Chapter Seven

"Blow," Sarin kept his hand there until I moved it away. I muttered thanks since I was fixated on food. Sarin got up and went to talk with Carden outside of the room.  

Sarin's P.O.V.

I pulled Carden out of the room to talk with him about Blair and her status of needing to mate but not fully ready to accept that. My own body was burning with a white fire again as it did back when I first met Carden but now that we had Blair it was now becoming unbearable to handle not saying something to Carden.

"Blair and I need to mate," I shifted on my feet I wasn't nervous per se but Blair was and I was having those feelings. " She just wants to deal with the pain but I know she won't be able to stand the constant thirst, I can barely stop myself from wanting to bite you and fuck you both. I know of her reserved nature even when she was Belladonna she would still be nervous but she knows what you had done in your entirety; all the dark and destruction you had caused,  the many women that felt like teaching you sex, we knew the way the true Carden was. We both aren't sure how the Carden after Blair-Boo is, I know the before with Belladonna but she knows the after with her. I'm just the stronger part of her, I'm still a part of her though as the old Belladonna and I feel stronger reservation to the situation before us." 

"I don't want either one of you in pain, I wish you were ready however, I want you to both be sure and ready to become my beloveds. I can stay away if that is what is needed." Carden clapped me on the shoulder

I nodded and he walked off down the hall. I couldn't help but feel like his words were lies to his actions.

Blair-Boo's P.O.V.

I could hear muttered talking but I didn't care enough to go and eavesdrop in on the conversation I just finished the soup and went to the bed. It smelled deeply of Carden. It made me nervous to no end that what I was feeling was because my body was ready to mate Carden but I wasn't I still had trust issues with him. I didn't want to have them with him and deep down inside me somewhere I knew I once trusted him and that made me feel betrayed.

The talking was done outside and Sarin came back in without Carden. Apart from me wanted him in the white burning love way and the other part of me was happy that he wasn't in the room with Sarin and I. Sarin came and curled up with me in the bed.

"This isn't going to be an easy time for either one of us." Sarin said as our bodies shook in agonizing pain.

It wasn't just the deep sadness that at the point we were having could only be called depression that was probably added to by the fact we were in his bed.

This went on for all-day when nightfall came I couldn't stop my body from crying when I wiped it away I was shocked to find blood. Sarin tried comforting me as we both were crying blood. By the time I couldn't cry anymore I was asleep with drying blood down our cheeks.

The next morning we took warm showers to try and slow the agonizing pain going through our bodies but that night the depression was still way too much for our bodies and we cried blood. I was becoming very, very weak since my body hadn't had the extra blood intake that Sarin's always had. He kept offering to let me drink from him.  I wouldn't make him as weak as I was so I just cried the blood until we were asleep.

Dream in the Darkness

"Sarin why is that I'm so weak?" 

"It's because we haven't mated with Carden and since your diet has mainly been human food your body is taking it harder than mine."

Now that Sarin had pointed that out I noticed my body and how it was feeling. I could tell I was laying in Carden's bed with Sarin's arm pressed against my whole back. As I made myself more aware of my body I was also made aware of where Carden was and how I instantly regretted doing so because I shot up awake in bed. My body just let sob after sob out.  As the blood ran down my cheeks, Sarin stirred and handed me a towel to wipe off the blood.

"Blair, are you sure you still don't want to mate with Carden. I know we have reservations but I'm sure Carden would give us the time we need to work through them." Sarin said as he helped me wipe my blood stricken face.

"I don't want to, I just feel like this time being in-between and the way I had to live my life without you has all been a lie. That to be with Carden is like saying that lie was okay because I lived with Stefan and the shit I had to go through with school was so unbearable. I'm starting to recall things that happened in Egypt and then I feel betrayed by what is going on now with Carden," I wiped my tears and added to what I was saying, "At least with you I had someone to kick their weak asses with. Carden was just a bat and made people like me at least when I was younger want there wasn't a glaring difference it what I did compared to the rest of the vampires."

"Indeed, I wasn't with you this time and I feel like Carden did what he could for you as being Stefan for you. However, with your feelings being so overwhelming they become mine. I feel like this life now is a lie just as much as you do. That nothing that we could do would change the way we feel."

