SWNOVELS Chapter Plans and Plots
Being alive is so very burdensome. I had forgotten after six thousand years of being dead, what it felt like to need to eat— to feel your stomach growling, demanding to be answered. I had forgotten what it felt like to need to sleep, to feel tiredness descend upon one’s very soul. And there were other bodily functions I had forgotten about; things one needed to do to take care of one’s self. I sighed. Life, if I could call it that— when I had been trapped in the black tower in the pit of hell, was much simpler— there I had simply existed, here I had to interact with other humans and pretend that I was someone I wasn’t. How was it possible that Lucifer had taunted and tainted so many women from my family line? I had known I was cursed, but I didn’t think God literally meant that the devil would kill all the women in my line… with the exception of Arabella and Mariah, he had slaughtered them all. Oh, of course he wouldn’t have called it that… no, HE thought he was doing us a favor, by bringing us back together, time and time and time and— no more. This wasn’t love! What had and I had had together, that had been once— a forbidden and quick love, but I had loved him. Now? A part of me craved him, after being alone for so long, to see one you loved? Of course, I would be crazy not to.
I sat up in the pretender’s bed, not having slept at all. I had begged her, the other Cassandra, to let me be in charge for a few days, just to get used to all these modern things I had never seen or heard of— like electricity, technology, the way people spoke… these slang words and colloquialisms, I could barely get my head around. Pushing myself up off the bed I walked over to the desk and sat, Mitzi, the cat jumped on my lap. This cat was so small, and yet, I couldn’t help but love her— she was the one living thing I felt like I could talk to, and she would just purr and allow me to be me, ancient and yet not, without judgment.
“Oh Mitzi! What am I going to do? I don’t know if the other me, I mean the other Cassandra will like this plan.. and I have no guarantee it will even work…” Mitzi looked up at me with her green eyes, her cat-like eyes, reminding me of Marcus, and she purred as I pet her. “But I have to try, don’t I?” Sighing, I put the cat on the ground and swiveled the desk chair, opening the drawer and pulling out a piece of paper and a pen. I had only recently learned how to write in this language, English, preferring the pictographs and symbols of my youth, which was a slight advantage now, knowing no one would be able to decipher my plans on this paper. The pens were wonderful, ink flowed out of them so smoothly and made it easy to keep records of what one wanted to say. Mitzi, not annoyed or put off that I had placed her on the floor rubbed up against my legs purring. “Alright Mitzi, here is the plan.” I paused briefly, making sure that my duplicate, Cassandra, was not eavesdropping… “I was thinking about the vampires. They don’t die, I mean one can kill them, but they don’t naturally die. So,” Yes, so… now would be the tricky part, or at least the part Cassandra the last Cassandra in my line might not like. “As a scarlet
woman, as I know from being the first of them all-” I squirmed in the hard wooden chair. “I have to die to be free of the curse, but I can only die if I am human.” Human… was I even human any more? These humans that existed in the now seemed so different then my brothers and sisters— were they truly daughters and sons of Adam?
The fan, which I loved, oscillated and blew my hair and papers everywhere, sending shivers down my spine. I sighed, and collected all the papers from where they had landed, again putting them on the desk in front of me. Mitzi jumped up and landed on the desk, planting herself on top of the papers I had just gathered. “That’s not helpful!” I scolded her, but as she meowed in return, my heart squeezed, and I knew I’d already forgiven her. I picked up the cat, put my pen on top of the papers in her place, and pulled her into a hug as I pet her, and she purred. I stood and began to pace the room, this little domesticated jungle cat in my arms. “So, if I am not human, then I won’t die.” I had been doing research on vampires, on this thing Cassandra had called a laptop— when I had been younger, and alive, I wasn’t aware that vampires could turn others to their race, I had just naively believed that they were born that way… after all, who would want a half life, even if it meant you would live forever. Now that I knew humans could be turned, the tiny thought I’d had the other day was taking a more definite shape. All I needed to do was to find a vampire willing to turn me, or this Cassandra— speaking of which, why had I been brought back? This Cassandra could have brought any of my past versions back, but she had asked for me? Was it because I was the only one who could figure out how to break the curse?
