“This coffee tastes strange.”
“That’s because it’s tea.”
“Oh,” Eileen looked at the cup and plucked out a piece of tea leaf. “That explains all the bits in it. Oh, Jessica, you didn’t sleep at all, did you?” Smiled at Jessica’s curious look. “I heard you tossing and turning all night.”
“I’m really sorry. Did I keep you awake?”
“I was already awake,” Eileen said thoughtfully. “Thinking.”
“About what?”
She blew on her tea and placed her mug down, fixing Jessica with a hard stare. “That you should move back in with me.”
“Why would I do that?” Jessica replied, perhaps a bit too bluntly. She shook her head. “I don’t need to come home, I can survive by myself.”
“Darling,” Eileen whispered, reaching across and taking Jessica’s hand. “You’re not sleeping, you’re avoiding this place.”
“I’m not.”
The hard stare came back and Jessica relented. “Okay, I have been avoiding the place. I just… there’s… never mind, it’s silly, I’m probably wrong.”
“Try me.”
Jessica sighed and willed a silent prayer to the sky. “I think I have a vampiric stalker.”
Eileen nodded, but didn’t seem surprised in the slightest. “I see. All the more reason to come home with me, yes?”
“Mum…”
“It makes sense to me,” Eileen continued. “You’re only a few months from giving birth and your nursery is a floorless box…”
“Walls are expensive.”
“…It has no windows…”
“I’ll just move one from this room.”
“And you don’t even have a cot.” Eileen sat back in her chair. “I want the best for my daughter and grandchild – is that so much to ask?”
Jessica pouted.
“Come stay with me, Jessica. Your room is still mostly as you left it and so is the nursery.”
“What about all of your dolls?”
“They can go to the garage for a while – they won’t mind. Well, Lolly Dolly might mind, but she’s always miserable anyway.”
Jessica folded her arms and looked out of the window of her tiny house. It had been all she could afford when she’d moved to the area. Back then it had been perfect, her own slice of freedom and independence. But her Mum was right; the house was not suitable for a little one. And, if Jessica was honest, even crammed to the rafters with her trinkets and toys, the house had never felt like home. She was barely there, and now, when she was, she was scared. Scared of Mr. Demonic. Scared that a random ghost would pop up. Scared that someone could once again coming knocking on her door to take her back to the Tower. Scared that her baby was indeed due in a few months and she’d done nothing to prepare. Scared of becoming a parent.
Just scared.
Jessica might have been twenty-three, but in that moment she felt so small. She didn’t want to be brave and fearless, not then – she just wanted her Mum.
“Darling that’s my not-coffee,” Eileen said, taking the mug back.
Eileen’s house was not huge by any stretch of the imagination, but it did have space for two adults and a baby. And her Mum really did seem to want her there. It felt nice to be wanted.
“What do you think I should do, Turkle?” She asked of her knitted companion.
“Move in with your mum, Jessica!” came a deep reply from her left.
“Turkle doesn’t sound like that.”
“What does Turkle sound like?”
“Um, like, move in with your mum, Jessica!” she said in a childish squeak, then she grinned. “You’re not going to take no for an answer, are you?”
“Nope!” Eileen laughed and resumed picking leaves from her tea.
Melinda, April and Wyatt had spent the night packing their things and moving to the apartment. It hadn’t taken them long to stuff the few things they owned into her one suitcase and bring it over. April had taken it upon herself to unpack it, leaving Melinda free to wander the apartment that she could call home. Her feet seemed to have a life of their own and had brought her to the flower room.
Moon had been a little sad to see her go, but Melinda promised to visit. As she sat in the flower room in Sage’s old apartment, Melinda looked around at the paints and pots and pens and smiled to herself. She felt like she was exactly where she needed to be and couldn’t wait to get started. Happy that she could have a creative outlet again. Something to focus on besides Faith and what she might be doing and who she might be doing it with. Happy that she could have some proper, meaningful alone time with April without the eyes of the world on them.
But all that had to wait.
She pulled out her laptop and tapped the power button, bringing the screen to life. If only it was so easy to bring herself back to life, she thought as she typed in her password. The screen flickered to bring up the last things he had been looking at and, whatever optimism the gloomy little vampire had had, disappeared in a metaphorical heartbeat.
Being a vampire hidden among witches was mostly confusing, most of the time. She wished she could go with the flow like April and Wyatt seemed to do, but she always felt so stuck, so hung up on details and drawbacks. She’d watched as April danced around the kitchen when they’d arrived, pulling Wyatt to his feet to join her. Melinda just wished she could be anywhere near that carefree. Not worried because she hadn’t heard from Lilith for a while and had so many questions on the tasks she’d set her. Not harrowed by the research she’d been doing on murdered witch burial sites, or confused about Lilith’s family tree. Not constantly sick with shame every time her dad dropped by to donate blood, or feeling like she’d been punched in the gut every time she thought of Faith.
Just content that things would work out. Like April was.