"Ugh," the pain was just so much that I started to cry in full force and wither in agony. I screamed in my crying, Sarin and I was both picking up on the strong presence of Carden. Sarin was up and pushing against the door. Even though the door was locked and Carden could even bust the door down but to repair it would probably not be on his list to do.

"Blair your brothers sent me-" Sarin opened the door and went out so fast I didn't realize till I was inside his head looking at Carden.

"Tell her brothers were not to be bothered by them and not you. We need to survive this week without caving into mating with you so leave NOW" Sarin said as he came back in. I saw my body seizing. 

"Oh dear god, you're in my head aren't you?!" 

"Umm, yes... I'm going to be okay?"

"This happened once before and I, we had to have a deep bonding session. It makes your body think of something else and forces you back in. I'm guessing with your emotions lining up so strongly with mine that we merged into one mind which as you can see is a bad thing." 

Sarin moved towards my body as he talked to me and grabbed me into a hug as he removed clothes to get to my bare skin.

I gasped as I went into my body. If not for Sarin I would have been freezing. The sex we had was amazing on so many levels not only to the fact that it placed me back in my body. It made me feel less and less like I needed Carden. I may be dead set on not mating him but if I had to it would be under a strict agreement I didn't have to be forced to do anything I didn't want to do. I didn't want to feel like a piece of property for Carden to use.

We slept for a few good hours. When I woke Sarin stirred awake beside me. Things progressed about the same as the previous days. The door was open when we both know full well that it had passed.

My brothers were the first to come by with Blake who still was styled like a cat. 

"Blake, are you a part cat?" I asked as she moved around the room after my brothers left. They had worried about me but realized that it's going to happen and they just have to let it past and not bother us. Most of all not make Carden come to fix it.

"No, I'm a vampire but I was bitten by the cat people so they might have past some genes to me. I have no idea if they even survived."

"I just think of you like a cat instead of a scary vampire." We laughed she kissed my forehead and left.

Soon after Carden came into the room all timid like. "Is it safe?"

"Yes," Sarin said as he comes out of the bathroom, "all safe and clear to come in."

I went to the bathroom to take a shower I could hear the two of them talking. Carden felt that something was moving outside the mansion that was here to fight us just like those people that wanted to kill Sarin and me. Carden was working so hard with his sister on the bill that they would have to pass. It should have been so long ago when I was still Belladonna not Blair, a reincarnation of her. We lived such different lives.

Past

I was outside on a rainy night in a stream by the house cleaning myself up. There were noises of the cat people they must have been on the other side of the large stream. I got out and got dressed and when to find where Sarin had gotten off to. Low and behold across the bridge comes to a female cat shifter moving Sarin by the ear. He was a disturbance to one of their sacred traditions. The cat shifter was one in which I was fascinated but I knew how they were so I let them be. Sarin got five whippings across his hands and whined like a baby for months while it healed slowly.

End of flashback

I got out of the shower and got dressed. I felt more myself instead of like a hot bloody mess.

"You two ruined my pillows!"

"We can get new pillows, Carden," I said as I dried my hair.

"No, we can't get new pillows like these! These pillows were pure Egyptian ancient silk fibers with duck down as filling."

"Sorry, they were comforting to us while we cried out blood. So very sorry that you have those of all things on our bed."

"I didn't think you would just reject me while you two had your cycle either!"

This is where Sarin stepped in, "You said they were pure Egyptian ancient silk fibers with the duck down," Carden nodded in a deep bow of agony that they were ruined. "We have bigger pillows than these in storage. We used them as our bedding."

"Oh! Yeah, that's why I must have been hugging and crying the shit out of these smaller ones."

Carden looks as though he might fall and cry himself. "You have bigger ones than these? How?"

"Well, we made them bigger. Belladonna was quite skilled in sewing them and seamlessly put four of these small ones together we have at least ten in a Europe storage cash."

Carden looked at me and then to Sarin. "You like seeing me weak don't you two."

I laughed, " No. Okay, maybe a little but I don't fully remember that time."

Sarin was laughing over by our nest of bedding over by the fire. "I know I do. It's refreshing." 

