Chapter 23 – Aurora
Something’s not right.
I remember pain, then Rorik’s voice.
Darkness.
When I open my eyes, I’m sitting in a chair in a dark room with a massive projector screen in front of me.
A movie.
No.
It’s my life.
My childhood.
A birthday party. I watch a chunky little girl… me… gleefully blow out birthday candles on a cake with a handsome man crouched beside me at a table. He has green eyes that look like mine and light brown hair.
My father.
He kisses my cheek and hands me a gift. I remember this birthday gift. I lift up my hand, and he latches a gold bracelet around my wrist. The jewelry has x’s and o’s on circular charms. The bracelet came with a necklace too. A heart pendant with a daisy-like symbol etched on it.
In the memory playing on the screen, I hold up the jewelry to show a woman standing off to the side behind us, arms crossed and a scowl on her face.
My mother.
The necklace was always mine? Then why did my mother have it? I always believed it was hers. Did she take it from me?
The movie changes to me as a pre-teen. I’m standing outside my mother’s office.
My father had long left us, and she had moved us to California.
We were living in a rundown home in Los Angeles.
Mother barely acknowledged my existence.
I decided to spy on her on this day. She’d been holed up, scouring through books and muttering to herself for weeks.
She recites a spell and flashes of light fill the room. Once it fades, she holds up a knife.
I’ve seen this knife.
It was the one that was found in a box of my mother’s belongings from the hidden room in the warehouse. The one I loved so much that Rorik gave it to me.
The movie changes again. I’m older. In my twenties. I’ve gone no contact with my mother and moved to New Orleans. I’ve opened my witchcraft shop and connected with the local coven. They warned me about accessing my magic.
She’ll find you.
A new memory. Last year. I was in my shop when a seer from the coven walked in. She had a troubled look on her face. Worry. I could sense it from her.
She walks to the counter where I stood and takes my hands.
“A blood mate emerges from the shadows. A vampire. He’s not the dangerous, evil monster perceived to be. You will be the key to breaking his curse. He will be your future.”
Then she releases my hands and leaves.
The memory changes. Six months ago. I’m in Manhattan.
I hold a necklace in my hand. The one found in the box from the warehouse that lit up when I put it on and Rorik got near.
My mother’s necklace. Or so I thought. I took it from her.
Before I left New Orleans, I tracked her down and broke into her house and stole it.
Because it’s mine. It always belonged to me.
I run my fingertips over the pendant, over the sigil etched on the charm.
When I set the necklace down on the table, I whoosh my hands over it and recite words that aren’t audible in this memory. There’s a glow, similar to the one I witnessed when spying on my mother in her office.
This memory fades, replaced by another.
No, not a memory.
A… warning.
A knife. My mother’s knife, but my hands are on the handle. And the blade is plunged deep into a chest.
I wake up.
“Aurora?”
I turn my head towards Rorik’s panicked voice. I’m in bed in his room. Or my room. Our room? He brushes my hair out of my face, his brows pinched.
He’s so beautiful.
So caring.
And he’s mine.
“I want to bond with you.”