silencieux oubliette

Part I

         A steady dripping and the sound of my rasping breath were the only sounds in the darkness: that, and the manic chattering of rats scurrying around me.
         This, I remember, was the lowest point in my life.  This was my punishment for being who and what I am.  A rose cannot be any other flower but a rose…and I can be nothing other than what I am, a vampire. 
         Though I would give anything to get my mortality back, I can no longer return to that way of life.
         Punishment for a human killing, if caught and imprisoned by other humans, can be a long and enduring ordeal, most often finalized by death.  But I wasn’t being punished for killing a human, my punishment came fro a group of three other vampires that had banded together and decided I was a threat to them.  The details of what I’d done to them are another story entirely, and spans centuries of time, but the torment I endured as reconciliation for those wrongs are the focus of this tale.

Part II

         My prison, my dungeon, was a deep, dark well.  That first night, I could only hope that the top was covered.  Being a creature of the night, I could see a little of my cell, but beyond a few feet above me, it was a mystery how deep I was.  The walls of the well were going to present a major problem for me.  I approached some of the stones of the wall with my hand outstretched, though I stopped well short of touching them.  Power radiated from them and repelled my hand like two like poles of a magnet.  I pressed forward, forcing my hand closer and I would begin to feel the skin turn hot and burn.  I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.  Quickly I followed the wall in a tight circle and was getting the same sensation from every stone that surrounded me. 
         Blessed!  Each and every stone, as high as I could reach had been blessed.  A common misconception about vampires is that, as shown in the movies, crosses are poison to us.  We cant look upon them or touch them without some sort of burning effect.  This is untrue.  What effects us, being damned, is the holy blessings of God placed on the cross.  So with that said, anything could be blessed and used as protection against the undead. 
         But there is also another twist to what most people believe.  Not just any holy man or priest can bless an object.  Only a person truly touched by God would issue such blessing on an inanimate object.  And these “Touched of God” are few and far between.  So knowing this, sitting at the bottom of that well, I couldn’t fathom how my accusers were able to get a man, touched by God, to bless each and every stone of that well.  Was it even their doing?  Did they stumble upon this place by accident?  Did they even know the predicament they’d placed me in?  I know my death wasn’t their ambition, why would they put me here otherwise?  No, they wanted to show me that they were stronger.  They wanted me to live with that fact.

Part III

         The more I became familiar with my dark confines, I began to realize something else.  For confirmation, I stretched out my arms in opposite directions.  My fingertips rested inches from the walls and my elbows were still bent.  To make a rough gestimate, the well was roughly five feet in circumference, if that.  Now, since I’m six-foot-four inches in height, and I can’t touch the walls, how was I to rest?  I do have enhanced strength and more stamina than any human, but even vampires have limits and have to rest.  If I’m to be here for any lengthy duration I’m going to need to lie down.  Even lying in a fetal position would become uncomfortable.  Sitting up would pose unbearable with no back support. 
         It was then that I knew what planning and pains my foes had gone thru to make this the most unbearable experience a vampire could endure.  And I do mean endure.  I would not die here.  I would survive and exact my revenge. 
         Another sad fact dawned on me then.  What about sustenance?  By sustenance, I mean blood.  It’s odd that this question would pose itself after so many others.  Blood is the basis for my existence, yet it was one of the last questioning need to scramble from my mind.  I wouldn’t necessarily die without blood, but the lack of blood would slowly bring on the onset of insanity and my body would wither and dry.  Eternal sleep would set in and it would take the sacrifice of five humans to give me enough fresh blood to bring me out of this state. 
         I could not allow this.
         I had to get out of here.
         I was in a real bind.
         Dawn was approaching and I turned my eyes upward to face my next problem.  I was in a well, but were my foes sympathetic enough to cover mouth of the well before leaving?  If not, then this was a death sentence.
         Another common misconception about vampirism was that with the rising of the sun, a vampire “died” or “went to sleep for the day“.  This again is untrue.  Yes, sunlight will burn us, though we don’t have to sleep through the day, though most of us do for the simple fact that accidents do happen.  I could feel the rising of the sun and knew that the darkness of night must have been surely turning gray with the coming dawn.  From my blessed hole I could not see the coming daylight, and with each passing moment I breathed a breath of relief knowing that I was protected from those deadly, burning rays of sunshine. 
         Just to be sure, I kept my gaze to the mouth of the well and noticed that there was something wrong.  There was a small hole in the cover of the well and I could see a bright spot of sunlight shining on the damp stones of the well.  As the sun rose higher outside, the spot of sunlight made a slow trek down toward me.  I watched for hours, hoping that the sunlight would reach an apex then retreat up the opposite wall. 
         I was not so fortunate.  I watched with growing dread as that spot of sunlight came straight down the wall and crossed the floor mere inches from my feet.  For almost two hours I had to stand out of its path and away from the blessed stones of the wall at the same time.  The touch of either would be more pain than I wanted to endure.

