August 2018
Sparse meadows met by crowded pine forests lined the autobahn as we headed towards Windeck. After checking into our hotel late last night, bright and early we were on the hour long drive between Cologne and the small town in the municipality Lukas and Ben's parents lived.
We had decided going back and forth was the best option, even if it meant a lengthy travel. Having the big city to retreat to every day gave us the peace of mind that we were far from prying eyes and ears, able to debrief where necessary. Cologne was large enough to slip into the masses if we needed a quick escape too.
Ben and Lukas were in the front seat, chatting away about strategies and what if strategies, while I tuned out, eyes distracted by the fleeting tiny towns and wind turbines. My own 'what if' questions playing on an endless loop.
"Ollie?" Lukas had asked, dragging me from my mind. They were both silent, as if they had been waiting for me to respond to something for a while.
"Yeah?" I mumbled, half dazed as I turned my attention back to them. Ben's eyebrows were furrowed, glancing at me concerned in the rearview mirror, Lukas's neck craned to look at me.
"We were wondering why you're so quiet. Are you okay?" Lukas asked.
Nodding, I gave him a pathetic smile that he saw through in an instant. Next thing I knew, he was unbuckling his seat belt then, in the blink of an eye, had joined me in the back.
"What's wrong, Zappy?" he asked softly.
Rolling my eyes at the choice of nickname tied with the unfitting tone, I said, "Nothing. I'm fine."
"That's not true, Olivia," Ben said from the front seat. "Talk to us or I'm pulling the car over."
Always the threats with him... I thought to myself. "Just worried your parents' aren't going to like me." I flickered my gaze between Ben's in the mirror, and Lukas's brown warmth, steadily watching me by my side.
To my surprise though, they both grinned, then started to laugh.
Brows furrowed and lips pouting, I mumbled, "I don't find it very funny."
"Ollie, Ben's dad wouldn't care if you had a buzz cut, piercings and tattoos showering your body, and were pregnant with someone else's kid. All he cares about is that someone has managed to love his unloveable son," Lukas said in a warm manner, but as the last comment came out of his mouth, Ben sounded an offended, "Hey!" from the front. "He's going to love you," Lukas concluded.
"I'm sure you've offended a considerable number of people who express themselves through piercings and tattoos and short hair," I said, though I felt the nervousness subside slightly.
"I've still made my point. Ben's dad is an exceptional guy. The father I wish I had. He will never hate you."
"I notice you aren't talking about your parents though."
Lukas looked thoroughly confused at that comment. "Mine? Why mine?"
"You're my best friend," I said it as though it were a matter-of-fact. "I want to make a good impression."
Lukas gave me a small, but genuine, smile, his eyes twinkling at me as he was evidently touched by the fact I would care about his family liked me. But the way he looked at me stirred my heart slightly, causing it to give a slightly audible thud, washing me with shame as my eyes flickered to Ben. His knuckles were white against the steering wheel, but he didn't say anything.
When my gaze came back to Lukas's, the moment was gone, a sadness washing his face as he began to speak. "Their opinion isn't important, Ollie, and you shouldn't be offended if they don't like you."
"That's not promising..." I sighed.
"My dad doesn't like anyone," he started. "He's almost as bad as my uncle, but he has some morals left, which is why he and Ben's dad told us of my uncle's plans a year ago. They wanted us to find a solution because they weren't proud of what was going on and couldn't stand up to him. But my dad... he's not exactly a great father so I would never take his opinion to heart. He was the very one who let my uncle take me away..." But Lukas didn't ever finish that sentence. His eyes glazed over as his mind drifted into the past.
"His mum is better," Ben added, seeming to notice we had lost Lukas. The comment dragged our friend back to the conversation.
"Mum is quirky and really good at putting on her facades when in front of others, but she will like you. You don't need to care about their opinions though. Ben's dad is the only one that matters and he will love you, I assure you." Lukas smiled warmly at me then slowly extended his hand forward—as a heads up to turn my zaps down—to rest it on my arm in a comforting manner.
"I'm still terrified," I said after a few moments of silence.
"Well... Be prepared to face it because we're just about there," Lukas said, glancing at the window behind me.
Windeck had come into view, tiny in comparison to the sprawling city of Cologne. As we drew closer to the town, dottings of traditional Germanic architecture began to appear, lives surrounded by green land, housing becoming more frequent the longer we drove. The town, nestled in a thicket of green forestry and looming hillsides, belonged on postcards.
