by Jasmine Walt
People who had betrayed their own kind? I don’t ask why anyone would do that. Mankind does it all the time. I’ve always considered it a sign of weakness or fear, though right now I find it hard to see the men who attacked us as driven by anything other than blind fury.
“And the one that ran off?”
Tess frowns. “To alert the Maltorim of our location, I’m sure.”
“Tell me more about the Strigoi and the Maltorim then.”
Over the course of the next hour, Tess explains to me in detail about the Strigoi. They are the elemental race of water with an ability to change their essence from a human appearance to animal. Most are good, here to hunt the Cruor, which I come to learn are, in majority, bloodsucking monsters—earth elementals originally meant to purge the evil from mankind. So much for that idea. William is one of the few exceptions, but he is also part Ankou, and perhaps that is what sets him apart.
As Tess describes the Maltorim, her tone is dark and heady. They are a preternatural council comprised mostly of Cruor, thought by some to be messengers of the Universe. But rumor is they are not the true messengers—they are imposters with self-serving agendas who have brainwashed the masses of elemental races.
The rest of what Tess says sweeps by me, unabsorbed. I know all I need to know to get by, to do what I need to do and get out of here. Remembering the specifics are better served to people who plan to stick around. Like William.
The silence that falls on the room makes my skin itch. I drum my fingers on a nightstand. Then I pick up the little wooden box that’s sitting there and examine it. I wind a small metal piece at the bottom.
“What’s this?” I ask Tess. I’ve never seen anything like it before, not in this lifetime, though I seem to know the word for it: music box. I open the lid, and sure enough, a song begins. The first few notes are almost familiar.
Tess snatches the music box from my hands and snaps the lid closed. “Don’t touch that.”
“Sorry.” I frown. “Where did it come from?”
She tucks it in a drawer. “I made it. It doesn’t even exist yet; just pretend you never saw it.”
Something tells me she shouldn’t have made it. This is the kind of thing that gets us trapped here. Making too many changes outside of what we have been sent to do, altering history further than we are allowed.
Before I can say another word, William calls us over to where he sits by the fire, his fist pressed to his mouth. He still wears no shirt, and it’s impossible not to take in his muscular chest and broad shoulders. I’m thinking of him more than I should allow. I pull myself together and lift my gaze to his face to see his eyes are already on me. My face heats. My heart is silenced by his intensity.
“The Maltorim have sent their warriors,” he says. “The Mort community is larger than we anticipated, or growing too rapidly. Why else would the Marked Ones be here?”
I take it the ‘Marked Ones’ are the Strigoi marked with the Ansuz runic letter. I don’t answer William’s question, though. The question is clearly intended for Tess.
“The Maltorim should be working with us,” she says. “Not that they ever do.”
“Unless they are here to deal with my kind,” William replies solemnly.
I shake my head. “Your kind?”
He turns to me. “It wouldn’t be the first time the Maltorim were more concerned with the dual-natured than the Morts.”
Tess cuts in before I can ask what he’s talking about. “But why protect the Morts? The last time the Maltorim did that...”
Their eyes meet in a knowing I cannot share, but I feel it’s nothing good.
“Another army?” William asks. His eyebrows cut lower over his eyes. “It would risk too much to do that here, to do that now.”
Tess’ expression is apologetic and, for the first time, I see her as vulnerable. I wish I were strong enough to be her rock, though I’m sure she would just turn me away.
William’s sorrowful eyes aren’t directed toward me, although my stomach still sinks when I see his expression. He devotes his attention to Tess and rakes his hand through his hair.
“If they are trying to stop us from moving the Morts, that means the Maltorim want the Morts here,” he says. “Which means those Strigoi that attacked us tonight have the resources and strength in numbers that we do not.”
I wait for someone to look at me so I can respond, but when that doesn’t happen, I interrupt. “Then we have to fight the Morts and these Strigoi—these Marked Ones.”
Tess lets out a bark of laughter. “You say it like it’s nothing.”
This time, I’m not offended by her biting sarcasm. I’ve noticed the way she’s tugging on her earlobe, which I’m starting to think is a sign she’s distressed. She’s scared and defensive.
“I didn’t mean—”
“You don’t know what you are doing or what you are up against,” she says. “We aren’t prepared for this. It is one thing to fight the Morts but another entirely to fight the Maltorim.”
That’s not what I want to hear. “If it’s hopeless, it should mean nothing if I leave.”
“No,” William says. “Tess is right: we aren’t prepared for this. We don’t walk away, though. Whatever we do, we fight. Any elemental would tell you that is your only chance for survival.”
Tess folds her arms across her chest. “We don’t have time for pep talks, William.”
She crosses the room and grabs a large, leather-bound book from a shelf beside the door, then returns to sit beside me. She opens to the first page and gently traces her hand over a symbol much like a star within a circle, but she quickly stops and flips through to a later page.
“Cord, this war has been going on for some time. It’s not just our war against the Morts. It’s the war among the races that create the Morts in the first place. We’re just cleaning up the mess. Unfortunately, there is more to learn than we have time to teach.”
