Tomorrows Child

by Starr West

  A noise much closer bought me to the present, back to the room, to the cold stone floor and the absence of light. The sounds were familiar now: a key grinding against the fingers of a lock, a latch clicking open and hinges screeching against the rust. I blinked, checking if my eyes were open or closed, and turned toward the sound. The darkness was disorientating and without the sound, I would not have known the direction of the door. A sliver of golden light cut through the darkness and a young girl entered. In that brief moment, I only caught a glimpse of the girl.

  The door closed and the familiar blackness returned. I welcomed the darkness and cursed the blade of light that stabbed my eyes. She dragged something, large and heavy, and dropped it near me with a whoosh of stale air and a dull thud.

  “Here, take it,” she said. Her voice was sweet and young, not the voice of the captor I had imagined. I said nothing. My body was pushed into the corner, my spine grated against the hard wall.

  “It’s water.” She reached out and took my hand, placing it on the cup. The water was warm and bitter. I drank it eagerly, my knotted stomach wrenching. But it kept me alive and I endured the pain, knowing that the shadow between life and death had been extended a little longer.

  The girl was quiet, I could feel her warmth and hear her heart beat and the in and out of her breath. But apart from that, she sat motionless. Why was she here? It seemed a strange act for a prisoner to be provided with a companion. In lucid moments, I tried to understand, to find some justification for my situation. I could find none.

  My last memory was of Phoenix, lazing against his warm chest and losing my thoughts in the flickering flames. But that wasn’t it, that wasn’t what brought me here - that was a dream. Even when we weren’t together, my dreams connected us. We had learnt how to communicate in the dream world as if it were an extension of our normal life. But I hadn’t dreamt, not since… when? I woke in the darkness and could recall no dreams. Drifting in and out of consciousness didn’t help and I hadn’t been able to find my dreams or Phoenix.

  “It won’t be much longer. She said you’ll be ready soon. That’s why I’m here, so you understand. So that you make the choice before you die. You can’t die… I’ll get the blame… and then… well you’re not going to die so I’m just not talking about it.”

  What was she talking about? I could ask her, but would she answer? Would there be any truth in her reply? But I remained quiet. The shivering had stilled a little; perhaps because I was focusing on the girl’s warmth and the image of a warm fire still filled my head. Both provided a solace I had been unable to find in previous days.

  “If you talk to me, I will get you food. I’ll tell her you’re friendly and not at all mean. I’ll tell her if you’re mean. If you don’t talk to me, she will know and I can’t lie to her… she would know. Talk to me, Psyche.”

  If talking were all I needed to do, then I would talk, but I doubted it would be that simple. “You know my name?” My voice was hard and raspy and unfamiliar, no louder than a whisper.

  “Yes, I know lots; I know you’re special. We’ve been waiting for you for a long time. You’re going to like it here.”

  “Like what?… Living in complete darkness? Slowly starving to death? I don’t think so.” I could talk, but I didn’t have to be pleasant.

  “Oh, it won’t always be like this; this is just to help you decide. Once you choose to live, you can come out.”

  “I already decided to live… before you locked me away.” This crazy girl couldn’t be responsible; she was far too simple.

  “It isn’t me who took you. She said it’s for your own good. She said you’re in danger. Volante said you need us.”

  I’d heard that name before, but I couldn’t extricate the memory from the recesses of my mind. I was still dazed, though I was feeling less confused than an hour ago.

  “You stole me?”

  “Not me. Volante, and she didn’t steal you - she rescued you!”

  “So it’s just me? There’s no one else here?”

  “No, just you, but it was night; you were here when I woke up in the morning.”

  “Tell me what you know, I need to know everything.”

  “I don’t know about everything. But I can tell you about you. Volante said you were lost and in danger. She said you needed her, and she needed you. She said you are special. She put you in here to keep you safe and told me to give you water and the special black powders. She said a little powder would keep you well so you wouldn’t die. I knew it would help. I take the powders when I’m allowed and they help me.”