“What if I can’t find a vampire who will help me?” I fell backwards onto the bed, and Mitzi squirmed in my arms, not liking this change of positioning, I let her go, rather than suffer her murder mittens. I had been scratched by her a few times in the first few interactions I had had with her. Mitzi scrambled off the bed and went to play with a ball of yarn that was in the corner of the room. “Of course, there are lots of vampires at Acroft High…” Or I assumed they were based on what I had gleaned listening to Cassandra’s interactions with Mark, and the girls in her class. I could see their true form, what I didn’t understand was why Cassandra couldn’t. The girl, Violet, reminded me of my mother— Eve. I hadn’t thought about her at all in a long long time. I felt like no one really knew her, the real her, my mother. Sure there were myths and stories, but my fierce independant mother had been reduced to a footnote in history. Of course, she was the mother of all living, all humans, but she was much much more than that. My mother was not mild and fearful, she fought hand in hand with my father when animals attacked us, once we were pushed out of the garden. She disciplined us when we disobeyed, and she led our family— equally alongside Adam, helping him in every way he asked or needed, sometimes without even realizing he needed what she supplied. I had rebelled often, being punished for my disobedience, but afterward, my mother had pulled me into her arms and sang to me our history, and how loved we were by God. As much as I wanted to think I was different then my mother, I knew a lot of who I was, and how I acted was because of her model of motherhood and womanhood. My mother was a survivor, and now I had the ability to not just allow my family line to survive, but also to break the curse set upon me. Yes, we were going to survive. I would finally be at peace… but was that what I wanted? To go into a peaceful sleep, and enter the pearly white gates? I threw a pillow over my face, just as the alarm on the clock beside the bed screeched, which meant it was morning, and the other Cassandra would be waking soon, and I would be pushed to the background again, forced to either sleep or listen to her inane thoughts, and conversations as she went to school… unless…
“Okay Cassandra.”
Ahhh, here she was already…
“I gave you the whole weekend, and now I expect you to-”
“Wait!”
“What now?”
“Yes, you gave me the weekend, but please, let me have a few more days!” I tried not to think about my plan, so she wouldn’t see or hear what I was going to try to do.
“And why the hell should I?”
“I just need a few more days to figure out the ‘bumps’ if that’s what you’d call them, in this plan. I mean, you do want my plan to work, right?”
I felt her sigh, even though she was just a presence in the back of my brain, and I was still in control of her body. “You know, you’d have to go to school as me-as Cassandra? You’d have to actually take classes, and learn things?”
“Actually, that’s exactly what I was hoping for!”
“Really?”
“Yes really,” I muttered, as I stood and went over to the wardrobe. I opened it and pulled out a pair of jeggings, and a purple tank top. “I was thinking it was time for me to see if I could pull off being you— and this will be a great test.”
“And this will help you?”
“Absolutely.” I made a face at the outfit I had pulled out of the closet and threw the ensemble onto the bed, searching through the closet for something else.
“I mean-I guess… as long as you don’t put me in clothing thats-” she stopped short when she saw me holding up a floral dress with a sweetheart neckline and low scooped back. “Really?”
“What? It’s actually not that bad.” I held the dress up to myself and spun around, “I love the pattern, it’s like wearing a garden!” A giggle rose in my throat— I hadn’t laughed in, well in forever. I had forgotten I could laugh.
“Alright. Fine.”
I pulled the pink cotton nightie off and slipped into the dress, tying the back strap into a bow and then standing back to admire the way the dress fell, and swirled. “See? It has these cute little puffed sleeves, and it even goes just above my knee— there is no way you can tell me you think this dress is… what was the word you used?”
“Immodest.”
“Yes, that’s the word.” I closed the closet, and picked up the little gray purse I’d found yesterday when I’d been digging around in her stuff. “Does this go with the dress?”
“Um, I guess?”
“Perfect.” I opened the purse that Cassandra always seemed to use, and swapped over her wallet, lip gloss, keys, phone and iPod. “Also, thanks.” I waited for a reply, but my pretender seemed to be too annoyed with me to dignify me with an answer. “Look, I think we should lay down some ground rules.”
“Really— you want something else? I’m shocked.”
“It’s nothing really— just a trifle.”
Another sigh. “Just tell me Cassandra. I’m getting tired.”
My whole plan depended on Cassandra, my pretender, not knowing the details of this plan, so I couldn’t have her popping up whenever she wanted. “When I am you, and vice versa— I think we shouldn’t eavesdrop, unless we have permission.”
“You mean you want me to take a backseat in my own brain?”
“Please?” I bit my lip and held my breath. She had to say yes, she just had to.
“As if I have much choice. You’ll also not ‘eavesdrop’ on me when I’m me again?”
