Vampyre | Book I of Bloodlines

NOT A DREAM, A MEMORY

Viola

Once Darius sank his fangs into my neck, my whole body weakened with a pleasure that trembled throughout. It's as if he poured liquid euphoria into my veins, sending a blissful heat that spread into my extremities.

It felt like I was dying and being invigorated with life simultaneously, sending my consciousness to a place beyond this realm. At first, I thought it was a dream until she asked me a direct question and waited for my answer.

"Viola, did you hear me?" I looked at my mother's gray eyes, which reminded me so much of the ones I see every day when I look in the mirror.

"It's your choice, little one. What will it be?" My mother asks.

I stared at her, trying to recall when this dream started, but I found myself dropped into the middle of a world that had no beginning. I looked around at the world I was suddenly in and recognized my surroundings immediately. This was once a reality—I was in my mother's garden. I was five years old, lying on a blanket under the oak tree beside her.

My mother handed me a lily of the valley flower, and I inhaled its fresh, creamy scent.

I consider her question and think it over. "I think if he loves me, then it's okay. Will he love me as Daddy loves me?"

She laughed warmly, a sound I didn't know I missed until just then. I engraved it deeply into my memory, not wanting to forget it again.

"No, not like Daddy," she sighed. "I know you can't imagine this now, but this man, this creature, he will love you on a whole new level you've never experienced, and you will love him so much that the idea of being apart from him, even for a minute, would make your heart bleed to death."

I recall my response vividly. "That doesn't sound very healthy to me."

My mother chuckled. "Perhaps not."

"Mother, I'm not ready to make this choice," I say quietly. "I don't understand."

Her eyes locked onto mine, and she smiled. "All right, how about now?"

Now? Now I'm twenty-two, the same age my mother was when she died, lying side by side with her in the garden.

As I rolled onto my side to face her, like a reflection in a mirror, she did the same, and our gazes met.

"Now, I want to spend all eternity by his side..." I said with a hint of hesitation, which she detected.

"But?" She encouraged me to explain.

I searched for the words to help best describe the complex and contradicting emotion that weaves it's way into me.

"But, I..." I trail off.

"You don't want to die?" She asks cautiously.

I nodded. "For the first time in my life... I want children, his children, and only his children. I've never wanted children before, but with Darius...it's different.

Mother nods, smiling softly. "Then a Dhampir you will both be: half and half. Two halves that make one whole."

"A what?" I ask but never get my answer.

"I love you, Viola," her last words echoed as she was engulfed in pitch black.

When I opened my eyes, I woke up in my bed. It took a moment for me to feel my body, and when I lifted up my hand to examine it, I saw it for the first time with my new, semi-immortal eyes. The new wavelengths of light I was able to see made the simple, moonlit room more ethereal than ever before.