Chapter 263 - All The Time In The World

We didn't hear from Maria again. All the better.

With or without her, my business kept expanding, to the point where the person on top of it became a CEO responsible mostly for numbers, and not for the hand-on work I liked the most in the antiquities dealership.

But with how "good" I was with numbers, the role of the CEO could only belong to JJ. We made it official, registering as partners, now that the laws allowed vampires to own businesses. JJ found a joy in putting numbers together and people at the right places. I found joy in finding stories of old items and bringing them to people who would appreciate them with lots of money. In our company, my role was that of a top-level expert used for the most special occasions and the most important deals. And a figurehead, of course.

I was perfectly satisfied with that arrangement. My name rang farther and wider in both supernatural and normal circles with each year. People asked me to identify magic items of forgotten origins, to appraise old relics and to tell if the hatred of an old king really clung to the dagger with which he was killed by his concubine.

I and JJ both had to travel a lot for our deals. Usually at the same places, though not always. Separations were always hard on us, but they were never long, and they only made the reunions all the sweeter. The travelling itself was something I found a lot of enjoyment in, in a big part because of my most often present company.

JJ told me many more stories from his life over the years, and many interesting facts about the places we found themselves in. At one point or another, he set foot at every place there was on continent except for the most wild and devoid of people—but never left it because of his fear of ships.

Airplanes gave him an opportunity he never had before to see the other continents, and the wonder and curiosity in his eyes at the sight of New-York were more amazing than the city itself with its endless skyscrapers.

"To finally step on this land… it was worth the journey. Still, I am thankful that it was mercifully brief," he told me then.

Yeah, airplanes weren't without their own plans. A relatively small metal box, that, to make it worse, moved with a dizzying speed in the air kilometres above the ground. This was a scenario of his nightmares. JJ held well during the flight, but if he had a little less self-control, he would've broken something with how hard he was clenching fingers on the armrests of his seat. He couldn't even force himself to sleep for the duration of our flight.

There was a bright sight to that, though. I was so focused on his troubles that had no time to worry about being afraid of airplanes or anything like that, even when it shook or trembled in a turbulence.

That was just one flight, though. The next ones went easier for both of us. And it was true that the results of each of our journeys were worth it. I never thought of myself as much of a traveller, but it was impossible to not love every new place I put a foot at when it was JJ's velvet voice describing the scenery and the best parts of it.

Besides business, I also had some obligations in my coven. I never ventured deep into the politics of covens in our city, and Nightingale Coven mostly accepted it. They benefited a lot from having me in the list of their members, and my use of its resources ended with reading books from their library and learning from Ghost, who was somewhat of a pariah, anyway.

Still, sometimes I was asked to interfere, help, or give advice. One of that was, for some reason, I didn't understand, on who would be the leader after Elder Elena retired.

I was really tempted to tell them to pick Ghost, but instead voted for my old pal—well, more like an ally with a sometimes common cause—Prom Queen. The years did good to her—she matured and dimmed down in enthusiasm, but brightened with wit. They did little to her flashing sense of fashion, though.

Maybe it wasn't such a good choice, because she was twice as bold as Elena to pester me with requests. Maybe it was a good one, because her efforts pushed Nightingale Coven from the mediocre position it had amid the full-sized covens of the city to the top spot, and competed with covens across country in size and prestige.

Good times. But times they were, and like any time, they took their toll. They were small things at first. A new wrinkle under my eye. The additional effort I had to put to stay up late. But I noticed, and JJ noticed, but the one to notice first was my teacher, and he was the one to announce that it was time.

"Better start early if you don't have to worry about magical contamination. It will be easier to revert signs of ageing when they are smaller," Ghost told me.

It was both a dread and a relief. Even with all my training and practice, even though there were few new things Ghost could teach me these days, I won't be able to say if I am up to this until I really succeed.

It was time for me to make my first step real into eternity.

My body was worn by years. I always took care to heal the most obvious things, the same way I had to regularly replenish my blood, but ageing was a more slow and subtle change. Even when I looked for it, it was hard to notice without something to compare with nearby.

Making a full map of my body in its healthy and young state, though, was a thing Ghost made me do years ago. He himself didn't need his own anymore, since he remembered his aura without it. So did I, but I needed these notes for my assurance, at least.

The procedure itself was both harder and easier than when I assisted Ghost. Easier, because I didn't have to use feelers and could just look at what I was doing with myself in aura-vision. Harder, because in a way it was like cutting out your own appendix. Except, I didn't have even local anaesthesia.

I had to make small and precise change in the aspects of my aura, and sometimes they brought with it physical sensations. Not always pain, but always a some degree of discomfort. This wasn't new for me, but normally my operations were much faster, and therefore less unpleasant. A rejuvenation like mine, with everything being renewed at once, would take a few days with breaks.

The hardest part was to keep the concentration up after a few hours of digging in your own gut with what felt like invisible fingers. At least I didn't have to hurry. Ghost insisted I made sure that I was well-rested before I move on to a next segment of my body.

What a hassle it was. But when I was done, and looked at myself in a mirror to see my skin as smooth as it was when I was just twenty years old, when I looked at my aura and saw it brimming with youth… When I could smile at JJ with not even a drop of doubts and fear for my future, for our future—it was all worth it.

And when I laughed and hugged him and showed these spots where the wrinkles were before but weren't now, he I saw a tiny shadow disappear from his eyes, too.

This was just a beginning, though. It put me together with all the other successful and long-living arch-witches, but not on the top of their list of coolness. Well, there wasn't a list of coolness, but after centuries of doing whatever they were doing, arch-witches tended to accumulate skills and spells.

One's learning was never over. So wasn't mine. My next goal became to find a way to help Ghost with his memory problem. Working on someone's mind was always hard, and with Ghost it was twice as much, because he was a witcher. It was, though, a good project to work on.

Not the only one of mine, though. There were so many things I wanted to do to help those around me. I dug into the ways to give vampires a way to taste human food again, and to give them a better protection from the sun that they accumulated over the centuries of life. I researched how to improve on my body, to make it better, faster, stronger, and able to last without my help.

There were a lot of things to do, and that besides my job.. Good thing that I had all the time in the world.