The whispering of voices swells in the night air like dough rising.
The legion of vampires troop in as quietly as they can. Avoiding anything fashionable and glamorous, for this isn't a ball, just an assembly under the full moon. Well, this is what the werewolves and witches have reduced us to. From making hay while the sun shines to walking short while the moon glows. Using crypts to navigate, and codes to get into sanctuaries, like unwanted immigrants.
As I stand by my window and look down at the gathering, my heart cringes at what our future might turn out to be. Will there be any repose? Any turnaround? Or will there be more bloodshed and reincarnations for someone like me?
The moon sits comfortably in the sky. Watching over us the way a lender looks at a debtor. I cannot read the shapes of the clouds that pass through it, but I see an axe, and it appears to be chasing someone on the run.
What I can't tell is if that is supposed to be a wooden axe or if it just...
My door opens and I turn around at once.
"Ruzena? Are you alright, dear?" my mom's voice reaches me even before she comes into the glow of the candle lights.
I walk to her. "Someone cannot be safe in her own abode. Even if it's just an act."
Mother takes my hand in hers and plants a kiss on my knuckles. "You don't have to worry, Ruzena. Everything will go just fine."
I have found this statement very hard to believe after eight reincarnations, and I've become very critical about our balance of late.
I look at her. She is wearing a black dress, with tight long sleeves, and this style creeps down the rest of her lower half. She looks splendid this night.
"You know, with the way you're dressed for the occasion, Mom, one would think you're happy deep down. But you're not."
"You don't have to be so offensive with your words, Ruz," Mother chides. "This is a celebration. Not a.."
"Funeral?" I cut in.
She looks at me. But she isn't surprised. She looks defeated instead. Like I've just replanned the whole agenda for the night, and it isn't what she is expecting.
I sit on the edge of my bed. Outside, I hear my kind laughing with ecstasy and clinking glasses like pirates. I can smell their happiness and joy from here. Enveloping them like a cocoon. But one thing about cocoons, they are just protective cases that always break open to reveal something different.
Something I have witnessed a lot of times.
Mother sits beside me on the bed. She doesn't hold me on the shoulder or try to comfort me by telling me that it will be alright. And for this, I respect her.
"I know things have not been well with the vampire families of Manstadia since the alliance between the witches and the wolves. We have been at their mercy.."
"For too long, Mother..."
"The Elder Supremo is looking for a way out," my mother reasons. "This will not be our fate for a very long time, Ruzena."
I sigh. I see no way out, myself. We have prominent weaknesses that any layman with common sense can exploit. I am losing hope. And I tell her how I feel.
"Even if you are losing hope in the process, don't you ever lose faith in your father, girl."
I give her a curious stare. "Is this you speaking from experience, Mother?"
"Verily," she replies. "And I hope you don't forget this. No matter what. No matter how things turn out tonight. It's a night of celebration and joy. You, amongst others, are turning eighteen today. Time for you to become a full-fledged vampire like the rest of us. To embrace who and what you really are. This, my daughter, is the hope that we place in you all. If we can't make it work ourselves, your generation can be much more surprising. Of this, I have no doubt."
"Seems odd that I am the only one who feels the opposite," I say, pouting.
"Your father and I look forward to seeing what your powers will be in the coming spell, daughter."
My mother walks out of my room, and I am left sitting alone in the glow of the lights, wondering if the flames will suddenly burst into mania and incinerate me.
*********
I walk down the stairs and through the threshold. My dress is black as well, but it opens wide from the waist, making an upside-down umbrella.
What I thought was mild cheering has now developed into a rout. The crowd is now twice its size. I see families and their eighteen-year-olds milling around them dressed in black with the wreath of dandelion flowers around their heads.
I walk quietly to a deserted table and take my seat.
Some of the girls come to talk with me. But shan they see that I am not in the mood for flimsy conversations, they depart at once.
"Ruzena."
I look around me and see no one that has called my name.
"Ruzena."
This time, I don't bother craning my neck. I know he's here.
"Hello, Damian. How nice of you to show up. What are you doing here?"
"Not yet," Damian says. He hardly ever speaks too much. Just a couple of words to express himself, and strides away.
Damian walks into my view, right from the ether, like there is an invisible wall somewhere here. He is wearing a black robe with gold fittings at the hands and helms. I see a picturesque of the heavens gliding across his robe. It's like I am looking right at the filaments.
"Is heaven mind-numbing that you have to come here seeking something ?"
