And it was just a ten or so feet from the cold, hard ground that she felt warm, familiar hands wrap around her body.
The plummeting feeling sinking in her stomach gradually stopped, as her descent towards the ground slowed considerably. Her body, earlier weightless, was now pressed against the strong arms and chest of someone. His smell was enough to drive her worries away.
“Caught you in the nick of time,” a warm breath of air rushed into her ears, whispering words of comfort.
Yarra cried out tears of relief. Avice had rescued her.
Chapter-7
One Month Ago
The attack by the Bloodlust Clan and her narrow escape had left Yarra reeling for weeks. Melanie’s death served as a reminder as to how the enemy vampires viewed the preciousness of a human life.
“They look at you as blood bags, that’s all,” Alicia Selleck said, when Avice brought her home.
Yarra nodded. If she were to remain alive, and to keep such undesirable forces at bay, she would have to help the Keepers of the Blade.
As the weeks after the first attack progressed, so did her capabilities. She could summon visions now, though it left her exhausted.
Alicia squeezed the spongy receptacles of her mind for future visions until Yarra could do no more. In the end, Avice had to step in to stop his mother from driving her into irreversible fatigue.
“She is helping us get a lot of intel,” Alicia said in a huff.
“Even so, mom, she has to rest.”
Yarra kissed Avice appreciatively on the cheek when Alicia left the room. There was a distaste in his mother’s mouth that she did not like.
“She does not approve of us, does she?” Yarra asked.
He sighed. “I guess there is no hiding it from you. As much as mom loves that you are helping us, she is prejudiced towards your powers. She says that it must be contained. And it isn’t like her to believe in inter-power relationships.”
“A vampire must marry a vampire,” Yarra breathed. She had heard of such prejudices. It was in fact, the very reason her clans-people had died in the first place. They were deemed too powerful to survive.
“I think that is bullshit, though,” Avice said. “We should be able to choose who we want to love, and who we want to spend the rest of our lives with.”
‘Werewolves had it lucky’, Yarra thought. If they wanted to accumulate more followers, all they had to do was bite a human. Vampires had lost that ability to transmute their traits onto another person through a single bite.
Pressing her hands on his tattoo, she smiled. She traced a finger along the tip of the shaded grey of the blade on his chest. It served as a good namesake of his clan.
Protectors, warriors who believed in the sanctity of the human life.
Yarra, though not one who wanted to contribute to war, felt that she was aiding in vanquishing an evil force, and that justified her actions.
“You don’t have to fight in this war if you don’t want to,” Avice reminded her.
“But I want to. For you,” Yarra said.
And so she did.
*
The war fought against the Bloodlust Clan proved to be a victory for the Keepers of the Blade. With Yarra’s ability to see the future, Alicia was able to maximize her limited army and choose the best possible outcomes.
War was not Yarra’s strongest suit. In her visions, all that she saw were images of people killing each other. This was not the life she was made for. Even if Alicia maintained that the Bloodlust Clan deserved to die.
“You have exacted revenge for the demise of your people,” Alicia said, after the last member of the Bloodlust Clan was killed.
Yarra did not feel happy. Only self-disgust enveloped her heart. She had helped perpetuate death. She had assisted in the massacre of many, but for what good? Was she now a good person, because the bad guys had been killed? She did not feel so.
Even when Avice and she had celebrated that night, the sex felt short-lived. All she could think of was those people whose death she had helped made a reality.
As her lover entered her, the earlier wave of pleasure gave way to the number one vision that had been plaguing her from the first day she had met Avice; the one where he would kill her.
“You seem subdued tonight,” Avice said after they had made love.
Yarra could not bear answer him. Instead, wrapped a leg over his body and rubbed her hands along his delicate stubble. The war had made them both characters lacking in empathy.
Avice’s apathy was fuelled by the blood he had removed from his many enemies. Yarra’s indifference came from the knowledge that the man she loved would kill her in two months.
She just did not know why.
Chapter-8
One Hour Before the Present…
In any such war, there would often be scapegoats. The war between the ‘Keeper of the Blades’ and the Bloodlust Clan was no different.
Yarra was made the symbol of blame, the Joan of Arc to be held culpable for starting a two hundred year old war between them. All because she was the descendant of the Oracle.
No one cared about evidence, or about direct accountabilities in the grand scheme of things. It only mattered that she shared a particular trait; that she were of the same gender, or race, or origins as the original Oracle.
All that mattered to Alicia Selleck was that a war would not happen between the vampires anymore. And that was by eradicating the Oracle.
So much for indebtedness.
All was explained the hour before Avice sneaked into her apartment that night. She was getting ready to sleep, combing her hair in front of the mirror, when the vision came.
