Blood is Thicker than Water

[Kiera de Auvergne]

The Diamante Manor was silent. Except for the delighted giggling of one ten-year old girl. Of course Kiera would deny that it was giggling, she was a big girl now, but sometimes, the excitement of playing with her parents and flying and dancing and fencing, still wrapped her in joy and she couldn’t resist the little bubbles of laughter that escaped her lips as she raced down the corridors of the Manor.
She was approaching her parents’s room now, and she slowed down, unwilling to be reprimanded for running inside the Manor corridors. She was just about to burst into the room, and pull her Mother for an impromptu fencing lesson, when the sound of loud voices stopped her:

“No Vi, I will not allow it.”

“Alessander, there’s no other way! They’re coming for me and you know that Kiera’s going to be the first vic-“

Her father’s normally calm voice was strong and unshakeable, with an underlying tone of anger. “You think I can’t protect my own daughter?”

Her mother’s perennially cool and composed voice was cracking, “This is not the time for ego issues Alessander. You know how powerful they are, how desperate. They will do anything to know the future of the War. Anything.”

Kiera’s eyebrows wrinkled in confusion. Her parents hardly ever fought. And even if they did, it was minor disagreements. None of them ever raised their voice. But now….they were arguing loudly…..about her?

“I don’t care Vi, you can’t possibly expect me to desert my child and send her off somewhere all alone.“

“She won’t be alone, Drippy will be there with her-“

Her father’s voice cut off her mother mid-sentence, outrage and disbelief shining through every word, “You’re going to send off our ten-year old daughter, to another continent, in the care of a house-elf?”

Kiera’s mind was spinning rapidly. Send off? Another continent?

“She will be safe, Alessander.” Her mother’s voice sounded weary. “Besides, I’m pregnant. Since you refuse to allow me to drop the child, despite all sensibility, we’ll go to the safehouse. I’ll give birth to the child there, you can take her to America, and then after I pick Kiera up from Asia, I’ll follow you.”

“I don’t understand why we can’t take Kiera to the safehouse directly.”

“Because they’re powerful people Alessander, why the hell do you refuse to understand that?” Kiera winced when her mother swore, she never swore. “If they break into the safehouse and something happens to Kiera then-“

“Have you ever thought that something could happen to Kiera when she’s in another continent, Visperia?” Her father was using her mother’s full name, another bad sign. “You just refuse to understand how dangerous it could be-“

“Fine then.” There were thumping sounds, like her mother walking to the other end of the room. “You can take Kiera and go to Asia, and I’ll go to the safehouse-“

“You’re pregnant Vi, its not safe for you to be alone-“

“Then make up your mind, Alessander.” Anger and frustration found equal purchase in her mother’s voice. “You can either go with Kiera to Asia, or come with me.”

Silence. Then her father’s voice, quiet, almost inaudible, “I’m going to go check on Kiera.” Footsteps, walking towards the door.

“Alessander.”

The footsteps stilled.

“Its either her, or me.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`

One year. That’s how long it had been since Kiera had heard her parents argue on that fateful day. One year since the decision had been made to throw her life in the flames. One year since her father had decided to be with his pregnant wife and send his daughter away.
Of course, eleven-year old Kiera didn’t think of it in those complex terms. She simply thought of it as one year since she had started hating her mother.
Because even after all these days, only one sentence was stuck in her head, repeating itself like a death knell which refused to stop ringing:

Its either her or me.

She had ran away soon, after reaching the house in Japan where she was supposed to stay like a prisoner, indoors, never to go out. Drippy refused to stop dogging her, she followed her wherever Kiera went, making sure of her safety. But after she ran out of the safehouse, there was no way to make way back in, not without the Portkey they had used in the beginning. Drippy could not Conjure food and money, there were limits to house-elf magic. Kiera grew used to darkness, to scavenged meals, to sleeping on porches, to not remembering what a bed and silk pillows felt like, just to keep running away from the house-elf who was the only living being who still cared about her.

She was in one of the dark markets of Tokyo now, where masked traders bought and sold Chimera eggs, where old women with rotting teeth beckoned to her to come have a sweet and talk to them awhile, where emaciated vampires stared at her longingly and beady eyes watched her from every corner. She disliked it, and ran into one of the quiet bylanes, then started walking listlessly.

“Lookie what we have ‘ere.”

