A/N: This Bonus chapter was brought to you by RoosterGod! All haid the mighty Rooster 🐓!!!
[Blood Diary Entry]
The engine's soft rumble, the peaceful thuds of raindrops on the window, and Rebekah's powerful heartbeat. They all made a soothing melody that made the rest of the world fade away. All of that made me recall the uneventful past few days.
With mother now behind the wheel, we had to stop more times than before, either in gas stations to just stretch our legs for a moment, or by occasionally resting the night in one or two not-so-memorable towns.
And during all of this, Rebekah had remained constantly close to me. At times, she would run her fingers through my hair; at others, she would just hold me as we basked in each other's presence.
Normally, I would grow annoyed, or perhaps suffocated, by such things. Yet oddly enough, I found myself wanting more of it. Just being around her made me calmer and more relaxed; I could see it was much the same for her.
These strange feelings of comfort I felt around her, these didn't stem from the vow, at least not only from the vow. There was something else that pulled me to her, and her to me.
Some moments we would huddle around closely, as she told me of interesting and funny things that happened to her during her long life, at others she would listen attentively—with the curiosity of a wide-eyed child—as I spoke about Veythra, home to the species I belonged to. She asked me multiple times to describe the sky, the eternal twilight, a truly breathtaking phenomenon.
Mom once caught us while we were having one such conversation and decided to listen to it. It ended up with the three of us getting too excited over it, and we stayed up the entire night, talking about absurd things.
Naturally, Rebekah had to be the one driving the next day.
Because of that, we even made some faster progress on our trip, but as soon as my mother caught up on her sleep, she wanted to get behind the wheel again.
I found it peculiar, her sudden insistence on driving the SUV, but neither Rebekah nor I decided to dwell on it, and we simply went with the flow.
It was only today that we reached the third stop in our long journey.
A quiet and quaint town in the middle of Pennsylvania. Utterly unremarkable, but that in itself had some charm to it. It was entirely organized and built as if it had stopped in time.
The main street gave me the feeling of walking in a Western movie; the organization of the shops and everything else just made me feel that way.
But the strangest thing was that the entire city felt… empty. There were no cars on the streets, no people walking on the sidewalks, no nothing.
Even when I focused on my potent senses, I barely caught any traces of life, and they were so scattered as well.
Rebekah and Mom seemed to notice this as well, as Mother spoke nervously. "Rebekah, do we really need to stop here? This whole place is giving me a bad feeling."
Rebekah took a second before answering, stuck in her own uncertainty. "Yeah… It's something important. But let's just be quick and get away from here. I'm also not liking what I'm seeing." She stopped speaking and exhaled slowly. "This place used to be so cozy as well. I don't know what is going on."
I turned to look at her, still in her embrace, looking into her deep blue eyes. "What do you even want from here anyway?"
She brushed a strand of hair from my forehead before saying anything. "I just know a reliable druid that lives here. At first, I only wanted to buy some essentials from him, but now, I'll see if he's heard something about that Scandinavian witch Gloria spoke about."
I looked at her curiously. "Why? Why are you interested in any of that?"
"She had one of my mother's belongings, Darian."
I grew confused. "And?" I asked, and then I decided to clarify my confusion. "It's not that unusual, is it? Your mother was a powerful witch; you and your brothers are testimony to that. So, I think it is only natural that others would want objects of power that belonged to her. I don't see what is so special about this. Did I miss something?"
She shook her head. "I understand what you're saying, but I have a nagging feeling there is more to it."
"How so?" Mother asked.
Rebekah turned to look at her. "Because we found it in possession of her apprentice, not of herself. And witches—though they like to preach they uphold balance and nature's order—are mostly immensely egotistical and greedy. There is no chance one of them would simply hand over an expensive and powerful artifact just like that."
I nodded. "Makes sense," I said, "if you need any help, just ask."
She smiled and gently caressed my face in acknowledgement.
"Just one thing I wanted to ask…" Mother spoke in an uncertain tone. "You were locked away for eighty years, Rebekah… shouldn't that druid you know about be dead by now? And even if he isn't, he is incredibly old by now." Then, thinking about something, she added when she remembered the ridiculous existences she was speaking to. "By human standards that is."
Rebekah shook her head. "No, no. Druids are really long-lived, easily being able to reach the 500s. If you do see an aged druid, he is either very old or simply chose to look like that."
Mom and I nodded our heads, absorbing the new bit of information about the supernatural world we were thrown into.
I managed to see a faint hint of appreciation in my mother's eyes. Seemingly approving and being thankful about Rebekah's willingness to teach us.
I shared that feeling as well, because just thinking about how big a headache it would be for me to learn all of these things on my own.
Rebekah then proceeded to give us directions to where she supposed the druid still lived. "Last I remember, he liked to manage a chocolaterie, and I don't much think he stopped it, even after almost a century." She spoke, and noticing the puzzled looks my mother gave her, explained further. "It's a fancy name for a chocolate store; it's actually French."
I chuckled. "So, he's a snob?"
"Something like that." Rebekah giggled.
After a few more twists and turns, we arrived in front of a store, which I could only describe as a diabetes haven.
My sharp senses told a different story, though. I smelled herbs, the faint scent of formaldehyde, and an acrid and ashy smell, which I found really unpleasant. Deep within the store, a steady heartbeat that neither spiked nor slowed down.
It was eerily steady.
We all got out of the car and entered the store; the melodious jingles of the bells echoed around the empty building.
Standing behind the counter, wearing a perfectly neutral expression—yet easily one of the oddest beings I'd ever seen, in this life or any other.