I swallow, not sure I want to know anymore, not sure I can take any more. I just want to go back to the life I belong in. But I manage a nod and stare at the displayed pages.
Tess continues with the details I don’t care to hear. “The Cruor should have eradicated the evil in humans, but instead became evil themselves. They sustain their immortal life by drinking the blood of humans.”
“And your creator sent them?”
“You could say that,” she says. “We are told the tale of the Universe, of an entity that has always been and always will be, the ones who oversee our planet, who create but cannot destroy. When the creation of Cruor went wrong, the Strigoi were sent to stop them.”
William lowers his head and pinches the bridge of his nose. “The war started first among them. That is when the others came.”
“The Ankou?” I ask.
“Us,” she confirms. Her tone and patience right now reveal an almost sentimental air about her, and I wonder if I’d been too quick to let her usual attitude fool me. “We were supposed to bring peace with our magic and were also intended to do as we do today—reap the spirits of immortals who have met a final death. Remember how I told you that when the Ankou arrived, they brought with them the ability for other elementals to cross-breed?”
She says this with such gravity that confusion sweeps through me. “Yes?”
“There is a reason the Maltorim doesn’t like that. Dual breeds have less pronounced weaknesses and a wider range of abilities, which make them a threat,” she explains. “And also an asset to the humans. They are the most capable of actually protecting humans against the darker elementals.”
Tess spends the next hour showing me these things in her book, as though I need to be convinced. What is there to convince me of? I do not bother to doubt things any more than I dare to trust them. I just listen, only wanting to learn enough to get by.
She flips back to the front of the book and shows me the star within the circle once more. “This pentagram indicates creation is not done,” she says. She touches the east point. “Air.
This is us, the Ankou.” She touches the bottom points of the star and names them each. “Fire, for the Chibold, and Earth for the Cruor.” She continues around to the west point. “Water, for the Strigoi.” Finally, she touches the point at the top. “This is the spirit.”
“The Morts?” I ask.
“No,” Tess says gravely. “Our world does not yet have an elemental for the spirit. Morts are merely the spirits of the elementals that have already existed.”
For all the answers Tess and William have, there are still things that even they do not know about this world. It’s hopeless.
Tess closes the book and returns it to the shelf. I expect her to talk some more, to explain and define and everything else she has done, to drone on in her somber tone with words and ideas that hold no meaning for me. But instead, Tess grabs her coat, her boots thud across the ground, and she walks outside, the door creaking closed behind her and shutting with a quiet puff.
10
January 1692
I’m alone with William. My heartbeat ratchets up. I’m suddenly so alert I think I’ll never sleep again, and I don’t know if it’s because I’m worried about Tess or excited to be alone with William.
My attention darts to him. “Is she okay?”
“She’ll be back.”
I pull the blanket Tess gave me tighter around my shoulders. “I wish I could go back.” I swallow around a lump in my throat. “I can’t get stuck here, like you guys said.” I look up to him pleading. “I can’t.”
A long silence stretches between us. He crosses the room and slides a large leather pouch from beneath the cot. Crouching beside it, he pulls out some clothes, then freezes, a crumpled shirt in hand, and slants his gaze toward me.
“Sorry,” I say, and quickly look away, thinking perhaps he wants some privacy.
I hear more shuffling. Then his footsteps crossing the room. The fire casts his shadow over me, and he sits on the floor right beside me.
“Cord...”
When I look up, he’s holding a small doll, staring down at it in his hands.
“My mom thought I was going to be a girl,” he says. He chuckles, but there’s another emotion behind that. Sadness. A lingering sadness.
“You okay, William?”
He nods, swallowing, then pushes his arm toward me, holding out the doll. “Here,” he says. “For when you return to your daughter.”
“I—I—” I’m on the verge of tears. “I couldn’t take that from you. Your mom gave it to you.”
“Not exactly,” he says. “But come on...I don’t need it. Your little girl, she needs it.”
I hold the blanket around my shoulders with one hand and reach out to take the doll with my other. I hold the doll in my lap. It’s made of rags. Strings of fabric make a mop of brown hair, and holes are worn in the skirt of the doll’s blue dress. There’s a smudge of dirt on her face and a rip in the arm.
“It’s perfect,” I whisper, staring in awe.
“You’re going to get back to her, Cordovae,” he says in a low, hoarse voice. “It’ll all work out. You’ll see.”
I press my lips together and nod. “Thank you.”
I set the doll aside. I won’t be able to bring it with me back to my cabin in Salem—they’re all a little off kilter there these days, thinking dolls are voodoo. But I will bring it back to Anna. William has given me hope of that.
In that moment, my feelings for William shift. I can trust him. Why do I feel as though he’s the only man I’ve ever been able to say that about? William hasn’t just given me a doll. Hasn’t just given me hope. He’s given me this idea...this idea that I could love a man. And that scares the hell out of me.
I glance up, catching his soft gaze. An urge to kiss him flits through me, but I tamp it down.
“Thanks again,” I say.
“It’s nothing. Come, now. We better check that arrow wound for an infection.” He moves to my side and slides the blanket away from my shoulder to check my wound. As he does, he chuckles. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many freckles.”