“Promise, cross my heart!”
“Fine. But Cassandra, don’t screw this up.”
I nodded, and I felt her fall away, back into the recesses of wherever we went when the other person was in control of this body. “Great. Part one of this plan is in progress, now-” Now, all I had to do was convince Violet I wasn’t crazy and to help me. Here’s hoping she is as kind and generous as she seemed. Out in the kitchen I could hear Ray or Mariah puttering around. My stomach growled. “Well, I guess it’s off to face the parents.” I left the bedroom and made my way towards the sweet aroma of coffee— that was one beverage that I truly loved.
Ray was in the kitchen, humming, he had obviously just come in from a run, he was wearing sweatpants and a hoodie, and I could smell how sweaty he was. I crinkled my nose just as he turned to look at me.
“Oof— I smell that bad, hey?” Ray had a frying pan in one hand and a flipper in the other. “Well, let me just finish making breakfast and I’ll hit the shower.”
I nodded, and went to grab a mug out of the cupboard. Cassandra had mixed emotions about her step-father. When I looked at him, I saw a human, who might just possess some abilities to see or sense the supernatural, but that was it. He was, of course, a real leader and go-getter— he was a man who saw what he wanted and was not afraid to go get it. That was the real reason he had married Mariah Pirot. It was also the reason that he had adopted Cassandra, Mariah’s daughter— this man had always wanted a wife, and a family, and now he had both. He truly loved his step-daughter, that much was clear. What was not clear is why Mariah had acted the way she had— I could sense she was hiding things from both her husband and from her daughter, but what? I did not know. “Mom home?” I asked as I reached for the coffee pot.
Ray laughed, “don’t worry, you’re safe. Drink your caffeine little lady. I promise not to tell.” Ray flipped a pancake off the frying pan and onto a plate. “Also, eat up— I don’t want you starving on your way to school.”
I rolled my eyes, but grabbed the plate, and sat down on the bar stool and watched Ray hum as he continued to make a stack of pancakes. I slathered butter onto the pancake and doused it with syrup. “You really like cooking, don’t you?”
“Yes, I guess so.” Ray pushed his wire frame glasses onto his face, and glanced at me. “Someone has to make sure you ladies eat more than just takeout.”
“Thanks.” I am sure that was referring to the way that Cassandra and her mother ate before Ray came into their lives, but because I wasn’t one hundred percent sure, I refused to comment or make a witty remark in rebuttal.
“Are you enjoying school these days?” Ray turned off the stove top and leaning against the cupboard watched me carefully, his arms crossed against his chest. Ray was from what I had observed, an excellent lie detector.
I swallowed my mouthful, and washed it down with a giant gulp of coffee. “Yeah, I think I’m even making friends.” Well, that much was true.
“Look at you, branching out, a boyfriend, friends other than Melanie.. What’s next, you moving out, or going to some fancy university?”
I laughed. All that was quite absurd. “One step at a time! Right?”
“Right. Well, I’m off to shower, then I’ll be heading into the office. Look, after work, your mom and I are heading to a corporate meeting, slash ‘party’ to celebrate signing this big client for the firm, so we won’t be home till late. You going to be okay here by yourself?”
Was I going to be okay? Of course, this worked really well with my plans. “Yeah, absolutely.”
“Awesome. I’ll leave some money for takeout in the drawer,” he pulled out his wallet and put a few twenty dollar bills in the drawer by the oven, “and you make sure to make good choices, okay? Like no boyfriend over while we’re out?” Ray gave me a death glare.
As if I wanted to see Lucifer, I rolled my eyes. “Thanks, Ray. And no problem. I was going to see if my new friends wanted to maybe hang out after school, I mean with Melanie gone, it might be nice to have a girls night!”
“Excellent.” Ray looked so relieved. “And hey, if those girls want to come back here, totally cool. Now, I’m going to hit the shower, and head to work, see you later, hon.” Ray started humming again and left the room.
Perfect. Everything was coming together really nicely. Now— off to school and see if Violet and Irene wanted to hang out— I’d love to see what vampires did for fun in their free time— and maybe just maybe then, I could see if Violet would help me. I grabbed another pancake from the stack Ray had left on the counter, and collecting the gray purse, left the kitchen and then the house behind me.
