So Flows the River of Blood
Chicago, Illinois, 1864
With more force than was truly necessary, Astra slammed the door to the room that Elijah had reserved for them. The walls around it shook as the resounding bang echoed throughout nearly the entire building. Elijah flinched from the lobby, the sound even louder for him that it was for the humans around him. Astra didn't seem to care, because she proceeded to do the same with the bathroom door as well.
"I apologize," he said hurriedly but calmly to the man behind the front desk, who looked at him incredulously for a moment. "A simple argument. She will calm down soon." The man nodded, still appearing flustered and irate at what had happened, before he handed back the money that he owed Elijah and allowed the vampire to leave and try and speak with Astra. It wouldn't do for her to wake up everyone in the hotel. Again.
"A simple argument?" she hissed as soon as he was inside, her voice carrying through the door of the washroom. "You killed me, kidnapped me, and refuse to leave me be!" she growled out, throwing open the door. Elijah ran forward, stopping directly in front of her, and reached out to catch the door before it could swing back and hit the wall, creating more noise.
His eyes held her own, the hatred that was directed at him leaving a swelling pain in his chest that he had hoped would never return. Hundreds of years had gone by and she was still just as angry, if not more so, than he had last seen her. "Please, calm down. You know that there is no need for excessive anger."
"It is not a switch that can be turned on and off, Elijah," she spat his name like venom and pushed past him violently. He didn't try and stop her, but turned to watch her carefully as she stepped up to the chair by the window and fell to sit down, not carrying that she was slouching and appeared improper. To hell with society's norms, she was sick and tired of it. She wished she was back in Rome, when she could wear the thin summer dresses that didn't nearly break her ribs.
"I understand that you hate me, Astraea-"
"Astra," she corrected darkly. "I go by Astra now. Astraea brings far too many questions to the surface."
Elijah let out a huff of air that resembled something of amusement as he looked away from her. "So that is why it has been so difficult to locate you through connections. You've changed your name, you've changed your style. I am surprised that you aren't wearing a wig to change your hair colour." Against her will, Astra made a face at the mention of wearing a wig that had Elijah smiling with mirth. As much as she tried to say she had changed, she was still very much the Astraea that he knew. "You will always be Astraea to me."
"Then you're going to be far behind in the times," she scoffed, turning her attention out the window.
"When did you last feed?" Elijah finally asked, seeing her flinch. He glared at her back when he realized that she hadn't been taking regular care of herself while he was gone. "Astraea-"
"I'm not a child and it is Astra!" she nearly shouted, rising to her feet in outrage. She had hated it when she was a newborn vampire and she still hated it to date; she was a grown woman, over a millennium old, she did not need to be treated like a child. Elijah appeared before her in challenge, his broad-shouldered, six foot tall, muscled frame towering over her like an imposing force. "You cannot treat me like you did back in the beginning, Elijah. I'm not going to lose my mind just because I don't feed for a couple of weeks."
"Weeks?" he hissed out, his eyes darkening. He had thought he taught her better than that.
"Well it's not exactly easy for me!" she finally screamed, pushing at his chest enough to force him back a step but got right back in his face a moment later with a hateful glare. "I can't just go and compel some man or woman like you and the others can; it's more difficult for me, Elijah, and you know it. Even you had trouble with helping me in the past."
"Let me help you now then," he tried to reason.
"No," she denied immediately. But Elijah wasn't having it and stepped up to her, offering his wrist to her. She shook her head and turned away from the temping offer, closing her eyes and holding her breath almost childishly. Elijah wasn't going to have it, though, and grabbed a hold of her waist, pulling her against his body, and bit into his other palm to draw a pool of blood into his palm and entice her further.
She was stubborn though, and continued to hold her breath with her eyes closed. Reaching forward, Elijah tipped his hand just slightly and caused some of the blood to drip onto her lip. She jerked back in reaction, but his arm around her waist and his chest against her shoulder kept her in place. She sealed her lips as tightly as she could and her hands fisted in the material of her dress as she fought against the urge to lick the warm liquid from her bottom lip.
"Drink, my love," Elijah whispered in her hair, his breath brushing her skin hotly as he lifted his hand once more, the cut healed but the blood remaining. "You must keep yourself strong, Astraea. Drink." She made the mistake of instinctively swallowing when he said the word 'drink', a simple knee jerk reaction to the one syllable word, which in turn caused her vampire reactions to kick in and force her to inhale. Elijah could feel her body slacken slightly as her mouth opened, inhaling deeply. The dark veins beneath her eyes appeared and her fangs dropped down from her gums. "Go ahead," he continued to encourage soothingly. "Bite."
