Throat (37 page)

Donne made a face like somebody had just sprinkled dirt on her tongue. “You are so lucky to be alive, Fresh.”

Lena put her hand on my shoulder.

“You love history; let me tell you another story.”

“There once was a family that lived in the Temperance Community of Telfair County in the state of Georgia in 1818,” Lena said. “The father operated a large plantation there, with a boatyard, gristmill, and a brick factory. He was said to be a hard, driven man. Ruthless and lacking in mercy. Other than his business interests, he had but one love in this life, his only son, a boy named Karel.

“One night in March, the father and his son were camping on the banks of the Ocmulgee River, where the brick-making clay was extracted. A small band of Creek Indians saw their campfire and crept up on the two.

“Karel was instantly killed and his father badly wounded. The Creeks then proceeded to scalp them both. The father was forced to watch the scalping of his beloved son. Then it was his turn. The Creeks peeled back the flesh while the man was still alive. The father did not scream, but lay as still as death, withstanding unimaginable pain in order to escape with his life.

“Then, as it happened, someone else arrived on the scene of the torture, almost unnoticed at first. She was tall and slender and appeared to be very, very young. Certainly no older than twelve or fourteen. The Creeks paid her no mind at first, supposing they could kill this frail child at their leisure.

“Instead of immediately fleeing, the girl came forward as if to watch what they were doing, curious. Then she reached down, took the first Creek by the hair, pulled his head back … and opened his throat with her mouth. She did the same with the next. The
third, the one who was scalping the father, threw down his scalping knife and fled. The girl pursued him and took him on the run.

“You see, Emma, there was more than one predator abroad in the woods that night. But this kind of predator hunted alone.

“The girl returned to the scalped man where he lay on the riverbank. Again, curious. She knelt and drank from the body of the child first, while his blood was still warm and alive. Then she turned to the father … and took him too.”

Lena looked at me with an expression that chilled me to the soles of my shoes.

“That young girl walking alone in the forest—seemingly no more than a child—was
die Esserin
. And the man who had been scalped was Wirtz. He answers only to her Call.”

We walked a ways farther without speaking, then I finally told them everything about that terrible night in the Georgia mountains. Even how my epilepsy had enabled me to escape. Everything but my scrambled condition as a vampire.

“Wait,” Donne said, making us stop. “He drank from your leg?”

“Yeah,” I said. “He started to go for my throat, but after I hit him, he acted all offended, as if he expected me to be honored to be ‘chosen’ to feed him. I wish I could have broken his nose. Driven it into his brain, actually.”

“You … hit … him,” Donne said. “Whoops.”

Anton’s mouth opened in apparent wonder. “It’s considered a great insult to strike a
Verloren
, Emma.”

“The throat is sacred to
Sonnen
and
Verloren
alike,” Lena explained. “
Heilig
. In his mind, Wirtz would have been honoring you had he taken you there. You dishonored him by striking his face.”

“It’s the worst thing you could have done,” Anton said. “It’s no wonder he’s after you so fiercely, eh?”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “Are you serious? I was supposed to just lie there and let it happen? Be honored to have my throat torn open?”

“Bingo,” Donne said. “In the eyes of a high-ranking
Verloren
, you didn’t play the game fair. A human girl actually striking a being so superior to her? It basically never happens.”

I stopped walking. “You almost sound like … this is all okay with you.”

They stopped beside me. “I am sorry, Emma,” Lena said. “We didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. It is only that … it has been so long.”

“So long what?” I said, turning to face her.

“Since we have known anyone who dared to fight back.”

We were sitting at our usual place on the stone wall at the
Steinhaus
.

“The throat,” Lena said, “is an instrument. Much more than an instrument of the voice or of sound. It is a kind of … transmitter, using the
Feld
, of course. It transmits thoughts, communications, even feelings. The
Verloren
are most attuned to … aggression, base lust, anything discordant. They use a very narrow spectrum of the
Feld
’s true possibilities. But they are effective in the way that they use it.”

“You could say aggression is their frequency,” Anton said. He was lying back with his hands behind his head and his eyes closed.

“What about the
Sonnen
?” I said. “What is your … frequency?”

Lena seemed to think about it a moment. “Perhaps you are ready to begin.”

“Begin what?”

“Learning about the
Kehle
.”

Now Lena and I were seated side by side atop the chimney at the Stone House Hotel, looking at the lights glimmering across the valley. The same chimney I had shouted from the night we met. There was just enough room for the two of us.

Lena had sent the other two vampires back to the hideout. I got the feeling she was afraid of embarrassing me if they were watching.

“It is good to be up here,” she said. “Somewhere high that is not so … encroached upon by the larger
Felds
of things like trees, even the ground. Let us begin.…

“The
Feld
is not something that can be fully explained in words,” she continued. “It must be experienced.”

“So how do we do it?” I said.

“You are so new,” Lena said. “I wonder if you will like the answer.”

“Try me.”

“All right.”

Lena reached over with her hand and placed all five fingers on my neck as if she were about to choke me.… I flinched a little, surprised, but her fingers rested so lightly there, I didn’t feel threatened. But there was another feeling—one I didn’t have a name for—that stirred the instant her skin met my skin.

“As I said before, the first and most important thing you must know is that the
Kehle
, or the throat, is
heilig
. Sacred. The most sacred part of the body. Many say it is the heart, but that is not true. There are several reasons for this. First, the throat is the seat of the voice.… Say something.”

“What do you want me to say?”

“All right, Emma … that was out loud. Now … say it, not out loud, but keep your mouth closed and speak deeply within the
Kehle
. Your throat.”

