Forgotten Heir: Realm Doors Book One

Chapter Six

Cara woke early the next day feeling nervous. She crept silently from her stall, passing Ric’s, then Kalidir’s, then Luke’s, and finally Anthony’s. They were all still asleep and oblivious to her as she slipped through the darkness and into the main barn. The fire had almost died, only glowing embers remaining, crackling and sparking, so she grabbed up more wood, piling it around the embers to ignite and keep away the winter cold.

Next, she went to the fridge which Luke had hooked up to a little, rumbling, oil fuelled generator... Not that they couldn’t keep their food fresh outside in the snow, she thought in amusement, but there was a chest freezer too, and a box full of cans, uht milk, and things that wouldn’t go off. Ordinary food, unlike what she found in the fridge. Cara sorted passed jars of blood to find the butter and the bread, but it didn’t disturb her at all. She’d lived with a vampire before, and it was better to have well fed vampires hanging around, rather than starving ones.

Skewering the bread, Cara held it over the fire and watched it slowly toast. She wished someone had brought marshmallows; she'd never toasted marshmallows before. A sugar rush for breakfast probably wouldn’t make for a good day, though.
When the bread finally turned golden, she coated it in butter, a small amount melted onto her fingers. The warmth reminded her of the blood, her blood, trickling down her hand the previous day. She looked at her wrists. There was nothing more than pale pink lines where the cuts had been, and by midday there’d be no marks left at all. She felt guilty all the same; she had been foolish. She hadn’t cut in a long time, and she knew she wasn’t going to change the world by starting up again.

Pushing such thoughts aside, she bit into her toast wondering how long it would last, this chance to get up in the morning knowing she could eat. She jumped slightly as Anthony appeared beside her, gripping a jar of cold blood.

“Hey,” he offered cautiously.

Cara swallowed her mouthful of toast. “Hi, I didn’t notice you come in, shouldn’t you still be asleep? For like the next twelve hours?”

He shrugged and perched on the bench beside her. “Nah, we all want to be alert for your soul walk.  Kalidir told us it can be...” He paused tentatively before finishing, “intense. We all want to make sure you’re ok.”

She snorted in mirth, unsurprised. “So this spirit walk thing is dangerous then?”
Anthony laughed. “I said intense, not dangerous.”

Taking another bite of toast, Cara chewed slowly, watching the flames licking up the new wood she’d placed on the fire.

“I always feel like there’s a trial coming my way, like doom is looming dark and dangerous on the horizon, till I just want to scream so loud I scare whatever it is the hell away from me,” she admitted, sounding resigned, even to her own ears.

“Maybe that’s what the prophecies are about, then” Anthony chuckled in response. “Maybe you’re an elahdril dog whistle. One day you’ll scream so loud that the mangy mutts who call themselves were-wolves will run away back to Lunescape in terror.”

Anthony shouldered her playfully as he chortled. She pushed back, finding a smile for him.

“That would be nice and easy,” she murmured.

Anthony fell silent, though, and she knew he wanted to ask her something he wasn’t sure she’d answer. She suspected Ric would be his chosen topic, knowing Anthony didn’t trust him and suspecting he'd realised she was responsible for Ric's current state. 

She poked the fire with her skewer, frustrated and sending glowing red sparks upwards. “Come on Anthony,” she sighed. “Penny for your thoughts?”

He gulped down a mouthful of dark red blood with such a look of revulsion it left her wondering how much life remained in the refrigerated gunk. There’d be something, as only dried blood was completely dead. She couldn’t imagine there being much life left in that old ‘O’ negative though.

He shuddered again at the taste, then looked over at her, stating, “You and Ric, you were involved with each other for a while?”

“A year,” she confirmed with a constricting ache in her heart.

“A whole year,” Anthony whistled, “That’s a long time to go without committing treason.”

She dipped her head in agreement. “I have trust issues, and when it came to it, I wanted him to know everything about what I was first. Ric had already witnessed what I thought was the worst of me, so I hadn’t expected him to react as he did when I told him I was elahdril.”

“How did he react?” Anthony requested quietly.

Cara felt her fingers go to the cold scar at her throat as she began to shake impulsively. Her pulse sped up automatically as she gazed  into the fire, not really seeing it, or the barn, or Anthony.

“Whoa, hey,” the voice next to her pulled her back. “Why the sudden panic? It’s alright, you’re safe here. What happened?”

“Nothing!” Cara yelped as she stood so abruptly she almost tumbled into the fire. She clenched both hands to stop them trembling. Take a deep breath, she answered, “I didn’t know our relationship was illegal until he left me for it. I went back on the streets and started dealing my blood. So ended the only happy year I can remember in my life.”

She studied the blond vampire, who perched uncomfortably in front of her, rolling his half-full jar of blood between his hands.

“So there, Anthony; the next time you put your hands around his throat remember you’re fighting the one thing I once value enough to try and live for.” She didn’t really have the energy to be angry, though. Thinking about the last hour of her relationship with Ric’s always left her lethargic. “He found me starving in a hospital basement, being crawled on by rats. Then, for a whole year, he gave me something better than that. No matter how he reacted to what I am, he gave me something incredible. For one whole year I thought I had some chance of being more than an alley dwelling, charity shop burgling, nobody.”

