Chapter 7

After a few hours, Alice freed herself from his embrace and rose from the bed, not bothering to cover herself. Jasper stared at her, transfixed by her beauty. She was perfect in every way that he could see. Soft, perfect skin, perfectly proportioned body – he gazed in awe, his heart bursting with an emotion he was afraid to name. Then the shame came. Shame that he could never offer her the same physical perfection. His skin was marred and repulsive. It marked him as the loathsome creature that he was and always would be. He tore his eyes from her, suddenly nauseated by the fact that his vile body had dared to touch such perfection. He reached out and grabbed his pants from the floor beside the bed and pulled them on under the covers. Even fully clothed, he found himself unable to face her. He closed his eyes tightly, burning with self-loathing.

Jasper heard her dress and felt the pressure on the bed when she sat down beside him. She did not say anything at first, but he felt the confusion in her as she tried to interpret his actions.

"Jasper?" she asked tentatively after a moment. "Is something wrong?"

He didn't answer. He couldn't answer. How could he tell her the truth?

"Did I do something wrong?" she asked. Her voice caught as she nervously bit her bottom lip.

At that, Jasper opened his eyes, surprised, and met hers.

"Never," he said adamantly. Instinctively he raised his hand to caress her face, but clenched his hand at the last moment, refusing to further dirty her with foulness. She took his hand and completed his movement, leaning into his gentle touch and meeting his eyes. Jasper found himself lost in hers for some time, falling, falling, falling into the red deepness. He shuddered with the intensity of the emotions he felt, emotions that had so infrequently been directed towards him. It was like a drug, her love, but Jasper was terrified to let it do its healing work on his soul – for how much worse would the withdrawal be when she left? And he was not foolish enough to believe that she would stay for long with one so unlovable as himself.

Alice broke the silence, her eyes tracing the dark purple circles under his eyes.

"Your eyes are so dark...you need to hunt."

Jasper shuddered at the thought. "I'm fine," he said, his voice barely a whisper.

"No, you need to hunt." She paused, her eyes going distant for a moment. "It's time to leave Philadelphia anyway," she said, suddenly, matter-of-factly. "We'll hunt along the way."

"Really, I'm fine," Jasper replied weakly, then shook his head to dispel his dark thoughts. "Where will we go?" he asked, a bit of the old hopelessness entering his tone. He did not want to drag Alice along on his never-ending, miserable journey to nowhere.

"Cleveland," she said simply.

"What's in Cleveland?"

"Our next stop." She sighed. "I don't know why, but I know we go to Cleveland. I can see it."

"How does that work, your ability?" Jasper asked curiously.

"I...I don't know exactly," she admitted with a bit of embarrassment. "I just suddenly see things. Out of nowhere. They just appear in my head, and I know that's what's going to happen, how things are going to go. Like I saw you, right after I awakened after my change. I saw you and knew we would be together someday. And I saw...I don't know his name. I always thought of him as Father. He's tall and blond, like you, but he has golden eyes. I don't know why. He's one of us, but his eyes are golden, not red."

"Golden eyes?" Jasper shook his head. He had never heard of such a thing.

"Yes. Like amber. The two of you..." she paused as she searched for the words. "The two of you...you were there for me in the darkness, one my lover, one my Father. I wanted to be good, to be someone worth knowing, when I met you. And when we meet him. We...someday we're going to meet him, Jasper. Some day he's going to be part of our lives. I know that, as surely as I knew you would be."

"Where is he?" Jasper asked simply.

"I don't know. But I know the next step to finding him is going to Cleveland. We have to go to Cleveland to find him."

Jasper sighed, rising from the bed, making sure his clothing was in place. "Very well," he said softly. "If you say that we will go, we will. Lead the way. I will follow."

They walked slowly once they cleared the city, in no hurry to reach their destination. As they walked, they talked of silly things, of serious things. Once or twice he even laughed. How long had it been since he had laughed? He couldn't even remember. At night, the stars came out. Away from the city they were bright and clear. He stopped in a clearing, looking up at the stars. His arms encircled Alice's waist from behind as they stood, gazing up at the sky. They were not tired, of course, but the beauty of the night required stopping and appreciating it, at least for a little while. He found himself trembling as he held her. It was so difficult for him, believing the feelings he felt from her. She wanted him here. She was happy with him. Throughout their walking and talking, he had felt no awkwardness, no hint that she was not exactly as happy as he was. Her joy was filling his heart to bursting, and he wanted so very much to give in to the feelings. But he could not stop the fear from his own heart. The fear told him that such a thing could never last, that giving in to her joy would eventually only cause him more pain. The fear told him it was dangerous to hope. Believing, even for a moment, that she could love him once she truly knew him was a dangerous chimera.

