Chapter One

The town was silent as the shrouded figure approached. Not even the dead stirred, for fear they would incur the traveller’s wrath.

The people were terrified of him, though there were few who knew why. An aura so evil hung off him like a poisonous creeper to an abandoned manor.

“And so we meet again Tyshän...” the man whispered to himself. As his whisper travelled, a fine sheet of frost formed on the windows around him.

On the horizon, a dark cloud loomed; a rare sight for a desert oasis. He walked down the length of the main street in the town. The once colourful gardens standing proudly outside withered in his wake, as if they had lost the will to live.

He passed through the town without pausing to rest or purchase food or water, though he was worn, ravaged by travel. The only thing that lingered from his presence in the town was a mysterious curse. The life and joy of the people were sapped away and evil creatures attacked relentlessly until Tyshän’s situation became no less than dire.

----

Terra turned into the street, ever weary and painfully aware she was being followed. She didn’t dare look at him, but kept walking. He was getting closer. Her long fingers twitched, itching to touch the hilt of her knife, if not to use, mainly for comfort.

She made her decision. Her fingers crept to her hip and brushed against the hilt, when a hand came in contact with her shoulder.

“Nice night for a walk, isn’t it?” the shadowed man said. He had an accent she couldn’t place.

“What do you want?” Terra asked, barely keeping the fear from her voice. She sensed a smirk behind her.

“Just a nibble, love,”

Vampire... The word reverberated in her head as she snatched her knife from the her hip and jabbed at the man’s throat.

“Close, but not quite,” he responded, catching hold of her fist just inches from him. A smile played on his lips, and Terra caught a glimpse of long white fangs before he descended, sinking his teeth into her neck.

Not a moment later, he pulled away. A burning sensation had filled his mouth, and he retched.

“Garlic,” he spluttered. “Clever.”

Terra couldn’t answer. The vampire had put his teeth straight through an artery and blood was now streaming freely from the wound, quickly staining the front of her shirt a dark red.

Her head was spinning dangerously. She eased herself to the ground, and leaned against the wall of a house. A small, white cat was the last thing she saw before blacking out.

When Terra came to, she was in total darkness. A little weak, she didn’t move as she tried to work out where she was.

“Let’s see...” she said to herself. “I went to see Father... went to the tavern with brothers... was bitten by-“

Terra shot bolt upright. Her heart was pounding so hard she thought it would start echoing in... wherever she was.

“No... no, this can’t be happening...” Terra muttered to herself. “NO!”

“Bloody hell, will you shut up!?” an all too familiar voice said through the echo. “Even my kind need sleep you know.”

“W-where am I?” Terra’s voice shook. She swept a hand through her long, thick, knotted chestnut hair as she looked around, attempting vainly to see through the dark.

“A crypt,” the vampire sighed. “Mine, in fact.”

“Why did you bring me here?”

“I couldn’t very well leave you on the street,” was the reply. “You’re too pretty to be buried.”

Terra blinked. “Er... thanks... I think,” she said, not sure whether she should be flattered or frightened.

“When you passed out, I gave you some herbs to stop you turning,” the vampire continued. “But I would wait until morning before attempting to leave.”

“Why’s that?”

“The treatment sometimes doesn’t work. In that case, you’ll suffer an extremely painful death - or so I’ve heard. The sun and vampires doesn’t mix very well, you know.”

Terra snorted and lay back down. Her eyes closed and she found herself in a dream.

A large cavern. At the far end, a king’s throne. But there was something sinister. It was covered in something... yellow? Pink? It had the texture of leather. Terra was sitting on the throne, facing the tunnel that led to freedom. It was blocked with a boulder. At Terra’s feet, a woman was lying, saturated in her own blood.

Terra’s eyes snapped open. Outside, the muffled twitter of birds indicated it was daylight. Groggy, and confused by the dream, she sat up and looked around.

“Walk in the direction your head was facing,” came a sleepy voice. “About five steps should get you to the door. Stick your arm out first before you leave. If it’s burning, shut the door quick; I’m not going to save you. If not, you’re free to go.”

