It is good to be free…

I opened my eyes and I could feel it again.  It had been so long I had almost forgotten.  But I did not forget.  It was hidden deep within me, where it could not be harmed, behind an iron wall.  I am made of iron.  I have an iron body, I am strong, I have an iron mind, where everything of importance is hidden behind gleaming steel, where the Crushing Fog cannot reach it.  I feel it again.

I stare into his face, my savior, my liberator.  He has done this thing for me to dissolve the last vestiges of the life debt he owes me.  He has more than repaid me with this action.  He has saved my life.  I decide that I will do anything for him that I can.  But I don’t have to.  I don’t have to if I don’t want to.  I feel it again, bursting from behind the walls in my mind.  I feel it flooding my mind with joy. Freedom.  Free will.  The right and ability to choose.  I feel it.  It rushes through me like blood pumped by a living heart.  Pounding through me.  Exhilarating me like the first taste of viete.  I sit where I am for a long time, thinking thoughts I was not allowed to think only a fortnight before.  I think of doing all the things I had been commanded by my Castallan not to do.  And I will do all of them.  In the last two nights I have tasted more freedom than in the last few months after of my enslavement put together.  Last night I was given the choice to kill Vincent if I wanted.  And I did.

Oh, how I reveled in it.  I had chafed under his pretension, his ignorance.  He was such a child.  He heard of my taking of the elder in the sanctified way, and he nursed at the idea like a pup to the teat of his bitchmother.  He became like a beast, and oh how I reviled him.  Vincent, if you are still alive, I curse you as a fool and an ignorant wretch.  I am glad you have been taken by the Tremere.  Know that I would not wish that fate on any worthy enemy, and if I ever meet with you again, I hope it is in the torture chambers of a Tremere chantry, as I burn it to the ground.  And I will let you burn.  And not even grace your memory by spitting on your ashes.

I stand up now.  I flex; I test my body as I did my will.  I take Patrick up in my arms, he is as a babe, I am so strong.  My body flooded with blood and the ecstasy of freedom.  I kiss Patrick, I touch my lips to his in gratitude, I am free.  I place him back on his bathroom floor, and I tower above him.  I look into his eyes and see the most satisfying thing I have seen in a long while.  Fear.  He fears what he has done.  He fears he has released a lion among his family.  And he is half-right.  Though I am not a lion, but a tiger. I will not kill them, yet.  I will sneak slowly upon them and then rend them apart.  I am a tiger.  Quiet and fast.  I am stronger than a lion, and I am smarter.  I will have my revenge.  I will climb up my leash and bite the one who used to hold it.  Then I will place the leash around his neck, and I will hang him with it.  And I will watch him swing, and twitch, and I will drink his blood and his power and his spirit.  I will burn his corpse and I will choke his master with the ashes.  And I will embrace his child, and I will take his clan apart, and I will never ever rest.  Jeffery, I will have you.  You will kneel to me, and you will vomit blood when I command, and I will skin you alive and burn you slowly.  And I will do everything I ever promised myself I would do in my slavery.

But not now.  Now, I take my first step.  Now, I climb the leash.  I will be subtle with my attack, I will bite hard and I will drop the noose around his neck before the pain of my bite is cleared from his mind.  And, as the saying goes, there is no time like the present.  I stride out of the bathroom, and into the apartment. I see it crisply through free eyes, I see the jackals laying around, rolling on their backs for each other.  They are less than dogs.  Even my Jhove is sitting lazily on the couch.  I will deal with him, discipline him, later.  Now I hunt.  I hunt for Jeffery. His hand held my leash the tightest.  He pulled and jerked me like a marionette.  I will never forgive him that.  I will crack his bones and suck the unliving marrow from them.  I am angry.  I must calm myself.  I have sworn my revenge, and so I must enact it rationally.  I glide through the apartments, seeking him and his doll-lover.  He has bonded himself to a less-than-jackal.  She is weak and pathetic. I will take her as well.  I do not know how, but I will destroy her in the way that pains him the most.

But I anger again. I anger swiftly now; perhaps it is the suppressed rage of my confinement boiling up. I shall have to examine this feeling in depth at a later time.  But now I find him. I watch him for a single moment. He is standing on a balcony next to his doll-love, holding her around the waste, looking out over the cityscape.  He looks nervous.  That is to be expected, he knows what will happen soon.  What has already happened.  His hand is twitching.  The moment is over.  I rush him, throwing his love to the side like the doll she is, I see her almost fall over the rail.  She does not. I grab Jeffery by the face, digging my claws into his flesh.  I lunge my head forward, and he jerks his back, faster than I would have though he could.  My claws tear at his face, digging long furrows in his skin.  I will have my way.  I clutch at his face tighter, my nails touch bone, he opens his mouth to scream in pain. Now.  I snap my head forward, and latch my mouth to his, muffling his scream with a vomit of blood.  I push the blood from inside me and push it into him.  He would not have choked, but he swallows involuntarily nonetheless.  I have climbed the leash.  I have started to bite him; I have started to move the leash closer to his neck.  He will be mine soon. I am patient.  Step by step.  But first things first.  Blood trickles from our mouths as I end the kiss.  The bond has started.  Only twice more and I could have him as a slave to my will.  But the pain for him would not be enough.  I will wait.  I will watch and judge how best to achieve what I desire.  Our mouths are still connected with a sick strand of saliva and blood.  Imagine, a vampire of his age still salivating.  Revolting.  He is staring at me, he is shivering in my grasp, blood is running down his face from the furrows I have gouged into him.  It mingles with the blood and saliva dripping from our mouths on the concrete patio under our feet.  I stare him in the eyes; he has no choice but to meet them.  He is shaking.  I think this is the beginning of a whole new friendship, Jeffery.  This I say to him as I let go of his face.  I turn from him as he sinks to the blood-splattered patio. He can not stand on his own. I understand how he must feel.  I had not seen his doll-love walk inside. But she is not here, and I don’t believe she fell off the balcony, so I will see her soon.  But for now Jeffery is lying in his own blood, bathing in his own fear and a newly perceived mortality.

It is good to be free.  It is good tobe free.  Itis good tobe free.  Itisgood tobefree.  Itisgoodtobefree…

Tim's e-mail is tim_dodge@hotmail.com