4. Valtu
Valtu
THEN
T wo women died at my hand on the same day.
Two witches.
And yet, after the loss of Dahlia, I feel nothing for taking the life of the other witch. A sign that my humanity has been compromised, but my soul feels too ravaged to care. Frankly, it’s hard to care about anything.
But Solon and Lenore care. They care about the bigger picture. To me there is no picture at all, just a negative, like watching film get developed in reverse.
So tonight we’re getting rid of two bodies.
There is no moon, we have no lights, but we can see. The three of us living beings in my small motorboat with two dead ones.
We go past the long island of Lido, past the channel markers, out into the Gulf of Venice. The waves are big out here, and there are boats and ferries going back and forth, their lights bobbing with the swell, but we move easily through the dark.
I bring the boat to a stop when I think the water’s deep enough.
It’s cold. I shouldn’t be cold but I am.
It smells like snow and sorrow on the wind.
I stare over into the inky depths and I wonder what would happen if I latched the bricks onto myself.
If I sank to the bottom with my dove. Her wings may be clipped now but that doesn’t mean I have to be without her.
“Valtu,” Solon says gently, but there’s a warning in his voice. He knows my thoughts. “We need you here.”
Why? So I can kill someone else?
So I can lose someone else?
“We’ll get rid of the witch first,” Lenore says.
She leans down and picks up the girl by the shoulders.
I feel like this is the first time I’m getting a real look at her.
I don’t know her name but she’s pretty, maybe late thirties, smooth skin and dark hair.
I wonder if she was a true friend to Dahlia or if she operated under Bellamy’s thumb. It’s possible she was both.
Solon reaches down and takes her feet, the bricks resting on her stomach, and they unceremoniously dump the body overboard. The witch goes in with a splash then immediately sinks. I look away, not wanting to see her face as it disappears into the depths.
“Valtu?” Lenore says softly and I realize I’ve been looking off into the darkened distance for a while. “It’s time.”
I look down to see her and Solon holding onto Dahlia, this time with more reverence.
“Did you want to say a few words?” Lenore asks.
I shake my head. There is nothing to say. Nothing that I can say that would be a tribute to her, to our love, to any of this.
Once upon a time, I would have told her that I’d see her again.
This time I’m not so sure.
This time I feel, because I’m the one that killed her, that she won’t be coming back.
If I were to say goodbye, it would be final.
Lenore and Solon hesitate, then they carefully place Dahlia in the ocean.
This time I watch as she sinks.
Watch as her pale face is swallowed by the deep, her hair flowing around her like silken seaweed.
And then the words finally come to me.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
I’m so fucking sorry.
* * *
A few days pass. At least I think they do.
Time takes on a new form. No longer this thing that is on my side, a friend for eternity. Now it’s the enemy. It flipped while it was in the trenches with me. Pulled a gun. Told me it was going to hold me hostage now, trapping me in it in never-ending agony.
Time has turned on me and taken me for a ride before.
Then, I used the betrayal as fuel, as a springboard for my monstrous ways.
I used it as much as it used me. But this time around, I am a slave to it, in the never-ending current that all immortals are blessed with.
No. No, now I see it’s not a blessing at all.
But a curse, its roots twisting in deep, fastening me to eternity like a tree growing through stone.
“Valtu,” Bitrus says in a gentle voice, an equally gentle hand placed on top of mine.
I swivel my head toward him, wincing slightly at the slice of sunlight bouncing off the windows of my neighbor across the canal.
“What do you want to do?” he asks.
I blink and adjust my sunglasses. Look around.
We aren’t alone. Sitting in my back garden in Venice are Lenore and Solon, as well as Bitrus and Van Helsing.
It was only two nights ago that I said goodbye to my beloved Dahlia as she sank to the watery depths.
There hasn’t been any time for me to process anything, but I know my grief over my lost love has affected my cognitive abilities.
I know of the pressing matter at hand, at the danger of having Saara and Aleksi in charge of the book, of monsters or whatever the hell is roaming around this city, but I simply do not care. I don’t have it in me.
I manage to take in the faces of my friends.
While Bitrus’s dark face is looking at me with concern, taking his hand back gingerly, the others are talking animatedly.
