Death, A New Beginning [Lancaster d’Artois]

[Shadis (DELETED 7818)]

Her black, peep toed heels clicked upon the cemented ground while the hem of her plain, black dress caressed her calves. She wore a black cardigan to cover her shoulders, but it did nothing to hide the v neckline of the dress. Her long black tresses were pinned up in a messy bun, but the occasionally lock fell from its place to frame her pale face. Her brown hues watched where her steps went, but tucked safely in her little black hand bag, were drugs that she didn’t care to remember the name of. The only thing that she had told the drug dealer, was that she wanted a lot of it and it costed her a pretty penny. The price didn’t matter to her anymore, because she was coming back from her mother’s funeral.

Shadis had only had one living relative left as she had been the only child of Landeril and Lily Divinus. Her father had died when she had been young and so she didn’t really know him, at least, that was all that her mother had told her. She hadn’t let that bother her though and she had excelled within her classes, gotten into University and majored in the Science of Occult Studies as such things had always appealed to her. Lily, her mother had always encouraged her, even though she had protested at first, preferring her daughter to major in business or law. After graduation, she decided to become a professor at the very same university and never regretted it. That was until she had received a phone call of her mother’s accident. It was all a blur now, everything including the funeral. Now, she was left with nothing and she just didn’t know how to deal.

She wanted to work, but the University had given her leave to grieve and no matter how hard she tried, she just simply couldn’t grieve in the way that was expected of her. She didn’t want the reality of her mother's death, to be real. So she had decided that she would join her, but suicide had never been something that she really had the nerve to do. Shadis believed that drugs would be easier to take but she needed to ply herself with as much liquor as possible and just as it happens, the place where she was staying was a pub. The woman pushed through the doors of the pub and a sigh fell upon her lips, she knew her face should be red with tears, but they just simply wouldn’t come. Perhaps it was because her intentions were to join her mother in eternal death.

Slowly, she darted behind and between moving bodies towards the bar and slipped onto a stool and gently tapped the bar until she had a tender’s attention. “Just some aged scotch if you have it,” she said before she proceeded to pull the pins from her hair and her raven locks tumbled down around her shoulders. Her shoulders sloped then as she gathered the pins to shove into her small purse before she rested her forearms upon the bar, her lips pursed and her gaze focused upon the bottles behind the bar. If only she could drink herself to death, to fall off the edge of a tall building. Finally, the glass was presented and the tender poured the liquid into it. Just as he was about to pull away, her hand moved to grasp the stranger’s wrist, “Please, leave the bottle. I’ll pay for it, just…” The woman took a deep breath and nodded, “Just leave the bottle.”

[Lancaster]

When Lancaster woke up in the morgue, he did not call for help.

Clambering out of the cold, metal drawer was an effort; his limbs ached, and his mind was in overdrive. He imagined this was what it must feel like to have woken up from a nightmare, only to realise that it wasn’t a nightmare. It was real. Although he had spent time in the Shadow Realm before, this time it was worse. This time, he really did lose his mind. Even as he pulled the crisp air into his lungs, even as he felt the hardness of the floor beneath his feet, the metal table cold and sharp against the palm of his hand as he stumbled to regain his balance, he struggled to comprehend where he was or how he had got there.

It took him a few minutes to realise that he was alone; that the sobbing, ragged, tormented voice that he heard did not belong to anyone else. It belonged to him. If he’d had the foresight, if he’d had the focus and the concentration he might have tried contacting Cytherea or Skylar. One of them could have met him here. They could have brought him clothes. They could have helped.

Looking back, now, he was glad that he hadn’t. He was glad that they didn’t have to witness him like that, so lost and confused, so completely out of his wits. He already assumed they could not think much of him, their seemingly pacifist sire who suffered bouts of tempestuous violence. Their conflicted sire, who wanted to keep them safe. But he couldn’t, could he? They had found men who they felt safer beside. No, he did not believe that they didn’t care about him. But he did not believe that they needed him.

In one of the cupboards he’d found some scrubs. With every last ounce of his wits, of his barely-together sanity, he’d made it back to Lancaster’s; Allurists have a way about them. It had not been hard to convince a kindly soul to give him a lift back to the pub; he’d gone through the back door and straight upstairs. Pi, Skylar, and Cytherea were alerted as to his return, but only after he’d had an hour-long shower, the water set to boil, and he was dressed.

