As soon as we retrieved our little luggage (which was all packed by Lucrecia of course), we went out of the airport. It was freezing cold outside. January in South America was hot and heavy, yet here it was winter, and winter in Scotland was definitely not winter in South America! Snow covered the sidewalks and frozen flakes fell silently on us. It was beautiful scenery though cold as it was.
Luckily they had some heavy winter jackets in the airplane! It was very smart of somebody to have a stock of those waiting to be needed in the plane. Perfect for a getaway! Maybe a little bit too perfect even . . .
Our car was waiting for us as soon as we crossed the airport’s doors. It was a dark red SUV with dark windows. It seemed comfortable enough, and it would blend with traffic. It was nothing to attract too much attention to us.
Corbin walked assertively to the parked SUV and opened the side door. He held it open for us while we got in and then jumped in the front seat.
“Corbin my man!” Squealed the driver and gave Corbin a high five. He was a dark-skinned, almond-eyed boy. He was probably in his early twenties and had a very friendly face. His broad smile reflected his friendship with Corbin and how happy he was to see him.
Dark brown eyes crowned his affable gaze. His bone structure was broad and framed almost perfect features: faultless jaw-line, a straight strong nose and high cheekbones. He was definitely a very handsome man. His beauty was not straightforward but more of the guy-next-door kind. Not exuberant but completely approachable, and adorable!
His scent though was somewhat disturbing. He smelt sweet and tasty, like warm bread on a Sunday afternoon. It was very subtle at first, but it slowly grew to be intense, compelling, and almost too enticing to restrain myself. He was deliciously human.
I could feel my nostrils quivering involuntary. It was becoming hard for me to stay still, I wanted to capture more of this sweet scent, I wanted to bury my fangs in his perfect flesh. To be completely honest, I wanted to make him my breakfast.
Jonathan noticed quickly enough. He very quickly wrapped his arm around me and held me tightly against his chest. With one hand he stroked my hair and held his firm grip and with the other he started rushing through his rucksack.
I could hear him fumbling about, looking for something with his free hand. Jonathan’s fragrant shirt against my face helped me forget the tasty smell that was driving me crazy before. Jonathan always smelt like home.
He finally found what he was looking for, a small silver hipflask with a glass top. He handed it to me immediately. I let my eyes fall on its glass cork and saw it looked dyed with a crimson tint. I fumbled with it lazily, yet it didn’t quite convince me. It still appealed me more to sink my fangs on our driver’s neck, but, what I wanted was apparently not an option.
My doubtful manner seemed to be clear to Jonathan and he decided to “convince” me further apparently. He took once more the hipflask from my hands and opened it. The slight smell from its luscious contents instantly called my attention. He had convinced me easily. Teasingly he moved the flask in front of my face and I wanted to speedily take it from his hands, but he was faster. I had completely forgotten about the poor driver, and wanted only the flask’s contents now.
After playing with me for a few seconds he finally handed me my prize. I swallowed it whole in a gulp. It was not warm and fresh like the driver would have been but it was satiating and delicious anyway. And most important of all, I had not killed our way out of the airport.
By the time I had decided not to eat the driver and grew nice and calm again we were already on our way. I started looking out of the window for there was not much more to do and while I delighted on the snowy countryside, I wondered when The Order would contact us.
Everyone except Corbin, the driver, Jonathan and I were asleep. Lucrecia looked like a porcelain doll with her dark lashes caressing like butterflies her silky cheeks. The twins were as eerie asleep as they were awake. Their eye movement was identical, and if one turned, the other moved too in a mirror-like manner.
I was also wondering who this human was, and why he was helping us. He surely knew enough about us to be our driver, but where did he come from? I decided to take advantage of my mental abilities and ask Corbin. It seemed like a useful way to practice and to keep myself from complete boredom.
I had to improve my skills, I knew I was not specific enough and I had not yet developed a way to veil my thoughts. Therefore I decided to practice.
First I imagined a big tunnel; big enough to crawl through it, going from me to Corbin. I pictured everything outside it blurry and unclear. The tunnel was strong and nothing could get out of it. It was smooth and like a vortex, if I left something inside it I would be sucked towards Corbin. Once I convinced myself it was strong and ready I let my question fall into the tunnel.
“Who is this guy?” I asked.
Corbin startled a bit at my mental question and quickly answered in the same way.
“He is a friend of mine, though he is human. Remember we said at some point that some humans were starting to realize things and even very mild inheritors were finding their way through the net to other vampires? Well, he is one of those. His wife discovered some years ago that something about her was not quite right.” he said and made a small pause. Corbin surely loved adding suspense to everything. As soon as he paused, my eyes unexpectedly started looking at the driver’s hands. They looked strong and young, and a simple gold band decorated his finger proudly.
“She was studied for many things because she started telling the doctors that she was not quite right.” Corbin had resumed his tale as if he had never made any pause, “The thing is they found her to be perfectly right, though some doctor decided to check her for porphyry. Porphyry is a disease that apparently tends to be mistaken for vampirism, and she knew that so when they said they were checking for porphyry, she started looking for other things.