But he so wanted to believe.

Jasper sat on the soft grass, making his lap a pillow for Alice's head. As they gazed up at the stars, he ran his fingers idly through her hair.

"Jasper?" she asked after a moment. "How does your ability work?"

"My ability?" He sighed, curling a short strand of her hair around her finger as he searched for the words. "It's my blessing and my curse all in one. I can...well, I can both feel and influence emotions. I can influence a large group of people..." He trailed off darkly, remembering how Maria had used that ability... "Or I can influence just one: a targeted influence. As for how far I can feel..." He paused, trying to decide how to word it. "While broadcasting my emotions is something that must be done consciously, feeling the emotions of others is not. There have been many times I wished it was," he said, losing himself for a moment in dark memories.

He shook his head and continued.

"I can feel everyone, all the time. Distance does decrease it, but it never completely goes away. There's always a....hum, a baseline of emotions that is always there. But I can feel each individual person, too. I can feel what you're feeling, Alice. And it makes me happy, although I can't understand why..." His voice caught. "I can't understand why you feel that way about me..." He trailed off as Alice gasped, her eyes yet again distant. He was recognizing that look already – it was the look she had when she saw something.

"Alice?"

"Jasper...there are humans coming..."

He paled.

"Oh, god, no...not now..." he pleaded, but their scent hit him almost immediately, wiping his prayers from his mind. The transformation in him was instant. All discussion, all tenderness, all humanity was lost as he fell into a crouch, the muscles in his body primed and tensed - the perfect predator. He had waited too long and was far too thirsty to fight his body's need.

He leapt easily from the ground to the lowest branch of the nearest tree, where he could watch his prey approach and wait for the perfect moment to pounce. His body trembled with anticipation, and a nearly sub-sonic growl came from his chest. As the two human men – hunters, most likely - approached, chatting and unaware of the danger awaiting them, Jasper shifted his weight slightly. When they were directly beneath him, he leapt from the tree, landing on the nearest human.

The kill was not pretty, but it was fast and efficient. He was not a newborn, to leave a mess when he was done, or a sadist to play with his food. He killed, drank, and discarded.

When it was over, he threw a hand over his face and staggered back to the tree, leaning against it and burying his face against the trunk. His whole body trembled as the emotions of the human he had killed coursed through him. He swallowed, trying to control himself enough that Alice could not see his weakness. He could hear her cleaning herself not far away and could feel her emotions – calm and satisfied.

She was not weak, like he was.

His victim's death-terror hit him full force causing him to whimper and dig his fingernails into the hard wood of the tree. He wanted to scream. Were he alone, he would have. But he could not – would not – scare Alice away with his weakness yet. He heard her come closer, and he shuddered as he swallowed back a cry.

Dear God, don't let her see me like this.

"Jasper?" Alice called, looking around her. "Jasper, where are you?"

The wave of pain and horror hit him so suddenly that he could not restrain the wail that was ripped from his heart. The next moment, Alice was beside him with her hand comfortingly on his back.

He raised an arm to cover his face, as if he could somehow hide himself from her with it.

"Jasper!? What's wrong? Are you hurt? Did they hurt you?"

Jasper scoffed in his pain. "Humans can't hurt us..."

"Then what is it? What's wrong?"

"I'm so weak..."

"Jasper! Tell me what's wrong!"

Her fear and worry were intensifying. She was becoming frustrated. He cringed. He did not wish to upset her. But she would surely be more upset if she knew...

Oh god, it hurt...

"Jasper!"

"It happens every time I hunt," he cried, his voice given a sharp edge by the pain. "Every time. I feel them dying. The humans. I have to die with them, to feel everything they felt, or it won't go away!"

He sank to the ground, covering his head with both of his arms.

"You feel the humans' pain?"

He barely had the strength to nod.

Alice was silent. He expected at any moment to feel the brush of wind as she threw herself from him and to hear the sound of her fading footsteps as she fled from him, happy to have escaped as easily as she had from the weak vampire who could not even feed without showing such weakness.

But it did not come.

After a moment, he felt the gentle pressure of her arms snaking around his waist. He gasped as she touched him, in surprise and confusion. She pressed her face against his shoulder and held him tightly. He tentatively lowered one arm from his head and put it around her, then the other. She snuggled closer.

