Path of the Vampire forum

She laughed. She really, really laughed. Loudly, with a big gleeful smile. His offer was hilarious. She shook her head. "That's not what I want..." Her voice was tinted with the laughter, almost a giggle. She reached out, and closed his hand around the money, signalling to keep it.
She then turned to the girl, lying on the bench, and with the back of her hand moved the girl's hair away from her neck. "I want to do what you do.." She ran her thumb over where he had bitten the girl, though the bite had already sealed.

"I want to be like you.. I was sure you existed, you see.." She began to babble. She still spoke fairly slowly and with her airy voice, but she spoke a lot. She listed, mostly just to the air, reasons why she thought Vampires were in this city. Once she had finished, she looked at Cosimo with a smile that was tinged by relief. "I knew your kind existed."

The excitement made her giggle again, childishly, like she couldn't contain herself. Her mother always scolded her for such outbursts, but this time she got the whole way through her babbling nonsense without interruption, and her glee had overflowed, making her porcelain cheeks flush. Her eyes looked him up and down as she calmed herself. She was glad she'd found this one. Something about him was... Fun.

Her eyes became large, like a puppy that had been kicked, and her lips tightened. She began shaking her head, her curled hair falling around her shoulders as she did so. She looked naturally harmless and cute, though she knew she could be otherwise.

"Please.." Her hands clasped together in front of her, as she looked Cosimo in the eyes with child-like pleading. "I want to.. I can see myself like it.. I've seen it, so it has to happen." The reason she longed for it was mostly boredom. She was ignored by her peers largely, due to often being labelled 'That crazy girl', which left her with little to do but pine over fantasies. The idea of shifting through the night with such power - being trusted with such a heavy secret - as a Vampire, struck something inside of her and gave her vivid visions of the things she could do.

Esmeralda wasn't crazy - not totally. But her imagination, at least that's what she assumed it was, was often frighteningly intense. Perhaps that was what gave her the absence of fear, the absence of dread when dangerous people past her at night. Maybe that's why creatures didn't frighten her, because somewhere in her head she could see a scenario where they were not dangerous. Like what was happening right now, right to her. Plenty of the signs she had sussed to lead to these ghosts made them seem dangerous and harmful, but she had happened onto a safe one. Like she knew was possible.

So that proved to her that was her path. Something to have gone just so smoothly for her, must have been laid out and planned by something. Either way, her young heart was set on the idea. So her eyes looked into the Vampire in front of her, and suddenly, she thought of words that could appeal to him. She leaned in, and smiled. "What could go wrong, really?"

Her expression quickly changed. Her face lit up, her eyes bright with obvious happiness, and she gave a wide smile, truer than any other she had exchanged. She nodded excitedly, and had an urge to reach out to hug him - though she did not, as she knew neither would really like the exchange. "Is there a place for these things?" She asked, with a slight rush to her voice. She wanted to go now.

Esmeralda's hands played with the frills on her night dress as her heart pounded. No doubt he could hear it - but she didn't mind. It didn't drum out of fear, after all. She rarely ever felt fear - she felt hate, sadness, and all the other horrible things, but she was never scared. Her mother called her desensitised and stupid. She reasoned that it was foolish - this man could be taking her to just kill her. She quickly shook those thoughts away. There's a chance that I can get what I want.. There is no way that I'm not going to take it.

Her hands moved to her hair, which she pushed back behind her shoulders again. The ringlets often had a life of their own, so she usually wore it tied back with a ribbon, when not dressed for bed. She was busying herself by focussing on trivial things like her hair, keeping her mind off of what was about to happen - in case something did interfere and crush her path like a figurative giant stomping his way home. She liked to keep her hopes down - though with such an excitable mind, it was difficult.

She had stepped closer to the man who was to sire her without realising. She liked how she gravitated towards him like that. It was his energy. His attitude. It comforted her without her even realising that it did. Her family were very old fashioned and strict - so perhaps she needed this new brightness in her life more than she needed the change. But both came hand in hand, it seemed. And that only fuelled the brightness in her pale face.

With a grin, she then moved away from the bench. "Let's go.."

There a very obvious pause after that question. She took a while to answer, and her bottom lip was out in the slightest of pouts as she thought about it. Finally, she spoke. "I live with my mother. She's what's left." The absence of her father did not bother her. It bothered her mother. And it made her cruel. People decided it was her father leaving that made her the way she was - skittish, childish - but the culprit, in Esmeralda's eyes, was her mother. It was not a violent relationship at all, that was never the problem.

Her mother, Arleigh Craft, was cold. She was strict, and instilled formality into Esmeralda from a young age, and was often full of wisdom. But since the natural passing of her father she had become distant. The last time Arleigh had addressed her daughter was before a formal dinner two weeks ago. She had pulled on Esmeralda's dress and hair, and pinched her cheeks until they were rosy, making a 'presentable daughter' out of her. She took it without reaction, didn't even hate her for it, but was certainly not compelled to stay with her.

Arleigh could think up some lie, like she did so many times, about why her daughter was not around. Her family had always been formal and uncaring to an extent - so Esmeralda knew she wouldn't be missed as long as her mother could make it look like she was still there, with old family paintings and excuses.

"She won't mind. I barely see her anyway." She paused again, and then shifted the conversation. "What's your name, Mister?"

As he told her his name, she smiled gently at him for a moment, but then became distracted by their surroundings. Her eyes flitted around, looking at each tree, each flower, each crack in the path. She liked to do this to solidify each place she visited in her mind, so her memories could be as useful and vivid as possible. And this was certainly a night that she wanted to remember.

"My family name is Craft.. I'm Esmeralda." She paused for a moment, then nodded to herself. "You could call me Mer, if you'd like.." She gave an unladylike shrug, and mentally scolded herself for it. She liked to appear as proper and well-mannered as possible, something which had been drilled into her since she could crawl.

She thought for a moment, He wants to know something about me.. Think of something interesting.. Esmeralda struggled to think of something positive. She was easily upset, became attached to silly things, and loved to garden - but everything she planted always died. She had no notable friends, and one scary ex boyfriend, and her only talents lay in cooking, which was a skill now useless, and in playing the violin. She turned her body towards Cosimo, whilst playing with her fingers, before answering. "Snakes." She said that mostly to herself, solidifying her choice out loud. "I love snakes.. At home, I have a Royal Python. She's only a little thing, a baby.. They make great pets." She enthused.

Her mother had let her have one on the grounds that it would not be dangerous. The python did occasionally bite, and Esmeralda had been on the receiving end more than anyone else, but her mother didn't know that. She loved the way that the elegant animal could strike, fangs bared in an instant to sink into flesh.. The thought almost made her shiver.

She turned her gaze back in front of them. "I feed her mice. Dead ones, though. She thinks she hunts it.. It always makes me laugh how much prouder she seems after eating. She doesn't know it was given to her without a pulse." She gave a light laugh, which was almost like a giggle. "I think you would like her.. She's always up to mischief."