Melinda wanted to bang her head against the table. It all felt so much. So impossible. So… ugh!
“Woah! Either you’re strung up or you’re fly-swatting with your noggin.” Wyatt said as he entered the room. “Everything okay, Mel?”
“It’s fine,” she muttered, rubbing out the key imprints from her forehead. “I just feel a bit overwhelmed with everything.”
Wyatt, who had been searching on a shelf for something, spun on his heel. “Shoot, I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“Maybe not, but can I help fix it? Is this moving a bit fast? You don’t have to move in if you don’t want to.”
“No, I do, I like it here and I’m excited to be around April more.”
“But…”
She sighed. “But this research I’m doing for Lilith is… it’s a lot.”
Wyatt nodded. “Her family tree?”
“No, I’ve parked that for now, I need to ask her what she remembers of her mother or father, even just when they might have lived or died – her real parents, if anything – I can’t even start without that.” She drummed her fingers on the keyboard. “It’s this other task, the burial site one. I keep finding all these grim articles and pages but nothing concrete. It’s driving me mad.”
“Ah.” Wyatt quickly glanced to the hallway to check that April was still unpacking her suitcase and singing to herself. Some brooding lyrics, but in her chirpy little voice it sounded like a pop song. “Maybe what we want isn’t on the internet.”
“Everything’s on the internet.”
“Not everything.” He grinned. “We could start locally and check out the coven’s death log.”
“You keep a death log?”
“Yeah, why are you smiling? Think about it – we witches live so long that we can’t record our births and deaths in the traditional way or we’d be found out. We keep a totally secret log in a totally hidden place at the coven meet-up area. Wanna go check it out at the full moon meet up tonight?”
“Oh! You’re going to the meet up?”
He shrugged. “Yeah, thought I’d get myself back into the swing of things, y’know.” He scuffed his foot on the floor. “Wanna come with?”
“Uh, vampire, remember? Centuries-long feud with the witches…”
“Oh right, yeah,” he laughed. “I guess I’ll be looking up the death log myself.”
“Won’t it look suspicious?”
“Nah, I can just say I’m studying.”
“But won’t it take you hours?”
“Nah. A simple ‘find’ spell will work.”
“A find spell,” Melinda repeated. Yet another spell. And a death book, too. So much information. Gnome, no wonder she felt so overwhelmed and confused, like, 99% of the time.
“Most of the older sites will probably be built over or desecrated so I’ll just focus my attention in the last 100 years or so, should only take a few minutes and then back to the party.”
“It’s a party?”
“Sort of. There’s food, drink and music. Nobody gets their kit off, so not a real party – we’re not as wild as some covens. Well, once Snotrag got a bit tipsy and got his co… ” Melinda squirmed a little and Wyatt scratched his head. “Anyway… yes, it’s a party and yes, I’ll be going to this one and yes, I’ll slope off and look through the doom book for you. What will you be doing tonight? Don’t say research.”
She was going to say research so she just pouted. “Maybe I’ll see if April wants to go up on the roof and sit under the moon? Or maybe we’ll just play video games in the snug.”
“Orrr, you could take advantage of an empty house – you know what I’m saying?”
“Changing the subject,” she muttered.
“Changing,” Wyatt snorted.
“Does the book log the death of every witch?”
“Every one in the Windenburg Coven, yeah.”
Melinda squirmed and Wyatt sighed. “Yeah, Mum’s in there, I had to sign the book after she, um, died.” He gave her a watery smile and she gave one back.
“What did they record it as?”
“An accident,” he said quietly, “so whatever Lilith is looking for isn’t going to be in our kitchen. Not that we buried her in the kitchen but… you know what I mean.”
“What do you think Lilith is looking for at the burial sites?”
“Dunno. God, I hope it’s not bones,” he shuddered. “That’d be a grim potion and it sounds bad enough as it is.”
“How so?”
“You just don’t mess with death and stuff as a ‘good witch’, Mel. That’s the realms of dark magic. And I… I don’t wanna do dark magic. I hope that’s not what this’ll come down to.”
“…throwing shapes at the sky,” April sang as she entered the room, “I watch you crying to me.” She looked brightly between Melinda and Wyatt and then at the laptop screen. “Oh! I forgot that Lilith asked us to look things up. Have you found anything about her family?”
“Not yet,” Melinda huffed. “Unfortunately Lilith’s description of her mother as a ‘prostitute murdered in Windenburg in 1709’ doesn’t really yield any accurate results.”
“Hmm,” April mused. “Maybe they didn’t know she was a prostitute?” She turned on her heel and began to wander the room, taking in all the flowers.
“It’s sooo pretty in here, Wy,” she whispered in awe, delicately touching some nearby blooms. “What are these called?”
Wyatt barely glanced over, “pansies.”
“And these?”
“Peonies.”
“What about—”
“Poppies.” He turned to leave. “I’ll check out the log tonight, okay?”
“Okay,” Melinda replied as Wyatt went to join his daughter in identifying all the flowers.
