Jonny opened his eyes. The darkness of the room was barely a shade different from the nothing of unconsciousness. He lay still, waiting for some sense of vision to return to him. The distant tapping of water dripping nearly lulled him back to sleep but the thought of Julie kept him focused. And the memory of Hank's words and the hope they tried so hard to instill within him. He wanted so badly to believe. He wanted so badly for there to be a way out. For there to be a way to stop the Emperor and save his sister. The room was dimly aglow now. Lost in his thoughts, his eyes had done the work of adjusting to his surroundings. He rose to his feet and dusted off his clothes. For the first time in days he was hungry. Truly hungry. His appetite had dissipated terribly in the last few weeks since the Emperor derailed his existence into this new terrifying path.
A Foederati soldier stood stationed at the entrance of his quarters. For some reason, Jonny hadn't expected that. But it didn't take much time for it to dawn on him that there could be no stone left unturned to show any hint of alliance between himself and them. He decided it was time he had a decent meal. "Hey buddy, you guys just gonna let me starve or what?"
***
Every day was a struggle to get by but somehow, day in and day out, between the early hours of getting the boys up for school, walking them to the bus stop, watching the Imperial soldiers sneer at the three of them, cooking the food their neighbors had so generously donated, cleaning the house, and spending every spare second watching those bastards from the bedroom window and taking note after tedious note, Alexandria was beginning to step into a rhythm. The only stumbling blocks she foresaw were the growing need to find a job to support herself and her brothers and just how she would manage to keep the boys safe when she was ready to take action.
She needed something. Someone. To help. Someone to share the burden. Or at the very least someone to be willing to take on two small boys in the event she got herself maimed or worse, killed. She'd found her mind wandering night after night, thinking about the Foederati. Why there were no whispers or shadows of the rebellious faction within Shelby. She had lived here all her life and met many people, and she was sure she was not alone in her fury against the Empire. Hers wasn't even the only family who had been struck with such a devastating loss at the blood-soaked hands of the Imperial soldiers on this block. She could only imagine how many people had been tortured or murdered within the entire town.
Someone had to be out there. Ready to strike or... perhaps willing to try. She scribbled down the latest details from Imperial Fuckface # 3's latest watch and closed up her notebook and put it inside the dresser drawer beneath her father's underwear. At least there, she knew the boys wouldn't come across it. The last thing she needed was to get them involved in her planning. She couldn't bear the thought of those beautiful little faces, so much like her father's, yielding even a scratch.
For probably the thousandth time since that shotgun blast, tears raced their way toward her chin sending a chill up her spine and a shudder through her frame. She couldn't let the despair take over now. She had to be strong. She stiffened and wiped her face just in time for the sound of the bus pulling up to leak in through the open window. Somewhere somebody was waiting to drive these fuckers out of town. And it would take a lot of swallowed tears to find them. So she swallowed them now in a sort of metaphorical pact with herself. She would find them. She would do whatever it takes. Composed, she walked out to meet the boys at the bus stop, a smile on her face for the first time in weeks.
***
He was in her dreams again that day. The tall muscular blond one. The one who had taken everything from her. Rosadelma hadn't gone a single sleep cycle without reliving the exact moment he took away her last drop of blood and the light drifted out of her eyes into the very ether itself. His name was Harek. It hadn't resurfaced at first, but after seven days of dreaming about him, she finally remembered the name the other vampires had called him. In her sleep, her lips mouthed the word against her teeth.
Harek.
Her resolve to make them all pay had dwindled as of late. Even though she knew the chances of finding this one creature in all the world were slim at best, she wanted nothing more now but to find him. To find him and him alone. To make him pay for what he had done to her sweet Shanene. The dream changed now and she was clawing at his throat, ripping away his flesh, lunging for his left eye with her teeth. A large grin grew on her face as she turned over and savored Harek's death.
