Chapter 25 #2
She threaded her hands through Aster’s hair, keeping her skull in place, then looked deeply into her eyes.
And for a moment a bit of tenderness seeped through — a look that said I can’t promise you much, but I’ll promise I’ll miss you if I lose you — and then before Aster could say anything to that, Sylvia’s red eyes spun like a hurricane, and Aster was pulled into the eye of the storm.
***
The first time it happened, they were in a hunter’s cabin. Aster didn’t recall this memory at all. It had to have been the deepest, most buried seed. The root of the tree.
It was night, and it was cold, and their bodies were pressed close like two dogs huddled for warmth, and Sylvia told her to kiss her. Aster’s heart had beaten so fast in reply that she didn’t know what to do with it. She didn’t understand why it was trying to leap out of her chest.
It’s just a kiss. She’s just being nice. She’s just being Sylvia.
Aster had stared at her friend’s pretty face and knew immediately that she did want to kiss her. It wasn’t a question of want, it was a question of how much and how long.
Because she got the uncanny feeling in her chest that her desire would immediately outweigh Sylvia’s, that the moment Aster touched her lips to Sylvia’s, she’d be desperate up to the very second that Sylvia withdrew, and she’d miss it for every moment afterwards.
So she said something stupid. Something like, “Are you aiming to steal a kiss from me, Sylvia Maroven?” And Sylvia had obviously hated that — for a reason Aster couldn’t understand, Sylvia had hated it so much that she pressed her hand to Aster’s mind and trapped it in a dream.
***
The second time, Aster remembered the faint outline of the memory.
They were traveling in the early 1800s, on one of the first passenger locomotives. The train was so noisy Aster had stuffed cotton in her ears, and Sylvia was fiercely journaling across from her, one leg hoisted up to the seat, a notebook pressed against it, a pen in the other.
She looks stupidly lovely, was what Aster thought at the time, and also now.
She was younger, before the first age lines had settled in, wearing a long black dress, leather boots, and a tan winter jacket that draped lazily around the seat, deterring other passengers.
It was one of those fancy ones only the rich could afford.
Sylvia had stolen it off some Swedish princess.
“What are you writing?” Aster asked.
“A book,” Sylvia said, not looking up. Then, she paused, in thought. “No, a manifesto. That’s a better name. More arresting. I want something that will get people out of their seats.”
Aster chuckled. “I thought books were for getting people in seats.”
“Not this one.” Sylvia smirked, then raised her head, turning the notebook around so Aster could see.
The original title was A Book On Common-Ownership, but book had been crossed out, and the title rearranged underneath, so now it was named The Common-Ownership Manifesto.
“I’m conducting an experiment. A bit more ambitious than my usual ones. ”
She tapped the pen to her chin, and it dabbed a blip of ink there.
Aster stared at it as Sylvia continued, “I thought it’d be interesting to see if I could change the societal order of things around by suggesting a minimal number of people.
Just slip this into the pockets of a few prominent leaders and see what might happen.
We’re heading to France soon, so maybe I’ll start there. ”
She shrugged, then tossed the notebook onto the table. Aster’s eyes slid down to the page, where a few other ideas had been crossed out before this one. There was one called See the Sokolovs about the California Gold Rush. Aster squinted at it.
“The Sokolovs,” she breathed. “Who are they?”
Sylvia had her hand raised, flitting it around obnoxiously to try and wave down one of the staff members.
“Old enemies of Catrina. The wife Yasmine is an on-and-off pen pal of mine,” Sylvia said simply.
“Last I heard they were getting friendly with President Polk. It seems there’s going to be a lot of shiny minerals flowing into that most western state of theirs, and since we’re hit a bit hard as far as our financials, I thought, maybe… ”
Sylvia made a noncommittal gesture with her hands, and then brightened when an attendant finally noticed her aggressive waving.
“Finally. I’ve been trying to get your attention for hours, I was scared my shoulder would soon sustain a permanent injury,” Sylvia huffed.
Aster had been counting — the other woman had been waiting approximately fifteen seconds.
“Two coffees, please. Don’t go light on the sugar.
And three pastries. Any kind. Preferably with jam. ”
The attendant nodded with an apology, and scurried off.
