Page 32 of Blood Claims
The sun had dominated what it could from the day and was close to setting. But what light still lingered shone through the glassless bay windows that framed the open doorway of the Tuberculosis Pavilion lobby. Which was part of an infamous quarantine unit where Typhoid Mary died, finally succumbing to her namesake illness in 1938.
The woman, also known as the less distasteful Mary Mallon, was an Irish immigrant who worked as a cook and was made famous in an unfortunate way. She was the first identified asymptomatic carrier of typhoid fever in the United States. And seeing as she was identified as the source of multiple typhoid outbreaks between 1900 and 1907, she subsequentially was quarantined. Something that lasted for the rest of her life on North Brother Island, with or without her consent. Twenty-six years were spent as a prisoner to her fate, for she was said to have died in this very room of the quarantine unit.
Perhaps this was why I felt a dark affinity with it, knowing of my own sickness and the inability to prevent my own fate from taking hold. And speaking of fate, Circe soon emerged from the broken doorway, one that hadn’t seen a door at its frame for many years. The overgrown grounds were at her back, with parts of the natural world trying to claim this room through the rotting window frames.
The floor was covered with pieces of plaster and paint chips that had rained down from the cracked ceiling above, coating each surface in its dust. Broken pieces of furniture framed the circular room with a rolled-up carpet pushed to one side, dumped like a dead corpse.
Beams of light streamed through, illuminating the panic on her face as I kept closer to the shadows at my back where the light could not penetrate fully. Of course, due to my family’sunique gifts, the sunlight wouldn’t kill me, like most Vampires. But as time went on and my darkness took a tighter hold, the aversion to daylight would only increase.
However, the witch didn’t know this, which was why I allowed this meeting to happen just before sunset, so as she would never mistake me for having such a weakness. Now just how long she had been lingering outside the hospital grounds, I had no idea. But she certainly looked agitated, and I soon found out why. Especially after scanning behind her and finding a prominent part of our bargain missing. Which was when I forwent the formalities of acknowledging her arrival and went straight to demanding,
“Where is the girl?”
She started to look panicked, her dark brown eyes darting side to side before finding a particular patch of cracked flooring to focus on. As if she couldn’t bear the sight of my anger any longer.
“The Erebus twins, they… they got there before I could bring her through the portal, My Lord.”
I gritted my teeth at the word twins, before acknowledging the true reason for my irk.
“Come again?”I asked dangerously, despite not missing the part where she had failed me.
“There was nothing I could do… but the dagger… I have it!” she argued, before taking scrambled steps back over the debris as I let my shadows branch out, cloaking the room in the darkness I was addicted to. She then gripped the broken strap of the satchel and held it out to me, telling me this was where the dagger was kept. And although I was eager to take it from her, I couldn’t help but redirect my thoughts elsewhere.
“You had the time to take the dagger but not the time to grab the girl and portal her here, is that what you claim?” I asked in a dark tone that matched the shadows now circling her.
She shook her head, the red hair that had once shone like a flame in the sunlight a dull, darker shade that shook around her. But it was the slight glimmer of doubt I saw in her eyes that told me a different story. For I knew of her cruel nature and, therefore, had a feeling that she had first wasted time toying with the girl, instead of bringing her straight here to me.
“Please, My Lord Vasileios! I can get her for you. I know a way!”
I took measured steps toward her, making her back up into part of the window frame. It was the side where the outside world had tried to infiltrate the decaying building, by winding its vines around the wood before sneaking inside the room. And it was a part of nature I would use for my cruel pleasure now.
With barely a flick of my hand, my darkness crept along the floor toward it before it reached up to touch the greenery. It then seeped into the plant, absorbing it whole and turning it to black. Then with this newly possessed piece of the earth, I used my control on it to wrap around the witch’s throat. It was like a deadly snake doing my bidding as it coiled around her, minimizing her air supply. It instantly made her struggle against it, as I had once seen her do to her victims. As I also suspected she had done to the girl. The thought made me murderous, as the unnatural feeling started to take hold.
For no one touched the girl with a cruel hand… no one but I.
“Please… don’t… do this…” she pleaded in vain, but I would do as I pleased. Which was why I reached out a hand, commanding the vine to take the bag off her and bring it to me.
“I… I… brought you… what you… wanted,” she struggled to say, making me snarl back,
“Not everything!”Then I turned my attention to the bag and just as I was opening it, my fury took over. “But at least your efforts were not a complete waste as…wait, what is this…? Is this a fucking joke!”I snapped, enraged as I pulled the daggerfrom the bag and recognized it instantly as being a fake. Because of course I knew what the real one looked like, having seen it every day in my father’s study. Not that the witch would, but even so, it was clear that this fucking toy in my hand wasn’t even sharp enough to slice through butter, let alone the flesh of my kin!
“My Lord… I… I…” she stammered, something that ended with a shriek of pain when I crushed the fake dagger in my hand while simultaneously tightening the hold on her neck.
“You think me a fool, Circe?!”I asked in a deadly tone, my fury building as I stepped closer, my height increasing with every step. My darkness being allowed more freedom to take hold, warping the side of my face that, until now, remained looking human. Which meant in my rage it was now matching that of the one beneath the mask.
Her eyes widened to the point I thought blood would burst from the vessels. Her mouth opened as she desperately tried to take in air, her hands clawing at the possessed vines. But then with just a flick of my fingers, I had large thorns grow from the vine, cutting through her skin and making her snatch her hand back from trying to escape. The scent of her blood made me snarl like some wild beast on the hunt.
“N-o… the girl… she must have switched them… I… I didn’t know,” she croaked out, and despite my growing anger, I couldn’t help myself from being a little impressed, for the little bookkeeper was proving to be quite cunning. Vanessa Cadell was a name I had learned from the file I had seen Circe gather and since then, I had been conducting my own research on the mortal. A mortal that this witch had greatly underestimated.
“Tell me, witch, why I should keep you alive, when you continue to fail me?” I asked, despite my darkness practically begging me for the soul it wanted to consume, it’s hunger never sated.
She started to speak but it came out as a broken whisper I could barely hear. Which meant I was forced to deny my impulses for a few seconds longer, in case she had one last trick up her sleeve to salvage this. And thankfully for her, I wasn’t disappointed.
“I cast a spell… on the girl… connected to… me,”she forced out once I had allowed the plant to ease its hold on her.
“What spell?”
“A mind storm… it can be… be transferred to you.” I narrowed my eyes down at her. I had heard of this spell before, one that once cast, it contained a small piece of a person’s state of mind. The barest hint that allowed its owner to connect to them when in a vulnerable state,say, like when sleeping.But it would also allow me to hunt her with ease, as I would be able to use my darkness to link to this small piece of her mind and with it, find her whereabouts. Meaning I would always be able to find her instantly.
