The Little Nymph

Briar stayed huddled into her suitor's arms though her eyes had peaked around the arms keeping her close at the body laying at their feet. The dead man's eyes still stared up at her with a glazed expression. Now that the adrenaline - or whatever made her act so rashly - had started to wear off, her heart began to ache for the families of these two men. If they had any that is. 

"For how long will these victims stay as bad people, Lord Mahlikai?" Her words were still wobbly from the amount of emotion she was feeling. Thankfully, whatever happened to her had made it so she didn't need to feel the emotions running through them. She thought that would make it far worse. 

He didn't say anything for a moment. There was not an ounce of guilt that she could see from the demon, but wasn't this what she signed up for? Briar could see each response run through his mind and watched as he denied using any of them at all. "Let us bring you home before the sun rises. And your mother along with it. She has a lot of explaining to do. For you and myself, darling." He made a move to hold her hand in his, but she immediately pulled her hands into herself when she saw the red slowly staining his hands. She nearly tripped over herself when her mismatched gaze caught a glimpse of her own dirty hands. The evidence was all over both of them. 

The hunger she still felt in the deepest pit of her stomach was flipping now into bile that was beginning to rise in her throat. She wished she had the choice to swear off feeding from living humans ever again but he made sure that would no longer be a possibility. The bile then shifted again within her into the flames of anger that lit up the branches under her skin. Then it was extinguished by the guilt of blaming him. She could never truly stay mad at Mahlikai for what he forced her to become, could she? He already told her. He had just given her all that she wanted; more time. Her emotions were becoming a complete mess; similar to her sister's closet.

Before they could get back to her town home, Mahlikai had promised her that he would stay by her side through the rest of the learning process. He reminded her again, before he abandoned her on her porch, that it may be hard to be around her kin or any other human character. Briar accepted this fact with a simple head nod. 

As she crept through the house with the suitor close behind her, she realized it was no longer as quiet as it was when she left. They must have been gone for a very long time. At least a longer time that she thought they were gone for. The helping hands were already preparing for the day ahead and Briar could hear each and every one of their heartbeats. This was just making her stomach begin to turn all over again. The idea of trying to eat them was making her nauseous, so she was quick to pull him the stairs to her room. She was quick to shut the heavy door to her room and Mahlikai was quick to find himself laid across the loveseat in her room. 

Briar left for the restroom that was connected to her spacious room. Her mind was on overdrive as it kept a keen ear to where everyone in the house was moving to and from. The water flowing into the tub was the only thing helping her keep calm. It was drowning out every other sound within the home. She was tempted to leave the water running and partly unplug the drain so she could keep it going. However, she decided she needed to get used to it now before she had to deal with the sounds of beating hearts coming from within the same room as her.

She stuck a single dirty foot into the bubbly water first and watched the mud stuck to the bottom of her foot trail in smoke-like lines. The demon was entranced as it swirled in the once clean water. She took another step into the porcelain tub and slowly slipped under the still water. Slowly the bath began to fill with blood of her victims. She watched with watery eyes as she continued to watch all the guilt building inside her begin to swarm her mind. In a surreal state of mind, she lifted two blood-soaked fingers into a pinched position and watched as she rubbed the grime from the pads of her fingers. 

Her head lifted to the ceiling as it all started to sink in, taking a large breath in and out. As she tried to take another one in, she stopped as a rosy scent hidden under a delicious copper entered her nose. Briar knew who that should be. One of the maids always used an expensive amount of perfume. She must have gone to do some quick cleaning around her room. Did she see Mahlikai? Would he show himself and ruin her reputation? 

Her eyes slipped over to the door as she waited for any cue that she saw him. There was silence. Then, a knock at the bathroom door. "Miss Blythe? Do you need any assistance in dressing for the day?" 

"No, thank you though. I can take care of myself." She shifted to look forward at the wall in front of the bathtub again. There were a few thuds as the maid walked away again. 