Anthony nodded, gulping down the last dregs of his breakfast before murmuring, “I’m sorry, Nekyra, I didn’t mean to pry.”

Just then, Kalidir and Luke strolled in, pausing to frown at Anthony and her.
“Everyone ok in here?” Luke requested calmly, “because you could cut the air with a knife it’s so tense.”

She plastered a grin onto her face and forced her shoulders to relax.

“Morning!” she chirped, with excessively cheer. “It’s great. We’re great. Want breakfast before we start whatever we’re doing here?”

Ric appeared from the darkness, pushing passed Luke and growling in Anthony’s direction.

“What exactly have you done to make her quiver like a leaf?” he snarled.

Cara suspected he already knew, though, and she found herself wondering just how good vampire hearing really was. Stalking to the fridge to grab a jar of blood, she then hurl container at Ric, who caught it in astonishment, a second before it smashed off his head.

“Let it be,” she snapped at him. “And I am not ‘quivering’ like anything. Also I’ve eaten this morning,” she informed him, with no small amount of defiance. “You know what I said last night, if I have to feed myself up then so do you, so get on with drinking already.”

Ric tore the lid off the jar, his nose screwing up at the scent of the refrigerated human blood, but he swigged it disdainfully, his expression challenging her. ‘Happy now?’ it requested angrily, but he said nothing more as he threw himself onto the rug in front of the fire, forcing down another mouthful.

“Right, well,” Kalidir rubbed his hands together in expectation, keen to move on, “I’m not really that hungry and I’d like to get started as soon as possible, if you’re ready, Nekyra?”

“I’m ready,” she conceded, thinking that anything would be better than standing there with the three vampires staring at her, their expressions ranging from embarrassment to frustration, with a little bit of confusion thrown in for good measure.

Kalidir spread a blanket out on the floor, lighting candles in a circle around it. He signalled for Cara come to him, to sit in the middle of the blanket, which she did without question. However, the trembling she'd denied hadn't yet stopped, and suspected it would only get worse once her memories came alive.

The elf is hunkered down in front of her, whispering, “You need to understand that once this starts, it cannot be stopped. Trying to stop the ‘soul walk’ after it’s started tends to kill people. You need to understand this because what you see, with your history, might not be pleasant.  You will be obliged to finish the journey once it starts.  I can’t step in, I can’t influence what happens. Nor can anyone else.”

Feeling like she was going to choke, Cara only managed to nod, indicate that she understood. It took a great deal of effort to finally ask, “Will you be able to see what I see?”

Kalidir affirmed her suspicions, “As part of the magic I'm going to cast, I'm making it possible for anyone in this room to see. If you want anyone to leave say so now.”
She reached out to him, pushing her hand into his. It felt strange; feeling his warmth after touching Ric’s coldness so much in the previous two days.

“Everyone can stay,” she said. She'd feel safer knowing people who actually seemed to want her alive were close by. “Just tell me this is going to be worth whatever I have to relive.”

“I can’t promise anything, my princess, but I’m hopeful,” Kalidir responded with a gentle smile.

“Ok.” Cara cracked her fingers, feeling like she should limber up for a fight. “What do I need to do?”

The warrior eyed her carefully, the thought ‘you aren’t going to like this one bit’, clear in his expression.

“You need to drink something.” He shifted his weight uncomfortably, running his hand nervously over his head, although his next admission confirmed her worst suspicion. “It’s a drug to us. Most of the time it’ll just give us a high or dull our pain, it increases our libido, makes us more prone to recklessness. It has all the same affects as our blood has to vampires. The first time we take it, though, it does something else.  It brings on visions, shows us the turning points in our lives, helps us remember things we’ve been forced to forget. It’s not just a drug that produces a chemical reaction, it’s magical, the same as our blood contains magic. It’s addictive, it’s illegal, and I wouldn’t be asking this of you if I didn’t think it was vitally important.”

Cara felt herself pull away in apprehension, a sense of dread is filling her as she asked, “What is it, this drug?” despite already knowing what he’d to say.

Kalidir glanced over at the others, worried. “Well this is where I need a volunteer.”
Shit, Cara thought in abhorrence, her reservations confirmed.

“It’s vampire blood isn’t it? You want me to drink vampire blood.”

Luke hissed angrily, and Cara wanted to shuffle further from Kalidir. Surely he couldn’t be serious? He looked absolutely serious, though.

“Are you still willing?” he asked.

Looking anxiously over at the three vampires, Cara realised that although they were all wearing similar expressions of repugnance, only Ric seems on the verge of gainsaying Kalidir’s request.  None of them want to give their blood, but she felt positive Kalidir would persuade one of them eventually.  She guessed she was receiving her dues. She'd given her blood as a drug to get into Blutholme, to stop her nightmares, and right then circumstances required her to take the blood of a vampire to willingly bring on hallucinations. Swings and roundabouts, she thought, wondering if karma affected her kind.

