4. ARA

I couldn't understand the way he'd made me want more of him. He'd vanished in the blink of an eye, and all I'd wanted was another kiss from those sweet lips. I couldn't even smell him in the air. Wherever he was, it wasn't here.

Estefania approached me, a flute of champagne in hand. "Where did—"

"Vanished," I grumbled.

"I'm surprised you're down here," she said.

"I had a question about this phone," I grumbled, pulling the thing out of my pocket. I didn't like sleeping for too long, the world would happily go on by while I slept. "What does this mean? And why does it keep saying not available?" I took the glass of champagne from her. The stuff was adored by humans. I placed my nose at the tip as my niece was busy looking at the phone. There was a strange notion of Nash in it, delicately balanced and sweet, just like him. He had secrets. I was desperate to figure them out.

"Ok, well, this is your WiFi, and you need it. It's for the internet. You have it installed, but there might be some dead zones in your apartment," she said. "Like areas of intense magical energy."

"Like your friend," I said, dipping a finger into the champagne and sucking it.

"We're not friends. He's just the only person here close to my age," she said. "But I saw the two of you kiss. What was that all about?"

"Witches are a distraction," I said, savoring the strange lingering taste of him in the champagne. "I can smell his magic, it's all around."

She giggled. "He was doing tricks for the guest. Making fireworks in champagne."

That made sense why the liquid tasted burned, but it was the magic I was mostly intrigued by. I finished the glass and found a counter to place it on. "Ugh," I grumbled as Estefania followed me around. "Why did I insist on a masquerade?"

"I don't know, uncle," she said. "But I think it was pretty fun."

"Of course, you do, sweetheart," I said, itching to take the mask off, but I didn't want to break the rules I'd set. It was a bad showing as the host to remove your mask. "I'm going to head back to my quarters. Make sure the guests have fun, and don't let any of them beyond the barrier."

She nodded and handed me the phone back. "And you've got to make sure you find those places with good internet connection," she said. "You've got to get through the last twenty years of world information."

The world had changed on all fronts. And I wasn't going to get to know all of it through information on a contraption. I needed to hear certain information, straight from the horses mouth. Like, the current supernatural world's standing amongst the humans.

I'd slept for twenty years. I wasn't going to bed anytime soon.

Fashions were the one area of change that always held me in great confusion. We'd gone through times of people wearing the tightest jeans and tank tops to the most loose fitting clothes like amorphas blobs. But the one trend that never went out was a sharp suit.

A midnight blue suit with stark white shirt and polished black boots allowed me to fit in. I'd combed my hair back and with a little pomade, held it in place.

The reality of my trip was to find the witches. I had to know more about Nash. He was so different to what I remembered of witches. The vampires and witches had a tumultuous past, so it was a surprise to find myself kissing one.

Passing the illuminated signs for dollar pizza slices and naughty video stores flashing pink and purple neon X's in their windows was hypnotic. I found myself staring at the signs and watching people walk in and out beyond the doors and the curtains.

New York was the city that never slept, because everyone was so busy fornicating. I headed into the store, beyond the velvet curtain to see rows of cases. People were moaning out, masturbating right there into their palms.

There was a scent, and it wasn't cum.

I locked eyes with a woman at another velvet door. A red one. Her blond hair, slicked back into a ponytail with two delicate strands curled up on her cheeks. She was a vampire. And from the scared look on her face, she knew I was one too.

Stepping quickly toward her, she didn't have enough time to form a sentence. Stuttering out an incoherent and incomplete thought.

"What's behind there?" I asked. "Your master?" I cooed, pursing my lips. "No. Your maker?"

"Mr. De—De—De—DeMauriel," she said, forcing a hand to her jaw to quell the chattering. "It's really you."

"Of course, darling, who else would I be?"

He bowed her head and rescinded the red velvet curtain with a pulley, opening it for me. "Hellenia is in charge. She is my maker and master."

"Hellenia," I repeated. "Is she back there?" The space behind the curtain was complete darkness.

She nodded. "She's been waiting for you."

As soon as I stepped beyond the curtain threshold, it fell back in place behind me. I headed forward in the comfort of complete darkness. There was another velvet curtain fifteen paces in front of me. It led to another, larger room, cold blue lights overhead had me raising an arm to recoil. "It's bright," I exclaimed.

The clip clop of heels on a hard surface came. First, from two angles were men in suits. And as they all formed a line across as if I was forced to pick from a line up.

