History begins at home.....

After a brief skirmish with the shadow fiends in the swamps of Mistborne, Angelica and Jay retire to his house for some well needed relaxation. After Jay has unlocked his door and invited Angelica across the threshold she immediately heads for the meat store and whips her bloodied hands over the Braysin Family Crest. Jay in a fit of rage scolds her as that first hanging cloth is the last reminder he has of his mother, who was slain at the hands of a Hungry Vampire Shadow slayer during the last Shadowing war.
It was this event that makes both of the Braysin’s despise the vampire’s of Aenea, yet for some yet unknown reason, Jay happily travels in the company of Angelica.
They proceed into the main living area and Angelica careless bounds over to the petrified Beholder “statue” that marks the main living space, a gift to Jay from his long term friend and Shouri’s arcane mentor, Crideas Bane.
The main living area is divided into several smaller sections, the right hand training camp, the central library and the east side dinner area. Many other rooms branch off from the living area, including an indoor garden. Jay has cared and nurtured the willow tree that grew up through the floor and has set up a small shrine to is patron goddess, Andra, under its hanging leaves. Jay can be heard yet again by the neighbours outside,
“
I offer my praise to Andra, the Earth mother. May her dominion over nature always continue.”

Stepping out of his indoor garden he wanders to see who is in the house today. He finds Angelica in the barracks chatting up another shadowchild. Does she ever stop flirting? He ponders to himself. Angelica can feel the pull of a rather large arcane artefact in Shouri’s Sorceress Study next door and moves to investigate.

“Yeah, this turned up about six months ago now”, Jay says pointing to the odd orb of force that now dominates the room,” Don’t know how it got here, or who conjured it, but we can’t get rid of it”

Angelica makes a slight “hmmpf” sound in her throat, knocks and lets an arrow fly into the centre vortex. The arrow is lost to the orbs magic, she does not look happy that she cannot damage her target with her currently equipped weapon, but tries another six times anyway!

Leaving the study, Angelica makes a note that the other shadow children look slightly more “solid then usual”, but Jay dismisses it with a shake of his hand. Stepping back into the main living area Angelica asks if Jay has any bottles of blood down in his cellar, she dashes off to check, completely ignoring his warning shout,
“Wait!! Don’t go down there, the cellar’s not been safe since my extension!”
“Not safe!”, she remarks back,” Yeah not safe for whatever I’m about to meet, Do I look like I play safe, Jay?”
She blows him a raspberry and continues down the stairs. Rather shocked at what she finds, more shadows but disturbingly quiet ones. A spectre and a wraith, harmlessly flouting about with no ill content for ones so normally deprived of their sanity.
Jay Braysin: “These guys showed up about the same time as that orb.... I dug up something trying to extend the basement... We had to enlist the help of Crideas, Alastair and the great Amethyst Dragon to seal the area off”
Not taking Jay’s serious tone into account, Angelica continues to flirt and play around,
“So what do you have in there? Hrm? All your ex-vampire girlfriends who've gone mad?”
Continuing to an oblivious audience Jay further explains that he found something, immensely evil down in the cavern networks below, he is sure the evil is slowly leaking up his well but has filled it in for now. Angelica and he agree that when the Great Amethyst Dragon says it’s time to unlock that door they will venture down together and destroy the evil at it’s source. Until that time the evil that has imprinted itself on that door will stay locked beyond it.
“Well, whatever it is down there it can’t be any worse then me”, Angelic says, with a slight shrug of the shoulders. She turns ignoring the husks of the three shadows and walks past them back to the lounge upstairs.

