Solara didn’t move. His head didn’t even lift.
“Her throat is burning,” Solara muttered. He stepped into their minds and saw everything as they did.
The burning in her throat was stronger, she wanted to lick the blood on her fingers, but the idea of it repulsed her. Before she knew what she was doing, she brought it to her lips. Stephan watched realizing this would be the only way she would come to terms with her new life. He called Solara from the other room. It was his turn now, he had to explain the why, an answer only he knew. He went to her and knelt by her feet, he pulled her fingers from her lips and looked at the confused expression on her face. Her hands were over her ears, trying to block out all the voices that were assaulting her. But the more she tried not to hear the louder the voices got.
When the pain was too much, he leaped out. His body trembled from the after-effects of immersing himself into two worlds and straining his gift. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t control myself. I thought at the time that I was doing what was best for us. For us to be together, I love you and wouldn’t hurt you intentionally. I only hope that one day I will deserve your forgiveness. I should not have imposed my wishes on you.”
Kayla backed away from him. Solara was on his feet taking slow steps towards her as she took steps away from him. She was shaking her head, unable to understand what he was saying to her, and trying to shake off all the voices in her head. They stopped when she was backed into a corner. She sank to the ground and pulled her knees to her chest. She cradled and rocked herself.
The sight of it tore through Solara. He turned back to Stephan looking for help to soothe her pain.
“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” Kayla screamed out. A gasp escaped her lips when she realized that neither Solara nor Stephan were speaking. “She wants a glass of milk. He loves her but he’s afraid to tell her.”I don’t want to hear. I don’t want to hear. She looked up at Solara, pleading eyes fixed on his devastated one, Help me!
“She can read minds. It’s torturing her. She thinks she’s going crazy. What do I do?” Solara sat next to her on the floor.
“I want Scarlet. Take me home. I want to go home.” Kayla spoke her voice wheezing out of her lips.
“You can’t go, home baby, you need to stay here for a while. You may hurt Scarlet so I need to teach you a few things before you see her.” He was talking to her as if she was a child.
She rocked herself in the corner for a while longer. Stephan had taken the blood away to the kitchen. He was going to put it in a glass for her. They needed to get through this part too. He hoped it would go as smoothly as possible. Solara’s gasp had him running back to the living room. Kayla was sitting on his lap in his arms. He was surprised but didn’t know what to make of it. Maybe she had forgiven him, besides that is what people who are in love do. Forgive, understand and accept each other, maybe Scarlet would accept him as Kayla had accepted her life and Solara’s mistake.
“My throat is burning, does that mean I want blood?” She looked up at Stephan for the answer, the man she was snuggled into did not seem to be of any use at the moment. “And the voices in my head…”
***
Stephan gave her a weak smile. He deduced that Solara and Kayla might have had a conversation in their way. That was why he didn’t hear the pleading and the begging and Kayla finally forgiving him. They had something special.
He went back to the kitchen and got her two glasses, “You need to drink this, both of them. The small cup is human blood the other animal blood. You need to control your thirst as soon as now. The human blood will help you in the sunlight, they make your tattoos fade a bit, and they dissolve into your skin color.” She nodded, he hoped she understood, for the sake of Scarlet.
Stephan had to leave, Scarlet would be awake soon and he had to get back to her. “Kayla I need to go, I have to explain this to Scarlet. You will be fine Solara will take care of you.” Stephan thought that she would have to take care of Solara. Though Kayla seemed to be taking the situation well, he hadn’t come out of his frozen state. He was lucky that she loved him enough to look past the betrayal, he hoped that he was half as lucky.
He grabbed his jacket and walked out of the apartment hoping the day would end better than it had begun.
***
Stephan walked up to the front door, dreading what he was about to do. How was he going to tell her what he was what his friend had done to Kayla? He walked into the house Vincent was on the sofa watching television. Scarlet wasn’t down yet it was still early so he didn’t think she was even awake. He went to her room, she was still in bed but awake. She pulled the covers down inviting him to join her. His heart always melted whenever she did that, she was not only welcoming him to her bed but to her life she trusted him and he was about to break that trust.
He kicked off his boots and lay beside her, he held her in his arms. He wasn’t going to tell her right away, he would hold on to that moment just in case things didn’t turn out as she hoped. She drifted back to sleep as she often did when he held her. He began to plan out his words.
***
Scarlet got up to go to work, she was so happy. She always had this look in the mornings after they had made love. She never asked him where he went off to in the middle of the night and he never volunteered the information. The three of them got into the car and headed to the diner.
Stephan drove in silence, he didn’t take his eyes off the road but he occasionally kissed her hand. He didn’t know what to do but he would wait to tell her until that evening. He had asked Vincent to play waitress yet again for Kayla. When Scarlet asked why he told her she wasn’t well. With all technicalities observed he hadn’t lied, she wasn’t well she was far from it. She was dead, the living dead to be more precise.
Scarlet informed Joany that Vincent would cover Kayla’s shift that day, that way he would still have to pay her. Stephan stepped out a couple of times when he thought Scarlet was too busy to notice. He had to call Solara for an update on the newborn. So far so good, Kayla understood, what was happening to her and was accepting it. She also agreed to stay away from all human contact as she learned how to control her urges, but wanted Scarlet to know the truth. She also seemed to be in love with her new tattoos, especially because of what they represented, and was sad to see them disappear. She seemed to take it well especially when she was informed that she would get new talents with her immortality.
Stephan thought that she had come a long way since that morning. Kayla embraced her new life. She had also promised to help Stephan with Scarlet in the event things became ugly. Solara also seemed happy, she had forgiven him and now he could start forgiving himself. He had to see that what he had given her was not a curse but more time with him.
