Chapter 13: The Vampire (part 1)

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  It takes us mere two days to establish a functional routine: In the mornings, when we review my late night study notes, Seth receives his payment, extracted right before my bedtime - and during the evening lessons, with another impressive feat of sleight of hand, he returns the tiny glass bottle, now emptied and cleaned, to the hidden compartment in my notebook.

  And Chiselle is none the wiser.

  On the third day, the redhead is getting so aggressively bored from watching us perched over the desk for hours at a time that she decides to try and interrupt a study session, for which she is berated most thoroughly by her master.

  By the fifth day, she falls asleep in the armchair during our lessons.

  After six days, she ultimately decides to terminate her self-proclaimed role as our warden and instead tends to her housekeeper duties while we work. At one point, Seth catches her eavesdropping on the other side of the door and invites her inside to resume her supervision, challenge lacing his voice as he does so, but she refuses with a scoff.

  “I thought as much,” the master of the mansion says to no one in particular as he closes the door between them and locks it. He turns to me. “Now, where were we?”

  “You were explaining if there's a way to tell if the ‘c’ in ‘sc’ is hard or soft,” I say, my finger caught on the word ‘scholar’ somewhere in chapter two of the book I’m reading aloud to him.

  “Indeed,” he says and slips back into the chair next to mine. “As I was saying, ‘sc’ is fickle, as there is no pattern to determine whether the sound is like a simple ‘s’ or ‘sk’. We need to identify the rest of the word first, and then we memorize the individual words over time.”

  I rub my temple tiredly. “I have no idea how you can even remember all of that.”

  “In some instances, there are clues.” Seth inclines his head towards the book. “Oftenmost, when ‘sc’ is followed directly by an ‘h’, the sound is hard like a ‘k’. ‘Scholar’, ‘scheme’, and ‘schedule’ are a few examples.”

  I stare at him. ‘Oftenmost’ is just another way of telling me that even this rule is not completely reliable. I feel like tearing the damned book to pieces when I ask: “And how often is ‘oftenmost’?”

  “More likely than not. However, as with the vast majority of the linguistic ruleset, there are exceptions. ‘Schism’ and ‘schilling’, amongst a few. Generally speaking, words we have adopted from Germania tend to be soft on their ‘sch’.”

  I glare at the word again, ‘scholar’, and exhale ever so slowly through my nose, my patience wearing spiderweb thin. “But I can never tell the difference, that's the problem.”

  “You will learn in time, I guarantee it,” Seth says with a mild smile. “Language is complex and intricate. It takes years to master, even the written word.”

  “Is that supposed to reassure me?” I let go of the page and lean back in my chair. The tightness of the book’s binding makes the pages flutter by, before the book snaps shut on its own. “I find it rather demotivating to know that I still have a horribly long way to go, even after you are done teaching me.”

  “We have about three weeks left, and look how far you have come already,” he insists as he opens the book anew and begins looking for page twenty-three. “Your progress has been impressive and a pleasure to observe, truly. Trust the process and your own abilities.”

  He grabs my hand with his pale, cool one and puts my finger back on ‘scholar’. I stiffen.

  “‘A wandering scholar’,” he reads. “What next?”

  He touched me. Sure, we have brushed shoulders from time to time - it’s nearly impossible when sitting this close for as long as we do. But besides the one time we shook hands, this is the first time he has touched me intentionally. Casually and unhesitantly. Skin to skin.

  Like with the handshake, the feeling of his strangely cold skin lingers on mine for a moment. But if I’m not mistaken, his touch felt… warmer than the last time, just ever so slightly.

  “Kia,” the man beside me says, and instantly I blink back to reality. “Would you like a break?”

  I nod and close the book before he can retract the offer.

  “Alright.” Without another word, Seth gets up and pours himself a glass of liquor. Leaning back against the stone wall of the fireplace, he swirls the liquid around, silently watching me.

  “What?” I ask, perhaps a tad sharply.

  The man takes a sip, irritatingly languidly, then swirls his drink again. “I cannot entirely tell if you are on the verge of discontinuing your tuition, or if you simply want this so fervidly that you cannot control your emotions.”

  Something about his words, about his lack of trust in me, stings like a sudden slap to the face. I find myself getting to my feet and approaching him, raising my chin and squaring my shoulders to signify dignity rather than rage.

