Vampire City by Heather Crews

Obviously I knew, from the beginning, I had married a vampire.

I have this image in my head, the day of our unceremonious wedding. It was late in the fall. Thick clouds blocked the sun. We both wore black, a macabre detail we hadn't planned. Afterwards, outside the courthouse, we stood staring at each other for a moment, hardly able to believe our new happiness. We are married. I leaned my head against his chest and he circled his arms tightly around me. With one hand he stroked my unremarkable brown hair, shaped into a chin-length cut I hated. His hair, ice-blond and just touching his shoulders, tangled freely in the wind.

Now my hair is long. Now, I am afraid.

~

Him. Oswald. Tall and broad-shouldered, his skin so pale, a faint grayish cast hinting at his undeadness. Strong, lean features. Green eyes like glaciers, the irises ringed with black that leaks into the green like spilled ink. Quick to smile, but usually without showing his teeth. Quick to forgive mistakes. Quick to fall in love.

He asked me to marry him. I didn't hesitate when I said yes.

~

The vampire city in the north is not overly large, yet not so small. Ruined and abandoned by humans, it seems terribly desolate, even filled with vampires and their wives. Though vampires own cars, they don't use them within the city, so the streets are traveled only by foot and thus there was never a need to clear the rubble. The crumbling buildings responsible for all this debris are the color of watery tea, their weakened walls sagging like rotten skin. The air smells a bit like sulfur. In the winter the snow is like dirt-smudged frosting on a smashed cake. Summer never brings much warmth, and very little sun.

But he is here and I like the city well enough, even if I do find it frightening at times. It's almost impossible not to feel frightened with unfamiliar vampires occupying little shadowed houses and hidden apartments, concealing their wives from other vampires who feel no loyalty to any woman but the one they married. I don't know exactly what could happen if I ever wandered outside alone at night, vulnerable to the whims of any passing vampire stranger, and I don't want to know. In this city, especially, it is the husband's duty more than anything to protect his wife. Our bones are so fragile in the wrong vampire's hands.

I know other wives must fear my husband, as I fear theirs. But even though I know he is a creature of darkness, I couldn't have asked for anyone better. I do love Oswald passionately and I know he loves me.

I know it.

~

We all heard rumors about some big ceremony vampires were supposed to perform on their first anniversaries, but no one knew what it entailed. It was a surprise, I supposed. I don't interact much with other wives, so I can't be sure what happens to them after that first year. Maybe there's a reason we hardly see each other. A reason we're so isolated.

Well, I never liked surprises. I decided to do some research about this rumored ceremony. Which wasn't, as it happened, a rumor at all.

The book I found in the library mentioned common fates for a wife: a husband could drain her blood entirely, trade her with another vampire, or even throw her at the mercy of unwed vampires—a grave insult. Every choice involves a ceremony of some kind.

But, the book informed me, a vampire husband can only get rid of his wife on the first anniversary of the marriage. The ceremony was all part of some convoluted system of vampire rules and traditions.

Less horrifying, I read further on, and much less common, he could choose to stay with his wife. He wasn't obligated to get rid of her, just permitted to do so.

He could choose to stay with me, I assured myself numbly as I closed the book. He loves me.

Vampires are very strong and ruthless, not known for their compassion. Some say they don't even have hearts. Who knows if they are really, truly capable of love?

In the back of the book I saw a long list, a record of vampires' names and the choices they'd made. The handwriting was cramped and hard to read on the yellowed pages, but I deciphered enough to know hardly any of them had actually stayed with their wives.

Maybe Oswald was drifting away from me, I thought, the information in the book having made me paranoid. Did he stay out later and later each night when he left to hunt? Did I detect the scent of some alluring perfume on his chilled skin when he came home? Was his kiss on my cheek—and why not on my lips?—too hasty, too soulless?

My blood was like ice. Some moments it felt as if I couldn't breathe. My body seemed to flutter and muscles in my face would twitch. What had I gotten myself into? How could I get myself out of it?

When Oswald woke in the evening, he lit the candles and wrapped me in an embrace from behind. My body responded to his beloved familiarity and briefly I thought I must have read that book wrong or misinterpreted it somehow . . .

But I knew what he could do to me, and knowing was the only thing to save me. Because I had to get away. I had to run.

"Is something wrong?" Oswald asked.

I turned to him with a loving smile. "I'm only thinking about our anniversary," I told him truthfully.

"I'm looking forward to it, my love."

I bet you are, I thought gravely as he left our home to hunt in the night.

~

In the morning, after he fell asleep, I packed a small bag of clothes and a few servings of food and water. I didn't know how long it would take me to get a safe distance from the vampire city. I didn't know where I would go. All I knew was I wouldn't be safe with Oswald much longer. I couldn't chance that he might not love me enough to choose our marriage over those deadlier options. I feared the faces of the other vampires. I feared the part of Oswald I did not know, the part that stopped him from warning me about this horrible tradition.

I left our home, hurrying through the wreckage in the streets. I headed south. I saw no one.