“Um... thanks...” Terra said, following the vampire’s directions. A snort of laughter was her only reply.

She thrust her arm out the door. Golden sunlight fell on her pale skin, and left no mark.

Taking this as a good sign, Terra stepped out from the crypt and shut the door behind her.

“Where have you been?” were the first words Terra heard as she stepped through the front door of her manor.

Terra sighed, just before her mother’s second husband stormed into the room.

“You didn’t come home all night! You’re lucky you weren’t killed!” Terra suppressed a laugh, but Jekhar didn’t notice.

“What were you doing? You were with your mongrel father, weren’t you!?”

“You can talk, bloody half-breed,” Terra muttered, just loud enough for Jekhar to hear.

She knew it was coming, and had braced herself, but the force of her being thrown against the wall still winded Terra.

Jekhar raised a hand and punched her in the jaw, where a bruise from the last beating had just healed.

Terra had become used to the beatings now. When Terra’s mother left her father five years ago, it was for another man; Jekhar. The man had always considered Terra a spoilt brat and had attempted to beat it out of her.

She approached her mother many times, but the woman was too terrified to be much help. So, Terra frequently sought shelter at her father’s house in the depths of the city.

“Beat me again,” Terra muttered to herself. “Kill me even. Better yet, kill yourself. You’re a useless attempt at a father anyway. You’re insane.”

Jekhar held Terra by the throat and repeatedly punched her. The painful crunch of her nose breaking was heard over Jekhar’s heavy panting.

“Come on, dear stepfather,” Terra said hoarsely, as she carefully reached down, her fingers brushing against the hilt of her blade. “You can do better than that.”

Her fingers closed over the hilt and slashed at Jekhar’s eye. The man clapped a hand to his eye, at the same time releasing Terra.

His wide, stubby hand was glittering with scarlet blood as he took his hand away. The knife hand cut just under the eye.

Jekhar, now in a terrible rage, threw Terra to the ground and kicked at her ribs. The steel-capped boots he wore did their job; Terra gasped as two or three ribs buckled under the force.

With each kick, Jekhar’s strength was drained steadily. Each kick grew weaker, but Terra still flinched at each; her ribs were digging further into the fragile membrane of her lung, and soon they would pierce through.

“Go clean yourself up,” Jekhar finally spat as he relented tiredly and made his way up a flight of stairs to his bedroom.

Terra lay on the floor, her breathing short, erratic. She slowly eased herself to her feet and caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror as she stumbled outside.

Her throat was red and was developing a bruise, as was her left eye, which was almost swollen shut. Blood streamed from her nose, mingling with the dried blood already on her shirt from the previous night. Her jaw was swelling. Underneath her clothes, there would be many more bruises, as well as two, maybe three cracked ribs.

Terra slammed the door behind her as she started the trek to her father’s home.

Chapter Two

Jorell pushed back his long black fringe as he fed the fire with yet more coal.

“I hope this works,” he mumbled to himself, his voice deep, gravely.

He had to work quickly, maintaining the fire at a very hot, very precise temperature, whilst also keeping the candles arranged around the anvil alight.

The door of his forge creaked open. Jorell slowly unsheathed his beautiful sword, handed down the generations. He would have preferred not to keep it; it reminded him of his family. On the other hand, however, he was proud of it. It was masterfully made, superbly balanced with an edge to match.

“Who is it?” he growled, gripping the sword tight.

“An old friend in need of counsel,” came the reply.

“Seregon...” Jorell said softly. He returned the sword to its scabbard and turned, facing the newcomer.

“It’s Serge now,” the man replied. “As far as the world is concerned, Seregon died ten years ago.”

“I haven’t seen you since...”

His voice cracked. He couldn’t bear to end the sentence.

“You are a broken man Jorell,” Serge said, sweeping forward, his cloak trailing behind him. He put his hands on the big man’s shoulders. His voice was steady and consoling. “You have not yet recovered from what happened. You couldn’t have helped her.”

Jorell nodded forlornly, his brown eyes sparkling in the candlelight.