Curled up in the armchair, he hadn’t know what to do with himself. He hadn’t known how to proceed. He hadn’t wanted to sleep anymore, but he couldn’t resist the sun’s pull.

When he woke up, he dressed; the usual jeans, and plaid, button-up t-shirt. Tonight's variety was blue and white, the top two buttons undone, the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. He moved like an automaton; work. If all else failed, he could work. He could do that. It would be a distraction, and the crowd would help. That’s how he found himself down in the bar; behind it, he continued to work like an automaton, doing things by habit. He even smiled by habit, greeting the customers and pouring their drinks like every good owner should. He collected glasses. He washed them. He served. Around and around it went.

Until he felt the strong grip of a hand on his wrist; he blinked, finally looking. Finally actually seeing the customer in front of him; a woman. Young. And so sad. So, ******* sad. He could feel it, thrumming through her fingers. Could feel it, as if it entered his own bones. He nodded, slowly, and put the bottle down on the counter. He glanced at the bottle he’d picked; inadvertently, he had picked his favourite. His drink of choice.

”That’s the best in the house,” he said, his Australian accent contrasting with the Canadian twang around them.

”You should enjoy it slowly…” he said, almost inquisitive. Hoping, maybe, that the woman might open up. He had to remind himself that he couldn’t fix everyone. Even if he tried.

[Shadis (DELETED 7818)]

Shadis’s fingers slowly let go of the man’s wrist and her hands wrapped around the glass instead. She almost didn’t catch what the man said, but she did. She blinked once and then she lifted her chin so she could actually see the man in front of her and noted the jeans paired off with the plaid, button up shirt. The colours were interesting, blue and white although she didn’t know why. “The best… huh?” She lifted the glass so she could take a sip and she nodded. “I have to agree, I have never tasted anything like it,” And probably won’t ever again, she thought to herself. Such a waste of a good scotch really, especially when it will all end tonight. Her chocolate hues looked back at the man and glanced over his form for a change, why did he stop to talk to her when she had thought that he had been nothing but busy before?

“Enjoyment is not really a luxury tonight good sir,” for I shall meet death soon enough. She knocked back the rest of the liquor before she moved to pick up the bottle and pour herself another drink. The woman glanced at the man before she pursed her lips a little, why was she even bothering with conversation with this man? It was a little pointless now, but perhaps the conversation would help her gain the courage to actually commit suicide. “I’m surprised that you paused to have a chat with a lonely traveler such as myself.” There was no point in admitting that she actually came from Harper Rock, that she had been born here until she moved away. It was the man’s accent that really peaked her interest however, “I believe that I don’t really know your accent sir. Curious, do you mind if I ask just as to what it is?”

As soon as she asked, her head angled slightly to the right before she return her visage back to the drink in hand. While she generally enjoyed a scotch nice and slow, her goal was nearing and time was an issue. The young woman wanted to be gone by sunrise, to no longer be breathing the air that surrounded them. Sunrise was her goal and time ticked by as she sat and drank the scotch. Unfinished business kept flooding her mind; she was somewhat of a perfectionist like that, but as each thought entered, she shoved it away. It all no longer mattered, no one would grieve for the one that was an only child. She didn’t have friends and that was because she had surrounded herself with books and her research. She only had co-workers with no emotional attachments to them. Her last emotional attachment had just died and she couldn’t grieve for her. She was unable to.

The woman looked up again, only to see him still there and she simply shook her head. “I’m not really much of a talker, especially upon this day.” She finished off her glass and continued to pour herself another glass. “Work has given me extended leave and it is expected that I grieve, yet I cannot find the tears to do so.” A sigh caressed her lips and she lifted her right arm so then her elbow could rest upon the bar top and she leaned her head into her upturned palm. At this point and the rate of her drinking, her mind was buzzed and her perfectionist thoughts were no longer strong. They were thoughts that were placed into a file to be viewed later, a later which would never come if she went through with her plans upon this night.

