Neophyte / Adept
Authors: T.D. McMichael
The Wiccan Diaries
Vols. 2-3
by
T. D. McMichael
Copyright 2013 by T. D. McMichael
All rights reserved.
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We were born on the Summer and Winter Solstice,
respectively. He was a Gemini, I was Sagittarius. He didn’t think he was human.
I didn’t think he was not.
We were as far apart, celestially, as it was possible to be.
And yet...
I fetched out my diary from underneath my pillows. Lennox
had insisted on separate everything. That included beds.
I clicked my pen. I had to get this down.
“We are here,
finally,”
I wrote, putting the pen between my teeth. I scratched it out.
For there to be a ‘we’ there would have to be two of us. “I am
here. Why do I feel like I’m all alone? Oh
yeah, maybe because I am...”
It was hard to feel upset, with how beautiful everything
was. The morning was my favorite time of day. The fog surrounding the lagoon
islands closed us in. We were stuck someplace between the Lido, on the one
hand, and San Clemente, on the other. On our own private island.
Venice was in the distance. Venice, Italy. Too far away to
see. I had not yet set foot there. It was the home of Lennox’s small but
distinctly loving family. Having never actually met them, I couldn’t say for
sure, but I was beginning to think Lennox didn’t want me to; like I wasn’t good
enough. I couldn’t think of another reason why Lennox had not introduced us.
“Nonsense,” he said. “That’s why I brought you here.”
But I couldn’t help feeling like there was another, secret,
reason, he had brought me to one of the oldest cities on earth. It had been
three weeks.
That was almost a lifetime to have been away from Rome,
parted from my new life and everything in it. There was my best friend Ballard,
for one thing. I could feel him growing restless, even though we had agreed not
to write. Lennox had frowned against me bringing my laptop, which meant no
sending emails back and forth.
There was another reason why I wanted to keep Ballard close
by, though. He was a werewolf. Or
something
.
He was different. That was all that mattered. We all were.
My landlady, a secretive crone––I couldn’t be
sure if she knew more than she was saying––had agreed to continue
letting me my small room above one of the brightest and busiest tourist areas
in Rome. Something Lennox thought was perfect, because when I was all alone I
was having the dreams––nightmares of creatures stalking me, and
something worse. That was all over with, wasn’t it? The necromancer who had
tried to kill me had been beaten, hadn’t he? Even my other friend, Marek, who
had tried–– No, who
had
bitten me, was off.
Who knows where, doing who knows what. He was a vampire like
Lennox, and I, I was something else. That was part of the problem. Who was I?
My past was more confusing than a jigsaw puzzle.
Was I a witch? Or just a potential witch?
My pen hovered over the page. It was as indecisive as I
was... About everything: my life, my love. What I was even doing here?
“Dear Diary,”
I
wrote again.
“We are fugitives in a
gorgeous villa, whose crumbling rock exterior hides a very lovely hovel,
indeed. It is almost winter. I didn’t know it, but it snows in Italy; just not
everywhere. We are near to the Dolomites. Italy’s own portion of the Alps.
Lennox has suggested we go snowboarding. Not now. But someday.
“I like that word:
someday. I have taken to thinking about vampirism, and the Immortal Life, as I
call it. Anything to get closer to the person that I love. I do love him.
“I know this sounds
like me trying to reassure myself, Diary, or even you, but–– You
know how you know when you know? I’m still trying to imagine he and his family
strapped to their Burtons straight-up grinding on the snow up there. They must
fly down the mountainside, which is something I would dearly love to see, if I
could, if I could keep up.
“The name of our
place? Rat Rock, of course. Lennox assures me that there aren’t any. In fact an
old legend has it that Rat Rock was used during the Black Plague to quarantine
the doges and other people of significance, who came here to die. A good cover
story to ward off any adventuresome Venetians, who may want to set foot on our
island. Actually, Lennox and his family use it, for when they ‘want to get
away.’ Something I take to mean, for when they want to eat human beings.
“Which is why Lennox
doesn’t think he’s good enough to be with me.
