A Lover Cursed

Grief

It was difficult to breathe, and not just because in her running, Calantha had re-broken several of her fragile ribs. She had woken feeling like the earth was resting on her chest. Next to her, Tohrment sat with his arms folded, staring at the TV mounted on the wall in the corner. The Friends re-run seemed like it was from another world, like it was a totally alien thing.

"Hi, Chandler. Monica just broke my seashell lamp."

"Neat, I'm gonna die alone."

Only on the periphery of her awareness did she hear a knock on the door, followed by a vampire whom she had assumed was a nurse coming in and saying something to her.

"What?" Calantha asked, blinking a few times trying to clear the mental haze that was over everything.

"I was wondering if you needed anything for pain."

"Pain?"

"Yes."

"Um..." Calantha tried to clear her mind. "No, no I think I'd better not."

"Better not? We want you to be comfortable."

Calantha finally could look at the nurse. "What's your name?"

"I'm Ehlana. I'm a nurse." The nurse's eyebrows furrowed together just slightly.

"Oh, that's right. I'm sorry, I forgot your name for a minute. No, no I don't need anything for pain."

Ehlana nodded, smiling professionally.

"The doctors wanted me to ask if you've had a chance to feed yet."

Calantha tried to keep her face even, but she shifted uncomfortably in the bed. "The human doctors?"

Ehlana hesitated. "Yes. Dr Whitcomb and Dr Manello."

Calantha sat forward and rubbed her face. "So Havers isn't here?"

"I'm sorry, he's not."

"But he's somewhere on this side of the ocean, right? I could have sworn I saw him..." But then it could have been a dream. Calantha was aware she sounded a little crazy. She took a deep breath and tried to pull it together. Get into reality, she thought.

"Dr Havers is at the main hospital where he works. This is the Brotherhood clinic."

"Right."

"You may remember seeing him. You were brought to his ER first, because they happened to be much closer. You were transferred here after you were stabilized. But if I may, Calantha, it is very important that you feed. Your lab values this evening are not much better than they were." Calantha could feel it, that her blood volume, her iron levels, her clotting factors, everything was depleted. "If you don't feel you can feed, then we'd like you to talk to someone. We have a therapist here, and she would like to come in."

"I, um..." Calantha looked at the celing. "I can feed. I know I'm sick." Feeling a little more connected to the earth just by virtue of talking, she looked around the room.

"Here, take my vein." Tohr stood up and offered his arm.

"Thanks." but she hesitated, a threat of dread slowly breaking through the numbness she was feeling. "Tohr," She looked up at him. Maybe it was better not to know? "Why hasn't Welsie come to visit? Did she come while I was out or something?"

Tohr took a sharp breath, and his face seemed to go through several emotions at once. His eyes darted up to Ehlana.

"I'll give you two a minute." Ehlana said quietly and ducked out of the room.

Tohr sat down hard in his chair again. "Cal, I'm so sorry..." he covered his face with a hand and hung his head.

"She's dead too." Calantha said, her voice flat.

"Yeah, years ago. Wrath called your parents, I guess I just assumed-"

"It's okay, Tohrment. My parents and I haven't been on speaking terms in a long time. And they always thought I was too fragile for hard news. Its not your fault I didn't know." Calantha could feel the tears threaten again. She grasped the railings of the hospital bed she was lying in and squeezed, trying to bring her mind back to earth again so she wouldn't drown. How could one person hurt so much and still live?

No, she knew the answer to that question. She'd been lost before, alone before. When she was kidnaped and kept for years before and after her transition, they told her she had no more family. Said they were all dead. And why wouldn't she believe them, it was the Second World War, and everything was falling apart all over Europe.

But her thoughts didn't dwell on what happened with the Nazis. It went to something else. It felt like a memory, but seemed more like a dream? Before she'd woken up in he Brotherhood's clinic with those human doctors.

Calantha stood in a void. It was white everywhere, but not blindingly so. More like she was in a fog. Before she realized what what was happening she took a step forward, and another. Something ahead was calling to her, begging for her to come closer. She reached a hand forward in the fog, and wasn't surprised to see the wood door before she saw it. It felt so solid under her hands, and so... right.

Just as she was reaching for the door handle, something punched her in the chest. The force of it knocked her backwards, and she clutched her chest as she fell to the ground. She tried to stand, that door still calling out to her, like a soft bed after too many sleepless nights. But she was hit again, this time harder. The force of it knocked her completely to her back.

"Ow. Shit." She muttered when she could breathe again. She stayed there a second to see if it would happen again. When it didn't, she stood up and reached again for the door.

"Calantha..." someone whispered in her ear. She spun around, startled. There, standing in the mist was a tall, thin male. He was looking down, his hands at his side. His brown hair was parted perfectly, not a strand out of place which struck her as... important? "Please... Come back." Calantha looked back at the door. "You're not allowed to leave... not yet..."  she knew she wanted to go through that door, Knew instinctively that that was the easy way. But something in that voice... She turned back, just to look, she told herself. Just then he looked up at her, his soft blue eyes seemed to bore into her heart. He was carrying the weight of the living, of suffering. Easing pain and suffering was the work of her life as a healer and it wasn't in her nature to turn her back on someone who needed her.

"Why does it have to be me who fixes everyone else?" She wondered out loud, and to her own ears her voice sounded just as tired and worn as his. He reached out his hand, and with a wince, she took it.

So Calantha has chosen to stay in the land of the living. And, at least at this beginning, she was going to have to make that choice over and over. Her head felt light and dizzy. "Can I still have your vein?" She asked Tohrment.

"Of course."