At First Sight Of Sunshine ~Chapter 4~

Chapter 4

“Tricks and Treats”

         The next few weeks passed, as weeks often do, in a slow blur. Other than discovering that the history we were being taught was twisted beyond belief, and discovering that the typed copy of my schedule had mysteriously vanished off the face of the earth, nothing of much dire relevance passed, so I see no reason to elaborate too much. Adrik and his little friends, despite my most valiant of efforts, had somehow managed to weasel their way into my good side. I was even beginning to warm up to darling little Hellsing.  I had forgotten what having friends was like, not that I would admit they were my friends, but it was nice to be accepted. They took me for a human, which was fine by me; I honestly wasn’t in a rush to have everyone know I was a Vampire.  I learned that Adrik and his sister Adrienne were Shifters; and their grandmother was the center seat of the Animagus Council, Heliyx and Scy were from the Fernis clan; Scy’s grandfather was the head of the Were Council.  As for Victoria Hellsing, it turns out she was a very bright young woman, with little interest in carrying on the family business. Which suited me just fine, but I still had to resist the urge to give her the “Not all Vampry are evil” speal… but I was quite sure the doctor would not have considered that “low-key”. And since Daddy Hellsing was only a few hundred feet from us at any given location at the school…  “low-key” was not something I could afford to botch.

         Other than my surprise interaction and friendship with the group, point five demon ass had pretty much left me alone, I still got a snide look or gesture every now and again, but hell; he didn’t touch or talk to me. So I was happy. I had figured out, however, that my new nemesis (the demon boy) was also masquerading as a human. I suppose I should have figured that out on the first day, you see glamour has a very distinct scent when you know what you are smelling for, and he had it all over him. So it should have been easy to assume he was actively hiding what he really looked like. I have to say I was very curious, but after a week of being left alone I realized that I would much rather be silently curious than have any sort of contact with him.

         By the time a month and a half passed, I had begun to actually enjoy the company of the others, and before we knew it, All Hallows Eve was just a day around the corner.  By a vote of five to my one, it had been decided that we should go all out and dress up. So since they would have no compromise, I decided that if I couldn’t beat them, I should join them, and said I would be a Vampire for Halloween. I was going to actually be myself around them, and they would have no idea.

         Victoria had decided to tag team with me and be the Hunter to my Vampire… oh goodie. Heliyx and Scy were going as a Witch and Warlock while Adrik and Adrienne were going to be their familiars. I really had to admit I had a lot of fun picking out a costume, I’d never really dressed up for Halloween before, not for fun anyway, and almost the whole school came dressed up on Halloween day. My costume choice was terribly stereotypical of peoples’ views on Vampires, for which I sent up a silent apology to all my family.  To my surprise, however, the night before I left for school my sister-in-law, Elizabeth, appeared on my door step with arms full of black leather clothes, declaring that my store bought “Elvira” costume (as she put it) was simply inadequate and insisted on helping with the costume. Hours later, and after my bed room was covered in random discarded items that had been dubbed not worthy, I had a full outfit for the next day. The black leather was shined and polished as only Elizabeth can, and then she told me to have fun, gathered the rest of the clothes back up, and was gone before the blink of an eye… as my family tends to do.

         When the sun rose the next morning, I was already very awake standing in front of the mirror waiting for the vaccine to work its way into my blood and wondering why I had neglected leather for so long. The gleaming soft black does wonders to make pale skin look so imposing. So there I stood, the high heal boots came up to my knees and, after my shins length of silver clasps and buckles, blended almost seamlessly into the leather pants which were almost like a second skin yet oddly comfortable, the top Elizabeth had approved of, was a low V-cut halter made of the softest leather I have ever seen, it was fitted snug to me and ended just at the bottom of my sternum. I smiled at the outfit, pulling out an inch thick band of the leather and fastening it around my neck, forsaking my crosses for a while, and then I pulled on the gloves Elizabeth had insisted upon. They came up nearly to my shoulders, the gloves ended just short of the first joint on my fingers, leaving most of my fingers exposed. Then for the piece de la resistance, I pulled on the long leather jacket, it swept down within a half inch of the ground, the back splitting at about knee level so two pieces fell towards the floor. The sleeves were belled ever so slightly then became more fitted in the upper arm. The jacket fastened with one large metal buckle, which matched the smaller buckles on my shoes and rested in the same place my shirt stopped. It had an extremely accentuated blazer like collar, which tipped upwards in the back of the neck to frame my face just slightly.