Astra couldn't supress a groan as she finally lunged forward and bit down, taking in the cooling blood before more warm liquid flooded into her mouth. Elijah sighed against her hair as her fangs dug into his flesh, the feel of her tongue gliding over his skin as her sucked the blood from his body almost as good as it was for her. She took a hold of his chest and pulled it closer to her, trying to get more. The hand wasn't a very convenient place to bite.
While she was focused on his hand, Elijah was able to loosen and push aside his shirt enough to expose the neck and artery to Astra. Cutting along the skin with his nail, her attention immediately shifted at the new scent of blood and her eyes turned to look up, red and violet and deadly. Her teeth released his hand, but she immediately dove for his neck. He refused to flinch as she violently ripped into the skin of his neck and began to pull deep on the wound, filling her mouth continuously with warm blood.
He could have sworn he heard her sob briefly against his neck as her hand fisted in his shirt, but he couldn't have been sure. She didn't make any noise afterword as he wrapped his arms around her, refusing to let her leave until he could give no more. He could be healed fast enough, and she needed it more than he did. She wasn't a new born anymore, and he knew that, but he still couldn't accept the fact that she wasn't his to take care of.
"I will always care for you, Astraea," he said faintly, as she began to take weaker, lightly pulls of blood from his throat. Soon, her fangs slipped completely from his neck and she fell to lean against him, sated for the time being.
Roman Empire, Tiber River, 78 A.D
Astraea's entire mind was sluggish as she felt Elijah tremble against her, his grip never loosening around her form. It was more than he had ever done in the past, even when she was caught in a fit of coughs he had never reacted so severely. Doing all that she could to keep him calm, Astraea simply remained completely still and allowed him to bury his face in her hair. She could faintly hear two other people nearby, but Elijah was blocking her view of them and preventing her from moving.
"Elijah," a soft, female voice said cautiously. His arms tightened around Astraea and for a moment she feared she wasn't going to be able to breathe for much longer, but Elijah released her a moment later, never one letting her go completely but allowing her to sit on her own instead of staying perched on his lap. Looking over to where the voice had come from, a beautiful, young blonde woman around Astraea's age was standing warily a couple of feet away with Nicklaus.
"What did you do?" Nicklaus asked in English, the words broken and confusing for Astraea because of her lack of practice with the language, but she was able to tell what he had asked his brother. "How can this be?"
"I don't know," Elijah answered, looking down at Astraea with a look that had so many different thoughts and emotions locked within it that she truly had no clue what to do with everything they were saying. What had happened that was so terrible? What could Elijah have done?
"What happened?" she finally mumbled out, hesitantly looked between the brothers. Nicklaus avoided her eyes, looking off over the water. Astraea's eyes then snapped over to the water, finally taking notice of the rocking and the lulling sounds of the waves lapping the sides of the boat. Whipping around, Elijah reached for her to late and she was on her feet and looking back in the direction that boat was coming from, seeing the high cloud of black smoke still hanging over the city. Screaming in agony, she would have probably jumped from that boat if Elijah hadn't wrapped an around her waist and pulled her down, preventing her from moving.
"There is nothing that can be done now, Astraea," he explained quietly, the sobs that were beginning to shake her body breaking his heart. "I only had enough time to get you out." She shook her head, trying desperately to deny that her family was actually dead. The people that had loved and raised her couldn't be gone; she refused to take in the reality of what she subconsciously knew. They would already be dead.
"I was supposed to die with them," she gasped out, her cheeks flushed red and stained with the salty tears that cascaded from her amethyst eyes. "I was supposed to die with my family!" she screamed, beginning to thrash against him. It wasn't much use, though, because of Elijah's abnormal strength she would barely even wiggled her body around.
"You did," Elijah said in a short, hesitant voice. That stopped Astraea cold, her entire body turning into stone as she processed his words. She was dead? "When I found you, your heart was not beating. You had been coughing and collapsed. You died in my chambers." Astraea didn't even twitch as she listened to Elijah's usually soothing voice whisper in her ear, his words calm and soft but so harsh all at once. "I held you in my arms only minutes before and you were cold. You have been dead for hours, Astraea."
"No," she finally managed to choke out. "You are lying. I know you are lying, you have to be. I am alive!"
