Poem by Mary Elizabeth Frye
Practikal Magik, Bex Drake, Amstar thank you for your reviews much appreciated darlings...
To fear is to have one's heart jump into one's mouth and one's stomach to disappear totally
Eternity's hands were shaking as she looked up at him. She was shivering but she was not afraid. Not yet. Just shocked. Though she had never seen a picture of Hellfire she had assumed he looked how his name sounded. Tall, which he was anyway, with flaming blonde red hair and wildly changing eyes like most Redfern's. But no.
The vampire who stood in front of her was no more and no less than a beautifully ordinary human. Chocolate hair falling passed his ears, and wistfully flicking out at odd angles, his eyes a puppy dog look to them but with an age standing behind them shadowing the innocence they portrayed. His face had not changed physically since he had revealed who he was but Eternity looked up at him differently.
He was no longer the man who had saved her life that cold and lonely night. He was the man who had condemned her to this life.
"But you can call me Michael." He said finishing off the sentence as though the two minute pause had never taken place. "No one does any more. We all have a reputation to keep, little girl and I have no one left to call me by my social name. My human name. I was once like you. Human. Pathetic and weak. Strong personality though or at least that's what Hunter's always said. And that's why he choose me."
Eternity's brains raced and raked up all information on Hellfire.... None of it was fitting. "No, it wouldn't, little girl." Michael Pope raked his hand through his hair throwing it back but some stubborn hair fell forwards in front of his eyes again. She ignored the twinge in her that her old friend Hayley would have placed, had she been there... he's beautiful. "Daybreak spies picked up information fed to them by me. As did Midday Sun though they were slightly cleverer than you lot. Midday Sun didn't trust people as much as you."
Her mouth formed the O shape. She got the feeling he was secretly laughing at her. He stood up swiftly and walked to her. She looked down to the floor, a cold old fear beating at her. He laughed aloud and sat down next to her leaning back on the sofa. She could no longer see him and the feeling of fear rose again and she tasted the acidic bile in her mouth. She leant back and started to feel the presence of his arm around her shoulders. She kept her eyes down.
"On the subject of Midday Sun isn't it a terrible shame about Dover?" She let no physical sign of her repulsion to him but her mind was screaming something terrible. "Real shame. He was such a... brilliant fighter. But he's bound to make a mistake. He's only human." Eternity swallowed choking down the ball of anger in her throat.
"And you've never made a mistake?" She asked. In the vaguest corner of her mind she was wondering why on earth she was not being bled dry. What was, possibly, the vilest man on earth's motive? What was he trying to do? Michael Pope let out a chuckle.
"I have. Once." Eternity rolled her eyes. Once. Yeah right. "And I have a constant reminder of it." She felt his smile light up the room with a fiery humour. She shuddered against her will. "But no. My mistake will not be the death of me. His was." Eternity felt her hair being lifted and shuddered as Hellfire's fingers danced along the finer parts of her hair.
"He had another mistake you see." His voice had changed to hide a hint of humour and he spoke around his smile. "Something he never forgave himself for." Hellfire let her hair drop back to her neck. He laughed as she shuddered. "You see Ben Dover was not his name. Actually his name was another." Hellfire contemplated this for a minute. In spite of herself Eternity held her breath to hear. He was intriguing her more than scaring.
"Ben Dover was named 'Ben Tippet' when his little sister was taken away from him. His little sister who when she was, oooo, fourteen say, on holiday in Italy. Some pretty perverted vampire liked the look of her and chased her until she almost died. She was rescued by one Valerio Pazler who when she awoke with no knowledge of who she was or how she came to be took her to daybreak. But her big brother never forgot her. He left his parents to chase his sister who had presumed to be kidnapped by the mafia for a ransom. As no ransom arrived the brother presumed vampire and set up an organisation against them back in his home town. Now a national organisation the most deadly anti Night World run by humans in the world. And you are the cause Ms Tippet."
"Now I'm going to deal with my mistake and your friends, I hope you realise what you have done. Save me the bother of killing you." Ms Tippet fainted. Hell's fire left the room laughing loudly leaving the door unlocked. He didn't look back as he attacked a daybreaker and drained him dry.
-*-
Eternity's eyes opened with a start. Her head felt like a dead weight that her shoulders could not take. She stood hastily remembering in an instant what she was never to forget. She scrambled out the room almost falling in her haste. The dreary drab of her surroundings was covered in the layer of elusive black. The stretched of dried blood hung in the air.
She stumbled almost as though drunk into the foyer of the warehouse. The shadow of a hung body stopped the lights from shining directly upon her. She fell forward with a sudden feel of dizziness. An arm caught her and she looked up into a face. She had met this man once a year or more ago but the same feel of trust and blackness arose in her. Cathcarte. He smiled and vanished into the black.
The shouting came into her confused mind. She looked up to see Carthage. He was shouting, his voice almost broken, at Hellfire. Next to him Valerio's hands crafted witchfire into a orange ball. Valerio seemed just to be playing with it not actually preparing it as a weapon. Hellfire himself looked angry though this was impossible as Hellfire never showed anger. Just hate. This was not hate.
The shouting was not so that she could comprehend it. The meaning however was clear. I don't like you. Carthage stopped to look at Eternity suddenly as if suddenly noticing her presence. When he turned back again his pupils had dilated his fangs extended. "What the hell did you do to her?"