         I allowed my fangs to extend to their normal length, my hair and my skin I also allowed to be normal, but I popped I the “aqua” blue colored contacts for the day. I would change my eye color tonight when I put in my “contacts”, as for my fangs, my excuse was that an uncle of mine was a dentist and he had agreed to give me some fitted “false” teeth. I turned and smiled at the mirror. I had to admit I hadn’t had this much fun getting dressed in a long time, and I would definitely be wearing leather more often.

         Walking into the doors of Blood Mont that day I felt powerful in a different way than I normally do. My vanity, mixed with my pride, and my knowledge that I was walking through the school almost completely unveiled and unknown, gave me an odd sense of being on top.  I heard a few whistles coming from some Wizards dressed up like costume shop werewolves. I saw some mouths pop open from some slut-muffins dressed up like playboy bunnies. And I could feel the eyes following me as I made my way through the commons towards the faint scent of my… friends… I suppose I should call them. I made a very definite point to ignore Mr. I’m An Asshole Demon, as I passed him, though I found it hard not to smile.

         I paused at the edge of the crowd when I saw the group standing there. Scy and Heliyx looked very silly in their costumes.  Tall witches’ hat and wizard cap, with dark robes and magic wands. Adrik sat at Heliyx’s feet as the slim back cat, while Adrianne perched on Scy’s shoulder as a charcoal black raven. But what had caused me to pause was Victoria. She sported pleather pants that could have almost passed as real. Combat boots, a black tank top, and a black trench. Her blonde hair was pulled back into a pony tail, and her hands sported fingerless gloves. But that wasn’t what took me off guard. She wore a halter, which contained six sharpened silver stakes; two crucifixes hung from her neck, and strapped to her right thigh was a regulation pistol that the hunters used to pack a Vampire bullet in, they fill the hollow bullets with a chemical called “Liquid Sol”; some scientist invented it years ago, and it has almost all the properties of sunlight only in liquid form… and it kills you from the inside out. I doubted it was loaded, but I had to really argue with myself on whether or not I was going over there.

         Adrik made the decision for me. Jumping up from the ground and shifting mid leap he waved at me as the others turned and gawked, “Hey Lil!” I twitched, now we were to nicknames apparently, “WOWZA! Awesome costume! Holy crap!” He pranced over… yes pranced, and circled me while the others did the same. All mumbling how awesome the costume looked.  I stepped out of the circle, with a laugh.

         “It’s just some old scraps I found lying around.” I checked my watch, and with a feigned shock continued, “Wow, class starts in five minutes, Gotta go!” And I slipped past them and restrained myself from bolting towards my first class.

         I walked into Creative Writing with a few minutes to spare. Since I had been rushing as fast as I could without being noticed. Sitting on the corner of Ms. Crawft’s desk was a basket full of sugar goodies. I smiled and pulled out a vanilla flavored tootsie roll.

         “Happy Hell’s Eve Lillith!” Her voice chimed from my left. It took me off guard to realize that I hadn’t been paying enough attention to sense her in the room at all. I looked up at her and grinned. She was dressed up like a bad Disney movie witch, frizzy over sprayed hair and all.

         “Happy Hell’s Eve Ms. Crawft.” I managed over my giggle, “Love the costume!” She looked down at herself and laughed.

         “I thought it might be fun to be a stereo-type today. Yours is quite impressive. Almost like you knew what you were doing.” Her voice on the last phrase hinted at something, knowing something. I got a chill for a moment, but smiled.

         “Too many bad horror movies, and over written vampire novels will do that to you.” I laughed a little and walked to my desk as others started to pile in. Glancing over my shoulder just once I caught Ms. Crawft staring at me with some sort of intensity I didn’t quite like, before she turned her attention back to complementing costumes.

         “Class.” Ms. Crawft said as the bell rang. “I would like to introduce you to our new student.”  She motioned to the girl standing next to her, red mow-hawk, tattoos, piercings, and an unmistakable scent of magik. “Please welcome your new class mate, Amelia.”

         “Hello Amelia” came the muddled and cacophonous sound.

         Our new class mate responded in kind, taking a quick moment to state she would prefer Ami to Amelia and strolled right over and plopped down next to me. There was no hesitation, no look of ‘oh crap’, just ‘I’m gonna sit here so there.’ I smiled and nodded to her, and was granted the same respect. I still couldn’t place the scent under the magik, but I figured I had plenty of time to get it. So for the time being I turned my attention to Ms. Crawft, pleased to finally have a class mate I could stand. Perhaps today would be a good day after all.