  Powders? Drugs maybe, at least this explained the dazed and confused feeling as well as the absence of dreams.

  “How long have I been here?”

  She shrugged, “A week, maybe a week. It’s hard to remember the days now. But it’s long enough to make the right choice. If you told me now, I could let you out.”

  A week, a whole week… Surely if Phoenix were alive, he would have tried to rescue me, or Libby would have tried... She must know where I am! She always knows… unless… they are both dead or there’s magick involved. I should have realised before, I’m not skilled enough to deal with this myself. Volante could be using any type of magick - magick I don’t even know about.

  “Tell me everything. Tell me about your life here and what I’m deciding. Tell me what I should do. Tell me why you think I’m special.” My only chance might be to let them think I agreed to whatever it was they wanted, and then escape.

  “She said you would come round, Psyche. I’m so happy and you can be like my sister. Special, like me. The others, they come and go… They’re not special, not at all.”

  “Please,” I had to focus, “Is Volante a witch?” I knew that she probably didn’t call herself a witch. Libby didn’t either, but it’s what she was.

  “Sorry, um, not a witch… Do you mean like flying and broomsticks and stuff? Psyche, you are funny.”

  “What about spells, does she do spells? Has she given you anything special? To keep you safe? Something like that?”

  “You mean like this?” she said, fingering the small charm she wore around her neck. “It says Caitlyn; that’s my name.” The charm was engraved with a symbol that I hadn’t seen before. But this could mean she practiced some type of magick.

  “Yes, exactly like that. Is there anything else she does? Special things, something you’ve never seen anyone else do?”

  “Maybe, but she isn’t like anyone I’ve ever met. She saved me. In the bad days, I lived with my mum and my baby brother. Mum left us and went to find food, but she never came home. We waited and waited for days. We had water, lots of water, but no food. Pete died first… We were hungry and he cried and cried. He wouldn’t stop. I couldn’t stand it. I wanted to run away like Mum had. But when he was quiet, I knew he was dead. I left him then. I knew I had to find others, to find someone alive. I’m only seven, you know. I need someone to look after me. Volante found me. She brought me here, and now I’m like her daughter.” I could understand how alone and confused this child must have been. No wonder she idolised Volante.

  “Volante is special too, more special than me or even you. She told me she is the most special person alive. All the others like her have died… or she thinks they have died. She called them, but they never came. That’s why she needs us… she’s special. She needs special things.”

  The girl stood, reached up and opened a window. The light filtered through and left shadows on the far wall from the bars over the opening. It really was a prison. She held out her arms and showed me a series of scars, some fresh and raw, while others were older and newly scabbed over. The cuts were small, just nicks really, but it looked as if she had tried to cut herself, but changed her mind a hundred times. One of the freshest scars was ensconced in a deep rosy pink bruise. The sight turned my stomach. What was she showing me?

  “This is how I help her… Volante needs my life force, my blood.”

  “She drinks your blood?
Like a vampire? Caitlyn, that’s wrong.”

  “No, not like a vampire, she doesn’t have sharp pointy teeth or anything. She’s not evil, she’s special. She needs special medicine that’s only found in blood. It’s the life force. She said before everything got messed up, she had lots of friends who could help or she could go to the hospital, but now she needs special people, like me, so she doesn’t get sick.”

  “So this is what she wants from me? My blood?”

  “Sure, sometimes, but she said you’re really special, and she can get the life force from just touching you, without your blood. You’re really special and she won’t need so much blood now that you’re here.”

  “What if I say no?” Caitlyn looked at me with alarm, as if I had just broken a sacred vow.

  “You can’t say no, or you will die. You have to choose to live, Psyche. I don’t want to be alone anymore. The others said no and they all got sick and weak. Some even died. She didn’t kill them, you know. They just chose not to live. It was their choice.”

