Until the Sun Falls from the Sky (The Three #1)(54)
“Really?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“How did that work, considering vampires are immortal? I mean, it would stink to be forever young and your partner…” I trailed off and my eyes grew wide.
He noticed my dawning comprehension and pulled me even closer. “That’s right, Leah. Back then it wasn’t unusual for vampires to keep their mortal mates alive for centuries. The healing is strong and, if constant, meant a vastly elongated life for the mortal, even going so far as making a mortal immortal should it have continued indefinitely. If feeding ceased, it would take years before the properties were fully expunged from the mortal’s system, they wouldn’t age for some time. Once they did, their normal aging process would begin again as usual.”
“Oh my God,” I whispered, overwhelmed by this stunning news.
Lucien ignored my reaction and kept with his lesson. “After The Revolution, The Immortal and Mortal Agreement prohibited inter-cultural unions. All vampires who had them where ordered to release their mortal mates.”
I stared at him in renewed, now horrified, astonishment.
I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t imagine being with someone, maybe for centuries, and all of a sudden being forced to part.
Something about this made tears sting my eyes. “That’s terrible.”
“It was,” he murmured, his tone stating eloquently that he agreed. “It also didn’t go over very well. All of them refused. Thus began The Hunt, which is an ugly piece of our history they don’t teach you in class.”
I didn’t think I wanted to know.
Lucien told me anyway. “All vampires and their mortal mates were hunted. Every last one. When caught, they were tortured until they denounced the relationship. If they didn’t, which was most often the case, they were executed.”
I couldn’t process this. It was too hideous.
“Both of them?” I breathed.
He shook his head but answered, “Sometimes, yes. Sometimes it was just the vampire, other times, it was the mortal.”
The tears in my eyes clogged my throat and I forced them down in a painful swallow.
Lucien continued, “It has served for centuries as a powerful lesson to any vampire who might wish to cross that line.”
As it would!
“I don’t like this lesson,” I whispered.
“It isn’t a nice lesson, pet,” he agreed.
“I don’t understand why they did that!” I returned hotly. “Why would they do that?”
“Survival of the species, both mine and yours. We can’t survive without you. And a vampire and mortal cannot procreate. Further, at the time, vampires hunted for their food. Mortals were prey, literally, and vampires were feared greatly. For millennia, vampires lived underground, not out in the open, many mortals didn’t even believe in us. We were considered unreal monsters, too vile to allow the fragile mortal mind to believe existed. It was in a time where many fed without stopping, leaving their victims dead, so there was a great deal to fear. We were largely nocturnal. We were entirely predators and most were highly content with this life.”
Okay, it was safe to say he was freaking me out.
He either didn’t notice or didn’t care because he continued.
“Then there was a shift of sensibilities that led to The Revolution. There were vampires who were growing tired of living in the shadows, saw the advantages of eternal life and wished to exploit them. Those vampires over the centuries acquired great wealth, sophistication and started to move within the mortal world. They became vastly more civilized than the predatory vampire, even going so far as having what are now concubines, without contracts of course and without the limit of one at a time. Many of those vampires had several concubines, sometimes dozens.”
“Is this covered in class?” I interrupted and Lucien shook his head in answer to my question and kept telling his story.
“Other vampires preferred their life as hunters and felt this growing section of our culture who wished for something more was threatening their way of life. And they were correct. This was the reason for The Revolution. The vampires who wished more from life allied themselves with mortals and fought the predatory vampires. The Union of Vampires and Mortals, the one that orchestrated the Agreement after The Revolution, felt there needed to be strictures governing the interaction between our cultures. Their intentions were sound, even just. The priority was to protect our prey and protect our species by facilitating Vampire Claimings or, in mortal terms, marriage. Even vampires don’t often procreate, it’s difficult but it’s impossible with a mortal. For our species to thrive, they thrust these edicts on us.”
I had a million questions. Maybe even a million and two.
As was necessary, I started with one.
“Why do you need to procreate when you don’t die?”
“We die. Sometimes accidentally, a house fire, for example. But usually, it’s suicide. Eternal life isn’t for everyone.” I sucked in a shocked breath and Lucien continued softly, “It’s an honorable death, Leah. Not frowned upon in any way. Eternal life can get trying.” I nodded because that, too, made a weird kind of sense. “Then there are the executions for those who break the rules, mostly if they hunt. This doesn’t happen often. And lastly, there are the rights vampires have against their own. For instance, if a concubine is misused by another vampire, her vampire can exact retribution which can come in the form of assassination.”