War Against Myself and Others Chapter 1

I

 heard Ms. Violet coming. She barely scraped the ground once (as was her pattern of walking about every hundred steps although whether or not it was for my benefit was still entirely a mystery) and that was all I needed. I opened my eyes and focused on the world around me, coming out of my meditative state so as to be ready for when my mentor entered the room.

I made a short futile attempt to smooth my growing red, turning white (supposedly because the stress of vampirism was different for me somehow), hair kept in a constant state of messy fluffiness by the leftover static electricity my special created, it drove me, and Ms. Violet nuts to have to either keep my hair cropped short (no easy feat let me tell you) or dealing with a veritable lion’s mane of fluff that caused even those scared of my mentor and me to snicker when they thought we were out of earshot. They quickly learned of course, that we were never out of earshot.

As Ms. Violet entered the room, the way she always held herself combined with her sharp edged features making her look just as dangerous as ever. She inspected the whole area, looking for some flaw in my appearance or the state of the small pocket in the side of one of the cave walls that was my living area. Her gaze drifted over every corner of the bare, grey-brown room totally void of anything but its occupant and a small flat rock use for practicing writing, something apparently unique to our kind, though the thought stymied me, it had been easy enough to learn. Why wouldn’t anyone else want such a simple means of communication with persons when you were not around to say the things yourself? In any case, I had kept that corner of the room very neatly organized ever since I had lost my chalk and Ms. Violet had refused to either help me find it, or give me any time to go get a new piece of the stuff. Eventually, her eyes flicked away from the room, and onto me. She frowned when she saw my hair but only in that small twinge of exasperation that meant I would get it cut tonight or soon after dawn.

I stood up and just looked at her, waiting for her comment. I had learned early that silence taught me more about what was around me. I spoke of course when the situation required it, but I usually found myself refraining from making any sound whatsoever until I was asked a question.

“You rested well I trust?” She asked. Mere formality of course, if I hadn’t rested well, then I would be expected to push through it. I nodded, knowing that any other response would just double or triple the regimen she already had planned for me that night.

Her deep, mahogany eyes, bored into me, as if gauging whether or not I was ready for something. For my sake, I hoped the obsidian haired woman found me ill prepared, but not weak. Her trials, even the supposedly mild ones, were grueling and painful beyond even the sting of struggling to get free of a newly grown rosebush.

“Come then, we have a long night ahead of us, it is your fifteenth cycle after all.” She said turning away from me to leave the cave.

My ears perked at the mention of my age, she had always hinted that there was somewhere we needed to go when I was older, but I had assumed that she had meant when I was proved to be able to live longer than average, maybe even only after ten thousand cycles. But only fifteen cycles?  It probably wasn’t what I thought then, she just wanted to let me know I was near the end of my time of aging, in about five cycles, I would begin only gaining a cycle of age for every 730 cycles I lived. Maybe she would release me form apprenticeship soon.

She lead me out into the night, the stars a welcome sight as always I looked over the horizon, the valley in which we lived still had some short grasses living here, despite our continued presence scaring almost every piece of wildlife away, there was a lack of predators and plenty of sunlight (unfortunately) but no longer much nutrition for the larger plants to live off of.

I followed her, in a much different direction then we had ever seriously gone before, and for almost half the night, after the moon reached its peak, I worried slightly, but Ms. Violet seemed calm enough, maybe she had somewhere to wait out the sun when it showed its terrible face.

But no, Ms. Violet was already slowing down, crouching just low enough that the foliage provided complete cover for her lean figure. I slowed too, making small adjustments to my posture as I tried to figure how much exactly I had grown since the last time I had hid in this type of plant life. Ms. Violet shot me a disapproving look and I slouched down a bit farther, of course I had forgotten to take into account my tall brightly colored hair.

Frustrated with myself, I scanned the area around us with all of my senses, curious as to why Ms. Violet would bring us here. I was supposed to learn something, I knew it, but, what could it be? What would drive my mentor to bring me so far out of our normal area that would involve this tribe of humans?

We approached a small cave, more of an outcropping really, but still, it was strange that they would have made the effort to expunge anything else living in there for only… one or two humans in total, surely the cave was deep enough for close to half their tribe.

