The Art of Dying

“Wha-what? Bu-but… h-how…? That’s, that’s not possible.” Oliver asked confused. “Unless…”

“Unless you’re from ‘Ellithia’ too.” C.C. completed Oliver’s sentence. ‘Ellithia’? What the hell is that? “But if you are from our world, then why are you scared?” She questioned as Oliver put on his grey trousers that were lying discarded on the floor before going to take a seat beside her on the bed. Deep breaths Del, deep breaths.

“What the fuck are you, Oliver?” I asked him a little more calmly as he started to put on a black shirt. He then picked up his pocket watch from C.C.’s bedside table and in a flash, his stripes disappeared and his eyes returned to their usual blue color. What!? How!?

“I’m a fate, well a fate descendant.” He replied offhandedly. “What about you?” What about, what about me? They were all looking at me expectantly.

“I’m a human as far as I can tell. What else would I be?” Ok, I think I need to sit down. I made my way to my bed and took a seat, leaving Zane hovering by the door.

“You can’t be human, otherwise Olly’s influence over you would have worked.” C.C. said as if it was obvious. “So what are you?”

“I, um… uh… eh?” What am I, if I’m not human?

“You already know what Olly is and well I think that, what you saw earlier told you the nature of Zane’s.” C.C. said as I glanced Zane’s way. He was casually leaning against the door and gave me a seductive ─if not a little scary─ fanged smirk. Yep, vampire. “And I’m an angel of death. So now, what about you?” Fates, vampires, angels of death, what other freaky thing is out there?

“Uh, as of five minutes ago, I thought I was human… So, I really don’t know.” But if I’m from their world then why didn’t my mom tell me anything?

“How can you not know?” C.C. asked. “Maybe you were adopted.”

“No, I’m pretty sure my mom’s my real mom. We have the same eyes and smile and...”

“Maybe you’re a ‘Morpheleon’ that would explain why you look like your mother but at the same time you’re not related to her.” Oliver explained. “Anyway, it’s simple, either you were adopted or there was a mix up at the hospital where you were born, cause it’s impossible for a human to have an ‘Ellithien’ baby. And your mom is definitely a human.”

“How do you know? Maybe she didn’t tell me because she just didn’t want me in this freaky world to protect me or something.” I asked. “And why can’t humans have ‘Ellithien’ babies?”

“‘Ellithiens’ are poisonous to humans.” C.C. went on to explain. “We can touch them with no danger but if we exchange bodily fluids with a human like a blood transfusion or simply kissing, it would be fatal to them. So you see… making a baby with a human would be impossible.” Oh, gosh. So it’s true I am an ‘Ellithien’. I kissed Guillaume and Antoine and they both immediately fell dead. I knew it was my fault. Wait a minute. I turned to face Zane with an angry look on my face.

“So, if kissing an ‘Ellithien’ is toxic for a human, why did you try to kiss me, Zane?” I asked him indignantly. “Where you trying to kill me?” But if he wanted to kill me, why not just drink my blood? Argh! This is so confusing!

“Vampires are not toxic to humans.” He explained calmly, still keeping his sexy composure. “We’re not toxic because being a vampire is a change, you can’t be born one. Once we change, our body goes through a complete metamorphosis, changing every one of our cells, so that we are not entirely ‘Ellithien’ anymore. And anyone can become a vampire, hell even a human could become a vampire, so kissing you wouldn’t have killed you. It would just have rocked your world.” He finished with a wink my way. At least he didn’t want to kill me. That’s reassuring.

“As for your mom… Do you remember seeing me leave your house this summer? We crossed path?” Oliver asked looking intently at me. I nodded my head, looking directly at him. “Well, I had this vision of you at our wedding,” He said looking lovingly at C.C. “as C.C.’s maid of honor. It just so happened that C.C. and I were looking at venues for the ceremony in Montreal. So when I saw you, I knew I had to make sure you met C.C. and so I followed you to your house and the next day, while you were away I used my influence on your mom to make sure that you would attend ‘Mortis Academy’ and meet her, since it was in your destiny to meet her.” Destiny… Pfff, yeah right. Well if everything they say was true then… maybe… Oh, I don’t know. Gosh, I’m too tired for this, right now. Then a thought hit me.

