How old was I when you first set your foot in our village? Could I already walk, talk even? Was I able to hunt already? Or was I a baby, so small and innocent, that the affairs of the adults did not yet concern me, for all I had to do was sleep in my cradle till my mother fed me from her breast? I did not know that, and you refused to tell me each time I would ask. Perhaps it was simply not for me to know when you'd entered my life, for you were there, and it was all that mattered. Perhaps, there was still something you were hiding… after all, it was no one else, whom taught me, that is often better to hide your reasons, to be revealed some day than tell them upfront.
Now, my first clear memory of you was from when I turned five. It was the time of my turning, a day, when a young boy would get his first tool of war, but all were more concerned with the newborn triplets my mother held in her arms. Their pretty little blond heads smiled at me mockingly, as if to say "look who they care for", and even though I knew no one could control the day on which they would come, I still felt as if they chose this day, just to make me the forgotten one. The fire lit for the occasion of my transformation died, and was replaced with the fire of the house, to feed the whole village on this how joyous occasion. I soon fell into self loathing, as my moment fell, like the sun from the sky, to greet the night. But it was also the night, that brought me relief in form of your soft femine hand, pulling my boyish one away from the settlements. There in the deep, deep forest, you lit a small fire.
It was not big enough to give us any warmth, and it barely gave any light, but I could feel it was mine. The ceremony was short, the body paint limited, and most of it I could not even see, yet when I finally went to sleep that night, hiding a knife bellow my head sack, I felt completed. It was, as if someone finally put the last puzzle into its place, and the picture was finally a whole. That night also, I had my first dream of you.
Was it love, I begun to feel at that time? I like to believe it was. Not a romantic one, for this one would come soon enough, but a caring parental kind, of which I had so little to this moment, and even less now that my mother had three more young boys to take care of.
I soon begun to spend my every moment with you, and learnt much more form observation, than from what you spoke, for you spoke very little even to the chief of the village – my father. Your days were busy for a place as small as this, as people hoped for shaman's guidance though not only life's struggles, but their delusions and dreams as well. First you would let me watch, but as weeks passed, even through we still had not exchanged words, you would give me tasks. To fill the water tanks, to grind herbs, to lie down on the flour, as you would listen to my heart beat… how silly it felt back then, when I still had a beating heart of my own. I would not let out as much as a giggle now on this matter. Only after a year of me faithfully following you, you have spoken to me. And at instant I knew your voice, as if it was in my ears from the very start.
'Why do you try so hard, chief boy, to please me?' was your question.
If you asked that of me now, I would say, that I have found a new mother in you. A new sister, a new soul to stand by mine. I would say, that I felt, that if you were to leave on that day, I would simply die out of loneliness. I would say that I knew you were my hope, and perhaps I would gain a smile, but even though I knew all those things, what could that little child say to you truly? What could I not show by words, I gestured by a hug, that you have accepted, and stood through, as I begun to sob into your soft brown hair. Oh, how tempted I was to cry 'I love you mom', and I even did, but with the overflow of tears, and spit, and snot, not one could understand my words, even if anyone but you have cared.
It was then, that I have realised that strange glow in your golden eyes, that shown at night, for even long after I stopped crying, I could not sleep, so you let me into your tent, and watched as I slowly lost myself into a dream, in the only place, I truly felt safe.
But who knows where would I be now, if it wasn't for my curiosity, so abruptly aroused by you peculiarities. Why was it, that you were livelier at night, than at any moment of the day? Why would you never eat with the rest, or even ate at all? Why were there animal skins in your tent, but not a single time you have prepared one of such as food, or to the village?
Most of all however, what concerned me, was how, when everyone aged, you have stayed the same, an image of youthful perfection best seen in the light of the moon.
It was but nine years later that I have finally realised what were you. Though I should not give myself the credit for finding something, when it was given to me by the owner himself. I could feel it in your voice, as you told me of your nature, that you were planning to leave soon, and it have terrified me more than any other news you would bring. I could not care less that you were a reaper, a taker... the death itself. All I could think of, was that the woman, who for many years was my own mother, and now crept also to much different parts of my heart, was about to go. Why would you even want to? People here respected you, loved you even. The fact that you have not grown an inch only gave them joy, for having such marvellous witch with them, was a blessing.
