Immortal Memory (Iris' Atlantis 1)

18: Farewell

Valentina

Autumn bled into winter, and little changed in the great outer world, excepting the weather and the snowy blanket that covered the city that turned into watery blight with winter storms. Timothy stayed as the glass skeleton, frozen in time. Clover found a passion for computers and her occasional witch visitors had a sad tone to their eyes. I worked on my thesis and kept alive the little university dojo when I had an extra hour in my hands.

But many things inside of me had changed. After Timothy blew up, my world simply wasn't the same: I couldn't help staring at the vendor by the university's metro station, who sold hot steaming ice cream. I still went to the Marquise. But it wasn't just Hellebore who troubled my mind there, as I laid my laptop onto a creaking table and got a pot of hot tea to accompany. The occasional visit from Plume, the vampire, always turned my stomach. Especially on the days when I had Scale Tongue's lectures. I couldn't look the professor in the eyes anymore. They had been twins. Not just siblings. And I could see Plume's young, unearthly features reflected on Scale Tongue's aging face. So I didn't look. At either.

I dipped a spoon in my tea. I had come to the Fair Marquise for an early morning study session. Lavender had promised to join me later in the day. I didn't wonder why she didn't feel like getting up early. I didn't wonder about it at all, as I had seen her yesterday.

I grimaced at the cup.

I doubted she had gone to bed early.

Hellebore came helpfully to offer me a jar of honey as I was about to rise to fetch it. I took it, added a generous spoonful into the tea and gave the jar back.

I wasn't at all convinced my regular visits to Blizzard's house were healthy. But I went. Not every week, but maybe three out of four I sacrificed a Monday evening to go and stare at the skeleton. I was often silly enough to even talk to it. And sometimes I talked with other people while I was there.

And that was what was troubling.

In the building lived two families, one couple and one young student. They were all related, though the blood relation was sometimes almost nonexistent. Yet it was there. They had one ancestor in common.

And that one ancestor usually slept in the vault of the house at daytime. And there was more than a simple relation of course. They were what was apparently called willing donors. Everyone was linked. Though not everyone remembered that. Not all the time at least. But they had come after rumors of a mystery. They had looked for the vampire.

I had seen many empty stares as I mentioned Blizzard. And while everyone seemed to have memories of Timothy, they all affirmed to me that they simply hadn't seen him for years. They were startled if I told them he had been in an accident. Confused when I dragged some to see the skeleton. They wouldn't remember any of what I had told if I tried to continue the topic next time I visited.

And they started avoiding me.

Blizzard had explained that while they wouldn't remember the details, they would remember how I made them feel. He had told me this after one of the self defense club meetings, when he had taken the contacts off his eyes after all the others had left. The dojo was still the only place where we really talked. I hardly saw him at his home when I came. Hardly ever.

It was slowly driving me mad. At home it was Clover who gave me blank faces. At the university I couldn't bear the lovely professor Scale Tongue. And even in the presence, in the home, of my oppressor, the same confused, blinded gazes followed me. There were terrible secrets that I knew of and could share with no living being.

Was it then any wonder I sometimes talked to a skeleton inside a vault?

I had always liked Timothy. It had always been easy to be with him. Ever since Blizzard had introduced him at the club. He hadn't been a brilliant martial artist. But he had been earnest, straightforward and respectful.