Colder

There lies in the centre of each man’s heart

A longing and love for the good and pure;

And if but an atom, or larger part,

I tell you this shall endure - endure --

After the body has gone to decay --

Yea, after the world has passed away.

The longer I live and the more I see

Of the struggle of souls toward the heights above,

The stronger this truth comes home to me:

That the Universe rests on the shoulders of love;

A love so limitless, deep, and broad,

That men have renamed it and called it - God.

And nothing that ever was born or evolved,

Nothing created by light or force,

But deep in its system there lies dissolved

A shining drop from the Great Love Source;

A shining drop that shall live for aye --

Though kingdoms may perish and stars decay.

I finished reading the poem to Jasper. I’d grabbed the book of poems off my shelf that morning and tossed it in the picnic basket. I always liked to have a book with me, just in case I needed something to stave off boredom while I was out and about. I didn’t think for a second that Jasper could ever bore me but it was just a habit. Jasper has discovered the book and asked me to read a few of my favourite poems to him while he unpacked the picnic basket for our lunch. Well my lunch mostly, he only nibbled on a few grapes and a piece of cheese. This particular one was titled Deathless and it was my favourite poem I had ever read, by any poet.

Jasper was laying on his side on the blanket he’d laid out for out picnic and I was sitting beside him, the book in my lap. Reading through the poem again, a sudden question popped into my head. “Jasper, can vampires ever die?” I asked curiously. His eyes widened in mild surprise at the question and the corner of his mouth turned up into a heart stopping half grin.

“Yes, we can. But the only things that can kill us are other vampires. The only thing strong enough to get through our skin is another vampire’s fingernails or teeth. Because of that we try…” he emphasized this last word and paused for a brief second, “to remain civil amongst ourselves. If we cannot solve a disagreement amongst ourselves in a civil matter, Asael will solve it for us.” He shifted to a more upright position and entwined his fingers with mine.

I leaned against his shoulder and pressed a brief kiss against his neck. “Who is Asael?” I asked my voice laden with curiosity.

Jasper laughed and pulled me into his lap, he nuzzled his face against my neck and murmured, “I suppose, I promised you the story today didn’t I?” he was asking himself more than me. “Alright. Asael is the one who makes and enforces our rules, he is essentially our King. We really only have two rules. Our numbers are few and we must protect the vampires we do have. Without extremely good reason, killing another vampire will earn you the sentence of creating two more to replace the one that was stolen.”

“What’s so bad about that?” I interrupted him.

“Well,” he began patiently, “When you create another vampire a bond is formed between the two vampires that cannot be easily broken for the bond is deep, much like the bond of parent and child or a husband and wife. As you can imagine, because of that, we tend to be very careful about whom we bond ourselves too in that manner. It’s not to be taken lightly at all. This becomes a punishment when, Asael chooses the humans you are forced to bond to and you have no say in the matter.”

“And the other rule?” I asked when he’d finished his explanation. I had more questions but I wanted to hear about Asael first.

“The other rule is quite obvious. We must keep our existence a secret from the humans. Asael works to enforce that, if a vampire gets a little overzealous with his desire to feed on humans or has allowed a human to see whatever gifts they might possess. Asael will be sure to destroy that vampire. Do not get me wrong, he is not a tyrant. He rules us fairly and justly, he will listen to your explanation and has been known to grant mercy for those who truly did not understand the error of their ways. But he can also be ruthless if need be. I have never met him myself but I have heard stories that he has ripped the top of a vampire’s skull, right off his lower jaw. Even I would not be able to do such a thing but the older the vampire, the stronger they get and Asael it is said is 5000 years old and the first of our kind. All we know about where we come from was told to us by him.”

“Where you come from?” I asked in confusion.

Jasper nodded, “The ironic part about the story of our origins is that almost every human on the planet already knows the story. They just don’t realize that it’s talking about vampires.” He smiled and shook his head in amusement before continuing, “You know the story about Lucifer. He was said to be the most beautiful angel in the heavens but he grew angry with God for giving the humans free will and adoring them as his greatest creation. Lucifer envied the humans for God’s unconditional love and led a small army of 200 angels to rebel against God. The angels were cast from heaven and sent to live on earth until the Armageddon when they would be tried and judged for their crimes.”

Two of these fallen angels, Lillith and Nilaiha, chose to rebel against God even further. They found two brothers named Cain and Abel and seduced them into marriage. Nilaiha became pregnant with Abel’s child shortly after their wedding and she gave birth to a child of unimaginable beauty. She became pregnant with a second child within a few short months.

Cain became jealous of his brother’s growing family. Try as he might, he could not seem to get Lillith pregnant. She became angry with Cain for this and blamed his brother, saying Abel had put a curse on Cain in order to increase his own family, effectively stealing Cain’s potency. She told Cain that the only way to get his seed back from his brother was to kill his children while they slept and then to cut off his brothers head and drink his blood.

When God saw what Cain had done, he branded him a murderer and decreed that Cain would be forced to walk the earth for the remainder of his life with nothing but an unquenchable thirst for human blood and all of his descendants would bear the same mark.

A short while later, Lillith finally became pregnant and gave birth to a boy even more beautiful than his cousins had been. This boy was different though, being half angel and bearing the Mark of Cain. He had the appearance, strength, speed and immortality of the angels and the insatiable lust for human blood of his father. His name was Asael.