  My God, I was being held captive by a modern day vampire. I had read about this, sanguine vampires who drank blood and psychic vampires who drained a person’s spiritual energy. Both contained the life force Caitlyn spoke of. I thought it was a myth, but I had not read about a vampire who fed on human blood and spiritual energy. It was repulsive in the extreme, and what made it worse was that she had convinced this poor child it was normal. This child believed it was essential to life.

  “Do you drink blood, Caitlyn?” Perhaps I could explain, convince her that it was not normal, that a vampire didn’t need fangs to be evil.

  “Not often. Sometimes when Volante has taken too much, or needs more than she normally does. Then she gets me to drink some, just to keep my strength up. I don’t need it like she does. She says if I get real tired, the best thing is a little life force. I feel better right away.”

  Volante was training this child as an apprentice and it was unlikely that I could convince this girl to leave, to escape with me. Escape was my only option. I had been here too long to expect rescue, relying on Phoenix, and I feared the worse. A woman capable of draining the blood of a child was capable of anything.

  I didn’t know all the differences between the Hollywood-style vampire and a real vampire. The one holding me captive could have been capable of anything. If the bloodlust so vividly displayed on film was real, Phoenix may very well be… even Libby… It was unbearable to think of their demises this way. But I had to assume that I was now alone.

  It was some time before we spoke again. I was plotting an escape, but my first escape had to be from this room. Leaving this room meant agreeing to become a blood donor or worse, an apprentice to a vampire witch. Both ideas sickened me.

  Caitlyn stood, “I’ll tell her you said yes, okay?” I looked at her, I was seething inside and wanted to scream and shake sense into this girl, but I said nothing. She walked to the door and reached into her pocket, taking out the key before leaving the room. She had the key all along! She was my escape and if I hadn’t been drugged, I may have been able to discern this sooner.

  Every day, I had learned more about the magick of nature, but nothing about human nature. The perversion that surrounded me was difficult to comprehend. At least in the Hollywood version, a vampire was either a parasite to be slaughtered, or the hero with at least one redeeming quality. It could even be a tortured soul in love with the heroine. At the end of a movie, I could switch off the telly and forget all about vampires until next time. This was different - this was real - this was a nightmare I couldn’t turn off.

  The door opened and a large figure blocked the light, I could see Caitlyn peeking around her from behind. “You will bath, come.” She didn’t have the evil voice I imagined; she wasn’t ugly either. There was nothing remarkable about this woman that would invite suspicion if I met her in the street. But I wasn’t going voluntarily to my death, or worse, to a lifetime of blood-letting.

  “Stand!” she screamed, but I couldn’t stand. So I followed slowly on hands and knees. I had not moved much in the past week and the cold stone floor caused my joints to freeze like rusted hinges. I crawled along behind. Obeying, but not understanding why.

  She led me to a bathing room. Not a normal bathroom; it was different somehow. The room was huge and built completely of stone and concrete like the rest of the house. Iron bars over the window were the premeditated act of a predator and a sign that I was not her first prisoner. A strange lamp filled the room with an eerie yellow glow. The lamp smelled like sulphur. Several shower roses hung from the ceiling, clustered together. Caitlyn ran in and turned on a tap. Water flowed simultaneously from every showerhead and into an open drain in the centre of the floor. The woman pulled me to my feet and pushed me under the heavy stream of water before she left.

  The water was as cold as ice. “Use this, and take your clothes off,” Caitlyn said when she handed me a large cake of soap. I stripped off my soaking clothes and dropped them to the floor beneath my feet. I was glad to be rid of the putrid things. The soap was gritty and stung like acid, but smelt like grease. I scrubbed with fury, to take away the filth and the misery, but it was pointless.

  Caitlyn must have told her that I agreed to become one of them like she said she would. She planned to entice me into a life of blood-letting - a willing victim.