With that interruption, Briar decided to get her mind together again. She rubbed the staining blood away until her skin turned pink. She left the tub a gruesome scene that she prayed no one would see before it drained completely. The new demon dressed in a plain yellow dress with simply green embroidered vines detailing the bottom and edges. Her hair would simply stay brushed through until she decided she would be able to face one of the maids without wanting to eat them. 

Briar sat at her vanity while she brushed at her knotted hair. "I am pleasantly surprised, love." She frowned at his praise, looking over her shoulder to where he appeared behind her. "Not many could stand being so close to a human so soon after their first feed. You did very well."

The woman did not think she did well. Her mismatched eyes met her own again as she readdressed the mirror. Her eyes were dilated, leaving her pupils to take up almost all of her iris', and her gums ached. "You mock me." She resumed her brushing slowly and meticulously. If she was too focused on brushing out every small knot, she wouldn't be able to think about every delicious smell that wafted from under her bedroom door. 

He didn't seem to back down at the sight of her denial, "I wish I had the restraint you were just able to show when I drank for the first time in my immortal life." There was silence for a moment as she had nothing else to say. "Oh, and here you go." 

Briar stood from her chair after slowly setting her brush down onto the vanity. She tried to soothe out the claw marks as she dug too deep into the wood handle. When she turned to address her sire, he held up a simple gold ring. She picked it up with furrowed brows. She knew many rings in her lifetime and this one lacked everything they were. It was a plain gold band without a single shiny accessory. The woman didn't seem to sound like a gold digger but, if this was an engagement ring, she would be very disappointed. 

"This isn't a proposal, my love. Or any of the sort." Despite what he said, he still took it from her inspection and slid it onto her left hand's ring finger. He bent down with his bright green gaze staring up at her and kissed the ring with a charming grin. "There is no promise behind a ring as dainty as this one. Though it is infused with a wiccan's touch. It will be able to protect you from turning to ash under the blistering sun." 

"Thank you, lord Mahlikai." Her sister barged into the room as Briar lifted her hand to inspect the ring for a second time. Nothing seemed different about the ring. There seemed to be no way to tell if what he was saying was the truth or not. 

The slamming of her bedroom door against her wall had her flinching at the sudden and loud noise. Neither were entirely surprised by the sudden entrance since they could both hear her sharp footsteps from a mile away. However, Nesryn gasped in shock. "Il est impossible que vous vous en sortiez sans me donner tous les détails," the human squealed and rushed forward as if to get into her face. Briar sucked in a sharp breath, stumbling a step back. "Oh... J'ai oublié que tu t'es mêlé à des démons." The demonic woman scoffed at her sister.

Mahlikai took a step in front of the newly turned woman, eyeing her sister as if Nesryn was the true threat. "I would be careful, Miss Blythe. Your sister is having a difficult morning controlling herself and, whatever you may have said, is obviously touching a nerve. I recommend you do not test your kin any further." He watched Nesryn for a long moment before he stepped away from both of the twins entirely. 

The room went silent as Abigail entered the open room. Each of them watched the matriarch as she strode in with her head held high. Their mother looked the women in the eyes before she let her gaze settle on her eldest daughter, "I suppose I owe you an explanation." The oldest woman turned around and slowly closed the door behind her. Even the human sister could hear the soft click as she locked the door shut. Abigail wanted not another soul to hear what she had to say. That was obvious. 

Nesryn moved to sit on the bed while Mahlikai leaned against the bed's large frame. Briar stood in the middle of the room, watching her mother begin to pace back and forth in front of the three. The demon stared hard at the matriarch and waited patiently for her to begin. 

"Please understand that I could not tell you while you were in pain. You weren't in the right of mind so you wouldn't have understood anyway. I can see you are now somewhat here, even if you are distracted." All eyes flicked over to the girl in the center of the room who was fiddling with her thumbs. "I had already told you that you are, indeed, a servant of the Earth. When I first had you, I hadn't known what that meant either. I never thought it would be important for me to know what my mah tried telling me while I was still young. She was still the crazy old bird that she is now, but what she said is true. I understood that since you snapped your elbow at four. Those branches beneath your skin? They weren't something brought upon you by the demon's venom."

