If you thought that I had abandoned this story...you were right. But then, suddenly and unexpectedly, inspiration struck! It's been a year and two months since my last update (a really old pen name of mine is used in the cover that I made), and I'm terribly sorry for that. But if you're still sticking with me and this story, thank you! I hope you'll enjoy the rest of the ride!

Will had never been particularly fond of the sunlight. The sun made everything brighter, clearer. He could perfectly see every little detail on people's faces, the tiniest hint of emotion. He hated it. Could he read people, even total strangers, as easily as one would read a book? Did he sense things, have hunches? Was he possessed? Did he have any special powers? He didn't know. He doubted the last two scenarios could be true - he had never been a man to believe in the spiritual, in a higher power, and so on.

Will had always preferred the night. The cloak of darkness concealed things and during the late hours awkward, anti-social Will Graham could have something that resembled peace.

Now, however, knowing that the sun would never touch his skin again, he wanted to see. He wanted to see his last sunrise before he truly became a creature of the night.

There was something frightening but also exciting about knowing that he would never see the sun again. He was privileged. He was aware that a change would take place, a change that would not leave him the same. Most people died without doing so many things they wanted to. Will had been forewarned. And yet, all he wanted was to see the magnificence of the sun. He was a simple man.

And when he woke as a changed man, the sun didn't matter anymore. Neither did his old life. He had been reborn, transformed into a higher creature. Hannibal had o generously and selflessly offered him a great and rare gift.

And now Will was hungry.

"So it's true," Freddie interrupts, unable to control herself. "Vampires drink blood."

Will's barely-there smile makes her own blood freeze in her veins. "Indeed," he says. "We can't be nourished any other way. If a vampire does not feed for a certain period of time - depending on the vampire's age - they wither, become nothing more than flesh and bones. However, I do not think that a vampire can starve to death."

"How did you feel about having to drink blood?" Freddie asks, breathless. Someone else would be disgusted, appalled, perhaps frightened. However, she is intrigued, excited even.

Will shrugs, making the gesture full of grace somehow. "I supposed that I should feel repulsed by the very idea. But the hunger was too great. It was like a powerful ache, deep in my bones. My craving was a strong force; I felt like the blood was calling me. The blood is the life!"

Freddie can't help but smirk at the quote taken from Bram Stoker's Dracula and spoken in a hoarse voice. "Please, carry on."

"You see, the thing about Hannibal is that he didn't just kill random people. Oh no, he had a list of future victims. Some of them were criminals - thieves, cutthroats, and the like. Others were...well, exceptionally rude. And Hannibal Lecter did not tolerate rudeness."

The two men were extremely discourteous, according to Hannibal. They spoke offensively to people, especially women, were mean to little children, and sometimes, when no one - apart from Hannibal, but they did not know that - was watching, they stomped on people's gardens, crushing beautiful flowers beneath their merciless boots.

Will did not care much about the men's insults to humanity. He was too busy being hungry. At the same time, he was also too busy looking at the world with his new eyes. Now that his transformation was complete, everything seemed even more impressive. He felt like he had been almost blind all his human life, not being able to see even a quarter of the beauty the world around him had to offer.

Sight, hearing, smelling, touching - all his senses were stronger. Now he only had to try taste.

And try he did. As a vampire, he was as quiet as a shadow. Their victims knew they were there only when it was too late, only when their cold arms were already around their warm human bodies. Will had expected to feel as inexperienced as a virgin on her wedding night, but instinct led on instead. He bit into the man's soft neck and felt his life nectar flow in his mouth and down his throat. It made Will's taste buds explode; the new vampire was certain that he moaned at least once during his feeding.

The drums came again. He could hear his victim's heart beating fast in an attempt to keep the man alive. He could feel his own heart beating almost as fast, excited. At some point, the one drum began to beat slower and slower, its music fading. Will did not pay that any mind, but he felt a pair of hands on his shoulders, gently but firmly disentangling him from his victim.

"Never drink until the heart stops," Hannibal advised in the dark, "unless you want to join your victim to their doom."

A part of Will wanted more, but he nodded. He did not want to die. Not now. He had so much to learn, so much to do. His new life had only just begun and there were so many new experiences waiting for him.

They walked among the humans, arm in arm, and got no weird looks. No one had any idea, any suspicion, that they were something different, not human at all. Monsters in human suits, walking among humans as if they were just like them. It made Will laugh.

Hannibal raised any eyebrow and looked at him, curious and amused. "What is it, Will?" he asked.

"We feed on them and walk among them and they don't even know."

A ghost of a smile appeared on Hannibal's well-defined face. "To them, we are two rosy-cheeked men taking a stroll. Feeding leaves us warm and as alive-looking as possible," he explained. "If we had chosen to feed an hour before getting back in the coffin, we would look sickly to them, too pale. You, Will, being a new-born vampire would appear to them as a man who should be in his deathbed, white as a ghost, your skin as thin as parchment, your bones sticking out as if about to tear your flesh."

All mirth was now gone from the younger one. "But you wouldn't look like that?"

Hannibal shook his head. "I would look very pale, but not as skeletal as you. As vampires grow older, the need for blood gets less and less great. Right now, dear William, you need blood to survive. But after, let us say, two centuries, a glass of warm blood would suffice."

At that point, Will could not yet see how such a small amount of blood would be enough for a vampire or why, for that matter, someone would be satisfied with it when they could drain a human almost to the point of death. He did not question Hannibal, though. His maker seemed to know exactly what he was talking about. There was an aura of wisdom emanating from him. Will had the feeling that the knowledge he carried had not been passed on to him by his maker but he had got it, instead, from experience. It made Will wonder about the vampire walking by his side, about his life as a human and his rebirth as a blood-sucking creature of the night. He didn't find the courage to ask, though. Not that night.

That night they shared Hannibal's coffin again. And when he said that they should make arrangements for a second coffin the following night, Will felt a pang of disappointment.