Chapter 156 - Life Among the Tanti part 2

And what a wonderful living it was! I thrived among the Tanti, my true nature known to them all. I was no longer a wraith, drifting through a timeless dream-existence. I felt like a seed that had put down roots. These were my people, my descendants, but it was more than simple kinship. They were an industrious and hearty race, and I was invigorated by them. All through the day and night, I could feel their life force coursing around me, through me, and I soaked it up like the leaf soaks up the light of the sun. Life among the Tanti was nothing like the furtive existence I endure now. It was almost like being a mortal man again.

Yes, I live among humans in this modern era. How could I not? You have spread across the face of the Earth. Yet, the denizens of this modern world no longer believe that vampires are real. You dress the Strigoi in mythological costume, thinking us no more real than dragons or unicorns or fairies. Or worse, make us over into pop culture icons. White sparkly boy toys.

Oh, I'm quite aware of the fervid fictions of the modern adolescent female! The handsome, ageless object of desire… androgynous, all but emasculated. I understand why the fantasy makes you weak in the knees. I assure you, however, most of my kind are far more likely to rip out a girl's throat than accompany her to the prom! I'm probably the most civil immortal you'll ever meet, and that's not saying much. I'm just as bloodthirsty as the next.

This clandestine modern existence, all this hiding and creeping about… for nosferatu like me, it is like being imprisoned. We must conceal ourselves from the world, for our own protection and yours. Such secrecy wears on the spirit, a millstone grinding the heart to dust, but can you imagine the alternative? What would happen if some modern pharmaceutical company got a sample of our semi-sentient blood? What wars would be waged for the secret of our immortality! We would be hunted like animals, vivisected, turned screaming inside out.

If there is one law among my species, one universal rule that is adhered to by even the most incorrigible member of our secret society, it is this: we must never again be known to mortal man. We must ever remain the fitful shadow that trails mankind on his march through the endless ages. A boogeyman. A dark fantasy.

But the Tanti knew me. They knew of my nature. Some of them believed I was a god, some a vampire trickster, but most of them suspected I was a little bit of both, their wind god Thest, reincarnated in the body of a bloodsucking T'sukuru, and they were right.

They knew that I was not like them. They knew that I subsisted on blood. They had had dealings with the vampires of the east-- as recently as the winter before, when one of my kind appeared in the village and demanded a tribute of blood. Several of the Tanti had let open the veins in their wrists to appease the fiend, and he had passed on without harassing them further. My cold white flesh and aversion to sunlight was no mystery to them. They were only confused by my desire to live among them… and my congenial nature. The only T'sukuru they had ever met were arrogant and demanding. 

After their initial distrust-- and when I didn't go on a killing spree, sucking the blood out of all of my neighbors while they slept-- they thawed towards me and my vampire son Ilio. Their curiosity gradually overcame their natural wariness. They allowed me to join them in their everyday labors. I sat in their tool-making lines, helped haul in their catch when the fishing boats came in late from the lake. I bartered for supplies or new clothing or crafts with the meat we brought back when Ilio and I hunted. They spoke to me as if I were a mortal man. The fishermen even gave me a nickname. Shast'pa'ulm. It meant "snow white"… referring to the color of my flesh, of course, not the fairy tale character. The moniker had feminine connotations, so it was a little bit of a rub, but a good-natured one, and I was proud of it. It symbolized their trust in me.