Briar stared down at the wood floor with the nail of her thumb pressed hard into the pad of her index finger. "I don't understand," she heard her sister object. "What does that make her? Do not tell me that she's a servant again because none of us have any idea what that may mean… What does that make me?"  Mahlikai moved from the bed and stood beside Briar to give a comforting presence. He saw her fiddling with her fingers, but didn't take away the coping mechanism.

"Briar is a nymph. Nymph meaning a minor female deity and a personification of nature itself. Blessed to us by our gracious earth mother. She is a tree nymph, one of the Meliae, as my mother had told me once before. They already live so long, but now you've opened her up to immortality. She's meant to balance out the world and make sure that all are equal. Now you've damned her to an eternity of being what she is sworn to destroy." 

She was so confused. Her brain was practically running in circles as she tried to gather any information she knew of the nymph species. It had to be of Greek mythology. Abigail's mother studied the gods and goddesses of Greek mythology on one of her family's trips to Greece. 

"No, Nesryn, you are not like her. You aren't a nymph. You are perfectly human just like me and just like your father."

Being a nymph made so many things finally make sense. The reason why she only felt truly at peace in the forest near her home, the only real untouched place she was allowed to explore as a child. It must have been the reason why the forest constantly called to her, even at the center of their large home town. Nesryn had told Briar when they were young that the forest seemed to bend towards her being, but she never believed it. She thought it was her way of saying that she looked beautiful and would simply thank her with a large grin, usually a response that would earn the girl a confused look. When Abigail would work on the garden, Briar was always by her side. Loving the feel of the saturated soil beneath her bare palms. Her sister never shared her love for the outdoors, but that was normal for a noble woman.

Several emotions ran through her body, but the one she fed on most was surprise. It was the most words that Briar had heard her speak at once and all of it still seemed to be gibberish again. Then, she froze up. Understanding the reason why Mahlikai and Nesryn radiated so much surprise. Her mother just admitted to something that could ruin the family line. The family's pure reputation.

"You understand what you're saying then, right mother? If you're human and father is human. Then I come out as nymph?" She stared into Abigail's eyes. Eyes that avoided her intense gaze and turned to the ground instead. Briar hummed, nodding and looking up at Mahlikai. He was already watching her and picked up her bitten arm. There was no longer a bandage around her wrist with no actual wound to hold her pain, but the scar remained to always remind her of what made her this way. He played with her hand quietly and innocently. Like he hadn't caught on to what her mother was insinuating.

"Do you not feel guilty for your betrayal against father?" Nesryn was utterly baffled as she watched her mother's neutral gaze. Briar's tongue ran along the tops of her teeth, pondering what to do with this new piece of information. 

"No," her mother admits with a shake of her head. It was a question, but Briar still hadn't expected her mother to answer truthfully or at all. A shaky breath escaped her and she entwined her fingers with Mahlikai's. A way to keep herself grounded and away from sinking her teeth into her family.

Finally, Briar decided what to say. "I believe you should go. The both of you." Her sister let her eyes drift up to the man that held the nymph's hand who stared back at the woman daring her to take a step forward towards them. She was most likely thinking of the scandal it would be if they were left unattended. Though that didn't matter now. She was to live for an eternity and he was helping her not drain each human under the house dry. Briar stood, "Now." Nesryn flinched back as her sister's pupils dilated unintentionally, leaving the pair to whatever they wished.

Her mother quietly reminded her of the social event that their father was meaning to force them to in a day's time. It was odd. Her father forced them all to go, but never interacted with them while they were there. Probably made to parade them around like the trophies women were.

"Are you ready to get to work then, little nymph?" Briar pouted. She was not little, she reached his forehead in height. Either way, she nodded along and motioned for him to continue on.