Carrick's pale eyes shone in the moonlight as he gazed back, unblinkingly. "It must seem very simple to you. You don't know what the thirst for blood is like when you're first made. It's all you can think of. Some men become berserk monsters, ravenous, like wild animals. They'd kill their dearest friend and bathe in their blood, if they aren't controlled. Think of every lust and drive your body has, and multiply it. That's what it can be like. Not for every fledgling, but some."
His voice did not change in tone, but the urgency of Carrick's words were plain. "You don't know cold until you've lain in a grave that you dug for yourself among stones and frozen earth; if you were mortal you'd be dead of hypothermia by morning, but as a vampire, all you can do is shiver and wait for the sunset."
Carrick wasn't sure what Hermes meant by there being more than one way to fly. "We can't turn into bats, you know. Which is a shame, really."
He waited fro a moment, considering his words before he spoke them. "It would be final and forever to me. To make a new vampire is not something I've ever taken lightly. You'd be joining one of the oldest bloodlines in the world. The responsibility on my part is more that I think you realise."
"There was something else about which Carrick was hesitant, but the monstrous pride that had grown in him over the centuries stopped him from voicing it. Hermes was his slave; beholden by every law of the land to obey him, pleasure him, serve him in every way the vampire desired. If he became a vampire, Hermes would be free - free to love, or not, as his own heart took him. Certainly his place would no longer be to kneel at his Master's feet, or to submit to the discipline and the painful pleasures inflicted in Carrick's bedroom.
That power over the boys he owned, that domination, was so central to everything Carrick had always been. What was it going to be like to set Hermes free and take him into his bed as a free man; a vampire of his own ancient bloodline?