In the vision, Alicia was sitting next to Avice. She had the demeanor of a ruthless general, with the upper curve of her lip, not in a warm smile but a cold leer of victory. It was the look one worn after a deliberate and triumphant victory over an enemy in a war motivated by greed and power.
Alicia Selleck looked at Avice, who did not have the heart to meet his mother’s gaze.
“Kill her, tonight.”
“But mother,” Avice tried to cajole her, but Alicia was quick to slap him across the face.
“You are a Selleck. A member for the ‘Keepers of the Blade.’ Which is more important to you? Your status, or the love of a dangerous girl?”
“That girl helped us win a war,” he said quietly. His hand touched the bruised spot where his mother had just slapped him.
“She did, and now she is collateral damage.”
“You can’t possibly mean that,” Avice said, horrified. “Is this how we repay her for helping us vanquish the Bloodlust Clan?”
“Yarra is an Oracle. Her kind is too powerful to be kept alive, Avice,” Jared Selleck said. His voice was softer than Alicia’s, although just as resolute. “There will come a time when she might turn against us.”
“I can’t believe this,” Avice said, stepping back. “You are just the same as the Bloodlust Clan. You don’t care about all lives, just the lives of those weaker than you!”
Alicia spoke up. “Everything we do is for the survival of our clan. And Yarra, as much as she has helped us, is detrimental to our existence.”
“But I love her!” Avice exclaimed.
“Does she love you?” Alicia said quietly.
“All these years of being together, and she has not had a vision of you?”
“Not even once,” Avice echoed softly, looking thunderstruck.
“Kill her tonight,” Alicia said, pressing a small handgun into Avice’s hand. “Only then will I know that you are a worthy member of our Order.”
The vision vanished in a dazzling flurry of broken images, like butterflies flitting away from a meadow of flowers.
When she returned to reality, Yarra stared at herself in the mirror. She did not recognize the girl who looked back into those accursed eyes. The brush hung prematurely in her hand.
The hair was brushed long, and messy in its unruly curls, just the way Av
ice had loved them. And tonight, he would be coming to kill her.
Chapter-9
Back To The Present…
Yarra lied awake, her eyes staring intently into the wall. The shot from Avice’s handgun did not come.
Avice’s cologne still lingered in the air. His presence filled the room, creating a tense atmosphere within them. His breath was short and harsh.
She understood now why the Sellecks wanted her dead. She was used goods. What was worse, the power that she harbored was one that was feared by Alicia Selleck. And those who were gifted with such potent superpowers did not deserve to live in her eyes. And she could also comprehend how Avice had been coerced into killing her. Family came first, to many people.
He had also been convinced by his mother that Yarra did not have his heart.
“I do love you,” Yarra spoke out suddenly.
A small but audible gasp came from behind her. She heard the rustle of his clothing, but did not turn around to face him.
“You knew I was here?” His shallow breath came out, hoarse.
“I knew all along, Avice. I knew that this would happen from the day that I first saw you. From the moment that we sat down on our first date together at that café across the street, I knew that you would kill me. I just did not know why.”
Avice did not speak. She took the opportunity to wipe her eyes. The white walls became blurred from the tears welling up.
“You often asked me of our vision together. For months, I could not answer you, Avice. Because, it was this. This was the only future I could foresee for us. And in those visions, it always ended up with you killing me,” Yarra said, sniffing. “How was I to tell you such a morbid prediction?”
“Why didn’t you?”
He too, had started crying. There was a loud metallic thud on the floor where the gun was dropped. Running to her, he grabbed at her shoulder to make her face him. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me this?”
“Because I do not care, Avice. Even if you were to kill me, I would die knowing I enjoyed every moment spent with you in the past year?”
Avice sobbed and smiled weakly. “Even with the war and all?”
“War and all,” she nodded. She reached up to wipe the tears from his face.
They held each other for a while, neither one knowing their future destinies. Avice leaned in and kissed her on the lips, procrastinating on the need to worry about what will happen.
“I know why your mother wants me dead,” Yarra said, the moment his lips parted from hers.
The bewilderment in his eyes could not be contained. “How…?”
“She is right. I am starting to get better control of my power. I can not only foresee the future, but see that which has transpired. I am a demon, Avice. Not an Oracle who holds answers. My Eye sees too much, it can know too much, it can pervade all.”
“Baby…, I…, I…,” Avice stuttered.
“I will not hold it against you if you kill me now,” she admitted. It pained her to see him in such a bad way, torn between choosing the expectations of his family and matters of the heart.
War was not a life that she would have chosen willingly, or easily. If she remained alive, there would be the need to constantly live in fear, to look over her shoulders. Perhaps today she would be able to escape the ‘Keepers of the Blade’ with her precognition, but until when?