“Wait, hold up. You brain-raped my mom!” I exclaimed.

“I influenced her; it’s hardly brain-rape as you so put it.” He seemed offended by the term I used. “And anyway you were meant to come here. Not only to meet C.C. but to apparently learn of your origins. So you see, it’s a good thing that I did what I did. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go back to my dorm and sleep since we have classes tomorrow. I suggest you do the same.” He gave a lingering kiss to C.C. and left. C.C. then looked pointedly at Zane.

“What?” Zane asked her amused. “Are you kicking me out?”

“Don’t you have your child to check up on?” She said derisively. He huffed exasperated then threw me a dazzling smile and a wink before disappearing out the door, in the blink of an eye. “Finally alone.” She muttered. “Do you have any questions? I can’t imagine what it must be like discovering you’re from a whole other world that’s linked to this one and you didn’t even know it existed.”

“Linked to this one? What do you mean?” I questioned but then I yawned. “Sorry.”

“It’s alright. I can see that you’re tired, I am too. What do you say we wait until tomorrow for this sure to be lengthy discussion?”

“It’s good with me.” I replied before grabbing a PJ from my clean pile and went to the bathroom to change. I know I should be more disturbed over the events that just occurred but I’m just too tired to care. I brushed my teeth, washed my face, brushed my hair and returned to the other room. C.C. had turned off her lamp but I could still somewhat see where I was going since the curtains where open and the moon was bathing the room in a soft glow. Settling under my covers I said: “Goodnight C.C.”

“Goodnight.” I heard her mumble sleepily into her pillow. Not long after that I was lost to the world and away to dreamland.

Silvery-grey, snake-like eyes stared hypnotically into my green ones from a small distance. It was the only discernable thing that I could see in the room, everything else was black ─even darker than an abyss. A pair of glowing blue eyes and of glowing red eyes joined the creepy grey ones. A soft light got turned on and I could see a little more clearly.

I recognized Oliver with Chris and Zane. Zane and Chris’s fangs were out with blood dripping from them and there was also the little Asian girl from earlier lying dead at their feet. Her neck was mangled, the blood pouring from wounds on both sides of her neck formed a sick sort of halo around her head and her black eyes stared vacantly back at me. The boys also had this wild hungry look in their eyes while Oliver just looked plainly nuts –he too had fangs protruding from his mouth though his were thinner and were dripping some sort of green goo instead of blood.

They approached me slowly like predators stalking their prey and then the two vampires jumped on me, each grabbing a hold of one of my arms, keeping me in place. Panic seized hold of my chest and I began breathing with difficulty. What do I do? Zane and Chris had their gazes fixed on either side of my neck but they weren’t attacking it ─they seemed to be waiting for something.

What? I don’t know. Oliver strolled over leisurely and just as he was about to strike, like a viper getting ready to catch a mouse, a voice interrupted him. “Wait!” Thank god. I let out a sigh of relief. C.C. walked over from the shadows in the room, dressed in a little, black summer dress under a black hooded cape and she held a scythe in her right hand. She then silently made her way over to where I was. “I first have to give her the access to the world of the dead.” With those words, the small flicker of hope that I had, shattered. She completely caught me off guard as she got on her tip-toes and rapidly kissed me on the mouth. “There, the kiss of death.” What?! She then stepped back and called: “You go ahead boys. She’s all yours.” Oliver got this creepy sadistic smile on his face as he went for the right side of my neck, Zane for the left and Chris went for my right wrist.

Just as they were about to sink their teeth in, I woke up gasping for air. I felt my heart beat a mile a minute before I tried to slow it down.

The curtains in the room were open and light came pouring in. I was safe; I was alone in my dorm, it was only a dream, ─well more like a nightmare but the point is─ it wasn’t real.

