Final Days

by C. L. Quinn

  Warm air blew in off the Pacific Ocean. On her stomach, stretched out in a cushioned lounge, Windari watched the sun drop into the sea. Number Four was giving her a full body massage while the remnants of the sun’s rays warmed her face. He was nervous.

  “Mistress, I thought you couldn’t be anywhere near the sun.”

  “I am a child of the moon. Our clan can tolerate small amounts of low level sun exposure, like the beginning or the end of a day. But I risk it sometimes. I know my limit, but I push it. It’s a game. These days, I find I am bored more easily, so I flirt with danger just for a little adrenaline kick.”

  “I will service you as soon as I am finished with this massage, if you would like.”

  She glanced back at him. He’d been an excellent blood-bond. Compliant, sexy, learned very quickly, and performed perfectly. But she was even bored with him lately. And the sex was feeling underwhelming. What she really wanted was a good fuck with a first blood male. She wanted Ahmose.

  “I wonder…” she said suddenly. Number Four leaned over.

  “I’m sorry, Mistress. What did you say?”

  “Nothing. I’m just wondering if I can get one more concession from someone. If I give a particular vampire something he wants, I wonder if I can bargain for something else I need.”

  Number Four had no idea what to say, so he just dug in deeper and tried to please her. It was getting harder to do these days. Number Three had pissed her off about four weeks ago and he hadn’t seen him since. It worried him.

  Eillia put her son in his crib. The cell was chiming, Daniel was yelling up the stairs, and she’d spent the night worrying about Koen. She was exhausted.

  Tamesine looked up from the balcony where she had been sitting watching a beautiful clouded sky cover and uncover a nearly full moon.

  “Would you like me to take him?” she asked.

  Eillia smiled and nodded. “Would you? Thanks, Tam. I need to get the phone and see what my husband is yelling about.”

  Tamesine got up and strolled over to the crib to pick up the plump baby boy who was closing in on his first birthday in a few months.

  She was stunning. Long and lean, with full breasts and long natural blonde hair, she moved with grace and confidence that she had only recently rediscovered. Until just before this child was born, Tamesine had been full blown mentally ill. Even on her best day now, she herself wasn’t certain she really was better. She still had moments when she panicked and thought she was going to go over the edge again. Coping with life had become too difficult for her over centuries of chaos.

  This little baby boy had changed it all. From the moment her lifeforce sensed his, knew he was there, a connection began that had only grown stronger. In her state of psychotic confusion, he had reached to her and let her know she was loved. And that it was going to be okay. Tamesine had believed him, believed in him, and began to believe in herself again.

  She would give her life for him.

  “Come on, Cade.” She lifted him with gentle hands and took him back out onto the balcony with her as his mother hurried down the stairs.

  Lighting up the white clouds from behind, the moon was the ultimate night-light.

  “Look at your world, little man.” Tamesine held him up to look at the changing sky as the clouds moved across the brilliant glow. He watched with her, his eyes following the swirling patterns. Anyone watching his bright eyes would wonder how much he understood. Tamesine thought he could see all the knowledge of the universe.

  “He’s been here before,” she had told his parents one night six months ago. “Caedmon is an old soul.”

  Eillia never disputed anything Tamesine said. While Tam sometimes still said things that sounded a little insane, Eillia had learned that insanity could have a very close relationship with truth.

  Taking a seat on a wide wood rocking chair, Tamesine held the baby close.

  She knew many of those in this household were afraid of her. She didn’t blame them…she’d been sick for a long time. And she’d hurt a lot of people. Luckily, Caedmon trusted her completely and gave her another chance at life. She would never let him down.

  She began to sing an old lullaby to him while he fingered a long blonde curl.

  “Um, um, sandman’s a’ comin,’ and he’ll be here, mighty, mighty soon, and if you don’t cry, he’ll be droppin’ by with a great big lollipop moon.”