Catching up with to take a seat t the round table Jay simply states, “Your not really all that bad Angelica. Not that bad for a vampire at any rate. Your kind of different. And after your kind slaughtered my mother during the last Night war, that is a really hard thing for me to say… or have you forgotten about the vampire versus shadow children war?”
A statement that did not go un-noticed as Angelica replies,
” Bah, I don't fight in wars. Too much politics.”
This gives a small giggle, but he feels impulsed to continue to explain,
“Sorry but that war is why I normally kill your kind on sight, but you,” He says staring deeply into her eyes,” Your eyes, you were different, you just are”
Her curiosity now sparked Angelica arches an eyebrow and smiles coyly, always tempting Jay for more information then he lets on.
“Please go on Jay, why am I so different?”
“Ah forget it, you know how I feel. Even if the shadow children are loosing this fight, how many of us do you think are left ? There's me, them three in the barracks, one in Mt.Holme’s alchemy store, a few others scattered across the lands. Soon I'll likely be the last of my kind, last of the shadow children.”
Looking as though she knows how he feels, Angelica tries to lighten the mood by toying with Jay’s emotions,
“Smitten are we? Never mind. For your information Jay, the vampires don't fare so well either. There are few powerful ones left. And the younger ones are weak and worthless”
Not letting her playful joke get the better of him, Jay’s dark mood about this war doesn’t shift, as he gulps down a beverage he continues,
“The vampires are all over the place. Their everywhere, leaving behind "empty" caskets of what where once my friends and family.”
Still trying to lighten the mood and stop an onslaught of personal history, Angelica tries one last attempt to lift Jay’s spirits,
“ Then perhaps instead of fighting, you should consider bringing more shadow children into the world.” She gulps back on a small vial of blood and presses her face right up to his, but his dark mood remains and still going further into his depression he continues on, almost to himself,
“No matter what I try, the swamp shadows remain stupid, mindless shells. Your kind suck the life out of us shadow children, that’s for sure. Our very precious life and soul. All just to "feed".”
Sitting back into her own chair, Angelica looks at the floor with a minor trace of worry and sympathy, for a moment she reconciles from Jay and the almost heartless comment he just made. Deciding that maybe it is time she opened up to someone just once she quietly whispers into the rim of the vial,
“ I don't enjoy it. I feel no satisfaction from hunting those beneath my skills. I hunt anything that gives me a challenge, shadow children are not very challenging. I have a blood ring for sustenance, and the many dragons I kill fill my blood bottles amply.”
The words were spoken so softly that they pass right over Jay’s head, still caught up in his own world and misery he continues to get even more depressed,
“I mean look at those two down there, possibly great and mighty Shadovar. Now just empty husks of their former glory. Weak and pitiful”

Coming back at him with new resolve Angelica almost snaps back in anger,
“ The strong survive. I survive, and you do too. I survive, alone, because I have too.”
Finally feeling that he may have gone one step too far, Jay places his hand on Angelica’s and looks at her, his words soft and forgiving,
“Its why your different, you feed when you need to, not just for the fun.”
Breaking into a grin, joyous the subject matter has lifted a little and Jay has brightened, she sips her vial and jokes,
“Oh, I do have my fun still Jay. I hunt dragons, a thrill for me. I hunt anything that is a challenge. Even the other vampires. The elder master of Calithia and I have a long history. He's not very fond of me. Though I have no way to put him down for eternity”
Speaking again with each other on more familiar ground Jay replies,
