Darkling

by Sabolic, Mima

  “Sure thing. You can take whatever is available in the garage. Keys are inside, but I’d recommend learning the road first—it’s pretty curvy.”

  “Okay, thanks, Blake. I had wondered if we scored a car in this arrangement.”

  The movies were fun, and so were the sodas, popcorn, and beer. After the last movie, the three of them took off for lunch and I went into my bedroom.

  Lying in bed, I checked my Facebook page, posting some comments, then texted with some friends. I read more of Baudelaire’s poetry and looked for more clues. So, today was “Friend’s” day. Nice. It was time to return to being the Nika I knew; I didn’t want to stay a second longer in this shell I’d been hiding in.

  I took a long shower. Washing my hair, I remembered Blake’s comment and chose carefully among the gels. Tangerine with milk—a great scent. No need for perfume after that. I put on my new dark blue skinny jeans, a black button-up shirt and the chestnut flat boots. Julia returned and then left again, and I thought of Lyndon. How was she spending her weekend?

  The silver SUV was waiting in front of the dorm-building door. The chauffeur said his name was Mark and asked about my music preferences. I could so get used to this kind of treatment.

  “It smells like snow,” he said, driving.

  Mark was man in his fifties, who didn’t bother much with talk.

  “I heard everything was white this time last year.”

  “It was,” he replied.

  It was warm in the car, but I definitely needed a scarf and gloves outside— which, of course, I didn’t have. I’d never even owned any heavy winter clothes. I saw the bridge we had crossed when I had first arrived. Mark turned toward a row of houses and then stopped, honking once. I heard Doris from the window.

  As soon as she opened the front door, she jerked me inside and gave a huge welcome hug. I wasn’t much of a hugger, but I liked her nearness. It was as if her every touch ignited some spark of life in me. Paradoxical, I know, considering she was a vampire and all. But hey, nobody had said their hearts don’t tick!

  “I couldn’t wait to see you!” she said, rushing me joyfully up the stairs.

  “Me too.”

  “I have something to tell you.” Her grin was enigmatic.

  We went through a red door.

  “This is my place. Dad’s downstairs, but he’s not here tonight. Anyways, I remembered my dream! You’ve GOT to hear this!”

  She probably meant the one with me in it. I heard music and many voices in her apartment; we stood in the hallway as she told me about the dream.

  “I was sitting near a window, an antique mirror in front of me. Outside the room, the weather, clouds, and colors were changing with apocalyptic speed—as if the end of the world was happening, but slow enough for some life forms to survive and still try to make something out of it. On a table, next to the mirror, were three long white cards with different symbols. One was a spade, the second was a heart, like in a card deck. The third was a butterfly. I felt like those three symbols filled me with some deep wisdom. Then, when I looked in the mirror—my face was different. It was your face.”

  I was shocked. That’s one creepy dream.

  “I dreamed it a long time ago and completely forgot about it until I saw you.”

  “So weird! Nightmarish!”

  “No, not really. It was just a dream like any other, only in this particular case it brought me to you.” A smile spread over her face. “And that, my new friend, deserves a toast!”

  Doris pulled me into her living room, paying no attention to the others. There was four, um, vampires, and no one looked familiar. She handed me a glass filled with dark fluid.

  “Calimocho. To dreams!” She raised her glass.

  “To your dream.” Our glasses clinked together.

  “Oh, right. You don’t like dreams.”

  “Not when they are nightmares, and that’s the type that seem to follow me,” I said.

  “I learned to explore their meaning, ’cause, apparently, they lead me to certain things,” she giggled, taking my hand.

  “Come on, the gang is in my bedroom.”

  Her room was spacious, even more so than mine, and there were seven of us in it. Aiden came up to us immediately.

  “So you’re here. Doris was really happy that you accepted her invitation,” he said.

  I replied with a smile at the image of Doris filled with her child-like happiness, jumping around, euphoria radiating from her.

  “She’d remembered the dream that connected us.”

