Chapter 5: A New Life
History is the pain that children breathe when they exhale their future
Lungs saturated by the kicked up dust and plagued sentiments of the open air
The burn of alcohol on a wound, the absence of a moon
All things wrong, but all things are what they are
Life goes on involuntary, as do our shaking gasps
Thinking that perhaps if we hold it long enough we will vanish from the future
Extinguish the flames we swear are burning with in us
Bear witness no longer to the world that has turned its cheek to the
inevitable continuation
Not willing to take another breath until finally, we fall
Fall fast asleep and begin to breath again
Involuntarily
The remainder of the night filtered through the hands of time with slow
contemplation. A night to be remembered as well to be damned. Aramis could
do little more than pace the hallways, studies, and parlors of his manor with a
sick feeling of regret. A dusty old grandfather clock chimed away every
dismal hour throughout the day as he searched for the release valve to the
events that he had done. Hands were still tainted with three separate bloods
and the visage of the girl was vibrant in his mind.
When he arrived home, he wasn’t exactly sure of what to do. How long it
might take for her body to become like his? Till it would be sensitive to the
waking sun? His memory couldn’t recall how long he slept there on the shores
of Balimyst before waking with that first shine of day break. Before he had
to crawl on bended knee to that pitiful sanctuary that any other would see as
a shack. She had endured enough pain in those moments before he found her,
so he didn’t want her first experiences as a vampire to be sharing that emotion.
He had decided to lay her in a room on the east wing, close by the stairs
that led down to his cellar where he slept. He had done his best to make sure
all the curtains were bound and closed so that when the sun rose it wouldn’t
bleed inward. Taking the liberty himself, she was now dressed in a dark blue
woolen pajama suit that he had used once upon a time. Till this night they had
laid within a drawer in his old room on the third floor. A bit dusty they were,
but better than the blood-soaked and tattered dress that she was found in.
At the closing of that day, Aramis had been awake and with out feeding
for nearly two days and was without his bloodwyne. The hunger and frenzy
built within him as he found himself forced to leave the manor in search of
blood. He was only to his gate as he came across a jack rabbit scurrying by.
He quickly pounced upon it and drank. In the back of his mind, he knew he
didn’t want to leave her in the manor alone. What if she were to wake up
while he was away? This question prodded his mind all the while he rode
towards town. As luck would have it though, a meal would be found much
sooner than the four miles it was back into Pavion.
On the side of the road was an extravagant carriage with drawn satin
curtains to the windows and four magnificent steeds in the lead. It was oddly
placed in the direction of his home upon the only road that would take you
there. This would normally have given him some concern, but not this night.
This wasn’t going to be the normal. This wasn’t going to be merciful.
Aramis’s body was unleashing the primal nature of the predator he is due
to the lack of nourishment. The old man, who was sleeping in the cart, would
never wake from his slumber. And God’s pity would need to be on him if he
felt any of the pain. His horse hadn’t come to a stop before Aramis had
spotted him and leaped upon him, raking his teeth upon the neck from just
under his ear to nearly the man’s collarbone. He was drinking as if from a hot
spring that was coming from the soul of this stranger. The blood pulsated in a
fury upon the initial tearing of the flesh, catching Aramis in the forehead and
ran down his face. His bloodlust was so strong at this point that he nearly let
it consume him. He took the last heart beat’s worth of blood before the man
would die and take Aramis with him.
He had to quickly pull himself away from the corpse and fell back to his
knees. His mare was bucking about in the road with the instinct that all animals
tend to have with regard to creatures of the night. Just then, a conscious
thought returned to his mind: the girl was still in the house, alone. He could
have consumed an entire family at this point, but knew he had enough to last
him another day.
Hopping off the front bench of the carriage, he pulled the reigns of his
horse and got himself back into the saddle. With heels digging in to tender
sides of the beast, he snapped the leather straps and headed back for home.
He was in such a panic to get there that he left the body of his feast there
in the carriage without thought until he reached his gates. He assumed that
he would have time to go back and retrieve the evidence of evil before daylight
as he walked back into his home. Immediately he returned to the room he had
left her, only to find her still in the same position upon the bed as he had
previously seen her. No changes, no movements to be noticed other than her
chest lightly moving. Not that vampires needed to breathe, it was just an
involuntary reaction of the human body that still had lungs. He squatted beside
her, laying a hand upon her forehead to find a cool feeling.