It seemed that after that comment Carden lost any interest in talking about our week hidden away. I went and joined Sarin in the nesting bed. Carden went into his closet, I heard papers rustling and vibrant cursing in several languages. What I presume to box went tumbling. I got up and opened his closet to find him under a tiny home-sized mountain of paperwork I picked one up it read: "I never thought I was condemning my mates when those laws were passed. Now that the women, Belladonna has died I don't want to save those in-betweens or my other male beloved.

I've thought about it some more today. The first shock of finding my mates and one of their deaths has worn off. I will be writing up a draft of the Between Bill, to save my beloveds kind. I was angry she was gonna and I wasn't in time to meet her and mate with them. For them to be with me, them to be mine and to be theirs. . . 

Carden grabbed it out of my hands, I was sure there was more but it must have been private at that point and I was over steeping.

"Sorry, I was worried about you. I didn't mean to pry." I turned away and Carden grabbed my wrist.

"You're not prying were I don't like you to be. I have so many documents in here that if you saw the wrong one I don't know if you could live with my choices of how I've run my domain." He handed me an accordion folder.

"That paper belongs with the rest of these, read them all if you'd like they may bring back some memories." He kissed my head and closed the door to sort the papers.

Sarin comes over to the closets behind me. "Was he too rough with you?"

"No, just sounded rough" I turned back towards him "he gave me his journals." Sarin looked at the folder and back at the closed closet with vibrant words of different languages being shouted.

  "Looks more like old single papers than a diary."

  "A single paper has multiple entries and they don't have dates just thoughts," I said going and sitting at the chairs facing the back forest that was outside. Reading where I left off: For them to be with me, them to be mine and to be theirs fully. I don't know if I'll ever see Sarin again, I feel like it's my duty to at least know where he is.

  It's been some time since I last knew where Sarin was located he moves so much and there never seems to be a reason why. It was troubling me deeply so I looked into it. The human police were finding dead bodies along his trail. They were all in the coven ordered to go kill the in-betweens for the Unlawful language. Did my grandfather fear them so much to kill them all on the grounds of their language? It wasn't a big group of people, it wasn't a growing movement, it had to affect my mates even killed my women.  I followed the lead I had on the bodies and found that he had my grandfather on the run, he was getting revenge for both of us at this point but grandfather seemed to be a thousand steps ahead of Sarin.

 I just feel so broken still I keep seeing her face in every girl I see. I hate that even though my grandfather has been dead for ten years now I still can't place where Sarin is. I've found a girl, I had plans off aging down to her age. It hasn't worked I try and try and the youngest I go is a senior in high school. I have to be with this girl. She's Belladonna for sure. I have to be with her, I can't find Sarin so I've come to think he just doesn't want me to find him. I don't blame that thinking I was rude. I still might be. Just like I felt that I need to know where Sarin was I feel like I need to be with this girl, she's so little and I don't want to do anything to hurt her. I've left my sister in charge while I go be a bat and watch her. I'll be taking detail of bodyguards with me, I only want to watch to see if she is Belladonna.

I handed the page over to Sarin. I looked through the folder and saw there was only one in the very back that looked new it read: I've spent time with her since she climbed up on the roof and grabbed me. She's grown so much and is five and fiery. God, I love her so much I've only come back to get the news that a movement for my power needed my attention. I dealt with it just like all the others. Sometimes I hate that I can be challenged for my power. I just want to go back to Blair-Boo she has a hard enough time with me that without me for so long I've begun to do such horrible things that my sister is sending me back.

Blair-Boo is not Belladonna. She has this old soul feel to her but she doesn't have the makings that Belladonna had it's like she's my new beloved. If it wasn't for her parent's status she wouldn't be able to even go to school and be safe. They are backed by us and their children are safe unless the highest laws are broken. She still is an in-between, I fear if people find out about her that I'll have to hide her away even better than she is now. I've spoken to Blake about her and she knows that she will need to be hidden away. I hate that Blair-Boo is always to locked away. I so badly have to fight every day not so change out of my bat form to court her. I watch her as she sleeps, I want so badly to hold her close. Be there for her in a bigger way. I scared her so much when I left that night. She knew I was gone as Stefen, It broke every part of my heart to see her scared of me. His father didn't help the fact that he acted like I wasn't even there other than to say who I was.

