The Carmen Chronicles: Rebirth

Chapter 19: Starved

Time. It was a strange thing. I witnessed the world around me change every day. The flowers would bloom and wither, the grass would grow and die, the animals would hunt and be hunted...But the humans were the species that changed the most. Every day, I watched the villagers from afar, and marvelled at how much they missed. Their hair grew half a millimetre each day, even their fingernails grew a tenth of a millimetre overnight. Their faces were constantly changing as the hours passed, bringing them closer to that one day when they would take their last breath. Me...I had taken my last breath almost a decade ago. As a human, anyway. My heart had not beat in two thousand, six hundred and twenty two days. The day of my death had come and gone, and here I remained. My physical appearance exactly the same as it had been all those years ago. My hair had not grown, not a single millimetre. My nails remained the same length. The fine age lines in my face from the twenty-seven years I had lived on this earth as a woman were barely visible under my alabaster skin. But they were there. What was not there was the greying hair I expected to have as a thirty-eight year old, the aching back that was so often talked about in the older adults in the village, the weak knees... No. I supposed my hair would never change its colour, my face would never show another age line, my body would never feel that pain. My muscles had been petrified, turned into solid stone by the venom of my creator, Benedict... And yet despite the frozen nature of my body, my dead heart still ached at the mention of his name.

My friend...

After seven years, two months and six days, I found myself back in the same cave on the edge of a tiny village in England. Alone. Again. I waited for the reappearance of my elusive friend at the edge of the Mediterranean Sea for two weeks before finally deciding she was never coming back for me. On a dark, moonless night, I reentered the village and returned to Babington Cottage. I was not sure what I had expected to find, in my mind I had imagined Victoria tearing half the house to pieces as she murdered my friends, but everything looked almost as I remembered it. A single drop of blood that had stained the floor had been cleaned away, the scent tainted by the strong smell of an alkaline solution, though my eyes still made out the minuscule specks left in the creases of the wooden floor. As I searched the house, I was not sure exactly what I was searching for, if anything. I wanted... Something. Something to remember my friends. But the more I searched, the more surprised I became, as I discovered almost all of their personal belongings were missing. Even their clothes, though that did not surprise me as much... I expected the village Elders would have insisted their clothing be donated to those who needed them. I smiled at myself sadly, Mary would have wanted that. There was nothing for me in that cottage, I guessed I should not have been surprised. This village was not as poor as the village I was raised in, but there were still those who were poor and desperate. They probably raided the place in the dead of night, taking as much as they could carry. I left Babington Cottage empty handed, knowing I would never return, the memory was too painful. The following day, I returned to the woods and buried John and Mary side by side. We were miles from any tracks, and the trees that surrounded their graves looked scraggly and old, as though they had been there for a hundred years; but I knew they wouldn't have cared. They were together. There was only one thing left I had to do: find Emily's body. This was a puzzle I could not seem to solve. Apart from our fight, the forest floor had not been disturbed by any other means, and I seriously doubted Victoria had the time to hide her body somewhere far away that night. I was behind her, but not that far behind. I searched every inch of those woods for three weeks, and found nothing. It made no sense, why would Victoria have hidden her body from me? The girl deserved a proper burial beside her parents. I had no idea how the afterlife worked, but I was sure that the spirits of John and Mary would not rest until I recovered their daughter's body and laid her with her family, where they would sleep forever. But I never found her. Stricken with grief, I journeyed back to the cave, the very same spot I met Emily as a child, the day I made that foolish mistake of standing under direct sunlight. I thought of her, of John and Mary, of Ana, her parents... This all started, and ended, with me. I was the link that tied us all together. Ana's parents were gone, Ana was gone, Benedict had left me, and then I found Victoria, but now she had left me, too. Everyone... Everyone I had ever cared for, was gone. And it was entirely my fault. As the days turned into weeks, my thirst became almost intolerable, but I refused to leave the sanctuary of the old cave.

I killed everyone.

I did not deserve to feed. What was I to do, hunt, find another innocent human and take their life so I could continue on? Victoria never had a problem with hunting, but I did. I always felt the guilt. It stayed with me like a ghost, murmuring words of condemnation in my weakest moments. I was useless as a vampire. How is it I could be what I am, and have such great difficulty with hunting?

Following my natural instincts?

I would never fit in, not in this world. During my years with Victoria, she had taught me so much about our strength as immortals, about our place. She made me believe we deserved this second chance at life, an opportunity to truly live and be free. The humans were our prey and nothing more. But even with her teachings, I had formed my own rules for myself. I decided I would only hunt those who were elderly and childless. Victoria had wondered about that, she remarked she had never met another immortal like me. As out of place as I felt, I could not change who I was. I despised my thirst for human blood, I hated the way my mind methodically planned out each attack, and I hated that I enjoyed the thrill of victory as I slaughtered my prey. Well, no more. I would not feed again. I was tired of being a murderer. I would remain here, in this cave. Perhaps I would die here, I had no idea if vampires could starve to death, but I supposed I was about to find out.

*

Four weeks and five days had passed, and I barely had the strength to stand. I had not moved from the ground in three days, my body felt so weak, it was an enormous effort to even raise a single finger. I had wanted to visit John and Mary's graves every day and lay fresh flowers upon them... But I did not trust myself. If I detected the scent of human blood, I would lose control, and this would have all been for nothing. I remained in the cave.

Five weeks and two days...

As the dawn broke, I sat up slowly and felt the hot air blow against my hand as I exhaled deeply from the enormous effort it took to move. My mouth had never before felt so parched, I could not even taste my own venom that usually lingered around my tongue. I raised a hand to my neck and rubbed it, irritated. My throat was dry and sore, completely engulfed by the fire within that raged on, hotter than ever. Even my skin felt dry. I had not one moment of relief, every breath of air I inhaled would stoke the flames once more, sending a blazing inferno up my throat and into my mouth. My brain demanded I hunt, showing me imaginary images of Victoria somewhere across Europe, free of me and and well-fed. But I refused. I would not give in.

Six weeks and three days...

As the rain began to pour at the dawn of a new day, and with the villagers in church for the next few hours, I decided to take the long way around the village, and visit John and Mary's graves. It took me ten minutes to stand, once I did, I felt an odd sensation of unbalance. My legs felt as light as parchment, I stumbled back and grabbed the side of the cave for support. And suddenly, through the deafening sound of the rain, I heard something. Footsteps.