Elijah hushed her softly, wrapping his arms around her shoulders and drawing her close, feeling the rigidity of her body. She was as still as the marble statues of the slowly disappearing city, her body just as cool as the stone that sat in the sun, still a cold rock but warmed by the bright flame in the sky. Her body was in shock from whatever had happened to her, that he could tell, and her mind refused to accept the words that were coming from his mouth. All she did was shake her head and mumble no, trembling against him as she continuously denied and denied and denied.
"He is telling the truth," Nicklaus said quietly from across the wooden deck, crouched down low. "I was with him when he went to retrieve you. You were lying in front of the balcony, there was blood around your mouth. You were very much dead."
"Nicklaus," the woman hissed beside him as his bluntness, getting a fairly hard swat on the shoulder. Astraea looked up toward her, her eyes reddened and glassy with tears.
"Who are you?" Astraea finally asked, her voice raw. The other blonde looked over to her in surprise for a moment, not expecting a direct question from the distraught woman.
"I am Rebekah," she answered softly, moving forward and kneeling close to the two of them, but remembering Elijah's protectiveness and keeping a distance between herself and the other woman. "The younger sister to these two fools." Rebekah's Latin was slightly clumsier compared to Elijah's and even Nicklaus's, but she was still surprisingly fluent for someone that hadn't been living there. At least the brothers had been spending more time there than she had and were able to further familiarize themselves with the culture and language.
"Elijah has told me so much about you," Astraea said gently with a sad smile rising to her lips. "It saddens me that we must meet in times such as this."
Rebekah returned the smile weakly before looking up at Elijah. He had a frown of concentration on his face as he thought over everything that could have caused Astraea's condition. It wasn't normal for a human woman to come back to life, even if her circumstances were special. Could it have been the way she was born, the same reason for her sickness, for her coming back to life. Did her body heal itself? The chance of her body beginning to die again left heaviness in Elijah's heart that he wished to could remove, but the only way to do that would be to banish his love for Astraea.
"As…much as I hate to tell you, Astraea, Elijah and Nicklaus speak only the truth. I do not know how it is that you are alive, but you were dead only minutes ago," Rebekah finally said regretfully. She hated that Astraea constantly had to be told she was dead, but she wasn't going to allow the girl to force herself in believing a lie. Elijah's eyes, also, were too much to bare as the woman he loved continually called him a liar.
"So what am I now?" Astraea asked in a meek voice, ducking her head down until her chin nearly touched her chest. "Am I dead? Alive? Something else entirely?"
"We do not know," Rebekah hushed softly, "I have never seen something such as this before now. We are as confused as you are."
Sorry that I didn't get the chance to update in the past couple of days! I've been going all over the place recently. I got a tattoo on Sunday(a maple leaf! Yes, I'm Canadian), and a root canal on my tooth on Monday and then there's school and work. My god, it's amazing that I still do this and have a social life; sometimes, I am very proud of myself! I hope that you all enjoyed reading this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it!
As for a question that XxXLIFEafterDEATHXxX has asked about Astra; I don't base her off of anyone specifically. I know that some people take an actor or actress and use them to make banners and such for their stories, but I don't do that. I understand it is how things work in film, but I prefer when my characters are completely original, totally inexistent before I put them into words. Astra is as she is described, physically. As for her personality, I take things from friends, family and my own imagination. A lot of what I write it completely out of my head, which I enjoy the challenge of because I haven't experienced what she has so I enjoy working out the emotion that goes with the scenes. Hope that answers your question! P.S. I'm glad that you took notice of the information that I look up! I want this to seem as realistic as I can make it, and it won't do to have all the facts wrong. Plus, the history of Pompeii is very interesting when you take the time to read about it.
Wow, long note…
Chapter 42 – We Are Young
"I was twenty four summers when I died," she finally answered, "Just barely, too. Less than a season."
The strange phrasing was forcing Damon not to crack a smirk, leaving him to purse his lips and nod his head in understanding. She seemed to notice and glared at him briefly, turning her back to continue with reading through the book titles, hoping to alleviate her boredom. Elijah had bought her hundreds of books to keep her sane when she was alone, as he often had to leave with Nicklaus and Rebekah was travelling, leaving her alone. That was often dangerous.
"How old are you, Damon?"
"I'm one-hundred and seventy-three years old as a vampire, but I was twenty-three when I was human," Damon answered, counting off the years in his head. Astra gasped and her hand flew to her mouth as her amethyst eyes widened. He raised an eyebrow at the reaction before he realized that she was trying not to laugh behind her hand. "What?"