by G. K. DeRosa
“I’m not really sure,” he said with a chuckle. “Maybe you really are a bad influence on me.”
“You’re certainly not Dante’s star pupil anymore, that’s for sure,” she said cracking a smile.
“It was worth it, just to be able to get to know you.”
Celeste could feel her face flush, and she got up to avoid Marco’s piercing gaze. Still looking out the window and purposely not facing him she said, “Thanks for not ratting me out about Maddie and Maks too.”
“I figured you had your reasons for not telling them everything,” he said. “Besides, with the way that Dante was acting, I’m not sure he needed to know anyway.”
Celeste walked back over to the couch. “I wonder why the Council decided to let Alek slide on the attack. I just don’t get it.”
“Neither do I. It’s so unlike Dante,” Marco said. “I really don’t want to go back to Rome yet and leave you with all of these things up in the air.”
“Thanks, I appreciate it, but I don’t want to get you into anymore trouble,” said Celeste, sitting down beside him.
“Maybe I’ll just hang around for a few more days. Besides, getting an international plane ticket on such short notice is bound to be expensive,” he said with a wink.
Stepping through the doorway of her home, Celeste was filled with a sense of relief – something she hadn’t experienced in weeks. It was as if one step across the threshold meant a heavy weight was lifted from her shoulders. She was immediately greeted by the familiar smells of home.
“Celeste! You’re finally back!” said her mom, racing down the stairs and wrapping her in a hug. Celeste couldn’t help the gaping smile that drifted across her face as she took comfort in her mom’s warm welcome. Her mother finally let go, and took a step back, suddenly noticing Marco over Celeste’s shoulder.
“Mom, this is Marco,” she said, scooting over to the side to let him in. “He was a big help to me and Aunt Maddie in Warsaw.”
Marco extended his hand politely and then pulled her mother into a sneak attack double-cheeked kiss. “Marco Caccia,” he said, “piacere to meet you.”
“Yes, of course. I’ve heard so many wonderful things about you, it’s almost as if I already know you,” she said with a warm smile, not even slightly flustered by the onslaught of kisses.
“Is it okay if Marco stays here for a few days?” asked Celeste. “He has to help me out with a couple of things before he leaves for Rome.”
“Sure,” said her mom, with a slightly skeptical tone. “Marco, why don’t you follow me up to the guest bedroom, and I’ll get you settled in.” She led Marco up the stairs, and turning back to Celeste said, “Don’t you go anywhere young lady, we have some catching up to do!”
Celeste walked over to the refrigerator and stared blankly inside. She pulled out a bottle of water and sat down with a sigh at the kitchen table. The momentary sense of relief from arriving home was beginning to fade, and her mind began racing with all the revelations from the past few days. She could feel the outline of the ring in her jeans pocket, but she dared not slip it on her finger. She had begun to feel fairly confident without it, and she didn’t want to start any bad habits again. What am I going to do with this thing? She supposed she should let Stellan and the others know she had it; Dalla would certainly be relieved. As she sipped her water, she marveled at how one little ring could cause so much excitement.
Her mother’s footsteps sounded as she came down the stairs, distracting Celeste from her musing. She looked up expectantly at her mom when she appeared in the kitchen.
“Now tell me, how are you really doing, sweetie?”
“I’m fine,” she said. “Nothing really turned out as I thought it would, but at least Aunt Maddie found Maks.” After all the wild adventures, at least she could console herself with the thought that she had helped her aunt reunite with her true love, even if he was a vampire now.
“Don’t you put on a brave face for me. I know there’s something bothering you. Please let me help you,” her mom said as she sat down.
Celeste turned toward her mom, her shoulders drooping. “There are so many things wrong right now that I wouldn’t even know where to start. My relationship with Roman is a mess, Alek brought Roman and Nico’s mother back from the dead and now she’s crazy, I don’t trust this new Council member Dalla, Dante is acting weird, Stellan and Roman are at each other’s throats, and I killed Dani Lynn!” finished Celeste as the tears began streaming down her face.
