by Jamie Ott
"Hello?" she half asked-half said.
She expected them to be angry with her, but they weren't.
"Hi, glad to see you're alright," said Ciaran.
"We're at our old house in the city," said Aine. "In case you're wondering."
"Look, I'm so sorry. I don't know what Sestin meant to you. I tried to refuse him, but he kept coming at me."
"It's alright. We understand. One thing many of us look for, as we age, is the right person to end us. Since many will be looking to gain the strength of that person's blood, we always look for the choicest person. We don't want to give our gifts to those we don't believe in," said Aine.
"Or someone who would misuse our powers," added Ciaran. "Sestin chose you because he liked you. Keagan is just jealous. He's always been a least favorite of almost everyone who's ever known him."
"He's hot tempered, shallow, possessive?" Aine supplied.
Confused by the idea that Sestin liked her, she said, "He seemed barely able to tolerate me."
"The old ones lose patience. You would too, if you had to deal with people like you, century after century," said Aine.
Normally, Starr would have taken her words as insult, but, as she reflected on the wisdom of it, it made sense to her. Dealing with puerile man for centuries might just drive her crazy too.
"There's something I don't understand: What's the difference between consciousness and a soul?"
"When a human takes of the Primordial blood, or is bitten and turned by a vampire, it's said that he or she suffers mortal death. That in the hours between, our soul leaves our bodies, leaving us more animal; acting on pure instinct," said Ciaran.
"But Sestin kept saying he wanted to separate his conscious from his body?"
"A euphemism we sometimes use. What he was really saying, was that he was ready to die; that he didn't want to think anymore."
"Do the Primordials have souls?"
"Not typically, unless they're half," Ciaran replied.
"But we really don't know for sure," Aine interrupted. "Honestly, it's just hearsay. One would have to die in order to find out."
"Does this make me a Primordial now?"
"Maybe an honorary one, if they choose to acknowledge you. You do look deader than ever though."
Final Transformation
Chapter 8
She fell from the sky to her knees, in the dirt of the mesa top. Considering she was still ill from the blood, she was just glad to have made it home.
Starr could have stayed with Ciaran and Aine, but she didn't want to risk Keagan coming for her when she was weak.
Starr stood and carefully walked into the Lake George house - where the kids moved to after the clinic burned down.
"Hey, everyone," she said lowly.
"Starr's home," Misty shouted to the house.
Over the next few days, she went in and out of a feverish sleep. Occasionally, one of her friends would come in and check on her.
When she finally woke up one morning feeling refreshed, she went downstairs and poured herself a large cup of coffee.
"Hi, Starr," came her best friend's, Marla's, voice. "What happened to you? I thought vampires couldn't get sick?"
But when Starr turned around, Marla shrieked, startling her and making her drop her coffee.
Shane ran in and said, "What's going on?"
Speechless, Marla just pointed at Starr, then, slowly backed away.
"What?"
When they wouldn't answer, Starr got a towel and began cleaning up the mess.
"What happened to you?" asked Marla.
"It's a long story, guys. I'm too tired to get into it, right now."
"What happened to your eyes?" asked Shane.
The question was bizarre. At first she shook it off, but then she froze.
A second later, she bolted up the stairs to the bathroom.
Her eyes were wine colored, like Sestin's or Ciaran's.
So that was how they got it. But how did Fernand not have red eyes, too? He drank their blood.
"Contact lenses," she said to herself.
Road to Heaven
Vampin Book Series #12
By Jamie Ott
Copyright ? 2012 Jamie Ott.
All rights reserved. For permissions or information, please contact [email protected]
Publication: 6/7/2012
No parts of this book may be used without permission.
Road to Heaven
Vampin Book Series #12
By Jamie Ott
Copyright ? 2012 Jamie Ott.
All rights reserved. For permissions or information, please contact [email protected]
Publication: 6/7/2012
No parts of this book may be used without permission.
Snow Mountains
Chapter 1
Too tired to care about being seen, she descended from the sky.
Softly, she landed a few feet from the entrance. The thick layer of snow crunched under her heels, as she walked, quickly, to the door of the shack.
From the air, she sensed that it was a caf? the locals visited, even though it looked like an old condemned building.
She kicked off caked-on snow from her boots, and pulled back the door.
The patrons all looked up, as she walked to the bar. She could see why, too: She stuck out greatly with her jet black hair and clothes.
In the rural parts of Scandinavia, many people were fair haired, not to mention dressed very plainly.
She slipped off her black faux shearling coat, and hung it on the back of a bar stool, and scooted in.
Her sunglasses had practically frozen to her face. Despite knowing that she should keep them on, she removed them.
Keeping her eyes down, she asked the bartender for a beer, stew, and sandwich.
She rubbed her cold hands on her face.
It had been several months since she'd left Lake George. The decision wasn't hard to make because she thought the images an old vampire planted in her mind would be enough to guide her to Valhol, but she was wrong.
