Page 30 of Besieger
Theotherthing was not easier to explain either.
“One problem at a time,” Mihaela inhaled and began putting her books and notes in the bag.
When she stepped outside the library she was greeted by the biting wind and hollow stillness of the streets. Sofia’s inhabitants tended to bleed out of the city whenever a string of holidays fell in succession. People left for the countryside either to reunite with distant family or to enjoy a vacation from the hustle of the capital. Cars stood motionless, covered in snow on the corners, traffic lights and Christmas decorations blinked on and off cheerfully.
It was still early and the trams and buses were running but Mihaela chose to walk home instead. Her way stretched long andstraight, from the library to the residential building where her parents lived. If she was lucky by the time she got there they would have already left for the New Year’s dinner at her cousins’.
Her parents had kept Mihaela’s room immaculate; her clothes washed and ironed, neatly arranged in the wardrobe. Her books and little knick-knacks still perched on the desk and shelves, untouched since the day she left for university. There were two mirrors in the flat—a small mirror above the bathroom sink and a larger one in the hallway. She was thankful that her room was bare of mirrors or glass surfaces; her only reflection hardly visible in the frosted windowpane.
She could not bear to look at her reflection; the face of a liar gazing back at her. Astra had assured Mihaela that nothing in her physical appearance had changed. True, her eyes held a sharper gleam, and when she smiled her wide toothy smile, her fangs peeked through. But she was still a young woman of twenty-two with a tousled bob of dark blond hair always falling into her hazel eyes. A willowy creature prone to frowning, chewing at her lower lip and fidgeting, unable to stay still for even a minute. Her hands were always reaching to fiddle with something—her sleeves, her hair, if she was holding a pen she doodled, scribbled and scrawled.
And every time she lied, Mihaela would lift a finger and tap the tip of her nose, a smile forcing its way onto her lips. She tapped her nose, broken and mended at a crooked angle from the many times she had fallen off a tree as a child.
Turning into a vampire had not grounded Mihaela. From the first sip of blood her entire body had vibrated, ready to fling itself against the fabric of reality in hopes of tearing through. When Mihaela spoke or moved too fast, shaking off the costume of a mortal, Astra would reach out to anchor her.
“We can leave,” Astra had suggested. “Start somewhere brand new as someone else—as someone of your choice.”
Mihaela had refused. She did not like leaving things undone. The history degree took four years, most of which she had already completed, and then a thesis defence. Once written and leather-bound, her work would take its place among the countless volumes in the university archive. It amused her to know that the author would outlive the work, instead of the other way around.
Maybe in a few decades she would come back, enrol once again in the history faculty and write a new thesis. Fill the library with her work, examine everything her ancestors had built and fought for over the centuries. She might even finance research, archaeological digs, preservations of icons and restoration of tattered tomes. Mihaela did not know how a vampire would go about collecting and maintaining an immense fortune but vampires were rarely poor in the novels she used to read. They were counts and countesses, warlords commanding armies of the dead, swarthy gentlemen in search of damsels.
“Ugh…!” Mihaela pulled a face and decided to stick with khan Krum for the time being.
At a traffic light she turned to look over her shoulder, expecting to see Astra walking behind her. Her companion tended to sneak up on Mihaela, following her like a stray until Astra grew bored or cold and would embrace her for warmth. Like vampires, demons were a curiosity Mihaela had yet to understand, and Astra rarely spoke about herself or her infernal nature.
Mihaela’s head began to throb like she was on the verge of a migraine, the hairs at the back of her neck prickling.There it is again… She could not shake the feeling of being watched. Something was trying to tug and urge her to veer in a different direction. The few people she came across briefly met her gaze and hurried past in the night; their footsteps over the snow and sand sounded heavy and like an insistent drum to her heightened senses.
As far as she knew, vampirism did not come with the gift of premonition or a second sight. In the myths of old, it was oracles—women chosen by the gods—who foretold the tides of war or a deity’s vengeance. Mihaela was no oracle, she was not chosen by a god. She felt helpless under the dread of something waiting to unfold.
Something wrong and out of my control. Again.
She had not felt this anxious and on edge since she was mortal. The uneasiness followed her throughout the night. It had been there—the day before; and the day before that.
Lost in her thoughts, Mihaela kept walking, wary of moving cars or figures, casting glances over her shoulder. She read the minds of those around her. Once she had learned how, it was easy to peer into a person’s thoughts. The real challenge was silencing the constant flow of ideas, fears and desires. To have her internal monologue as the only rumbling in her head.
The only mind she could not read was Astra’s. No matter how much Mihaela had tried, she could not pierce through the veil covering her demon’s thoughts.
Without realizing it, she had reached the uphill path that led to her building. The streetlights were sparse here and the barking of a dog echoed in the distance. Chewing on the inside of her cheek, Mihaela trudged the uncleared pavement; sand crunched under her boots.
No matter how many years passed, whenever she walked across the ice at night she recalled the time her dad had slipped and nearly broke his neck on this very path. When he came through the doorway Mihaela’s mother shooed her out of the room. She, the ever mischievous child, had peered through the crack of the door, curious to see the state of her father. He had come home with his clothes wet, his chin bloody from where he had hit the ground.
It was a strange thing, what her mother had done. Not only hiding the sight of her father hurt but also the sight of her mother tending him, helping clean the cuts.
The memory and any reminiscence of her parents dissolved. A tingling sensation crept up the fingers of her right hand, pulling on her nerve endings as if someone was patting her hand gently, trying to get her attention.
“Astra?” Mihaela hesitated. She liked it when Astra materialized from nothing, as if stepping out of another time and place, and intertwining their fingers in welcome.
There was another jolt and she stopped mid-step before the dark entrance of the building, standing on a patch of snow and scattered sand and salt. From the corner of her eye Mihaela saw a figure reflected in the glass door, a silhouette walking towards her. She tried to turn and face it but her body failed to obey.
It was horrifyingly similar tothattime four months ago.
Mihaela’s pulse quickened. Too many pairs of hands gripped her and dug into her skull, wrenching her face upwards. Fingers pressed into her temples, pushed the hair away from her forehead, pulled the flesh to the side, burrowing in,searching. The pressure made her ears pop, her vision blurred, the world around her slipping out of focus.
Look at him!A male voice commanded and the pressure increased. The fingers dug deeper into her skull. She vaguely felt the nails leave marks under her chin from the effort to keep her looking up, then twist her head to the side. The figure reflected in the glass moved and multiplied.
Her mind reeled. The sand beneath her feet shifted, and the building to her side tilted dangerously close. Something was pushing her back—back to whenithappened. Mihaela did not want to remember. She did not want to be the trembling thing on the ground, confused and alone. Still warm and still alive, her last moments as a human.
The man reached out to pull her up to her feet. His hand seized her wrist like shackles.
