Zolneryev

Novgorod 1246

Five years had gone by and Evelina and I had somehow managed to remain lovers secretly. Even after all this time, I still didn't love her per se, but I did care about her. But unrelated to the affair, I worked myself up to a manager/overseer position with Vasilyev's factory. As far as I knew, he didn't know about me and Evelina. I didn't want him to know either. I respected the man and I didn't want him to think ill of me in any way. I must admit that I probably got the position I did more because he liked me as a friend and was doing me a favor. I'm sure a lot of the other workers thought that. Since I was a Zolneryev, there really wasn't any other way this would happen to me unless I was friends with the boss. My equals said as well many times to my face and behind my back, but I never said anything about it. One however had become my friend since I'd started working there.

He and I had become especially good friends. His name was Levka Zolneryev. I'd even told him about Evelina and what was going on between us. When he knew which Evelina I meant, he'd just stared at me a moment and eventually told me I was an idiot, and he didn't bring it up again the rest of the night or until the next time we had dinner at my house.

"Does Vasilyev know about this….hanky panky going on?" I laughed a bit to myself at his choice of words, then shook my head.

"No, he doesn't know about it. I would never let him know about it. I like the man and he doesn't deserve this from me."

"Interesting. And yet you're still sleeping with her." I sighed.

"Levka, she's the one who started the affair and she's the one that insists we keep it going."

"A huh. And since when do women call the shots in a relationship?"

"She does when she's married into the royal family and could easily blackmail me if I do anything to upset her."

"Would she do that?" I shrugged.

"Probably not, but I don't want to chance it." Levka shook his head a little and sighed. He decided to change the subject to something work related.

"You know we have to make a long distance hall tomorrow right?"

"Yeah, I heard. Vasilyev said I needed to go with you guys too." Levka looked surprised.

"Why would he want you to come with us? You haven't been on a packaging trip since you were promoted." I shrugged.

"I think he wants to make sure there isn't another incident like the last time." Levka sighed.

"We don't need our manager to protect us from looters, we need soldiers."

"He's sending two with us. Don't worry, we'll have protection. But Vasilyev still needs to make a financial arrangement with the emperor so the protection can be permanent. I'm also supposed to make sure they do their job properly." Levka chuckled.

"A Zolneryev would know how a soldier should perform I suppose. Though I'll admit, it's always bothered me that they never demanded we train with the other soldiers." I shrugged.

"They don't want to muddy the waters I suppose." Levka rolled his eyes a little to himself.

We went to bed shortly after that. We needed to make the delivery early in the morning and we needed our sleep. We were up at the crack of dawn and at the factory ten minutes later. It took everyone another ten minutes to get all the supplies on the carts. Once the entire ordered product was on the carts, we set off towards our destination. It was to a smaller village an hour away from Novgorod. It was a freezing cold morning and I had buried myself under three blankets on top of my heavy fur coat and hat. I was contemplating letting my beard grow out, I was so cold. I'd take the tax, I didn't care. (Yes, around this time, men were taxed for having beards. Don't ask me why. I only know this because in math class, this was one of the freaky fakes our teacher read to us.)A half hour after we left, we began hearing things from the woods. It was probably just wolves, but I told the two soldiers accompanying us to be on their guard.

"Do you think there are more looters out there?" Levka asked me.

"It's probably just an animal. But I'd rather be prepared and not need to be than not be prepared and wind up dead." Levka smiled.

"I won't argue with that logic." All the men remained silent, listening for anything that might be other men's footsteps. But there was nothing. I told the soldiers to remain away and relaxed a little when nothing happened after five minutes. But then another sound came that from the woods that made me concerned. But before I could bring it up, something lunged at me from the bushes. It was like a boulder was thrown at me and I could feel most of my bones breaking. Then I felt a stinging bite on my neck. I yelled, but there was more yelling in the background and I couldn't hear my own voice over it. Desperate, I reached to my right and grabbed the first thing I could, a large stick, and hit the thing on top of me with it.

