WitchBite

Resolute

 Minutes turned to hours. Hours bled into days. Days melted into weeks, and finally, weeks turned into months.

I'd wondered if all this time I would look back on this passage and wish I would've been more productive. Then came the realisation that, now being a Vampire, time is something I most likely have an over abundance of. Would I live forever? Do Vampires eventually die of old age? Do I even want to find that out?

There was usually an unspoken finality to being mortal. An ever present knowledge that death is a certain. It is historically a great motivator. Even if it was as normal as finding love, maybe having children, growing old together: without that full stop; was there a point to it all?

I sat in the quiet expanse of my old bedroom at Tithe Manor. Once a routine had been set of visitng the Vampire clan once a week for my daily dose of "life juice", it was fairly easy to fall back into normalcy. Almost normalcy anyway. My days of shuffling around the manor, and walking through the forest was filled to the brim with absence. It followed me everywhere like a grim phantom, the lack of company. Or rather: the lack of the wanted company.

With my father now incarcerated in a specialised prison, and awaiting execution by fire, leadership of the Witches had yet to fall on anyone. Royalty isn't defined by bloodlines or heirs here, which means the likely-hood of me being a successor to my father. Especially as I didn't want it, was next to nil.

Although I'd be lying if I said I hadn't half entertained the idea. King. Me. Can you imagine?

My ears twitched at the subtle disturbance of shifting stone, turning my attention to my bedroom window. While normally I would assume it was one of the usual house members pottering around the flowers for night-time watering: something bid me look, and so I leaned forward on my bed, and peered through the windows.

My eyebrows furrowed in a slight confusion at the figure that stood there. Dirty blonde hair that'd seen better care, and had not seen a cut in a long time. An expression of trepidation on gaunt features that didn't translate well on whether it was vengeance or just pure nerves. For there stood Jace, dressed in a dark blue hoodie and jeans, he stared at me staring at him. We held that look for what felt like ten minutes before the sudden awareness caused me to open the window, sliding it upwards.

"Can we talk?" Jace croaked, clearing his throat before repeating it and stuffing his hands into his pockets. I gave a quick nod, swinging my legs over the ledge and dropping to the ground. A convenience I had now long abused, considering any damage I would've normally sustained were either so minute that I healed almost instantly, or just didn't happen at all.

"You seem to have taken to being uh... this" He said gesturing vaguely in my direction "quite well." I tilted my head with a friendly smirk. Jace was trying to ease the obvious tension that hung thickly between us. Something that I suddenly was aware of how easily it didn't bother me. "You look... different."

"Thank you?" I responded giving a brief chuckle.

"Sorry." He responded sheepishly averting his gaze to the floor.

"It's okay." There was a silence again. One that previously would've had my palms slick with sweat, and my heart pounding with an errant need to escape and flee to the safety of my room. But despite how uncomfortably Jace was handling it, it didn't seem to matter to me. Gone was the sleepy passivity, quiet confidence, and built frame of the young wolf that so lovingly devoted himself to my best friend. He seemed small. Weak. Like the sudden breach of a night bird through the treeline would cause his heart to leap from his chest, and the difference of before flooded my emotions with a familiar pity. I knew this. What it was like to be afraid of everything. A spike of sadness poisoned that pity I felt. "Are you okay?" I finally asked, if anything to draw Jace's attention from the undoubtedly whirlpool of suffering he was spinning in.