Nevermore, the Complete Series (48 page)

I laughed, thinking on how I loved the lack of sleep – for the most part. “Goodnight, Jason.”

“Night…” he said and walked out the door.

I apologized to Salem for putting us in jeopardy, although I knew all along that Jason didn’t pose a threat. Salem was more terrified by the news that I nearly ripped my friend’s throat out – neither of us could quite understand what led to that. Human blood had never smelled so good to me until recently, but Richard had said that I would slowly be consumed by my vampiric side…the raven in me would just postpone the inevitable. Had that been the reason all along for why my thirst for blood was so weak at first but had been steadily growing? The idea of what may come if I did not reach the fountain made my shudder. I would not let myself become corrupt like so many others had – like Hannah had, like my mother had…I was stronger than them. Or so I hoped.

The night felt like it was passing slower than any night I had ever before experienced. There was a simple black-rimmed analog clock on the wall whose hands seemed to barely move. Each minute felt as if hours had passed, maybe Jason had been right – maybe a life without sleep was not the greatest thing in the world.

I kept my cell phone close in case anyone called or texted me with news about Karen, but I wasn’t expecting anything at this hour. Salem lay beside me on the firm, uncomfortable mattress, staring off at the clock along with me. He hadn’t said much since my apology, and it was killing me.

“I have an idea,” I said out of the blue as the second hand ticked by slowly.

“What is it?” he asked, finally tearing his eyes away from the clock and whatever thoughts had been occupying him.

“After we’re done here, we should go back home.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Home? Home no longer exists, Alex.”

“I’d still like to see it…and then, we can find a new place to call home, furnish it and have it ready and waiting for us when we get back. We’ll be the only ones that know of its whereabouts until the right moment.”

His gentle smile was a relieving sight. “That does sound nice. Still, I wish Paul hadn’t burned the place down. I can’t summon a house, you know.”

I half-smiled then resumed staring at the clock. “I’m not going to become corrupted, am I?” I asked suddenly, my smile instantly fading.

Salem sat up and stared into my eyes. “I would never let that happen, Alexis. You are pure at heart, and the urges you feel are only natural. Besides...in just a few days you will be cured. You have but a little more time to endure that longing for blood.”

The touch of his hand against my face brought the smile back and I relaxed. “Just a few more days,” I whispered and sighed, still not completely convinced.

Morning approached with bright rays of sunlight bursting through the breaks in the yellowed blinds. Birds chirped outside the window, and a knock sounded on the door. Salem was the one to answer it.

“Good morning, Jason,” he said politely and then paused. I could sense that something was wrong.

I peeked around the door at my friend and knew immediately that something was off. Was he concerned that we were going to attack him? His face was ashen and his eyes were clearly moist. I leapt from the bed and ran to him as Salem stepped quickly to the side.

“What is it?” I asked, pleading for an answer.

He shook his head, biting his lip as he clearly fought back the oncoming tears. My eyes nearly begged to water along with his when I was positive of the news he came to deliver. I opened my mouth to ask for his confirmation but I couldn’t bear to speak the words.

“It is Karen, isn’t it?” Salem asked for me.

Jason could only nod his head as he wiped at the flowing moisture. I pulled him close against me and let him release his anguished cries on my shoulder. My mind was a flurry of worrying thoughts – was she gone? Had she just lapsed back into that comatose state? I didn’t want to know the answer. I couldn’t ask. It had to be something else.

Mitchell approached the hotel door and spotted Jason and I in a tight embrace and I looked up at him. He appeared somewhat shocked and part of me wondered if Jason had told him my secret.

“Did Jason tell you?” he asked as he continued to observe us. I merely shook my head.

He hung his head in sorrow and I could see his lips tremble. “Karen…she…she didn’t make it through the night Alex…”

“NO!” I shouted, startling Jason out of his daze and probably nearly bursting his eardrum. “This isn’t real! This isn’t happening! You’re lying!” But why would he lie about something so serious. It must be true, but at the same time it couldn’t be. I had just been there last night and she was waking up.

