by Aiden James
“Don’t look at me, girlfriend, I have no frigging clue about this shit.” Tyreen shrugged when I shot her a look that begged for her insight into what was about to go down. “Like you, I’m just comin’ along for the ride. It’s my first era too!”
Garvan carried me to the riverside and Chanson brought Alaia—in spite of my protests, since I wanted to carry her myself. But, I relented, since we left the hut a few minutes late and I trusted her above all others.
When we arrived on the glistening white sand beach of the Kosi River, I was amazed at how clearly the full moon’s brightness illuminated our surroundings. Gustav had decreed that his entire nation of vampires gather. Although this gave me an inkling of what to expect, the sight of so many of those pallid predators dressed in robes and sarongs surrounding Gustav was a bit unnerving.
Nearly half of his assembled kin hovered just above river, their undying king at the fore. It looked so surreal and effortless, almost as if the water’s surface was solid, like Jesus upon the Sea of Galilee.
“Come, Txema!” Gustav called. “Come to me and bring Alaia with you!”
At first I hesitated, thinking about how much I loathed his presence and trusted his motives even less. But Chanson came over to me, still holding my daughter tucked safely in her right arm while she held out her left hand for me to take.
“I know what you’re thinking, and yes we can all hear your thoughts quite clearly once again, dear cousin,” she said, her tone milky smooth, and with as much compassion as anything else she had ever told me. “Trust Gustav as much as you have ever trusted me. Walk with me, and you’ll see… you are about to experience something incredibly wonderful. Alaia’s ‘la sanctification du sang’ will mark the fourth era of our survival as a vampire race. Both of you will share in an event that has not happened in over three hundred years.”
It sounded important; it sounded unique… but also ominous. I figured after Alaia was born, we could work on the business of raising my child as normal as possible, surrounded by love and protection. Mainly my love and protection. Yes, there would be the inevitable nocturnal ‘light feedings.’ But, my understanding was this would be handled on my terms to a large degree, and honestly I was already trying to figure out a way to remove her from the situation, something like a Red Cross blood donation for instance.
The way everything had been going since her birth made me feel more and more certain Alaia wouldn’t have much normalcy in her life. She already lacked a daddy, or any family aside from myself present in her day-to-day existence. Now it looked as if she might not have a mommy as much as a vampire committee who dictated what mommy had to participate in as Alaia’s guardian. This royally sucked!
“It’s not near as bad as you think, Txema, and you would do so much worse on your own,” said Kazikli from across the river, unabashedly picking up where my thoughts left off. “Alaia has my love and devotion, the same as you. Gustav and the rest of our leadership, feel the same. Chanson, Garvan, the others, they’ve proven their devotion, and there are more you’ve neither met, not seen, but I assure you, they watch from the shadows. Those fools among us who would follow a different course? Woe to them if they so much as touch either you or this blessed child! Let this be a promise to you, and a warning to them, that it would be their last action on this Earth!”
The entire group erupted into applause, with a few ‘Here-here!’ responses from either shoreline. Kazikli walked out onto the river with Nora, and soon Xuanxang followed her. He bowed toward me, while the others standing on the water motioned for me to come to them.
“Hey, sister, you can do this. I’m coming too!” said Tyreen, from my left side.
“The rest of us are right behind you,” said Armando, his tone filled with playful glee. “I’ve really been looking forward to this―my second ‘River Dance!’”
Leave it to the jester in our group to make me feel more at ease. Snickering at the reality I had no choice but to participate since I was surrounded, I took Chanson’s hand and we all moved toward the river.
Here is where the night started to get really weird. And this coming from me, who kind of lives in the definition of weird these days. If they had held me up physically, I would’ve assumed my companions were the reason I was gliding above the Kosi’s glistening surface. But it wasn’t so, as Chanson lightly held my hand. A powerful current of air beneath my feet dipped and picked me up again—to the point it was hardly perceptible.
The only experience I could compare it to was the feeling when you’ve been walking along pavement or cement and then step into shifting sand. Only in this case, we went from the soft sand along the riverside onto this bizarre energy field. But even that doesn’t do justice to what this truly unique sensation was like.
“Chanson, hand Alaia to me,” said Gustav, once we reached where he stood.
He was dressed in a crimson robe with gold sashes, and another of those garish papal hats graced his head―this one appeared to be made entirely from gold. Chanson did as instructed, while I looked on with my heart racing. I fully understood why she carried Alaia, since I dare say I might not have been so cooperative if I were the one holding her.
Gustav tenderly took her in his arms, and to my utter amazement, Alaia cooed and made more sounds than she had up until then. We’ve already discussed how these kids develop far, far faster than a normal human, and I had assumed that the way she acted since she was born was the extent of this speed. But, now my newborn child sounded as if she was trying to communicate with him. I was close enough to see her smile, and she kicked her legs and moved her arms, and even pointed her fingers toward his face. All the while, Gustav eyed her lovingly with a proud papa expression I’d not seen from him until that night.
“Are you ready for us, sire?” Xuanxang motioned to the rest of us gathered around him upon the water.