“Oh sweetie,” said Mrs. Wilder as she pulled her daughter into her arms, “it’s all going to be okay, I promise. Just tell me everything.”
Once the worst of the sobbing had passed, Celeste decided to tell her mother everything that had been going on over the past few weeks, even the part about Maks and Roman’s role in his death.
***
Stellan stared despondently at the pile of clothes scattered on the small twin bed in the basement, and he suddenly felt an onrush of guilt at the deplorable conditions he had allowed Dani Lynn to live in for so many months. He felt as if it were somehow his fault that Dani had run off with Alek. If only he had given her the ability to day walk sooner perhaps this all could have been avoided, he pondered sullenly. Finding an old duffel bag, he filled it with Dani Lynn’s meager possessions. He needed to remove them from the house before the feelings of guilt proved too overwhelming.
“Stellan, where are you?” came a voice from upstairs.
He zipped up the bag and swung it over his shoulder to trudge back up the stairs. Before he closed the door behind him, he glanced back for one last look at his feisty vampire roommate’s old room and whispered, “Goodbye, Dani Lynn. I hope that you have found the peace you deserved.” Emerging from the basement, Stellan found Dalla anxiously searching the house.
“Oh, there you are!” she exclaimed. “I was looking everywhere for you.”
“Is everything all right?” he asked. “I thought you were staying in Astor this evening.”
“I was planning to, but I needed to talk to you about Dante,” she said, pushing her short silver hair behind her ear. She went on to tell him about his strange behavior at the Council meeting and his refusal to allow Celeste to pursue Alek for his crimes.
“That is very odd. Why wouldn’t he want Alek to pay for what he did to Astor and its inhabitants?” questioned Stellan as he settled back into his chair.
“And it’s still imperative that we get the ring back,” she stressed.
“Now that I have Alek’s blood, tracking him will be no problem. But if Celeste was given a direct order not to intervene, I don’t want her involved in this,” said Stellan.
“But we need her and the Constantins to defeat Alek, especially now that Lilliana is back and we have no idea what she is capable of,” she said, at the edge of her seat and wringing her hands together.
Stellan stood and took a step toward Dalla. He narrowed his eyes and asked, “Why do you want the ring so badly?”
“It’s much too powerful. It can’t fall into the wrong hands. It’s just not safe,” she declared.
Stellan looked unconvinced. “Although Lilliana is not quite in her right mind, I don’t believe that she would do anything to endanger us. Her memories of us must be locked up somewhere inside her subconscious.”
“Of course, you always take her side!” Dalla said bitterly as she stood up.
“I’m not taking her side,” he said grasping her trembling hands. “I simply will not risk Celeste’s life for a silly ring unless there is a good reason for it.”
“Fine,” she said dropping his hands, “I will figure out another way.” And she disappeared in a bright flash of light before he could say another word.
Stellan ran a wrinkled hand over his face with a sigh and walked over to the liquor cabinet. Reaching for a bottle of scotch, he poured a glass and settled down in his favorite chair. As he sipped on the drink, he caught sight of Roman and Nico through the window walking back toward the house.
“Not this again,” he muttered to himself as he tossed his head back to finish off the scotch.
The brothers strode into the living room talking animatedly. It was a far cry from Roman’s black temper they had all witnessed earlier.
“I thought you boys had left,” said Stellan, peeking up from his chair.
“No, we were out back on a little hike,” said Nico. “The weather’s really not that bad for January.”
“And I needed to clear my head,” said Roman.
“Good,” responded Stellan.
“I’m sorry if I was out of line earlier,” continued Roman, taking a step toward Stellan. “Nico has convinced me to see the error in my ways.”
“Has he now?” asked Stellan incredulously.
Nico slid across the couch and landed right in front of Stellan. “I can be rather convincing, you know. At least that’s what the ladies tell me,” he said with a smirk.