“ I know I have no-way of stopping the vampires either, any of them. Not eternally... The elder master in Calithia is a thorn in my side too. Each time I take him down, I destroy his coffin, I stake him, I have baptised him in the waters of Andra, gotten Shouri to destroy any traces of magical residue, and he still reforms. !!”
She smiles and licks her fangs, urging him to continue in the methods he has used thus far.
“The last time I went there was with the mighty Paladin Rayvensclaw Nightkind, though it is now rumoured he has fallen from grace, and still no luck. But the elder master fears something. He knows his days are numbered. One day, I'll get him and put a stop to this war. But there is something he fears more then me and I think that’s possibly you.”, Jay chuckles at his last comment but Angelica elaborates some more,
“He does. He's tried to kill me a number of times as well. And you know what happens to those that try to kill me ! They die, eventually. It could be he fears me. I helped put the wards in place trapping him down there. The mighty powers of Dalix, the warder, and Zolaras, lady of death, combined for one mighty shield. He is powerless to move his casket, he can only reform it and himself there, and their alone. His little harlots roam free though. I come across them in the upper levels often enough. I put them down whenever I see them.”
Jay cuts in, “You say you helped with the shielding in that place?”.
Realising that she just told someone something that she has never spoken of in her life, her past, Angelica quickly tries to steer the conversation away,
“ So tell me Jay, how did your mother die?”
Jay tilts his head towards the ground, sips his drink and the flashing images of the past fill his eyes.
“ It was so long ago now that mother died. I don't really remember much of it. I remember we were running, in the wild forests. Mother was so good in the forests. We could hide for an eternal day in the forests, in the canopy of the great trees. Shouri says it was someway to the southwest of here. A place these folk call the wild lands. But I don’t fully remember.”
Thinking she may know the area, Angelica asks a quick question, “Was it near Veleron's domain?”
“I don’t really remember, Shouri says that she travelled to me by foot, along distance too. But for me, things got really fuzzy after that stupid glowing portal. I don’t remember much before coming to these lands. I should have listened to Shouri.. "Do not meddle in magic, brother.. it is not your domain", but I couldn't help tinker with magical things. They were fascinating.”
Sharing his love of magical artefacts for a brief moment Angelica reminds Jay how dangerous magic is, but urges him to continue,
“There was this pool. Like a bright white pool, it glowed from inside but didn't, it had rainbow fumes from it, but no vapours, it sang to me, but it was quiet. It was like a portal to everywhere and nowhere. It was just a pool of water but it wasn't. It absorbed me. It brought me here. Such an oddity back then.”
Taking a small breather to down the rest of his glass and get a refill,
“It took me to a scary looking purple and red hued place. I passed out on this pedestal. Highest place I could find. I awoke cold, and shivering in the Sleeping Dragon in Valorians Vale. Stripped naked and confused. My memories drained. It was some time before I realised I was half way across the continent, transported without an amulet of control by an ancient portal of the wanderer that had collapsed on to it’s back. When Shouri finally caught up with me to inform me of our mothers passing at the hands of a vampire shadow slayer, she said that she tried to follow through the portal but it had collapsed. We are still searching for the shadow slayer that may have used it to escape after mother’s death. We’re not really sure who opened the portal in the first place, or how to get back there.”
Jay passes Angelica another vial of blood from the stock in his kitchen, that he keeps just for her. She leans forward on the table and takes a sip, before telling her own story,

