by Gloria Dark
“What voice?” Demian shouted, looking around them. The forest seemed vacant.
“Remember the lady I told you about?” Lucius replied, his voice hypnotised as he reached forwards, deeper into the woods, “She’s calling for me! Ermelinda needs my help, she needs me!”
“WHAT?” Demian’s heart exploded with fear and fury, “Ermelinda Morinji? Are you insane? Do you even know who she is? She’s our enemy! If it were truly her, it meant we’re all in great danger!”
Demian tried to pull his brother back to snap him out of the insanity, but he stepped on something. A puppy as white as snow, his features resembling a wolf, but too magical to be an ordinary one. Its paws had sharper nails, its teeth looked like daggers. The ears were long and pointy, but the fur around its neck was thicker and longer at the back, forming two braids. There were two tales instead of one.
Demian froze, remembering the drawings from the books he read.
“A puppy!” Lucius knelt next to the creature, “He’s injured!”
“Lucius, step back slowly! Now!” Demian demanded, still frozen, “It’s a Death’s wolf!”
“But he’s injured, we must help him!” Lucius refused.
“Are you listening to me?” Demian whispered angrily, “It’s a pup of the Death’s wolves! If there’s one, there are hundreds more nearby! We must run while we have a chance!”
Suddenly, a much larger wolf jumped out of the bush, flashing its angry teeth. The Death’s wolf was as tall as a grown-up vampire would be if there were any nearby. Its head was the size of Demian himself.
Jumping in panic, Demian brushed a tree with his hand by accident. It moved, waking up its brothers and sister.
“They are moving, we must go!” Demian pulled Lucius up, trying to run away.
The trees started to walk, moving and forming walls, changing and swapping their places. They pushed the boys away from each other so far, it was impossible to tell which direction to go. They formed a solid wall between the brothers.
“Lucius!” Demian shouted repeatedly.
“Demian, where are you?” Lucius yelled, crying, “I’m scared!”
“Keep talking! I’ll find you as long as you speak, keep talking!” Demian shouted, forming fire into his hands, throwing it to the trees, but the forest was immune to the flames.
“Demian!” Lucius yelled, his voice full of panic.
A sudden howl drummed trough the trees. Demian tried all his powers to cut through the trees, but nothing worked. The boy was helpless against the trees.
“Lucius?” Demian shouted, but there was no response. Only more angry howls joining each other, “Lucius!”
Demian’s heart shattered, his chest burned with agonising pain. His brother no longer replied. The trees had pushed them apart, and the Death’s wolves that never spared a life surrounded the frail boy as easy prey.
“No…” Demian cried out, collapsing on the ground in tears. His chest suffocated him, his raging mind made him feel nauseous.
As the trees continued moving and spreading their sleeping dust, Demian had to find an escape. His eyes blurred and ears burned with a loud pulse. Trying to regain the last pieces mind, he focused on his nose. He hadn’t left anything like a bloodstained glove outside the Sleeping Woods, but he knew the scent of his ever-blooming roses. Breathing in the air deeply, managed to find the rose fence and craw black into the garden.
Panicking about Lucius, Demian ran to his family to confess they were at the Sleeping Woods without permission, but the cold faces didn’t even change their expressions. They were more concerned about fon Vorigans rather than their poor boy.
“That will serve you as a lesson not to go where you’re not allowed to!” Dorian replied coldly.
“If you saw Lucius escape, why didn’t you come straight to us? Why did you have to risk your own life? If Lucius met the Death’s wolves, there’s nothing we can do!” Luminor sounded angry.
“But Lucius is our family! We must do at least something!” Demian shouted, his voice breaking.
“Silence!” Dorian demanded, “Think before you speak, boy! Lucius has never been one of us, he’s weak!”
“You heard them!” Scarlet added, “The boy is dead already, we will not risk our lives to mess with the beasts. If he were surrounded by them, there wouldn’t even be any bones left!”
