The Rising Moon

by Nilsa Rodriguez

  On top of the dust-filled dresser was a basin made of beautiful hand painted porcelain filled with water. Beside it was a vase overflowed with white roses. They smelled freshly picked. Next to the vase was an envelope addressed to me.

  I picked up the crème colored envelope and ran my fingers over the embossed scrolls that framed the pretty paper. Inside, it held a note that read:

  You mean more than life to me.

  Please forgive me.

  Forever yours,

  Adam

  I looked over to the door as the knob began to turn. I expected to see Adam but instead a short, round woman carrying a tray filled with food stood at the door.

  “Good evening,” she said.

  The woman wore a black cardigan sweater and a long black skirt. Her hair was pulled back into a high bun. Her face held no expression.

  “My name’s Anne Musgrave,” she said placing the tray on the edge of the bed, “You have to forgive the dust and covers on the furniture but this room hasn’t been used in many years.”

  She removed the fabric off a table and chair and wiped it with a damp cloth before setting the tray on it.

  “My name’s Angelia Lafosse. Where am I?” I asked.

  “You’re at the Ambrose estate.” She replied, as she began to remove the white cloths off the rest of the furniture, “Mr. Ambrose brought you here two nights ago.”

  “I’ve been here that long?” I couldn’t believe it.

  “Yes ma’am.”

  “Are you a relative of Adam?” I asked, taking a slice of bread in my hand.

  “No.” she replied. She opened the window to allow the room to air out a bit. “I’m the caretaker of the estate.”

  “Where is he?” I asked.

  “Mr. Ambrose will be here when the sun sets.” She stood by the table and glanced over to the tray of food, “When you’re done eating place the tray on the table in the hall, nearest to the door.” She glanced at the window, “My duties end at sunset. I’ll be back in the morning with your breakfast.”

  And then she walked out of the room, closing the door behind her. My stomach moaned with hunger. I licked my lower lip and looked over at the tray of food. The aroma of roasted chicken, potatoes and vegetables smelled delectable. I cleaned up the tray in five minutes. I wiped my face and hands and carried the tray to the table outside the door as instructed.

  The house was quiet, except for the usual settling sounds of an old house. I curiously looked into the dark narrow hallway. The walls were covered in a faded crème floral wall paper. I imagined the hall must’ve looked beautiful in its heyday with its wooden crown molding and crystal sconces. I heard a sound coming from the last room on the right. It sounded like footsteps and furniture being dragged throughout the room. My eyes grew wide with fear. I quickly dashed back into my room.

  The sun had already set and the dark of night was all around.

  “I see you’re awake.” A soft voice said from behind me as I stood looking out the window.

  “Adam,” I gasped.

  With a wave of his hands, the candles and fireplace became lit and the sconces on the wall were shut off.

  “I didn’t mean to startle you.” He cupped my face in his hand. The cold feel of his skin made my face flush red. “Do you forgive me for striking you the other night?” His voice was soft and sincere.

  “Yes.” I replied. I was a wolf when he found me. Maybe knocking me out was the right thing to do. God knows what I could’ve done to him if he didn’t.

  “I’m glad to see you’re feeling better, but you really should get some rest.” He held my hand and walked me over to the bed.

  “But I feel fine,” I protested. He smiled and pulled the covers up to my chin and dragged a chair beside the bed. “Thank you for saving my life the other night.”

  He nodded, never taking his eyes off me. “Who or what were you running from?”

  “I wish I could remember. My memory is shut I just remember bits and pieces of what happened that night. I do know we went to the Ulric ranch because earlier that day, we discovered that my boyfr…,” I stopped before completely saying boyfriend. “Lyle was responsible for nearly killing one of my friends.”

  Adam never took his eyes off of me. Then he asked, “So, Lyle’s your boyfriend?”

  “Uh… we never made it official, but I did care for him a lot. I felt he was someone I could trust with not only my feelings but with my heart as well. Until I saw what he did to my friend.”

