Chapter 6 Rowan
SIX
ROWAN
The Art in Artifice
I may have not had a natural heartbeat in a century, but I swore it was pounding at the way Naomi was pulling me along, her bare hand wrapped around my wrist instead of just making contact with my sleeve.
My God, I marveled to myself. It was electrifying. I was extremely grateful she was facing away from me, lest she see the gobsmacked expression on my face.
From the moment we started talking, I’d been intrigued.
After so many years of trying to win the favor of undead who were obsessed with smoke, mirrors, and artifice, her openness and honesty was refreshing.
Almost a panacea for my mood. Even though I wasn’t the strongest texter, we’d texted back and forth all night long after the initial contact.
We’d kept it relatively casual, naturally, and yet I’d already learned so much about her.
Like that she was a dog person (but thankfully she didn’t dislike cats) to the point of having a career in taking care of them; that she was nearly in her mid-thirties (talk about robbing the cradle); that she had a big family but lived separately from them because she wanted to be her own person.
Honestly, I truly admired that. If my sire hadn’t chosen to move on, I’d probably still be living with him, still content in our small but simple life.
During our conversation, I kept going back to her photos, looking at the sweet smile she wore in some, and the mischievous glint in her eyes in others.
I had been drawn in by her beauty, of course, but it was nothing compared to how she looked in person.
Sure, she had all the same curves, including thighs that looked like they could crush me, but there was this…
this vibrancy to her. It was so different from any vampire I’d ever been drawn to, and it reminded me a bit of a type of old-fashioned warrior I wasn’t even sure existed any longer.
And she was funny.
It wasn’t fair—it really wasn’t—but I certainly didn’t mind. In fact, I could already feel a keen interest bubbling within me, spreading out through every part of my mind and body. It wasn’t quite infatuation, yet, but it sure was interest.
“Where are we going?” I asked in amusement as she continued to tug me along. Her fingers were blazing hot, and I worried she would notice how corpse-cold I was. Those worries vanished when she looked up at me, all smiles.
“Do you hear that?”
“Hear what?” I frowned. I had exceptional hearing, and I couldn’t really pick up on any—
Oh.
The first note I detected was like an exclamation point in the air, and the second one had me grinning like a loon. Live music!
“Is there an event going on?” I murmured, happily perplexed. I was normally so on top of such things, but I hadn’t heard about any concerts going on.
“I don’t know,” Naomi said happily, and for a moment, it definitely felt like she was just as much of a music fan as I was.
Could she really be that thrilled for me?
It seemed almost impossible. So many vampires only cared about music if it was played on an organ or a string instrument—none had ever shown interest in jazz at all.
And I was almost certain what I was hearing was jazz.
We traversed onto a fancy slate path with wrought-iron streetlights and benches. A moment later, the trees opened up, and I saw a band sitting in front of a fountain in what looked like a village square.
“Huh, I don’t remember this being here,” I murmured.
“You sure you’ve been to this park? I think this has been here for, like, twenty-five years.”
Whoops. Not the first mistake I’d made tonight but I’d gotten better at covering for myself. “That must be it! I don’t—”
“Get out much,” she finished for me with that cheeky smile that I was growing more and more fond of by the minute. “I heard.”
“Glad to know you’re listening,” I shot back.
Naomi turned to someone walking by. “Pardon me, what’s going on here tonight?”
“They’re trying to raise money tonight to have a full-on jazz festival this fall. Kind of like a pop-up thing,” the stranger said.
“Wow, that’s so cool. Thank you. Have a great night.”
“You, too.”
Whistling, the man walked off, and I stared at Naomi in awe.
“What?” she murmured, catching my expression.
“Just… you’re very charming, you know that, right?”
She blinked at me, and I got the impression that no, she didn’t know that. While I wasn’t scared of humans or antisocial, I didn’t think I could stop a person and get information out of them like that—not without using a bit of glamour magic.
“Thank you,” she said eventually, and I decided not to press the matter. After all, maybe she was the more normal one, and I was the person who felt the need to wear an entire face of makeup just to go out in public.
Well, that was perhaps oversimplifying things a little bit.