“I keep thinking that if I had just stayed with her a little longer...” Jorell blinked and turned back to the hearth. He checked all the candles and the heat of the fire. Throwing another log on the fire, he said, “Well, you can’t win ‘em all, can you? What brings you here? Girl problems?”

Serge snorted. “Well, there is one... but that wasn’t what I came here for...” he trailed off, observing Jorell; his movements were becoming frantic.

“Is there any way I can help?”

“Hand me that bottle of whiskey over there,” Jorell said, gesturing vaguely behind him. “Making this type of sword always goes better when you’re too drunk to care about the outcome.”

“More wise words from the man who lost his family to dark sacrifice,” Serge said serenely as he obliged.

“At least we stopped him from summoning whatever it was they were trying to,” Jorell replied sharply, his expression blank. He drained the entire bottle and returned to the fire.

Seeing the fire was hot enough, the alloy malleable, he took the metal from the fire and proceeded to hammer it into the shape of a sword. Each hit caused an ear splitting ring, more than what was the norm. Soon the metal was too cool to hammer anymore, and Jorell returned it to the fire.

“Now, what were you saying?”

“There’s a town, in the desert, called Tyshän,” Serge replied. “Well, there was. It was recently destroyed. They say a curse was put upon it. The townsfolk either died of a mysterious illness, killed each other or was killed by the creatures that laid siege. Does it sound familiar?”

Jorell cast his mind back. Yes, he remembered.

“That couldn’t have been Daraneth,” he said grimly. “He’s been imprisoned by the strongest of spells. He can’t escape, not while Raleron is still alive.”

Serge’s expression was equally grim. They sat in silence, holding each others’ gaze.

“I suggest we pay our old friend a visit,” Jorell said finally. He went to a cupboard and produced a bottle filled with a thick, white substance.

“Put this on your face and arms,” he said, passing the bottle to Serge. “There’s some powerful magic in that which should stop you from combusting in the sunlight. We leave as soon as I finish your sword.”

----

Terra awoke suddenly, not sure how, but knowing she was being watched. A warm breeze came into the room through the open window. A gibbous moon glowed a soft white light over the city.

Terra got out of her bed and lit a candle. She could hear her father and brothers snoring softly, all three deep asleep. She had taken refuge there for the night. Her eldest brother had set the three ribs that were cracked, but they were still very sore.

She turned back to the bed and almost dropped the candle.

“What are you doing here, Cirinde?” Terra asked, sitting next to the elf. “And in the middle of the night no less!”

“Get dressed,” Cirinde said, her voice quiet but commanding. “Get your knives. I have a horse waiting for you outside.”

“What? Where are we going? Can’t it wait until morning?”

“Don’t talk, just do,” Cirinde said, standing up and sweeping through the door.

Terra and Cirinde were almost half way to the next town when Terra dared to speak.

“Where are we going?”

“To a tavern,” Cirinde said simply. She sniffed at the air, and pulled on her hood, concealing her blue-black skin, long white hair and pointed ears. Terra did the same. A moment later, rain fell from the sky in a sudden downpour, drenching everything around them instantly. They could not see more than ten feet in front of them, nor the meadows to their left, the forest to their right.

“We are meeting two old friends of mine,” Cirinde called through the storm. “I do not know why they wish to meet, but we shall find out soon enough.”

----

Serge sipped at his ale as he carefully scanned the other inhabitants of the dingy cabin.

“When did you say they were coming?” he asked. “And why ‘they’?”

“They should be here any minute,” Jorell replied. “If Raleron is dead, we need all the help we can get. Cirinde’s convinced the girl is trustworthy.”

“Girl?” Serge repeated incredulously.

Jorell was about to answer, but was cut off by the door opening and two drenched, cloaked figures stepping out of the heavy rain.

The taller of the new arrivals led the way to Serge and Jorell’s table.

“Seregon, Jorell,” Cirinde said, sweeping back her dripping hood. Serge, as always, found himself mesmerised by the elf’s black eyes. “It’s been a while.”

“Seregon is dead,” Serge replied with a smile. “It’s Serge now.”

