Thirteen
Saben had been walking for hours, hadn't slept since the Longest Night. She wrapped her arms around herself her thoughts racing. She had never wanted a child. If anyone knew she was carrying a bastard witch child they'd kill her. It was Night World law. Or worse yet the Day would take pity on its bastard blood.
"I'm sorry, kid." She murmured to the foetus. Tears had already dried on her cheeks, dust clinging to the glittering trails.
Her bare feet ached from her zig zag journey through the desert. Her tongue was thick, desolate.
She found herself suddenly standing in the middle of a residential neighbourhood, houses dappling in the early morning light.
Saben had never known this kind of life she wondered what kind of life a child of hers would have.
She knocked timidly on a door, waiting with trembling hands. A girl opened the door, she was no more than seventeen maybe a little older, her pretty face softened by long golden hair and Saben was struck by how different she was from Blaise. The difference of Day from Night.
"Hello." She said, the notes of those syllables brought fresh tears to Saben's eyes.
"You're Thea?" She asked, her voice was hoarse, trembling like her hands.
"We've met once before." Thea said though she couldn't place the girl's name nor face.
Saben took a step toward the girl. "Yes, I am…was…a friend of T…Blaise."
"Blaise? You know Blaise?" Thea's eyes lingered on her black feet, her muddy dress and wild pink hair. She drew her gently inside but a guarded smile lit her face. "Please come in out of the heat."
Saben found herself sitting on a couch. The smell of animals was strong, she could hear the snuffling of an animal beyond the door. She stared at the cosy living room, the mismatched furniture and picture frames bearing smiling faces of normal people. A picture of Thea and a blond boy twined together, their bright smiles were almost obscene.
"I don't know what to do." She confessed. "I need help but I don't know who-"
"What's the problem?"
She looked back at the photograph of Thea and her lover embracing and swallowed.
"If you don't tell me I can't help you."
"I'm pregnant." She whispered.
"Oh."
"Tobias…"
"Oh."
After a long silence she spoke. "I can't tell them, they wouldn't understand."
"And you thought I would?"
"You have a human lover, Blaise told me what you did for him: what you gave up for him." She stared up at the witch's face, benevolent features arranged in sympathetic distress but whether it was for her or the fact Blaise had confided such an intimate tale, Saben couldn't distinguish. "You have to help me."
"What exactly do you think I can do for you?" Thea was on her feet, pacing, already thinking.
"I have nowhere else to go." Saben hung her head.
Thea made an excuse to leave the room and she could hear Thea's voice through the halls. She was on the phone, maybe calling someone from the Day. Maybe Tobias. She felt the urge to leave and in a hurry, looking around the room for an escape rout.
Thea soon came back looking sad but resolute. "I'll arrange for a place for you to go but, Saben you have to tell Tobias about the child"
Shocked and relieved Saben's hand twisted on her stomach as if she could cup the multiplying cells in her womb. "Thank you."
Abberline stood at the large, tinted window of his apartment looking out on a glittering sprawl of the city below.
"Good night?" Celsia was seated comfortably on the couch and had been since before he had got in that night. She stared at him in silence until now, interrupting his reverie.
"There's no going back, Celsia." He replied cryptically.
"Sound advice." She replied running her hands up and down the back of the couch. "Come sit."
He shook his head, resolute to continue his vigil upon the city.
"Where were you tonight?" She asked her eyes narrowing into icy, suspicious slits.
He didn't reply.
"Abberline?"
He hid his face from her to disguise his tears but she caught a whiff of grief in the currents of the air. She stood and went to stand beside him at the window, her eyes on the sight of the winking lights beneath them. "You should not regret, Abberline. We are creature above the chattel, we should not be fond of our meat-"
He reached out and gripped her wrist, squeezing hard, grinding bones together. "Do no lecture me."
His eyes were intense, devouring, he was a vampire who had moved with the early tribes of the Nation, decimating empires and devouring humankind. She swallowed, eyes slipping to his hand on hers.
"Change her and end this mess." She whispered.
Possessed by inexplicable rage he pushed her to the ground. She landed gracefully, catlike, lifted her silver eyes to his face and let out a short sharp hiss. "Did you go to her tonight, Cebren? Did you go to her expecting her to swoon? Did she kiss you and confess everlasting love? She is yours for the taking if you would but take her."
