PAST 1821 The comely, young lad opened his eyes. His brain was fuzzy. He has no memory of anything. Who am I? He panicked trying to remember. He didn’t lose his ability to think that was for certain, but why couldn’t he remember anything more? He felt something sticky on his mouth. Blood, he realized, horrified at the thought. Why was his mouth bleeding? “Hello there, darling,” an unrecognized voice said, enough to make the young man snap out of a trancelike state. This must be a dream. I must be dreaming, he told himself. He looked up at the owner of the bewitching voice and saw the most beautiful woman he had ever laid his eyes upon. “Wh-who are you?” he demanded, nervously. “I am so happy you are awake, my darling. The real question you should be asking is who are you? Well, darling you are mine,” the beautiful young woman responded mystically. An unexpected disgust crept within the confused lad’s veins. Although he could not remember anything, his gut was telling him he hated this stranger in front of him. “You are such a beautiful man, Gualtiero, my love,” she said playfully. “Gualtiero? Is that my name?” he asked another question. “It certainly is,” she responded. Twirling her hair through her fingers, she smiled widely at him. “You belong to me, Gualtiero.” She kissed him without another word. A passionate, torrid kiss. The young man called Gualtiero didn’t understand what she was doing, but he was craving for something else, not whatever this thing she was doing to him. He gave her a light shove. “Whatever you are, I believe you are not from here,” he spoke, unable to hide his disgust, wiping his wet lips of blood and saliva. “No one attacks another human as if they were food. Have you totally lost your mind?” “You are my food, Gualtiero, my darling,” she winked seductively. “I’m… I’m hungry,” Gualtiero said, suddenly feeling so weak. “I need…” “…another kiss?” she finished. “Blood! Good heavens! Why am I craving for blood? Wh-what did you do to me?” Gualtiero asked, horrified. Something was definitely amiss. He was not craving for food. He was craving for blood. Like an animal. Like a… like a monster. “Get away from me, you monster, get away from me!” Gualtiero warned. She watched him with amusement and curiosity. “Now that is not the way to show gratitude, darling. I saved you from an illness. You were going to die. And out of the goodness of my heart, I saved you,” she told him, sounding like a mother explaining patiently to her child. Gualtiero tried to strike the woman with his fist in a sudden movement, hoping to catch her off guard, but she was too quick for him. Shocked at her speed, he fell on his knees, frail and vulnerable. He was really feeling so hungry. How could he crave something with such urgency and desperation? He licked the blood left on his mouth. He also consumed the smeared blood on his hand. But it didn’t satisfy anything. He just kept wanting more and more, but there was nothing more for him to consume. He looked at his surroundings and noticed he and the mysterious woman were in some place surrounded with so many trees. He could see everything with a clear vision. He could even hear animal sounds from afar. He ran to the nearest tree with a plan in mind. He felt as though he was gliding through it instead of running. His sudden speed was dizzying. He couldn’t stop his forward momentum and instead of hitting the tree with his fist, he came crashing to an old tree hitting his head violently. A rush of blood flowed all over his face. Blood, he exclaimed excitedly. Blood! “Very creative, darling, but it won’t suffice in the long run,” the woman said mockingly. She watched Gualtiero with adoration. He looked back at her with disgust and animosity, then proceeded sipping his own blood gushing from his head. “Are you alright?” Gualtiero and the woman shared a look. An intruder. “Your first meal,” the woman whispered to him. Gualtiero snarled. His senses were working overtime. He could smell it. Blood. He wanted more blood. “Hello there, gentleman,” the woman told the paunchy man seductively. The man was instantly transfixed. He was staring at a goddess before him. She walked ever as gracefully towards him. “No! Run!” Gualtiero screamed from behind her. But the man either did not hear him or did not sense any kind of danger. The woman suddenly revealed her fangs to the man. He had never felt so scared for his life. He tried to run, but the woman was so much faster. She reached for his leg, tugged it with such a beastly force until it got detached from his limb. The man, with only one leg left, fell to the ground in excruciating pain. “Please, God save me,” he chanted a prayer with shivering lips. “Forgive me for my trespasses.” The woman, who looked very much like a predator now, gave him one last look before she sank her teeth into his neck, sipping every bit of blood out of him. “Leave him alone!” she heard Gualtiero scream behind her one more time. Gualtiero moved with a lightning speed towards the woman and a fight ensued. The plump man opened his eyes just in time to witness a fight scene right in front of him. The couple – or monsters, he thought to himself – were hissing at each other. Attacking and counterattacking. His heart was numb from terror but he was still praying the young man would win the battle. And he did! His prayers were answered. He saw the woman knocked out unconscious on the ground. The bloodied young man offered him a hand, which he accepted without hesitation, only to regret it. The lad’s hand was ice cold, as though he were dead. The terrified man walked a step backwards, unsure whether to trust the young man or not. He was suddenly giving him a strange, creepy look. His decision came a second too late as Gualtiero suddenly attacked him, unable to control the bloodlust anymore. He sank his teeth onto the horrified man’s neck, and didn’t hold back anymore. He sipped through the veins until there was no longer any blood left in his victim. The woman squealed in delight. “Oh, darling. You are amazing!” Gualtiero let go of his lifeless victim. For a minute, the woman thought he was staring at her ready to initiate a kiss this time around, but he was just eyeing the severed limb, still bursting with dry blood. He sucked the blood out of it, until he finally stopped, panting. “What have I done?” he screamed in horror to no one in particular. The woman came towards him and kissed him once again. What else tastes better than this? Blood, sweet human blood, on the lips of the most beautiful creature on the planet, the woman thought. Gualtiero was powerless with shock. She stopped kissing him for a moment, only to look at his face with reverence. “We are now going to be together, my darling. I made you invincible. I made you a vampire,” she smiled. She pushed him to the ground and went on top of him to kiss him over and over…