I wasn’t sure what she meant, but I thought I would try it anyway.
What do you want me to say?
It felt kind of stupid; the noise that came out through my neck was like some creature’s in a cheap horror movie.

“Do not worry about the sound,” Lena said. “You will get better at controlling it. It is the vibration that is important. If you want to control the
Feld
, you must learn to control it through the vibration of the
Kehle
. Try again.” She kept her hand on my neck.

I repeated the words, mouth closed, speaking deep within my throat. I didn’t feel so self-conscious this time.

“Did you see?” Lena said. “I could feel your words, your voice, with my fingers as much as I could hear them with my ears. Second, even more than the lips or the mouth, the throat is also the seat of love, passion. There are those who say that the kiss was invented because the throat was too tempting, too dangerous. There is such a natural instinct to taste your lover’s skin just here.…”

She trailed her thin fingers over my neck, making my skin pulse and tingle deliciously. I couldn’t help feeling a little strange. No girl had ever touched me this way. I’m not even sure Sagan had.

“You are uncomfortable,” Lena said. “And for this you must be at your most comfortable, or the lesson will be a failure. Close your eyes and think of something … pleasurable … and that may help.”

I closed my eyes as her fingers continued to trail over my skin and thought of Sagan.
His lips there. His mouth
.

“Um … I’m not sure how relaxing this is,” I said, giggling a little nervously.

“It will be easier as we go along,” Lena said. “You haven’t been touched many times, have you, Emma?”

“It shows?”

“Please, keep your eyes closed. Continue to focus on your pleasurable image.”

Sagan popped into my head again … the way he looked this afternoon as we wrestled the compressor into the Jeep. Shirt off, the wetness of his skin, the strong line of his jaw punctuated by tiny beads of shining sweat.

“Don’t let me fall,” I said, smiling and breathing deeply.

“The throat, the
Kehle
, is the center of a person’s
Feld…,
” Lena went on. “You can make adjustments within your
Feld
by what you say in your throat. You can even communicate over long distances with other … vampires.” She squeezed my neck gently. “Especially those who have tasted you here.”

“Oh great, like Wirtz,” I said.

“Shhh,” Lena said. “He would be the easiest, yes. But focus on the good. The words do not even have to be audible. Only that they must be spoken words within the throat.”

What do you want me to say?
I said again in my throat. It didn’t seem silly at all now.

Again Lena’s hands moved lightly over my flesh, almost stroking.

“Are you ready?” she said.

“I think I …”

She sank her teeth into my neck.

I know I jumped a little, because both of us nearly fell off the chimney. But Lena wouldn’t let go. I could only turn my head so far, but—acting on an instinct deeper than I could explain—I kept my eyes cut hard to the side, staring in horror, desperate to see what she was doing.

After a little while the muscles that controlled my eyes began to ache. Lena was still attached to me, drinking. I reached for her, but she clasped me with both arms.… I knew I was stronger, I knew I could break away … but for some reason, I wouldn’t let myself do it.

Almost immediately I was flooded with the most intense sensation of … comfort … I had ever experienced. But this wasn’t the comfort of a seizure—part of me was terrified and furious, afraid that I had been tricked, that all this was just an elaborate scheme to turn me over to Lena’s side. But the other part … the other part of me was in orbit.

The less I resisted, the better the sensation. I knew she was draining away my heart’s blood and I didn’t care. My whole life I had been asleep—the nervous twitch of daily living, the sense of always being on my guard, ready to fight, to attack … it all began to evaporate with each drop of blood I lost.

I couldn’t struggle against this feeling. It wasn’t a lack of strength; it was a lack of will. I wanted her to drain me. I wanted her
to carry me as far inside her world as she could … even farther. There was nothing wrong with what we were doing. There was nothing wrong with me loving this feeling. This overall feeling of being needed, adored, wanted.

At that moment in time, I had never felt more important to anyone. Not my mom, not Manda, not Sagan. I was important to her, to Lena. That was all that mattered. The thought of leaving this feeling was painful. It was like seeing the real world for the first time.
Seeing the inside of the universe
. Knowing the way it all worked even if I couldn’t say it in words. What I was experiencing was beyond thought. Thought was no longer necessary. Everything was already there that was needed.

I felt Lena’s lips gently suckling at my neck, could almost hear the ticking of the blood rhythmically slipping into her throat. We were no longer two people, but one person. But that didn’t begin to describe it. We weren’t just one person … we were all people. Huge masses of people and souls and thoughts and non-thoughts, which was all there was and all there ever would be. I was separate but not really separate. I was small, but I was unimaginably large. I couldn’t think, but I did something that was more than thinking. It wasn’t a thing that took effort like thinking did; it was a thing that took non-effort. Letting go. Opening. And in that opening I saw …

Oh
.

If this was death, then it poured out slow and sticky sweet and wasn’t really a leaving at all, but a kind of arriving at this new place where I had always been, but just didn’t know it before.
Take me. Take me all the way there
. But she already had. There wasn’t any “taking”; this was more like “releasing.” Letting the prisoners go. Nothing to worry about ever again.

Wham
.

Lena had pulled her mouth away. I slumped forward, nearly toppling over the edge of the chimney. She caught me and held me there in her arms.

“I almost … I almost … could not … stop,” she said. Her lips and teeth were red. She licked them with a red tongue. “I have never … Emma … please …”

“Oh wow.” I wiped my eyes.

I didn’t want her to ever let me go. Lena ran her shirtsleeve over my neck; it came back smeared with blood.
My blood
.