"Mistress, I seek your protection," I whispered, the ritualistic lines like a chain across my tongue. "For the blood we share, for the blood we have shared, I would return to your home and the shelter of your wings."

Indolently, she reached out and wrapped a strand of my bra.s.sy hair around her finger. She had always loved blondes, but I suddenly realized the maid was dark-haired. I wasn't the first lover to break her spell, but I was the latest, and I was very afraid.

"Sweetest Evelyn," she murmured. "Welcome home, my darling."

She pulled me close with just my hair wrapped around her finger and I could feel the coiled strength of her body. Oriana put her mouth very close to my ear and as I did my best not to squirm, to keep my hands fisted at my sides, she very gently licked the rim of my ear.

"You're not going to run away again, Evelyn," she whispered. She was so quiet that a human could not have heard her at all, but to me it was like she had rung a bell. That tone of command, iron and completely unyielding, was enough to make me wet, and G.o.d, how I had missed her.

"No, Mistress," I murmured. Her hand stroked down my neck to my tie, toying with the knot while her sharp teeth slid along the sensitive skin behind my ear.

"The men's clothes suit you, Evelyn..."

"Thank you, Mistress."

"But you don't need them right now, do you?"

The command was implicit but I didn't move. If she wanted these clothes off of me, she could take them off herself, or at least give me an order. I wasn't her little dog any more, and I wasn't going to jump at her slightest whim.

She laughed as if she could read my thoughts and her cool breath in my ear almost made me bend.

Instead she stood up, the long folds of her linen dress falling down to her bare feet, and tapped my lips sharply with her finger.

"I believe I don't need to show you the way?"

Still so polite. She wasn't ordering, not quite yet, but I knew very well this was just velvet sheathing the steel. I could drag it out, or I could be a good little child and follow her to bed.

We pa.s.sed the maid in the hall, and I couldn't help lifting my chin a little. The jealousy in her eyes stiffened my spine and made me remember that yes, some people would have died to be in my place.

The moment the door to her bedroom closed behind us, it was as if she had had enough games. She pushed me face first into the wooden column of her vast four-poster bed, laughing to see me stumble. I just barely stopped my teeth from clicking down on my tongue and that was just as well. Alone, completely at her disposal and submissive to her whim, the taste of blood in the air might have driven her quite mad.

I glanced behind me and saw a thin stiletto in her hand. The smile on her face was meditative, but there was an antic.i.p.ation in her that was only growing sharper by the moment.

"Mistress...?"

"Shush, Evelyn. You don't need these lovely clothes anymore. Put your hands above your head."

The post was one I was very familiar with. I found the smoothened grooves that still fit to my fingers and hung on. I knew what she wanted, my frame stretched up tall against the wood and even the familiar posture brought a throbbing hunger centered low in my body.

Saying nothing more, she pulled the tail of my shirt from my trousers and I felt the cold needle point of the stiletto press against the small of my back. For a long moment, it hovered there, and then it started moving upwards. It must have been exceedingly sharp, because it cut through the cotton of my shirt and the silk of my vest without hesitation. The clothes pulled only briefly against my chest before they gave way, and the steel only grazed my skin.

At the nape of my neck, the blade paused, then was withdrawn.

"Turn around."

My hands still above my head, I turned to face her and, as if she was bored with slow seduction, she turned the front of my shirt and vest to ribbons. Her face was intent, as if I were a painting she was working on, and the tatters fluttered to the ground. This time, they were lightly spotted with blood from the scratches she left on my torso.

One tiny cut adorned my left breast, just below my nipple, and she considered it lovingly. That pert pink tongue came out to lick her lips and she bent her dark head. She was tasting, not drinking, but I still gasped, my nipples tightening under her clever tongue. My body arched against her, but she only casually reached out and tweaked my other nipple to remind me of my place.

My place was to be quiet while she cut my pants off and removed my socks and shoes. My place was to only shudder as she pa.s.sed a hand up my pale thigh and even when she briefly touched the tuft of hair between my legs, I was only to murmur, never to moan.

"I was afraid I would find you changed," she whispered with something like relief in her voice. "Tattoos, piercings, stranger things. But look, you are just the same."

She leaned in and kissed the s.p.a.ce between my b.r.e.a.s.t.s lovingly and with a pang, I thought of everyone who had left her, of places destroyed and countries remembered only by scholars and madmen.

"Oh, Mistress..." I whispered and, remembering herself, she stepped back, shaking the wrinkles out of her yellow gown.

