.  

"This was when I truly became a woman.  I had not yet seen sixteen
years when my master had found me near death at my mother's side. 
She had died of a fever, and I would have soon followed had my
master not brought me across.  I had always sought knowledge, but as
we traveled, I drank it down like blood.  I learned languages and
science, philosophy and mathematics.  

"Lucius was pleased; he acted as if these cities and these people
were a gift for me of his own devising.  That irritated me, but I
loved him so that I ignored his arrogance.  We stayed in no one
place for long, and at first, we were happy.  

"Not all that I saw was good, of course.  I had known that evil
existed, had seen it on a small scale it my own world.  That,
though, did not prepare me for what I saw.  I saw children starve
while the wealthy ate so much they vomited, then ate more.  I saw
women raped repeatedly then tossed a small coin in payment.  I saw
politicians take taxes from the poorest, and give them to the
richest.  And soldiers.  Soldiers were everywhere, but I had always
known what they could do.

"I was never as capricious in my killings as Lucius was.  He would
kill anyone for any reason.  He told you that I would kill for a
dress or a knife, but he was wrong.  That was what I told him, yes,
but he had never understood my desire to kill only those who
deserved it.  To him, bringing death was our right.  To me, it was a
duty, a responsibility.  It was the beginning of a rift between us.  

"We took to hiding things from each other, after a century together.
 It was never as idyllic as Lucius remembered it.  We argued
continually in Athens, for three years.  I nearly left him then, but
I loved him too much..."

The vampire stopped, and when she didn't begin again, the old priest
opened eyes that he hadn't even realized had been closed.  She was
still staring into the fire, but tears made red tracks down her
cheeks.  Digging in his pocket, the man pulled out a handkerchief
and offered it to her.

She took it, and for a moment, her eyes turned toward him in smiling
gratitude.  He sat perfectly still, stunned by the light of her
beauty.  She was a fallen angel: a child of light living in the
darkness.  To look on her was to look upon every fantasy and
nightmare he had ever had.

After wiping her cheeks, the vampire balled up the scrap of cloth in
her tightly clenched hands.  She nodded her thanks, then resumed her
story.

"His treatment of me changed as well, and I chafed against it.  When
we had lived alone together in the forest, we had been equals. 
However, when we moved in the mortal world, he treated me as a
mortal woman.  That meant I was property, chattel.  He seemed to
forget that I was intelligent and articulate.  He loved me, I knew
that, but after centuries together, I began to wonder if that was
enough.

"He felt the need to protect me, to shelter me from the world. 
Once, I'm unsure of where we were, we were returning to our lodgings
after a particularly brutal feeding.  We had killed an entire den of
thieves in one hour and bathed in their blood, laughing.  On our
walk home, he insisted we take a ridiculously long route home so
that I would not have to walk through the part of the city that
housed the brothels.  I said nothing to him, merely smiled.  By this
time, I was tired of arguments.

"Finally, I decided that perhaps if we were to live in one place, as
we had in Gaul, then our life would be happy again.  Lucius agreed
to a home, and I was so happy that I let him chose the place.  Soon,
we were installed in a house outside of Rome.

"It did get better between us.  Not as perfect as it had been at
first, but Lucius again began to look upon me as an equal.  He still
sought to protect me, but, after a time, I realized that he did it
out of love.  I forgave him his faults, as I was sure he did mine,
and we lived in relative peace for over half a century..."

Again, the vampire paused.  Looking at her, the priest could tell
she did not want to tell the next part of the story.  The other
vampire had stopped at this point as well.

"Go on," the old man whispered.

"I returned home just after sunset, Lucius told you that.  I went
into our bedroom to wake him.  As soon as I entered the room,
however, I was stopped by my love for him.  I saw him lying there
asleep, and I could see how he had looked as a little boy.  His hair
was mussed from sleeping, and one arm was thrown over a pillow,
holding it close, as he did me.  I was amazed that after centuries,
I still loved this man.

"I took off my clothes and carefully crawled into bed beside him. 
Pressing myself against his blanketed back, I bit into his neck,
thinking to be romantic.

"I was instantly assaulted with his uncontrolled memories.  They
pounded at me through his blood, and I was unable to pull away,
though I tried.  Scenes from different times jumbled together, and I
saw and felt my mother being raped by him while a young girl begged:
'Make love to me, Father!'  I was horrified, and in my struggle to
push away, I bit my own lip.  My blood mingled with his, and he
pushed me away.  By the look on his face, I could see that he
recognized the woman as my mother.  I should have guessed sooner. 
After all, we had, upon occasion, passed ourselves off as father and
daughter during our travels.

