“She became with child, a fruit of that abuse. It was the single worst moment of her entire existence, and the happiest of his. Arwan believed this offspring would carry his powers. His rightful heir. She sought to extinguish that flicker of life, but no one dared to lay a finger on her in aid. She did it herself.”
The horrors of a female so desperate, so broken in her fierceness that she reclaimed control over her own body in such an act of defiance, wash over me like foul, oily tendrils of inkling. I could have been her if the Fates had been much crueler than they already were.
“Arwan did not take it lightly. His aberration knew no bounds. He accursed her with the darkest magic known to any creature. A vile blood ritual meant to bind her to him for all eternity, to strip her of any free will or sense of self. Her thoughts should not have been her own anymore; her desire nothing but a tool in the hands of her master. But something backfired.”
“He created the first vampire,” Killian says, his voice stripped of any emotion.
“All magic comes at a price. Not even the Dark Lord, in his arrogance, could have prevented what happened. His powers split in two: the crimson shadows of Akaori, and the lethal silver shadows he remained with. His magic dimmed, but still tarried a weapon of mass destruction. In his weakened state, Akaori fought him off and escaped.”
Ereshkygall bares her fangs, the pointy tips of her canines almost glowing like dying stars.
“I was the first vampire she created. A companion to bear eternity with her, to help her keep her demons at bay and hide from Arwan’s scourging fury. We spent the next decades on the run, not forming any allegiances or roots. But that all changed when we stumbled upon a buoyant band of misfits, thieves hell-bent on wreaking havoc in the southernmost parts of the realm. They viciously murdered and pilfered, descending like chimeras in the night, but only taking from the scum of the realm and giving to the many unfortunate. Their leader was an unbearable male, handsome as he was prideful, wielding his powers to bring justice in a pernicious world.”
“Aeon,” I murmur, the name heavy on my tongue.
“Arwan’s bastard child and true heir. A Dark Shadow-wielder. Hidden by his mother so his father could not sink his vile claws into him.”
“He was the child of her abuser?” I ask in shock.
“Indeed. It was hate at first sight,” Ereshkygall chuckles, deep in her memories. “Akaori saw his parentage in his shadows, and he regarded her as just another one of Arwan’s whores. Their mutual hatred was sopassionate, everyone around them could see the undeniable truth to which they were blind. But when they finally came together, they were a force to be reckoned with. The kind of love they write poems about. The kind that ignites wars. And ignite it did.”
Her smile fades as she casts her weary gaze back upon us, and my skin prickles in dreadful anticipation. I can’t stop wondering how this all ties back to us?
My shadows churn, pressing into my skin, as if willing me to remember a life that isn’t my own. Yet, there’s a murky cloud of nothingness surrounding the parts of my mind that ache with this tale. Where recollections should reside, there’s only a gaping void.
“We stopped running, and that was our downfall. The beginning of the end. They started dreaming of a better world. Of peace and prosperity for all races. Ending Arwan’s reign and all the atrocities. We were all swept up in that hopeful illusion; we couldn’t perceive failure as a possibility.”
“But you failed,” Killian says without judgement, only sorrow.
“Spectacularly,” Ereshkygall answers, ghosts of past regrets flashing in her eyes.
“We underestimated the length of his vicious obsession. When he discovered it was his own bastard that had Akaori’s heart, blood of his own blood, wielder of the dark shadows he had lost, he didn’t just retaliate. He called upon the vilest blood magic in this realm, trying to obliterate us all, to decimate Aeon from existence and ensnare Akaori once and for all to his infernal will.”
I hold my breath, sensing the culmination of this story approaching, and my shadows twirl around my ankles in comfort.
“But, you see, magic has a will of its own, good and bad intertwined, as they have always been since creation. That’s something Arwan never understood or chose to ignore completely in his demented delusions. He bound his blackened soul to theirs, ensuring mutual destruction. Still, that should not have mattered, but mistakes were made on our end too. We sentaway the dragon before the last battle, hoping to preserve his life, and it cost us dearly.”
“K’haram?” I whisper in surprise. The world around me dims as I sense his ancient presence coiling around the recesses of my mind.
“You summonedme,Omri? Your distress is pouring down the bond like bubbling tar. It’s quite jarring.”
“Ereshkygall is talking about the past. The ending of Akaori and Aeon at the hands of Arwan.” I project the words into my head.
“Ah, yes, their final moments,” comes his rumbling response. “Listen to her, Omri. You’re so close to the truth now. I shall await you on the other side.”
His consciousness vanishes from my own, only a slight pressure remaining, like a phantom limb’s ache.
“The night before the battle, the prophecy revealed itself to us collectively. We understood the price that had to be paid. The death toll. I was to be the only survivor, the one destined to guard the secret until your arrival. The realm itself found a way to preserve a sliver of balance, to give us the chance to restore it in an unforeseeable future.”
“However enlightening this history lesson was, it still doesn’t answer my earlier question. Who are we to you? I presume descendants of Akaori and Aeon. That’s the only suitable explanation for your prolonged overture,” Killian says, measuring each word as if tasting the imminent revelation.
Ereshkygall’s lips quirk upwards in a ghost of a smile.
“Hmm, not quite.”
Chapter 25
Killian
