The Cursed

After Olivia's drunken escapade, she had silently decided to never bring the topic up again. Fortunately, Alexander didn't seem to want to bring it up either, so Olivia was eventually able to continue going about her days.

Actually, not much had been happening these last couple of days. Life had become mundane and routine with no anomalies or problems cropping up.

As Olivia ate her lunch, she looked up to see Orpha sitting opposite her. Sensing her gaze, Orpha looked up from her bowl and gave Olivia a small smile before continuing to eat her food.

In fact, compared to when Olivia first saw her, the Orpha of today now resembled the other Givers around the table more than she ever did. Orpha's original neutral skin tone now looked as pale as could be, matching the other Givers.

It seemed that the De Vere family had already started to use her.

Olivia only looked at her for a few more seconds before turning away and finishing her meal. To her, Orpha was simply another Giver on the dining table.

The carriage drove through the bustling streets. Yet again, Alexander and Olivia were on the way to another crime scene. As the carriage came to a stop due to some traffic, Olivia looked to her left. There, stood a shop where the windows were closed and the door locked tight. Among the other shops, this was the one that stood out the most. The only shop along the line, who still had their doors closed although it was daytime. Looking at the sign on top, Olivia slowly sounded out the letters to read 'Maidens Garden'.

"Interested?"

Olivia turned her head to face Alexander, his head resting on his hand as he leaned against the window.

"Why would I be?"

"You seemed to be awfully immersed while looking there," Alexander commented. As she looked at him, Olivia could never quite tell whether he had always been observing her or whether he asked her out of curiosity.

"It's just quite… nostalgic," Olivia did not divulge too much into her answers, these memories were more fitted to be locked away.

"Oh? I thought you were a mere child when you were captured," Alexander cocked an eyebrow.

"Hmm. What do you think?" Olivia neither denied nor confirmed his unspoken accusation. She merely gave a small glance at him before looking back out the window. By now, the carriage had long drove off.

"Alexander! Miss Olivia!" Eli waved over once the pair had arrived at the scene.

"Hello, Eli," Olivia politely greeted back, while Alexander gave a nod.

The trio walked further, before stopping where all the other investigators stood.

In fact, it would be precise to say that everyone seemed to be looking at the same scene.

In front of them, stood a row of villagers impaled by sharp wooden stakes. While most of the vampire investigators standing around didn't seem to be too affected, the same couldn't be said for their human counterparts.

"How awful," Eli turned away, his face losing its usual rosiness.

A nearby vampire, came closer and gave a brief rundown.

"This happened just this morning. As the other villagers started to get ready for their jobs, one of them stumbled across this scene, causing the guardsmen to section off the area. It seemed that no one had heard anything. Looks like it all happened under their noses."

Olivia looked at the stakes that were in a straight line.

"Are you alright? Should you be looking at such dreadful scenery?" Eli asked Olivia.

Olivia looked over at Eli, "Why not?"

Eli continued to stare at Olivia. Unlike the other non-vampire investigators who were all looking pale and queasy, Olivia seemed to look normal. As if such a horrific scene had no effect on her.

"And what has the investigation shown so far?" Alexander's voice rang in the background.

"Well, one thing we've noticed is that it seems neither vampire's nor witches had a hand in this," The investigator's eyebrows furrowed as his scarlet eyes roamed down the line of corpses.

Olivia had heard what the investigator said and her mind started to whirl.

'If the cause was neither a vampire nor witch, who could do such a thing? Do humans have such capabilities or is it something else?'

As Olivia kept on thinking, the nearby guardsmen were tasked with the most gruesome of jobs. They were now instructed to remove the stakes from the corpses, and pile their bodies up for further investigation.

Of course, such actions were not to be completed by those from the bureau. The one's from the bureau were of noble backgrounds, who could ever ask them to do such menial tasks? And thus, the job lay with the common guardsmen who didn't seem to be all too pleased with the idea.

"I'll have you step in for this," Alexander spoke in a low tone.