  “I cut myself up every night to pay for this,” I say, my voice barely more than a whisper. “I don’t just want this - I need this.”

  And just like that, in the blink of an eye, the final trace of the cordial teacher is gone. Another side of him awakens entirely.

  The drink stills in his grasp as his eyes lock onto me, dark and endless like the starless night sky. “And why do you need this, Kia?”

  “I already told you.”

  “My intuition tells me there is more to it,” he says and tilts his head. “Power and freedom, but with the intention of what, exactly? What are you trying to accomplish? Or perhaps you are running from something?”

  I lift an eyebrow and smirk. “Who is the curious one now, my lord?” I ask with the full intention of irking him, and I’m not sure why. Perhaps he is digging too deep, crossing lines. “Why do you want to know my motivation?”

  A soft huff escapes him, and he empties his glass in one large swig before setting it down amidst the strange display of glass jars on the wooden shelf above the fireplace.

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  “We all have our reasons,” he murmurs, the smell of whiskey on his breath filling the air between us. Suddenly I realize how close I am standing to him. I take a step back and sit down on the edge of the desk.

  “Let us make another deal,” I suggest with an attitude of casual indifference. “For every question you ask me, you will answer one of mine. Truthfully, of course.”

  Something flutters in my stomach as Seth flashes his teeth in a wide grin, equally predatory and delighted by my proposition. “I agree to your terms. What shall be your first inquiry, then?”

  “Those jars,” I say and point past his shoulder. “What is the purpose of them?”

  “It is a calendar, if you will,” the man explains without hesitation. “Each marble represents one month.”

  I remember counting a score of them, all with a dozen marbles - except the one to the far right.

  “But why twenty years?” I ask. “And are you counting up or down?”

  “Ah-ah,” he chides softly. “So impatient. First you must answer a question of mine. Those are your own rules, after all.”

  “Fine.” I cross my arms over my chest. “I want to forge my own path in life. Running an inn is fine, but hopelessly dull and uninspiring, and right now I stand to inherit my parents’ tavern. I don’t want to live my entire life in Trefield. The ability to read and write could prove to be the key to a new destiny.”

  “How… poetic. Power and freedom indeed,” Seth says and grabs the nearest glass jar from the fireplace shelf. Fishing out a few marbles, he blows the fine layer of dust off and twirls them in the palm of his hand. “In that regard, you and I are not too different. I am counting down to my own freedom, you see. Twenty years of incarceration almost at an end.”

  My eyes narrow. The man before me, in spite of his silver hair and rather frail-looking frame, appears not one day older than twenty-five. Why would anyone imprison a child? And why hasn’t he just left the mansion? There is nobody here to stop him, after all; he could probably overpower Chiselle if she tried to.

  Seth then chuckles, the sound deep and low. “I recognize disbelief when I see it,” he says and puts the marbles back in the jar, and the jar back on the shelf. “Come on, ask your question, Kia.”

  “If we pretend for a moment that you are speaking the truth,” I say, ignoring the feeling of the wooden edge starting to bite into my rear, “then I would like to know what, exactly, you stand accused of.”

  “Gladly. But first you must answer me this: From which part of your body do you extract my payment?” With an uncharacteristic brashness, his eyes travel over me, lingering on my throat for a brief moment, until they settle on my face again. “I have yet to locate any fresh scar on you.”

  A chill runs down my spine at his words, at his silent invasion, as he catches me entirely off guard. I was prepared for personal questions, but not like this. Not intimate. If I wanted to, I could terminate our game this very instant, but I still have a few things I want to know; information that would likely cost me something in return no matter when I would try to obtain it.

  Feeling a sudden heat in my cheeks, I let my gaze drop to the floor. “Inner thighs,” I croak.

  Silence.

  “I see,” he finally speaks under his breath. “Clever girl.”

  Clever enough to avoid detection thus far, despite Chiselle’s physical inspections every now and then, despite even the master’s own secret appraisals. The cuts on my inner thighs are beginning to line up like an orchard of light pink stripes, but they are shallow enough to heal considerably overnight, and they rarely bother me throughout the day as long as I make sure to wrap them in fresh cloth strips.

  Fidgeting awkwardly with my cuticles to avoid looking at him, I clear my throat softly. “Your turn.”

