Damned Beings. The Conversion (Book 2)

By Eba Martín Muñoz

Gothic novel, dark fantasy

In the first volume of the saga we met a whole gallery of supernatural characters fighting for their place in the world. We submerged in their fears and desires, in their vices and defects. We discovered their motivations: love, sex, power, acknowledgement..., but there were many mysteries left to discover.
What happened for Eva to want to kill her childhood friend? Where is she hiding and why? What role, in the story of the protagonist, do characters like Leo and Alouqua play? How will the battle to the death between Ianire and Luna end? Most of these questions will be unveiled in this second volume. Though we can guess at what new mysteries and questions will open for us...
Are you prepared for a new volume with more doses of horror, tenderness, magic, eroticism, tensión, humor and suspense?

• Language: English
• Publisher: BadPress
• Release date: Jan 9, 2017
• ISBN: 9781507158548

Book preview

Autor: Eba Martín Muñoz

Título original: Seres malditos. La conversión (Libro 2)

1ª edición: julio  2016

Este libro se imprimió en CreateSpace y Amazon

En julio de 2016

© Eba Martín Muñoz, 2016

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ISBN-13: 978-1522888048

ISBN-10: 1522888047

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Todos los derechos reservados. Bajo las sanciones establecidas

en las leyes, queda rigurosamente prohibida, sin autorización

escrita de los titulares del copyright, la reproducción total o parcial

de esta obra por cualquier medio o procedimiento, comprendidos

la reprografía y el tratamiento informático, así como la distribución

de ejemplares mediante alquiler o préstamos públicos.

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Dedication

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For you. Always for you.

For allowing me to love you with all my soul.

For being the son I will never have.

Always you. My life, treasure. My Leo.

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Special Thanks

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To Núria, voracious and indefatigable reader

with exquisite taste.

Your words gave music to my fingers. You cannot imagine how much I admire and appreciate you in such a short time.  I could eat you!

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To Judith, because you are living proof of how care and friendship can be forged in just a few months and over such long distance.

I have already told you I love you, have I not?

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To Conchity, for being one of the most

enthusiastic

readers I will ever have, and how

thankful

and generous readers you are to me!

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Also thanking the care and complicity

of Laura and Pilar. I love you!

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To all the readers who write

and excite me daily telling what my novel has made you feel and enjoy: Paula, Perla, Tere, Esteve,

Adriana, Txemuski, Soraya,

María, Abdu, Marián, Ángela, Jaime, Karin,

Pedro, Marta and a long etcetera.

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And to Barakaldo, the city which saw my birth and growth, where I learned to weave my dreams with realities, words with feelings, giving life

to new worlds and books.

"I want to disappear and not die.

I want to be and endure

and know that I endure.

I call on the gates of death

and walk away.

I call on life and flee in shame.

I want to be my whole soul and

I cannot do it.

I want my whole body and

I cannot get it."

Vicente Huidobro

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"Probably, out of all our feelings,

the one that is not truly ours is hope.

Hope belongs to life.

It is the very life defending itself."

Rayuela, Julio Cortázar

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The only love that dies is the one which has stopped being dreamed of.

Largo lamento. Pedro Salinas

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A true friend stabs you from the front.

Oscar Wilde

I promised you I would always wait for you. In turn, you made me fulfill my promise.

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The morning is worth as much as a scream. And the monsters cry out with the sun, and put on the ties and shoes to look like lost fish.

Le courrier d'Espagne informs of another death in a hidden alley:

Another dead one killed a knife

And they smile, the dead reborn out of the groans smile;

mirrors of fog dressed like everyone’s neighbor.

How many souls fit in a bottle to alter the rotten body!

The monsters of the abyss smile at you with the eyes of the sweet best friend. Who let the dead revive among the living.

Who gave them the body of those people we loved.

The church bells toll on the dead town of living dead

and all march to confess and continue covering bodies in shrouds that shivered

because of the morning dew in which we return deceased.

They hide among us monsters, and we smile at them,

worth to them as little or naught as a scream.

As the morning is as worth as the dead one who killed the knife.

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Poem by J Navarro Tomás, friend, poet and artist.

Recapitulation of characters and actions in Book 1

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MARIA: Mother of the protagonist. Mortal woman, from Madrid. Raised in an orphanage and without love, as an adult we see her turned into a prostitute and drug addict. She rejects her son since the beginning. Her boyfriend, Pedro, abandons her a few days after she gets rid of the little one, when he discovers her using drugs again. Then she loses herself in her haze of drugs and prostitution. We see her about to lose her house.

I (PROTAGONIST): He is born as a mortal but with extreme empathy (he hears and knows every thought in others) and with peculiar powers, like modifying/eliminating thoughts in others and forcing them to say or do small actions. He feels the rejection of the world and his mother from the first minute after his birth and spends his first years without any contact with the world, save from that of an abusive and cruel mother. With seven years, he is abandoned by Maria on a bus, on Christmas day, and ends up in an orphanage in Zaragoza, where he will meet Eva and Sergio, his only friends. He discovers, also, that he is unable to hear and enter Eva’s head. The rest of the children will hate or fear him after the incident with Alex.

About his adult age, we know he is already a vampire, that he is alone and continues suffering. He is the inventor of Fangbook (among other brilliant ideas) and we know that his great friend wants to kill him for something that happened in the past. This fact gets him in touch with the Trinity, three beings which run the Academy of magic, where they will teach him t multiply his powers and end Eva. At the moment, he had gotten rid of the dream demon wo hunted him on Eva’s orders.

IVAN: Professional bounty hunter, hired by Eva to hunt the protagonist, who becomes a junkire in order to do his job. Although he took secondary inhibitors so the protagonist could not discover him, he did it when he tasted his blood. Ends up finally murdered by the protagonist, in a fit of rage and scorn, after a sexual relationship in his house. His body will end up devoured by Clon, Helena’s gul.

