Chapter 335 - Irema part 1

"Be not afraid," the raven-haired vampire said as she stuffed my head in the leather pouch. "I've come to liberate you. I am your granddaughter Irema. Your child Ilio was my father."

Twenty years had passed since I held her in my arms, but I recognized the woman the child had become. I knew that she had spoken the truth the moment the words departed her lips: that she was my granddaughter Irema, and that she was Ilio's daughter and my own mortal descendant through her Tanti mother Priss. I could see her father's face as if it were an image floating behind her features. Same dark hair and almond shaped eyes. Same round face and plum-like nose. But that was all the time we had to speak before she spirited me away. We would not converse again until we had escaped the God King's city and she felt sure that it was safe to stop and rest a while.

As I'm sure you've already surmised, the assault on Fen'Dagher was simply a feint, a diversionary tactic meant to distract the God King from the true purpose of the raid: my liberation from the wall. As soon as my head was plucked from its pike, the blood drinkers racing toward the mountain reversed course and fled immediately from Uroboros.

As the God King's warriors flew out to meet the invaders, my liberators exploded in every direction. Some of them ran toward us. Others withdrew to the East and West Walls, veering wildly to and fro. Once clear of the city, they continued without rest, flying in every direction across the badlands that surrounded the mountain, drawing off as many of our pursuers as possible.

Irema leapt down from the South Wall and drew a zigzagging path in that direction. While she quickly picked her way through the wooded hills that led to the sea, her compatriots raced away at full speed, battering their way through anything that stood in their path and just generally trying to make as much noise as possible.

Faced with the fragmentation of their forces, the God King's warriors faltered. They turned back to the Fen in confusion, unsure whom their masters wished them to give chase. By the time the God King's generals had rallied them to pursuit, the Uroborans had no hope of apprehending my brave soldiers. They had fled too fast and too far to be captured.

I wish I could have seen the God King's face when he realized his trophy had been stolen from the wall. I'm sure he was apoplectic. I was, of course, denied the satisfaction as I was bouncing in a sack on my granddaughter's back. With every lurch and jolting leap, I was borne ever further from Khronos's empire of flies and shit.

Ah, my beautiful Irema!

She had named herself my granddaughter when she took me from the wall. That declaration was true in every sense of the word. In fact, Irema was twice over my granddaughter. She was my granddaughter by way of the Living Blood, being the blood child of my fledgling Ilio, and she was my granddaughter by way of mortal bloodline, being Tanti and thus descended from the People of the River.

When last I saw her, Irema was a mortal child, the daughter of my fledgling Ilio and the Tanti woman Priss, whom he had impregnated in the village of the Oombai. Oombai was a burgeoning agricultural society, allies of the God King who traded slaves with Uroboros. The Tanti were just one of the tribes they had raided for slaves. Ignorant of their wickedness, I had taken Ilio, still a mortal boy, there to find a wife. Irema's twin sister Aioa was the namesake of the fiery slave who inspired me to make war on the decadent Oombai. Although I did not know it at the time, when I destroyed the Oombai elders and liberated their slaves, whom they called the Neirie, I was liberating my own mortal descendants. We followed the Neirie home and later joined their tribe, and Priss, my blood child's only mortal lover, birthed two beautiful baby girls, Ilio's daughters, whom they named Irema and Aioa.

The time I spent among the Tanti was a peaceful season, before I was taken to the God King, before the First Great Vampire War. No wonder I felt so comfortable among them, as the Tanti were the descendants of the People of the River. My people. I came to the realization slowly, as their language and customs had greatly evolved since they forsook their home in the Swabian Alb, fleeing the encroaching glaciers to more hospitable climes in the south. Millennia had passed, the last great glaciation of Europe, and they were a very different people than the one that I remembered. But they had not given up all the old ways. They still revered their wind god Thest. When it dawned on me who they actually were, I did not think I had ever known such joy, and that joy was redoubled when they accepted me into the tribe, in full knowledge of who and what I really was. They knew that I was a blood drinker but they treated me as a sort of quasi-divine uncle. I befriended Priss's father Valas, who was a man after my own heart, earthy and ribald. In the evenings, Valas would come to my hut and drink framash and gossip about our tribesmen's sex lives. I lived openly among them, their T'Sukuru protector. I was able, at long last, to master my bloodlust. After Ilio's mortal wife gave birth, I helped to look after the twins. For the first time in ages, I was truly content. No, more than content. I was happy. I had a family. I had a tribe. I belonged.

