Rebel (Civil War Period)

Chapter 23..

Georgiana's P.O.V.

"Antoinette." I spoke pleasantly into the phone, as if there was not a vampire army at my neck and a little girl to protect.

"Georgeeeena!" The voice at the other end was shrill and overly enthusiastic. French people from the 19th century, what could you do. I would imagine that if she could right now, she would smack a kiss on each of my cheeks. "Moi chére, what can I do for you?"

I sat in my office in the basement, which was the one where my actual business was taken care of. The one upstairs was mainly for receptions and business talks. I looked at the white walls, family portraits decorating them and diminishing the feeling of being in an asylum.

Asylum. Marianne.

Even now, after 140 years, I could not forget what I had done to her. I had planned, during my mortal years after Jasper's death, to get her out of it, but then the issue about the legacy had aroused, and then I had been Changed and forgot parts of my previous life. Marianne being one of it, and so she had died, at the age of merely thirty, in the mental institution, to which I had sent her. All for my own family; my children and my husband.

I had not even come to answer Antoinette when she was already continuing to talk. "It has been so long, Georgeena, since we have met."

"Indeed it has, dear Antoinette. Hence my question; would it suit you to visit me?"

"Oh, moi chére, twenty years nothing, and then suddenly an invitation? Tell me, what is your true intention?"

I smiled grimly to myself. "I have an issue to discuss with you and Jacques."

Antoinette sighed dramatically at the other end, then she answered: "Naturellement. We will arrive tomorrow, if that suits you?"

"Perfect, Antoinette, I thank you."

"Oh, you sly thing, what have you up your sleeve now?" She sighed and hung up. I snapped my phone shut and pushed myself out of my chair.

"What has become of you, Georgiana?" I whispered to myself as I looked at myself in the mirror. "For decades, you know nothing but to control, to plot, to kill, to obtain power... For what?"

I touched the place where my heart used to be. It was ice-cold, and not only the skin over it - my very heart had died. I shrugged the melancholy moment away and walked over to the dresser where I always kept a few spare clothes. My blouse and jeans were ripped, and I had been taught from day one of my life that appearance was everything. As I dressed, my eyes fell onto a portrait of my family, a smaller one than the large one over the fireplace upstairs.

My father, standing proudly beside his family - died one year after the end of the war, grieved to death by the ruin of his family.

Susannah, my sweet sister - ended up walking the streets, then got pregnant. I found out years later that she had killed the child and had been arrested, then went mad in prison and died, too.

To think that I had not only done this to them, but could have also saved them from perishment... I shook my head. All reproach would do no good, it would not bring them back alive, just like my husband would not return.

If only I remembered his name, so that I could, at least, visit his grave....

I looked up at the ceiling. Upstairs was a woman who was what I could have been, what I had been once; a mother who feared for her child and would do anything to protect it. The moment I had seen the little girl, there had not been the least of doubts about what I would do. I had always followed my heart, no matter what grief it lead me to.