RAUL: Kingpin of the mafia and prostitution in Bilbao, he is a mortal who falls in love with Luna. He ends up permanently deaf, by Luna’s hand, when he does not obey her orders. She murders and tears apart all his girls and forces him to get her pregnant and marry her. After the wedding, he finds himself free of Luna but Ianire summons him with a calling and attraction spell from which he cannot escape. So, he goes to Madrid and dies that same day, devoured by Ianire.

LUNA: Powerful and immortal necromancer, from Bilbao. Although she is 102 years old, she look like thirty something. She is the daughter of a great wizard, whose spirit attempts to kill her when she refuses to raise him from the grave. She shelters a girl (Ianire) as an apprentice, until they become enemies and swear eternal hate for each other. She manages to become pregnant through black magic and her relationship with Raul. In order to protect her twins from Ianire, she gives them to her step sister and submits herself to a self-amnesia spell. After several failed attempts to kill Ianire, Luna revives the demonic doll Paula and manages for her to end in Ianire’s house.

IANIRE: As a child of eleven years, this Basque meets Luna, when she provides her with several books of magic. When she feels prepared, she murders her parents (his father raped her and the mother kept quiet and allowed it) and eats their hearts. She traps their souls in a locket, which she always carries around her neck, and starts her relationship as Luna’s pupil. This relationship is broken when Luna uses the sex slave she had presented her with when she became an adult. She settles in Madrid, from where she competes against her teacher. She tries, unsuccessfully, to find where one of Luna’s babies is (she ignores both are alive), until she abandons her search and her desire of revenge or destruction when she falls in love and marries Arioch. The last we know of her is that the doll is already in her house and she is leaving to Rome in a Honeymoon trip.

LEO: Architect from Salamanca, is vampirized by Selene as he was in Poland concluding a project. After the job, his intention was to go back to his land to get married in an arranged engagement which horrified him, and from which Selene saves him. After several centuries of love with her, he stops loving her and yearns to be free. He becomes an animarian and refuses to go back to hunt with her. In Paris he meets the love of his life, a mortal whom he turns, and who is murdered by Selene. He turns insane for several months, killing every human who bumped into him, as he saw Selene in their faces. He manages to recover his sanity and regenerate his brain, thanks to Tutmes’ pyramid. There, he says farewell to his love and pays a visit to his friend Van Gogh, in Paris, on his way back to Spain.

SELENE: Ancient vampress who seduces Leo thanks to a perfume of love attraction she applied to her hair. When it runs out, she sees she will lose him, but denies reality. When she discovers her beloved has converted another, with whom he has gotten married, she murders her. When she realizes he will never be with her again, she commits suicide by impaling herself with a stake, believing that her vassal would die as well.

MAITE: Parisian mortal woman, who will live a story of love at first with the vampire Leo. Recently converted and married to him, Selene ends her by ripping off her spine. Tutmes will revive her, for a mere half an hour, so she can say goodbye to Leo and take away his grief and guilt for not avoiding or foreseeing her death.

VAN GOGH: Historical character, will be turned in Paris by a woman, half vampire half demon succubus, who abandons him soon after. After becoming friends with Leo, his Master comes back to retake the relationship, but she abandons him suddenly again, after threatening him to kill him and leaving naked, flying, out of the window.

EVA: Daughter of Luna, she will go live in Zaragoza with her aunt along with her twin brother, to be under her protection. During delivery, she almost bled to death because her brother had devoured one leg almost up to her knee. With less than a month of life, she demonstrates her qualities as a magical baby, by speaking and showing knowledge of the world around. She is about to reunite with the brother.

We know that with four years she ends up in the orphanage, where she will meet the protagonist, eight years later. Despite the prophetic dreams her mother sends her so she keeps away from him, they become friends. Although we have not seen Eva in her adult age (we ignore where she is, what she does and why), we know that she has become a witch in her adulthood, like her mother, and that her only motivation is finding her old friend to take revenge upon him and kill him.

HUGO: Son of Luna and twin sister to Eva, born locked to the leg, semi devoured by him, of his sister. He has a monstrous and reptilian appearance, which he mutates after being baptized. He then becomes a beautiful baby, except for his great terrible maw and sharpened claws. He will live in a great cage in the apartment adjoining his aunt’s, fed with raw meat. His growth and development is abnormally fast, looking like a year and a half of age in just one month of life and speaking in a reduced vocabulary. Coprophage, with simian movement and aptitudes, he shows attraction and aptitude in plastic arts and music.

SERGIO: Friend to the protagonist at the orphanage. A child from Burgos of eleven years of age, mute after his father, in one of his drunken bouts with beating included, cut out his tongue. He is sensitive, intelligent and intuitive and gets near the protagonist immediately. Thanks to a book, he learns sign language by himself and starts teaching it to the rest of the center staff.

MARIO: One of the roommates at the orphanage. With ten years and very short for his age, he shows, in turn, a tendency towards violence. He is transferred to another center when he plots, along with other classmates, to give a beating to the protagonist after the death of Alex.

ALEX: The third roommate. A smiley and friendly boy, of fourteen years, madly in love with Eva and very jealous. When he is about to punch the protagonist, he defends himself making him believe he has spiders on his body and ends up dead in a psychiatric clinic after clawing out his eyes.

LIDIA: Step sister to Luna, daughter of the Wizard and a mortal. Retired Zaragoza nurse, of 70 years. Being alien to wizardry, she finds herself implicated in the care and protection of her sister’s magical babies.

LOURDES: Young skilled woman, of 19 years, forced by her parents to give her child up for adoption. She becomes a wet nurse and caretaker for Eva, with whom she stablishes a mother-daughter relationship immediately. Despite the promises to her boss, curiosity gets the best of her and she enters the other apartment to see Hugo.

ROBERTO: Warden at the orphanage, of 25 years, obese and balding. His father, fan of binge drinking and the belt, leaves him a bit retarded. He enjoys mistreating and sexually abusing some children. After an encounter with the protagonist, he believes he is Death who has come looking for him and decides he must poison the food in the center to avoid it. The protagonist erases those memories and, with them, his fear and evocation of his childhood stuttering.

