Rain fell softly to the cold, cobble-stoned road. The faint pitter-patter of silvery drops against cold, empty stone the only sound in the otherwise silent night. Within the overhanging branches of the great oak trees small birds slept soundlessly, not a ruffle or a whisper to be heard. No bat shrieked in the feeble light of the moon. All of nature bowed down in silent awe and commiseration - as if the world itself understood the finality of the vampire's last night. 

Nathaniel paused in his frantic flight, collapsing against the rough, wet brick of the alley wall. A great shuddering cry escaped his lips as he fell back, his legs sliding slowly out from under him and carrying him to the rain slick cobbles. There was no where left to run, nowhere that They could not find him. When His eye fell on him and He sent his servants down to round him up there was nowhere on earth he could run to be free. They would hunt him down, assault him with visions and memories and torment him with images and recollections of his blood filled past. Running would only keep them at bay for so long. And now that he had stopped running they would catch up fast. 

Memories. 

 They were like the rushing of a turbulent river - strong, so fearsomely strong and waiting for him to make that single misstep from whence they could drag him beneath their foaming waves to confront the fears and terrors held beneath the surface. Stampeding horses of terror ran reckless through his mind - manes flying, eyes rolling wildly in their shining black heads as they charged back and forth through the river of his soul. Each passing, each thunder of beating hooves shook the earth around him, his feverish mind recoiling from their onslaught as they rampaged back and forth as though in both contest and challenge to himself and his river - driving him closer and closer to its turbulent waters. Closer and closer to the pain and fear long hidden and forever buried within the subconscious of his soul. Horses of retribution, horses of guilt and remorse - equine embodiment of all those human emotions buried long ago. 

In the darkness of the night he had taken his vow. The completion of a bargain that would see his soul end in damnation and fire and pain even whilst it promised him an escape. Chains of silver and gold to keep at bay that which would have kept him from his goal - remorse, guilt, conscience; yes, even his very soul. Chains that were meant to hold forever. 

"You promised me!" Kneeling in the rain and the mud, his words of accusation were thrown to the unhearing heavens - unfeeling Gods upon long rotten thrones. "It was never supposed to be like this! Our bargain...." 

The world tilted and he slipped sideways to the cold, wet floor. He lay for a moment, curled on his side, the rain trailing through unruly auburn locks and across cold white skin. His arm lay outstretched, the finger curled lightly as through clutching something invisible to the eye; and blue eyes stared out through clouds of pain. The violent anger deserted him in a moment. But the emptiness that swam in to fill its place was keenly felt. Somewhere inside the fragile, pale body a battle was fought with a fury - the golden sword of retribution against the minions of his soul who tried vainly to hold closed the remaining chains that bound him safely within himself. One by one the minions fell to the vicious fury of the sword, driven back by those fragments of his mind that had already broken free from their cursed chains to dive into the battle as a whole. A cycle started a hundred years passed reached its culmination within the soul of the frail and fragile man curled upon the cold abandoned alleyway on a silent, miserable night. 

All those lives stolen. All that pain caused. 

The voice that haunted and pursued him whispered insidiously within his mind. The phantom ears of his soul picked up its malicious tones and relayed the wicked words to his very heart. The river surged, a memory bursting the surface as the young man coiled away in sudden fear. 

Face it! 

Killer. Murderer. Traitor. Liar. 

Face it! 

"I will not!" He cried out into the silence of the night, floundering back as though suddenly remembering how to move his physical body, he scrambled back on the smooth, slick cobbles into the centre of the deserted alleyway. It did him no good. The onslaught, though he could see it with his eyes, belonged to his soul - it was not a thing of the physical world. 

Somewhere music played; a solitary fiddler stood in the empty lane - body twisting and turning in the rapture of his silent song. The notes drifted, first one then another, rising to a tumultuous peak and carried through rivers of time and memory to assault Nathaniel's ear. The alleyway widened before his eyes. A stone square opened up around the immortal fiddler who stood now on a pedestal of stone. The air around him began to shimmer and bleed as forms and silhouettes began to form - a crowd appeared around the player and the air filled with the soft chattering hum of awe and conversation. 

"No!" the howl erupted from Nathaniel's lips as he staggered to his feet. The alleyway disappeared beneath his hand and he groped out frantically for a touch of brick wall. Nothing. "Why are you doing this to me? Did I not serve you well enough? All those years of my life - even my death I gave to you!" 

