Disclaimer: I don NOT I repeat, do NOT own Nightwalker though I would kill to But I do own Kitani, Hex, and Sakashima
Authoress Note: THANK YOU EVERYONE!!!!! I'm so glad you like it! Though I adore cliffies ::hides:: don't hurt me.
It didn't take long for Shido's eyes to adjust to the change in light. He stood with his darker copy in the center of a run down room. The wallpaper was peeling and so dirty it was hard to believe that it was once white. Empty beer bottles and cans were scattered over the floor along with the tattered curtains that were torn from the windows. Graffiti covered the outside as well as inside. Every bit of glass was shattered and holes textured the walls. There was no sign that anyone had ever lived there within the last ten years.
Sakashima pulled at his sleeve signaling him to follow, leading him through a broken and vandalized door into a hallway. There were five different doors there and together, they passed through the only at the very end. Inside the detective was pulled to the far corner, into the closet, and through a small door in the far back, concealed with a sheet of metal. They only had to duck their heads for a few feet before they came out in another hallway. There was a staircase with doors on the next level. Instead of going up, he was led under it and through another hidden doorway. After walking down another low ceiling hallway, through the boiler room, and up another flight of stairs, they reached the final door. As they stepped through the threshold, they passed from the abandon apartment building into a palace.
The whole room was ablaze with jeweled lamps with ivory stems and marble bases. White lace curtains hung in front of boards painted to look like the windows they covered. Deep red velvet carpet stretched out past the small marble square inside the door where you place your shoes. A great crystal chandelier hung overhead, making everything glimmer even more brilliantly. Dark wood end tables of mahogany sat on either side of red courtly settees and chairs with golden legs. The polished tables were adorn with beautiful white doilies, hand painted vases overflowing with roses and other little trinkets. A grand piano sat to on corner, music on the stand, keys exposed and ready to play as if awaiting the ghostly hands that would flow over them like liquid fire. Cabinets of the same glorious wood sat against the wall with golden knobs and decorated, frosted glass door displayed glittering stem glasses of all sizes. An Old World globe sat on its wooden stand in by the desk in front of the only window that wasn't borded. Dark wood shelves lined one wall, filled with a wide variety of books; a few that were open on the desk, ready for study. Potted ferns and climbing plants sat on either side of the bookcases with wide foliage like hands reaching for the plaster ceiling.
But above all, the most beautiful thing there was the angelic statue that rested on one of the settees. Her placid face was flawless and emotionless and her eyes were shut lightly as if in a shallow sleep. The top of her dress was unzipped, the sleeves empty of her arms. The cloth was held almost protectively over her small chest with one elegant hand. The other was placed in her lap. Curls the color of post-storm skies fell unbound over her small white shoulders. She was like and archangel, fallen from heaven, the way she sat there, her delicate form surrounded in tendrils of sunshine and a pair of strong white arms wrapped about her waist.
Shido was a little shocked that in his fascination, he hadn't seen the man behind her. She was sitting on Cain's lap, trapped in an embrace with his chin resting on her head, rocking her slightly back and forth.
Hex stood like a ghost, poised with a violin, a Stradivarius, to his chin, the bow resting just barely above the strings. Sakashima was already sitting at the piano, his fingers outstretched and ready. They were two statues awaiting a silent message from heaven to begin a festival of white faces and sculpted limbs.
Hex's bow glided over the strings in a soft, eerie note accompanied by a low chord of the piano. Sakashima's fingers flew over the black and white keys on their own accord as he tapped his foot to the rhythm, his eyes were shut, not acknowledging the music but feeling it. He hit another low chord with one hand while his other flowed over the higher keys. Softening, he turned to look at Hex, who'd been playing the harmony, and gave him the okay to go on. With rapid strokes the strings sang mournfully as the young vampire tore the sadist notes from the gleaming instrument. He bent forward then craned back in an odd dance as if he were ripping the notes from his soul instead of the violin. The piano had stopped as the shrill hymn broke into a fast, riveting melody before dying away with one long low tone.
The room fell silent; no one moved; the immortals were all stunned. Or at least Shido was. He had never heard anything like it. The pure despair expressed in that one ending note was enough to chill the blood in his veins. He would have shivered from the feeling but he couldn't move in the least. Hex sighed heavily when he lowered the lustrous instrument as if he hadn't drawn a breath through the entire performance. A slow clapping resounded through the silence. Kitani sat like a porcelain doll applauding quietly. In time, her Master joined in in her appreciation. But even with this new sound, Shido couldn't move. The song had seem to bind him in spirit so all he could do was stare.
The girl's quiet voice broke his seemingly eternal trance. "Sakashima?" she said, barely noticing the lips upon her shoulders and neck. "Could you play a song that I may dance to?" Her elder brother nodded and as he turned back to the keys, was stopped by a gesture from Hex.
"You may play later brother." Hex turned his attention to Shido. "I would like to take our guest out and he seems quite shaken at the moment." The boy smirked and came to the detective's side. "How would you like to come out with us? We can show you the city in a whole different light."
Without thinking, Shido nodded though afterward he was screaming at himself for accepting the offer. Kitani rose to her delicate bare feet and smiled. "Then I shall have to change, it's terribly difficult to keep up in this gown." In one swift movement, she passed through a door near the back of the room. It seemed that the other three didn't need a change of wardrobe.
"Sakashima," Cain's deep voice addressed his son. "Why don't you and I prepare some drinks so they might be chill when we return?" The two men were gone through the archway beside the bookcases, leaving the detective and the youngest son to stand alone in the parlor. There was a slight pull on his sleeve as the black haired archangel pulled him to one of the shelves.
Reaching up, he took out a single book, bound in leather, and opened it to the back inside cover. There was a small pocket there and with confident white fingers, he withdrew a small silver key. Striding off to the glass cabinet, he unlocked it and reached into the back to pull out another key. With both keys in hand, he lifted one of the potted ferns on the floor and pulled up a small trapdoor to reveal a lock. He put the second key in the locked and turned it. A panel on one side of the bookcase moved exposing another lock. After opening that one, five leather bound books sat in the hidden compartment. Along the binding in gold lettering read "Darkside Stories".
"Why are you showing me this?" Shido asked, baffled. Hex pulled out one and held it out as if the detective were supposed to take it. As he reached out to accept the book, the breath was caught in his throat when his fingers fell on the gold lettering beneath the title that spelled out his name.
Another Authoress Note: Ahahahaha!! another one! well I'm give you a preview. One: you'll find out what these books are and why one has Shido's name on it. Two: . . . . . um . . . . well . . . . . yeah. That my friends . . . is a secret