Becoming Vampire

3. Risks

Because Bible has received more vampire blood of a much higher quality, some of his senses have intensified.

He realises that as soon as he gets out of Jeff's house, rushing through the city to get back to his room before sunrise.

He can hear all sorts of noises: animals grunting and people breathing and objects clacking... the almost empty street just before dawn becomes surprisingly loud. And it's overwhelming trying to separate the important sounds from the background noise.

Little by little he starts identifying the sounds, like someone picking up individual threads from a big messy ball of yarn. Mice and rats squeaking is noise, wood cracking is noise too, and there's someone breathing hard behind that wall... Now he can also hear people's heartbeats if they are close enough, and it's very distracting. But Bible can see how this can be useful while trying to find possible preys.

He has to do as Jeff said, feed without kill, and make them forget. He also instinctively understands the principles of mind control, he just needs to practice.

Bible's boss is waiting for a new post and a title that has been promised by the King, but court matters always go slow. Paired with the beginning of winter, they will have some months ahead in this home in Paris before it's a suitable time to travel again. He's still technically working as his secretary but there are many other servants here, so his job is not as demanding as when they are abroad.

Bible has been saying he is ill the two or three times his boss tried to get him out of the house in daylight, and because people are scared of catching whatever illness he's got -it's clear from his extremely pale countenance he's not the healthy young man they all remember-,  they tend to leave him alone. 

So Bible works at his desk during the day, blinds and curtains tightly closed. And when he goes out, it's always at night. 

He's keeping Jeff's expensive clothes inside a chest in his room, carefully folded, waiting for an occasion to wear them again. He can't show up so elegantly dressed in front of his boss and colleagues, that will raise all sorts of questions. 

He wants to drink blood like Jeff's again. He still remembers the taste, just thinking of it gets him all excited. Maybe he can find blood similar to Jeff's to quench his thirst, maybe similar enough to fool himself.

So, when he goes out searching for food, he looks in places where young aristocratic men can be. He hangs out with Sorbonne university students in bars and brothels. And the most successful place for him so far, the gymnasium.

Bible has always been good at sports, so he joins the fencing and also the boxing club at the university. After exercise, those young men always  propose to go out for some drinks, so it's easy for him to meet new people each time.

The first night Bible hunted by himself was so easy. After a fencing session, he went to a bar with his partner, who got drunk, falling asleep on the table. Bible just needed to help him get to his room at the college to feed from him, uninterrupted. The guy passed out from alcohol, he was even snoring and the only mind control he had to exert was to not allow him to wake up.

The next time he hunted he didn't plan anything, it was at the changing room after a boxing session, an impromptu decision.

Bible and his partner were the last to stay at the gymnasium that night. It was past dinner time and the other guy was fighting like he was on a mission, he didn't seem to notice the late hour. They exercised for a long time until Bible asked him to stop. Then, in the dressing room, when Bible took his sweaty shirt off, he noticed the other guy staring at him.

In the spur of the moment, Bible decided to try his mind control skills, emptying the guy's mind, closing his eyes... In a split second Bible was over him sucking his blood. He tasted way better than the previous guy but still far far away from the sweetness of Jeff's blood.