Chapter 21 – Dahlia
Dahlia
I’m beaming.
There’s nothing better than knowing you’ve just hit something out of the park, and from the way the applause is getting louder and louder, the pride I feel grows along with it.
Magic may have increased my skill level on the organ, but I haven’t used it for that since I got here.
What I just played and how well I played it was a result of hard work and practice, and while I was so nervous earlier about being able to do the piece justice, I know I have.
The string section accompanied me beautifully and together the music just seemed to take over the concert hall, coming straight from our hearts and our bones, perhaps fueled by the ghosts of centuries of performances in this very building.
Instead of demurely getting up and hurrying off stage, I stand up and smile at everyone in the audience, giving them a bow, feeling absolutely radiant. Moments like this have come infrequently in my life—I have to make the most of them.
I walk off the stage and Valtu immediately comes for me, his grin so wide and breathtaking. In his elegant vintage tux I get a vision of him at a party in the late 1800s and I’m stunned at how his iniquitous beauty transcends all decades.
“You were fantastic,” he says, pulling me into a hug. “I am so proud of you,” he whispers in my ear.
“Thank you.” I’m tempted to tell him that people are watching us and they only know us as professor and student, but he pulls back and gives me an affectionate squeeze on the shoulder.
He knows how we have to act. Besides we got a lot out of our system before the performance.
Who knew I could be played like a cello?
I go back to my seat to be polite and watch the rest of the performances, but I can’t stop glowing inside, and even though Valtu is standing further back in the audience, I feel his eyes on me the whole time. They never leave me.
This morning when I finally dragged myself back to my apartment to get ready after finding a dress, I was struck with the loneliest sensation.
Being there, in that blank narrow space the guild controls, with just my suitcase, my crystals, potions, herbs, and blade of mordernes , that weapon that I once viewed as a partner and now view as a leash, I realized I didn’t want that life anymore.
If being a witch meant I had to spend the rest of my life killing vampires under control of the guild, then I didn’t want to be a witch anymore.
I want to quit.
I want to tell Livia and Bellamy that it’s over.
I want to live my life with Valtu. I want to go to the school as a real person and figure out what to do with my life with him by my side. I want to make decisions that benefit me and what I want, not some misplaced sense of justice put in me by an organization that has controlled most of my life.
I just don’t know where to start.
I know there are some things that need to be dealt with.
I know that the book has to be found and I’m going to need Valtu’s help for that.
I know that I need to be able to kill Saara and Aleksi, and I can’t do that without my blade.
So it’s not like I’m quitting cold-turkey.
I need to finish things for the sake of me, Valtu, and humanity at large, and not for the sake of the guild.
How these things are going to play out though, I have no fucking idea.
I have to take it one day at a time until my hand is forced.
Which means I’ll have to continue pretending to be someone else.
If I let my guard down ever, if I ever tell Valtu that I’m a witch, do I think he’d still want to be with me?
I don’t think so. I don’t think he would take all the lies lightly.
He’d say that he never knew me this whole time, that I was just a fabrication.
Even if I didn’t tell him about my true purpose, he’d want nothing to do with me.
I know him well enough to know he wouldn’t kill me or throw me to the wolves, but at the same time he’s a passionate and moody creature.
He would feel the betrayal deeply, and he’s unpredictable.
So, I’m kind of fucked.
But as I sit here at the recital, I push that out of my head because I just want to keep living this fantasy life forever.
Finally, all the performances come to a close and it’s the after party.
I get up, making small talk with my classmates, which normally kills me because I’m seriously bad at making small talk and always bring up the weirdest things instead.
I crave interesting conversation instead of forced niceties, but my classmates know me well by now and they don’t seem to mind if I’m yammering on about a random fact or if I abruptly walk away because I’m bored.
Tonight I’m complimenting them on their performances because they all did so well, and eventually we find our way to the inner courtyard which has been done up in a million icicle fairy lights, fake snow on the tiled floor, candles flickering and dripping wax on candelabras.
It’s beautiful and moody, just like this city.
There’s a lot of people here and everyone seems happy.
The city has been so on edge lately that it’s nice to see, and I think a lot of the revelers are letting their hair down.
The students especially seem to all have drinks in hand that are quickly disappearing, and the relief at the recital being over is palpable in the air.
