Marek (Buried Lore Book 1)

by Gemma Liviero

  ‘To kill! I will not go. What do you plan to do with me?’

  ‘I do not plan anything. Oleander is the leader of this delegation.’

  ‘Huh,’ scoffed Marek. ‘Leader of bloodsuckers! That is hardly a title.’

  ‘Yes, I suppose, in a rather crude way. There are other circles across the lands. We are just one. Oleander believes hers to be the strongest.’

  ‘And if I choose not to become one of you?’

  ‘I wish I could tell you, Marek. Oleander has her reasons for not coming to see you at this time. Perhaps it is so your blood grows stronger and then you will have no option but to take a life. It will be by instinct. You won’t be able to stop yourself.’

  ‘You are vile. To think that someone so beautiful could turn out to be vermin.’ He directed this with venom but I knew it was only the hunger talking. Once he took his first soul it would get easier. I had to tell myself that, before the words sunk in deep enough to bruise.

  ‘I am not a murderer,’ he shouted. ‘Oleander! Oleander!’

  ‘Hush now.’ I put my arms around him like I had done several nights before, and he was too weak to resist. He felt so thin in my arms. ‘She has asked not to be disturbed for any reason.’ Even I did not know what she was doing and was curious as well. I vowed to seek out Jean who was her closest confidant. We would do something about Marek soon. It was time to set him free to make his natural choices.

  Chapter 9

  Marek

  My hands were covered in blood. I studied them for a moment and looked at the trail of deep red against the white. A short distance away, the wolf lay with a gaping neck wound. Could I have really done this? I had seen the animal the day before from my window, and again this morning, almost beckoning me into the forest. This was the same beast that was unafraid of me.

  *

  Earlier

  The light was only just up. The weather changed the landscape so that each morning I had a different view of snow on trees. Only I, and my kind, would notice the subtlest of changes. That morning I felt a rush of energy. The pain still sat low in my gut but I was numbing to it. I turned the door handle and was surprised to find the door unlocked. Did they now trust me or was this some kind of trap, I wondered. I no longer trusted anyone, not even Zola. Although there was sympathy in her face, there was also resolution that I must change.

  I had made it out the front door and strode into the barren world. The wolf was not in sight but I could sense him. There was a new smell. It was his fear. I ran through the trees. I had no shoes but I was so hungry; it mattered not about my appearance. Then the wolf was just ahead running fast; his breath was laboured. While he weakened my resolve grew stronger.

  The wolf stopped near the lake. This place I newly feared for what lay beneath its surface. Perhaps others had shared Irene’s fate. Perhaps more of Oleander’s victims.

  The wolf was cornered, panting. It faced me and growled. It remembered me. Last time it had been an ally, now it was wary. And it had great reason. It ran towards me and leaped hard against my chest, pushing me back into the thick snow. We rolled until we were almost at the frozen water and I felt its warm breath at my throat. Though I was severely depleted of physical strength, my need was greater.

  With one hand I grabbed its snout and the soft flesh beneath its jaw. My mouth inclined closer until I could smell its earthen essence. I bit into its soft flesh. It was blood lust but my mind failed to waver at that point and I was not thinking of mercy, and not thinking like a human. The wolf gave a guttural cry. It had stopped the fight but not quite surrendered. Its salty blood was on my lips and it was a most amazing sensation as it passed over my tongue, as if I had woken from a deep sleep refreshed. I could feel the vitality of my body and my organs responding and healing within. I could not stop drawing blood but it was not the blood that was causing me to feed in such a frenzy. It was something else my body craved. It was the animal’s soul.

  It whimpered without sound, pleading for its life; a sound that only I could hear. Its torso was unmoving, paralysed with the vicious toxins I had implanted. Only its heart pumped fast, the blood flowing through its veins to reach my thirst.

