The Progeny: Chapter 22

The empty glass stained with the blood Evie had just downed sat nestled between her hands on the kitchen table. After her first glass, Varsee had showed her to the bathroom and had given her new clothes to dress into after her shower. Evie had scrubbed her hair aggressively, turning the suds a vibrant red that roused her hunger. She felt sick at the growling in her stomach. That was her own blood. Her own human blood - which was now needed to feed her immortality. The curse of which she had just been freed from. It felt like she had escaped a prison only to be shoved back behind the bars, and this time with two strange vampires and no sign of Caius.

The jeans Varsee had given her were too long, and the vest was a little baggy but Evie had covered it with her own simple grey canvas jacket. It had been crumbled up in her backpack that her saviours had taken from her car when they had found her.

Now the two vampires were watching her. Varsee was in front of her, pacing the kitchen while her brother leaned against the wall behind Evie, making a chill crawl up her back. This room was just as sickly floral as the living room. Even the tiles were tinted pink.

“So, seeing as you’ve already been a vampire. I’m guessing you know the basics,” started Varsee, still pacing. “No walking out in the sun unless you want to burst into flames and become a big pile of goo-”

“Or as I like to call it, icky sticky.”

Varsee sent a harsh glare to Alexander over Evie’s head.

“What? It’s icky and it’s sticky. I once got covered in the stuff from head to toe. Took me like five showers to get it all out of my hair.”

Evie’s eyebrows furrowed and she turned in her chair. “In what situation would you be covered in vampire goo?”

“When the woman you’re getting down and dirty with gets killed by a vampire hunter right on top of you,” he replied matter-of-factly.

Her lips parted, speechless for a moment. “There are vampire hunters?” She spun back to Varsee for clarification. She looked tired, relaxing back against the kitchen counter.

“Were,” Alexander said, making Evie look back. “Were vampire hunters. Back in the 1920’s. They were all killed.”

Evie shook her head, confused. She had lived half of her human life in that time. “How have I only just heard about this? Vampires were known back then?”

“Only by a few,” chimed in Varsee.

“Yeah, a church full. Everyone thought they were loonies. Which they were. When they pissed off a group of ancients- probably members of the Court- they tried to hide out in their church and did all of that ‘the power of Christ compels you’ crap, expecting it to work. Which we all know is a load of bull. And so, yeah-” He shrugged, “they were all savagely slaughtered.”

“The moral of that story is, nothing good comes from rogue vampires letting humans know we exist,” rounded off Varsee.

“But now it’s different,” said Evie, looking back at her. “Now they know.”

“But rogue vampires are still a threat to our existence. Which coincidentally brings me to my next point.” She pushed herself off the counter and started pacing before the fridge again. “No killing humans. Or using your vampire abilities in any way that would affect the Equal Rights Movement.”

“Or the Vampire Court is going to be on you like a pack of wolves.” When Evie turned round, she wasn’t met with the spark of wicked humour in Alexander’s eyes that she had grown used to, but instead, he actually looked spooked. And that unnerved her even more.

“Why? What would they do?” She looked back to Varsee. “I didn’t even know the Vampire Court were still around.” She had hoped they were no longer around. She hadn’t heard about them since Guardian had stopped checking up on her and Caius. And that had only been a few months after he had Turned her.

“Did you hear about that robbery at the bank?” asked Varsee.

Evie nodded. “When the vampires used compulsions.”

“The stolen money was returned to the police station a few hours ago. No sign of the vampires.”

“Our guess is the Court got to them,” said Alexander. Evie was starting to get used to the way they finished each other’s sentences. She found it rather endearing. Clearly they had been together for a very long time. So long they were able to know what the other was thinking.

“But what does the Court do to them?”

Varsee stopped pacing. She folded her arms over her chest and hunched a little, as if feeling sick. “Destroy them.”

“As in-”

“Turned them into icky sticky,” Alexander elaborated.

Evie gulped and shrank back in her chair. “…oh.” She twirled the empty glass on the table, staring at it numbly for a moment but then jerked forwards and sucked in a breath –a breath she forgot she no longer needed- and stared frantically at Varsee. “But Caius-” Her new Maker’s eyes glazed with sullen contempt and her tensed up shoulders relaxed. “He…he killed thirteen humans. Does that mean-”

“He’s either dead or on the Court’s radar.”

Evie clutched her chest and dropped back again, tears burning the backs of her eyes.

“Hey, maybe that explains why he didn’t come back for you.” Alexander slapped her on the back from behind and then squeezed her shoulder. “He didn’t break your promise. He just didn’t stay alive long enough for fulfil it.”

Evie growled and winced as her fangs unsheathed and sliced through her tongue. Her grip on her glass tightened until it started to spider-web with cracks. She huffed out a calming puff of air through her nose and relaxed, loosening her hold. “You could be wrong. How do you know so much about the Court anyway?”

