The Blood of Darkness

Chapter 10

Val

As soon as I enter my room, closing the door behind me, I slump against the wall. I can't seem to steady myself; my hands are shaking and my breathing comes much too fast.

I can't....I can't even think about what just happened with the Rurikan spy. Not right now. Not when I'm barely holding on, not when I'm scrambling for whatever humanity I have created within myself.

So my mind moves somewhere else, back into the past, and nausea boils up inside of me, so fast that I have to slide to the floor.

Sometimes memories are the worst kind of torture.

First it was that brothel, that gods damned brothel. I could barely stomach walking in, especially with Brander's forceful grip on my waist. Every step we took brought another memory back. Of my childhood. How I grew up. My mother.

I have always tried to forget my life before I met Vance, before I moved into the castle, but the memories remain clear and vivid, even four years later.

Up until a few months after I turned twelve, my childhood wasn't that bad. My mother paid a kind, elderly servant named Paloma to raise me in our small apartment in the heart of the kingdom. Paloma had schooled me, brushed my hair, sung me to sleep, held my hand, and took me on adventures around the kingdom. She was more of a mother than my mother ever was.

She would kiss the tips of my Dark fingers and tell me that I was destined to do great things.

Oh, if only she had known who I would become.

The only days I would fear were when my mother came home. She would spend most of her days with various men, letting them buy her furs, silks, alcohol, and other luxuries we could never afford otherwise. Then she would spend her nights at the nearest brothel, a few streets down. My mother was very beautiful on the outside, with straight, dark hair, long legs, a young face, and dark eyes. But on the inside, she was rotten, cold, selfish, and incredibly vain, as well as an alcoholic.

Oddly enough, my mother enjoyed being a courtesan. She loved to be adored, wanted, and prized. And, of course, loved the money as well. But none of it other than a few coins to Paloma went to raising me, or the apartment. Instead, she would spend the marks on drinks and useless extravagances. Eventually, Paloma was paid so little that she mostly took care of me using her own money. I have always wondered why she didn't quit, but the answer is obvious, even though it seems unfathomable to me now.

She cared about me. Loved me just like she would a daughter.

The thought is too painful to linger on though.

My mother grew up in a wealthy, noble family, and was a powerful Frost. Then she ran away with my father to get married. From what I know, he was often careless and foolish.

Shortly after running away with my father, my mother became pregnant. The night she told my father, he went out to get drunk and never came back. It was later found out that he was killed in a drunken brawl. Alone and disowned by her family, my mother had no one and nothing. She wanted to start over and become wealthy.

So she made a deal, a promise of some sort. In exchange for her Frost powers and firstborn, she would be granted unsurpassed beauty. And so began her work as a courtesan.

I don't know who or what exactly she made the deal with, other than that the beings were dark and from another world. I only even know of it through what she would tell me on the days she came to visit.

About once a month, she would come home during the daytime, and order Paloma to leave. She would look at me, with my dark eye, black fingertips, and white hair, and shake her head, eyes narrowing. My hands didn't become fully black and my hair didn't start changing colors until years later, when I was sixteen and living at the castle. Unless someone looked closely, it seemed as if I was just wearing dark nail paint on my fingers.