  Caedmon giggled. He liked the sound of Tamesine’s voice. She tickled him under the chin.

  Eillia called from the edge of the room.

  “Tam, could you bring Caedmon? Park wants to talk to us.”

  Tamesine pulled him close and got up to follow Eillia down to the main floor of Koen’s villa.

  She loved her life here, loved these people who had embraced her in spite of her awful past. Less people were living here now that Koen’s daughter and her family had moved to their own villa just up the street. Park’s daughter was as close to Caedmon as Tamesine was, and she loved the little girl almost as much as she loved this little boy. Tamesine hoped no one would ever try to make her leave. She couldn’t. She could never leave this first blood baby. It was her only worry in the world.

  On the ground floor, the household was gathering in the breakfast room where the vampires usually dined right after rising for the night. She noticed snacks behind each chair even though they had dined just a few hours earlier.

  Daniel watched Tamesine carry his son in, and although he trusted his wife’s judgment, Tamesine knew he still felt uneasy with her around his child. Smiling at him, she carried the baby over and put him in Daniel’s arms.

  Daniel looked up and smiled his appreciation at her. She smiled back. Tamesine had always liked Daniel. It made her sad that he still didn’t think she was well enough to be near Caedmon. Time was all she needed to prove that she was good for him. She looked over at Eillia, who nodded her head in approval for taking the boy straight to his father. It would help seal the fracture he felt about Tamesine.

  Taking a seat near Eillia, Tamesine reached for a column of donuts. A favorite sweet treat from America, they dripped with icing. Looking around, the only people at this meeting were Park, Bas, and little Cairine, then Eillia and her family, and herself.

  She waved to Cairine whose small teeth were exposed in a wide grin, and looked up at Koen’s gorgeous daughter, who commanded the center of the room.

  “My father is still not coming home. They have found nothing yet on Alisa’s whereabouts, and I am becoming more and more concerned about his health. He’s obsessed. I have no idea if she is still alive, but there might be one last way to try to find her. Eillia and I have discussed it at length and we both agree…this idea has merit.”

  Park came towards Tamesine.

  “Sweetie, this involves you. We all need to agree to this, you most of all. There is something we haven’t mentioned this past year because we thought it might do more harm than good, but I don’t see we have a choice anymore.”

  Park paused and pulled a chair up next to Tamesine. Eillia pulled hers closer.

  “Tam,” Park said, serious. “Sweetie, you know how Eillia and I have gone on a spiritual journey with you and joined you in your mind? You know we did that to help you, right?”

  Tamesine looked back and forth between these two women who had brought her back from darkness.

  “I do.”

  “Good. Well, we have some news. There is a possibility you are one of a set of twins.”

  Tamesine didn’t react. She just continued to watch Park. Park continued.

  “So, we have never been able to access your memories, your past. No one knows where you came from. But we met a woman who is your splitting image in South Africa last year. Her name is Windari. Tam, does that sound familiar?”

  Tamesine thought about it. Rolled the name back and forth on her mind.

  “No, it does not,” she said.

  Park nodded. “Well, all right. Anyway, we think she may be your twin sister.”


  “I have a sister.” Tamesine said it as a statement, not a question.

  “You might. Actually, I really think you do. The thing is, we don’t know where she is. And I think that, if you are her sister, then there may be a blood connection we can trace. Tam, we really need to find this woman.”

  “Okay. I will do whatever you want me to do.”

  “That’s good. Thank you. But we’re going to have to go back into your mind. And if we’re searching for her, and we find her, some memories that you have blocked may come back. Tamesine, I’m concerned that it could be more than you can handle.”

  Tamesine looked around the room at the faces of her new family. She felt stronger and clearer than she could ever remember in all the years she had been alive.

  “Park, if you need me to do this, I can do it. If it will help Koen, I must do it. You are all here for me if it goes wrong, is that true?”

  Eillia scooted up and put her arms around Tamesine. “You know we are. Always.”