"Beautiful Evelyn, still so eager," she said.

She swirled her finger around the sensitive cup of my navel and trailed it downwards. She started to circle the pad of her finger gently over my c.l.i.t, making me arch and strain towards her. I knew better than to let my feet leave the floor, but I could still show her how much I wanted her, how very much I was willing to let her do.

I couldn't tell you how long it pleased her to play like that, to finger my c.l.i.t until it was throbbing and aching.

Then her slippered foot slid between mine and pushed them gently apart. I moaned and my own aroused scent was sharp in the air between us. She smiled, showing those lovely sharp canines of hers, then two of her long, elegant fingers were inside me.

"Tight," she murmured. "Has it been so long?"

"It has, Mistress." I said, that blush coming up to my face again. How could I tell her this was something I did not give up easily, when she had always had it from me with little more than a whisper?

Her fingers were gentle, stroking and opening, and I gave myself up to her, letting my head drop and moving my hips in a slow grinding counterpoint to her hand. It was unbearably sweet and it was unmistakably coming home.

She stopped when I was biting down my moans and stepped back to look at me. Oriana slowly raised her damp fingers to her mouth and the taste must have pleased her. With her clean hand she gestured to a red leather armchair I knew very well. Even the sight of it made my hips roll forward and when she snapped her fingers, I let go of the post and stumbled towards it.

The oxblood red leather was freezing cold against my bare skin but I barely noticed it as Oriana stripped out of her dress.

Dressed she was a stylish woman, but naked she was awe-inspiring. She had once told me she didn't know how old she was when she was turned, but I had guessed it was no older than twenty or so. Even as one of the undead, her dark skin had lost none of its l.u.s.ter. Her b.r.e.a.s.t.s were round and heavy with dark nipples that were almost blue while the curve of her belly led to wonderfully curly hair. For almost ten years, she had kept me closer than her clothes, and even after a generation away, I wanted to come to heel.

I sat with my knees together, patient and obedient until she tapped them with her harder-than-diamond nails. Until she gave me that little signal, I was not allowed to move, but now I could drape each leg over an arm of the chair. The position made me lean back and I knew how crudely and wantonly I was displayed because she had once held up a mirror to let me see exactly that.

She drew up the matching red ottoman and sat close to me, pa.s.sing her hands up and down my inner thighs with apparent pleasure. I had always pleased her like this, so very open with my hands resting on my knees and my face flushed with pleasure.

This time when she smiled, it was even sharper than before and I knew she couldn't stand it much longer.

She slid her thumb along the crease of my thigh, high up where she was only an inch from the aching fold of my s.e.x, pressing hard until she found the strong beat of the vein that she was looking for.

"There you are," she said softly, almost reverently. She pressed even harder for a moment, until I could feel the way the blood moved under her thumb, then she bent her head down.

Oriana lightly tapped the sensitive flesh there once, twice, and again before she was sure and then with a viper's quickness, she sunk both fangs into the tender flesh.

You're never ready for it; it never gets easy. It's pain and pleasure like a lightning bolt and I swallowed enough air that I couldn't even scream After a moment, the agony slowed, and I felt, as though from a very long distance, her hands clenching tight on my thighs. Even with my eyes screwed shut, I could imagine the way her entire body was shaking. It always felt as if I were falling when this happened, as though I was falling away and leaving every unnecessary part of me behind. There was a roaring in my ears and blindly, I reached down to tangle my fingers in the cloud of her dark hair. I tugged hard, knowing I couldn't hurt her, knowing that for all my great strength, I couldn't force her away. I didn't want to.

I was saying please, I was saying yes, but most of all I was saying her name, all t.i.tles stripped away. She was Oriana and she was making me hers in the most elemental way possible. It went far beyond marking; this was a complete devouring.

I swallowed hard, tasting tears, and I bucked up to meet her mouth. With every nerve on fire, I couldn't tell how long I could stand it. It had been so long since someone had fed from me like this, since I had allowed someone to sit in judgment over that thin margin of pleasure that came before true death.

She pulled away from me with a jerk, replacing her mouth with the flat of her palm, pressing hard. I nearly shrieked at the feel of her pulling away, losing my grip on her hair, and all I could do was sob breathlessly with exhaustion and desire strung like a piano wire.

Her tongue came out to whisk away the small traces of blood on her lips, neat as any country cat, and she met my eyes.

