(from an idea by Ed Bernstein)<\/i><\/p>\r\n\r\n
The pale pre-dawn light in the eastern sky blinked out, was replaced with a handful of stars like sparks tossed from a fire into darkness. Cherna stepped through the door as it hissed open, then turned to wait, cocking her head to better hear the faint strains of music that drifted across the lawn. The door slid gently closed; and a momentary, almost indiscernible brightening of the light beyond it heralded Ilya\u2019s arrival.<\/p>\r\n
The door opened once again and Ilya stepped out. Strips of black silk rustled and swirled about her legs, allowing an occasional glimpse of pale thigh and ankle as she walked.<\/p>\r\n
\u201cShall we?\u201d Cherna murmured. Arm in arm, they strolled across the lawn toward an archway.<\/p>\r\n
\u201cWhere are we this time?\u201d Ilya asked.<\/p>\r\n
\u201cWho knows?\u201d Cherna said. \u201cMika didn\u2019t say. Istanbul, perhaps?\u201d<\/p>\r\n
Ilya glanced around. \u201cWhere is Mika?\u201d<\/p>\r\n
\u201cHe must have gone on ahead.\u201d<\/p>\r\n
They continued through the archway into the courtyard beyond, into the hubbub of laughter and music, into the party.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
The synthesist\u2019s break after his second set was nearly over when Ilya finally cornered him near a table of punch bowls and glasses on the third floor of the mansion, under a crystal chandelier. She lifted one black eyebrow and the corner of her mouth to catch his attention, then moved closer to him before he could turn away.<\/p>\r\n
\u201cAren\u2019t you Terry Winters?\u201d she asked innocently.<\/p>\r\n
He laughed, surprised and pleased. \u201cYou\u2019ve heard my music?\u201d<\/p>\r\n
\u201cI\u2019ve heard a lot about you. You\u2019re earning quite a name for yourself.\u201d<\/p>\r\n
He laughed again, with a touch of self-deprecation. \u201cIn some circles, maybe.\u201d<\/p>\r\n
She smiled, a brief flash of white teeth. \u201cWould you like to accompany me outside?\u201d she asked. \u201cIt\u2019s very nice out tonight.\u201d<\/p>\r\n
\u201cI\u2019d love to.\u201d<\/p>\r\n
Ilya led the way to the ornate French doors at the end of the room. Winters followed her out onto the stone balcony beyond. The quarter moon had moved nearly halfway up the sky, lending a silver glow to the courtyard below them. Guests wove back and forth in intricate patterns, laughing, dancing, singing.<\/p>\r\n
\u201cYou know,\u201d Winters mused, looking down at them, \u201cI sometimes think if I watched people moving around for long enough, I could translate the motion into music. A theme or a melody for each of them, weaving through each other until\u2014\u201d<\/p>\r\n
Ilya\u2019s soft touch on his arm interrupted him. She put a pale index finger, half-sheathed in black silk, to her too-red lips. \u201cShhh,\u201d she breathed.<\/p>\r\n
Surprised, he forgot to blink for a long moment, lost in her eyes. Then: \u201cYou\u2019re very\u2014\u201d he began, but she stopped him again.<\/p>\r\n
\u201cDon\u2019t talk.\u201d She lifted her face toward his\u2014hardly lifted at all, really; she was almost his height\u2014and he bent toward her. Their lips met, opened. Winters brought his left arm up behind her back and pulled her toward him. He reached backward with his right hand to set down his wine glass, but it slipped from his fingers, shattering with a crystalline susurration on the stone floor. His vision blurred.<\/p>\r\n
He felt his knees buckle, but something held him upright. From a great distance, he heard her soft voice: \u201cBeautiful. Such a prize.\u201d Then came a stabbing pain at his throat, and blackness.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
Ilya shut the French doors gently behind her as she returned to the room. Mika, obviously bored, watching the well-dressed partygoers surrounding the punch bowl, leaned against the wall by the door, one black boot at the end of a bent leg resting at the top of the wainscoting. His bright red lips turned up at the corners when he saw Ilya, one black eyebrow lifting above his dark glasses. He pushed himself away from the wall as she approached, leaving a dusty footprint on the mahogany.<\/p>\r\n
\u201cWhat of the night, dear sister?\u201d<\/p>\r\n
She smiled back, a flash of white teeth. \u201cA true prize, dear brother. Have you noticed our hosts\u2019 appalling lapse of taste? The musicians have been playing without a synthesist for nearly an hour.\u201d<\/p>\r\n
The eyebrow again, and a gesture with the red wine in his left hand toward the balcony doors. \u201cTerry Winters?\u201d<\/p>\r\n
Ilya nodded.<\/p>\r\n