  “So you don’t care for him anymore?”

  “Not the way I once did,” I turned my eyes away from him and began to tug on the blanket. “I’ve always been a closed person. It’s not easy for me to trust people. And Lyle made me feel as if I can tell him anything and he would understand.”

  We sat in silence for a little while. His eyes were on me once again. I stared right at him wanting to know more about him. Who was he? Was he really a vampire? He surely didn’t look or behave like the vampires I’ve seen on T.V. or read about in fiction novels. He didn’t wear a cape. Instead, he wore a black leather jacket, T-shirt and jeans. His hair wasn’t slick back and dark, it was silver, short, and wildly styled as if he rolled out of bed and bang!...his hair was done. His face was smooth and pale. Everything about him was perfect. And I also didn’t see sharp fangs in his mouth when he spoke.

  I knew I shouldn’t be so stereotypical, but it was true. Nothing about him was scary.

  “Can I ask you something?” I asked shifting my body to the side and resting on my right elbow.

  “Sure.”

  “Are you really a vampire?” I just came out and asked him.

  In the past, it would’ve scared the hell out of me if I knew I would’ve been sitting this close to someone I thought only existed in folklore or horror movies, but my world has changed a lot in the past several months. Hated by a witch, loved by a werewolf and having a best friend who transforms into a raven---I guess you can say I’ve become immune. I no longer couldn’t go on believing these creatures were fictional characters created to spark fear and curiosity. I myself have become a believer. I couldn’t escape it. For I myself am one of those creatures. A child of the moon, as Lyle had put it. I was a werewolf. A reincarnated, immortal werewolf nonetheless.

  He took a deep breath, “Yes.”

  I swallowed hard, “For how long?”

  “Too long,” he replied, leaning back on the chair. He ran his fingers through his hair and scratched the back of his head.

  “Have you ever had the feeling of déjà vu? As if you know someone you’ve never met or you find yourself in a place you know you’ve been in before, but maybe in another life? That’s how I feel right now, as I sit here with you. I can’t help but feel a deep connection to you and this place…” I began to say.

  He sat up, again. He tilted his head to the side, examining me closely. “Yes. That’s why I can’t seem to take my eyes off of you. You look just like her.”

  “Who?” I asked.

  “Zaria,” he began to say. “She was beautiful, sweet and very brave.”

  I began to regret not reading her diary. The night Ani gave me the diary I rewrapped it in Veena’s quilt and buried it in the far side of the closet beneath a pile of outdated clothes. I couldn’t convince myself to read it. I was afraid of whom I was in a previous life and worse of how I lived my last days on earth before I died. But as I laid beside Adam, I wanted to know everything about the two of them.

  I plumped down on the puffy pillows, “Sweet, I’ve been called before. Brave, only recently. But as far as being called beautiful…” I shook my head. “You loved her very much, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, with all my heart and soul,” he promptly replied.

  “Can I ask you something else?”

  “Sure.” He replied smiling his slow easy smile.

  “How did you become a vampire?”

  The smile quickly wiped away. It took him a moment to finally answer. “I was bitten.”

>   I rolled my eyes. I knew that’s how a person became a vampire, but I had hoped for something more detailed than that. My dreams about the night Zaria took her life always ended the same. I wanted to know what happened after she plummeted to her death.

  “I know what the wolves did to you the night Zaria died. I’ve relived it in my dreams.” I paused and caught the sad expression in his eyes as he relived that night. “How were you bit by a vampire if you were already dead? Didn’t the werewolves kill you?”

  He took a deep breath and stared into the distance, “I did die that night.”

  I sat up and crossed my arms across my chest. “How can that be possible? I thought vampires only drank blood from the living?”

  “I died in the hands of a vampire, not the werewolves. You see, after the werewolves left me for dead, I managed to crawl several feet into a hallowed tree. What I didn’t know was that the tree was the resting place of a vampire.”

  My brows wrinkled in confusion.