ALBERTO AND MANUEL: The other two wardens of the boys building. The first one, an athletic and handsome youth of 20 years, of a good character and worried about the children. The second, of 31, responsible and fair, but very clueless.

MAIU: Very ancient vampire and demon, from the pre-Christian Basque mythology, who is able to acquire different shapes (human, serpent, dragon...). He assists to the even and gives the protagonist the stone of protection against Amextar.

HELENA: Italian vampress and hippie of about 110 vampiric years. Practices free and shameless love (dedicating herself to it professionally), although her true passion is Clon, the gul she keeps as a pet. Both are massacred by the Black Agents after the snitching of another vampire.

MASTER K: Vampire of 200 years from the Sahara, pianist and musical healer. He has certain magical powers and is descendant of a great sorceress. He becomes friends with the protagonist and puts him in touch with the Trinity, of whom he is an intimate friend.

IULIAN: Master vampire of 600 years, Rumanian. His brain already shows great deterioration, apart from a controlling personality and with certain perversion. He is a traitor to his kind, denouncing vampires to the Black Agents in exchange for money and favors. He dies murdered at the end of the book, carbonized under the sun, when the protagonist makes him believe it is night, as a vengeance for the deaths of Helena and Clon.

SUSANA: Vampress from Vallecas, recently turned by Iulian. Searches for her place in the world after the conversion, after not being able to continue teaching Math at her institute. He must fight against the continues pressure and absorption of her Master. At the end of the first book we see her embarked in the project of writing a book, as a suggestion of the protagonist.

DIEGO- ARIOCH: Demon of Vengeance, who can metamorphose into any of his victims. He is a mercenary who kills any kind of being, alive or dead, in exchange for a fee. His real appearance is that of a gigantic black creature, winged and feathered, who carries a long sword. In his human appearance, he usually adopts that of Diego, a black man of huge size. He is contracted by Luna to end Ianire but they both fall in love at first sight and he abandons the charge. The last we knew about them was that they were preparing to travel to Rome as a honeymoon, after the wedding and the paseíllo of presents.

PAULA: Diabolic doll (or active vessel) created by the Wizard to protect his daughter Luna during childhood. In her interior mingle the souls of three beings: a witch, a mortal and a demon woman. Luna revives her to spy on Ianire and protect her little ones and herself from the other. She ends in Ianire’s house, as a wedding gift, when she is about to leave on a marriage trip.

MAXIMILIAM: Vampire of 400 years, wizard, and one of the members of the Trinity (the three beings who run the Academy of magic since a century ago). Among his powers stands out the ability to seduce and manipulate anyone with the modulation of his voice. He declares himself multi-sexual and seems very attracted and interested in the protagonist, who ends up rejecting to have an affaire with him since his sixth sense communicates him he dies something and must not trust him.

PERSEFONE: Sorceress and executor of evil creatures, she is another one of the members of the Trinity. Black amazon of 120 years, of great beauty and very prone to theatrics and speaking in questions. By the end of the previous book, she had just rescued a girl from a demon, who had hurt her in the thigh.

THE PROFESSOR: Lycanthrope of 200 years and the third member of the Trinity. The majority pf magic classes at the Academy fall upon him. He is the one who seals the stone where Amextar is trapped in and gives the first class to the protagonist.

TUTMES: Son of the god Tot, was bitten in 1450 a.C. by a vampire and turned into one, with qualities of both worlds, and the most ancient one on Earth. Of peculiar and outlandish aspect (make-up, Egyptian attire, adornments in gold, snake on the head...). He resides in London, where he dedicates himself to sorcery. He helps Leo regenerate his damaged brain through his energy pyramid and concedes him the chance to see and speak to Maite for the last time.

ALOUQUA: About her we know she is Van Gogh’s Master, the painter friend of Leo’s, and that she is a succubus and vampress at the same time, killing (or driving to suicide) all her lovers. She abandons Van Gogh again, in the middle of sex, with a weird behavior (she flies out the window, completely naked), not before threatening her vassal with returning to kill him.

We see her again as a guest at the wedding of Ianire and Arioch, to whom she gives a small box which traps human souls. Maiu also mentions her in his chat with the protagonist, but we do not know why.

AMETXAR: Demon of dreams whom Eva sends to end the protagonist, but it ends up trapped in Maiu’s stone thanks to the magical labor and instructions that Maximilliam and Persefone give to the protagonist.

BALBAN: Demon of deceit, of similar appearance to Arioch, hired by Luna to introduce, with deceit, the doll in Ianire’s house. He fulfills the charge when he recognizes the demon Eisheth (mother of prostitution) inside the doll, with whom he had had intense sexual relations in the past.

I (1)

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Valdecañas de Tajo (Caceres), Sunday August 12th, 1973

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The freckles trotted merrily on her sun bathed face. The strands of reddish hair danced a slow waltz with the wind, which, in love as well, flirted with her endlessly. Eva laughed, sating the air with the joyous musical bells of her laughter. Sergio and I filled our eyes with her, lost in her smile.

Eva prepared to jump into the swamp from a small jutting stone which placed her some 60 centimeters above us.

‘Catch me, shitfaces!’ she challenged us, wrinkling her little nose and sticking her nose out to us.

Immediately afterwards, she dunked into the water in a clean but noisy fall.

Shit, the leg. She didn’t remove the leg!

I took off my shirt quickly and dove in search of her. Not until I was in the water did I realize that I had never swam, not in my whole life.

Well it is the perfect time to learn, kiddo, my brain told me.

I started kicking and bracing clumsily. To my surprise, it worked.

I’m not sinking!

Nonetheless, I could not hear her nor see her anywhere. Only the stunned and restless thoughts of Sergio reached me. I can’t see her, I can’t see her!, his head said. And also: What do I do? I cannot scream for help nor can I leave in search of aid. I cannot leave them alone!.