[Lancaster]

Intrigue held Lancaster steadfast. The staff were used to this; their boss was often snagged by one particular person at the bar. He often stopped to talk to people for hours at a time. They thought it was just a quirk; part of his normally buoyant personality. They did not know that sometimes, the customers liked talking to him because of his honesty. Lancaster had a way with words; his honesty was never brutal, never blunt. Not if it didn’t need to be. He wove intricacies into his sentences, philosophies that he’d picked up from random books, or from history. He was a reader, Lancaster; although he had never studied further than high school, he was a man of the world. He’d never really picked up technology, often scolded for his inability to reply to text or emails, or often check the family forum. He didn’t see why he should live his life through technological gadgets when he could just as easily talk to people face to face.

When on a plane or a boat, on a bus or a train, it was always so easy to just pick up a book and read. Or write his music. The music had fallen by the wayside, recently; something that he would have to try to seek to remedy. It had helped, in the past. Where some people wrote journals to vent, Lancaster played. His emotions were flung into the void via song.

Besides which, with his empathic abilities, he tried to help as many people as he could. He tried to embody the cliche bartender; the one whose shoulder a stranger could always cry on. People were drawn to him, sometimes, like flies to honey. He didn’t mind. He quite liked it.

And this woman… she was so proper. She spoke as if she’s stepped out of the 1800s, her words so formal in comparison to today’s lingo. And despite her admission to being not much of a talker, she certainly had a lot to say. She had asked him a question, only to move on, to talk about her own sorrows. Leave to grieve. Someone had died, then. That wasn’t too hard to guess.

”Australia,” he said, in answer to her question.

”Call me the pied piper of travellers. I used to be one. Now I run a haven through which they can find reprieve,” he said with a small smile. Normally, he’d have tried to infuse the conversation with his own good humour. He’d have tried to lift her spirits. It was hard to do, when his own spirits were severely lacking.

”Elliot Lancaster,” he said, straightening as he offered his hand in greeting. ”I’m sorry to hear that you’re grieving. The scotch is on the house,” he said. Whether or not it was wise to give a bottle of alcohol to someone who was grieving was questionable. But Lancaster was a generous person, and he knew that if he were in this woman’s place, he’d want to drink himself into a stupor, too. In fact, he was already half considering taking a bottle up with him once the bar was closed. It might be nice to be completely drunk, before sleep took him again.

[Shadis (DELETED 7818)]

The man offered his hand and she straightened up so then she could shake the man’s hand with her right. “A pleasure to meet you Elliot, the name is Shadis…” She was about to mentioned her last name, but there was no point. She was the last of her line that she knew of and it would soon be a dead line. “Just Shadis.” She attempted to smile at the man, but it was almost a grimace, “A pied piper huh? Well, this place is lovely. I have a room here actually, I got here last night truth be told, but I won’t be staying long.” Not in this world anyway.

It was then that she realized that she still had a hold of his hand and she slowly let go of it and dipped into her purse to throw the last of the money that she had upon the bar. “Sorry to leave suddenly, but I have a… schedule to keep. Plus… I prefer to pay my way, no freebies for me tonight. Oh… and keep the change, I won’t be grieving for long.” Another sigh followed as she snapped her purse closed and slid off the stool, her right hand snagged the bottle off of the counter as she moved away. The humour had slid right over her, for she had a one tracked mind.

She moved in between and behind people once more as she made her way towards the stairs and she slid her purse over her shoulder so then her left hand could grip the rail as she made her way up them. Her path from the bar to her room was slow and mostly a blur, but the man, the Australian man stuck in her mind. Why did he offer to give her the scotch? Why had he been so nice when he had previously been focused and busy with his work? The questions stayed for only a brief moment until the door to her room closed behind her. Slowly, she placed the bottle upon the bedside table before she kicked off her shoes and shrugged off her black cardigan. The young woman reached into her purse and pulled out the bottle of little blue pills. Never would she had considered drugs, never in her right mind until today.

Shadis sat down upon the bed as she stared at them for a moment and she took the scotch bottle in hand and drank deeply. Once she pulled the bottle away, a sigh caressed her lips. She would have done it by now, but the man stayed in the fore-front of her mind for some reason. He was kind and she regretted the way she spoke to him, but she couldn’t see any real reason to develop a friendship with a man when she wasn’t going to be around long enough. It was a shame really, that he or one of his staff members would find her dead body after sunrise. She shook the little bottle of pills again, before she lifted the bottle of scotch to her lips once more to drink a mouthful. It was now or never.