It was in the midst of the night, that you have told me that. Sad eyes, which I learned to call golden discs, blurred with tears. You did not want to go, as much as I didn't want you to leave. Hundreds of things rushed through my head. Millions of things I could tell you, but among them, only one fit into the mouth of a boy, barely growing into manhood.
"You don't have to leave…"
Yes, you didn't have to.
I now know, what made you decide to leave so suddenly and it brigs me both pain and joy. It was a reason not only for your struggle, but often for mine too, especially when we decided to finally go our separate ways.
But at that time, I did not want to know. Thinking of the reasons, I felt, would only make you wish to go more.
Or maybe I simply feared that the truth would ruin my perfect memory of you? The fearless and the flawless you? However what happened was the moment I've waited long for, and dreamed of for longer than I can understand. You have slowly leaned toward me, and our lips brushed on one another, as if you tried to get a little taste of me. You were to leave, because you felt something toward a human, and that was forbidden. You were to leave, because you did not have a heart to turn me at that time. You were to leave, because you wished no one else, would have to face your fate.
You were to leave, but I was stopping you, because you could not decide which of your actions would hurt me less.
It didn't take me long, after that certain night, to decide of my future fate. I would be a reaper too, I would be a taker, I would be the companion of death. You were already my mother, my sister and my lover, and I could not think of the world where I would live away from you. And somewhere in the madness of your head, or so you said, even though I could not imagine any madness in you at that time, after many nights we fought when you refused to even think of turning me, you said yes. Now, I am over two thousands years old, and I know what you have meant by madness. It's too long a life, even for a vampire.
You refused to turn me straight away. You said I have to prepare, for those you turned were different to you. They could not walk the sun, they could not touch silver. And, if they were to be struck in the heart by a piece of wood, they would die straight away. Night and day I would now live with you. I ate less, I slept during the day, I practised tracking in the moonlight and fighting with my bare hands.
All that and more, till the night we dug a grave for me. All that and more, till the night we spend in it, covered with dirt and undisturbed by any light. All that, and much, much more, till the night we raised from under the soil and drained all that lived in the village, to then dance naked over their dead bodies before we left that place forever.
'My lover, my brother, my son.' were the words you whispered to me the night after 'Now we are one, but there might be a day, when one will be apart. You have to promise to me now, that you will survive, no matter what. That you will seek the strength to live another day, and maybe on one of those days you will gain a child like the one you are, that you will wish to spend the eternity with. But for that, you have to survive.'
So I promised to live as long you wish me to, closing the space between us. A taker of lives, born anew in the grave. And on that very night I have tasted the silence of the world with no heartbeat, no sun and no forgiveness.
'Godric!' a harsh loud voice cascaded on me, awaking me from what I believe, was a nap. My mind, still stuck deep in my memory, tried to convince me, that I was looking into a pair of golden eyes of my maker, but I knew the smell of my child well, and the clouded vision powered by my deepest wishes was gone like the wind. Eric wasn't her, he will never be. He had too much aggression in him to even resemble her. On the other hand it was hard to find anyone similar to her. I have never seen another vampire to always thank for given blood or apologize for the stolen. To her, aggression was redundant… useless.
But there was something she and Eric had in common, that I have lost, maybe even on the day that I asked her to relieve me of my duties. Both had this eagerness toward life, this… need to face the future.
'Yes, my childe' I shifted my stiff body.
'You were restless in your sleep.' however unnatural for our kind is to sleep at night 'and I have hoped to stop this… discomfort. Far more, I still haven't got the chance to talk to you about the fellowship of the sun and…'
The silence was unexpected. How sweet and bashful Eric was while speaking to me. I have never seen him act this way toward anyone else. Even toward the human, he was so desperate to claim as his.
'…in you sleep, you spoke names. Familiar names, yet I don't now why do they feel like that. Would it be too much to ask, what was it that you dreamed of?'
As if I was ever as open to share my dreams with him. What could I say to let his mind at rest? I could tell him it was a dream of our times in the wild, back when he paid little attention to names and places we've seen. I could tell him it was a story of what I've done when we grew apart. I could tell him many things, and many stories that would be both true – for they all really happened – and falls – as none was the subject of my dreaming.
'My maker.'
