Hidden Carmina

by Adri Sinclair

  Fayola, who had been keeping her thoughts to herself, could not help but compliment Carmina’s choice as well. Nothing about Carmina’s history would have given them a clue about this choice, and yet, it is almost poetically fitting of Carmina’s own nightmares. Fayola finds herself drawn further into fascination when she learns that Carmina’s blood, if reports are to be believed, has a property similar to an elixir, which restores the very rare blood disease found in their kind. Of course, Fayola does not believe any of this; it would be preposterous to think. It is however fascinating and she wants to know what it is about this girl able to capture a race so unconditionally.

  Dimitri is a nervous mess when he learns of the Ancient Company heading in his direction. His immediate thoughts turn to the book he received from Carmina. The value of the book is in the leverage of it being from an Ancient’s home. That in itself is a prestige you cannot purchase on a street corner. The information it holds is of great value too, especially if you are the warring kind and need information of other covens, their estates and their particular environments. Dimitri has already vowed that he will do all he can to not betray Carmina. She has become part of his increasingly boring life and her presence has brought a vigor to his estate he’s not felt since he was in love with Margarith Jane Ivolgin. When the Company arrives and informs him they merely want a tour of his estate and are interested in meeting his living display, Dimitri partially relaxes.

  Liam is walking on coals. The nervous energy emanating from him is tangible. With every step he takes, he can feel Carmina’s presence diminishing and it is eating holes in his patience. Jarrod and John are no better either and their clenched fists are not the friendly expression the Ancient Rulers had in mind when they met with Dimitri.

  “Dimitri, you have a vast collection but forgive us our impatience, old friend.” Will is a poster child for exterior calm. “We have come to you with an intense curiosity of your living display.”

  “Ah, you mean my Carmen. Yes, of course.” Dimitri motions the group to a large arched door. Liam is ready to open the doors himself but the ranked instructions from Joseph, Fayola and his father prevent it. Dimitri opens the massive doors and continues to prattle on.

  “She is a treasure. If she would have it, I would have given her immortality, my Lords and Lady – but, alas, I have a contract.”

  If there was any doubt in Liam’s mind who the woman in the glass box is, it was dispelled the moment Dimitri spoke those words.

  “Father…” Liam’s voice was harsh and reverberating through the link. His eyes focus on the glass box and his worst nightmare is confirmed. Carmina is ill… very ill. Her body is writhing and flailing under the heavy grip of a nightmare. She is small, having lost most of her weight. Her frame is fragile, held together by skin alone, which itself is ashen and swollen, tender, with a pale blue tint. Liam feels himself move as if in slow motion. There was nobody who could stop him in that moment. Jarrod and John could not keep up but they were not staying behind either.

  “Liam, wake her up!” Will puts a hand on the frantic Dimitri’s arm, hiding his own shock and disdain. Fayola changes shape, flying above the glass box. Joseph closes the doors behind them, his eyes looking around for any indication of exits.

  “Dimitri, I apologize—” Will is interrupted by a roar which shakes the entire room.

  “Open it!”

  “Yes, of course, I am sorry. I had to protect her!” Dimitri is speaking fast, blurring his way towards the box. “I had to ensure that I cannot get to her myself… the glass won’t break, let me just get… She is innocent of whatever crime you think she’s committed!”

  Unbeknownst to him, Dimitri secures his own existence, as it is clear that he has no idea about Carmina’s nature and her involvement with the Ancients.

  The mechanism is too slow and Liam begs with Fayola. “Please… Help her!”

  Fayola swoops down and grabs onto an antique head sculpture, turning and smashing it into the glass violently. With the pane halfway lowered, it shatters at the second assault from the Vulture.

  Liam has already started watching Carmina’s dream, and like before, he has to wait for the susceptible opening that will allow him to intrude and wake her. The breaking glass around Carmina spurs the blood servants to her side. When Liam manages to wake Carmina, he hears her call for Alina who rushes to her with a flask cold water.

  Darya is flicking bits of glass away from Carmina, making sure she cannot cut herself while she’s waking up. When the pair are convinced of Carmina’s wellbeing, as it stands, they turn their attention to the party around them. John shifts into wolf and Jarrod starts circling the pair in an effort to divide their attention. Liam scales one of the posts to determine a way closer to Carmina.

  Dimitri watches in silence while Will and Joseph too change shape. He is convinced that he will make good on his promise to Carmen after all. His house is full of Ancients and they have just all converged on her. The blood servants stand no chance.

  ***

  My eyes categorically won’t focus suitably so I close them again. My head is splitting in two. I am too tired to fight it. Am I dying? It would be such a relief. I thought they say that when you die your life flashes through your head. Why is it, then, that a stranger’s white and red eyes I see in front of me? Darya and Alina are growling and snarling around me, I feel them move over the bed. My body is numb; maybe Dimitri is keeping his promise after all. He must be so proud. I try to smile but the effort spitefully increases the hammering that threatens to crack my skull.

  SNAP!

  The echo vibrates through my entirety and I choke on my breath.