Stephan decided to tell Vincent what had happened the previous night when he went on his break. He wasn’t pleased about it at first he thought it had been a very careless decision on Solara’s part. But he went on to joke about how he would have to watch his tongue now that she could kill him. Vincent was always light-hearted wanting to see the best in every situation. Stephan wondered why he didn’t find someone to love.
Stephan got a call from Solara he sounded frantic, he gave Scarlet an excuse and told Vincent he was on guard duty before leaving. He made his way to the apartment door, he could hear breaking noises coming from inside. When he walked in the house was in chaos, Solara was holding Kayla down in the next room. He thought the easy-breezy transformation was too good to be true. It was going to take longer than they thought for her to be let out into the world again.
“What happened?” Kayla was kicking into the air trying to break the hold Solara had around her, Stephan crouched next to them holding her legs down.
“She caught the neighbor’s scent and went crazy. We have to get her out of here. She can’t be around people, it’s not helping.” Solara was concerned about the situation they were in. Where could they take her that it would be far away from people and still be around the bay area?
Kayla stopped fidgeting, and looked straight at Stephan, she had heard and understood everything they had said. Stephan was glad that she could still communicate when in a state of frenzy, maybe they could reason with her. They had to force her to adapt to her new life as fast and as soon as possible.
“I don’t want to leave here. I don’t want to leave Scarlet.” She had calmed down now. They now had an answer to what now they needed to know how to put it to her without angering her.
Stephan looked her straight in the eye and spoke to her as one would do to a child. “You can’t be eating your neighbors just because you are thirsty. You need to control your thirst or I won’t let you anywhere near Scarlet. Do you hear me?” he knew demanding it was not a good idea but he was getting desperate. He stood his ground even when she let out a snarl, Solara didn’t move from where he was so he assumed that she wouldn’t attack him.
When Kayla nodded at him he knew that she had accepted his conditions and hoped she would not make any more trouble for them. She had to learn and if it were under any other conditions he would have let her come around it on her own time. But now he couldn’t risk it, the life of the woman they both loved depended on it. He thought a week would be sufficient time for her to have adapted only then would she see Scarlet.
He left them but promised to check on them the next day, as for now, he had to find a way to tell Scarlet why they had her friend locked up. He thought that she would also need time to accept the idea, she would need to prepare herself mentally before she came face to face with her friend again.
***
Stephan sat across from her on the bed, she had her legs crossed in front of her. She looked calm enough to take the news, and if things took a turn for the worst he would deal with them. He had sent Vincent to Solara to help him with Kayla, they were alone to deal with this with no interruptions. He would start with his past and work his way to the present and if it got too much for her to handle he would leave Kayla’s situation for another day.
“Honey, I need to tell you something and I don’t know how you will react and that scares me. It’s about me, my past, and how it seems to have followed me to the present.” He paused there he wanted to read her reaction so far, she still looked calm. She stroked his cheek before putting her hands on his, she said nothing but sat there waiting and listening.
“Before I start I need you to have an open mind.” When she nodded he continued he couldn’t stop now, it was now or never. “I am not from around here, from this time at least. I was born in the early eighteen hundreds and grew up here but back then it wasn’t much. All there was were little cottages and we living off the water. Anyway one day I decided to take a walk on my own, I needed to clear my head I had just been drafted into the army and I was leaving the day after. I was walking along the shores when two women approached me they were beautiful so I didn’t think they would pose any danger.
“We were enjoying each other’s company when one of them attacked me from the back. They had me pinned to the ground in a second. I panicked but couldn’t fight my way out of their hold, they were strong too strong to be humans. One of them slit bit me and the other slit her wrist and put her bloodied arm over my mouth, she held it open as the blood dripped into my mouth. My body was in pain and this incredible heat burned through me. I lost consciousness a few seconds later.
“When I came to, my body still felt like it was burning, I was soaking wet from sweat. Everything was clearer, my eyesight, my hearing, and my sense of smell. It was as if my senses were boosted to the maximum. I noticed that there was someone in the room with me, I didn’t think he could be human he had a strange smell and his heartbeat too fast.” He stopped before he continued he knew what he was about to say next would revolt her but she had to hear it.
“I killed him. I fed on him and he died because of it. Everything in my body wanted to taste his blood and my throat burned for it, so I fed on him. He tried to fight me off but I was too strong for him.
“Anyway after I did this the two women from the previous night came to me. They told me that they had made me into one of them and the transformation was complete. They had given me immortality by turning me into a monster. I had both the venom of a vampire and the blood of a beast running through my veins. They had created me for both of them, to be used by them….”
He stopped when he saw the look on Scarlet’s face. She didn’t say anything but he could tell what she was thinking. She drew back her hands, got off the bed, and headed for the door. Somehow Stephan appeared before her, he didn’t want to scare her but since it was full disclosure he thought that he should be himself.
***
Scarlet froze and stared at him, he was insane… she was alone in a house with a lunatic.
Oh God, how did I get here?
She was getting hysterical, she took about a second to calm down, one of them had to have a grip on reality, and since didn’t seem to she had to be the designated lucid gal in the room.
“Don’t be afraid of me. I won’t hurt you I could never hurt you I love you.” Stephan looked like was getting desperate now.
“Okay let’s calm down here.” Scarlet was searching for another exit out of the room, she grunted when she realized her best shot was through the window. She had to decide whether to reason with the crazy man or take a chance with gravity.
Stephan sank to the floor, his head hang and his legs sprawled carelessly on the floor. He looked like a broken man. She stopped planning her escape and looked at him, she felt pity for him. She wondered whether she believed what he was saying. She decided to give him a chance to explain himself.