Vincent and I sat side by side, peering at the over-the-top gore of Géricault’s famous painting The Raft of the Medusa. He had convinced me to take him to the Louvre, even though it was a weekend and packed with people. “I want you to teach me about art so I can understand why you’re so affected by it,” he had said. Which was so romantic that before it was even out of his mouth, I was pulling him down the street in the direction of the museum.
We sat in one of my favorite rooms—one that contained melodramatic historical paintings on canvases as big as king-size beds. The sensational scene before us seemed oddly appropriate as a backdrop for a discussion about undead superpowers.
“So what’s the story with this energy transfer thing?” I asked.
“Energy transfer?” Vincent repeated, confused, his eyes glued to the scene before us. He seemed to be studying it in a problem-solving way. The decomposing bodies didn’t seem to bother him— I could tell he was just juggling the geometry of the live humans in his mind to strategize how many he could save in one go.
“Yeah. Jules mentioned it last night. He said something like Georgia would be weak because Arthur would have her energy. What’s that mean?”
Vincent tore his gaze from the painting. “Well, you know why we die for people?”
“Besides out of the kindness of your nonbeating hearts?” I joked. Vincent took my hand and held it to his chest. “Okay, your beating undead heart,” I corrected myself, reluctantly pulling my hand away. “If you die saving someone, you reanimate at the age you lost your human life. It’s a compulsion meant to preserve your immortality, right?”
“Right,” Vincent said. “But you know we only die occasionally—maybe once a year in times of peace. Most of our ‘saves’ don’t necessarily involve dying. Did you ever think about why we would spend our immortal lives watching over you if there wasn’t a solid enticement? Whatever you’ve heard about superheroes, none of them are out saving the human race just because they’re really nice guys.”
I immediately thought of Violette. Of her and Arthur holding out until their sixties until they died for someone, and then only doing it because Jean-Baptiste needed them. They didn’t seem to love their job, to say the least.
Vincent turned his body toward me and linked his fingers through mine. “Imagine that everyone has this kind of life energy inside.”
I nodded, picturing all the tourists walking around the room with a glowing cloud inside them.
“So you know how, when someone’s been in a near-death situation, they sometimes suffer post-traumatic shock? Well, try to picture it as that energy, or life force, being temporarily sucked out of them.”
Remembering my own brush with death the previous year, I said, “After I barely escaped being crushed by the side of the café, I was pretty weak and shaky for a couple of days.”
“Exactly,” Vincent said. “So if a revenant is responsible for the rescue, the energy or strength that has been figuratively ‘sucked out’ of the would-be victim is literally infused into the revenant for the hours or days that it takes the human to recover.”
I thought about it for a minute, and then stared at him in surprise. “So when you and Charlotte rescued me, you guys got my energy? And same for Arthur with Georgia?”
Vincent nodded.
“And what about the girl who almost got run over by the truck the other day? I saw her afterward, sitting in shock by the side of the road.”
“Which is why I was able to stand up and walk away from the accident scene,” he confirmed. “That transfer of energy makes us physically stronger. Our muscles, hair, nails, everything goes into overdrive. It’s a rush—like a hit of power for us.” He watched for my reaction.
“So, basically what you’re saying is that I’m going out with a druggie zombie with a death wish. Who used me for my energy. Well”—I gave him as serious a look as I could muster—“I guess I could do worse.”
Vincent’s laugh turned several heads, and we stood to leave before we drew any more attention to ourselves.
“So Arthur’s going to be okay?” I asked as we passed the gigantic tableau showing Napoleon’s coronation.
“Yep, thanks to Georgia loaning him her strength, among other reasons”—and at this, Vincent turned his eyes from mine in an incredibly suspicious gesture— “he’s actually not in any pain and has his full strength.”
What was that about? I thought, my curiosity piqued. But I had to drop the thought to refocus on what he was saying.
“But his wound won’t heal completely until he’s dormant. And since it’s pretty serious, he’ll probably be laid up in bed a whole day after he awakes.”
“Why?”
“The more severely wounded you are before dormancy, the longer it takes you to recover,” he stated, shrugging as if it were mere logic. “If a severed limb is reconnected during dormancy, we could need another day or two of recovery after awaking. Regenerating body parts lays us up for weeks.”