Of Light and Darkness (8 page)

“The whistle, Evangeline!” Charlotte yelled from underneath the wolf. “Get the whistle!”

Evangeline, who had been frozen in a state of terror, suddenly snapped and ran for the little silver thing twinkling in the dirt. The wolf diverted its attention to her, leapt away from Charlotte, lunged for Evangeline, who now had the whistle clasped tightly in her hand. Evangeline shrieked when something small darted in front of the large animal, intercepting it from her.

Charlotte rolled on her elbows and saw the small body the wolf was now thrashing around with in the dirt was Edwin. The sound of burlap ripping made bile crawl up Charlotte’s esophagus. She could see piles of stuffing spilling out one of Edwin’s limbs.

“Edwin!” She stumbled forward, tripping as she ran for the beast. She lacked a plan, but her mind was clouded with the image of Edwin’s body. Charlotte leapt onto the beast’s back and pounded on it with her fists as it continued to snarl and tear.

Someone else jumped on next to her. In a flash of moonlight, she saw it was the mortal man before she was thrown off into the dirt again. The wolf-man vaulted away from the now lifeless pile of rags and back at Charlotte, pinning her to the ground. It dug its claws deep into her shoulders as she cried out.

Evangeline blew the whistle with all her might; the sound trilled high above the growling.

The Lycan was about to tear Charlotte’s face off when a silver shadow gunned through the night and slammed into the beast at full force.

The two skidded several feet through the dirt. They tangled, throat for throat, limb for limb in the darkness. Vampire and Lycanthrope. Evangeline ran over, pulled Charlotte into her lap and held her as they watched both figures roll and tumble with each other, growling and flashing silvery fangs and claws.

Valek roared, clutching the half-wolf by the neck and sent it flying into an elm, its body crunching against the impact of the thick trunk.

The human man, his clothes soaked in his own blood and dirt, stared wildly at the four of them. First Evangeline, then Charlotte, next Valek, and finally the wolf whimpering on the ground. He watched as it twitched. It fought to get up, stumbling over itself and shaking its head before it set off deep into the forest, disappearing in the heavy shadows.

“Let him go.” Valek sighed through his exhaustion. He rolled over onto his back and panted. “He’ll die soon enough. He’s too weak.” He inhaled slowly, seeming to smell the fresh blood lingering in the air. His nostrils flared, and he snapped his neck in the direction of the one closest to him, eyes enveloped in black.

Both Charlotte and Evangeline stared in horror at the Vampire they thought they knew so well. The monster before them, however, seemed altogether different. His gentle mannerisms had sunken somewhere deep in the dark waters of his mind. He looked at Charlotte as a shark would look at bleeding bait. The drunken passion behind his wild gaze surfaced as he stumbled toward her, fangs gleaming behind parted lips. He moaned softly, tortured, aroused, hungry.

Creeping ever closer, he got to his knees, sinking one claw in the soft dirt. He leaned in so close to her face, she could feel his cold breath on her eyelashes. She pressed her back more firmly against Evangeline’s shoulder.

“Charlotte—” he hissed. The sound of his voice was foreign and serpentine as it slid from behind his lips. Her pulse quickened in her throat and she willed it to steady, shutting her eyes.

Charlotte felt Evangeline’s grip on her tighten.

“Yes, Valek. It’s Charlotte. It’s
Lottie
,” Evangeline soothed.

Valek’s wild gaze did not leave Charlotte’s throat. “Lottie—” He breathed again, saying the word, but attaching no comprehendible recognition.

Charlotte swallowed and bravely pulled away from Evangeline. She inched closer to Valek, looking directly into his eyes. The sound of her pulse was as vibrant in her own ears as she was sure it was in his.

“Yes, Valek. Little Lottie.” She smiled and hummed the familiar lullaby he had always hummed to her when she was afraid. The same song when the Fairy had attacked her in his office, and when the thunderstorms had scared her. “Little Lottie,” she sang again.

Something human grasped at the flickering light in his eyes, and he withdrew from her. He stood back up, fighting hard with himself, forcing to turn away.

“L-Lottie.” His breathing was staggered as his hands balled into fists against his eyes, rubbing them feverishly. His focus turned on the other mortal who was staring at them, a petrified mess in the dirt.

The man writhed on the ground, trying his hardest to stand and run. But something cracked in his hip, causing him to arch backward and cry out. His head pressed to the ground. Tears drenched his bloody face.

Valek’s eyes glazed over again. He bent to the ground at the man’s side. “That is a lovely smell,” he whispered. Valek reared back, as a cobra would, and struck, sinking his fangs deep into the mortal’s jugular.

Evangeline let out a tiny scream as Charlotte buried her face in the Witch’s angular shoulder. Evangeline tried to cover Charlotte’s ears so she would not have to hear the man’s inevitable demise.