She giggled, unable to help it. “Oh this is ironic, someone, somewhere is really laughing about now.”

Kalidir stepped  beyond the ring of candles to pull a bag from his weapons chest. He drew a syringe from the bag, murmuring nervously, “Ok, who’s it going to be?”

The three vampires folded their arms across their chests. Ric seemed to vibrate as a low growl resonated from his throat. His expression grew brooding as his arms wrapped tightly around himself.

“You said it’s addictive. You said it’s like E.B...” Even his voice is a rumbling snarl. “You can’t do that to her.”

“It’s only once, Ric. There’s almost no chance of an addiction forming from this, I swear it to you,” Kalidir told him. “We need this, friend, because we need Nekyra ready to fight. Right now I can’t even begin training her.”

Anthony’s hands went up as if shielding himself.

“No,” he said with a shake of his head. “I can’t Kalidir. I won’t give her my blood. This is wrong.”

Luke remained silent, still, fire in his eyes as he bites his lower lip in concern. Reluctance was written in his tense posture.

Kalidir watched them with a plea written on his face. “I wouldn’t ask for this if I didn’t think it was essential. Please. If you want her to help you keep Blutholme alive she has to face this”

Pinching the top of her nose, then rubbing her eyes, Cara tried to persuade herself that Kalidir knew what he was doing. She didn’t have the experience or knowledge to understand why she believed him, but she suspected he was right about one thing; something was blocking her from being what she should be. She wondered if she should be surprised by how reluctant vampires could be to give up their blood...

It didn’t matter though. She knew what she wanted. Well, not wanted exactly. She didn’t want any of it at all. But she knew whose blood it would be easiest to swallow.

“Ric,” she breathed gently, “please.”

He trembled, a blunt refusal in his eyes. He indicated to his own, addiction wrecked body, saying, “I won’t risk doing this to you.”

“It won’t,” she replied, with a confidence she didn’t feel. “I’ll be fine.”

He growled again, backing further from Kalidir and the needle.

“I can’t risk you this way,” he insists again.

“There’s a lot of things you won’t do for fear of risking me, Ric Burn,” she snapped, more harshly than she meant to. “But right now I’m being told this has to happen, that it has to happen so I can defend myself against what's to come, and I would rather it came from you.”

Please, she added in her mind, please do this for me Ric, I’d rather it was you than Luke or Anthony.

His mouth drew into a tight line and an agonised groan escaped him as he debated with himself, before accepting defeat. With speed not possible of a mortal, Ric grabbed the syringe from Kalidir. He pierced his vein without even a gasp, and drew his own blood, all before Cara's eyes could register what he was doing.

He passed the filled syringe back to the elf with a snarl. “If anything bad happens to her, I’ll kill you.” 

She knew better than to doubt his words, and from Kalidir’s expression, so did he. When Kalidir brought the blood to her, removing the plunger from the syringe, she raised her eyes skyward for a second.

“If any god is really listening, please forgive me.” 

Then she swallowed in one gulp, trying not to let the cold, sticky, gloop touch my tongue.

The effects were instantaneous; the barn spun nauseatingly until Cara regretted eating that morning. She felt her toast rising inside of her, and she swallows hard to keep the food safely in her stomach. The barn walls fade into half existence, only to be replaced with the cream walls of her childhood home; the house her father had bought in the Mundane Realm, to let him have closer contact with vampires.

The house was decorated for her third Christmas. Although the elahdril didn’t follow human religion, her parents had celebrated Christmas to fit in with the locals. The tree lights sparkled, casting bright flashes of colour over the pile of presents left under its green boughs. But the memory wouldn't be a happy one.

Cara screamed as the world lurched and she felt like her stomach was torn out through my navel. He consciousness was ripped from her body, leaving her prone form to collapse inside the ring of leaping candle flame. With a shudder she slammed into the phantom body of her three-year-old self, to stare in horror at the cream coloured wolf circling her father.

The beast growled at him, its lips peeling back over yellowing teeth, each razor sharp and deadly. The she-wolf’s black claws clicked against the wooden floor, scratching the varnish as she drew nearer to her prey. Cara peered out from behind her mother as the woman placed herself between the wolf and her child.  She watched magic flare from her father’s hand, living flame ploughing toward the wolf, but it doesn’t affect the creature at all.

“Get out my house!” he raged at the wolf. “You have no right to be here, beast!”

The wolf barked at him and each shrieking yap drilling into her skull. Cara wanted to reach out and pull her father away. She wanted to save him from his inevitable fate. She couldn’t though; she had no control over the past. She was nothing more than a passenger along for the ride.

In the barn silent tears stream over the cheeks of the body she no longer inhabited, but from where she stood in the half present image of the past, she could only feel the softness of her mother’s skirt as she push my face against her leg.