  “Oh, I know. She tortured me over that one until she finally got it.” His tone was sweetly mocking as his hand gently touched Doris’s cheek. I averted my gaze, giving them some intimacy.

  There was a barefoot boy sitting on the floor, wearing jeans and a green t-shirt with small white palms printed on it. He was leaning against a couch, his knee bent, talking with a blonde doll. I thought he looked familiar, but I couldn’t see him well. My eyes followed his hand as it lifted a beer bottle toward his lips, and suddenly—his eyes were on me. I would have known those eyes anywhere!

  Andrei Belun was relaxing in a way I’d never seen him before. When our eyes met, I felt my cheeks redden. He looked perplexed, and then his blond companion noticed me. I lowered my gaze, feeling like I’d been caught doing something wrong. I cursed under my breath and turned toward Aidan.

  Then a realization hit me. Ever since I’d arrived in Norway, I’d taken on three new trademarks—blushing easily, lowering my gaze when meeting someone else’s eyes, and using silence as a comment in a perfectly normal conversation instead of speaking my mind.

  “Someone mentioned you’re a Warrior,” I said to Aidan.

  “Yes. Belun and I worked together before we came here,” Aidan looked at Belun, who was still looking at me.

  “And now you two work together,” he added.

  Yay.

  “We’re trying.” I muttered, but Doris caught my tone.

  “Cheer up! After Aidan, Belun’s my second favorite person in the world.”

  Oh God. So they were close. Well that explained how relaxed he was. But I still couldn’t match up that frowning bossy guy in black with this casual boy in light colors. He still looked serious, but somehow calm; there was only a shadow of that furrow between his eyes—those eyes that disintegrated my physical existence in my dream the night before.

  “I didn’t know Doris had such a pretty friend.”

  A beefy vampire with light brown hair came up. He sipped at his drink, contemplating his next words, since he had hit the wall of my silence.

  “I saw you last night at the reception, but I couldn’t steal a free moment of your company,” he said. Now we were alone next to the drinks table.

  “I didn’t see you.” He laughed at my response and drank up. Then Doris showed up and pulled me away.

  “Remember Mia?”

  “So…” Mia focused on me. “What do you do in your ‘real’ life?”

  “Social studies at Berkeley. You?”

  “Oh, I’ve been a grad student twice now.” She gave me a sly grin.

  “That’s cheating.” I smiled back.

  “That’s our reality.”

  “Okay then, where do your recent interests lie?” That was my effort to make conversation with a vampire.

  “The fact that Simona’s been glaring at you for the last couple of minutes.”

  “What? Who’s she?” I was startled.

  “The girl next to Belun.”

  Something clinked in my stomach. “I wouldn’t know. I’ve never met her.”

  We managed to talk, but not without some effort. I noticed that none of the vampires answered questions about where they came from—they would offer some vague reply about the last place that they had lived. Apparently, personal questions were a touchy subject.

  “Hi, I’m Simona.”

  I turned toward the voice.

  “Nika.”

  “Nice to meet you.” Her caramel
eyes clearly said differently. Poor girl, I thought, she definitely misunderstood the looks between Belun and me.

  “How come you’re here?” Well, this girl knew what she wanted.

  “Nika is friend of Doris,” Mia jumped in, her tone sharp.

  She didn’t like this girl. But Simona wasn’t satisfied with the answer.

  “So what do you do?” she persisted, but I decided to make her sweat. I didn’t like the way she was looking at me.

  “I’m a Berkeley student.”

  “Then what are you doing here?” she retorted.

  “I got bored of the California sun.”

  Mia grinned. There was silence, then Simona offered me a fake smile before she turned and left the room.

  “Girl, that was impressive.”

  I winked at her, feeling satisfied that one bitchy vampire didn’t get what she wanted.

  “Simona has attitude problems; it’s good you put her in her place.”

  Bryn joined to tell us details of the previous night’s encounter with some boy who she liked. She had it bad for him; she was completely in a giggling girly mode. Mia tossed out a few cynical comments, but patiently listened to her friend and gave some advice, which made me warm to her.