“I try to tell him
that I don’t care. ‘What’s past is past,’ I say. But he has fears: among them,
that he may try and hurt me.
“‘I can withstand
anyone else––but not you,’ he says. ‘It’s like flame upon wax.’
“‘If you mean you melt
me,’ I said.
“‘No. It’s just.’
“‘What?’
“He can be so prettily
metaphoric. ‘You burn me.’
“I suddenly
understood: I was the flame. How could that be? If he knew what he did to me...
He would understand it was I who was worked upon by him.
“Or wished to be.
“‘It’s like our first
vacation together,’ I said, the day after we had first arrived, ‘like
our––well, our...’
“‘What?’ he said to
me. ‘Say it. I feel like we don’t say it.’
“‘Honeymoon,’ I said.
“He immediately
proceeded to turn into an ice cube. I could literally hear him freeze over. If
he used his voice it would have chilled me. Instead, he disappeared into his
room; I barely saw him anymore. It frightened me.
“That I could lose him
that quickly...
“‘Rocks can’t be
burned,’ I said, hoping he would come back to me, and stop being an island unto
himself. After all, there were so many things I wanted to ask him, particularly
about himself. Anything to do with himself was off-limits: just that I know I
was too good for him and blah blah blah.
“Just once I wanted
him to see himself clearly, the way I did, for him to know
what I knew him
to be. But we had separate beds. It wasn’t
even like we were boyfriend-girlfriend. The word ‘honeymoon’ had driven a wedge
between us. I was determined to bring him out of his funk.”
* * *
I tucked my diary away. It was a running commentary of my
time spent in Italy. A portable friend I could berate with the things I found
out. I got up and made my bed and looked around my room.
Vampires lived here. I had to remind myself of that. I
suddenly got nervous about the possibility of meeting his family. It was like
anything that had been postponed too long: artificially worked up into
something ‘significant.’ I wondered suddenly if I would be required to put on a
‘performance.’
I don’t do well with things when people are watching. One of
the reasons I had not yet chosen to let Lennox in on my little secret. Because
when we were not alone together––which was a kind of double
entendre––I was busily researching all things supernatural,
particularly as they related to me.
I sat on the edge of my bed and put on my shoes, tying the
laces tight. Lennox’s modest island getaway was exactly as it should be: with
very little to distract from the solitude. Rat Rock would always be a place of
contemplation for me. It was empty of any kind of frills, except for that
spectacular view. I went out with a baggy sweater over a pair of tights, and my
long, black hair done up in a ponytail, and was hit by the early-morning
sounds.
The lagoon water was granite-colored and choppy. I began
stretching and walking around. Visibility was practically nothing. I could just
make out the San Clemente tower and the old insane asylum, and the sun, a muted
white orb that hung low on the horizon; its rays licked at the shoreline of Rat
Rock, but seemed to die in the early-morning fog. The sound of creaking vessels
could be heard off in the distance.
Venice and its environs were awash with boats; they were
like bicycles. Everyone had one. We had one too. A small wooden affair. Lennox
had carried it from the rock outcrop that functioned as harbor, to a small tool
shed adjacent to the deceptively small cabin.
I took a sniff of the salt air, and watched as a flock of
seagulls hovered overhead, and was about to turn, to go in and make a pot of
coffee, when a voice behind me startled me out of my reverie.
“But the sun,” I said.
Lennox paid no attention. He was standing in a grey t-shirt,
and pair of shorts, the kind I saw all the fishermen wear––except
Lennox’s didn’t have fish guts all over them; and he was hunched over with his
arms folded, as if cold.
His dark hair was wild and unkempt and all over the
place––as if he had had a long night. I noticed the bags underneath
his eyes.
He was my age––if you didn’t count the fact that
he never grew older. Even in the pale light he looked haggard. He grimaced. “I
should be okay for another hour or two,” he said looking at the sun. I wondered
what would happen if our shack burnt down.
“I don’t need to breathe,” he said, as if that settled the
matter. It took me a moment to figure out.
“You mean you would just jump into the water?” I said.
“I would hang out down at the bottom until nighttime,” he
said, nodding his head.
