Necromanos Alabaster sat in a dark corner of the tavern drinking vodka spiked with an addition of his own. As he swirled the mixture in his glass, his attention was focused across the room to a woman sitting at the bar. She had red hair like the fires of a phoenix, moved with the grace of a cat, but also with the nervousness cats often posses. He had seen her a couple of nights before when she was here with a friend. When they left the bar with a young, rude, and obviously drunk man, he had followed them. What he saw after he followed was why he had returned to the tavern tonight. So he could see what might be learned of this woman.
     She finished her drink and left the bar. Necro took another sip of his drink and rose to follow her again, purposely tipping his drink onto the tabletop, fumes rising from the spilled liquid.
    Walking into the dark moonless night, he saw the woman was headed towards a part of the street more poorly lit than the rest. He continued following her, smiling to himself. For if she is what he thought she was it was where he expected her to go.
     He followed at a distance where most people wouldn't have noticed him, but he suspected she was well aware of his presence. Seemingly to confirm this, she ducked into a side alley as she passed it. Necro continued on, if his heart had been a living organ it would have been racing. He walked past the entry of the alley and wasn't surprised when he was grabbed and pulled into its inky blackness. With a force that would have left any mortal man gasping for breath, she slammed him against the wall and bore down upon him, her eyes red with fury.
     "Ah! Your eyes now match the beauty of your hair!" Necro said with a flair in his voice, and a wry smile.
     The woman was momentarily taken aback. The effects of her blow should have left him stunned at the very least, but here he was smiling with seemingly no ill effects. She quickly retightened her grip, adding a shoulder pressed into his chest.
     "Who are you? Why are you following me!" she demanded, loosening her grip on his throat slightly to allow him to reply.
     "Lady of the night," Necro answered, "I am Necromanos Alabaster, two nights previously I witnessed yourself and a companion in an altercation with a fellow who's evening didn't turn out the way he had hoped. I returned to see if I might learn more. You have intrigued me, Milady."
     She looked upon the man she had in her clutches. He was taller than she was his skin a pallor akin to the name he presented. His hair was black as pitch with white streaks throughout it. His attire could be described as overly romanticized, extravagant gothic. Velvet pants of rich, deep purple, with leather knee boots, and his shirt was flowing black silk of a fineness she had never seen before. He wore silver earrings in each ear, and a silver chain and pendent set with an onyx stone. If she had seen such attire upon any other man she might have laughed, but this man exuded masculinity.
     "Might I ask of your name?" he inquired with an antique politeness.
     "Raven," she said softly, and then with more assuredness,
     "My name is Raven.”
     "Well met, Lady Raven. Now if you'll relinquish your grip a touch, perhaps this meeting could be to both our benefit."
Raven was cautious. She knew nothing of this man except for his name. Then on some inner instinct or maybe a gut feeling she released her grip upon him.
     When released, Necromanos bowed with a flourish, took Lady Raven's hand and kissed it.
     "Necromanos Alabaster, at your service,” he said, "Now shall we move our acquaintance to a decor more suitable to our demeanor?"
Raven, still stunned from this strange meeting, didn't reply at first, but decided to go with her intuition and agreed to a change of locale.
     "My car is parked across from the bar, where are we going?" Raven inquired.
     "If you will extend your trust in me a little longer, I suggest we go to my residence. Be assured no harm will come to you, and the sunrise is but a couple hours nigh."
     Not missing the reference to the sunrise, Raven figured if she had come this far she may as well rely on her instincts and trust in the unusual man she had encountered.
     Necromanos and Raven walked back towards the tavern and their cars. Raven had a million thoughts going through her head. Who was he? What was his interest in her? Perhaps most importantly, was she making a grave mistake in following him? Before she could devise an answer for herself, he spoke.
     "Lady," he began, "put your worries aside. I have sought you out for a reason. A reason I sensed in you the other night. You and I are of a similar mind, but until we reach safety, I think its best not talk about it now. Sunrise will be upon us soon.”
     Raven let it go at that for now. He obviously knew what she was, but perhaps more alarmingly, might know or at least have an impression of what's been on her mind of late.
     They reached their respective cars, and Raven followed Necro across town, wondering what she'd gotten herself into.
When they arrived at a rather mundane apartment complex, Raven was a bit surprised that he would live in such an ordinary place. They parked their cars, and Necro motioned for her to follow him across the parking lot. She was perplexed, if he didn't live in the building, then where did he live? She was answered when she saw on the other side of the parking lot was an old cemetery.
     Necro explained, "The cemetery is one of the oldest in the city. Many of the graves date to the early 1700's. The historical aspect is appealing, but the convenience is I may park in the apartment’s lot without arousing any suspicion about my car. Come, let us be quick!"
     They walked through the gate and continued towards the rear of the cemetery's boundary where the oldest graves would be. They were approaching a grand mausoleum, and Necromanos made his way directly towards it. The granite facade of the structure was covered in ivy, almost making it appear as a great square shrub, barely discernible from the greenery around it. A large iron door was centered on the facing wall. Necro pulled a large key from his pocket and unlocked the door. It swung open without a sound. Necro stepped in, retrieved a torch from the inside wall by the door and lit it.
     He walked into the gloom of the mausoleum, the torch casting eerie shadows across the walls. As Raven followed him, he approached a raised stone sarcophagus in the center of the room. With little effort he lifted the lid to reveal a staircase leading downwards into a hidden crypt.
     "The crypt below is where the original residents had themselves entombed as deterrence to grave robbers," Necromanos told her, "They were from wealthy families whom were buried with their favorite jewelry and in their most lavish clothes. I imagine the poor souls within the above ground tombs are street derelicts or the like. I've made the crypt somewhat more hospitable for those of us not touched by the forever sleep. Let me show you."