Had we been visiting for any other reason, I could find myself getting lost down the cobbled roads and dirt tracks, finding inspiration for all sorts of stories. It was the perfect town to find my way back into the work of fiction. Its sprawl screamed with magical delights and a long history of fairy tales waiting to be uncovered.
Alas, it was not a time for story writing. Despite the intense green colouring and bright blue skies, my view of the place was already clouded with grey. We were not here on a fun getaway or really to meet family.
We were here to kill an ancient, undefeatable vampire, notorious for his genocidal plans who had also happened to nearly wipe out my own species and was plotting destruction of humankind. Not the usual European getaway.
"Olivia?" Ben asked from the front seat, pulling me from the thought spiral before it had a chance to constrict on my mind.
"Yes?" I responded, welcomed to the distraction.
Yet it turned out to not be the distraction I craved in that moment. "When we get there... you need to do your best to play along with the conversation. Do not under any circumstance test people's opinions. Sound like you're on board with everything no matter what because you never know who is listening and who will report to Rüdiger. When we are back at the hotel tonight, you can vent everything then."
"Okay," I said in a small voice.
"Here we go," Lukas mumbled as we turned into a driveway by a nondescript house. It was nothing like the mansion in London, but totally belonging to its surroundings.
A Middle German House with its neighbour a couple of steps away, the yellowing masonry was broken apart by thick, dark brown beams, exposing the structural skeleton of the house. The wooden pillars lay vertical, horizontal, and randomly connected between in askew diagonal placements. The two-storey house was roofed with dark grey shingles, adorned with a chimney evidently off for the summer.
Before we had a chance to climb out of the car, the front door to the house burst open, a middle-age man running towards our car with a large smile on his face. Despite the neater hair style and dark green eyes, I knew immediately he was Ben's father.
Ben leaped out of the car and ran for his father, throwing his arms around the grown man in a way a little boy who had not seen is father in a long time would. Seeing them enveloped in each other made my heart flutter with warmth. Seeing Ben show affection for another human filled me with reassurance that no matter what happened, he'd always have his father.
Yet before I could get a glimpse of the man, as Ben pulled out of his father's arms, Lukas replaced him, hugging the man tightly. Ben walked back to my side, wrapping his arm around my waist as he nudged me closer.
Finally, Lukas pulled away from the man he evidently admired, and Ben's father turned to me a warm smile on his face. He held his arms open and said in a thick Northern British accent, "We hug around here, Olivia."
Ben's gripped tightened on me, holding me in place while he shook his head at his dad.
"I'm afraid Ollie has witch's warts, Stephen," Lukas explained, shaking his head back and forth like it was such a shame.
Ben's father—Stephen—lowered his arms immediately, eyes wide as he took a gentle step backwards. "Oh my. Who did this?"
"Erica."
Stephen's eyes narrowed as he looked at Lukas. "She would never do such petty—"
"They got in a fight about something stupid and Ollie intentionally poured her water over Erica's new sketch for a design she's been working on... So Erica cursed her the day before we came here," Lukas sighed.
Yes, that's exactly what happened... I thought, trying to look like I was recalling the memory.
"Witches..." Stephen muttered under his breath.
"Hey!" Lukas retorted. "I'm part witch and Ollie is full witch, so don't offend us." But Lukas was grinning.
'Witch' was the excuse we were going for with my magic just in case anything slipped. And to explain why and how I had bonded to Ben.
"Very well. Come inside all of you. The middle of the day may see a bit of sun so we need to be careful," he said, and ushered us inside.
As Stephen, joined by his son in the kitchen, fixed us up some beverages and light snacks, I took my opportunity to browse the living room. It was nothing different to any other human house I had seen, fitting with Ben's decorating choices (lacking the black colour pallette). Witches, I had noted, were much 'extra' at decorating, choosing to have all sorts of gems, potion bottles, and other magical instruments and embellishments around their quarters. Vampires, without magic in their line, were simpler. They blended in more easily. They were less bold. At the same time, there was an eerie deadness to their decorating choices. Things were always purposefully placed and rigid, neat and tidy. Like any sign of living was an offence to their nature.
I couldn't help my eyes drifting to the wall above the fireplace, adorned with the only signs of a life lived. An array of photos from differing time periods were fixed above the mantle. In the centre, a painting of a woman with curly brown locks and iridescent blue eyes—Ben's eyes—stared back at me. She was breathtaking, even for a human. Somehow through a mere a depiction of the person, this woman oozed warmth and tenderness, mirroring the stories Ben had told me.
