My Little Ventrue Pt. 10 Ch. 03

After a few more moments, the trembling woman settled, let go of her necklace, and faced Triss. Nodding, she dragged the knife across her palm, and held it out over the bag.

Drip.

Drip.

Triss closed the bag, and met Sam's eyes. The woman looked destroyed. Normally Sam did a damn good job keeping her sadness at bay, same as Triss, but the girl was a little too honest for it. You could always see a hint of sorrow behind her eyes. Now it was all laid bare, and Triss couldn't look into those eyes for long. Felt like trying to stare down a blizzard raining ice shards straight into the eyes.

Triss closed the bag and raised it high. "Be found and returned, Mary. I call to the darkness that watches and listens, that knows the dead. Find, and bring a piece of Mary back to me." Nodding, she handed the bag to Sam, and with a shivering hand, the poor woman took it.

Death descended on them. Triss didn't know who listened to the ritual, what spirit or god or whatever decided to entertain their stupidity, but someone or something answered the call. They stood there, looking at each other again, and the two of them gulped as the air twisted and exploded into a hurricane. Black mist swirled around them, disappeared, and reappeared, toying with them as it worked its magic. Felt like something twisted and horrible. Not Black Blood, but not too far removed, something just as fucking death like.

Worse was the bag. The contents moved, and bounced and jiggled, as if someone had locked up a ferret in there. They knew what it was now, a crystal ball being formed and bouncing around with some sort of life blueprint, but until it was done, it seemed like it wanted to get out. Sam clutched the bag to her chest hard as it struggled, pinning it, like letting it go would mean the end of the world.

Eventually, the wind disappeared, the black mist disappeared with it, and the bag in Sam's arms calmed down. Still moved, still wiggled, half alive and looking for a body to complete and a soul to fill it, but calm. Sam nodded, her own body calming as she looked down at the bag, and then at Triss.

"Can I... look?"

Triss smiled and nodded. "Yeah, but uh, maybe outside," she said, pointing to the fridge door.

The three of them walked out of the fridge, Sam still shaking but smiling, and Jen smiling warily, like she was afraid she'd jinx the good luck. Smart girl.

Sándor looked their way as Triss closed the fridge door behind them. "Success?"

Sam nodded, and held up the bag. Slowly, with a trembling hand, she reached into it.

The tiny crystal ball glowed a gentle gold, lighting up the dingy basement, and their four faces, each of them wide-eyed as they stared at the small moving images on the perfect, smooth surface. Even Sándor widened his eyes as he realized what the crystal ball showed.

It was evening, sun setting. There was an alley. Samantha and Mary were walking beside each other, smiling, laughing. They didn't see the woman coming toward them. No, they saw her, they just didn't think it was a woman about to stab them both, dozens of times.

More than that, other images flickered over the ball. Scenes of Mary and Sam, standing over Jack's grave. Scenes of Mary, going shopping with her mom. Scenes of Mary and her mom watching a movie together, both of them wrapped in a big blanket on a couch, eating popcorn.

Mary's thoughts. The last thoughts she'd had, before she died. The things they wanted to do that day, or week.

"We were... gonna watch one of the new Marvel movies, you know? She really likes Chris Evans."

Likes.

There wasn't any holding back anymore. Sam stared at the ball, clutched it tight in one hand, caressed it with the other, fell to her knees, and screamed once. One very deliberate, agonizing scream.

The three of them stared down at her for a bit, frozen. But before Triss or Jen could snap themselves out of being struck dumb by Sam's too powerful, too overwhelming display of enough raw emotion to break a mountain, Sándor squatted down beside her.

"May I see?"

"W-What?" Sam said between her choked sobs.

"I would like to see your daughter's final living moments."

Sam blinked at the man, as if he'd just asked something insane, or maybe offensive. But after a few seconds, she nodded, and held out the small orb to him.

He didn't take it. He looked, and leaned in so he could look better, but he didn't touch it, as if it'd be sacrilege. As if picking it up from her hand would break the poor woman. Like, maybe killing her daughter again.

"She's beautiful," he said, a small smile on his face. "And she looks really close to you."

"She... She was. She wasn't at first, but when Jack disappeared, things changed. We relied on each other, you know? After James, and then Jack, we only had each other."

Sam went on. She held out the orb for everyone to see, and the small crystal ball gently teetered in her palm, half alive, as Sam described Mary and their time together. With one hand she clutched her necklace tight, the other the crystal ball, and her sniffles slowly passed as she described her daughter to them all. She'd told Triss stories about her before, but not these, peeks into the most private, tender moments between the two. It took a lot of effort to keep from crying with her.