***
After wolfing down the jerky and fruit the soldier had brought him, Jonny sat watching the dimly lit cavern walls, analyzing every grain of dust, every pointed hanging stalactite, like jagged teeth trapping him within the mouth of an angry head buried beneath the earth. He had just started to drift back to sleep when the Emperor's voice spoke to him again. This time, its tone and tempo equally and deceptively gentle. "I judge you have slept well, Mr. Cross?" He paused for a long moment.
There was no way to return an answer with the guard standing firm, so Jonny merely looked in the man's direction to give answer.
"Yes, of course. I'm not at all surprised. They would know better than to leave you unguarded during the daylight hours with no vampire awake to stop you walking right out the front door." The words "front door" sounded alien from such a tongue. "No doubt, I have a way around that. For now though, do your best to keep comfortable. In a few hours you will request to see the man Hank and when he comes to you, I'll have further instructions." Fear struck Jonny then. How would he know when to call on the man? Was there an exact moment or was it arbitrary so long as he waited for the mid afternoon hours. There was a long silence and Jonny felt the urge to scream.
"Your heart rate is quite high, Mr. Cross. Calm down. This will all be over soon and your sweet little sister will be returned to you." The words stung even in that mock voice of pity. Jonny decided the time must not be all that important or Joseph would have made his instructions explicit. Another bout of silence surprisingly made Jonny wish the Emperor had more to say. If for nothing else but to keep his mind occupied. To keep away the wandering thoughts that roamed inside his head, taunting him, dismantling his nerves little by little.
Jonny took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He would need to calm down if he was going to have any chance of getting through this. He focused back on those same stalactites and tried to replace his original image of teeth with one of dripping icicles from snowy days in the city with his family. A time so long ago and so very far away. He could still remember the look on Julie's face when he hit her in the head with one of the biggest snowballs he had ever seen in his life. How she had screamed at him with that tiny bulldog's war cry from delicate red lips struggling to spit out the cold flakes of white powder covering her mouth.
Jonny smiled. Some memories shine through even the darkest clouds.
Chapter 24
Utter Silence
Fall leaves of gold, red, and orange floated down from the trees from both sides of the road as Hank drove the small Volkswagen up the curvy hill. Wind blew against the car with the rising voice of a wraith. Hank's grip tightened around the steering wheel and as he slowed to steady the car around a particularly narrow turn, a small secluded old blue house crept out from between the trees. There was no mailbox and the house looked as old as the woods that surrounded it. This was the place. Hank stopped the car, examining the land around the house where it met the road looking for some sign of where the driveway hid beneath the crisp blanket of autumn. Another gust of wind burst through and swept an armful of leaves to the East, revealing a small patch where gravel met grass and Hank decided he could figure out the rest from there.
He pulled the car into the driveway and put it in park then fumbled around inside the glove compartment until he found the small remote control device. A glowing red light came on when he pushed the power button and a metallic scraping scratched through the windows from outside into his ears. A moment later and a small dark opening grew in the ground ahead of Hank an
d he eased the car into drive and gently tapped the gas. The car edged forward toward the opening, meeting slanted earth and sliding forward within until all around Hank, outside the windows was nothing but solid black earth swallowing the Volkswagen into oblivion. When the car was again level, buried beneath the yard, Hank killed the engine and pushed the button once more, watching as the last glow of grim gray light faded away into utter darkness.
A moment later, a bright fluorescent light flickered twice and then came to life, filling the odd chamber with white unnatural light. Now illuminated, the walls of mud, clay, and roots came alive with motion as insects of all kinds crawled, slithered, and burrowed through them. Hank shivered at the sight but shook off the chill of it, and opened the car door. Up above, the glow spread down from three long pale tubes of lights mounted on what appeared to be a dark army-green metal ceiling soiled with mud. Behind the Volkswagen, a crudely dug corridor led off to unseen chambers equally hidden beneath the ground.