After that I thought that it was a good moment to learn to dive as it had been to swim, so I introduced my head in the water, fighting against the rocks of that unknown and hostile environment for me, trying to locate my girl.

There she is!

Eva struggled on the bottom to get to the surface. Her prosthesis, stuck between some aquatic branches, served as a counterweight and sunk her back over and over, preventing her from floating up.

Helping myself pathetically with my hands and holding on to whatever I found in that sandy ground, I managed to get close to her in the depths of the abundant swamp. Eva fixed her eyes on me, full of anguish and urgency. The air on her lungs was running out. I felt Sergio crying on dry land at not seeing any of us.

I pulled on her prosthesis to unhook it from those stubborn branches which hugged her artificial leg. Nothing. I knelt down to her knee and decided to remove it. Later on I would go get it, but now the priority was for Eva to get out of there and breathe. My fingers had become some useless and trembling sausages, unable to undo the harness and free her from that mortal trap.

Please, please, take me in her place, God, but le her live. Please!, I pleaded as my sausages turned back into dexterous fingers.

Eva lost consciousness and fell on my back, as I, kneeling, focused in undoing the damned straps.

Finally!

The orthopedic leg fell to the bottom and, with Eva in arms, I reached the shore, slower that I would have wanted to. Her skin showed a slightly blueish tint.

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‘Sergio, help me hold her head forward!’ I yelled to my partner, who was standing, petrified, with an ocean of tears drowning his face.

Do you know what you’re doing? he asked me mentally, reacting at last and helping me sit her up.

‘No idea, but I’ve seen it on TV,’ I answered him as I opened Eva’s mouth with my fingers.

I performed the mouth to mouth on her, or something like that, but her eyes remained closed.

We have to press on her chest, or something like that, and then blow inside her mouth, Sergio indicated me amongst sobbing.

‘Move!’ screamed Alberto, our warden, who came running (no: flying) towards us.

He pushed us aside, gathered Eva in his arms and started the reanimation techniques (the real ones, and not the shit we were trying to do): cardiac massage, mouth-to-mouth and back to cardiac massage. The seconds turned into minutes, hours, years, and I saw myself without her, again, in my life.

Please, please... Don’t take my Eva, Lord, please...

At last, the longed for liquid poured from her lips. Eva started to cough spectacularly, just like I had seen in countless movies in these cases. The muscled gallant aiding the damsel in distress. And we, the children, in awe. I noticed how jealousy pinched me in several parts of the body.

This will not stay like this. I’m going to recover her leg. At least I’ll save something...

I dove for a second time in those foreign waters to me. I submerged my head in the zone I remembered finding Eva. The water was not as clear I was I would have wanted. I could not see a pickle and started noticing burning in my eyes.

I wish I could perceive objects as I can do people. Without Eva down here it’s going to be very hard to find her leg.

I swam, again despite the plants which lived in the bottom of the swamp, the rocks and some unusual objects which should not be there. I recognized a plant which I had held on to minutes before and I proceeded. Soon I would have to go out to the surface to take the oxygen my capricious lungs demanded with inflexibility and impatience.

Bingo!

The leg rested on that surface of sand and stones. I gave it a bestial pull, with all the strength I had left, since I barely had enough time. The leg kidnapping plant gave in and gave me its hostage on the first try. With the warmth of triumph running in my guts and lips, I went back to the surface.

By then there was a group of people surrounding Eva. Several children from the camp, piqued by curiosity, gossiped and enjoyed the show. A thankful and teary Eva hugged her savior with enthusiasm while Sergio gave little hopes in excitement.

I have to tell him that looks very faggoty...

Manuel, our oldest warden, tried to prevent without much success that the children got too close to Eva and Alberto, so she could be calm and was able to breathe. Fortunately, Ro-Ro, the walrus, was in the orphanage, taking care of the poor children who had stayed without camp for having one or several failed grades.

One more motivation to pass the next course...

Car pulled you out of the water, Sergio explained to her through sign language, which we three had already mastered, kneeling beside her.

Eva looked for me with her eyes. I too some steps forward so she could see me, since I had remained a bit behind the wall of children. She gave me a colored smile. Embarrassed, I smiled back at her and walked up to her.

‘I have your leg!’ I showed victorious, lifting her dripping prosthesis.

‘My hero!’ she answered, making a voice of stupid damsel as she made exaggerated gestures of gratefulness and love.

You ass! You make me laugh even when I feel in my mouth this acid taste of the panic to lose you!

And looking at her, suddenly, I had the absolute certainty that she had given me life, not Maria. Her name was true:

Eva: woman who gives life.

I love you, Eva. I love you... Not like a man loves a woman, but as I love myself, as part of my own being. I don’t even need for you to reciprocate me. It’s enough for me if you allow me to continue loving you like this and the sun will keep on shining for me.

I walked up to her with her leg up high, as if it was the first prize of the hardest championship in the world, the trophy with credited me as the strongest, fastest and smartest of all the competitors. The mixed feelings of envy and admiration of Sergio came to decorate my head as a laurel wreath. I was the winner...

‘Come here, you dummy!’ she urged me making a face of mock anger. ‘I’m going to give you a hug so tight your every bone will crack!’

And boy did she fulfill her promise! How could a lanky, meatless girl like her have so much strength? But, my God!, I swear I have never had another contact as intimate as that one, so plentiful and blissful. I had my place in the world: HER.

LUNA (1)

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Zaragoza, Sunday January 1st, 1961

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Lidia opened the door. Hugo was in the center of his cage, standing, with a circumspect and serious air. Eva tensed up in the arms of her mother and the atmosphere became intensely dense and dark. Both siblings looked at each other. Both knew what would come next...

The retired nurse stepped aside to open the way to her older sister, who carried the little one in her arms. They walked into the great hall and got slowly closer to Hugo’s prison. He had stuck to the bars and stretched his arms towards his twin.