It wasn’t that I had to wear makeup—I wasn’t ashamed of being an albino—but without it I drew a lot of attention from humans, which I didn’t want.
Frankly, it reminded me a bit too much of when I was one of them myself.
The people who had been around me had gotten used to my complete lack of pallor, but anyone new who wandered through our village always stared and asked questions.
That was what had drawn me to Ibrahim in the first place.
The tall, pale stranger had rolled in one night, somehow unburned from the desert sun and cloaked in finer clothes than I’d ever seen in my life.
At the time, I had thought he was a wealthy merchant, like ones I’d heard of in tales and legends, but he didn’t act superior to us in any way.
“Do you wanna go sit up front?” Naomi asked, pointing to the chairs set up in front of the musicians.
“We don’t have to,” I hedged, even though of course I wanted to! I just wasn’t sure it would be appropriate for a first-date activity. My conversation skills would be negligible while they were playing, and then I’d go on and on afterward.
“Do you not want to?” she asked, her head tilted to the side.
I couldn’t help but wonder if it was offensive to find that habit more and more canine-like.
Why was I pretending to be something I wasn’t? Surely, I had already maxed that bar out by masquerading as a human; I didn’t need to add anything more onto it.
“You know what? I’d love to.”
“Hell yeah!”
Her enthusiasm surprised me, and I grinned like a cat that got the cream as she led me forward. I didn’t need her arm looped through mine or her hand on my wrist, but I appreciated their presence.
Was I really over a century old and having a reaction to what was essentially holding hands?
Apparently. Then again, when was the last time I’d actually had such contact?
My family had died before I even turned fifty, their only son unable to have children in the traditional way, and my maker had been gone several decades now.
Was… was I touch starved? I’d never thought about it before because I had my music, my instruments, and my Brammy boy. What more could a vampire possibly need?
I looked at where Naomi and I were joined by the tiniest bit of skin.
A lot more, I admitted to myself. I need so much more.
I was pretty sure Naomi didn’t notice my dazzled nature, but if she did, she made no comment on it.
Once we reached the chairs, she let go of me, and it almost felt like a physical blow.
I never would have thought I could crave touch so strongly, to long for the warmth and vitality that emanated from the sunny woman, and I was scrambling to come to terms with it.
“Wow,” she murmured, only barely audible above the sound of the band while they went forte on their rendition of “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy”.
Already, I could feel the reverberation of the trumpet traveling through me, starting at my feet before making its way to my undead heart, animating it once more with the sheer musicality.
The saxophone followed right after, its notes forming a lasso around me, cocooning my willing form into its embrace as I was drawn deeper and deeper into the uproarious tale of a man who couldn’t be stopped from breakin’ it down even when he was snatched up by the gool ol’ army itself. “This is so cool!”
Cool. Cool. Wasn’t that the epitome of jazz when it came down to it?
I remembered the very first notes I heard, approximately a week after I’d landed in America.
It was an exciting but also terrifying new land of opportunity, where vampires were supposedly able to get by without notice a lot easier considering the sprawling cities between large chunks of rural area.
Perfect for feeding, hiding, or blending in.
I’d gone into a bar, looking for a drunkard I could pay to let me feed in a quiet alley, only to be met by a small, five-man band with a trumpet, clarinet, trombone, a bass, and a banjo, accompanied by a full-figured and rapturous woman singing her soul out.
Instantly, my prey was forgotten. As their music filled my mind and soul, I knew I had reached the land that was for me.
A swirling mass of people from all over the world had united together to make the most beautiful thing I’d ever heard in my life.
Now, eighty years later, I felt the same. Something about music being played by those who loved it, were moved by it, spoke to the deepest parts of my soul and reminded me just how incredible yet ephemeral life could be.
“Incredible,” I agreed, only belatedly realizing that Naomi was waiting for me to say something.
“I’m glad you think so. What luck we found them here.”
Yes, luck.
In all my years traversing this thing called life, I’d seen enough miraculous coincidences to wonder if luck was a thing at all or if some things were indeed fated.
Because at the moment, as I watched a modern jazz band play their hearts out with a beautiful, kind, and enthusiastic woman next to me, everything felt like fate.
Maybe I should have been dating humans all along.