Two Truths and a Liar

II • The Unforgiving

Jenna

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There is nothing more unsettling than knowing you have a purpose.

Knowing that against all things happening in life, any choices you could've made along the way, choices that would have carved out the outcome of your life and the quality of your future, that it would always, always end the same way. That you were born to do one thing, and one thing only. There was no other option. No other way to live.

My shoes click against the deserted aisle, each passing pew bathed in red moonlight that filtered through towering stained-glass windows, semi hidden in the shadows of the fallen night. I could feel the sensation, that burning in my hands and the clear jabbing in my heart that told me they were near. I walked with purpose and felt every even breath swell through the hollowness that was me. Brows furrowed, I scanned the sanctuary, flicking from one thing to the next, searching for anything out of the ordinary.

There was nothing, not here. Not yet. I knew that they couldn't be here, they'd be fools to come so close to something so holy. But that urge in me grew stronger with every second. They were here. Standing firm at the end of the aisle, I closed my eyes.

"Ipsum revelare,"

Silence met my call.

I stood, waited quietly. And then I felt it. A sudden movement not far away, like the sweep of some fabric whipping across. My eyes flew open. "There you are."

They weren't here, in the church, but I knew they were near. Turning on one heel I drew my dagger with care, and kept it clutched in one hand as I wound my way down, through the pews, to the closed side-door. My pace quickened. I threw the door open and let that blinding full-moon glow wash through me, through the doorway. I stood there for a second, peering at the thick thorn bushes on the outskirts of the yard. The door snapped shut behind me.

A rustle to my left, and I was running again. The dagger in my hand caught the moonlight for the last time before submerging in shadow, as I crouched low and hid behind the bushes. There was a quiet noise, so familiar, so revolting. The echoing presence of something belonging to the grave. The tear and feast of destruction. I wrinkled my nose. The air all around smelled of blood. I could taste it on my tongue as I breathed, that wretched metallic burning. Those horrible things. The thought of them made my skin crawl with hatred.

I saw it before it saw me. I saw it's dark form crouching, just on the other side of the bush. It's thin figure caped in torn clothes, it's bare neck sallow and bloodless.

I made no noise, leaping over the bush and landing just feet away, stood, and came closer. There was no fear. All I felt in that empty careless thing that was me was annoyance. It stopped, hearing the soft crunch of my footsteps against the leaf-strewn ground. I stopped too, and watched it whip its head around.

He was like something molded, greyish green and white all blended in a sickly bleached-out sort of way. His eyes were dark, two black holes gleaming from an age-old rotted face. Blade-like teeth glinted in his gaping mouth, curved into a downturned o, a trickle of blood running down his lips and drip-dripping onto the ground he knelt on. Onto the form he leaned over.

I didn't get a good look at the victim, moments later he was escaping at alarming speeds and I was following him almost as fast. It was quick. I overtook him in less than a minute, and as he cowered, hissing and screeching through blood-stained lips, myself pinning him to the church path with my knees. With my hands I raised the dagger, muttering the words with eyes fixed on the thing, unmoving, unblinking.

"Plus semel mori, you vile creature"

He screamed as the power flowed through me and I recounted the sins of his kind. I blessed the dagger, and without hesitation, plunged it straight into his heart.

***

It was too late for her.

The victim was young, maybe only ten or twelve. She was light in my arms, ghostly pale and sickly, tragically dead.

The bite can turn anyone, but she'd been almost completely drained. There was no way she'd survive, her frame light from so much blood loss. I'd done it countless times before, but something about her round, sleeplike face hit me. She was so young.

I stepped over the slowly disintegrating corpse of her attacker and held her close. I could feel her decaying, losing life, the raw autumn wind whisking her away to somewhere far away. I hoped she'd find peace, and as I ascended the church steps, I wondered if they went to the same place after being killed again. The holy books I'd studied had never said what happened to them after the second death, after being finally sent to the grave that had failed to hold them. Hours of reading, copying, learning from my teachers, and I'd never even thought of it.

Of course I knew hundreds of curses and blessings and all the symbols for all the ways to take them, how any object with the right properties could kill them if given the right words, how to find them, how to control my natural abilities passed down from those before me. I knew how to sense them from miles away, and to know exactly when they've taken the life of another. I knew how to reason with one, trick one, trap them in their own promises. But I'd never really learned how to understand one.

I had the keys to the basement on my belt. There was a trap-door there, one that led to a set of stone steps eaten by time. The hidden room under the church was dark and long, stretching forever underneath. I didn't know if anyone knew about it but me, and my predecessors, but I could access it easily and it did what I needed it too.

Lamps on either side of the stone walls lit as I passed, illuminating rows and rows of marble and stone caskets. I lay her on top to reach the one beside it, pushing the heavy lid just enough to lay her in. It was empty before, a palace of stone holding nothing but a few cobwebs. As shadow engulfed her, I stood and watched her dissolve for a second, before sliding the lid back over her and marching back towards the steps. The musty aroma of the room stayed with me even after I was back up and into the world of the living again, along with it the feeling of cold hanging on to every bone in me, the tiredness I'd felt since birth. I'd done it countless times, and I'd do it countless times again until I'm gone, hidden away in a coffin just like her, and all the others fading away into the darkness below. Maybe I'd remain until the end of time in a box of stone, or wood, earth, or a jar, or the coroner's cabinets, even. I didn't care. I'd never know when or what or how I'd die or be buried, who cares? No one would remember me after all, no one lasting. I'd turn to dust just like my relatives who used to be just like me, sending to the grave those who thought they could beat death.

I'm the only of my kind in this town. I'm destined to do this until the day I'll be replaced, to the next born of the holy line to fight them. My purpose is to kill. I don't know anyone, not a friend, family, nothing. They're all just faces, aren't they? Passing like the seasons.

My name is Jenna Avella, and I'm Deadwood's only vampire slayer.

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A.N. Meet Jenna! If you've made it to chapter two, congrats! Thanks for continuing in reading this story, enjoy your stay! As always, be sure to vote and comment letting me know what you think :)