"Who painted this?" I found myself asking as Stephen and Ben joined the living room with a tray of refreshments.
Stephen smiled warmly, set the tray down, then walked over to me, careful to keep his distance as he looked up at his late wife. "I did," he whispered. "It wasn't long after we married as she was already pregnant with Ben. There was so much beauty in her in that very moment as we awaited our precious boy. I had to capture it."
As I turned to look at his affectionate gaze at the painting, I saw the way Ben looked at me. A pang of guilt echoed through me, not only for once questioning whether Stephen had ever kept Ben's mum as a blood source, but also for Ben who did not deserve my cheating heart.
"She is beautiful," I whispered, but as the words left my mouth, Ben's hand found its way into mine.
I glanced at him as he smiled down at me.
"You're beautiful," he breathed, eyes glowing into mine.
I met his gaze for a moment, smiling at him. Until my disloyal and disobedient heart called me to turn my head and meet his brown eyes, oozing with longing, clouded with despair, sparking with surprise when he saw me looking at him looking at me.
· · ───── ∘☽༓☾∘ ───── · ·
In the late afternoon, Lukas and I excused ourselves from Stephen's house to take a walk around the town. Lukas was adamant I should have a tour of where he grew up, allowing Ben and Stephen to have a private moment to catch up.
As we walked side by side, not saying much, I kept remembering Ben's tightening grip on my hand back inside when I looked away from him. The way he so desperately clung to me the whole morning and throughout lunch, careful to keep me away from Lukas, determined to keep me in his reach.
I knew there was going to be a point I could no longer run from my reaction to my best friend. At some point I had to confront why I was responding like this to him and why my bond wasn't working how it should. But what kept me from doing it was knowing it was a worthless endeavour that would only cause heartache for me and Ben. Lukas liked someone else, so digging through what I hoped were fleeting moments of affection were destructive and useless.
But I was pulled from my thoughts as Lukas's voice disrupted the air. "Whenever my uncle would let me outside, I would run down this street, all the way to the edge of town. Just because I could," he said.
There was a lot to unpack in that statement. The fact that his uncle would 'let him' outside tugged at my heart in venomous pulls, but I pushed aside the bubbling anger growing within me towards his uncle, focussing on the rest of the story. The way Lukas had told me the story suggested it was a fond memory that he was sharing. But realising that was a fond one saw the rage burning at the fore once more. "In human speed, I hope," I said in jest, but as he glanced my way, I knew Lukas was aware where my mind was racing.
He grinned at me nonetheless and replied, "Of course. I just loved that feeling. Me and the world. The wind on my face as I ran. The sun prickling my skin... He only ever let me out in summer because he knew I would never go far despite what he did to me."
I took a deep breath at that comment, unable to compose myself for his story.
"I didn't mean to upset you," he sighed, giving up his attempts to make it seem like a happy memory.
I shook my head. "I suppose it was a really lovely experience for you at the time." Glancing around at the townhouses lining the main street as we walked further down, I began to see its sparks of magic for a young Lukas. The town would have been beyond beautiful when you spent most of your life underground. "It is picturesque."
He grinned and spun around, walking backwards in front of me as he spoke, pointing at the shops as we passed. "Some things are still the same and some are different since I last lived here in the 80s. That shop was always a butcher as long as I can remember. But that supermarket didn't exist back then. We had separate fruit and vegetable stores. The bakery has migrated down the street as different families have come and gone trying to make it work. And that store..." He stopped walking, and I nearly ran into him, but came to a halt just in time.
Lukas's gaze had clouded over as his mind drifted to a time long ago when the vacant, decaying storefront was obviously alive and busy with business. I squinted at the peeling paint, trying to get an idea of what used to be there. But the writing was illegible. "What was it?" I finally asked.
Taking a deep breath, his eyes met mine. "It used to be an apothecary."
"A pharmacy?"
He shook his head. "Not using the German word intentionally, Ollie. An actual apothecary from with older medicinal practices. The pharmacy moved into town not much longer after she..." But he didn't finish his sentence, his eyes losing themselves in the empty store once more.
She... Was this the girl Lukas was breaking his heart over? I followed his gaze into the store, trying to imagine it in all its glory. Trying to picture the woman who held Lukas's heart all those years ago. The person who had him drifting off in conversations every now and then.
When I turned my eyes back to him, he was looking at me already, searching me. Then whatever mood had captured him was gone. Lukas put the past where it belonged as a warm grin spread across his face. "If I beat you to the end of this road first, you have to go for a late night swim with me at the hotel." And then he started running.