Setting sun
~
Cadence
~
She told me to be careful this full moon, Cadence thought to herself. She told me.
The oracle, Vaela, told Cadence this exact piece of information and laid it out before her, was the disaster that reaped through the Fenris pack. Lycans and werewolves dead, bodies rotting and to bury.
Vaela knew a catastrophic event would take place and as the clock struck the full moon, it did.
Cadence crouched down, whacking her hair out of her face as she piled stick upon stick on top of each other, framing them into a wooden mountain to be lit into a blazing flame.
After walking for hours, Cadence retracing her steps back to the cave, she managed to find it through memory; trekking it to the creek that lead her back to the place she was held captive in not long ago.
The dome of it, like rocks had fallen in had a crack of sunlight blinding through gave Cadence the sight to see her surroundings much clearer.
In the morning, when Gabriel informed Accalia and Cadence of the news, Cadence couldn't find it in herself to care. It wasn't news for her to process as devastating, but just a piece of information that only lead to more questions that aren't answered.
Who would have done this?
Many of her ideas had been crossed out by the time she left the house after lying about sleeping at Erisa's for the night. Cadence knew it was a good lie, but not one she could run with for long. Suspicions will arise, how could they not?
Cadence knew she needed to tread carefully, but that didn't rule out the possibility that Alexene was behind those murders last night and every possible evidence pointed to her in Cadence's eyes.
It made sense. Too much sense. Maybe Alexene wanted to send a message to Lycus. A message Cadence had no clue could mean.
But that didn't matter, this little plan wasn't going to work with Cadence and after today, she'll be shoving it right in Alexene's face.
The bitch can try toying with me, Cadence maliciously concluded as she picked her knife off the ground and twirled it between her long fingers.
Cadence wasn't armed last time, weak and easily manipulated due to the events that shaped her into a docile and compliant girl that needed to get out of the situation fast. Too much happened that day, weeping her into tiredness and feebleness. It won't happen again.
You don't threaten the lives of a hunter's family and expect to get away with it.
Cadence won't comply this time, she'll have her knife slicing into Alexene's throat so fast she won't see it coming.
It was dusk now, the skies cooling over with plum purple and deep blue. The sun had settled behind the trees, slowly disappearing from view with flickers of searing sun rays.
Sighing, Cadence whipped out her lighter and flicked it on until a little flame came into view.
Grabbing a piece of paper from her bag, she ripped it out and lit it up, throwing it in the base of the sticks.
Cadence jumped over the stream and sat down by her bag, waiting as time passed by painfully slow. An hour almost withered by once nighttime crept in and when it did, footsteps bustled through the cave. Cadence shot to her feet, whipping her knife behind her.
Alexene was much shorter than Cadence, but she seemed quite firm in her stance as she wandered on in, pale face agleam against the flames, hair out of the face and eyes, bloody. But Cadence couldn't ignore the innocence that met Alexene's features, she had a baby face, mirroring the appearance of a young teenager.
"Hello again, Cadence Larren," Alexene greeted, voice plush and soft as velvet. She came to a halt by the flames and delicately laced her covered arms behind her back.
Cadence only gave a hard nod, not saying anything as she came a few feet closer, but maintaining distance. She felt her hand become clammy as she clutched into the knife harder, gauging Alexene's expression which prevailed gravely coldness.
"Scared of the sun, aye?" Cadence said smoothly.
Alexene gloomed deeply, no creases brushing across her skin as she quirked a brow. "Do you have any information for me?"
"Did you hear about what happened at Lycus's pack? Twenty-three wolves were killed on the night of the full moon, snapped necks and ripped out hearts." Cadence informed her, coming close to the flames that encompassed her in warmth. She needed that, all she felt right was iciness inside of her.
No sway of movement brushed along Alexene as she stilled like a tiger ready to attack. "I did not ... that's devastating news."
"Yeah," Cadence drawled out mockingly, "maybe you should pay your respects to Lycus."