Over the years, the Foederati had managed to create twenty-seven different subterranean safe houses like this one right under the Empire's collective nose. Hank stood in awe of the work that had been put into the place. He wasn't quite sure how he felt about squeezing through that narrow "hall" but he was far too tired to let his queasiness get the better of him. So, he took a deep breath and charged onward, walking fast enough that hopefully he wouldn't notice anything crawling around him. On him would be another story altogether.
***
The deep oblivion of dreamless sleep dropped away with no seeming transition as the familiar haze-like texture of some other reality came into focus all around the Queen. Half-crumbled and blackened buildings once adorned in bright neon city lights littered the horizon beneath a moon-lit sky. The shaded forms of vampires crowded the debris-scattered streets in the darkness, waiting for something with thickening anticipation and a growing hunger. They were dead to her. And not just like the rhythm-less hearts of her human vampire children, but completely foreign. She felt no connection or familiarity from them.
They were hers. Bellona's.
A wave of writhing swept up from the torrent of pale faces as they scattered toward the edges of the city, waiting... Waiting to be released. To feed. A tall male with long tangled blond hair and a thick beard, viking by the look of his build and features, stood in the middle of the charred remains of Necropolis and, by some synaptic means unknown to the Queen, he sent out the words "Go. Feed," to the entire horde of creatures, ancient and human alike. The vampires shot outward from every angle of the city, running, flying across the barren desert that separated them from the rest of the world. A dozen or so ancients swept into a small town a bit farther to the Southeast, its lone green sign reading CEDAR CITY as it blew back and forth from the gust of wind left in their wake.
Within seconds, the screams tore through the previously silent evening, rising in number and varying in pitch as hundreds of people were slaughtered and their blood drained, devoured. Among the dying, the Queen knew, saw, felt the hearts and minds of young Jackie's family and quickly realized this wasn't the present or the future, but the past. The bloodshed ignited a hunger within the Queen that would have left many human vampires guilt-ridden, but she was unable to feel such guilt. But love, she felt fully. More fully than any other creature that walked the earth. Love that knew no bounds, no sacrifice too great. She didn't love Jackie, in fact she had been surprised at how quick and biting the jealousy had been when she sensed the girl and Simon's lovemaking. But the fledgling's suffering would be great. The city of the dead, ironically reborn, would quickly reveal itself as the source of that suffering and the drastic brash of her actions would be greater.
She saw then, with vivid clarity, the last moments of Jackie's life as the anger flared out from her in rising chunks of bent steel and broken glass. The Queen had known of her power from the moment it sparked and she couldn't deny a sense of pride in the full development of its potential, but even it wouldn't save her from so many deadly creatures. Her power pushed away those closest only to reveal another layer of white flesh and sharp teeth. Before long, her strength was spent and they reached out for her and pulled, tearing limb from limb and flesh from bone, her solitary scream, blood-curdling and hate-filled right to the very end. The vision shifted and the multitude of shining stalactites along the ceiling of the Hive sparkled over Simon's head as he stood watching the Queen, her legs spread, face covered in sweat, a cry of pain betraying her soft once-reserved lips.
In that moment, the Queen could sense her vulnerability from Simon's mind. Images flashed in his head and he saw all the things she had been keeping from him. The uncertainties of her predictions in the past, the doubts, the lingering fears she'd kept to herself as she led her children through war and blood and death. But the most damning of all sent him to his knees as the last moments of Jackie's life played out in his mind like some internal psychological hell he couldn't escape. And when it was over, he stood. Her eyes met his in mid contraction, and she saw both the vain mask of her own face through his eyes and the torn bitter expression on his. And for that moment she knew what all the others had felt. All the suffering she had caused to bring them all this far. Sacrifices, all necessary to give them all a chance at some long shared collective future, but so many casualties along the way. And that love waved over her again. It was a tragic love. A love so broken no human could understand. A love only hinted at in the father who breaks the neck of his child to stop its suffering. A love that knows the depth of its own consequences.