Part IV

         Day in and day out I sat hunched over, resting, then standing, avoiding the circle of sunlight and the walls of the well.  On the sixth day, I stood mere inches from the wall and I felt that time was moving slower and slower.  It was taking forever for that spot of sunshine to retreat up the opposite wall.  I didn’t think I would make it.  My knees wanted to give.  My back was so sore with lack of support that I just wanted to lean back against those blessed stoned and call it quits.
         I had not spoken in days, but at that moment, I looked up at the top of the well and screamed at the top of my lungs, but what came out of my mouth was nothing short of a dry croak.
         When the sunlight was safely up the opposite wall, I collapsed into a ball in the center of the floor.  I was panting and everything around me was a fuzzy blur.  My eyesight was beginning to go.  I needed blood badly.
         Then, on the night of the seventh day, I heard a scrapping from above.  The well cover was being slid aside and I could see the dark tapestry of a starry sky.  I also saw the dark silhouettes of three men.
         “Dinner time,” one of them said and something fell into the well with me.  One hit my shoulder with a squeak then fell to the floor.
         Rats!  My captors had seen fit to honor me with my first meal, and believe me, at this point in the game, if it took rats blood to keep me sane, I was all for it.
         This, as I’ve already stated, was the lowest point in my life.
         I was about to go down one more step.
         I reached down and snatched the nearest rat I could find and sank my fangs deep into its fat, furry little body.  I drank deeply, feeling the warm rush of energy spread through my body before.  I drank until I no longer felt the little creature’s heart beat, then I snatched up the next rat, then the next.  There were four in all, and I left the fourth one alive.  I had need of more blood, much more blood, but what little the three rats had provided would only sustain me for a short time.  Besides, the fourth rat could feed off the carcasses of the other three, disposing of their rotting bodies that would only otherwise begin to rot and attract flies and other undesirable insect into my already cramped living space.  I would save the last rat until I truly needed him. 

Part V

         Days piled upon days and weeks upon weeks and still I waited in my silent dungeon.  My legs were barely usable to stand on, but somehow, despite the cramped confines of my living quarters, I found the willpower to move away from that killing spot of daylight as it crept, first down one wall, then up the other.  I accidentally brushed against one of the stones set into the wall one day, (I don’t know which day, I’d long since given up counting) and my shoulder burst into flames.  Luckily, I had a neat pile of rotting rat carcasses close at hand and used one of the discarded bodies to sop out the flames.  Most injuries obtained by a vampire would heal quickly and leave no trace that an injury had ever occurred, but such wasn’t the case with holy burns.  I would have a scar for the rest of my immortal life, a constant reminder of what I’d endured here.
         My captors had proven to be useful in that every seventh night, they would bring me rats.  Why did they do this?  Why didn’t they just kill me when they had the chance?  They could just leave the cover off the well and I would be nothing but ash on the morning of the following day.  Whey could pull me from my prison and behead me in my weakness, I would be powerless and unable to stop them in my present condition.  These thoughts and many more like it scrolled through my mind like a long, mental grocery checklist.
         But, like a kiss long remembered, the taste of revenge, of vengeance,  lingered on my mouth like the blood of my first feeding, so long ago. 
         Then, 298 days after my imprisonment, came my escape.
         And what followed that…?