  Images started to appear in my head. First they were shadowy moving objects followed by flashes of light. Soon these mottled patches took shape and I was seeing the thoughts and memories of the wolf. I saw buildings, streams, villages, people clapping and dancing round the fire, shiny bracelets and sun through trees. It felt as though I was walking through memories that were my own. But they were not. I had become the wolf.

  In these memories I held something. I lifted it to my face to see that it was a mirror and in it was the face of a boy possibly a few years younger than me. My victim looked hauntingly back at me. These were human memories.

  I pulled away with horror from the wolf’s neck and gasped for air. My heart was pounding, my body tingling. I felt reborn but this should not be. This was not me, the son of a humble honest carpenter. I looked at the wolf lying still in its bed of snowflakes. This wolf with human memories was close to death. What had I done? At least I did not take its soul. Within its chest, its heart was weak. There was no light in its eyes. I put my hands over him to place the healing heat from my hands. I would cure what I had done. For a moment the wolf sensed me there. There was no hatred but a sense of relief or resignation. This wolf had lost the will to live and without that, I would not be able to help him. But I tried. For so long I do not know, but long after he had died and his body grown cold.

  I wandered through the forest in parts I had not been. I had lost my goals. I had no plan as I could no longer return to my father in this state. As I descended a steep rise a deceptively deep patch of snow gave out from under me, sending me headfirst down into a gully. When I hit the bottom, I landed on my side on something sharp.

  I was winded but only briefly, managing to compose myself and wipe away the slush. I pulled out the half buried object to discover it was a spoke from a wheel. It had been split apart with a pick or an axe. As I walked along the gully suddenly what I thought were branches were more forthcoming. There were hundreds more pieces of debris and not just wheels. Canopies, remains of windows, seats, and other broken pieces of carriages and carts littered the ground for as far as I could see.

  This was a graveyard of carriages and I wondered how many hundreds had been lured here to these extravagant events to die, their belongings tossed aside as garbage, their bodies dumped in the canal, and the last link to their disappearances – their transport smashed to pieces and hidden deep in the forest.

  I staggered all day through the forest aimlessly like a demented beggar, my mind a raging tornado, my body trembling. With the last of the light fading I found myself standing in front of my place of nightmares once more, Oleander’s castle, the grey monster I had grown to hate.

  The wolf’s blood stained my shirt and sleeves. I was wretched. Oleander stood behind a window with someone else. Someone I thought I knew but could not remember. My mind wandered between events, undistinguishable as real or imagined.

  Why did I feel so good yet want to die as well?

  Zola

  Marek appeared in the library doorway. The harsh white light at the window filtered through his wild hair, making him appear haloed.

  The night before he had fallen into a deep slumber, which was not unusual for first time blood-takers, and he had to be carried to his room. There he stayed all night, drowsy and incoherent and no doubt reliving the moment, for at first it does not seem possible.

  Then late morning he woke to discover his room was locked once more. He began throwing himself at the walls and eventually breaking down the door so great was his strength especially with blood. We had been in Oleander’s library discussing that it was time for him to see her when we heard the noises and the banging.

  In the library, Jean pressed upon him to return to his room immediately until he was calm but Oleander allowed it. He looked perhaps like he would kill someone. I
t was the same look I encountered when I first laid eyes on him. I knew he was powerful but Oleander had her own special weapon.

  Celestina was there. Marek had not yet noticed her as his focus was still on the destruction of his sister who was driving him into madness. I touched his arm and it was enough to divert him. I nodded to the corner of the room that he had failed to notice. Several emotions passed across Marek’s face, from anger to disbelief, amazement and then pure joy. He rushed forward grabbing Celestina by the hands. She looked bemused at first and then she stepped forward. The real soul of Neve within this shell had always considered herself above everyone else and worthy of more attention. Her persistence and her eagerness to please Oleander had paid off – rewarded with this new young body.