Then the she-wolf pounced, flying through the air, huge paws lashing out at her father’s chest. Cara listened as her father was torn open, with a sound like ripping cloth. She saw the bubbles gurgling from his chest cavity, through his blood. His last exhale on earth didn’t even reach his mouth, leaving through the torn walls of his exposed lungs. His heart had been ripped clean out of him, along with shard of shattered bone, and it lay, unbeating, in the growing pool of blood at his feet. He swayed for what seemed like an eternity before he finally crumpled to his knees and then fell face down onto the slick floor.

Cara's three-year-old eyes flash brilliant bronze as she switched to her magical sight. She watched her daddy’s aura flicker once, twice, then fail, and she heard the screams she'd screamed so long ago. She felt her throat burn with the force of them.
Cara tried to push passed her mother, but the pregnant woman shoved her sideways, under the dining table, before she can step forward. She stood there defiantly, clutching her swollen belly, and Cara wondered if her unborn baby brother had kicked as he felt their mother’s heart speed up in fear. Or had he been held still by the same paralysis that then froze her to the spot, begging over and over, “Please don’t. Please, you’ve taken him, please leave. Not my babies. Not my babies.”

Cara hadn’t really understood back then, just how to be completely terror stricken. She’d been afraid, of course. She’d seen her father die but she hadn’t really understood it. The finality had escaped her, a little. But while reliving it, she felt herself choking. She felt herself try to freeze, even as her toddler’s body tried to stretch out for her mother. 

The wolf growled louder, slashing forward but missing her pleading mother as she jumps back.

“Please,” Cara hears her beg again, still to no avail.

When the wolf leapt, it didn’t bother to claw at her. The creature landed hard on Caran's screaming mother, grabbing her head in its huge jaw and twisting her neck with one sharp move. Her lifeforce is extinguished instantly, but the little glow in her womb takes longer to fade away into darkness. Cara's baby brother wasn’t killed instantly, slowly suffocating instead, inside the body which should’ve kept him alive until birth and immortality.

The wolf turned to Cara as she sensed the death of the last elahdrilas child, the last elahdrilas bar one. Cara trembled as I crawled out from under the dining table, towards the monster. She cried out as her tiny, white-socked feet slip on the wetness, and she landed on her back in a pool of her father’s blood. She rolled over, pushing herself onto her hands in the gore. She sensed that the wolf would be laughing at her, if she had been in her human form. And as Cara staggered to her feet, the beast crouched down low, ready to pounce again.

With a howl she sprang forward, and Cara screamed, thrusting her soaking hands forward. The she-wolf flew backwards as waves of energy rippled out the girl, fast moving and powerful. The glass panes in the windows of Cara's home shattered, sending sharp shards piercing out into the night. The wolf hit the wall hard, her spine severing. She wouldn’t rise again. In one terrifying, instinctive action, Cara had taken her life as easily as the monster had taken the lives of her parents.

In the ensuing silence, she’d been left alone for hours. First she shook her mother, trying to wake her up, despite knowing she’d wake up ever again. Then she crawled over to her father, grasping his cooling hand and sobbing uncontrollably. Eventually, she lay down at his side, her hair soaking up his blood, and stared at the twinkling Christmas tree lights reflecting in the darkening, congealing pools. Christmas Eve slowly passed into Christmas day, and she remained alone with the bodies and her tears.

It was late on Christmas Day when the front door opened and her Aunt Rowlisa stepped into the devastation. She had a black bag slung over her back, a sack which wriggles and twists against her, and Cara could hear the croaking whimpers of a girl, about her age, too tired and afraid to shout any longer.

Rowlisa threw the bag roughly to the ground without glancing at her niece, who watched as she ripped it open and yanked the other child out by her hair, to stand in the chaos. Cara recognised the girl, the ghost who'd haunted her nightmares, and on the floor of the barn, her body shivered in revulsion. Then, with one quick flick of a knife, her aunt sliced open the girl’s throat.

Rowlisa of Vonagh dumped the murdered child beside Cara's mother, then snatched up the last Rhynlas princess, whispering, “That will buy you some time, little one.”

Cara would've expected to whimper. She though she would've cried. She didn’t though. Her traumatised child-self didn’t utter a word. Not one word. She wouldn’t speak again until she was almost thirteen, living her childhood in self-imposed muteness, unable to find the words to express what she'd seen and done.

Her aunt carried her from her home to place her in the back seat of a non-descript car. Cara didn’t fight as the woman placed her hand over her eyes, whispering in elvish, “Utolis... Forget. Forget what I’ve just done.”

The scene shifted abruptly, lurching Cara sideways and forward into her five year old body. Her aunt shook her roughly, screaming so that her spittle showered Cara's cheeks. “You just listen to me! Don’t you dare do that again! Don’t you dare use your magic on me. It’s evil, you hear me?” She paused, grabbing her chin and pulling Cara's face within millimetres of her own. “You are not strong. You are weak; a disappointment to your parents and to me. Do not try to use magic. You don’t have the strength for it. It’ll rip you apart like that wolf did to your foolish daddy, you hear me?”

