“A deal, you say? And you do have all this fear for a deal?” Jason punched him. “Do you think I'm stupid? How flimsy you look now, hunter! Ahh…” inspired noisy. “I can smell the fear! What a human feeling, so pathetic! My victims smell the same when they understand that death is approaching them. And you are more pathetic because you have sold all your glory for a girl!”
Jason prepared to give what seemed like his coup de grace but it burned into flames before his hand could touch Kaliel. With his last strength, he redirected his attack beyond Kaliel and disappeared into a shred of black ash.
A scream made Kaliel jump off the floor and run towards her. Ali lay on her back with her hair scattered as if a hurricane had dragged her. It had been her again. Again she used her gifts. And again he had been paralyzed.
“You’re okay?” Kaliel picked her up and pulled her hair back from her face. He touched her neck: she still had a pulse. “Ali... Ali...”
“I’m fine... He deserved it...” Ali muttered. “His spirit was rotten...”
“Oh, forget it... And get used to it: the demons are worse” Kaliel commented. His relief was so great that he had to suppress a smile.
“You can get me down now” said Ali. “I'm fine”.
But he just didn’t do it. He bent down to pick up the bag of broken mirrors and kept charging her into the street.
“I'm fine!” Ali repeated. “Get me down...”
Kaliel gave her a cold look and tried not to let his face reveal his thoughts. He couldn’t explain how such an innocent spirit could be chased by so much darkness. But there was something else that hadn’t been explained so far: why could she have so many demons but no angels? Why had the Heavens given her up to the snares of hell without a guardian angel balancing the scales? The only answer was that her soul was cursed. If she had sold it in a pact that would explain her gifts but he was sure that she had nothing to do with it. Maybe haunted. Rejected by the Heavens, in any way, like him...
“I don’t want to...” he murmured without looking at her and continued walking towards the Master's house.
16
Forbidden
The small tudor-style house had nothing to distinguish it from the others on the block. Kaliel knocked on the door with his knuckles and seconds later a man in his thirties appeared.
“Kaliel!” He was happy. “It´s been a long time since you last visited me! You look so... different”.
“Yes... Being me was old-fashioned” Kaliel replied dryly. The man, who seemed to understand him beyond his mask of coldness, laughed heartily.
“Please, come in” offered cordial. “My name is Alexander. Welcome” he said to Ali as he shook her hand.
“Alanis... Ali” she replied.
Alexander led them to a pair of red velvet armchairs in front of a large wood-burning stove. In the center, on a very low table, an exquisite tea set with drawings of a blue countryside rested. The boy took his place in one of the armchairs and distributed the three cups of steaming tea. Did he have it ready? Did he know that they would visit him?
“Tea is always ready in my house” he told Ali. Surely he’d noticed her surprise.
“Sit down” Kaliel muttered.
Ali obeyed; his arms were crossed and that, in Kaliel's language, meant he wasn’t going to change his mind.
The next few seconds were somewhat uncomfortable. Alexander looked between her and Kaliel but nobody said anything. After two silent sips to his cup, he finally relaxed against the soft back of his chair and said:
“I see that you have brought me something to repair... and I also see many more things, but you will say and I will not continue until you ask me” Alexander narrowed his eyes.
“Morfeo's mirror” Kaliel confirmed, handing him the splinter bag. “Can you fix it?”
Alexander wasn’t the stooped old man Ali imagined when Kaliel mentioned that they would go in search of the "Master." However, his attitude was as hermetic as one might expect from a sorcerer.
“Of course I can” Alexander smiled “because this mirror wanted to be brought here tonight. Repair it will not be the issue but what you want to show us...”
Kaliel sighed irritably and sat on the armrest of the chair next to Ali.
“I should have imagined it!”
“Is that mirror alive?” Ali asked.
“No... I mean it was destiny... Call it what you want” Alexander said while drinking relaxed. He was, in fact, the only one who could feel relaxed. “I just see the signs and interpret them. I don’t judge wills...”