‘What do we do?’ Lidia whispered to Luna. ‘Do we allow Hugo to touch her?’ she added, fascinated and horrified at the same time.

‘I don’t know...’ she answered, in whispers as well.

Both remained standing, expectant and not taking their eyes off of both babies.

‘Tatoooo!’ the little one cooed on her mother’s bosom, with the typical babbling of children of young age.

‘Sowy... sowy...’ Hugo answered looking at the floor, ashamed, as he pointed at the space that should be occupied by a leg in Eva’s body.

‘This is going well, isn’t?’ Luna asked smiling, looking for confirmation.

‘Too much...’ her sister answered, unconsciously touching the wound in the hand which Hugo had inflicted on her some days before.

‘Lesgo, lesgo!’ Eva crooned, shaking her hands in the air.

Luna bent down to Hugo’s height, so the little twins could see each other in the eye. Both glowed with happiness. The room, the world, went mute. Even the doves on the ledge became quiet and abandoned their cooing, feeling the magic of that instant.

Hugo showed his arms through the bars again, struggling as well to get his head and the rest of his body out of that jail where he remembered being in since forever. Jail from where he dreamed of another world, letting himself get carried away by music and his painting, transporting himself beyond his cage.

He placed his terrifying hand on Eva’s cheekbone, caressing it with an unseen delicacy and softness, treating her skin like a canvass to portray his compositions. She grabbed the chubby fingers of her brother, which ended in disturbing claws, and caressed them in turn.

‘I forgive you,’ she smiled.

‘Me no,’ he answered with liquid eyes, his smile dripping away from his face. ‘I two legs. You, one,’ he concluded, as if there was nothing more to explain.

Both women observed the situation, overwhelmed by emotion, restlessness, grief and happiness. All at once. The necromancer brought Eva’s little face closer to Hugo’s cage, trusting her intuition. The twins brought their faces closer and presented each other with a kiss on the lips. The four hearts in that room were about to burst out of pure exaltation.

‘Holy mother,’ Lidia whispered, gripping her rosary.

‘It’s going to break my heart to steal away this moment from their thoughts and memories, and bind their gifts,’ Luna confessed, looking at her sister from below.

Lidia nodded with a heavy heart. She had just started realizing her little mother nephew was more human and less animal every day. Was there salvation for him? She gripped her rosary tighter.

‘Say goodbye, little ones. If things go well after the ritual, you’ll be able to see each other every day,’ Luna announced.

And even live together, as brothers. I wish...

She did not remember ever feeling so vulnerable, sad and blissful like then. Perhaps when she was still a child, playing at being a witch with her father, admiring him and looking at herself in him.

I’ll kill anyone who hurts even one of my little ones. Paula, I hope you’re doing your job, because I cannot contact you now. I need to be with them one hundred percent.

Hugo pressed himself tighter against his sister to say goodbye, with a hurt expression. Guilt and comprehension of his actions floated over him.

‘I, bad. Nom nom,’ he concluded, touching his own face, surprised at finding it wet.

‘A bit,’ his sister agreed.

The doves went back to their activities and frantic conversation. The play had ended. Hugo climbed up to the nest on the ceiling to share his sadness with the dark. Luna stood up with the little one in her arms, helped by Lidia, and the three of them abandoned the apartment in a sepulchral silence, all of them submerged in their own thoughts and feelings.

‘And now, what?’ Lidia asked again, with a shrunken heart, as soon as they walked into the house. ‘Are you sure you want to do it?’

‘Bind their powers? Of course!’ the witch answered, faking a stoutness she was far from feeling. ‘We need them to be as normal as possible so they can have a chance to be happy, to live in society. If it was not viable for Hugo, at least for her...’ she answered, looking at the offspring in her arms, who also did not take her eyes off of her.

‘Do you think that Hugo... someday... could...?’ Lidia started, trying to verbalize the uncertainty which choked them both.

‘I don’t know,’ Luna shook her head. ‘But, if there is a possibility, it’s this one. You don’t know how much it annoys me not being able to research sortileges to see if it’s possible to revert his monstrosity. Since, by the time I get home, I’ll have forgotten my little ones again. Nonetheless, it’s necessary. Because of Ianire, that... I hope Paula gives me good news and I can have them with me soon.’

‘Paula?’

‘Someone who’s helping me, sister, so everything gets resolved,’ the other one answered without going into detail.

Lidia conformed just the same.

I welcome all help if with that I can recover my quiet life of retired elder without worries. And, in turn, how I’ll miss them. Both of them!

Lidia became surprised at that thought, so unexpected and revealing. She loved them!

‘I need a room where I can be at ease to work and where I can have some space, sister,’ Luna informed her. ‘can I use your room to prepare the binding of powers?’

‘Of course,’ she answered, reluctantly, with a discreet smile. She hated to have invaders trampling in her realm.

Luna headed to the bedroom, the sacred territory of her sister, with her sorceress briefcase in hand.

Look at her, like a doctor: with her briefcase and everything. I hope she doesn’t leave the bedcover all messed up with concoctions or bloody filth. My poor crocheted carpets! Puajjjjj.

Lidia took Eva to the hall, put on her favorite soap opera on the radio, and tried to relax while her sister built and wrecked in her room.

‘Lulicas?’ the little baby inquired.

Lidia jolted on the couch.

One just cannot get used to a baby of one month of life speaking!

‘Lourdes will come in two days (if you have a concept of time as well, you impish child...)’ her aunt told her.

––––––––

Luna had spread her books over the bed, consulting them hectically, unable to decide on which sortilege to apply.

It must be 100% effective, but at the same time not invasive with the minds and personalities of my babies. Yeees! This is perfect...

She abandoned the bedroom in a rush, walked into the kitchen and prepared to boil a pot of water. With a simple infusion and the prayer of binding she would resolve her problem. And, with a bit of luck (with a whole lot), she would take away all the animalistic properties Hugo possessed, physical and mental.

Ianire! What if she detects my babies because of this spell? Her fear spoke to her.