Alexander had moved so he was now resting against the fridge. Evie sheathed her fangs, the click making him smirk. Her eyes shifted to Varsee. She did not dislike Varsee, although that could be the supernatural bond between them talking. On the other hand, she was sure that she was starting to find her brother rather repulsive with his smug attitude and lack of empathy.

“Our Maker was part of the Court in the back end of the eighteen hundreds. He left when he found that he had grown rather immune to the malice of their actions and he began to fear himself.” Varsee’s eyes flitted to the floor. “Godfrey was a good man.”

Evie’s eyebrow arched. Alexander shuffled awkwardly, folding his arms tighter over his chest. He held Evie’s gaze, strong and dark. “Godfrey’s dead. Are the two things related? We’re pretty certain.”

She gulped and looked to the table top. “It seems like a lot of people in your life are dead.”

“Isn’t that true of any vampire?” The gravity in his voice made Evie squeeze her eyes shut. Please don’t be dead. You promised. You promised you’d come back to me.

“So what exactly do you know about the Court? We should swap notes. You’ve clearly heard of them,” said Varsee.

Evie shuddered and opened her eyes. Her teeth gritted together and a burning hatred erupted inside her, old and familiar. She might have played jump rope with mortality and immortality, but deep down, she was still the same girl. A girl riddled with nightmares of that gleaming bald head, wrinkled features and dead eyes.

Her hands slipped under the table and she clasped them tightly together. “I met them once.”

A gust of air made her hair flip over her shoulder and the screech of something scraping against the tiled floor made her eyes bounce up. Both Varsee and Alexander now accompanied her at the table, their eyes wide with rapt interest. Varsee sat straight, her shoulders tense as she gripped the edge of the table so tightly her knuckles looked like they were going to burst out of her skin. Whereas Alexander was crouched on his seat, his bony knees angled outwards. He had the chilling resemblance of a bird of prey.

“You met them?” Varsee echoed.

“And you’re still alive?” said Alexander in awe.

Unable to look at them in the eyes as she unveiled her worst memory, she casted her eyes to the table top. They were wide and empty, looking inwardly at the horror of the night as it played in her mind like hitting play on an old video. “They-” She cleared her throat. “Guardian…the head of the Court…he…he made Caius Turn me.” Her eyes flickered up, just to check if they were still listening. They were. She was also pretty sure that they had leaned into her a little more.

“Caius…fell in love with a human. He shared vampire secrets with her and so, to punish him, Guardian killed her and forced him to Turn me. To be a Maker. I was his first and only progeny.” She winced at the word ‘was’. Now a vampire again, yet no longer belonging to Caius, it just didn’t feel real. It didn’t feel right. Yet that tug was there, sharp and insistent, like she was tethered to Varsee by an invisible cord.

“Godfrey spoke of Guardian. This happened in 1934?” Varsee asked in a cool, collected voice.

Evie had started picking at a piece of skin in the corner of her fingernail. “Yes,” she said, twisting the hard skin and snapping it off with a small burst of empty victory. Blood welled up in the tiny slice and coloured the underside of her nail red. She watched as she healed, her skin simply sealing shut.

“Have you seen them or heard from them since?”

She shook her head. “That’s why I was shocked to hear you say they were still around.”

“They never left.”

“Do you know Lady Sylvia? The woman off the telly?” asked Alexander.

Evie nodded. “She’s the chairman of the Vampire League.”

“The Vampire League is the Vampire Court. Just the more political, harmless side.”

She picked at her nail, trying to remove the dried blood trapped under it. It was a distraction. A distraction from everything. From the discussion about the Court. From being in this house in the middle of nowhere with two perfect strangers. From no longer being human. No longer being alive. And from being without Caius.

Evie heard a chair scrape against the tiles and in the corner of her eye, saw Alexander leaving the room with the graceful silence of a vampire. Now it was just her and Varsee. She could sense her close to her, like an open flame.

“You need time to adjust. I get that,” Varsee finally said in a voice that was calming. That was when Evie noticed the slight lilt in her accent. She wasn’t from England. It wasn’t a surprise. Many vampires had travelled the world because being in the same place for too long...watching everything change around you while you stayed the same filled you with an intense yet empty sickness close to vertigo. Evie had experienced it but had never left the country. She didn’t want to stray too far from her old human life. She liked to know she had easy access to the graves of those she had lost. Who had aged and died while she still remained twenty-three years old. Twenty three years old for a hundred years.

A hundred years by Caius’ side.

And now was she destined to spend another century or ever by Varsee’s side?

“How about I show you to your room? We have two spare,” said Varsee in a tone so soft it seemed to ease Evie out of her own thoughts instead of yanking her to the present.

Evie nodded numbly and watched Varsee get to her feet.

