The Mammoth Book Of Vampire Stories Written By Women

Stuck in the same yearning, dreadful moment through twelve whole years of real life — even when he was working his land, loving his wife, mourning her, mourning the children whose hope died with her. Running his father's plantation, adjudicating disputes, approving marriages, attending christenings; watching La Hire decline and fall, being drunk at his funeral, at the bal , at his own wedding

Only to be drawn back here, at last, like some recalcitrant cur to his hidden master's call. To be reclaimed, over near-incalculable distances of time and space, as though he were some piece of property, some tool, some merest creeping

slave.

Marked, as yours. By you. For you.

But — this was the entire point of "my" Revolution, Jean-Guy remembers, suddenly. That all men were slaves, no matter their estate, so long as kings and their laws ruled unchecked. And that we should all, all of us, no matter how low or high — or mixed — our birth either rise up, take what was ours, live free or die .

Die quick. Die clean. Make your last stand now, Citizen, while you still have the strength to do it

or never.

"It occurs to me," the chevalier says, slowly, "that after all this we still do not know each other's given name."

Whatever else, Jean-Guy promises himself, with one last coherent thought, I will not allow myself to beg.

A spark to oil, this last heart's flare: he turns for the door, lurching up, only to find the chevalier upon him, bending him backwards by the hair.

Ah, do not leave me, Citizen.

But: "I will ," Jean-Guy snarls, liquid, in return. And hears the chevalier's laugh ring in his ear through a fresh gout of blood, distant as some underwater glass bell. That voice replying aloud, as well as — otherwise —

"Ohhhh I think not."

I have set my mark upon you.

My mark. Mine.

That voice in his ear, his blood. That smell. His traitor's body, opening wide to its sanguine, siren's song. That unforgettable red halo of silent lassitude settling over him like a bell jar once more, sealing them together: predator, prey, potential co-dependents.

This fatal Widow's kiss he's waited for, in vain, for oh so very long Prendegrace's familiar poison, seeping into Jean-Guy's veins, his heart. Stopping him in his tracks.

All this — blood

Blood, for all that blood shed. The Revolution's tide, finally stemmed with an offering made from his own body, his own — damned —

soul.

Prendegrace raises red lips. He wipes them, pauses, coughs again — more wetly, this time. And asks, aloud:

"By your favour, Citizen what year is this, exactly?"

"Year Zero," Jean-Guy whispers back. And lets himself go.

Good Lady Ducayne

Mary Elizabeth Braddon

Mary Elizabeth Braddon (1837-1915) was one of the most sensationalist and bestselling Victorian authors. Although her best-known work is probably Lady Audley's Secret (1862), a melodramatic tale of madness and murder, she also turned out dozens of novels and numerous short stories often anonymously or under various pseudonyms, in addition to editing two of her husband's publications: the monthly magazine for ladies , Belgravia, and the Christmas annual The Mistletoe Bough.

" If I could plot like Miss Braddon, I would be the greatest writer in the English language," wrote Vanity Fair author William Makepeace Thackeray, while Arnold Bennett described her in 1901 as "part of England" .

Her other books include a variation on the Faust legend , Gerard, or The World, the Flesh and the Devil (1891), and the collections Ralph the Bailiff and Other Tales (1862) , Weavers and Weft (1877) and My Sister's Confession (1879). More recently, eighteen of her best supernatural stories have been collected by editor Richard Dalby in The Cold Embrace and Other Ghost Stories, published in 2000 by Ash-Tree Press .

The following novella originally appeared in The Strand Magazine, just a year before Bram Stoker published Dracula. It was one of the first tales to feature an unconventional incarnation of the undead, in which a non-supernatural vampire exploits a dependent relationship with her victim. It also has some interesting things to say about the role of women in British society at that time

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