"Came here to see you," Damian says, coming to take another seat at the table, opposite me. Good Heavens! His eyes look like the depths of hell. Brick red color. Like lava from a volcano.
"How thoughtful."
"Yes."
I give him a serious look. "Well, what do you see?"
"Can't say."
"Why? You're not getting involved by telling."
"Are you sure?"
"Am I not?"
"I do not think so," Damian states. "Ruzena."
I look away from him and at the rest of the assembly. I see some young men shooting darts at the board. The rest of them are shooting stares at me. None of them are looking at Damian.
I open my mouth to ask him a question. But he speaks first.
"Only you can see me."
"Oh," I say. "But stop doing that."
"Reading your mind?"
"Yes. It makes me... uncomfortable."
His eyes touch my face and I feel the heat from them like the spit of a geyser. "Sorry."
I honestly do not want him knowing what my turbid mind thinks of when I sit alone. And now that I am with him, I cannot help but wonder what he is made of. Galaxies? Universes? God food mixed with the sun's essence?
"Happy birthday, Ruz."
"Thank you," I say. "For remembering, at least."
"I never forget."
"Do you still remember the time you killed me?"
"I do."
"And? You never told me why."
"I had to. You cannot reincarnate without dying."
"Which sounds like you did get involved."
He shakes his head. "Wrong. Dying has nothing to do with your skirmishes. It is only a circle that must need to be completed."
This is the first time he has really spoken at length. I decide to stop talking about death and change the topic. "So, what will my powers be?"
He cranes his head in a direction like he's looking for someone. "It is unprincipled to expect what you already know. Wait."
My father comes over to hug me. Tells me the same thing Mother told me a while back. About them looking forward to my powers.
He doesn't notice Damian sitting at the table either, looking at him with unwelcome eyes.
Father introduces me to men and women in his council. And I saw that the seesaw isn't balanced even here. I wonder if this is the same or different with the werewolves and witches.
Obviously not.
They all smile at me because I'm the daughter of an Elder Supremo and O am among the children turning eighteen today.
One of the younger men offers me a glass of something to drink. I smile affably and tell him that I am too nervous to keep anything down, except if he wants me to redesign his outfit.
This works and he lets me be.
The moment finally comes. The eighteen-year-olds are told to line up, facing the full moon which sits comfortably behind the Manstadia crest.
The face of a bat and the body of a mouse were welded to a bronze staff.
The Elder Supremo mounts the stage and begins to chant. A chorus follows. One by one, I hear the eighteen-year-olds behind chant along. It's just me that doesn't hold up the refrain.
From the corner of my eyes, I see Damian get to his feet. He doesn't look comfortable any longer.
The Elder Supremo grabs the bronze staff and raises it over his head. The crest channels the glow of the moon until it is just one single fluorescent beam of light. He rotates it so that the shaft touches each of us, me coming last. And as this happens, the chanting continues. Our families come forward. They bite on their wrists and we are asked to drink their lineage and become more.
This is the clarion call.
"Drink and become more! Drink and become more!"
It goes on and on. Until the voices become one. Like an entity is speaking through each one of them.
And finally stops.
This is when the eighteen-year-olds start changing.
*********
It is a scary sight, and it is something to behold as well. The rest of them leave their human form and turn into something that can bring chills to the psyche of even a serial killer.
It is like a snake shedding its skin. But this carries more noise than I ever thought it would. They become twice their height. Looking monstrous with sharp fangs, longer ears, and capable of anything sinister.
I look at my parents. They are both expectant. I see it in their eyes.
When I look at Damian, I see something else. The moving picture on his robe isn't that of the heavens anymore. I see the faces of creatures. Changing. Shifting. And it looks like a reflection of what is happening to the birthday children.
All of them.
Except me.
But this little bit of difference did not interrupt the fun. It continues like my part is supposed to come right after the assembly.
Father and mother come over.
I speak first. "I didn't change. Why?"
They exchange a confused glance. And I know that question should be directed at me instead.
I leave their presence. To Find Damian.
"What happened?"
"Wait," he says, looking at his fingers.
I look at his robe. The horror on its hone, replaced the splendor of the heavens.
The rest of the assembly danced and cheered. One human out of the rest shouldn't dampen their joy. Of course.
I am looking at the god when he suddenly raises his head. The picture on his robe suddenly disappears and its real golden shade is revealed. Damian spells out, "Darkness lurks around"