Devotion

"I never enjoyed healing."

Zakira looked at me incredulously, but I continued.

"They fear us until they learn we can use their blood to aid them. Then they plead for their lives. It's pathetic."

"But you're a Cleric now, Opal."

"Clerics are not Witches, Zed," I flatly said. For it was the truth. We followed the will of our God. But we had yet no bible. No holy words or commandments. Only a symbol.

But still, Zed prayed. Day and in and day out, she prayed to Mani, as I did to Amun.

My faith was as unbroken as hers. But her devotion far outshined mine. But where she had devotion, I had a connection.

Though I loved her dearly, Zakira was not one to be described as wise. Though much of that was simply a ruse. She was far more intelligent and sagely than she let others be even acutely aware of, which was a wise act in itself. But she was also hasty, somewhat pacifistic, and a bit naive.

Especially for a Vampyre.

I loved her dearly, so that's how I knew. She had yet to notice the signs. Or perhaps he did.

She could be masterfully deceiving after all."

"It has been some time. Years since I've seen another of our blood."

To my surprise, Zed didn't wheel around at the sound of the regal voice. She slowly opened her eyes, took a final look at the moon, then stood to face about and peer upon the porcelain face of browns and deep reds.

She was strikingly similar in appearance to Zed and I. A doll-like frame stood just slightly larger than ours, with dark skin adorned with many chains and piercings to accent her bulbous crimson eyes beautifully.

She was starkly similar in makeup to Zed and I as well, I learned after focusing my eyes on the web of veins spanning her small frame. Dark and cold, they were. Pulsing ever so slowly with the blood of a beast.

"I'm here to teach you of Vampiric Witchcraft. Though." Her lips curled just enough to show a fang twice as long and thick as ours combined. "I'm sure you both are in no need of instruction. I am Vanya of the Zveri." She bowed. "It is an honor to meet those from another Clan after all this time."

'Oh. The mother tongue.' I snorted. Then bowed politely. "Opal of the Melns."

"Zakira. Of the Virkne," she struggled to say. "I no longer carry the name though."

I practically saw her reaction before it happened. Raised brows and bulging eyes turned to Zakira, giving her the aura of friendship while aiming to fill herself on any information she could glean. "Oh?" Came the recoil. "Then what is your name now?"

"Uh." She stammered. "Zakira. Of the Bloodmoon."

"Uh-huh." Vanya leaned back nodding, dissatisfaction hiding beneath the chains hanging from her face. "So you intend to build a new Clan?"

A ridiculous notion. An impossible one, we all knew. But Zakira paid it no mind.

"I intend to build a church." Zed cheekily corrected her, making me nearly lose my stern scowl.

"A religious vampire?" Vanya chortled. "That's new. To what deity do you pray?"

"That one!" Zed swept her arm outward. And Vanya's eyes followed. Out the window and up to the moon. "Mani, the World Weaver! Or the Orbiter. Whichever one sounds the coolest cause he's, like, really great and stuff."

"Mani." She slowly nodded, as if she were committing the name to memory. "So then, you wish to become a Cleric of this, Mani?"

"Duh!" Zed scoffed. "He wants me to find a priest and build a church. It's going to be fun!"

"Do you always talk like that when you're nervous, or...?"

"Are we here for lessons or inquires?" I stepped in, staring deeply into her eyes as I awaited her answer. And it didn't take long for her to back off shrugging.

"I am simply trying to help," she said. "There are many lost souls here and in the greater peninsula. A church dedicated to the right god may do them some good. But, others may not be so happy with the arrival of a new pantheon."

"And they will rue their vacuity should they commit sacrilege against our God." I sneered. "He is not merciful."

"There's such fervor in your faith that I can't help but believe you." Vanya passionately smiled.

"You'll be the same too." Zed pettily huffed. "Once you meet him."

"Once… I meet him?"

"He is among us." I smiled, baring my fangs this time. "In our class."

Again the tables were turned. Vanya, centuries older than us perhaps, stared deeply into our eyes in an attempt to ascertain the truth. And, finding one she couldn't come to believe, she asked. "What name does this student go by? Not Mani, I presume."

"My God is Amun."

She recoiled immediately, blinking her incredulous eyes at me rapidly. "The Nox child?"

"You know him?" I asked, unsurprised.

