Author Note: yea not a whole lot of talking or anything in this chapter, but theirs gonna be more in the next one. think of this as a synopsis of the first 40 years or so of her existence as a vampire.
Chapter 1: Facing Truths:
"Clara," I got up from the table. Running to meet my brother, Jasper outside our southern home "Clara!" he called out again. Jasper was a major for the Confederates, fighting to north since all we wanted was to be our own country. He'd come back to Texas a week before and was waiting to leave for a new battle soon.
"Yes brother," I called making my way up the stairs to the porch where he was waiting "What is it?"
"I'm going to town Clara, and I need you to behave. Mother and Father will be home soon, do you understand?" I smiled at him, and stuck my tongue out. "Cute, but really I'm serious. your twelve years old. You need to start to grow up, I'll be home before dark." With that my brother crossed the yard to his horse, riding off into the woods and down to the trail that would lead him to town.
"Goodbye brother!" I called out to him. He waved but didn't yell anything back. Thunder rolled over our town of Houston as the day was turning to twilight, the clouds began to circle and it was clear a storm was coming. Balls of light lit up the sky, and the thought of my brother's safety crossed my mind.
"I wonder where Jasper is," I sighed "Nellie what time did he saw he was getting back?"
Nellie had been overseeing the family since her brother was a baby "At sundown miss, but it would'nt be unlike him to be late." She rolled her eyes "Maybe he's lost, or just riding that crazy horse to death." she sounded as nervous as I felt. We were optimistic though, I waiting for Jasper to return that night, and the night after that, and so on.
My parents eventually gave up hope of seeing their son again. I left a candle burning in his bedroom window, which faced the wood where he'd gone. It was the color of gold, and was made by Nellie herself with the bees that our house kept. No matter how much she said Jasper was a pain, she raise him, and loved him.
Soon however, a week turned to a month, then a year, another year, it was on the third year that the light died, ending the glow so similar to the sun. That was also the day I considered my brother dead. It was on a summer day in the fourth year that I realized how wrong I was.
I was the woods, being a young girl I never thought much about being alone, how unsafe it was for a human. I had ventured far into the tall trees to pick the flowers of the woods, they always had the pretties flowers at least in my eyes.
I was getting to near the edge I assume, because the next thing I remember was tumbling to the ground, falling and landing near a barn... and my brother. The first thought that came to mind was I must've been dead, but feeling the gash at my forehead told me otherwise, as it bled rapidly. Jasper was at the side of a barn fighting with another man. I waited for the other man to leave before I approached him.
"Jasper!" I called out, hiding in the bushes. His head shot up "Jasper." he was at my side in a flash, his cold hand clamped tightly over my mouth, the other moving my strawberry blonde hair from the wound, giving it a good look.
"Clara, dear god, what are you doing here and what happened to your head?" He shook as if so angry he could burst ",It.. it doesn't matter you.. have to go now! Now!" I grabbed my brothers wrist and held it down as hard as I could.
"No Jasper, not without you." I stood my ground "you shouldn't be here either. you must come home" my brother shook off my hand. "Mother and Father miss you a terrible lot." I begged.
"Clara listen." he grabbed my face with his hands "you must listen. I have to stay, you have to go. before they find you. It's too later for me Clara." He turned me around and forced me to begin to walk back, but I stopped.
"Visit me, please. Our parents are always to busy, your the only family I have and I thought you were dead and you let me think you were dead! Why Jasper?" I could feel my eyes becoming heavy with tears. "I'm sorry if I've disappointed you Jasper." I yelled, turning blindly I ran away from him. My Long, curly hair fell loosely covering my face.
It was because of my hair that I ran into him. He was a tall, oak tree of a man. His feature were sharp, like they were bluntly carved with a butcher knife. His eyes were like cherries sticking out behind the shrubbery of his brown hair. I fell to my butt the moment my head hit his stoney chest.
"Lost little girl." it wasn't a question. "Let me help." he grabbed my collar and lifted me off the ground. He began to carry be back in the direction of my brother.
"I'm not lost, just walki-" The stone-man interrupted
"Walking," he laughed "well your going the wrong way." The large barn and surrounding building came into view, as did Jasper. He sat in the same place he was before.
"Jasper!" I called out, crying for my brother. He looked up and quickly caught up to the slow moving mountain.
"Garth," Jasper called "what are you doing, you've hunted." I didn't like the way that sounded, 'hunted' and knew whatever it was it couldn't be good.
"She was snooping." Garth pointed to me and then looked back at Jasper "Takin' her to Maria." I couldn't help but find his clear Chicago accent funny.
"I'll take her Garth." I felt myself being place down and switched to my brother. "Come on Clara. By the way, Garth meet my sister Clara." Garth waved at me, now friendly. I followed Jasper through the little town in the middle of the woods. "Why didn't you just run Clara?" Jasper didn't stop walking. He sounded terribly sad.
