by Bell Stoires
“Canine companion?” she asked, looking at the golden coat and long nose that was depicted in the image.
“Agatha,” said Officer Ryans, and though his voice was dismissive, Ari guessed that there was sadness behind it.
“She has your eyes,” said Ari, smiling as she handed his wallet back. “I have a Pyrenean mountain dog called Crystal.”
“I lost Aggie a few months ago; just about broke my heart,” he said, before reaching for Ari and resting his hand gently on her shoulder. “Look, I can see that you’re a good person. It’s my job to catch the scumbag that hurt you. You’re not the first person that-”
“Well… as soon as I remember, I promise I will do everything I can to help you catch the person who did this to me,” she said, not looking him directly in the eye.
“It’s Lee,” he said kindly.
Ari nodded her head sadly. She felt horrible having to lie to him but what was the alternative? She couldn’t tell him what she knew; that the reason that so many other girls had died might be because of her. Because someone out there knew how old she was and that she had gone to the Grace Valley Orphanage. As she thought this, the mystery of the murders in Brisbane pressed down on her, darkening her face. Who was after her and why?
Chapter 23- A Great Cost
Later that day Ari had been visited by her lead physician, who had promptly declared that in forty-eight hours, Ari would be able to be discharged. Later that afternoon, during regular visiting hours, the entire coven, except Patrick and Ryder, came to visit her. Ari beamed at all the faces that stared back at her, until she realised that someone was missing.
“Where’s Patrick?” she asked, and suddenly her eyes became wide and fearful. “Oh God I forgot… is Ryder… is he…” asked Ari, searching the coven’s faces.
“Oh sugar he is fine,” said Sandra, sweeping over to her and hugging her hard. “Ryder is a healthy little fledgling. The vampirism took like a treat.”
Ari breathed out a sigh of relief.
A moment later the door to her room opened and a plump nurse with long red hair ambled in with a food cart.
She took one look at all the people in Ari’s room and said, “Only two visitors at a time!”
Ragon grimaced, moved over to Ari and whispered, “Sandra and Larissa are going to stay for a bit to talk to you. Clyde and I have to go and give the police a statement.”
She could tell by the distasteful look on Ragon’s face that the prospect of going down to the police station was not something that he was looking forward. She kissed him quickly on the lips and watched as the coven members began filing out, while the stern nurse tapped her foot expectantly.
“Be safe,” said Thomas, hugging Sandra.
Larissa and Cambridge too were exchanging goodbyes.
Cambridge had swept over to his mate and kissed her passionately on the lips.
She smiled up at him, and reached a hand out to cup his dark cheeks, saying, “I love you.”
For a while the three girls chatted. Ari wanted to know every detail about Ryder’s transformation, and so Lariasa and Sandra spent almost an hour describing it and everything else that had happened since she had been in a coma. When they had finally finished, a soft knock on the door followed a tall nurse with dark hair tied into a pony walking into the room. For a moment the nurse seemed to be surprised that Ari was not alone, but then bustled over to Ari and began reading her chart. Ari stared at the woman; even with her face mostly covered by a blue face mask, it was clear how beautiful she was.
“How you feeling?” the nurse asked in a croaky voice, moving over to Ari and checking her drip line. “Sorry about the mask… I was just down in the respiratory ward and it’s mandatory to wear one between wards.”
“I’m feeling fine,” said Ari, watching as the nurse began drawing up something into a syringe.
Since waking from her coma, Ari had recovered quickly. No longer was there pain and yet now an odd shiver swept up her arms and settled in her heart. She stared at the nurse; there was something strangely familiar about the large dark eyes that stared back at her.
“What’s that?” asked Ari, looking at the thick yellow liquid that had settled in the syringe.
“Just some pain relief,” said the nurse.