Olivia looked on as she watched one of the guards try to remove the corpse from the stake before stopping to vomit, "When?"

"Once Silas is done with his own investigation."

"It's not like I have anything else to do," Olivia sighed as she turned away from the scene and faced Alexander.

She continued to look at him while he looked down at her before breaking eye contact and walking towards one of the victims houses.

Olivia followed after him as he opened the front door to a particular house and walked inside.

They both looked around. The house was eerily silent, the only sounds heard were the creaking of the wooden floorboards.

Alexander continued to walk around although there wasn't much to see as the houses in this area were shabby and decrepit. Olivia walked over to the kitchen, on top of the stove was a saucepan. The fire had long died out. It seemed like the victims of this household were getting ready to eat supper.

"The incident didn't occur this morning," Olivia commented, as she lifted the lid of the saucepan to see what looked like burnt porridge stuck to the bottom of the pan.

"It happened during last night," Alexander confirmed her suspicions as he looked in the direction of the kitchen.

The pair then walked into another house.

They both looked around the room, the footsteps echoing between the thin walls. In this house, it seemed the owner put up quite the fierce fight, as a lot of objects were strewn across the room. As Olivia walked around the house, she looked down at the floor to see drops of blood littered around.

Suddenly, Alexander picked up a few small sounds.

"What's wrong?" Olivia asked as she noticed him no longer moving.

Alexander's eyes were fixed on the ground, "There's a noise."

"A noise?" Olivia muttered, walking closer to where he stood.

Alexander slowly stepped towards a particular part of the room, Olivia quietly following behind him. Once he got there, the sound he heard became much closer.

He crouched on the floor and started knocking on the floorboards before he found a hollow area.

"Why? You think there's something in there?" Olivia asked, confused by his actions. She, of course, could not hear the sounds Alexander was speaking of and could only follow what he was doing.

As soon as Alexander had knocked on the hollow area, the sounds changed to an almost whimpering tone. Once he was sure there was something there, without hesitation, he ripped off the entire area of wooden floorboards.

A cloud of dust rose due to his actions causing Olivia to start coughing as the particles invaded her nose and throat.

Once the dust had settled, Olivia could finally see what Alexander had supposedly found.

And he had indeed, truly found something.

Inside, lay a small human child, curled up. His eyes were wide open in fear, while his tiny hand was tightly wrapped around his mouth in order to not make a sound. Alas, he was unfortunately found by Alexander.

"Oh? And what do we have here?" Alexander stood up and stared down at the boy.

"The killer didn't seem to find him," Olivia said as she looked at the boy.

The child was utterly terrified. He had no clue where his parents had gone and in front of him stood a monster. A horrible monster, with deep and dark, red eyes.

Olivia noticed that the child had become paralysed with fear. In fact, she assumed that the boy had not even noticed she was standing there as his eyes were solely glued on to Alexander.

"Stand up," Alexander commanded the young child.

At this point, the child started to tremble yet he did not move an inch.

"Boy, unless you wish for death, listen to my words."

Tears started to stream down his pale cheeks, his eyes reddening by the second.

However, the young boy heard a calm and soothing voice from the side. His eyes finally shifted from the vampire to notice that he was not alone as another human woman was standing next to him, "Stand up, he will not harm you."

After taking a few more seconds to gather his wits, the child stood up and stepped out of the small hole he was in. He looked warily at Alexander and decided to stay closer to Olivia.

"Speak. What happened last night?" Alexander asked, his eyes boring into the young child.

"I do-don't know. Someone was at the door and then mama told me to hide," The boy honestly answered, not daring to look at the vampire before him.

At the thought of his parents, however, his fear became second as his head snapped up at Alexander, "Where is papa and mama?"

"Dead."

The boy gasped, before tears began to stream down his face. His hysteric wails echoed throughout the dilapidated house as his face became increasingly red.

Alexander furrowed his eyebrows at the annoying sounds.

