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    GothicScapes Presents: Blood Gothic and Beyond the Pale
    GothicScapes Presents: Blood Gothic and Beyond the Pale
    GothicScapes Presents: Blood Gothic and Beyond the Pale
    Ebook52 pages31 minutes

    GothicScapes Presents: Blood Gothic and Beyond the Pale

    By Nancy Holder

    ()

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    About this ebook

    "Blood Gothic" and "Beyond the Pale" are two short stories by Nancy Holder, presented by GothicScapes. "Blood Gothic" is about a woman who wants a vampire lover--and will do anything to seal her pact with him. "Beyond the Pale" is what happens when the Erl King of Goethe's fantastical poem invites a young woman to "ride so late, through night and wind" with a Changeling in her arms.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherNancy Holder
    Release dateJul 18, 2012
    ISBN9781452428062
    GothicScapes Presents: Blood Gothic and Beyond the Pale
    Author

    Nancy Holder

    USA Today bestselling author Nancy Holder has written approximately 80 novels and over 200 short stories. She has written novels based on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, and Smallville. She has received 4 Bram Stoker Awards for her supernatural fictio. She is active in the horror, science fiction, and fantasy fields, and teaches at the University of California at San Diego and the University of Maine.

    Read more from Nancy Holder

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      Book preview

      GothicScapes Presents - Nancy Holder

      GothicScapes (tm) Presents

      ~ Blood Gothic ~

      ~ Beyond the Pale ~

      by

      Nancy Holder

      New York Times Bestselling Author of the Wicked series

      Smashwords Edition

      Copyright 2012 Nancy Holder

      Blood Gothic - First appeared in Shadows 8, edited by Charles L. Grant, Doubleday, 1985.

      Beyond the Pale - First appeared in Chicks Kick Butt, edited by Rachel Caine and Kerri L. Hughes, TOR Books, 2011.

      ~ * ~

      Dear Reader,

      I hope you enjoy these two short stories. One is about a woman who yearns for excitement; the other is about a one who wishes she had less. I hope you'll let your imagination ride away with you as you read Blood Gothic and Beyond the Pale.

      With all my best,

      Nancy Holder

      ~ * ~

      Blood Gothic

      by

      Nancy Holder

      She wanted to have a vampire lover. She wanted it so badly that she kept waiting for it to happen. One night, soon, she would awaken to wings flapping against the window and then take to wearing velvet ribbons and cameo lockets around her delicate, pale neck. She knew it.

      She immersed herself in the world of her vampire lover: She devoured Gothic romances, consumed late-night horror movies. Visions of satin capes and eyes of fire shielded her from the harshness of the daylight, from mortality and the vain and meaningless struggles of the world of the sun. Days as a kindergarten teacher and evenings with some overly eager, casual acquaintance could not pull her from her secret existence: always a ticking portion of her brain planned, proceeded, waited.

      She spent her meager earnings on dark antiques and intricate clothes. Her wardrobe was crammed with white negligees and ruffled underthings. No crosses and no mirrors, particularly not in her bedroom. White tapered candles stood in pewter sconces, and she would read late into the night by their smoky flickerings, scented and ruffled, hair combed loosely about her shoulders. She glanced at the window often.

      She resented lovers—though she took them, thrilling to the fullness of blood and life in them—who insisted upon staying all night, burning their breakfast toast and making bitter coffee. Her kitchen, of course, held nothing but fresh ingredients and copper and ironware; to her chagrin, she could not do without ovens or stoves of refrigerators. Alone, she carried candles and bathed in cool water.

      She waited, prepared. And at long last, her vampire lover began to come to her in dreams. The two of them floated across the moors, glided through the fields of heather. He carried her to his crumbling castle, undressing her, pulling off her diaphanous gown, caressing her lovely body until, at the height of passion, he bit into her neck, drawing the life out of her and replacing it with eternal damnation and eternal love.

      She awoke from these dreams drenched in sweat and feeling exhausted. The kindergarten children would find her unusually quite and self-absorbed, and it frightened them when she rubbed her spotless neck and smiled wistfully. Soon, soon, soon her veins chanted, in prayer and anticipation. Soon.

      The children were her only regret. She would not miss her inquisitive relatives and friends, the ones who frowned and studied her as if she were a portrait of someone they knew they were supposed to recognize; the ones who urged her to drop by for an hour, to come with them to films, to accompany them to the seashore; the ones who were connected to her—or thought they were—by the mere gesturing of the long and milky hands of Fate. Who sought to distract her from her one true passion; who sought to discover the secret of that passion. For, true to the sacredness of her vigil for her vampire lover, she had never spoken of him to a single earthbound soul. It would be beyond

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