A slightly underfed black haired woman sat on a rock just inside the cave, looking out with a hopeful expression on her face. The fire at her back gave her plain hide clothes a slight orange tint and shaded most of her features with a sharp glare. Even through the glare, she looked broken, slumped shoulders and hesitant movements accenting her disheveled appearance and more unwashed then normal smell. She wrung her hands and glanced furvitively out into the darkness from time to time, waiting for- something… us? But no, if she was waiting for us, then she wouldn’t be human, and I had already used every technique to identify non-human entities that Ms. Violet had taught me and even some that I had learned on my own. If she knew that the woman in the cave was not human, I would know too, right?

“Why do you think we are here?” Ms. Violet asked in a low barely audible tone.

“The woman?” I asked in an equal tone, unsure, but she was the only unique thing about this situation.

Ms. Violet nodded “Her name is Leeda and she is the object of a very special lesson. A technique I haven’t yet taught to you, one that requires a live human is present for you to practice on.”

I nodded, curious, but also shifting my weight slightly, whomever this woman was, she wasn’t likely to go through the relatively painless process of being eaten, but something much worse, and since my mentor knew her name, she had been specifically picked out for this, which meant it wouldn’t be painless at all, especially if her apprentice botched it in even some minor way.

Ms. Violet motioned me forward and I slipped into the darkness, taking a circular route to the cave, avoiding the nervous hopeful looks that made my stomach churn in a way I hadn’t experienced ever before.

I covered the woman’s mouth firmly cutting off any coming noise and pulled her out of sight in the cave. She thrashed in my arms, she was strong by human standards, she even had the sense to aim from time to time, but I had dealt with his kind of behavior before, so I quickly had her out of sight of the cave and into a dark grouping of foliage, pinned against a tree and mouth still covered.

Ms. Violet stepped out behind me and the woman’s eyes widened, looking down at me with so many mixed emotions I couldn’t make out any of them, the only thing I could make out was a question directed at my mentor. She stopped struggling when Ms. Violet nodded and looked more broken than ever, slumping in my grip, her blue eyes boring into mine, as if trying to see something, trying to find someone in me she had met before.

“Take your hand not covering her mouth and cover it in your cobalt lightning and with what you would normally do to break someone’s will to turn them into a thrall,” Ms. Violet began taking on her instructing tone of voice.

I did so, carefully so as not to let anything fly lose before I was done with whatever it was I was supposed to do. My arm seemed steeped in shadows, they swirled and thrummed along my pale forearm, sickly and beautiful.

“Now, reach into her,  just where her heart is and grab what should feel like a spider web.”

I pushed in where I could hear the woman’s heartbeat. I met some resistance, but as the shadows moved down my forearm to my fingertips and seemed to make it intangible. I gripped the thin filament type strands.

Leeda shuddered violently and screamed under my muffling hand, struggling more violently then I could ever recall a human doing before as I tugged on the fragile feeling thing. Under Ms. Violet’s instruction, I pulled the wispy, sphere like object out.

It was, beautiful, blue and brown, it almost seemed to smolder the way it moved, not quite crackling under an unseen but doused fire. Leeda went limp as I pulled the last strands out. Something churned in my gut, this felt wrong, very wrong, and the type of wrong you can’t get over merely by repetition.  Whatever this thing in my hand was, I didn’t want it.

“Now, eat it.” Ms. Violet, my mentor, said coldly.

I grimaced and brought the shimmering fragile thing to my lips as Leeda quickly grew cold under my own, cold, pale hand. Briefly, I tasted life, warmth and memory, fear and loss, blood and sweat, love and joy, and every other thing that sustains the living the way they are. Before I could taste more, I let go. Accidentally dropping it and watching it quickly disappear, not visible without my making it solid enough to reflect the meager moonlight that filtered down through the tree’s branches, not something that’s meant to be seen but had been forced. In the same instant, I let Leeda fall to the ground. There was no need for me to restrain a corpse. I braced myself for Ms. Violet’s anger, clumsy, she would call me, weak, and then we would spend hours, exercising my hands and fingers to train them to proper deftness. Probably train the rest of my reflexes while she was at it.

But she didn’t snap at me, or tell me what was going to happen. She just stood there, eyes filled with disappointment and a strange, calm, fierceness I had only seen from her the one time she had been losing a battle. She was vicious, that look, could only mean that the target of her anger, me, was going to feel the worst pain she could currently think of then get torn to shreds and jumped upon until she was satisfied with the crumbly mess that was left.

I swallowed and looked her in the eye, trying not to portray any fear, but only respect and apology. Looking away now would be disastrous but staring her down would have similar consequences.

“Be back at the cave before two dawns have passed” She said icily, her lips forming a thin tight line, an order, one that I couldn’t break without her breaking me through the agreement I had made with her long ago.