The young woman popped open the lid of the pills and tilted her head back to pour the pills into her mouth. She struggled to swallow them all, but she lifted the scotch and drank to help her swallow the rest. Swallow after swallow, she placed the bottle of scotch upon the bedside table and shifted her position to lie upon the bed just when she began to feel it, the lack of air as if she was suffocating. Her mouth gasped open as she rolled over to her side and she felt so light headed, so dizzy. Pain lanced through her body and it started to convulse as she felt everything start to slip away.

[Lancaster]

Literally, he wanted to say. Sometimes when he got up on that stage, when he sang to the crowd of humans, they gathered at the foot of the stage like rats ready to bend to his will. Most of the time they came to their senses, afterwards. Every now and again he had people follow him around, back to the bar; ask him questions, and become far too interested in his life. With his inability to lie, Lancaster had grown accustomed to new and adventurous ways of escape.

Except, he hadn’t the chance to expand upon anything that he had said, nor question Shadis’s response. He’d wanted to ask where she was from; what was the origin of the name? With her tan complexion, her dark eyes, dark hair, she looked exotic. Indian? Middle-Eastern? She had said she was a traveller. Half the reason Lancaster had opened Bunk Backpackers was so that he could talk to the travellers. He could live vicariously through them.

He wanted to know her story. Who had died, and why here? Why did she not live here, with the person who had died? Where was she going now, and what would she do? Questions that could be asked delicately, answers that could be lured without having asked any questions at all.

Instead, Lancaster was forced to not an accept Shadis’s departure. He couldn’t force people to stay and drink at the bar and nor could he force them to share their woes and allow him to try to help them. He watched as she weaved through the crowd, before he took the money from the bar and deposited it in the til. People always came and went. When they left, he would get back to work. He would find someone else to talk to. And though Lancaster did get back to work - though he did clear away some empty glasses and pour another couple of drinks, he couldn’t get the woman’s last words out of his head. They kept repeating themselves, over and over, the bad feeling in his gut churning until it was unbearable.

Keep the change. I won’t be grieving for long.

It was an odd time to think about it, but Lancaster remembered Stryge; the last man that Pi had turned. He had tried to kill himself with a shotgun that she had sold to him. Oh, how he wished Pi were beside him tonight. The bar was empty without her. Something was missing.

But then he saw Shadis’s dark eyes again. He felt her hand on his wrist and he remembered how sad she’d felt. How it had, somehow, spoken to a grief that lived so freshly inside of him. It was perhaps twenty minutes later that he dropped the cloth and weaved his way through the crowd. He made his way to the stairs and bounded up them, two at a time. Six foot six in height, it wasn’t hard for his lanky body to scale the floor. It took only a second to find the check-in book. To find her name, and the room she occupied.

At the door, he knocked. The keys jangled in his hand, that bad feeling spreading throughout his limbs. He didn’t even remember grabbing the keys, but he had them. And for good reason. When he got no answer, he knocked again. He called out her name. He tried the door, but it was locked. Cursing under his breath, he found the right key and slid it into the lock. He pushed the door open.

When he saw her lying there, with the empty pill bottle nearby, he blamed himself.

It was what Lancaster was good at, blaming himself. He should not have given her that bottle of scotch. He should have told her she wasn’t allowed to take it away; she had to drink it at the bar. Why hadn’t he seen this coming?!

”No, no. Shadis! What have you done?!” he all but wailed, voice deep with frenzied concern; as if he’d known this woman all his life, and her actions had cut him to the core.

[Shadis (DELETED 7818)]

Shadis had heard that when someone’s life flashed before their eyes, she never really thought that it would be literally. In her barely conscious mind as she gasped for air, she heard the Australian man’s voice cry out for her. Why? Why when he didn’t even know her? Another convulsion as her gaze found the man’s form standing in the doorway. Why did he care? She wanted to say not to care, to just accept that she was dying, but without the air that she couldn’t quite get she couldn’t say a word. The colour of her skin had turned a pale blue due to lack of oxygen and froth bubbled forth from her lips as her eyes rolled back into her head. She felt the darkness crawl into the fringes of her vision and she couldn’t help but wonder about the Australian man. The woman felt her body give one more shudder and her head fell to the side, her fingers slowly opened, revealing small half-moon cuts from her nails when they dug into the palms of her hands.

