Magdalene believed if she had lived during the early years of Picasso she would have shamelessly offered her body to him as a model, a lover, a harlot, to share one kiss, a warm embrace, to copulate into late night until sun shattered the silence of naked morning.

Her train of thought was broken by a prominent man behind her who smelled intoxicating. Her nose deceived her. At first, she believed he smelled of cut grass, distinct and oddly alluring. She turned and locked eyes with his thousand-yard stare. He had at least five inches in height on her.

Instantly, she turned away and moved on to Between the Years covering Picasso's surrealistic period, the Graphic Alcove, the Garden of Delights, Mythologies: From the Centaur to the Minotaur. Magdalene was aroused by the images of the Minotaur over powering and ravaging women.

She saw herself in the images.

Samuel was alone. He hadn't anticipated the huge line-up and wished that he had come later in the day when the crowds would thin out. He was determined to see each pencil sketch as closely as possible. His height afforded him with the ability to gaze over the heads of those around. He watched with amusement as one particular, outstanding woman pushed with intensity and determination, moving her body into the crowd, inching closer, until it seemed that her nose would touch the glass. She was lost and enthralled in a five-minute examination of each sketch. Stepping into her, he smelled an unexpected scent he couldn't place his finger on, a subtle, bitter spice that reminded him of frankincense.

Her hair fell past her shoulders. The warm weather of Montreal had frizzed and curled the ends.

The unusual choice of time ideally suits an unencumbered stroll in the enclave as the lazy streets roll up past the darker stage of twilight. And the windows and doors shut and lock and the very few, the few who walk alone are unaware of what fate awaits. Nighttime is the cloak shrouding the frightening dream that twists the day of sun and cloud into a disguised form of incubus, the ancient demon who extracts purity from between sumptuous, plump thighs and suffocating the cries of objection. Nighttime absorbs and swallows the life-giving sustenance. For at night, when all should be safe at home, anything and everything is possible, the least is unimaginable and few know enough to remain indoors.

Yet, he is entirely at ease during daytime and while his preference is for night roaming, in light he is calm and reserved for the unraveling of his eternal being moves in any sphere of time and space. He delights in the irony, knowing that she sleeps during the day in the rented home he had selected so very close to her own -- she sleeps next door.

Sir William's steps are characteristically silent and smooth. He moves in Sandy Hill, walking south on Chapel Street, and then onto Stewart before arriving at Augusta and Wilbrod. He begins his surveillance of blood potential.

It has been days since feeding and his hunger is intense but he utilizes a developed defence mechanism for quelling his desire without expending unnecessary effort; his mind produces detailed imagery of plates of solid foods, to satisfy the rabid lust of one-hundred men. He wants to feed before he speaks at length with Magdalene, before he leads her to enlightenment by revealing her ultimate purpose. He estimates there is less than two years remaining in the remarkable period of time that is his life, once the new offspring is thriving, born from the love of his hybrid son and human wife.

"Of course," said Sir William with confidence. His nostrils flared and her fragrant scent curled in his nose. He inhaled quietly, filling his nasal passages deeply, while simultaneously bringing to mind an image of her on the rack as Samuel was above, turning the crank.

Sir William, on rare occasions, however extreme, would respond to the female species with arousal. He was surprised; sitting across the table from Magdalene incited in him a desire for wanting a woman the old-fashioned way, through intercourse.

He smelled again, breathing in far longer, allowing the scent to remain inside his nostrils, holding it with his mind, recognizing her scent, attaching it to her as though it were a silk cover clinging to her limbs. He couldn't stop looking at her. The lingering aroma of marijuana was picked up; caught in the material of her clothes.

"Are you a real... I mean... are you a," she dared not say the word.

"You are a cultivator of organic plants, are you not?" he asked.

"Yeah," she answered. "Organic is ideal. Food tastes better, especially meat like chicken if they're raised free range without antibiotics and fed on grains instead of animal parts," Magdalene looked around, horrified she was about to say that word in public, to use the very word which had been resting on the tip of her tongue from the moment Sir William's face became known to her.

"Are you a..." she tried once more to ask. Again, the word would not come out.

"A super-charged, reanimated human," he said, finishing her sentence.

Magdalene looked around to ensure no one was within proximity.