Stellan chuckled. “Of that I have no doubt.”
“In all seriousness,” said Roman, “I won’t rest until our mother is back with us in her right state of mind, but I am willing to hear you out on what may be the best manner to accomplish that.”
“Thank you, Roman. I appreciate that. I hope you boys know how much I truly care for your mother. I would never let any harm come to her. We will determine the best course of action to ensure her well-being, and in the meantime we can keep tabs on Alek with this.” Stellan pulled out a small vial from the interior folds of his robe with not more than a few drops of blood in it.
Roman nodded. “When can we get started?”
***
“Now you know everything,” said Celeste as she looked across the couch and waited for her mother’s reaction to her confession. They had been talking for hours, and the ache in Celeste’s chest seemed to subside as she spilled out every painful secret she had been holding onto for the past few weeks. Her mother listened attentively, trying not to interrupt and inserting comforting words into the conversation when appropriate.
“Celeste, sweetie, you’ve been through so much and all you’ve done is try and help others. You can’t blame yourself for what happened to Dani,” she said.
“But I killed her, Mom. I killed someone I’ve known since I was a kid. I didn’t have to; I could have gotten the ring back some other way. Or I could have just let it go. Something dark came over me and I don’t know what it was, but it scared me. I wasn’t in control anymore,” admitted Celeste as a chill raced through her spine.
“I can’t pretend to understand what it must be like to live with the responsibilities that you have been burdened with or know what the repercussions are of all of that power. But I know my daughter, and I know that you wouldn’t kill another person for no reason. Dani was a vampire. She wasn’t the same girl with whom you grew up.”
“I know, but especially after seeing Maks, it made me realize how much of the old person is still inside of the vampire. When I first met Maks he was super scary, and I was sure that he was pure evil. But then when I saw him and Aunt Maddie together huddled on the floor of that abandoned house, something had changed in him.”
“Though that may be true, Dani made a choice to go with Alek. He wasn’t holding her against her will. She chose the wrong side, and she died as a result of it. It wasn’t your fault,” said her mom taking her hand and squeezing it.
A part of Celeste knew that what her mother was saying was true, but she still couldn’t shake the horrible guilt in the pit of her stomach. It was like a shade of darkness had snuck into her heart and was burrowing deep inside of her, desperately latching on.
“And what about Roman?” her mom asked, changing the subject.
Celeste sighed and ran her fingers through her disheveled curls. “I don’t know anymore. I love him so much, but I don’t know if that’s enough. Knowing that at least he didn’t kill Maks or turn him into a vampire makes me feel better, but there’s something that Marco said that I just can’t get out of my mind.”
“Marco, huh?” her mom said with a cynical smile. She may have been out of the dating game for a while but she certainly wasn’t blind to Marco’s charms or good looks.
“Mom, don’t look at me like that. He’s just a friend, and he made a valid point. He said that I shouldn’t expect Roman to not be a vampire. After all, that is what he is. He tries hard not to be, but in the end sometimes vampires do bad things. I guess I was naïve to think that Roman could fight it 100 percent of the time.”
“That does make sense,” she said.
“I just have to decide if I can live with knowing that,” Celeste said sadly.
“You need to talk to Roman. You have to tell him about Maks and how you feel. At least that’s one thing that you do have some control over.”
“I know, you’re right. I’ve been avoiding the inevitable. I’ll go over there first thing tomorrow to talk to him.”
That night, Celeste laid in her bed her eyes wide open fixed on the small cracks in the ceiling. Rocky nuzzled her gently from the foot of the bed, but it was no use, she simply couldn’t get to sleep. Her chest was heavy with worry and her mind was filled with concerns and unanswered questions. She pushed the covers back and sat up, reaching for a pad of paper and a pen from the night table. She vaguely recalled reading somewhere that if you wrote down everything you were worried about, it would help you let go of it. After a few minutes of feverish scribbling, Celeste had managed a bulleted list of concerns covering three pages mostly regarding Roman, but she still had no idea what she was going to do. Her jumbled thoughts were focused solely on him as she finally drifted off to sleep.
