Chapter 4 – Valtu #3
I shrug. “And it’s not my fault if it’s true.” I flash her a mirthless smile. “Now, if you’re done badgering me, I need to be off.”
I move past her and she doesn’t move out of the way, causing my shoulder to brush against hers. For a moment I see her for who she really is. Not some leggy Slavic model, but something made of bones, crepey skin, and red eyes.
A monster.
All vampires are monsters, but some are…
extra special. Some have been created by Skarde himself.
Not through breeding with humans, which has resulted in ninety-nine percent of the current vampire population, but by the “old-fashioned” way—bringing them close to death, then bringing them back to life with vampire blood.
The only problem with creating vampires that way is that they turn into raging monsters, debased to primal animals with insatiable bloodlust. It’s against vampiric code to create any this way, but that didn’t stop Skarde.
He was above the law until the moment of his death.
Some, over the centuries, learned to control their hunger and rage, suppressing their monstrous forms until they were hidden under the human skin. But sometimes the creature is hard to hide.
I look back over my shoulder at Saara to see her baring her fangs at me before her teeth slide back to normal. “Have a good day, Professor,” she says to me, a sly gleam in her eyes.
She knows what I saw, what I felt back there.
And she likes that I saw it.
The truth.
That she’s a daughter of Skarde.
This is going to make things complicated for me, isn’t it? Considering most of the vampire world believes I played some role in his death.
I quickly leave the washroom, hurry through the club, and then out through the main door at the top of the spiral staircase until I’m stepping into a small, narrow hallway.
There are no lights in here, on purpose, but I can see in the dark.
Once the door to the Red Room shuts, I walk to the door in front of me and push it open.
I’m met with fluorescent lighting. One of the most impressive libraries in Italy, and the books are still treated with the horrid aesthetic of fluorescent light. Luckily the lights are dim where I am, but even so it’s enough to make me wince.
My eyes adjust and I make my way from the back of the library through the aisles, passing the section that is set aside as a museum, with rare books, music sheets, and musical artifacts under display, then past the stacks that have eager beaver students already flipping through books to study.
No matter what Saara says, or how it looks to the rest of the vampires, I really do love working here.
I’ve always flitted from place to place throughout my life, and while I’m not setting down roots here in Venice, it does give me a sense of purpose to be a teacher, a way to pass on all that I have learned over the centuries.
It makes me feel relatively normal, even though I’m not.
And most importantly, because the Red Room is accessed through the library, I’m in charge of it.
It doesn’t matter what city I find myself settled in, I usually create a feeding club for vampires if there wasn’t one before.
I like to be the one who unites the vampires together.
The reason Saara thinks everyone is besotted with me is because they are—I provide them with fresh human blood to drink, and fresh human bodies to fuck.
Every vampire knows who Valtu is, even without the Dracula notoriety, because they need me. That’s why I’m popular.
Well, perhaps not in my class. As I make my way through the storied halls of the grand school and down to the concert room, I’m already picturing the look of disdain on the one person that doesn’t seem all that enthralled with me.
Dahlia.
And when I enter the concert room and see her on the stage, sitting at one of the pipe organs, her fingers and feet poised to play, I feel that animosity again. It surrounds her like this dark cloud that I don’t know how to read.
“I assume you know well enough to not let your feet touch those pedals,” I say loudly to her as I shut the door behind me and walk through the rows of chairs toward the stage.
She freezes, her red hair falling over her shoulder in such a way that it reminds me of a sunset hitting a waterfall. It does something to my gut, that feeling again of knowing her, coupled with a surge of adrenaline that seems to go straight to my dick.
Christ on a bike. You’d think I got it all out of my system.
“I know well enough,” she says, twisting on the bench to face me. She’s already wearing her own organ shoes, her slim Adidas sneakers resting beside the bench.
A throat is cleared and I realize that the three other students in our class are staring at me expectantly. I’ve completely ignored them so far, and unlike Dahlia, they’re all sitting in the front row of the chairs like most students should be.
I gesture to the students and give Dahlia a steady look. “Well? Perhaps it would be best if you sat with your classmates instead of jumping right into things. As you can see, there are four students and only two organs.”
She gives me a small smile but doesn’t look reprimanded at all. She slowly takes off her organ shoes and puts her sneakers on, then walks off the stage, taking a seat beside the others.
I give my head a small shake and then paste a smile on my face when addressing the others. “Welcome to your first practical class.”
I run over the curriculum with them. Unlike the history class, which students of all instruments attend, everything in this class is focused on having the best training on the pipe organ.
Everyone here can play, but today it’s a matter of finding out how well, and that in turn will affect things down the line, such as the winter recital and other small concerts they’ll be involved in.
Then we proceed to the demonstrations. On the concert hall stage, beneath the molded ceilings and alfresco paintings, are two organs, one on each side of the stage. There are two grand pianos situated closer to the middle, as well as cello, a percussion set, and a few other instruments.
One by one the students take their place at the organ that Dahlia was originally sitting at, playing a piece of music.
