Blood and Infinity

1

As soon as my memory returns, the dead guy in the alley next to me isn’t nearly so terrifying.

I sway with vertigo as memories roar through me. They’re vivid, life-size, as if I could touch them.

Leander pulls me close to him and rests my head against his chest, propping me up as memories fill me up like water being poured into a glass. I’ve spent the last few months in a state of fear, determined to know who I was, frustrated to be nobody and have no one. Now I know who I am and where I came from, and I’m pretty sure the reality was a lot worse than I’d ever thought possible. Sweet ignorance. Who’d have thought?

I grew up on an island.

An island where I, and every other human who lives there, is food. Those who own the land and us are called the Infinite. Here, in the real world, they are vampires and figments of one’s overactive imagination.

If only.

My teeth chatter. I’m soaked, so wet it’s like I just came out of the ocean. Although, the New York rain is a heck of a lot colder than any water I’ve ever been in.

Sometimes, back home, the water would be so warm that swimming wasn’t even cooling. I’d come out of the water and not notice the transition from wet to dry. No goosebumps on my skin. The sand would be too hot, and we’d run to our towels for safety. Echoes of laughter sound in my mind.

A long time ago now. A different girl in a different world. I shiver in the dark alley. A few feet away lies the man Lord Marchant killed in order to be strong enough to remove my amnesia.

Lord Marchant has just murdered a man. Something I have never seen before. Not from him, anyway.

He holds me against his chest. And yet, I don’t feel comforted. Comfort is not a word I would ever use to describe my reaction to him.

I’ve lived for him.

I’ve died for him.

A million images flash through my mind. Leander laughing with the sun on his face as he fought his best friend in a faux duel. The look of shuttered yet rapt attention he has given me before he’s drunk from me on the night I fell to my almost-death.

His hands sweep down my arms, trying to reassure me. Rebecca, he says, and I inhale a shaky breath.

I remember, I say, and he shifts back so he can look down at my face. His eyes search mine and another shiver goes through me.

I don’t like the cold, I say. If I’d been born here, would I like it?

On the surface, it’s a simple question. And yet, the question applies to him, too. If I’d been born here and met him later, would I like him? Love him? Be willing to die for him? Or would I have been smart enough to stay the hell away like a sane person would?

His smile is weak. I should take you home.

I tense. He must feel it because he quickly says, Not the island. Here. My apartment.

I can’t believe you brought me to New York, I say.

You would have died if I hadn’t. Now come. We have a lot to discuss. But let’s not do it out here where you might freeze to death.

I assume he’s speaking metaphorically, but when one of the Infinite says the word death, it is in one’s interest to take them literally just in case.

Lord Marchant is dark and perfect, his brown hair black in the wet night and the absence of light. It was Lord Dalmaine… He wanted me to jump, he told me to—

His image rises before me. He is the opposite of Leander. Golden and horrible in his perfect good looks. The cruel twist of his lips, the coldness in his eyes, the absolute terror he inspires inside me—those are the qualities I remember about Lord Dalmaine. I used to think Cassandra was the worst of them all. But that isn’t true. Not for me. For me, the worst of them is the one who’d actually been the architect of my death. Lord Dalmaine.

Let’s get you away from here. And call me Leander. From now on. Promise.

I’ve called him Leander when I couldn’t remember who I really am. The way I have acted, the boldness of my actions, rose in my mind like a nightmare. I’ve yelled at him, tried to harm him or seduce him, accused him of trying to murder me. My knees weaken, urging me to go to the ground and abase myself. And yet, I don’t. I’m sorry, I say, instead.

Why?

For the way I behaved…when I couldn’t remember. It was deeply inappropriate.

A forced chuckle. Humoring me, I think. It was…interesting. Don’t concern yourself. Blame it on forced amnesia. He steps back, holds out his hand for me to take. Let’s go.

I can see the dead man out of the corner of my eye. And yet, Leander looks at me as if all were, well, normal. I nod and follow him down the alley. Of course, I do. I always would. Follow him into darkness and out of it.

But I don’t take his hand.

Who am I now? What part of me and who I’ve become over the last three months is real? I’ve grown up as a slave, deceived about the real world.

How could I have any authentic personality? Am I like a house constructed on a faulty foundation? No matter how solidly built the structure it could still crumble to nothing.

Maybe none of my personality is actually me because I’ve grown up living a lie. I’ve been shaped by monsters and bred to obey them like a slave.

No, we are slaves. And here I’ve been free. And the one who made both of those things happen is walking me carefully away from a scene of violence and murder.

I’ve been so scared when he drank from that man. Now that I have my memories back…I don’t like it, but it isn’t shocking. Shouldn’t murder always be shocking?

It’s a question for Dr. Brown. A wild, hysterical laugh bubbles up inside me at the thought of trying to explain it to my psychiatrist. He’d definitely want to up my meds.

