~Dark Dreams~
The sequel to 'A Haunting House'
by Emerald Embers

Rated NC-17 for m/m sex, LOTS OF IT, and some mild violence.
Spoilers up to and including TotBT, and for my story A HAUNTING HOUSE which you MUST READ FIRST!!! P.S. it's written under 'Louise'.
I still love your comments so GIMME GIMME GIMME!
This spec is dedicated to Ralza, that wonderful (come on, you know you are) person who always comments on my stuff. She suggested it in the first place, so it's thanks to her that this even exists!
Also, I *really* did try putting gaps between dialogue, but... it just doesn't feel right. For me, it makes my work look a mess. I *hate* doing it. It's unnatural to me. So; Sorry, sorry, and again sorry. Forgive me, etc. Please don't hold it against me, hmm? I'm scared to death that you'll never speak to me again for not doing as you asked...

[Louis]

I woke up in Lestat's arms again. I pitied him, when he awoke he would still be angry with himself for the previous night, as the bite he had given me had taken more blood than it should have. I pressed my palm against his chest, felt his heart beating, and rested my head on his skin, listening to the pulse. Ah, if there was anything I missed about vampirism, it was this. Being able to hear the comforting sound of his blood in his body. And the scent as well... unbelievably delicious. I saw that his eyes were half-open and I decided to wake him up fully, licked his nipple lightly, using my free hand to play with the other. "Mmm... Louis? Is that you?" "Would you allow anyone else to do this?" "Not while I know you're in love with me." That was a sweeter answer than I could've hoped for, and I lifted my face up to his. "Kiss me, Lestat. You won't hurt me. It was an accident when you did. Understand?" "Well... okay. But you *must* tell me if I hurt you this time, promise?" I nodded, and closed my eyes as I waited for his lips to press upon mine. Strange this, to have all sexual feeling localised in my hips, so much more fulfilling to have my whole body involved in the sensation as with vampires.

When he pulled back, Lestat asked, "And I suppose you want me to make love to you as well?" "Maybe later. Right now I just want to snuggle." Lestat smiled and hugged me, then I saw the look in his eyes change and I knew what was coming. "Louis, I'm so sorry for last night. It's just... you taste so gorgeous and you used to have so many reservations about blood-drinking." "When I am made..." "Yes, I know. But I'll miss being able to read your mind. I've always loved hearing your thoughts." "I know you do, Lestat, and I'm sorry. But I *couldn't* be anyone else's fledgling. I want to be yours, I want to belong to you. And I couldn't share an embrace like that with any other. It would be like an infidelity - to die for someone else. To allow someone you didn't love to bring you mortal death. I couldn't do it." Lestat's eyes filled with blood tears but I avoided them. I was not going to make Daniel's mistake and get so obsessed with the taste of the other's blood that I grew suicidal. "Lestat, when will you actually make me again?" "You shouldn't ask me that, you know I'll only let you and you alone make that decision."

I nodded at Lestat's words, after all, I actually wanted to know what I looked like as a mortal for a few days longer before I took his blood. Suddenly I sneezed and Lestat started laughing. "Louis! Cover your mouth! Didn't your mother teach you any manners?" I blushed and reached for the box of tissues at our bedside. In my first few days I had forgotten how easily I contracted illnesses in my youth, and as a result I now had a cold. It wasn't too bad anymore though, now that I had tissues, throat sweets and syrups to help me cope with the sickness. I still remember when my great-auntie died of a bad cold. In the modern world, even though it would still be a tragedy, it would also be laughable that a tiny common virus could kill in a world busy fighting cancer. After blowing my nose I looked up at Lestat who was fighting back laughter. "That's it. The mood is gone now." Lestat finally burst into hysterics, said, "I'm sorry, it's just... look at yourself in the mirror." I looked and realised what he meant - my eyes were bloodshot, my nose was red and swollen, and my hair was a mess. "Do you think I should have a shower?" Lestat nodded, then smiled seductively, "Can I help you?" I returned his nod and smile, grabbed a bunch of towels before dragging him into the bathroom with me.

