Bound By Blood (5 page)

             
Samanthŕa
looked outside and saw that the trail of fire
had
begun. She thought of her other sisters
, now, who she and Dezarãe would have to wait for
.
H
ow pointless it was for them to be traveling this night. If
their
father
,
Dĩas
,
had left things alone
,
then they would already be here.
And that truth brought another aggravation to mind . . .

             
Dĩas
had decided that all seven of them
needed to
live separately. He had sent her sisters to live with their
different
mothers of
assorted
bloodlines
,
while Samanth
ŕa
and
Dezarãe
-- having the same mother --
remained here with him.

             
Seven
sisters were born on the same night under the same alignment of stars and moons
.
Their bonds were
unbreak
able.

             
If he
t
hinks
that separating
us
would sever that,
her mind hissed,
then he
’
s a bloody fool.

Samanthŕa
clenched her fists as she
remembered him saying
at the time
,
“Nothing but mischief and headache would
result
if
I
allowed them all to live under the same roof.”

             
That
night she held back her tears as her sisters were taken away.
The only thing that kept those tears imprisoned was . . .  even then,
as her heart shattered into a million pieces, she knew that her sisters were the lucky ones. She couldn’t help but believe in that
as she stared coldly at her father
,
who wasn’t even
fazed
by their leaving.
             

             
She might have acted out, so that she could have left as well, but
Dĩas
would
never
send
Samanthŕa
to live with
her
mother Chymeŕah
, although h
e had threatened to send Dezarãe
,
and would
,
if he felt he had no other choice.

             
Why not?
Chymeŕah
was a force to be reckoned with. She could not be controlled
n
or tamed. She did not choose sides but instead aided whichever one she s
aw
fit.
She
was unpredictable.  

             
Dĩas
believed that if
Chymeŕah
had to
o
much
influence
over
Samanthŕa
, then that would be as bad as keeping all of the sisters under the same roof. By keeping
her
away from
Chymeŕah
, he could keep
Samanthŕa
under his watchful eye
and
control
.
Samanthŕa
,
he needed desperately to control
and he made no secret of this
.

             
Mischief was but one of his
many
reasons for separating the sisters. His main fear
, though,
was their
A
wakening
,
which was
fast
approaching. He did not want
Samanthŕa experiencing
hers. He would take grave measures to make sure she didn’t.

             
Grinding her teeth, Samanthŕa took a deep breath and attempted to put such thoughts behind her.

             
“Have they begun lighting the tail of the
Drągýn
? That’s one of my favorite things
,
you know. I love the way it lights up the forest and
the
night.”
Dezarãe
sw
ay
ed and s
pun around as if she were
a
thread underneath a Sephŕel's
spell. Her
question
,
however, snapped
Samanthŕa
completely out of her thoughts. 

             
“Yes
they started
,
but the
Phãegens
have
also
stoppe
d.
"
Strange
.
"
Maybe they are waiting for the wind to die down
.
”
Samanthŕa
looked
to analyze
what was
stirring beyond the mountains
,
in the deep of the sky
. She hadn’t even noticed the wind before
,
or the storm causing it.
Her mind was in a million places this night.
If only she could focus . . .

             
She
turned away and
played with the flame of a candle
, feeding on its energy
.
Perhaps, I'm hungry.
Her hand moved back and forth over it. She was still leaning against the balcony doors, tired of waiting. She was awake and ready to go.
What
was keeping her other sisters?

             
“
What
?
What wind? It’s a clear night
,
”
Dezarãe replied
.
“I
must have checked the weather a thousand times before
you
finally woke.
I
shook
out
at least twenty
verms
,
(fuzzy worms)
throwing them before the fire. N
one
of th
em
showed
the threat
of
any
thing
other than
fair spring weather.
" If storms were comin
g, verms would go gray and stiff
. If cold was coming, they would thicken and turn white. If warmth was on the horizon, then the Verms shed their fur and began spinning their cocoons. "
I made sure of it.”
Dezarãe
joined
her at
the window
.

             
"Then what is that?"
A
storm
was
brewing towards the
Sea
of Abyss
past the mountains
.
“Looks to
be something of power
,
”
Samanthŕa
observed while
point
ing
to
the dark
scarlet
colors
erupting
throughout the sky like a
vein.
A d
ark impervious cloud just as red and just as deep swallowed up the
stars
,
but only temporarily
,
before it rolled outward into a transparent haze
. “It’s obvious from the colors,
and
how it came out of nowhere
, don’t you think
?”
She could recognize a storm of power from anywhere.
Must be one of great power
.

             
Just
then,
Samanthŕa
remembered the voice in her dreams.
“
A storm is coming. It is time
.
”
She
felt
as though someone had rattled her cage. She turned her back to
Dezarãe
, though, forcing a blank smile,
in an attempt to hide it.

             
“
D
ĩas
and the Elders better
not
have done any
sinister
magic to foul up this evening’s celebration!
" Dezarãe clenched her fists, as her eyes changed into tar pits. "
It’s not every night I get to visit the
Lycãon
Realm
.”

             
The
Lycãon,
were
but
one clan
of the twelve bloodlines
Samanthŕa and Dezar
ãe shared.
Those of the
Lycãons
were wolves
,
who shar
ed spirit with a
Strygĩ
man or woman.
The
beast in them dominated, as the
y kept themselves secluded
in
side the borders of their
mountainous
realm
,
away
from the
other
eleven
families. They had turned their back on
D
ĩas
, claiming he had poisoned
the bloodlines under his rule.
Samanthŕa was
the only one they would deal with
,
as their mistrust of
the
other
bloodlines became worse and worse with each passing
season
.

             
Samanthŕa knew that tonight's sacred affairs meant
far
more than what they normally stood for. The importance of the bloodlines joining in the rituals and ceremonies were crucial. Their attendance may have ended up being the
only
fine thread keeping any connec
tion at all between the Lycãons and
other families. It would take more than a storm to stop her from going . . . .
The survival of her bloodlines depended on it.

             
“It doesn’t
feel
like
D
ĩas
or the Elders
’
power. It
feels
stronger
,
older
.”
Samanthŕa admitted
,
having found herself hypnotized for a moment or two
by
the effects of the storm. She couldn’t shake the dream either. She had thought very little of it until now
,
since she had the same dream almost every day.
And w
hat the voice said was always the same. She had grown so used to it that she did not
even
notice
when she awoke, that
he had said something different
this time
.
What was it
. . .
exactly? She
strugg
led to remember, but t
he energy from that
,
and from the Be
al-Tene
festival
,
was enough to leave
her
feeling
forgetfully
intoxicated. The bloodlines were so sensitive when it came to feeling energy and its effects.

             
Wait,
she stopped.
Someone is near. Someone I loathe
.

             
The door to the room flew open.
Monéaklá
of the
Mãrquis
ŕa
entered as if she were the bloody Queen of
Had
ãe
.
As
usual,
she was frosted with more jewels than the throat of winter. Her large oversized breasts were pushed higher than the
diamante
stars
.
The poor fabric of her dress struggled to keep them at bay. It looked as though it might rip at any second
,
letting
loose
the
two imprisoned heaps
,
slinging
them
forth to beat them all to death
.
Instead of objects of temptation, they looked more like weapons of mass destruction.