Next to her, Sandra and Larissa were talking animatedly and seemed not to notice as the nurse lifted up the drip line and began slowly injecting the drug. Ari watched the yellow liquid make its way down the fluid line and into her IV. A great drowsiness washed over Ari, and she felt her eyelids become heavy. Glancing across the room, Ari’s eyes fell again on the beautiful nurse. At the same time, the nurse stared down at her. Both her dark eyes had become cold and icy, and Ari felt another shiver race up her spine. The smile which had been on Ari’s face was suddenly stifled, and her eyes bulged, just as her hands became like large weights at her side.
“Kiara,” Ari breathed, and both Sandra and Larissa turned around to stare at her in confusion.
“What honey?” asked Sandra, looking at Ari with concern. “What did you say?”
Ari’s eyes were open, fixed in horror at Sandra and Larissa, but she could no longer move.
“I think you two might need to leave,” said the nurse in her faked croaky voice, “this girl needs her rest.”
Larissa and Sandra looked down at Ari in concern, apparently torn between staying and leaving.
“But visiting hours don’t end for another hour,” said Larissa, now turning to look up at the nurse suspiciously. “What did you just give her?”
The moment Larissa’s eyes met the nurses, they widened in realisation. Larissa had only enough time to gasp in surprise, before Kiara had thrown Ari across the room, pulling her arm free from the drop line. Instantly Ari’s eyes were forced open, as the white hospital wall was brought into fast approximation; she hit it hard, letting her hands take most of the force so as to shield her surgery site from the main blow. When Ari slumped onto the floor, she was barely conscious. Staring up at the ceiling, she saw Larissa and Sandra, snarling and spitting. Kiara looked down at Ari, her eyes mad as she threw off the mask covering her face.
“You just couldn’t die could you?” said Kiara, her voice no longer croaky, but cold and full of malice.
Kiara moved towards Sandra and kicked her hard, causing her to fly past Ari and land against the hospital bed. Larissa growled, looking down at Sandra in horror before turning back to face Kiara. In a heartbeat she charged at her but Kiara was ready, and withdrew a concealed dagger from behind her back. In the time it took for Larissa to see the glimmer of light caught by the blade, it was already too late, and Larissa’s speeding body slammed straight into it, the silver knife burying deep into her chest. Staggering backwards, Larissa’s hands grasped at the blade to pull it out.
“EDTA?” whispered Larissa, her voice suddenly congested, as thick blood spilled from her mouth and nose, trickling down her pale flesh like a slow running waterfall.
Ari looked at Larissa in confusion. What was going on? Larissa was a vampire; she could heal herself… she was immortal.
“No,” Sandra screamed, racing to Larissa’s side.
At the same time voices sounded from outside, and a loud knock rasped against the closed door.
“Ariana?” a male voice called from behind the door, “unlock this door.”
Ari looked wildly around the room. Her body felt numb, but slowly, very slowly, she was able to raise her head to see Larissa. The expression on Larissa’s face seemed to be frozen. Crumpled on the floor, Larissa’s wild and untamed hair covered her face, soaking up the blood from her mouth, so that her normally red hair was now thick and black looking. The strange angle that she had fallen, gave Larissa’s body a distorted appearance. Next to her, Sandra stood suddenly, glaring menacingly up at Kiara. She made to move towards her, but Kiara blurred over to the window and jumped through it. Ari watched as the curtains blew madly in the wind and realised that Kiara was gone.
“No, No, N
o,” said Sandra, moving back over to Larissa and cradling her in her arms, so that the blood which continued to pour from the hole in her chest began to soak through Sandra’s shirt, colouring it bright red.
Instantly Sandra’s wrist was in her mouth and she tore at her own flesh, forcing the blood which spilled freely, into Larissa’s partly open mouth. Larissa’s head rolled dumbly, and her arms and legs went limp. Sandra gripped her tighter, one hand under her head and the other brushing away blood stained hair that had begun to cling to her face.
“Tell Cambridge…” Larissa croaked, trying to catch her breath as wayward blood stained tears escaped her eyes, “I would have done it all over again…”
But her words were cut off before she could finish them. Her eyes had grown wide and un-focused and her pupils had expanded, so that only thin halos were left of her normally gloriously, honey-green eyes.
Sandra cried hard, trying desperately to plug the wound, despite the fact that it was no longer bleeding.