After a while, the boy was still continuing to cry. As Alexander could no longer tolerate the sound, especially when he hadn't found any promising information, he decided to stop the boys wails, "Quiet."

The boy suddenly stopped. Of course it was not voluntary. Alexander had infused a slither of aura with his words, almost knocking the poor boy out. Once his aura vanished, the child was finally able to catch his breath and in the meantime managed to reduce his cries into a few pitiful sniffles.

"Where will I go now?" The boy quietly spoke as he looked at Olivia with teary eyes. He clearly understood that his parents were no longer in this world and neither could he continue to live in this house without paying tax. He knew that he was now alone. An orphan.

"Do you have other family members?" Olivia asked in a soft voice.

The boy thought for a bit before nodding, "I do."

"Then you'll live with them."

"But I don't like my aunt. She's always mean to mama and says horrible words to me. Can I live with my uncle's family instead? They're very kind and nice. I also like playing with my cousins," The young boy sincerely asked Olivia in a small voice.

Olivia understood that although he was talking quiet calmly right now, it was just him repressing his emotions. His small hands agitatedly wrenching his shirt gave away his true his feelings. His lips had long lost their colour. On top of that, he clearly didn't want to anger Alexander any further either. Who could be fine after learning the death of their parents?

Olivia gave the boy before her a gentle smile, "Sure, whatever you want."

Alexander watched their interaction with interest but did not interrupt.

Once the boy was handed over so he could be put in his family's care, Alexander and Olivia bid Eli and the rest farewell before getting back on their carriage.

Halfway through the journey, Alexander spoke up, "And here I thought you no longer had any feelings towards humans. Was that a mistake on my part?"

Olivia did not turn to look at him, "I do not care for anyone."

"You seemed to be awfully nice to that child."

Olivia leaned back against the seat and closed her eyes, saying no more. Alexander looked at her for a while longer before doing the same.

Soon, they had reached back to the De Vere household. Once they had stepped inside, Olivia felt that something was off but she didn't quite know what.

Nonetheless, she had walked to her room and shut the door. As Olivia sat down on her bed, she began to feel that her body was slightly sweaty. Especially since the weather had began to get hotter, just having a walk outside caused a person to feel humid to no end.

Taking advantage of her privilege, Olivia closed the door to her room and walked across the hallway to get to Alexander's room.

As she walked closer, she could hear muffled thuds coming from behind his door.

Curious, Olivia opened the door.

Except, what greeted her was a bloody Orpha and a bulging Alexander, with veins covering his temple. At the moment, he looked extremely horrifying.

"Ah, is this your beloved Giver? Or so I've heard," Orpha gave a twisted chuckle as she gazed at Olivia who stood there trying to absorb the scene in front of her.

"What is going on?" Olivia asked, ignoring Orpha and looking at the abnormal Alexander.

What exactly could've happened within the half an hour that she wasn't with him?

"Hmm… him? I cursed him," Orpha replied nonchalantly, as she leaned against the wall.

"Cursed…" Olivia's eyes slightly widened as she finally looked at Orpha. Only one thought flashed through her mind.

"A witch? That's what you want to ask, correct? Let me satisfy you then, yes I am," Orpha gave a cynical smile.

Olivia walked closer to the heaving Alexander, stopping a few steps away from him. She could see new features that weren't always there. Bluish veins that ran across the side of his temples, as well as his fingernails that had increased in length taking a darker colour compared to their usual healthy pink. Not only that, his once crimson eyes, had turned completely black, so much so that Olivia could no longer see the whites of his eyes.

"What have you done to him?" Olivia asked, continuing to observe Alexander as he began to claw at the ground.

"Fear not. His curse won't stay for long. Only for a day. But I wonder…" Orpha cocked her head to the side as she looked on at her masterpiece.

Weirdly, Olivia felt oddly calm at the face of this as she continued to talk with Orpha, "What?"

"I wonder if there'll be anyone left alive by tomorrow," Orpha gave a hysterical laugh.