  “Not all vampires sleep in houses or in coffins,” he said. “As I was lying on the ground, close to death, my blood drenched the soil and awoke the vampire that was buried beneath it.” Adam leaned back against the back of the chair. A frown appeared between his eyes as if he was recounted the moment, “He broke through the ground, grabbed me by the throat and locked his fangs on my neck taking with him what little life I had left.

  Zaria’s eyes and how they sparkled in the moonlight was all I could think about as I felt my life slowly escape my body. As, I stood face to face with death, I only wanted to see her. My thoughts and love for Zaria streamed into his veins as he drank my blood. He saw what I saw, and felt what I felt. My heartache became his and my desire for revenge became his as well. He gave me a choice that night. He said, ‘Die and never see your love again, or accept to live as I do and get your revenge and reunite with her once again.’ I chose to become this monster because I wanted to be with Zaria again---only to discover days later that she was dead.”

  Tears filled my eyes. “I’m sorry,” I whispered as I cupped his cool and clammy face in my hand. I couldn’t help but feel responsible for Zaria not only taking her life, but for taking his as well.

  “I was so angry with myself for not being able to protect her from the Lobison’s. I hunted every one of them and killed them all, except for the witch. She got away before I could rip her into pieces as I did with her brothers.” His eyes turned dark with anger.

  “On the night I killed the last remaining one of them, I returned to the cliff from which Zaria took her life. I wanted her to rest knowing that they couldn’t hurt anyone ever again. I apologized for failing to protect her that night.” He took his eyes away from mine, “My life meant nothing without her. My mission was over. I killed the bastards who took her from me and now my only wish was to be with her on the other side. So that night I vowed to stay on the cliff until sunrise. But as the sun began to rise, I heard her voice.” Once again, his eyes were on mine, “She asked me to wait. She said she’d return. And so I did.”

  “And how did you know I was Zaria?”

  “You called me.”

  I looked at him in surprise. “I did?”

  “I returned to the cliff every full moon since the night she last spoke to me, hoping to hear her voice again. Many years passed since she last talked to me. Until the other night, she told me she had returned.”

  “But how did you know I was her?”

  “You pulled me into your dream,” he replied. Suddenly I remembered Sinks Canyon. It was a dream. “When I saw you that night at Sinks Canyon, I knew she had returned, because I felt it here,” he placed his long, slim hand on his chest. “A vampire’s heart seizes to beat the night he becomes a vampire, but when I saw you, I felt my heart thump.”

  I smiled and snuggled close to the pillows. “Did you ever regret being turned into a vampire?”

  “I did, after learning Zaria was dead. But now I don’t regret it, because if I hadn’t done it, I wouldn’t have met you. The nearly two hundred year wait was well worth it.”

  Adam talked about his early days as a vampire. His many travels around the world and how no matter where he was, he always returned to the cliff every full moon and waited to hear Zaria speak to him once again.

  I asked him if he drank human blood, and he said yes. I nearly leapt out of the bed when he told me he did, but I didn’t. Vampires drink blood, that’s what they do. He also told me that at the beginning when he was merely a young vampire, the thirst for human blood was greater and so he was vicious in the way he quenched his thirst, but now there were “humane” ways to satisfy the need for blood, like compelling his victims into a deep sleep and taking just enough blood needed to satisfy his thirst and not take their life. He also admitted to buying bags of blood from blood banks, attending donor blood parties and on occasion, drinking animal blood to sustain his thirst.

  He asked about me. My childhood, my hopes and dreams. I told him the story Ani told me about my parents, how they died. I told him of my childhood growing up in River View hospital and how I was shuffled from foster home to foster home until I came to live in Lander with the Millers. I told him my hopes were to be able to live a normal life…well as normal a life can be for an immortal wolf. And my dreams were to be able to love someone without the fear of losing them. We talked for hours. It felt like we were old friends catching up on the years we’ve spent apart.