 I'm to go back on her birthday, it's so far away. I feel so dirty thinking of this little girl. I feel like I should just die for being filled with these evil thoughts. I watch as she's gotten older and the urge to court her gets stronger and stronger...Blake says "She's your beloved.  You give your body whatever age you want. We could look like our parents but we like being young why? Because we want to find our beloveds we feel the need to find them. You saw your beloved once you're seeing her again. You're waiting for when you can and that's coming. Don't dare feel like your some horrible person, Carden. Sure we've done bad things...horrible unspeakable things for so many reasons." She wrote on so many things but Belladonna being back I'm not even sure Blair-Boo was her. I've been sending people out looking for Sarin if he was here would he know or does he know that Blair-Boo is part Belladonna or is her.

I go back tomorrow I've thought over everything Blake's said. I was going to wait, I was going to keep her safe,  I wasn't going to be the monster I always was. She was the light I needed before I leave I'm going to stress to her that I'm not to come back here or to the Main house.

  "You read all of them well I was in there?" Carden asked.

  "Not just the one I picked up and this one," I looked over to see Sarin had been ready from the beginning. "Looks like you have a better reader than myself." I put the paperback in the folder and went to the bed on the floor.

  "I didn't know you had such strong feelings for me while I grew up, Carden." I played with my hair

  "I still feel that way," he moved his hands gesturing to his older body, "I'm not anywhere near your age."

  "Sarin's not either." I pointed out

  "My body stopped aging when you died. We were 27 when it happened," he said over his shoulder while reading the journal of Carden.

  "I hate myself, I'm lusting over a 16-year-old body."

  "I'm your mate," I said and Sarin said at the same time, "She's your mate." 

  "She's my mate and that should've been enough to justify that I want' to touch all over her body. I want to mate her in the strongest way possible." Carden was sitting on the end of the bed with his face in his hands. I got up and crawled into his lap.

  "I'm not ready to mate yet. Sarin's body age is 27, I'm a reincarnation. I have so many things to work through." Carden nuzzled my neck.

  "You bite her and we won't forgive you." Sarin said still reading the papers. I pulled back. Carden looked sad and concern.

  "Why is it you don't want to mate me?"

 I opened my mouth to speak then closed it but Sarin filled in my silence, "She feels like your a liar, she knows a good part of your life when Belladonna was around and she knows you only Stefan as good as Belladonna knows Carden. Blair-Boo doesn't know you as a person now. I don't blame her. I don't know this Carden in front of me. Why do you think I'm reading all of these from the beginning? For fun, no. I read them to see why the Carden I use to know is gone. Maybe it's just an act."

  Carden was still staring at me on his lap, "Is that true. You both don't know who I am anymore. You both don't trust me?"

  "Trust you we do," Sarin said Carden's head snapped towards Sarin and in a blink of an eye I was on the floor, and Carden had his hands around Sarin's throat which meant mine.

  "I want to hear her speak!" Carden said throwing Sarin back into the chair sending my head farther into the floor. Wood splintered off the sides of my head. My head throbbed with the pain of the floor. My lungs whizzed finally getting the air they needed. My head throbbed more with pain and this time dizziness. I felt my eyes flutter close.

Darkness

  "Sarin?" I was in front of the door with the light underneath. I went backward until I stumbled on the furniture.

  "Why? Why is he so angry? Was it because that's how I feel and Sarin said it. Would he have done that to my body if I told him those things? I can't seem to believe that he's changed. I look at him and think  that  I'm his world and whole life and other times I look at him and I think that he'll abuse me, treat me like  I'm a trophy to show off, and push me around." Silents and in the dark.

  I don't know how long I've been on the couch in the darkness. There is so little to do without Sarin. I guess I should just try to sleep here. I don't think it's possible to sleep here though.

P.O.V Sarin

  "Blair-Boo!" I was at her said but her eyes had fluttered shut by the time Carden stormed out the room not even knowing that he'd hurt her.

