LIGHTS IN THE SHADOW Read online

  I saw Carmen standing at the door. She was wearing a yellow T-shirt and sweatpants. Her blond hair with white streaks was almost waist-length. The lines around her eyes were like proof that she was a proud mother who has been through a lot. Most of the time, she reminded me of my mother.

  She turned to me and swiftly crossed the room. Suddenly, she held me tight like a mother who just reunited with her kid. She was terrified. She kept talking while she held me in her arms. “Oh my god, Mia! Are you okay? Did he do something to you? I can’t tell how scared I got when I heard…”

  “I’m fine, Carmen. It’s all gone.” I enjoyed her very familiar scent. The way she smells reminds me of my mother, and when she embraces me, I always feel one step closer to my mother. “Besides, isn’t all of this just a dream? What could he do to me?”

  The moments the words came out of my mind, I felt that I was wrong. She stared deeply into my eyes with wisdom. “You are wrong about that.”

  I knew that already, but I kept my silence.

  She sat beside me and kept holding my hands. She was still nervous about what happened, or even worse, she was dreading the upcoming disasters. When I looked at her face, I noticed that she was white as a sheet. Her blue eyes were darkened with fear. After thinking about where or how to start talking, she began to speak nervously.

  “Girls, I want you to listen to me very carefully, okay? This is very serious.”

  We all nodded.

  “Mia, I want you to draw the man who called himself Alejandro in your dream. Can you do that?”

  I just started to see how dangerous things were. Even though I didn’t have much talent, my mother was an artist, so at least I could try. Plus, it was my sophomore year of art history, so I had seen a lot of paintings before.

  I nodded briefly and looked at Aida. She didn’t get me at first, but then she unwillingly went to get some papers and a pencil for me. I picked up the pencil and started drawing. At first, I drew an oval shape for the head and tried to center it. I was pretty sure his beautiful hair would take a lot of space. I stopped worrying about the technical issues and thought about the details. After a while, my hand started to rush effortlessly on the paper. It was almost like my hands had a mind of their own as my vision started to blur. Even though I was staring at the paper, the only thing that lingered on my mind was Alejandro’s perfect features. I was almost captivated by his vision. I could practically feel him leaning down to my ear, as clearly as I could see his perfect face right before my eyes and the sensation of his breath over my skin. How could I possibly fit this much perfection into only one drawing? I didn’t need to overthink to remember his eyes as dark as a thunderous night, his shapely lips, and his perfect nose, which seemed to be carved from marble. His perfection has already haunted me. I pushed myself to draw every detail of him.

  I was so focused on my drawing that I could only faintly hear people talking to me. They were asking questions at first, and then they started to call out my name. Ultimately, they started yelling at me. Somebody was shaking me. Suddenly, it was hard to breathe. The last breath I took was stuck at my throat. I felt like choking. I couldn’t tell if my eyes were open. The only thing that was still clear to me was Alejandro’s face, but then his face also started to wither.

  And then… Nothing…

  Everything just went black.

  When I opened my eyes, I was lying on the floor. We were still in the same room. I recognized the place from the aquarium lights, which reflect on the ceiling. Everybody gathered around me. Carmen shook my head gently and then took me into her arms. When I was able to focus on her eyes, I started to make sense of the words they’ve been using.

  “Mia! Mia! Pull yourself together! Come on, please!”

  Carmen was touching my cheeks nervously.

  “What happened to her? Why did she faint? Oh god, why are her eyes still blue? They should’ve been back to brown by now!”

  The first thing that crossed my mind was ‘wow’. The person who was nervously speaking was Lana. I haven’t heard her sound that scared for so long. I kept staring at Carmela. She was usually the calmest one who was standing in the middle of the room without saying a word. The only thing she could do was to watch me with concerned eyes. I tried to straighten up my back and opened my mouth. I could breathe again. After two attempts, I could say, “I’m fine.” Suddenly, they stopped talking. I grabbed Carmela’s arm, and she supported me to stand up. Carmen took my other arm, and they laid me down on the sofa. My head stopped spinning after a few seconds. As they see me get better, the tension level in the room dropped a little bit.

  “What happened to me?” I said.

  “It must be him. He is trying to block everything about himself. Maybe he doesn’t wish to be found. The only thing I’m certain about is that he wants you.”

  “What do you mean?” I said.

  “Maybe he thinks that by leaving us in the dark, he can prevent being exposed.”

  “Who is he?” asked Sophia to Carmen curiously. Aida was keeping her silence. Her fear of what happened could be read from her face.

  “But how can this be possible? I mean, how...”

  Carmen was still trying to put the pieces back together. “Carmen, who is Alejandro?” said Lana impatiently. We were all losing our patience.

  “He should have been stopped. He wasn’t supposed to be this powerful. This is not possible! So it’s all true. The time is about to come,” she said to herself mysteriously.

  Even Carmela, who somehow managed to stay calm all along, was afraid now.

  “Carmen, this is not a good time for riddles. Please just tell us who he is.”