She kept rummaging through the kitchen, restless. There was no other choice but to take the risk.

White rose petals, nutmeg, a pinch of mustard seeds and another one of sea salt. Stir it good in boiling water... There, like that... Then, I simply let it cool and pour the potion on them as I recite my plea.

She poured the liquid in two glasses and, with them in hand, walked up to Lidia.

‘Everything’s ready. As soon as the infusion cools down a bit, I’ll proceed with binding their special qualities,’ Luna informed her.

‘How are you going to make Hugo drink that thing?’ the old lady questioned her after analyzing that concoction full of floating plants.

Luna laughed openly. It was her first laughter in days and she desperately needed to unwind. Lidia understood immediately and joined her frantic and senseless laughter, until tears showed in their eyes.

‘They don’t have to drink it (besides, they’re babies),’ the sorceress clarified, wiping her tears away as well. ‘It will be some kind of second baptism.’

We’ll see if Hugo transforms again, and into what...

‘This is ready... Shall we begin with Eva?’ she added, touching the glass.

Lidia stood from the couch, noticing that the muscular stiffness of the last days started to ease up, and she made as if to exchange the little one from hand to hand.

‘No, Lidia, it’s better if you hold her while I pour the potion on her and pronounced the magic words,’ she indicated her, as she left the glasses on the center table and pulled out a thick candle from her purse. She lit the candle and looked around. ‘Where do we this? If we do it here, I’ll ruin your couch and the floor.’

‘What do think of the sink?’ Lidia suggested, thankful that her sister had decided to do the baptism away from her dear couch of flowers and carpets.

Luna nodded and went back to the kitchen, carrying the lit candle in one hand and one of the glasses in the other. Lidia followed her, at the same time trying to calm a nervous and excited Eva.

‘No, no, no!’ the child cried, squirming in the arms of her aunt.

‘She knows, she guesses it...’ Lidia exclaimed, alarmed.

‘Yes,’ Luna agreed without turning to see them. ‘And it’s time for her to stop knowing and guessing so many things. It’s time for her to be a simple baby. She’s not even a month old, by Barabbas!’

‘Luna! For the love of God! Don’t mention the Devil in my house or in front of the children, I beg you!’ her sister exclaimed, visibly angry.

Fucking prude you are, little sister, with your saints and relics...

‘Alright, sister, I’ll try to moderate my language and avoid sinful expressions,’ she mocked simulating a face of regret.

But the Devil has helped me more times than your God has helped you, or me...

They stood at each side of the sink. Lidia, to the right, carrying the little one, who remained in disagreement with what was about to happen. Luna, to the left, with the potion and the lit candle, which she placed on the countertop, next to the trough.

‘Hold her over the sink, please,’ Luna requested.

The little one broke in tears, resisting reality. She did not want to be just one more baby. Lidia followed the instructions and lifted the girl, who kicked and screamed, over the sink. Her mother brought the liquid close to the girl’s head, poured its contents and then recited:

‘I take your hands in mine. Your powers I shall bind.

From now until the age of fifteen,

these chains you shall not be able to break.

Even if death shall befall me,

and in its bosom it surprises me,

‘til you turn fifteen there shall be nothing to dread.’

––––––––

Eva, feeling wet and uncomfortable, started crying her lungs out.

‘Go ahead...’ Luna invited her.

‘Eva? Who’s in the apartment next door? Shall we go see him?’ Lidia asked, anxious.

The baby continued sobbing, oblivious to the words of her aunt and her surroundings. She noticed that unpleasant wetness on her body and her body asked her to cry, cry and cry. Lidia looked at Luna in relief and, for the first time, aware of the admirable power of her sister.

‘Now she is as she should be...’ Luna declared.

I forgot that I cannot have my children with me because of that slut, of course...

Ianire, you’ll pay for all of this: that I’m losing the first days if my children, living in a house away from them, with the heart and mind in darkness. You will pay!

‘Why at fifteen?’ Lidia asked, full of curiosity.

‘It’s the age when Father had our first chat as adults with me. When she turns fifteen she’ll be ready for a lot of things, without revealing herself to the world, but also not too late to show her her destiny, her powers and train her in (black) magic.’

‘And Hugo? What will happen to him? Will you be able to hold his hands for the sortilege?’

‘No problem, I will freeze the room, us included, and we’ll see what happens,’ she explained her.

‘Freeze? Are you freezing me too?’ Lidia got startled.

‘I could do a selective freezing and direct it only to him, but it requires more work and effort than a generic one for the whole room. Of course... If it scares you so much (and I see it does...), you can always stay here with Eva and I’ll go alone. It’s not necessary for you to come with me,’ Luna clarified.

‘That’s better. I don’t want you freezing me,’ Lidia answered with relief.

‘I understand.’ As if I was going to freeze your brain, you fool... ‘Give me the keys and I’ll be right back, alright? But we have to heat the potion again... It’s not good for me cold...’ she added, pouring the liquid back in the pot and placing it over the fire.

Lidia placed the keys of the apartment beside the empty glass and left for the bedroom to change the little one’s clothes.

In January, and being so small, she should not stay wet any second longer, Lidia thought on her way to Lourdes’ room, always with the little one in arms, grumbling and goading about it. She tried not to leave any space for the fear which, inevitably, made its way into her: What’s going to happen to Hugo?

––––––––

Luna went back to the hall with the enormous cage. Hug stepped out to receive her mother, with tears in his eyes. Both perceived the force of the moment, the uncertainty of the changes that would be produced. Hugo contemplated his drawings for the last time, trying to keep them forever in some corner of his memory, so that was not taken away from him as well.

I have to hurry. This pestilence is choking me. What an unbearable stench!

‘You know what’s coming now, right, my baby?’ she asked, immensely sweet and moved.

They make me feel so human!

Hugo nodded, not looking away from his paintings, and stepped away from the door. His mother was going in.

‘DESINE, TEMPUS, DESINE NUNC[1].’