I smile, thankful for his light tone during such a stressful time, but my heart is racing and my mouth is dry, so when I finally speak, my voice comes out shaky and nervous.
“Verity says it’s the curse of having fair skin.”
“No, absolutely not a curse. That red hair of yours however...” he starts, and playfully I slap his arm. He grins and raises his eyebrows at me.
It feels good to be this close to him. Like a warm, buzzing feeling that makes me lightheaded and induces fear in me that I’ll become addicted to being around him. Suddenly, the fire in the cabin seems to combat the winter chill too easily. The sudden heat makes my stomach dip and flutter. I need to shift the focus, before I really lose my head over him.
“Does the wound look all right?” I ask.
He peels back the bandage Tess placed earlier and assesses the wound. “It’s superficial. You should heal quickly.”
“I should?”
His canines elongate, and he bites into his arm. He holds his wound out toward me. “Drink. My blood will heal you faster than the herbs.”
I stumble beneath his firm eye contact and swallow around the tightness in my throat. “Because you are, uh.” I can’t even think straight with him looking at me. “I—uh—you’re also—you’re a Cruor.”
“Do you think of me as a monster now?”
Isn’t that what Cruor are?
“N-no,” I answer. It takes me a moment to realize I’m answering truthfully. William is different.
His own wound has almost healed completely. I feel guilty that he hurt himself for no reason, but I am not willing to drink his blood. I’ll wait for the herbs I’ve consumed to do their job.
William drops his arm to his side and raises his eyebrows. His expression wavers, and the shakiness in my chest melts away a little. “I know you want to get back to your past. That you want to remember.”
“Of course.”
“Suppose remembering were a curse?”
“What do you mean? Do you know something else about my past?” I can’t hide the hope in my voice.
“I’m sorry, Cordovae, but I know nothing of your past that you didn’t know when you first encountered me. However, I remember my own. Sometimes it’s better not to remember. Sometimes it’s better not to go back.”
I shrug, dismissing his sentiment entirely. “What do you know, anyway?” I ask, suddenly defensive. “You couldn’t possibly understand.”
“No,” he says sternly. “You couldn’t possibly understand.”
There it is. That look in his eyes that tells me he’s hiding something. If it’s not something about me, though, then it’s something about him.
“Try me,” I say, challenging him.
“You’ll hate me,” he says. His anger has already dissolved, and it’s not hard to see the emotion it was meant to mask: sadness.
“There’s nothing that could be so horrible,” I say, “not as horrible as what I’ve lived through.”
My words freeze on my lips. What have I lived through? What did I even mean by saying that? Something in my mind tries to break free, to answer my questions, but instead I just feel uncomfortable. Uneasy. Disturbed.
William raises an eyebrow.
I shake my head. “I’ll hate you more if you don’t tell me.”
He exhales slowly and sits back, resting his arms on his knees.
“I was not born a dual-breed,” he begins. “This is why I cannot walk in the sun and why I can no longer consume the poisonous plants that keep most Ankou alive. Had I been born of equal parts, my dual nature would have been a gift. A dangerous gift to possess, perhaps, but a gift nonetheless.”
I feel all the muscles in my face tense. “Why would I hate you for that?”
“Because of what I did when I was turned.”
A silent moment stretches between us. He’s staring at his hands. Finally, he speaks. “I had been born Ankou. But late one night, whi
le out gathering food for my family, I was attacked by a Cruor. I awoke to a bloodlust so unbearable I could not control it. My maker and my coterie thrilled in their own innate nature and wanted the same for me. ‘Why should we fight what we are?’ they said. ‘Why ought we fight mother nature?’”
His voice filled with contempt, he continues, “They enjoyed my bloodlust as a newborn Cruor. They cheered me on as I hunted one human after the next, blinded by thirst. They chained me in silver and starved me for months. Then...” William’s head tilts, his expression almost daring. “Then they brought me home.”
His jaw tightens, and his eyes glisten. The pain in his voice is too raw to have no effect; I am wounded and unnerved by it. “Home, Cordovae, to my family. Home to where my hunger so overtook me that I slaughtered everyone I had ever loved. It was not until my hunger was sated and I was standing there among the carnage, among my coterie’s laughter and cheers, that the weight crushed into my chest over what I had done.”
I can’t look at him while he tells me these things. It doesn’t seem right. It feels like he shouldn’t tell me this. Or perhaps I just don’t want to absorb the point he is making.
“You see, Cord? I am a monster.”
I don’t know what to say. It would be insensitive to tell him that my past is not so dark. Insensitive for me to tell him that, if I remembered, it would not be such things. I am not like him. I’m not Cruor, and I do not have any kind of rage or bloodlust or anything he has experienced. Though my heart breaks for him, though I understand why he would not want to go back to the way his life was before, his story has no impact on my own desires.
“I’m sorry,” is all I can say.
“But you still want to go back,” he says, defeat winding though his words.
“I’m sorry,” I repeat, for a different reason this time. “But you...But I wouldn’t...We’re not the same.”