The wound on her neck had retracted to what looked like nothing more
than a cat scratch. The bruises upon her face were long gone as the surrounding
skin of her eyes had returned to a paler tone of peach, lightly dusted with
bluish tones where bruises once were. It was obvious that her body was
healing itself as his had done from time to time since his change.
The sun would be up soon and his body was weary with fatigue. He made
his way out of the room and down into the cellar to find his bed. His sleep
was instantaneous once the soft satin sheets touched his cheek and the black
quilt was carried over his shoulders. Death itself didn’t sleep this good, ironic
as it is.
It was only a hour after Aramis had went below that the woman tossed in
her slumber. A hand would go up and start twirling with her hair. Eyes began
moving rapidly as she was entering a nightmare of sorts. Her face grimacing
with hidden visions of her mind’s eye. A hand caught a full grip of the dangling
curtains and began to tug on them. Grinding the fabric between her fingers as
she started to whimper. The bindings of the curtain and the post it hung from
all began to give way as the screw and nails buckled. Her breath started to
get panic stricken within the dream, until the hand holding the curtains clinched
and pulled downward in a violent thrust. It all came down upon her letting in
the dawn’s earlier light upon the room that took on a rusty glow with the
scattered dust.
Green orbs would open to see the room dimly lit by the dawn. At first, she
just laid still with eyes fixated upon an unknown point on the ceiling. But then
she tossed, kicked, and spun around to her stomach, clenching at her throat
and chest, as if awaking to the exact moment when she blacked out. A few
screams were let out, shallow and without force. Just another involuntary
reaction to the fear she was felling. The fear was real, but there was nothing
left of the pain.
It was at that time that the sun began to peek itself over the brim of the
outlaying forest, and spears of light came shooting through the room. Each
ray landed upon her skin, even through the woolen clothing Aramis had put
her in. It sent a burning sensation through her whole body as if she was laying
next to a fire. and it caused her stomach to cramp like no other time before.
Because she hadn’t fed yet as a vampire, the sun wouldn’t kill her as it hadn’t
killed Aramis on his first waking hour as a vampire. But the pain was making
her wish it would. With her body racked with the horrifying agony, she formed
herself into a fetal position there on the bed as she began screaming with
grunting cries.
She pulled herself inch by inch towards the edge of the bed, still trying to
remain in a ball. Once she made it to the side, she fell head and shoulders first
off the bed and crashed onto the wooden floor as the rest of her body followed
suit. The impact of her small frame sent a rumbling echo throughout the
wooden planks of wood the house was built of. She was sprawled out on the
floor, now looking at the small space under the bed that was too small to
crawl into.
She continued to scream out for help from within the room. The sounds of
her voice echoed through the halls of the manor and down the stairs into
Aramis’s cellar. He sprang up out of bed and remained motionless with a
panic of his own. Had he heard something or was it only an impression from
a nightmare? Ears tuned into the creaks and soft sounds of the old house with
high anxiety. Until he heard the shouts again and charged up the stairs running
to the room.
“I’m coming…be still, I’m coming!” He shouted as he made his way up
the stairs and then to the door. He twisted the door knob and threw the door
open in a manner he would find to be a mistake.
As the door opened, the angled light from the window came pouring out of
the room and into the hallway striking his chest. The direct sunlight was
enough to cast him down the hall as his clothes caught fire from the searing
flesh underneath. He was an immortal fireball that crashed into the wall,
taking down with him a wall full of paintings and glass cased dowries. Yelling
out as he patted out the flames, he did not know if the flames alone could
destroy him now that he was out of the sun.
Aramis gazed down the hallway with a sigh. For with the angle of the light
coming out, he wouldn’t be able to look into the room itself. He stood up and
ran down to the doorway, as close as he could as he spoke to her.
“It’s going to be okay…are you alright?”
“No…Something is burning me in the light.”
“I know. I know. Please, stay calm.”
He opened a door behind him and went in. It was once his mother’s room
that had not been changed in all the years since her tragic murder, only months
after his birth. He reached for a large vanity mirror and came back out into
the hall. He would only have one chance with this, but he needed to see inside
the room. He angled it down to not get a reflection of the sun and held it past
the frame of the door to have a look inside. Her reflection was minimal,
transparent at best. He could see the sunlight was shining halfway up the
walls but could see her sitting on the other side of the bed, next to the window.