The tears of Hugo froze on his cheeks. Luna penetrated the cage. She could touch him for the first time since his birth. She caressed his beautiful cherub face.

How soft skin he has! And how pretty he is! If not for those claws and maw...

She lite the candle again, placed it on the floor and poured the glass on him. He had mutated in the previous baptism. What awaited him now?

‘I take your hands in mine. Your powers I shall bind.

From now until the age of fifteen,

these chains you shall not be able to break.

Even if death shall befall me,

and in its bosom it surprises me,

‘til you turn fifteen there shall be nothing to dread.’

––––––––

Luna stepped out of the cage, with the candle and glass in her hands, and made sure the cage was properly locked. Expectation gnawed at her.

‘CURRE, TEMPUS, CURRE IAM[2].’

The little body of Hugo started trembling...

SUSANA (1)

––––––––

Madrid, Tuesday October 22nd, 2075

––––––––

‘Miss Susana?’ a cracked voice pronounced at the other side of the cellphone.

She remained silent, not comprehending, observing her own cellphone. She wondered who was calling her from Iulian’s phone, why was he doing it and where the hell he was. Something terrible must have happened so that someone had his phone and he allowed it.

And why is he calling me? No one calls a vampire at seven in the evening!

The young woman, who had decided to wake up early to write her book (How to be a vampire and not die trying), had gotten up barely a half hour before, when the sun was still threatening outside. She was really excited about her writing project and, if she could help it, she would manage on her own without setting foot in the bracelet factory of her Master.

Part time my ass. I’ll be a full time writer!

‘Miss Susana?’ the elder voice repeated. ‘Can you hear me? Are you there?’

‘Yes...’ she answered at last, ‘Who’s this? Who’s calling? Where’s Iulian?’

A terrible certainty crossed her brain like a lightning bolt: Iulian was dead! A fleeting glimpse of knowledge shone for a fraction of a second...

The Red Demon? What’s he got to do with all this?

The light went off and her brain returned to darkness.

‘I’m Jorge, his butler, miss Susana,’ the voice introduced himself. ‘We had precise instructions to notify you in case... someday... something happened...’

‘What?’ she mouthed, becoming horrified at herself as she found herself anxious, and even happy, after tasting the bad news she imagined already.

‘The Master’s dead, miss Susana,’ the mortal confirmed her, making a theatrical pause as a sign of mourning. ‘We ignore what went through his  head, but this morning he walked out of the house at six in the morning, in broad sunlight. He caught us sleeping. When we heard his shrilling cries and went out to help him, it was already too late. Nothing’s left of the Master, miss Susana.’

‘My God!’ the vampress managed to exclaim. Nothing she could add would be enough to express what she felt in that instant.

‘The Master, who was very foreseeing, miss, had left a series of written documents: his will, his last wishes, a sealed letter for you (the Master was very traditional), a whole list of minute instructions we had to obey as final part of our job. He held you in very high esteem, miss, and the first instruction we had to follow was to call you and communicate you immediately about the disgrace.

Susana sunk back in silence. Up until a few seconds before she was struggling against that euphoric sensation of freedom which flooded her. But now...

Does this means Iulian’s left me as heir of his part of the properties? I don’t believe it... There’s got to be some fucking catch or clause...

‘as indicated by the Master, miss Susana, we must deliver the letter addressed to you and communicate you when the opening and reading of the will shall be executed before a notary. The notary is yet to give us a date, but he is already informed that it must happen at night. I’ll call you again to inform you if the hour and day of the event, but it will be here, in the Master’s villa.

When do you think you’ll be able to pick up the letter? We would be very thankful if you’d come this very evening-night. We have a lot of work to do and, as the Master disposed, our contract ends the last day of the month of his disappearance. We do not have much time and he had given us a lot of tasks,’ the worker lamented.

Very typical of Iulian. What a bugger! Now these poor humans will go to the streets, after bearing him for so many years and fulfilling all his charges. What will become of them now? And the factory employees?

‘Thank you very much, Jorge,’ Susana said. ‘I’ll go to the manor tonight, around ten, to pick up the letter, alright? I’m really sorry... FOR YOU,’ she remarked.

She was starting feeling free to be herself, to express what she thought and felt.

‘See you later the, miss,’ the old man said, shocked by the low loyalty of his talker.

And this girl was the Master’s pupil? She seems to be as happy as we are sad. Of course she’s going to mount on the peseta now and we’re off to the streets.

‘See you later!’ she repeated, hanging up the call.

Iulian dead! And what a horrifying and strange death! Because he’d never commit suicide. Never... Carbonized by the sun... Uffff.

Her body shivered because of the chills provoked by the images which populated her mind. Her eyes got wet, much to her chagrin.

And yet he did not deserve that end either, poor Iulian... And, nonetheless, the deaths of Helena and her pet...

A yell was born in her stomach, pierced through her chest and flowed from her lips, unstoppable and spontaneous:

‘Dear God, I’m freeeeee! Freeeee! And now what? I’m a novice vampress... Maybe the Legend will want to be my Master and take me as his pupil... That’s what I’ll do...

She grabbed her phone again and dialed a new number. Six rings later, I took the call:

‘Eva? Is that you, Eva?’ I asked, sleepy, from bed.

I could swear I as dreaming about her. She had a fantastic appearance despite everything. She ported two perfect legs and, for a brief lapse of time, I felt her close again. A second of doubt... Then... then, I think she tried to kill me. I do not know, the memory slipped my mind with the voice of she who called me on the other side.

‘It’s me, Susana.’

‘What time is it? I was sleeping. Give me a second to clear my head, please,’ I asked her.

‘Quarter before eight... I’m sorry, I woke you, of course...’ she apologized, ashamed.

She was ordering her thoughts to tell me about her Master’s death, and ask me to become hers from now on!

How am I going to tell her I can’t?

‘Yes. I was still sleeping, but my alarm was going to sound in fifteen minutes. Don’t worry,’ I answered, trying to appear calm. ‘Tell me...’

