Within the Cards

by Donna Altman

  Ellie’s grandfather no longer lived by the vampire’s rules, and her grandmother was a witch that could tolerate the birth of a vampire child. They felt they were free to reproduce. With the procreation of the new race of half vampire, half witch, a race within these races began, and this secret society of crossbreeds grew at a rapid rate.

  Ellie’s grandfather was Ultress, the purebred vampire that became the ruler of the race known to immortals as the Witchyre race. From his eviction from the vampire clan, he grew a hatred for his own kind. He passed down his hatred for the hybrids to each of his offspring. This hatred was strong and unforgiving. This emotion of hatred that witchyres didn’t know until taught would prove to be the downfall of Ultress. Ellie was different. The only thing she hated was the monster they wanted her to be. At least before, I came to her and before her family erased her memory.

  As I recounted the stories of her past, her grandmother had many mystical powers. She was one of the most beautiful women among the witch family, and her name was Elizabeth. I was sure this was where Ellie got her unfathomed beauty. Elizabeth fell in love with the vampire that had been outcast by his own. She bore him several offspring. Pure witches were not true immortals. They were warm-blooded like humans, but had a life span that last for several hundred years. To humans this was an eternity and was immortality. To my kind, this was a mere short block of time that comes all too soon for the ones that cherish them.

  Ultress wanted to keep the mother of his children. He loved her, and he needed her powers to maintain his control and lordship over the newly formed immortal race. He knew she was aging, and her time on earth was growing closer to an end. He persuaded her to allow him to change her, and she vowed to the changing because she loved him and wanted to spend an infinity of time with the vampire she loved.

  After they had reproduced six children, she drank his venom one night as they made love. This changed her into the undead, but she retained her magical powers. She was no longer a purebred witch, but now she was a vampire with abilities that made her different, as was he. As with my changing, this was a burning that one does not forget. Although it was quick, it was extremely painful. However, for a witch that could cast a spell to decrease the misery and torment of this change, it wasn’t as excruciating as I am sure it would be for a mere human. I was lucky Ellie changed me and used her powers to decrease the pain for me. It was only with the love of one’s companion that a being could withstand the pain and agony of the change.

  Ultress and Elizabeth’s offspring were the true witchyres. The males would later become known as the Lords of the Witchyres or otherwise simply known as the “Lords”. Their six children consisted of three sons and three daughters. Their names I could not remember. They were the original six of the new race, and they would carry on this evil way of thinking. They were not just bloodsuckers with eternal life. They were mystical beings. Each of these immortals had powers. Some of their powers were identical, but each witchyre possessed certain powers that differed from another witchyre. One thing that didn’t differ was the hatred for the pure blood vampires. This hatred grew fierce as these spores grew into adulthood.

  The growth period for a witchyre was shorter than that of a human. The incubation period of an embryo to human form was nine months. However, for the witchyres this incubation period was less than six weeks. At the age of eighteen, a witchyre had reached their full growth, and the aging process was complete. The eighteen-year span for a witchyre was only a couple of years. Normal humans barely learned to walk and talk, but witchyres were at the point they would remain for eternity. They would never grow older than the age of eighteen. They never change in their looks or urge.

  When Ultress and Elizabeth’s offspring reached their full maturity, greed and hatred, mainly from the males, backfired on the pair. The fatal defect for Ellie's grandparents in the genetic makeup of the witchyres was that this new race had no ability to feel compassion or love. Hate was the only emotion that could be taught to them or maybe it came natural. This race began to see Ultress and Elizabeth as purebreds. This made their parents different and once again outcast to this new race. To a witchyre, their parents were just entities that past them immortally. They felt nothing more or nothing less for them. There were no loyalties.

  Ultress and Elizabeth’s fates were unlucky at best. Ultress, being a purebred vampire and Elizabeth being a purebred witch that Ultress changed into an immortal was not what their offspring wanted to control their race. Their son’s inability to love increased in strength as time pasted. Their greed for power caused them to turn on the two purebreds. Ultress’s physic ability had weakened; he was not able to see what his sons had in store for Elizabeth and himself.

  The three sons turned Ultress and Elizabeth over to the purebred vampires with an agreement they would not be punished for their parent’s sins. Ultress’s maker destroyed both Ultress and Elizabeth because since her change, she was a product of his makers as well. The leaders of the vampires made all pure breeds witness their punishment to reinforce their commitment to stand with their own race.

  Once the witches and wizards found out about Elizabeth's destruction, they were angry. They turned their backs on the hybrid vampires and the crossbred witchyres. War was eminent between the three races. The witches would be at war with the witchyres for betraying Elizabeth and with the vampires for destroying her. The vampires would honor their agreement with the witchyres until they had a reason to change their minds. This had been the fear of all immortals. This war would come some day; it was only a matter of time. It was a time that would be an eternity for a human, but it was a time that was a short span for an immortal.