After about half an hour we emerged, both equally soaked to the skin, fighting for larger shares of the towels piled on the floor in front of the fire. "Louis, you have got to get dry or you'll just make your cold worse." I nodded and grabbed my favourite towel off him. He fought to get it back but I tutted quietly and said to him, "Dear me Lestat, are you forgetting? I'm the invalid, therefore I get right of way." "You just be thankful I have no concept of my own strength." "Why should I be thankful?" Lestat moved up to me, rubbing his nose against mine. "Because otherwise I would have no qualms about spanking you!" I laughed and started roughly rubbing my hair dry with a towel, saw Lestat cringe. "Louis, please, let me do that for you. You really must take more care of your hair, remember, your hair will be pernamently the shape it's in when I make you." I nodded and sat between his legs, allowed him to dry my hair. He was so gentle I could have almost fallen asleep where I was. After a while I felt Lestat's cheek rest on my now dry hair, and I turned slightly, so that I could wrap my arms around his waist. I looked quickly around to check that all the shutters were closed and Lestat lifted his head briefly to put the fire on low for safety with a quick mind trick before returning to resting his cheek on my head. We fell asleep in that position.

***

I was there again, the house, barely able to breathe. My chest was being torn to shreds by the burrowing piece of glass, entering my heart, hurting me, so painful... and then the constricting. The creature, spirit, whatever it was, taking over my body, making every struggle to retain control over any part of my body incredibly hard. And the fatigue, fighting to stay concious despite numbness and loss of blood, knowing that if I slipped out for one second it would have full control... and then Lestat coming to save me. Only this time he didn't! He took the knife, and rather than pull out the glass he smashed it so it stayed in fragments, and then whirling smoke, redness, blackness... his voice in my ear, "You think this is bad, wait until you see what we're going to do to your lover Lestat..." a demon, torturing me, pain so intense...

***

"Louis, Louis wake up! You're doing it again, you've had another nightmare!" Lestat holding me by both shoulders, shaking me gently, drawing me into an embrace. "Oh god, Lestat, I'm sorry for doubting you..." "Just a dream Louis, just a dream, the house is gone now, shh..." Sweet nothings, comforting but not actually meaning anything." "Thank you, Lestat..." I whispered, stroking his cheek softly. "You don't need to thank me Louis, I would have woken you no matter what. I can't cope with seeing people in any form of pain, mental or physical." I smiled, unbuttoning his shirt, kissing his sensitive skin. "I can't wait for you to be a vampire again. At least you would want sex at more appropriate times." I moved my hand down to his hips, knowing how he loved this now that I constantly had human warmth. "It doesn't seem inappropriate to me..." I whispered as I started pressing him down to the floor. "Not anymore, Louis, not anymore. But it's still strange when your emotions change all the time." "I thought I was prone to mood swings as a vampire?" "Not this extreme! But at the moment, I'm beginning to... think they're... quite... usef..." He never got to complete his sentence as I took him for the first time.

When we finished making love, I folded my arms upon my lover's chest, feeling the gentle movements of his lungs inside his body, enjoying the heat our lovemaking had sent through his arteries. "What's it like not being on top for once, Lestat?" I asked as he stroked my hair softly. "That was one of the most enjoyable experiences of my life, Louis." He brushed his lips against mine gently. "Even if it *will* take some getting used to." "Lestat?" "Hmm?" "I love you." I did not hear his reply as I rested my head on my folded arms and fell asleep while he stroked my hair soothingly. The dream was much pleasanter this time around, involving Lestat covering me with tiny elderflowers so I looked like I was dressed in snow. Thankfully the flowers actually smelt nice in this dream, unlike in reality. After all, it was only a dream, and did not need to have any connections with the real world.