  “Then, that is what we will do. When would you like to start?”

  With a noticeable sigh, Park relaxed. “I want to apprise Koen of what we’re doing. He’ll need to get his teams ready in case we really do find her. I’ve been considering this for the past few weeks and I’ve been reluctant to approach you about it, but I think it is our only option now to try to locate Windari.”

  “Then we shall do it.” Tamesine lowered her head. She could do this, of course. But… She had a sister?

  How could she have forgotten such an important thing? She had been ill for a lot of centuries, so if she had family, wouldn’t they have been looking for her? Wouldn’t a twin sister have been searching for her other half?

  Somewhere in the back of her mind, something told her she did not want to open this memory back up. But she had to. If this could help Koen, she would do it without hesitation. She was stronger now, she could do this. Couldn’t she?

  Koen had just gotten back inside the apartment and pulled the UV barrier in preparation for sleep when his cell chimed. It was his daughter.

  “Hi, baby,” he said, glad to hear her voice before he laid down to the daunting task of trying to sleep.

  “Father. I think I may have a plan to find Windari.”

  Tamesine’s body went lax as Eillia and Park reached deep into her mind, past mental barriers too strong to breach, just like before, until suddenly they felt Tamesine’s mind shudder and it was like a bubble popped. They blew into her memories, and journeyed back through her life to a point where they found exactly what they needed to find. Windari was her sister, a perfect twin. And her murderer.

  Eillia almost lost it as she and Park watched events that shaped this first blood who had been betrayed by the one person in the universe she should have been able to trust.

  Between them, Eillia and Park tried to repair the shock and pain that Tamesine felt as she died so that who she was today would have a chance at surviving it when they re-emerged from the spiritual plane. They still needed to make the connection so that they could use Tamesine’s blood to trace her sister.

  Weaving magic into their trio of minds, Eillia and Park were shocked to feel Tamesine’s power blow in and take over. She surged their power out into the sky and traveled with light-speed around the world to stop in the United States and circle a space, over and over, dizzying, even in their spiritual plane existence, and then shot like lightning back to their bodies and crashed into them, not soft, like they usually did, but fast and hard.

  The three bodies that held hands in a circle flew backward. Eillia was grabbed by Daniel, Park by Bas, and Tamesine hit the sofa behind them.

  Alarmed, because they hadn’t seen this end so violently before, Daniel and Bas held their women carefully and spoke to them to rouse them as quickly as possible.

  “Sweetheart. Eillia. Baby, are you okay?” Daniel said, while gently tapping her cheeks.

  He looked over to see Bas doing the same thing as Tamesine sat up and crawled over to them.

  “They’re okay. It might take a moment.” She said quietly, tears in her eyes.

  “What happened?” Bas asked, caressing Park’s hair.

  “Something. Awful. But we know where my twin is. She’s in the American state of California. Los Angeles. Tell Koen he will find her in a house by the ocean. This one.”

  Tamesine scratched some numbers and an address on a piece of notepaper and handed it, scrunched up, to Bas. Then she got up shakily and started out of the room.

  Daniel lay Eillia on the carpet and hurried over to stop Tamesine.

  “No. Stay here. The women will want to make sure you’re all right.”

  “I’m always all right. I’ve survived a thousand years, Daniel. I’ll survive a thousand more. I just…” She closed her eyes as she spoke. “I just need to go to my room now.”

  She pushed his hand away gently and walked out of the room, head high, back straight, more regally than he’d ever seen her before.

  Daniel looked at Bas, who shook his head too. Then he hurried back to hold Eillia as she was coming around. Bas held Park, but touched a button on his cell phone. He held it to his ear.

  “Koen. God. It worked. Windari is in L.A. I’m texting the address. Good luck.”

  He dropped the phone as Park opened her eyes.

  “Tamesine,” she whispered.

  “She seems okay. She went to her room. How are you, baby?”

