I thought I died. It felt like it – the peace that came with it was palpable. Instead I slept in his arms for a long, long time. Just him and me in the darkness, surrounded by death. He had caused me so much pain, and yet he was the one I turned to when it was all over. Was this part of his plan as well – to make me seek him out, despite how much I hated him? In any case I woke up at last, but I was not myself. I could see them all coming towards me in the dark – trying to take my body once more.

My fathers face all around me, the other ones that had suceeded, manipulated and destroyed my innocense. I whimpered and closed my eyes, but I could still hear them, breathing, waiting. Aro's arms tightened around me, but he said nothing. We were still sittting against the wall, we hadn't left.

"I can hear them coming, can't you hear them?" I asked, whispered in the darkness lest they hear. I shivered, my eyes roaming around in the darkness, searching.

"It was a trick. It was all a trick to make you suffer. Nothing of what you hear is real." he finally said, one of his hands stroking my cheek. But he wouldn't look me in the eye as he said it.

"You helped him do this to me. You allowed him to do it." I whispered, and he let me go as I suddenly stood up – but the pain in my body didn't let me do it easily. There was no anger or malice in my voice, just wonder – just a statement of the truth. I picked at an invisible scratch on my arm and coughed, an aborted sound that might have been a cry, a shout. The dead bodiea around us - both human and vampire, some of which I'd killed. Aros hands vere messy, covered in blood.

"Yes. I always knew that you had something in your blood that was special. Something that wanted out – I could sense it. But I knew that it would never be unless something was done. Your punishment was a good excuse – and this ancient vampire, whom you have killed, was aware. "

I listened to his words, yet they formed in the air to snakes that bit at my flesh, coiling around my lungs. I looked at my hands, my skin – I had felt them burn as I touched anyone who came near me. How they had vaporized anyone who dared to touch me. I looked at him again and he turned his head away, and now I could see what he was feeling – shame. My hands shook as I held them out to him.

"I don't understand – why do I have this? Did you curse me with this?" I asked, my voice small. He sighed in the dark, his feet propped up on a corpse at his feet. "It is not a curse, it is in your blood. Your family line was counting on it – but not even I could predict a gift of such power. We knew that the celtics protected a family of vampire hunters – hunters who were rumoured to come from the offspring of supernatural creatures. When I saw that necklace, yes the very one your mother gave you – I knew then that meeting you twice in my lifetime was no coincidence. " His words – more talk, more manipulation.

None of it could be true.

I backed further away from him and his eyes widened as he got up off the ground, his eyes fixed on me.

"Just stay away. Just stay the fuck away from me." I hissed, and for once, he obeyed. He looked down at the stone floor in silence, but that didn't last. A sudden look of urgency came over his face as he looked back at me – something not quite sane in his eyes.

"Please. Please don't go."

"You know I have to. There is nothing left between us now. Nothing at all. "

"I can't undo any of it, I know. And I've tried, god knows I have tried to make you do as I wish but I can't- " he stopped talking, swallowing hard as he just stared at me for a moment. It was as if he was realizing something as he did so, a dawning horror on his face as tears began to fall.

"I can't make you love me."

His words left an imprint on both of us. I felt the shadows within myself withdraw a little as I saw his tears. He was the one who was naive, not me. I shook my head at him.

"I do love you, Aro. But not in the way that you imagined. I love you because your days and nights are never part of reality. I love you because you have demons too. I love you because you think devotion is forever, or not at all. But it is not enough to make me stay." He began advancing towards me now, with a desperation and a drive in his eyes – a predator trying to corner his prey, but a predator who is weak and starving – one who cannot last without the other.

"Do you want revenge? You can make me suffer as much as you have. Oh I will give it to you, my suffering, my pain at your will. I know that would make you happy, it would make it all better!" he exclaimed, beginning to reach out for me when I retreated, baring my hands at him.

"Don't!" I shouted and he faltered, unsure.

"Nothing of what you say will convince me to stay. And I will go Aro, and whatever you try, it will not stop me. Not this time."

It had been a long, long time since I had seen him look truly afraid. It reminded me of our time spent together in that other life, when he used to wake me after nightmares, his face ashen and terror without an end written on his lips. He bore the same expression now, desolation and fear. I was finally going to leave him in the dark, with his own demons.

And part of me hated myself for it.

After I had left the castle, the outside devoid of other people, it seemed just like an abandoned building, like nobody had lived there for centuries – and in one way, that was true. But the cars were still parked outside. I hobbled my way down the stone staircase by the entrance, and as I walked away I suddenly heard a distant crash behind me, along with a long, agonizing scream.

I continued walking away, getting into one of the many cars that still littered the driveway. As I drove away on the small road through the forest, the castle became smaller and smaller in the distance, before finally disappearing altogether from my sight.

I drove for a long time, through the night and into the early morning. It began to rain as I crossed the border to france, but I kept the windows rolled down. As the toll booths loomed near, I realized that I had no identification with me, or a passport. But there was no fear or worry as I realized it. I doubt my old passport would have worked now, give to how I'd changed, both inside and out.

The girl on that picture was maybe still there, somewhere inside me. But the one who gripped the steering wheel with gritty and bloody fingernails was somebody else entirely.

THE END