  Dawn was fast approaching and although I wanted to continue talking, my eyelids grew heavy. He took my hand into his and brought them to his mouth for a kiss. He closed his eyes, long pale lashes feathered over his hollowed cheeks and then he was gone.

  ∞ CHAPTER 22 ∞

  DAWN BROKE WITH a bright ray of sunshine creeping through the window. I glanced at the empty chair beside the bed. Adam was already gone. I sat up, rubbing my eyes. Cool, crisp country air drifted through the window brushing against my cheeks. A knock on the door broke the lazy feeling I felt.

  “Come in.”

  Anne walked in carrying a tray of food, “Good morning Miss Lafosse.”

  “Please call me Lia.” I said as I stepped out of bed and gazed over the large breakfast she prepared of toast, eggs, sausage, fruit and jam.

  “You outdid yourself, Anne. I don’t think I can eat all of this by myself, why don’t you have a seat and join me?”

  “I can’t, Lia,” she said, swinging a cloth in her hand. “I have a lot of chores to do in this big old house. Like I mentioned yesterday, we haven’t had company here for many years and so I have a lot of dusting and cleaning to do.”

  I sighed loudly and cupped my chin in my hand. I took a sip of the freshly squeezed orange juice.

  “If you’d like I can help you clean the house,” I suggested. The idea of being cooped up in this room was beginning to get to me.

  “Oh no! No, no.” she gasped, “I have a better idea. Why don’t you take a look around the house? There are a lot of rooms to explore. I’m sure Mr. Ambrose wouldn’t mind, but promise me you won’t enter the last room at the end of the hall.”

  My eye grew wide, “Why?”

  “No one is allowed in that room. So please, just promise me you won’t even step near the door.”

  “Ok. I promise.”

  After taking the last bite of breakfast, I washed up and opened the large mahogany wardrobe with hand painted cherubs on it. There were only Victorian dresses inside, nothing modern and comfortable like a comfy pair of jeans and a T-shirt. I pulled out a dark blue, cap sleeve dress with hand stitched flowers on it. It fit me perfect. In the bottom drawer of the armoire was a pair of black heeled slippers. Although I never wore heeled shoes before, I slipped them on because there was nothing else I could wear. I glanced at myself on the full length mirror that was nailed on the armoire door. My hair was in dire need of taming. I opened the vanity and pulled out a silver brush with white bristles on it and ran it through my hair, styling it up in a tail.

  I placed the empty tra
y on the table outside the room, as I had done the past couple of days and continued to walk down the narrow hall. I stepped into the next room on the left. It was another bedroom. A large bed rested on the far wall with the same décor as the room I was in, except the color was blue. Anne had already removed all the cloths off the furniture. The dark mahogany wood furnishing was glossy and smooth. I stepped out and continued to the next couple of rooms. Six in all. All of them Victorian with no modern amenities like a phone, T.V. or radio anywhere in sight.

  I made my way down the wide curved staircase into, the foyer. To the right of the foyer was a library with hardwood floors, freshly polished furniture and shelves stuffed with old books. Peeling wall paper adorned the walls adding to its aged décor. I pulled out a book of poems and took a seat on the dark blue sofa.

  I heard Anne next door. I sat the book down and went to see if she wouldn’t mind some help. The room was a den. Paintings hung on every wall. She was dusting one of the paintings in her hand.

  “Good afternoon, Anne.” I said as I strolled into the room. “I know you said you didn’t want any help, but I’m bored and I really wouldn’t mind helping you clean the house. It’s the least I can do to repay you and Adam for taking such good care of me.”

  Her face was pale, as if she’d seen a ghost.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.” I said, but her expression was wooden. “Is something wrong?”

  “No, Miss Lia. It’s just that dress you’re wearing…” she turned the frame around. It was a painting of a woman wearing the same exact dress.

  “She looks like me.” I grabbed the frame out of her hands to get a closer look. Her hair cascaded down her shoulders in dark set curls. Her skin was pale and her eyes were two different shades of blue, exactly like mine.