by Rue Volley
“She is mine… blood sweet as wine.” She said.
I took a breath and knew that both Jonah and Lily still had their habits, I guess it is a good thing that they feed and not kill, although the thought of encountering a ‘feeding’ did disturb me. I know that I don’t crave blood, but I also have not witnessed it in such a long time. I can only hope that I would not feel anything if it happened to go down while we were staying there.
The car stopped and I jumped out, more out of pure curiosity than anything. I always thought that Jonathan’s house was the biggest thing that I had ever seen or walked around in, but there I was standing in front of this towering monster that stretched up towards the sky and realized that Jonathan’s house looked like a guest house compared to this. I stood there and shielded my eyes from the sun and focused in on an angel, with a staff in its hand, looming over the entryway and I felt Josh step up behind me. I looked at him and he grinned.
“This is unbelievable.” I said.
“It’s freakin huge.” He said as he grabbed my hand and we walked up to the door and stood there staring at the two large handles. Josh looked back at Jonah as he stood there and grinned.
“Dude… this is like a whole town.” He said.
“Yes… I agree, could fit an entire town into it if needed.” He said.
Lily walked past us and opened up the doors and I stood there, shocked at the size of the entryway. It was bigger than the Library at home. The floor was marbled in black and white checkers and a huge chandelier hung high in the middle. I looked at the center of the room and watched as water cascaded from two cherubs holding vases and grinned. Josh squeezed my hand and I felt his hand vibrate in mine as we probably had the same thought.
“Cherubs.” I said as I half laughed.
“Sweet.” Josh said as he set his bag down and looked up the stairs that went straight up and then split at the top, running along the sides of the second floor.
Johnathan stepped in and looked around.
He sat his bag down and looked at Jonah.
“Guess you couldn’t find anything bigger?” he asked.
Jonah laughed and looked at him.
“Oh I know this pales in comparison to your own home, but we make do.”
Johnathan smiled, and I really did feel a slight feeling of relief. At least he acted as if he was alive.
Lily grabbed my hand and pulled me from Josh. I looked back at him as she ran with me towards the stairs.
“I have spent weeks preparing your rooms… come.” She said.
The fact that she said “weeks” disturbed me. I glanced back at Josh and he followed us. I was glad because this place was so freakin big, I was absolutely certain that I would get lost no problem. We ran up the stairs and she pulled me to the right and we walked quickly across the walkway. I looked down at the first floor and Johnathan and Jonah looked smaller to me… two small boys, standing in the middle of a beautiful checkered floor. I looked up and saw a huge picture and watched the painting as I passed it by. The eyes seemed to follow me. Lily leaned in and whispered.
“That is our Mother, Jonah insisted on hanging it up… I couldn’t have cared less.” She said. I let the painting of the pretty woman pass me by. Lily had her eyes and Jonah had her lips. Funny how that works, how we get bits and pieces of our parents and not all of them. I guess we are not clones.
Lily stopped and I bumped into her and Josh into me. She swung a large door open and there it was. The most beautiful room I had ever seen. The bed was large with red sheer curtains flowing over the top of the canopy. It sat high off the ground, looked oh so comfy, like if I dropped on it I would sink into it and sleep forever. The pillows were oversized, red and gold… not the crappy gold, but the old looking antique kind. I do hate gold, but if it looks old I can deal with it. The room also had a fireplace in it. The grate was old, black iron with a beautifully intricate pattern woven into it. As I approached it, the pattern revealed itself to me… birds… black ones. I grinned. I know that Lily knows I love birds and I would not doubt if she had done that on purpose. I looked at them as they swooped in droves, and sighed. I reached out and touched it and the metal felt cold and hard. Lily laughed.
“Birds… birds… birds, you like?” she asked.
I looked at her and grinned as I stood up straight.
“Of course.” I said as I glanced at Josh who looked at the bed.
“It’s big.” He said.
“Yes… room for three or four maybe.” Lily said as she walked to it and tapped the comforter. I rubbed my neck and Josh smiled.
“I think just two.” He said.
Lily rubbed it and continued to grin.
“Oh… you must see this… had it installed last week.” She said as she walked to two large double doors and swung them open. It opened up into a large bathroom, which had a huge white antique tub in the middle. Both sides flanked with an atrium and a skylight loomed overhead.
“Holy crap.” I said as I walked in and looked around the room.
“This is almost as big as my house.” I said as I looked at all the trees and flowers and pretty much half the plants existing on the planet.
Lily walked to the tub and let her fingers trace the side of it.
“This bathtub is a hundred years old; I saw it and thought of you.” She said as she looked at me.
I grinned.
“Lily… I mean, this is crazy cool.” I said.
She smiled big and walked up to me. She hugged me and then looked at Josh.
“I am pleased that you like it, I love it as well.” She said.
I looked up and watched clouds…gray ones float over. She looked up too.
“The only down side… very little sunlight.” She said.
“Oh, it’s okay.” I said, as I didn’t want her to think that I was overlooking her generosity and planning on account of gray weather.
