Dark & Familiar

Chapter 4: Tea For Two

I was escorted from the bathhouse through marble halls up wide, winding stairs that erupted in a violet sky. A palatial garden stretching in every direction beyond sight was broken only by perfectly manicured hedges flowering with white petals so dense they appeared at first glance like feathers.

The naked woman that bathed me broke my balking stupor, beckoning me beyond a crystal bridge that crossed a red stream that looked mysteriously like blood.

Koi fish of great size and unidentifiable origins teamed in massive numbers below the river's surface, feeding off one another. The schools of fish ripped at their classmates, tearing scales and ripping fins, sending fresh plumes of blue blood into the water where it oxidized and transformed into the ubiquitous red liquid in which they swam and breathed and lived and died.

Across the river, a table was prepared. Made of pure gold, but small. Built for two.

"Tea will be served shortly". My attendant told me, instructing me to be seated.

I sat and once more looked up to the violet sky. It was completely alien to me.

"Where am I?" I said to myself. Not expecting any answer. But, to my surprise, an answer came.

"You're still on Earth." A familiar woman answered with dazzling eyes. As she took her seat, two attendants pulled her chair out for her and moved her puffy dress to the side so she could sit comfortably without lifting a finger. "Not on Earth, actually. Underneath it."

"I'm under Earth? Like underground?"

"Yes, but not as you understand it."

"But there's sky."

"Beneath the Earth plane you are acquainted with is another. Another plane. Another sky. Another sun."

She pointed to a floating orb I had missed. A small and distant blue light with a glow more similar to the moon.

"Humans that have visited are not usually allowed to leave with any memory. But sometimes they recall images in their dreams or when they suffer some trauma or a near-death experience. On Earth, this place is called Heaven."

"Heaven? Am I-- dead?"

"No, of course not." She laughed, clapping once and attendants rushed to her side to pour her tea.

"Would you like some?" She asked.

"I want to know what's going on." I insisted, unwittingly flustered.

"I made this tea myself. I promise you it's unlike any tea you've had before. Grown right here in my garden, in Eden."

The attendants didn't wait for my consent. They poured me a cup right away.

I looked at the tea, a green liquid, curiously glowing with an intoxicating aroma like that of vanilla, but so potent it nearly caused me to faint.

"Do I have to drink it?"

"No," she said, "you are free to do as you like."

"Can I leave?"

"Why would you want to do that?" She asked, genuinely.

"Can I leave?" I repeated, more forcefully.

"If you wish..." she sighed deeply, "but then you'll never know."

"Never know what?"

"Anything. You humans above are kept like cattle. An uneducated species with amnesia. You don't know who you are, where you're from, or why you're here. You think you're spinning on a cartoon ball in outer space and you think you have real elections and presidents run your countries. You think the government is your friend and public schools educate children. You think health comes in a pill and happiness comes in a pill and all of you work till you die without ever knowing why." She took another sip of her tea, "Doesn't that bother you?"

It did bother me. Even though I had no memories and I couldn't even remember my own name, it bothered me to my core. Like there was a primal urge as basic as hunger that demanded to know The Truth.

But there was a competing urge just as strong. The desire for freedom. In my living memory, which was rather limited, I had only known slavery. I had been in a cage. I had been auctioned off like property. I had been cleaned and polished like a trophy. I had been ordered around like a robot. And as I looked at the woman's attendants I wondered if The Truth would come at the cost of my Freedom.

"What do you want from me?" I asked the woman, "What's the deal, I drink your tea and become another mindless servant?"

She laughed. "I have no need for any more servants. I'm looking for someone special."

"Special how?"

"I can explain later. All you need to know now is what I'm offering– and what I'm asking. In case it wasn't clear, what I'm offering is the Truth. We covered that. What I'm asking for in return is your loyalty."

"You seem to be able to get loyalty easy enough." I huffed. The slavery of the attendant familiars here didn't sit well with me.

"My familiars obey me because they have to. My vicar, on the other hand, is free to do as he likes."

I remembered Ahmad in the bathhouse warning me not to take this position, cutting a woman's throat right in front of me to punctuate the message. I should have taken the warning more seriously, but my curiosity would often get the better of me.

"You mentioned the word 'Vicar', what is that?"

"A representative, of sorts. Creatures like me--"

"Vampires..." I interjected.

She smiled, revealing shining fangs. "We have rules like any society. When one of them is broken, there is a consequence. However, punishing immortals had long-lasting consequences. Created a lot of bad blood. So, a very long time ago, we came up with a new system. We created a proxi, a person to take accountability for our actions. A Vicar."

"A vampire steps out of line and you punish their slave? What kind of monsters are you?"

"Sounds unfair, doesn't it? But it's not just the punishments the Vicar receives. That would be inhumane. Maybe we are monsters, but we aren't uncivilized. We recognized long ago that if our human counterparts would bear our pain, they should also share in our pleasure. In exchange for their service, the Vicar gets all the freedom and agency of their master. They cannot be controlled by compulsion. They may move freely between Earth and Eden. They can know the truth of the world. And they can even be given access to their prior lives. Which brings us back to the tea..."

The woman leaned forward and pushed my tea cup toward me slowly.

"If you drink this tea, all the skills and abilities of your lifetimes will return to you."

"Prior lifetimes? Are you saying I've lived before?" I asked, incredulous.

"Probably hundreds, if not thousands of times."

"Why don't I remember?"

"Part of dying, I suppose. I wouldn't know. It may surprise you to learn that both vampires and humans are immortal. Just not in the same way. While we vampires never die, you humans die for eternity."

I looked down at the glowing green tea. The potent scent like vanilla wafting into my nostrils sent sharp pangs of pain into the front of my cortex and down my spine into my gut, leaving me nauseous.

"There's nothing we can do about your memories. They're gone. But skills are different. They seem to embed themselves in the very fabric of the soul. You carry them with you from life to life. They need only be activated. That's what the tea will do for you. It will activate you. And as your accumulated skills and abilities return slowly, you will realize your full potential and I will teach you the Truth of your reality. Only then will you be worthy of becoming my Vicar. Once you are mine, I will be yours. We shall share pain and pleasure in equal measure until your death do us part. So, you see, not really a slave at all. More of a partnership. What do you say?"