  “He is… Alejandro,” she said like it was news. Then she lowered her voice like she would give us a secret and whispered.

  “The Master of Darkness…”

  CHAPTER 3

  We all stared at each other. We’ve never heard that name before. Maybe we all expected her to say that he is ‘the bogeyman’, but I guess the two were equivalent. Another calamity caused by our ‘gifts’. If we were just ordinary people, none of this would’ve happened to us. I wish we could choose our lives. I never bragged about my talents before, but I knew there would be a day when I will be grateful for them. Even though I didn’t say that out loud, I could feel that day was getting closer and closer.

  I checked their faces one by one – to see if anyone knew what Carmen was talking about – but they seemed as lost as I was. Lana waited to see if Carmen is going to say anything else, but she was still frightened by her own words. “So? Who is this Master of Darkness? What does he want from us?”

  I was grateful to Lana for summarizing every question I had in mind.

  “Don’t you understand? He must’ve found himself some followers. I would never guess he could escape from captivity. I wasn’t even sure he was still alive.”

  “I understand that, but I still have no idea what he wants from us.”

  Sophia was a realist, just like me. “Oh… I’m not sure how to explain this, but I can’t think of a better time to start to try.”

  This whole mysterious attitude was totally out of Carmen’s character. Plus, I’ve never seen her that afraid in my entire life. Still, I didn’t say anything. I was just listening in silence. Who knows what else we would find out? “Do you remember that night fourteen years ago?” she asked.

  “How could we forget that horrible night? Sometimes I still have nightmares about it,” said Lana. As she was tümünthe oldest of all of us, she remembered that night better than anyone else. She was nineteen back then.

  “I would never want to put you through this again, but... Do you remember what I told you the night when Helena and your aunt passed away? ” Helena was my mother.

  “Yes,” Carmela said and kept on talking. “Years ago, you said that my father had killed a Zathef because he’d thought they were responsible for his sister’s death. Even so, my mother had wanted to save him from his unfortunate fate because she knew that no
t only was it very hard, but also it was considered one of the biggest crimes to kill a Zatfeh. On the other hand, my aunts had only got involved in this in the hope of protecting my mother. They had wanted to save her if they could, so they tried to stop her from interfering with my father’s punishment. However, my mother had been determined to save her husband, so she interrupted the Zathef council meeting. That night the council had decided to punish my mother and her sisters as they had been considered as accomplices to my father’s crime. No one could question the authority and decisions of the Zathefs’, so they had had no other option but to wait helplessly for their punishment: Execution. They’d never lost their hope till the very last moment, but that night…”

  Carmela burst into tears as I shuddered with the horrible thought of this memory and struggled not to cry. Lana and Sophia exchanged glances, and Aida was sobbing quietly. She was the most unfortunate of all of us because she had almost no memory of our mother.

  Carmela kept on talking. “That night, Zathefs came. I remember chaos… And the flames… Everything was horrible. They took the revenge of the dead Zathef, and they made an example out of it as a warning to other Azurites.”

  She had to adjust her breathing before being able to start talking again because she was crying in silence the whole time. Aida didn’t know all the details of this horrendous incident before, so I feared that it might affect her badly.

  She unexpectedly opened her mouth and said, “What flames?”

  “The whole thing was disguised as a fire. The police reports recorded the incident as a house fire due to electrical failure.”

  “Why would Zathefs do such a thing? Weren’t they supposed to be the good guys? They can’t be that cruel. It’s not fair!” said Aida.

  “Zathefs are neutral beings by nature, but still, our mother and aunts died because of a simple misunderstanding. I agree that it is not fair at all,” said Lana.

  “Don’t forget that Zathefs are strict about their laws. No crime can go unpunished when it comes to Zathef laws,” said Carmela. That was what Carmen taught us.

  “But my father was the one who killed a Zathef.”

  When Carmela opened her mouth to answer me, Carmen interrupted her. “Forget everything you think you know,” she said. “Nothing is what it seems to be.” She glanced at us all.

  “Your father is innocent.”

  The shock was so sudden that I felt dizzy for a moment. At first, I felt that my nerves suddenly go numb, and I almost could hear my blood slowed down in my veins. Still, I didn’t faint. In a short period, I gained my senses back. I was afraid. The last few hours were like being on an emotional roller-coaster. I could feel that everything Carmen said was just the tip of the iceberg. Everything I knew, our family history, the sorrows of our past suddenly became vague. My brain quickly adjusted to the new information because I already doubted my past. It was all a lie. We’ve been deceived for so many years.

  All of us glanced at Carmen to hear an explanation, and she continued talking. “Nothing is what it seems to be,” she repeated. “Your father was only trying to defend Helena, and so were your aunts. Helena did something she was not supposed to do. She committed an unforgivable crime, and she suffered the consequences along with everybody around her.”

  She stood in silence. I knew. I knew the worst was yet to come, but I still asked.

  “What did my mother do?”

  She didn’t answer. “Carmen, what did my mother do?”