Salem stood idly beside Jason and I, longing to break apart our hold and be the one comforting me. I released my friend immediately and Salem took me in his arms, holding me tight against his chest as I dug my nails into the flesh of his back. The fury I felt was overpowering – not only could I not express my anguish through tears, but I couldn’t do anything to save my friend. She was gone. Of all the loved ones I had lost…why did Karen have to be among the list? She was so young, she was so happy. She was about to embark on the next stage of her life as a college student and she finally met a boy that erased all evidence of feelings she had for Jason…and that same boy took her from me. Brian. I despised that name now, I hated him.

“Alex…” Salem gasped in pain as my talons had unknowingly extended and clawed into his back. I could feel myself transforming and shut my eyes tightly, hoping to suppress the change. Jason and Mitchell couldn’t see me like this. “Relax,” he whispered soothingly into my ear, so quiet that my human friends wouldn’t be able to hear.

I inhaled deeply. It was a reflex, it wouldn’t help me to relax at all, but somewhere in my mind I was convinced that it would. All I could think about now was finding this Brian boy and tearing him apart, limb from limb. It was his drunken mistake that took Karen away from me – why should I not be the one to take him away from his friends?

“Is she still in the hospital?” Salem asked as I fought my urges. My talons retracted slowly as I listened intently for an answer.

“Yeah, but she’s going to be transported to a funeral home by this afternoon. Her dad is calling all of her friends, relatives and teachers to tell them what happened. Mrs. Williams has been hysterical ever since she heard the news – but who could blame her…” Mitchell’s answer ceased to comfort me. He looked up at me curiously. “I’m surprised you’re not bawling your eyes out like Jason is.”

If only he knew. “I would if I could!” I snapped. He had known Karen nearly his whole life as well. Sure, he hadn’t been a major part of our trio but he was always around. Why wasn’t he crying? He had the ability yet his eyes were dry. What a waste, I would give near anything to flood the room with tears. Although I shouldn’t be mad at Mitchell, it angered me deeply.

He arched a curious brow. “What do you mean ‘if you could’?”

“I just can’t! Okay?!”

He was genuinely confused by my answer and taken aback by my unintentionally angry tone, but that was no surprise. Salem whispered into my ear that I might as well fill Mitch in on our secret as well. I was reluctant at first, but requested that he brace himself for a difficult truth. I told him everything, even things that I failed to mention to Jason the previous night. I told them of how it all began, that I was not only a vampire and a hunter but that I had the ability to transform into a raven. Mitchell gazed at me with wide, amazed eyes and Jason seemed distant and out of focus.

“Wow,” was all that came through Mitch’s lips.

“So you believe me? Took more than words to convince your brother.”

“Well, Alex you’ve never lied to anyone as far as I can remember, and I don’t think you’d be making up stuff at a time like this. Can you like…turn into bats and stuff?”

I shook my head. “No. Just a myth. Lots of that stuff isn’t true.”

“And this fountain you heard of…it can change you back?”

“Yeah, hopefully.”

“Why would you want that, though?” he looked genuinely confused. “You could live forever…who wouldn’t want that?”

“To sit back and watch from afar as your friends and family live, age, and die while you always stay the same? Who would want that?” I answered glumly. I was still in shock from the news of Karen. It wasn’t real – it was just a story…the same as vampires being able to turn to bats. I should be rushing to the hospital to see her, to make sure it wasn’t all true…but I was numb.

“Oh,” he said quietly. “Well, couldn’t you just like…change us all into vampires?”

“You’re not being serious are you?”

He shrugged. “I guess so. It would be nice not to have to worry about dying…Karen would still be with us if she were one of you.”

His comment hit me deeply, but he was right. Why was I so willing to become mortal again, knowing that I could die suddenly…at any time? Because I wasn’t selfish… Salem wanted this life, he wanted to grow old. After one hundred and twenty-seven years, who could blame him? Yet, what if he ended up being the one in a hospital bed with tubes sticking out of his veins, fighting to keep him alive? We would both be vulnerable to disease, broken bones and death.