Instead, she'd been searching for months, trying to tell her inner demon to use its instinct to find the old peak. Her senses continued to lead her between the half dozen countries; one day she'd fly to Norway, then to Finland, and the next: Sweden, or some other place.
As it was, she didn't even know what country she sat in, at the moment.
She was simply exhausted.
The only thing that kept her going was the knowledge that Credenza would come for her, in the end; after she'd done massacring all the 'barbarian vampires of the world.' However, Starr, now, knew better, even the Order of Black had gone into hiding.
She just didn't understand it.
Valhol was on a Scandinavian mountain peak. Sestin, the old vampire, showed it to her before she killed him.
But why did she sense the city of Valhol in nearly every Scandinavian country?
"Here you go, Miss," said the man.
"Thank you," said Starr, as she greedily started drinking down the hot liquid.
Never in her life had she appreciated the taste and feel of hot soup so much. Not that her kind ever felt cold anymore - or at least not in the human aggravating sense, but it did suck to be wet and moist all the time; not to mention stiff jointed.
Since she'd died, her sense of hot and cold had become skewed, somewhat. The only way she knew when temperature was a problem was when her joints and muscles got extremely stiff. For a human, this would be called advanced hypothermia.
Thankfully, the stew helped considerably. She sighed as the warm liquid bled down her throat, and into her stomach. From there, like coals in a fire, the warmth spread to her heart and traveled up and down her back.
"Anything else, Miss?" asked the barkeep.
"A room?" she asked plainly.
"Yeah, you're gonna go down the road a bit, and, hey Miss, you're gonna wanna look at me."
Starr put her sunglasse
s on and looked up.
The man stared at her, like she was weird, and then proceeded to use his hands to point and charade.
She tried to pay the man with the little prepaid card she'd picked up before she left the United States. After all, she was only seventeen.
Not that she could get a credit card even if she was older, for most of the banks in the world still weren't working. This meant the half million dollars she owned was stuck. As it was, the money she had, she'd stolen from the penthouse of a rich dead man in NYC.
"We don't take that. We're just a small establishment."
"Well, I'm sorry," she said annoyed. "I only have U.S. dollars."
She slapped a ten dollar bill onto the counter.
The man bitched about her to his buddy in some language.
As a vampire, her kind inherited a certain form of telepathy; one that enabled them to understand people who spoke other languages. Unfortunately, that didn't mean they knew how to respond.
Starr was too tired to care, anyway.
Just as she was about to walk out of the door, the man said to her, "Hey, Miss! This won't cover the exchange fees. We need another five."
But Starr could tell the man was manipulating her. He was simply annoyed at having to deal with a foreigner. However, Starr was in no mood to humor him. In fact, when she was groggy and tired, she, her self, became feistier.
She turned around and said, "You think I don't know that you're messing with me. You don't need another five dollars, and you're certainly not gonna get it. But, if you'd like, you can come and try."
"You watch your mouth, Miss, or I just might," the man said, as he threw his pencil down on the counter.
"Come on, then!" she said, beckoning him with her fingers. "I've had a crappy past couple of days. Kicking your ass might just be the sort of release I need."
When he just stood there, silently, she shrugged her shoulders and opened the door.
"Don't come back," he shouted.
She turned her head back and said, "Don't tell me what to do."
As she made to exit the bar, a man in a grey baseball cap said, "Hello, Miss."
Starr ignored him and walked on.
She stood for a moment and stared over the miles of snowy plain. The sun glared down, crisply, making her skin tingle.
Normally, she was okay in the city or at the Lake. The sun didn't bother her, much, there; perhaps because of all the shadows of the buildings, trees, and mountains that obscured the sun's direct rays.
When it did bother her, a little sunscreen was all she needed, but ever since she'd arrived in Scandinavia, like a 3rd degree burn, her skin constantly, painfully, tingled.
The fables would have you believe that vampires just simply went poof because of ultra violet, but it wasn't so. When one dies, so does the body's natural ability to produce secretions.
It was the skin's production of natural vitamins', melanin and sweat that kept the living protected, and when they died, so did those defenses which took eons to evolve.
She pulled a small bottle from her pocket and smeared the sun protectant all over her face, neck and hands.
Starr walked left, down the road. Several trucks drove by, blowing up brown slushy-snow around her.
She turned left at the sign and walked under a short over pass.
The small hotel was a few miles down, in the center of a tiny strip. It was wedged between another restaurant and a large building.
Behind the hotel counter, a white haired lady checked her in without much fuss.
She set her bag on the lumpy bed. Immediately, she pulled her clothes off and hung them about the room to dry.
Into the hot shower she went. Her muscles and joints relaxed and expanded as they thawed.
As she toweled her skin dry, she couldn't help but notice the way her eyes showed up on the cloudy mirror, when even her blue-black hair couldn't hold up against the steam.
The redness was the result of the Primordial blood she drank, several months ago. That was the reason she kept her glasses on at all times.
She did try contact lenses, but flying through the air at those temperatures kept freezing them. Several times, she'd already peel them from her eye ball, as they broke down into little tiny shards in her socket.