  Everything seemed so much like a college dorm party that I had almost forgotten the fact that I was in a vampire den. Since meeting Doris, things had changed. These pale dolls had become like any other girls, talking about their love, woes, and fantasies. I hit the kitchen, looking for more cola for my Calimocho. Filling my glass, I felt my buzz and loaded up on the coke.

  “Alone at last.” It was the beefy guy again. He was too close to me, so I took a step back, but he followed me. I could smell alcohol on his breath.

  “What’s your poison, sugar?”

  Avoiding his gaze, I stared into my glass.

  “Calimocho.”

  He leaned even closer, putting his hand on my hip. An entirely new kind of fear rushed down my spine. Every pore on my body filled with a burning feeling. I couldn’t move. Not even a twitch. Not a word could come out of my mouth. His hand was gripping me and his face was almost touching mine. His breathing was fast and shallow. I was immediately drenched in cold sweat, and my stomach was killing me.

  His head swung abruptly around.

  “Hey, man,” he said, without loosening his grip.

  “Leave her,” demanded a familiar voice.

  “I’m not doing anything she doesn’t like.” His voice still relaxed, confident. But a hand came heavily down on his shoulder; he squeaked.

  “Get lost.”

  I stood frozen, gripping the edge of the sink. Andrei Belun was in front of me, looking down into my face; he hesitatingly touched my arm.

  “Are you all right?”

  My throat still tight, I could only manage to swallow.

  “Nika?”

  I tried to concentrate on his eyes, to recover myself. It didn’t work. Belun watched me closely and, as if he had just made a decision, he pulled me with him.

  “Let’s go.”

  I followed mechanically, like an empty shell. He found my coat and we left the apartment without saying goodbye.

  On our way to his SUV, he held my hand. Then he tucked me into the passenger seat and buckled my seat belt. As he drove there was only the sound of the engine and our breathing. I recovered sometime during the ride, but the silence was so intense that I couldn’t cut through it. Our eyes met a couple of times, but nothing was said.

  There were around twenty different cars in the compound’s garage, mostly SUVs. Belun left his car keys inside and walked me to the front door of my building.

  “Goodnight,” he said softly, and walked away.

  For some reason, I was speechless. But a couple of seconds later, I forced myself to run after him. I caught his hand and he turned to me. His eyes were even darker now, but they were free of anger. I held one of his hands with both of mine.

  “Thank you.”

  We stared at each other in silence. Then I felt something wet drop onto my forehead.

  “Snow,” he offered, smiling. Something inside of me sensed a change, and I liked it.

  “Goodnight.” I managed to sound normal.

  “Goodnight.”

  And this time I was the one who turned and left. I didn’t hear him move until I crossed the threshold.

  I had just gotten out of the shower the next day, when my phone rang furiously. I rushed out of bathroom and grabbed it.

  “Hallo.”

  “Nika! You ok? When Belun told me what had happened I couldn’t wait ‘til morning to call you. I mean I’d have called earlier but he told me to give you some space—.” Doris was babbling hysterically.

  “I’m fine. It shook me, I mean. But now I’m fine.”

  “I’m so sorry for leaving you alone.” Her voice broke.

  “It’s not your fault. I should’ve been able to defend myself, but I froze.”

  “Oh, poor thing. But it was me who brought you into that situation! I should’ve known better.”

  “Thanks for your concern, Doris. But you can’t take the blame for your guests. Things got out of control; something like that could have happened to me in Berkeley.” Maybe.

  “It was in my apartment!”

  “Stop beating yourself up. I have to run—call you later, ok?”

  “Sure, ok.” She sounded dejected.

  The unpleasantness of the previous night no longer bothered me. What bothered me was my own inability to react.