  The witchyres multiplied into vast numbers, reproducing with each other, brother with sister; uncle with niece. Incest was a human word not known nor cared about within the witchyres. They carved power and numbers. Their only loyalties were with the vast numbers of immortals they could create. Love and compassion were not a priority. They were not even words they cared to understand.

  Ellie’s life began just a small fame of time before her grandparent’s annihilation. She did not like to go into further detail of her conception. This was not something she thought was prideful. Ellie didn’t talk about it to me. All I knew was her sisters raised her, and her mother had left her many years ago. She didn’t know much about her mother or father nor did she remember her grandparents. All she knew was her sisters were in control of her, and she had to listen to them. My mind again pushed deeper into the history of Ellie’s creation.

  A Witchyre’s body temperature was warmer than that of mine, but they thirst for the blood of humans as I. They inherited mystical powers from their witchery ancestors and their taste for blood and true immortality from their Vampire ancestors. This made them a force to fear by all races. They were almost impossible to defeat. They were the only immortal that could reproduce and live forever. They had few flaws, so they were an almost perfect race.

  Their eating habits were of that of the vampire thus causing friction at times between the two races. The vast numbers produced by the witchyres cause alarm with the vampires. A meeting with the rulers of each clan drew lines that neither group dared to cross. Witchyres got a part of the territories of the earth to feed as vampires got the other. Witchyres were savages and didn’t save their prey. Once they decided on a food choice this human never survived their assault. This was true until Ellie chose me.

  She was the exception of the witchyre rule. I was her creation in a world that I wasn’t supposed to exist. A witchyre was never supposed to change a human. This was part of the agreement with the vampire purebreds. Changing a human was not the way they reproduced. Yes, I was the only one of my existences. Others that knew I walked the earth considered me a hybrid. I was even a hybrid to Ellie because she had no memory of my creation. However, I was far from a normal hybrid of the vampire clan.

  Ellie was one of three daughters. Her sisters were older, and they had greater control over
the direction of their family. The three daughters were direct descendants of the original rulers of the witchyres. Ellie’s mother was one of the three daughters of Ultress and Elizabeth. Ellie never spoke of her mother because her uncle’s removed Ellie from her many years ago.

  Ellie was the youngest, but her ambitions were to connect with the outside world. Her thrust for blood was strong, yet unlike the others of her kind, she didn’t feel the loathing for humans. She had developed a compassion for the living. She hated she needed to feed on their blood. Her compromise was to only part-take of those that were dying. Within her race, her feelings were unheard. They never compromised. They hunted and took at will. They never worried about the death and sorrow of mere humans. This again was a cause of the constant battle and hatred between the hybrids and the crossbreeds. The facts that they were different and feared kept these clans at odds. Although, this wasn’t the only battle they encountered. The witches and wizards hated them for over-throwing and destroying Elizabeth.

  The youngest grandchild had a spell cast on her at the time of Elizabeth’s annihilation. Ellie was the brunt of the spell. This was the reason Ellie was different from the others. This spell made her feel the compassion of a human. The witches and wizards were not doing this out of kindness. They thought this would destroy the ruthlessness of the witchyres. They knew if they cast their spell on one, with the constant multiplying, the spell would pass from offspring to offspring and would eventually become the downfalls of the powerful clan.

  This spell didn’t work as the witches and wizards wanted because the rest of the witchyre clan saw Ellie as strange. They didn’t understand her need to protect the food in which they feasted. The witchyre clan considered her ridicules and weak. They fed on her weakness and treated her as if she were of a lower class. The other witchyres punished Ellie because of the way she believed. They made her feel inferior to the rest of the clan. The males of this race would not have anything to do with this fragile beauty. She was in her own right an outcast, a witchyre not accepted for her beliefs. Her sisters would not destroy her. She was the one that held a power of witchery that none of the others held. She could control the elements of the universe, and her sisters knew some day they would need her.

  Ellie’s differences in her compassion made her estranged from her sisters. She did not attract the males of the witchyres, so they allowed her to forgo the rite of passage into adulthood. She was never bred by a male witchyre. They feared her concepts would pass on as the witches had hope. Her family allowed her to leave and walk alone. Her walk would be limited. Her time alone would be short in the immortal world. However, this was the time she was free from the killing and pillaging of her clan. It was the time when she created me. She was happy during the years we were together, and she walked in peace. Ellie’s sisters controlled her right to walk freely, and they proved their control when they removed her from me.