They parted and Hellenia revealed herself. Six foot in heels. Electric purple hair tied up on top of her head. She wore a midnight blue power suit, the female version of mine. No shirt, just her breasts held up and pushed against the interior lapel of the jacket.

She tapped her foot on the stone and stared at me, lips pursed and brows knitted. "Well," she said.

"Hellenia, my oldest friend, I—"

"Old," she cackled. "Come here, it's been far too fucking long, Ara."

We met in the middle and embraced in a hug.

"And my best friend," I said. "I thought you would've moved on to bigger and better things."

"Next time you fall into a depression, please don't force yourself into a coffin for twenty years," she said, grabbing me by my cheek. "I missed you. I missed being havoc and mayhem with you."

"Me too."

"How did you find me?"

"Truthfully, I was staring at the neon outside, smelled something familiar, thought it might've been a trace of a witch I seem to find myself falling for," I said, feeling the biggest relief shake itself off me.

"You fall hard and fast, Ara," she said. "And for a witch."

I knew the warnings, I knew what people said. "So, who is this small army of men behind you?"

"Those are my mates," she said, gesturing a hand at all eight of them. "I really took control over my destiny once you were gone. I own businesses up and down Manhattan. These men don't get jealous, and they do exactly as they're told. At all times." She snapped her fingers and they all stood straight.

"If anyone was going to have find themselves at the center of a mating nest, it would be you," I said.

"And I use them to keep order," she said. "By the way, has anyone told you that you're considered a vampire elder now?"

A groan came out from the depths of my throat. "Please, don't."

"The vampires are going to want to see you," she said with a smirk. "There's only two of them left now. Some of the others fled to Europe, and others down to South America."

The vampire elders oversaw areas with vampire covens in them. I was never in their good books. I did as I pleased but I never had a coven or thrall. I preferred to live a solitary life, with my staff of helpers.

"I'm not ready for that type of responsibility," I told her.

"It's in the bylaws of the land," she said. "I won't report you being back among the living, but I can't say the same for all the other vampires in the city."

I shrugged. "Help me find a witch."

"The witch you're falling in love with?" she shook her head. "I don't get involved with the witches. Nobody gets involved with them."

"I'm not asking you to go rifling through their garbage, I'm just asking if you know of a witch name Nash," I said. "An aether witch, I believe." I pressed a finger to my lips. "Yes."

Hellenia turned to her thrall of mates behind her. "No promises," she said. "But I can ask around. I don't want you getting in over your head, Ara. The witches protect their own, and they've grown in strength since you went to sleep."

"Good." I took her hand and admired the ruby ring on her marriage finger. "Congratulations."

"No," she said. "I'm not married. This has the blood of my first mate."

"Rodrick?" I asked.

"Oh no, he wasn't my first. This is Julian's blood. He was a human. I had to let him go. And I refused to turn him. You see what happens when you turn a human into a vampire." She gestured her ringed hand to the men. "They're no longer themselves."

A smirk formed on my lips. "That's why you're not telling the elders about me. They'd never approve of you turning—one, two—eight men."

She giggled. "Remember those that are loyal to you, Ara." She patted a hand at her chest. "I'm loyal to you, and anything you need. My friend."

"I could do with a map," I told her. "I've forgotten all the regular haunts of the city."

Hellenia explained to me how a year after my slumber began, there was a shift, and all the major elders of the supernatural communities came together to move around the supermarkets, bars, and other establishments catered only to our kind. She had one of her thrall bring out a worn map from somewhere deep in her system. There were also new lines drawn out on the map of Manhattan, all segmented and color coded to show whose territory you were entering. I had a singular block where my apartment was. It had been zoned in black, which meant out of bounds for all.

"You can keep this," she said, rolling the map up. "The moment vampires without Alphas sniff that you're out of your coffin, they're going to come, seeking you to take them in."

My niece had left a lot out. Although I had to give her credit, she wasn't from here. "I can understand why a lot of vampires fled to Europe and South America now," I said. "It all seems to be a little controlling."

Hellenia had a smile that nothing could wipe clean. "Don't leave without saying goodbye," she said. "But I hope you'll stick around and try changing things. For far too long Raquel and Sven have been running things. They're together now too." Even snarling, she smiled.

Raquel and Sven, their names brought a hazy image to mind. There had been several elders. I'd know their names if I saw them written down, but they weren't coming to the front of my mind in the moment.

Armed with a map of the city, I knew exactly where I wanted to go.