***

Warm, thick ichor rushed past Valek’s lips and ran slick down his throat like hot, sweet molasses. He held the human’s neck secure to him as he swallowed heartily, enjoying the grapple as the man clawed and shoved. He listened to his wild heartbeat, like the pulsation of a thousand hornets. The man’s life pooled around Valek’s lips, the smell singeing his nostrils.

Finally, the human was drained, finished, and Valek came up for air. He craned his head toward the moon as the leftovers swam in a string of garnet down the side of his face. The animal in him disappeared, and even though some of the feeling still stuck at the forefront of his consciousness, he was at least sane again. He slowly got to his feet and turned to see Evangeline quaking, clutching Charlotte as though she were a small child.

Valek frowned then knelt beside them again with a wary look toward the Witch. He placed a cool hand on his Charlotte’s shoulder.

Charlotte’s head immediately shot up, her eyes drenched. That was the first time she had ever looked at him like this. Like a monster. He hushed her, running his long fingers down her cheek.

“I am so sorry, Lottie,” he said sadly. This time he really had done permanent damage. “Don’t cry.” He caught a tear that lingered on her face.

Charlotte’s knees shook like they might cave. She saw the heap of burlap and stuffing on the road. Edwin, the once enchanted rag doll, lay dead in the mix of fur and dirt. She looked to Evangeline again, a plea in her eyes this time.

“I can fix him.” A tear rolled down the Witch’s bloodless face. “I promise. It will be…easy.”

Charlotte nodded, finally starting to feel a little less numb as the onset of sadness began to swell at the bottom of her throat. She didn’t say anything. Instead, she got up and gazed down at the tow of them. The glamorous Witch’s hair was caked to her face with dirt and sweat, though she was still just as beautiful as she ever was. Charlotte glanced at Valek one last time.

Valek, Charlotte’s only confidant in the world, was now beyond recognizable to her—their differences painfully apparent. She would never be close to what he was. She was the prey, a link in his food chain. She’d never felt so far removed from him. Not when he argued with her about sneaking into his bedroom. Not even when she’d found him with Evangeline the night before—her worst fear realized.

She ran back down the dirt road. Back to her home, to where it always used to be safe. Back to where things were familiar. She ran as the wind dried the tears on her face. She ran until all she could think about was the path in front of her. She ran, leaving Valek, Evangeline, and a crumpled little Edwin behind.

Chapter Eight

Reservations

Valek surprised Charlotte when she breathlessly stumbled through the front door. Of course he had beaten her home. The air was blazing in her tattered lungs. There was nowhere else for her to run to now.

“Why did you run?”

Valek’s lips peeled over his fangs when she didn’t answer him immediately. He stormed up and grabbed her by the shoulders. “
Why
did you run away?” he demanded again, shaking her. “It’s
me
, Charlotte.”

It was all too much for her. She collapsed to her knees. Meredith Price had been right. Valek
was
a monster.

Valek, keeping his hold on her, also lowered to the floor, transforming his grasp into an embrace instead. She pressed her face into the hollow of his collarbone, wishing it had been a comfortable feeling, like it always used to be.

“It’s just me, Lottie.”

Now he cried, his tears washing his eyes red. Charlotte looked down as they splashed in ruby beads on the floor beside her. “You are safe with me. I promise you that. I don’t know what happened to me out there,” he whispered.

She looked up at him, attempting desperately to steady her breathing, but it continued to break in involuntary gulps, like small children did when they could not control their crying fits. Charlotte closed her eyes against the sight of him, but still felt his weight all around her. She pulled away and quietly got to her feet. After one silent moment looking down at him, she traipsed up the stairs to her bedroom, feeling his gaze on her back the whole way up. She carefully guarded her thoughts until she was away.

She moved over to her vanity mirror and gaped at the streaks of brown caked on her face and clothes. She forced her breaths to come out even and used the side of her desk as a crutch. The soft breeze outside her open window cooled her hot face as she tried to shift one of her shoulders, still drenched with the drying blood. She flinched. The wound stung where the cotton clung to it.

She leaned in a little closer to the mirror, tenderly pulling away her sweater to examine the lacerations further, when Valek’s dark reflection in the mirror made her jump. She spun around to see him looming there sadly against her doorsill.

Charlotte responded by averting her gaze to the floor.

He approached her and lifted his hands without a word to her to examine her.

When she didn’t offer, he said, “I need to mend this, Charlotte, before the wounds become infected. Your body temperature is already a bit high.”

Charlotte gingerly shifted her arm to him, wincing as it moved.

He looked closely at the gash, trying to pull the fabric away to see the damage more clearly.

“I cannot assess how serious this is.” His voice was stoic and empty. If it were possible, which she didn’t think it was, Charlotte’s heart sank a little further. “You’re going to have to take that off.” He rolled up his sleeves.