“Take a day off from school to grief, I’ll tell everyone you’re grieving for fon Vorigans. Make sure to get yourself together, we cannot waste any time sitting and crying when an enemy is roaming freely, fit enough to kill the strongest vampire women there had ever existed!”
“But…” Demian no longer controlled his body, it trembled with cold coming from the inside, his cheeks flooded by salty sea pouring from his eyes.
“Go to your room! Now!” Luminor pointed upstairs.
Demian ran to his room, crying hysterically. He hid in his giant wardrobe as it felt like the only safe place. His palms tried to catch the salty flood, but they ended up drowning in tears. His vampire heart broke and shattered into cold pieces of ice. Demian always knew deep inside that his brother would eventually die, but he still hoped it would be a peaceful death while he sang him a lullaby.
Hitting the walls with loaded aggression and pain, he caused objects to fall from the shelves. Something made a creaking noise in the back of the wardrobe, dragging Demian’s attention towards his private sanctum.
Suddenly, he remembered there was Eden’s gift laying under the broken toys. The boy crawled under the tight wall of clothing and picked up the godly instrument. Its symbols glimmered with bright gold, moving and pointing towards where the bow laid on the floor. As if speaking to the vampire, the violin made him pick up the bow and calmed his tears.
Without knowing what to do, Demian slid the bow over the strings expecting a loud noise, but it came out silent and calming.
“Morcie…” Demian whispered the weapon’s name. It took over his fingers, showing how to move. Demian didn’t resist. Just as Eden had told him, he surrendered to the melody.
Like a beautiful enchantment, the boy’s body moved under the spell of the music notes. At first, he allowed the instrument to control him, but his emotions were too wild, too scattered to be dominated. After successfully playing a beautiful melody, Demian took control over the bow himself, moving it much faster, creating a song of madness.
Dark blue colours escaped the godly instrument, flowing throughout the wardrobe. They slid over the boy’s skin like a comforting caress. More lights and colours appeared in the empty space between the items of clothing and the furniture, swirling and dancing in the melody. They embraced Demian with warmth, calming his rage, his shivering body, his mind.
Suddenly, the melody formed an image before Demian’s eyes, making everything else dissolve into the darkness. As if fallen into hands of shadows, everything seemed black. A darker shade appeared in front of the boy as he continued playing the violin. It moved and grew until materialised into a large feather. At first, it seemed like it could belong to a giant bird, but more black feathers started snowing from the skyless space.
The image punched the boy’s guts; it wasn’t just any feather.
“Abyss…” Demian whispered together with the enchanting music.
Demian wanted to stop playing the violin, but it didn’t allow him to step away. The music continued creating dreams full of darkness and angelic feathers. Demian’s pupils turned into two thin lines, his eyes lit up like red flames. The dark visions swallowed the boy completely.
Chapter 5: Awakening of Abyss
Awakening of Abyss
Demian woke up in his bed, still dressed in the same dirty clothing he had during the hunt. He couldn’t recall how he ended up in his bed. It was clear that none of the servants put him there as they would never allow him to lay there dirty.
The boy felt dizzy, unable to remember what happened during the night. His memory seemed to be swept away.
Demian glanced at the window where
the gold and silver lights entered the room. It was an early morning, and staring at the sun made the boy’s heartbeat much faster. The intuitive feeling made him run outside the castle without any logic behind it.
Passing his family member in the hallways, Demian ignored everyone. He ran outside in the garden and went straight to the giant fountain near the entrance. His heart nearly exploded, unable to believe his eyes. The boy rubbed his eyelids to ensure he wasn’t hallucinating.
“Lucius!” Demian shouted out, running towards the fountain.
Lucius laid on the sculpture unconscious. He was still in his pyjamas, but there was not a single hole in them; only a few dirty patches.
Demian was about to touch his brother when fear slapped him. There was the little Death’s pup laying on the boy like a guard. His white fur seemed fine again; no dirt, no blood, no injuries.
Lucius opened his eyes and glanced at Demian. His face lit up with a bright smile immediately.
