Chapter 374: Ways to Kill a Vampire 2
"It was an incredibly dull book, honestly," Nedra recalled. "And because it was so old, some of the language was difficult to understand, particularly concerning the vampire’s immortality. Zagan originally had hoped I would be able to end his life for him, and when I couldn’t, he gave up on me being able to do it. But I kept researching as much as I could. Killing him would mean freedom for all of us."
"You seem pretty free," Penelope remarked. "You aren’t in containment, are you?"
Nedra frowned. "Just because I am not in containment does not mean I’m free. He knows I won’t flee. He has too much leverage," she mumbled.
"Who are you?" Penelope asked again, having not received an answer the first time.
"My name is Nedra. I created the island here," she told her.
Penelope huffed, shaking her head in response. This Nedra had done an incredible amount of work to help the vampire.
"I know how it looks, but..."
"Do you? Because it LOOKS like you are co-conspirator in locking all of these alyko away. You are giving him the very means in which to do it!" Penelope exclaimed, shaking her wrists out in front of her to emphasize the point by displaying the golden cuffs she was bound with.
"You should have seen how they were kept before!" Nedra replied. "They were dying just from neglect and fear and hopelessness. Now most of them have a lot of freedom, and even those who are more restricted have the sun and trees and... each other. It is so much better than it used to be."
"They are still here! Prisoners of a vampire! Collectibles kept like objects just for their remarkable ability," Penelope exclaimed.
"Look Winter, even if I did none of this for him—even if I left the alyko in the dark and refused to help him, or if I freed them all, he would just kill the people I love and go retrieve all of his precious alyko again, locking them away to rot. I am trying to make the best of a bad situation here!"
Penelope groaned and dropped her head in her hands. "I don’t agree with you. I don’t think you should just roll over and do whatever he wants."
"Who says I’m rolling over?" Nedra yelled and then grimaced, glancing to the thick stone wall, praying it was thick enough to contain her voice.
Both females glared at each other until Penelope finally groaned. "What did it say in this book? What was the notation about a vampire’s mate?"
"The book spoke of their immortality—how that which is not living cannot die. And it pretty much left it at that, but someone scrawled in the margin: ’That which is not living also cannot mate, and yet the heart beats for a rare few who find a creature destined for them.’"
"It said exactly that?" Penelope asked, running it through her scientific mind for analysis.
"It may not have been exactly that, but that is what I recall. And what I took from it is that..."
"That a mate is possible—destined even—for a rare few, and that those rare few will have a heart that beats," Penelope interrupted. "Which means those are also the rare few who can die."
"Precisely," Nedra nodded.
"Who’s to say that they aren’t vampires who already have a beating heart—like from the very beginning. How do we know a mate would start the heart beating?" Penelope asked.
"We don’t. We don’t know anything," Nedra shrugged. "But if a vampire had a beating heart from the beginning, then they wouldn’t be a vampire."
"That is interesting," Penelope agreed.
"But the ’rare few’ part made that possibility kind of go out the window. I didn’t give it a whole lot of thought afterward. How lucky would that be if Zagan were actually one of the rare few to have a mate?" Nedra chuckled bitterly.
"You’re right," Penelope groaned. "And how would we even be able to identify a mate for a particular vampire? That is a whole other scientific experiment entirely."
Nedra’s eyes narrowed at Penelope who was staring hard at the floor, imagining ways to artificially create a mate for Zagan. "Where is August?" she asked.
"She went ’exploring’ to try to find where the alyko are kept," the Winter answered.
"Exploring where? How was she able to get out?" she asked.
"Just the castle, but she has been gone too long," Penelope replied, wringing her hands together nervously. "She has an enchanted talisman. It was her mate’s."
"There are no alyko here in the castle other than you two. Unless there is more I don’t know about, but he hasn’t asked me to make other cages like this one," she told her. "That’s why I was so curious about who was in here."
"Well it’s great you’re here. You can help us," Penelope said, standing up from the bed. "Let me out, and we can go find August together."
"Why would I do that?" Nedra chuckled.
"Because... you can," Penelope frowned. "Why wouldn’t you? We want the same things. We want to find a way to kill him."
"And you think that just because you’re here, all of the sudden that can be done? I’ve been wanting that for years, Winter. Years. And he has been wanting it for even longer than that," she said, outstretching an arm toward Zagan’s room.
"Has he though?" Penelope asked. "Are you certain that he wants to die? Or is that just a way he justifies this massive operation he has going on here? It seems to me like he is enjoying himself too much. He finds this all very entertaining."
"He seems to be enjoying himself when he’s with you?" Nedra asked. "I’ve never witnessed anything like that. He is always angry and miserable, keeping to himself for the most part—locked up alone in this dark castle. He is careful around me, because he needs me, so he doesn’t rage like he used to when I’m around. But I see a creature who hates his own existence, which is why he takes it out on the alyko. He takes it out on his lycans, too."
Penelope thought back to the times they were together. He followed her around like a puppy, teasing her when she couldn’t open doors. He didn’t seem miserable. He was intelligent and curious and terrifying sometimes, sure, but definitely not the brooding, angry creature that Nedra was describing.
"Maybe he is just hopeful now that August is here. He knows she is different," Penelope suggested.
"Hmm. Maybe you are right."
But Nedra’s gaze narrowed in on Penelope once again. Regardless of what the Winter said, it was significant that she was here in the castle, too. It couldn’t just be that she was here to help with August. Zagan wanted her here. The question was why.