I look around for Valtu and see him speaking to a couple of professors, plus a tall, barrel-chested man with glasses and dark red hair, who I’ve never seen before. I don’t want to disturb them, so I head over to the bar.
Stop dead in my tracks.
The woman in a wispy white gown standing in front of me dealing with the bartender is none other than Saara.
I’d recognize her build—and her ice-cold vampire vibes—anywhere.
If I had my blade on me, it would definitely be glowing blue and tingling for me to kill her. My palms itch.
I think about turning around but before I can, she does.
She gives me a blasé look, about to stride past me with her glass of wine in hand, but then she kind of pauses, quickly appraising me with a cocked brow, and a feeling of dread fills my chest.
“Oh,” she says to me in a faux friendly voice. “You’re Professor Aminoff’s student.”
I try to smile, try to breathe. Why does she know that?
“I am,” I say, trying to move past her to order as the bartender gives me a look of impatience.
She reaches out and rests her fingers on my shoulder and it feels ice-cold and sickly, like some weird poison has leeched through my skin and into my veins.
“I really enjoyed your performance,” she says. “Both of them.”
Then she gives me a devilish smile and walks away, her heels clicking on the tile. I watch her disappear into the crowd, afraid to take my eyes off her.
What the hell was that about? Both of them?
I give my head a shake and the bartender calls me over.
I order a negroni with a splash of prosecco in it, and end up downing most of it before I’ve even left the bar area.
That’s when the tall red-headed man approaches me. He has a strange energy that I can’t make heads or tails of at the moment.
“Dahlia Abernathy?” he asks, his accent slight and vaguely German.
“Yes?” I ask, my suspicions running all over the place since that weird exchange with Saara. Everyone feels like bad news now.
He holds out his hand. “I’m a friend of Professor Aminoff.”
“Oh, are you a professor too?” I give his hand a shake.
“No I’m a doctor,” he says. “Doctor Abraham Van Helsing.”
I stare at him for a moment. “I’m sorry. Doctor Van Helsing the…” I lower my voice, “vampire hunter?”
He laughs. “Don’t be foolish, I am no such thing. It’s just a name.” He clears his throat and gives me a quick smile. “Vampires don’t hunt vampires.”
“Ah,” I say. “You’re a vampire. I figured as such.”
“You don’t seem surprised.”
“Val told me the signs to look for,” I say, though that’s a lie, it’s just my vampire radar feels a little scrambled tonight. “I’m pretty good at picking them out.”
“Did you know the woman you were just talking to was a vampire?”
I take a sip of my drink, nodding. “I did. She’s pretty obvious. She’s got all the bad vibes going on.”
“You’re right about that,” he says and gestures to the side of the courtyard by a large potted olive tree strewn with fairy lights. “Let us discuss this in a more private place.”
We walk over there and I have to admit, I’m more than amused that I’m talking to Van Helsing. “So, like, you’re going to have to explain to me because Val doesn’t talk about his past very much, but how are you Van Helsing? Did you know Bram Stoker too?”
He chuckles. “Never met the man. But I was a dear friend of Val’s at the time.
When he met Bram in Cruden Bay and told his story, I was naturally a part of it.
Well, I guess I shouldn’t say naturally , I didn’t think my friendship would come up, and I most certainly didn’t think that it was worthy enough to be fictionalized in the greatest piece of horror literature of all time.
And I really didn’t think I’d one day be played in a movie by none other than the great Hugh Jackman. ”
I laugh at that. “Well, you don’t look too different from him.” I’m not flattering him either, Van Helsing is hot, and though he’s wearing a suit, I have a feeling his body would rival Hugh’s. But he’s a vampire and that’s usually a given.
“Oh, aren’t you kind,” he says warmly, a twinkle in his eye.
“So what was Val like back in the day? What was this, the Victoria age?” The only friend of Val’s I’d met was Bitrus, but that was in the Red Room and I wasn’t able to ask him any questions.
Of course, I want to know Bitrus and Van Helsing too, but honestly I’m just greedy for any information about my vampire’s lover.
He nods. “Val…” he trails off, his expression souring. “We had a few good years, the two of us in London. He had just come out of his shell—”
“His shell?” I can’t imagine Valtu ever being introverted.