25 Years Later
Liseli lounged against the wall outside the vampire nightclub Las Noches, sipping something from a glass bottle. What was in the bottle was immaterial; vampires were immune to nearly all poisons. Risika had been right; Liseli was strong, very strong. Though she still stood no chance against the Big Three, Jager, Aubrey, and Risika, Liseli could hold her own against others such as Jessica and Fala.
For the first time in over a thousand years, a vampire meeting had been called. The witches were getting too strong. The Smoke line was experiencing a revival; over a hundred new members had been initiated within the past year, somehow the witches had discovered a new and more method of turning humans into witches. The vampire community was suffering, even Risika had been in a few close scrapes lately.
"Listen up," Risika shouted over the din. Nearly a thousand vampires lined the streets of New Mayhem; everyone was fighting, talking, or fighting.
"She said, LISTEN UP!" Aubrey shouted louder than Risika. Although they were sworn enemies Aubrey and Risika had called a temporary truce, or at least a halt of open hostilites, until the witches could be dealt with.
"You all know why you were called here today; the Smoke line must be halted," Risika said, "Some of you have been scraping by, avoiding conflicts with the witches, we demand that this stop."
"Vampires have always been, and will continue to be superior to witches. We must show them that we are not afraid to kill them," Aubrey said, his tattoos moving on his arms as he waved them in the air.
"The vampire community, united, is infinitely more powerful than the witches. It is time to tap into that power. The Smoke witches must be killed," Risika said, her golden hair flashing in the bright moonlight.
~*~
The vampires had learned that the witches were recruiting their new members from various high schools and colleges. A few vampires had been shadowing a few choice witches and had learned where they were planning on looking next for new members.
Rowenoak High School.
Rowenoak was located in Virginia, in the middle of a fairly large and busy city, just the type where a few students would not be missed when they entered the world of the witches and the vampires.
As the most powerful young vampire, it was Liseli's duty to keep an eye on this school, and to kill any witches that she saw. Liseli was excited for this job; she had fought witches before, but had never killed any. Usually vampires tried not to kill witches because there were so few of them that the death of any one would lead to retaliation from the other lines. This situation was an exception, the witches must be killed, swiftly and thoroughly. Liseli had been given a magical knife, similar to the one that Aubrey carried, except that this one had been forged with dark magic, thus preventing any witch from using it against Liseli. If a witch were to attempt to alter the magic within the knife, it would taint their magic with darkness, thus lessening the effect that their magic would have against any vampire.
Liseli shouldered her bag; she would be living in the apartment of a weak vampire who lived in Rowenoak. Checking her reflection in the mirror, Liseli vanished from the room with the smallest of *pops*.
~*~
Perhaps it was due to her tattoo of devil horns on the upper left arm; or maybe it was her tattoo of a black rose whose stem encircled her entire right arm; or it could have been her outfit, tight black pants with a black metallic tanktop. Whatever the reason, Liseli was attracting the stares of several students as she sat in the back of the classroom ignoring the teacher.
Liseli was busy testing the auras of the teenagers in the room, checking them for something. She wasn't quite sure what she was looking for, but she was checking all the auras for something unique. She had found nothing so far.
A bell rang and everyone around her stood up and began to leave. Somewhere in Liseli's memory of being a human she recalled that it must be lunchtime. Walking outside into the bright May sunshine Liseli put on her sunglasses to protect her eyes from the light. Liseli had not bothered to conceal the color, or lack thereof, of her eyes. She had noticed that a few people appeared to be wearing black contact lenses, she would let people think what they want of her.
Liseli sat under a sprawling oak tree watching the students go by. She did not eat anything; not that Liseli didn't find the students here appetizing, but she assumed that drinking the blood of one of them would have raised some serious suspicion. A girl sat down on the side of Liseli and took a peanut butter and jelly sandwich out of a brown paper bag.
"Hi, my name's Mary," the girl said.
Liseli nodded in Mary's direction.
