Sacrifice Helle Season Two

I threw my bag on the floor and bumped down on the couch. Our living room was a small and cozy one, with one big couch in which I had taken place and one smaller one, following the walls into a corner. Terrible design from the 50’ties I bet. Okay, maybe just 90’ties, but old enough.

Mom and dad wouldn’t be home until at least 2 hours. They both work so late! Well, I thought it was late, because I always had to wait for them to get home before I could get some proper dinner. You think you see me cooking? Yeah. I snorted thinking about last time I had to cook. For Asami. Burned meatballs or something. Even Darien criticized them! The thought of it made me smile.

The front door slammed and I heard footsteps in the hallway.

“Vaan!”, I yelled at him. “Come here!” His cute face popped out from around the corner, “What?” “We need to talk.”, I said, “We REALLY need to talk.” He slowly got himself into the room and leaned on the couch. I looked up at him; he was staring at the wall in front of him, emotionless.

For a while none of us spoke. I was trying to formulate questions in my head, too many questions, and too few words. My hands were fiddling with my sweater and I got lost in my thoughts. When I looked up at him again he was staring at me intensely and I shrunk under his gaze. Indeed he still held a certain amount of authority about him. He was only hiding it from others, like my mom and people in school. But not now. Now I felt his strong eyes on me, like they could literally force me down to the ground. Made me want to fight him it did.

“There are plenty of things you know that you must tell me.”, I finally said. He didn’t reply so I continued. “You know.. Or.. You ought to know more about the Advent than I do and about why my sister .. Why you took her and… For what purpose. Also.. About Raphael..” “Hold it now!”, Vaan interrupted me.

His mood changed and he bumped down on the couch next to me, he seemed a little annoyed by my questions, or to be more precise; that I asked about Raphael. I was unsure if I was intruding his private life with such a question, but I grabbed hold of myself. I was entitled to some fair answers! Damn his privacy after everything he did to me and my family! I had the right to know everything concerning this matter!

“I want to know, I have to know! Put some truth behind your words and help me get Asami back! That’s the least you can do! What does vampire community or the Lord matter to you now? You are a human like me, so stuff it! I want answers and I can think of no one better than you to do the answering! There can’t be the thing you don’t know!”

He shot me an angry glare. “Drop your sister, Helle. Face it, you’re never gonna see her again. It’s hard, I know, but start realizing that little Asami will never return.” “How dare you say something like that?”, I snarled. “I know it.”, he said in a nonchalant tune. I clenched my fists and before I knew it I had hit him right in his face. The punch wasn’t strong though, since I was sitting sideways towards him and he was that close, still he fell backwards on the couch.

I froze realizing what I had done and feeling stupid for it. “Damn it! Shit!”, I heard Vaan mumble under his breath. But instead of saying sorry, or ask him if he was okay, I snorted. “Feh! Wimp! You deserved that!” I crossed my arms again and looked away from him. “I had quite forgotten how pain feels. Thanks for reminding me.”, he replied. “I didn’t hit you that hard!” There was silence and so I turned back towards him to see how he was doing.

“Oh, shit, your nose is bleeding!” I forgot all about how I was supposed to act grumpy and say that it was his own fault, and instead I jumped up from the couch heading for the kitchen to fetch some tissues. I was back within seconds and handed him the paper tissues I had found. He gratefully took the paper but gave me an odd look. ‘What?’ “Uh? Oh!”, I looked at the content of my other hand, I had brought scissors with me. Mom once put them on Asami’s forehead when she had bumped into a wall about a year ago, to cool her forehead down so she‘d have less of a bruise. They were the first thing I saw when in the kitchen, and I knew they’d be cool.

I laughed a little, “Here, they will help cool you down, place it on your cheek or.. Over your nose.” He continued to look at me weirdly. “You’ve got to be kidding me..” I shook my head and he took it. I couldn’t help letting out a giggle, but the sound of my own laugh tensed me up again and I quickly sat back down facing the wall and not Vaan.

“Well.. That brings up another thing I wanted to ask you. About.. How much vampire there might still be left in you. I mean. I see you don’t take being punched any differently from others so.. I guess..” “They are gone.”, he cut me off, his voice sounding funny and so not like his regular sensitive and intriguing voice. Guilt flushed up in me, it was my fault that this once so noble being was stuck with paper tissues and a nose bleed. Vaan with a nose bleed. An image I still found hard to believe.

“Gone completely?” “Yeah. Well, I don’t know to what extent, but I know for certain.. I am weak. Just like a human.” “But your charisma and.. “ A small laugh made me turn to him, his eyes were warm and smiling, “Personal traits dear, I wasn’t sired for no reason.” His laugh ended with a sigh, “My sire.. What expectations she had for me...” He stopped talking, his eyes looked dreamy and I knew he was thinking of something that belonged to the distant past.

Then his face looked concerned and his eyes met mine. ‘What do you want to tell me?’ I wanted to know what he was thinking, it was as if there was something he wanted to tell me, yet he held it back. “Is it something about Asami?” He took his eyes off me and his expression turned cold again, “No. Now what did you wish to know from me?”

