Not Safe

Chapter 10

The strange things happening around Elara eventually stopped.

The lamp stopped flickering, its weak light finally becoming steady again.

The curtains became still, no longer shifting even though the windows were closed and there was no wind moving through the room.

The room settled into silence, and Elara lay peacefully on the bed again. Her breathing was slow and even, and the tension that had filled the air seemed to fade with the strange activity.

Daniel stood a few feet away, disappointment written across his face. His shoulders had lowered, and the hope he had carried only moments before seemed to disappear.

Amelia remained beside the bed, staring at her daughter. She watched Elara's pale face carefully, searching for any sign that something had changed.

Maybe she had guessed wrong.

Maybe the blood hadn't worked.

Maybe Elara's awakening wasn't happening yet.

Then Elara moved.

At first, it was only her fingers twitching against the sheets.

Amelia noticed immediately.

Daniel looked up, his attention snapping back to the bed.

Her fingers moved again, curling slightly as though she were trying to grasp something in her sleep.

Slowly, Elara's eyes opened.

They were silver.

Almost grey.

But there was something different about them now.

A faint glow seemed to sit behind them, subtle but unmistakable, making her eyes appear brighter than they had before.

Amelia and Daniel rushed to her side.

Elara struggled to sit up, and they both reached out to help her. Her body moved stiffly, but she seemed more aware with every passing second.

"It's fine," she managed.

Her voice was weak, but not as weak as it should have been. There was more strength behind it than either of them expected.

"I'm not that weak."

She raised her hands, trying to tell them to stay back.

She didn't mean anything by it.

She simply wanted space. She had just woken up, and the two of them were standing so close that she could barely breathe without feeling watched.

But something responded to her movement.

A sudden force burst from her.

The air seemed to crack around her as an invisible wave exploded outward.

Daniel was thrown across the room.

He hit the wall before falling heavily to the floor. The impact shook the room, and a sharp sound escaped him as his body struck the hard surface.

Everyone froze.

Elara stared at him in horror, her hands still raised in front of her.

"Dad!"

She hadn't meant to do that.

Daniel quickly pushed himself up, though his movements were slower than usual.

"I'm fine."

He said it too quickly, and the strain in his voice made it obvious that he was trying to convince them.

He exchanged a look with Amelia before turning back to Elara. The look was brief, but it carried something Elara couldn't understand.

She noticed.

She didn't understand it, but she noticed.

After everything that had happened, she had begun to recognize the looks they gave each other whenever they thought she wasn't paying attention. The quick glances. The silent warnings. The way they seemed to communicate without saying a word.

They were hiding something.

Again.

Elara swallowed and asked how long she had been unconscious.

Almost a day.

The answer surprised her. She had expected to have been asleep for only a few hours, not nearly an entire day.

She looked at herself, waiting to feel weak or exhausted. She expected her muscles to ache and her head to feel heavy.

Instead, she felt strangely fine.

Better than fine.

Her body felt lighter.

Stronger.

Every movement seemed easier than it had before. Her limbs no longer felt heavy, and there was a strange energy moving beneath her skin.

There was still a strange metallic taste on her tongue, but she assumed it was from being unconscious for so long.

She didn't know what else it could be.

Amelia suggested that she rest for a while before coming downstairs for dinner.

They could talk then.

Maybe explain what she should expect.

Her voice was gentle, but there was something careful about the way she spoke, as though she were choosing every word before saying it.

Elara rolled her eyes but agreed.

Before they left, however, she noticed Daniel holding his arm. He kept it close to his body, trying not to move it too much.

She asked what had happened.

He dismissed it as nothing.

She didn't believe him.

His back had probably taken most of the impact when she had thrown him across the room.

But his arm was different.

He was hiding something.

Again.

She said nothing.

Not yet.

---

By dinner, Elara's appetite had returned completely.

The smell of the food reached her before she even entered the room, filling the hallway with warmth and making her stomach tighten with hunger. For a moment, all the questions in her head disappeared.

She sat down and ate.

Amelia watched quietly, her eyes following every movement Elara made.

Elara finished her food before either of them.

She barely noticed how quickly she had eaten. She had been too hungry to slow down, and the food seemed to disappear from her plate almost without her realizing it.

Daniel did.

So did Amelia.

Neither commented.

They simply waited.

There was something heavy hanging over the table.

Too many questions.

Too many things left unsaid.

The silence between them felt unnatural, broken only by the faint sounds of plates and cutlery.

Daniel eventually stood to return the dishes.

Amelia waited until he was gone.

Then she looked at Elara.

She had never tried this before,reading someone's mind.

Well not since she escaped that facility, mostly because she had been too focused on finding her daughter

She had been too weak for most of the journey, and after escaping the facility, she had barely had enough strength to keep herself moving.

But now she had to know.

She needed to know what wa going on in Elara's mind, it was something only pure blooded vampires could do

Amelia focused.

She reached for Elara's thoughts, carefully extending her mind toward her daughter.

Nothing.

She tried again.

Still nothing.

It was almost as though there was a wall between them. A solid, impenetrable barrier that blocked Amelia completely.

Elara noticed the change in her expression.

She studied Amelia for a moment before getting up. Amelia's face had gone tense, and her eyes seemed distant, as though she were concentrating on something Elara couldn't see.

She stepped closer and placed a hand against Amelia's forehead.

"Are you okay?"

The moment their skin touched, Elara screamed.

The sound tore through the room, sharp and terrified.

She pulled away immediately, stumbling backward as though Amelia's skin had burned her.

Amelia stared at her, shocked by the sudden reaction.

Daniel came rushing back into the room.

He moved toward Elara and held her carefully, trying to understand what had happened. His hands were gentle, but his expression was tense as he looked between Elara and Amelia.

But Elara wasn't looking at him.

She was staring at his arm.

His sleeve had shifted.

The scald beneath it was visible, dark and uneven against his skin, the mark left by a burn from a hot object.

Her eyes widened.

That was what he had been hiding.

But before she could ask, another image flashed through her mind.

Amelia.

Not as she was now.

Different.

Younger.

Weak.

Locked inside a cold room.

The walls were pale and empty, and the air seemed filled with the sterile smell of metal and chemicals.

A baby lay beside her.

That was what she had seen when she touched Amelia.

The image vanished as soon she took her hand off.

But Elara remained frozen.

She had seen something she wasn't supposed to see.

And she couldn't explain how.

She didn't know whether it had been a memory.

A dream.

Or something else entirely.

But she knew one thing.

Amelia was definitely her mum, and she was the baby born in the facility.