"I did run! As fast as I could Jasper." I shook my head feeling tears return "are we going to see that Maria girl" Jasper nodded. Before long we were at a large building which looked abandoned, but the inside was in pristine condition.
"Maria!" Jasper called, in a flash a lovely women appeared. her hair was Brown and her skin was a dusty white. Her eyes glowered with a combination of power and anger. They were also the same color as those of Garth's.
"Jasper Darling, how are you and who do you have?" Maria kissed my brother's cheek, making him smile for the first time since my arrival. She walked around to face me, I was already taller by a few inches, I was roughly 5'6" and Jasper 6'3". "Anyone special?" she asked, clearly expecting the answer to be yes.
"I have a favor to ask of you Maria. This is my sister Clara, and I need your help." He said this in a single breath, looking down at me with an unknown sorrow.
"She's a little young, but we do have younger." Maria pulled my face into her hand, forcing me to look at her. She pushed my face to either side "Healthy, and just as pretty as her brother is handsome." she added flirtatiously. There was a long time before anything else was said, although eventually she sighed "I can try Jasper. Your sister, huh? Where did you find her?" She laughed showing that it was a joke. "Follow me dear girl."
I looked at my brother who was also following Maria. We went up the large staircase, and down a hall until almost all the light of the house had faded. Jasper stopped at the door to a room. "Listen Clara I can't go in here, it's hard to explain now, but just be a good girl and do what she says. This is your chance to show me how much you've grown in four years." I nodded.
The room was dark, more so than the hallway. Maria instructed me to sit on the couch in one of the corners, it was grey but dark marks of scarlet stained it's surface. A shaky breath escaped me as she came over. "Relax, your brother would kill me if I killed you," she laughed again at her own joke. "and I have to much in store for him and I that I just can't let that happen."
She leaned down to my height on the couch. Maria came near my ear, I could feel her breath on my neck, it was cold as ice and sent a shiver down my spine.. A tiny whimper escaped from me before I felt her teeth drive deeply into flesh. The sound itself, of ripping flesh was not knew to me -I had lived on a farm- although this time it echoed through my eyes like a shriek of a bat in a cave. Her bite was excruciating, like fire, like hell. I saw her tear her mouth it coated in my blood, still dripping from her mouth, she spat sending it away before wiping the rest away on a handkerchief she pulled from her bodice.
"Your brothers lucky, you don't taste nearly as good as him." with that she exited in an instant.
I could hear someone screaming, the type of scream that only death could bring. When the person screams with all the air they have since they knew they would never have another breath. Then realized that it was me. I kept screaming for a long time, before my voice turned hoarse and my world turned to black. Pain surrounded me, and I could only faintly hear what was going on over my screams while I drifted in and out.
It must've been days that went by before I woke up. When I finally did, there was no pain. I didn't move right away, but someone must've noticed that I'd stopped yelling because after another day or so Jasper made his way into the room.
"How are you?" he asked, sitting next to me. I just looked at him, I didn't really know what I was feeling.
"I don't know... what happened to me." my voice was shaky, and sounded a little strange.
"Come on, ill show you," Jasper stood, and stuck out his hand. I grasped it and we walked across the room to a mirror. "Look." He pointed to the mirror. I was almost scared to look into the mirror, but I slowly moved to it. A gasp escaped me.
"What happened to me?" My hair had gained a little more strawberry to it's color, and the features of my face became much less subdued. I was much prettier than I was before and then I saw them. The two orbs of red, glowing like fire from my eyes. "Jasper." I swirled around, grasping my brother into a slightly scarred embrace.
For the next few hours Jasper and I talked. He told me about the vampires, and the wars, why newer vampires are more powerful. It was probably the strangest thing I'd ever heard. Then he told me that he was going to leave Maria and the rest of this behind. "I'm joining a Nomad group, come if you want to Clara." he'd explained.
Jasper did leave Maria's Coven a few months later, but I couldn't. I felt like I owed Maria for not killing me when she had the chance, and for not killing me after Jasper left. I quickly took over my brothers role in the coven. I was their for almost twelve years before I left like my brother had.
It was a vegetarian vampire named Clark that eventually convinced me to leave Maria's coven. Clark had darker skin when he was human, so he had a creamy, light olive color as a vampire. it took me many years to come close to perfecting his diet. when I did my eyes turned a brownish-golden color, replacing the bright red. We had both managed to get fake information good enough it might as well have been real. We settling I a tiny town in northern Maine along with two other older vampires. The two others, Amanda, and Scott awere Mates and vegi vampires as well, and soon began to act as our 'parents'.
Author Note: yea not a whole lot of talking or anything in this chapter, but theirs gonna be more in the next one. think of this as a synopsis of the first 40 years or so of her existence as a vampire.