“I see.”
I wanted to see more. In fact, I needed to.
Again, I asked him what was bothering him; he just shook his
head. I was too accustomed to his dismissiveness where it came to himself. This
time I was determined to get something more.
“I feel like you brought me here and then changed your
mind,” I chided him, noticing the pained look he wore. I interpreted it as a
form of guilt. “Just so you know, people don’t like being felt sorry for.”
That was another thing. “I need you to come back to me,” I
said. “I don’t like it when we’re uncommunicative.” He tried to stop me, but I
steamrollered on. “Let’s say something were to happen. By that I mean some
vampire thing came up, and you needed my help. It could happen,” I said
defensively. “How would I know what to do? Unless you tell me.”
There. I waited for his response.
“You want to know... more?” he said. He was almost
incredulous.
“Duh...”
Not my greatest comeback, but it got the job done. At least
he was talking to me again.
Lennox said, “A vampire lives forever. In theory.”
“What does that even mean?” I said, pressing my advantage.
“By that rationale, there should be vampires walking around
since The Creation,” he said. “Only there aren’t. Not really. Do you
understand?”
“I understand that I love you. I understand that I want us
to be together,” I said.
He shook his head.
“You’re doing it again,” I said.
He looked at me.
“Having second thoughts. Changing your mind,” I said, when
he looked like he didn’t understand what I meant. “Am I so repulsive?”
“Of course not,” he said.
“Then... why?”
I walked away from him. I walked all the way down to the
water and picked up a stone. It plunked into the water.
I imagined it traveling all the way down to the bottom and
sitting there all day. I waited.
“Do you want me to take you back?” he asked.
I shook my head. Petulant.
He put his arms around me and I fell back into his embrace.
I was so easy. “Just tell me what’s going
on
,”
I said. I craved knowledge, knowledge of him, his essence, his everything.
He nuzzled my ear.
“It
is starting,” he said.
* * *
We were inside and I was treating him like he had an
infection. “Describe
it
. Where does
it hurt? How do we stop it?” Poking and prodding and pinching him.
He smiled. “The vampire coming of age cannot be stopped,” he
said.
“So it
is
the
Agonies.”
“Yes,” he said.
“You don’t look in pain. Just a bit morbid. And I thought
you said you couldn’t die,” I said.
“You’re not paying
attention
,”
said Lennox.
Maybe I needed coffee. I made a pot.
“Okay. You can’t die? But you can die?” I said.
“Something like that,” said Lennox.
I looked at him, exasperated. “Explain,” I said.
He watched as I hastily prepared my cup of coffee: plenty of
milk and sugar. All the good stuff, to compensate for my lack of honey. He
reached out and held my hand. Our fingers intertwined at the kitchen table. I
drank my coffee, waiting for him to speak.
I expected him to go on with what he had already told
me––The Agonies were tests administered to new vampires, less than
a century old. Instead, he seemed to retreat within his mind, just when I was
getting him back.
I cleared my throat. “You were saying,” I said.
He looked up at me, between his eyelashes, in as seductive a
way as I had ever seen. Lennox had lavender eyes, too beautiful for words. My
brain went numb.
“The thing about a test is, you don’t know the questions,”
he said.
“Unless you cheat,” I said. “I won’t lose you. I mean it.”
He wasn’t listening. “I don’t fear for myself. It’s
you
I’m worried about,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
“Come on, Halsey. Don’t you think it’s a little unfair? You
know everything there is to know about me. Enough anyway that the Lenoir will
get nervous.”
The Lenoir was this big bad Paris vampire coven. Supposedly
peacekeepers. They made the laws, among them that it was forbidden for someone
like me to know of their existence. I had a way around this. We had skirted
this conversation before.
“Only if Marek tells,” I said.
So far as I knew, Marek was off, trying to cure himself, of
the vampire malady known only as
The Suck
.
He had to find and kill the necromancer responsible for it––the
necromancer who was also responsible for the death of my parents. I thought of
him out there, Marek, not un-fondly. “What is it between you two, that makes
you dislike him
so
much?” I asked of
Lennox.