For a long moment we waited, and then she removed her hand, revealing flesh that was puffy and dark, but not in the least b.l.o.o.d.y. There was a smudge of rusty red on her palm and she brought it to her mouth.

The feeding made her hot, and even though no part of her touched me, I could feel it, a vital animal heat that came off of her like sheets of water. Oriana's eyes were dilated black and at times like this, I was sure that if she did not recognize me, did not love me, she might have killed me.

"Good," she purred in a voice that was almost a growl. "So very, very good..."

Her hand came back to my thigh and kneaded it, leaving small traces of blood with her sharp nails and I started rocking against her. I couldn't pull away, but I couldn't find the words that would let me ask for what I wanted, either.

She pressed a finger inside me again, testing my desire. What she found must have pleased her, because she stood up and stepped away.

"Down on your back," she said, pointing to the carpet and I half fell out of the chair in my rush to obey her.

She walked around me with painstaking slowness, once tapping my ribs with a small, perfectly formed foot. Then she was kneeling over my head, placing her beautiful c.u.n.t right over my mouth.

I must have moaned, because she laughed huskily. The raw hunger had been taken off of her, and sated, she could be very generous.

I reached up and spread her nether lips open with my fingers. She was as wet and ready for it as I was, and when I started lapping her folds, paying special attention to the sensitive area right above her c.l.i.t, she sighed in appreciation.

"If I feel the slightest p.r.i.c.k of your little milk teeth," she said scathingly, "I will remove them."

I might have been disappointed, but then her mouth pressed hard over the place where she had so recently bitten, and there was the tip of a fang hovering over my sensitive c.l.i.t. It jabbed down, and I screamed, more out of surprise than pain.

Then she was pressing down on my mouth harder, effectively silencing me. No, not just silencing, riding, and as if by instinct, my hands went around her hips to bring her down even closer.

The next time her sharp fangs tapped me, I was ready for it, and this time, I thrust up.

By her small cry, I could tell I surprised her, but then she laughed, something I could feel throughout the most intimate parts of her body.

"Bad Evelyn," she crooned, "Don't I give you enough?"

I felt a hard pinch on the fleshiest part of my l.a.b.i.a, her gentlest bite, and I was lost again.

"Oriana, beautiful, f.u.c.king gorgeous monster Oriana, love you so much." I moaned. Then I couldn't take it any more and my hips arched up one final time. Her c.u.n.t filled my mouth and I hung on to her hips hard enough to leave bruises. It was everything I had ever wanted, everything I couldn't live without, and I was hers, entirely.

Some small eternity later, I noticed that I was half-curled up in her lap and someone had been in to light the fire in her room. Oriana was singing to me in a language I didn't know, but when she felt me stir, she stopped and fondly stroked my face.

"Oh, welcome home, child," she said lovingly. "I have missed you so."

"Mistress..."

"You needn't worry about Miss Delgado," she said lightly. "She never comes to Europe, and she most definitely will never come to London."

Because I am here, was what Oriana left unspoken, and she didn't need to bother telling me where my safe harbor was.

Already I could feel the old chains of servitude and tradition come up to bind me, but now, cuddled up safe and warm for the first time in ages, I didn't even feel like fighting. Perhaps in ten years or maybe twenty, I'd chafe under her rule and run again. For now, it all sounded like terribly hard work when I could simply stay in Oriana's lap and let her pet my hair.

As I watched sleepily, she nipped her fingertip and brought it to my mouth.

The taste of her blood, warm from her body and rich in a way I have never encountered elsewhere, filled my mouth and, exhausted and content, I slept.

At the Pageant, the Vamp Lori Selke Theda Bara steps out of her limousine. She is the greatest movie star of her age-the Vamp, embodiment of the erotic conqueror, feminine darkness. Her name spells Arab Death. Men fall at her feet like cherry blossoms. She consumes her lovers to the bone. The century is still an adolescent, and she is the ultimate expression of the era's New Woman: independent, predatory, sweet, and deadly as a poison flower's kiss.

She is accompanied by Andrew Hollis, in the employ of her publicist and of Fox studio, and her escort for the evening. He will play the role of her ardent admirer, but in reality, he is her handler and a.s.sistant; her actual love life is as moribund as her reputation is profligate. Theda has been asked to preside over the First Annual Pageant of the Vampires, held at the Lyric Theater in New York. Pageant of Vampiresses, actually, for every contestant is female.