“Good… good. Well, settle in, dinner will be ready in about an hour… then the party.” She said.
“The what?” I said as I looked at her.
“The party, you didn’t think that we wouldn’t throw one with you all coming?” she said.
“Oh I just… I mean, we are here because of Brooke and…”
“It’s cool Lily, a party will be fine.” Josh said.
Lily grinned and walked towards the door. She stopped and spun on her heel to look at us.
“The closet is through the doors, past the bathroom. I am sure you will find that it has whatever you need to wear.”
I looked at her and she grinned and walked out, pulling the doors closed behind her. I sighed and looked around this ridiculously large room and settled on Josh, who was looking at that bed.
“This is amazing.” I said.
“Agreed.” He said to me as he picked up his bag and walked towards the bathroom. I looked over to the wall size windows and walked to them. I leaned up and looked out over a large garden, a maze built into it out of high dense shrubbery. I felt a vibration on my fingertips and lifted my hand from the window.
“I think that you will want to see this.” Josh yelled out.
I looked back and saw a light coming from two large doors barely cracked open past the bathroom. I walked towards them, still taking in all the room had to offer. The lamps were all large and the lampshades consisted of feathers. The obvious color scheme being red browns and black. I grinned as I passed a table with a photograph on it, the same one I have at home with all of us in it. God, Lily really went all out to make it feel homey here. I didn’t know how to begin to thank her properly. I stopped at the doors and pulled them open. I stood there shocked from the sight. The closet was long and wide. Clothing filled both sides, one side obviously boy and the other girl. I grinned as I looked up and saw the ceiling, curved and painted like the ceiling of a lavish church. Josh stood there pulling on a jacket, dark gray in color… leather with a small collar with a snap. He turned and I ‘oh’d’, he looked amazing in it.
“I lik
e.” I said, as I looked him over.
“I need to shop… soon,” he said as he pulled the jacket off. It was true. Josh has excellent taste in clothing, but he hardly ever shops for anything new. I think he would honestly be content to wear some of his clothes until they fall off from age. I looked down the ‘girl’ side of the closet, and just knew that I could spend a week in there alone, trying everything on. “Oh.” I said as something caught my eye and I walked to it and stopped. I pulled out a dress, light pink and beige in color and Josh tilted his head as he watched me look at it.
“Are you feeling okay?” he asked me.
I looked up at him and shrugged my shoulders.
“Yeah, why?” I asked.
“It is pink.” He said.
I looked back at the dress and grinned.
“I know I know… no one is more shocked than me.” I said.
“Huh.” He said as he turned and started to rummage through more clothing.
I let my fingers trace the material on the dress; it looked like it was older than anything I had ever seen… in a most beautiful and classic way. The neck scooped wide; surely it would hang off one shoulder, if not two. The middle of it had a corset, old leather, riveted with antiqued silver. It just felt so comfortable, like it had been mine forever and that hardly ever happens when you find clothing… especially dresses. Pink...ha! I am so not a pink girl, but this was so light in color, it was hard to think of it as pink… more like skin tone. I grinned and hung it back up. Josh looked at me and grinned.
“I take it that is what you will wear tonight?” he asked me.
“I guess… no, no… yes it is.” I said.
“Okay then.” He said as he continued to look down the line of clothes. He settled on something and smiled.
“Sweet ass.” He said.
I looked and he turned to me and grinned.
“What?” I said.
“I just found something to wear.” He said.
“Since when do you care what you have on?” I asked him.
Josh shrugged his shoulders and walked out of the closet. I stood there and bit my lip as I considered why he would care and then it hit me… Johnathan. Oh crap, was Josh really trying to outdo him? No… no way. This was old news; I mean kinda ‘new’ news from the airship… but old news in our lives. I mean Josh knows he is it for me, right? I mean he has to… no doubt. I sighed and looked back at the dress and then decided that me and that bathtub, and I guess the handmade forest around it, have a date… a very important date. I needed to soak in that tub for at least a while before this evening gets under way... Oh crap, this evening, the party… Blah.
***
Johnathan rolled over and looked at the skylight. He moaned as he felt his head and the pain surged through it. He sucked in his breath and tried to focus as his eyes adjusted to dimly lighted room.
“What the fuck?” he said as he sat up and looked around.
It smelled bad, very very bad. Like old rotting flesh and he held his hand over his mouth and coughed.
“That is just nasty.” He said as he stood up and looked around.
The room was small, looked like a well…only a little wider than most wells. He walked towards the wall and started to feel his way around the rough surface. He tripped over something and looked down, realizing that an open mouthed skull was stuck on his barefoot.
“Oh shit!” he said as he shook his foot and the skull fell and rolled across the stoned floor. He looked down and the low light started to adjust for him and he realized that he was standing in a room filled with skeletons, some still rotting with old flesh.
“Oh my god.” He said as he backed against the wall and looked up.
“Hello?... Hello?... What the hell is going on?” he yelled upward towards the circular hole at the top of the well.
