Harsh Light of Day

by Jaye A. Jones

CHAPTER 2

  I smelled the fire. I knew what it meant. My books were all I had of the life they stole from me. And now they were taking those away too.

  I hid among the darkness using the torchlight I hated so much to my advantage. All I could do was hide. Not because I was scared of what Colin was going to do to me, but because I didn’t want to have to look at any of them. They made me sick.

  My vampire family. Ugh.

  If Declan hadn’t bothered me, I would have finished my book. No one would have even known I’d been there. But I sensed him standing there, felt him watching me, not blinking, obsessively unable to give me any peace. I couldn’t take it anymore, and just had to open my big mouth.

  I was on the last few chapters too. Now I’d never know how it ended.

  I heard hastened footsteps coming towards me, so I backed against the wall and focused. I closed myself off, pictured myself as invisible, as inaccessible. I was made of stone, just another part of the granite wall I leaned against.

  Stone Lena, surrounded by walls.

  It wasn’t such a hard thing to imagine.

  Henry walked past me with a mission, oblivious his arm came only inches from me. His vacant expression matched his consort who followed steps behind him, as she always did. Henry and Mary had never shown any discernible personality traits I could remember. They were Colin’s willing servants, off to destroy the one thing that kept me sane since I joined them.

  Because they couldn’t possibly let me have something of my own. Because I never belonged here at all, and everyone knew it.

  I had no idea what it would feel like to fit somewhere. I had no memory of belonging.

  As soon as Henry and Mary were out of sight, I ran. Swift and light footed, the flames of the torches along the walls whizzed past and looked like one orange line out of the corners of my eyes.

  It didn’t matter where I was going. There was nowhere to go. No way out but through the front door which was sealed by so many ancient locks I could hardly count.

  There were actually only eight.

  But the locks were old and loud. The grinding of the gears made a distinct sound I wouldn’t be able to dampen. Any other way out had been boarded up years ago, with metal planks and iron screws.

  There was no hope of freedom.

  Outside Colin’s absurd Castle, it was the 21st Century. There were lamps with bright light bulbs and alarm systems that made medieval torches and eight ancient locks ridiculous. There were cars and restaurants and school buildings, all outfitted with television screens that could entertain with all sorts of stories.

  I knew not because I remembered, but because of my books.

  The aroma of burnt paper struck my senses. Furious, I jumped down a flight of stairs, my feet never touching a step.

  Why was I even bothering? What was the point in running? What was the point in fighting? In caring?

  I could picture my vampire family standing around the bonfire made by my belongings. Even though I hadn’t yet mastered the ability to sense where Declan was on the level he could sense me, I knew he was helping his beloved Colin with whatever task was asked of him. As usual.

  It didn’t matter that Declan knew what the books meant to me.

  It didn’t matter that it had been Declan who got them for me in the first place.

  Colin commanded, and Declan obeyed.

  I imagined Colin’s cruel partner Viola, the perfect embodiment of how a vampire female was supposed to behave. Sort of like an evil, plastic flower, she was cruel and gorgeous and unchanging, forever. Viola would revel in tossing my books into the fire, the flames reflecting in her cold eyes. Those flames belonged there. She loathed me, and I loathed her back.

  Colin was the Master of our vampire family, or the leader in non-vampire terms. He would be standing away from the flames, too self-important to do the task himself. He’d throw one of my precious books in ceremoniously, and then let the rest of the family finish the job.

  Colin was always too formal, too coifed, too polished. Transparently fake. He demanded my respect daily, but didn’t deserve it and would never get it.

  Nothing would ever change here. This was my existence and this would be my miserable existence for countless lifetimes.

  If I’d known how to end it all, I would have years ago.

  The door came into focus during the peak of my pity party. Though the manor looked the same with grey stone and torches on all three floors and even in the tower at the highest point, I didn’t think I’d ever been in this hallway. I’d never seen this door.

  I’d gone all the way down to the first floor and hadn’t even realized, too preoccupied with my thoughts and my memories to notice. The family tended to stay on the upper levels, I thought for safety in case the humans ever decided to investigate, which I constantly expected, and somewhat wished would happen.

  In the beginning, I’d explored all of the levels of the big house, but hadn’t ventured down to the ground floor for many years. Torches were not even kept lit down here, and even to me, it was nearly pitch black. But that wasn’t going to stop me.

  When I reached the door, I wasn’t surprised to find it welded shut. With one, efficient yank I pried it away enough from the doorframe to slip inside. I was two floors away from the rest of the family. I doubted they heard the noise.

  The room smelled of stagnant air and cobwebs brushed my face as I walked through. There were small, dirty windows on the walls close to the high ceiling letting in light from the dawning day outside. Soon, I’d be able to see perfectly. But the darkness felt private, like it was there for me.

  I savored the silence as a few minutes passed, waiting for the sun to rise a little more outside. There was no scent of fire in this room, no crackling of flames, or prattling family members. I loved it.

  When the room was bright enough for my eyes to take it in, I saw the outline on the floor. As if I knew it was there. As if it had been placed there today for me.

  It was my birthday present. My first one in twenty miserable years.

  The air in the room was still, which made it easy to hear the quiet wisp of breeze coming from the outline on the floor. The door was as clear as day to me now.

  I could smell fresh air. It had to be coming from outside the Castle, which made me think something I’d never dared seriously consider before.

  Maybe there was a way out.

  The door lifted easily, revealing a wooden ladder leading into the darkness below.

  It was a cellar.

  Maybe I should have thought more about what lied beneath. I couldn’t see where the ladder led. But I leapt feet first, only a fleeting and easily rationalized moment of doubt entering my thoughts.

  There was nothing left here for me. Colin would tighten his reins on me for hiding things from him for all these years. It didn’t matter that I’d chosen books as my rebellion. I’d wished for other things in the past, a flashlight, an ink pen, a calendar. Any of these items would have led to the same overreaction if they were found. All of it was a link to the human world, a world I was infatuated with, a world I still remembered, and a world we were absolutely prohibited from knowing and encouraged to forget.

  There was wet mud at my feet. There were vines touching my skin and spiders crawling in my hair. It all felt magnificent. It was something new, something different.

  A slight breeze was the only beacon I needed and I walked through the dark with confidence. I had to push hard to get the rickety door open. Plants had grown over it, sealing it shut and likely hiding it from view outside.

  But when the plants gave way, and the door opened out to the world, to the real world at times I worried didn’t actually exist, I felt joy for the first time since I became immortal.

  For the first time since I died, I was free.