And then the God King's slavers came.

When one of their raiders stole some children from the village, Ilio and I went to challenge the invaders. Zenzele and her marauders were the first vampires I'd encountered, aside from Ilio, since I was transformed into a blood drinker. Having the advantage of numbers, and trained to fight as vampires-- which is a very different thing from mortal battle tactics, I assure you-- they bested us easily. I surrendered to their leader in exchange for the Tanti's freedom. I ordered Ilio to take the Tanti into hiding, and then allowed Zenzele to take me to Uroboros. Ilio must have done a good job of hiding them, too, as the Tanti evaded the God King's slavers for the next twenty years.

Well as you know, Khronos and I had philosophical differences. Very hostile philosophical differences. Zenzele and I had become lovers during the journey to Uroboros, but she was still loyal to her king. I was taken for an audience with the God King, as was customary with all "wild" blood drinkers the raiders encountered. Zenzele hoped that I would be accepted into Uroboran society, that Khronos would approve of me and that I would be allowed to join her raiding team. I had no intention of doing that, but I wanted to see this God King. I wanted to learn more about these Uroborans so that I could better protect the Tanti when I rejoined my mortal tribesmen. As you might expect, I immediately pissed Khronos off and he ordered my summary execution, which strained Zenzele's loyalty to the breaking point. Mayhem ensued. With a handful of confederates loyal to Zenzele, we battled our way out of Uroboros and set off across Europe, looking to amass an army powerful enough to challenge the God King. It was during this time, as I marshaled my army, that Irema grew into a woman, and someone—probably her father—gave her the Living Blood.

I did not yet know who had made her an immortal, not for certain, or how she had come to join our forces at Asharoth. There was no time for explanations. Not until we were safely away from Uroboros.

Being a head in a sack, I couldn't see where we were going. I couldn't tell where we were except that it seemed unusually bumpy, as my head kept bouncing up and down against her back. I could tell the nights from the days by the winking of the light through the seams of the bag. I knew that Irema travelled several days without rest, and that she was beginning to tire. I knew this because her pace slackened and she had begun to make mortal sounds of exhaustion—little sighs and groans as she climbed over obstacles and leapt down modest declivities. Finally our flight ended, and she flopped down in what sounded like a cavern of some sort. I could hear the wind thrumming in the stone chamber, much like the sound you hear when you hold a conch shell to your ear, and the rhythmic hiss and slap of waves lapping at a shore.

I was hoping she would remove me from the bag immediately, but she did not. I waited impatiently, listening to the sounds of her movements. She did not sound harried in any way so I deduced that we were safe. Patience, Gon, I counseled myself. She went away. She came back. She went away again. She came back again. At last she settled down beside me and then I heard a high-pitched squealing sound. A moment later, the whoosh of flames igniting. The smell of burning wood.

A fire was crackling merrily when she took me from the bag.

"Would you like to sit here beside me, or would you rather stay in the bag?" she asked, holding my head up before her.

There was no way for me to reply. I had no lungs to give my answer voice.

When she realized I was physically incapable of speaking, she thought for a moment and then said, "Blink once for yes. Blink twice for no."

I blinked once in acknowledgement.

"Would you like to sit here beside me, grandfather?"

I blinked once.

"All right," she said. She smiled, pleased by our cleverness, and then she placed me atop the crumpled sack, adjusting my head so that it was braced against the log she was reclining on. She turned my face so that I could watch the fire, patting the top of my head like a pet. She sighed, looking toward the mouth of the cavern for a little while, watching the waves roll in and whoosh against the nearby shore. After a little while, she shifted down onto her side, stretching out her legs and propping her chin on her fist, facing me. She regarded me with affectionate amusement for a moment, looking me over, and then asked, "Does it hurt?" Nodding toward my ragged stump.

I blinked.