     Necromanos stepped into the sarcophagus then helped Raven in herself. Closing the lid behind them, he led the way down the stairs. The staircase went down about the equivalent of one story. When they reached the bottom of the stairs, another door was revealed.
     "Enigmatica Luxitourious," Necromanos read the words above the door, "Luxury in a place unexpected! Welcome to my humble abode."
     Necromanos set the torch he was carrying in a sconce on the wall, and opened the door to the crypt. Raven noticed there wasn't a dank smell she would have associated with the interior of a crypt. Instead there was an unfamiliar, yet pleasing scent; like some exotic perfume. With her night vision she could make out some shapes in the room, but couldn't discern its layout.
Necro stepped in, bidding her to wait a bit. He walked in and faded to a shadow, then came into full view as he struck a match and lit an oil lamp.
     Raven saw the interior of the crypt for the first time, and was in awe. From the light of the single lamp she could see it was nothing like any crypt in her experience. Not a damp, stone room with the smell of decay lingering. This crypt was beautiful! She could make out a rug of intricate design on the floor. There was a sofa of rich leather along one wall, flanked by two exquisite tables adorned with large glass oil lamps filled with red oil. A coffee table set before it, which looked to be made of silver and glass. On its clear surface was a small collection of candles in varying heights, and a small sculpture of a dragon, gold with ruby eyes. In the alcoves where the coffins once were laid were many books, some of which looked very old, in a wide range of subjects. There were books on poetry, literature, and even some books on alternative religion. The last of which puzzled her.
     Necro lit the lamps on either side of the sofa, and Raven was treated to a more detailed view of the room. It was decorated in a medieval style, or maybe Gothic romantic, she couldn't decide. But it was one of the most warm, inviting rooms she'd been in. The areas of the walls not having alcoves were covered with tapestries, and most of the floor with beautiful rugs. The ceiling was painted dark blue, with variations in depth of color so to make it seem like clouds across the night sky. The effect was that this was not a crypt, but a special, secret room in a magical castle.
     "Lady Raven?" Necromanos asked, seeing that she seemed transfixed.
     "Beautiful," was her reply.
     "I'm glad you find my home inviting. I never was one to want to live in squalor. I have done what I could to make a crypt a home."
     "You have succeeded very well," Raven said, then becoming dizzy, Necro directed her to sit on the couch.
     "You've not fed tonight, I know. I have a remedy that will satisfy your hunger." he told her.
     Necro went to a cabinet, retrieved a bottle of wine, and poured a glass for Raven and himself.
     "Wine is not what I need..." Raven began to say.
     "Wine itself, no, but I have an addition that will abate your hunger as well as any human victim." he explained.
     He produced a vial from the same cabinet. It contained a dark red powder that seemed to sparkle and glow. After dispensing a measure of the powder into each glass, the wine took on a fiery red glow of its own, with fumes rising from the glass, and then it faded.
     "The powder is a refinement of dragon's blood, it will satisfy your hunger," he assured her. Then he took a swallow of the wine.
Raven watched him. She noticed as he drank some color returned to his skin. For a moment he looked almost human. She held her glass in her hand, eyeing the liquid it held. The glass had warmth to it, human-like warmth. She cautiously took a sip. It was the temperature of human blood! She quickly drank down the rest of the spiked wine. A feeling came over her, the satisfaction of her hunger, but something else as well. She felt the wine flowing through her body, spreading it's warmth to her extremities, filling them with a tingling sensation. She felt her body flush as the dragon's blood spiked wine flowed throughout her system. Her heart began to beat, something it hadn't done in many years. She began to breathe, not from an action out of habit, but because her body actually needed air! After a few amazing breaths with her heart pounding, it was over. Her hunger had been abated, but now she was full of questions.
     "What..." she began, still flustered from her experience, "...happened?!"
    "Dragon's blood has the effect of bringing back some of our lost humanity. Ironic if you think about it," he said with a slight chuckle, "blood from a creature of destruction giving life to a vampire!"
     "But how?" she inquired, still puzzled.
     "The Blood of the Dragon, when taken in this concentrated form, has the effect of 'jump starting' our systems. It satisfies our hunger, while at the same time, the fire of the Dragon restores some human qualities."
     He paused for effect.
     "And with enough of it, we could become human again."
     Raven now believed she knew why he had sought her out tonight.
Necromanos didn't give her time to begin her questions, instead he said to her.
     "I have been a vampire for over 300 years, but I've never taken a human life."
     Raven sat in stunned silence after Necromanos’ confession. A vampire needs, craves blood, but he had found a way that their innate compulsion might be overcome. She was sure he was aware of what had been troubling her mind.
     She had come to hate what she was, nothing more than a parasite feeding off the blood of others. She remembered the man she and her companion had bled the other night. She felt no remorse for him only because she has sensed in him an evil; a sadist who took pleasure in creating pain and suffering of others, but it was becoming tiresome to search out the scum of society.
     She longed to be normal, to be human again. She had been a vampire only thirty years, but sometimes it seemed an eternity. To live her life and die like everyone else now seemed as attractive to her as vampire immortality did years before.
     She was about to begin her questions when Necromanos spoke.
    “Dragon’s Blood, real dragon’s blood, is a very rare commodity. When a dragon died it would turn to ash, bones and all, a short time after expiring. But under the right conditions enough of the bones remain to allow the marrow to be harvested. If the dragon dies where it is very cold, sometimes a few of the longer, more massive bones can survive. From these sources is where I’ve acquired my limited supply. I have been searching for a more abundant source so my vampirism may be cured.

To be continued...