“Yes,” he said softly, without looking up from Alaia. She continued her antics as if fascinated by his powerful presence. Or maybe it was those kaleidoscope eyes that prompted her response―sort of like a preternatural baby mobile. “Go ahead and create the circle.”
Chanson took one of my hands while Tyreen took the other. Armando and Garvan linked hands as well forming a semi-circle and on the other side it was completed with Xuanxang, Nora, Kazikli, and four other vampires―two of whom I recognized, including Suddhodana.
We all stepped forward, and once the circle was complete, Gustav floated into the middle and raised my daughter toward the moon. He chanted, and it reminded me of what I’d sometimes hear when I joined Momma at the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart’s Sunday mass in Richmond. The words were in Latin, but spoken so quickly and fervently that I couldn’t quite catch anything beyond ‘sangui’ and ‘sanctus.’
While Gustav continued to chant, the crowd around us rocked back and forth on both banks of the Kosi River, and the vampires in the circle walked around Gustav. I followed suit, praying silently I didn’t fall and somehow disappear into the swift current. The vampires in the circle emitted a low humming noise, and as we picked up our pace around Gustav, the humming grew louder, until they all seemed to vibrate.
I started to freak out. I was gulping down breaths. This was more than a little strange, but then, what did I expect in this already insane world of the undead, right? Well, try adding this to the crazy scene that night. Amid the chanting, humming, and swaying, weird vibrations caused me to lose my grip on both Chanson and Tyreen. The moon distorted like something out of a Salvador Dali painting. Now, I fully understand this had to be some kind of illusion―it had to be. The physical laws of the universe can only be stretched so far. My pragmatic mind ceased trying to figure it all out.
As the moon warped, its light narrowed and drifted down toward us. It was as if our little vibrating circle drew it in. Meanwhile, Gustav shouted, and I thought my baby might be crying. My heart began to beat quicker and the anxiety grew in my stomach until I felt like throwing up. I couldn’t stop moving. It was like I was somehow force
d to continue the rapidly increasing pace, and had to run to keep up. I would’ve tried to move into the middle of the circle and take my child back from Gustav, but at that instant, the light of the moon touched Alaia. Once that happened, a whirlpool yawned open under our feet, sucking all of the water down into an enormous hole that seemed to stretch endlessly. I say that on account of the moon’s weird light flooding into this whirlpool-hole. It looked like a giant bottomless drain.
My ears filled with screaming and it took me a second to realize it was me screaming for it all to stop. I felt increasingly dizzy and knew I was about to pass out. Right before things went black, and I plummeted into the enormous void beneath my feet, I looked up at Gustav and my baby. They were both smiling, and glowing brighter than even the moon.
Then I fell into the hole.
Incredible G-forces squeezed and crushed my body, sucking me down to the earth’s core, somehow exposed by the strange magic. But, at the point when I thought my face would be torn from my skull by the sheer wind force of falling so fast, the entire experience abruptly stopped.
I awoke on my back and quickly sat up. Somehow, I ended up next to the fire pit where Kazikli and I had chatted for hours that first day. Someone had laid blankets upon the bench beneath me, and the fire’s soft flames illuminated the faces of my protectors. They all watched me. But instead of the worried looks I normally received, they looked at peace… happy even.
“It’s over now,” said Chanson.
“W-what’s over? How did I get here?”
I felt incredibly disoriented, and my head swam from the barrage of craziness. I looked over at the river, and it was empty of the horde of vampires I had seen earlier. Only Kazikli and Gustav were near the banks, and they walked toward us. Gustav still held my baby. She smiled and cooed softly in his arms. I was going to have to teach her to be a better judge of character.
“Alaia is yours to cherish and raise as you see fit,” said Gustav, as he stepped up to me. He offered the same loving expression to me that he had given Alaia.
My own brief foray into reading other’s thoughts might have ended, but I could truly feel the love emanating from him to me. I felt somewhat guilty for my earlier reaction to him, the mean things I’d recently said, and how I’d felt toward him. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t that I didn’t believe at least some of it was still true; I had new information to modify my overall assessment of this vampire king.
“She is now safe from Ralu’s reach until puberty, when she will be ready for the next ceremony,” he said.
“So, that wasn’t a dream?”
“No, dearest Txema, it was not a dream,” said Kazikli, whose smile was now more of an amused one. “It was an experience that contained moments of truth and moments of fantasy. It’s not the same for everyone, and each time we do this, it is an entirely different experience from the last ceremony.”
Great. That made me feel so much better. I’ll be guessing forever as to what was real and what was fantasy. The second I think I have the slightest clue as to the nature of, well, anything, something like this happens. What a mind fuck!
“Exactly!” Raquel chimed in gleefully, letting me know she was right on top of my silent musing. No doubt the others were too. “I told you that it would be fun!”
I was about to say something sarcastic in return, but Chanson stopped me.
“Save your strength and let your mind rest,” she said. “Because as of tomorrow you will need to gather your things and say goodbye to your Sakya hosts.”
“But, Gustav said that Alaia is now protected from harm for a long time,” I said. Granted, I didn’t want to stay in Nepal forever. I just wasn’t quite ready to rush back into the twenty-first century. “Why so soon?”
“It’s not Alaia we’re worried about. It’s you,” she said.