\"That is<\/em>\r\n quite a catch, my dear. My congratulations.\"<\/p>\r\n They kissed. Drawing back, Mika licked his lips and said, \u201cSweet.\u201d<\/p>\r\n Ilya touched the corner of his mouth, brushing away a tiny spot of red. \u201cYes. Music in the blood, or so it\u2019s said.\u201d<\/p>\r\n Mika nodded. \u201cI\u2019ve been only a trifle less successful. Jacqueline Pierce.\u201d<\/p>\r\n \u201cThe senator? Well done,\u201d Ilya said. \u201cAnd Cherna?\u201d<\/p>\r\n \u201cLittle luck thus far tonight, I\u2019m afraid,\u201d Mika said. \u201cOnly a dancer, and an unknown one at that.\u201d<\/p>\r\n Ilya licked her lips. \u201cWell, there should be time for one more round before we move on.\u201d<\/p>\r\n\r\n Cherna\u2019s pale face and hands were barely visible in the dimness, despite subdued lamplight seeping in from the hallway and starlight through a high window. Mika stepped all the way into the darkened room, shut the door behind him, removed his sunglasses.<\/p>\r\n \u201cWhat brings you here, dear brother?\u201d Cherna asked. She leaned back in her chair, her short, fashionable black leather jacket falling open to reveal a thin blouse.<\/p>\r\n \u201cLooking for you, my sweet,\u201d Mika said.<\/p>\r\n She stood, and they kissed, hungrily. After a minute, Cherna stepped back, breaking the embrace. She laughed: a high, wild sound that stopped abruptly. \u201cYou haven\u2019t had your second turn yet.\u201d<\/p>\r\n \u201cNo,\u201d Mika said. \u201cBut I\u2019m about to rendezvous with a certain important personage....\u201d<\/p>\r\n Cherna asked, \u201cAnd who might that be?\u201d<\/p>\r\n Mika smiled, slowly, starlight glinting in his pale eyes. \u201cChris Washington,\u201d he said.<\/p>\r\n \u201cVery nice,\u201d Cherna said.<\/p>\r\n \u201cReady to concede?\u201d<\/p>\r\n Cherna glanced at the door. \u201cNot quite yet, dear brother. I\u2019ve a prospect arriving shortly who should put me solidly in the lead. Would you be so kind...?\u201d<\/p>\r\n \u201cBest of luck,\u201d Mika said. He replaced his glasses, opened the door a crack, and slipped out. Back in the room, Cherna sipped her wine, moistening her red, red lips, and settled back in her chair to wait.<\/p>\r\n\r\n The moon was gone from the sky, and pale talcum light powdered over the easternmost stars. Cherna and Ilya toasted each other with champagne across the remnants of a tableful of hors d\u2019oeuvres, then kissed. Recorded violins whispered from speakers hidden in the foliage. Of the other remaining guests scattered across the courtyard, a few still chatted quietly, but most had drifted off to sleep in chairs or lounges.<\/p>\r\n Mika stepped from the shadows of an ornately-carved doorway to join Ilya and Cherna. To Cherna he said, \u201cAh, there you are, dear sister. Ilya told me of your success; I congratulate you.\u201d He drew her close, and they kissed.<\/p>\r\n At length, Mika stepped back and turned to Ilya. \u201cShall we depart?\u201d<\/p>\r\n \u201cCherna\u2019s turn, I think,\u201d said Ilya. \u201cWinner\u2019s choice. Though how you managed Sarah Fiona Cheng, dear sister, is quite beyond me.\u201d<\/p>\r\n \u201cIt was merely luck, dear sister,\u201d said Mika.<\/p>\r\n \u201cSkill, rather,\u201d replied Cherna. \u201cYou<\/em> wouldn\u2019t have managed it, dear brother. Remember Hans Frieling?\u201d<\/p>\r\n A black eyebrow twitched with annoyance, above dark glasses. \u201cVery well. Point conceded. Your choice.\u201d<\/p>\r\n Cherna smiled, white teeth behind red lips against pale skin, a curve of dark wine on chalk, blood spilled on snow. \u201cI know just the place,\u201d she said.<\/p>\r\n The three strolled back through the arch, back toward the booth. Ahead of them, another group of guests, laughing, blinked out one by one, going home. When they were gone, Cherna stepped in, adjusted the settings, vanished.<\/p>\r\n \u201cGood night, dear sister,\u201d Mika whispered to Ilya as he followed Cherna.<\/p>\r\n As she waited for the door to cycle open again, Ilya whispered to herself, \u201cYes. Yes, it is.\u201d A good night: the fading night now part of the long night past, and the renewed night to come, to be followed by night after night after unending night, free of interfering daylight, uninterrupted darkness stretching forward into eternity....<\/p>\r\n The door opened, and she stepped through.<\/p>\r\n\r\n This story was first published in 1990 in Swarthmore\u2019s annual science fiction magazine, the Bug-Eyed Magazine<\/cite>, which I was an editor for. It was reprinted in 100 Vicious Little Vampire Stories<\/cite>, ed. Robert Weinberg, Stefan Dziemianowicz, and Martin H. Greenberg (Barnes & Noble, 1995). I previously characterized that reprint as having \u201csome fairly big changes,\u201d but on closer inspection I now (2023) see that there were only about ten small changes of phrasing and punctuation. The version on this page is a mix of the original BEM<\/cite> version with some of the changes from the anthology version.<\/p>\r\n In retrospect, I think I was being too cagy about the core idea, because various readers have interpreted it as something other than what I intended. The idea is meant to be that in a world with teleportation booths, vampires would never have to face daylight; they could teleport from nighttime in one part of the world to nighttime in another part.<\/p>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"parent":5427,"menu_order":40,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-20634","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/20634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20634"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/20634\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20770,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/20634\/revisions\/20770"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/jed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\r\n\r\n
\r\n\r\nNotes<\/h2>\r\n