An Immortal in London: Corruption (5 page)

My brows furrowed and my lips curled into a sympathetic smile, I leant forward and kissed his cheek lightly before I stood and walked into the house to check for intruders before I left for my own place. My phone rang out in my pocket, it was Levi.

“Drink?”

I smiled and took a breath, “I’ll find you in five.”

“Don’t you look charming,” Levi said, as I walked over to him.

I looked down at my cream heels and smoothed down my blue chiffon blouse. As I tucked a loose curl behind my ear I smiled up to him and shrugged, “I figured I wouldn’t look too good covered in blood.”

Levi pulled the arms of his grey shirt down, “I’ll take the next one.”

I rolled my eyes as we walked into the small bar and took a seat in a booth at the back.

Our waitress stopped next to Levi, he smiled up to her, his charming green eyes se
ducing her right where she stood, “a bottle of your finest red.” His lips suggestively framed each word, I watched as the young woman blushed and ran off to the bar.

“
I think she just wet herself.”

“
It’s my speciality,” he said, remaining nonchalant, a devilish gleam in his eyes.

“When was the last time you gave a girl more than a smile?”

He took in a sharp breath as I mock wounded him with my question. “Drink your wine,” he uttered, keeping his smile.

He
watched as I put the glass to my lips and the cool red liquid caressed my tongue.

“What’s the verdict on the wine?” he asked, his hand coming to my lips as I lowered my glass, with his thumb he delicately stole the drop of wine that lay on them.

“I’ve had better,” I said casually, my lips parting as his fingers slipped away.

“You’re hard to please.
”

I sat back and smiled so easily that I barely noticed, “Easy to disappoint.”

“I’ll take that as a warning,” he said laughing lightly.

Without warning my eyes fooled me, Levi faded into the darkness and Sedric sat before me on my father’s lawn. Our afternoon tea had been served and we were alone under the shade of a chestnut tree.

Sedric smiled across to me and his lips moved as if he was going to talk but instead he continued his smile without a word, his eyes were lost in mine, captivated by the love that I held for him.

The sun warmed what little skin I had on show, as was the way. The cool grass tickled my bare feet and my laughter filled the air. Bird song was a distant trickle of music that mixed with the light breeze and my whispered words of love.

Levi’s eyes were locked onto mine full of concern and the most sincere fear I had ever seen within him. I sat back and shook my head.  I stood and stumbled to the door, the few people that were sat at the bar looked on with little concern.

I closed my eyes and leant against the cool bricks of the wall. London’s influence on me was becoming too much, I was losing control of my memories. Katelyn had been the only person to help me take control and she wasn’t there to help me because the bastards that we were hunting had killed her. Anger flooded my body and as I smashed my hands against the building the wall beneath me shook and Levi’s iron hands pulled me from the scattering of lose house bricks that crashed down onto the frozen ground.

Levi stepped away from me as I ran my hands though my hair. I rested a hand over my heart and closed my eyes, “I’m sorry.”

“
It’s okay.”

I shook my head and looked over to him, “It won’t happen again,” I said
again
, the only sound of my regret lay buried in my own head. “I’ll take the north, you take south. I’ll see you later.”

He turned and ran to begin his patrol, I stood for only a second before I set off to the north and scouted the area for any stray dead wandering
alone, away from the tribes. Not all of the dead in London, take Greg for example, were involved in the corruption, but nevertheless each dead immortal was a threat to our way of life, and their numbers being so high, whoever stood in our way would be taken down.

A shadow across the street from where I stood caught my eye as it moved down a nearby alleyway. I stopped and listened, I felt for the darkness and I found it. I crossed the road and peered into the alley, with one final look around me I disappeared into the shadows.

Upon seeing his face my body froze. Victor’s blazing eyes delved into mine. My breath caught in my throat and I forced my eyes closed. I felt the cruel intensity of his cool fingers as they parted my lips and traced the contours of my face, as his shadows held my body and cloaked me from the light. My breath returned to me as I slowly opened my eyes to see that the alley was deserted.

I hadn’t heard, but my phone had been ringing. I had three missed calls from Levi. As I pressed call I suddenly felt it. Light and dark colliding, like a thunderstorm it shook the ground on which I stood. Levi was fighting
a tribe, just how many of them there would be I couldn’t tell.. Our blood bond was the reason for what I felt, it was one of the many defensive traits of immortals, knowing when your kin was in trouble had saved many a blood line in the past.

They were in the city centre; no mortals were around, just why or how I didn’t understand. Strange things always occurred when the corruption grew to such a state of
overwhelming darkness. The dark was outweighing the light and it was destroying the city and the people within it. 

There was a slender darker than coal female with black cropped hair,
who had her arms around his neck. I ran, pulling her off of him and crushing her rib cage to reach inside to tear out her heart. I had no time to pause, I span on my heel and dove into the fight. Levi was holding onto the largest hunter by the throat, I forced my hand through his back and pulled his heart from his body, he fell limp in Levi’s hands and he dropped him onto the cold ground. We both turned on the third and final creature. He looked from Levi to me, over and over. He looked over our shoulders; Levi looked as I kept my eyes on him. He turned and ran, but not fast enough. I stood above his trembling body and with no pity in my heart, broke his.