“Yes, Ms. Violet.” I said nodding obediently, wondering why I was not to follow her back to the cave now.

She took a step into a particularly thick patch of shadows cast by the tree. They wrapped around her and she was gone. She did this often enough but it still frightened me to think that at any given moment she could step out behind me on a well lit night and get a good shot in before I even had time to react. I shook the feeling off and looked around. The only thing to see was a few humans wandering around  in a circle near the sleeping humans, protecting them from the creatures that came out during ht dark hours. And Leeda, eyes still open, pale and cold with death, stiffening rapidly in the autumn chill, and still giving me that same, odd look that was making my stomach churn. It had been as if she had known who I was.

This was, strange.  I had killed before, tons of people, people I hardly knew, people who’s screams of terror had only whetted my appetite and people whose names I knew with no feelings of guilt. Yet now…

My thoughts were interrupted by the sounds of a human male attempting to be stealthy, turning my thoughts to how I hadn’t eaten that night, and how humans tasted much worse when they had stiffened up and their blood had congealed even slightly.

I waited, carefully tracking their movements, exaggerating the movements just so that he could see I knew where he was.

He stepped out, brown hair, tanned skin, dark eyes, and an expression that could kill a baby bird. He held a spear, it was tipped with something blunt, it looked almost like a dirty piece of moonlight, it glittered menacingly, it wasn’t sharp, but it still looked like it could do some damage. Not to me of course, there wasn’t anything that could harm me that was utilized by humans except for fire.

“Identify yourself, monster.” He said coldly, pointing the weapon at my chest.

I shrugged, I didn’t really care for him to know my name, so he wouldn’t.

“Did you kill this woman?” He asked, obviously having come to his own conclusion already. His jaw set and his calloused knuckles turning white from gripping the odd spear.

I flashed him a smile, letting my fangs show,  not bloodied, but obvious weapons to any that cared to keep their heads long enough to look at them for more than a heartbeat or two. * shrugged again and examined my fingers. I was determined to fight him while he was in an uncontrolled rage.

He remained in a very closely controlled calm actually. “This woman” He said through gritted teeth, “Was named Leeda Ki’dirnet”

I froze and eyed the man dangerously, listening intently now at the mention that this woman and I had shared a last name.

“She was waiting for her son,” He continued “he was going to be brought here tonight. It’s the only thing that has kept her going, fighting to actually survive on her own rather than letting others take care of her, she never accepted a handout because she wanted to in some way, be a good example to the son she wouldn’t see for sixty seasons and more. Many thought she was insane to think the demon woman would keep her word, looks like they were right if you were sent by that woman to kill Leeda.” As he talked, his grip on the spear grew tighter until I caught the faintest whiff of blood that meant his hands were bruising.

I glanced back at Leeda’s corpse, a lump of dread forming in my gut. Ms. Violet, no matter how sadistic at times, was a woman of her word. Which could only mean one thing, my own mother… was staring at me with wide, dead, blue eyes, malnourished because she had wanted to teach me that taking handouts wasn’t the way to live even when you were alone and… only human… Now that she was paler, I could see some resemblance between the two of us but… I probably looked more like my father… what had happened to him? This man obviously wasn’t him. Was he dead or had he left? If he was dead, he had probably died trying to stop Ms. Violet, if he was alive, I certainly didn’t care for him.

My thoughts were cut short by blinding pain in my left shoulder, the touch of cold death. I growled and instinctively grabbed the man’s arm and twisted him to the ground my knee making his spine creak form pressure as the pain built in my shoulder. I had inadvertently caused the spear to go deeper into and then through it. This wasn’t right, spears didn’t hurt! Or cause black oozing blood that could only be mine and not the human’s to flow steadily from a ragged wound. I ripped out the dull ,dirty, blood stained piece of cold moonlight and stepped off the man, glaring at the weapon, trying to figure out how in the world, this man had found out that this could hurt my kind, and where the rest of it was so I could go and destroy the lot of it.

The man scrambled to his feet and tackled me! I rolled with the impact and wound up on top of him. I flung the spear away and heard it clatter against a rock as I dug the heel of my palm into the man’s throat, blinded by rage, guilt, hunger and pain, I felt a grim satisfaction t the center of the storm of emotion, just watching him gasp for air and thrash, helpless.

I regained myself, calming as I remembered. They were food, I was no longer food. This was the separation. This man was a bit smarter than the other humans. But that was all the more reason to get rid of him now. I sunk my teeth in. What else would I do? I was hungry and if I was able to simultaneously remove a thorn in my side all the better.