‘Iulian’s dead! It seems he walked out in the sunlight, in broad dawn, and burned in a manner of seconds,’ she announced me, nervously. ‘Don’t you think that’s crazy? It’s all so strange!’

‘Indeed it is,’ I lied like a bastard. It was better like that. ‘Do you need something?’

Silence at the other side of the line. Nevertheless, her questions and requests had already reached me. I hated to have to let her down like that...

‘Actually, yes,’ she started shyly. ‘I’d like to ask so several things. The first one is for you to accompany me tonight to pick up a letter Iulian left written for me in his house. I have a bad feeling. Maybe it’s just a fear of mine, but I’d rather go with company. Can you come with me to get it?’

‘Today?’ I put on my Sorry voice. ‘I have class at the Academy and I can’t miss it... But I’m free tomorrow if you need me...’ I offered her instead, knowing she would reject the idea. There were going to be too many noes in a moment.

‘Well, don’t worry. I’ll go alone. I’d rather have it and read it as soon as possible or the anxiety won’t let me breathe easy.’

‘I understand. And I’m sorry...’ I answered. ‘Let’s see in what else I could help you. Tell me.’

‘For you to join me in the reading of the will and the document of last wishes. I’ve never been in something similar and I’m afraid I might get somewhere I cannot get out of for signing something I shouldn’t, for compromising with something I don’t really want or can do, for feeling obligated to something or getting cheated,’ she explained herself.

Her words brought memories of the past to me, of my life as a human, when they red to me Sergio’s will.

Poor Sergio... My mind transported me to the last day of camp, in the summer of ’73, when Sergio got so scared he peed himself...

—————

It was a Saturday. August eighteen to be precise... It was an unusual summer day. The heat spread everywhere like a bad smell which was impossible to escape, clogging our nostrils. The sun seemed to have abandoned the Earth and the clouds threatened with a storm all day, but it was three in the afternoon and the darned cirrus did not fulfill their promise still.

Our hearts were also impregnated with the gray of sadness. Because I have always thought the color of sadness had to be grey, and not blue. The next day we would leave the camp not to come back until after twelve long months in the orphanage, if luck and the grades accompanied us.

Children and wardens appeared grumpy and taciturn because of the disgusting combination of it being the last day of vacation and the sticky heat which dehydrated us, prevented us from sleep or perform any activity which required any movement apart from breathing. The bad mood reigned, contagious, through all the camp.

‘Shall we go to the camp?’ Sergio suggested, with his hands.

‘Fine by me. We can refresh ourselves a bit,’ Eva agreed smiling. The sky filled temporarily with rainbows. ‘Yeees, hardheads, this time I’ll remove the damn leg. Don’t worry.’

‘Should we not let the adults know so they’re aware of where we are?’ I asked, eternally worried by the consequences of any action.

‘What for?’ she asked, shrugging her shoulders. ‘All of them must be taking a nap...’

‘Alright!’

And the three of us went running to our last adventure of the year in broad nature.

––––––––

‘Last one’s a donkey!’ I yelled, making the bomb dive in the water.

Even it was dead and warm, not fulfilling its purpose of refreshing us.

‘This isn’t fair!’ Eva exclaimed, irritated, as she undid the straps on her orthopedic leg.

Sergio was already in up to his calves when Eva joined us in the merry splashing.

‘Puajjjj! It’s warm!’ she grumbled. ‘Today everything seems lifeless, have you noticed?

Eva had the gift of explaining in four words what the rest of us felt and did not know how to express. We both nodded in the affirmative, trying to push from our minds the dark omens. I started to shiver despite the heat. They also noticed that that day, in that forest, there was something not going right.

‘Shall we go back to the camp, guys?’ Sergio proposed.

His skin, just like ours, was crawling.

‘Yes. There’s something here...’ Eva declared.

The fact of seeing her so scared was what terrified Sergio and me. We got off the water quickly. If something intended to catch us, let it be in dry land.

‘Let me help you with your leg, Eva,’ I offered, hurrying up.

‘Alright,’ she answered without protest.

Bad deal.

A breeze blew which, far from comforting us, disturbed us even more. The breeze soon turned into a hurricane wind and started buffeting my face.

‘Am I crazy or is the wind hitting me exclusively?’ I asked in restlessness, trying to protect my reddened cheeks from the bunch of slaps the wind was giving me.

Sergio was standing, agape and full of tears because of the wind. Eva, who had just stood up from fastening her leg, rose her arms to the skies and yelled:

‘Mother! That’s you, isn’t it? I can feel you. Even the air smells rotten. What do you want?’

A green whirlwind of leaves torn from the trees surrounded Eva and me, leaving Sergio out of the circle. If he had been able to, I’m convinced that he would have screamed his voice out.

‘Mother!’ Eva repeated, raising her voice over the whistle of the wind.

The leaves fell suddenly to the ground, surrounding us in an unsettling circle. The wind hissed like a rattlesnake, threatening and vicious.

‘Stay away from my little one, blood drinker!’ the wind whistled, whipping my face again.

‘Drinker my ass, Mother! He’s my family, something you never were! Stay away or I swear on all your dead that I’ll go spit on your grave!’ she screamed, with unseen scorn and pain.

‘Evaaaaaaaaaaa,’ the wind resounded again, in a sad and broken melody. ‘My life, you must get away from him before you turn fifteen or you’ll regret it. You still have time. Leave hiiiiiiiim.’

Then the forest fell silent. The wind ceased and the swamp went back to being an inert and immobile mirror.

‘What was all of that?’ Sergio gesticulated, crying and shaking.

He had peed himself in the very instant the wind began its threatening chant and started lashing me with disoriented branches from trees.

‘Shall we sit right here?’ she invited us, pointing at the green leaves on the ground. ‘Calm down. It’s passed and she won’t be back. At least, not today. I have something to tell you...’

We did it because it was her, but we were not happy at all. The thoughts