As I dragged his body back to Levi, I saw that the others were alight, Levi lit up the coward that I had slaughtered and we stood back, looking over the destruction.

“How is this happening?” I asked.

He looked down to me gravely, “I’m beginning to think that the mortals might be right, if this continues we will see the end of the world.”

That night my dreams were plagued with nightmarish images of London city hidden beneath a mass of shadows. I was stood on the roof of the palace next to someone, just who I couldn’t see as each time I turned to look at them I would fall from the roof and the dream would begin again.

             
A cool breeze woke me and I found myself curled up on the window seat of my bedroom in Gabriel’s house. I sat up and stretched my arms out in front of me. I scratched my left arm just inside my elbow to satisfy an irritating itch. The morning sun shone into the room as I pulled open the curtains. The warm light bathed my skin as I dressed and tried to shake last night’s dream from my mind.

             
Levi was sat downstairs glaring at Gabriel. I walked into the room and both of their faces turned to me. Gabriel stood as I entered and rolled his eyes as Levi stayed sat down and simply watched me sit down opposite him.

             
“You look chipper?” Gabriel asked, although I wasn’t sure if it was intended as a question.

             
“Apocalyptic dreams give her a high it seems,” Levi uttered, under his breath.

             
Gabriel frowned and looked to me, I held open my hands and shrugged, “Don’t ask me.”

             
He seemed to wait for an answer from someone else, but suddenly held up his hands and said, “Oh, that’s what I wanted to ask have you seen my keys anywhere; I haven’t seen them since I went out last week?”

             
“They’ve been missing for a week and you decide to ask now?”

             
“I haven’t needed them…”

             
I sighed and turned away from him. I skipped out of the room and waited for Levi to follow me out. I pulled him into the library and stood over where he sat at Gabriel’s desk. “How’d you know?”

             
“I wasn’t certain, but you’ve confirmed my suspicions.”

             
“It was you, on the roof of the palace?”

             
He nodded, “Every time you fell I tried to catch you, but someone else got to you first and the dream would start again.”

             
“We over killed,” I whispered, so as Gabriel wouldn’t hear.

             
An over kill was exactly what it sounded like. The balance was enforced by the fates, a power that no one questioned, or conquered. Corruption of the balance was inevitable, as is mutiny on a ship with a wretched captain; however it has much deadlier consequences in the immortal world. Even under the threat of corruption, if a single immortal kills enough to unsettle the balance they are punished. Levi and I had killed four between us that night, four too many it seemed. It would start with dreams and if continued there would be hallucinations, and overall mental anguish, I myself had never felt the force of the further punishments as I lived my life suffering with constant hallucinations of the past.

             
“There must be more of the living in London than we thought,” I said.

             
He nodded, “We have to find them, if we can organise ourselves as the dead have, then we can avoid… we should take tonight off.”

             
I reluctantly agreed, if I had to suffer nightmares to sleep soundly knowing that the dead were truly dead then that was a price that I was willing to pay.

As hunting was out the question I stayed close to Gabriel’s. Levi had abandoned me mid afternoon, so I took it upon myself to escape in a neighbouring park.

              “Is this a bad time?”

             
Conflict, it was the running theme of my life I was certain, I couldn’t go a day without it. Whether it was a physical fight, emotional, or even mental, there would always be conflict. I had had so many civil wars within my own mind I was sometimes surprised that I could still think at all.

             
“I don’t see a better one appearing anytime soon,” I said.

             
She smiled and handed me a yellow rose, “I’m sorry I never called.”

             
I took the rose and smiled regretfully, “I didn’t expect to see you back.”

             
The last time that I saw Clarence was in 1910. She was Levi’s only surviving family, family in the true sense of the world. They had travelled the world together for centuries, but during the late 1700s Clarence finally took off solo. We would spend whole days together, lying in the sun on a grass bank in the south of France. I could have listened to her stories for hours on end, never to hear anything else. When she left I moped for weeks, until I got my first postcard, I had begged her to take me with her, but she insisted that she needed to be alone.

             
“I’m back for good baby.”

             
I pulled her into my arms and smiled as her long black hair tickled my nose, “I’ve missed you.”

             
“Levi has been telling me all about your new thing in his letters,” she said, as she twisted her hair around her fingers and smiled across to me with her darling green eyes, identical to her brother’s.

             
“Thing?”  I asked laughing, “I suppose that is the only way to describe the mess we’re in.”

             
She laughed and shrugged, “From everything that I’ve read you two make quite the team, can I be expecting little baby hunters any time soon?”

             
I pushed her hands from my stomach and sighed, “First that would be impossible, and second, you’re reading too much into it, we’re fond of each other in a respect sort of fashion…”

             
“You’re rambling, I don’t care that much, you can do what you want with him. I don’t suppose you’ve seen Bernadette since we last spoke?”

             
I shook my head, “no, but I‘m still looking.”

             
“You should drop by sometime, I’m going to say hello to the bore so I shall speak to you later,” she kissed my cheek lightly and seemed to glide along the small path out of the park.

The day had been quiet after I saw Clarence.