She froze for a minute, remembering she had nothing on underneath, other than her bra. Blood pooled to her face, and she bit down on her lip. She looked up at Valek who was staring back numbly, but expectantly. Slowly, she turned and began peeling off the sweater, in spite of the voice in her head that had suddenly begun protesting very loudly. He had known her since she was in diapers after all. This wasn’t
so
bad.

The article of clothing dropped in a heap on the floor by her feet. When she faced him, she heard Valek clear his throat, as if her actions made him nervous as well. Perhaps she should have listened to the voice.

He squinted at the deep gashes in her shoulders, taking one frail arm in his frigid talons. Her heart pounded so frantically, she bet he could see it leaping through her skin. A cool sweat began to form on her brow.

“This is very deep,” he diagnosed with a sigh. “Come downstairs, please, so I can clean it and close it up.” He kept his tone even as he led the way out of the room.

Charlotte meekly followed, making the wood creak beneath her. Her mind flickered back to Meredith Price again as she glanced down at the blood drying on her body. The dull stench of rust and iron circled her. It was probably
much
more prevalent to Valek, she suspected. The inevitable words resounded in her head once more.

‘
Vampire
.’

‘
You can never be too careful
.’

Valek opened the door to his stark office The walls and cabinets were white, sterile almost to the point of being eerie. They did not match the rest of their home at all. This room seemed lifeless, which was appropriate. Being here instantly made her uncomfortable as she began to go through all of the deaths that she knew had happened here. A chill suddenly kissed the tops of her shoulders and she hugged herself.

“Have a seat,” Valek instructed forbearingly, gesturing to the large, leather office chair behind his massive, slate desk. The lack of tone in his voice was unnerving. It sounded hollow and metallic. His eyes seemed to be made of slate.

He went into the cabinet under the sink in the corner and pulled out a bottle of rubbing alcohol, suture thread, and white gauze to wrap the wounds in. She watched him carefully, wanting so badly to articulate what she was thinking. She wanted to ask him questions, to solve the problems, but her tongue stayed swollen in her mouth. She just sat there quietly, her eyes fixed on his face, searching for any sign of emotion at all as he walked back over to her.

He leaned casually on the corner of his desk and started to dab the blood away with the alcohol. Charlotte flinched. The smell of it invaded the entire room; Charlotte could tell he still wasn’t breathing.

“Look away, please.” His voice was low, almost a whisper.

He started to sew up the gashes in her left shoulder. Wincing every time the needle poked through her skin, she clawed at the chair arms. Her teeth ground together as she chose something to focus on, deciding to fix her gaze on a drawing of hers that hung on the wall in a black-wire frame. It was a colored-pencil version of both of them, in front of a box meant to resemble their house. Something she had given him when she was ten. The simplicity of the colored markings made her smile. Only
he
would have found it beautiful enough to put in a stupid frame.

“Done,” he said, releasing her.

She looked at him, surprised. It seemed like it didn’t take any time at all. She got up from his chair. “Thank you.” Without another word, she walked out of the office.

She ran back up the stairs and into her bedroom to find something to cover herself with. There was a time where that situation wouldn’t have been awkward at all, though it was now.

After a quick, hot bath, she rifled through some different tops in her dresser drawer, settling on a cobalt button-down. Without opening it, she slid it over her head and hurried to her closet where she pulled out a light, pink sweater, one Valek had picked out for her last year.

She plopped down on her bed with her sketchbook and a black, graphite pencil, and started sketching, not sure what she was drawing yet, just letting the graphite lines mark where they wanted. Her abilities had significantly improved since that drawing she gave Valek when she was ten.

She suddenly found herself concentrating on that framed picture again, how it looked hanging in his office, and started re-sketching it with the ability she now possessed. Maybe when all of this confusing turmoil was over and things were back to the way they were just a few days ago, she would give it to him.

Focused on what she was doing, she jumped halfway out of her skin when something abruptly chinked against her windowpane. She put her sketchbook down, eyeing the glass, waiting for that deformed Lycan to come leaping through it, bent on revenge.

Something thudded against it again, and she slowly got up and walked over to it. She lifted the pane and looked out into the night. Standing on the ground was Aiden, clutching various pebbles in his hand. He dropped the one he was about to throw and smiled up at her.

“Charlotte!” He waved his hand around above his head.

“Shut up!” she whisper-yelled at him. “Are you really throwing pebbles at my window? Isn’t that a little cliché?”

He dropped all of the pebbles to the ground, his cheeks flushing, his hands scratching the back of his head. “Yeah, I guess,” he admitted. “Come down here!”

“Shh!” She put a finger to her lips. “No! Valek is home. It’s not a good time.”