The darkness swept her under like a blanket cocooning a person in sleep. She would never have felt that it would be such a welcomed feeling, as she barely slept and once she had caught onto something which had caught her appeal; she barely ate too swept up in her work. Her mother used to laugh and check upon her often, she even made trips to see her beloved daughter working as a professor at the Uni. It had been one of those returns from seeing her daughter, that a drunk had crash into her mother’s car; a drunk that had walked away while her mother died of blood loss. Shadis had blamed herself for her mother’s death, if only she had worked closer, if only she had insisted that she stayed an extra day. The darkness swelled like the ocean broiling with dark intentions, however she felt as if she was floating.

Was this death? Was this how it felt like to be dead? She reached a hand out only to press it to her pained chest, as if her heart was still thudding, struggling to give her body life. ’Just stop,’ she whispered to it. If only she could command her body now, but it was out of her hands, she just had to wait until her heart gave up just like she had. Life wasn’t worth living, not without her mother, her mother who had been her anchor. ’Mother… I’m coming, I will be with you in death soon enough,’ she said to the swelling darkness that surrounded in swirling patterns which threatened to take her to their depths. It wouldn’t be something that she would struggle against, but instead welcomed it. It just wasn’t happening soon enough, had she not taken enough drugs? Had the Australian man called an ambulance? She hoped not.

Softly she bit her bottom lip, not that she felt it, she couldn’t feel anything anymore, just the death that surrounded her and waited. Waited for the inevitable end, surely the drugs had had enough time to work their way through her system. No one could save her, no one and she found solace in that fact. The woman closed her eyes and sighed, every tensed muscle in her body relaxed as she fell backwards into the swirling darkness. As she did this, she felt her heart slow down and it was only a matter of time before it gave its last beat. ‘Goodbye world, I will not be missed…’

[Lancaster]

Suicide was not something that Lancaster had ever considered for himself, and nor would it be something he would ever consider after what he had just experienced. What would death be like for a human? Would they go to the same place the vampires did? Was that who the spirits were, that the vampires consumed for their own benefit? The lost souls. Wasn’t there a myth about those that committed suicide? They did not go to heaven, and they did not go to hell. They went to purgatory. It wasn’t a belief that Lancaster invested in. He didn’t believe in heaven or hell and, to him, the Shadow Realm was hell.

If he thought about it later, he’d know that was part of the reason why he saved her. It was part of the reason why he’d try. He’d just come back. from hell, and he would put anyone through that. Not even a stranger - someone he didn’t know.

What kind of person would allow another person to kill themselves? It wasn’t within Lancaster’s nature, anyway, regardless of where he’d just been and how much he had struggled to get back. He went immediately to the bedside table and picked up the phone; he dialled out, and called for an ambulance. The operator picked up and asked what the emergency was; Lancaster hesitated. He reached over, to grab Shadis’s wrist, fingers pressed tight to the pulse. It was fading. The ambulance would take too long.

”It’s… I made a mistake, sorry,” he said, before quickly hanging up the phone. He didn’t want to hear the lecture about prank calls; it hadn’t been a prank. It had been serious. But it was too late. Even Lancaster could tell, it was too late. Even if he stuck his fingers down her throat to try to get her to throw up whatever it was she had taken, it was too late. No, if he was going to get her to respond, it wouldn’t be to throw anything up. It would be to consume.

The phone now hung up, Lancaster clambered onto the bed and pulled the woman’s body onto his lap. Without thinking about it, he brought his wrist to his mouth; he summoned thirst, hunger. He thought of Pi. The canines lengthened until he could tear into his own wrist, the pain nothing in comparison to what he had suffered before.

He tried not to make a mess as he tilted Shadis’s chin, pushing his bleeding wrist over her mouth.

”C’mon, mate. Trust me. You do not want to die,” he said, almost begging. [/font][/size]

[Shadis (DELETED 7818)]

Death, it was so close that Shadis watched the tendrils of darkness slowly wrap around her wrist as she fell towards them. However, she was snapped back to her body for some odd reason as she felt a trickle of thick, sweet and coppery liquid making its way down her throat. Was this death? She wanted nothing more than to cough it back up, to tear herself away from this delightful source of liquid, but her survival instincts kicked in and she swallowed. Another shudder from her drug riddled form soon followed and she felt herself begin to slip from the reality once more, as she was pulled back under by the sweet coolness of the darkness that surrounded her unconsciousness. Death had finally claimed her and she felt relief as her beating heart finally gave its last beat.