  Had I frozen because he was a guy, or because he was a vampire guy? As appealing as the latter sounded, I wasn’t so sure that was the reason. Unfortunately, I had lived in a glass bowl my whole life. Ever since I could remember, everyone around me had been kind and good. Now the glass had shattered and everything had turned out to be an illusion—fake images that my brain had doodled of twirls, rainbows, hearts, and all that kind of crap. Still, no man had ever attacked me that way before. Maybe that’s the way my ex-boyfriend had felt when he had gone for my ex-best friend; I mean, there had been some intimacy between me and him, but not this untamed lust that had freaked me out the night before. If I had felt even a little bit of the same feelings as that vamp, it would have been different at the party. But I hadn’t, and clearly he had wanted to use me—to use my fear to his advantage. Asshole.

  I walked in on Belun dragging weight lifting equipment around the gym.

  “Hi, how you feeling?”

  “Okay,” I said.

  He scanned me from top to bottom, as if looking for physical evidence to back up my answer.

  “First, you’ll work on your strength. Second, hits.”

  I nodded and sat on the weight bench. First, I worked my arms, then switched to my legs. Each series of reps was short, and at the end of each one Belun would add a little more weight for me to lift. At least it was easier than running.

  Since I wasn’t chasing him through the woods, I took the opportunity to try and check him out. However, every time I looked in his direction, he would look right back, as if he was protecting himself.

  When I started with punches and kicks, my concentration surprised me. I was hitting the pad he held, and this time he didn’t push at me. He changed its positions frequently, though, which made things more difficult for me. I tried hard to do it right.

  “I see you found your motivation.”

  “Yeah, looks like it,” I replied.

  “Running at 8 p.m.”

  I made a face, and he smiled. Smiled?—Yes, actually smiled. Then he left the gym. I wondered where he went after our training sessions and what his duties were in the compound. Simona’s face flashed in front of my eyes—was she his girlfriend? I guessed that if she was, she would know that he was working with me, and there wouldn’t have been a need for those unpleasant questions of hers. So maybe she wasn’t—unfortunately for her. With long blonde hair and nice clothes, she was very pretty. Her pale face was soft and tender; however, her eyes reflecte
d a vicious restlessness. She was a bit shorter than I, but delicate, with a bigger chest. A nicely packaged witch.

  At breakfast, I saw some of my colleagues. They occupied two tables and I sat down next to Julia and Blake.

  “Well, good morning. You don’t look as terrible as usual for this time of day.” Tibor was just Mr. Hilarious.

  “I accepted my torture and my torturer.”

  “How did it go last night?” Julia shoved me lightly.

  “Okay.” Which was the truth, more or less.

  “I heard you made a mess there.”

  Everybody looked at Lyndon, then at me, waiting for an answer.

  “An incident occurred, but everything’s fine now.”

  I didn’t want to elaborate. What was this girl’s problem? And how could she possibly know what had happened the night before? I planted my gaze into my cereal bowl. It was easy to ignore their eager looks. I just gave them the same evasive treatment they’d given me before when I asked about Lyndon.

  “So, would you guys mind if Blake and I asked for all of our psych tests?” I didn’t bother with the overture.

  “I asked for them last year. But they refused, saying it was the invasion of privacy. Nika thinks that if we had your approval, they’d hand them over,” Blake added, with more finesse.

  “Is that for your little project?” Lyndon asked.

  “Yes.”

  They looked at each other probably wondering about what was in each other’s tests.

  “There’s also the option of stealing them . . . without your consent, I mean.” I challenged them, feeling the atmosphere change. All eyes were on me, which made me chuckle. And Blake’s clearly didn’t like my threatening them.

  “I thought I’d never see this: a lamb turning into a wolf.”

  Everybody laughed. However, there was something to Tibor’s remark—I was tired of feeling fear. I at least wanted to get to the point where fear was irrelevant, where I’d be in control of my own mind. Little by little I was beginning to believe more in my abilities while being less frightened by the abilities of others.

  “Of course, all of the tests, as well as what we find, will be available to all of you. You are welcome to see our tests, too, just to prove our motives.” Blake returned to diplomacy, but their previous laughter had told me where we stood.