A man. A man with eyes crinkled into lines, betel-nut stained teeth, and a smile. Kiera had a bad feeling about that smile. She started backing up, into a corner. The man leered at her further.

“Aw ‘oney, don’ be scared.” The man was approaching her, slowly. His deformed right hand was withdrawing from behind his back, a dim light gleaming on something in his hand. A knife. “Dun’ you wanna play?

“N-n-no its okay. I-I’m fine. I’ll j-just g-g-go now.” Kiera’s heart was thudding rapidly, as she rapidly tried to make her way out of the lane. But she had backed the wrong way, she was stuck. Kiera drew in a rattling breath. Its okay, she could handle this. She was eleven, she could definitely handle this. That still didn’t stop her from freezing when the man ran the edge of the blade lightly over her cheek. “Pretty gal.”

“Drippy no let you hurt Mistress!!!!”

A sharp sense of relief pervaded through Kiera’s mind: her house-elf was here. Then she froze with horror and shock as the man swung around and plunged the knife into Drippy’s chest. She was dying………..no, she was dead.

The last living being who cared about her…..dead.

Silence. The man bent down, and ran a dirty thumb on her cheek, “Aw, is the poor gal a-cryin’? Is jus’ a filthy ‘ouse-elf.”

Kiera’s hand, somehow, found the house-elf’s body, even as her eyes stared at the man. Her hand ran over the cold, bloody, motionless chest….and found the handle of the knife. She pulled it out….slowly.
The man was too busy leering at her to notice. Then, in a flash of light, and darkness, Kiera slashed his throat.

Blood, warm and sticky, gushed out. It was too less though. Too less to wash the stain of the man’s touch on her cheek. Too less to erase the memory of her house-elf being killed before her eyes. Kiera stabbed him again, stomach, sides. Blood. More, more, more blood.

So it was that at the tender age of eleven, Kiera committed her first murder.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A member of the Association found her by chance, hours later. A dark-haired girl, drenched in blood, sitting with the dead bodies of a man and a house-elf in a dark lane of Tokyo, a blood-stained knife in hand and staring into the distance.
Of course, she wasn’t there right now. She was in an old dingy warehouse somewhere in Tibet, where the Association member was speaking in whispers to his superior. Regarding her.

“Frankly, it was the eyes that scared me. They look like they belong to an Inferius, if you ask me.”

The superior, an Asian woman dressed in crisp pants and a shirt, knelt down. Her voice was kind and soothing, but her eyes were sharp, searching, fixated on the quiet impassive dark-haired girl in front of her, “Darling, what’s your name?”

The dried blood was stuck to her hands, her clothes in hard brown crusts. Her voice was immovable, “Kiera.”

“Kiera what?”

“Kiera Diama-…….” The voice broke off for a minute. “Kiera de Auvergne.”

“Is this….” The woman paused, as if wondering how to put this delicately. “Is this the first time you’ve ever murdered somebody?”

No answer.

“What I mean is…..have you ever stabbed, that is, hit someone with a knife before? With lots of blo-“

“I know what murder is.” The voice snapped. It was cold, dangerous. “And yes, this is the first time I’ve ever killed someone.”

The woman remained silent. She got up, then in a bare murmur to the man beside her, “Get the other one.”

Minutes later, an exotic-looking girl, perhaps a year or so older than Kiera, entered the room. The woman ordered her briskly, “This girl’s name is Kiera. She’s going to be part of us from now on. Get her cleaned, show her where to sleep. I’ll talk to her later.”

Kiera followed behind the girl silently. Her legs seemed to work of their own accord, her mind drifting in the fog that had spread ever since she had gripped that knife in her hand. It was still with her now, in her pocket.

“Did you kill anyone?”

The girl started, when Kiera addressed the blank question to her. Then with a shake of her head, “No.”

“Then why are you here?”

The girl tilted her head, considering the question. “I didn’t kill anyone. But I did steal from people quite a lot. And stabbed an old shopkeeper in the knee, once. If that counts.”

“Why did you stab him?”

The answer was simple. “I was hungry.”

Then the girl considered Kiera, her greyish-blue eyes scanning over her. “You know, probably I’m here coz I can do this.” A few seconds later, her hair turned blonde. “Only really special people are here you know. I think you’ll like it here.”

The fog in Kiera’s head cleared slightly. “What’s your name?”

“Rin.” The girl smiled. Or smirked, it was difficult to tell. “Welcome to the Association.”