“Some story Jay, no wonder you seemed a bit over the place when I first met you. There were very few shadow children from where I came from. Have you read a book called The Shadowing?”
“Yes, I have a copy here on the shelves”, Jay gets up and digs out all seven volumes of the Shadowing Books, counting the dead and victorious from each Shadow war, as written by the surviving Lycanthropes, the people always caught in the middle. As he places the sixth book on the table a solitary tear drops down his cheek, that one lists his mother. Angelica reaches out and holds his hand, the message received with no mention of any words. She slides the book away from him and continues,
“When I was very young, barely a toddler, I lived in that city. That's when Veleron came.”
Disbelieving what he just heard, Jay blurts out,
“ You lived there? That was years and years ago. You barely look over 20.”
“Indeed, I lived as a slave for one of the minor liches under Veleron's rule. A half-orc lich. Sadistic and intelligent for his kind, I was young when I was turned. 17 by human standards for an elf.... that's incredibly young.”
Jay still stares in shock, thinking she can’t be that old. That is almost as old as the first war, that was hundreds of years ago. Angelica ignores his icy stare of disbelief and continues onwards,
“I was turned by one of the lower ranking vampires who would steal into the lich's dungeon. During Veleron’s dominion the lich, Orgrak, and his power-hungry kind would ignore the doings of the lesser vampires. This one slipped through the net too. He would visit at midnight, he would feed on me, and he seduced me, told me if I told no one about him, he would one day free me from my lich master. And, I believed him. I enjoyed our secret meetings. But, after two months, the Lich caught him coming to me. They fought, but the lich was too powerful. That's when my sire begged for mercy, and said he didn't care for me, he could find another, “cow“.”
The bitter memory passing inside Angelica’s head causes her to curl her lips and bare her fangs. In keeping with her and trying to calm her down again Jay holds her hands,
“ How dare he say that. You deserve better. What happened to him? Did the lich kill him off?”
“ Yes. And then he turned on me. I knew at that moment, nobody would free me. And if the Lich could destroy the vampire that turned me, my first love, he would destroy me too. The lich had many treasures about his den. One happened to be this bow.”
Angelica lays her bow down on the table and Jay instantly recognises that it’s wood is familiar, and ancient. So ancient that Angelica must really care for her bow, everyday.
“ As the lich finished off my sire, I grabbed the bow and a magic arrow next to it. I had only one chance, and I took it. I shot the arrow at the lich's phylactery. It was my first kill and since the lich was one of Veleron's favourite minions, I knew it wouldn't be wise to stay around.”
So intrigued and caught up in Angelica’s past, Jay begs her to go on,
“What did you do next? Did you run?”
“ I would be blamed for the lich's death as well as the other vampire's demise. So, yes. I took the bow, and I left the city. I lived in the woods outside the city, evading hunters looking for me, surviving as I could. I eventually became so good at killing those sent to kill me, that I knew Veleron would come for me himself. I survive because I chose to. Nobody would rescue me, except me so I left Veleron's domain before I outlived my own luck.”
Trying to piece together the history and get it into some kind of timeframe within his head, Jay asks,
“Out in the forests, hiding, as was most of my people, as Veleron’s mad army went to war, in their search for the best “feeding stock“. The creatures that had only a soul for draining to make them more powerful. My kind being no more than shadows knew that this meant us. We ran from the domain, scattered across the lands. Hiding with our wolf blood brethren. Using them as our mighty shields. Our trusted companions, and righteous followers to slay the vampire hoards. Your kind butchered and raped, pillaged and maimed in a search for something none would say. Did you even know about the wars ? “
Looking rather shameful Angelica sighs,
“I knew of the war. But I was as much a target for other vampires as shadow children. I would not be dominated or controlled.... I would not fight for them. I was being hunted on both sides. Because I took something else from the lich’s dungeon. From Orgrak himself. Do you want to see?”