But this was one consequence too many. One she couldn't bear. And yet, if she told him now, he would surely die. She had seen that too in the swift flash of a single image she watched them melt together, Jackie and Simon. She searched desperately for some sequence of events within the hierarchy of time and events that stretched out like branching synapses connecting and networking reality between these two children, their past, present, and future. Not one of the scenarios ended with Jackie's heart still beating. And the only one that ended with Simon anything but broken and empty led to death.
There were, she knew, scenarios she couldn't see. Factors she couldn't know. And even the ones she could see could be traps of time where the most important details stand in the shadows laughing back at her, but she found herself vacant of any hope. Either she could tell Simon what she had seen and he would die.
Or she could tell him nothing and let him spend the rest of his centuries stumbling from one day to the next, awash in loss and regret and fury.
She woke then from the vision and the darkness and opened her eyes. Simon lay there, eyes closed and sleeping soundly, his head pressed against her breast not as her lover but as her child and she knew then what she would have to do. Blood dripped down toward his motionless face from her own and with the flick of her tongue she caught it and tasted the heavy burden of her love.
And, in utter silence, the Queen wept.
Chapter 25
Pure Numb Desolation
Deep in the darkness of an unconscious mind, Bellona woke up. She knew her awareness wasn't quite real, wasn't quite hers, but it lived and that was enough for her. Her gracious host slept deeply now in a dreamless sleep and maybe with great effort and some coaxing of her own, she could wake it to do her bidding. She longed for her children. For her eldest human vampire and her one true love born of her own womb. She had learned little of what had happened since her life had been drained, but she had learned enough to know Josephus was still alive, fighting to end a growing rebellion enveloping him.
When she had first awoken in brief flashes of awareness, Ishan was at least awake within his own mind, experiencing hers. They thought his sense of identity was corrupted by the power of her blood within him, but she knew better. What lived within him wasn't merely her memories transferred through blood. Her essence had made the journey as well and now she was becoming more and more alert as time went on. The moment his eyes had opened with her mind in control, she had
wanted to find his brother. To try once more to make the bastard pay for what he had done to her.
Dear sweet strong Marcus. Destroyer of nations. Conjuror and conqueror of empires. How she loved her eldest child. And yet he wasn't her eldest by far. Josephus had woken within her womb nearly a century before but Josephus stopped being her child the moment he became her lover. She mourned then again for Marcus. He had come to her in the night, a warrior man, mortal coil wasting away, looking for clues to where his soldiers kept running away to die.
She'd had a mind to snap his neck at first but she could sense great strength and a careful calculating mind within him. With the flash of an image into the minds of her ancient children, he was overtaken and drained and given the baptismal fire of her blood. He awoke anew in darkness and quickly fell into place as her closest confidante. Second only to Josephus, he set the pieces moving to end the Roman Empire, he slew thousands for her throughout the centuries, and anything she asked, he would do.
When Joseph built his own empire and left her behind, sweet Marcus wanted his head. He might have had it too, if he'd been given the chance to build up his own army. To dismantle what Joseph had built brick by brick. But she had but to ask and he let the fire within him quench at her beckoning. Instead he was there for her in her loneliness. No one could take Joseph's place but he had done what no one else could to try.
She had wanted so badly to rule by her lover's side. But her love was too strong for her to bear losing him so when he refused her, she let the matter dissolve. She knew, sooner or later, he would need her again. And when that time came, she would be ready. And so it did.
The vampires of Necropolis spit on Joseph's constant blessings and joined the ranks of his enemies. And so, she had no choice but to come when he called for her. The great balance he had created had been toppled and so he needed a new weight to even things still. With a hint of desperation in her voice, she had requested Marcus to help him. Help his father, his true father. His father of darkness. They were all connected by her blood and so it didn't matter if they didn't agree, didn't see eye to eye, they could commune through her and finally build something new as one.
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