“Demian, I have so much to tell you!” the boy shouted out.
“Death’s wolves didn’t harm you! But how?” Demian was stunned and shocked by many things at once.
“When I was surrounded by the grown-up wolves, I was scared they would harm the little pup as he was already injured. I took him in my hands, attempting to protect him, but the other wolves started howling. I was so scared, I started to cry!” Lucius explained, “But then my tears landed on this pup’s fur and healed his wounds, and the others backed off immediately!”
Avoiding the little wolf, Demian embraced his brother so tight he was scared to break him, but it seemed more painful to release.
“Death’s wolves can talk! Well, not really, but they talk in my head, I can hear them!” Lucius continued.
“How did you get out of the woods?” Demian asked, uninterested in hearing about the beasts. His heart was overwhelmed by many emotions, and one of them was the happiness to see his brother alive. “I thought you were… dead.”
“I’m sorry…” Lucius squeezed his brother tighter, feeling guilty for making him worry.
Suddenly, the rest of the Morteeze family ran outside too. Noticing the little beast, they froze at the entrance.
“Boys, get away from that beast!” Scarlet shouted.
“If there’s one of them, there will be many more nearby!” the other grandmother - Ophelia - warned.
Lucius embraced the little puppy. He knew his family would try to attack, he could sense it before it happened.
“Go back to your family!” Lucius said to the animal, “Don’t ever come back, be safe!”
The wolf made a sad noise and ran away. Scarlet and Dorian tried to attack it with their powers and magical flames, but Lucius managed to stand up with arms spread, trying to protect the animal.
“Please, don’t harm him!” Lucius shouted out, but his words turned into a spell.
A high wall made of ice appeared between the grown-ups and the boys. Its crystal shine shielded the little wolf from the flame balls running its way, allowing the wolf to escape.
The ice shattered and snowed down like glitter, but the Morteeze family glared at the boy with annoyed eyes as if watching an enemy. Demian was left speechless too. He had just witnessed his twin die, and now he was back to life with powers nobody had ever seen. Powers that didn’t belong to their fiery family.
To punish the boy for daring to stand against the family, as well as using magic against them, Lucius got locked in this room. Confused about the mysterious power, the family forbid Lucius to feed for the next three days, and they bolted the window so that the boy could not escape. Demian was not allowed to see him either.
No blood from Lucius meant no blood for Demian as he was the one emptying the bottles. Confused and shocked about the situation and everything he had seen, Demian tried to focus on his studies. He was worried about Lucius and couldn’t stop thinking about the Death’s wolves. Lucius had also mentioned many disturbing things like Ermelinda’s voice.
Studying on the third day became impossible. Demian’s mind became uncontrollably impatient to find out the truth, but his body craved for human blood. It made him intolerant almost towards everything, including the tiniest sounds. His senses heightened, allowing him to hear through the walls.
“I swear, if they weren’t twins, I’d think Stella had cheated on me!” Luminor yelled in another room, “That boy is nothing like us. Where would that power come from? Ice! Some damn ice!”
“I don’t understand it either,” Dorian replied, his voice piercing through Demian’s ears from another room. “Our family has never possessed ice, we’ve always been pure fire!”
“Maybe it’s the blood he drunk?” Ophelia added, “That woman from the Blood Bank must have done it on purpose!”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Lucius is too weak to be able to absorb any powers from any blood!” Luminor laughed with no humour.
Suddenly, the sounds muted. The black feather appeared in front of the boy’s eyes like a hallucination. It floated through the library shelves as Demian watched it from afar.
“Hunger is making me mad,” Demian murmured, pinning his eyes down to the book, trying to ignore the strange visions.
Another feather appeared on his desk, but the boy dissolved it into dark mist as his hand swiped through it, trying to push it away.
“It must be the chaos in my head…” Demian whispered to nobody, trying his hardest no to think about Eden, trying not to think about Lucius and his death, trying to push out all ideas about fon Vorigans.
He failed.
