Chapter Text
Avid’s throat felt raw from screaming, though he hadn’t been, not anymore, at least. His heart still felt as if it was home to a wooden stake. He felt the aching hunger, body still thinking he was dead, still thinking he needed to be healed.
But he didn’t.
Because he was alive. Avid was alive and he didn’t know how. He knew he was still a vampire, he could feel it in his very being, could feel the desperate hunger as if he’d never been satiated by a single drop of blood. But he was just outside of Oakhurst. An Oakhurst that was empty.
Empty and as though no one had ever stood foot in there, no sign of the people that had come to Oakhurst at the same moment as Avid.
And strangely he didn’t feel afraid, just hollow. A hole in him that had been filled by a few people before. First it was Elle, something that he ripped away from himself, an action he regretted endlessly. Then it was Drift, the friend that had listened even if she didn’t fully believe it. Then Shelby, Shelby who believed him without question. And then…
Then Scott.
Avid missed Scott, missed the sarcasm, the smooth accented voice that had assured him he would not be harmed within the coven.
Scott hadn’t meant to lie about that. He had meant it. It wasn’t Scott’s fault Owen and Pyro had decided enough was enough. Avid couldn’t find it in himself to be angry. He looked to the mountain he knew the crypt lay within.
He didn’t know why he had woken up. He was supposed to be dead, he was dead, but he was alive.
It was a strange feeling. The water in the fountain showed the same reflection he’d had the first day in Oakhurst.
It was as if Oakhurst had never happened. There was no trace of anybody, not a sound echoed through the ruins.
Violet eyes were in his reflection, a color he hadn’t had in ages. He was a vampire, again, he could feel it. It wasn’t the infection finally taking hold of him. He’d evaded it by asking Shelby to turn him. There were bandages around his throat, bandages that served no purpose anymore.
He unwrapped them, setting them on the stone of the fountain.
He looked around the barren town, feeling a kind of apathy. But also.. an emotion he couldn’t place. Perhaps it was grief, but that emotion often felt suffocating. Maybe it was acceptance, or sadness.
But no anger awoke in him. He almost felt numb.
Avid breathed a shaky breath in, though he didn’t need to. Oakhurst needed repairing, if no one was coming, if Oakhurst would never happen. It needed a guardian.
He missed his coven. He missed Scott. He was hungry.
He looked to the cream colored beacon. He rested a hand on it, smiling faintly at the memory that had been the thing he’d built his theories on.
“Scott’s a vampire! The beacon stopped consecration as he walked in!”
He’d been right, for all the wrong reasons, but he’d been right.
He sat beside it, might as well desecrate it if he really was the only one here. Alone in an empty town with only passing animals and a neutral beacon to keep him company. He laughed though there was nothing funny going on. The quickest way to insanity indeed.
“God.” Avid was still giggly, he hugged himself the temporary moment of lightness replaced the crushing loneliness.
A thought occurred to him suddenly, “If this is the start..” he mumbled, the beacon glowed a dark comforting red.
“If this is the start again, then.. then he might still be at the castle!”