[The Reading] Ley Lines
Posted: 04 Aug 2018, 03:02
THE TEN OF SWORDS REVERSED
The events in this post take place shortly after Arauchia was turned in Summer 2011Unnecessary breaths rushed in and out of Adela's lungs as she sprinted down the street. The sun was rising behind her and she could feel it's siren song calling her to slumber. Boots skidded across the pavement as she turned the corner, her goal now in sight. The sewer grate lied just ahead of her. Adela rapidly closed the last yards between herself and the manhole cover, which she rapidly shoved aside before leaping down the opening. Fingers of one hand caught on the ladder rungs while the others reached to pull the cover back and protect her from the oncoming solar flare.
With a bit of a dejected sigh, the fledgling shadow slid down the ladder rails and landed on the cobblestone below. One of Adela's only solaces was that the eternal darkness of the sewer helped stave sleep off for a little longer. She slowly trudged off towards the northwest where her little makeshift camp would be awaiting her. A scowl was worn into her pale features as she revisited her current predicament, much like she always did during her walk home every morning.
Three weeks ago her entire existence had been dumped on its ***. Adela had chased a notorious gangster's trail her from Spain, to Italy, to New York, then out to Harper's Rock. Turned out there was a whole group of gangsters operating out of this little podunk town. They seemed to have a good relationship with the police, so they were able to operate relatively uninhibited. While the Spaniard loathed this corrupted arrangement, it would make it far easier for her to infiltrate the stronghold and take out her mark. Thusly, her blades found his neck and Adela slipped out to prepare to head on home. But she didn't make it.
On her way back to the hostel, Adela found herself under attack by a brunette woman whom she would later come to know as Shan. The last thing she remembered before blacking out was a sharp burning pain in her neck. Next thing she knew she work up on a couch in a stately looking manor and the woman who had attacked her was gone. Without her maker sticking around, Chia felt alone. Granted she poked her head in from time to time at the shadow's guild, but Chia was largely left to her own devices other then the discussions she had been having with Velveteen and Zachariah Staus.
As she reached her alcove, Adela kicked off her boots and started to unroll her sleeping bag. She collapsed onto it, curling up into a little ball as the tears began again like they would every night. Adela had gone from a jet-setting, work hard play hard sort of existence to being stuck in this tiny town. She felt utterly trapped, unable to escape from this fate that had been chosen for her. Supposedly, Shan liked how Adela moved as a hunter while dispatching that slumlord and hand picked her to be apart of the undead legion. Least that's what Velveteen told her. Sure, Adela could see that as a compliment. She just wished to have been consulted before she was robbed of her family, lifestyle, and freedom in moments. Violet eyes squeezed shut as the blonde let her mind drift off to memories of the sun, and that walking into it might be a not so bad way to end her suffering.
But wait a second. Adela abruptly sat up and her eyes shot back open. Instead of cursing her luck for the thousandth time, a new idea came to mind. Senor Staus had talked to her the other day about something for his city council project or something. The different households and factions were discussing how to better manage vampires that violated the code of secrecy they were all to uphold. Things like being spotted snacking on humans, or using powers recklessly in the open. He was proposing a bounty hunting agency.
That wasn't all too dissimilar then what she was, right? Instead of hunting corrupt and cruel humans, she would just be going after badly behaving vampires. And making god money to do it. But furthermore, what if being a vampire made her a more efficient assassin. Then if she could get home, she could help her beloved family in Spain carry out their calling. For the first time in weeks, a faint smile appeared on Adela's thin pink lips. Tomorrow, she would go back and as Senor Staus more about his ideas. But for now she let the anguish fade away and slip into deep sleep.