The Curse of a Vampire

When the day finished, Alex, unfortunately for Eric and Nate, didn’t end up in hospital. However, he was close to be beaten up by Stella for annoying her the whole day.

“Are you going home, now?” Nate asked his sister while trying to catch her pace. She seemed to be in deep thoughts after the history class and, even if he knew it may be nothing to worry about, the older brother couldn’t restrain his feelings. Stella shook her head and walked right past the car.

“I’m going to the library.” Nate stopped and raised an eyebrow, dumbstruck.

“What?” He mumbled, completely confused and left alone on the street.

Stella chose to ignore every presence she felt on the way to the central library in town. Truthfully, Alex and Nate weren’t anywhere close and Eric seemed to have turned back to being the normal high school student Stacy told her about when she was alive. Now that she thought about the earlier events on her life, she felt a little responsible. It was her fault for every life there has been taken but she couldn’t recognize she felt sorry for them, because she wasn’t.

Inside the building, the clerk was the same innocent girl Nate has talked with before. Stella didn’t know her but the girl saw the resemblance between the siblings.

“Can I help you with something?” The older female took a moment to stare into the human’s big eyes. It made the poor girl feel like her soul was uncovered and, trying to loosen up, she smiled.

“I want to see the whole documents you have about the Blanche family.” The clerk narrowed her eyes, thinking.

“It’s weird. A year before came a guy who asked the exact same thing.” Stella nodded.

“That might have been my brother.” The smaller figure finally understood why the female in front looked so familiar and walked the same path she has gone on when Nate first came there. Stella trailed slowly behind, her eyes traveling over each book on the shelves. While the clerk walked into a back room, she started to trail her fingers on the older looking books. At one point, a familiar title caught her eye. “Curse or Blessing: Words about Night.” She furrowed her eyebrows at the subtle meaning of the name. The subject was, obviously, about vampires and their night life. She grabbed the book out and started to flip through. One page got her attention more than the others and that one had a small image on it. “I heard many explanations about the curse of night but none seemed to sound real. However, one day I met a young beggar, who didn’t look to be older than I or be that poor. His personality intrigued me. His name, he told me, it was Gavin. He was, supposedly, a young descendant of the well known Kraftig family. I heard about them when I traveled to Germany. It is said they were the strictest family in the early 1870’s. Also, he told me about the curse they created. ‘If someone dared to kill voluntarily a member of the Kraftig family, they would be cursed with the teufel entfesselt . I searched for more information about it but everything I found was the translation. It meant ‘the uncontrollable devil’. “Stella’s eyes narrowed at the information and her eyes wandered to the picture. There was actually a small tattoo of a Cerberus. The vampire closed her eyes and gulped silently. She has seen so many hints regarding the mythology that she was sure the new information about the teufel entfesselt was just another clue to her origins.

“Excuse me,” Stella’s concentration faltered when the girl walked back out and handed the vampire female the documents. “This is everything we have about the Blanche’s. It may not be very detailed, though. There wasn’t much information about them.” Stella nodded and took the papers. She walked to the small arranged place for reading and started to flip through them.

Meanwhile, Nate was still worried about his sister’s nightmares and went for help to the only man, besides Matt, where he could find some answers. The Arche mansion looked exactly the same and James could be found, like always, in the basement, where he would either hide some corpse he has been drank blood from or invent some new sadistic machines. He felt immediately the younger noble and turned just in time so he could cover up what he was doing down there.

“What do I owe this pleasure for?” Nate rolled his eyes and sat on the couch. “Is it about Stella?” When he saw how he got it right, the Arche noble smirked. “What has she done now?”

“Nothing. It’s not what she has done but what someone else is doing to her.” James interest quirked instantly. “Nightmares. She wakes up in the middle of the night screaming and sweating.” James eyes darkened in amusement.

“What makes you think she has nightmares and not some other dreams?” Nate glared at him and growled. James chuckled and sat on the opposite couch. “Fine. What do you think is the cause of them?” The Gregory noble shrugged. He really didn’t have any idea. “Have you heard her scream or mumble something while sleeping?” That got Nathan on thinking deeply. He did listen on her once. She has fallen asleep downstairs once and she seemed to frown a lot.

“I believe she’s abused in some way. She doesn’t seem to have any power on whoever does that. She can’t protect herself. I know for sure there is a man and he is a vampire with great knowledge.” James raised an eyebrow and leaned back, his legs crossing.

“Does she know how he looks?” Nate shook his head.

“She doesn’t want to speak about that. I tried, Alex tried and Eric doesn’t seem to even want to try. She won’t talk with anyone except Matt or Tobias…or…”

“Me.” James finished his sentence. “Since Matthew and Tobias left for England, how does she feel or react to the people around her?” The young noble sighed.

“She changed and we knew that would happen. She controls herself a lot better than before but she seems to know something that we don’t. Something that might have a link to what happened last year.” James nodded, getting everything memorized.

“The truth is that Stella felt the danger getting closer and closer. I thought he might have some link with the vampires that came in Firehole but I just let it as a hypothesis.” Nate got up and grabbed a hand through his hair.

“Who?” James crossed his arms in front his chest and licked his left fang.

“Ian Kraftig.” Nate remained completely foggy. He hasn’t heard that name before but something was wrong by how James seemed to pronounce it. “You don’t know who he is. You weren’t even born when he ruled the world of the vampires. I though Matt killed him but it seems he either has a descendant or he is alive. I would hope for the first one, young Gregory. The Kraftig’s were very strict and they never left someone, be it vampire or human, alive if they have wronged the rules of the family.” Nate placed a hand on his forehead and started to massage his temples. It just became even worse than before.