Raven's Ascent

by Ben Blackwell

  “Treachery?” The scarred vampire laughed. “This whole city is ours. Be glad we allow you to have a place in it, witch.” The way he spat out the last sentence made it clear he was one of the more patriotic vampires who didn’t feel like sharing their city.

  The tension in the room was tangible, cold and brittle like ice about to break in. But before the Elders could throw back a response, the Countess turned to the vampire and glared at him icily. He shrank in his chair like a scolded child.

  “We should have asked for it,” she said as she turned back to the Elders. “That was a negligence on our part. But we hope we can move past this with the right token of apology.”

  I still couldn’t remember her name, but I admired her attempts at deescalating the situation. While I certainly didn’t like vampires stealing our stuff, a diplomatic solution sounded a lot better than fighting over it. A duel maybe, but I didn’t think they would agree to one. That was more of a street-gang thing, I assumed.

  My lips curled, and I suppressed a chuckle as I realized I had thought “our stuff.” I was already feeling like a part of the magical supernatural community instead of a lone outcast.

  The Elders looked at each other, then a woman finally spoke up. “We shall accept, but a fair trade is in order, more than just an empty gesture like last time.” The others murmured in agreement. Whatever had gone down last time obviously still upset them.

  The Countess slowly lowered her head in acceptance. “Let us get the dagger back in its safe and talk about how we can make up for this… unfortunate incident. Since the ball was interrupted, I was thinking another event could be organized, this time on your terms.”

  The vampire on her right took the dagger and handed it to one of the vampire guards behind him, who put it in an elegant wooden box, adorned with intricate carvings. The guard then marched around the table, followed by two other vampire guards, one of the Crimson Fangs, and Octavian.

  “An event? That is barely better than that useless plot of land outside the city you offered last time!” the Elder witch protested again. “We need something real this time.”

  The Countess pursed her lips at the mention of the plot of land, clearly not pleased. “It’s not about the land, it’s about what you can make of it,” she stated with a hint of disappointment in her voice. “But I’m sure we can find something more agreeable.”

  I was curious to see what they would come up with, but my attention was diverted by the vampires walking by in front of me. As he passed me, Octavian pointed toward the door with his head, briefly making eye contact. I looked at Allard, who had been watching them walk past us with the dagger. He nodded slightly, then turned his head back toward the table.

  Quietly, I followed the vampires outside. Octavian fell two steps behind the others, and I quickly caught up to him.

  “It’s not the same dagger,” he whispered to me.

  “Not the one you stole, you mean?”

  He looked at me with a frown. “No, not the one we got back from Nox Aeternis. It’s harmless, not the one that turns people to demons,” he explained quietly.

  “Yeah, I knew that,” I scoffed without looking at him.

  He frowned at me again, but didn’t say anything.

  We walked through a few more hallways and past more medieval weapons, shields covered with coats of arms, and old paintings. But after about a minute, we reached a more modern part of the castle, where stone made way to regular concrete, lamps to torches, and oak doors to steel security doors.

  As we reached the first one, I watched the vampire flashing an access card in front of a panel next to the door. We seemed to have reached a vault not too much unlike the one I had been in just hours ago, but with more technology and less magic.

  As the door beeped and opened, I turned toward Octavian, finally breaking the uncomfortable silence between us.

  “Has anything you told me been true, or was it all just a lie?” I whispered angrily.

  He stopped and looked at me in surprise. The others had just passed through the door and looked at us expectantly. Octavian’s eyes darted between them and me.

  “Go ahead, we’ll catch up in a moment,” I stated with a look toward them, then pulled Octavian to the side around a corner just to be sure. They might not like that I kept him from doing his job for a moment, but I had to know the truth.

  “I want to believe you, I really do.” I sighed. “But everything so far was connected to vampires, but also conveniently never incriminating you or your clan, until you were caught red-handed.”

  “We are not behind any of the attacks,” he hissed, staring at me angrily. “They were all magical, remember?”

  “A convenient alibi, making vampires the last suspect we would think of,” I hissed back.

  “Oh, so you really think if we wanted to stop the Ring of Elders, we would go through all these troubles and still fail?”

  I gasped, then laughed at his unveiled arrogance. “You really think you vampires are soo superior to us?”

  “I’m just saying, if we wanted the Elders dead, they would be dead,” he replied coldly. “Whatever is going on, we are not behind it. Except for that dagger, apparently, but I didn’t know anything about it until today, either.”

  I stared at him, my blood still pumping fast, but my anger had already calmed down. I was expecting him to try to make me believe him, come up with ridiculous excuses, or even big puppy eyes. Instead, he seemed utterly convinced that they were not the bad guys here. That didn’t mean that they truly weren’t, though I believed that he at least wasn’t involved himself.

  I sighed with frustration, then shrugged. “I’ll believe you, for now. But if I find out you lied to me, I will kick your ass,” I added with a deadly glare.

  “That seems fair,” he chuckled.

  “And then I will tell your mother about it. Her disappointment will be never-ending,” I added, suppressing a grin.

  His face paled. “You wouldn’t dare,” he whispered.

