Chapter 2 — LEADER SECRETS

I looked at her skin glow under the sun light. Her golden hair flowed like a gold river down her head. Her smooth skin and deep dimples made her look perfect. My dreams were filled with her warm scent. My cold heart was immediately filled with warmth at the mere thought of Dawn. Dawn was just a human girl yet to me she was like a bright star in my dark cold heart.

I had cherished every moment of yesterday, every moment that I basked in her sweet scent.

I sat on the couch. I had taken a short walk around the block but I saw no sign of Dawn. I hadn’t even picked up the slightest traces of her sweet scent. I had returned home before anyone would notice.

I was sitting on one of the sofas, waiting for Jhan to come back from wherever he went so I could bombard him with the mountain of questions I had mentally piled. I was still in pyjamas, the light blue colour of the material gave a nice contrast to my dark skin.

Yesterday I had heard Jhan tell the other that I was a Supreme. I had no idea what he meant but my mind had been wrapped it since then. The attic was officially my bedroom now, the house had run out of rooms, the young, beautiful vampire known as Tia had talked to me for the first time. She had told me to stay in her room but I humbly declined the offer.

Something touched my shoulders, or someone, startling me. I jut my head and spotted Tia's brown hair. She walked from where she had mysteriously appeared behind me to the other side of the sofa and sat behind me. She was still in pyjamas. I kept my gaze on the small table that was places in the middle of the three sofas. A white ornate vase was set upon it with bunch of fresh flowers I assumed Leya had put there.

"I don't sleep, these are just very comfy," Tia said, brushing her hands over the silky material of the pyjamas she wore and I completely ignored her.

"How are you doing?" Her voice was soft and caring. I didn't know how to answer the question; the fact that I could not remember anything from my past except that I was a cancer patient would trouble anyone. Nobody gave me any answers and when I had tried asking Leya, she said Jhan would be able to help me. Now someone asks how 'I'm doing'?

"I can take you to the playground later... It's this place where vampires meet to test our strength and other abilities."

I pretended not to hear her although I did like the idea.

She heaved out a breath. "You must have a lot of questions... I can help you." I turned to meet her blue orbs. She gave a small smile which I did not return.

But I did have some questions.

"So you—we cannot tolerate sunlight?" I asked, I remembered Leya had told me something like that. She did not answer instead she stood up and headed for the windows. ‘What is she doing?’ I asked myself.

On reaching the closed windows she turned around and looked at me. I looked at her, we just stared at each other for about five seconds—she was beautiful. I had almost gotten lost in her pretty blue eyes when she very suddenly pried apart the curtains. Rays of golden sunlight kissed her skin and for a second nothing happened. But suddenly she let out an ear defending shriek.

Her skin seemed to be blistering and evaporating off into the air as some kind of whitish steam. I stood pinned to spot, shell-shocked but on seeing get start to fall I easily skipped over the sofa, catching her before she hit the floor and closing back the blinds to prevent the dangerous rays from doing any more damage. The skin on her face and neck looked like it had been burned with fire. I watched the scorched skin start to heal, slowly the blisters faded until it was all gone. Her light skin vibrant again. 'Not a single drop of blood', I noticed.

"That's what happens when we go into sunlight," she mumbled while taking the seat I had previously occupied.

She had recovered so quickly from those burns and was already full of energy.

"Who was I?" I asked. Tia didn't answer, she just looked at me, allowing akward silence to seep in.

“You were dying of a cancer when Jhan found you," I was about to ask her how he found me when I was in a hospital but she continued, "It's how we keep up the population, we vampires don't just impurify anyone. You see, we give people a choice," her voice dropped lower than a whisper but I could still hear every word she said clearly.

"So he was there on purpose..." I reasoned to myself. "But I don't understand so you ask people before impurifying them?"

"Not just anyone, people who are dying—who want so desperately to live," she said.

"But how could you tell?" I asked her.

"The mind's-eye," she said it as if those three words had magically endowed me with all the knowledge I needed to know.

"Jhan is gifted, he has an ability only few vampires possess; the ability to read and manipulate someone's thoughts and memories," she said.

This sounded all too crazy to be true.

"But he says it's more complicated than that, truth is we without it can never really understand how it works."

"So what you are saying is that, 'I' decided to be impurified?"

She nodded stiffly.

"But why?" I muttered to myself, I knew I wanted to die before I pulled the drip cord, but of course no one knew that.

"You know..." She drew closer to me, "I can help you figure out what you want to know."

Even if I wanted to leave this house to figure it out, Jhan will never let me, unless I sneak out,' The thought was tempting, I could sneak out and go to the hospital... 'I don't remember which hospital it was.'