  Ellie’s sisters were strong and unmerciful. Both of her sisters married other witchyres. These were cousins that came from somewhere in their family tree. Marriage in the clan was for power not love. A stronger force was all the true witchyres yearn for. They wanted to overtake the immortal world and rule the lands where all immortals walk. If they maintained the power, they would be the ones that all would answer to, and they would pass judgment without retaliation from the purebred of the other races. This wish was still not granted. Vampires still controlled certain territories and found ways to fight against the beings that considered themselves the higher race in the immortal world. The vampires knew the witchyres had a few flaws that one day would prove their downfall. They continued to hunt for these flaws so they could use them against the witchyres when the time came.

  Love was a word the witchyres considered meaningless. Ellie, on the other hand, thought differently. She wanted the love and compassion she saw in humans. During the time Ellie walked alone, she created me. It was a time when she found the love humans shared. It was a time when Ellie was mine, and I was hers. I would do whatever it took to return her longing need for commitment to love. I wanted the love we once shared and somewhere deep inside of her, she wanted that too. Had it not been for the spell her sisters cast to remove her memories she would remember me and would have never left me to go back to the ways of her family. She hated their ways. She would never go back to their ways without being forced. This force came in the form of a spell.

  This illustrious family did not tolerate being tarnished in any way. They had to maintain power in the immortal world. If it were known one of their kind left the family and walked with the purebreds, their race would be seen as a mockery in the face of all immortals. They felt if you could not control your own, then how could you control the realm of the world of the undead.

  Embarrassment was not something a witchyre would stand for much less the leaders of this clan tolerate. They knew the only way to bring her back home to their lifestyle was to cast a spell on her. Without a spell, she would have never left me. Ellie would never leave me unless she had no choice. I knew they forced her. She loved me, and I loved her. I could not give up on her now. I would never give up on Ellie. She was more than a lover; she was my wife.

  Chapter Six

  TAKEN AWAY

  The day they took her away was burnt in my memory as if it were yesterday. We had recently moved to the Georgia coast. Savannah was a beautiful town. It was settled in Seventeen Thirty-three. It was an old city even in the time that Ellie and I lived there. It withstood the Civil War, and Sherman spared it during his march through Georgia.

  The buildings were tall with beautiful architecture. The town’s roads spared the old oak trees layered with Spanish moss. These roads didn’t intersect with the normal cross formation. They made squares around the towering trees. Local people walked these roads visiting each square to familiarize themselves with the occupants of that area.

  Savannah was a town that flourished due to the river that ran through it. The river was wide enough for large vessels to pass easily and made the owners of the cotton gin industry rich. Ellie and I strolled the river’s edge every afternoon. We hunted its banks for drifters and drunks that happened to fall into the watery rolling tide. It was the same river where Ellie and I married each other and formally pledged our eternity. Our wedding was a small ceremony of a few friends that we came to know after moving to this great city.

  We met these friends when we arrived in Savannah. The southern hospitality over-flowed and seeped through every crack in the town. The southern accents of these people slide off their tongues with a slow grace of etiquette. Ellie love to listen to the women as they gossiped over the week's news. She laughed when she said, imitating the sweetest of southern charm, “they could cut your throat and make you supper with the same knife.” These southern bells flowed with grace and certainty as they chattered while watching their children in the street’s squares.

  Our time in Savannah was the happiest. We were married in Liberty square under an oak tree that Ellie was sure was older than she. The day I saw her in her wedding dress made me realize that although we were immortal and considered dark creatures of the night by those who spoke of these fairy tale myths, we were, for all that attended, a normal young couple just beginning their lives together. That day we both were no longer outcast, but we were considered part of a family of friends. These friends never realizing that we shared a secret.

  Ironically, Ellie and I sat in Liberty square on the last day we were together and laughing at the conversations of the women that watched people pass by each time greeting each other. There were two women in particular that day that Ellie found amusing. We listened to these two women as they sat on the bench near us.

  “Hello, Margaret,” one of the women called out as a small framed woman strolled by. She stopped for a few moments.

  “Hello, Olivia,” she returned the greeting with a smile.

  “How is John doing? I heard he had taken ill.” the woman named Olivia spoke, looking up at the
woman standing in front of her.

  “He’s doing well, thank you for asking. The doctor said he should be as good as new in a day or two.” Margaret smiled with her reply.

  “Well, I hope he feels better soon. We missed you all at church Wednesday night. You missed a good service.” Olivia spoke again.

  “I’m sorry to hear that, I do hope we will be able to make it on Sunday.” Margaret smiled again. The southern way was to smile politely when they greeted others and carried on a conversation.

  “Well, I must be going. I need to pick up a few things at the market and get back to John.” Margaret spoke as she waved goodbye to the two women sitting on the bench. They returned her gesture of goodbye and waited to speak again until the woman named Margaret was out of hearing range.

  Ellie began to laugh. She knew the thoughts of the two women, but I didn’t miss much because southern women usually do not keep their thoughts silent for very long.

  “I bet he’s sick, more like sick from the whiskey.” Spoke Olivia to the other female sitting with her. They both began to laugh.