A Shade Of Vampire: A Shade Of Novak Part 15

I wonder where they keep all the humans? If these vampires drink their blood, it would be convenient to keep them near the kitchen. Perhaps in a dungeon. That's normally where the poor mortals end up being stuffed in fairy tales.

I looked around the room for any sign of a door in the wall, or a trap door, but found none.

Hmm.

And then I heard it. Distant sobbing. I held my breath as I tried to make out from which direction it was coming.

I retraced my steps back out of the kitchen and took a sharp right turn. I walked along the corridor until I reached an open door. I peeped through it. In a hall I'd never pa.s.sed by before, a woman perched on the windowsill, the window flung wide open. Her whole body convulsed as she cried out against the mountain wind.

The witch? Huh?

Her wailing was so heart-wrenching, I had to remind myself how she had treated me and Caleb to stop myself from going up to her and asking her what on earth was wrong. I had never expected such a creature could experience sorrow and grief. Even the witches back at The Shade were guarded with their emotions. So to see this woman howling disturbed me deeply.

I stood dumbstruck for several minutes. I was knocked to my senses only when footsteps came down the main staircase. I scrambled away in time to see three male vampires descend into the entrance hall and walk straight through to the dining room. I climbed back up the stairs and returned to my apartment.

s.h.i.+vering, I jumped into bed and curled up beneath the blankets, the witch's wails still echoing in my head. Her grief reached into the marrow of my bones.

Whatever and wherever this place is, its halls are haunted with sorrow and pain.

I miss The Shade.

I miss home.

Chapter 22: Rose.

The noises started again soon after midnight. I tried blocking my ears with my hands and curling up in a ball, but I couldn't stop the sounds from trickling through into my ear drums, disturbing me enough to ensure that night would yet again be sleepless.

I pulled on a dress and my coat and rushed out of the room. I crept up the stairs once again but this time, instead of opening the door, I sat down in a corner of the corridor, outside the room, beneath the shadow of a tapestry hanging on the wall. My imagination ran wild with images of what could be going on in there.

When the door handle finally turned, I held my breath as the witch exited, her hair disheveled, her dress awry. Once she had disappeared down the corridor, I stood up and eased Caleb's door open. I slid inside and closed it behind me.

I crept along the wrecked corridor and peeked around the corner.

The balcony doors were open, the curtains blowing in the wind. I walked over to them and pulled them aside to see Caleb standing in the cold, leaning against the banister, his muscled back bare and scarred with b.l.o.o.d.y cuts.

I couldn't help but gasp. But although he must have heard it, he didn't turn around.

I stood next to him and looked up at his face. His eyes were fixed on the horizon, where the ocean sparkled beneath the light of the moon.

I was at a loss for what to say to him anymore. He didn't respond to my questions about anything that was going on. I questioned why I even came up here. Somehow, after I'd heard the noises from the witch's visit, I just couldn't ignore it and go back to sleep as if nothing had happened. I had wanted to see his face. Look him in the eye. So instead I found myself mumbling, "Did you bring me these?" I indicated to my dress and coat.

"Frieda," he muttered, without looking down at me.

"But you asked her to?"

He breathed out and s.h.i.+vered. He walked back into the room. I followed him, closing the balcony doors behind us.

He took a seat in his wooden chair, but this time he didn't reach for liquor.

"Thank you, is what I was going to say if you'd have given me the chance," I said, crossing my arms across my chest. I paused, then, still eyeing him closely, said, "Would you like me to play for you again?"

From the blank expression on his face, he hadn't heard. But then he shook his head.

"Oh. OK," I said.

I sat down on the bed opposite him and dropped the coat down over my shoulders, staring at him. The b.l.o.o.d.y cuts on his torso and back were beginning to heal.

"Why did you come here?" he said, standing up abruptly and making eye contact with me for the first time.

Maybe he was just drunk last night when he indicated he'd like to see me again.

His eyes were so intense as they bored into mine, it felt as though I might melt beneath them. But I stood my ground. "So you want me to leave? Is that what you're saying?" I stared up at him, my eyebrows raised in challenge.

He glared at me. I glared back harder.

He sat back down.

"You know, you don't exactly strike me as the happiest of sorts," I said, my hands on my hips as I continued glaring at him. "A little smiling never did anyone any harm."

Whoa. I sound like my mother. She always was Little Miss Suns.h.i.+ne.

A bitter smile curled at the corner of his lips, then he breathed out a sigh and relaxed a little, his jaw becoming less tense.

"So," he said after a few moments. "You want to play for me again?"