Outside there was banging and Ari heard a man say, “Ariana, I’m breaking down this door,” just as the door burst open.
Before she knew what she was doing, Ari had thrown her arms up in the air and the door froze half open. Forcing herself to stand, Ari pushed herself against the door, not realising that she had stopped time until she saw the frozen foot that was still against it. Peering around, Ari saw Officer Ryans with an escort of what looked like nurses and doctors. Pulling her tear filled eyes away from him, she glanced back at Larissa.
“Is she…” asked Ari, but she knew from the lifeless expression on Larissa’s face that she was dead.
Instantly Ari hated herself and her skin quickly felt hot and tight, as if it didn’t belong to her anymore. All she wanted to do was escape- to leave the cursed body she was trapped in, along with all the death and all the pain that it encompassed. Loud sobbing pulled Ari from her doldrums, and she turned to stare at Sandra. She was clutching Larissa in her arms, cradling her like a baby.
“Sandra, you have to go,” Ari whispered in a croaky voice, now thinking only of protecting her. “Sandra,” Ari said again, forcing her onto her feet, “go!” she cried, moving over to the window and pulling the curtains back. “Hurry!”
Ari watched as Sandra picked up Larissa’s lifeless body and moved to the open window that Kiara had just fled from.
Sandra didn’t look back at Ari, but clasped tight onto her dead friend’s body and leapt from the window and into the night. Moving over to the window, Ari watched Sandra land and vanish into the night.
Before she turned around, Ari realised that she could feel that Officer Ryans was still frozen. This third instance of stopping time had allowed her the slightest of control over her powers. She felt the frozen figures waiting outside her room, as if they were connected to her and under her control, like pieces on a chess board.
Quickly she turned around; there was a large red mark on the tiled floor from where Larissa had been bleeding and Ari hurriedly grabbed towels from her room and began soaking up the thick congealed blood. When she had just thrown the last of the towels into one of her draws, she felt her hands twitch and instinctively knew that she didn’t have long before Officer Ryans unfroze. She had just enough time to straighten her hospital bed and jump under the ruffled sheets, when Officer Ryan’s foot pushed the door all the way open.
For a moment Officer Ryan’s blinked, then his eyes darted to Ari, who was lying in her bed, with the sheets drawn up to her chin, hoping desperately to cover her bleeding arm from where the drip line had been pulled away.
“What the hell…” Officer Ryans began to say, before commencing pacing around the room, as if he thought that there might be someone hiding from him. “Why was the door locked?”
Ari watched him move over to the window, glance down at the four storey drop and then pull the heavy curtains closed, apparently satisfied.
“I’m sorry,” Ari began to say, trying hard to force her voice to sound normal, even though it felt as if she were gargling hot charcoals. “I was asleep; I must have been having a nightmare.”
At these words, Ari felt the tears she had been fighting so hard to supress, fall from her eyes. Officer Ryans looked at her in disbelief and moved over to her.
“It’s ok; it was just a bad dream,” he said soothingly.
At his words Ari cried harder; it wasn’t a bad dream… it was reality- Larissa was dead and it was all her fault. Seeing Ari’s continued tears, Officer Ryan moved even closer. He seemed to hesitate, then pulled Ari close to him, wrapping his arms around her protectively.
“Shh,” he cooed, “I won’t let anyone hurt you.”
Ari was shaking; the chill that she had fought so hard to supress overtook her. Feeling her shiver, Officer Ryans began rubbing her arms, his papery hands bringing instant relief.
“Was it Ragon who attacked you?” he asked softly.
Ari pulled away abruptly, confused by his question.
“What, no! Why would you say that?”
“I saw your x-rays; I know that this isn’t the first time you have been abused,” he said.
Ari knew that she had to lie. She could hardly tell the truth; that a four hundred year old vampire had attacked her, but as he no longer had a head, he wouldn’t pose a threat to her… or anyone else. But her mind was chaotic. Her thoughts drifted painfully to Larissa, and Ari tried hard to push her friend’s lifeless face out of her mind as she mustered up the courage to lie.
