“Well, Brannon Weldon,” he retorted smugly, “I am Eldon Vorigan, Elder of the coven in this area.”
“Yeah, so I figured when word got around the sleeping vampires had finally woken up. We did know you were there. Just couldn’t get to you. And I didn’t realize you could call yourself an Elder when your ‘coven’ consists of no one but you and your wife.”
“You said you came here to talk, or do you truly only desire to attempt to insult me?”
“Just wanted to make sure you remembered the laws you have to follow. I’m not happy about your return, but your kind isn’t the lone one who follows tradition. We’ll leave you be as long as you don’t step out of line.”
“Ah, yes, the guidelines your ancestors and my people agreed upon in our pact of peace. Do not fear. My wife and I remember them well. We are leaving the humans we feed on quite unharmed, and their memories are altered as necessary. For the most part. There was a single man who had to give a whole donation, but one such meal is well within the limits we promised to not break.”
The look of confusion on Brannon’s face ignited into one of rage.
“Chester!” he cried in recognition, “He is dead then, and you killed him! You heartless bastard! You’ve made an orphan out of poor Bailey! She’s had to come stay with us!”
“Regrettable, but, as I said, his death was necessary in order to assure my wife’s own survival. A thousand years of sleep leaves one quite parched.”
“I don’t give a fuck about your wife!”
“And you care about the humans? At the very least, you think we are the monsters? If you’ve studied our history at all, you would know we rarely kill. The same cannot be said for you. How many hundreds upon hundreds of innocent lives has your breed violently slaughtered during times of the full moon? How many unfortunate souls have you burdened with your curse? We only turn those who ask.” he reminded the man in front of him proudly.
“We found a way to control our curse. We don’t kill anyone anymore.” Brannon revealed.
He was glad to see it was admitted guiltily.
“Still, your kind has killed thousands more than ours ever will, so my point remains.”
“Except we actually value human life!” Brannon barked, “You don’t, and you even used to be human! Yeah, history has retained that much information about you, Eldon Vorigan. You act so high and mighty, but you’re not even a pureblood.”
“I am not a pureblood, that is correct, Brannon Weldon. However, by manipulation of power we turned ones can not only grow as strong as those vampire by true nature, but we can be granted immortality as well. Furthermore, we retain the ability to breed. That is something those pure of blood could never accomplish. Us turned can spread the strength of our kind like nothing that has been known. Therefore…”
He glanced away before glancing back with a smile of the devil.
“We are higher and mightier than the purebloods could ever dream of, and we will swarm this land until we reclaim what has been stolen.”
He delighted in the torn expression on his opponent’s face. Brannon’s anger was palpable, but he was unable to do a single thing due to the pact suggested by his own people. More of his people were nearby, and the arrival of one delighted him further.
“Brannon.” the newcomer spoke.
And that one word was all he could say.
He burst into a bout of laughter like the kind that had not shaken him in years far beyond even the beginning of his sleep. It was meant to be insulting, and it certainly was, but it was also genuine, uncontrollable, and unintended.
“Please do not tell me this is how you’ve controlled the curse!” he asked between gasps, “You used to be great beasts actually worthy of fear and admiration! Now you look like someone fucked a dog and smashed the resulting spawn’s face into the wall over and over again for simple amusement! This is what you get for allying yourselves with the Hunters! They’ve domesticated you!”
“Bran, let me rip the damn bastard’s face to shreds!”
“Unfortunately, not this day, Spencer. We will not be the ones to break the pact. We will wait until he, his wife, or his demon spawn do, and then we will tear them all to pieces.”
“I am almost tempted to go ahead and break it!” Eldon continued to laugh loudly, “If only for the chance to strike you down magnificently! You have grown so weak I could take on your whole pack by myself! What a sham you have become! You can’t even call yourselves wolves!”
“Remember the pact, Vorigan. This will be your lone warning. We will not hesitate to show you that we are not as weak as you think. We have changed with the times. All the other races have too. You can no longer claim any allies, and no one cares if your kind survives. You have peace with us merely because it was bargained for in the past.”
“I will remember the pact as long as you remember who it was who bargained for peace in the first place, Weldon. At that point, we were not the ones being hunted for being demons.”
“We’re clearly done talking. C’mon, Spence.”
His lingering laughs haunted their departing footsteps.
_______________________________________________________
“Aurelia, you must hear of what has become of our old ‘friends’. I swear, I have not had such amusement in…”
His sentence faltered when he spotted her shuddering against the door to the bathing room, clenching at her stomach as if trying to rip her dress apart. With a moan, she slowly sank to the floor.
“Aurelia?”
He was soon next to her, lifting her face by way of his palm on her cheek.
“Your skin is cold and clammy in a way it should not be.”
“I thought this kind of ailment was left behind when I turned…” she grumbled through gritted teeth.
“Are you actually il-”
Without warning, a great burst of bile blasted from her mouth onto his legs.
_______________________________________________________
He found her kneeling at the end of her altar.
“I’ve cleaned myself proper. Is it unwise to approach you again in this moment?”
“You have no fear of that anymore. The sensation has passed. I’m merely…tired.”
“Yet why are you tired? Why does your stomach trouble you when it should not?”
She would not look him in the eye. She glanced away guiltily. He could only assume from embarrassment.
“It…It is wholly the wrong moment to expand our coven, isn’t it? We can barely scavenge enough blood to keep ourselves fed.”
“Yes? That is a true observation. I don’t dare think of even adding a fledgling when we don’t have room for so much as a captive to drink from.” he answered in mild confusion.
She stood abruptly.
“That is the truth,” she said confidently, “Do not worry about me. I merely thought to attempt to relieve our burden of hunting by feeding on a doe that passed by.”
“Aurelia, you know better than to do such a thing. That is equivalent to a human allergic to milk chugging a whole tankard of it. Few of our kind can handle animal blood without serious consequences resulting.”
“I know that. I simply had a poor lapse of judgement. It will not happen again.”
“I will see to it that it does not. While I have been reminded of our pact with the dogs, that does not mean we can’t stretch those boundaries to the furthest limits without breaking them.”
“Oh yes, I would very much like to hear of this amusing encounter of yours with them.”
She took his hand in hers and led him out of the room as he began recounting the tale.
_______________________________________________________
He watched her paint. It was nearly all she had been doing the past several days. Perhaps she wanted to make up for lost time. The nausea had persisted far past what had been expected, but it disappeared just as rapidly. She reassured him the problem was gone.
“Love, the sun will be up soon. It is time to put down your brush and come to bed.”
“In just a moment.”
That wouldn’t do.
She flinched when he approached. Still in a habit of guiltily averting her gaze from his, he wondered if the embarrassment from the loss of control of her stomach haunted her.
“My lady?”
He offered his arm, and his back straightened in satisfaction at the look of relieved surprise on her expression.
“So you do remember how to be charming.” she giggled coyly, accepting his arm.
“I suppose your painting is not the lone thing out of practice.”
Her rolling laugh morphed into an uncharacteristic high pitched shriek of frightened alarm when a sudden form leapt through the wall. Despite pulling her protectively close, he stumbled as he too jolted away in a rare instance of fear.
“Ah! I knew it! I knew I heard someone making a ruckus over here!” the transparent figure cheered merrily.
Silence then overtook the hall.
“Goddammit,” he mumbled breathily, “I hate ghosts.”
Be First to Post Comment !
Post a Comment