“Now of course we don’t know how accurate this story is as no one else was around to attest to this at the time.” Jasper added to the end of his story. “For a while the first vampires were born, as humans were but from the seed of a vampire. At some point we discovered the ability to create new vampires by willingly feeding someone our own blood. There are just as many born vampires as there are created vampires and the only difference between any of us is that created vampires are much more likely to be sterile and only able to breed by blood, and born vampires tend to be more likely to possess a special talent, though cases of the reverse are not considerably rare. ” Jasper grinned and smiled at me knowingly.

“So, vampires can be born. And… birth control is ineffective?” I asked cautiously.

Jasper nodded.

“And you’re a created vampire who has never had sex, so you don’t know if…?” I trailed off.

Jasper nodded again.

“And I could end up being a mother to a vampire.”

Jasper took a deep sigh, “That is correct. But there is more to it. Mothers who bear vampire children have a much higher rate of the mother’s death, due to the breaking of bones from the inhuman strength of the vampire child.”

I gulped. This was going to be difficult. “And how exactly is a vampire created? Does someone have to be dying?” I asked carefully.

Jasper eyed me tentatively, “No, that was just me. Someone simply has to drink the blood of a vampire that was offered up willingly to establish the bond. The vampire blood will fill your body, taking control, making you very sleepy, eventually once the blood reaches your heart, it will stop and when you wake, you will be a vampire, the undead and never have a need to sleep again.”

“So you were born of angels… Is that why your skin glows and you are as warm as the sunlight?” I tilted my head curiously.

Jasper grinned and lifted me off his lap, leaping to his feet and jogging out into the field and stopping beside a shaft of sunlight coming from the clouds, “Yes and no. Most vampires, being undead are actually ice cold. I am different in that regard and I honestly have no idea why, like any other vampire my heart doesn’t beat but I am still warmer than most humans. Also our skin doesn’t exactly glow. This is why vampires stay out of the sunlight, we’d be noticed immediately.” He rolled up his sleeves and took a step to the left.

The air whooshed from lungs and I forgot to breathe. I had never seen anything more stunningly, beautiful in my entire life. His pale arms and face shimmered with a rainbow of colours, like a prism of dancing flames across his skin.

He looked at the ground sheepishly when he’d noticed I’d stopped breathing, “Asael says it’s the skin of the angels, it’s why they were so beautiful, they shimmered with and travelled around on rainbows, God’s favourite palette.” He stepped out of the light and came over to sit down beside me.

I loudly sucked in a big gasp of air, finally remembering to breathe, “You are beyond stunning.” I said in a hushed tone.

Jasper frowned at my compliment, “Yes, because I really need one more thing to seduce you with. I’m not dangerous enough as it is. I may be descended from angels but remember they are fallen angels. My soul is damned to this earth for eternity. There is no heaven for me anymore. I am only allowed to wear the skin of the angels to remind me of what I shall never possess. Peace.” His voice was rough and tinged with pain and longing.

“You are not damned for eternity. Even the stories say you are damned only until judgement day. That means on that day, God will look at your soul and what you’ve done with your time on earth and he will judge you then. If God intended to send you to hell anyways he would have just sent the angels straight there. But He gave you the earth and very long time to make amends, to prove to Him they are worthy of heaven, worthy of forgiveness.” I reached up to caress his cheek slowly, “And no God could ever look into the soul of someone like you and not forgive you. Your nature is not your fault.”

He smiled softly at me then, “There is no absolution for a demon such as me. There is only torture and agony that awaits me. This…being trapped here like this, is a far worse punishment than Hell ever could be. I will walk like this forever, never changing. Watching the humans around me live the life I never had the chance to. Falling in love, getting married, having children and growing old with someone, sitting on a porch swing somewhere surrounded by the innocent faces of their grandchildren. The worst part of it is that I can feel it, I can feel everything they feel, the love, the happiness, the devotion and I know that I will never be lucky enough to…” He ran his thumb slowly across my cheek, “Keep such a treasure.” His gave me a weak, pained half smile.

I shook my head vigorously at him, “Don’t say that. You can keep me, forever and be happy with me. I’m not going anywhere.”

A look of pain crossed Jasper’s face, “Amelia, you are human. Unlike a vampire you grow and change. In a few years when you are older and I still look the same age, you won’t want me anymore and when you have found someone to marry and have a family with you will forget I even existed and someday you will grow old with that person and eventually, you will die but you will go heaven having lived a long and happy life. On that day, whatever is left of my soul will also die and I will be forced to remain here living out eternity, without you and that will be my Hell.”

My eyes filled with tears and I wiped them angrily away, “I will never forget about you, Jasper. I will never, not want you. If Heaven is a place without you there, then it’s not a place I ever want to go. I would rather spend eternity on this earth with you. That is my idea of Heaven.”

Jasper stared at me in bewilderment for a moment. Quickly he changed the subject, “We should go. Come on, I’ll show you my cabin if you like.” I took the hand he then offered to me and stood up. Instead of letting my hand go, he gripped it tighter and swung, me around up onto his back. I wrapped my arms around his neck and my legs around his waist. He took off in a flash, dashing through the trees expertly. I closed my eyes against the trees rushing towards me and squeaked in fright.