The woman didn’t know what to expect from death itself, she was surrounded by pure darkness with no hint of light, she couldn’t even see her own hand in front of her face. “Mother?” She called out to the open nothingness and she began to ran, she ran as if she could find the one person that she was looking for. ”Mother! I have come to stand beside you, to be with you even in death. Please! Respond to me!” Shadis came to a complete stop and looked over her shoulder, not that she could see anything. She lifted her right hand to run through her raven hair, what happened? Where was she? Had she truly died or is this just a small death detour? The woman didn’t know what she had expected. She had read about heaven and hell and due to her occult studies, had even heard of a purgatory, is that where she had found herself? ”No…” she whispered as she fell to her knees, she had died only to end up here? What had gone wrong?

It was then that she remembered the sweet, coppery taste of a liquid that had trickled down her throat, something that she had never in her life tasted and it was then that she began to shake her head. ”No…” Had the Australian man gotten to her in time? Had he managed to call and get the paramedics to her in time? It was the only explanation that she could think of that made any logical sense. Why? Why did the man care? Why did he save her? Was she in a coma? No… She couldn’t be, the woman had felt her heart give its final beat and it's last beat had echoed inside her own mind before silence had reigned. Her hand moved to her chest and clutched tightly at the fabric just above her heart as if she could feel any movement there, but she felt nothing but cold. She was dead, this much she knew.

Then, it was almost as if she felt a call or a pull to turn and walk in a particular direction, which she did. Perhaps it had been death that called her, or she deeply hoped that it was her mother responding to her call. What else was there to do? She couldn’t see anything else and as dead as she was, she apparently was alone in her death. So, as she walked closer and closer, she reached a hand out and it was almost as if she could see it. It was almost as if she could mentally see a light inside of her own mind, one that told her everything was going to be ok. She reached out towards it, hoping against hope that wherever she ended up, she would see her mother.

[Lancaster]

There was nothing to indicate that it had worked. Although Shadis had woken up, although Lancaster had seen and felt her take some of the blood he’d all but forced down her throat, he could not be certain. Her body went limp in his arms, the heart stopped beating. For all he knew, he could have been too late. The drugs might have counteracted the blood; they might have been too strong for whatever magic it was that thrummed through Lancaster’s veins.

For a couple of minutes, he didn’t move. His eyes squeezed shut and he rocked, with Shadis in his arms. He mourned not only for this unknown woman and her death, but because of his own proximity to it. Since he’d come back he’d tried to ignore it, the terror. The fact that he had struggled so much to get back. On top of which, Pi was gone. To Paris. Alone. He hadn’t grieved. Not until now.

But he didn’t let it hold him for long. He didn’t allow his emotions to overwhelm him; he pushed them to the edges of his consciousness. He had responsibilities. Always, with the responsibilities. Taking a deep breath, Lancaster slid off the bed and checked the Backpackers outside. No one was there. Stepping across the room he opened the door to the stairs that led up - to his own private quarters. It was where Skylar had been electrocuted. It was where he had taken Sia. It was now where he had decided to live, in Pi’s absence - but that didn’t mean he couldn’t have company. Did it?

He would think about that later. Back at the room, he bundled Shadis’s unconscious body into his arms. She still showed no signs of life, and Lancaster wanted to mourn all over again. But he kept it together. He carried her out of the room and up the stairs, making sure the door closed and locked behind him. Upstairs, he carried Shadis to the bed; the attic was enclosed, and there were no windows. No way for the sun to get in, whenever it chose to rise.

He laid her out on top of the blankets, a pillow under her head. He pulled the armchair up beside the bed, and he sat. He waited, his head in his hands. They’d probably all think he had a problem. Whenever he died, he’d come back and sire more people. But unlike Sia, this had not been a choice. This had been circumstance.

If he could save the whole world from dying, from going to that place, he would.

He tried to think. He tried to focus. Could he feel it? A bond? Was that such a thing? But he couldn’t focus. He couldn’t figure it out. Even when he laid a hand across the woman’s forehead, he couldn’t figure it out. So he waited.