“Kaliel...” whispered a voice on the threshold of what looked like a kitchen. A girl in a dress in the style of the nineteenth century had been petrified when she saw him. She looked like a Victorian princess, with her blond curls and bulging sleeves full of broderie, but Kaliel wasn’t even looking at her. The girl bit her lip, embarrassed and walked to them without taking off the eyes of both guests.
“Sorry, I'm Charlotte” she introduced herself to Ali. “Do you need me to bring you something?” She asked to Alexander.
This was all the strangest for Ali. Why did Charlotte dress like that? Why did Kaliel go around the table to cross the opposite side and avoid looking at her? He looked angry and she looked... hopelessly in love. Would they have had a romance with a sad ending? Suddenly Ali felt in the wrong place.
“I'm leaving, don’t worry...” She said standing up.
“Don’t you even try it! I won’t let you go!” Kaliel turned abruptly, still with his arms crossed over his chest.
Ali dropped into the chair again. She watched as Charlotte fixed her gaze on the floor, uncomfortable.
“Why does he have to be so rude?” She muttered to herself.
“Sometimes I think it's because he's afraid” said Charlotte. The girl filled the tea cups again. To Ali's surprise, the tea was still smoking. When tasting it, she found that it never got cold. It must have been some kind of spell.
“Afraid of what?” Ali asked. The girl seemed to know him well. Maybe she could tell her. Ali decided to take a relaxed posture and drink tea, in order to enter into trust with Charlotte.
But the girl didn’t answer.
“I think I haven’t introduced myself, I'm Alanis” Ali smiled, downplaying the Kaliel thing. “You're Alexander's wife?”
Okay, it wasn’t the best question. If Alexander were her husband she would never have been so obvious when looking at Kaliel. It was a completely inappropriate situation. Contrary to what she believed, Charlotte was amused.
“No! He is my father...” she laughed. “I know, I know. He's older than he looks...”
Actually, Ali couldn’t be surprised anymore.
“Oh, I'm sorry... And... You've known Kaliel for a long time?” Ali just couldn’t help it.
Charlotte smiled suspiciously. Clearly, she was waiting for that question.
“Many years, more than I would like...” the girl answered and hid her melancholy look in the depths of her tea cup. “What about you?”
“Oh, not much. A week maybe...” Ali remembered. “More than I would like too...” she joked.
Charlotte smiled amused but the grief was still there, screaming from her amber eyes. Then she said nothing and the silence began to become too uncomfortable. Ali was spinning in her head to possible ways to continue the conversation but there was only one thing on her mind: Kaliel.
“Why did Alexander say he looked different?”
Ali could imagine it: he had been a gentle and cheerful boy until a terrible disappointment in love broke his heart into a thousand pieces and he swore never to love again... Typical.
“He was more...” Charlotte moved her hand indicating that she was looking for the right word “prideful”.
“Even more!?” Ali was surprised. If her life were a comedy that would be just the moment she would spit out what she had just drunk.
“Yes... At that time he was so special. He didn’t talk to anyone. He was cold and distant. Too good to
talk to humans, I think ... And he certainly was”.
“What thing?” Ali insisted, prey to the intrigue.
“Too good” clarified Charlotte. “Kaliel was sublime. He had a special brightness, something that made him seem indestructible. Now he looks... vulnerable. He looks more...” the girl moved her lips compulsively but the words were slow to come out. “He looks so human”.
Ali frowned, confused. Vulnerable? Human?
“What do you mean by vulnerable?”
“You didn’t know? Kaliel is immortal... Or at least he was”.
“Oh, that. Of course...” Ali pretended to know. “What I really don’t understand is his rude attitude. Why is he so crabbed, so indecipherable?”
“I could never know that...” Charlotte said rising suddenly. Then her eyes alighted on Ali. “Maybe he's cursed, I don’t know, but it's like he’s forbidden to love. I have no idea how the rules are...” the girl looked away.
