//Author Note: I would strongly urge you to read Rotten Æther | Scribble Hub alongside this story. Shared world and setting, with crossovers coming!//

 

The darkness clings to me, desperate to respond to my calling. It is alive, not how a person is alive, but more akin to the grass underfoot, or the trees of the forest. It has only the simplest of wills, moving and acting on instincts so basic that most could confuse it for something unliving.

In other cases, they would even be right, but here in this haunted estate, the shadows are more than simple phenomena. They have inherited a small fraction of the life that was torn apart and scattered here, the life that I lost on that dreadful evening. It has been little more than a week, but to my corrupted sense of time, that may as well be an eternity.

My soldiers and servants stand in the open space of the gardens, a private place away from the outer city. They carry weapons at the ready, and some whisper chants as they try to pry through the darkness that surrounds them.

Perhaps, if the darkness was simply an absence of light, they would have some hope of achieving as much.

Stirring the æther that runs in place of blood, I shape minions from the living shadows, creatures with some small will of their own. Ghastly monsters warped further by the illusions that I layer upon them.

Henry stands at the front of the formation, paling visibly as he faces off against a ghost half his size. The ‘creature’ imitates the shape of a child, but only at a glance. If you would ask an intelligent monster to try and draw a human child, without ever having seen one, I imagine the result would be close to what Henry now faces.

Nothing is quite right, and the very sight of it is disturbing in ways that cannot be easily dispelled.

Henry lashes out with his sword, bisecting the figure, but his sword passes through easily without causing any real harm. The child reaches for him, feeding on the shock and fear that is born from his failed attack.

He stumbles back, relying on the others to his left and right to help, but they don’t know what to do when facing a monster that no blade can touch. They too, retreat, holding up their weapons to try and ward off the evil.

The child trips over as he attacks again and grabs at his ankle, attempting to drag him away into the shadows where my powers are greater. Where, should this fight be real, he would be torn apart by shadows that form into jagged teeth. A monstrous maw that would tear him apart as easily as the jaws of any wyvern.

“Henry!” A man, too young to have personally fought in the war, leaps to his side. Unlike the others, he holds flames in his hand, waving them at the fake child.

The monster retreats, the illusion stolen away by the flickering light to reveal the shadowy figure beneath. He doesn’t manage to dispel the figure entirely, but it is enough to recover his ally.

Henry says nothing, taking up his stance and quickly regaining his calm. There is still an edge of terror that remains with him, it could not be fully cast aside, but it no longer strengthens me to the same degree as it had a moment before.

They had agreed to delay in using fire and light magic so that they can face me in my full strength. Already some of them seem prepared to go against that deal, their fear feeding me power.

This time, I must employ a softer touch. I spread living shadows through the short grass at their feet. It is a subtle thing, the grass moves about as if caught by a breeze that is not real, while the darkness gradually deepens, unsettling them further though not one of them notices why.

I could grab them all with ease, but patience makes for a greater hunt. Feeding more of the darkness beneath them. I tickle at a man’s ankle with a limb that fades as soon as its task is done.

The man spins fast, stomping at the ground but looking past the shadows that he is looking for. His eyes are open wide but he sees nothing and says nothing to the others. He glances to the left and right hesitating to mention what he felt. He thinks that it was just his imagination.

The very first instinct that I must cut away from them. I circle them, sending a few shadows to dance before their eyes while the ones at their feet tickle and prod at them where they cannot see.

Slowly, ever so slowly, I weave dark tendrils up their legs, vines that bind themselves to the trees. A can vaguely recall reading about a parasitic species of vine that would slowly choke a tree to death, feeding on its still standing corpse. I take inspiration from it now.

For the sake of distraction, I show myself to them. Using telekinesis I expand the size of my coat around me, slowly walking toward them while the shadows still dance around me. Illusions shimmer to life here and there, small things, demented and disturbing but too indistinct for the men and women I face to give a name to what they see.

The young man who aided Henry is impatient, facing his fears directly with a sword in hand. He leaps right into a charge, or he would have, had his feet not been tied to the ground. The unspeakable terror he feels as he screams, gives birth to the shadows that catch him.

The shadows maw encloses around him, softened to keep him safe from harm but to keep him restrained for the rest of the fight.

Henry rushes to help but fails to notice the shadows around his own legs. In one moment, half of their number trip to the ground, their sudden surprise feeding my power just enough to grapple the other half down with empowered shadows.

I move in among them at the last moment to tackle the more stubborn thugs.

“Light!” Three soldiers chant for the magic, but one does not need to. The man with tall horns on his brow summons a small ball of light to hand as easy as anything. He is afraid but steady.