  The floor had an indent of her head and there were bruises on her neck there must've been the same ones on me. I was running to Blake's room. I knew her to be the same as back then. She'd know what to do to help Blair-Boo

  "Blake!" She was laughing at herself out loud. Turning to look at me she blinked a few times

  "Blair-Boo was hurt." She sobered up fast from whatever she was laughing at and went running through that mansion to see her.

  When we got there Carden was standing to be her, "Move Carden I have to assist her." I went around them and held her hand pulling her into the past.

Past Egypt P.O.V. Blair-Boo

I was pulled from the darkness so suddenly that it took me a while to notice I was with Sarin watching time from Egypt.

  "Sarin! Stop I have to go tend the garden." I could tell I had been putting it off since the weather had been bad with the haboobs.

  "We have enough to eat for this season. You can take a break and be with me."

  "We may have enough to eat but we don't have the money reserves we usually have. With the sandstorms being so close I wasn't going to brave it and tend the garden. It had to be today while it's clear and nice outside."

  "Fine, I'll come with you." Sarin gave me a grin that I knew to be a look of mischief.

  Outside the sun was hot and bearing down on our backs as we pulled the weeds and chatted about how much we could sell them at.

  Sarin grabbed my hand so I looked at him. He was crying so something must be wrong with me. "What is wrong Sarin. You rarely cry?"

" I don't know what's wrong with you but when Carden grabbed me and shoved me back he hurt you badly."

  "Can you show me that memory?" I looked back at the scene of us laughing and throwing sand at each other in the blazing sun of Egypt.

  "I can't watch it again. Let me know when you are done." He said kissing my hand.

P.O.V Carden

   

"What the hell were you thinking attacking Sarin like that!" Blake was livid with me I think more than I was livid with myself. I had seen Sarin running out of the room but there was no Blair-Boo behind him.

  I went back to the room to see her I saw her on the floor and tried to remember what I'd done to be seeing her on the floor. I fell to the floor looking over to Sarin that had the bruise that I'd given him and therefore Blair-Boo.

  "I proved them right. I'm still the old Carden that rules with brutality, that when I finally mate them make them my slaves. I haven't changed. I thought I had the more that I was with Blair-Boo I was changing it was about 13 years I'd been with her."

  "Carden if you want to change so badly do it! You don't prove their worries right!" She hit me upside the head. "Your lucky I was able to fix her brain." I heard the clicks of the high heel shoes she was wearing leave the room.

  Beck and Grant were in the room next. They gave me death glares and looked over their sister and Sarin laying on the ground together I moved them both at once to my bed. I pulled up a chair on Blair's side. I held her hand. I can't believe I got that angry with what Sarin said that I attack him. It was like I didn't remember her being on my lap. I couldn't remember the way that Blake had attacked him and it did the same to Blair-Boo. Blair's eyes moved and so did Sarin's the same way like they were living through something. Soon after Sarin was out of their mind link.

  "How is she?" He gave me the same look her brothers had given me and left the room. I sat there a second and then ran after him.

  "How is she? I need to know!" I was shaking. I was so fucking stupid...why couldn't I control my temper better. Sarin whipped around on me and thumped my chest with his finger as he said every word, "She's fine no thanks to you." He stalked off to Blake's room. I tried getting in but they wouldn't let me.

  I went back to my room kissing my dear sweet beloved on the head and held her small frame to my body soon I was asleep.

 When I woke Blair-Boo was gone, the pillows on the floor were gone, all the belongings she had were gone. Was she better, had they lift me? I moped into the kitchen to find her sitting in a seat while Sarin made her that soup thing. Neither one acknowledged I was there. It hurt even more.

  I kneeled beside Blair-Boo, "How are you feeling?" I placed a hand on her shoulder and she just shrugged it off. I felt so shattered inside I had just confirmed all her fears in me. I went and looked at myself in my room. Blake was right that I shouldn't have proven there worries in me to be true.

Blair-Boo's P.o.v.

  I woke in Carden's bed. I started to leave the bed to find Blake coming out of the bathroom with my things and all the pillows were already gone. Sarin came in a very relieved and happy mood. He kissed my cheek and carried me out of the room bridal style to the kitchen. He placed me at one of the table seats and went about cooking food for the two of us.

