The Journal of Vincent Du Maurier (Book 1) Read Free

that fateful jaunt, she had whispered to her maker in their tongue, her
French betraying her fear. “Je me suis fait mordre par les monstres.” I was bitten by the monsters.
    “Mais comment?” Jean’s disbelief hung in the air long after his voice echoed
through the cathedral.
    I asked her where she had been. I was in a foul mood, starving as I was.
    “I went to ze trattoria,” she said, “where we found zat boy.”
    “Foolish,” I said under my breath.
    The boy had already been infected and was on the verge of his
transformation. His insides sat atop his outsides and he smelled rancid. He was
unconscious, just barely breathing, and my clan was furious with me for
refusing to feed on him. It took some convincing to assure them his blood,
should it not poison us, would taste putrid.
    “I ’oped zere would be others,” Maxine said, “’iding zere.” She choked a
little.
    “Reposes-toi, ma douce.” Rest, my
sweet.
    Jean took her by the hand and led her to a pew. He
wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into him. She could no longer see
the look of horror on his face, the same one the rest of us will never forget. “But
I was careful,” she whispered to him, as they sat.
    “Obviously not careful enough,” I said since it was beneath me to cloak
my scorn. I expressed my anger at her reckless behavior openly, though I admit scolding
her then is something I regret now.
    “I made my way to ze alley at ze side,” she said. “Zere was nobody zere,
but I smelled eet.” Her eyes betrayed what eet was. “I smelled zat peppery sweetness and I knew it was fresh so I headed for ze
trattoria when suddenly I ’eard zem.”
    “The bloodless?” I asked.
    “No, ze ’umans.”
    “Where?”
    “Inside,” she said.
    “You heard voices?”
    “Yes,” she said. “I’m sure of it. I went to ze door and sniffed ze air.
Zat’s when I knew I smelled eet and zen I ’eard whispers, a single voice, and zen
… zen … I was captured.”
    Maxine looked at each of us, the sting on our faces making her tremble.
She had been caught up in a swarm of infected people we had come to call the bloodless.
The plague consumed the humans and robbed them of that delectable ichor we were
wont to devour. Losing our precious resource was a reality we still denied.
    “Zey surrounded me and I could not escape. Zey pinched me with zeir teeth
and dug zeir dirty bones into my skin.” She held out her arms to show us the
wounds she had suffered. I was horrified by the sight of her torn limbs. Mangled
teeth and bony fingers had punctured her marble skin and ripped out chunks of
vampiric flesh. Her body would not recover without fresh blood. “I barely
got—” She slumped forward and grabbed her stomach, as she let out a shriek.
    More compassionate than I, Byron insisted on examining her. He wanted to
inspect the wounds that would prove fatal. Jean held Maxine in his arms while
Byron studied her limbs. Her flesh blistered, macerated as it was from lack of human
blood.
    “Comment est-ce possible?” Jean’s eyes were wide.
    “She went out alone,” I said.
    I was callous in my treatment of her but I could have never known what
was coming. I believed it was as simple as Maxine having
flown too close to the sun, her wings now melting. I was angry with her for
daring to go out unaccompanied, and though I am not her keeper, I am somewhat
responsible for her. I am the one who led them here, I am the one who promised
to keep them safe. But if I am being totally honest, it is more than that. Her
vulnerability frightened me. It meant this plague could strike me down too.
    We stood around waiting to see what would happen next. I had never seen
a vampire succumb to human frailty. We had never been infected by disease; no
reports of vampires contracting HIV, Hepatitis, influenza, bubonic plagues,
black plagues, green plagues, or any plagues for that matter. We had assumed
this virus like all the others could only infect a mortal. But
we were