It was a beautiful service, as nice as a funeral could be. The sunlight was streaming in through the stained-glass windows of the Catholic church, casting a vibrant rainbow of colors inside. The marble and gold altar was adorned with white lilies and their sweet fragrant scent filled the air. Father Michelson had opened with a lovely poem and his kind words provided the comfort everyone longed to hear. Most of Celeste’s former classmates from St. Alice’s were there to pay tribute to their lost friend, Dani Lynn Meyer. Celeste wore a long-sleeved black dress, the same one she had worn to her father’s funeral and sat alone in the back. She glanced up at the first row and saw Jessica, Dani Lynn’s sister, and her parents consoling each other. Their eyes were red and swollen and the grief they shared was palpable even from a distance. Celeste’s heart clenched. I did this. This is all my fault. Suddenly Roman appeared and sat in the empty seat beside her. She was so happy to see him, that is until she saw the drops of blood dripping from his mouth and splattered down the pressed white shirt of his suit.
“Roman!” she yelled and the entire congregation turned toward her. But no one else seemed to notice the blood. She looked down at her own hands and they too were covered in the deep red liquid. “No!” she cried as she shot up out of her seat. As she dashed to the back of the church to the ladies room, Brian stopped her.
“Whoa! Where are you going?” he asked.
She hid her stained hands behind her back and motioned toward the ladies’ room.
“No, you can’t. We have to go up and say goodbye to Dani. They’re closing the casket. This is your last chance,” he said, taking her by the arm and steering her back toward the altar.
As she approached the casket, she could see Dani Lynn’s pale figure peeking through the opening. Kneeling in front of it, she and Brian whispered a few quiet prayers. Then Celeste looked up and gasped. Protruding from Dani’s chest was a wooden stake and her bright pink dress was completely covered in blood. Her vacant eyes were bloodshot and wide open, staring accusingly right at her. Celeste turned away and noticed she too was coated in blood, her hands, her dress – it was everywhere.
“No!” she screamed and whipped around to run away from the gruesome sight, but Brian stopped her.
“Look at what you did! This is all your fault. You killed her!” he shouted.
“No! No, I didn’t mean to, I swear
!” she cried as she tried to run away.
Suddenly Roman was there too, and he was holding her back. “It’s okay, Celeste. You’ve become a killer, just like me. You just have to accept it,” he said with an eerie calmness.
“No!” she cried out as she kicked and screamed.
Celeste’s eyes popped open as she looked around in a panic, slowly recognizing the familiar sights of her bedroom. She was completely drenched in sweat and her heart was still racing from the vivid nightmare. Checking her hands, she confirmed they were in fact not covered in blood, and she was alone in her room. It was only a dream. Taking a deep breath, she slipped her arms back under the covers and wrapped the blanket tightly around herself. She closed her eyes and shoved the terrible guilt back to the dark corners of her mind.
Celeste trudged up the pathway to Roman’s apartment, her heart as heavy as her steps were slow. She paused at the door hoping for a sign or something - anything that would tell her what she should do. Nothing.
“Are you going to come inside or just stand out there all day?” said Roman as he swung the door open, startling her.
“Yah, sorry. I was just trying to – ”
“Remember how to use the doorbell?” finished Roman with a grin.
Celeste knew Roman well enough to know that he was trying to make light of the situation. She could read his face like her own, and he knew something bad was coming. She hated to see him hurt like that, especially when she wasn’t even entirely sure what she was going to do yet.
“Where’s Nico?” she asked as she looked around the quiet apartment.
“He went up to Richmond for the day to visit Natalie. He’ll be back tomorrow,” he said. “It’ll be good for him to get away from all of this for at least 24 hours.”
“How are you holding up?” Celeste asked as they sat down on the couch.
“I’m better, thanks. Nico’s actually been the one holding it together for both of us, oddly enough.”