The words crashed inside my head. My maker...my maker...my maker...
"Min Ah! What's going...?"
I looked at Thunder with a hurt expression.
"Stay away, Thunder,"she spoke, making me quiver. "We don't know how he's going to react."
And once again I looked at her. What was she talking about? React? was she expecting me to jump on her? Attack her? Bite her? Fight with her and the others? Cry in front of her? What was she exactly expecting me to do? Actually, I was too shocked to think or react. The only thing that I could do was to watch her nine tails move behind her, filling the corridor with that strange light.
"Seung Ho..."
Her call...I could feel it in my blood. Every single cell of mine was pushing me towards her, towards her streched arms, to feel her warm arms around me, to cry in her imbrace...to be happy that she was there, a vivid presence in my life. But the voice inside my head told me to stay away, so my body did not move towards her.
"I thought you died,"I finally muttered.
"Dead?"she smiled. "I wish. No, Seung Ho, I was more present in your life than you can ever imagine. Now come, hear the story of your maker,"she signaled me to follow her in the living room. Which I did. Why? Because the bond between us was not broken. It was weakened by the years that passed without seeing each other, but it ws still there, burning inside my heart more brightly than ever before.
The door closed behind me without anyone touching it. So she had that kind of power...
"Sit."
I looked at her. Sitting there on that armchair with her legs crossed and her tails wrapped around her like a fur coat, she looked more like a queen than like the Kwon Min Ah I used to know.
"Aren't you going to sit?"shr raised her eyebrow.
"I prefer to stand."
"Cocky as ever!"she laughed.
That laugh again! Like the sound of bells tied at a cat's neck. It gave chills down my spine, making me wonder just how deathly was she?
"Step closer. I'm not going to eat you."
This time I had to obey. "What do you want from me?"
She analyzed my expression before answering. "What I want? I want you to stop being so awkward around me. It's not like I'm some kind of monster that it's going to eat you alive! I'm your maker. Aren't you supposed to be happy to see me?"
"Weren't you supposed to be there for me when I needed help?"I replied with a question. "Aren't you supposed to always tell me the truth?"
"No,"she answered, looking straight into my eyes. "I made you. I'm not obliged to tell you anything. I considered that it would be better for you if I keep my distance. And I think I did well. Look at you! You're a full fledged vampire without any human feelings residing in you. My purpose was to give you the gift of immortality, Seung Ho. Which I did. You didn't need me to feed you or anything like that. I was sure that you could find your own surviving way. Which you did,"she pointed out. "Did I not do well in raising you?"
Her words...they light the fire inside me. My anger was starting to heat up my blood, making it boil in my veins. How could she? Just how could she make me live on my own for so long, endure the sadness of countless decades and become a monster that shouldn't have existed from the beginning?!
"What are you?"I heard myself asking. " 'Coz I don't think you are a vampire..."
"Aren't you playing smart right now,"she giggle. "Fine! Let's play this game of yours. To answer your question:no, I'm not a vampire. I'm a nine-tailed fox, better said, a gumiho."
"A gumiho? Isn't that a mythological being that feeds on human liver in order to get human?"
"And look who studied history!"she mocked me. "What you said is true, but only for red nine-tailed foxes. And I'm a white fox, as you can see. The last one from my kind, actually."
"This doesn't answer to my question:how come you were able to transform a human into a vampire?"I asked, taking a sit on the sofa. Her history was quite interesting and for few minutes I forgot all about the pain in my chest.
"I am this world's last Creator. I was born as I am with the supreme power of creating and transforming. I'm an old fox, Seung Ho. Older than you can even imagine. Almost as old as this world...are you really interested in my story?"
I nodded. After all, she was my maker. Her story was my story.
"I was born on Norway's current territory, under the name of Kylala. The reason I was born as a gumiho, like the koreans named me, is that my mother was a murderer since childhood. She slaughtered her whole family when she was 5 years old. As years passed she commited many murders, but no one dared to confront her. Then she met my father. He was already taken..."
She stopped and looked at me, trying to read my thoughts. "Their society was one of women. They held the power. Men were used only for sexual plesure and for perpetuing the species. My father was the slave of a wealthy woman, but even so, my mother wanted to have him and in the end she got what she wanted, 'coz no one dared go against the leader. One thing my mother didn't knew:my father and his master were in love. Their relationship was the base of nowadays society."
Once again she stopped. This time she was too engrossed in her own memories to look at me. "Mother found out about that after she remained pregnant with me. Surprisingly, she set my father free. Little did he knew about the curse she put on him...My mother hanged herself in front of their house while seven months pregnant. That's the only way for a gumiho to be born in this world:the mother has to die and kill the child inside her. The souls mixture and the powers the child is gifted with make him become what I am today."
"So...what you're trying to say is that..."
"Yes, I was born from a dead corpse,"she silently whispered as the light around her flickered.
***
We remained silent as the room was filled with her light.
"I still don't understand. What do you want from me?"
She turned her icy-blue eyes towards me. This time there ws no coldness. Only a deep sadness and emptiness. Something was wrong...
"You know, I always considered myself a monster. A monster that created monsters, that saw so much hatred and killings and yet did nothing, but enjoyed the show painted in blood. I killed so many innocent people that I lost the count of them. I took lives and ate souls. I killed you and took away from you your mortality. Don't you hate me?"
Was it a rhetorical question?
Then she turned to me, watching me with a fiery expression. "I want you to help me kill them. My children. The night's children. Each and every supranatural being that lurks out there..."
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