But it wasn't Samantha Triss stared at. Yeah, she looked at her, and sometimes got lost admiring the memory she could see in the crystal ball, but damn it, it was Sándor she found herself looking at. Julias would have been super sad and empathetic with Sam, and would have done everything he could have to make her feel better. Yeah, it woulda been sappy and annoying, but it would have worked with some time. Julias could make anyone smile if given time.

But Sándor didn't do that. His eyes held something different. Understanding. Quiet, calm, understanding. And it was exactly what Sam needed. Who the fuck else was she gonna talk to about this? Athalia? Maybe, but Athalia wasn't the sort of person to just sit and listen. Maybe Triss judged the other Begotten too harshly, but she couldn't picture Athalia doing this, just sitting there and listening.

Sándor listened, steady face absorbing everything Sam said in a way no one else would be able to.

After a while, Sam stood up, and gently touched Sándor's chest once.

"Thank you. I know it's... it's..." Sighing, she put the crystal ball back in the bag, and held it tight to her chest as the four of them made for the exit. "It's hard to find someone to talk to about Mary. I do with Jack sometimes, and I've talked to Athalia, but it's hard." Despite herself, she smiled at the gargoyle. "It's easier to talk to you, for some reason. Thank you, for listening."

Her eyes lingered on Sándor, and her shivering faded as the man returned her eyes with pure, solid evenness. To anyone watching from the outside, Sándor would probably have seemed the asshole, dispassionate and uncaring. Couldn't be further from the fucking truth.

Dude was a gargoyle. That didn't sound like anything crazy before, but now, Triss could see how the dude bagged a wife. He listened to people. Genuinely listened.

"So, we doing this tonight?" Triss asked, gesturing to the bag. "We can, if you want."

"No. I need to talk to Mary again tonight first. Can we start tomorrow?"

"Yeah. Yeah sure, whatever you want, Sam."

Samantha smiled at her, and started up the stairs out of the basement. "Um... did you want to see her, Sándor?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was such a trip, seeing the place where Jack grew up. Sam had taken her here before once, so she and Jen could see Mary, and break the ice before they did any crazy shit involving putting the ghost daughter into a soulless husk body replacement. It'd become very obvious from the get go that Mary was unstable. She randomly yelled, or twitched in classic ghost fashion, and had trouble talking about some things.

But she loved her mom. Ghost or no, Mary loved her mom, and it was apparent in every word she said, the one time Triss had visited. Hopefully this visit would go as well.

First, the kitchen, where the side door of the house connected. The Prince kept the house on ice, so no one was gonna buy it, meaning Samantha got to keep it in the same condition it'd been the day she died, except for whatever changes Sam made on her visits.

Sándor kicked his shoes against the small steps outside before following them in, as if he'd walked into the house a million times before. Was the house he used to live in with his wife and kid like this one?

Triss watched him for a couple seconds, long enough for him to realize and meet her gaze with stoic curiosity. She looked away, and ran a finger along the counter tops of the kitchen.

"A lovely home," Sándor said.

"Thank you."

"It's... easy, to imagine your children coming home from school, and entering through this door." He slowly closed the kitchen door.

Sam looked back at Sándor with a big smile. Funny, she never smiled at Triss or Jen like that when the two of them had talked about her home. Homeowners sharing some sort of shared appreciation for home owning? Well fuck, all Triss knew was apartments and a crypt.

"On days I was home during the day, I used to give them snacks when they got home from school, right here." Sam stepped around the counter to the other side of the kitchen, the dining room, stepped behind one of the wooden chairs, and set her hands on its back as she smiled down at the table.

"They had good lives growing up."

"Musta," Triss said, and sat down on a stool by the counter. "I don't know Mary, but I know Jack pretty well. Kid is... well, you know."

Jen joined Triss at the counter, standing on the kitchen side and leaning down so she could set her elbows on it.

"Kindred are rarely as direct and honest as Jack. Those that are usually die young."

"Jack was always a peculiar one growing up," Samantha said. "He never did things... gently. Everything had to be done with conviction, you know? Do it right and do it honestly, or don't do it at all. Before James died, Jack was loud and proud about that sort of stuff. After, he got... quieter. And then angrier." Sighing, Samantha looked up and around at the empty kitchen, the wood corner cabinet, the stairs nearby, everything. "When I met Julias, I thought maybe Jack would find a father figure in him. And it seemed like that was happening, except, then he disappeared."

Julias, a father figure. Definitely a cheesy dad who'd love shitty puns one day, and then have deep, meaningful conversations with his kids the next. Triss would be the loud, angry mom. They'd balance each other out.

Jennifer came up beside Sam and put a hand on her shoulder. "It's always a problem with Kindred, how it affects the people they leave behind."

