Page 21 of Elegy of Twilight
I followed Indie further into the room. The women worked in the outer room in the sunlight, but daylight would dry out the books and make the ink fade, so they were kept in the inner room without windows.
Indigo lit a gas lamp and hummed to herself as she moved through the neatly organized room. Most of the books were put away on shelves, but a wall of scrolls took up the back end of the room. Indigo finally selected a thick book from the shelves and laid it on the table. I moved beside her as she flipped through painted pages, tenderly handling the book as though it might disintegrate into pieces if mishandled.
“Here we go. I studied this topic extensively when the first attack came, I wanted to fully understand the history of this region. Rumor has it the giants who used to dwell in the land didn’t want to mix their blood with humans, which led to incest. Odd things happened: children were born disfigured, and rumors of them shifting into creatures spread. Honestly, I always thought the old tales were just legends, embellished until their true meaning was lost. Then the first attack of the lamia came five years ago, and that shifted my perspective.”
“Lamia?” I asked.
“The official term for vampires, or, in this case, any spirit that is supposed to be dead and yet isn’t.”
“The undying.”
“Exactly.” Indie flipped another page. “Ah look, here’s an example of the giants shifting into creatures. This one is called a werewolf.”
She tapped her paint-stained finger on a picture of a man standing on two furry legs. His arms were abnormally long with claws on the end. Instead of the head of a man, he had the head of a wolf. My runes itched, and I clenched my sleeves, trying to hide them should they decide to uncharisterically shine, but Indie turned the page, and my itching ceased.
“Here’s the lamia, at least what we know of them. I don’t know who illustrated this book, but it stands to reason that the vampires of then and now would appear similar.”
I leaned over the table, scarcely daring to breathe as I took in the drawing. The creature appeared like a man, with arms and legs and long, unkept hair but a body that was underfed, thin, and sunken, with gaunt features. And then there was the face. It was pale, skeletal, and rotting, with blood-red eyes and a mouth that hung open, displaying curved fangs. Whoever had drawn the painting had taken the timeto depict the spiral of blood and drool streaking the vampire’s chin.
“This one doesn’t have wings, but sometimes they are depicted with claws and wings. In all appearances, the vampires bear a resemblance to bats.”
“What if the bats were diseased and started all of this?” I asked. “Bats are creatures of the night, blind in daylight, hunting by sound in the night. I heard of rats bringing a plague to a city in the lowlands and wiping out the population. What if this is just some kind of plague?”
Indie stared at me. “Huh. I’ve never heard that speculation before. But it’s not a plague. If it were, it would be spreading. That’s the oddity of our situation. I assumed vampires would create more vampires with their bites, but they don’t. No one has disappeared, they are just found dead, drained of blood. And the text don’t mention a cure, nor a reason why vampires suddenly returned to haunt us.”
“How do we know it isn’t spreading?” I asked. “Five years ago, there was just one incident, a single circumstance. What if it has spread to others, and they are the cause of the demise of our village? Just this morning, I saw another family pack up andleave. How much longer do we have to wait until everyone else either leaves or dies?”
Indie scratched her chin, then leaned over the book. “The library is here for seekers of knowledge. I’m going to hunt down more records and let you know what I find. Perhaps you can draw some conclusions I initially overlooked.”
I pressed my palms together. “Thank you.”
I worked with Indie a bit longer, reading through the passages and searching for more on the history of the strange occurrences that took place in Veilix. But no other answers came, and I left for the garrison, one thought ringing in my mind: Either Titus was not a vampire at all, or vampires had morphed to take on the appearance of humans.
But how? We buried our dead and they stayed dead. The knights killed vampires and they also stayed dead. Yet a group of them remained, almost as though they sprang out of nowhere. Perhaps that was why Captain Elroy was so focused on capturing the vampire king, after all, it made sense that the king of those undead creatures could create more.
10
LUCIA
“We have to try again,” I announced as I stood in Captain Elroy’s study.
This time, it was just him and me, and the door to his inner chamber was shut firmly. I tried to keep my eyes off it, but just being in the study made my skin crawl with the reminder of Edith’s bouncing breasts.
Captain Elroy sat, writing at his desk. “No,” he said harshly without looking at me.
I crossed my arms. “Why? We have to do something, and I saw the letter on your desk. The vampire king wants me.”
Putting his pen down, he frowned. “I don’t know what you think you saw, but it was my mistake. I won’t put your life in danger again.”
“If you don’t, I’ll go without you, and I’d feel much better if you and your knights were standing guard for my encounter.”
“There’s no point in you going alone. The vampires will take you.”
“Then come with me for protection.”
“You don’t understand, Lucia. We succumbed to the music.”
“Well, plug your ears with cloth.”