I sighed and tried to prepare questions again. “Let me.. Try to list up some things, otherwise I’ll loose my trail of thoughts.” “Okay” “First off.. I wanna know what’s up with you and Raphael! He knows you and you know him, and I wanna know what that’s all about!” “Really, that’s none of your concern and of no relation to your sister!”, he rejected. “Shush! No interruptions!” He gave me an annoyed look, but leaned back on the couch and waited for the rest of my list. “Then I wanna know WHY my sister was taken and what will happen to her! And... There’s some things I don’t understand… Why does the Lord want children at all? And... How does one get to the underworld?”

We stared at each other, Vaan waited long before he answered, “The easiest question first. How to get to the underworld. There are two things needed. First of all you need wings. Angels, demons, some other creatures have that. If not wings then some other magical item that allows you to travel between spaces. Then there is the need of a gate. Gates are invisible, but open and close by the will of the Lords.”

“Lords?” “There’s more than one lord, Helle. Anyway, vampires and elves per example don’t have wings, however many of us possess the magic abilities required to open the gates to a visible plan and have us physically walk though them or teleport through a symbol of the gate, say, a circle… “ I interrupted him, “Get on with it, skip all the fancy details!” He sighed, “Okay, where were we..”

“Why was your sister Asami kidnapped? And what will happen to her? Honestly, Helle, no one truly knows what happens to the children or WHY the Lord demands them. Actually, if I remember correctly, there were times when he didn’t demand children at all, but other sacrifices. But those questions, I’m afraid, can only be answered by the Lord himself.” My shoulders slumped. “You ... Why her?” I looked up at him, his face cold and solid. “Randomly? You… Did you really intend to take me?”

That’s when his stone face melted away and he was forced to look down. Time stood still then, I listened to the sounds of something breaking inside of me. He really had intended to take me instead. “But the Lord wants.. “ “Virgins.”, Vaan finished for me.

My eyes filled up with tears. Asami hadn’t had to go through this. That place where she was now was meant for me, not her. There was nothing I wouldn’t do to trade places with her, and then to find out that she had been forced to take my place… I felt like I was suffocating slowly. But then I cleared my mind to get out a question I didn’t know if there’d be a point in asking. “Then why did you choose me?”

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‘Why did I choose her?’ Vaan held back. What did she need to know, and how soon would she find out even if he didn’t tell her? Was there even a need for her to know anything? He narrowed his eyes. There was something he wanted to know as well, something that would make it easier to just lie to Helle and say “Randomly.”

Helle held her tears back. It was so weird for Vaan to see that a person that not so long ago hit his face was now sitting there almost crying because of something he said. However it was also good to see true emotions again, a refreshing feeling. “Helle..”, he began. “Yes?”, she looked up at him. He paused and weighted for and against in his head, and then decided to wait with giving his answer for just a little longer.

“Why do you think I chose you?” Her eyes trailed off, looking at images inside her head. “I don’t know..”, she answered. “I don’t understand why. I thought .. I thought Asami was taken for .. Her beauty and.. That she was younger and.. I mean.. Everyone likes her better.”, she shook her head and looked up at the ceiling, “No one ever really wanted me anyway. Why would you choose me?”

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He waited a little longer, then finally said, “It really didn’t have much to do with you as a person, it was more like.. You were just there at the wrong place and at the wrong time. But randomly sounds like such a bad thing, I didn’t close my eyes and pick one, you know, it was… A decision based on various factors. They don’t matter now.” I sniffed and tried to think.

‘Of no matter now.’

If he was telling me the truth then. And also, if he was telling the truth, there was no hope of getting Asami back. He would know wouldn’t he? The great Vaan. He knew everything. Then I remembered something and my tears dried up quickly.

“So tell me the story about you and Raphael.”

“Why do you want to know? It is of no matter to you. I swear. Me knowing Raphael has nothing to do with you. If not for that poem that he stole. Should never have been written, but who would get it anyway…” Vaan suddenly got busy with changing the subject so I lightly pinched his arm. “Ouch, what was that for?!”

“Don’t tell me it is of no matter to me! Just tell me! Why is it such a damn secret?” He pouted a little over the mark I had left on his arm and mumbled something about abuse, then sighed and continued, “As I said, no matter to you, and I don’t care if you want to know, because it’s my business.” I was about pinch him again, but a few little words and a teasing smirk from Vaan made me quickly draw back. “Or maybe you would like to tell me about your relationship with that demon?” He laughed a little at my reaction to this, then rose up.

“I take it we are done here for now. We’ll talk later, but now your parents will be here soon, and I would just love to clean this place up a bit before Marie and Joseph get here.” Marie and Joseph.. So he was on first names with my parents already.. And busy making them like him.

“You know you just make me look bad when you act all cute and do all these nice things for them..!”, I yelled after him when he left. “Well, you can just pray then that my nose will stop bleeding by the time they get here!” Damn it! Nailed! Maybe I should start an anger control managing group -_- No way!