"I was crying and he only stared at me.  That he was my father meant
nothing to me, but I knew it did to him.  That young girl had been
speaking to him, and he had been appalled, disgusted.  I reached out
to him across the bed, but he threw the blankets at me.

"'Cover yourself,' he hissed.  'Leave my sight, devious beast.  You
are no better than she was.'

"I did not know of whom he spoke.  My mother?  The girl whose voice
I had heard?  I was still to stunned to move, to do anything, so I
only sat there with my hand outstretched toward him.

"After a moment of tense silence, he stormed from the room.  I
followed, leaving the blanket where it lay.  I could feel his anger
like a blow, and I knew of no way to soothe him.  Even in our worst
confrontations, he had never been like this.  Not once had he ever
turned his back on me.  He always insisted on fighting face-to-face,
pulling me back to him any time I moved to leave.  I knew not what
to do when he was the one to turn away. 

"'Lucius, we didn't know.  It's not our fault,'  I said to his back.
 'None of it matters now; I love you!'

"'It _does_ matter!'  he raged and vaulted out of the window into
the night sky.

"I stood there and stared out the window after him, but I did not
follow.  I could have caught up to him: I had always been stronger
than he.  But after an initial moment of panic, I was not sure I
wanted to catch him.  What would I say?  Had he stayed and argued
with me, we probably would have survived together.  We were skilled
at confrontation and after so long, that was our preferred method of
resolving problems.  However, with him not there, I had to _think_
about it, rather than just blindly react and scream.

"Did I truly want the man who had raped my mother?  I cared not that
he was my father; I had seen enough simple and deformed infants when
I was a forest witch to understand why incest was taboo.  Offspring
were not a concern for us...  But could I truly love the man who raped
my mother?  I did not know, and I stared out the window all night,
trying to decide.  

"When the sun began to rise and Lucius had not returned, I went into
our bedroom.  I could not bear to sleep in our bed, so I spent the
day on the ceramic floor.  That was how I spent the next week:
nights at the window, days on the floor.  I thought constantly,
trying to decide what I would do if Lucius came home.

"After a week, I had made no decision, and that, in itself, was
decision enough.  If the decision was that difficult to make, then I
knew that I could not love Lucius enough to stay as his wife.

"I called the slaves to me and freed them.  I hypnotized them to
spread horrible stories about the place, in hope that it would keep
our home untouched until Lucius returned.  I left, taking only what
I needed, and I never looked back.

"I went to what is now India.  I used my strength to protect people
by killing those who would harm them.  I moved from village to
village, trying to save everyone.  I could not, of course, but that
only spurred me on to more desperate and bloody measures.  I slept
in the cremation pits, huddled under the ashes from the sun, and
rarely washed.  My skin was almost always covered with streaks of
black ash and blood, and soon, they worshipped me as the goddess
Kali.  

"I spent hundreds of years there, I think.  I really have no idea
how long it was.  After a while, though, I began to miss the forests
of my home: the smell of pine and the feel of snow.  I returned to
the west.  

"The world was not as I remembered it.  It was dirty, dark, and
ignorant.  Vampires were everywhere, but I hid myself from them.  I
was more powerful than all of them, and they never knew I existed. 
I found that there were no longer any ancient ones.  I and Lucius,
if he still lived, were the oldest vampires.

"I know not why I hid myself from these new vampires and Lucius.  In
the new vampires, I felt an echo of the evil I had seen years before
in my master's blood.  He had always warned me against that, and I
still believed him.  As for Lucius...I simply could not face him.  I
do not know if I still loved him then or not.  I knew that he had
sought me out, over a hundred years before, when he had returned
from wherever it was he had gone.  I told myself that I was done
with him, and I went to the forests of my home without seeing him.

"It was over a century before I saw Lucius.  Now he called himself
'Lucien,' the same name in a different language.  It was in Paris,
and he had just brought across a beautiful prostitute.  I watched
her make her first kill, and I saw how proud Lucius was at her
ferocity.

"I was not sure how I felt to see him again.  Our time together had
been so long ago that it had ceased to seem real.  It was almost a
story, a myth.  I believed him in love with the beautiful Janette,
and I was happy for that.  How could I be jealous?  He was courtly
to her, if a bit cold.  She seemed to enjoy his company.  I was
curious, however, and I found myself following them, shadowing them
as they moved.  Lucius never noticed me, and he never said my name.