"I know. My sire explained it, and I don't blame vampires for keeping everything secret. But I... I kinda wish I got to see Jack become the man he is, you know?" Slowly, she looked to Beatrice. "And I'd have loved to see how his relationship with Julias grew, too."

Triss tried to hold her gentle, sad, eyes, but she couldn't.

And then of course there was Sándor. For just a split second, the dude looked sad too, something in the subtle furrow of the brow, but then he went back to his usual steady self. Triss could only imagine the weird balance of thoughts running through his mind. Hopefully the guy could get it through his thick skull that no one blamed him for anything.

"Sorry about the cold," Sam said. "The house is always cold now, and nothing I do heats it up. That's because Mary's here. Doesn't bother vampires, but I'm guessing it bothers you?"

"No," he said. Lying, telling the truth, no way to know. "Don't worry about me."

Easier said than done. Mary the ghost, the unstable and dangerous as all fuck ghost, couldn't direct her hate toward Jeremiah or Angela anymore, but she could sure as hell point it at Sándor. Considering how often Sam visited her daughter, especially the past few months, she'd probably told Mary everything about Jeremiah, Angela, Sándor, all of it. Whether that had prepared Mary to be calm, or just given her time to get angrier at Sándor before their inevitable introduction, Triss had no idea. And unlike the vampires, Sándor wouldn't survive getting a random kitchen knife in the skull from a murderous ghost.

They went upstairs. Sam paused on the stairway, looked down at it for a few seconds, smiled, and went on up to the small hallway. Bathroom on left, Jack's room on right, then the parents' bedroom on the back left, and Mary's bedroom on the back right.

Triss paused in the door frame to Jack's room. "Dude never got into posters or anything?" She'd seen the room before, but only for a moment. Now she took a good look at the double bed in the corner, the perfect spot beside the desk where a computer probably used to be, and the bare walls.

"No," Sam said, peeking past Triss into the room. "He would get super passionate about things, extremely, sometimes for months, but he didn't have any interest in expressing it. He used to tell me, what's the point in hanging posters of his favorite bands or games on the walls. You can't listen to or play a poster."

Jen chuckled. "I thought all young boys embraced hobbies with enthusiasm?"

Triss shook her head. "Nah. I get it. Some people just prefer to experience things and don't care about expressing them or owning them. Not a fan of wearing their interests on their sleeves."

Sam nodded. "Unless you get him talking about something that interests him. Then you're in for hours of chatting, and ranting."

Chuckling turning into outright laughter, and Jen walked into the room and ran a finger along the desk.

"Boys and their toys."

"I'm not so sure," Sam said. "I do wonder if Jack is a little different than other people. Sometimes I'd find him listening to a song, headphones on, and it was like... like he was in another world. Or he'd be watching a movie, and get so absorbed into it, it was like the movie became his world. Books, too. Sometimes, when something would catch his interest, it'd dominate his thoughts. He'd tell me sometimes he'd have dreams about whatever it was he couldn't stop thinking about, even if it was as random and silly a thing as trying to find a way to fit his desk against the wall at just the right angle so the sun wouldn't touch his screen for twenty minutes in the evening." She laughed. "It turned into a project, and soon he had new light-blocking drapes set up with a string that he could pull on and tie to the side of the bed post, so they'd block the light at the specific time of day, but then he could untie it and let the loose after."

Before Triss could laugh, and maybe make a friendly suggestion that Jack might be on the spectrum, fog began to fill in the cold room. It'd gotten chillier as they talked, but vampires being vampires, it didn't mean much to them. Triss only noticed because Sándor's breath had started turning into mist.

"Sometimes," a whispering voice in the growing darkness said, "he'd get so caught up in whatever was on his mind, he'd forget to eat or sleep. It's a wonder the kid made the few friends he did." The group's eyes eventually settled on the bed, and the misty white thing that formed there. Mary, looking sweet and innocent, legs hanging off the bed side and breaking apart into mist that mixed in with the rest of the rising fog. "But if I ever came to him with a problem, something that was bothering me, like my closet door not closing all the way, or my computer doing something weird, Jack wouldn't rest until he'd fixed it, you know? He loved to fix things, even if he got super obsessive about it."

Samantha smiled and nodded as she sat down beside the ghost, no fear, no hesitation, but no touching either. Her hand would probably go through her if she tried.

"Mary," Sam said. "You know Beatrice and Jennifer, right?"

Mary didn't get up, but did look up at the two vampires. Empty eye sockets. Yeesh. If only she could wear an eye bandage like Jacob did.

"Hi."

"Hey," they said.

"And, uh, Mary, this is Sándor."

Sándor took a step closer until maybe five feet separated him from the ghost woman. He didn't say anything though. Instead, he did that thing he often did, and just stood there, waiting, and listening.

Mary frowned.