“Hello? Psycho?” he said as he sighed and looked down. He stepped around a hunched body, flesh hanging from its jaw and ‘eww’d’ as he stepped past it and towards the only clear spot in the room against the wall. He sat down and looked at the dead body and cleared his throat as he rubbed his hand through his hair.
“I wouldn’t guess that you could tell me where the hell I am?” he asked the corpse.
The corpse sat there, looking all relaxed and thoroughly dead and Johnathan looked back up at the opening.
“Screw this shit.” He said as he turned and looked at the wall. He reached up and felt a small opening from where the stones had been placed crookedly, one on top of the other. He pulled himself up and scraped the bottom of his foot on jagged stone. He grinned as he reached up and felt another opening and pulled himself up more. He placed his foot on the wall and suddenly he felt something slice through the arch of his foot. He hissed and dropped down, hopping on one foot. He sat down quickly and looked at the bottom of his foot, shaking his head.
“What the hell?” he asked out loud as he touched his foot and pulled out a razor blade. He threw it on the stone floor and watched the blood flow from his foot. He looked up and saw small glints of light from thousands of blades shoved into the stone wall.
“Nice!” Johnathan yelled out towards the opening overhead.
“I will just heal myself over and over asshole!” Johnathan yelled out again.
“It won’t matter.”
Johnathan stood up quickly and tried to see where the small voice had come from.
“Who are you?” he asked as he bounced on one foot and the blood dripped on the floor.
“My name is Alandra.” The voice said.
“Who?... Where the hell are we?” Johnathan asked his unexpected cellmate.
“Valon… of course.” She said as she stepped into the light and stared at him.
Johnathan looked at her and realized that she was almost his age…maybe nineteen. Her voice gave no indication of that.
“Valon… Valon?” Johnathan asked her.
She glanced at the blood on the floor and back up at him.
“Do you mind?” she asked him.
Johnathan looked at the blood on the floor and hopped aside, Alandra dropped to her knees and leaned into the blood, warm and pooling on the floor. She drank as much as she could; making a slurping sound that disturbed Johnathan to his core. She looked up at him and wiped her mouth with her sleeve and stood up slowly.
“I am sorry; it has been days since I have eaten.” She said.
“You are a protector?” Johnathan asked her.
“Not exactly, I am just bitten… I have not been changed, but blood sustains me and flesh.” She said as she looked around the room. Johnathan swallowed hard.
“Did you kill these people?” he asked her.
“No... No, they were thrown in here dead.” She said.
“Oh that’s even better… I guess.” Johnathan said as he looked up at the hole in the top of the deep well. He looked back at her. “Listen, I am not dead so don’t go chewing on me.”
Alandra smiled, probably the first smile she had shown in ages.
“No… no I won’t eat you, I promise.” She said.
“Good, I don’t feel like killing you.” Johnathan said.
Alandra looked at his face and then up at the hole.
“No one comes, no one cares.” She said.
Johnathan looked at her and tilted his head.
“How long have you been here?” he asked.
Alandra squatted down and dipped her finger into his blood; she had left just a small amount behind.
“Years.” She said as she looked up at him and he sighed.
“Well, who the hell put you here? And how do you get food?” he asked her.
“Children… the children come and drop the bodies in the hole. I guess they thought they had killed me. When I hear them coming I hide in the shadows so they don’t know I am here.” She said.
“Fucking great.” Johnathan said as he looked at her.
“Where did they get you?” Alandra asked him.
“I don’t…I mean, I remember tr
aveling, I was heading home… to see family, I ah, I don’t remember.” Johnathan said.
“I was here, in Valon… when the demon came and killed everything. The children were spared and they did whatever he wanted, they always do I am sure… he would kill them otherwise.” Alandra said.
“What demon?” Johnathan asked.
“I don’t know his name… he came from the black water.” She said.
“What?”
“He rules here, since Caine killed all the protectors, he came and spared Caine’s life…now he does his bidding as well.”
“Where is this asshole demon?” he asked.
“I don’t know… probably here, in Valon.” Alandra said.
“Well, wouldn’t he be down here chompin' on us if he was in Valon?”
“He doesn’t care about us… he wants the girl.” She said.
“What girl?”
“The daughter of the sword and shield.” She said.
“What the fuck? You mean Rue and Josh’s, Sara?”
“I guess.” Alandra said as she looked around the room.
“Oh hell no… no, no, no.” Johnathan said as he started to climb again.
Alandra stood up and stared at him as he gripped the wall.
“What are you doing?” she asked him.
Johnathan looked back at her.
“Getting the fuck out of here.” He said as he hissed and allowed the blades to slice into his feet and hands.
“You will die.” She said.
Johnathan started to laugh. “Die here or up there… I pick up there.”
Alandra sighed and looked at the wall and took a deep breath. She grabbed the wall and started to climb. She yelped as the razors cut into her palms. Johnathan looked back at her.
“Just focus on the climb, block out the pain… you can, if you focus.” He said as he continued to climb, leaving a bloody trail behind him.
“The razors are poisoned.” She said.