My heart skipped a beat, and I remembered suffocating on that hospital bed again which made me wonder; how did I get to that hospital in the first place? ‘Didn't I have a family? Parents? Siblings? A whole life probably? School, friends? Places I loved visiting, foods I loved eating, TV shows I loved watching. Or was my life was always hooked up to a life supporter, had I always had cancer throughout my life?’ The thoughts came crashing into my head and I shrunk at the possibility. My mind was racing, I felt like an empty void had opened inside me

"If you want I could ask Jhan about—,"

"No, it’s okay I'll ask him myself." I couldn't risk anyone figuring out that I wanted to know about my past life, because then, they'll keep a closer eye on me. I needed to gain their trust so I could sneak away and figure it out myself.

I glanced at her, clearly reluctant to ask the question but desperate for a change of topic, "So... Tell me about yourself?" She seemed stunned by the question.

"You want to know about me?" She asked, smiling brightly.

I nodded, ignoring her enthusiasm.

"Well, when Jhan found me I was a victim of a car crash, a trailer from the opposite direction hit our SUV"—okay, I was beginning to regret asking the question now—"and didn't stop, we were going on a family vacation... My family was killed. I had to watch my sister bleed to death." Her voice had dropped even lower and she didn't try to hide the sadness in it. "And I couldn't do anything because both my legs were crushed."

 "I'm sorry..." Dread filled me up at the thought of young Tia watching her family die while slowly dying on her own. My imagination had already pictured everything out and for a moment I was the one watching my imaginary family die.

But she kept on going, "I was at the verge of death but then Jhan came. He told me that I was dying and that I had less than five minutes to choose between life as an impurified vampire or a peaceful death. He made it so clear that I choose life, I would become a demonic creature. A blood drinking vampire."

She paused and I saw the glistening light of tears at the corners of her eyes. The room was so quiet now it was like even the air around us listened in.

"I chose life of course. I knew I needed to get revenge for my family," she finished and there was a long pause. I wanted to apologize again but then I decided to ask her another question.

"Did you get your revenge?" I asked her slowly.

She straightened her back, frowning. "Of course I did, Jhan helped me locate him. It was an eye for an eye; he took away the ones I loved, I took away his family.

There was something to her aura. Some darkness that covered her features, made her look dangerous as she spoke about her revenge.

"I'm so sorry Tia," I said, feeling hurt for her.

I didn’t know which surprised and shocked me more; her clear expression of deep pain and emotion for or the cruel dark nature of what she did to that trailer driver’s family. They didn't deserve what came to them, although the trailers driver did. I dithered on the thought of to which side would her actions be justified; killing the trailers driver and putting his innocent family in pain, or killing his innocent family and enacting an eye for an eye justice on him.

The door opened and the stiff sound of boots against the floor could be heard. Tia abruptly made her way up the stairs, probably not wanting the Jhan and Jereum to her in that state.

At the same time Leya bustled in through the supposed back door holding a wet dripping shrub in her left, yellow rubber gloved, hand. Her long blonde hair dropped with water and she was still in a light-blue night dress. She stopped short at the sight of us. I looked at Jereum, whose face was contorted with a mixture of anger and disgust. Seizing the distraction, I stood up quickly to make up the stairs.

“Kaldar?”

It was Jhan’s voice. I turned around.

“Tomorrow I'll introduce you to the higher court. You need to be registered under our leaders.”

But I had picked up the familiar sweet scent. It wasn’t long before I spotted her from the open window. Mp3 player in her ears and jogging effortlessly.

The butterflies were set loose again. They fluttered around in my stomach. I watched her jog by, knowing that it wouldn’t be long before I start to follow her.

Sometimes I had short flashes of a life I knew almost nothing of. Short flashes of myself I could not understand and of a mother I barely knew anything of. Sometimes the flashes would reveal the face of vampire, one with dark skin and red glinted eyes. The flashes would show the vampire killing someone. Killing my mother. The vampire in my dreams was Jhan. My clan leader.

But I had a question on my mind. One I knew only one person could give me the answer for.

Who was I before my impurication? And why could I only remember very little about myself apart from my cancer and the secret of my clan leader killing my family.

Did Jhan kill my family and then kidnap and impurify me? Did he use his mind’s-eye to tamper and erase my memories out of guilt? And if he did, what other secrets was our clan leader hiding from us. I needed to figure it all out one way or the other.

Dawn, I knew I couldn’t resist her warm beauty and it wouldn’t be long before I showed her that I loved her.