Alexene gave a mesmerising but creepy grin, a set of straight teeth showing. "Perhaps, I should."
Cadence didn't wait, she reeled back her knife from behind her back and flung it right towards Alexene.
Cadence lunged over the fire as the knife struck into Alexene shoulder, a shriek cutting through the cave and before Alexene could process the knife embedded in her shoulder, Cadence pressed another one to her throat.
Locking her in place, Cadence pierced the blade into her throat, hard enough to bring forth blood. "You better start fucking talking or I'm going to slice your throat open." Cadence hissed out, her tone bleeding with anger and malice.
Alexene heaved a resigned sigh, attempting to gather her bearings with a knife stuck into her shoulder and locked her bloody eyes onto Cadence.
Cadence towered over her, darkness tracing her form as knew she had the upper hand and would use it to her advantage.
Alexene's innocent face evaporated like smoke and she casted Cadence another chilling grin.
"Slice my throat open, I assure you, it will heal." Alexene stated simply and her eyes spun red, dark and bloodstained.
Cadence almost faltered, disbelief soaring through her like a gust of wind to knock her off her feet. "What the hell are you?"
"Worse than a lycan," Alexene decreed with bared teeth and shoved Cadence backwards.
Cadence gasped, whipping her other knife up and guarding her form, preparing for anything if it came her way.
With a curled lip, Alexene ignored her and went for the knife in her shoulder. Without so much as a countdown to ready herself for the influx of pain, she ripped it out with a grunt and threw it to the floor.
"I killed those lycans and werewolves," Alexene spat out, her dark blood spluttering droplets onto the dirt, but she didn't so much as wince. "But Lycus had it coming."
"What did he do to you?" Cadence demanded, lowering her weapon as she noticed Alexene had no intention of doing anything. For now.
Cadence's suspicions were right, but she didn't feel anything by it. She knew why it made sense, but that didn't exclude the fact that only a piece of information as been unlocked.
"Take and take from me. I was staying with a coven long ago. He thought he killed me when he slaughtered them all those years ago. He was wrong and now, he's going to suffer as I did." Alexene drew in a breath as she peered back at Cadence.
Cadence observed her, the wound she caused and avoided any confusion that warped across her. The mark wasn't there, it was healed and only showed a patch of blood.
"Why did he kill your people?" Cadence asked.
"Corruption. Revenge. The world he saw wasn't how it appeared, so he wanted it gone. Like it never existed." Alexene answered.
Then I'll do what I've done in the past. I'll redecorate, Lycus once said.
Cadence controlled the shock rippling through her body and stood straighter, holding onto that front she was worn for so long. It wasn't surprising hearing this about Lycus, his past was filled with nothing but massacres, disaster and devastation.
But Cadence's face fell as those thoughts were replaced with something else. Accalia. She was aware of his life, but only what was written in books and spoken by the mouths of hunters. Not a survivor of Lycus's destruction. No one ever survived him.
"I need to get Accalia out," Cadence whispered to herself, darting her gaze to the ground as she swallowed the lump in her throat.
"Trust me, Lycus will either destroy her or treasure her as if his life depends on it. He won't risk repeating his father's mistakes."
Cadence snapped up, wide-eyed and demanded, "You knew his father? You've known Lycus for that long."
That was centuries, centuries of knowing a person. Their past was rooted that deeply?
And Alexene had played her cards well enough to have the world deem her as deceased, but all along she had harboured this streak of revenge.
"I have. I know Gabriel, I know Lycus, I know their entire bloodline till now. Their father, Roman was ... selective of who he treated right and disregarded everyone else around him, including his mate."
"How are you connected to the Fenris family then?"
"I wasn't ... originally," Alexene said, her eyes almost becoming fainter, a tinge of rosewood, wielded in ... remembrance as she shuffled on her feet. "But somehow, I ended up intertwining with the Fenris brothers, then everything unravelled."
Being told this didn't hinder Cadence's motive of getting herself out of this mess. She was a hunter, yes, but just that. She hunted lycans and werewolves, she doesn't commit to missions that involve anything other than her original duty.