Angelica summons her familiar, Poe. The mighty raven glides out of a portal and perches atop the table.
“caw!”
“I stole the lich’s familiar. He followed me into the woods. Poe, can you tell him, I’m getting thirsty for some blood”
And the mighty raven Poe replies,
“ caw! Yes. After Orgrak became a lich, I wasn't bound to him. But I stuck around and became his. He sent me off to find something. A little wench girl that holds the key to his demise. After this little wench killed Orgrak the lich, she stole a mighty bow from him. One of the only weapons with enough power to finish Veleron. I travelled far and wide. I left Veleron’s dominion over me and when I found her, I figured the wench would feed me just as well as Veleron did. Caw!”
Angelica lunges at the bird in anger,
“ What have I told you about calling me a wench?”
“caw! Said you'd pull my feathers out, but you haven't”
“ Only because I haven't found a use for them yet. As you can see, he's a little mouthy. With my own wizard training, I was at least able to bind him to me, and can send him away when he pesters me. Like now. But I don’t want him to go back to Veleron, so I keep him bound. And so, Poe and I travelled through the woods, and across deserts. I had been living in the deserts of Calithia for a few centuries before I travelled east. There was the whole affair with the Calithian elder master, and then some trouble in the north with a clan of vampires working with the Orcs. I had simply bested everything I could find there. I'm not settled if I'm not able to hunt. I don't know why, I just can't go back to being a thrall again, being helpless and not fighting.”
Jay listens intensely and begins to sympathise with this poor vampire outcast. He’s heard of the orc vampire clan before. The fangs of Othik. From Alastair’s mad drunken ramblings, but didn’t feel like interrupting Angelica as she continued on with her personal history,
“Being a vampire has given me great gifts and the will to fight. Yes, the clan had a rough battle with a travelling group calling themselves the Children of Sharlo. The children and I never had any quarrel. I was hunting with the vampire clan at the time though. But I refused to join them in their attack though on innocent passers by and children. And., well, vampires don't like it when you don't do as they tell you. I never heard what happened after that battle. I left for better hunting grounds. I never heard from the children again either, so I don't know who won, or if both sides perished. I did however run across one of the children a while back though. Big wolf blood. Not all there in the head. Didn’t even remember me. Shaggy beard and all. Alex I think his name was.”
She pauses to gulp another vial of blood. It gives jay enough time to inject his thoughts,
“Maybe one-day you'll find out. Maybe I need to somehow get you and my friend Alastair together. He knows more then he lets on about folklore and travelling groups in his silences. I only ever hear him now singing in battle, most of the rest is garbled drunken stupor.”
Agreeing with this point Angelica jokes that one day the quaking chorus of his favourite hymn will shake down all of Tarnesha. She mentions she spent enough time hiding down their that she has often heard his song vibrate through the walls.
Jay rounds the table to pick up some random sheets of screwed up paper he just noticed, to stoke up the fire a little. It’s a cold day outside. As he moves about he says over his shoulder,
“ Yes, I've met Alex Lunari after Shouri told me of him. She brought him round one-day I think, it was the dog-hair everywhere that gave it away. I never understood all that body-language stuff and how they speak without speaking. It's odd, mother and Shouri always did that too. Must be some kind of animal instinct. I picked up on some of it, but not the way they do it so naturally.”
“Yes Alex Lunari, not very quick in wit that one. He doesn't seem to remember what happened. It was long ago for him though. He babbled something about his family going to live with mother Andra or such. Then asked if I was food.”, Angelica replies, chuckling at the thought of something else thinking she was tasty enough to eat. Servant wenches don’t have that much comfort and other then Jay, Alex was possibly the nicest chap she’d met in years.
“And anyway, shortly after my encounter with him I met you in the Sleeping Dragon. Thankfully fully clothed and rather more intelligent. And you know the tale since.”
Leaning back on her chair and downing the last of her vial Angelica smiles over at Jay and gives him a wink. He can’t help but look into her eyes. He remembers giving her that shadow cloak that day. This vampire. This different vampire. The way the urge to kill her on sight just wasn’t within him, as it normally was for those of her kind. And then, still looking in to those eyes of hers, he remembers why. She is so different from the other vampires.
Lost in his own thoughts he didn’t hear that she had started talking again.
“… and that seems like yesterday for me. Time has little meaning to me. Much like death. But then I suppose yesterday to an elven vampire is actually a rather long time for you, Jay?. Jay were you even listening to me!”