It had been that way every day from that moment on. Cara remembered how her aunt repeated that claim over and over, until she'd been too afraid to even attempt using sorcery. Her own weakness was the one constant in her life, but between images of her aunt’s cruelty, she remembered other flashes of the past; her cutting herself, her crying in the night, her screaming at nightmares she couldn't comprehend.

In the present, she looked towards the place where an elf guard and three vampires stood, watching her life fold out in front of them. Kalidir’s hands clenched at his side. Ric’s fangs descended, and she knew he was growling, even though she couldn’t hear it.

Then her soul wass abruptly hurled forward again, to the day the letter arrived for her aunt. The woman read it five times before she rising from the couch in her living room, striding purposefully to her room without speaking to Cara. She pulled a suitcase from under her bed and began tossing clothes into it.

“Where are we going?” Cara asked her.

Rowlisa laughed at her assumption. “You aren’t going anywhere, child, but I am going back to Galahidras, finally. I have to be with my own daughter now. I’ve carried you long enough, and now it’s time for you to stand on your own two feet. You’re sixteen, you can manage that, yes?”

She felt her head nod, but she was scared. Her aunt was the only person she knew. Rowlisa feds her, clothed me, sheltered me. 

“But why?” Cara asked close to tears.

Her aunt glanced up at her with disgusted eyes. “You don’t deserve to be alive, you understand? I took you in through pity, but now my own blood needs me and that has to come first.” The woman paused, stepping towards Cara and pushing a wad of notes into her hand. “This will keep you going for a while. Use my money wisely and remember what I’ve taught you; do not consort with vampires, do not try to enter Galahidras or contact any of the elahdril. And understand this; the wolves will hunt you down without remorse. Pray no supernatural creature ever finds you. Now get out.”

As jarringly as they began, the hallucinations ended, bringing the barn back to crystal clarity and leaving Cara weeping. She trembled as she finally felt her spirit being dragged back into her real, solid, body.  She lay on the floor, panting and sobbing, face down on the blanket. Sweat dripped off her brow and she felt as though she were burning up. Pulling her sticky t-shirt away from her sodden body, she tried to cool down. 

How could she explain what it felt like to lose her whole family for a second time, and then to watch her only living relative beat and berated her into obedience, when all she'd wanted was to be loved.  She couldn’t put into words how much rage tore at her as she acknowledged that Rowlisa had beaten any strength out of her. Somehow she'd never realised it before. Had she been so desperate for love that she made herself blind?

Eventually, Cara pulled herself upright, staggering to her knees. Kalidir walked quickly but cautiously towards me, frowning.

“You were raised by Rowlisa of Vonaugh?” he’s asked, though he still sounded foggy and far away. “Your mother’s sister?”

Cara nodded once, not yet able to do more than cry, and shake, and cry some more.
“You do know don’t you...?” Kalidir asked as he drew nearer. “You know that your aunt is the mother of the False Queen? Rowlisa’s only child is Heliana.”

For a moment, Cara could only stare up at him, absorbing that truth; the woman who sat on her throne was her own cousin. She didn’t appreciate her oncoming epiphany, her moment of knowing clarity. Her aunt, the person she should’ve been able to trust from the day of her parents’ murder, had kept her weak to ensure her own daughter’s place on the Rhynlas throne.

Cara felt breathless as the elf guard joined her, asking frantically, “Why?” The words tumbled out as Kalidir reached down to help her to her feet. “Why would she save me?”

He is shrugged, pity in his bronze eyes. “I don’t know, Kyra. I really don’t know. Rowlisa is a...” he took her clammy hand as he considered his words. “She is a difficult woman. She’d disappeared years before your parents' murder, with a man below her station. She wasn’t seen again until Heliana found her whereabouts and called her back to court. We thought she was away conducting affairs or raising a bastard child in secret. She’d miscarried illegitimate children before, so when there were rumours at court of her being sighted with a girl child, no one thought to see if she was hiding you. She’s a seer, her gift is weak, but still it must’ve given her an advantage. She must have known to come to you, to prevent our people finding you alive and making Heliana’s rise more difficult. I don’t know why she kept you alive though.”

Cara attempted to stand, but the world tipped dangerously, forcing Kalidir to push her back into a sitting position.

“It might take a while for the effects of the vampire blood to wear off.” He signalled to Anthony. “Get Nekyra a glass of water, please.”

If only they had begun to wear off at all. Cara was lucky not to fall into the flames as she screamed again at the grabbing, clawing, ripping sensation returning to ravage her gut. She shrieked and shuddered as her soul was yanked unexpectedly from her body and was once more hurled into the half world of memory.

“Shit,” Kalidir exclaimed leaping away from her, his voice fuzzy as if coming to her through water. “It’s pulling her back in, I’ve never known that happen before.”

The world spun again, faster that time. With a thud that winded her, Cara collided into her skinny, starving body as it lay on a cold basement floor. It had been the body of a girl just turned adult, and a body wanting to die. As a more care free version of Ric crouched over her vision form, the real, live, current, Cara panicked. Her soul screamed and her body thrashed madly on the floor. Her spirit eyes turned to Kalidir, the vision flickering and jerking like a badly tuned channel on an old television as she struggled to escape her hallucination.