  “I’ll be okay. We did it. We found the twin.”

  “I know. Koen is on his way.”

  Park sat up as Eillia did and they looked at each other.

  “Oh, God,” Eillia said.

  “I know,” Park responded.

  Daniel and Bas were staring at them.

  “What happened?” Daniel asked.

  Eillia pushed to get up and Daniel picked her up to carry her over to the couch. He set her down gently.

  “Windari is her sister. And she murdered Tamesine about eight hundred years ago. Like she did to Starla. We felt her lifeforce leave her body. Daniel, she was dead for always. And yet she is alive.”

  “How is that possible?”

  “I don’t know. Park?”

  Park was quiet. Her eyes were downcast, but searching back and forth. “I think I may have an idea. Because of what happened to Starla. She was dead for always, too. I think…” She paused again, then looked at Bas. He massaged her back while she leaned into him.

  “I think it has something to do with pregnancy. Starla was carrying a first blood baby. That may have protected her. Windari cut her throat and broke her neck, effectively severing the head. It should be fatal. But what if the combination of a first blood pregnancy has a magic that protects the mother from harm?”

  “But how does that explain Tamesine?” Daniel asked.

  Eillia, Park, and Bas looked at him.

  Daniel nodded slowly. “Oh,” he said.

  Koen could barely breathe. They had her. He was on his way to Windari. He hadn’t expected Park’s session with Tamesine to work, but it had, so he and his team were in his private plane right now. As the small jet taxied down the runway, he felt the moment the wheels left the ground. His heart pounded so hard he actually laid his hand against it to try to calm it. But it wasn’t working.

  Until he held Alisa, and knew she was all right, and took her home to become vampire, nothing was all right. But at least he finally had a chance to find her and finish this horrible nightmare. Finally, he might be able to hold her again, to make love to her. He needed to see those beautiful blue eyes.

  Eillia found Tamesine in her room, curled up on her bed, two layers of blankets she didn’t need cocooned around her.

  “How are you, sweetie?” she asked the swaddled woman.

  Tamesine’s head moved a little, but she didn’t respond.

  “Tam, you have to speak with me. Remember how we helped you through everything before? You can’t go back inside your mind and keep yourself hidden anymore.”

  A few
moments later, Tamesine rolled over and peeked out of her blanket cave.

  “I’m okay. I just…I could never have imagined how horrible my life was. I have a sister, Lia. And she murdered me. I got a sense of my emotions before she hurt me. I loved her. A lot. She was my family…and she killed me. I was gone, you saw that. How am I still alive?”

  “Park has a theory. But let’s not worry about that at this time. I just want to make sure you know you have all the support you need now. I feel responsible for how you found out. Although, I guess we know now why you’ve been so, uh, sick, for such a long time.”

  “You mean fucking nuts.”

  Eillia smiled. “Well, yeah. But you are a member of my family now, Tam. We accept you completely and you know you are loved. Don’t you?”

  Tamesine pushed herself out of the blankets and sat up. “I sometimes do. But finding out I had a sister who hated me enough to murder me is unnerving.”

  “I don’t know how it couldn’t be.”

  Pausing, Tamesine tried to control unruly curls that insisted on covering her face. “How did I survive?”

  Eillia hesitated, Tamesine pushed.

  “No more hidden memories. You told me a long time ago that I needed to face my actions in my life. This falls under the same category. I won’t be truly well until I know who I was.”

  Moving closer, Eillia pushed Tamesine’s hair back away from her eyes. “I’m proud of you. Look how far you’ve come. Look at you sitting here, acting more like a mature adult than I am. For the first time, I can see you are going to be completely fine.” She took a deep breath.

  “Okay. You’re right. Park believes that Starla survived Windari’s murder attempt last year because she carried a first blood baby.”

  Tamesine listened quietly. “But that wouldn’t explain my survival.”

  “Unless…” Eillia watched Tamesine’s eyes widen.