A minute later he was back with their food, Sylvia paid him with a dizzying bat of her eyelashes, and soon enough they were tucking into it ravenously like a pack of wolves.
It’d been many hours since they’d last eaten, the trains were horribly slow and made a hundred stops heading southward, and by the time they were done, both their faces were covered with a dusting of powdered sugar.
“You’ve got —” Aster gestured with an amused smile to Sylvia’s face, which was now the victim of both pen ink and various schmutz, “Here, let me.”
She pushed their empty dishes to the side and leaned over the table.
The train rocked at the exact moment she meant to steady herself, and she fell forward, knocking her forehead against Sylvia’s.
It was a hard hit — enough to make them both wince — and dizzying enough that Aster accidentally brushed her lips up against Sylvia’s when she meant to withdraw.
The sound Sylvia made was something between a startle and a whimper at the contact, and Aster’s eyebrows flung upward, blinking quickly. “Oh – I’m sorry.”
When she withdrew, Sylvia was staring at her, cheeks flushed, and eyes red as saucers.
And not just red, but swirling.
“Sylvia?” Aster said, brow furrowing. “Are you—”
In the memory, Aster felt herself freeze.
But since she was reliving it now, simply a passenger, an external viewer, she could see the aftermath.
Her body slumped to the side, and she fell asleep.
Another memory subjugated into a dream. Meanwhile, Sylvia’s hands whisked up to her face, looking completely shocked.
“Aster— I didn’t mean to—” she mumbled. “Oh god, what did I do?”
When Aster awoke, hours later, Sylvia had a vacant look in her eye. Back then, she didn’t know why. Now she was beginning to.
***
The next time she kissed Sylvia, it wasn’t a mistake.
It was soon after, maybe only a decade, and even though Aster’s mind didn’t remember their accidental kiss, it was almost like her body did. They were visiting Riegersburg for the first time in three hundred years to fetch an old heirloom of Sylvia’s.
They were tight on funds (some things never change) and Sylvia insisted one of Catrina’s old scrolls could sell for a pretty penny on the vampire black market.
Aster didn’t even know there was a vampire black market, but then again Aster didn’t care to know many things about vampires — she left the socializing to Sylvia.
Aster had brought her daguerreotype camera on the trip, excited to capture the plunging valleys and rising mountains that she remembered seeing from Riegersburg. The view from the castle after she’d killed the Maroven clan had been one of her favorite memories.
Not for the killing, even though the revenge was truly sweet, but because it was her very first memory with Sylvia—the other vampire holding her blood-stained hand as they looked out over the landscape, and knew that this Earth belonged to them now.
That memory was like an aphrodisiac, one that made Aster feel giddy and stupid as she followed Sylvia around the courtyard, snapping pictures as Sylvia made small talk with the castle’s current custodians.
They weren’t thralls — Sylvia didn’t keep thralls — but they were as close as you could get, which meant they were well-paid employees.
Sylvia gave them salaries higher than twice the median Austrian average, which meant they didn’t question where the money came from, or why their boss seemed to never age through the decades.
“Here it is,” Sylvia said with a breath of relief. They were in the attic, moonlight seeping through as Sylvia finally pried the top off an old chest. The claustrophobic space smelled like dust and old wood, and it was oddly comforting. Even more so with Sylvia there.
Aster was busying herself by toying with old daggers —the Maroven’s had their faults, but taste in weaponry was not one of them — when Sylvia crawled up to her in the tight space, and proudly displayed the scroll.
Aster hummed, taking it, “So this is that old-fashioned magic you were telling me about?”
The scroll looked like a business contract, only hundreds of years old, and written in runes and hieroglyphs.
“Mhm,” Sylvia said, taking it back from her, wrapping it up, and securing it tightly with a string.
“Mass Suggestion contracts. Lets you brainwash a whole trove of sorry idiots at once, all you have to do is get them to sign the paper. Mother sparingly used scrolls like these, too much overhead, but she did collect them for rainy days, so to speak. You know, when she wanted to stamp out a peasant movement, or any kind of discussion about civil rights…”
Aster smiled tightly. “Charming woman, Catrina.”
Sylvia barked out a laugh. If Aster had been focused on the actual contract at that time, she would have probably burned it then and there.