Love. Loyalty. Trust. Faith.

These emotions and more radiated from Alice, meeting the darker emotions within him. They warred inside Jasper's mind. But in time, Alice's emotions began to gain ground. He felt the pain retreat slightly. He opened his eyes and stared at Alice, whose eyes were clenched shut in concentration. She was trying to force it away. Jasper shivered. He did not understand. This was completely beyond his ability to comprehend. Not only had she not left, but she was trying to help him force the darkness away. Her emotions cried that she loved him, that she trusted him, that she would never leave him.

It was all he had ever wanted. She was offering him everything he had ever dreamed of, everything he had ever wanted for as long as he could remember. His heart rebelled in fear. Nobody loved Jasper Lee Whitlock. He was not deserving of love. He was only deserving of revulsion. He was a monster. Horrible. Unlovable. Worthless.

"Jasper...stop!" Alice insisted softly, still holding him tightly.

"Stop what?"

"I can feel what you're feeling...it's not true, Jasper. It's not. None of it."

He had not meant to emote. But she had felt it anyway.

And she was still here.

He held her in his arms tenderly as time and her love fought a slow but eventually victorious battle against the pain. Even with her here, the pain was nearly unbearable at times, but holding her was the only thing in nearly a hundred years that had even made a difference. It was a pain that only abstinence could defeat entirely, and he knew acutely that he did not have the strength to starve himself to death. His body would take over, as it had tonight. The monster would consume him until his physical needs were satisfied. He had to feed, and because of it, he had to resign himself to the pain that he would suffer for it. There were no other options.

Alice snuggled into his arms, seemingly content to hold him as long as he needed. He knew in his heart that this would not – that it could not – last. But he didn't care. Not right now. He made a decision in that moment to treasure each and every moment he had with her, to live each moment as if it were the last one that he would have with her. He would not waste moments with Alice. He would love her as much as he was able. He would pour into each moment all the love in his being. He would love as if he were human, and each moment had the potential to be his last.

She looked up at him. Her red eyes met his own as he lowered his lips to hers worshipfully, kissing her with all the intensity of his being. Alice returned the kiss tenderly, lingering as she stroked his cheek. Then she stood and held out her hand to him, as if offering to help him up.

He stood as well, catching her hand in his as he did. He pulled her against him, stroking her hair, burying his face in it for a moment, radiating to her all the love he felt for her. He would let her know every single moment of every single day, as long as she would let him, how very much he loved her.

Suddenly he pulled away and took a few steps back before formally offering her his hand.

"Waltz with me, Alice. Here, under the stars, with only God and the heavens as our witness."

Alice looked around her and smiled, curtseying and taking a step forward to take his hand in hers.

Jasper had learned to waltz as a young man in Texas. His parents had owned a ranch. As the son of well-off property owners, he had been expected to attend dances and balls. As an officer in the army, it was little different.

But never could he remember a dance as perfect as this one.

True, his clothes were rags. There was no orchestra, not even a piano to provide them music. Alice's dress was not like that of the girls he had danced with then. But these external things made absolutely no difference to him tonight. When his eyes met Alice's, his loving gaze held hers as he led her to the music that played in his heart. It almost seemed to him that she could hear it too.

It was perfect.

Magical.

The stars twinkled overhead, and a light breeze ruffled the trees at the edge of their clearing. In the distance, his sensitive ears heard deer settling for the night and the flapping wings of the bats and night birds.

And still they danced.

He knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that this would be a night that he would never forget, that every detail would remain etched in his heart.

He twirled her gently and pulled her closer, gazing at her intensely.

And then suddenly, he smiled. Not just with his eyes. His whole face broke into a bright, broad smile that transformed him. It was a smile that few had seen. Years seemed to lift from his face. For a moment, one could see the hopeful young man he had been before he was changed, before he had been sent to a living hell for all eternity. He could not remember the last time he had smiled. It had been so long since there had been any reason to.

When the waltz ended, he began another dance, then another, then another. He was loathe to let her go, to lose this perfect place, this perfect feeling, this perfect night. When dawn broke, he still held her, dancing slowly to an internal tune, with his cheek resting against her head. He looked down at her as the first rays of the sun hit them and stroked her cheek when it sparkled like a thousand diamonds, but he spoke not a word. Words could not encapsulate this moment. Nothing could.

In that moment, staring into Alice's eyes, Jasper knew that his world had changed irrevocably.