Cirinde and her companion sat down. The other one pulled back their hood. Serge recognised the wavy, dark red hair and pale green eyes instantly. But she was battered and bruised.

“Terra?” he asked incredulously. “What in the blazes happened?”

Terra recognised the voice, not the face, as it had been too dark to see his face properly.

“You,” she muttered darkly. She gestured to her bruises. “This is all because you decided to feed on a defenceless girl two nights ago!”

She was angry, but couldn’t help noticing he was quite handsome. Short black hair, blue-grey eyes, a noble, slightly pointed facial structure and by the looks, he was quite muscular, though not nearly as muscled as his companion, Jorell, who had long, greasy black hair, an unshaven squared jaw, and looked as though he could snap her in half if he felt the need.

“You fed on Terra?” Cirinde asked dangerously.

Serge gulped and nodded.

“Yet she survived, and hasn’t turned...”

Serge nodded again. “There are treatments to stop the transformation, you know, my dear mage,” he retorted. “Something I would have thought you of all people would know about.”

“Let’s cut to the chase, shall we?” Jorell said hastily. “We think Daraneth might have escaped.”

Cirinde stared at Jorell.

“You’re kidding!” she said loudly. The other tavern patrons looked around curiously, but returned to their drinks quickly when Serge leered at them.

“He can’t have! The only way he could have escaped his bonds is if Raleron...” she trailed off, looking suddenly fearful. “He is alive, isn’t he?”

“We aren’t sure,” Serge said, his tone grim. “That’s why we asked you to meet us. We are going to visit Raleron.”

Chapter Three

The next day was very warm, albeit wet, due to the torrential rain through the night. The group rose west, towards the home of the wizard Raleron.

All were clad in simple travelling clothes, with their cloaks on in case it began raining again. Serge however, had his hood pulled low and his hands covered in gloves. While he used the magical serum Jorell had give him, he didn’t fully trust it.

According to Serge, Raleron was one of the last wizards left in the world. Daraneth, a prodigy from birth and gifted with many powers, killed most of the wizards, in the usual effort to ensure himself unrivalled. The last of the wizards went into hiding, but almost all were hunted down and killed. Only a few were skilled enough to hide from Daraneth completely. Raleron was one of those few.

Daraneth decided not to worry about the rest of the wizards. He set about preparing to summon something - presumably a creature from a Dark Realm, to aid him in his efforts to gain control over the world.

Raleron ascertained this, and called on his most trusted friends; the vampire Seregon; a human, Jorell; and a female elf by the name of Cirinde.

Each fighter had their own reasons for going, though Serge did not enlighten Terra. They managed to defeat Daraneth in the middle of the summoning ritual and seal him in a magical prison.

Raleron had been the Keeper of the prison; his magic powered it and kept Daraneth from escaping. If Daraneth was indeed roaming around the countryside, that could only mean that Raleron was either dead, or had released Daraneth of his own accord.

“So, why did you rename yourself?” Terra asked after she had spent a few minutes processing the new information. “Why do you want everyone to think you’re dead?”

Her three companions suddenly had identical dark expressions on their faces.

“Daraneth was the man who turned me,” Serge said simply. “He has the power to control me, and if he learns that I am alive...”

The vampire didn’t dare finish the sentence; nor did Terra want him to. But from this explanation came another question.

“How could he turn you, if he’s not a vampire himself?”

“There are other ways of siring a vampire. Magical ways, of which only few wizards know about,” Serge’s face was lost in the depths of his hood as he dropped his head. “I was an unwilling victim of his evil experiments.”

Terra felt sympathetic towards Serge, but nothing she could say would comfort him. It seemed Serge didn’t mind being a vampire; he was bitter only when he was forced to remember how he was sired.

Terra remained in a thoughtful silence for the rest of the day. As she lay down to sleep between Cirinde and Jorell, her mind was still whirling with what had been said. Soon, however, she was asleep, her last thoughts being of magic.

Terra was standing beside a table in what looked like an alchemist’s laboratory. Empty bottles of all sizes and shapes lined one wall on a built in shelf. Another shelf took up another wall. This too, held bottles, but these were filled with coloured liquids; green, yellow, blue, pink, orange, and some contained bizarre creatures of the like Terra had never seen. The remaining two walls were taken up by books of all shapes, sizes and colours crammed into yet more shelves.