Charlotte grabbed her skirt with both hands and hurried to the kitchen. Then she stopped, as if she had forgotten something.
“He looks... defeated. Maybe you'll find out soon enough” she finally said and disappeared behind the door.
Ali stood motionless, cup held just in front of her lips.
“Forgive my daughter” Alexander muttered.
He had appeared behind Ali, who stifled a cry when she saw him. Then she realized that his image was somewhat translucent.
“I can’t understand anything! I feel like I'm going crazy...” She confessed to that kind of ghost of Alexander.
“I know... But my daughter is right about something: Kaliel looks vulnerable” Alexander said. “Ali, your mission is to not let him fall...”
Ali didn’t have time to ask anything. The figure vanished and seconds later Kaliel and Alexander appeared where they had left. The latter, gave her a smile of complicity. Kaliel made a surreptitious panning around the room.
“Let's do this once and for all...” Kaliel suggested exasperated. Then, he placed the mirror on the chair in front of Ali and went to her.
It was still covered by the cloth Kaliel had brought it into. Alexander stopped at the side of the artifact and prepared himself.
“I ask permission to the Heavens so that the messenger of the mirror can speak to us today” the sorcerer whispered as he slid the cover.
Morfeo's mirror was a piece of art. In a circular pattern, the frame was formed by gold borders that rippled like waves and became entangled around them like flowers whose petals were hundreds of precious stones. Ali let out a sigh and approached to touch it. There was nothing out of the ordinary in its reflection until her fingers landed on it. It was then that the image began to rotate counter-clockwise. The colors dispersed and then came together again to show another shape. Now Ali could see herself projected in the mirror but she looked different as well as everything around her. A white dress fluttered over her almost naked body. It became brighter towards her chest and it was difficult to look. A light that almost burned her eyes came down from a golden sky and bathed her head and shoulders. But beneath her feet stretched an unfathomable darkness from which long, thin hands began to emerge. Dreadful, hollow-eyed beings were teasing her by tearing her dress and burning it.
Suddenly, the image became increasingly real. Kaliel and Alexander, the whole house, had disappeared and everything around her was devastation and fire. The sky was too far away and the light no longer shone so intensely. Here and there, the shadows rose from the ground and cornered her. Beyond somewhere in the blackness, hundreds of voices ripped through the air with their howls and the crackling of the fire became clearer. A human hand came out of the shadows towards her, inviting her. She couldn’t see the owner but, as soon as Ali took it, those creepy beings knelt before her. Deep in her heart she wanted them to disappear and, maybe for that, they did. At that moment she and her secret companion began to turn in a swirl of darkness in which Ali could distinguish many faces. There were Mireya and Heather. Chase! Ali tried to reach him with her free hand but he turned and burst into flames...
And finally she saw Kaliel with his face slumped and shadowed by the hair that fell on him, until a red flash appeared on his cheek. Kaliel bled. Ali wanted to reach him and could not, so this time, she fought until she got rid of the hand that was holding her and ran to him. He seemed to be dead. Ali shook him until he opened his eyes and looked at her. As soon as she took his hand, the ground beneath them opened and they began to fall into darker and darker places. The sky was just a distant point up there. Leave him said a voice. She noticed that blood flowed from Kaliel's hand and fell to her. I won’t let you go, he said but his lips didn’t move. There was blood in his eyes, blood on his hands and also on his lips.
“Kaliel!” She cried.
They still fell. She tightened him harder and tried to remove the bloody hair from his face, but wherever she touched him, a new wound opened and his skin paled more and more. Now he was cold; he was dying. Those squalid, hollow-eyed creatures returned and began to bite him to devour his flesh.
“Get away! Get away!” Ali chased them away with one hand and with the other clung to Kaliel. But the creatures multiplied. “Leave him alone! Get away!” She broke down to cry while trying uselessly to kick them all and then she hugged him to cover him with her body and her dress. And then she did it. “Enough!” She shouted and raised her hand. From her palm, the flames devoured everything they found.
“Enough, Ali!” begged a voice.
