I felt Valaine’s grip tighten, and darkness gradually flooded my vision. I didn’t move, yet I was weightless. The last thing I saw was Valaine’s head falling back, her skin glimmering like mother-of-pearl.
One deep breath later, I was sinking into the unknown—the great nothingness of a dormant mind. I was alone, but I didn’t feel lonely. I could sense Valaine everywhere around me, like a warm blanket giving me comfort.
“Follow my voice,” Phantom said, somewhere in the vast darkness. “Follow my voice, Unending. I am here to guide you. Look back on your life, dear sister. Find your earliest memory.”
I heard Valaine sigh. Silence followed as I lingered in the void.
“I’m trying… I think I was maybe four?” Valaine replied.
Tendrils of light and color spread across and up and down and in every direction. It dazzled. It mesmerized. It caught a life of its own as shapes began to form, three dimensions coming together to produce Valaine’s earliest memory from this life.
We were in a room with floor to ceiling windows and embroidered drapes that had been pulled aside to let in the hazy morning light. For a moment, I wanted to hide in the shadows, my vampire instincts taking me away from the burning daylight. But I remembered that I wasn’t myself here, that I was merely a passenger in Valaine’s head.
I could see the room through her eyes. It looked so big to a four-year-old girl. The furniture seemed like the artful work of giants. Her father, Corbin, came into the picture. He wore his official uniform, a crimson cape hanging from one shoulder. The medals on his chest jingled as he bent to pick Valaine up, smiling broadly.
His brown eyes were filled with shimmering love, and I could almost feel his affection for his daughter. She was only a kid, vulnerable and in need of his protection. At this point in time, he had no idea she was the true source of the Black Fever. I didn’t want to justify any of Corbin’s choices, but looking at him in this memory… I saw a more genuine side of him. One that had not even considered the possibility of someday killing his own daughter to preserve the Aeternae species.
“Hi, sweetness,” Corbin said, his voice blaring through my brain. It all felt so real, as if I were the one being held and adored, not Valaine. It scared me for a second. I tried to focus on myself, on my presence here. I was only an observer, and I had to remember that.
“Good job,” Phantom whispered, though I could not see her anywhere. “How firmly anchored do you feel in this moment, dear sister?”
“I… I don’t know. It’s steady. It’s solid. I can feel my father’s arms around me. The warmth of his embrace,” Valaine replied. Corbin lowered his head and planted a kiss on her forehead. “I can feel his fatherly love.”
“That’s great,” Phantom said. “It means you’ve found an excellent place from which to make your jump.”
“Her what, now?” I heard myself ask.
Corbin chuckled as Valaine’s chubby little hand reached out, her tiny fingers getting tangled in his beard. Tears filled his eyes when she pulled too hard, but he wasn’t angry. He patiently removed her hand and gently placed Valaine in her cot. “It’s time for your nap, my love,” he said. “I must go light a candle in your mother’s memory.”
There was grief in his voice. He missed Valaine’s mother deeply, but the presence of his daughter soothed him. I wondered if he was Master of Darkness around this time. None of us knew when he’d been appointed or how the appointment was even made. Either way, it was difficult to reconcile the Corbin I saw now, in this memory, with the real one.
“We have to go,” Phantom warned. “We cannot linger.”
“I’m… I’m ready to go.” The ache in Valaine’s voice was impossible to ignore.
“Good. Now, reach back farther. The memories are there, deep beneath the surface of everything you see here,” Phantom said. “Look around. Find something that is out of place. A thread that might have come loose, perhaps… that’s your gateway into a previous life. The memories are all connected.”
“But I’m basically a toddler here… how am I supposed to reach out?” Valaine wondered. “I don’t even think I can move my hands.”
“Remember. It’s not real. It’s not your body. You’re a visitor, and you can move,” Morning reminded us.
Valaine took a deep breath and spent a minute trying to break free from this point of view. I could feel her mind wiggling out of its position, like a fish trapped in a nook between two rocks. Finally, she was loose, and the view in front of us shifted. We floated around the room, checking every corner, every surface, every angle and door.