I looked at the clock on my bedside table, it read 11:03. I should get up and get ready to face the day. I have a ton of questions I need answers to and the only way to get them, would be to talk to C.C., or any other weirdo from ‘Ellithia’ but I think I’ll stick to C.C. She seems less threatening than Oliver or Zane. That is, if what happened yesterday was real and not a dream. Well, let’s go along with it for now and if nobody brings it up then it was probably my imagination ─just a fucked up dream, induced by lack of sleep mixed with accumulated grief.

A sudden thought hit me; if Zane is a vampire and Blake is his brother, does that mean that Blake is a vampire? And if so, does that mean that their parents were vampires or…? And what of Abbigail? Is she a vampire too? Or maybe she’s something else entirely. But I’ve seen them in the sun and wouldn’t they burn in the sun if they were vampires? Also Zane said you can’t be born a vampire, but...

Gosh, I’m not even out of bed yet and I already feel a head ache coming on. Ugh, why does life has to be this complicated? And what am-I? What kind of weird creature could I possibly be?

I don’t have any weird super power or distinct physical features that could help me identify my... um specie? Maybe I should write down all my questions. I released a resigned sigh and unwillingly got out of my comfy bed. I then rummaged under my bed for a notepad and pencil.

Finding one, I sat back on my bed and started to make a list. Here we go:

1-What am I? I think that that’s the most important question.

2-What are Blake and Abbigail? Oh and Nina? And Dixie?

3-What is ‘Ellithia’? Where is it?

4-Is everyone here at ’Mortis Academy’ from ‘Ellithia’?

5-Why is it a secret that there is an other world and mythical creatures? Why haven’t I or anyone heard of it before?

6-How many species is there from ‘Ellithia’?

7-Are unicorns real? I love unicorns. What about dragons and phoenixes and other beastly creatures?

8-How did Oliver return to his ‘normal’ form after just grabbing his pocket watch?

9-Does C.C. have another appearance than what she looks like normally, like does she have glowing eyes like Zane and Chris or stripes like Oliver?

10-Oh and lastly why does everyone hate Zane? Oh and why does everyone find what happened to Chris horrible?

Other questions also popped into my head but those I couldn’t ask any of them, they wouldn’t know the answers. Who were my parents? Was I adopted? But my mom wrote about giving birth to me. Was there a mix up at the hospital and I ended up with the wrong mother? Did my mom lose the baby she was pregnant with and adopted me in order to get over her grief? But I have my father’s nose and… is it just because I’m a ‘Morpheleon’ like Oliver suggested I was or…?

I put my notepad and pencil down before holding my necklace and looking at my dad’s picture inside. Yep, I definitely have his nose and forehead but is that just a result of some unknown shifting ability on my part. But if I was adopted then my mom would know something would be up with the fact that I look like both her and dad, so it must have been a mix up at the hospital.

Leaving the notepad and pencil on my bed, I grabbed some clean clothes and decided to go take a shower to get my mind off of things.

The shower didn’t help any. I kept having questions pop up in my head like: Are my biological parents dead? Are they looking for me? Do they even know that they have the wrong child? etc. So if this shizzle is real it’s a very depressing reality. Looking at the time on C.C.’s beside table as I exited the bathroom, dressed in dark blue jeans and a red T-shirt, I saw that it read 11:57. Maybe I could get some answers at lunch, at that very moment my stomach decided to make itself known and grumbled.

Throwing on my black faux-leather jacket and black and white ‘Converse’ shoes; I grabbed my notepad, pencil, MP3 player and cafeteria pass and went out the door. Putting one earbud in my right ear ─letting the other dangle over the left─ I put on some ‘Black Veil Brides’ as I made my way to the elevator in order to get to the cafeteria.

Getting out of the elevator, I went down the small hall leading to the glass bridge and crossed it. Almost as soon I stepped out of the bridge and onto school ground I heard the bell ring. Students suddenly filled up the previously empty corridors, heading for their lockers or the cafeteria. I walked into the cafeteria and went directly to the food service area.