What was on me pulled away, but not from pain. I realized it was a man, much paler than me and his eyes were red. He didn't seem to be bothered by me hitting him. If anything, he looked amused. He stayed sitting on top of me, knowing it hurt too much to try and move. Then, I suddenly felt something burning on my neck, but I couldn't put it out. Instead, I opted to scream, hoping someone would help me. But no one did. Once I started screaming, the man on top of me began laughing. Then he stood and grabbed a hold of my neck. I couldn't breathe anymore, but that didn't last for long. He brought me closer to his face until his mouth was near my ear. Then he whispered.

"Welcome to my world."

Then the man threw me into the woods, farther than I thought a man would be able to. By the time I'd landed, the burn was radiating all over my body and it was all I could feel. I was staring into the sky with the snow falling and the blistering chills doing nothing to ease my pain. Even when nightfall came, the cold did nothing for the burn. I wanted to move, maybe take off my coat to ease the burn, but I couldn't stand to. Three moons passed before I began feeling any relief. It ended first in my hands and feet until it worked its way up to my heart where it burned mercilessly for several minutes. Then the pain stopped, and I breathed out only to realize that I didn't need to breath. How odd. I also realized the cold didn't seem to bother me either. I sat up, took off my glove, and stuck my hand into the snow. I waited a few minutes, but there was no pain, no numbness from frost bite. I realized my hand was paler too.

I stood up and began walking aimlessly. I crossed the path that I remembered was what my group and I had been on the road. They weren't there anymore. There were a few remnants of the broken cart and a few shards of vodka bottles, the contents of which I could easily smell, but no bodies. Not even some blood, but the snow would most likely be a culprit of that. But then I also realized my throat was still burning. It was horrible, but I didn't know what to do. I tried eating snow. There was a slight relief, but nowhere near good enough. I started walking down the path, not knowing what else I could possibly do. Hours passed, and I crossed paths with travelers. Without even thinking, I killed them all and drank their blood. The blood soothed the burn. I also saw myself in their silver buckles. My eyes were scarlet red, but it didn't frighten me like I thought it would. I was more bothered by all the ringing sounds that were in my ear. Some were louder than others, but somehow, I knew these sounds and what direction they were coming from. I followed one of those rings to a woman in the woods gathering firewood. I drank her blood too.

I realized the rings were coming from people. It was strange, yet oddly convenient for hunting, and I took it to the fullest advantage. It was three years of wondering before I heard tenors, as I called them, that weren't like the others. They were different in such a subtle way, but enough that I knew it wasn't human. That's when I met Anna and Alecsandr. They were kind to me and they took me into their group with open arms. They asked me several things about what I remembered about my human life and how long I'd been a vampire. We ended up walking for hours until we reached a little cottage that seemed to be theirs. I found that strange that vampires would have a cottage. Then, as we approached, out came a little girl. Alecsandr tried to avert my eyes to her while Anna took the little girl back inside, scolding her. She was a vampire like us, I could tell. She had our red eyes and I could smell her sweet scent even from as far away as I was.

"Who was that?" I asked Alecsandr. He seemed extremely reluctant to tell me. I wondered why.

"It's no one. Just a little village girl my wife took in."

"You changed a child? Whatever for?" I couldn't understand why Alecsandr was so distraught seemingly over me realizing he and Anna had this child. But he breathed out and looked me dead in the eyes with a stern, but pleading gaze.

"If I explain this to you, you must keep this a secret. You're to tell no one of this."

"Of course. Why is there such a problem?" Then, Alecsandr realized I didn't understand what the problem was. Then he sighed in relief.

"It's a silly thing. I wouldn't worry too much of the matter, but I ask that you still keep that little girl's existence a secret. Please. Anna would be heartbroken if anything happened to that girl. Her own children died of disease when she was human, so she changed the girl when she found her suffering from the same disease as her children. She even named her Kathryn, after her eldest daughter."

