Page 44 of The Royal Street Witch
“I will never do that. Cassius is all I have, he is everything to me. I’ve lost one brother, I won’t lose another!” His voice vibrates with anger and I take a step back, having never seen him this upset before, and I hate it, I do. But I’ve put so much on the line and I deserve to know the truth. So I seize the opportunity and ask him the question he’s dodged in the past.
“What happened to your brother?” It’s expected to grieve the ones we’ve lost, but I suspect the loss of Bastian’s blood brother is why he clings to Cassius.
Blood lines his eyes instantly so I know it’s tragic. He stands, an internal conflict consuming him, and then he sighs. I cross my arms and wait.
“I have lost every person I loved from my human life. That is the fate of a vampire. But there are things that happened in my human life, a loss so deep, an internal gutting that’s carried over and will haunt me forever. So I’ll tell you how I killed my brother if that assuages your anxiety over getting caught.”
Fangs slide out of his mouth while I ignore the dig. With my body growing heavy, I fall into the couch because there’s a pain in his eyes and that’s what he meant when he said he’s been broken. He paces in front of me, hand squeezing the back of his neck, voice shaking in a way unfamiliar to me.
“We grew up near Sacramento, California. Heavy rains in the winter mean fast river currents in the spring. Back then was different from now with today’s helicopter parents that don’t let their kids out of their sight…times were different for us. There were two rules—get home before dark and never go to the river alone. We had snuck there before, but this day was the first of spring and I was itching to catch a rainbow trout. It wasn’t the first time we snuck there, but this time I begged him to take me. It had been raining, and the river was gushing and the bank was muddy. Luc went to get a closer look because it was so loud, so fast. And he slipped.”
I open my mouth to speak, the sorrow pulling across his face making me want to go to him, but he puts up his hand as if to shush me before I’ve said a word.
“I stood there, watching him slide down the muddy bank, down into the water. I watched the river take my brother away, screaming for him, while he screamed for me, not knowing what to do. His head and arms dipped up and down through the current as I ran alongside him, but the water was too fast and he was out of my sight in seconds. I stood there, Aster.” He falls on his knees in front of me. “I remember thinking that my dad was going to kill us, kill me. That we were going to be in so much trouble. I stood there for too long before getting help.”
I run my thumb along his jawline, an ache forming in my chest. A pain for his pain.
“When they found him, found his body, my father took his belt to me. Threw me down the stairs. Broke my arm and gave me fifteen stitches.” He grabs my index finger and runs it along the scar on his forehead. “I deserved all of it.” A blood tear falls down his cheek, and I wipe it away with my thumb.
“You know that’s not true.”
“Luc was better than me, always wanted to please me, always did things for me. He was the purest heart, and I was the fuck up, the one that didn’t take life seriously. And he’s the one that ended up dead, robbed of life at fourteen years old, and I’m here for all eternity.
“And Cassius, he became that big brother I needed, that big brother I lost. I know it’s fucked up and dysfunctional. But how can he leave me? I can’t lose him.” And another blood tear falls and I sink down to hold him. Because I don’t have any words that can comfort him, noit will be okay, orCassius won’t die. Because I don’t know what will happen, but for the first time I realize this unfavorable outcome affects Bastian so much more than it affects me.
“I’m so sorry, Bastian. I don’t know how to fix it.” His green eyes open and close, blood-tinged and helpless.
“You don’t have to fix it.”
He looks like a boy to me now as I wipe the blood from his face. He stills, watching me tend to his bleeding eyes, his fangs sliding back up. I wipe his ceramic face, cheekbones so perfectly chiseled, lips so pouty and full. “It wasn’t your fault that your brother died. You were a child. Your father should have comforted you instead of beat you. If I could change the past, I would.” My blood boils at the thought of a man beating a broken boy, and it’s my nature to fix things to create spells or potions to heal. But my hands are tied on this one, so all I can offer is comfort.
“Of course, you would,” he says and grabs my wrist. “You came along and changed everything.”
If someone was watching from the outside this would look like a precious moment between two lovers, not a forbidden relationship between a vampire and witch, and all the feelings swarm around me and I just want him in my arms. I pull his face to mine and kiss him, so tender, so gentle, that I pull back to take a breath before I move in for another. His arms encircle me, needing me, pulling me tightly against him, like I’m a life raft.
Falling on the floor and falling apart within each other’s grasp, I whisper, “I didn’t want you to go anyway.” That had been the plan all along and I can finally admit the truth. I would have been devastated if Cassius accepted the potion and they both left together.
He whispers, “I’m not going anywhere. But promise me, promise it’s you and me. That’s the new plan. I stay and we’re more than just a taste. We see where this goes.”
And I don’t know how it’s possible, how I’ve broken down my barriers so completely, but I’ve found myself committing to only him through whispers while making love, promises to keep it quiet, to enjoy it while it lasts. Because it can’t last forever. I will embrace what’s budding for now, watch it bloom, and mourn its death. Because it will indeed die, so for now, I promise.
THE FIRST TIME I SAWblood running from Bastian’s nostril, I froze, wondering if vampires still got nose bleeds. We were dancing on Frenchman Street, to a Zydeco band playing on the corner. Sweating hot, under an afternoon sun, I wondered if the disguising spell I put on him was malfunctioning, so I reached up and touched it. Thick and warm, real blood, something the disguising spell wouldn’t cause.
Disguising spells are a creative way for witches to have a little fun. I still saw the same Bastian Delacroix in front of me. But everyone else saw a shorter, blonde man with shoulder length hair.
“What?” he said wiping his nose and then looking to his thumb. “I’m bleeding?” He held his hand up to his nose to stop it.
“Does that ever happen to you?” I yelled over the music, and he just squinted his eyes and grabbed my hand with his free one, pulling me away from the crowd, away from the music.
“No,” he said, and I ducked into a bar to grab some napkins, my heart suddenly racing. I looked up to the sun beating down on us while Bastian wiped the blood away and smiled at me.
“How sweet,” he had said, wrapping his arms around me, kissing my lips. “You’re concerned.”
And I was. I tried to shrug it off as a fluke. Some strange happenstance. But now, as Bastian and I lie next to his pool, as I watch blood run from his nose again, my body tenses.
“Shit,” he says grabbing a towel, sitting up and wiping his face.
“Again.”