The first student, Leo, an Italian boy who can’t be any older than twenty, played a very lively and vibrant rendition of “A Whiter Shade of Pale.” The next student, a bespeckled girl from Bristol in her thirties called Margaret, who I switched to English with since her Italian was so atrocious, played a noisy version of a Jehan Alain piece.
A quiet and brooding-looking German boy named Johann played a surprisingly jolly piece of something he said he wrote himself.
And then finally, Dahlia slips her organist shoes back on and takes her seat on the bench.
She glances at me over her shoulder, waiting for my cue, and I’m momentarily distracted by the smoothness of her pale skin, a couple of freckles that appear under the thin strap of her burgundy camisole.
I clear my throat, bringing my eyes to meet her. “Go on then, Dahlia.”
She nods, closing her eyes as her fingers pause in the air above the keys.
Then she starts to play.
Toccata and Fugue in D minor.
You have got to be kidding me.
It’s arguably the most famous piece of organ music in the world, and most people don’t know that it was Bach who wrote it. All they know is that this is Dracula’s music. This is the music for vampires and haunted houses, and whatever version of me that Hollywood wants to throw at the world.
And here is Dahlia, playing it and playing it extremely well.
It’s like she knows , I think to myself.
But of course she doesn’t. She can’t. Humans will never believe in vampires unless the vampire explicitly shows themselves.
After that, there is no turning back, but until then, the human mind won’t allow it.
They truly believe we are as made up as Santa Claus.
She’s continuing to play the song too, which makes me realize she’ll play the whole long damn thing unless I stop her. It’s hard to, though, as I watch the skill in her fingers and feet, how effortless it is. She’s almost as good as I am. Yet another thing for me to puzzle over.
“Thank you, Dahlia,” I say loudly and she abruptly stops, giving me a loaded look over her shoulder, as if I’m being rude. “I’m afraid I have to cut you off or we’ll be here all day.”
She shifts around on the bench, her brows raised. “And what do you think?”
“About the song? It happens to be one of my favorites.”
“One of your favorites?” The corner of her mouth lifts. “Well that’s pretty cliché.”
I frown, feeling my body go still. “Cliché?” I repeat.
Well, fuck. Maybe she does know the truth.
“Yeah,” she says, her smile turning to a smirk. “As an organist.”
I swallow. “Right.”
As an organist.
Not a vampire.
An alarm chimes on Leo’s phone, signaling end of class. It can be easy to lose track of time in here.
“Well then, that’s the end of your first class. I’ll see you all tomorrow.”
Everyone gets up from their chairs and leaves the classroom and I am acutely aware that Dahlia is still sitting on the bench, not moving.
I give her a quick smile. “I know you probably want to play some more but I’m afraid another class is coming in here.”
“Are students allowed to practice after class otherwise?” she asks me in English.
I make the switch. “Not without permission.”
“From you?”
I nod, folding my arms across my chest. “Yes.”
“Can I get your permission?” she asks, her voice taking on a sweet tone that causes a rush of blood to my cock. For a moment I see her in the Red Room, on all fours, asking for permission to come.
Bloody hell.
“Not today,” I tell her, shifting my stance.
“Then another day?”
“Well see,” I say hoarsely gesturing with my chin to the door. “We better get a move on. I believe strings are up next and they can be a moody bunch when they don’t get their way.”
She breaks eye contact with me and I feel a strange sense of relief, like she had been looking too far inside me, past all my walls.
She quickly slips on her sneakers and gets to her feet, sweeping her hair over her shoulder as she walks over to me, stopping a couple of feet away.
I can smell her clearly, a meadow of wildflowers on a summer’s day.
The scent triggers a memory but it’s too fast and fleeting to catch.
“Can I ask your permission for something else?” she asks, her eyes staring right into mine. I can’t get a read on them. There’s a boldness there, a desire, and yet underneath it all I still get the feeling that she despises me.
It’s confusing as hell.
“What?” I ask, my voice dropping.
“If I may take you out for a drink?”
I blink at her. She’s serious? I laugh. “You’re asking me out for a drink?”
She nods, her mouth in a firm line.
I give her a half-smile, unsure how to handle this. “I can’t…I don’t do that. Date students, that is.”
“Who said it was a date?” she asks. Then she shrugs. “Okay. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She hops off the stage and walks past the rows of the chairs to the doors, leaving just before students for the next class start walking in with their violins.
Did she just ask me out for a drink?
And I said no?
The violin students are giving me a funny look, so I get off the stage and make my way past them to the halls, trying to mull over what just happened.
I wasn’t lying. It’s in the rulebook that teachers can’t have relationships or sexual encounters with their students. People do get fired for it and I wouldn’t be an exception. The last thing I want is to lose my job here.
I’m just surprised that my first instinct was to turn her down.
I’m also surprised she asked me in the first place.
If it wasn’t a date—and perhaps I was being a bit presumptuous there—then even her just wanting to be around me has me perplexed. I thought she didn’t like me? In fact, I swear she still doesn’t, which has me even more curious about her.
And that’s a problem in itself.
Because curiosity almost always gets me in trouble.