I picked out a bowl of vegetable soup, a slice of cherry pie and a bottle of water. I gave my pass to the cafeteria lady, who scanned it and gave it back to me before I headed to the garden/terrace. I sat at our usual table under the Wisteria tree and anxiously waited C.C.’s arrival.

Unfortunately it wasn’t C.C. that was the first to arrive but Blake. “Hey.” He said as he took a seat in front of me at the table. He was dressed in all black, making him look, oh, so, sexy. I turned off my MP3 and stuffed it the right pocket of my jeans.

“Hey.” I replied trying to look casual without looking at him and choosing to focus on my soup instead.

“Del, are you ok?” He asked me. “I know it must be weird learning about this whole new world that you had no reason to believe existed until now but I just wanna let you know that, I’m here for you, if you need me.” As an after thought he added: “For anything.” I looked up into his sincere pale blue orbs and again felt that damn spark, making me blush and I quickly averted my eyes back to my meal. So it was not a dream. Interesting…

“Thanks, Blake.” I said softly. Why does he have such a strong effect over me? Gosh, I’m pathetic.

“I was─” He started to say but was caught off by the arrival of C.C.

“Hey, people! How’s it going?” She asked taking a seat beside me.

“Great” Blake said at the same time that I replied: “Fine.”

“Ok. So, Del… Do you have any questions?” She asked cheerfully and seemingly very eager.

“Yeah, um I, uh, made a list.” I said, opening my notepad.

“Right, ok, go ahead.” She encouraged. Ok, I’ll skip the first one for now since I’m pretty sure they won’t know the answer and chose to ask the second question, first.

“Well, this one is more for Blake. Um, Blake, if Zane is your brother and he’s a vampire, then are you one as well or…?” I asked looking up at his mouth with the cute snake bites piercing, not daring to look into his mesmerizing deep eyes.

“No, I’m not.” He said patiently. “I’m a ‘Gladow’, as was my brother before he got changed.”

“What’s a ‘Gladow’” I asked intrigued. I’ve never heard of that before. Vampires, angels of death and even fates like in ‘Disney’s Hercules’ sure. But ‘Gladows’… that’s a first.

“I’ll show you on ‘Mertell’.” He said giving me a sexy smile. Gosh, I’d like to kiss that mouth.

“What’s ‘Mertell’?” I asked, confused.

“It’s our international holiday.” C.C. jumped in. “Every year, on what everyone in this world refer to as Halloween, in our world it’s ‘Mertell’ or ‘day of the dead’. We all dress up for the occasion but in our real forms and have this big party in the woods. Also it’s the one time a year our loved ones come back from the other side, well their ghosts, that’s why it’s called ‘day of the dead’. Anyway, it’s loads of fun, you’ll see.” I’ll see…?

“Oh, ok. Um, Abbigail is what? Is she a ‘Gladow’ too?” I asked timidly looking at Blake, though not directly in his eyes, more like his nose.

“She’s an illusio… And the heir to Death’s throne.” Blake explained. Huh?

Abbigail and Oliver joined us at that moment. “Hey guys.” Oliver greeted us while Abbigail just silently greeted Blake. They each briefly kissed their lover before C.C., seeing my confused expression elaborated on Blake’s very vague explanation.

“My uncle is not just an ordinary angel of death like every other angel. He has a ring that gives him the power of about a thousand angels of death combined.” She explained. “That’s because a long time ago humans and ‘Ellithiens’ lived together peacefully. That is until some ‘dickheads’”

“C.C.!” Abbigail said appalled.

“Ugh, piss off Abby.” C.C. looked at her like she was an annoying bug. “Anyway, as I was saying before being rudely interrupted. The ‘dickheads’” She said, putting emphasis on the ‘dickhead’ word, to piss off Abbigail even more, making her looked meaningfully at Blake for him to do something but he acted as if he was oblivious to her stare and focused on C.C.’s history lesson of their world instead. “decided that we were better than humans. Since according to them, humans were weak, pathetic creatures meant to serve us. Just because we have powers that they don’t and we can kill them by a simple kiss, they came to the preposterous conclusion that we were to be gods for them.

