Dead King's Sword (Old Draft)

12. Close Your Eyes

Zeren

***

I remembered how Erin and I first met. Barely out of the womb, we started first grade. Back then, our class already had cliques. People from wealthy families gathered in groups, while those who had been sponsored by the city as I was—pity students whose parents had filled out an application form to get them into a prestigious basic school tended to stick together.

At five years old, I didn't care how famous my school was; I only wanted to hang out with my friends and have fun. I had been a child who spelled her name with a 'V' instead of a 'Z' because she believed it sounded cooler. A child who was so afraid of ghosts that she slept with her father when her mother was away. And a child who loved her mother so much she was scared to talk to her because she had already heard her mother arguing with her dad about how all his children had shitty cores.

Erin, the new girl, hadn't known I was poor. She didn't know I was a pity case when she sat next to me the day my friend was absent. And when Erin started drinking blood, the other kids wrinkled their noses and moved away from her as if she had fleas. Erin had been our first vampire or part-vampire. A descendant of Shovek.

She had this cold indifference I admired.

I wanted to see what would make Erin break; how could I make her feel the same rotten feelings I did?

While others ignored Erin, I did everything possible to make her notice me. I set her uniform on fire and wrestled her in the playground while other students cheered us on. And when she yelled my name for the first time, I remember feeling so incredibly happy that she knew my name.

My own mother had a hard time remembering the five letters of the name my father had given me. She called me 'Zena, Zern, Zarna...." No matter how far it was from the actual thing, as long as it had a Z in it, I always responded to her summons with a smile on my face.

But within a few days, Erin learned my name without any trouble. She perfectly memorized every letter from the Z to the N, which made me like her even more.

As time passed, tormenting each other became a natural part of our lives.

We had our separate friend groups, likes and dislikes, but pestering each other and flyball kept us from drifting apart.

Until recently, Erin had always been a few steps behind me whenever I looked over my shoulder.

The gate to my cell creaked open, and Walt walked inside. I didn't know his actual name, so I had named him Walt as a placeholder, and it stuck. He was a tall, dark-skinned man with a sturdy build and a broad chest. His black hair stood erect as if he had been electrocuted.

On his neck was a tattoo of a diamond eye. Hanuc's eye. He kicked my shoulder. "Get up."

I slowly picked myself up off the ground and sat with my back against the wall.

"Have you decided to be obedient now? Will you do as you are told?" Unlike the others, he spoke with an American accent. He spat, and his saliva hit my cheek, but I didn't wipe it off. I didn't have the energy to do anything. I was so hungry I understood why vampires sometimes ate people.

I stared at the sand covering the floor, its uneven distribution, and how some sections were bumpier than others. It had been a few days since I had last washed or brushed my teeth. I had never felt more unclean.

Walt squatted near my side. "You know what I don't understand?" he asked, taking the remote for my collar out of his trousers' back pocket. He pressed the button; electricity burned my skin and jolted my senses. I inhaled through clenched teeth once the shock passed. He touched my cheek as he gazed into my eyes. "Why is it that all of Hanuc's descendants have been born without magic cores for the last hundred years? It's not fair that only Virah's offspring can practice magic, is it?"