Treason: Chapter 3 - Purgatorio
Confutatis maledictis,
flammis acribus addictis,
voca me cum benedictis.
Oro supplex et acclinis,
cor contritum quasi cinis,
gere curam mei finis.
-Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Requiem
***
The first thing Maharet realized when she looked down was that the big
colonial-style house was afire. Flames were everywhere, she could feel the
intense
heat though she was still flying far above the burning building. Where were
the others, had they been able to escape? Frantically she scanned for Mael,
found him almost immediately, his mind full of confused thoughts and images.
She tried to contact him, but he did not answer, he was concentrating on
something else and maybe did not hear her call. Quickly she flew towards him,
she
needed to know that Eric and Jesse were alright, that they were not hurt. He
could call them, could hear them as she could not. And what about her sister?
She should be safe in the refuge deep below the house, but what if the heat
and the roaring of the flames had woken her? No, that would be nearly
impossible. Mekare had not moved for fifteen years, there was no reason for
her to
awake just now.
She finally spotted Mael, he was kneeling in the grass, a safe distance from
the house, bent over a small figure. Maharet knew that it was Jesse even
before she saw the face, the red hair. Where was Eric then? Certainly he had
not
stayed inside the house, he was too strong to be trapped there. And even if
he were, the fire could not hurt him anymore. Her blood had made him
powerful, strong enough to withstand the heat of the flames without any major
injuries. Had he left for a trip to one of the small towns that were close? He
sometimes did that, maybe he was not here right now.
Descending quickly, Maharet landed next to Mael, who spun around when he
felt her presence, a fierce expression on his face. He seemed ready to defend
himself, appeared to be prepared for whatever attacker might come. Strange
that
he did not recognize her at first, he had already raised his fist to attack
her when realization dawned on him. What had happened here to make him that
nervous? Mael was not somebody who had his temper under control all the time,
but never before had he been about to lash out at her. It was as if he had
not known who she was.
A low moan made him turn his attention to the body that was lying behind
him. He knelt down at Jesse's head, and Maharet flinched when she saw what had
happened to her fledgling. Her clothes were torn, her hair disheveled and full
of clumps of dried blood. The back of her head was one sole wound; Maharet
was painfully reminded of the night she had created Jesse. The frail woman had
looked the same back then, having been thrown against a wall by a reckless
vampire.
"Mael, what happened here?" she asked, tearing off the sleeve of her dress
in her frenzy to expose her wrist. "What happened to Jesse?" She raised her
hand to her mouth to make a wound, to offer Jesse her blood.
Mael shook his head, and caught Maharet's wrist in his hands.
"I have tried already, but she would not drink."
"What do you mean, she won't drink?" Maharet placed her wrist at Jesse's
mouth, and watched with growing horror as the blood flowed down her
fledgling's
chin without any reaction.
"She must be in a coma, she was awake when I found her, but she has neither
talked nor moved since then." Plain worry in Mael's voice; Maharet knew how
much Jesse meant to him.
"Can you hear her thoughts? Talk to her, tell her that she is not alone,
maybe that will wake her."
"There is only silence, she is unconscious. Maharet," Mael looked at her
directly, a more serious expression on his face than ever before. "She said
something before she became... silent."
"What? Mael, what did she say?"
"That Mekare has risen, and that they should not have done what they did and
will now pay the price."
"Who? What does this mean? Did she say anything else?"
"Yes..." It was clear that Mael was reluctant to tell her about this.
"What? You have to tell me." Mael took her hand before he spoke.
"She said that Eric is dead, that your sister killed him."
Maharet fell silent, she could not believe what she just heard. It simply
could not be true, Eric was too strong to be killed that easily, her blood had
been powerful enough to protect him. No, this had to be a lie, Mael had to be
making this up. There was no possibility that Eric was dead. It could not
be.
But why should Mael be lying to her?
She scanned his mind, tried to find any evidence for what he had said,
wanted to see through his eyes what had happened when Jesse had been awake. As
soon as she found the memories, she wished she had not done this. It hurt so
much to see this, to see her daughter, her fledgling lying on the ground in
her
own blood, weakly attempting to get up while murmuring incoherent phrases.
Mekare risen... should not have done this... not right... will pay the
price... Eric dead... by Mekare's hand...
Maharet could not guess what this meant, and why Mekare had done this. Jesse
and Eric had never hurt her, why had she attacked them? Why had she killed
Eric, her sister's fledgling? Had she not known that Maharet loved him? Or had
she done it just because of that? Perhaps Mekare had wanted to hurt her
sister, to punish her for something... but Maharet could not think of any
mistake
she might have made. She had always taken care of her sister, had washed
her, dressed her, even brought victims down into the refuge though Mekare
never
touched them. Maharet had offered her sister a home, a safe place to hide.
She had protected her against the others who might come to take her blood, or
to destroy her. Was this the reward? Hadn't Maharet always made sure that all
the others of their kind were well, that they observed the rules?
No. She had not. The rules had been broken, not once but several times.
Lestat had violated them in making David Talbot a vampire, Marius had even
created two fledglings though they had all agreed that no more vampires were
to be
made. Armand and Pandora had written books that further exposed their kind to
the prying mortals. Was Mekare angry because of this? Did she think that
Maharet was not worthy to rule in her name? But she could not have killed Eric
and hurt Jesse just to punish her... Then again, who knew how Mekare thought,
how she reasoned. She had been lost to the world for so long, she could have
lost all sense of reality; the attack could have been a way for her to show
her disapproval.
Again Maharet tried to feed Jesse, tried to force her to take the blood. At
first there was no reaction, then Jesse just pressed her lips together
tightly, she refused to drink and began to toss her head to escape the blood,
as if
she were frightened of it. She began to panic, tried to get to her feet only
to fall to the ground again. Maharet attempted to soothe her, but her words
did not reach her. Whatever had happened to Jesse, it had left her in a state
of shock, and Maharet could only hope to get her out of it.