Beneath a small ornate cabinet with gilded doors was a shadow. It sprawled farther out than it should have, considering the amount of light coming through the window. It seemed out of place, and Valaine noticed it, too. “Is that it?” she murmured.
“Let’s find out,” I said.
Glancing back, we saw Valaine—the four-year-old—resting in her cot. She was fast asleep, her black hair curled and framing her porcelain face. Not a care in the world. No idea what her future held. No understanding of the betrayal she’d endure from her own father. It broke my heart to see her like this, so blissfully unaware. But the past was the past. It could not be changed.
Valaine shifted focus back to the shadow beneath the cabinet. “This feels wrong,” she said.
“Then go into it. Inspect. Don’t be afraid. All you’re doing is opening a door,” Phantom advised. She sounded closer than ever.
The closer we got, the blacker the shadow grew until it enveloped us, and we were back in the big nothingness—only it wasn’t the same as the first time. No, it felt different. Colder. Completely foreign. It was difficult to understand the feeling it gave me, but I knew Valaine felt the same way, as shivers rippled through our common consciousness.
“Where are we?” she asked.
“You did it. You’re between lives,” Phantom said, and I imagined her smiling.
“Okay… what now?” Valaine replied.
“Relax. Let the memories come to you. The one closest to the surface will emerge,” Phantom explained. “Whatever you do, don’t forget—it has already happened.”
It sounded like a warning. Soon afterward, an image began to form and another room came into focus. Unlike Valaine’s nursery, this one was tall and dark and damp. Water trickled down the black stone walls. We were somewhere underground, and torches flickered all around us, mounted on iron arms. Amber light cut through, revealing the faces of those present—we were not alone anymore.
This was different. Dread grabbed me by the throat, its clawed fingers digging in.
“Are we sure?” Petra asked. Yes, Petra was here. We were bound to a wall, unable to move, stuck in Valaine’s previous body. And Petra looked worried. Slightly younger, and worried, clad in blue velvet. Her silver hair still had a few streaks of black in it, and was much longer, hanging down her back in a tight braid.
She was joined by Danika, Corbin, and Zoltan. They all looked different. Younger, somehow. But they were definitely Darklings, and they were staring at us with a mixture of anger and fear.
“I cannot believe we missed her this whole time. Right under our noses,” Danika muttered.
“Please, let me go,” we said, through the voice of Valaine’s past life. “I didn’t do anything. I’m not who you think I am.”
“Silence, Sessilly!” Zoltan snapped, raising his scythe to our throat. “We know what you are. This isn’t our first time!”
Petra appeared distraught. “Zoltan, I hate to say this, but… is she really the one?”
“Did you not see her manifesting at the announcement of Murya Shatal’s pregnancy?” Danika sounded somewhat bored. She’d definitely been through this stuff before. It no longer affected her. But we were getting valuable information here. We already had a name for this past version of Valaine. Sessilly. We could find her in the empire’s archives as one of the Darklings’ victims. “Do you want your siblings to survive, Petra?”
&nb
sp; “Of course I saw her!” the high priestess hissed. “I’m losing my eldest brother to the Black Fever already! I just want us to be absolutely and undeniably sure. Either way, Aganon and the rest of us will be spared! I’m here to make sure of that!” She paused and gave Sessilly a sad look. “This girl is my friend. Truth be told, I often thought of her as my little sister. Therefore, it’s not easy for me. I hope you all understand where I’m coming from.”
“We’re friends, yes!” Sessilly pleaded. “You can’t let them kill me.”
“You’ll only be spared if we kill the source of the Black Fever. In this instance, it’s Sessilly. Come on, Petra. We’ve had this conversation so many times,” Corbin muttered.
“No, please…” Sessilly pleaded for her life, and I felt the horror, the anxiety, the rage caused by what I could only perceive as a dreadful injustice. “Petra, I trusted you!”
“I’ve had enough of this,” Zoltan said. He pressed the blade deeper into my skin—our skin, Sessilly’s skin—and I felt the metal slice through. The blood was warm as it flowed down my chest. I screamed. We all screamed from the raw pain as the scythe cut flesh and bone and tendon, separating the head from the body.
