Bastien’s POV
My heart stuttered in my chest when I saw the site before me. A beautiful girl with red blood eyes, long dark hair falling down below her shoulders. A girl who seemed to be at least 16 years old, a slim figure clad in black, huddled around 2 young boys who were blonde, blue eyed and looked to be about 10 years old or so. They had slight lithe figures, thin yet strong. The wind blew strongly and gusted our scents to her nostrils as they flared, she looked up at us, a growl left her chest as she in an instance was standing protectively in front of the boys, covering them with her body. She had her hands up in front of her ready to fight.
“V……Vera, honey, is that you?” Lottie piped up softly, her voice coming out hoarsely. She took a couple of tentative steps towards what looked like an older version of our Vera, her hands splayed out showing she meant no harm. Vera pulled the boys in closer to herself and looked like she was getting ready to bolt. Just as she was about to spring off Lottie spoke softly
“A leanbh (Child) don’t you even know your own mother?” looking down at Lottie I saw tears of venom coursing down her face in little rivulets. I moved to wrap her in my arms, she leaned into me wrapping her arms around my back. Vera reacted to the movements with a hiss but she had a confused look on her face too. She cocked her head to the side looking at us. Faine and Alec were standing quietly nearby, all of us waiting, hoping.
“Dugo (blood),” I said hoping to trigger her memory of us.
“Mother?” Vera asked in a high questioning voice. Then she shook her head slightly as if trying to shake something out of it.
“Mother?” she said again. Suddenly all sounds around us disappeared, no wind, no rain. The silence was eerie until it was broken by a sweet voice that I’d recognise anywhere,
“Mom, Dad?” she asked with a little smile forming on her lips, her eyebrows raised up on one side as she looked happily back and forth between us “are you really here, I mean really here?” she asked again. She rubbed the heels of her hands to her eyes and when she pulled her hands away and saw we weren’t an illusion she dashed to us and crushed us both to her.
“You’re still alive? I was told you were dead” she gushed. I wrapped my arms around her and Lottie too, Lottie’s shoulders were shuddering and her tears were coursing down her face again, harder this time as she grabbed Vera’s shoulders and crushed her to her body. Rubbing her hand over Vera’s hair, face, chin, back, as if she were checking to see was it really her Vera in her arms.
“Mom, I’m ok, I’m here, and I’m alive. I’m just so pleased to see you, I can’t believe it.” She stuttered in between her own tears.
“Dad, I thought I’d never see you again. I love you both so much!” she bawled into my shoulder and sniffed and cried even harder as I tugged her as close to me as I could with Lottie stuck to the other half of her. I felt a hand on my shoulder and a tug; turning my head to the sidex I saw it was Alec.
“Can you believe it, our little girl is home, she’s back!” I declared happily to him.
“Welcome back Vera, but we’re going to have to get home quickly, there’s a storm coming in very fast!”
“So, we’re vampires, a storm isn’t gonna bother us.” I said.
“Ya, but even vampires can’t escape the ravages of a tornado, and there’s a big one coming right for us.” He replied. I turned around to see what he meant and saw the outlines of a black tornado twisting and turning in a huge vortex coming our way, lightening flashing in the sky lighting up the world with its bright flashes and showing just how big the tornado was. I gulped as I realised we had to get the family home now. Hopefully it would avoid our homes, I pulled out my phone to call the others to warn them to batten down the hatches, but the storm was causing too much static for any conversation to be understood. Vera and Lottie were inseparable. Alec had the kindly man who helped us in his arms and Lacey and Faine each had one of the little boys in their arms, Lottie and I had Vera between us, arms entwined, afraid to let go in case it was all a dream, and we took off running as fast as we could. The man in Alec’s arms looked terrified. I’d say not knowing whether to be more scared of us running at vampire speed or of the impending storm coming our way.
The wind was getting so strong that I felt myself being pulled backwards towards the vortex spinning behind us. Cars, buildings, animals, trees, bushes, everything in its path were being sucked into it. I looked back again as a bolt of lightning crashed to the ground about 10 feet ahead of us and split an old oak tree completely in half, leaving it burning.
“Alec, we’re not going to make it home in time, it’s almost here.” I roared to him trying to make myself heard above the roar of the storm. Rain was lashing against us, which normally wouldn’t be a problem but the suction from the tornado was very strong and despite our strength and speed I couldn’t see how we were going to survive this in tact. Suddenly everything around us stopped. Not a tree moved, not a blade of grass moved, our clothes stopped flapping and everyone’s hair that had been whipping around suddenly hung down as if we had been transported away from where we were. I looked around me and saw the same stunned expressions on everyone’s faces…10 feet on any side of us the trees were practically bending in half with the force of the wind, some of them were being ripped out of the earth they’d stood in for 100’s of years, by their roots and were being sucked up, cows spinning around high off the ground, cars, bits of buildings, flew around us. It’s like we were in the eye of the storm but the vortex had yet to touch us. I noticed we weren’t moving anymore, as if we were frozen in time. I tried to wiggle my fingers and did so.
I wondered what the hell was going on; I looked around me and saw that Vera was locked in a grip with Lottie. Alec had put the man down and they were looking around us too. Lacey and Faine were standing near each other and the two little boys were holding each other’s hands, eyes focused on each other and were standing rigidly. I was afraid to speak in case I’d distract them and then my family would be lost. Yes, we’d get caught up in the storm and flung off to God knows where. I’d only just got my family back and I didn’t want to risk losing them so soon. I stared at the boys and felt a tingle in my arms like a little current. It must be the boys creating a force field around us and protecting us, but would it be strong enough to withstand the vortex coming towards us. It was about 100 yards away from us. It had come in from the sea at a very fast rate. The bottom of the vortex hit the force field and next thing It was as if it had bounced off a rubber wall and it had turned direction away from us, our homes and out to the sea again. I breathed a sigh of relief as it moved away quickly. It must have been spinning at a few hundred miles an hour. Little did I know about tornados?
We were moving again once more in the direction of home and headed towards our house. The man was in Alec’s arms again and he looked terrified.
“What are we going to do with him? Alec muttered to me at vampire speed.
“I’ve got just the thing” muttered Faine and smiled as she passed by a little yellow flower, it had seeds of brown in the middle. She didn’t say what it was but just picked up a handful of them from the roots and stuffed them in her pocket. The little boys were no longer holding hands but they were still staring at each other, as if in conversation. It was then that I noticed that were almost identical, except that one of them had a little dark freckle under his left ear in the shape of a heart. The other didn’t, well at least from what I could see.
“Aunt Faine, Lacey, you can put the boys down, they can run themselves, we’re not in any danger now,” Vera said. They looked at her and smiled their thanks as Faine and Lacey let them down to the ground. They each grabbed hands with Faine and Lacey and we all ran off home. The winds were dying down around us now and things were starting to look brighter in the early sunrise and the air became clean again, the sulphurous smell of the rain was leaving. By the time we arrived home, we were greeted by the rest of the family who all wore the same worried expressions on their faces and then relief when they saw who was with us.
“Who are these little boys Vera?” Faine asked her.
“Why, they are to be your sons Auntie, meet Justin and Brian!”