  “Are you certain you do not want something stronger than water?” Seth asks as he strides to the bookcase with the drinks compartment, likely to refill his own glass. “It might loosen up those nerves of yours.”

  “Oh, a bit cocky, are we now?” I murmur, for which I earn another low chuckle, smooth and refined like silken sheets. My attention remains stubbornly on my nails. “But no thank you. I would much rather be served an answer to my question, as per our agreement.”

  “Such impatience, Kia. We have nearly two full hours left of your evening lesson.” I recognize the sound of the cork stopper being removed and then liquid sloshing into a glass. “But as you wish: My sentence is matricide.”

  A violent gasp locks the air in my lungs, and I gape at him involuntarily, all pretenses of disinterest gone in an instant.

  “I am innocent, naturally,” he adds with a shrug and drinks calmly, as if he just told me the sky is blue.

  If I’m not mistaken about his age, then he has to be innocent. He would have been a child the age of four or five at the time; and even if he did do it, it could only have been an accident. Which sick individual would lock away a small child like that? Hardly Chiselle, as she is not much older than him.

  Their aversion to strangers is beginning to make sense to me, as societally shunned as they are. The poor souls must have been alone for years upon years as part of the punishment. It’s no wonder they are engaging in strange and ungodly practices at this point.

  Pity overwhelms me, and I blink at him, at a complete loss for words. “I… I don’t know what to say.”

  “Which is most fortunate for me, as it is my turn,” Seth replies with casual joviality wholly incongruous with the current atmosphere. Once again, he swirls his drink around, eyes following the tiny maelstrom. “Tell me, what is your biggest fear?”

  “Give me a moment to think,” I request, mostly to finish digesting the staggering piece of knowledge. My backside now aching against the edge, I allow myself a full seat upon the desk, pushing a few things aside as to avoid knocking something over or wrinkling the papers. Seth appears more humored than annoyed at my attempt at delaying - or perhaps he merely finds my new seating arrangement to be absurdly inappropriate. Either way, he waits patiently for me to arrive at a conclusion.

  “To be buried alive, I think,” I finally say. “The idea of being encased or confined to a small space makes me terrified and nauseated like nothing else.”

  The slave traders’ wagon, although large enough to contain a handful of people, had been bad enough. The memory of waking up in the endless, suffocating darkness lingers in my mind, vivid as ever. It still haunts my dreams.

  “Interesting,” he remarks thoughtfully.

  Swallowing the lump in my throat, I settle on my final question for tonight - the very thing I have wanted to ask him for days.

  “One more, and I’m done for now. Alright?” When Seth nods his agreement, I speak the words: “Are you really a vampire?”

  If I can make him confess to their shared delusion, perhaps I can persuade them to abandon their blood consumption practice. For their own good.

  “You refused to believe me the day I told you,” the man before me points out, “so how do you propose I may irrevocably convince you this time?”

  “Easy. Show me. Prove it to me.”

  “Oh, you foolish mortal,” he says as he shakes his head to himself, a sardonic smile pulling at his lips. “Consider yourself warned.”

  I watch him with a considerable dose of calm scepticism as he circles the desk. Opening my notebook to the hidden section, he plucks the small knife from the carved compartment and hands it to me.

  “One drop of blood, if you would be so willing,” he says, the look on his face reading as a smug challenge. “At your leisure.”

  Unsure of where this is going, I place the tip of the blade against my finger. I sure as Hell am not going for my thighs with him present. “Would this cause problems with Chiselle?”

  His eyes, now fixed on my finger in apparent anticipation, gleam against the flames in the fireplace. “Not if you make it superficial.”

  This blood obsession of his makes me uneasy, but I have no one but myself to blame in this situation. I asked him for proof, after all. Besides, it would be hypocritical of me to refuse to play along now, as both of us know I’ve done worse things every night for a week.

  Carefully, I push the knife through the outermost layers of my skin. The cut is shallow enough that I hardly feel any pain.

  Not once since Seth’s first payment have I seen him this enthralled. Deadly still like a predator, he barely moves a muscle, his attention unwavering. He is like a spring ready to be let loose.

  Putting the knife down, I press around the tip of my finger, and one deep red droplet forms on my skin.

  “Magnificent,” he whispers next to me, his voice weirdly strained.

  I turn to him in expectation. “So?”

  And freeze on the spot in pure, undiluted horror.