My friend here, always supported her, and when she started looking for vampires in the net and believing she might have something to do with them, he was there. He never thought she was bonkers or anything like that. The thing is, after a few months of research and findings, she finally found real vampires.
To make things short, they got in touch with them and now belong to a very wide web of human friendly vampires and human donors. His wife happens to be a very mild vampire, and was lucky to find others because if not, she would have had no clue.
I’ve always had a really good relationship with these people, and when I needed them, they’ve always been there. They ask no questions and help as much as they can.” He finished saying this with the slightest nod of his head, and I was completely sure that nobody had the slightest clue of our conversation.
Corbin’s words made me really reflect on our driver. He must surely be a good guy; he seemed kind-hearted, understanding and reliable. He was reliable enough to risk his life for us that were not even human like he was.
My mind started wandering off to how many people actually knew about vampires. It was like a whole secret world within the world I had always known. How could some people not know about it? How did I live so many years knowing nothing? It was like needing glasses but never knowing it, until someday I started wearing the right kind of lenses and the world looked nothing like it used to.
I was drifting away in my mind until I suddenly realized the car had stopped. A big green pick-up truck was blocking our road and a very tall guy stood beside it with dark sunglasses.
He was pointing at an almost hidden, tiny road that appeared at our left. Its entrance was partly covered by some bushes, and getting in there would probably cost the SUV some serious scratches.
“Turn left” Corbin said aloud to the driver and woke James up. He sat straight and straightened his clothes. He looked at our surroundings and seemed calm though I was sure he had no idea of where the road would take us.
Without flinching the driver turned left and started the bumpy road that would take us God-knows-where.
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The winding road was so narrow that if we had wanted to turn it would have been impossible. Bushes and marshes packed its sides so tightly that at times we had to go even slower because a branch was deeply scraping some paint off. We never went faster then 20 miles an hour in the easiest parts of the road . . . that alone can give you an idea of how complex this hidden path was.
After what seemed to be unending hours, we got to a clearing in front of us. The road suddenly grew very wide and got to a perfectly circular area that had a dark-blue SUV parked to the left. To the far end of the clearing the road narrowed again and disappeared between the tightly packed bushes.
When we got to the clearing a dark haired woman opened the door of the blue SUV and motioned for us to stop. She walked very calmly to our car and stopped beside Corbin’s window.
“It’s time to change cars” she said and turned back to her car, when she was halfway there she stopped and added: “and tell your driver to go back home”.
Corbin simply patted our driver’s leg and then hugged him. He hugged him like most guys do when they hug a friend. He patted his back and held him tightly for a single second, just as if too much affection would make them feel uncomfortable.
“Wake up people!” James said, “We are here.”
Ginny was the last to come out of the SUV, we had all gotten out of it and waited reluctantly in the clearing. Corbin was the first to move towards the open door of the blue SUV and James walked right behind him.
Behind us, I could here the engine of our own ride starting once again and its wheels turning on the lose gravel. We had no turning back now. I hoped the odds were on our side.
We got in, not really knowing what to expect and found it to be bigger than it looked from the outside. I sat with Jonathan to my left and Lucrecia to my right. She seemed to want to keep me close, and I really did not mind.
The dark haired woman sat in front of us and a big, Asian guy sat at the back. I could not see much of the driver, and had no clue about its gender. It could be a man or a woman, for the driver seemed to be tall but no other features could be told from the back. His or her hair was cut short and tucked in a woollen cap, so it was impossible to tell much more about the driver.
We were tightly surrounded I suddenly realized. If we wanted to escape it would be very tough if not impossible.
Not one of us said a word while we were smoothly taken towards their place, and not one of them uttered a word either.
We probably drove for about one hour until the van stopped in a halt. The dark haired lady jumped up and opened the door. She was very fast, and unlike the rest of our clan, she moved nothing like a human.
“Follow me, and don’t stay behind.” she said in a firm voice and started to make her way between the tall frozen grass and the snow covered bushes.
We all walked behind her without making a sound. We were silent like shadows, and kept a tight formation. She was at the front leading the way, and the Asian big guy was tightly keeping our back.
The path we took between the bushes was probably taken frequently since footmarks were almost visible in the virgin snow and the few patches of grass grew short. We turned right and then left many times, making our sinuous way like a snake. Nobody spoke while we walked, it was probably too uncomfortable to make small-talk with these guys and probably they did not trust us enough to speak.
We walked perhaps some ten to twenty miles before the thick bushes became less dense and a big country-house became visible in front of us. It was tall and white-washed, green wooden shutters adorned each window and green tiles crowned the roof. A small flagstone patio extended itself to the front of the house and wooden porch seemed to go all the way around.
It was an adorable house that probably dated back to the early twentieth century, yet a sense of abandon lingered in the air. The plants in the patio were unkempt and the paint of the shutters was peeling off. Though gorgeous as the house looked at first sight it was actually quite abandoned. Not much seemed to be living in it except perhaps a ghost or two. It was the perfect facade for hiding.