From the fury in Lenore’s eyes, to the stern determination in Solon’s, to the spark in Van Helsing’s, I know their entire focus is on eradicating the vampires and taking back the book.
The whole reason they have gathered here isn’t because they feel I need companionship (I would rather be alone more than anything else), but because tonight they want us to ambush Poveglia, the island where the rogue vampires live.
You don’t have to do this , Bitrus says to me inside my head. I know Lenore and Solon are your friends, but don’t you think they’re a little too eager to get their hands on the book?
I give Bitrus a steady look. They are trustworthy , I tell him.
The problem isn’t them. It’s me. I don’t give a shit about anything anymore except for some way to end this constant pain and suffering inside me, this black and gaping maw that is eating me alive.
Bitrus doesn’t know Lenore and Solon like I do, but even if they were planning on taking the book, they won’t be able to.
That book will be mine. Inside those cursed pages lay answers, keys to end my suffering.
I know that if I get my hands on it before they do, I could possess more power than any other vampire, and I would use that power to bring Dahlia back from the dead.
There has to be a way. There has to be a spell to bring her back. Necromancy is one of the oldest dark arts, ones that vampires have never been privy to, for we’re the ones who have never needed it, and it wouldn’t be much of a grimoire if it didn’t have a few spells for it.
Of course, being in possession of the book doesn’t guarantee that the magic will work for me, and getting the book in my possession isn’t guaranteed either. But that’s really the only reason why I will be going to the island of Poveglia tonight.
Bitrus is still staring at me so I give him an even deeper look. I’m fine , I assure him. And I’m going.
Bitrus nods then takes a sip of his white wine and turns his attention to Solon. “Only Valtu and I will be allowed on the island. Perhaps it would be best if only the two of us went tonight.”
“Absolutely not,” Solon says firmly. “It’s too risky. And Lenore and I are the only ones with magic of our own. You’re going to need all the help you can get if you want them destroyed.”
“You will be noticed,” Bitrus counters.
“We won’t,” Lenore says, sitting up straight. “My cloaking spell will cover us. If Abe waits in the boat as getaway, it will cover him, too.”
“Even with giant demonic plague doctors guarding the water?” Bitrus asks.
For a moment I don’t know what he’s talking about, then it all comes flooding back.
It’s a risky thing we’re going to do, and despite what Bitrus thinks, I know we need Lenore and Solon’s magic to pull things off.
It’s the only way we can defeat Saara and Aleksi.
Because Bitrus is right. It’s not just the vampires we have to outsmart, we also have to get around the legion of demons and ghosts and monsters those two have been letting out into the waters of Venice, the same creatures preying on the humans in the town.
We’d be foolish to think that we could do this without any magic.
“Her magic is strong,” I manage to say, my eyes flitting briefly to Lenore. She looks both surprised and ashamed at my compliment, no doubt because of the guilt she still carries for Dahlia. “And Solon’s is helpful. We’ll need all the help we can get tonight.”
Nearly everyone looks relieved. Probably because this is the first time I’ve really spoken about tonight, or really anything else for that matter.
I see the look in their eyes, that little spark and hope that maybe I’ll be okay, that maybe I’m on the mend, that there is this future where I am back to normal, back to the Valtu that they know, and this grief and sorrow will be past me once again.
I’ll get over Dahlia like I had to Lucy and Mina.
Oh Valtu , they think, thank god he’s so resilient .
I hate that look. I hate it because it reminds me that my grief makes them uncomfortable. That they would rather pretend it doesn’t exist at all. That I don’t exist at all. Because what am I without grief? There wouldn’t be anything left of me. I would cease to exist. Grief is all I am.
“Then it’s settled,” Van Helsing says. Out of everyone, his expression is one of concern.
He’s the one who has been with me through grief before, and he’s seen the animal I have become.
I know he’s waiting for the turn, wondering when it will happen.
There is no relief in his eyes. “Tonight we’ll head over to the island.
Valtu, find some excuse to invite yourself over.
If that doesn’t take, we’ll just have to chance it.
We’ll all go over on the boat, but only me, Lenore and Solon will be cloaked from the vampires and whatever else they have lurking on that island.
We’ll formulate a plan of attack so that they are surrounded.
It would be helpful if we had some sort of plan or blueprint of the island. ”