“Alright, good girl, now stay away from the window.”
“What is going on here?” she cried, as if a blade had been held to her
throat.
“All will be explained in time, child. You must trust me now.”
“Trust you? Who are you?”
“My name is Aramis. You have nothing to fear now.”
“How…how did I get here? I want to go home.”
“I brought you here. You are going to be safe.”
“Where’s, where’s Ian…McGregor, where is he?”
She was pushing the questions on him faster than he wanted. He didn’t
know how to explain any of what had happened in a way that wouldn’t make
her go insane or flat out not believe him. The one thing that he knew he had
to have from her at that moment was her trust. He had to try to turn the
tables on the line of questioning.
“What is your name?” he asked, completely avoiding the question of
McGregor for now.
“Shyanne Silverose. Pleasure to make your God damn acquaintance, sir.
Now tell me what the hell is going on here,” she scuffed.
“What do you remember last?”
“What are you, a head shrinker?”
“Just answer the question. Think back, what do you remember?”
“Ian. We fought outside of the bath house when I caught him there.”
“Caught him there, so you know him?”
“Yes, I know him. He’s the father of my child.”
“You have a child?” He spoke with a sound of regret in his voice. That was
minimal compared to his feelings after her next statement.
“No. Not that it’s any of your concern, but I’m pregnant.”Aramis’s head
dropped back against the wall as if he didn’t want to see her anymore, not
wanting to look at the mistake he had made. Creating a vampire was bad
enough. But what of that child that grew within her? “That’s what the fight
was over. That’s why he…” Suddenly more of it was coming back to her.
“Cut me. No, no, where are my cuts?”
“They have healed, Shyanne,” he said slowly.
“Healed? How long have I been here?”
“Oh, not too long, a few days perhaps. Do you remember anything else?”
“He…he raped me. Held me down and cut me with his knife. Then some
guy came out of nowhere and got him off of me. It’s like a dream. I kept
asking him to help me, to do something. It has to be a dream, right? I mean,
where are my cuts?”
She then stood up, lost in her own thoughts, and stumbled across the floor
and walked back into the sun without thinking twice about it. She stumbled
back with a cry and fell upon her backside with a scream.
“And what is with the damn light?!”
“There are many things that you want to know, Shyanne, many things that
you will have questions about. It is important that everything is told to you in
order. And that you understand everything that I tell you. You asked me for
help, and against my best judgement, I have. And now you must trust me or
else go down the road I pulled you from.”
Her eyes widened there upon the floor as Aramis spoke, thinking back to
the twisted collage of memories from that night. She now knew where he
was going with this.
“It was you. You took him off of me?”
“It was me. Me who grabbed you from death and delivered you into a
new life, as requested. But please, stay calm and all your questions will gain
answers I swear. And before you ask again, neither this nor what you
remember has been a dream.”
Shyanne curled up into a small fragile ball on the other side of the room,
tucked away into a corner where she could see only the mirror and a partial
reflection that looked on from a shaded edge of the door jam. Her mind was
resistant to the reality of what she had no choice but to accept as truth. And
to that truth would be volumes of knowledge that she had no idea of where to
begin searching or asking for. She pulled at a loose thread upon the stitching
of Celtic knot work on the green pajamas that she wore, trying to find a
starting point.
“Why am I having this pain from the light? You can start there.”
Aramis nodded to her from his end of the reflection, seeing that she was
becoming calmer now and perhaps in a better state to understand what he
was going to have to tell her. Not that anyone could ever truly be prepared for
such news.
“The light is no longer the source of life for you as it once was. There is no
true answer that I know of as to why its presence burns, but you must learn
to respect it and its domain now. What the sun touches now, you are no
longer privileged to. You will find that you’re not at your top form during the
day light hours even if in the shadows. But during the night you are seemingly
weightless and without bounds.”
“Why is this? You make no sense.”
“For what you are now, is no longer any creature of God that I am aware
of.”
“Then you’re telling me that I’m Devil-sent?”