His light floats down to free his legs, while he keeps a spear between us. With both light and spear keeping me away, I can do little to nothing as he frees the others near him. I send waves of cold and shadows against him, but as he frees the others who raise lights of their own, even that isn’t enough to distract them.

I dive in, trying to regain my lost momentum, but the tide has turned against me. With light and fire, they drive me away.

“Well done,” I disperse the shadows and lower my hood, nodding appreciatively at the one thug who saved them from their despair.

“You held back,” he grumbles, the heavy accent makes it difficult to understand him. I suspect that he does not speak much.

“I only held back, to keep from killing anyone,” I say, shaking my head. “I truly am this weak when you use the right weapons against me.”

“You’re telling me that these shadows are just as strong now, as they were before?” Henry asks, physically tearing apart the few retreating shadows at his feet.

“They are weaker, but only because you are making them weaker now,” I say. “Just as you were enhancing their power earlier in this fight.

“Remember, my kind will feed on your terror. When you saw this young man fall and realized the trap, you all felt a spark of fear rush through you. That is what gave me the power to throw you to the ground. It is why most of you would have been dead if I’d been serious.”

“The light took your strength away,” The horned thug says.

“It did,” I nod. “Remember this, when you must face others of my kind. Light, fire, confidence, and faith.”

I wave a hand at Belle, who is now approaching me. I summon shadows, surrounding her from every angle, only for them to sizzle away into nothingness as they squeeze in around her. She does not even show a hint of fear.

“Vampires are stronger than anything, while we’re in our element. You must deny us that element, so long as the hunt belongs to us then nothing can stop us,” I say. “But if we become the hunted, then we are terribly vulnerable. Deny us the darkness, deny us your fear, and you will survive.”

“I hope that’s as true as you claim it to be,” Reeve Lewark says, stepping out from the darkness and leaning on his cane.

“You have come to join us?” I ask. “Is your young apprentice with you? There is a rather unusual phenomenon here that would certainly interest him.”

“This isn’t a social visit, I’m afraid,” he says. “I’m on the trail of what I suspect to be vampires. I came here to ask for your help in testing my defences against your magics.”

“I would not delay you in such,” I say. “Perhaps we might discuss these defences with my people? They will need as much and more in the coming months.”

The reeve nods, politely. The young boy trailing after him is looking all about, already enchanted by the strange magics that I had wanted him to investigate.

“I will have to find a time to invite Merry here to help,” I say, as the reeve steps closer to me. “If anyone could make for a vampire hunter, it would be that man.”

“Merry?” Lewark asks, standing tall before me. His confidence practically glows around him, much more pronounced than I’ll find in most people.

“A priest of Tilia, his faith is more powerful a shield than anything I’ve seen,” I explain, summoning illusions around the reeve to try and startle him. Inspired by the natural magics infecting my home, I surround him with whispers layered upon one another.

“Faith?” he asks. “I will track him down.”

“It would be worth your time,” I say. “You cannot mistake the sight of the man, his face is quite hideous.”

“Should a noblewoman be speaking so rudely?” he asks.

I send a wave of cold down his neck, and create a new whisper, “What did you forget?”. He shivers and his confidence flakes away.

Pressing the illusions closer, giving them the flesh of shadows, I push in on him. A flash of light, bursts from a ring on his finger, burning away the shadows and illusions.

“It works,” Lewark says, looking down at his new ring, even as his emotions even out. “Glad I don’t have to track down that enchanter for a refund.”

I stare at the large red gem that adorns his finger, frowning at the sight of it.

“If I were to take you by surprise…?” I ask, but he shakes his head.

“It works on its own,” he explains, shaking his head. “I just needed to know that it works.”

“When and where are these vampires hunting?” I ask. “I would like to assist you in this war.”

Lewark frowns as he looks me over, leaning heavily on his cane. He wants to refuse me, but something is holding him back from simply saying so.

“I want to know as well,” Belle says, stepping up to my side. “If there is evil filling these streets, then I want to be a part of destroying it.”

“You should not involve yourself in this,” he says, but he does not refuse us. “I can tell that you’ll be following me into this regardless.

“The festival next week,” he says. “I have reason to believe that they will be using that time to eliminate another criminal organisation. I intend to catch them in their hunt and turn it against them.”

If it is during a hunt, then this alliance may work better than I had thought.

“I will prepare myself for a fight,” I say.

Belle nods quickly by my side.

I continue to train my soldiers and servants through the evening. Belle and the reeve join in, and I quickly learn that I can make opportunities to reach them through their defences, though they adapt well each time, and it is never easy.