In the square around him the crowds continued on. His cry had not ruffled even a feather upon the elegant hats of the long-dead women. Ladies in brightly coloured dresses of silks and velvets paraded past, little dogs on leashes yapping at each other as they passed. Whilst the men in their finely tailored suits strode back and forth, some offering an arm to their female companions as they paused to watch the solitary musician on his pedestal of simple stone. 

The sun was setting, its golden glow disappearing beyond the horizon, and the fiddler played on. Behind him Nathaniel caught a glimpse of familiar milky white skin. A flash of gold in the crowd. A seductive laugh and a crook of a pale white finger. An instant later she was swallowed by the crowd. 

"A dream... A memory. Mere shadow of my mind come to haunt me with what was and could have been. Get away from me!" He staggered backwards, lifting his arms to fend off the vision before him. The ragged shirt that clothed his arms flapped damply in the breeze and he closed his eyes against the visual onslaught. 

If only he could do the same to his ears. 

"Nathaniel... My Nathaniel... Why?" 

The words drifted on the breeze to assault his ears. 

"So much... There is so much of it! I can't stop the bleeding. Nathaniel, help me!" The cry turned into a high pitched wail as behind closed eyes Nathaniel felt the touch of ghostly hands on his shoulders. 

His eyes snapped open to flickering candlelight and a dusty cellar. Gone were the gay crowds, the solitary fiddler, the slowly setting sun. In its place rested dust and spiders and flickering candlelight reflecting on empty bottles of glass. A wine cellar then. 

"Please! Help us!" Disorientated, he took a step back, staggering over the ghostly remnants of an empty, shattered crate. A broken plank jabbed him roughly in the calf, not a vision then... Living memory. Like the crowds in the square. 

She crouched on the floor, the tattered silk of her blue dress pooled around her. The candle that rested in its holder sat on the floor flickered weakly in the darkness. Blonde hair had escaped from its confinement to drift about her pale face, highlighting her terrified expression as she knelt frantically over the fallen body on the floor. 

Blood. So much blood. A veritable lake of it spread out from the crumpled body, her skirts were bathed in it as she knelt there, hands pressed frantically to the gapping wound as she sought to keep the fallen mans body from pumping out it's last remaining life. The jagged wound that ripped apart his throat glittered sickly in the flickering light. Nathaniel felt his knees buckle beneath him, carrying him roughly to the straw covered floor. Somewhere, outside, deep in his mind was an awareness of the rain and the stone floor of the alleyway - frantically he clutched at the memory of the present, desperate to push away this horrid image of torment and pain. 

No. Stay and face it, coward! You wrought this - you will not run from it. Take what is rightly yours and face it. 

Against his will he felt his body move. Deep within his soul began that terrible pounding, hunger and thirst blended into one, never sated - no matter how much he fed it. That euphoria, that joy - all that mattered was to feel it again. The price so high and yet, when paid with innocent blood not his own, so easy to do. Dark eyes glinted in the flickering candlelight as he moved forward on hands and knees across the straw scattered floor. Blood scent rose from the dying man. His hands could recall the feel of phantom struggles of the youth - strong and young and full of life as he had struggled and fought within his unyielding grasp. The blonde haired woman must have seen something in those flickering eyes, that feral almost animal stare for she had recoiled, giving up in an instant her futile attempts at saving the young mans life. 

"Sabrine!" In the cold, wet alley he called out. The ghostly woman heard nothing of his plea. A spirit of his imagination, trapped within a tortured soul she could not know how he fought and railed against the vision before him. Another wave cascaded over him, forcing him back down into the memory. Time had passed during that brief respite. Cold and limp she lay now in his arms, empty eyes staring vacantly to the rafters of the cellar. The candle lay dark, fallen to its side, empty, extinguished and cold. The light of the moon filtering through the wooden planks above, through the wooden door that led up to the empty night time streets was enough illumination for his unnatural eyes to take in the devastation around him. 

Inside the demon's body Nathanial railed and fought. 

Sabrine... You dare to speak her name aloud! You never knew even then... What was she to you? A pretty face? An unknown woman? Merely food for your demonic soul? 

"Enough!" With a violent cry Nathaniel threw himself backwards, propelling himself away from the vision to land in the cold rain of the empty alleyway. Frantically he scrambled backwards on hands and knees until the reassuring strength of the brick wall rested at his back. With shaking hands he pushed cold, wet hair back from his eyes and stared down to the mouth of the alley. All was silent in the depths of the night. Even the moon had hidden her face from his trial. She had no wish to witness again the bloodshed of those ancient nights. 

Would you like to see another one? 

