Lucius - Thousand Year Old Vampire - Part 12

28.1 The house stirred as a visitor came to see me. No one knew what to make of it. I didn’t get visitors. When we had visitors they were people who came to see Marcus. Octavia led the visitor into Marcus’s study where I waited. When we met the woman looked at me and I stared back at the ghost.

What I saw was impossible. Fabia stood there in front of me, with a reserved smile. She was young and beautiful. She was alive. How could that be?

Octavia sensed my shock and came up to me to confer. I told her to lock Claudia in her room and to leave us.

I walked up to Fabia and circled around her, expecting some kind of trick. Her eye color looked slightly different from what I remembered. She didn’t have exactly the same posture. Though it had been many years, perhaps my memory was at fault.

“I know what you are, but that’s not why I’m here,” she said. The longer I looked at her, the more I blamed my memory. It might have been the light, she looked as she’d always had.

Maybe even better. A memory of the taste of her blood bubbled up from the past. The hair at the back of my neck stood up. My throat felt dry. I’d not make the same mistake again.

She asked if I knew who she was. I said, “Of course, you’re Fabia.” That made her smile, she said she wasn’t sure if I knew she existed. When seeing my puzzled face she added. “I’m named after my grandmother.”

The woman before me wasn’t my Fabia, but still she was. It looked like her, sounded like her. Smelled like her. It dumbfounded me. This was Fabia.

“My grandfather Quintus, is a vampire just like you.” Upon hearing this I had to sit down. Through my sloppiness, I’d turned Claudia. I must have done the same with Quintus all those years ago.

In stunned silence I listened to her as she continued. “My mother lived in fear all her life and passed away a few years ago. Recently my brother an experienced fisher, and regrettably also an experienced drinker, fell from his boat and drowned. My family have died one by one, all that’s left is my grandfather Quintus and you. Now tell me great-uncle, why does Quintus hate you so?”

Octavia interrupted us and brought us wine and fruit. In my state of shock I almost sipped some. Fabia tasted the wine and ate some grapes.

I told her that Quintus once stole a love from me, and then later that I’d stolen her back. I said that Quintus held long grudges, but that at least I’d forgiven him for taking my love from me in the first place.

We spoke for hours. At times the conversation came back to Quintus, she wanted me to seek him out and try to talk to him. To see if he could forgive me. She wanted to be part of a family and what little she saw of Quintus alone gave her no warmth.

I steered the conversation in other directions. Said that I’d written songs about her grandmother and that she was even more beautiful. I tried to charm her in the best ways I could. Told her about the songs I’d written.

Even though it made sense to me that she was the granddaughter of my Fabia, that part still didn’t seem real. In some way I couldn’t explain I was sure this was my Fabia. Whatever difference I’d observed in their appearance from the beginning I could no longer see.

I tried to prolong her leaving, but finally she had to go. As she left she had me promise that I’d seek out Quintus and talk to him, which I never would. I had her promise to come back again, which I hoped she would.