Page 94 of Love Bleeds

Chapter Thirty-Three

Crimson slept, but he didn't find peace in his dreams. They were just as mad as his reality, if not more so. It was hard to tell which was which, really. The lines blurred so easily. One moment, he would be lying in his bed, trying to communicate something to the other vampire, and the next, Aldrich would turn into Nicolai and he realized that he'd been dreaming after all.

Or maybe this wasn't a dream. Maybe he really was back in that dreadful basement, with his sire. Maybe any hopes he'd ever had for escape had all been foolish and he would always end up back here.

Maybe his dreams were prophetic.

That thought almost scared him more than the possibility that he wasn't dreaming at all, though he wasn't sure why.

He wasn't sure of much of anything.

It was hard to think. So hard to hold on to an idea, to a thought, or even just an image. Even emotions were fleeting.

He had no concept of time either. The minutes seemed to stretch and slip him by in ways that made no sense.

The only constant was hunger. He was always hungry.

And he was always scared. But that emotion was less concrete than the hunger. He wasn't sure what he was scared of. His heart raced and his pulse sped up and he didn't know why.

Sometimes, in very rare moments of clarity, he could put his finger on the reason. It was never spelled out clearly, but he would get this impression of a smile, of bright eyes looking at him, making him want to go on, to keep fighting.

Those moments, he knew.

He wasn't scared that something might happen to him.

He was scared that something might happen to the only thing that mattered in his universe anymore. To the person all of his thoughts and emotions and hopes and dreams revolved around. His sun.

Luke.

The name fell from his lips like a prayer. He liked to say it, to hear it.

He never wanted to forget it again.

Hewouldn't.

It was more important than even his need for blood. There was some serenity in that, and so he held on to it, for as long as he could, chanting his love's name like an invocation.

Until reality inevitably shifted again.

Until he saw visions of his sire again, trying to tell him something. Something important. Crimson almost understood. He repeated the words to himself, then lost them again. He tried to tell Aldrich, when he saw him again, but he wasn't sure that he was making much sense.

There were so many things in his head, and so few of them made sense.

He thought Aldrich was trying to talk to him.

He was sitting on his chair by the bed. He wasn't holding anything, though. Most of the times he tried to speak to Crimson, he was holding a bottle or something he could jab him with so he could feed Crimson. Crimson didn't want to be fed, though. Not with the stuff the other vampire had been giving him. It was all poison. The reason reality was becoming so blurry.

He closed his eyes, but Aldrich said his name again, more sharply.

Why couldn't he just leave him alone?

Aldrich's mouth moved again, forming words. He was saying something about visitors. Was someone else coming here?

Where was here, anyway?

Crimson turned his gaze up to look at the ceiling.

He was somewhere with a ceiling. A ceiling that didn't look like the ceiling in the room where his sire had kept him. That was good.