I didn’t mind the thirty minute walk to the school. There was so much to see, and so many different kinds of humans out and about. I watched business men, very similar to Ray, rush about— briefcases in hand, cellphones at their ears, serious looking faces… There were joggers about, and mothers with strollers and coffee cups from the local Starbucks in hand… everyone seemed to be busy, rushing, not looking at where they were really going, or what beauty existed around them. The commercial storefronts gave way to a more residential area, here, there were less people, but lots of houses, packed into narrow pieces of property, with lots of steps leading to shadowed front doors… I wondered what it might have been to grow up in this world, instead of my own— and as I did I heard a car horn honk at me, I looked up, and saw Violet waving out of a dark green sedan, she rolled down the window,
“Hey Cassandra! Want a ride up the drive?” I hadn’t realized how close I was to the school, but I must have been walking along the ivy-covered brick wall for some time, because the gate into Acroft was looking just up ahead.
“Sure!” I skipped over to the sedan, and pulled open the back door and slid into the car. The first thing I noticed now that I was in the car was that Violet wasn’t driving, “Oh, I didn’t realize you weren’t alone.”
Violet giggled, and the driver, a tall muscled vampire with dark brown hair and neon green eyes turned to look at me. “Hi.”
“Hi yourself.” I mumbled back, realizing at once I recognized that dark brown hair with the fine red highlights along his scalp. “I’m Cassandra.”
The vampire nodded, “yeah, my wife has been telling me all about you.” He smiled and flashed his brilliant white toothed grin at me. “I’m Viktor, Viktor Worthington.”
“Your Juliette Steinheart, I mean Worthington’s son?”
Violet and Viktor shared a look, clearly I had said something that had given away I wasn’t Cassandra, or the Cassandra they knew… shit.
“You know who my mother is?”
“Ummmm….”
“Violet, I thought you said that Cassandra was a human who knew nothing about our world…”
“Well, yeah. I mean, that’s what I thought.”
“So, how does she know who my mother is, and her maiden name?”
I sighed. So much for pretending to be Cassandra. “Look, Cassandra is human.”
“And now she’s talking about herself in third person?”
“Viktor, I can call you Viktor, right?” I didn’t wait for him to respond. “I am Cassandra— human, marked by the Nephilim, that much is true.” I took a deep breath, “but I am also not.”
“What do you mean, not?”
“Violet, look into my eyes. I know you have the gift of foresight, and the ability to sense when something is false, you can read emotions, and even control them— please, you will be able to see if I am lying.”
Violet locked eyes with me, her jaw slightly agape. “How?”
“Please?”
Violet nodded.
“While it is true, Cassandra Pirot was marked by a Fallen, and it is also true that she transferred to the accelerated program here at Acroft, what you do not know is-” How did I say the rest? I struggled to find the words. “There is a curse on my family— a curse that every woman in my line must bear— we are born destined to die, to die at the hand of the Fallen. I come from a long line of scarlet women. In the beginning we were cursed by God for picking, for choosing… for loving the devil himself. This-Cassandra, the human who entered your world, she is the last in this line of women to bear the mark. She has no children to continue the line, but she is still doomed to die— and faced with the devil himself, and seeing now way out, she asked him if-if…”
Both Violet and Viktor were so dialed in, staring at me as if trying to figure out how to process wha I was saying.
“She asked him, if, to bear the pain, she might be able to bring another past version of Cassandra back, so when the time came, she would not have to be the one to endure the mental and emotional pain of being taken— and the Cassandra she asked for? Me. The daughter of Eve, her original ancestor.”
Violet broke eye contact with me and looked at her husband Viktor. “She’s not lying babe, you know I can tell when people are lying… I don’t know how it’s possible, but she’s telling the truth. And now that I think about it, I can sense her presence, it’s not the same as Cassandra, this presence is ancient, powerful... ”
Viktor grunted, “I don’t like it.” He looked away from Violet and stared me down. “That still doesn’t explain how you know my mother…”
“That-that is a longer story, and if we’re not careful we’re going to be late for school.”
“Okay, so let’s say we believe you, Cassandra. What is it you want? Why are you here?”
Viktor pulled the car up to the gate, and violet swiped her gate pass. The massive iron wrought gates swung open and Viktor drove the car up onto the ancient property of Acroft.
“I’m here because I need your help. I know how to break the curse, so Cassandra won’t die, and the rest of the women in my line can finally be set free and their souls finally allowed into the pearly white gates.”
The car slowed to a stop in the parking lot, Viktor looked at me from the rear view of his mirror. “And how could we help you with something like that?”
“I need you to help me become a vampire.”