Аманда Хокинг: Letters To Elise: A Peter Townsend Novella

Then I felt something, a sensation I’d never had before. Like a heat in the pit of my stomach pulling me. As if I’d had an invisible thread tied to me all this time that I’d never noticed before, and someone just picked up the slack and began to pull me.

In the din of the thousand voices that filled up the street, I heard one clear as a bell. I turned towards it, not that I had a choice. The thread yanked at me so hard, it was turning me.

“You expect me to let you have that for -” the voice was saying, that clear, perfect girl’s voice lilting with an Irish accent. But she stopped speaking when I turned around, when she saw me.

I couldn’t move or breathe or do anything. The whole world fell away, and she was the only thing I could see.

Her eyes were gray, like a heavy fog that blanketed me, and her skin was white as porcelain. Red flames of hair framed her face, and the pink petals of her lips parted as she stared at me.

I could hear her heart above everyone else’s around her, even though her heart beat much softer and slower. She had the heart of a vampyre, and it sounded strangely exotic against the frantic beats of the humans. It sung to me, calling me to her.

I don’t remember walking over to her. I’m not sure that my feet even moved. It was as if I’d evaporated into a mist so I could float through all the people crowding the street until I stopped in front of her.

A cart filled with tomatoes separated us, and no gap had ever felt farther. We were only a foot or two apart, but I needed to be closer to her. The distance was terrifying.

An old woman stood next to me, trying to push me out of the way to continue haggling over the cost of tomatoes, but I ignored her. I was immovable, like granite. I couldn’t go anywhere unless this beautiful girl asked me to go.

I had never seen anything more lovely than her, and I doubt I ever will again. She was most painful to look at, like staring at the sun, because she was so perfect. She appeared young, maybe sixteen when she’d turned, and she was flawless in a way I’d never seen anyone, not even other vampyres.

“Hello,” she said, her words barely more than a breath. A strand of red hair had fallen across her forehead, and she tucked it back with delicate fingers.

“Hello,” I said, my voice as soft and weak as hers. She’d stolen all the air from my lungs.

“My name is Elise,” she said at length.

“Elise?” I smiled, knowing there had never been a name that sounded more beautiful. “I’m Peter.”

“Peter,” she repeated, and my knees became weak at the sound of it. She turned back, breaking eye contact with more for an excoriating moment as she yelled back over her shoulder. “Catherine! Can you watch the cart? I have to…” She trailed off and looked back at me.

“Will you walk with me?” I asked, filling in the gap.

She nodded once, and another vampyre came over. Her dark hair was tied back in a braid, and she gave Elise and me an odd look.

“Elise?” she asked. “What’s all this?”

“Catherine, I have to go walk with this gentleman,” Elise said.

Catherine tried to press her for more answers, but Elise didn’t have any. She stepped out from behind the cart and walked next to me. We turned down a street, moving away from the bustle of the market. She kept staring up at me, and I down at her, as if we were both afraid that the other would disappear.

She turned into a stable, empty aside from a few horses. She put her hand on one of the wooden pillars, as if to steady herself, and looked at me. Her eyes were hypnotic, forcing me to look at them. With her, I had no willpower of my own.

“Who are you?” she asked, almost in an awed tone.

“I already told you. I’m Peter,” I said, hoping that would be explanation enough, and moved towards her.

“Are you a sorcerer?” Elise asked and stepped away from me. She climbed up on a bale of straw, so she could look down at me.

“No.” I ducked below the beam so I could walk over to her. “Are you?”

“No.” She shook her head, and I noticed a small braid she had in her hair, keeping it back so it didn’t fall in her eyes.

She reached up, hanging onto the beam, and her dress pulled taut against her bodice. It awakened a fever inside of me, and my whole body began to heat up.

“How have you put this spell me on then?” Elise asked.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

I reached up, putting my hands on the same beam as her. My fingers brushed against hers, causing a jolt to surge through me. Her eyes widened, so I knew she felt it too. I leaned on the beam, so our bodies were so close they were nearly touching, and I breathed in the sweet perfume of her flesh.

“This,” she said softly. “This is a spell, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “If it is, I don’t care. I don’t ever want it to stop.”

I leaned in, meaning to kiss her, but she jumped down off the bale of straw. She ran out of the stable, her dress flowing behind her, and she glanced back at me over her shoulder. I’m not sure if she wanted me to give chase, but I didn’t have a choice.

I ran after her, and she sped up. I was faster than her. I easily caught her. I grabbed her wrist, gently as not to hurt her, and she stopped, whirling around to face me. Her body pressed into me, so I could feel how hard her own heart hammered in her chest. She stared up at me, searching my face.

“What game are you playing?” Elise asked.

“This isn’t a game.”

She pulled her wrist from my hand and stepped back from me. “Just because I want to kiss you doesn’t mean we can.”

“Why not?” I asked, and I made myself stay in place. I wanted to follow her, to be close enough to touch her again, but I knew that wasn’t what she wanted, so I stayed firm.

“Because.” She stood up straighter. “I am a lady, and I have morals.”

“Yes, of course,” I nodded, feeling the blush on my cheeks. “I didn’t mean to… tarnish you.”

“Good, because you can’t.” She turned away. “If you’d like to walk with me, you can. But nothing more.”

I hurried to catch up with her, and we walked slowly down the road. A little boy ran out in front of us, nearly into her, and she paused to let him pass.

“You don’t know what this is?” Elise asked softly after he’d gone. She kept her eyes focused on the path in front of her, only occasionally glancing up at me.

“You mean this… pull between us?” I asked.

“Yes, exactly,” she nodded quickly. “The pull.”

“No, I haven’t the faintest idea,” I shook my head. “My maker might know, though.”

“You know your maker?” Elise looked up sharply at me.

“Yes, don’t you?” I gestured back to the market. “Wasn’t Catherine yours?”

“No, she’s a friend, more like a sister.” Her steps slowed a bit as we talked. “My maker was a stranger that my father paid to turn me, and then he promptly abandoned me.”

“Your father paid him?” I asked, not hiding my shock.

“We were dying,” Elise explained. “Both my younger sisters and my mother had already died. It was only my father and I left. The famine hit our family hard.”

“So to save you, he hired someone to turn you?” I asked, and she nodded.

“But he left me, alone with my father.” Her face darkened. “I had to learn how to be a vampyre on my own.”

I remembered how I’d been when I’d first turned, and I could only imagine what a starving girl like Elise had done, alone with a human.

“I’m sure my maker will have answers,” I said, hurrying to erase the thoughts on her mind. “Would you like to go talk with him?”

“Not now.” She shook her head, and her hair looked even more like fire as it shimmered across her back. “I should be heading back to help Catherine.”