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Anno Mirabilis, Anno Horribilis
A Conversion Day Challenge Story
by Nancy Kaminski
(c) August 24, 2006
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"Faaaaather!" Divia's sweet young voice rang through the villa.
"Father, where are you? I have a gift for you!"

Lucius Divius, late legate of the Roman Emperor's legions, flinched
minutely, then smoothed his features. There was a hint of madness
underneath that voice. He had learned over the past year to fear and
respect that tone, and also to hide his reactions. Flinching was not
well received.

"I am here, Divia," he called.

She breezed into the spacious room, her entrance making the oil lamps
dance. "Why are you still inside on this auspicious night, Father? I
would have thought you'd be out celebrating!" Divia appeared to be a
vivacious young girl at the brink of blossoming into a lovely young
woman. Looks were deceiving. She was frozen in time, forever thirteen.
She was a vampire.

And so was Lucius Divius, her mortal father, her immortal son. It was
a role reversal Divia reveled in and never let him forget. That she, a
bastard daughter born of a former slave-turned-courtesan, could
control her well-born and powerful father caused her no end of
amusement.

When Vesuvius erupted, it was she who had saved Lucius from certain
death. While those around them gasped their last breaths in the
poisonous vapors that filled the Pompeiian air, she had brought him
into her world of darkness and immortality. Lucius was grateful, of
course, but in his heart of hearts wished the gift could have come
from virtually anyone other than Divia. To be so beholden to a girl---
a bastard daughter, no less---was galling.

She had just called him 'Father.' That did not bode well. She did that
only when she wanted something from him he was loath to give, or when
she was up to something.

Putting on a bland expression, he faced his vampire master. "What
should I be celebrating, Divia? Is there some local festival I should
take note of?"

Divia took his hand and drew him towards the door. "No, Father, it is
precisely one year since I created you! It is your Conversion Day.
Surely you remember such an auspicious occasion?"

"How could I forget? But it did not occur to me to celebrate. Is this
customary amongst our kind?"

"Well, I always celebrate mine, and you must celebrate yours. I have
prepared a special surprise for you. Come!" And with that she lifted
into the dark, fragrant Egyptian night. Lucius watched her small form,
white linen shift fluttering about her slim feet, recede into the
star-splashed sky. He sighed, steeled himself for what was to come,
and followed.

Together they flew to the south, following the moon-silvered Nile away
from Alexandria. Most mortals were in their beds. There were only
occasional flickers of fires and lamps from the sleeping hamlets
below. On they flew over lush irrigated fields and date palms, ancient
temples and monuments, until Divia stopped and hovered over a tiny
group of mud huts huddled by the great river. She turned a radiant
smile on Lucius and gestured. "There, Father. My gift to you!" She
plunged earthward, and Lucius followed.

They landed together on the footpath that led through the center of
the village. Lucius swept his gaze over the rude huts. There were at
most ten one -or two-room mud brick dwellings, with animal pens
outside. A drowsing donkey twitched an ear at the immortal intruders.
Drying fish were strung between poles along the path---these were
fishermen, eking  a living fishing from the dhows moored at the river
bank.

"Why are we here, Divia?" Lucius asked, a note of impatience creeping
into his voice. "Surely you do not seek the company of illiterate
fishermen in this celebration you have planned for me."

Divia twirled and danced towards the nearest hut. "Oh, but you are
wrong, Father! These illiterate fishermen will help us celebrate most
wonderfully." She clapped her hands loudly and called in Egyptian,
"Come forth!"

Two figures emerged from the hut, moving with the woodenness of those
under a vampire's spell. They walked slowly towards the vampires and
halted in front of them, staring blankly into the darkness. They were
a young couple, recently wed as the woman's swelling belly attested.
Both were naked save for clay amulets strung on leather thongs around
their necks. Divia stroked the young woman's face. "See, Father? A
gift, just for you."

Lucius could smell the life in the woman, her blood and the blood of
her unborn child. The sound of the two hearts echoed in his ears, and
involuntarily his fangs emerged. The call of the blood was
irresistible. He reached out and caressed the woman's face. Her dark
eyes drifted slowly towards him but didn't register any alarm. He
swept the long, heavy blue-black hair back from her neck, exposing the
veins. So enticing…

"For you, Father, just for you, because I love you, my father, my
son," Divia breathed in his ear. "And when you are done here, there
are more." Divia gestured to the other huts. "All just waiting for
your kiss, Father." She smiled, her own fangs gleaming in the
moonlight, a little girl with a demon's face.

Lucius could feel his self-control slipping away, the ecstasy of the
blood insistent in his brain. And with it was Divia, her thoughts
insinuating themselves into his mind with the blood lust, urging him
on, sharing the slide into the mindless feeding frenzy of a new
vampire. He moaned and lunged.

It could have lasted an eternity. It could have lasted just minutes.
Time ceased to have any meaning for Lucius. The depths of emotion and
life overcame him as he ravaged first the woman, then the man, and
then the rest of the village, hut by hut. It was a red haze of lust
and hunger and power and death.