“I don’t know who attacked me,” she said, looking around the room for inspiration. “I didn’t see their face. But it wasn’t Ragon. And a few months ago someone kidnapped me. That’s what my injuries are from. They took me from my home and-“
“-oh god! But did you tell someone? Tell the police?”
“No,” she said, not looking him in the eyes. “I didn’t think they would be able to help. After I got away, I just wanted it to all be over.”
“But maybe whoever took you before, is the same person who tried to kill you? Do you know where you were taken?”
“No,” she said, seeing both the stone bench she had been tied to in Ragon’s family mausoleum, as well as Kiara’s estate and the crude cell she had been forced into.
“Do you remember anything at all?”
A loud slamming noise pulled both Ari and Officer Ryans from their conversation, and they stared up as Ragon burst into the room, closely followed by Clyde. The second Ragon’s eyes fell on her she broke down again and felt Officer Ryans reach for her, trying to comfort her.
At first Ragon did nothing, his eyes darting to Officer Ryans and the intimate way he was holding Ari. Then moving over to her, Ragon held out his arms and Ari moved over to him, letting the sheets that she had been gripping onto tightly, fall away.
“What the…” said Officer Ryans, seeing the blood on Ari’s arm from where the drip line had been pulled out. “What happened?”
At these words Ragon’s fangs unsheathed. Seeing this, Officer Ryans reached for his belt where his gun was concealed. But his mortal speed was no match for Ragon, who bent over him in a second and struck hard at his neck, relishing in the taste of warm fresh blood.
“Smooth,” said Clyde.
“Go away and forget about Ari and what you saw here today,” said Ragon, staring down at the policeman.
Officer Ryan’s stood quickly and made to leave.
“Wait,” said Ari.
Ragon’s eyes widened as she moved over to officer Ryans. Automatically her hands reached to trace the puncture marks on his neck. She couldn’t help but feel retched. He was a good man, and she felt for him… more than she would have admitted in front of Ragon.
“Thank you,” she said, reaching on her tippy toes to embrace him, as she wrapped both her arms around his broad shoulders, “thank you for everything Lee.”
When Officer Lee Ryans left, he didn’t turn back to look at her. If he had of, he would have seen that she was now sheading new tears for him, and the brief
friendship they had shared. But that, along with all his memories about Ariana would be gone now; Ragon had commanded him to forget about her. Perhaps it was better that way. Being friends with Ari seemed to only put the people she loved in danger. At once Ari thought of Larissa- but she couldn’t be dead... she just couldn’t. This thought pressed down on her again, crushing her from the inside out. Then, cruelly, flashes of Larissa painting her toenails, teasing Clyde or embracing Cambridge, swept into Ari’s mind, until she forced herself to stop. The breaths she took, cost her deeply, and she pressed hard against her ribs, hoping to mask the pain.
Chapter 24- Frangipani Farwell
“I came as soon as Sandra phoned me,” said Ragon, reaching for Ari and pushing her sticky hair away from her forehead. “She told me what happened and-”
“Please tell me it’s not true,” said Ari, looking imploring up at Ragon while Clyde shifted his weight uncomfortably.
“Are you ok?” asked Ragon.
Ari nodded, saying “Yes,” but her voice had broken from the effort. “But… what about Larissa?”
“I am going to kill Kiara,” hissed Ragon, pulling Ari so close that her head was cradled against his shoulder.
Ari cried again harder. Ragon’s avoidance of the topic confirmed her worst fears- Larissa was dead.
“But… what about Cambridge and Sandra?” asked Ari, her voice muffled by tears.
“I have asked Cambridge to wait for me to get back before he does anything,” said Ragon.
“They were together for centuries,” said Clyde.
The moment Ari heard Clyde speak she broke away from Ragon and hugged him tightly.
“They had more time together than most,” said Clyde, his hands wrapping around Ari’s waist.
Reluctantly Ari pulled away, staring from Clyde and back at Ragon.
“We’re checking out,” said Ragon, grabbing Ari’s hand and pulling her out of the room.
