Chapter Six ~Cret~

Every scroll, book, or paper that once resided on the bookcases that were built out from every wall in Rhea's former room now littered the floor. Two hours had passed since I was locked in this room by that Ryder woman, whom I suspected and confirmed to be a vampire. Their shadows so easy to tell apart from those of mortals. A vampire's shadow was muted and shallow with a slight red tint to the black, they almost appeared transparent except for Serenity's and this lord of hers.

Since being detained I had studied every bit of information stored within this room, and all I had to show for the last few hours was a mess. I had yet to find anything that could be of any use to me. No information about this mysterious person, the vampires’ operations, or how Serenity survived all those years ago.

This wasn't like Rhea. The moment she had identified Serenity she would have plunged herself into the stacks of research. Pulling on any bit of information possible to come up with her coveted answers. Instead of finding text about vampires, regeneration, strange reports from the neutral territories on her desk, all I found was books upon books about creation. Everything from the abstract belief that we all spawned from flowers the Sakaineses believed, to the myth of lava giants being our creators. It was pure insanity—was Rhea losing her mind toward the end?

Why would she be looking into kids’ stories? I tossed another book into the growing pile of clutter.

Pulling book after book from the endless shelves I also had yet to find her legacy. Rhea's special and most treasured item. A simple brown leather book. Every theory, thought, or idea that Rhea had was contained within its pages, but it had more than just one lifetime of secrets contained within. This one small book was something she hid and handed down through her many generations of life. That one book contained more information than any other item, race, or scholar ever could. It wasn't here. It was nowhere to be found.

This brought about a troubling thought. Recalling back to the interactions with the mysterious shadowed lord, I was drawn to his swift change in demeanor toward me. It was such a change, from mocking to accommodating. If you could call being a prisoner much of a difference. Still the way he acted after learning my name troubled me.

Did he know?

Tugging the scarf from around my head I let the uncoiled end fall around my neck freeing my messy hair. I tussled it more with my fingers then combed it back in troubled realization things were far more than what they appeared, and me without a single clue.

There was nothing here. Not a damn thing I could use, but there was one more place I had yet to look. The book could be there, the problem was getting out of this room.

Rhea's room was windowless with a thick wooden door with the hinges on the outside, and a small fireplace with a blazing fire. This room proved to be a most effective cell. I could break through the door, it wasn't a challenge with my unnatural strength, but it would bring masses of brainwashed humans in the manor as well as the vampires. I still had no idea how many were here.

It's too risky.

I would have to think of another way out of this place, even then I knew my time was limited. These people suspected me, it was clear by the lord's behavior. He wanted me here, this shadowed lord that I was more than convinced was the Lord of the Vamdari by the way Serenity acted toward him.

The image of her hand sliding so willingly into his, her figure drawn into the shadows enraged me even now. The smell of her still lingered all around me in a faint taunt. It was so damn distracting.

No, its stronger now.

That sage scent was much stronger than the faded memory I had been wallowing in. She was coming. A smirk spread across my lips at her curiosity and the victory I felt in knowing she would come.

I had studied Serenity for decades, watched her every move from my shadows. I could predict everything about her, except that she would live. I was still conflicted about that.

The second I was locked away in this cell I called my voided servants, little shadow puppets that took on any form I wished them, another skill my father unwillingly passed on to me. Sending them out to the Opsona clans I gave them all the information I had learned so far, but I left out Serenity. If they found out my raven beauty was alive it could be the end of me. They would surely take my life in place of her as part of our contract, and while that instilled a nervous fear within my mind I didn't care.

I would be lying if I didn't admit I felt relief in knowing she was still alive. The moment I saw her life returned to me, an energy and passion for a world that had become so meaningless in her absence. She was no longer a specter from my wildest fantasies sent to remind me of a bargain I so foolishly entered into.

You can't let her live, that mental pest of mine reminded as the sound of the lock turning drew my attention.

It was right—I couldn't let her live. Serenity was an unnatural force fueled by her need to satisfy the desire of the vampire overlord, and that powerful master of hers. Vampires were loyal creatures, driven by lust of vanity and blood but loyal all the same. That was Serenity's only flaw, nothing shook her faith in those in command. She even expressed a type of pleasure in furthering their cause, driven forward by an unquenchable thirst for more power, more control. Yes, I would have to kill her, but later.

