It was a dreary, stormy afternoon. The sky was dark grey, the wind howled, the rain poured down in a vast shower, thunder rumbled, and lightning flashed every so often. Malakai was wandering the vast ornate halls of the large home he found himself in. Each hallway was decorated with fine oriental rugs and there seemed to be endless nooks with plush Victorian style chairs and furnishings. He was apprehensive and a bit…creeped out. The two girls who were with him in the family room earlier were sent off to their rooms for “study” as their mother put it, and then there was their mother, Brandywijn, with looks that could drop a man dead. She would disappear in the vast ornately furnished house for hours. When Malakai would go searching for her, he would never find her, but out the corner of his eye he would catch glimpses of her peaking at him from a corner or from behind something, shrouded in shadow faintly, just enough so she was not fully visible. When he would turn to her and call out to her, she would vanish in the blink of an eye, like an apparition.

“Was she…toying with me?”, Malakai thought to himself.

She certainly had avoided him for the entire time he was in the house, he had not truly encountered her since he awoke in the family room armchair. The house seemed only to be lit up by candelabras and flame lit wall lanterns. As he rounded yet another corner after a long hall, he noticed a large grandfather clock at the end of the hall he had just turned on to. The grandfather clock ticked loudly. The ticking of the large clock was the only other discernable noise besides the pitter-patter of the rain on the windowpanes and the low rumbling of thunder from outside. Suddenly he felt a chill run down his spine, a bright flash of lightning flashed and suddenly at the end of the hallway in a long white tunic shirt stood Brandywijn. She was in the shallow shadow, so you could see it was her, but her features remained slightly obscured. A low grumble of thunder sounded, and Malakai spoke up.

“Are you going to avoid me the entire time I’m here?”, he said in a perturbed tone.

Her smile was large and white, her two canine fangs were longer than the average persons and came to a much, much, sharper point, yet she still radiated a beauty that was, otherworldly. Her hair sat up in a messy, disheveled bun, wisping about, giving an irresistible casual feel to her ornately crafted feminine features. Then, she spoke, from the shadow.

“This used to be your favorite look of mine. Wearing your tunic with my hair up like this.”

(*pregnant pause*)

“I always thought myself a fool because I would painstakingly groom myself and put myself together all the time…yet it was when I was in my most disheveled careless form that you could not keep your hands off of me.”, Brandywijn sighed and seemed to float towards him in a slow traipse.

She stopped in front of one of the windows, where the fair moonlight shone majestically through and stood in it’s pale glow. Malakai was dead to rights, his heart gushed with want, his blood steamed with desire to reach out and touch her, feel her soft skin and embrace her close, yet he was still apprehensive. She was too dainty a figure to seem threatening, but her piercing grey eyes betrayed her delicate demeanor. Her eyes radiated power, her gaze was like a trance, the type of trance a predator puts its prey in to make it remain docile before the strike. As if she heard his thoughts…she smiled and said.

“Malakai are you frightened of me?”, her smile turning to a faux sad expression as to imply that she was openly teasing him.

She reached out her right hand, on it was a large oval ring with a black onyx stone, trimmed in gold. Her delicate hand limply held out for him to grasp it. Then he heard a low voice in his head that said, “Flee…”. At that moment in that exact instant, she was upon him, she was not as tall as he was, her head reached his chest, yet her presence felt overwhelmingly strong as she stood with her body pressed up against his. She maneuvered herself in front of him, facing towards him, pushed against his left leg and softly placed her hands on his chest and leaned back slightly, causing him to reach around her and hold her up in his left arm. She smiled her dazzling fanged smile, as he held her, and she spoke again while in his grasp.

“Do you…trust me?”, she asked in a challenging manner.

Thunder clapped loudly outside and caused the house to vibrate slightly. Then her smile turned to a scowl. She freed herself from his arm and in an instant was on the far end of the long hallway in the shadow again, next to the grandfather clock. She spoke in a flat voice and said.

“He doesn’t want me to have you…and he…is a tyrant…a tyrant whose will is no trifling matter…”

She paused a second and then continued.

“Come to bed with me? He only grumbles to warn you, he won’t interfere with your freedom of will. So come to me my love, join me in our bedroom. I do not require much ‘sleep’. However, I know exactly how to lull you to sleep…and you…you need your rest.”

Malakai was confused and apprehensive, but her allure was too great. He followed her, as she disappeared around the corner. When he got to the end of the hallway and to the corner where she had turned, he saw that it led to a large round foyer type area and at the end of the foyer were two large wooden doors. The large doors slowly and audibly creaked open, revealing an ornate bedroom lit by the bright glow of the moon from outside. She sat at the end of a large bed and said,

“Come rest my love. I won’t bite…in fact if I bit you, I’d certainly die.”

Malakai stood in the foyer area looking in the bedroom at her. She reached out her hand again and this time her smile felt, genuine. He really did not feel she wanted to harm him in that moment. Even the thunder subsided a bit and the rain slowed down slightly. Malakai stepped toward her and slowly walked into the bedroom…

To be continued…

Written by Marcos Lopez – 7/20/22024