Part VI

         They came while the moon was full and high in the sky.  There were two of them, mortal lovers searching some hidden spot to fulfill their lusting desires.  Lucky for me they found my well.  I could hear their conversation as I desperately tried to get my voice to work.
         “Hey Emily, look at this,”  said the young man as he banged on the lid, the echo pounded against my eardrums like an invisible sledgehammer.
         “Help me,” I managed to whisper as the well cover began to slide slowly off.
         “Did you hear something?” asked the female.  I could hear the fear in her voice.  It sounded sweet to my ears.
         A light flicked on and shone down at me, hurting my eyes.  I shielded them with my forearm as I took care not to stumble against the wall.
         “Please, help me,” I said again.  I couldn’t see them for the blinding light, but I could hear the young man tell Emily to go and fetch a rope. 
         As she ran off into the darkness the young man leaned over and asked me, “Are you all right, mister?  How long have you been down there?”  A puff of wind stirred his hair and must have sucked some of the stagnant air out of the well because the young man cursed the smell and pulled himself away from the edge of the well.  I could hear his retching from my dungeon. 
         He forced himself to look back over the edge and asked, “What’s that smell?”
         “Rats.”
         “Are you ok?  Are you hurt?”
         “I’ll be all right real soon,” I said, hoping that he didn’t hear the menacing tone in my voice.  “I just need your shoes.”
         “M-My shoes?” he asked.  “Why?”
         I explained, and I hoped that it didn’t sound too lame.  “You see, If you are going to pull me up with a rope, I will need some shoes to use against the wall.  The stones are very sharp and I’m already weak from blood loss.  I can’t afford to loose any more blood.”
         The reason I needed his shoes was a blatant lie of course.  I couldn’t touch the stones with my flesh for fear of being burned and the shoes would keep this from happening.  The bit about the blood loss was so very, very true though.  So true that I wouldn’t be able to help feeding from the very people who would soon become my saviors.  It wasn’t much of a “thank you” but I am a vampire, what else was I supposed to do?  I was hungry and my meal was waiting just above me.

Part VII

         My muscles screamed and protested as I slowly rose from the confines of my silent dungeon.  I faked relief as I fell against the young man, my arm about his shoulder and my face resting against the curve of his neck.  The excitement of the evening pulsed through his veins as his heart beat fast.  I could hear that beating call me.  I sank my fangs into his neck and relished the gush of blood as it flooded over my lips and chin.  The young man gasped, and besides that, he never made a sound.  The young woman, Emily, never new anything was wrong with her lover until it was too late.
         I drained their bodies then dumped them into the very well that had held me captive for so long, but not before taking the young man’s clothing.  He was somewhat shorter than me, but I was so thin with malnutrition that the clothing fit better than I would have thought, baggy and loose. 
         I fled south and stumbled upon a small farmhouse just before the sun began to rise.  I hid myself away in the storm cellar.  An elderly widower occupied the house alone and would make a fine meal once the sun set.  I stretched out on a stack of old clothes that I’d found in a box and relished in the fact that I was free.  The blood from the young couple at the well was enough to rejuvenate my weakness and pains, but I was still far from healthy.  As the sun rose, I slept the sleep of the dead for the first time in almost a year and dreamt dreams of satisfying revenge.
         I felt the sun set and as the last whispers of light fade from the sky, I arose.  The old man whose house I’d infiltrated went to bed with the setting sun and I took his blood as he slept.  It was the least painful way I could have done it. 
         Now, I had an appointment to keep.
         I had escaped my prison the night before my captors would return for feeding.  So here I waited high up in an old cedar about a hundred feet from the small clearing that held the well.  I waited for the three vampires with a patience only one could obtained from almost a year of imprisonment.
         I had no intention of exacting my revenge today.  All I wanted was to see their faces as they looked deep into that well and realized that I was no longer there.  They would know that I was out there somewhere, watching.  They would question why I didn’t take them then and there, then relish in the fact that, as they fled, they would become overconfident in their escape.  They would disappear into a bustling, rat race world and hope against hope that I would never find them.
         And then, as time wears on, they will begin to relax.  Their thoughts will turn from me and it would be then that I strike.  I will maim them, I will scar them for death is too good for them. I will torment them day in and day out with the knowledge that at any given time, I could take them.  Their lives are in my hands and I will do what I will with them. 
         They managed to confine me to a silent dungeon with dripping stone walls and, knowing that I’m still alive, the three of them will confine themselves to a prison of constant paranoia.  Just when they begin to forget about me, I will give them another glimpse of the one they imprisoned, and they will know, fresh and anew in their minds, that death will never be too far away. 

The End