         My next two classes were nothing to fantastic to tell about. Our History teacher was dressed up like Elvis… older Elvis, which made every one laugh. He did a lecture about the history of All Hallows Eve. This was interesting but by no means worth talking about.  Mr. Breming, who sported a very good likeness of a Scarecrow, showed us some interesting chemicals we could mix to create orange and black flames, while being very careful not to light his straw on fire, and passed out some candy as everyone left.

         As I was walking towards the courtyard I stopped at a drinking fountain to get out of the way of the lunch crowd. As I was taking a drink someone stepped beside me and, in a voice that was low enough that no one but me could hear it, asked me one of the questions I’d never thought I would here at this school…

         “So tell me, does anyone here know you’re a real Vampire?” I snapped my head up, to find my newest classmate, Ami leaning up against the wall right next to me. I couldn’t quite say anything at first; I glanced over my shoulder to see that the hallway had emptied, with the exception of me, Ami and the girl who was peaking over Ami’s shoulder. I cleared my throat, and responded as quietly as the question had been asked.

         “Vampire… whatever gave you that idea…” I looked down at my costume, “Cause I could see where the costume might give off that impression… but it is Hell’s Eve after all.”

         She smiled a little wickedly and way too knowingly, “Come on, I’ll never forget the smell of Vampry. It’s to unique to confuse with anything else.” The girl peaking over her shoulder nodded, causing her green and black hair to flutter around her face.

         I was too shocked to notice that I was still hunched over the drinking fountain with one hand on the leaver while the water was still splashing away staring at these two, and wondering if I’d get in too much trouble from the Council if I killed them both. I stood slowly, straitening my shirt and clearing my throat to give me time to think, then glanced around one more time to make sure the halls were clear around me. I assume Ami got the general idea of what was going on in my head, because she quickly popped up from the wall while saying, “Don’t worry! We’re not going to tell anyone. Jesus! I was just curious.”

         I blinked a bit shocked and looked over at her, “No. No one knows, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

         She shrugged. “Don’t blame you for that.” I raised a brow at her and she smiled again, “I’m Ami.” She held out one hand and motioned over her shoulder with the other, “And this is Kiila” I nodded still a little miffed, no student in the school should have been old enough to have met a Vampire face to face. But when I shook her hand, I suddenly understood why, it was her Magik that gave her away, and I wondered why I didn’t smell the glamour before.

         “I didn’t know the Fey were socializing again…” I said with a small smile as we dropped hands.

         “Most aren’t. But we were getting sick of the old country.” Ami said as Kiila nodded behind her again.

         “Trying something new then… I see.”  I let myself relax for the first time in the last several minutes, the Fey were tricky creatures, but I had little fear they would be the ones to ‘Out’ me.

         “It seemed like a fun idea… High School…Drama…Dances… the whole nine yards. A very welcome relief to the monotonous balls and galas of the Court.” She smiled at me and I nodded taking a moment or two to take her and the Fey behind her in. They were Gremlins I found out, part from my nose and part from later on.

         Ami was a good three or four inches shorter than me, with a characteristic stocky build. Mind you, and this is very important, she was not overweight, but Gremlins are generally a strong stocky bunch. Big on top, well built in the middle, and wide hips.  Her sent was covered in glamour as was, I assumed, her entire appearance, Gremlins don’t look a bit like humans.  But how she looked at the moment, was pale cream skin, deep brown eyes, a strong nose that tipped down just a little in the front, and perfect pink lips. A red mow-hawk, couple tattoos and a bunch of piercings.  The little Gremlin standing to the side and a little behind her, had a slim build for a gremlin,  her nose turned up just slightly at the tip, she had honey brown eyes, and black and green hair that covered one half of her face… along with the multitude of piercings. I do mean a LOT of piercings, both of them had their faces decked out, nose, lips, ears, eye brows, septum, Ami even had one on the back of her neck.

         You see, most Fey are extremely sensitive to Iron… it hurts them like nothing else. But the Grem, are a very special exception, they are iron workers by trade, alchemists that can work metal with their minds, hands and magik. So the piercings I had no doubt transferred far under the glamour, as a statement that they were stronger than other Fey. The amount of Iron a Gremlin puts in itself is a testament to just how much stronger they are, it’s one of those vanity things, a lot like how Vampry will wear their scars with pride, or show off how long their fangs are, or have an Aura stand down to prove who is better.  With Gremlins it’s much simpler. “I have more Iron… I win”

         The Fey, though Preternatural in their own ways, had long refused to be even closely associated with any other race.  They had no desire to be part of the council or in the public eye; in fact most humans still didn’t know they even existed.  This being said, you can imagine my surprise to meet two Gremlins at Blood Mount.