"I'm sorry," she said with a frown. "I wish there was something more I could do for you. Zenzele is waiting for you at Asharoth. They have a body for you there. A headless body. It belonged to the Eternal Yul. She is hoping you will be able to join with it until they can find the rest of your real body. My sister Aioa is searching for it now. Aioa is very good at finding things. So far we have recovered an arm and two legs. The Masters of Uroboros hid the pieces well. They were very far apart. Your leg was at the bottom of a deep shaft. It took Aioa several days to climb down and retrieve it. They hid your right arm on a mountaintop and your left arm in a forest."

Each revelation struck like an arrow, but instead of blood I bled relief. My body was being retrieved! All the lost pieces of me were being recovered and brought back together. It was just as the spirits had promised. Soon I would be whole again!

Oh, Zenzele! My beautiful, fierce, clever, loyal, loving Zenzele! My queen! My goddess! I am yours until the end of time!

I closed my eyes in thanksgiving. When I opened them again I noted how tired Irema appeared. Exhaustion had etched deep lines in her moonstone features. Her eyes and cheeks were sunken. The veins stood out in her neck and the backs of her hands. She needed to feed, as the young ones always do. She needed blood, but I could tell that she was too exhausted to go out and hunt for it. Shame sobered me. Must I always think first of myself? No wonder the fates punished me so. I deserved every sling and arrow.

"I wish you could talk to me, grandfather," she said wistfully. "There are so many things I would ask you right now!"

I smiled and blinked, not in answer but to show her that I shared the sentiment. There were a great many questions I might ask of her, too. Like how our people had fared after I surrendered to the slavers. Where had the Tanti fled? How had they managed to elude the God King for so many years? And I was curious how Irema had come by the Blood. Had Ilio given it to her before he sought me out in Uroboros? He had gone to the city of the blood drinkers because her mother, Priss, was dying. That much I had learned from Khronos himself. He had taunted me with my failures before his minions ripped me apart. Ilio had given Priss the Living Blood. He had done it to heal her of some fatal malady, but the transformation was flawed. It had only granted the woman a temporary reprieve. Ilio was a weak blood drinker, only a little more than mortal himself. Priss was made an even weaker T'Sukuru by his blood, and her body had begun to fail only a few short years after her transformation. Khronos, in order to set Ilio against me, had given Priss his blood, but not even the God King's ancient and powerful blood could slow the woman's steady decline. Priss had died, and in his bitterness Ilio had betrayed me. Would that I could speak, I would have had all my granddaughter's secrets. I might have confessed my failings to her as well. Asked for her forgiveness. Told her all the things that had happened to me since our parting. Assure her that, as always, I had only the best intentions. We might have stayed up all night talking. But I couldn't speak. I could only return her wistful gaze, blinking occasionally to answer some of her simpler questions.

It was daybreak when she stopped in the cave to rest. The world outside was still but for the rhythm of the tides. Still and dark, just the faintest glow of daylight streaking the low hanging clouds. She had run for three days straight. But the sky was brightening now, and Irema declined as the sun rose up. Her eyes dimmed as the heavens brightened. She laid her head down on her arm, dark curls framing her face, then rose up again and asked if I'd like to go back in the bag, thinking I might be more comfortable inside of it.

I blinked my eyes twice, emphatically. No, I certainly did not want to go back in the bag!

"All right," she said with a chuckle, lying back down. "As you wish, grandfather."

She closed her eyes.

"When I wake up, we will continue to Asharoth," she murmured, and then the life fled her features.

The death-stillness of the sleeping blood drinker-- normally I find it quite awful to behold. In sleep our illusions fall away and we are revealed for what we truly are: lifeless husks animated by a voracious parasite. Cold, dead, stony shells.

But not Irema.

As she slipped into that deathlike repose, my granddaughter's cares fell away from her features, leaving only a flawless beauty, long dark lashes curled against her cheeks, ringlets of jet black hair piled upon her brow. I would have thought she were an angel if angels had been invented by then. She certainly looked like her father with all that curly black hair!

I watched her sleep for a little while, quietly amazed by her perfection, and then I turned my attention to the mouth of the cave. The sky outside was a bright summery blue. I could see just a sliver of the sea from my vantage, its surface gray and restless that morning. Gulls wheeled in the sky overhead, screeching and diving, tussling over tidbits of food. Their movements were as restive as the sea. I threw down the barriers of my mind, opened myself fully to my preternatural senses, and stood watch over my slumbering granddaughter.

Irema slept as the sun rolled across the sky.

I guarded her.