Lestat woke me up eventually, telling me that it was getting late at night and I still hadn't got up. "Sorry Lestat, I'm just shattered. I think its this cold, its really draining..." Lestat smiled and ran his hand down my side to my hips. "You didn't seem so drained last night, honey." I groaned against him, stirring quickly. I felt like an adolescent boy, I seemed to have no control over certain 'body functions', to put it politely. At least I did not have any of the problems I had also suffered back then - I still had clear skin and I wasn't allergic to as many foodstuffs. The most handy change though was that I didn't have to wear breeches any longer, and I had boxer shorts to help make any 'inappropriate bulges' less obvious. Lestat had been constantly careful with me all the time, demanding that he accompanied me *everywhere* so that I wouldn't get into trouble, and watching extremely carefully over my diet so that I wouldn't get ill. My musings were cut short as he started stroking my loins, and I pressed myself against him, wanting release. At last he rolled over and made love to me, and I loved watching him, the curiosity he held about my humanity. He would caress and stroke every curve slowly, as though in a new process of discovery. He had been like this during the first few years of our vampiric relationship, and I expected this would carry on long into when he had made me again.

At last we got out of bed and dressed, and I paced the floor nervously, ran a hand through my hair. "Why are you worried, Louis?" "It's just... that nightmare I had last night... it was so real..." Lestat nodded, said, "It's probably traces of vampiric blood just making your dreams even vivider. I wouldn't worry." I shrugged, forced a smile, then Lestat swept me up into his arms. "Lestat?!" I laughed. "I am not going to have you moping all day over a stupid dream. Now, tell me; where are we going?" I shrugged. "Anything on down the cinema?" Lestat spouted a list of films, but only one caught my attention. "Sleepy Hollow? Isn't that by Tim Burton?" Lestat shrugged, "I think he directs it..." "Why didn't you tell me? Let's go!" Lestat carried me out of the room and down the stairs, before flying me out to our local cinema.

The film actually had a very, very fast beginning that totally freaked me out. Perfect! Lestat however just sat still in his seat, head tilted slightly back. I found it very cute this habit he had, of watching screens down his nose, at least most of the time. I was still quite drowsy and snuggled up against him, finding him warm to the touch. Probably fed recently. I unbuttoned his trousers and slid in my hand which quickly regained his attention, but I was only teasing him slightly, I was more interested in the heat of his loins. After a while, I looked around the cinema, saw that we were the only people in the cinema, and I unbuttoned my trousers, pulled them down before dragging him to the floor with me. Lestat seemed quite shocked but I pressed a finger to his lips, whispered, "There's no one to look at us, Lestat. And you can't deny that it's fun, can you?" Lestat needed no more encouragement and he pulled down his own trousers, made love to me in the gap between the seats while on screen Johnny Depp was having the fright of his life.

After our brief escapade, Lestat and I left the cinema, agreeing to buy the video when it came out or simply watch the movie some other time. Possibly both! We had our arms linked as we walked down the street, his fingers loosely stroking the skin of my upper arm, laughing to each other about the looks some of the mortals were giving us. Some of them were malicious, some didn't care, and some actually seemed very pleased. I intruded on the thoughts of one young blonde girl walking down the street with her parents and got quite a shock. Not only was the poor girl bisexual and completely terrified of telling her father about it, but she seemed actively aware of my intrusion. I looked over at the girl and her eyes met mine for a brief second before she paled and turned away, her mind screeching, 'My god, I've got to tell the others...' Lestat's grip on my arm tightened possessively as he saw my gaze following the girl and I turned away from her, kissed Lestat lightly on the cheek. "Don't be jealous honey, it's just... she's one of the believers, you know, the ones who recognise us?" Lestat smiled, looked back at the girl for a moment, then whispered in my ear, "Do you reckon we should prove it?" I glared at him. "You are not taking a victim in the middle of the street!" Lestat shook his head. "No, I meant just a little drink from you, other mortals will see it as necking, but she'll know..." I thought for a moment. "Better not risk it, the others will be mad if they find out you've been revealing our nature to yet another mortal." Lestat nodded and resumed walking down the street with me, his arm now sliding around my waist and holding me tighter, ignoring the catcalls some of the mortals were making.