  She took a deep breath. “This is another long story, but I guess it’s time for you to know the truth.”

  We were waiting for her to speak curiously. Like it was not bad enough that the truth about our family was concealed from us for years, we were all pissed about the fact that everything was revealed after such a rough morning for all of us. If Alejandro or Rio did not disturb my dreams, would we still be living a lie?

  “Your mother, Helena… She fell in love with someone else. Someone she should’ve stayed away: Alejandro’s father. However, they were both married. Besides, Alejandro was just a child back then.”

  We all gasped. I would’ve never guessed that our beloved mother, who -we all believed so- selflessly sacrificed herself to protect my dad, was actually in love with someone else. We’ve always looked up to her, admired her. As a matter of fact, we were all a bit hurt by the fact that she loved our father so much that she risked being separated from us.

  “Carmen, not that I approve of any of this, but how could they be given a death penalty for that?” asked Carmela. Once again, she was the only one who easefully accepted the situation. While we were still trying to process everything we heard, she was ready for more. She was always calm and not easily surprised. What mattered to her was time. Sooner or later, she would accept everything and move on while the rest of us kept living in the past.

  “What was the first thing that I’ve taught you? Never break the rules of your clan. But most importantly, never consider opposing the Zathefs. According to Zathef laws, adultery is strictly forbidden. Besides, Alejandro’s family was shunned by society. Even though Alejandro’s father was an Azurite, he married a Zathef. It was not an approved one. They both defied their clans to be together. Only because Alejandro’s mother was a Zathef, they were not given a death penalty, but it didn’t keep them from being excommunicated.”

  It was a very dramatic love story. However, what was the role of my aunt in it? Why were they killed?

  Carmen kept explaining.

  “Helena had met Alejandro’s father, the same year she gave birth to Carmela. Then, their forbidden love started. Your mother fell in love with Alejandro’s father, the moment their eyes met. While all of these were happening, Alejandro’s mother had found out that she was pregnant. However, she was aware of her husband’s affair with Helena, so she left. Nobody knows exactly where, but it is said that she gave birth far away from everything. I think she had left the child to a close friend of hers. After she came back, even though her husband didn’t bother, Helena apologized to her a million times. Besides, Helena told me that she never actually had an affair with Alejandro’s father. She was just platonically in love with him. For years, they kept on their relationship as if nothing had happened. Even though your mother was still in love with Alejandro’s father, she kept that to herself from then on.”

  She lowered her eyes to the ground.

  “She loved you so much. Around that time, she found out that she was pregnant with you.” She looked at me. I narrowed my eyes. She knew how I felt more or less, but she kept on. “On top of it, there was a boy who had to grow up without his father because of an affair which never actually happened. That’s why your mother went, so see Alejandro’s mother as soon as she came back. Helena was miserable with guilt even though she didn’t do anything wrong other than falling in love.”

  I was sickened by this shameful story.

  “Did she take her child back?” It seemed like none of us took the story well.

  “Never. She was blessed with the ability to foresee. After all, she was a Zathef. That’s why she never mentioned her son to anyone. Years later, we found out that she was visiting him occasionally.” She paused for a moment.

  “After Aida was born, fate made their ways cross again, and that fanned the flames of Helena’s long lost love. She was so lonely and depressed. She loved your father. She never wished to put him through such terrible things, but the heart wants what it wants. She had to think of you, your father, and an innocent child who was sent away from home. I have no idea how she had processed everything in her mind, but she was in a point of no return, so she left.”

  I let out a breath I didn’t even know I was holding. Carmen kept talking.

  “Of course the Zathef council couldn’t overlook such a scandal. When the whole thing came to light, it was shameful for everyone. Alejandro’s father rejected Helena’s love, but for some reason, she was so loyal to him that she took all the blame. And regardless of everything, your father and aunt
s couldn’t sit still while Helena was being punished. They stood up against the Zathef council together. They tried to fight until the very end.”

  “And as expected, Zathef council killed them all!”Aida exclaimed. The whole mess was more than she could handle. Carmen stared at her with angry eyes because Aida broke her concentration like that even mattered.

  “No, that’s not what happened. That night when everyone was waiting for the Zathef council’s arrival, Alejandro’s mother attacked the house with a little army and killed everyone except you girls. She had something else in mind for you. She was blinded by anger. She was a jealous wife who took the risk of being executed. She wanted to make Helena pay for taking the love of her love away from her. At first, her only intention was to kill Helena, but when your father and aunts crossed her path, she killed them too. She burned everything. Because she knew her days were numbered, she also killed her husband, even though it was painful for her. The truth is, because she was a Zathef, it was much easier for her to kill once she yielded to anger.”

  “It’s gruesome!” Lana said with disgust. None of us were crying. It was almost impossible to put a bold face on under such shameful circumstances.

  “No, it’s not gruesome. It’s just another sad love story.”

  “A person in love would never do these things,” Carmela said.

  “She died, right? She deserves to die.” I said, thinking of that woman. My voice came out louder than I expected.