“I fear that may be the origin, but you are not Devil-sent. If anything, you
are sent by seed of myself. Like a father and child, my blood now courses
through your veins. And like a father, I have passed along my attributes and
hereditary particulars. These are the things I’m warning you of.”
“My Father? You are not my father. My father passed from this realm
many…” Before she could finish her statement, Aramis pushed back into the
conversation to make clear his meaning.
“I am not your Father in the sense that I and a woman through natural
acts produced you. No. But I am still the creator of what you now are. The
result of the last living breath you ever used to speak. The desire for help
coupled with the only thing I could offer in that manner. A new life, spawned
from my life. Your plea was to not let you die, and though you did, you will
never die again. You are immortal, Shyanne.”
“Immortal? Do you know how completely insane you sound?”
“I know it can’t be easy to accept, but it is God’s honest truth. Does it
seem so farfetched when you truly think about it? We are told all our lives
that in our deaths we shall find immortality. Be it an eternity in paradise or an
eternity in hell. Who’s to say that the eternity can’t be spent upon the same
realm as our waking, living souls inhabited? What if I told you that I not only
let you die, but quickened the process? And in doing so, brought you back to
life like nothing you’ve ever been? Like nothing you’ve ever seen? A creature
that you may have seen nightly and never known as you walked the streets. A
creature talked about in folklore the realm over and the basis for many a
nightmare or boogie man. The shadow that seems to follow you but isn’t at
your side. What if I told you…that you’re a vampire?”
“Then I’d say you are crazy.”
“Crazy to assume that vampires can’t be in the light of the sun? Can you
think of any other reason why your skin seems to flame when touched by it?
Feel with a finger just within your lips. Can you explain any other way why
you have seemed to have a unique change in your upper jaw line? Slightly
pointed teeth now just along the outer rim, set a bit higher upon the wet flesh.
I know you have a desire in your appetite like you’ve never felt before that is
intensified by the sun’s touch. Can you in any other way explain it?”
“Stop it!” She screamed at him with a frightful tone. She was becoming
outraged by the very thought, for she couldn’t reply to it. It all made sense.
Every word of it was pieced together without any jagged edges. But to her, it
just couldn’t be true. “You’re speaking of hobgoblins and things that go bump
in the night. Relics of ancient stories and myths to frighten the masses. Things
that haunt the simple-minded. Not the reality that exists!”
“The reality that exists is proof that all things are possible. With all the
splendors that this realm offers in way of life, why would you not believe that
something such as ourselves wouldn’t have been thought of as well by the
creating gods? Elves who can easily live over two hundred years. Trolls,
dragons, Elorians, gypsies and magicians who can control nearly any and
everything they touch. All the way down to the complicated creatures we
once were as humans. Why?”
“These are creatures that have been in existence since the beginning.”
“And possibly so have we. That’s the very question of the point.”
A silence over took the two of them for a few passing moments that
seemed like hours to Aramis. He hadn’t really expected this kind of reaction
from her. He didn’t expect to have a debate of God’s design either. But he
really didn’t have any expectations anyhow. This wasn’t anything he was
used to and feared the notion that it could happen again later in his immortality.
That he might one day again make the mistake of creating another.
He could do nothing more than stare at the young beauty that he knew
would always look as she did now. Soft wavy locks of brown, her eyes searching
for the truth amongst the empty air around her as if lost, surrounded lined her
face like a picture frame created by some unknown artist. Her silken skin,
slightly pale and perfect. She was the mold for innocence in his eyes. An
innocence that he had taken and was now left with the heavy heart of regret.
Her left index finger traced along her upper teeth and felt exactly what he
had just described to her as her eyes closed in further disbelief. She straightened
out one leg and rested her forehead against the wall, still keeping her hands
clasped together hugging her other knee. She couldn’t look at him, her creator
and father. Her mind struggled with all the evidence mixed with all the stories
and lore that she knew of. The horrific details of some of the things she had
heard of in the past. Stories that spoke of body snatchers and cannibals. The
undead pirates of the Keys and all the horrific tales that were spun from
them. All too curious was she now whether or not they were correct.
“Then you have created a murderer? A consumer of blood from innocent
victims and damned to take lives and live in coffins…that – that is what
you’re telling me?”