“I heard about what happened. I think I have a theory,” he said, a little more hushed than before.

“A theory about what? How did you find out about that?” She leaned a little farther out the window.

“I ran into Evangeline. She was carrying a pile of stuffing back to her house.” He shrugged.

Charlotte frowned. “That
pile of stuffing
was Edwin. But you need to be quiet, Aiden!” Valek would surely hear them, if he hadn’t already.

He smiled. “I will if you come down here.”

Charlotte sighed. How was she going to resist that? “Fine, but not so close to the house!”

“Agreed.”

“Where should I meet you, then?”

“At my house.”

Charlotte looked at her watch. It was one-thirty in the morning. “Isn’t your mother going to be furious with you for having houseguests? It’s amazingly late!” She shoved her watch out toward him, expecting him to see the little ticking hands from where he stood, a full story below her.

“My parents aren’t home.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and kicked the pebbles by his feet. “Look, you’re wasting more time by arguing with me.”

“Fine! I’ll meet you at your house in five minutes if you leave now!”

He smiled up at her. She watched his silhouette disappear back into the trees. Her heart fluttered. She closed her window and turned to see Valek standing once again at her threshold.

She gasped. “Valek! What—?”

“What does Aiden want with you at this hour?” he asked, dryly. His usually excitable features were still bland as ever.

Charlotte sank again. Of course Valek heard them. “Oh…um….” She couldn’t lie to him, he would know. “He wants me to come over.” She fidgeted under the bandages on her shoulders.

“At this hour?”

Valek looked so handsome leaning up against the baroque scrollwork around the doorframe like he was a part of it. It crushed her that she couldn’t just sit down with him and simply talk this out. She wasn’t ready, the humiliation too fresh.

“He doesn’t have school in the morning, and he knows this is the only time I’m ever awake,” she explained.

Valek shrugged, the edge of his words biting. “Have a splendid time.”

Charlotte’s eyes widened. He was never this easy. Was he just trying really hard to give her some space? “All right,” she said, making sure he was serious.

He didn’t say anything further.

“Then I guess I’ll be back a little later. I won’t stay out too long.” She took only a tentative step to the door in case he really was having more of a difficult time than he was letting on.

“Be careful.” His voice wavered.

She decided she didn’t want to say anything else to him. Instead, she cleared her throat and uncomfortably brushed past him. But before she got to the top of the stairs, she turned back around to see that he was still watching her, like one of those haunted paintings whose eyes followed you no matter where you stood in the room. Suddenly guilty, she ran up to him and delicately wrapped her arms around his middle. He reluctantly hugged her back.

“Not too long,” he whispered.

She looked up at him before descending down the staircase and out the front door.

The night outside was getting cold, a common autumn evening. Brown and orange leaves crunched under Charlotte’s sneakers as she walked down the road toward the suburb district. The warm glow of the floating, bewitched street lanterns stretched her silhouette long and black across the road. She lifted her hands in the air like claws and studied her shadow. What if she were a monster?

Hands from nowhere reached from the darkness suddenly and wrapped around Charlotte’s face, concealing her scream. She fought with the grasp, only to find she knew those hands all too well.

Aiden released her, laughing.

She punched him hard in the arm. “So what’s your theory, pond scum?”

“Wait until we get to my house,” he whispered, looking around.

“What is wrong with you? You were just screaming at the top of your lungs at
my
house!”

“Shut up!” He put a hand to her mouth again. “Noisy thing.” She made a face and knocked it away. He wound his fingers between hers and led her a little faster down the street.

“You’re acting really weird.”

She grimaced at their hands woven together. She didn’t like it at all. It felt too warm, somehow. Too normal.

“Oh, so you get to be a freak all the time and I don’t?” He smiled wryly, eyes still darting about the emptiness of the streets.

“Funny, but let’s remember who the freak really is.” She flicked his slightly pointed ear.

“You’re the only human living in a town of Elves and Witches. I would say you’re the freak in this case.”

The two made their way to his house without any more words. It was quiet and dark with the promise of missing parents.

Once inside, he led her into the den where they both sat together on the warm, knit area rug, an olive color on the dusty, wooden floor. He put a finger to his lips. “Don’t make a sound. My brothers and sisters are
finally
sleeping.” He rolled his eyes.

“So, where are your parents?” Charlotte pried.

“My mom’s in Prague…visiting my dad.”

“Why is your dad in Prague?”

“He works there.”

“He works there?” She blanched.

“It’s a really long story.” He cut her off, and she glowered at him. “He works there at the Regime headquarters. My dad is fourth in command. The Wizard’s Regime headquarters is in Prague.” His explanation seemed to ramble together.

Charlotte frowned, trying to wrap her head around what he was telling her. She had never actually met Mr. Price. “The
Regime?
  But I thought—”