I stood and started walking towards home. I couldn’t get there in one night of course, but I could find shelter closer than this one was.

Chapter 2

W

hen I finally felt safe enough to rest I holed up in a cave I found thankfully free of life. It was cool and dark only a little way in. So I was more than comfortable enough to think about what had transpired.

I didn’t like the conclusions I had to draw. Ms. Violet had put me up to something she had hoped would break me, or my mother. I was certain now that she was my mother. I didn’t know how to mourn, wasn’t entirely sure that I should. Definitely not for the man that had attacked me. (I cursed myself now for leaving the weapon intact.) But my mother had seemed to love me, seemed to care that I had changed, and her scream; I had heard screams before, caused them, but never one that… cutting.

There was no undoing it now and I tried to tell myself that I didn’t care about her, didn’t care that I had likely given her something far worse than death and had only nearly escaped doing much worse, didn’t care about a human. But...I wanted to mourn; she had been my mother and everything I had been taught gave that meaning. So I suppose it was my own fault that the feeling that had clenched my stomach earlier seemed to overwhelm me. What I would later learn was called guilt tore through me and immobilized me. I tried to calm down and think clearly. But my own inability to control these unfamiliar emotions, the ones I hadn’t been trained to ignore, came to a startling light as I replayed the look on her face in my mind, the look on Ms. Violet’s face, what my mother would think about the way I lived.  I almost forgot about Ms. Violet’s order, I would die if I disobeyed but I also knew she wouldn’t care. She would be disappointed, but this instance intensified every memory of how she felt about me. I wasn’t cared about. She just wanted someone strong to do her bidding. Someone strong and smart, but not smart enough to try and defy her. No more.

“So, are you going to stay there until you die?” A wolfish feminine voice asked dryly

I started, not even Ms. Violet had been able to sneak up on me in at least a year. Had I been that far gone? I looked up to see a beautiful cobalt blue she-wolf looking at me as if she couldn’t quite decide whether or not she should put me out of my misery. She looked, old, well powerful and young, but her liquid gold eyes looked more ancient and strong than even Ms. Violet. If that were the case, then I felt that it probably wasn’t all that unusual for her to have something causing strange fur color, and for her to have picked up the human language at some point.

“Well? If you are I’m sure I could speed up the process, you don’t smell edible but I could never stand seeing a pup lose their parents with no pack to care if they live or die afterwards.” She said, her voice still dry, but with an undertone of genuine compassion for my situation.

I shook my head “just until sunset” I said

“And then what?” She asked choosing that moment to sit down next to me. “Do you really wish to go back to an Alpha who has caused you this pain?”

I shrugged; I didn’t exactly have a choice in the matter.

“Ah, so you are a pup who is hurt but feels he cannot leave for fear of the one who hurt him being an excellent tracker?” She said more than asked nodding like she understood but didn’t approve.

I frowned, she knew a lot for someone who had only become interested in me in the last night or so. “Who are you?”

“Most call me Lightning, some call me Serach, Lightning is more formal, but I prefer Serach.” She said with the air of someone who had repeated a line far too often.

“Lightning?”

“Yes, I’m what some call an elemental, though that’s usually saved for the lesser beings my pack can control that are usually humanoid” She shrugged “But there are few more accurate terms other than nature spirits and we are as flesh and blood as most mortals.”

I thought about this, no, there probably weren’t better terms for what she was. I put that bit of information away to think about later, right now, I had a creature whom was in all likely hood, older than Miss. Violet; possibly older than the earth itself.

“May I call you Serach?” I asked carefully, I didn’t want to assume, but she had given the option and seemed friendly enough.

She nodded, a gesture I’m sure she picked up from watching humans interact.

It occurred to me that I may have invaded Serach’s home, she wasn’t trapped here like I was. “Serach, why are you interested in me?” I asked to cut down the number of questions I would have to ask if this wasn’t her home.

“Because you seem rather remarkable, because you are strong, you share many qualities and oppositions with me, you share my power including the color, and until your most recent actions, I thought you could not be broken.” She said, she looked at me in a way that made me see fire in her eyes, large enough to consume a whole forest, and yet gentle enough to leave more than enough for new growth to thrive.

I frowned, she knew a lot about me for someone who had supposedly met me only a few beats ago.

“You don’t trust me.” She said flatly, it wasn’t a question, nor an accusation, but she wasn’t happy either.

I shook my head.