Startled at hearing her sudden change of tone, Jay spins round on Angelica with the fire poker in his hand, taking straight to point on her heart. Defiantly she leans against the table and gazes intently at Jay, the sense of the kill swelling up inside her, the sound of his heartbeat filling her with sorrow and joy. Realising his mistake Jay lowers the poker back into the fire.
“Sorry, the tone you just used was just like “one of them”. I really don’t know what came over me. My head hurts so much to think about the passage of time, like someone or something is stopping me from seeing to far into the past.”
Noting the anger in his voice and the action he just took on hearing her vampire tone, Angelica pauses for a second,

“You really do hate vampires, don't you? I can see the pain you feel when you think about things past. The death of your mother. The war on the shadow children. It must kill you to even contemplate speaking so civil with me.”
“ Hmmm. It did, but now I'm not so sure of that past. Not all of your kind wanted this war, some of you were different. But then so where some of the shadow children, they welcomed the war with open arms, and then there were those with the lycanthropic blood that got caught in the middle anyway.”
Angelica keeps her icy gaze fixed on Jay. His eyes looking sorrowful at the masses slain under the vampire lord Velorons rule. Saying in a heartless tone that has lost much of the once innocent young girls spirit, Angelica imparts new knowledge to Jay,
“Yes not all my kind wanted this war, but we don't feel remorse. There's many things we don't feel anymore. Remember that. And when we do it's not like what the living feel. It’s an effort to remember all those emotions, and they mix and swirl with each other, separating out a singular emotional response is a nightmare chore. But for some of us the effort is worth it. there are few now who wish to remember what it is was like before, that is why I’m so different.”
With a deep and filling heart, Jay looks at the ground, sorrow for this young vampire lost at such an early age to the chaos of this war,
“Yes, I'm sorry, Angelica. I hate the vampires. But you are like none of the others, you didn't kill me on sight, no baring of fangs, no display of ill-will, no hostilities. But it is not fully why you are so different.”
Pausing to catch his breath, Jay looks up into her eyes across the table,
“Your eyes Angelica are so beautiful, I wonder if you even know why you are so different to the other vampires? When was the last time you looked in a mirror Angelica?”
Leaning into her hands on the table and deep in thought over the last question, attempting to remember an entire century of her past for any mirrored glances of herself, Angelica shrugs her shoulders,
“Before I turned into a vampire and my reflection was stolen away from me, the only mirrors in Orgrak’s dungeon were for scrying on others, not oneself. As a slave girl for him I didn’t exactly have a vanity suite in my cell. To be honest I don’t think I’ve ever had the opportunity to look at myself. Why are you asking?”
“It’s the reason why you’re so different from the other vampires, why you have the will to stand and fight them and possibly why they have such a hard time dominating you. Your eyes, Angelica, are not fully elven, nor do they run with the insanity of vampirism. They are, how to say it, shaded! Like dark but not dark, smoked, like that of a shadow child but so much more, solid. So curious, fascinating and beautiful.” Angelica smiles, licking her fangs.
“Why Jay, you sound smitten. You really think my eyes are of shadow child origin? I didn’t know that. No one has ever mentioned it. It could be possible, I never knew my parents. There could be shadow blood in my past.”
Jay leans in and hugs Angelica, pausing to kiss her gently and she brushes her fangs against his neck, resisting her urge to bite. Jay moves away to his bookshelves, searching and scanning the many rows for a particular volume,
“Actually now I think about it, I had a book here about the inter-racial relations with the wild lands elves, out by Veleron’s Domain, and a list of those alive before the first shadow war broke out,”
Reaching out for a thick tome, Jay suddenly drops to his knees, as though paralysed resisting the pull of very strong magic’s, screaming in pain and holding his head. Angelica flies over the table faster then her own thoughts and grabs him, scanning the house for any possible enemies or magical fields. She finds no trace of anything. Coming out of his pain and looking at Angelica with a slightly confused smile, she arches her eyebrows for an explanation.
“Hello Angelica. What were we up to? My head, feels so fuzzy, all of a sudden. Why are we at my house. We were in the swamps, trying to get some intelligent thought back into the shadow fiends. I’ll assume we came to my house for some supplies. Did I get seriously hurt or something? Not another brush in with Your Lady?“, he giggles as though his head is filled with air. Angelica gazes at Jay with an intense stare,
“Yes, we were, then we came home because we’d given up at dawn. Are you okay?”
“Yes. I’ve got a bit of a fuzzy headache.” He says standing up and getting a drink from the kitchen. Looking over his shoulder as he goes to the kitchen, directly into Angelica’s eyes, the expression on his face that he is trying to find the words and moment to her about them. Angelica says she’d like a dragon blood mix, heavy on the blood and probes the last few minutes a little deeper,
“Maybe, when you don't feel well, you should just talk with a priest of Asis. It might help. They can cure many illnesses in the living, little sniffles, broken bones. Maybe when your head hurts like this.”
“What do you mean? It’s just a headache. But I suppose you vampire’s don’t even remember what a damn headache feels like. You don’t feel anything at all.”
Gasping in shock at Jay’s statement, Angelic gets the feeling that not all is quite right here. This is a very different Jay that she is talking to. Almost as though the last day has had no meaning or effect, she slides the book he was about to read under the bookshelf, in case it was the cause of this lapse. Still curious however she presses onwards in her inquiry,
“Jay, do you remember where I came from? If I said the name Orgrak the lich, would it mean anything to you? Do you know who Veleron is?. Ever met a rude raven called Poe?”
Thinking about the sudden influx of questions, Jay scans his bookshelves whilst thinking of the answers,
“ I don’t think we’ve ever spoken about where you came from. Orgrak the lich? Never heard of him but he sounds like something we should hunt. Veleron was an ancient vampire lich lord of old. I doubt there is anyone still alive from his time, hopefully including him. And a raven called Poe? I don’t really go about talking to ravens, unless he happens to be someone’s familiar I don’t think it’s possible to talk to him. Why are you looking at me like that?”
Angelica holds Jay's head in her hands gently and gazes at him intently, searching for any spark of recognition. But Jay’s mind looks completely blank. The events from the past day just are not there. The memories stolen.