“Lie on the table,” a sharp voice ordered. Terra looked around and saw a tall, thin man with sandy coloured hair and goatee. He had cold, dull green eyes, and he wore crimson robes scattered with sparkling gold runes of some sort.

Terra found the man’s voice hard to disobey; it seemed to be laced with honey. She obediently lay on the table, and leather straps snaked up and bound her neck, wrists and ankles to the table.

Immortality. Perhaps she wanted to live forever, or maybe it was the large sum of money that had been offered that had tempted her to be the guinea pig for this wizard’s experiment; though she knew she would never get the gold.

“I’ve only ever tried this on small animals before,” the wizard said in his honeyed knife of a voice. “So far the results are good, but I don’t know about humans.”

“I don’t mind,” Terra found herself saying. The wizard didn’t seem to care. He dropped a large, ancient tome in between her feet and opened it to somewhere near the end. He traced a long finger down the page, muttering to himself as he did.

When he found what he was looking for, he came around and placed a hand over Terra’s mouth, and one over her heart.

He muttered an incantation. A searing pain erupted through her head and connected to her heart. She tried to scream but the wizard’s hand was covering her mouth.

Suddenly, the pain ended, and Terra was left with a strong thirst. The man opened a book and wrote notes in it; presumably the observations of what had just happened. The book suddenly snapped shut and the wizard returned to Terra.

He laid his hands in the same place as before. Terra knew what was coming. She squirmed frantically, trying to get free, afraid of the pain.

“Calm down!” the wizard shouted, pressing down harder on her mouth and chest. The bonds tightened too. Terra frantically tried to get free of the bonds; she fought harder.

“Terra! Calm down! Please!”

The wizard reached down and slapped her hard.

Terra bolted upright. Or, she tried to. Cirinde was sitting on her stomach, knees pressing Terra’s arms down.

“That must have been one hell of a nightmare,” the elf said as she pushed herself off Terra. “I’m sorry I had to slap you, but you just wouldn’t wake up. You woke me up with all your thrashing.”

Terra sat up wearily, rubbing her stinging cheek. The fire had been stoked up and Jorell sat a little ways from them, scraping his thumb sideways across a great battleaxe, glancing curiously every so often at Terra, but generally staying away and ever watchful for intruders.

Terra looked around for Serge, but in the early morning twilight, the vampire couldn’t be found.

“Serge is out hunting for breakfast,” Cirinde said, answering Terra’s unasked question. “Let’s go for a walk shall we? There’s a stream a little way away that we can wash in.”

Cirinde pulled Terra up and they walked into the forest.

“May I ask what the dream was about?” Cirinde asked as they trudged through the trees.

Terra took a deep breath; she did not want to relive it, but perhaps Cirinde could help. When she finished recalling the dream, they were kneeling by a cool stream, washing their faces and bodies under their clothes.

Terra was worried; Cirinde had not spoken at all, and as she progressed through the dream, the elf’s expression grew darker and more worried.

“Cirinde?” she probed tentatively.

Cirinde seemed to snap out of her trance, and looked at Terra. “What you are dreaming,” she said quietly as she rubbed the dirt away from her legs. “They are Sereg - Serge’s memories.”

Terra frowned. “What do you mean?”

“When someone is turned; their sire’s memories are passed on. Whilst you were administered with an antidote, you were almost turned, therefore Serge’s memories must have passed on to you.”

“But I don’t want to have his memories,” Terra retorted. “They are horrific! I don’t want them!”

“I know they are horrific,” Cirinde replied, laying a comforting hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Serge has been through a lot more than most people. But you are stuck with them; they can’t be taken away.”

Terra and Cirinde continued washing in silence. They did not notice Serge in the shadows of the trees a little way from them. As he had listened to the discussion, he too was forced to relive something that which he didn’t want to relive.

He turned away at last, wiping his wet face, and took the wild boar back to camp.

Chapter Four: