Though vampires do not need to breathe to live, we still required air to oxygenate the blood, to talk, and, in this case, more air to play a musical instrument. It stays a habit, even after we become undead, to breathe, but most of us lose their talent for music as a result of not needing as much oxygen. I had figured out how to make music the likes of which could not be replicated in human lungs; the trick was pacing and storing the air expulsions.

I was not the only vampire to master this trick, but I was one of the few to appreciate it.

The first note came to my lips unhurriedly as I began an old melody. It was an English drinking song, but as I played it grew‒both faster and louder. The vampires present continued their conversations, but the Emperor was held entranced. I played, leaning against the Black’s body for support while I drew my power around me. I pulled two long red scarves from my sleeves and tossed them into the air, holding them up with my power.

The two gauze scarves began to waver in the air, swayed in time to the evolving tune.

The song began to rise for the chorus, I added the illusion of drums rumbling‒impressive due to the difficulty of creating sounds from nothing. Sight and smell and touch were easy, but sound required something extraordinary.

The scarves twirled and twisted, growing larger until the beat grew heavy. Suddenly, dancing girls simply swirled out of the sheer fabrics as they shuddered in the magical breeze. They were me‒scantily clad, with bigger breasts, and all lipstick and red gauze, completely naked under the see-through material. They both wore dazzling red masks; the right one had blonde hair, the left had red. Both had pale, flawless vampire skin and sly grins.

Those watching the performance clapped, thinking, naturally that they were two girls I had been concealing the whole time. However, they were nothing more than a silk scarf, fluttering in the air. Mine is a rare power, and the strength and power of my illusions were unparalleled.

They smelled like me‒rose cream and stage makeup‒moved sensually like any female vampire should, the lilting light in their eyes was completely my own. I concentrated as I played, air and moisture in my mouth, blood hissing in my veins, and my mind working furiously as I produced the performance. I can only describe it as focusing on two things at once. While reading a book, making a shopping list, or tapping your foot in time to your music player. My hunger grew in my clenching gut, winding its way through my limbs with serpentine efficiency. Drawing on my illusions drew also on the reserves of my will.

I would need to feed soon. But the Emperor seemed pleased; he would reward me with a feeding before all others. He had never seen my illusions in this form. In the last sixty years, I had truly perfected my rare gift.

I finished the bawdy drinking tune and started a new one, placing my fingers in different positions on the flute.

The girls were dancing a traditional Persian ballad now. It was seductive enough that the Priest caught the blonde’s wrist; his eyes, hungry with his lust, turned wide as he felt her flesh and blood. Though I could not see through her eyes, I made her giggle before she slid from him, nothing but silk.

She was nothing but silk and tactile illusion.

He was staring now, as many were.

“I felt her heartbeat; I could smell her body‒but she’s… not really there.” He told the crowd.

The music lifted. Had I been human, I might have been sweating. My lungs were burning as I inhaled, but I drew out the next roll of sound. It was a hauntingly complex melody and to divide my mind between the music and my illusions was difficult.

No other vampire could have played a musical instrument while simultaneously casting illusions as powerful as mine.

It was one of the talents that made me a Dominus.

My illusions were more than simply smoke and mirrors; they could speak, they could touch.

They could kill.

To be able to create a basic illusionary image was not an uncommon ability among vampires, but I knew of no other that shared the power with me to such an extent. The flicker of a wrist, the twist of a mirror; those were parlour tricks.

I tossed two blue scarves out, closing my eyes as I concentrated on the simple pulse in my tune, and brought two male versions of myself to life. They perfectly mimicked the two women, black hair and blonde hair. The black haired man stalked to the blonde girl and, pulling her into his arms, immediately began to dance with her. It was surprisingly easy to dance when you are of one mind about the act. Every step was perfectly in sync, every look full of the exact mirroring emotion. My illusions danced together like they were making love on the dance floor.

Without warning, a new instrument joined my flute; I recognized the player‒the Musician. He was the only other Dominus who performed at these functions. Unlike him, I could not use noise as a weapon; I had seen him shred a challenger from across a crowded room with a violin’s sharp trill.

He had a small drum balanced between his legs and, while he absently matched my song for the beginning moments, he soon brought a set of pipes to his mouth to change the tune. How I had not noticed the drums before? I do not know; he was wearing a plain tuxedo like most of the other guests. I didn’t mind, the Musician was a good man.

We soon shifted into our more comfortable roles; I let him dazzle the guests with his music while my illusions danced and cavorted. Then, the blonde man whom I had created reached out and pulled the Black away from me.

I stumbled backwards, giving confused, wide-eyes to the crowd. I twisted into a series of flips to bring the attention of the crowd back to myself, I drew my hands back and vanished from sight, filling the room with dazzling flares of rainbow-hued light. Each flare turned into whatever I could think of fast enough‒butterflies, dogs, cats, bats, cricket posts, hamburgers and even a famous singer.

As the music crested, I felt my fangs harden in my mouth, yearning for blood‒almost there; I could feel it.

By now the dancers I had made were all but bursting in their rhythm, and the Musician expertly took the cue, pounding his drum into crescendo. As the beating of the drum reached its finale, the dancers simultaneously exploded into a spectrum of light that blossomed overhead. At the magnificent display, there were gasps and laughter of shock and awe.

I leapt high into the air, arcing gracefully, my toes touched the ceiling. I was painfully aware of the heat and life energy pulsing around me.

Simply lifting my hand, I tugged at the air and my scarves flew from their slow descent to my hand, pulled by invisible strings. Throwing myself into a cartwheel through the crowd, I landed at the doors of the council hall-‒currently closed‒ now shimmering with light. I sent a small burst around me like a halo as the final note continued to thrum. As the music fled into silence, I swept into a low bow‒aimed unerringly at the Emperor‒my arms reaching to the twin double-door room behind me.

The room stared at me, the source of the bizarre show of power and grace, shocked. At the Emperor’s childish laugh, the clapping began.

A perfect finish.

Like all the inevitably poorly timed catastrophes in life, the ceiling behind me abruptly caved in, as if the very roof itself was so enthralled by my performance that it had literally come down around me.

I could not have timed it better myself.

I had not timed it at all.

I froze, dust and plaster whooshing around my legs. Something heavy groaned under the weight of the fallen ceiling, and the sudden, cloying smell of blood assaulted my nose.

I smelled death, the aftertaste of fear and something familiar and troubling ‒I do not know if I was surprised or shocked or suddenly terrified. The single thought that raced through my head was, “Did I do that?” I quickly I shook it away; it was absurd! Of course I had not done it!

I had not even touched the ceiling other than to bounce off it lightly.

“Incredible!” The Emperor was still clapping; he thought, as the crowd did, that this was my finale. Then, halfway across the room, his pale grey eyes met mine. Whatever must have been showing on my shocked face alerted him; the humour in his face died.

I straightened agonizingly slowly, tasting death, vampire blood and plaster in the air. I lifted my head to look at the damage above me when a shadow rolled from the hole, dropping into my waiting arms.

I stopped breathing; I stopped everything, I stared at the lifeless, dull eyes of the decapitated head I was holding. My fangs burned a terrible, burning pressure in my mouth; my eyes widened with comic alarm.

It was as if I had never conjured up a severed head before.

Not this one. I knew those eyes‒that face. Even if I had wanted to, I could not have moved. My heart felt as though it hammered in the cage of my chest and was about to burst.

I was not good with violence; it made me freeze up.

“Investigator!” The Emperor’s roar cut through my daze.

I nearly stumbled as an older looking man pushed through the crowd. He was wearing a blue and green dinner jacket and his salt-and-pepper hair was brushed neatly behind his too-big ears. His eyes were a sharp dark blue ‒ glared at me as he pulled a monocle from his front pocket. He easily plucked the head from my frozen fingers.

Blood dripped over my arms and hands.

His look was one that seemed ready to ask the simple question of what I had done now, as if this was my fault.

“The King,” He murmured in heavily accented English, “Is dead.”