In the end, when they decide to cast enough light to illuminate the entire garden, there is nothing that I can do. While this is a critical weakness, in a way, it also speaks of my new nature.

“Vampires are not soldiers,” I say. “They cannot hold a castle against a determined army, and they cannot defend themselves from a knowledgeable hunter. We are hunters. When lights are spread around like this, when the prey is prepared to cast us out, we retreat to wait for a better chance.”

“We cannot assume that the stronger vampires are beholden to the same weaknesses you are,” Reeve Lewark says. “We must expect them to be prepared to face hunters like us.”

I nod in agreement.

“Vampires are creatures full of lies and deceit,” Belle eager for the fight. “Lies can’t survive the light of the truth, we will beat them. We will stop them.”

When we cross the point in time that dawn becomes closer than dusk, we agree to end the night’s exercises and the reeve goes on his way. The apprentice confirms my suspicions about the corrupted æther and natural magics filling my estate, though he understands it more completely, the natural scholar that he is.

“It’s becoming a minor æther well,” he says upon leaving. “I’ve rarely ever seen something like this. It’s incredible!”

I offer him a room, should he ever wish to continue his study, but Reeve Lewark pulled him away.

Belle lingers a while longer, waiting for a chance to speak without company. Walking the gardens with her, I give her that opportunity.

“What do you want, Tina?” she asks. “I don’t get you. You’re trying to do so much good, but only ever through killing people. I don’t know what to think.”

“Are you any different,” I ask.

“I don’t know,” Belle says, pulling at her hair. “I talk with Merry and some of his other followers, I’m figuring it out, but what about you?”

“What about me?”

“Do you have someone to talk to about all this? It’s easier to fall to the evil inside yourself when you don’t have someone to help you confront it.”

I say nothing as there is nothing to be said. I have no one, and no matter how much Belle may wish to save me, she cannot be that person to me. Not with the weight that now hangs between us.

That kiss, and her reaction to it, still affect our relationship.

Perhaps it’s childish to hold onto the bitterness I feel, but even if it is, I cannot simply remove that part of myself.

I cannot open up to her, as I would have done in the past.

It is not her fault.

It is mine.

I wanted what I could not have and permitting myself to act upon that wanting has only taken away the friendship we could have otherwise had.

“I can just forget about what happened,” Belle offers, breaking the silence.

“But I cannot,” I say, balling my fingers into a fist. “I…” My frozen insides grind and spin.

Do I truly love Belle?

Is this affection truly love?

“Is it?” I ask myself, retreating into my own mind.

I sit once more at the table for dinner, chained to my seat. I do not resist, for there is no meaning behind such futile actions. I am already dead, and if I’m dead then that explains why I feel numb watching this horror show play out before me.

It is the same, but for one difference. The red-eyed man is not here with us. In his place, I see myself as I am now. Thin ice forming over cold skin, cracks spreading, before disappearing again moments later.

The others are screaming.

Is that right? Were they screaming? Or am I twisting the memory further?

I can clearly recall my stepmother screaming.

Until she wasn’t.

Without any words, I stand before myself. With cruelty defined by its carelessness, my blood is freed from my veins, and my life is stripped away.

“Tina,” Belle calls out, her eyes shining too bright as she breaks me from my delusions.

I want to be like her.

The energy that she has, the passion. She still has the life that was drained out of me. I want what she has, but it is beyond my reach, so instead a desperate part of me wishes to see it destroyed.

I want to destroy the light in her, and see her become as I am now.

Would she love me then? Once she’s kissed the hand of death and been returned to this world as a ghost.

No.

And such mad thoughts do not deserve even a moment’s consideration.

If anything, I must reject passion. I must stand true to my values and reject the tumultuous emotions that would ruin me. I alone still live where the rest of my family lies dead. The images of their deaths still flicker by on the backs of my eyelids.

It is easy to avoid them when I have no need for sleep.

Why should I think back to that incident? Why should I face the human emotions that no longer belong to me, the ghost that remains?

There is no purpose to it. I cannot return them from the dead, not unless I can learn the necromantic magics that have illuded everyone for the past century.

No. They are dead, as am I. The human emotions ought to be buried with the dust that remains of my family. They are unneeded and unwanted, and if I were to pretend that these feelings were real, it would only make me incapable of serving my people as I should.

“Tina,” Belle calls for me again, her faith burning at me.

“You do not need to worry for me, Belle. I will be fine.” I lie, the weight on my chest growing heavier as I try my best to ignore it.

 

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

 

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