"You're new here right? I don't think I've even seen you before," Mary said, "Would you like some of my sandwich?"
"No, that's okay," Liseli responded. Liseli had only been changed 25 years before and was still young enough to treat humans nicely. She always bore in mind that they were prey, but she could be nice enough to them, when she wasn't trying to kill them, that is.
Mary looked like a sweet, innocent, teenager, the same kind Liseli used to be. Mary was wearing a purple sundress that complemented nicely her brown hair, which was pulled back into a tight bun.
"So, umm, what's your name?" Mary asked.
"Liseli," Liseli replied. She was not using a fake name because she wanted any witches around the neighborhood to know that the vampires were watching them.
"Interesting, what is it? Celtic?"
"I really don't know, the person who gave it to me is weird," Liseli said, thinking that if Mary ever met Risika, Mary would find her a lot more than just weird.
Mary laughed. "I imagine your mom is pretty cool."
"Why's that?"
"Well, there's the name, and the tattoo," Mary said.
"Actually, it's tattoos, plural," Liseli said.
"Oh, I only saw the rose. Where are the other two?" Mary asked. For all that Mary looked like a prude she had quite a curious streak in her.
Liseli twisted so that Mary could see the devil horns on her other arm and then lifted her hair so that Mary could see the Chinese character on her back.
"Oh, what's that one on your back?"
"It's Chinese."
"Does it mean anything?"
"Damned one," Liseli said, a faint smile playing on her lips as she waited for Mary's response.
"Really?" Mary said, raising her eyebrows, "Are you a Satanist?"
"No, not really," Liseli said.
"Why do you have a tattoo saying 'damned one' on your back then," Mary said, taking a bite out of her sandwich.
"Hi girls, can I have a seat? My name's Taylor" someone asked, dropping a bookbag onto the ground.
Liseli looked up, squinting in the sun. The person who had asked, Taylor, was a fairly attractive young man, with blond hair and a very nice tan.
Taylor sat next to Liseli and leaned over to whisper something to her.
"I don't know what you're playing at, vamp, but once I find out, you're trash," Taylor said, nearly hissing.
Liseli rubbed her chin thoughtfully, pondering over who Taylor was. He was a witch, that much was painfully obviously, both from his comment and his aura, which revealed him to be of the Smoke line, though a relatively new initiate, less than 5 years old.
Suddenly she remembered. Taylor had tried to attack her the previous year in Boston while she had been feeding. The fight was pathetic; Liseli had escaped having drank not only human blood, but a fair amount of witch blood as well, and Taylor had been left in a ditch, having passed out from blood loss.
"So, Taylor," Mary said, "What brings you over here?"
"Oh nothing special," he replied, grinning broadly. "What's your name?"
"I'm Mary and that's Liseli," Mary responded.
"Liseli, that's a rather exotic name," Taylor said. "What's your last name?"
Taylor was obviously trying to find out more about Liseli; usually the line from which a vampire came from revealed their strengths and weaknesses. There were too many vampires for a witch to keep track of them all, and Taylor had probably forgotten which line Liseli had come from, if he had even known at all.
"Silver, my full name is Liseli Silver," Liseli said. She said this proudly; the Silver line was the strongest in all the world possessing very few weaknesses.
"Say Liseli, why don't you take off your sunglasses? There should be enough shade here for any living being," Taylor said, reaching over and whipping off Liseli's glasses.
Liseli cried out as the sunlight hit her tender eyes. That was it; no one hurt a Silver vampire and lived to tell the tale.
~*~
A/N: This continuation of the first chapter was not planned when I first wrote Risika's Fledgling, but I got a lot of feedback saying that they liked Liseli (who, by the way, is not a Mary-Sue. I would never portray myself as a bloodthirsty dark creature!). Please review or e-mail me at SmallSarah@aol.com with comments, questions, or ideas. The plot for this series is not yet complete and I would be grateful for any suggestions or requests (hey, you might even get a cameo). -Serafina