It was my fault Karen was gone. I should have changed her the night before when Salem and I were alone with her. I could have stopped this but I didn’t. Maybe it was as much my fault that she was gone as it was Brian’s. Gone – and no fountain could ever bring her back.

“Maybe he’s right, Salem…” I mumbled as I pulled away from him. “Maybe it’s best if we stay like this forever. Could you bear to see me lying in a hospital, dying? Maybe it is actually selfish to become mortal. We would be hurting the people who care about us by being able to get sick, hurt, or die. Just look at what happened to Karen…to Janet. If they’d both been like us I would have never lost them…”

He placed his hand on my cheek and gazed into my eyes. “That is just part of life, Alex. It is how it was meant to be. We are born…we live and grow and pass our knowledge on to the next generation. This is not how life is supposed to be. We are not meant to be frozen in time, stagnant and alone.”

“But we’re not alone. We have each other…and if we just did what Mitch said then we’d not be alone…we wouldn’t even have to see anyone we loved die. I don’t want to end up like Karen…” my voice cracked as I spoke her name. Reality was seeping in more and more as the minutes passed. She was gone. How was I to carry on knowing I would never see her again, never hear her voice again? The numbness that had mostly kept me calm to this point was fading into misery.

My name was the last word she had said. The last word whispered through the lips of my best friend.

I regretted not sinking my fangs into her wrist and turning her into a vampire. She’d still be with me, whether she was corrupted or not…that was better than death, wasn’t it? I couldn’t help bringing myself back to this same point time and again.

“This is all so strange,” Mitchell commented.
“Vampires. I mean…if vampires are real than what all else is? Ghosts, witches, werewolves?”

“Well…I know for sure about witches and vampires…not sure about anything else.”

“Really? Witches?”

“Yep,” I answered and glanced at Salem. “Witch’s blood runs in Salem’s family.”

Mitch glanced at him. “You just get weirder by the second.”

Salem smirked. I watched his eyes flicker purple and a red rose appeared in my hand. The thorns pricked at my skin but it scarcely mattered, the wounds would heal in seconds and I felt no pain from the pricks. The Banner brothers just stared in awe and I couldn’t help but smile slightly.

“You’re just going to give that up, too?” Mitchell’s mouth fell agape as he spoke. 

“If it is a sacrifice I have to make in order to live an ordinary life, then it is one I shall commit to,” Salem vowed. “But, let us get back to the more severe matter at hand. Where are Mr. and Mrs. Williams?”

“I think they’re at the hospital right now,” Jason answered between sobs.

Salem nodded. “We should meet them there and share our condolences for the loss of Karen.”

“No!” I exclaimed without thinking. “If…if we go there…that means this is all real. I’m not ready for this to all be real. I’ll never be ready. I just want to go on with life thinking that Karen is out there somewhere, doing makeup and hair…alive.”

“Alexis…I know this is not going to be easy but-”

“No, you don’t! You don’t know how this feels!” I snapped back at Salem unintentionally.

He pulled me into a tight hug. “Alex, she is gone. I am so sorry, really. But she is gone whether you choose to accept and believe it or not. Karen would not have wanted you to go on like that.”

Although tears still would not stream from my eyes, my voice began to sob. Whether it was from muscle-memory of what my body could do back when I was still human or not I didn’t know.

“I’ll make sure they’re still there,” Mitch said, patted me on the shoulder, and pulled out his cell phone.

We waited quietly while he communicated to Karen’s parents. I could hardly imagine the devastation they were feeling in comparison to mine. True I had lost my best friend, but they lost a daughter – that had to feel far worse. This got me to thinking about what Paul had to go through when he lost Destiny – he, too, lost a daughter, but at least it was only temporary and he got to play some sort of role in my life. But if he didn’t change his ways, he was going to lose me forever.