  Volante didn’t “just” become a vampire and to her, it wasn’t a matter of survival. I certainly don’t believe that you are turned into a vampire. It’s a choice, a perverted pleasure. Volante must have been indulging her perverse behaviour for some time because she designed a structure to act as both a prison (for those like me) and a fortress for her. In safer times, she would have needed to keep people out as well as entrap them. I imagine it worked both ways. The bars would make my escape difficult and rescue practically impossible, as long as I remained locked away.

  The clothes I wore, or what remained of them, were tattered and covered in filth. Whatever happened to cause my clothes to be less than a modest covering was beyond my comprehension. I shivered against the chill and wrung the water from my clothes. I was closer to death than ever, but I had chosen life more than once and I wasn’t going to quit today.

  Caitlyn came with fresh clothing and said, “She is waiting. You must hurry.” She waited until I dressed and then skipped ahead with fast little steps. She saw nothing wrong with her life and the blood-letting that was a regular part of her existence. I guess for Caitlyn, this was better than death, which from her account, appeared to be her only other option. Caitlyn’s blond hair bounced as she skipped and the flounces on her baby-doll dress flipped and twirled. Caitlyn looked ridiculous, but she was seven and probably enjoyed the attention and dressing up, regardless of the perversion that surrounded her.

  Volante stood near a table, waiting for our arrival. The table was fully set in all the finery one would expect at a formal dinner. She was dressed in a full-length passion red dress, which hugged her body, leaving no mystery as to what was hidden beneath. Her black hair was tamed into a roll at the back of her neck, yet wisps of it fought to escape. Around her neck hung a bright red stone, too large for a ruby and too intense for a garnet. I knew of no other red stone so I deemed it fake, in any case. I was sickened by all the pretence. She smiled and told me to sit.

  It occurred to me that there could be much to gain from my casual observations of this vain and heartless woman. The meal was simple, much like we ate at home, but it lacked the variety and flourish that would have matched the illusion she tried to create. I ate. I was starving. Once or twice, Caitlyn kicked me under the table as a warning to slow down. Volante ate as if she were at a royal dinner, picking up small pieces of food and nibbling them to oblivion. She sipped red fluid, which probably wasn’t blood, but could have been. The meal was consumed in silence, but not due to my presence. This was normal behaviour for this strange pair. Around the table, other places were set, but the plates remained empty and sat between unused forks
and knives. There were others perhaps… I hadn’t asked about “the others” Caitlyn mentioned. Perhaps it was set for them, others who hadn’t yet succumbed to the jaws of the leech.

  “Psyche, come and stand beside me. There is little need to be afraid and you must be willing to give or…” Her voice faded. She didn’t finish the sentence and I imagined that it indicated my fate would be the same as those who came before me and tried to resist.

  I obeyed, not sure why I was following her instruction so willingly, but I had little choice. It wasn’t fear… I was repulsed. Volante stood facing me. She took my chin and looked deep into my eyes. The human sparkle was not present in the dullness of her black, soulless eyes. My imagination perhaps, since I’d already judged this woman, though she was yet to act in a way that lived up to Caitlyn’s stories or my imaginings.

  Volante placed a hand over my heart and the other on my cheek. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She stood, motionless for the longest time and then opened her eyes. Her outstretched arms extended toward me as if she would embrace me, but she didn’t. She reached out, coercing the energy to her and sucking in air with long, deep breaths. Her head rolled back as she continued. It was as if she sucked the essence of a drug that hung in the air, intoxicating her a little more with each breath. At first, I felt nothing and then a deep tugging from within as I felt my energy draining away, absorbed by the vampire. My heart beat faster with each of her breaths, at first, but then it slowed. A dull ache formed across my forehead and dizziness began to engulf me. I felt sick; the nausea overwhelming me right before my knees buckled. The world spun and sounds rang in my ear until there was nothing more. She didn’t even notice my weakness and continued sucking at the air, arms extended and fingers twisting and pulling my energy to her. I had no more to give and collapsed to the floor. She noticed that.