“You probably want to know why I would know so much about you then.” She asked

I nodded, could she read minds? It wasn’t unheard of, if incredibly rare.

“I first observed you a while back, you were still growing then and I could still see your potential.” She said calmly “You have all the qualities I mentioned before, and seem like you would live a long life, I think you are worthy of something I wish to give you on a condition”

I gave her a questioning but still mistrustful look. I wasn’t stupid enough to agree to a condition without knowing what it was.

“A non-lethal fight with me, if you win, I may find you worthy, if I win,” She shrugged “I will leave and you will never see me again.”

I thought for a long moment, but of course, I could never turn down a fight, it was in my nature. I stood “I accept your terms Serach”.

In a flash she was attacking me, teeth and claws barely missing me while the lightning she sparked between every strand of fur burned my hand where it sent her over my head. I growled, this woke the wound in my shoulder, I had forgotten it until now. I would have to end this quickly if I could, and avoid using my left arm.

She moved the battle at a blistering pace, moving to my back in mere blinks of my eye and attacking with more ferocity than an angry Miss. Violet. I was barely able to keep her from ripping my throat out let alone land a hit.

However, as she sent me deeper into a corner, as the situation got more desperate, I got better, faster, I felt power flow through my limbs and the world slowed for me. A hidden reserve of not only power, but insight and bloodlust surged through me. There was no way I could win, and that thrilled me.

I kept her drawn away from the entrance, calculations running through my head; If I could hit that stalagmite, if I could slip through this shadow unseen, if I could hit her at this moment…

The world became a blur of red and blue mingled with a strange joy that pushed me ever harder. I felt pain but I didn’t register it, crippling blows merely slowed me for half of a moment. I felt strong, I felt rage, I felt like everything that caused the nightmare to be attached to the word vampire. And suddenly it was over, I had Serach pinned to the ground, she was breathing heavily and looking at me strangely, she expected me to kill her. Her blood was just as red as a human’s, but it reflected blue rather than white, the same blue-white of starlight. I stood and my hands were coated. It didn’t feel right, she had been friendly and she was far more than food. I had lost control, again. I felt like an idiot. “Sorry” I mumbled, half afraid that Miss. Violet might hear me apologize to someone I was able to beat in a fight.

Serach stood, she was already healing in places, but she was still slightly shaky. “You won fairly, do not apologize for sparing my life.” She said “However, you did lose yourself; I had hoped it was your alpha’s influence that caused these lapses.”

I shrugged, they were something that I had always dealt with, most of the time Miss. Violet was able to stop me… but she only did that when she felt like it. The intensity of battle brought out something in me any time that I got pushed too far. I didn’t like it but it was a part of who I was and I couldn’t change it.

“For defeating me in battle, I will give you a token.” She reached into her mouth with her paw and pushed one of her fangs out. She lay it on the ground and looked for my reaction.

I picked it up and examined it. It seemed normal enough, a wolf’s fang, white but not perfectly so, worn in places where it rubbed against the others or against the bone of some animal, nothing special.

“For losing control I withhold part of my gift. But for impressing me, I will tell you some of what that token can do.”

I looked at her, tokens from a defeated mythical beast were often dangerous, but they were valuable and only dangerous when someone tried to misuse it. This would be useful.

“For you, running a spark of electricity through it may call me to you. I am not a servant, nor am I obligated to come to you, if you mistreat me or become a man whom with I cannot associate, then I will no longer come to your call.” She spoke very seriously, as if this was all of the upmost importance. “as long as I am alive it will retain the slight warmth it does now, and if you chose to do so, one day it may allow you to find Aaron the sword of lightning, it cannot be stolen from you. It can be turned into a sword or dagger that never lose their edge. However, I do caution you, do not show this to your alpha. She will take it from you and use it for her own purposes. You will not receive another one of these Viorel.

I stiffened, she knew my name, she had been watching me, but I hadn’t realized how closely. I nodded to her gratefully “I will keep it well” I said.

She nodded back to me and left the cave. I felt like I had failed some sort of test, and in doing so, I had lost something far greater than this token. No point in lingering on it though. I pulled a thin scrap of leather from the pouch I carried with me and strung it around the tooth so that I could hang it under my leather tunic.

Thankfully, a small pool of condensed water allowed me to wash the blood from my hands and the place on my tunic where my own blood had spattered. By the time I was done, it was about sunset. I hadn’t been able t meditate this day, but it wasn’t something that was required of me every day even when I exerted some energy, I would last until daybreak at the very least. I picked up my pouch, and slipped into the night