“What comes of your gift is up to you. I will show you that not everything
that you have heard is true, and there are things that are true that you’ve
never fathomed. There is a path that all must choose no matter the life form
we are. And from that path more choices, and more choices, no different
than those you made just a few days ago as a mortal. What if, out of our
monstrosity, we put our deeds to greater good? So that the horror that we
must imbibe is digested with those would do the sinister acts that are assumed
of us or worse?”
“Do you fashion yourself a hero, Aramis? That’s a rather lofty way to see
yourself,” she said with a half grin, the other half still trying to take everything
in.
“I do not see myself as a cleansing agent for the realm, nor a hero for the
masses. But I do see myself as one who utilizes a damned trait to further the
life of innocence. Something that I am too far removed from. And perhaps I
do it simply to make a attempt to save the soul that I know is damned.”
“And thus is the life you’ve given me.”
Those words felt like daggers through his ears as she said them. Each
word sharper than the last until all grew silent again, and he just knew that he
had lost his hearing due to them. He lowered the mirror as he himself laid his
head back against the wall, trying to keep his mind on track and that he did
the right thing. That he saved a life, not damned it. But conflicting arguments
raged in his mind. That she would be where she was destined to go in her
death. But in his haste to save himself, he had taken that away from her.
Aramis then picked the mirror back up to see her as he heard some scuffling
about on the hard wood floors, only to find a empty corner where she once
was. The sun had moved a bit upon the walls and it was as he noticed this that
he saw Shyanne appear from under the bed, now on his side and only
feet from the door. She had crawled under the bed and now stood to her feet,
looking down to him.
“And what of my child?”
This was the question that he knew would come and had no answer for,
though he had promised her answers to everything. He just plain had no idea
of what might or might not occur from this situation. To be a vampire was like
an ailment to him, locking one in their current age. He feared that it would be
the same scenario for the fetus within her.
“To that end, I do not know. I can only imagine that it would be a vampire,
but biologically speaking…it would still need to grow, and vampires do not. So
I can’t with any certainty give any answer. But I do assure you, that if all is
well, all things will be taken care of for that child.”
“Taken care of? Aramis, do you realize that you just told me that you don’t
know if my child will survive! How dare you claim anything?” Her words
became shouts as she punctuated her sentence with a slap to his face as he
was attempting to stand. Shyanne then jumped on him, slapping at him as he
held his arms up to fend of the blows. “I hate you, I hate you…why?!”
Aramis finally got hold of her wrists just as her screams became sorrowful
cries to him. Blood tainted tears began to rapidly fall from her face like pink
rain drops and he pulled her close to him. Cradling her with a bloody tear that
was building in his own eye with her cries.
“Because you asked me to.”
That was all he could muster for an answer, spoken in nearly a whisper as
he then lightly banged his head back against the wall a few times. He knew
that he had to get them both to bed. The next night would be a make-or-break
night for both of them he felt. One in which they would find a common ground
or become the longest living things that never were to cross paths again. He
picked her up in his arms and carried her down stairs into his cellar slowly
step, by step.
“Where are we going?”
“We both must find our rest till the sun falls..”
“Oh gods, please…I can’t sleep in a coffin!”
“Do not worry yourself. Even I do not bend to that rule. Coffins are a
thing of lore because we are described as the walking dead. You may have
my bed and I shall find my spot on the floor till we can arrange something
better in the evening.
“I couldn’t sleep now…not – not after all of this.”
“When you lay down, you shall fall faster asleep than a brick being dropped
to the ground. And when you wake, we shall continue this and much more.”
“And what if I should simply walk out into the sun once you’re asleep to
end it all?”
“Then you will find yourself in a pain till the sun retires for the day. You
are not yet a pure vampire in the sense that you have yet to kill. This is the sin
that binds us. And once you do, rest assure that hell awaits the final death of
a vampire.”
The oddity of this was he was saying this as he pulled the blankets over
her. He had no sooner left the blankets upon her shoulders than he watched
her eyes close and witness her body fall into a slumber. There was no time
for prayers, perhaps because God simply didn’t want to hear the pleas of the
wicked. Or because vampires were such perfect instruments of death, their
minds allowed no time for a thought against their nature. And should the sun
find you in a deep sleep, all sins would be found upon your head in your death.
Forgiveness was beyond them.
“Darkest eve…my child.”