  I held it back for another second, then snorted out a laugh. He chuckled for a moment, but quickly calmed down and gestured toward the corner. “Let’s go back and catch up with the others. I don’t want them wondering.”

  I followed him to the security door as he flashed his own key card, then we entered a hallway that looked like it came straight from a movie. It was completely light-grey, with a floor made of dark grey tiles. There were no decorations, no paintings, nothing at all adorning the walls, except the small black half-spheres of cameras that were placed at various locations in irregular intervals. This was a lot more high-tech than the Elder’s vault.

  There were doors leading further in on both sides of the hallway, a plaque above them designating each a unique code. Octavian walked past the first few, then turned to one door on the right and flashed his key card again.

  The door opened with a beep and slid into the wall silently.

  Behind it, bathed in flickering neon lights, were three dead vampires, covered in burn marks. Shards of glass and drops of blood covered the floor. Several glass cases on the sides were smashed in, but the artifacts seemed untouched. I quickly scanned my room for the dagger but couldn’t see it. What I did see, however, was the ornate wooden box. Broken apart, next to the dead vampire guard. Empty.

  Octavian’s face was pale again as his eyes darted back and forth between his comrades, then the shock quickly gave way to cold determination.

  “You set me up, Raven,” he whispered with barely contained anger. “You talk of betrayal, but then you and your witches murder my people in our own home.”

  “What? I didn’t—" I started, but he completely ignored me.

  Octavian stepped into the room to press a button next to the door, and immediately, an alarm started blaring, red, and spinning lights went off everywhere.

  “I had nothing to do with this!” I yelled, but he only regarded me with a cold glare. I understood that the burn marks made the magicals look guilty, but how was I sud
denly the bad guy?

  “The council will decide what happens to you, but I hope you’re proud of yourself,” he said icily. With that, he crossed his arms, leaned against the wall, and ignored me completely.

  The tension between us hung in the air like icicles, sending shivers across my body. All I wanted was him to know that I wasn’t behind any of it, but he wouldn’t hear it.

  The imaginary icicles shattered when I heard footsteps approach. Many of them. Dread filled me, as I only now truly realized what he had said. He, and thus, the clan, believed that I was behind an attack on their people. And had helped steal an artifact from their vault.

  I might be able to get through to him, but there was no way I would get a fair trial if I got in front of a vampire council. And I didn’t think a slap on the wrist was going to be enough for them. Raina’s story flashed through my mind. If even vampire guards had the authority to kill at their discretion, I didn’t think they even had a prison for their enemies. Or trials.

  This is bad.

  Very bad.

  13

  The old, wooden chair I sat on wobbled with my every movement. It was an odd contrast to the rest of the castle. One leg had broken off, and later fixed with duct tape, while every other piece of furniture I had seen so far had been in pristine condition, ornate and elegant.

  Otherwise, the room I was in was empty. Just me, the wobbly chair, and two armed and angry vampire guards at the door. I had tried to make small talk, to see if I could gain any information. Other than cold stares, I had gotten nothing.

  So I waited. I must have been at least an hour now since I was brought here. It didn’t take much for Octavian to convince them to put me in a cell. One glare at me when the guards came, and I had already been cuffed and put in this room.

  And now the Elders and Countess had a new break-in to argue about—only that this time, they seemed to believe I was the perpetrator. Or at least an accomplice. I still didn’t fully get it. I had done nothing other than accidentally being at the scene of the crime, with Octavian, who could testify that I didn’t do anything. But there were no other suspects as far as I knew.

  I sighed and looked at the right vampire guarding the door. “So, what exactly is vampire law like? Should I call a lawyer?”

  He stared back at me with creepy grey eyes and a weird mustache. “No lawyers.”

  “Do I even get a trial?”

  He still stared at me without blinking. “No trials.”

  Well that wasn’t helpful.

  When the vampire’s gaze left me to stare blankly in my general direction again, I sighed and leaned back on the chair. My fingers tapped on it while I considered my options. But since I was a prisoner of the vampires, trapped in their castle, my chances of escaping were slim. I had to put my faith in the Elders, pray they would get me out of this.

  Another half-hour passed until footsteps came from the hall outside. Multiple pairs, I noticed. At least two vampire guards—their rythmic, synchroniced march with heavy boots on the stone slabs was easy to recognize. And then at least one more person. Was it one of the Elders, telling me I was free to go, or was it my executioner?

  A nervous shiver ran through my body as the footsteps came to a halt outside the door. It beeped, clacked, then opened. Allard stepped through, with two vampire guards behind him.

  “Come on. Let’s get you out of here.”

  With a sigh of relief, I followed Allard. The guards he arrived with flanked him, while the two guards from the room were right behind me. I could feel their stares in my back. One wrong move, and I would probably be stabbed to death before I could say ‘sorry.’

  After a brief and quiet walk, we reached the front gates. The vampires fell a bit behind as Allard brought me to one of the cars we arrived in. “Go home. I’ll let you know if there’s an update.”

  He opened the rear door and I got in, but held it open for a moment before he could close it. “Allard?”

  “Yes?”

  “Thank you. You know, for believing me.”