Both finally touched the bottom of the abyss.
“Come back, Ali” calmly ordered Alexander's voice.
The shadows withdrew like a veil and she saw Alexander's house again but the flames didn’t leave. She realized that she was still clinging tightly to Kaliel, this time in real life, and with her hand still raised, she had really set the whole house on fire to protect him from her visions. Embarrassed, she pushed him away from her so that both of them fell facing each other. Kaliel watched in astonishment and breathed hard. She had never seen him that confused before. It was evident that he didn’t know what was happening either.
“You were bleeding!” Ali said breathlessly. But on his perfect skin there were only wisps of smoke, as well as over her. “I saw you…”
Kaliel looked away and they both discovered that they were locked in a circle of fire. Alexander watched blankly from a corner, his hands clasped behind his back. Then, with a snap of his fingers he made all the fire and damage disappear. The room became even quieter.
“Everything you saw I saw it too” said the sorcerer.
“I saw her in the mirror! Alexander, she has no...” Kaliel murmured.
“You already knew that” Alexander told him.
“How is it possible?” Kaliel opened his eyes wide and they turned a vibrant green.
Ali was too disturbed to ask what they were talking about. However, Alexander addressed her:
“The flames of hell are on you girl: you belong to them before you were born. I don’t know what serious thing they have done with you but the truth is that you are already condemned and your curse is so dark it can drag even the angels to hell with you”.
17
The Master
Embarrassed, Ali walked silently back to the cathedral. She kept on meditating on the visions she had had when she looked at herself in the Mirror of Morpheus. If Alexander had said that it was the mirror that had wanted to take her there to communicate a message, what had it meant? Why did it seem to mainly involve Kaliel when the boy had been part of her life for only a week? Then she remembered the moment when the vision disappeared and she found herself clutching Kaliel in an attempt to protect him from her own delusions. How stupid it was to think that she could do something for him when it was clear that she was weak. How stupid she must have looked as she burned down Alexander's house like a psycho... The more she thought about it, the more rage she felt. And more anger gave her not being able to be as cold as Kaliel. She was too sincere. All her emotions
easily loomed on the surface of her eyes. Had he noticed her desperation to save him? And what would he think of that? After all, she didn’t know what to think about herself after that either. But thinking about it, she was a girl with very good feelings who easily became attached to people and there were no reasons not to appreciate the only friend she had right now. Worrying about him was just a way to return the favor.
“What are you thinking about?” He murmured. Ali noticed that slight tremor in his voice. Since when did he care what she thought? Maybe he just wanted to kill that awkward silence that enveloped them. Maybe he was also embarrassed.
“What that vampire said...” Ali lied.
“Did you hear everything?” He sounded somewhat alarmed. “Don’t worry, it wasn’t true... He just wanted to annoy me”.
The words of the vampire with the tattooed head were revived in Ali's mind. He was attacking Kaliel with the story of his plans to abuse her. At that moment, Ali was hidden in the room from which she had escaped minutes ago with the help of Larsen. Jason's desires had left her frozen in horror so she didn’t notice the vampire's true intentions: to disturb Kaliel. But one thing in particular was spinning in her head... Why did he tell Kaliel that he could even dare to imagine it? Would he have made a vow of chastity? It would make sense if he wanted to redeem himself. Then she remembered what Charlotte had said: as if he were forbidden to love...
“Hey...” Kaliel watched her with a frown. Ali had lost herself in her thoughts and hadn’t answered. His emerald eyes peered at her.
“Did you know that girl, Charlotte?” Ali asked.
Kaliel shifted his gaze to the front. He looked as embarrassed as when he saw her appear in Alexander's room and wrinkled his nose as if they were passing through a dung field. Then they came to the trees in the backyard of the cathedral and she couldn’t see him so well.
“Why do you despise her so much?” She insisted.
“What did she say?” Kaliel asked sharply.
“She didn’t tell me anything... That's why I'm asking you”.
Dark Temptation Page 12