  ‘Where were you?’ asked Marek but he was gushing, forceful and she was having difficulty responding. For a start, her voice was odd. She had not yet found it comfortable, but she did look ravishing in a dress of crimson, edged with lace and matching shoes. The front of her hair was swept up and twisted onto the top of her head with ivory combs and long black tendrils flowed down her back. Dark eyes stood out like shining creek stones and her bare neckline was powdered like her face, making her olive skin appear creamy. I knew she had potential, which is why I had chosen her, but I had not imagined her to be a living gem, and perhaps competition for my own renowned beauty.

  Marek looked at her as if he might devour her whole. Celeste drew back slightly from the attention and looked to Oleander for support. Oleander crossed the room in seconds and whispered in her ear. Like the first pluck of a lyra, Celeste responded immediately. ‘Oleander found me.’ She rested her hand on Marek’s forearm and so began the lie.

  I had accepted situations like this many times before but somehow this was different and this new Celeste, though an old acquaintance, did not sit comfortably with me.

  ‘Oleander, perhaps Marek and I can talk privately for a moment,’ I suggested.

  Oleander sent me a warning look. Do not say anything more. This has nothing to do with you.

  Celeste smiled triumphantly as if she had passed some great test but there was also a look toward me as if somehow she was then superior.

  ‘It seems your Celestina had some witch blood after all,’ Oleander said to Marek, and more lies.

  ‘Celeste?’ queried Marek. ‘Is this true?’

  ‘Yes, it’s true, Marek,’ said Oleander, answering for her. ‘We just had to draw her out of her shell where she’d been hiding herself away all these years.’

  Marek wanted to believe this; therefore, he readily accepted the lie. He took Celestina’s offered hand, his look suggesting for just a moment that there was no-one else in the room, and I wondered if he had ever really looked at me the same way. He still had some unfinished business elsewhere and walked up close to Oleander.

  ‘What have you done to me?’

  ‘Nothing that would not have happened anyway.’

  ‘You cannot keep me here. I am taking Celeste back to my island.’

  ‘I do not think so. In time you will be happy here, Marek. Time will heal your resentment.’

  This infuriated Marek and he grabbed his sister by the shoulders. Before he had a chance to shake her he was thrown back into the air with invisible hands landing him on the far wall.

  Except for me, no-one moved to help him but he shrugged me off anyway. Marek rubbed the back of his head, which had taken most of the impact. My help was wasted here. It was clear he no longer wanted my attention.

  ‘You are no sister of mine.’

  He grabbed Celeste’s hand and turned to leave.

  Jean moved to follow but Oleander told him to stay.

  Celeste gave me a backward look. Had I detected some triumph over her trophy? For Marek was not only the brother of a powerful witch, he was also potentially joint ruler and something of a prize catch for any strigoi female, and this match seemed to meet with Oleander’s approval.

  I felt snubbed and in that moment after they left, I experienced another emotion that I had not felt for years: jealousy.

  Marek

  Celeste and I would find a way out of here. I did not care where she had been or how she came to be with Oleander but I knew, for the sake of us both, I must get her back to my island. It was not safe here.

  I took her to my room and shut the door. It was the first chance I’d had to really look at her and take all of her in. She was a dark beauty. I could not believe she now spoke. Never had I heard her voice. It crackled slightly at the beginning of her sentences after its long hibernation.

  I sat her down at my dressing table and told her of my plan to return home and take her with me.

  ‘That hole!’ she said.

  Celeste was confused. Poor girl I thought. She did not remember what I told her about the island. Who knew what Oleander had exposed her to?

  ‘My sister is evil. There are things you may not know about her.’

  ‘Really?’ she answered too casually, distracted by my objects on the dresser, the pictures on the walls and the clothes hanging in the closet. She picked up the shell necklace from my island and examined and admired its rainbow effect in the light. It was almost as if I was not in the room. I noticed the brown rose carving I made for her sat on a black satin ribbon around her neck.

  ‘Celeste, please listen to me. You know that I must escape before this evil takes over. I must not succumb to the miscreant within me.’

  ‘Miscreant?’ This had momentarily captured her attention and her wandering eyes glanced in my direction before attaching to something else.