When he came back to himself he was standing alone near the river, his
linen tunic a darkening red. His body was slick with blood----whether
it was his victims' or his own blood-sweat, he did not know. He looked
back at the cluster of huts to see Divia break the neck of a two-year-
old boy with a jerk of her hand and then drop the body near a heap of
dead adults. She raised her glowing golden eyes to look at him,
smiling like a mother would at a child who has done something clever.
He shuddered and turned away to stare at the dark water sliding
silently past.

Abruptly he walked into the river, to rip the sodden tunic from his
body and wash the blood from his too-white skin. How he hated the loss
of control, the utter mindlessness of the kill. He submerged himself,
sinking to the silted mud below and letting the soft sibilant sounds
of the water wash through his mind. A fish, watery moonlight
glittering on its silver scales, swam into view, looked at him
incuriously, and was gone.

He had been a killer in his mortal life, and had visited death on
countless numbers of Rome's enemies, personally or through his
legionaries. He was a killer now. The difference was that, in his
mortal life, he had always been in control. He had performed his
duties coldly, calculatingly, and never allowed emotions to cloud his
mind. He had not found joy in killing---or remorse, either. He was
ordered, he obeyed with ruthless efficiency, and was rewarded for his
successes.

But this...this... Words failed him. The vampire consumed him, reduced
him to a ravening animal, mindless in pursuit of what he needed and
wanted so badly. He craved the smell of fear, the hot rush of blood
and emotion, the overwhelming sense of power and invincibility the
vampire gave him. If only he could have that without the madness!

Control. He would have control, if it took him a mortal lifetime to
learn it, he vowed to himself. With control this new power made him a
god, beholden to none. Except...

A thought insinuated itself into his brain, amused and impatient at
the same time. "Are you done with your bath yet?" Divia, calling him
to heel yet again, pulling the string ever so gently and ever so
insistently. He scowled into the black water. Divia...there was a
problem that needed to be dealt with. Not now, but eventually, when he
learned control and won free from the chains that bound him to the
daughter he both loved and hated.

He shook himself mentally, and suddenly saw the absurdity of sitting
in a river and brooding like a sour-faced  Stoic at an orgy. He had
always faced adversity head on, coolly planning how to turn it to
advantage. He would continue to do so. He would play Divia's games and
lure her into parting with the knowledge she held out to him so
tantalizingly and so out of reach.

"I will never do this to anyone I bring into the night," he whispered
into the water. "Never."

He rose from the river and strode back to shore, where Divia was
waiting impatiently for him. "What have you been doing down there,
Lucius?" she asked, an unpleasant smile on her face. "Ordering the
fishes to swim in line?"

Lucius had the uneasy feeling that Divia knew full well what he had
been thinking about underwater, and schooled his face into a
noncommittal expression. "No, my dear, I was simply---resting. It was
such a strenuous celebration," he added, nodding at the carnage in the
village.

She sighed. "Oh, yes, it was glorious, was it not, Lucius? And you
were magnificent," she said, running a frank gaze up and down his nude
form. "Positively magnificent, a lion among sheep! We must find
another reason to celebrate again soon, don't you agree?" She linked
her arm with his and started back up the path through the village.

He allowed himself to be led, but objected mildly, "It might become
rather obvious if villages disappeared so frequently. Discretion would
be wiser."

"Discretion! Does the lion apologize to the sheep, or the eagle to the
mouse? Of course not!" She waved a negligent hand at the pile of
corpses. "They do not matter, Lucius. Only we matter, you and I, and
we shall do as we please, anywhere, at any time."

He pulled away from her. "And it pleases this lion to be discreet,
Divia. I have no desire to be pulled out of our home into the noonday
sun, or hunted by the mobs."

"You can be very dull sometimes, Lucius." She faced him, her eyes
narrowing dangerously. "Dull and priggish. Why, one could imagine you
do not appreciate all I've done for you. Or that you do not understand
our relationship."

"Oh, I do, Divia, I do," he replied bitterly.

"I don't think you do. You," she gripped his wrist and started
squeezing, "belong to me. Me! And you will do your utmost to please
me, as your thanks for this great gift I have given you." Her grip
increased. "We are bound together, Lucius, for eternity. Just remember
that how pleasant that eternity is depends entirely on," she smiled
cruelly, "your discretion." She released him.

Lucius rubbed his bruised wrist. "I see." He gazed over the
devastation they had created, and then looked at Divia. "You may
depend on it, I assure you." For now, he added silently.

Divia's smile turned bright, the smile of an innocent young girl. "I
knew I could, Father." She turned and raised her face to the sky. "Oh,
the sun will be rising soon. We must go home now." She lifted into the
air and was gone.

Lucius took one last look around the small village. Never again, he
thought. Not unless I will it, not unless I am in control.

"Faaaather!" The call was both verbal and mental.

Play the game, lure her to his snare, gain the advantage. "I am
following you, my dear," he answered. 

For now.

Finis


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Comments, criticisms, and damp Roman vampires may
be sent to zinnia@gmail.com
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