His mouth fell open to reveal his fangs and his eyes turned an unnaturally bright blue illuminated by his anger. "You know nothing."
She laughed and rose to her feet, swaying slightly. "I have watched you in a daze for these past eleven years and for what? A child? A little nothing. Vermin."
"Don't push me."
"You are a Lord of the Night World, feared across the expanse of the globe, a nightmare, a scourge and yet you tremble. Take her, Abberline."
"She is already taken." He snarled.
She stared at him.
"I am not a creature to beg." He continued in a calm voice that did not match the wild storms in his eyes. "I will not debase myself by having her as a prisoner at my side spitting curses at me."
Celsia grit her teeth.
"It would mean both our deaths." Abberline was honour bound to the council who raised him to be a Lord of the Night. Through them he had power, through them he had command of legions of vampires. He could not turn his back for the company…the love of one human girl.
"You can sanction the change, persuade your allies to-"
"And what reason should I use? The truth?"
Celsia shook her head, no. They would set upon him like wolves on meat and they would pick him apart, hurtling toward execution. Death for an immortal was more fearful than for mortals, she knew. Attached to life as they were, centuries creeping to eons of life.
He walked up to her and lay a kiss upon her cold cheek. "You have such power of me now, Sia. I fear you'll use what you know against me, stab me in the back and twist the blade."
"You're right to fear me, but I would never betray you." Because she loved him though she would never again say it aloud.
"We will speak no more of this." He said arms encircling her, hands stroking her back. "And this thing will simply disappear."
"Yes, my Lord." She replied softly and thoroughly unconvinced.
Despite the danger of being there, Thea Harman marched into the magic store. Grandma's store, she thought to herself sadly. Suddenly surrounded by the familiar sights and smells she felt dizzy but she curled her hands into resolute fists, and didn't delay in bounding up the staircase.
"What are you doing here?" She spun round to find herself face to face with her cousin.
Blaise's arms were folded across her chest, her head tilted to one side a perfectly shaped eyebrow arched. She was radiant in her simple Egyptian dress reminded Thea of Ishtar, goddess of love, war and sex.
"I've just come to collect some things." Her voice was not as firm as she had wished and she felt instantly nervous.
"You know you're not supposed to be seen here. Where's Saben?" Blaise didn't beat around the bush. "I know she's been to see you." She approached only to pluck a single pink hair from Thea's shoulder.
"What of it?"
"No one has seen her since and I was curious as to why."
"Just leave it alone Blaise."
"You can't keep secrets, Thea." She shot back.
Thea shook her head and pushed past Blaise toward the spare room, a room she had stayed in once, the familiar place made her throat thick with tears. Blaise watched from the threshold as her cousin started to collect clothes from the drawers.
"How do you know that's hers?" Blaise asked.
Saben held up a t shirt riddled with holes. "Somehow I don't think this is Tobias' style."
She worked in silence after that, the tension between the cousins growing. Thea's unhappiness deepening as Saben's words buzzed about her head until she couldn't stand it any longer. She turned round setting an intense stare on Blaise who remained calm and cool. "Saben told me what you said about Witches and humans. It's a lie, a racist lie."
Blaise laughed. "Oh come on, Thea. The Circles would have never allowed it, it was ruining Grandma's good name having her star pupil settle down with vermin."
"Grandma would never have let you-"
"Grandma's dead."
Silence fell between them.
"I'm taking her stuff and she doesn't want either of you to see her again. Neither do I."
"Maybe it's for the best." Blaise nodded.
Thea shook her head, feeling the crushing weight of disappointed. Her lips trembled, eyes shining with unshed tears. She had thought better of Blaise, had hoped that Blaise could understand. "I hope you feel ashamed of yourself." She whispered before she left.
Climbing into Eric's car, Blaise watched from the window as they pulled onto the road and disappeared from sight.
"Thank you." Saben muttered as the unnamed vampire dropped her bag on the porch.
She looked up at the house. A large white painted haven, a safe house where no one would find her, no would care. She had been assigned a nurse to tend to her now and again because of her pregnancy but for now Saben was alone.
The keys jangled in her hand.
She put a hand to her flat belly. "Home sweet home, eh kid?"