  I could feel Carden come into the kitchen but I was so brought into myself that I didn't even want to look at him. I had the flood of fear inside me that I did when Stefan was gone and Carden was in the hallway speaking with my father.

  I was glad when he left. My brain hurt so much and Blake had told me that Carden had broken my skull resulting in those skull fragments to then pierced my brain when he did those motions to Sarin. She followed up with say that I might not be able to do things to the full balance I use to be able to do.

  Sarin was done cooking at came and helped me eat. I was like I had a hole in my lip and lost most of the food to my shirt. We went back to Blake's room. She wasn't there. He undressed me slowly and placed me in a filling bathtub.

  "Maybe I should just let Michell have me. Then they would all be gone and I'd come back later like I did this time and I'd have you all to myself, Sarin." It was slow and hard to get the words out.

 "No! Don't you even think that? You'll recover and you have me now, always." He said as he washed my body. I watched as the water turn a diluted red. I must have had a lot of blood on my whole body.

  "I don't understand why he would even think those actions were okay to do to you. You were just saying what I thought. Do you think he would've done that to me?"

  "He's always had a temper. I think with the many years with you it mellowed out but it's resurfacing in big waves that take over him. Like a relapse of an addict. Not that it justifies what he did to us. I don't know if that he would do the same to you if you said it versus me."Sarin worked on my hair slowly and very gently. Soon he was done and I was getting dried off by him.

  As he clothed me there was a knock on the bedroom door I stiffened it was Carden. "I'm going to get you dressed. Like he's not even here." Sarin said sitting me down to put on my underwear, pants. The shirt was easier to put on. Carden had entered the room so when we came out Carden tried yet again to talk to us. Sarin just helped me into the makeshift pillow bed, "You comfy?" Sarin asked standing over me coving me up. I nodded and gave him two thumbs up since it was so very hard and took quite a long time for me to speak.

  "Good now I have to unplug the bathtub. You think you'll be okay here?" He whispered so softly in my ear kissing me as I nodded. I closed my eyes as they were so heavy. My brain still hurt so much. I was happy not to be in that dark room any longer.

  On Sarin's way to the bathroom, Carden grabbed his upper arm. "I will not take being ignored any longer," Carden said

  "Let go of me." Was all Sarin said starting to continue to the bathroom. Carden's grip tightened on Sarin's arm and I moaned as the pressure on my arm felt like it was going to brake.

  "You'll let go of me unless you want to break her arm." The pressure was gone and then as I started to drift off I heard the tub gurgle as it drained.

 Sarin was in bed with me when I woke. I didn't move at all from when he tucked me in. I looked at my arm to see very light bruises. It would be gone in a few days with eating the soup.

  Carden was starting to just prove all my greatest fears. Sarin is the other half of me we had the same feelings about everything. Even more so when it came to Carden but now we had different opinions but they were different both on parallel paths of thinking. Stefan was a part of Carden that couldn't speak and that I had to take care of. As Stefan, it was the small things that made Carden good but now all those things that made him a monster were coming out like waves washing the beach like addicts going back to their favorite cocktail of drugs they so depend on. My body was so badly damaged that trying to seat was a task that took another person. I was started to realize that from now on everything I do going to take another person.

  Blake was up packing the room along with the little things we had. I saw boxes with Grant and Beck's names on them. Were we leaving somewhere and was Carden going there? I raised my good arm and waved it around in the air knocking the floor to get her attention. She came over with a smile on her face and helped me sit up I pointed the boxes.

  "We're leaving here for the main house. The In-Between Law has been passed a while ago and now it's being enforced and there were more of you guys in hiding coming to the communities to live peacefully like they should've been able so long ago.  That's who was moving outside of here. You two finally got what you wanted all along-" Blake told me as she got me comfortable sitting up.

  "We also wanted to mate with him back then so that's the only thing we don't have. We got Belladonna killed. We got this problem now where he can't control his temper that's almost killing Blair-Boo." Sarin said getting up to finish the little things to pack.

 "Well I guess that's true you don't have what you wanted then but you can have it now. I don't see any point  being here anymore now that the law is passed." Her supernova eyes sparkled a twinkle as she looked at me like her eyes gave a silent tear to me.