“Stop it!” her solid body yells. “ Please don’t make me watch this.”

She guessed where the vision would lead, and it wasn't a memory she want to share with anyone but Ric. Kalidir shook his head nonetheless. He couldn’t do anything about it, as he’d already explained to her. Behind the elf, the real Ric stepped backwards shrinking away for what he knew would follow, as surely as Cara did. He stared into her vision with as much horror as she felt. He was mesmerised by it, though, even as she thrashed and rebelled against this scene.  She fought with all the strength in her soul, her struggle reflected in the whipping of her empty body on the floor.

“Don’t!” Kalidir cried in alarm. “You’ll kill yourself if you try to stop it from running its course!”

Forcing herself to give in, to let the vision play out, Cara watched as the ghost-of-Ric-past carried her emaciated teenage self back to his apartment in the Mundane Realm. She couldn’t turn away as he helped her regain some semblance of a civilised life. She wanted to cry as she watched him take her kayaking for the first time, setting out under the stars and coming back under the dawn sun. She'd laughed, splashing lake water at him. She's been so happy back then. 

When the vision shifted again, she felt the pages of her photo album between my fingers as she filled it with mementos of their adventures together. Phantom Ric laughed at her side as she sorted through the pictures.  It felt torturous, watching hour after hour of her only happy memories play out and knowing she couldn’t ever have that time again, knowing that at any second even her memories would shatter in fury. Those memories saw her strongest she's had ever been; the least tormented.

She couldn’t stand it, feeling herself fall in love with Ric again. She beat against the vision in an attempt to escape, causing a pain like a thousand drums to ring out inside her skull. But she didn’t possess the strength to fight her way fee, and she could hear her living body gasp in agony as she rebelled. Blood trickled from her nose, from her lips, and she knew she must resist the urge to keep struggling. If she didn’t, she would die.

Then it came to it, and she lay on Ric’s bed the way she had done five years earlier. She breathed in the scent of him, clean and familiar and so definitely hers. He nuzzled playfully into her neck as she tried to tickle his ribs. 

“Stop it Ric!” she laughed at him as he nipped her neck without breaking the skin.
He grinned and kissed her jaw, her cheek, her nose, then her lips. She ached again with ripples of desire as his fingers trailed playfully over her stomach, tracing over her waistband and under her t-shirt. She felt her body searing at his touch and kissed him hard, winding her fingers in his hair and letting his tongue explore her mouth.
“I want you Ric,” she murmured at him, her breath becoming ragged as his hands start exploring my body.

He smiled down at her. “I love you, Cara Rhine.”

Reaching up to stroke his cheek, she knew she love him too, with all her heart and soul. She wanted to be his, completely his, and she finally felt ready for that. There wass something she wanted to do in advance, though. She didn’t want to give herself to him without being honest first. She wanted him to understand what she was but she'd never told anyone before and felt  scared. 

“I need to ask you something,” she told him as he continued to stroke her stomach.
He took hold of her hand, bringing it to his mouth and kissing each fingertip in turn. He sensed her nervousness and anticipation, it made him curious.

“What’s that, my love?” he murmured as he ran his lips over her wrist.

“Will you always love me, no matter what?” she queried, barely whispering.

“Of course,” he answers without hesitation, leaning over to kiss her again as he pulled het closer.

She grinned happily, her body burning for him, adoring him so much she couldn’t breathe. Ric laughed mischievously, moving his body over hers as he realised on impulse that she was finally ready to give in to him.  Her own hands ran down his chest to search for the zip of his jeans and his fangs descend as she pressed up against him. Mating and feeding produces such similar reactions in vampires and she wasn't afraid of his fangs. His reaction had happened before, many times, as they'd curled playfully around each other. She kissed him, feeling his elongated canines against her tongue.

She could do it.

She could tell him.

Wrapping her arms around him, she whispered softly, “I’m not human Ric. I’m elahdril.”

He froze in her arms the moment the words are out of her mouth. He inspected my happy face for any indication of a joke.

“Don’t say such things Cara, it isn’t funny.”

His voice had grown serious and although his body still pressed against hers in expectant desire. There was tension too. She frowned up at him, her heart sinking.
“You said you loved me no matter what. Why are you looking at me like I’ve admitted to something too atrocious for words.”

“Tell me you’re joking,” he begged, one hand still pressed hopefully against her cheek.

She shook her head in confusion, saying, “I’m not joking Ric. I am elahdril.”

In dread, Cara sent one last shock wave of revolt through the vision, and on the floor my body spasmed, but there was nothing she could do. She stared over at the real, solid, E.B addicted Ric, to discover he’d sunk to the floor, his head in his hands. He wouldn’t watch. He couldn’t let himself watch. His shoulders trembled, she wondered if vampires could cry? He was ashamed, so very ashamed, and she felt like she was drowning under that understanding.

In the vision Ric rolled off her, sitting on the edge of the bed with a stony expression.