“What about me?”
“The ceremony that protected your baby girl has also alerted Ralu and his minions to your present location,” said Kazikli. “He’s coming soon. Very soon!”
slept with Alaia in my arms that night, reluctant to let go. I’m talking about both her and the tranquil world of the last few months I carried her within my womb.
My precious angel had an added glow to her countenance that had to have come from the ceremony. She seemed so peaceful and radiant, and I watched her until my eyes grew too heavy to keep open, fully knowing she’d need to be fed again within the next hour or so.
The comfort from Gustav’s proclamation that she would be safe from Ralu’s reach until she got significantly older was one I clung to. Although, there seemed to be a painful, albeit inevitable, separation from me at some point to ensure her survival.
I silently cursed that my invisible cloak, which came from the spiritual protection of the Sakya clan and my ability to hide my thoughts from prying vampires, had somehow disappeared in a matter of a few days. I felt more vulnerable to impending disaster at that moment than at any other time I could think of.
For Alaia’s survival alone, I made up my mind to cooperate fully with my vampire guardians. I’d have to ignore the ominous feeling that my defenselessness was as poisonous to my daughter’s safety as it was to my own. This included my ultimate fear that if Ralu carried out his threats to kill me, my daughter’s ceremonial protection would prove inadequate to save her, the very last of our bloodline.
Instead of dwelling on the terrible things that could happen, I decided to pull upon the knowledge I’d gained from Yangani and Suddhodana, to meditate for a positive outcome according to my most cherished thoughts and practice what I’d come to call the Sunfire Aura. That seemed better than trying to remember the Hail Marys from my youth.
The dawn’s light steadily approached. I knew Garvan, Chanson, and Tyreen would soon be leaving for the nearby cave that had been their ‘hotel’ for the past few nights. I was pretty sure Armando and Raquel had already gone back to the cave, since there was very little in the village to keep them entertained.
It was in this context I drifted off, thinking I’d rest for a little while and snap back awake when Alaia became hungry.
My departure from such an uncertain world and arrival into the realm of dreams must’ve been immediate. I was even in one of those lucid states of awareness that it could be a dream, although there were aspects that felt far too real to be a concoction from my subconscious mind. I sat up in my bed, not overly surprised that I was still inside my hut, and that my baby girl slept soundly at my side. But a fire raged outside.
The smoke floated inside, carrying an acrid odor of burnt wood and flesh, and stung my eyes. Alarmed, I picked Alaia up and headed for a small window, hoping the fire hadn’t spread around back. It was free from flames, so I climbed through after gently setting my baby on the ground outside. Seconds after I picked her up again, the flames engulfed the thatched building, which collapsed in on itself, sending a flurry of sparks and tall flames into the air.
I scurried away from the intense heat and flames, shielding my face from the fire that seemed on the verge of spreading out of control. Terrible screams of men and women echoed beyond the flames, and I thought these poor people had been caught in the fire without a means of escape.
As I looked for a path to safety, sudden movement drew my attention, coming from low within the fire. The heads of Yangani and the midwives who had delivered my child rolled toward me. An enormous figure emerged, carrying a bloody sword.
“Well, well… what have we here!” the hateful fiend roared, before adding a boisterous laugh to go along with his menacing words. “If it isn’t the last two vampire lovers… ‘Les Amantes de Vampire.’ Txema and her little vermin heir. What name have you chosen for the creature?” Ralu stuck out a long serpent-like tongue, as if tasting the acrid air. “Ah, yes, the smoke tells me, Alaia!” The fiend had ripped her name from my mind and I despaired at keeping her safe.
I wrapped my arms tightly around my daughter, who was now awake, cooing again rather than crying like me. Ralu had finally foun
d me. Dressed in the deep crimson velvet robe he favors, he looked even more frightful than I remembered him from previous dreams. In those visitations I only had dim firelight to define his features, from the bowels of the dilapidated Byzantine cathedral he had once called home. Not this time. I got to see him in all of his hideous glory as the fire threatened to rage out of control in the minutes before daybreak.
Like bloody pools of fire from the depths of Hell, his eyes sat further apart than they should, giving him a reptilian visage. The rest of his appearance was much worse than what I’d previously gathered. In addition to the double set of fangs that I had learned reveal an ancient status, his lips were partially rotted away, revealing sharp, jagged, and rotting teeth. Huge boil-like lesions covered his neck and part of his face, although the rest of his bald head and pointed ears looked the same as with any other Nosferatu. The lesions trailed down to his blood-soaked hands, each of which was capped with thick predatory talons revealing the blade was an affectation as much as a tool of slaughter for him.
In his other hand, he carried a jeweled golden scepter, similar to Gustav’s, an item Ralu had always brought with him in dream visitations.
“Please leave me alone, Ralu!” I wailed, crouching before him since there was nowhere for me to escape. “My baby and I just want to go back home to America and get away from all of this vampire shit! Then you and Gustav―along with all of the other vampires―can work out your problems without us interfering.”
“How lovely, indeed!” he shouted, then laughed uproariously again. “That would suit me perfectly… except for one little thing. Can you guess what that would be? Hmmm?”