"I know of the Nox. Thus I know of him." She knowingly smiled. "Can you introduce me?"

"We can pray for his presence." I began stepping out. "He's probably somewhere smoking."

"After our lesson."

As she implied, the word 'lesson' was a misnomer. It was more of a certification, seeing as we learned all of the Vampyric arts years ago. There was nothing here for us to learn except the lore of the other worlds and the path I- we chose. Vanya knew that, and so didn't see the merit in wasting our time. Instead, she offered a surprising amount of insight about religion on our return to the viewing platform on the top floor.

And then came her begging to see Amun.

"What is she doing?"

"What does it look like?" I quietly snapped.

"I thought you were both Clerics," Vanya whispered back. "Why aren't you praying?"

"This is when her prayers are the loudest." I motioned towards the moon above. Mine is loudest during Twilight."

Her eyes suddenly trailed away as she muttered. "Twilight…" Then snapped her almost glistening eyes back to me. "Will he come?"

"If you have faith." I smiled.

It was clear she had doubts about Amun being a God. But so too was it clear that she knew of Amun's family personally. She acted like me and Elijah after our initial introduction to him. Tentative. Awed. Overwhelmed, even. He was like the sun if it walked on two legs and radiated death. His energy enriched our spirits like blood enhanced our constitution. Though it did that too.

It was that blissful feeling that announced his presence. And Vanya allowed its pull to tug at her without resistance. She was standing before God in a flash. Bowing almost to the knees as she excitedly asked. "How does the Raven slumber?"

I retained a wince in my eye upon hearing such a desperate tone, but Amun seemed not to care. He only smiled warmly while a distant haze swept over his eyes. "She's beside herself with glee!" He nostalgically sighed. "I imagine her smiling in her grave right now. Waiting for the next time I commune with her. Doubly so, with the knowledge that her nest grows while she sleeps."

"I'll be sure to tell her you said hello, Miss…"

"Vanya." She bowed lower. "It is my honor, my Lie-"

"God." I corrected before Amun could.

"Amun is fine." He smiled wider. "Or Mani."

"Mani." Vanya carefully repeated the words. "I've heard from these two that you think you're a god?"

"Is," Zed interjected. "Not think."

A devious smirk spread across Amun's face as he asked. "What do you think, Vanya?" And I found myself clutching my holy symbol before his words kept flowing. "What did you think? When you saw the earth release from the Mortal Plane to take root in the sky?"

"I-" She stammered, seeming to fail in shifting into the new pace of the conversation. "I- I was speechless. I didn't know what to think."

"Oh?" Amun recoiled in apparent surprise. "Speechlessness is so often spurred from what the unconscious mind thinks to be inconceivable. It convinces you of a lie, preventing you from acknowledging what you know to be true.

"So, tell me." Amun pressed on, seeming to repeat himself. but catching Vanya off-guard once again by asking. "When the barren earth in the sky eclipsed the blazing sun, what did you think?"

"That- that these lands have met their end." Came her flat reply.

And Amun was quick to point out her folly with a low chortle. "So quickly that answer came to you, Vanya. So easily does the mind conceive total destruction, despite it often having never seen it. That is the curse of existence, whether it be natural or undead.

"The Call of the Void." Amun waved his hand through the air as if he were gesturing toward something miraculous. "When its ring was answered by a sapling that rose to compete with the Bodhi Tree. Tell me, Vanya of the Zveri. what did you think?"

Pride, arrogance, suspicion, whatever it was that kept her in doubt, I saw it shatter at the mention of her name. Though, somehow, speechlessness still had its grip on her. As she stood there, somehow slumped into a mess and standing submissively before God, all she could mutter was. "The Nox has returned."

And Amun's grin widened further. "Yes."He hissed. "My Clan has come out of hiding. So tell everyone you know to spread the word, Vanya. The twenty-fifth scourge of the night is here to play.

"I am Mani, the World Weaver. The God the Moon orbits. The Man inside the Moon." He pointed to the radiant orb above with a hint of the same light imbued in his finger.

Then, he spread the occluded light across the ground below. "I am the Elven Devil. The Twilight Fiend. The God of Devils. Amun.

"Tell everyone you know, Vanya." He leaned close to her and whispered. "Gloom stalks the horizon."