She won't play into the hands of a person she doesn't know just out of a threat that could entail nothing. Or everything.
"I'm not helping you," Cadence's voice cracked, teasing at the nervousness that traced her words. "You kidnapped me at my weakest, manipulating me to do your bidding. This is your problem and you're not about to make it mine."
Alexene's face hardened like stone as she glowered at the flames that blazed aimlessly, ash flicking up to the roof of the cave, flying up to the dome and into the night sky.
"Oh, Cadence," Alexene chimed and bristled, directing her focus onto the huntress. "This could have been easy for you."
Before Cadence could even register what was crossing through Alexene's mind, at a rapid pace, she was in front of Cadence with her pale hand locked around her throat, slicing her breathing into feeble gasps for air.
Cadence was lifted like she weighed nothing, Alexene's strength alike to a lycan, unmatchable and unrelenting.
But that was before she revealed features that resembled a semblance nothing compared to a lycan or even a werewolf, but a face more demonic and hellish Cadence could ever imagine.
The redness of her irises bleeds into the whiteness of her eyes, spilling a brewing bloodiness like pools of crimson liquid. Veins protruded from her skin, emitting into thick lines marking around her eyes and face. Her skin became paler like a phantom and pearly white teeth beheld sharp fangs that could pierce into metal, the top row extended four teeth into sharpened canines.
Cadence almost wanted to scream out of fear, outright fear that engulfed her in wallowing desperation for air. But she couldn't, who could hear her? It was only her and Alexene on these sides of the woodland and whatever happened now, Cadence knew her life would be on the line.
"What the hell are you?" Cadence screamed, frantic to know for her gain as she struggled for air. If she was going to die tonight, her body to never be found and rotting into bones and dust, she would die knowing the being that took her life.
"Bloodsucker, lamia, a demon, but you may be familiar with the term vampire."
There's no such thing, Cadence managed to think, gripping at Alexene's hands to pull her off, but it was useless, she was completely immobile.
"You're scared," Alexene noted, her face frowning slightly at Cadence's reddened face, "but no matter. Now, I'm going to give you two options Cadence Larren and if you refuse either, I'm snapping that neck of yours. Either, I compel you to find the item I need or you do it willingly so I don't drink the people you love dry. It's your choice,"
Cadence blinked slowly as she weighed her options, a blackness suddenly fading over her as she struggled to suction in a breath.
The term compel filters through Cadence's mind as she contemplated Alexene's demands. She doesn't have the faintest clue about it or what it could do.
Feeling that measured with a cost Cadence wasn't willing to lose, she shoved that option to the side as she dabbled on the other one. Drink her family and friends dry? Their blood?
"Ah — I'll — I'll do it willingly," Cadence ushered out through strangled breaths and just on that answer, she was released, her body collapsing to the floor. Relief soared through her. She could hug the dirt in solace.
Her throat seethed with pain that couldn't be lessened, not even rubbing the skin helped as she looked up at Alexene who hovered over her like a levitating ghost.
Cadence heaved in a harsh breath as Alexene bent down to her, her demonic features vanishing and traced back to the child-like face of a young girl that could do no harm in the world.
"I don't want to glamour you to do my bidding, Cadence, it's far too difficult, but if you do not comply with my instructions, I assure you, Accalia, Tristan, Thea and Erisa will all die by my hand." Alexene crooned darkly and circled around the fire.
There weren't just lycans roaming the earth, werewolves their prodigy to keep their blood thriving and hunters to hunt them. But vampires, creatures of the night and drinkers of blood.
They exist, they're real and Cadence is in the presence of one.
She couldn't wrap her head around it, only because this has been a mythological creature told within stories and fiction, nothing more than that. Cadence couldn't wither her thoughts away on this right now, she'll throw herself in the discord of supernatural creatures soon.
"Why do you need that item?" Cadence referred to the drawing Alexene had shown her when they first met and instructed her to find.