Responding to his question she says,
“ I told you just a few minutes ago about Orgrak and where I cam from, about Veleron and Poe. But you don't remember. And you told me of your mother, Shouri and yourself hiding in the forests of the wild lands. How you found an ancient and broken Portal of the Wanderer and stepped through to find yourself in the Sleeping Dragon Inn, in Valarions Vale, naked and confused.”
Thinking over this statement, Jay looks stubborn and sternly at her,
“ No you’ve never spoken of such things, and I have certainly not told anyone other then Shouri how I got messed up tinkering with any portals. No one but the barkeep at the Sleeping Dragon knows that I arrived there naked, well no one but him and you now. Lucky guess on your part. I’ve never spoken of my past to anyone, your kidding. Maybe you've just heard me in my dreams.”
She stamps her foot on the floor and grabs Jay’s shoulders to spin him towards her.
“ I am not one to play games, Jay Braysin. WE have been confessing our secrets to each other all damn day! You have spoken of these things with me and you don’t remember. You are not well. I’m not certain you’ve been well since stepping through that portal. Do shadow children often have shadowy memory?”
Taking a step away from her and brushing his hand against the hilt of his sword absently as he sits down at the table, Jay looks at her with sorrowful eyes.
“Shadow children never forget the past. But perhaps you are correct. Just lately I’ve been forgetting small details, like where my whetstone is, my soap and other things. Ever since that pool of glowing water. I’m still yet to find out what it was, but maybe Shouri was correct and it was something I shouldn’t have been tinkering with. As I stepped through it I felt another presence, something wild, some…..ARRRGGGGHHHH”
Jay falls backwards off his chair, screaming in pain. He settles for a moment and almost puppet like stands up, words boom from his mouth using his vocal chords, but it is clear they are not Jay’s,
“Things that should be forgotten. Remain forgotten. But this one is persistent to remember. This is trying my patience. The knowledge is burning inside of him, master. One day we will find out how he trapped us in his mind. The portal should not have malfunctioned like this. She and that accursed bow, that keeps us from finding her, are so within reach. Look at how she pities him. Poor mortal. Our power will control him one-day. Master, I think she hears us. Stop the ultimate astral domination spell testing then, fool.”
Jay collapses to the floor, shakes his head and refocuses his eyes.
“ Oh, Angelica. My head hurts so much. Maybe one day I’ll find a cure for this headache.”
Walking around the table to help him up she looks puzzled, and slowly reaches out to touch Jay's cheek. Her face a blank display. She takes two bottles of dragon blood and mixes them together with some water. Deciding not to push him further and wanting a change of subject she speaks to him light heartedly,
“So you really gave Shouri permission to spruce up the house, she has done a wonderful job.”
“Huh?. Erm, I don’t know. What was the question? If that is what we were talking about then yes, I gave her permission. But I did ask her to keep that statue looked in the basement. I know Crideas and her top up the magic once in a while, but I fear the damn thing will break free one day. Are you drinking a double? Why in the world would you be doing that? You only ever do that after something has deeply disturbed you. What’s wrong? Want to talk about it?”
She turns and hides her face from Jay, a solitary tear dropping down her cheek. The effort it must have taken for her to perform this act lost on anyone but another vampire. And few remain that would understand or even try to. She gazes into her glass, her usually fiery expression turned somewhat sad.
“Maybe one we could see a Priest of Asis. You’d come with me wouldn’t you Jay?”
“Yeah of course, not for myself though, I'm in top condition, a little tired maybe. Bit of a headache, that war with your kind takes its toll. I’m glad your not like the other vampires, one day I’ll likely tell you why I think that is and you can tell me about your past. Never mind about that actually, its possibly a very long story. The past can be painful for all of us. Always look on towards the future. The past can stay there. Remember it always but never repeat it. That is the way of the shadow children. Learn from the mistakes, build on the successes but always move to the future. Yeah, anyway what else we been up to today?”
The spell erasing even the last few moments from him, and yet in his mind, locked away, the pure memory of everything that has transpired for the day. A tortured mind. A mind that screams denial at the domination of a lich from across the ages. A lich of great power that was never fully destroyed and the soul of the one defiant person that refuses to let him get access to the one they love. Locked in an eternal war in the head.
Angelica grins deviously, showing a little of her fangs, tells a story to Jay about how they have spent the whole day inside at home, doing housework. Whilst repeating the actions she slyly tidies a loose book on the floor into her pack for later reading. Getting herself a little worked up in her storytelling she lets her hair drop down all around her face and makes seducing remarks and moves on Jay as she explains that maybe for one night, they spend it sleeping together. She finishes her story in the bedroom explaining to the poor memory lost Jay that have actually made the bed around seven times so far, she giggles and then hits him square in the face, sending him out for the day. She goes to rest in Shouri’s room next door, all the while knowing that somewhere in his head are her two worst nightmare’s and her only hopeful dream.

RustyDios wrote:Ah.. back in the day when there were only us three on-line 80% of the time, with "Guest Star" appearances by Eric and the dreaded "Lets have some fun" mad-monster-mashups by ...