"No...." But all too late and too futile. The river gave a roar and washed over him again, its terrifying current grabbing hold and dragging him under. A crowded tavern became an empty field, memories of tramping across country in the mud and the rain turning to a glittering ballroom in the blink of an eye. Each memory cascaded over him, each one driving him to face again and again each death wrought by his hands, every drop of blood spilled, each life stolen. 

"Please... No more." He lay limp and pale on the floor of the alley, somehow he had travelled through those visions to lie at the mouth of the lane. Along the road beyond a solitary cat strolled past. It paused a moment to cast the fallen man a disdainful glance before stalking off with a dismissive flick of its tail. Tears of blood tracked and pooled down ivory cheeks, diluted and then washed away by the falling rain whilst above him, in the night sky, the moon returned from her hiding place to illuminate the land. 

"Does it hurt so my love?" The voice was soft and insidious in its beauty, whispered from behind him, it no longer spoke to his soul but to his immortal ears. The sharp click-clack of heels against stone followed, marching slowly, almost leisurely towards his fallen body, echoing against the walls of the narrow lane before halting by his face. He turned his head, scrambling to his knees to stare up at his tormentor. 

"Would it satisfy you if I said yes?" his voice croaked from his throat as he staggered to his feet. Better to face this terrible beauty standing than to cower like a whipped cur at her feet. "Or would you simply indulge yourself further in the damnation of my soul?" 

A soft, wicked laugh rolled forth from her painted lips. Blonde hair cascaded down across her shoulders, framing a pale yet sharpened face that at first sight looked to be carved of ivory. And flickering behind her shoulders, visible and yet invisible at the same time, a pair of ivory wings. An angel... Cruel and malicious tormentor of the damned. 

"Everything I did..." 

"You did for Us, for Him. Yes, I know. I've heard it all before. 'My sword is in your service if you will just grant me this one thing...' and so on, so forth. I've heard it a million times over." 

"I did what you asked of me. I weeded them out for you. You pointed and I went. I did your bidding; every time. Every death, every murder... I did for you, on your command, with the tools given to me by you! And now you come to show me retribution? This is how you repay a faithful servant? Perhaps the Gods are truly dead." He staggered back from her and looked to the cobbles. 

"Not dead. Never dead... Just... Temporarily incapacitated. Besides, you knew what the terms of your contract were when you signed up - its not my fault that you took the liberties you did or attached yourself with such dedication to your duty. Face it Nathaniel - you are a vampire, not an avenging angel. The bargain you gave was your service until time saw fit to end it - in return for absolution from your crimes. We did not promise you forgiveness for any new ones." 

"How can acts committed in service and under His orders be crimes?" 

"Theft. Murder. Slaughter. Addiction. I believe you also had a hand in acts of adultery more than once..." The woman shrugged her shoulders, the wings shimmered in the moonlight. "The thing is, we gave you the tools, that is true. But we did not tell you that you had to use them, nor how to go about your tasks. That we left up to you - so you see, in the end, the sin is yours. You failed us. And for that you pay the price. Trust me Nathaniel - what you felt tonight, that is but a taste of things to come. You'll see in the end - you'll come to understand the traps into which you fell and you will know in time how you failed us." 

An ivory hand reach out to caress his blood stained cheek. "A pity really. You were one of the best. But, it is no use crying over spilt milk as they say. Or perhaps in your case spilt blood. The sun rises soon, her eye seeks you out. Unlike the moon she is no impartial watcher, her passions burns with a heat that warms the very air we breathe, and she is angry with you Nathaniel. Furious even. You will not find mercy from her come the dawn." 

She pushed him back and away from her, causing him to take a step back. Behind her already were the blood red streaks on the horizon that foretold of the sun's arrival. No time to run for cover now, even if his Judge would have allowed it. The night was passing, the day rising, and the final moments of his existence blowing away like grains of sand in the wind. 

"I hate you." 

"We know." The angel bowed her head to him. "We know all things, and we know that you will understand us in the end." 

As the furious eye awoke on the horizon the angel left Nathanial to his fate. It caught the vampire in its sight and it's fury burned with the anger of a hundred, thousand lives. The world turned to blazing, livid light until it's fury was finally sated and it's light extinguished. The angel watched from above. Clutched in her ivory hand, its thorns piercing her skin was a single, solitary rose. And with an almost exaggerated slowness a single tear of scarlet blood fell to the ground from her pale fingers. Set free by those wicked thorns, the blood fell to the ground below,  to be soaked up into the dust that was slowly blowing away in the light breeze of the early morning. And slowly the solitary rose floated down to join it. 

A single rose on the floor of an empty alleyway, the only testimony to the vampires demise.

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