  “Almost too late, you bastards,” the remaining voice fades from me.

  The silence is comforting; the peaceful calm in my body is soothing. Finally. Finally.

  A firm female voice speaks:

  “Alterius non sit qui suus esse potest.”

  [Let no man be another's who can be his own.]

  I don’t know what it means but the two women at my side stop snarling and growling. They’re leaving.

  The silence is interrupted by a voice deep inside my soul; his beautiful, tortured and sad voice. I am so happy to hear it. I am ready to let go now. I am complete.

  “Carmina… my Rockflower, what have you done?”

  My heart is slowing down, not to a calm but far beyond calm.

  I feel it stop.

  “Liam…”

  ***

  The Ancients feel the link open, they hear the voice and, as one, reach for Carmina who does not respond. The attention of the Company, including Dimitri, focuses on the single human heartbeat.

  “Liam…”

  His name resounds in the room, rolling like a rumbling thunder, then fading away along with her heartbeat. The silence in the room is absolute.

  “Alis volat propriis [she flies with her own wings],” Fayola lays a hand on Liam’s shoulder, sliding it down to glide over Carmina’s red tresses that dangle over his arm.

  “No… No… She… NO!” Jarrod rushes forward and puts his head on Carmina’s chest, listening for a heartbeat and trying to feel a pulse, finding none.

  The Ancients all grab on to the fading thread in their minds, but it does not respond. Dimitri’s shriek is followed by a series of smashing artifacts.

  “She still… I can still change her.” Liam grasps desperately.

  “NO!” Dimitri thunders at him and Liam is confronted with snarling teeth in his face. “I promised her. You are Ancient, but I promised HER. You will have to kill me first.”

  Jarrod and John storm towards Dimitri but Joseph and Will cut them off.

  “He’s right. It would be a dishonor to her.”

  “Liam, put the girl down.” Fayola demands; when Liam is not fast enough to move, she shoves him hard. “I said PUT the girl DOWN, boy!”

  Liam kneels in the broken glass. Consumed by hopelessness, he lays Carmina against the bed and strokes her hair.

  The Vul
ture woman moves in closer over Carmina.

  “Your mother is right, boy, you are an idiot!” Fayola declares and changes back into her human shape, having no preconceived ideas about nudity at all.

  “John, your wolf is warm, she needs that. Dimitri Thana, we need blood to go into this girl.”

  Jarrod is halfway out the door already before Fayola can tell him they need animals’ too.

  “Anemia!” he shouts over his shoulder, almost excitedly, at Dimitri.

  Dimitri is unquestionably confused. Why are the Ancients trying save Carmen?! What interest is she of theirs? Confused or not, when an Ancient demands something, you get them what they want. Especially when the Ancient commanding you is the Vulture Ruler herself. They are known for their thorough disposal of insubordinates.

  “I have a clinic nearby, we can go fetch—”

  “No, we take her there, it will save time.” Liam is firmly caught up with himself again as is reflected in the lucidity of his thinking.

  “You cannot take her, you have no heat.” Fayola rolls her eyes at him as if he is a naughty child who is not listening.

  Dimitri shouts a short command in a guttural language and Alina and Darya, who have not moved since their dismissal, appear at Carmina’s side. They pick her up with blankets and all.

  “She will get there fast, warm and safe this way.”

  “Jarrod—” Liam starts, but Dimitri puts his mind at ease:

  “I will send Vadim to direct him. Why do you have a half-breed in your party?” The response he gets is a growl that chases him out the door.

  The clinic is not a public clinic. As with many things that involve activity of immortals, you would not know of the existence of the clinic or the occupants in the depths of the monastery. Dimitri and his servants see to a change of clothing for the now naked Ancients too while Carmina is rushed off to receive the care she is in desperate need of.

  “Liam…bro,” John speaks to his brother for the first time in months. “I am sorry.”

  Liam turns towards his brother and then grabs him in a firm embrace. “I am sorry too, John. You were right.”

  “Partially. Partially guilty. She needs us both.”

  Two howls go up into the Russian night, and two blurs follow the trail of their beloved human.

  Reviving a Heart

  By the time the group is gathered around the small bed, Carmina is hooked up. Her heartbeat is slow and labored but it is there, to the relief of the strangest collection of immortals. Fayola is leaning up against the wall, observing from a distance. She is still enthralled in the drama playing out in front of her. She cannot decide if the gods of creation and creatures are playing tricks on them, or if they are genuinely interfering in this girl’s life, and theirs. Since the first time she heard the human’s name, there has been nothing but constant disorder in their realm. And yet - Fayola smiles at the thought - and yet, look how she brings them together.

  Liam is careful to maintain a constant physical connection to Carmina. He watches and monitor her sleep to make sure she does not tumble into a nightmare. Jarrod’s arrival virtually slays the party when they realize he had caught just about any living thing in a twenty mile radius and compacted it under his shirt. The silly grin is irreversible. He was evasive over a rabbit he ‘found’ for Carmina.