“You really are crazy,” he concluded furiously. “Why the hell would you lie to me about that? Am I just some game to you? What are you, a thrill seeker looking for some danger?”

He’s snarled in rage and she was suddenly very aware of the fangs which she'd dismissed moments earlier. His eyes shone bright silver, glowing furiously with their own brilliant flame.

“No,” she whimpered. “Of course this isn’t a game. I adore you Ric, but I thought you should know before...”

He didn’t let me finish. “Before what?” he shouted. “Before you have me commit high treason?”

She struggled to choke back tears as she cried back, “Treason? What treason can there be in love?”

He leaped from the bed, hissing at her, “Idiot girl! I can never love an elahdril.”

Stunned into speechless hurt, Cara tried to stand, but her legs threaten to give way, and she sits down hard on the bed again. She didn’t understand, didn’t grasp what Ric was telling her. A person couldn’t just stop loving someone for their species, could they?  He was in love with her, she know he was. How could it be impossible for a vampire to love an elahdril when she loved him so forcefully? 

He followed the same routine as her aunt had done years earlier, dragging out a suitcase and preparing to leave. Looking back, with more experienced eyes, Cara saw his panic as well as the betrayal he felt.  She felt the survival instinct in him, telling him to fight, or flee, or both. Never before had she realised just how strongly primal forces had taken hold of Ric that day, through his fear for them both. But the fear made him angry, and he was a soldier; his fight instincts were far stronger than his urge to flee.

She lurched forward, intent on grabbing Ric’s arm as he hurriedly, furiously packed his things into the case. He pushed her off, roughly bruising her arm.
“Get the hell away from me!” he roared, his silver irises flashing dangerously, his pupils wide and dark.

With the next attempt, she managed to grab him. She pressed her mouth against his as he twisted and shuddered against her.

“I love you!” she implored desperately. “Ric, I love you.”

“No!” he yelled, his misery and terror pulling his heart far from where she could reach it.

He flung her away from him as he relinquished the last dregs of control to the predator he really is. Cara didn’t scream as he lunged towards her, his face contorted in fury, his fangs descended dangerously. She didn’t recognise the vampire charging at her in inconsolable rage. She knew he’d rip her throat out, tear her windpipe open and let her die in bloodied, gasping agony.  Feeling her back slam into the wall of the apartment as he rammed into her, Cara winces. A sob of pain racked her body as glass from a shattering picture frame pierced her shoulders. Then his elongated canines tore through her skin and her life blood spurted hotly onto his waiting tongue.  At the taste of her, he moaned, his thirst growing as he experienced of the first time what it was to drink elahdril blood.  He pulled his head back with a gasp to stare at her with confused silver eyes, and for a second she foolishly hoped he’d let her go. He couldn’t.

He pushed his hard body against her and she felt his usually icy skin already burning with her blood. Then his mouth was on hers, his lips separating her lips, his tongue searching for her tongue. She tasted her own coppery blood in his mouth, felt his fangs scrape her lower lip as he kissed her desperately.

She began to cry as he reached down to pull her skirt up over her hips. She didn’t know that man. She didn’t want her life to end like that. It wasn't how her demise was supposed to come about. It wasn’t how she wanted the last shreds of virtue to be ripped from her, crying and terrified, and pushed up against a wall.
He tasted her salty tears and laughed viciously.

“This isn’t what you want, little elf?” he whispered in a ragged, needy voice. “How about I end your worthless life for you instead?” 

His mouth moved to her throat again and her breath caught as he took a long draw of her blood. Soon, she felt her heart begin to struggle, her pulse racing at first before it slows in oncoming death, and she could hear each breath wheeze painfully from her aching lungs. She felt dizzy and weak, but at least the burning pain in her neck was dulling as she began to slip out of consciousness.

Ric dropped her then, staggering back in horror as he struggled to regain some semblance of composure. He dropped to her side, pulling her into his arms and pressing his fingers to her wounded neck. He knew that his venom would scar her; it was one of the few things that could, but he doubted he had the strength to heal her without killing her. His thirst was great as the magical blood of her people burned in his veins screaming ‘more, more, more’, and he knew he must run if he wanted her to live.

“What have I done?” he cried staring at Cars.

She gasped and choked as his venom poisoned the wound at her throat, and as her body fought it off. The blood still poured from the bite mark, forcing Ric to push her away. He knew she’d live, but only if he left before he could do more damage. So he ran, not even grabbing his case as he fled, leaving her lying in his apartment, crying and in agony on his floor.

The apparition faded, but so broken-hearted is Cara as she's pulled back into her aching body, that she didn’t notice the world spin or the crunching jolt as reality engulfed her again. The barn fell silent apart from her desperate sobs as she curled up into a trembling ball on the floor. Her throat stings, and when she touched the scar she found it sticky with new blood, bleeding as profusely as if it had only just been torn open.

Her head was thumping and she felt like someone had tried to beat her to death with a sledgehammer.  Every muscle and joint ached.