         I finally shook myself out of my musings and appraisals of the two with a thought, “So is there any reason in-particular you wanted to know of my status of anonymity?”

         To that they both shrugged in unison and Ami, who seemed to be the more talkative of the two answered, “I was just surprised to see a Vampire up and around at this time of day, let alone masquerading as a human. We thought there might be some important purpose behind it. A scandal in the Vampry Court” I raised a brow at her, she corrected herself before continuing, “Excuse me, the Vampry Council, maybe a secret mission of the Balance? It’s just so unusual to see one of you anymore that we were curious.”

         I shook my head with a smile, “If there was a scandal in the Council, I’m sure I’d not know about it, I do try my best to stay away from them. And you should know very well the Balance keeps itself out of everything. It’s rumored that it was disbanded thirty-five years ago. I’m just here as a sort of favor to an old friend.” At her quizzical look I shook my head softly, “No, I don’t wish to discuss it, it’s relatively unimportant I assure you, and has nothing to do with secret missions or scandals.”

         She shrugged at the answer, “Well my curiosity is subdued, and I’m hungry. Would you like to join us for lunch?”

         “Sounds like fun,” which was the truth, but I glanced out the window and happened to notice a small group of five people lounging in the grass and checking their watches and I sighed, “On second thought… rain check, I’ve made plans today already.” I nodded my farewells and headed towards an outside door.

         “By the by.” Ami called, “We didn’t get your name.”

         I paused and looked back with the door half open, “No, I don’t suppose you did.” And I slipped outside not waiting to hear the reply, though catching the grin it warranted.

         Outside was warm and bright and smelled like life. I strolled through the grass enjoying myself, feeling oddly lighter at not having to hold my secret from everyone; it’s a good feeling not having to be concealed. Adrik waved from a few yards away to flag me over, before I quite got seated on the grass with everyone he was already talking at me, I was still enjoying the air so I wasn’t paying much attention.

         “… other wise we’ll do something at our house.” He was saying before I snapped out of it. I blinked at him for a moment.
         
         “What was that?” I said flatly as I rummaged though my back pack for the non-descript thermos I had packed…or thought I had packed, I realized with a grimace. So much for Doctor’s orders….

         He rolled his eyes and sighed. “Keep up Lil’” I flinched again, and he continued in that sort of annoying slow pace people use when they have to repeat what they just said, “We…are… thinking… it …would…be …fun… to …go… to…a …Halloween… Party…. if-”

         Scy leaned over and smacked him on the back of the head, “Quit it, your making all of us annoyed!” Then he looked up at me and finished where Adrik had left off, “What Idio-Cat here was trying to say, was that we all wanted to go to a party, but don’t know of any going on. So we were thinking about doing something at Adrik’s house, unless you know of something more fun going on.”

         I paused for a moment before answering, they all looked at me with wide eyed hope, even Adrienne, sighing I answered, “A friend of mine is putting on a Hell’s Eve get together, I was invited and told to bring people… but I wasn’t sure if I would go…” The look in their eyes made it so I couldn’t refuse, it would have been like teasing a puppy with a treat then denying it. Some voice in the back of my mind, which I had grown to hate, chastised me silently You’re getting soft Lillith…sympathy does not become your kind. I shut my mind up and shrugged, “But I guess if you guys want to come I can call him after school and let him know we’ll be there.

         There was a collective squeak though the group and I sent up a silent plea that it wasn’t a very bad idea. Before I could linger on the thought the bell rang to single that lunch was over, so we all stood up and parted ways.

         The rest of the day was dull and uneventful. Kiila was in my last class now, every now and then she would glance my way when Mr. Hellsing would say something negative towards the Vampry, or talk about his experience in dealing with them. And after class Mr. Hellsing commented on how realistic my costume was. I shrugged it off with a lie about a relative being a special effects makeup artist and thanked him for the compliment. Before I left I arranged with the others to be at my house at 7:30, so we could carpool to the party, I wasn’t thrilled about giving out my address, but I was sure it would be less appreciated if I gave out the address where the party was…at least by our host.

         When I got home I had just started to question the intelligence of extending an invitation

         I hadn't thought about the atmosphere of the party before I invited the little group. And I realized only after they all made plans to come, that a party thrown by a Vampire, was likely to include a lot of Vampires. This could cause a lot of problems on the parts of the non-vampires, especially when one of those non-vampires was Victoria Hellsing… I had some phone calls to make beforehand it would seem.