Alicia Selleck would not rest till Yarra’s body was washed up lifeless in the shores of a deserted beach.
Avice stood from her bed and walked towards the window. His face was speckled in grave concern, his eyes squinting into the darkness of the night. She did not need him to tell her that they would be awaiting his return. The gun glinted on the floor, untouched. It would not kill her tonight.
Suddenly, she realized that her vision might not necessarily come true. All that she had known for the past year had to be suddenly unlearnt. Avice would not kill her. He did not want to either, knowing now that she loved him just as he loved her.
A wave of excitement surged through her body. The fact that she did not know what the future held proved exhilarating.
“Baby,” she murmured.
“Hmm?”
He did not falter when she stood behind him and wrapped her arms around his muscular body. He was no longer the awkward boy she had known twelve months ago. Tonight, he stood taller, prouder, and stronger than he had ever been. This was a warrior.
“Run away with me,” Yarra said, surprising even herself. Where did that come from?
Avice’s hiss of surprise was a sharp whisper. His hand clenched at the clasp of her arms around his body, unwilling to let go of the poignant moment.
“Either kill me and return to your family, or run away with me forever,” Yarra said. Her voice was listless, absent of wild demands. She said it with total apathy, accepting whichever decision Avice would choose to partake in. She would not harbor any ill-feelings towards him if he chose the former.
“I don’t want you to die, baby,” Avice said finally.
“And if I am to live, I don’t want a future without you in it,” she said.
Avice turned in his spot to face her. The juvenile pockmarks on his face had completely vanished to reveal a smooth, chiseled face underneath the deliberate swarthiness. Standing a head taller than her, his height radiated no strength tonight. All that was present was his feeling of vulnerability in front of the woman he loved.
“Then, all I ask for is one thing, Yarra.”
“Name it.”
“Consult your visions. Tell me what you see of our future.”
Yarra smiled widely. Closing her eyes, she imagined Avice and herself standing together in the empty black, canvas of unknown.
Slowly but surely, just as the pages of her university assignment had filled up the unwritten words, so too did an image began painting itself in real time.
She saw the future Avice and Yarra walking in a small green field, towards a small house situated in the middle of a vast meadow.
Brick homes were scattered sparsely, each too far away from another to discern with the naked eye, but it was paradise.
Birds tweeted, and the sky was a light pallor of grey and blue. They loved the superficial gloom weather.
Yarra’s vision adjusted. She could see the image of her and Avice walking quietly, holding hands. There was a clear baby bump protruding underneath her white sundress.
On Avice’s shoulder was a child approximately four years of age. She had Yarra’s nose, but Avice’s clear, ruby red eyes and tiny vampire-like fangs.
But what she also had was the healthy color of a human devoid of all paleness. And she was happy and smiling, not cold and brooding.
The place was on a plateau, in a highland somewhere in a fairy tale.
“Mummy, mummy!” the girl screamed in delight as a butterfly fluttered past them. She let out a chubby hand to grab at it but failed.
The Avice and Yarra in her vision continued to talk in voices Yarra could not hear, but knew to be pleasant conversations. Soon, the baby would be born.
She watched the happy family enter the home never to be disturbed by anyone. At the fencepost is a small wooden symbol with a delightful carving, “Home of the Davises.”
Avice took Yarra’s family name when they got married.
The vision evaporated like pollens blown in a windy day, and Yarra was back in her apartment. Avice still had his muscular arms wrapped around her dainty waists.
“Well?” he smiled. “What does our future hold for us?”
Yarra hugged him, her head resting on his chest. Without missing a beat, she told him what she saw, in true Oracle fashion.
After she was done, she closed her eyes and waited for Avice to make his decision.
Avice squeezed her shoulders and held her at arm's length. His brown eyes looked deep into hers. A warm smile broke out on across his lips, and the tears began welling in his eyes.
“Well then,” he said, “…, let us go make that visi
on a reality.”
Epilogue
Yarra knew that it would be a happy ending for Avice and her in the end. But, that is what it was, an ‘end.’ To reach that destination, they would have to cross convoluted bridges, slog through haranguing pathways, and schlep of tumultuous mountains. She knew that the ‘Keepers of the Blade’ would not take to kindly to Avice’s betrayal.
There would be plenty of wars to be fought before they can finally acquire their ‘happily ever after.’
And the next war will not be easy, for Avice would not be embroiled in a battle with some random enemy. He would have to fight the members of his own order. He would have to stand up to his mother. And that was not going to be easy.
Love Beyond the wall (A Rizer Pack Shifter Series Book 1) Page 43