A quiet melody crawled up his spine like a memory from a nightmare, making him nauseous. The boy remembered Morcie, the godly violin he played when he thought his twin was dead. Its music made him see the black feathers everywhere, and those visions scared the boy. Unfortunately, he had nobody to share them with. Not even Nathaniel who had left his home town to travel with his grandfather. Demian hadn’t heard anything from or about Eden either.
“You won’t be able to focus when you’re tired!” a sudden voice startled the boy. It was Scarlet who approached the boy, checking his hungry eyes. “When is the last time Luminor fed you? Your eyes are the brightest red I’ve ever seen!”
Demian tried to avoid his grandmother’s gaze. He missed the human blood, and the addiction to it made him nervous.
“You know, maybe you’re like me after all!” Scarlet giggled, sitting down on the desk to scan the boy, “Hair dark as the night, skin flawless, eyes the shade of my name and the hunger…”
“Will I be as dangerous as you?” Demian asked, his heart beating faster. His grandmother was a supreme hunter. She had many volunteers ready to sacrifice their blood, but it was never enough for her. Hunting outside the cities was what made her excited.
“How knows!” Scarlet giggled, her eyes a devious shade, “You know, I can never resist the scent of fear, it is my favourite flavour. I love hunting!”
Demian’s eyes lit up even brighter as his pupils shrank into catlike lines. His mouth watered.
Suddenly, Scarlet grabbed him by the neck. Her eyes pinned the boy down deeper into the chair.
“Can you feel it?” Scarlet’s voice turned into a beastly snake, “You can sense it, can’t you? There’s a visitor in our house, I know you can smell it!”
Demian sniffed the air. He was trying to resist breathing through his nose for so long, but he sniffed the air like a hungry cat. Sweet aroma tickled his lungs and spread over his chest until a red light appeared before his eyes. It moved towards the exist like a ribbon flying in the air, pointing directions towards the food.
“Why don’t you follow your instincts, I know you want it!” Scarlet whispered, waiting to see how the boy would react. She released the boy from her tight grip and smiled like a devil.
Demian stood up, following the floating redness. His mind turned off, leaving the boy with pure instincts. No emotions could get in his way as he surrendered to his hunger.
Following the red beam, D
emian entered another room across the hallway. It was a large meeting room where white walls full of paintings surrounded the large meeting table in the centre of the room. Its glossy surface reflected the ceiling where magical flames grew out of the blooming red roses. They moved slowly as if the flowers had a mind of their own.
The red light that led Demian to the room became stronger, billowing around a stranger. It was a female dressed in a white cloak from head to toe. Her face was covered under a large hood. Bright blue lights formed neon lines around the edges of the fabric, beaming blindingly.
Ignoring Ophelia’s husband Julius who stood next to the cloaked stranger, Demian dashed towards the sweet aroma. His mind was blinded by hunger, and the boy couldn’t think clearly. He tried to attack the human female, but her cloak turned hard like steel as the fluorescent lights detected the danger.
Scarlet caught Demian by his neck and pushed the boy to the wall, her angry eyes piercing through this soul.
“You’ve been feeding on human blood!” she hissed furiously.
Demian’s hunger drowned in mortification. He suddenly realised what had happened. The boy slipped right into his grandmother’s trap and have away his secret.
To cleanse his body from the forbidden blood, Demian got locked in the basement with no food for three days. The cell was absolutely empty. There was no furniture and no entertainment at all. At first, Demian switched back to his wild and hungry nature, but on the third day, he could no longer feel any strength to smash the walls. Instead, he laid on the floor with knees pressed to his face, trying to fall asleep to stop thinking about the hunger. The “cleansing” didn’t seem to help. It only made the boy hungrier. Angrier.
Suddenly, a strange tremble shot through the boy’s chest. Anxiety poured over his body, forcing him to sit up. Feeling scared and nauseous, Demian looked towards the railed window to notice a dark shadow slide across it. When he stood up to investigate it, the boy noticed thousands of black feathers laying all over the cold floor. One of them laid between the rails.