  “Why the animal blood? I have enough here for you all to have a feast!” Dimitri looks appalled at the idea of the animals in his clinic.

  “It’s not for us Dimitri. It is for Carmina.”

  “If you think there is an old wives tale cure for her ailments—”

  “Actually, Dimitri, there is. Raw liver and meat.”

  While the feeding tube is prepared for Carmina and a blend of raw meat and liver is concocted, Dimitri is informed of Carmina’s condition and developments. The Ancients are careful to reveal a measured dose of information to secure the original’s cooperation without making it a demand. When you have gained loyalty without force, regardless of your own station, it is harder to sway the devotion from such a mind.

  It is hard to convince the woman who stayed behind to stay put. If they leave now, if they move away from the clans now, there will be a vulnerability to the members. They still have to make sure that Carmina is safe, not just from Jackie, but also from a few covens and clients who may think about securing the commodity. Dimitri has worked non-stop to show his face of despair at the loss of his human trophy. Even the staff in the clinic are led to believe that their efforts were without results. The Ancients have to admit—Dimitri’s production was convincing, and self-same diverting. He has left the company to themselves while he spreads his sorrow in heaps and makes arrangements for the work to continue with the orphanage. Dimitri has decided that in supporting this cause, he alone has given Carmina the legacy of immortality and he didn’t even have to betray her to do so. He was rather smug about his plan.

  “All this fuss over a human girl,” Fayola breaks the silence finally. “Now I want answers too.”

  The group turns to her as one; all but Liam, who does not take his eyes off Carmina, his finger stroking over her wrist. She is far from safe, far from recovered. She is breathing, has a heartbeat and a pulse and is warming up marginally, but her dream room is dimmed. She’s not painting.

  Fayola puts her fingers out counting her questions as she speaks.

  “What is the deal with the story of the first - Ambrogio? How does she link? And finally, I get Liam’s obsession with her because of the bond, but everyone else’s?”

  John puts his hand up like a first grader. “Oe! Oe! I know the answers.”

  Fayola ignores him and turns to Joseph and Will. Will takes the lead answering the first question. “Carmina has been fixated on the story of Ambrogio and Selene. At first it was the idea of the gods interfering but then it became about the love between human and effectively, the first vampire. Carmina reads a lot of stories about the condition of our souls, or lackthereof. She refuses to accept it based on the story. According to Carmina’s perception, you cannot feel love as deep as all that, or make decisions set in emotional response, if you don’t have a soul. She also feels that to live immortally, is to suffer life.” He concludes that portion.

  “So she was not horrified that the man killed his lover?” Fayola doesn’t seem to believe the explanation.

  “No, she was not. She felt sad, upset and pity for the man and felt it unfair that he had to suffer for the woman he loved, let alone horrified at Selene for insisting that Ambrogio take her blood.”

  “By the gods, this girl is backwards!” Fayola exclaims but then lifts the second finger up.

  Joseph steps in.

  “Allow me, Will… You recall our first encounter with this girl. We saw her eat meat and then for a brief moment she was literally beating the heck out of our links in one go. We had our hands full to pull her thread from the chaos she became entangled in.” Joseph pauses and continues as soon as Fayola acknowledges the event.

  “We have all heard three voices within the girl. At first, we didn’t think she knew about them. There was no indication of acknowledgement, even when their advice was more logical than the girl’s own sensibility.”

  Impatiently, Fayola crows at Joseph, “Get to the point, old man!”

  “Well, she knew about them; says they’ve been with her since birth. When she met the Houses individually, these voices, one at a time, bridged her into our consciousness and once she was safe, they left.”

  Fayola stands with narrowed eyes, watching Joseph. “She had custodians? That is not possible.”

  Joseph shrugs and flashes the last connection through their link, reminding Fayola of the precise moment Carmina was bridged back into their links, including the Vulture House’s.

  “The last one was not too pleased with you.”

  “Aaaah, I will have to make right by Papa Legba.” To Fayola, speaking of the gods and goddesses is as natural as walking. Her African upbringing saw to that. Papa Legba is believe
d to be the intermediary between the Loa, a goddess, and humanity. Needless to say, Fayola also attributes her own condition to that of the spirits of her mortal teachings. She lifts her third finger and John puts his hand up again.

  “John-a-than, what is the matter with you?” She asks, but he is already taking the floor.

  “She’s like a honey-badger, Fayola. Not fearless, but ferocious. She will take on and probably win against the biggest and foulest of the immortals. She gains attributes from our Houses each time she links and we don’t know what your House bestowed upon her. Whatever it is, she is already faster than us. She has better senses than ours, yet she remains human. She is the missing link, Fayola.”

  Fayola sucks the air in through her teeth to make a tsk! sound at John.

  “What do you mean? I didn’t know there was a link missing, man.” She challenges John.

  “I don’t know, Fayola, but you have seen it. She challenges our races; she steals our dead hearts and give us a soul instead. Can you say she has not intrigued you, Fayola? Can you say she has not touched your mind in some way?”