That night I dreamt of him, I dreamt of Levi. We were stood together beneath a chestnut tree and he held his hand over mine on my stomach. I looked down and beneath our intertwined fingers my stomach bulged so beautifully beneath my white cotton blouse.

I woke up to see Gabriel sat beside my bed holding my hand whispering softly.

I sat up and felt the tears stream down my cheeks and land on my chest. “What were you dreaming of?” he asked, as he caught a tear on his fingertip.

I closed my eyes and smiled as more tears came, “being human.”

He opened his arms and held me at his chest. No words could soothe the pain that I felt in my
heart, and he knew that. I had had the dream before, only the man had been Sedric, each time it had been Sedric, always Sedric until that night.

He kissed my nose and stood, with my hands in his he said quietly, “you try to get some more sleep and I’ll shout you for breakfast in a few hours.”

“I’m supposed to be the one protecting you.”

He shook his head with a smile as he left the room.

I slept a little. But each time I hit the surface of another dream I would wake myself, afraid of what might be waiting for me. As I stretched up in a sleepy trance an itch travelled from my left elbow up to my neck, I followed it and shook myself off.

When I finally awoke and dressed for breakfast there was more than beans and toast waiting for me. Levi stood at the door talking with Gabriel. Both men turned to look at me as I walked down in my casual jeans and light blue sweatshirt. Consciously I pulled at the oversized cotton, and avoided looking into Levi’s eyes for fear that he too had shared my dream.

“How are you feeling?” Gabriel asked, his eyes searching mine.

I shrugged and smiled, “Fine, why wouldn’t I be?”

Levi was watching our interaction with his usual cool calculation and as I looked up to him I couldn’t decide as to if he had experienced the dream too.

“Have you had any more news about Oliver?” Gabriel asked, with his voice one of calm and strength.

Levi smirked, and handed me a piece of paper with two names, “We’ll be asking around today.”

“Two?” I said looking down at the two names.

“I’m a glutton for punishment.”

“Well I’m not, you’re in this alone.”

He frowned and his lips parted to speak, but Gabriel spoke over him, “What harm will one more day do Levi?”

“Fine,” he said, turning to go, “I thought that we were in this together, for Katelyn,” he added, his voice filled with disappointment, meeting my heavy eyes, I looked down at my bare feet and he left, leaving the door open as he stormed down the driveway.

“Why do you put up with him?” Gabriel asked.

“He’s a good person Gabriel.”

             
“I don’t believe it, I won’t believe it. You hated him for so long Victoria.”

             
I stayed stood looking out of the small window and shook my head, “people change.”

             
Gabriel left the hallway and I took my phone out of my pocket to call Clarence.

             
After three rings she picked up, “Vic?”

             
“I need to see you.”

             
“I will be with you in ten minutes.”

             
She pulled up in her small car and I ran out into the rain and jumped into the passenger side. She looked at me for a while before either of us said anything. As she always did with everyone she analysed every little detail, so heart wrenchingly similar to her brother.

             
“What’s Levi done now?” she asked carefully.

             
I sighed and wiped the rain from my cheeks, “It’s not him it’s me.”

             
“I doubt that,” she said as she pulled away, “you’re far too good for that man you know, he’s a hideous creature.”

             
“He’s your brother. How can you say that?”

             
“Because I have known him all his life,” she said as she rested her hand onto mine, “if you don’t tell me what’s wrong I can’t help.”

             
I sighed and shook my head softly.

I told her about the dream and the punishment that we had both suffered together the night before. She listened as I told her about what had happened in Paris, Katelyn’s death, my affair during the tribal attack, and Levi’s reaction when I refused to help him with our hunt for Oliver that day.

              Instead of focusing on the present her immediate reaction was one of shock at something that I had done many years ago, “You slept with a dead man?”

             
I nodded slowly and opened the window slightly, “I can’t explain it, but…” I began, but stopped myself. As loyal as Clarence had been to me in the past I couldn’t be certain that she would hold up her promise of loyalty.

             
“Come on, we’re sisters.”

             
I closed my eyes and sighed, “He had a scar identical to mine, and he was so
alive
and passionate. And his name, Clarence his name was
Victor
.”

             
“Victor?”

             
I nodded and turned to her, complete fear had taken over her, “Do you know him?”

             
“Did you kill him?” she asked quietly, before turning into an unused car park.

             
I swallowed painfully slowly, my fear equalling hers, “you know something, don’t you?”

             
“No…” she said avoiding my eyes.

             
“Clarence, who is he?”

             
She put her hands onto the steering wheel and closed her eyes, “Did you kill him?” she asked. I shook my head, and she pushed her hands through her hair, the same disappointment in her eyes as I had seen in Levi’s that morning. “He is bad news Vic, real bad news.”

             
“He could have killed me Clar, but he didn’t.”

She was staring
cynically into my eyes and my memory of the last time that I saw Victor in the alleyway span around and around in my mind threatening to throw me overboard. 

She looked at me and let out a breath, and as if she could see what was frightening me so,
“You think you love him.”

             
“No, of course I don’t think I
love
him.”

             
“I can’t believe that you would be so stupid. We are all f…”