But wasn't it better to tell the truth? After all, she was not a secret like I wished her to be, back in the days, when I thought I was her only child.
Yet it felt like a secret revealed, after I said it, and Eric seamed to turn into a stone out of shock.
'Please don't tell me' I chuckled quietly 'you thought I didn't have one.'
'Well, not as much that you didn't have one, as… it's hard to imagine you being turned. That's all.'
'We were all… all humans once. Even I.'
She was not.
'But why would I recognize the names from before the time I was born? You don't gain memories of the one who have turned you. I would know if Pam could recognize parts of my past'
'I would assume it must be in her blood. My makers that is, not Pam's. She was a...very special being. So different to any of us, so… old.'
Eric fell silent for a moment again. I could feel he was interested in the topic, as if knowing all that there was to know about me was his life goal.
'Why was she so special then?'
Indeed why? There were so many things she has seen in a different way than the rest of our kind. So many things that were exceptional in her. Her eyes, her face, her voice. The way she learned to fly, like it was a swim in the air. She had the ability to change the hearts of those who listened to her, even without charming them, and even though she was a beast in their eyes, she was more humane than any human ever born.
'She was a day walker.'
Oh. And that too.
Eric was no longer just shocked or curious. A day walker was after all not a common side of vampirism, and most of those who have claimed they posses it, burned long ago. The rest played it so they would never have to prove it.
'I mean no disrespect, but… have you ever… actually… seen that maker of yours walk the sun?'
I let out another chuckle. Yes you have meant no disrespect Eric, and I was not as stupid to just believe that a creature of the night would freely walk in the sun, just because she said so. And there was no doubt she could. She walked the sun every day, when there was a need for it.
'Yes, I am sure. I have met her in the full sun while I was still just a boy, and many times after I was no longer one, she still would live half of her life in it.'
Now, this next question I have expected.
'Can she make others walk the sun?'
I thought of it for a moment. She had developed many things for the benefit of our kind during her almost endless lifetime, that she have never shared with the rest of the community, but not even once I've seen her working on what I imagined would be called 'the essence of the sun'. She created a liniment that would protect us from the silver, and could prepare a brew that would let us eat human food with no consequences. She even knew how, with the use of her own blood and flower petals, to create an elixir that would make us see the world as if in the sunlight, but no. She had not created a serum for the sun.
'I have to disappoint you on this one my childe. However, who knows. I have not seen her since the day I became independent, and that was over a thousand years ago. Perhaps she now had designed a formula that would let us bask in the sunlight.'
'So she is still alive? And it's possible that if we found her we could see the daylight?'
That has stung. Find her? If she could be found, Eric would most likely never become a vampire. If she could be found, I would never try to sacrifice myself for the satisfaction of the Fellowship of the Sun. If she could be found, I would not be a sheriff. She did not like the attention that came with social positions, and I would follow her as far as she would go to be away from them.
'If she is still alive, you will not find her, until she will decide to be found. Believe me, I have tried.'
A grave silence covered the room, as a fragile hope of my hot blooded child shattered with this one sentence. It was every vampire's dream to be able to walk in the sun, and she most likely held the key to it. I thought of a reason why I even left her, despite all the amazing things she could be right now. I left with a promise, yet unfulfilled, that I will find a way for us to be human again. I promised, that the next time we'll see each other, would be, when I will know the way she can choose between the moon and the sun. I was young. I was foolish. But she let me go anyway.
I raised my head, as I felt Eric was about to speak, and perhaps of the fellowship this time. It would be a good way to get my attention off of all the longings of my dead heart. And truly, he was about to open his mouth, when a timid knock was heard from behind the door.
'Yes. Please, come in.'
A young human staff member came into the room, head facing the floor, hands together.
'There… there is a young lady asking for you, Mr. Godric. She said she does not need an appointment'
'Well, tell her she does.' growled Eric.
'Shush. And did this young lady revealed her identity to you. Perhaps it is Sookie that requires my presence, and then I can understand why she did not feel, she is in a need of appointment.'
The female moved slightly toward the door, as if she feared that we would jump at her and drain her.
'Sh…she had only… told me her name. She said you will know all if I pass it onto you. She said she is called… Eiree.
My eyes widened.
Who would have guessed, that it was the day, she has chosen to be found.