"So you saved her from certain death. I see. Worry not, I won't tell a soul of Kathryn." Alecsandr smiled.

"Thank you, Demetri. I'm indebted to you."

Demetri stayed with Alecsandr and Anna for years after that. Kathryn would usually stay in that little house while they went out looking for blood for her. Fifteen years went by. There was no change to Kathryn and no change to Demetri either. He'd become used to being in that group, but he remained relatively silent with them. The only request they'd ever made of him was to make sure they never encountered the Volturi. Despite having no way of knowing who the Volturi were, he promised to keep himself alert and avoid their tenors at all cost.

On the fifteen year mark, Demetri began hearing tenors approach, but it was a large group. He sensed eleven tenors together. Demetri mentioned this to Alecsandr, who instinctively knew only the Volturi would travel together in a group that size and asked him to keep them out of distance with them. He managed to do so for several months. But eventually, the group split up. That made it harder to avoid the Volturi. Days after that, Demetri noticed they were closing in on where he and his new coven where, but he still did what he could to avoid the Volturi. But eventually, it was impossible and they were cornered. All eleven vampires encountered Demetri, Alecsandr, and Anna. When a man with long black hair came into site, a larger man with cropped hair was holding Kathryn.

"Kathryn!" Anna Ran to Kathryn, but Felix pushed her back and she landed in Alecsandr's arms. "Kathryn, honey, are you okay?" Kathryn was sobbing tearlessly while the man with cropped hair held her by the collar. The man with long black hair looked at a tall, auburn haired woman in a language Demetri didn't recognize. Then she walked closer to them and began speaking to them in Russian.

"I take it you three recognize this little girl."

"Please," Anna pleaded, "Let her go. The fault is mine and mine alone. She was sick. I couldn't leave her that way. I had to help her." The woman looked back at the man with black hair and translated. He responded with a breathy laugh, spoke, then the woman translated.

"If you wanted to help her, you should have killed her. Instead, all you did was set yourself up for execution. Not just for yourself, but for this little girl, and the two men traveling with you." The black haired man then said something to the man with cropped hair. That man then twisted Kathryn's neck, separated her head from her shoulders. Anna screamed and tried to run to Kathryn, but Alecsandr held her back.

Alecsandr began to plea, but the crop haired man ran to them and killed them. He was about to strike Demetri, but Demetri, unlike his companions, fought back viciously. The black haired man began watching intently, telling his other members to stand back and let the two men fight. The fight went on for several minutes before Demetri eventually won and tore then man's head from his shoulders. After he won, the black haired man began clapping and Demetri looked at him oddly. He began walking closer to Demetri, who stepped back. The man glanced back at the woman pleadingly.

"He wants to read your mind. I think he has high hopes for you."

"He what?" Demetri said. The man then took a hold of Demetri's hand and stood still for several seconds before he let go and smiled. Then he spoke to the woman, who then interpreted.

"He's impressed with your tracking power. He said he's willing to allow you to live despite your involvement on the condition that you join our coven. Mind you, Aro's rather impatient, so I suggest you decide what you want to do now." Demetri glared at the woman.

"Join or die. That's my option? Fine! I can fight all of you off." The woman shook her head.

"Don't, please. I know it's a rather unreasonable request in such a short time, but please say yes. Enough will be killed today." Around that time, the man Demetri had taken down had managed to put his head back on and cracked it into place. He looked at Demetri with a smile and held out his hand for a shake and said something. "He said he's never been bested before and he's impressed. His name is Felix." Demetri reluctantly accepted Felix's hand.

"Demetri." The woman pointed at herself.

"And I'm Heidi." Then Heidi introduced the rest of the group and what their power was, then Heidi once again begged Demetri to accept Aro's offer. Eventually, Demetri sighed, rolled his eyes, and nodded.

"Fine."