Chapter 1Looking back and forth

The roofs.

Filled with various items displaying the people below. Sometimes some trash, but most of the times nothing but perhaps an air-conditioning unit. I was sitting in a place that brought back a lot of memories. A place I was once chased from by a large group of not so friendly kin. It was there I made a strange choice.

A little over two years had passed since I returned to Hitori. My unofficial but loved boyfriend I guess. It was really good to see him again, don't get me wrong. But our lives, with him working on his paintings, slowly drifted apart. I lived in the night, he lived during the day. Something had changed about us as well. It's like our love was a deep friendship that we didn't need to consume all the time.

Speaking of that... I'm still a virgin. I recall someone telling me it was definitely possible to have sex while a vampire but for some reason it felt wrong those few times to allow Hitori entrance. Partly this was because it reminded me of that one night with Khuna and him, but mostly it was just because it wasn't the right thing to do. It was then we both started to realize that we weren't lovers, but a deep kind of friends. It wasn't good or bad, neither of us was annoyed by it or disappointed. It was as it was. No questions for either of us, we both clearly felt it. No confusion either.

But boredom had set in, sneakily.

I had searched high and low, but the brotherhood had disappeared from the city. Or, at least, had hidden themselves surprisingly well from my seeking eyes. Very vexing. To make matters worse, crime wasn't exactly on the rise either. In the past few months, for example, I managed to stop a few assaults and robberies, but nothing of any importance. The books in the library weren't the best pals with me either. I loved to read when there were many things to do, as it was an option, a choice. But now reading would be my on-line solace, which wasn't how I wanted things. Opening a book should be some sort of reward, a closure or punctuation of a day well spend.

My days were literally drab. Without a goal, a purpose, the time slowed down to an agonizing crawl. And everyone else apparently busy with something important didn't really help me. Not a word from any of my kin anywhere either. Up until...

The roofs.

It was a place I did like to relax, even though I was usually too bored to even get here. TV fortunately never really got my interest and sometimes I was lucky enough to find the Gypsies. But that only happened once in the past four months. But tonight it would be different, though I didn't know it yet, feeling alone, bored and pointless.

"Hello Amy."

Muriel. By now I recognized the voice easily, and this time I was more than happy to see her. Her sword was in it's scabbard on her back and her clothes had changed a little since last I saw her. Still the same style, but I was sure she replaced two of them. Perhaps they'd been damaged over time. She stood not far from me, calm as always until I did something unexpected.

Unexpected for myself as well.

I was so happy to see another vampire, a little bit of adventure that I'd jumped up and hugged her. The very surprised look on her face was totally worth risking her pushing me away. But she didn't. After a fragment of hesitation, unnoticeable perhaps to a normal person but visible to us, she embraced me back and seemed to smile.

"Quite unlike you to be this friendly to me, are you bored?"

I nodded. "Out of my skull. I just don't know what to do, can't you teach me sword-fighting or something?"

She frowned a little. "No, besides I'm sure you don't want to follow my footsteps. Are you still bound to the earth?"

A little sad I looked up at her. "Yeah, though I can glide a little now and climb much easier."

"Patience and I'm sorry, it's not easy finding something to do, I do have one bit of good news though. Guess who's back in the castle."

I blinked. "Faith and Afentis?"

She nodded.

I hadn't checked back in the castle for fairly obvious reasons. Not being able to fly meant that my action radius was fairly limited without transportation. And even though I could drive, I still didn't do it very often. I never checked if they had returned after Muriel told me that they'd gone. It would be nice to see them again and maybe even be lucky enough to find something to do. I was also very curious on how Faith had been doing this whole time.

But... "Can you take me there?"

She smiled. "This time, I'm not going to be a taxi service forever."

Again I embraced her, feeling a lightness as I did. "Thank you!"

We were already flying. I had missed this feeling so much. She was much faster than I ever was, too. Rushing easily over the many rooftops and moving without any doubt or hesitation. She knew exactly where she needed to go or how to move. Even the landscape outside of the city looked like it held no secrets to her, and perhaps it didn't. The wind was fairly cold now, it wasn't long before snow might come, but I didn't care. I felt like a kid on a sugar rush. Happy.

The castle was fairly dark when we arrived, just the living-room and the kitchen had their lights turned on. What I didn't even think about is that a lot of vampires don't live long in the same place, as it creates questions. But since I'd only been one for almost four years, it wasn't really in the forefront of my mind. Besides, they had been gone.

As we landed, in front of the small entrance door, Muriel moved to release me and go before it was opened. I grabbed her more firmly. "Why? Don't you want to see him?"

"No, I..."

But that little delay was enough. The door opened, Afentis looked outside and saw her. He uttered only one word as he noticed her movements to go. Whispered soft, but audible to all.

"Wait."

Never before had I heard so much desire in his voice and somehow it reminded me of the very first time I heard it.