Eagerly, she climbed onto the bed and dug in her bag.
Her cell phone still didn't get reception there. It was nice to know that there were still places in the world not connected to the so-called grid. She just hoped the kids, and her friends, were okay.
She flipped on the television. Not that there were any good channels that far away from major cities; just a few news and information channels. Sometimes, there were shows from other parts of Europe though.
She settled back on the mattress and closed her eyes.
Cry Out
Chapter 2
For months, she'd been getting these visions, but she didn't know what to make of them. The only thing she was certain of was Credenza needed to be stopped.
This was also the reason she'd set out to find Valhol, and hence Lucenzo. He was the only person who would answer her questions, like if Credenza really was the one behind the attempted vampire apocalypse? Or if she really told Lucenzo to move into the clinic so as to keep tabs on her?
She sat on the edge of her bed, rubbing her aching head.
Normally, visions weren't painful. Plenty of vampires had them, but this was different. This was a psychic cry out; a connection to all the unliving: It was a warning of danger.
That night, her vision was of some town in Italy.
Credenza meandered through the streets of an entirely vampire town. People dropped dead, one by one, as she walked by.
She's coming! was the message, over and over, through the psychic wave lengths.
Vampires were scared, and they were going into hiding anywhere they could. Shane, Marla, and Mica - her best friends and fellow vampires, begged her not to leave the Lake.
She did anyway, because she was the only one who could possibly stop Credenza. Sestin knew that when he chose her to end his life, and take his power into herself.
Besides, Starr was certain that Credenza wouldn't go after her friends, or, at least, not yet.
In her mind, she saw Credenza walking through a dark neighborhood. Her amber eyes danced in the light of the fires that people had set, in the streets, in their attempts to kill her.
She was too strong to be contained. Like walking through a sand storm, she simply covered her face with her hands, as she walked through rings of fire.
Wondering if any of this had hit the news, she turned the television back on.
The only newscast was a woman in a bright white shirt, who talked of some up and coming Danish holiday.
Starr flinched.
Did she just say Danish?
After months of so much flying around, and following the scent of Valhol, she began to forget to keep track of the countries she'd landed in, from day to day.
Not once, did Starr consider that she should have searched Denmark. She just assumed Valhol was further north.
She picked up her room phone and dialed Shane's cell number.
"Hey, Starr," answered Becky, a girl they rescued from the street, back in NYC. "Let me get Shane. She's been wanting to talk to you; she's been really upset."
A moment later, her voice came on. She said, "Hey, how are you?"
"I had another vision. Hundreds more are dead. Did you see it?"
"We all saw it. Marla is doing okay, but Mica is another story. Hearing the cries of dying vampires, day and night, isn't doing her any good. She's locked herself in her room, and won't come out."
Upon being turned, a person experienced an increase in their natural abilities. For Mica, this meant a supernatural ability to hear things from far away.
"When are you coming home?" she asked. "We're scared."
"I know, but don't worry. You'll be fine. No one will touch you, I promise. Credenza's wants
me to trust her, and she can't get that by killing the people closest to me."
"Where are you now?"
"Denmark, actually, that's why I'm calling. Can you put Mot on the phone? I have a question."
"Look, maybe it's time to accept that Valhalla doesn't exist."
"Put Mot on the phone, please."
A moment later, his husky voice came through the speaker.
"Yeah?"
"I have a question. It's strange, but I want you to answer anyway. What can you tell me about Valhol?"
"Well, it's the hall for warriors, but that's about all. It's just some myth about heaven."
"Hypothetically, if a person were to claim it were a lost territory, where do you think it would be?"
"Uh, everywhere, I think."
Starr was stunned for a moment.
"What?" she asked annoyed. "Look, just answer the question. I don't have time for games."
"Hello, I did answer you. It's not my fault if you've got a thick skull. That region has only recently been calm. But back then, there were a lot of changes to the Earth."
Silence ensued a moment.
Slowly, she began to understand what Mot meant. It certainly would make sense as to why she'd been following a trail that led her aimlessly everywhere.
"Okay, I get it, now. What if a person wanted to locate the largest chunk of Valhol?"
"What a ridiculous question," he said. "I don't know. You'd have to ask a historian or something."
A few hours later, she packed her bag and flew to Copenhagen.
By ten 'o' clock she touched down on the upper level of a parking garage. She walked down several flights, and then checked into the adjoining hotel.
The city was just as cold as the north, except misty with salt-tasting air.
After dropping her bag off, in the room, she chanced another pair of blue contact lenses, and then walked down to the lobby and got directions to the Royal Library.
When she first entered the Met sized building, she stood about, wondering where to start.
From the ceiling hung many signs, but unlike other countries she'd been to the last few months, she was unable to decipher these words. It was known that these languages shared their roots with English, but Danish must have had other influences over the millenniums.
Her confusion must have shown on her face, for a friendly guy in a blue suit approached.