"If that's what you'd like."

He nodded. "All right... Rose." He swiveled in his chair so that he was facing the lounge.

His eyes followed me as I walked over to the instruments. This time, I didn't sit down at the piano. I rummaged around until I reached a large instrument which I suspected to be a harp. I pulled off its cover and was pleased to see that my a.s.sumption had been correct.

Wiping away the dust from the strings, I sat down on the bench and placed the harp between my legs. I began to strum a melody.

His eyes never left me the whole time I was playing. I could have sworn that his foot tapped slightly to the beat. After I'd grown tired of playing the harp, I moved on to the violin. Then the guitar. Then I sat back down at the piano.

As I started playing the keys, Caleb stood up abruptly. Crossing the room, he sat next to me on the bench. I stopped playing and looked up at him.

"No," he whispered, shaking his head. "Don't stop."

Still eyeing him, I continued playing. He stretched out his fingers on the keys of the upper portion of the piano and began playing the perfect accompaniment to my tune. He played as though he knew it by heart. He barely even looked up at the music sheet.

When the piece finished, my hands slid off the keys and I looked at him, my mouth hanging open.

He stared down at the piano, as though he was as surprised as I was by what he'd just done.

"That's the first time I've touched an instrument in a long time," he breathed.

"Caleb, that was stunning."

I reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder. He flinched as soon as my fingers touched his bare skin.

"I'm sorry, did I hurt-"

"No. No," he muttered, even as he shot to his feet and walked back across the room to his wooden seat.

I stood up too.

We stared at each other from across the room.

I don't know what to make of this man.

Feeling uncomfortable under his gaze, I averted my eyes and looked around the room. It was then, hidden away in a corner, that I spotted something out of place. It was a stereo player. I walked over to it and ran my fingers along its ledge. Beneath it were stacks of CDs.

So maybe this is how he practices his dance moves.

I fingered through the CDs. He had a lot of blues and instrumental stuff. At least, it was more modern than the stuff my dad had brought me up on. Hmm, but nothing you'd dance to in a nightclub. There goes my theory then.

"You have a lot of music over here," I remarked.

He nodded.

I picked out a CD and pushed it into the machine. I turned up the volume and stood up once it had started playing.

"So... do you want to, uh, dance again?"

He shook his head, the shadow of a smile crossing his face, and leaned further back in his chair. "I'll watch you."

I snorted. "Oh, yeah? I can't dance."

"You seemed to dance fairly well before."

"Because you were guiding my every movement."

He didn't seem to have a response to that. He just nodded slightly and looked down at the floor.

I walked back over to his side of the apartment and sat down on the edge of the bed.

"It's late. I guess I'll go back to my room now."

"All right."

He remained still, his eyes remaining on the floor, his body tense again. I was about to reach out a hand for him to shake it, but recalled the time I'd tried to touch him before and thought better of it. Instead I just said, "Good night."

When he didn't even respond to that, I picked up my coat, put my slippers back on and headed out the door.

But just as I was closing the door, I caught him whispering: "Good night, Rose."

Chapter 23: Caleb.

Rose Novak was everything that I wasn't.

Innocent. Vibrant. Untouched.

She was like a patch of fresh snow among the black ice that was the rest of my life.

I didn't want anything or anyone to make a mark on it. Least of all myself.

So when she'd tried to touch me with her soft warm hand, I'd recoiled.

When she'd tried to dance with me, I'd rejected her.

Whenever she'd pressed for answers about me and this castle, I'd brushed her off.

I wasn't refusing to answer her because I wanted to keep her in the dark. I wanted to keep her out of the dark.

I'd just wanted to lock her away. Away from me. Away from Annora.

I didn't want to tarnish her mind with the things that went on in my shadowy world.

But that night, I didn't know why I was in such a good mood. Perhaps it was because Annora had told me she was leaving to visit Stellan's island for a while. Whatever the reason, after I was sure that Rose had fallen asleep, I allowed myself to climb down onto her balcony.

As I caught a glimpse of her peaceful face through the curtains, her expression brought out an ache in me. An ache that both disturbed me and made me feel alive.

I recalled the time I had first laid eyes on her beauty, her face sweaty, her hair disheveled, breath smelling of champagne. She'd behaved like any other teenage girl looking for a night out.

Then she'd told me her name.

And I'd dropped her faster than a hot iron.

I'd heard rumors about the princess of The Shade-not just her beauty, but her innocence, her purity, her light. She was like her mother, they said.

I didn't want to be responsible for ruining that.