"She's perfectly fine. She's just found her brother. Coincidentally her brother just found God."
"What the fuck?! Stop with your fucking riddles!" Hellsfire laughed. Valerio came over to Eternity. He smiled peacefully at her. He seemed almost happy.
"Carthage wasn't ratting us out to Midday Sun. The spy was Wellington, Wellies mutt friend." Valerio informed her whilst picking her up and cradling her to his chest. Eternity shook her head. She looked up at him disbelivingly. It was getting to the stage where she didn't want to know anything any more. "We'd better be going anyway."
"Pardon? Wellington was a dog! How can he report on us? I'm not leaving." Valerio licked his lips animatedly.
"Dog shifter darling. And you don't get much choice in this." Valerio smiled as his legs buckled beneath him. His muscles stopped responding and she rolled out his arms onto the floor before the sound of the gunshot registered in his brain. He smiled up at her from the dirt as his eyes shut. Eternity yelped as the blood poured onto the ground from his back.
This was the last she saw before another gunshot sent a shower of sparks from the suddenly black lights. She felt for Valerio, she heard his breathing but her wandering hands could not find him. "Valerio?" She queried into the unending black. She felt close behind her the end. Carthage was within grasping distance.
He was not coming any closer. She turned to him holding her arms around his waist. They were as one in the war. She stood up with his help and they kept their arms intertwined as they walked out into the soft caressing moonlight. They as one looked up to see Hellfire. The wind whispered soulmates, the power was in the air.
"Hello." Eternity whispered smiling. Michael Pope smiled in return, baring his fangs as he did so. They disconnected from each other moving to opposite sides of Hellfire.
"So this is where you think you belong?" Hellfire asked looking directly at Carthage. Carthage's eyes had turned black with something that could not be identified as an known emotion. Smoldering within his soul he laughed. "With the humans. Your mother should have called you Hybrid. I'm sure glad you took your pathetic short lived mother's name."
"I don't belong anywhere. Least of all with you and yours." Carthage circled Hellfire who circled back both were showing fangs. Eternity stepped back out of it all.
"I never said you did. You don't belong anywhere because you never should have been born. Hybrids of mixed blood unclean and murderous. You proved that theory right." Hellfire sneered. Carthage snarled like the feral cats both he and Hellfire resembled. It was the only similarity between father and son.
"Soulmates, Hybrids. No such thing is there." Carthage snarled dancing closer upon Hellfire who dived passed and turned in a blink of an eye. Shots were heard from the warehouse. "Sounds like Midday Sun turned up a little late. I told them to come. Cathcarte will take back the body of Dover. To kill you, father, I reserved that honour for myself."
Michael Pope laughed into the abysmal night. "You believe that hussy to be your soulmate? You do not know the meaning of the word." Michael Pope blew a kiss to Eternity who looked stalwartly back. "Son you will not kill me." Carthage drew out a gun smiling like a kid in a toy shop.
"Then Christmas has come early." Carthage returned pointing the wood stake tipped gun directly at Hellfire's head. "Say goodnight, daddy." Eternity swallowed nervously. Carthage lowered the gun his eyes fixed on the gun Eternity had held earlier. From Eternity's knowledge there was only one bullet left in and it was aimed directly at her forehead. Michael Pope's gaze however had never left his son as he levelled the gun directly at the girl's head.
They pretty little triangle was interrupted by a sudden cry of anguish. From the warehouse came a half mad figure. Eternity had forgotten Hayley, her drunk friend who had disappeared that night in the warehouse. But Hayley apparently hadn't forgotten her.
Hayley's once pretty face was married with scars, her clothes were ripped as to not even keep her dignity. Even with the bloody face the expression made the young girls appearance worse. As soon as she saw Eternity such a rage came upon her that had never been seen before. Hayley landed upon Eternity with such a force than it send the girls flying backwards.
Hayley screamed as she scraped and tore at Eternity ripping her clothes and letting a small red rivulet mar her pale face. A single gunshot silenced the screams as a bullet firmly lodged itself in Hayley's brain. Carthage once again lowered his gun. He walked forward and kicked the dead human off Eternity. From behind him Hellfire watched with disgust. "Another one of your playthings gone wrong?" Carthage asked spitting at his father's feet.
"Things have gone wrong this evening..." Hellfire murmured half to himself. "Where were we?" he asked smiling down at Eternity who was staring up at Carthage with tears forming. "Oh yes. Not dying." Hellfire levelled his gun at her head.
Carthage pointed his gun at his father but lowered it a second later. "Leave. Let her be. But beware, I shall kill you not today, but tomorrow." Hellfire smirked and nodded looking at Eternity who was trying to stand. He smiled at the girl, mock bowed and walked away.
bang
Eternity fell backwards as an unknown force drove her away from Carthage.
A second later Carthage was by her side shouting, screaming, sobbing her name. Her eyes were fixed above to the half hidden moon and a small smile touched her lips, but she was as still as rock. Hell's fire laughed as he walked away swinging the now empty gun on one of his fingers.
But she still smiled up at that half-caste moon.
Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there I do not sleep,
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glint on snow,
I am the sunlight on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain,
When you awaken in the morning hush
I am the swift uplifting rush,
Of quiet birds in circled flight,
I am the soft stars that shine at night,
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there,
I do not die