I lean heavily into Leander, dizzy with knowledge.

I can carry you if need be, he says.

I imagine him picking me up. Imagine walking through the back alleys of New York in his arms. Isn’t this the sort of thing that’s supposed to be romantic? That’s what I’ve seen on TV and in movies.

But the last time I was held, it was by Lord Dalmaine. I’ve felt helpless and sick with blood loss and the foresight he was carrying me to my doom. And that’s not melodramatic, considering he ordered me to jump out a window.

I decide here and now that I never want to be carried in someone’s arms again. I’ll pray to any and every god necessary to never be that weak and vulnerable again.

No, I can walk. Thank you, my lord.

I step back from him, and water drips into my eye. He holds out his arm for me to take as if I were a lady from another time.

Fear spikes through me. I don’t want to touch him. Which is a ridiculous reaction. He could’ve hurt me at any point. Hell, he could have killed me at any point. He still could. Because I’m property.

Or am I? If I never go back, then I’m free, a voice inside me whispers.

What are the odds I would live to see out the year if I went back to the island? I need time to think it all through, to get used to being me again. Rebecca Finner. How amazing it is to be sure of my name. The relief is sweet, but I fear it will be painfully short-lived.

Neither of us speak as we walk back to his apartment. The doorman lets us in and we take Leander’s private elevator to the penthouse. There’s so much to talk about. So many questions he’ll want answers to.

And of course, I have questions I want answers to. But already my needs are subsumed to his. His questions are more important because he is Infinite, and I am food.

But not in New York.

He’s in front of me, opening the door to his penthouse, and I cast a glance toward the elevator. What if I just run? Break into a sprint and press the button? If the car’s still here, might the doors close before he could catch me?

He opens the door, gestures for me to go in. Who am I kidding? He would catch me before I made it ten feet. And I don’t have the courage to run away anyway.

Bad things happened to those who run from their Lord or Lady.

There is a roaring fire in the fireplace, but that won’t be nearly enough to warm me up. I am soaked to the skin and emotionally frozen. And every time I close my eyes I see Lord Marchant killing a man with brutal, unrestrained savagery.

I need to take a shower.

And then we will talk. His patience is not limitless. I hear it in his tone.

Of course, my lord. I dip down into a curtsy. When I rise, he’s frowning at me. My heart trips in fear. I’ve made a mistake. What was it? Bowing? Not bowing with enough sincerity? I have no idea what’s expected of me now.

You’re not afraid of me now, are you?

My smile is wobbly. No, just cold and a bit confused. If he knows it for a lie, he doesn’t say. For a moment, I’m grateful he’s giving me a reprieve, but then I feel…resentment? I think that’s what it is. He doesn’t own me here.

On the island, he could just snap his fingers and expect me to divulge my innermost thoughts. On the island, he could give life and take it away.

But not in New York.

Here he’d be arrested, thrown in jail.

I go straight to the bathroom, turn on the water and strip off my clothes. I’m so cold the water burns; the tips of my fingers and my toes tingle sharply. For the first several moments I don’t think. I don’t want to. I just try to feel the warmth and the water, try to be grateful I’m alive when I should be dead.

A hard shiver shakes me. Everything in my former life is different from now.

I have been orphaned at six years old and left for dead. And then I have been rescued by a monster who was so beautiful, courteous, and rich I believed him a prince from a fairytale or something equally ridiculous. But now I know him for what he is: The monster the other monsters fear. Leander Marchant is strong enough to rule them all. And he’d done it for centuries.

Hetty, the woman who had raised me, has always said Leander Marchant was the worst of the monsters because he kept us there when he had the power to let us go. He has brought our ancestors there and let his kind feed on us.

I’ve tried to justify and ignore those truths, focused on his beauty and the small kindnesses he did for our people and for me rather than the reality. Sure, I have been naive, maybe even brainwashed, but other people have been afraid when I had been entranced.

I put my face under the hot water so I won’t feel the tears on my face. I have been a fool.

But who am I now that I know the truth? Lord Marchant has once told me if I knew how other people live that I would hate him rather than love him. I would see how sick it was to worship someone like him.

Not only does he drink blood to survive, he keeps humans as prisoners, like livestock and beasts of burden. The children we have could be taken from us. Our lives are forfeit at the whim of any lord or lady on the island.

And all of this is because of Leander Marchant. The monster I have been stupid enough to lust over and give my virginity to. Just thinking about who I have been and how blindly I have worshipped him made me feel stupid.

Hetty has despaired of me and decided I am not safe to love. Because I had a death wish. In this moment, I’m pretty sure I don't have one anymore. What will happen when I get out of the shower? When I go back out and tremble in fear because I’m living with a monster?

I don't have long to decide what to do next. And I don't know what I can do. Would Leander let me leave if I want? Could I really disappear from this apartment and never see him again? Never see the people I have grown up with on the island again? Could I go about and live my life knowing somewhere out