"It's to unlock something, something I need and before you ask what it is, I cannot tell you. I can't risk anyone knowing about my plans, it could ruin everything,"
Cadence didn't push any further, even though she wished to.
Alexene whipped out something out of her jacket and Cadence immediately locked sight on it. It was a piece of folded paper and ... a device. A phone.
The vampire came over which made Cadence freeze in place, a shudder coursing through her as she felt a trickle of sweat lather her forehead.
Alexene handed the two items over to Cadence who clasped them tightly.
Unfolding the piece of paper, a drawing was placed on it. The item Cadence needs to find was drawn on with an edge that made Cadence recoil. The object looked ancient, like it didn't belong in this time, silver patterned around the rectangular shape. The centre of it was red, as though it could be blood or a diamond.
"What's with the phone?" Cadence questioned coldly.
"I won't be able to see you every time I need an update, so you'll update me through this. My number and name are already in there." Alexene explained smoothly.
Cadence said nothing, she didn't care to say anything else as she knew she was at Alexene's disposal. Her puppet.
"We mustn't raise Lycus's suspicions when it comes to your assignment, he may already know I'm still alive and after him, but that's as close I'm going to get for the time being. You'll be the one doing everything behind his back." Alexene added, gauging Cadence's expression that revealed nothing. Just a frozen portrait of a person hollowed out by harsh digs and punctured holes.
"He's been very quiet lately, I couldn't make any movements in trying to find your item. He made me see an oracle." Cadence thought she'd say.
Just play into her hands ...
Alexene's face remained passive, but a shade of her red eyes brooded with a glamour of distaste and spilled wine. "Really?"
Cadence gave a subtle nod before explaining herself, "the oracle couldn't find much, only blockages and couldn't depict my memories. You wouldn't have anything to do with that would you?"
The question arose innocently and sweetly as Cadence could fathom as she awaited an answer.
"I compelled you before I sent you back to the pack," Alexene confessed.
"What does that even mean?" Cadence asked sharply, wrenching her hands into her pockets to restrain herself.
Alexene waved a dismissive hand, overlooking the matter as though there was no harm done. "Compelled, glamoured, hypnotised — I influenced your mind to do my bidding. It's through eye contact and all I need to do is tell you what I want to be done and you do it. I compelled you not to speak of our conversation and you did just that. Perhaps that's why the oracle couldn't access your mind completely, my abilities plagued hers."
Completely and utterly rattled beyond belief, Cadence stepped back and tried to assure herself with distance. Anger raged through her like a bull ready to strike, but she couldn't do anything. Sure, impulsiveness was a behaviour Cadence has grown akin to, but not downright stupidity to attempt to take down a creature she knows nothing about.
Cadence felt her heartbeat at a rapid rate and she was sure, positive, Alexene would be able to hear it.
"No harm was done, Cadence. It was for your own sake. Lycus couldn't blame you for anything and once I retrieve this item, everything will change. Go back to the way they're supposed to. As it once was ..." Alexene trailed off and looked distantly into the darkness of the cave.
"I'll find your item," Cadence gritted out with hate burning her tongue, "but if you go near my family and friends, I don't give a hell what you are, I'll find a way to kill you."
The threat that hung thick in the air made a tight-lip grin to touch Alexene's lips and a look of anticipation to be the forefront of her expression. "No one can know I still live, Cadence Larren. Update me in the next few days of your findings."
With that, in her unnatural abilities which seem to dabble in speed, Alexene dashed out of the cave like she was never there, a gust of dirt flicking up and irritating the fire.
Cadence's blood went cold as did everything else within her, a nipping spike spearing inside of her like knives as she felt a sudden isolation wrap itself around her like a blanket.
Lip trembling and a single tear threatening to spill, Cadence collected her sleeping bag out of her backpack, laid it on the floor and curled up in it, ushering in the warmth it could provide.
Her only entertainment besides her creeping thoughts playing in her head like a merry-go-round was the dancing flames she stared aimlessly at as she slowly drifted into rest.