The Cell
Together, Rosalie, Kalen, and Faye make their way down the street toward their house, which stood at the very end.
They all pass by the tall trees and in a little while crossing the threshold of the old house.
"Will it really take that little to find her?" Kalen asks as he heads into the living room.
"It's not a complicated spell, even witches who aren't that experienced can do something like this."
Rosalie sits down in front of the fireplace, crosses her legs, and waits for the two of them to join her. Kalen stands next to the fireplace and Faye sits in front of her.
"So what exactly do I need to do?" Faye asks, looking at Kalen in disbelief.
"I'm going to need your bracelet. The same one you gave Nova right?" Rosalie assures herself.
Faye raises an eyebrow and removes the bracelet from her right wrist. She places it in her palm and Rosalie squeezes her hand tightly together with the leather bracelet.
Faye frowns, she didn't have good memories when it came to witches and promised herself to never work with them again, but she had no choice.
Kalen bites his lip and waits to see what happens. Rosalie closes her eyes and begins to silently recite several unfamiliar words that neither of them knows.
Even though they had been in this world for some time, they had never learned the language witches used to cast spells or cast runes. They didn't need it, so they just watched Rosalie hold Faye's hand.
Nova blinks and notices the dusty and dirty stone floor touching her face.
She slowly sits up, her right hand going to her head and then back to the wound on her neck that was bleeding a moment ago.
She had no idea how long she had been unconscious and was therefore very confused when she did not notice a single drop of fresh blood on her hand. All she feels is a sharp pain exactly where Aiden bit her.
She still has no idea what happened and where she actually is, it's hard to find your way in a dark place like this. Every corner of the large room is illuminated only by small lanterns that do not emit much light.
An orange glow reflects off the rusted bars and Nova finally turns her head to something she notices in the corner of her eye.
"Awake? I wouldn't be too happy to be you." she hears a voice echoing beside her.
She immediately notices Aiden, who is sitting on the ground with his back against the bars of his own cell. Nova notices a few grains of dirt from the ground in his hair, and his neck and leather shirt have her dried blood mixed with his.
A dark red that covers her silver.
"What happened?" Nova asks quietly.
Aiden sighs and stares at the stone wall in front of him.
"What do you think happened? Rosemary was one step ahead of me again. I finally thought it would work out. Damn witch!"
At that moment, however, Nova stops. "What is happening to me? What am I?"
She finally realizes what happened upstairs. How her blood turned bright silver and how Rosemary smiled at them both. She immediately looks at Aiden, who was just staring blankly into the darkness in front of him.
"I've been in this world for a long time and I never learned that something like blood could be toxic to vampires. How ironic."
"Are you telling me my blood poisoned you?"
"It's not poison per se. Vampires heal too quickly for the poison to stay in their system. It's more like something that paralyzes the healing for a few minutes and weakens your senses."
Aiden leans his head against the rusty bars and looks up at the dark ceiling.
"Plan A didn't work, I can just delete plan B from the list, and plan C doesn't even exist because I didn't think I'd need so many."
"Your plan sucked." Nova snaps, rolling her eyes.
"I'm sorry I failed. What will you do to me huh? We're already rotting in this hell hole. And just FYI, if it wasn't for your blood, I'm sure my plan would have worked. So it's technically your fault honey." Aiden says annoyed.
Nova opens her mouth and looks at him in disbelief. "Are you kidding me? What could be so important that you are risking your own life and the life of someone you don't even know?"
Aiden pauses and after a short silence speaks again.
"Rosemary has something I'd sacrifice this whole damned town for. This whole time I stayed away and ignored everything, just like he wanted. He wanted me to have a life if you can call it that from the perspective of someone like me. But when I found out in Ashwick a while ago that Rosemary was back, I just couldn't ignore it."
Nova still doesn't feel comfortable in his presence and the dark room didn't help at all but she listens carefully to his deep voice which breaks a little towards the end, like tears welling up in his eyes.
She doesn't plan on forgiving him for what he did to her and for bringing her to this place, but as she listened to him, she realized that he too was going through something related to Rosemary. however, she gives him the time and space to tell her what he wants.
"I don't know what Selene was really like, very few who met her are still alive, and if they are they will be some of the oldest vampires alive. I've heard a million stories and tales of who it is, but one thing is clear. Rosemary would sacrifice everything for her." Aiden begins, changing the subject for a brief moment.
"What do you know about her? About Selene."
Aiden shakes his head and looks at the girl behind the bars on the other side. "And why should I tell you anything?"
"Because you owe me."
"Owe? If I'm not mistaken, your blood got me here."
Nova smirks at him. "Talk, vampire."
"Look, nobody knows that much about her. Only a few bits of information are known, spread by a few witches and vampires who worked for Rosemary at the time."
"Kalen mentioned her once, something about being the mother of vampires?" Nova shakes her head.
"Oh yes, Kalen. Always passionate about history." says Aiden in a noble tone, trying to make light of the situation.
"To the point, please." Nova stops him.
"Okay, okay. They say that Selene was a human around 1420 and even now several vampires worship her as their goddess, that's why they work for Rosemary because it is known that she helped Selene create the first vampires who might still be alive, which is the biggest myth. No one here has ever seen them and there is only a small percentage of vampires who believe their ancestors are still alive."
"How could Selene create vampires? Wasn't she human?"
"And that's why Rosemary plays such a big part in all of this. When you have a witch from one of the founding families on hand, anything is possible."
"So Rosemary helped her give birth to a new race of people..." Nova says, thinking.
Aiden nods and stretches." But it doesn't end there. Selene is said to have been killed by what she created. Someone probably wasn't too happy about having to feed on blood every day and never look at sunrise ever again without their skin burning."
But before Aiden can continue, they both hear the sound of a heavy door close by. Slow footsteps head down into the dark room toward them and Nova presses herself against the cold bars.
A silhouette of a person appears in the orange light and slowly they both recognize who it is.
"Kalen?!" Nova whispers, not believing that she's looking at him.
Aiden raises an eyebrow and turns his head to the side. "How the hell did you get in here?"
Kalen blinks, trying to get used to the dark room. After a little while, he finally sees Nova sitting on the floor in a dirty cell.
However, the dark staircase and corridor had one drawback, no one knew where anyone was.
Kalen took a breath and was about to say something when at that moment the only sound he made was a loud scream and a moan when he felt a sharp pain in his stomach.
Nova puts both hands in front of her mouth in shock and in an instant is stuck to the bars, near the exit where Kalen is standing. Aiden's eyes widen as he looks at him, shocked.
"Kalen!" Nova yells in horror, currently stretching her arms through the bars.
Kalen slowly notices the wooden stake going through his stomach. A few seconds later, he drops to his knees and grabs the stake in his hands, trying to pull it out, which was not easy at all.
A sharp pain pulses through his entire body and he notices that it is almost impossible to breathe normally. He slowly turns his head up and stares at the silhouette of the person standing behind him.
An unknown person puts his foot on his back with full force and kicks him in front of Nova's cell.
Everyone stares at the mysterious person, who has a disgusting smile on their face, their eyes wide open and their head slightly tilted up. They hold another wooden stake in his hand and look towards Kalen who is lying in pain right in front of Nova.
She slowly moves closer to the bars, looking away from Kalen for a brief moment to take in the figure in front of her. Her pulse quickens like never before, she opens her mouth but not a single word comes out.
She knows who it is…