For the occasion, Theda Bara wears a dropped-waist sleeveless satin evening gown in midnight black which exposes her ankles. It drips with strings of exotic beads and pearls. She also wears a sealskin coat to ward against the November weather. "Call it panther-skin," she murmurs to Hollis as they step onto the curb. Her long hair is swept up off her neck; she wears a white lace half-veil, hearkening back to the days when women in open automobiles covered their faces for protection. Before entering the theater, Theda a.s.sumes her practiced, heavy-lidded expression, eyes ready to spring into startled horror or narrow in scheming contemplation at a moment's notice. It is a countenance designed to invoke the cobra's mesmerizing stare, or so Mr. Hollis's agency says. Theda has knockout-drops for eyes. Her body language, too, is fluid, snakelike, languid, but poised to strike.

Hollis himself is more demurely attired in a standard evening suit. His job is to remain un.o.btrusive, ignored. He knows this. He is Theda's shadow.

"How long is this little pageant supposed to take, and are we required to stay to its conclusion?" Theda inquires.

"Is that the royal 'we'?" Hollis replies.

"If you'd like to stay while I am excused, that is a perfectly suitable arrangement," Theda says. "What I meant was, am I to step in, make a little speech, and leave, or have I been volunteered to judge this as well?"

"Are you required to grade a pageant of charlatans and deluded fools who believe themselves to be mistresses of darkness, or can you slip out the back door after a few words with your dignity intact, do you mean?"

Theda sighs. "Don't be mean, Mr. Hollis." She stifles a small yawn. "I'm in New York to visit my family. I've agreed to attend this event out of charity. But I'd rather not spend all my time playing the part of the legendary love child of the Nile. It can be quite wearing, you know." She puts her gloved hand on Hollis's arm. "Do you remember our first press conference?" she smiles.

Hollis laughs. "Do I? What a marvelous show we put on, you and I."

"That room!" Theda exclaims, eyes flying open like shutters. "Reeking of incense and tuberose, the furnace on full blast. And I, draped in velvets and furs." She narrows her eyes and stifles a grin. "You're lucky I didn't melt away entirely."

"So was it part of the act when you threw open the window at the end of the afternoon and cried out..."

"Give me air!" Theda crows. They both laugh. "I've always had a talent for improvisation," Theda says slyly. "And that young reporter, Miss Parsons, dutifully wrote down every word I said. She was so pleased to have discovered my falsified origins. But that only made my true beginnings seem more mysterious, didn't it-if she's not an Arab princess from the Nile, where is she from?" She pats Hollis's arm gently. "Do you think they'd believe the truth?"

"Cleveland? Jewish? Never."

"All the better, then." She sighs. "If I thought that any of these girls here tonight had the same sense of the absurd, I just might enjoy myself."

"I suppose it would ruin my image to resort to my lorgnettes," Theda says, trying not to squint at her program. Hollis shakes his head with a smile.

"I shall have to rely on my memory, then." She holds the flimsy paper inches from her nose and reads each contestant's name aloud, with precision. "'Senorita Lupita Perez, famed throughout the Republic of Mexico for her deadly beauty and charm. Yosan, a vampire from the ancient empire of China. Blanche Johnson, the most renowned Ethiopian enchantress of Harlem. Mme. Yenika Lupotovsky, who claims supremacy among Russian vampires.' Where do they find these women?"

"They volunteer, I presume."

"And do they really travel from all over the country, all over the world, for this little pageant?"

"I doubt it. Miss Melania Staikos of Santorini here, for example," Hollis points to the program biography, "probably isn't from the Greek isles any more then you were born in Araby."

"Egypt," Theda corrects. "In the shadow of the Sphinx." She waves airily. "Don't you remember? A forbidden dalliance between my painterly French father and his Arabian mistress. But you're right. Half these women probably traveled no further than Brooklyn to get here. Well, I came all the way from California by train. I hope the effort is appreciated."

"I suspect they're among your biggest fans. After all, you are foremost among vampiresses. The Vamp herself, who seduces men and eats them for lunch, who probably sleeps in a crypt."

Theda smiles. Her teeth are straight and blunt. "There is something to be said for all that. There is something to be admired in the Vamp. She is independent of men's economic reins-free, then, to pursue her romantic impulses, however corrupt." Theda sighs and adjusts her stole. "But it is ironic to be typecast as the exotic, man-eating seductress. I wanted to be an ingenue, you know."

"Mary Pickford?" Hollis inquires.

"No, the Gish sisters. But I was too dark."