Eternity is Only A Lifetime Away

Fevers and Heartaches

Aleka awoke the next morning feeling more alive than she had done in years. She sat up in the luxurious bed in the chamber that she had called her own only a few months earlier. Her dark hair was tangled and twisted and her tired eyes tried to make sense of what was happening here. She didn’t recall coming to the castle and her memories of the previous night were so hazy. She pushed the sheets back from the bed and looked down at her attire, finding it perfectly normal to see the clothes from the day before on her body. Aleka looked around the room, feeling more confused than ever and with a million questions that needed to be answered.

The door opened and Lilia walked in, smiling when she saw the young warrior awake. “Good morning! Well, evening technically, but that’s normal.”

Aleka cleared her throat before she spoke. “How did I get here?” She flopped back into the bed and raised her eyebrows.

“Tristan flew you back here.” Lilia sat on the end of the bed and seemed puzzled by Aleka’s confusion.

“Why?” Aleka finally voiced the question after almost a minute of rattling her brain for memories of the night.

“You don’t remember?”

“Not one thing. The last thing I recall is leaving the house to head out to hunt down Sullivan’s vampires.”

Lilia’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion. This was extremely weird to her. She’d seen the people that the boys fed upon before and unless they were careful, they remembered. So, why was Aleka different? The witch was about to speak when the door opened again and Tristan stepped in.

“What exactly would you lot have done if I was asleep?” Aleka asked, folding her arms and staring at the cold vampire, ignoring the sudden twang of pain in her neck.

“I sensed you were awake.” Tristan said, closing the door behind him.

“Oh of course. You sense every little thing that I do.” Aleka sighed, resting her head on her hands and flicking her eyes between the two people standing at the foot of her bed. “Why are you all here?” She awaited an answer, hoping that she had the time to bathe before their plan or worries required her to do something else. It wasn’t often that she had a chance to relax and her heart had been set on a nice bath since she woke up.

“I came to see how your wounds were healing.” Tristan moved swiftly to the bed and moved Aleka’s long hair out of the way, his dark eyes fixed on her slender neck. To his trained immortal eyes, he could see that the bite marks had healed over almost completely now, but that his fangs had penetrated deeper than he’d thought meaning that she would find it harder to defend herself if another vampire attacked her before her blood cells had healed the bite entirely.

“What wounds?” Aleka narrowed her eyes and moved away from him, studying his gaze as he glanced across at Lilia. “Guys, I don’t do well with secrets so tell me before I jump from this bed and strangle you both with each other’s arms.”

Lilia closed her eyes and then spoke. “You let Tristan feed off you last night.”

“I did? When?”

“We fought a newborn and it weakened me more than I expected. I could not find the energy to hunt and so you believed it would be best to give me some of your blood simply to regain a little bit of my strength.”

“Right. So why do I not remember any of this?”

“Side effect.” Tristan seemed to answer her question rather quickly and Aleka caught the confused look that Lilia threw in his direction but the warrior shook it off, determined to have her bath first before dealing and processing any of this news.

“Okay then. Um, do you guys mind leaving me in private so I can clean myself up? I feel a little grimy.” Aleka asked, folding her arms and allowing her eyes to flicker between the vampire and the witch.

“No, not at all.” Lilia smiled an evidently fake smile and moved to the door, Tristan silently following behind her, his eyes fixed on hers the whole time. Aleka watched as the pair of them left, unable to shake the feeling that there was something they weren’t telling her.

“What was that all about?” Lilia asked Tristan once they were away from the room and away from any potential eavesdroppers.

“What do you mean?”

“It’s not a side effect.”

“It is. It is an ancient side effect that its likelihood is too rare to even mention.”

“Then explain it to me.” The blonde witch folded her arms across her chest and waited patiently.

The vampire remained silent and turned away, staring at a rather grotesque gargoyle statue that guarded the door to the dungeons. “Tristan, I’m not about to go anywhere and if you’re going to push me then I will use a truth potion against you.”

“You do not have the ingredients to do such a thing.” Tristan knew more about magic than most vampires. He had been around longer and it was a secret he kept to himself that he had been previously acquainted with Lilia’s family when she was still young.

She wavered slightly but then regained her determination. “Tristan, if this is something that could affect our battle then I have the right to know.”

“I cannot allow you to share the details of this with the rest of the rebellion.” He said in a dark tone, his eyes reflecting how serious this whole situation was.

“If it’s going to cause a problem, then I will have no choice.”

“The problem already exists. The problem is Aleka.”

“What on earth do you mean? You are aware that you drive all of us crazy when you keep up the cryptic mysterious act?”

“She trusts me. I, apparently, trust her too. The reason she cannot remember is because of an old occurrence. Back when Sullivan would have been a newborn it was fairly common for vampires to lure a mortal into their life, use them as a continuous life source for when the blood became scarce.”

“I asked for an explanation not a history lesson.” Lilia said, her impatience showing now.

“Fine. Meet me in the prophecy room in half an hour. I will explain it there. I do not trust this place. It is littered with the weak and buyable. If Sullivan were to ever discover it he could use it against Aleka and destroy her in seconds.”

He walked away, leaving Lilia standing there, more confused, concerned and bothered by his words than anyone could even begin to imagine.

Aleka slipped back in the hot bath, closing her eyes and sighing peacefully. She hadn’t felt so calm in the longest of times and she was starting to wonder if all vampire bites caused this feeling on a person and if they did, well they were better than any drug the mortal world could provide. However, she couldn’t help but shake the feeling that there was something wrong. The way Lilia and Tristan had been acting before leaving her room seemed stranger than normal. She had grown close to Tristan in the previous weeks and if anything had been bothering him or causing concern then she could usually get it out of him with a few clever words or a few basic threats. She was a rather impulsive girl whilst the vampire valued plans and routine above most things. Tristan was likely to tell her what she wanted to know before she could do something stupid, like run down the street and just attack anything that seemed remotely suspicious.

The bathwater was getting cold by the time Aleka stepped from the large tub but the thick towel soon warmed her body. There was a slight twinge in her neck every time she moved her head, but she simply assumed that it was to do with the biting the previous night. It couldn’t be anything major...