I had barely reached the outskirts of the city when I heard it—a scream so terrible my knees buckled and I fell to the ground. My bag bounced away from me but when I pushed myself to my feet I didn't bother retrieving it. I had to put as much distance between myself and the source of that scream as I could.

Because I knew it was Oswald waking hours early to find me gone. Heaving out of bed, inelegantly knocking his jar of earth to the floor. Lumbering through the house, out into the streets, to find me and drag me home.

Without a clear idea of what I was doing, I dashed to the nearest building, a sad and gray thing. The ceiling had collapsed, forcing me to climb and slide and stumble as I made my escape. Thick, leafy vines had pushed through cracks in the walls, tangling up in themselves. They caught hold of my ankles, as if trying to trap me for him to find. But I had to keep running, or find a good place to hide.

He screamed. He screamed my name. The sounds followed me, stoking my fear. I became clumsy in my haste to outrun his unearthly howls of desperation. What was it that made him want to find me so badly? Would he punish me for trying to leave him?

Would he bother?

I found myself moving closer to the sky, raw and blue, as I clambered up to what used to be the second floor. Concrete beams ran the length of it, moldy patches of flooring clinging precariously to them. I stepped tentatively onto one of the beams and, finding it solid, started to run to the other end of the building. On either side of me gaped huge picture windows, the glass long ago smashed out of them so now the trees reached freely inside. Their dense greenness blurred in my peripheral vision and then—a flash of black . . .

I screamed and stumbled to my knees, cowering against the far wall. I felt him rushing to me. When had I become so afraid of my husband? He hadn't done anything to deserve my fear. It was only that damning bit of information I'd discovered in an old library without any footprints but my own in the dust . . . Perhaps the information was outdated. Oswald—he would never hurt me. I was stupid to have thought such a thing.

Chancing a glance up at him, I glimpsed an unexpected sight: his face twisted into an angry snarl, his pale green eyes blazing red, his open mouth revealing fangs sharp and gleaming. It was the look of someone out for blood. Another scream escaped me as I turned away, stricken with terror, waiting for him to descend upon me.

Suddenly his hands gripped my arms, lifting me up with little gentleness, and he shouted at me. What was he saying? I felt too afraid to look at him again but I forced my eyes up . . . He no longer bore the horrifying countenance of the blood-starved. Instead he looked urgent, earnest, and hurt.

And frightening, like a corpse. A vampire should never walk during the day.

"What have I done?" he demanded desperately. "What have I done that would cause you to leave me?"

I hesitated. Then I revealed to him what I discovered in the library.

"Oh," he said, laughing as he exhaled the word. "Oh, is that it? Is that what's got you so upset?"

My face turned stony. "I think it's a legitimate reason."

He hugged me suffocatingly, his face in the crook of my neck and shoulder. "Those are such old traditions," he explained. "Only the most barbaric vampires get rid of their wives using those methods."

"So you're not a traditionalist?" I said accusingly.

Oswald smiled. "I'm a modern traditionalist." He touched my chin with his long icy fingers. "You know I would never hurt you."

I lowered my eyes, shamed.

"I ventured into the daylight for you," he said, as if I needed reminding. I could clearly see the way the hollows of his cheeks had begun to collapse with his weakness. The color of his skin, never particularly healthy to begin with, looked sickly. His hair was losing its shine. It wasn't even a very sunny morning, yet the light was taking its toll on him.

The sun means life, I thought absently. But not to someone who is already dead.

"Come home," he implored. "Return with me."

I looked at my husband wasting away before me. I saw the sincerity in his eyes. I broke with love for him.

Without a word, I took his hand and allowed him to lead me home.

~

Tonight is our anniversary, the night I dreaded.

I remember now why I feared it.

With a handful of other wives, I stand displayed on a platform before a sea of disturbingly impassive faces. Oswald's is among them. I never knew so many vampires lurked within the decaying confines of this city. Their numbers are unsettling.

But I don't have to worry. Oswald assured me that there must be a ceremony no matter the decision.

What decision will he make?

I shouldn't second-guess his intentions. I already know what he will say when his turn comes.

And yet . . .

"Those are such old traditions. Only the most barbaric vampires get rid of their wives using those methods."

Are there other methods? Methods the book in the library hadn't mentioned?

The wife standing directly to my left must have been married to one of those barbaric vampires, because he opted to drain her completely of blood. The one before her was traded to another vampire, as if she'd never mattered to her husband in the first place.

"You know I would never hurt you."

My turn. Oswald's turn.

My body grows numb.

I try to meet his eyes through the crowd but he won't look directly at me. I begin to sweat with fear. The elders are speaking to him. What if . . . No, he wouldn't. He said he loves me and I have placed my trust in him. Just because the first two wives met with an undesirable fate doesn't mean he will choose the same for me. Oswald isn't like those vampire husbands. He isn't barbaric. He will choose me, choose my love and safety.

Our bond will be unbreakable, I tell myself. Nothing will come between us after this.

Everyone watches, silent. I hold my breath as he opens his mouth to decide what will become of me.

He loves me.

I know it.






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