Bones of Salt

Roman

There was a spot at the official Blood Drinkers' training ground founded and led by Mira Abas and her former partner Dominic 'Minx' Morris.

The spot was in the garden, just before the fence that separated the grounds from the woods.

It was also right outside of the entrance of a secret tunnel that would lead you in or out of the castle, depending on which end you used, if you knew where to look for it.

In that spot, once, Minx Morris had buried the body of a man he'd completely drained of blood.

His spirit hadn't passed on – on the contrary, it became the most vengeful of the dead -- a Dybbuk.

But that was a story that Roman had already told.

Now, in the same spot, people gathered, though the body – a new body, this time – had been taken away hours before.

Some people, like Aurora Barbaneagra, had not come to the spot at all. They'd stopped far away from it, as if it was contaminated, and cried.

Other people, like Jonathan Loreta, Matias Vasiliv, and Cypress Taylor Spaulding-Macbeth had come to the spot, but they'd shivered.

As if it was contaminated.

And it was.

Roman Sioban, the only Speaker left for miles, perhaps one of the last Speakers in Meglenia, surely among the number of the rarest beings in the world, saw something else.

What Roman saw was an Apparition, a part of a deceased soul replaying the scene of their death over and over.

And this Apparition belonged to his older brother Atticus, who looked almost alive, as he said bitterly, "I've never been good enough, Roman."

Then, his eyes widened and a lance went through his heart, blood pouring from his mouth.

Roman knew about possibilities enough to know there wasn't a single Universe in which he could see this scene replaying in front of his eyes over and over and survive it.

He also knew he could not decide not to come to the spot. Roman was a magnet for Apparitions, and the other way around.

Besides, he'd never strayed too far from his brother.

Roman hadn't told anyone what had happened. He hadn't needed to. As soon as he tried to reach out to Atticus, he took the Apparition in the human realm, for all to see, until the contact had ended. There was nothing special about this, but it felt wrong.

Roman had never felt that death was unfair. He thought it was because he could understand so much of it. Now, he couldn't make sense of Atticus' loss, and he realized that he had merely been selfish.

Death had never been unfair to him.

"Can you help him move on?" Jonathan asked him, a week later. The members of Roman's team were the only ones who could speak to him without risking getting yelled at, and it was a close call.

"There was the Apparition of a woman in the basement, once," Roman said. "I helped her soul become whole again just months ago. Judging from her words, and the chains that still held her prisoner, she must have died centuries ago."

"The Blood Drinkers from Cad Irr are about to go back home," Cypress announced, as she ran into the hall. "Once they've perfected the box in which they're going to keep Minx hostage, there's no reason for them to stay."

"Them, I didn't mind," Jonathan said. "It's their human friend who's the one I can't wait to be rid of."

"Colleague," Cypress said, but she seemed to share Jonathan's thoughts.