She stared at the screen. Don’t overcomplicate things. Be like April. Her fingers danced over the keys, replacing one word: woman murdered in Windenburg in 1709.
Surely this wouldn’t yield anything new.
An article immediately popped up. Well, I’ll be darned. “Maria Pincushion. I’ve found her! Oh, oh no, the poor woman was found in a river… oh my goodness… that monster!”
Broof tapped politely on the open door. Inside, Leyla had just finished making the bed. He could hear a shower running in the adjacent bathroom and backtracked a little.
“Bruno said you wanted to see me – should I come back later?”
“No, you’re fine,” Leyla smiled, spinning into her clothes. “I’m just making sure Lilith doesn’t do a runner.” She thumbed towards the bathroom.
“Ah,” Broof entered and took a seat beside Leyla on the bed. “This is a nice room.”
“Yeah, I suppose it is,” Leyla said absently. She stared hard at the bathroom door, listening to the water running for a while and then turned to Broof, her voice barely above a whisper.
“Last night, the death flower bush bloomed.”
“It did?”
“It did!”
Broof grinned. This was it! He could take a flower and take Lilith and go and synthesise her a cure. Or rather, Wyatt could and he’d carefully, um, supervise. “So does that mean we can have a flower?”
Leyla’s smile fell. “Oh, no. It only produces one bloom and this one is reserved.”
“Oh.”
“I’m sorry, I thought we’d said that?”
Maybe she had, but Broof couldn’t recall. He swept his curl from his forehead. “So you wanted to tell me that a flower bloomed but we can’t have it?”
Leyla squirmed. “Well, yes, but I was rather hoping you might be able to help me and Bo to create a potion with it. It’d be good to practice using it correctly in a potion so you can safely test it in your cure, don’t you think?”
“A potion. What for?”
Leyla hesitated, she glanced towards the bathroom door and said in a low whisper. “It’s for Bruno.”
“Why does he need a death flower potion? Is it because he’s a werewolf?”
Leyla startled. “Oh, is it that obvious?”
Not to Broof it wasn’t, but he nodded anyway.
“Yes, he’s a werewolf.”
Broof nodded again, feeling a bit like one of those bobble-headed dogs on a car dashboard. He had sussed, with Lilith’s help, that Bruno was not fully human, but knowing that he was an actual real-life werewolf excited him. Questions began bubbling in his mouth and came out in one garbled “How?”
“How what?”
“How did he become a werewolf?”
Leyla clicked her tongue. “Well, he’s always had a thing for beasts,” she scoffed, looking back towards the bathroom with disdain.
Broof followed her gaze and his heart sank. Did Bruno have a thing for Lilith? Was it reciprocated? Was their budding relationship over before it had really started? Broof couldn’t compete with someone like Bruno – tall and handsome with that rough edge that women seemed to like. Broof stood precisely at the average height for a man and was sure that the words ‘rough’ and ‘handsome’ wouldn’t be how people would describe him.
“A thing for beasts,” he repeated numbly.
“Yes, he found a wolf cub whilst hunting, and took it home thinking it had been abandoned. Of course, it hadn’t been, and mother wolf was not happy. She hunted her cub down and left Bruno with a number of nasty, and infected, scars. It was inevitable that he’d change.”
“The things kids do…” Broof began, still feeling sad.
“Oh, no, this was only about a year ago.”
“Oh.”
“Bo has cured lycanthropy before so she knows how to do it, but we were waiting on the death flower. And now we have it, we can we create a cure for him. I’m sorry that we cannot give the flower to you, but you can have the next one. Bruno’s kids need him to not turn into a frothing, rabid beast every full moon, more than Lilith needs her own pulse.”
Broof glanced out of the window. “Isn’t tonight a full moon?”
“It is…”
“So will you give Bruno the potion today?”
“We can’t this soon to a change, and it needs to be taken immediately, so it will be tomorrow. Besides, we have the celebrations tonight.”
“So, what happens to Bruno tonight?”
“He’ll change, so we really have no choice but to lock him in that cell Lilith occupies.”
Broof’s heart hit the floor. He could barely get his words out. “With Lilith?”
“No, Lilith will have to stay with me for the night. She’d better not ruin the celebrations and I’d better not wake up to find her at my neck.”
At that moment, Lilith walked in from the bathroom, smiling at the pair on the bed. “Talking about me, I see.”
“Yes,” Leyla said begrudgingly. “You’ll be staying with me tonight.”
“Oh? I think I’d prefer the cell.”
“The cell will be—” Broof started.
“—Being cleaned,” Leyla finished. Broof, releasing an unspoken instruction to keep quiet, immediately did so.
“Oh, good,” Lilith said, she seemed to miss the unspoken cues; her vampire powers must’ve really been dulled by the spells on her, Broof thought. “That place stinks like wet dog.”
“Yes, well,” Leyla brushed this comment off with some difficulty, it seemed. “Are you ready to go to follow me about and get in the way while I do my chores for another day?”
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Almost Eternal 