And so every idiots believing in these absurdities regrouped and they formed a sort of cult. Long story short, they declared war against humans, forcing my family to do something about it. My grandfather along with several witches made a ring that multiplied his powers by a thousand and with this ring, he was able to put an end to the war. But the humans weren’t the type to forgive and forget, making us retreat to ‘Ellithia’ until they forgot about our existence. They made stories about us but with time, they became myths and legends meant to scare little children into behaving, and nobody believes in them anymore. We kept our existence a secret ever since.” She finished the history lesson. Well that takes care of question 5 and why I haven’t heard of this world before. “As for Abbigail being Death’s heir despite being of no relation what so ever to my family, well, her mom is my uncle’s fiancé. And Oliver saw her marrying Blake with my uncle as the one to walk her down the aisle.” She made a face as she finished that last sentence.

So Blake is to marry Abbigail. I don’t know why but at hearing this news, I felt this immense pain in my chest, like my heart just exploded into a million tiny little pieces. What the hell is wrong with me? Ugh, get a grip Del. “Yeah, Blake and I are meant to be. Isn’t that romantic?” Abbigail asked me looking pretty smug. Bitch.

“Shut up, Abby.” C.C. looked at her condescendingly, making Abbigail huffed before she averted her attention to her slice of pizza. C.C. rolled her eyes and turned back to face me with a warm smile on her pretty face. “Del? Any other question?” It’s fascinating, how she can go from exasperated to cheerful in a second, depending on who she’s addressing.

“Yeah, um. Where is ‘Ellithia’? Is it, like a magically hidden island somewhere in the ocean or something?” Abbigail snickered like what I just said was the dumbest thing she’s ever heard. She’s so mean, what did I ever do for her to hate me so? Except liking her boyfriend, that is.

“Ugh, ignore her, she’s an idiot.” C.C. whispered to me. Out of my peripheral vision I could see Abbigail roll her eyes. “As for ‘Ellithia’, it’s sort of a parallel dimension with various portals linking both worlds.”

“Oh, ok. Ummm, oh, Nina is a what? Oh and Dixie too, what is she?” Those are the only other people that I really talk too, beside our little ‘group’ here so…

“Nina is a genie and as far as I know Dixie is a simple human girl.” C.C. answered me kindly.

“A genie, like in Aladdin?” That’s kind of cool.

“Well, not exactly. She’s not blue or anything,” C.C. explained. “but she does have a lamp that she sometime hangs out in.”

“Cool.” That’s really nice.

“Oh, and she can speak directly to your mind. Like mind-reading but talking too. You know, since she’s mute and all.” She added. “Makes it easier to understand her, well, you know.”

“Yeah,” The bell then rang just as I was about to ask C.C. another one of my questions.

“Hey, gotta go.” C.C. said looking apologetic. “But, we’ll finish this later after school, alright?”

“Yeah, sure.” I replied as they all stood up to leave.

“Bye Delphine.” Oliver said before leaving with both his and C.C.’s tray in one hand and C.C.’s hand held in the other one. For a weird fate-thingy, he’s a gentleman.

“Bye guys.” I gave them all a small wave. Blake returned my wave and shot me a small smile before Abbigail grabbed his arm and dragged him away.

Alone, again. What to do? What to do? Maybe I could go check out the library. I haven’t been there yet. I only saw it briefly on my ‘tour of the school’ with C.C. but we didn’t stay long. Maybe I could even do some sort of mythical creature research or something.

Yeah, I think that’s what I’ll do. Grabbing my tray, I emptied what was left of its content in the trash then left the tray on the top with the other trays and left the garden in the direction of the library.

I took out my MP3 and as I made my way through the mostly empty corridors, towards the library, I listened to some ‘Avenged Sevenfold’. I walked up the stairs and entered the second story, then turned on my left before seeing the library right ahead. As I came closer, I turned off my MP3 and put it back in my pocket. Time to see what I can find about ‘Ellithia’ or anything I think might be related to it. Then maybe I could look for a good book to read…