I saw Petra tearing up, mouthing an apology as the light faded with Sessilly’s life. I wondered if this was the last time that the high priestess had had a real friend. Maybe Sessilly was Petra’s last attachment, emotionally speaking. Maybe she steered clear of bonding with anyone again after this, since it ended so badly.
Valaine cried out.
I fell backward, and the memory was gone. All the pain vanished. I was lying on the ground outside the inn. We were back in Orvis. We were safe.
“Oh, no…” Valaine managed, sobbing. I scrambled to my feet and rushed up the steps to wrap my arms around her. I held her close as she cried, her tears drenching my shirt.
Phantom and Morning sat beside us, still and silent. There were no words left, anyway. We had just witnessed the end of Valaine’s previous life. Sessilly. An innocent Aeternae vessel whose only fault was her connection to the Unending—the source of the Black Fever.
“I’m so sorry,” I mumbled, stroking Valaine’s long, silky black hair. She shuddered, but she didn’t pull away. “I’m truly sorry you had to see that.”
“They killed me. It wasn’t the first time,” Valaine croaked, “and they’re going to do it again as soon as they get the chance.”
“I know I told you to detach yourselves from what you were witnessing,” Phantom sighed, “but I also understand why you’d be unable to keep that distance. Especially given what you saw.”
Sharp pain cut through my temples, but I pushed it aside. There was no time, no room for any suffering on top of what we were already going through. Valaine grunted, resting her forehead on my shoulder. “My head hurts.”
“An expected side effect, like I warned you,” Phantom said.
Morning tucked a lock of hair behind Valaine’s ear. “You were amazing, sister,” she said. “You managed to remember something from a previous life. It means we’ll get to see more and farther back, the next time we dig in.”
“I… I don’t think I ever want to do that again,” Valaine whispered.
“You’ll feel better after you rest for a while,” Phantom replied. “We have to keep working at this. We need to get back to your truest self because that’s where we’ll figure out what sort of seal Spirit put you under.”
In theory, it sounded simple. But after this experience—I sensed slivers of pure darkness slipping out of Valaine as I held her—I knew it wouldn’t be easy at all. The more we peeled away at the problem, the more unpleasant it would get. The journey into one’s past was a massive task. The journey into one’s past life… well, that was infinitely harder. More tedious.
Perhaps dangerous in ways we had yet to anticipate.
Even so, I certainly wasn’t going to quit, and despite Valaine’s exhaustion and misery, I knew she’d get right back at it as soon as she could. “We’re in this together,” I said to her. “We’ll pull through.”
Valaine didn’t answer. She was already sleeping on my shoulder, softening in my arms as her mind drifted away to what I hoped were better places. I remained anchored in reality with Phantom and Morning, wondering what we’d discover in the next attempt.
Deep down, I was scared of what we might unearth. But excitement trumped the fear, because there was freedom in truth, no matter how unpleasant.
Tristan
Agreeing that a break was sorely needed, I left Phantom and Morning with the rest of the crew and took Valaine upstairs to her room. She settled on the bed, her arms limp, in and out of her half-sleeping state. I poured water into a bowl with a clean cloth. After a thorough wringing, I used the cloth to wipe some of the sweat from Valaine’s face.
She didn’t say anything for a while, but, now fully awake, her gaze followed me as I cleaned every bit of pearlescent skin I could find. The silence didn’t feel comfortable anymore. Something lingered between us—the trauma of a shared experience, as we’d both seen her die as Sessilly. We’d felt the blade, the pain…
“I know it’s hard, though I can only imagine what it’s like for you,” I said softly, the cloth following the line of her neck. “But you’ll get to the bottom of this. The fact that you managed to remember one past life on the first try proves the Reapers are onto something. That you really are the Unending.”
“It doesn’t make me feel any better,” Valaine replied. I put the cloth away, then crouched in front of her, listening. “I’m a stranger in my own body. There are roads I’ve been down before, roads I don’t remember. And the people I trusted the most—my family, my friends—most of them have been hunting and killing me for millennia. My ancestors, too. Tristan, how can I ever bounce back from that?”
