The Blood Duchess

Chapter 2: Kindred

The roots don’t grow this deep. It’s cold and earthy, and ten beds surround an altar that sits below an imbued crystal lodged in the skin of the world itself. We call it Kindred.

The stories say we found it like this as if it had always been here. Others fear it’s not supposed to be here at all - a relic from a cataclysm from before time ticked. What's certain is that, we cannot deny its arcane properties that give us new powers to continue our species’ survival.

As I stood below Kindred atop this altar, I saw twenty different versions of me reflecting in its many facets. Maybe it’s a metaphor for who I could become. The silk white gown, laced with scarletyte gemstones up each limb, barely clung to my body and warped on the many sides of the Kindred crystal.

The chanting of the soothsayer filled the room with a calm reverie, while acolytes led the subjects of this ascension to their stone beds. Runes of an old language offered insight, incantations and incredible stories of our species. This was hallowed ground to us and I stood at its heart.

Wearing linens that would melt off if all went as planned, ten vampires laid still in wait. Six women and four men awaited for the ceremony to begin. The soothsayer still hummed and I swore the crystal sang along in a mystical fashion, only heard between breaths. One of the initiates voiced her doubts.

“I’ve heard of burning ash where flesh should be. Is it often?” she asked while reaching for the bare skin at the base of her neck.

“You’ve heard fables, my dear,” an elder matriarch laughed and pushed her worried head back to the stone. “You must be motionless and confident.”

“We’ll see your entire body after it’s done though,” a shirtless, male initiate laughed.

“And we’ll cover her tenderness up when it’s over,” the elder matriarch smiled. Her white hair hung in elegant braids and each river that carved each canyon in her skin could offer an incredible story for our young minds to digest

“Probably not much to cover up on him,” the nervous initiate smirked, stirring anxious laughter around the room and a defensive silence from the wounded.

With preparations ready, the soothsayer chanted, “Blood of my blood become one. Blood of my blood, become one.”

All I had to do was believe in this process and touch the Kindred crystal so its power channeled through me to each stone pedestal. I was told the vibrations and sensations were pleasurable and with nowhere to go, the only way through the intensity is to embrace it fully.

“Blood of my blood, become one!” she yelled louder. I looked around the room wondering if her increase in volume came as a signal to begin. My mother’s face found mine, and with a supportive nod, I reached for the tip of the Kindred.

Energy sizzled before I even touched it, and a magnetic attraction yanked my hand against the polished end of the ageless crystal. An exuberant burst of tantalizing waves shuffled through every pore, bone and organ within, before careening to every channeling vine that led to each stone altar.

I felt wave after wave course through my body, each more intense than the last. Each forced weakness into my knees but alas I had no say in my posture anymore. My thighs trembled and my belly felt as weightless as midair on a horse. Euphoria shackled me down and I had zero objections.

The world had me.

The world took me into its maw and offered every sensation the heart could desire for just a minute. But beyond the brilliance, silhouettes rushed to one of the beds. Disorientation confused the matter, and the satisfaction I felt all over fuzzied my coherence. Suddenly, moisture turned to fire, pleasure to pain, and a deep, dark drum silenced every noise.

I collapsed from the altar.

“She’s burning up!”

“Get her dress off; some of these crystals are bad!”

My body had no say in what was happening to it while concerned acolytes removed the burning, silk dress. I’ve never felt this pain and this heaviness in my head before.

The room spun, the voices faded, and I suppose the world no longer wanted me.

* * * * *

It’s a strange phenomenon to be awake and asleep at the same time. I could hear their voices but still I could not speak to them. My mind drifted from dream to dream and sometimes it felt like nobody was home. I had been erased inside my own skull.

Once in a while, the searing agony that tortured me would return for just a flash before vanishing. I couldn’t describe it. I couldn’t describe anything at all. How did I receive nothing from everything?

“That’s the fourth.”

Who said that?

“Ah!” I screamed at the top of my lungs and tried to sit up in bed. “Ah!” I continued to scream from the conflagration within.

“She’s awake! She’s awake!”

My vision soon returned and I succumbed to the pain once more, passing out in a sweat and a whimper.

Finally, my eyes opened slowly and my concerned mother raced over to my bedside. “Dear Yyrdra, you’re awake. Can you hear me?”

I nodded and said, “Yes.”

Others crowded and my mother shouted, “Give her some room, you dolts!”

“Darling, Yyrdra,” my father comforted, he knelt and took my hand.

“What happened? What happened under Kindred?” I asked.

“Do you remember anything? You hit your head when you fell,” my mother asked. Her concerned, pale face has always been supportive of me, and although she was never a good hunteress, I owe my intelligence to her.

“I remember, yes, but everything was so bright and happened so fast.”

“Some of the scarletyte crystals on your dress were not purified properly and reacted violently from the Kindred’s energy. In fact,” she said and looked to my father to buy time for some reason. “In fact, we think they were tampered with.”

“Tampered? Someone did this on purpose?” I asked and rubbed my temple because the headache still bashed against bone. Several acolytes from the ceremony, the soothsayer and Akisma watched in the background with concern. Akisma smiled when I noticed her.

“We think so. One of the initiates didn’t make it.”

“Which one?” I asked before she even finished speaking.

“His name was Venor. He lay next to Bryla, the nervous one,” my mother replied.

I winced and felt guilty for his demise. The news of someone tampering with the ritual pushed the guilt away and I had to ask, “Was it a vampire or human who caused this?”

My father inhaled slowly and fidgeted with the gold necklace bearing the family crest dangling from his neck as he responded, “Vampire. No human would know how to, let alone have access to the smithies.”

So, as the world gave me every sensation a woman could ask for, I wore a trap around my body that nearly killed me. It killed another, and someone of my own blood wanted me to become one with dust.

That was unsettling.