The door opened with caution as she slid into the room on complete guard, she knew I was a threat and I would expect no less from someone like Serenity. There was no getting the jump on her, that was why the Opsona had created me. They wanted a weapon that could combat her unique abilities to sense danger, and put an end to the murderous Vamdari general whom none of them could get close to. She was far too skilled and the Opsona blood that mingled with the vampire inside her was that of the formidable Fisargo Clan. A bloodline that had long since been lost to us, their abilities were unique and they outranked any other in the Opsona world. They had the unique talent of sensory precognition.

This branch of Opsona were able to sense un-foretold events from birth, as they grew and regained their past memories they were able to adopt their special abilities to predict an enemies moves in combat. Some were even so skilled that the sense of future events could be focused into a refined image much like a seer could witness with enough herbal help. Even then a seer's premonitions were fuzzy and distorted by the mortal mind. Opsona Elders of the Fisargo clan had no such distortion and it was a gift that all the clans mourned the loss of.

Serenity was the last of that clan. The only one left carrying those special prosperities, and while the others should have been reborn into new bodies the Vamdari had found away to see to their definite end. Mingling the blood of demonic familiars in the vampire ranks with that of the Fisargo captives, they ensured the race could never be reborn. They were tainted.

Once an Opsona soul was tainted they lost their ability to reincarnate. Their souls and generations of experience died with them and faded into the stream of life where it was broken down over and over. Becoming part of a larger whole before pieces were extracted and formed into a new life along with millions of other small pieces of life energy from all over the different planes.

It happened to the best of the clans and now only a few remained, it was the raid on Serenity's village and people that forced the rest of us to become nomadic. If we didn't settle then we couldn't be hunted down and killed off. That night was a dark mark in our history, one I wish had never taken place like many others, but it happened all the same and now we needed to move on. To live on and go forward with what was left...Serenity.

Thunderous beats from my rapid moving heart flooded my ears when I took full sight of her, waves of raven hair dancing behind those elegantly cautioned movements of hers. Perfect round curves swaying just enough to draw my full attention as my lips spread into a wider smile taking in that intoxicating mix of saged-lavender. I can't do this.

My resolve to end her was crumbling with each passing moment, just thinking about what I had decided only moments ago brought a sickness into my stomach. I could never strike her again. I knew the door had closed but it took the clicking of the lock to make me realize I was staring, and even then I didn't care.

The stern look on her face and slightly creased brows said she was here for a reason. It was the same look she had every time something interested or troubled her, and it was the most attractive look I had ever seen on a female anywhere.

“Why are you playing this game?” Serenity was so blunt it should have shocked me but instead it only made me more attracted to her.

“I like playing games,” I purred back. “This one just happens to be quite challenging, and I enjoy a good challenge.”

What was wrong with me? Was I flirting?

I told myself the second I was locked away in here I would not be toyed with, I would not allow myself to fall into the temptation that was Serenity. There was no helping it, there was something about her and I think Rhea knew it was there even before she revealed my purpose in life. The day she explained to me that the Opsona clans wished my death but were willing to allow me to live in exchange for Serenity's life, I jumped at the chance. The thought of dying was not something I could entertain at that young age.

Even then with all my willingness to kill a stranger, Rhea kept me away from Serenity. I watched her from a distance, studying her every move like Rhea had instructed me, and when the day came I followed my teacher's orders without falter. Even with the pull I had been feeling toward Serenity, the emotions and desires that had grown inside of me just from watching her.

On that day I spent hours trying to quell the turmoil over what was to come, and when the moment presented itself I plunged my dagger into Serenity's chest without a thought. It was me or her, and I wasn't ready to die.

It all happened so fast I didn't need to worry about those troublesome feelings, but as the speed of battle slowed into a frozen point in time I realized why I was told to stay away from her. Regret took the place of the fiery desire to live, and as she faded in my arms I even tried to save her. I pulled the dagger out before her immortality completely drained from her body, but it wasn't enough. In my arms among the rain…Fire…Death, she slipped away from me. I won't relive that hell!