I didn’t have an answer, but I wasn’t going to leave her like this. “You know what? Maybe it’ll feel different once you remember yourself as Unending. Maybe none of those people will matter when your true consciousness returns,” I said. “As a Reaper, especially the very first ever made, I’m thinking Visio will seem small and petty and insignificant. The blood ties will vanish. All that matters is your freedom.”
She nodded slowly, the corner of her mouth tugging up into a faint smile. “I’m amazed you haven’t run off screaming.”
“You know me, Valaine. I’m always up for a good challenge.”
“That’s right. You only seem like the calm and peaceful erudite. You’re as fiery as Esme and Kalon put together when provoked,” Valaine said. “I remember seeing you fight the Darklings. You’re vicious.”
“I hope you mean that in a good way.” I chuckled.
She reached out a hand and cupped my cheek. Her touch sent electric currents through my whole body—burning wisps of something I’d become oddly familiar with. Our secret chemistry. “I absolutely mean it in a good way,” she replied. “Had it not been for you, Tristan, I would’ve succumbed to despair by now. Thank you. For everything.”
“Oh, don’t thank me yet. We haven’t even gotten to the really difficult part. You know, what Spirit actually did to you.”
Valaine scoffed. “It’s hard for me to hate someone I don’t remember,” she said. “But yes, I suppose you’re right. There are worse things to come, huh?”
“You’ll make it. Spirit is dead and long gone. He can’t haunt you for much longer,” I replied. “It’s time for you to become who you’ve always been. The years you’ve been spending as an Aeternae will seem like a blip in the greater scheme of things.”
“Your optimism is somewhat infectious.” Valaine sighed. “I can only hope that…”
Her voice trailed off. Her brow furrowed. All of a sudden, something shifted in the fabric of the universe. Something felt… wrong. The temperature dropped, and steam rolled out from between my lips. Goosebumps pricked my skin as an insurmountable wave of anguish toppled me and my resolve like a devastating typhoon. It pummeled me mercilessly, and I shivered
. Tears stung my eyes.
Valaine was frozen, looking more like a doll than a living being.
“Are you okay?” I asked, my voice breaking.
Why was I feeling this way? Why did everything suddenly hurt so much? What was happening, and why had I lost control over myself? Nothing made sense. Optimism had perished in the dark flames of misery, and…
“Wait. Dark,” I mumbled, trying to get a grip on myself. “Dark. Darkness. Darkness… it’s darkness.”
It was coming from Valaine. These terrible sensations. The sadness. The pain. The disbelief and the very death of my faith in her and the rest of the world. She’d tuned out, somehow. She couldn’t see or hear me anymore.
I called out her name, over and over, but she didn’t answer. I touched her hand, but she didn’t respond. Instead, the darkness oozing out of her spread, covering the entire room, seeping through the fabric and the wood and the glass on the windows. It got worse, to the point where pain throbbed in my chest. Hopelessness was not something I’d ever really been used to, so being hit by so much of it now, it… it almost broke me.
“Valaine, please listen to me,” I said, once again trying to reach out to her. She couldn’t even blink. “I’m here, and I’m not leaving you, okay? Whatever it is you’re going through, you obviously have no control over it, and that’s okay… but I need you to at least try.”
It got worse, and I wasn’t sure there would ever be good again. Something had snapped inside her during the Sessilly memory session. Something had been unleashed, and it was manifesting now, stronger than ever. I’d sensed it before, whenever Valaine had revealed her dark side, but never like this.
I dropped to my knees, trembling. “Valaine, you can’t let it get to you. You can’t let it break you. Please, listen to me…”
She didn’t react. I doubted she could even hear me at this point. If I let her unwind any further, I risked the darkness spreading beyond the walls of her room, and I had no idea how it might impact the others, if I was basically emotionally crippled and barely able to move. I couldn’t allow it to hurt my friends, my sister. I knew Valaine would never forgive herself if she caused them any pain.
A Shade of Vampire 83: A Bender of Spirit Page 6