Instead of leading us all the way up to the front door, the dark-haired woman made us go to the back of the house. The backdoor was heavily shut with wooden planks, but the basement door was unbolted. She pulled at it and it easily opened without the slightest creek. A light seemed to be shining all the way down in the basement. She didn’t go in; instead she held the door and motioned for us to get inside.
James was the first to cautiously go in, closely followed by the twins. They seemed to be pulled by something in there and were not restraining themselves at all.
I descended the creaking wooden floors behind Jonathan and with Lucrecia and Corbin tightly at my back. It was dusty and smelled a bit mouldy, like an old cellar after being closed for a very long time. It seemed completely deserted except for one small thing: it was very warm down there.
We heard the door being tightly closed behind us and neither of our guides came down. They left us alone for the rest of our journey.
Once we where all downstairs, I evaluated our surroundings: I needed to really look at where we’d gotten into. It was a very simple, softly-lit basement with not much furniture. It had dusty wooden floors and bookshelves that covered every piece of wall around us. Books old and new covered every inch of them and sat there like spectators of different eras.
Nobody could be seen anywhere down there. For a moment panic almost got hold of me and I believed it had all been some kind of a trap. We had been misled and like fools let ourselves get trapped in a cellar that looked like an old library! How could we have been so foolish?
I wanted to tell Jonathan to get me out of here; that I wanted to go home and kiss him. I wanted him to make all bad things go away. I was scared and took a tight hold of his hand when somebody opened the door at the top of the stairs that lay in front of us.
“Come on up here” a man gestured to us from the doorway, “what are you waiting for down there? The tea is getting cold.” he said and disappeared back into the light.
Jonathan tightened his grip on my hand and walked forward. This time, it was our turn to be the first ones.
The stairway was made out of very old and somewhat unstable black wood. It creaked and gave in a bit under every step we took. Our weight seemed almost too much for it to bear, and I was very happy when we finally made it all the way up. I was not planning on discovering the effect of wood on me, and especially not in this remote place. What had these vamps been thinking when they left a stairway like that one there? It was simply reckless.
The light past the doorway was almost too strong to withstand. After being in the book-lined basement it seemed almost too bright, but we walked towards it anyway. It was time to fulfil my destiny.
A brightly lit dinning-room stood past the door. It was old-fashioned and grandly decorated. The lighting was completely artificial for thick drapes covered the windows and even most of the walls. A long table was at the centre of the room. It was full of cakes and multi-coloured macaroons, and four steaming “Willow” teapots where waiting on it. Matching saucers and cups where ready in each seating spot, everything was ready for a tea party.
The man that had gestured for us to go upstairs was seated at the head of the table. To his right was our dark-haired guide and to his left was our other guide, the huge guy. They all had some tea already served and were merrily sipping from their cups. I felt as Alice entering one of Mad Hatter’s tea parties.
“Well sit down and join us!” the man said, as if it was the most normal thing for us to do. “The tea will only be warm for so long, so . . . what are you waiting for?”
He sipped joyfully at his tea. His hands were slightly wrinkled and his hair was almost fully white. He was the first vampire I ever saw that looked actually old.
Reluctantly our party looked at each other. We would surely get nothing out of these people by just standing there, and we had gone a long way to meet them. Still, it was quite od
d that after all the secretiveness they where all merrily sipping tea. Perhaps they where all bonkers after all . . .
Lucrecia was the first to motion for the table. She tugged at my arm and sat beside the very untalkative dark-haired woman. After vacillating for a very small second I gave in and sat beside her and Jonathan sat immediately keeping my other side. The rest of our family joined the tea-party too; it was probably the only way to get to know those weird vamps.
The old man at the head of the table gave us all a broad smile as soon as we were all seated. “I’m glad you finally decided to join us!” he said and gestured for us to get some tea.
We all poured the green liquid on our cups and I wondered what kind of tea it was. It didn’t smell of green tea, it smelled very herbal and strong; it was something I had never smelt before. I just hoped it was not some kind of poisonous herb or something like that . . . I wasn’t very sure I should drink it at all.
“Well Iris, come on, drink up your catnip tea honey. It can smell somewhat funny but it surely is good for you!” the man at the head of the table said and winked an eye at me.
How on Earth did he know my name? This was all too bizarre for me, I just wanted to go back home and curl in bed. Yet, I said nothing of the sort and simply took the cup and sipped some tea.
It was not as bad as it appeared to be; it had an almost minty pang to it and reminded me of something I used to drink as a kid I think. Some memory started to cling somewhere in my mind, but as fast as it appeared it faded away.
“Good girl” Now chug it down with a tasty macaroon, these are simply delightful!” He added and took a bite of his own macaroon.
I decided to obey; after all, the tea had been bearable. Perhaps even nice I must admit. I stretched my free hand and chose a pink macaroon from the plate to my left. It surely looked tasty, so I nibbled at it. It was completely delicious! The old guy had surely been right, these macaroons where amazing.
Distract my hunger Page 11