Lestat and I arrived home again at last and we slumped down on the sofa, flicking through the channels until we found a movie that we fancied watching, and had a bit of a laze for a few minutes. "Louis?" Lestat said after a while. "What?" "Nothing." I looked up with curiosity, saw him biting his lip. "Come on then, out with it." He looked nervous for a while longer, then turned to me, tears in his eyes. "There's something... I've been meaning... I don't want to hurt you, but..." I sat up, a lump in my throat, hoping against hope he wasn't going to tell me what I thought he might. "No, it's not that, I would never see another person behind your back, I simply... I simply couldn't." He took a deep breath. "I need to talk to you about... about *her*." I felt tears forming in the corners of my eyes. "Lestat, please, I don't want to argue again, not while... I'm afraid you'll hurt me..." Lestat shook his head. "No, I won't, I'm more afraid of what *you'll* do. To me *or* yourself."

Lestat took another deep breath. "What would you do if... Louis, I never hated her." I shook my head, "No, that's not true, you wanted revenge and you got it, you've always said..." "I lied, I didn't want..." I began sobbing into my hands. "Louis, I never wanted to hurt you! What I did, I did because she actually hated me, and she tried to kill me, and she would have stolen you away from me!" He reached for my hands but I snatched them back, hugging myself, hissed, "Don't you *touch* me! Don't you DARE TOUCH ME!" Lestat began crying. "It's true then. She won." "What do you mean, she won? She's DEAD!" Lestat looked up from his hands, blonde hair stained and sticking to his skin with the blood tears. "She always wanted you to herself, she always wanted to steal you away from me. She was there when I had the experience with the body thief that stole you away for so long, she tried to kill me and stole you from me then. And even after the concert, when I thought we might be able to overcome the past... even then, Jesse's sighting of her ghost revived her in your heart, enough to make you cold to me again."

I listened to Lestat's words, hearing the desperation in them. But he... yes. He had her killed, a long time ago. But he hadn't seemed so upset then about... oh, god. I moved around to kneel in front of him, pulled his hands from his face, streaking blood in finger-shaped marks down his cheeks. "Then you went to ground... because of me? It wasn't just because you were weak?" He nodded, sobbing still. "I thought I'd lost you," he whispered, and I threw my arms around him, hugging him as tight as I could. "Oh, Lestat, my love... you put yourself through all this, and you never told me?" He opened his mouth but it turned into a grimace of pain and he nodded, shaking with tears. My embrace tightened until it was painful to *me*, tears streaming from my eyes as I whispered, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry that this happened to you, I'm sorry for everything! It's not your fault..." His voice was almost incomprehensible as he gasped, "It is, it IS my fault!" disappearing off into sobs, but I reached up, stroked his cheek lightly. "It's no-one's fault but fate. And I don't know why exactly, but I feel... I feel as if..." I was stuck for words but I wasn't crying anymore. "I think that if everything had gone wonderfully, and there had been no tragedies or mistakes, I think that I would never have found out my feelings for you." Lestat was just sniffing slightly now, his tears stopping altogether. "Why wouldn't you?" I looked away for a moment, then back into his eyes. "Because I would never have questioned my beliefs."

Lestat nodded shakily and I put my arms around his waist, exhausted from all the emotions I had used in a few minutes. "I love you, Lestat." "I love you, Louis." He whispered. I knelt up after a while, kissed his lips gently, said, "Make me, tonight." He laughed slightly. "Of course I'm going to take you tonight, I've been doing it every night for the past two weeks, why should tonight be any different?" I laughed a little at his misunderstanding then smiled softly, shaking my head. "I said make me, not take me." He seemed a bit taken aback. "But... I thought you wanted to be mortal a little longer? I thought..." I pressed a finger to his lips. "You said it would have to be my decision and only my decision. Tonight you've only further proved how much you trust me with what you've been saying, and besides, before you sobbed all over me, even some of the mortals outside said I was looking particularly gorgeous tonight." Lestat seemed nervous, and questioned me about a hundred times, "Are you sure? You're certain?" Before I cried out in exasperation, "For god's sake Lestat! This is not 'Who wants to be a millionaire', it's my life! I want to be like you again, I want to be able to do the things you can do, and do things together that are impossible at the moment!"

