Bound eternal (vampire) adoption agency

Are your secrets where you left them cause now your ghosts are mine as well.1

--Gwen Stefani2

He was a pretty child in his pain. Charming in his panic. Stunning in his rage and despair. It was believed, that he would be beautiful in his death. Rayginna loved children.3

She loved pretty children with dark hair and lovely eyes. And Stephan, despite his being younger than all the others fit the description perfectly.4

His hair was soft and so thick with curls your fingers could choke in them, and his eyes, a blue so dark they were nearly black seemed to encompass his small angular face. The alabaster of his skin made his eyes dance with shadows.5

She was mesmerized by his eyes. She would have to have someone paint him alive before…well before. Ginna felt a tad uneasy about this boy, but she brushed the feeling off as nervousness because she had never had one so young before. All of her other ‘children’ had been in their early teens and late adolescence, and she had just taken them, not gone through all the trouble of actually adopting them. Stephan, dear heart, was special and only eleven, and he had just turned that.6

When she had been studying him for those two months, she had noticed that his parents treated him little better than trash. As her first sign of affection toward him, she had gotten rid of the two of them. Ginna figured that the experience would be good for him in the long run.7

As her second show of affection she had waited patiently for him to go through the long, complicated and mostly unnecessary process of the ‘system’. And she was not known to be a patient woman. She had been able to pull some strings, but only a few least people began asking questions that didn’t need to be answered. Such as how she had the contacts she had, how she was able to get them, and why she was using them on this particular boy.8

The fact that he had been sent to her orphanage was an added bonus, that the courts had granted her custody of the boy as quickly as they had was a given. After all, she was the perfect guardian.9

She was happily married in public, took care of dozens of children on a daily basis, and thanks to her and her husbands jobs combined she had a more than comfortable income. She didn’t have a record, didn’t smoke, drink, or do any type of drugs. Her home was large and spotless, and she could have as much free time as she could possibly want.10

She was perfect for her new son.11

Absolutely perfect.12

And he was more than perfect for her. Ginna believed that this time, this time, she could and would achieve her ultimate goal.13

In the weeks before the boy was to come though, Ginna was haunted by ghosts.14

Small wispy things that floated around her house. Drove her into walls and made her flinch and curse every time she saw a small figure pass beside her out of the corner of her eye. Woke her panicked and sweating in the morning, screaming in her ear, inside of her head.15

Screaming and screaming.16

Never quiet.17

A constant thing. A thing that had no end.18

The ghosts forced her to see. All the blood on her hands. All the souls she had abandoned to an eternity in purgatory.19

But there was hope. As the date got closer and closer for the boy to arrive, she began to watch him as often as she could at the orphanage. It became an obsession.20

A new one.21

And then one day, as she sat in her car across the street and watched him play, watched the sun glint across all that lovely black hair and sparkle in those amazing eyes, the young sweat shimmer on that pale skin, her heart clutched in her chest. Squeezed tight and held with an almost painful intensity and she understood.22

This boy would save her.23

He would be the last one.24

Greater and more powerful than all the others.25

With his death the souls would fade. Disappear.26

With his death her hunger could finally be satisfied.27

The hunger that ate at her.28

Feeding…feeding,29

Forever hungry.30

C'est ein affaire a' pus finir.31

It is a thing that has no end.32

*************33

Wake up, Demons have been walking the road to hell…they’ve been following you.34

--Unknown35

“Well what do you think?”36

Stephan shrugged, his shoulders uncomfortably tight under the weight of the woman’s gaze on him.37

“It’s alright I guess.” It wasn’t as if he would complain over something as simple as a room and the toys in it.38

God had given him a mother now, a home. He wouldn’t be complaining about anything again for a long time.39

“Well,” Said Mrs. Lattermore, sending him a bright smile when he glanced at her from over his shoulder. “You just come on down to the kitchen when you’re done unpacking here and I’ll fix you something to eat. You must be starving.”40

“Yes mam. I am. Thank you.” It was a relief that she’d offered. Stephan wasn’t comfortable just yet asking this woman, a stranger to him really for food. The time that he’d spent with his real mother had taught him better than that. Rayginna Lattermore winked at him, her hand reaching out so she could brush cold fingers across his cheek. The cold seemed to seep from her skin and down into his bones, and Stephan couldn’t stop himself from flinching away from her touch. He watched, heart in throat, as her eyes darkened to something fierce. Then the look was gone and she was backing away.41

“No need to thank me dear. We’re family now after all.” She laughed, “Besides, I can always tell when a man needs something to ease his appetite. It’s one of my many talents.”42

Trying to be as carefree as this graceful, beautiful woman seemed to be, Stephan said, “We were meant for each other then. I seem to be hungry all the time these days.”43

Mrs. Lattermore twinkled at him, dimples flashing for a brief blinding moment as the force of her pleasure pulsed throughout the room like a live thing.44

“I know exactly what you mean.”45

********************46

“So how is he?” The man's voice rang out in the empty kitchen with the force and suddenness of a gunshot and had Rayginna jumping and her pulse racing dangerously. She managed to calm herself only enough so she wouldn't commit murder with the human in the house before she made her was across the kitchen. The heels of her shoes moving over the linoleum floor as smoothly and as soundlessly as wind across glass. When she came abreast to the man she had christened ’husband’ almost ten years ago for the benefit of the humans, she leaned in until her face was a mere inch away from his and hissed between deadly canines. 47

“The boy is fine, and he will remain that way until I say otherwise. You will-”48

