I loaded our car up; Merida changed to the back seat, she was holding Astoria’s head in her lap trying to soothe her. Astoria had been beaten and then nearly drained. We had our medic trying to infuse her with transfusions of human blood but nothing was working. Her mortal body was just too weak. She was hemorrhaging internally from her injuries. Merida was now caressing her face and hair while she let out a tear or two. She loved Astoria for her kids loved her just the same.
I got into the car on the other side in the back and closed the door. The car was now moving. “We can’t let her die, not like this. this is our fault. Mine really, they took her to get me to talk. Had I not been so stubborn—” Merida broke down. Watching my wife’s sad heart was too much for me, I pulled Astoria to me without a word, carefully holding her on my lap. “This is not your fault, let it be me she hates for condemning her to this life,” I told my wife before I bit into Astoria’s neck and drained what little she still had. I ripped into my wrist and pulled it up to Astoria’s lips, letting my blood spill into her mouth. Astoria roused a bit, just enough to latch on and drink fully from me. Merida watched, crying still feeling so guilty for it all.
Just as Astoria had her fill of my blood, the car came to a full stop and we were loading into the planes that waited for us to take us back to Paris. The transformation was starting as Astoria was writhing and wrenching from the pain. I carried her in my arms into the plane, laying her on one of the seats. Lestat and Louis opted to come Merida and I to offer any support they could for their old friend. Marius stood and watched me as I was the last one to close the door. We caught eyes and stared at each other. Would I ever be able to forgive him? My hatred burned in him, he turned to go in to his own plane.
As we took off into the air, the mortal death started to happen. Merida cried through it but held strong to her conviction that this was the only option she had. Then Astoria slept the dead sleep and the physical changes started to happen. Her skin became pale, porcelain like, her hair glistened a brilliant shade of platinum blonde, not blue like her witch self a sign of the change in powers, her nails became translucent, her facial features perfected themselves, and surely her eyes would be different when she woke but for now she slept. The dead sleep. Would she still see the spirits that haunted her in this different world she belong to? Maybe she would see them more vividly now, now that she was not living… not dead… but not living. Would that make her closer than ever to them?
The plane landed in Paris and before long Astoria woke to her new world and she was hungry. Being around vampires most of her life she knew the deal, so I took her to our blood bank and showed her how to sustain herself with preserved blood. She was a quick learner. I was not going to have much trouble with her in this sense. Soon we were heading down under ground to go back to Sosaria and there they would be reunited with our kids, with Isonu and Venora. I longed for a bit of that peace.