  He looked at me with confusion for a moment, then his frown made way for a slight smile. “Sure. We’re here for our people.”

  His words echoed through my mind long after he closed the door, even until after the driver brought me home. I should be scared to death knowing that the vampires might deem me guilty. But somehow, I wasn’t.

  It felt strange to sit on the couch, with Lady lying on my lap, while others decided my fate. I didn’t really know the Elders, and they barely knew me, but I trusted Allard. There was only one person I felt I had to convince.

  ‘I had nothing to do with it. I just needed to talk. -R’

  I told myself it was practical, that it could not be helpful if Octavian—the vampire who knew me best—believed I was guilty. They would trust his judgement. He was a Crimson Fang, after all.

  Or would they? Did they even care about finding the truth? I checked my phone again, but he hadn’t answered yet.

  Lady looked at me with worry as I let out a long sigh. She barked once, then put her head on my chest. My worries eased as I moved my fingers through her fur, but the tension remained.

  I was on trial, and there was nothing I could do to prove my innocence.

  14

  Straining, I lifted the heavy wooden shelf that had been toppled over and pushed it up against the wall. I looked around at the pile of small trinkets strewn across the floor and sighed.

  “They really left a mess,” I said with frustration in my voice.

  “It is so kind of you to stay and help me clean up.” The old lady smiled at me while sorting small crystals into a wooden box.

  I was in a small shop for jewelry and trinkets, run by a witch, but not strictly for witches. She also had “lucky charms” with actual magical effects, but most items were purely decorative.

  That hadn’t seemed to be of much concern to the three vampires trashing the place, though. When I got here, they quickly bolted, but not before throwing over shelves and boxes. Luckily, not even they dared to harm an old lady, whose magic was already too weak to protect herself against a vampire.

  “I still don’t get why they would do this.” I sighed again. “How is this supposed to make anything better?”

  The old witch chuckled. “Oh, you’re so young and innocent. There’s a lot of built-up anger in the city since the incidents. I’ll be happy if that’s the worst of it, but if Countess Selina doesn’t take a clear stance, the vampires will get a lot more violent.”

  “The Countess?”

  “Yes, yes. She’s a good one, always trying to be diplomatic. But her people don’t respect her like they did her mother. Some want peace, but some vampires just want to be in control again, boss us witches around.” The old woman sighed. “Let’s just hope she’ll get a handle on the whole mess.”

  “Yeah,” I muttered in response without looking over at her. ‘This whole mess’ was technically not my fault, but I still felt responsible. If I hadn’t gone with Octavian, or hadn’t brought up our issues, we might have stopped the real attacker.

  Instead, it had turned into a cold-war-like situation in Darkhaven, with small acts of aggression like this one happening all over town. So far, nothing serious had happened, but it wasn’t looking good. It had only been two days since it all went down. Since then, I had been going from place to place since then, cleaning up and stopping attacks all day long. The vampires were neither convinced of my innocence, nor that the Ring hadn’t stolen the dagger. But they also weren’t willing to escalate and execute me, so I was exonerated—for now—and they were back to endless meetings and political debates.

  As I finished putting the earrings, necklaces, and display decorations back on the shelf, the old lady waddled over to me.

  “Thank you so much for your help. You’re a good kid.” She smiled at me with wet eyes. “Please, take this, it would look so good on you.”

  She took my hand and put something in it, then closed it and held it with both ha
nds. “And take care of yourself. We witches have to stick together when times are rough.”

  Before I could thank her, she had already disappeared into the back room. Carefully, I opened my hand, revealing a fragile bracelet. It had a thin, golden chain with a set of five different crystals balls on one side.

  After a few seconds of struggle, I managed to put it on my left wrist, where it fit just right. It looked a little strange on me, I thought, so delicate and fragile, which was not exactly the style I was going for. It was a strong contrast to my sturdy boots and black leather jacket.

  Also, it was clearly a very witchy bracelet. I hadn’t corrected her when she assumed me to be a witch, as had many others today, since I was wearing Evie’s necklace again. I figured it was a way of showing my support, that I was on their side. Not a lot of rogues were actively getting involved in the conflict, so I thought the pendant might help them trust me.

  But I wasn’t sure if it made a big difference. Sure, it made it quite obvious that I wasn’t some regular girl just ending up at the wrong place at the wrong time, but I had been treated with so much appreciation and trust today that I felt like the amulet was merely the cherry on top.

  I looked around, then shrugged and left the shop. It wasn’t quite tidy yet, but the old lady apparently didn’t want my help for the finishing touches. As I walked outside, I was greeted by the early afternoon sun bathing me in warm light.

  A smile spread on my face as I started walking. Despite the dire situation, despite the tension and attacks, I felt better than I expected. Now that lines were drawn, and I couldn’t hover on the sidelines anymore, I had to make a decision. All in, or get out.

  The Elders hadn’t even questioned me. One of them had talked to me, let me tell my side of the story, and after that, they were fully behind me.

  When Allard called me, asking if I could help out again, I didn’t have to think about it. Since then, I’d spent two days constantly running through the city, trying to keep the peace and prevent any conflicts from going out of hand.