Both Evie’s stained handbag and backpack were at the foot of the stairs where she had found them earlier. Varsee took them both for her and guided her up the stairs and down the landing. Even upstairs there were china plates hung beside framed painting of cats and dogs.

“Alex’s room.” Varsee nodded to the closed door at the end of the hall, facing the back of the house. “Mine’s the one next to it. That’s the bathroom. The two bedrooms left are pretty similar. That one has a bay window overlooking the front yard so that’s pretty nice. Don’t worry, the curtains are thick enough to block out the light. That one has a double bed, too, whereas the other’s just a single.” She turned, showing Evie a pleasant smile.

“I’ll take that one then,” said Evie, offering a faint smile in return.

“Okay,” nodded Varsee and shouldered the door open to the front facing bedroom. The one furthest away from Alexander’s room, Evie noted. Even with the light off and the heavy curtains drawn, Evie knew this room was furnished just like the rest of the house. It even had the musky smell of old people. Varsee flicked on the light and Evie cringed at the brown and cream colour scheme.

Varsee sighed and dropped the bags on the double bed that sat in the centre of the room. “Yeah, we haven’t touched this room since we’ve been here really. As you can see, we’re in no rush to redecorate.”

Everything had brown fringing. The lampshade. The cushions. The window seat. Everything. The walls were plain cream, which was something. But the floral patterns still covered the bedspread and the curtains. A heavy, uncomfortable looking brown armchair sat in the corner of the room with a cane propped up beside it.

“This place is pretty big for one woman,” Evie observed, wandering into the centre of the room. An oak wardrobe stood boldly again the side wall. She crossed over to it and opened the doors to find a rack of clothes obviously belonging to an old gentleman.

“We guessed she had a husband,” said Varsee. “She was on her own when we came but there are photos of her with a man. No children. Maybe he died. Or left her. We don’t know.” She sat down at the foot of the bed. “She lived in the bedroom I took. All of her stuff was in it. Just her stuff. Those clothes were always in here. That’s why we figured maybe he died and she just didn’t have the heart to get rid of his stuff so she put it all in here, out of the way.”

Evie closed the wardrobe, suddenly feeling guilty for violating a dead man’s privacy. She pressed her hands flat against the door and stood there for a moment, her eyes fallen shut. The backs of her eyes burned and she clenched her jaw at the sensation. “It’s hard to let people go,” was all she managed to say.

“That is too true,” Varsee sighed, making Evie turn back to her. Varsee was beaming at her from the end of the bed. Her eyes were bright and optimistic but Evie could see the pain hidden behind them that made her smile tight at the corners. “So, is this okay for you?”

Evie took another sweep of the room and nodded. “It’ll do.”

“Great. And look, I’m just next-door so, honestly, if you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask. You’re my responsibility now and I take my job as a Maker very seriously.”

“How many progenies do you have?” asked Evie, still trying to warm up to the idea that she now belonged to her and not Caius.

“Right now, only you. I tend to take on one progeny at a time so they have my full attention. I teach them all they need to know and then I release them.”

Evie was a little taken aback. Caius had always told her how disrespectful it was to release your progeny. It was a sign of giving up on them. A Maker was supposed to stay with their progeny until the very end. “You release them?”

Varsee looked rather confused by Evie’s wide-eyed reaction. “Yes. I believe progenies are your children. One day, they grow old and don’t need supervision anymore. It’s time for them to go and make a life for themselves.”

“Is that what Godfrey did?”

Her face darkened and her eyes casted downwards. “No, Godfrey had many progenies. He knew he couldn’t be there for them all so he made sure they banded together. He wasn’t with me when he died…but I felt it. We all did.”

“You and Alexander were both his progeny, right?”

She nodded.

“Speaking of Alexander…” Evie squirmed awkwardly, “is he always that…”

Varsee let out a soft laugh and nodded with understanding when Evie couldn’t figure out how to end the sentence.

“People deal with immortality in different ways,” Varsee explained, still not looking up from the floor. “Being in a state of permanence…it’s difficult. It swallows people up. My brother’s hardened himself. He acts like he is better than everyone else because it makes him feel safer. Makes him feel like everything is beneath him. But he has chinks in his armour.” She splayed her fingers over the floral duvet, watching creases shoot from the pressure of her fingers. “As do we all. No one is untouchable.”

Suddenly, a loud clattering sound came from downstairs. Both their heads whipped to the landing. It was the sound of a door swinging open and smacking against a wall.

A cold breeze seemed to wash over Evie. Not a physical breeze, but a sort of cold spell that hit her on the inside, seeping into her bones.

“Are you expecting company?” she asked, her voice a little tense.

“No…” replied Varsee, her stormy eyes squinting at the door in wonder.

“Was is Alexander?”

Varsee shook her head, an action that was slow and unfocused as she listened to the heavy footsteps creaking against the wooden flooring in the hallway below them. “There’s another vampire here.”