Page 47 of The Curse of Eternity
“Thank you for the garments.” Drake accepted the clothes Winston handed over, a matching light blue sweatpants and sweater folded on top of a white long-sleeve button-up and dark jeans.
“No problem. The guest room upstairs is still made up from when I’d been expecting you. Feel free to take it.” Winston’s final words were directed at me, but his glance at Drake seemed to pry at whether or not we’d be sharing a room. The idea came and went through my head as Drake started for the stairs, but I hung back.
“Thank you.” I rushed to follow Drake after a casual wave of acknowledgement from Winston, who then turned to head up the hall toward the drifting scent of freshly brewed coffee.
“Ladies first.” Drake waved me on, and I started climbing on aching legs.
“Come here often?” I asked.
“The house originally belonged to me, so, yes.”
My brows rose. On the second floor, all three doors—one to my right, left, and ahead—were closed, and I hesitated. Drake smoothly moved past me, angling for the room on the left before opening it. Following him in, I took in the hardwood bed frame and matching nightstands on either side. Against the corner wall with the sloping ceiling was a writing desk not unlike the one I remembered from Drake’s house in Albuquerque.
Atop the desk, another black-and-white photograph’s frame leaned against its stand, and I stilled when I recognized its subjects. Drake looked the same as he did today, the ends of his straight black hair reaching slightly past his ears. The full lips, high cheekbones and chiseled jaw were identical, unmarked by time. Beside him, dressed just as elaborated in an old-fashioned suit, was a young Black child with familiar bone structure.
“Is that…” Then I glanced at the paisley pattern of the bedsheets, and it dawned on me why the downstairs had seemed unusual. What kind of a mid-thirties guy, living by himself, decorated his house like it was still the 1960s? I turned to Drake, who studied the old portrait picture with reminiscent fondness.
“Yes, it is Winston and I.” Drake faced me, and a cavalier shrug lifted his shoulders. “As you may have surmised, he is far older than he looks.”
“But he’s not a vampire, I could tell.”
“Not in full, no.”
Oh—a piece of lore trickled back into my brain. Apparently, I’d learnedsomethingfrom what we were forced to study as kids.
“He’s a dhampir.”
Drake nodded, and I exhaled a long breath. Returning to the photo, I tried to find any kind of resemblance between them. They didn’t look alike, but if Winston had one vampire parentand one human… I didn’t want to pry, and surprise washed through me when Drake spoke without being prompted.
“Winston was a young boy when I took him in from an orphanage, sometime in nineteen-forty-eight.” The story didn’t roll off his tongue well, and maybe he hadn’t told it often—or ever, before now. “I had known his mother prior to his birth, and aided in her escape from the man who I believe was in love with her, but would have destroyed any chance of offspring.” A frown creased his forehead, but his thinly-veiled disdain was nothing compared to the horror slackening my jaw.
I should have expected that kind of gross violation of autonomy from the undead, but being around Drake was beginning to desensitize me to them. A deep, integral part of me cleaved in two—having been struggling to rationalize my experiences with Drake compared to what I’d been raised to believe about vampires. Everything I learned about him confirmed that he’d been human once. How he experienced the world wasn’t so different from the way I did.
We were both capable of caring for others, putting ourselves in harm’s way to protect someone else. Neither of us hesitated to defend ourselves when we were threatened, even if that meant reacting with violence. Vampires were defined by several traits, their strength, speed, longevity, and inception, to name a few—but beyond the bloodlust, and the bodies they’d left behind for me and my family to find, they were fundamentally the same as us.
Was it always so simple? Were they not doomed to commit horrible acts? Drake had proven that change was possible, even for those who never grew older. The thought dawned, rising in me like the sun and warming me throughout. Because the truth was that I’d stopped thinking of Drake as one of the undead. If he was just a man, how would I have judged him?
I wouldn’t have. He was too kind, his generosity and patience seemingly endless. Beyond his disarming good looks, there was genuine compassion in his every action. Regardless of what he really was, or how we’d come to be standing here together, I couldn’t fight how I felt about him anymore.
Face flushed, my heart throbbed as my lungs filled with relief—but why did I have to pick the worst time to understand that both realities could be true?That Drake could be what he was, andwhohe was at the same time. It was neverbeing a vampirethat transformed them into monsters—it was that they’d never tried to be anything but cruel.
As he continued the sad story of Winston’s start to life, I tried to bury the tenderness blooming within my chest to focus on his words.
“The mother rarely survives carrying a dhampir, especially when medicine was more primitive than it is now. Since he was orphaned, and left to face a world that would never understand his slowed aging, I opted to adopt him.”
“You guys seem close,” I remarked, and the corners of Drake’s mouth curved up ever so slightly as he handed me my fresh clothes.
“We often resided in the same household until more recently…”
Before I could ask anything else, he abruptly started to retreat to the hall. “The bathroom is the door on the left here, and you are welcome to use the shower. I will leave you to go about your business.” He reached for the handle to close the door behind him.
“Wait—” My hand rose, like I was about to stop him even though I was halfway across the room, but Drake already paused. His dark eyes bore into mine, expectant, and I steeled my courage. “I need to admit to something.” After what he’d justshared, it felt like I now knew a piece of him that many didn’t get to see. Maybe it was time I started trusting someone else, too.
“Yes?” He re-entered the bedroom, closing the door gently behind him to give us privacy.
“I—I’m not the person you think I am. I mean, I am, but…” Inhaling a deep breath, I blinked slowly and organized my thoughts. “Last year, I did something awful, and my cousin got hurt because of my bad decisions. I went on a hunt with my family, not exactly sober, and nearly got her killed.” The tears threatened to fall, but I was done hiding from the guilt.
“You do not have to share anything that you do not wish to, Maria. I did not tell you about Winston, his upbringing, to make you feel as if you owe me anything in return.”