The sincerity of his words had been received by Miss Birmingham as they had been intended by Sir William. He meant every word he spoke. That inner part of him that remained connected to his human self still had a human brain, and believed every lie he told to achieve what he had set out to do. But his vampire ruthlessness and seduction was truly the devil inside that ruled his nature.

Once Catherine stepped back into her room and moved aside in order that he could come in, he had already entered her in his mind; his hands had already unbuttoned her petticoat; his kisses were already traveling from the small of her back up to the nape of her neck. And her luxurious hair, that most wondrous place where the smells of each woman were held like flowers kept in a sealed box, would cover his face and caress his skin. Indeed, she would writhe on top of him, throwing her hands above his head to support her body. Her pert breasts would fall before him, offering themselves to his mouth like raw, uncut rubies to a skilled jeweller. She would then be helpless. She would take him deep into her, as much as her body would allow, and then disappear into him.

"I do believe chocolate is the work of Satan, would you not agree" asked Sir William mischievously. His cock throbbed. Stepping into her room, he shut the door behind himself. His clothes emanated the vampire aroma and Catherine almost swooned. When he opened the box to reveal the prized sweets of wrapped truffles, he watched her eyes flicker.

"I only wish for you to indulge in this extravagance. The shop owner assured me that he imports only the finest cocoa from abroad. I have already indulged in his offerings and they are nothing short of exquisite."

He saw the small hairs on her neck stand up. The bonnet he had seen earlier in the day was gone. Neither was her hair tightly coiled but rather, her ringlets had fallen out, splaying across her shoulders. Even the cleavage of her dress revealed her breasts like fresh rosebuds blooming and turning toward the kiss of the sun. He consumed her even before he had laid one finger on her body or before his lips had touched the moist texture of hers. To be able to watch her unwrap the chocolate and bring the delicacy to her lips was pure pleasure.

I reveal to you

my nature and secrets

when you listen quietly

I tell you what I mean

when the blood is pumped into my veins.

I pursue your heart

and fall toward the day.

When last it arrives,

first to tremble

is the morning grass.

Where else will logic lead you to,

in my haunted cave, wet?

Will you paint your likeness

on my walls?

Magdalene Crimson melted in sweet ecstasy. The pain hardened her nipples into rubies. Her legs were an eager, open mouth, spread far apart on the fine-oak stretching table. She gripped the clamps intensely. The worse the crack of the cane stung, the stronger grew her desire.

Samuel possessed her, changing the pitch and rhythm of her quivering flesh with rapid cracks. When he struck fiercely, the electric impulse of contact made Magdalene feel alive. Each crack felt like a hot wasp sting, reverberating and pulsating for seconds afterward.

Samuel instructed Magdalene in the arts and magic of hard play, exploring new dimensions of pain in their sanctuary, a place where boundaries were pushed in privacy.

The attic's slanted walls of brick and wood exhaled the sweat and flesh of her scent.

Her subtle and unusual aroma of fresh cut grass, her reddened flesh and writhing limbs seduced Samuel wholly. He marveled at the awesome strength of her body. Sir William Simon Hennessy, Magdalene's predecessor, had transformed her into an extraordinary female, the one and true vampire on Earth.

He skated toward her swiftly, his feet and legs well acquainted with the rhythm of skating even though he had not worn a pair of skates in almost a year.

Magdalene's warm smile was a beacon of bright whiteness under the dark bridge and he had only to imagine how divine her lips would taste in the cold.

Samuel abruptly tilted his body to an angle and with both blades cut a sharp edge on the ice. He stopped inches from his wife. "Like stealing candy from a baby."

"My gorgeous boy," beamed Magdalene. "I heard the sirens and I saw the helicopter lights. I think you pulled the entire police force away from their posts to chase after you. You are such a devil."

"I'm the devil you know and love," said Samuel, pushing his pelvis into his wife's body. He planted an enthusiastic kiss on her lips. Desire raged like a fire inside Samuel's loins...

I stand knee-deep in water

so cold, and fall even lower

than imaginable, below the ground

where dreams are no longer believable.

I only want his body to take me home,

to show me the way, to needing,

to knowing that I want no other man,

to come inside me.

I tell him everything,

when the cock strikes havoc

around midnight.

He didn't have to touch her

to know her thighs were as smooth

as the hour long.

He didn't have to feel her skin,

to know his grasp would slip

in his hands

holding her firmly

he needed only,

to stroke her hair once,

its length longer than his fingers

wanting the nape of her neck,

he knew her.