“Yes, yes Ginna I know.” He interrupted with a lazy grin, and a voice full of more amusement than any real irritation. “I will not touch the boy. He’s all yours.”49

Because his easy agreement rankled her, Rayginna drew back and straightened the skirt of her yellow sundress with shaking hands. 50

She bowed her head. “I apologize Gabrielle, I’m just…” the words for the feelings that coursed through her blood and sped up her heart escaped her and she opened her mouth once, twice, before staring up at her companion with helpless eyes. 51

“Nervous?” He supplied, his hands a gentle as they gripped her shoulders to pull her against his body, breasts flush against his chest. The feel of his arousal cradled between the juncture of her thighs had her teeth lengthening and she had to bite her tongue, feel the metallic blaze of blood coat her throat, before she had enough strength to ignore the familiar heat. 52

There was a child in the house now after all. 53

“Yes.” She answered, even as she pulled away and wrapped her arms around herself. “Yes, I am nervous. Silly isn’t it? How such a small child, a HUMAN, no less can make me quiver like a newborn vamp.” Rayginna shook her head and made her slow way over towards the fridge. A fridge that was stacked with lunchables and pudding packets as that was the only thing Rayginna knew for sure that children had a habit of consuming. 54

“Christ is that all you bought?”55

Gab’s voice was disgusted and Ginna frowned as she surveyed the fridge. 56

“What’s wrong with it?’57

“Children don’t just eat lunchables.”58

“They don’t?”59

“No.”60

“Well what do they eat?”61

“…hamburgers and cokes and shit like that.”62

Flustered Rayginna looked over her shoulder at him. “That’s a lie. Why would a child wish to consume drugs and rotting cow meat. It makes no sense.”63

He glared at her. “Which one of us had been watching television here lately darling? Me. And I’m telling you the little maggot will like-”64

“DON’T CALL HIM THAT DAMNIT!” The rage in her voice, the spike of adrenaline that shot through her at that moment had a pulse of power throbbing throughout the room. It was thick enough, and well aimed enough that it had Gab stumbling back against the kitchen table and gasping for breath as it pummeled into his chest and held him immoble.65

“That boy, that human is mine now. You will respect him as such Gabrielle or you will be just another ghost to add to a long line of them at my back. Is that understood?”66

He stared at her for a long time, his normally gray eyes awash in a black so deep it seemed to suck all the light and energy from the room. Then his gaze darted towards the kitchen doorway and he grinned, teeth flashing dangerously from his handsome face from under the glare of the overhead lights. 67

“I understand my dear. But does he?”68

Rayginna, even with her lightning quick reflexes was still too slow to catch the boy as he darted away. The last glimpse she caught of him was a pale face swamped under the weight of terrified blue eyes and a shock of black hair.69

All contrasts and graceful limbs the boy was gone as quickly as he had come. 70

Yes… this one would indeed be beautiful in his death. 71

Rayginna gave chase. 72

73

********************************74


And she heard a whisper say, a curse is on her if she stay.75

76

--Lady of Shallot by Tennyson77

78


It was an interesting thing.79

Being dead.80

Stephan wasn’t exactly sure whether he liked the sensation all that much.81

He knew for a fact though, that he didn’t like the company.82

“So what are you doing here. We thought you were gonna be Ginna’s pride and joy.”83

“We thought you’d be the one to save us.”84

“Why are you here?”85

“I don-I don’t know.”86

“Then don’t you think it’s best you leave now?”87

“Yes, leave now.”88

“Yeah, alright.” Stephan said, “I’ll leave.”89

90

*91

92

“What did you do? Shit Ginna don’t tell me you killed another one?”93

Rayginna looked over her shoulder from where she huddled on the floor with the boys limp form cradled in her lap. She recognized the tears sliding down her face to be those of disappointment, of frustration.94

After all how could she have killed another one, and so fast?95

She recognized the almost default emotions running through her, but the regret…the soul deep sadness was something new and unexpected. She ran shaking fingers through the thick black curls under the palm of her hand and groaned deep before looking down at the boy.96

The thought that struck her then was a strong one, an insane one.97

After all, you weren’t supposed to change the young, and even if you did the chances of them dying from the shock were almost guaranteed.98

But Rayginna wanted this one. She wanted him badly.99

After all he would drive the ghosts away.100

“No.” She said, in answer to Gabrielle's bitter censor. “No. I didn’t kill another one.” She looked at him and the smile she gave was luminescent. “He‘s just been reborn.”101

Gabrielle’s face paled and as he moved forward, his normally fluid grace was marred by a mixture of fear and the sick realization of what she planned to do.102

Maybe it was the shock of that realization that kept him from reaching her in time. Or maybe, as Ginna was so determined to believe, this boy was really meant for her.103

Either way the sick feeling in his gut did anything but abate as a soft light began to emit from beneath Ginna’s skin. She throbbed with power, pulsed with life and purpose. In that moment of ultimate death she was more alive than she had ever been before or after she had become a vampire, and with a small grunt that spoke of more effort than she would have ever been willing to show, she pushed that shinning light into the limp child before her.104

His eyes snapped open, his back arched, and opening his mouth he let out a scream that danced through the house like music. The blue of his eyes were swimming pools of darkness and light, like an ocean thrashing wildly under the force of a hurricane. The smooth alabaster skin moved over small lithe bones and his hair lifted and snapped in an invisible wind that seemed to encase both him and Rayginna.105

Gabrielle paused at the outskirts and with power pushing at his skin like the prick of a thousand needles he hunkered down to watch and wait.