Buried beneath an apartment building, only accessible by pressing the one, two, and three on an elevator button at the same time.

A sprawling underground market. A city under the city. It was incredibly busy, with market stalls, and food vendors. Heads turned in my direction, not all at once, but slowly, and surely, everyone eyed me, up and down. It had been a while since I'd been in the land of the living, not to say I was dead beforehand.

"You're the DeMauriel Alpha," a man said at candied fruit stall. "Please, take this." He offered me a sugar topped red apple in a bad.

"No," I said.

Accepting gifts was sometimes accepting ownership of some of these people. I didn't want to be indebted to any of them. I also didn't care that I was making myself known to the city again. I wasn't leaving the city, but I also wasn't going to kiss the ring of two so-called elders who were younger than me.

I didn't know exactly where I was going, but as I walked around, slowly becoming sucked into the underground world, I knew I was going to have a hard time coming out of it. I stopped by the doors of a bar, Fang-a-lot , it was themed in old British coats of arms, tapestries, and really tried to teleport me back in time until a woman at a podium, smacking gum in her mouth pulled me back to reality. "Hi, welcome to Fang-a-lot , what section of the bar do you want to be seated in tonight?"

"Segregated seating?" I pondered.

She looked me up and down. "Vampire."

I leaned in, the mint on her breath tried its best to hide the stench of rotting meat between her teeth. "Shifter," I mused.

"We're inclusive, but some people like to sit amongst their peers," she said.

"Do you have a witch section?"

She snorted. "Yeah, but witches don't come in here. So, we just use it as our mingle zone."

"Then I'll mingle."

The place was busy, people of all shifter creeds and vampire thralls were standing and seated, some together, others in their corners. This was the real education my niece should've been showing me. The way the world had stayed the same but also changed. Although she was busy entertaining my guests.

At the bar, I ordered myself a small drink of B-pos blood. I just enjoyed telling people to ‘be positive'. Blood had all types of notes to it, but most of it depended on who it came from. It was like wine in a way, different grapes gave different tastes, and all the ways it was crushed, pressed, and barreled up.

The blood I was given was awful. Like a mix of three people had poured themselves out in my mouth. I nearly threw it across the bar.

"Ara DeMauriel," a man's voice came at me from behind. "As I live and breath, I'd heard stories you'd killed yourself."

"Zo Boloric."

A tall, thin man, gaunt cheeks like he was constantly sucking the insides into his mouth. He was dressed in an ill-fit suit and as he walked, he held steady to a cane. He approached me with two youngsters behind him, almost waiting to see if he was about to topple over at either side.

"You're not dead," I remarked.

"Almost," he laughed, reaching me at the bar. He held himself up. "It's not a good time to be seeing me."

Zo was a weasel shifter, which seemed fitting considering he was considered the biggest snitch alive the last time I was awake.

"What happened to you?" I asked him.

"Witches," he said, coughing. He pulled out a handkerchief and spat blood into it. "I broke one of their things. An altar, whatever it's called. Cursed me. I no longer heal. And they told me they since the witch whose altar it was is dead, the spell has to run its course."

I glanced at the two boys behind him. "And those?"

"My protectors," he said, laughing and coughing more blood into the handkerchief. "It's funny, isn't it. But I cursed my bloodline too. Well, only if I die before my ninetieth birthday. In ten years, and then the curse will fall through to my offspring, and then their offspring."

"And you say witches did it?"

"No on purpose, I already asked the elders to convene, but I only have myself to blame," he said. "The witches are not the same as they were before you went under, Ara."

I felt like I was in a dream, almost. Everyone wanted to tell me about their experience with the witches. Perhaps world was around that I was set to take a seat at the vampire elder's counsel. It was unfortunate what had happened to Zo, but he knew the consequences of going through other's garbage.

"You should probably head home then," I told him. "Because I'm here looking for witches. Specifically, any of them that know of a young aether witch named Nash."

He shook his head. "Not that I know," he said, bowing his head at me again. "And I must refuse any offer to find out."

I pat his shoulder, feeling the bony exterior under his body. I could smell the death inside him, something foul was growing. I felt bad for the affliction, although it wasn't me who'd done it to him. "Good luck, Zo," I said. "I hope to see you around for the next ten years."

"And—and good luck to you, Ara, but please stay away from the witches."

The more I was told to stay away from them, the more I wanted to find them. I needed another kiss from Nash's lips, and I needed it before the feeling of them faded from my lips.