"It was not long before I knew that the relationship between these
two vampires was that of a father and daughter.  Strangely, for
that, I was envious.  I wondered what it would have been to be
raised as his daughter, to be doted upon as Janette was.  To have
lost our passionate love would have been tragic, but, then again, I
would never have known him as such.  

"It was a difficult time.  I was confused and disturbed.  I believe
now that I may have been insane.  I spent too much time alone,
watching through windows.  I lived vicariously through them, taking
no pleasure in my kills, no joy in art or music or learning.  I was
becoming careless of my safety, and I would have soon been killed
had they not brought Nicholas across. 

"To see him with two children that he loved was almost unbearable. 
I stopped following them, then, and it was suddenly 1228.  I went to
Egypt, where Lucius had always refused to go.

"I remembered the tomb that I had seen in his blood our first night
together.  Somehow, I knew it to be connected to the girl I had seen
centuries later.  He had hidden them both from me, so I knew them to
be important.  

"I'm not sure why I searched for the tomb, and the girl I was sure
was buried in it.  It gave me something to do, and eternity requires
an occupation.  I searched for hundreds of years, and I truly loved
my search.  It was a mystery, and I was enthralled with the idea of
unraveling it.  I rarely thought of Lucius.  He only came near once,
and that was when he followed Nicholas, who sought a cure for
vampirism.  

"Soon after that, I switched from proper study to grave-robbing.  It
had always been a lucrative trade, but I had never been interested
in the money.  However, I was finding it more difficult to get
access to tombs.  To mortals, I appeared to be a young girl, not the
archeologist I had become.  I found it much easier to employ mortals
to search than to do it myself.  I used my illegitimate gains to
fund legitimate research in France and Britain, hoping to find some
traces of my history.  I was content.

"Then, three weeks ago, two of my best robbers found for what I had
searched so long.  They contacted me for instructions on how to
continue, and I directed them to proceed into the tomb.  I still am
not sure why I did not go myself.  Perhaps things would have been
different, if I had...but perhaps not.

"I could feel her as my robbers released her: the young girl was my
mortal half-sister, Divia.  She had survived, evil and angry, for
nearly two thousand years.  I could do nothing but track her; she
was older and stronger than even I.  In dread, I followed her here
to Toronto, and watched as she taunted and killed those who would be
close to Lucius.  I did nothing until she killed Nicholas.  

"When she finally left him, broken and poisoned on the sun-image she
could not touch, I fed him my own blood to revive him.  I am not
sure, even now, why I did that.  Perhaps it was because he had
inadvertently saved me when he chose to be a vampire.  I did not
censor by memories as I let him feed from my wrist, and his eyes
grew wide with the story my blood told.  By his reaction, I knew
that Lucius had never told him of me, and I was, strangely, hurt.

"I made him promise not to reveal me, and sent him after Divia.  I
could not kill her myself, though she needed to die.  Her love and
hate were all that had fueled her for millennia, and maybe I saw
myself too much in her.  Maybe I could not kill my own sister. 
Maybe I wanted Lucius to continue to forget me.  Maybe I had no
reason.  But I could not do it.

"She died and I watched her ashes scattered to the wind.  I watched
and Lucius never sensed me, though Nicholas did..."

A log shifted on the fire, and the vampire paused.  Her eyes were
closed now, no longer paying any attention to the priest who sat
beside her.  For a long time, neither moved.  The old man had
nothing for this confession: no absolution, no words of easement. 
But she did not seem to require any.  She only needed to be heard.

Suddenly, she was looking at him.  He had not seen her move, but she
had.

"I have told you this to be sure that there is someone who knows the
truth of us.  You have heard both of our stories now.  Each is true
and each is false: Lucius and I each only saw what we wished to
see."  She slowly stood from her chair and leaned close to the
priest.  "I give you my thanks.  I will not make you forget; your
life is nearly ended.  I could give you death now, if you desire it."

He looked into her eyes of golden fire, inches from his own.  It was
a tempting offer.  She would not hurt him, and he would die
peacefully in his chair by the fire, a book of poetry on his lap. 
He was tired.  His bones ached and he no longer slept.  It would be
a good way to die.

But he was not yet ready.  He hadn't finished his book of poetry,
and he still wanted to understand these two stories.  He could not
die yet.

The vampire smiled at him, seeing his refusal of her offer.  She
leaned forward and kissed his cheek gently with cold lips.

"Thank you," she whispered, and was gone.