Affinity

Chapter 3 - Aaralyn

Aaralyn stood rooted to the spot as she watched him writhe and convulse in pain. She had witnessed this death many times. She knew it would only be a matter of minutes before his body emptied itself of blood and turned to ash to be swept away by the current.

You've done your duty. Now, turn and walk away.

The voice in her head was Raj's, urging her to stick to the rules she had been trained to follow. She tore her eyes away from the scene and turned to leave, but her feet wouldn't move. She looked back at the vampire and fought the guilt that was rising in her stomach like bitter bile.

Had she not just that morning given voice to her doubts and questioned the actions of their leaders? Had she not argued with Raj about the merits of exactly the kind of thing she was doing now?

Yes, she had. Yet she stood there watching the death of a vampire who, despite his mocking and taunting and sarcasm, had not harmed her without provocation or shown any real desire to do so.

Bloodshed will only continue to beget bloodshed. When will it end?

The weary voice of her conscience pulled at the strings of her guilt-ridden heart. She watched from the cover of the trees, listening to his gurgled screams as the blood came. He was a helpless wounded animal. Surely, the least she could do was end his misery.

His screaming ended only to be replaced by weak moans as his body continued to convulse. He choked again on expelled blood.

No, he wasn't an animal. He was a person. What had he said his name was?

She stepped hesitantly out of the cover of the trees and stood at the bank, peering across the stream at him. She glanced around, paranoid that someone may be spying on her, waiting to see if she would fail the test. She stared at the still-submerged lower half of his body. The water around him had turned red from his blood.

Suddenly, her vision jolted through her memory again: this time the stranger moved out of the shadows, and she saw his hard, strikingly beautiful face illuminated by moonlight. His startling blue eyes were trained steadily on hers. He spoke to her: "My name is Nathaniel Madison."

She whispered his name, and the vision dissipated. The bloody water before her was real, and the ash would follow if she didn't act quickly.

She swore heavily, not sure if she meant to be cursing herself, the vampire, or the situation itself. Not that it really mattered; she was already wading into the water.

At its deepest, the stream barely reached her knees, and she crossed it easily in five long strides. Once she reached where the vampire had collapsed on the bank, she fell to her knees beside him. She placed her hand on the vampire's body and called her power back to her, and the wind died down. The stream bent its force to her will, and the current swelled and rolled the vampire over onto his back before it resumed its usual pace and flow. Aaralyn reached down to take his face firmly in both her hands.

"Nathaniel Madison," she said again, as if to convince herself that he was real and to remind herself that he was a person. She cast one more long, anxious look into the trees around them before turning back to him and adding in a low voice, "You had better be worth me dying over, because I can't imagine any other way for this to end."

She paid no mind to the blood that he coughed over her hands in response. Rather than pull away, she leaned even closer over him and ran her hands down to his chest. She was no healer, but her spirit powers connected her to the living forces around her, and at least for now, he was one. She pressed her weight into her palms, closed her eyes, and concentrated all her powers on finding something alive in him that she could grab onto.