Lestat nodded finally and lifted me up onto the sofa, stroking my neck gently beneath his fingertips. "Certain?" "Forever..." I whispered as he kissed my neck shakily, so nervous compared with when he had first made me. At last I felt his fangs sink in and I gasped, pressing myself against him. 'Remember,' he projected to me. 'Remember, you must keep your eyes open, all the time, I'm going to drain you to the point of death, then I'm going to slit my wrist, and you MUST drink. Okay?' 'I know the drill' I projected back, but he frowned slightly. 'Louis, you've got to be serious about this, it's your life.' 'I know, I'm sorry, I'm just... this feels so wonderful next to last time...' 'Last time I was rushing things, and my only concern was that I wanted to make you my partner in immortality as soon as possible.' I felt a slight pain in my chest, my heart slowing, slowing... stopping...

BLOOD. Clear as anything, I could feel it flowing between my lips and I swallowed slowly, weakly at first, before latching on viciously. "That's right, drink..." LESTAT. Lestat's voice, in my ear, like musical bells. BLOOD. The blood again, losing myself to it, the taste, the feeling, the warmth, the light and darkness... oh yes... more... "Louis, honey, you're... you're hurting... just a bit more then." LESTAT. Oh, how could I forget you? Memories of pain and love flowing into me, and out of me as quickly as they came, so much to see, over five human lifetimes in those memories. "Yes, that's enough, that's *enough*!" The wrist being ripped away from my mouth, the wound taking a long time to heal. I started feeling organisation returning to my mind despite the mist that covered my eyes, blinking away slowly, the blonde curls... LESTAT. "I didn't... have I... how much did I take?" The gentle laughter, angel's laughter. "Enough. You'll be fully made quicker than you can imagine." I suddenly felt pain clenching all my muscles, and I gasped, "The death, Lestat... the mortal..." I vomited and couldn't say any more, so he led me into the bathroom, lifted the toilet seat so I could throw up in it.

After I was rid of all the disgusting mortal waste, Lestat cleaned the worst of the results off with toilet tissue, throwing the used tissues into the bowl and flushing them away. When I was basically clean he lifted me gently into the shower unit, turned it on, before peeling off his own clothes and using his shirt as a makeshift flannel, thoroughly cleaning every curve, every dip and contour of my body. When he was satisfied I was clean the shower turned into more of a leisure activity and he picked up a bottle of shower gel, squeezed some of the 'lynx voodoo' scented liquid into his hand. Lestat started massaging it over my body, allowing the water to run down through my hair in rivets, cleaning and scenting as it went on it's path to the plug-hole in the bottom of the unit. As Lestat knelt before me, water making his blonde curls into sodden ringlets of gold, running his hands over my thighs with the shower gel, I found myself unable to recall anything that had felt more erotic than this previously.

Lestat looked up into my eyes on hearing me groan aloud, a difficult task because my head was tilted back and my eyes half-lidded, then a wicked smile flew over his face and his hand roamed, cleaning contours I barely knew I owned, before he turned off the shower and he straightened me out. I hadn't realised but I had been holding my back in an arched position for a long time, and now my still rather human muscles ached like crazy. He kissed me deeply and I whispered, "Take me, tonight." He smiled mischieviously and asked, "Is that take me or make me?" I lidded my eyes fully and ran a hand up between his legs, catching him by surprise. "Take me, I guess?" I didn't even bother to nod, weakened with desire as he carried me into the bedroom, lowering me onto the cool satin sheets. "Oh, oh god!" Lestat seemed worried for a moment. "Are you okay, honey?" "Yes... it's just, ohh, ohhhhh... I... I almost forgot... what it was like... feeling things like th... th... this!" He allowed me to shift around on the bed for a while, getting used to the feel of things, before he stripped and settled himself on top of me. I gasped again. "Oh yes, Lestat... I didn't forget what you felt like... never will... take me, NOW." He smiled and nuzzled my chest softly. "What did you think I was going to do?"

The End