When she finally managed to roll to her knees, she noted that Ric remained crouched, wordless and anguished, where he’d dropped earlier. Silent tears slowly dipped of his chin as he felt every ounce of regret again. She managed to drag herself to her feet, to take a stumbling step toward him. As soon as he sensed her approach, he’s leapt onto his feet, backing urgently away.

The others stare between them in dazed stillness. There was pity on Kalidir’s face, anger on Anthony’s, and something she couldn’t puzzle out on Luke’s. None of it matters though, as long as she got to Ric.

Ric didn’t want to face her, though. He spun on his heel, running through the barn to the stables.

“Wait, Ric!” she called as she sprinted, stumbling through a world still spinning and dancing from the vampire blood in her system. When she caught up, he had already grabbed his coat and his limited belongings. She felt the gut-wrenching, heart-stopping ache of someone watching their loved one leave them again, pleading with him, “Don’t do this again.”

He looked beseechingly at her. “Cara, you know I have to. I have to leave to stop that,” he threw his arm in the direction of the barn, “from happening again.”
The others slid to a halt behind her, but she ignored them. “That was five years ago Ric, that won’t happen again.”

“But what will happen?” he cried back. “What do you want from me? It’s torture being around you, the smell of you, the sound of your voice, the feel of you so close by.” Ric pulled his three still-full vials if elahdril blood from his pocket, “You think this is bad?”  He flung the little bottles against the wall, smashing them. “That’s nothing. Gods in the heavens, I only started using the stuff because I wanted to taste you. You think E.B has done this to me on its own? No, Cara, it’s you, for five years it’s been you. Everything else is ash and cinders because I only ever want you.”

He pushed passed her and out of the stall, announcing “Hell, I don’t even know exactly what it is I want from you, but I crave you, every waking hour and every sleeping minute.”

“So just take everything, Ric, kill me if you have to,” she bawled, “because I’ve spent five years realising that I need you too. Not ‘want’, Ric, but ‘need'.” She charged after him back through the stable to the barn. “And there’s nothing on earth I can be if I can’t be yours.”

He rounded on her, fury sparking like from flint to tinder. “You can never be mine!” He pulled on his jacket, hissing, “Elahdril law forbids it and I can’t face what Dalahan and Rebecca faced; I can’t watch them rip you apart for loving me, then be forced go slowly mad watching over your eternally beautiful corpse. You are Nekyra ris hala ris Rhynlas, last of the elahdrilas and it’s your duty not to walk this path.”

“What if this is my path?” she was clutching at straws, she knew it, but she continued all the same. “You all want some grand union between elves and vampires to defeat the wolves, well, what about this union? Why does everyone think this is going to work when our laws would divide elahdril and vampire?”

She grabbed his arm again, like she had years earlier, and again he threw her away from him.  With the flash of descending fangs and glowing eyes, he thundered into her, pounding her shoulders into the barn wall.

“And there’s this!” he raged. “What if I lose my temper, Cara? What if I can’t stop myself again? I don’t know what I would do if I killed you.”

Already he bordered on attacking again, confused and running on fraught emotion. Normally such a show of vampire frenzy would terrify her. It had done ever since Ric first bit her. But right then it didsn’t, right then the vampire blood still assaulting her brain caused it to respond differently to Ric’s fury. Cara knew she should be afraid for her life, but instead she felt desire ripple through every muscle as he pinned her arms to her sides and his body pushed forcefully against hers. She gasped as the scorching heat raced through her, and she reached up to kiss Ric.

“Don’t,” he murmured in the second before her lips touched his.

In her vampire blood fuelled state, Cara chose to ignore his last plea, and it took only a millisecond for the pressure on her mouth to increase as he kissed back. His grip around her wrists loosened as his arms slipped around her waist, and he grew frantic as his mouth moved from hers, to her jaw, to wounded neck. She wondered if he’d bite her, but he didn’t need to. His tongue found the bloody mark and pressed against it. Ric moaned at the taste of her, the sound waking an equivalent response in her soul. She nuzzled against his neck, relishing his gasp as she sunk her teeth into him. She didn't have fangs, but she could still draw blood, and now she savoured the elixir filling her mouth.

Ric's lips found her again and they tasted their own blood on each others tongues. One of his hands slid up her inner thigh as her pulse raced so fast she could hear it thumping through her head until she was dizzy with it. Then, as suddenly as he'd given in, he pushed away from her in dismay, and Cara felt sick, realising he’d still refuse me.

“I can’t Cara,” he told desolately. “Please, woman, I have to go!”

Dejected, she yelled back, “Go where? The snow is waist deep outside.”

His voice became a pitiful croak as he struggled with his turmoil.

“I’ll go through Blutholme, I fed this morning and the sun can’t weaken me there. I’ll be fine. Do not follow me.”

“Don’t!” she begged again, but it was too late. He’d already shifted.

Cara stood, frozen, her body still blazing, her face and neck covered in blood, not knowing how to feel.  She looked up at the disbelieving elahdril guard and the two vampires who still gawked at her, and embarrassment rose, adding to the heat of her already burning face.  With another racking sob, she ran, throwing herself into her stall and under the sleeping bag to hide.