Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 85029 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 425(@200wpm)___ 340(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 85029 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 425(@200wpm)___ 340(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Here is a body, here is a soul.
Take it, do as you will.
The Darkness begins to move forward towards us and I stay right where I am, ready to receive my gift. The room glows purple now—a color so lavender and soft, not even a princess in a fairy tale could imagine such beauty. And this beauty is reflected off the slick surface of the entity that hovers over top of me.
It knows what we’re doing and it approves.
It wants Syrsee’s baby even more than we do.
This is true, but it doesn’t think like that. There is no biological brain inside the oil slick. But at the same time, it is nothing but brain. Finally, the outside world has caught up with what is happening deep under the earth. Paul told me once, a couple years back, that he knew what the Darkness is.
Nanotech.
Billions, maybe even trillions, of nanoparticles. Where it came from, I have no idea. What it wants, I do not know.
But it likes me. I know this because when it descends down onto Little Baby’s body—seeping into the blood weeping out of her—it covers me too. Caresses me too. Touches me too.
It has always favored me. Why?
Because I’m beautiful?
Paul is beautiful too, but he makes hideous things with the power of the Darkness.
So it’s something more than beauty. It’s the gentleness of a spirit, maybe? Or, more likely—since I am not particularly gentle—the spirit’s artistic vision?
Creativity is what it longs for, after all.
Suddenly, Little Baby screams and every muscle in her body locks tight. Her back comes up in an arch and I watch as the last of the Darkness disappears inside her.
I was holding my breath, so I let it out. Smiling.
Now the glow starts. The purple. It begins very light—even lighter than the pretty lavender mist all around us. So light, it’s nearly white.
But as the moments tick off, and as Little Baby’s blood mixes with the lavender, it turns dark. This is how to make Black blood, after all. Which was never black in the first place. It was always just purple.
And now, the magic begins.
Little Baby goes limp again. But as I watch, the Darkness is crawling under her skin. Like she is filled with wriggling worms. The first time I saw this—thousands of years ago—I was terrified. I really thought it was worms. Or something worse. Botflies, fruit flies, eye worms, mites.
I shudder just thinking about the horror.
Finally, the Darkness settles inside her. Of course, there are no textbooks to explain the process to me. That’s why I had to write my own. So what I think is happening now is just a guess. An educated one. The Darkness doesn’t just get inside the blood, it gets inside the cells. And once in the cells, it gets inside the nucleus. And once inside the nucleus, it gets inside the DNA.
Deoxyribonucleic acid. Base pairs, and hydrogen bonds, and helixes. A very specific structure with very specific instructions on what this body looks like, and sounds like, and how it behaves.
From here, it’s a simple act of rearranging.
Well, it’s not really simple. It’s very complicated and I doubt there is much of anything in the human tech world that can rewrite the DNA of a living organism and then keep it alive as it morphs.
Only the Darkness can do that.
That’s how vampires are made.
And that’s why it’s so difficult to make new ones. You must have the blessing of this dark god. You must have a vessel with the Black blood, and you must have a partner to help you. Not a human. Not a witch—she is the vessel, not the partner.
So you need two vampires and a witch.
That is how we make the babies.
But… if you have three vampires—oh, that’s when things get very, very special.
Little Baby is a gift. Something I’m using to entice the Darkness to take part in what comes next.
She is pale now—nearly silver in this light. Dead. Very, very dead. But we’re just getting started with this little ritual.
It’s my turn now.
I lean back on the ground, spreading my legs and arms. Little Baby is kind of in my way, but I just flop a leg and an arm over her, pretending she’s not there. Her body begins to shake—another seizure as the Darkness works magic inside her cells. And then there is a long gasp from her. A breath of life.
I have seen this done many times. So even though my eyes are closed and my mouth open in anticipation of what comes next, I know the Darkness—in all its purple glory—is leaving her body with that breath. And just as I have this thought, it enters me. Filling my mouth with oily, slick nanoparticles. Choking me, forcing itself down my throat.
I make myself lie as still as I can.