  ‘Yes. I cannot tell you what I have done and what my own sister has done.’

  ‘Hmm.’

  ‘Celeste,’ I said a little exasperated. ‘Are you listening to me?’

  ‘Of course, Marek but I am already weary of this conversation.’

  If I had not known her before I would say she was rude and shallow.

  ‘Do you want to go into town?’ she suddenly asked. Like a puppy suddenly thrown a new toy she came at me excitedly. ‘Yes. That’s what we’ll do. That will cheer you up. We’ll do some hunting and then dance into the night.’ She did a twirl and her skirts swished back and forth. ‘Now what will I wear?’

  Perhaps, I wondered, she had lost her mind. The Celeste I rescued from the farm was humble, not fickle. Oleander had bewitched her with finery. Her newfound status had gone to her head.

  ‘Celeste. How did you find your voice again?’

  She cleared her throat and, looking like a trapped bird, her eyes darted around the room.

  ‘It was Oleander. She used some healing magic.’

  It made sense but still left me to wonder why. She was trying to keep me here perhaps. Celeste was a lure.

  ‘How did she find you?’

  ‘It is easy for someone like her. Oleander knows things.’

  ‘Did you find your mother?’

  ‘Yes. I found my mother and my father. They are doing very well and were so happy to see me. I will visit them again soon.’

  She lied but I did not know why. Celeste, I believe, had never met her father.

  Celeste took my hand and flashed her dark eyes at me. It was a look that could break apart any man’s heart, especially mine.

  ‘Celeste…’

  She leaned into me with her hands against my chest, her face upturned. I bent to kiss her and my worries temporarily faded. Her lips were cool and soft and I cradled her head in my hands. I was suddenly delirious with desire and wondered if I could stay in control of my senses. I drew back from her lips and she fought to stay close. I pulled her hands away from my chest and the shirt she had begun to untie.

  She examined me with a cold vacant stare, before suddenly releasing me, annoyed that I did not yield at that moment. I stepped forward to touch her, reassuring her that I did want her badly but that it was not the time; that I had much to take in, that there was still much to do. She tossed her head casually, uncaring and moving further fro
m me, leaving me the one to feel empty and rejected.

  ‘Before you say any more I must tell you that I really like your sister and believe you are quite wrong about her. I like living here and I’m not going anywhere, but you can go if you like. Though I doubt you’ll get far.’

  I was stung by her dismissal, her sudden coldness. She confused my emotions, even more than Zola’s mysterious ways.

  ‘Oh, and please don’t call me Celeste anymore. I am Celestina.’ And she turned the door handle.

  My stomach began to spasm and I fell forward onto the floor. It was not yet a day since the wolf incident and I knew what was coming.

  Celeste did not rush to me but seized the opportunity to depart from the room and leave me to my pain. I did not know which was worse: the emptiness in my stomach or the void in my heart from her departure.

  Another came instead.

  ‘It is time Marek. I must say you are hard to change. But Brother, if you do not follow your instinct you will die.’

  ‘Get out,’ I screamed, but it was unconvincing to say the least.

  Oleander held out her hand and for the first time the sight of warmth from her was overwhelming. Her touch calmed me and I felt like a docile beast begging for her approval. I howled like a wounded animal. What I would have given to feel normal again.

  ‘Come Marek.’

  ‘No,’ I pleaded but it was pathetic. ‘I can’t.’ I was on my knees crying into my lap from the pain. Only Oleander’s soft voice seeped into my head; everything else around me seemed to drop away as if the candles had all burnt down, and I was already dead.

  ‘I can help you,’ she said. ‘I am your sister and we will forever be bound by blood. I can look after you. Don’t fight what you are.’

  I closed my eyes and tried to remember my father and my island but they seemed like a tiny speck in my mind. All that consumed me was my hunger and the affliction.

  ‘Mama would have wanted this,’ she said. ‘She would have been proud of both of us.’