With bated breath, we waited to see what the commotion was. I worried they wouldn’t make it back. What if it was a trap? Should we have all gone? I wasn’t sure splitting up at any point until we arrived on a safer island was a good idea.
When Jameson returned, heaving as he settled himself, his eyes were wild and enraged.
“The boat is gone. The vampires lit everything on fire before they headed back to their ships. We have no way out of here.”
Chapter 4
My heart stopped. We had no way off the island. From the sounds of it, Pierce was not going to stop looking for me. As much as I had wanted to stay in the storage building we’d just been in, I knew it wasn’t a possibility. Pierce would find us, and then he would kill the people helping me before making me like him—if he hadn’t already succeeded.
We needed to find another way away from this place.
“Let’s go back and regroup,” Jameson suggested.
Everyone agreed, and we made our way hastily back the way we had come. The mood was somber as we all worried about what we would do next. I didn’t know enough about vampires to make any guesses on the right course of action, so I’d wait to hear the others’ thoughts before making any decisions. If Pierce was after me and it came down to me or these people, I wouldn’t put them in danger to save myself. I would go to Pierce willingly if that’s what it came down to, then deal with the consequences.
I stumbled over a stray stone in the path, but before I could right myself, strong arms caught me around my waist. Tiredness weighed on me, and for a moment, I leaned into the hard chest pressed against me. Reluctantly, I pulled away, following the others without looking back, but I could feel eyes watching me closely the whole way. Pierce’s gaze had made me shudder with revulsion, but Jameson’s made me shiver with an opposing emotion. I hadn’t yet decided how I felt about that.
Henry was the first to enter the building we had previously vacated, and with a rustling sound, something grabbed him, pulling him further into the darkness of the room. With a yell, Nathan and Jameson surged forward, leaving Alice, Nettie, and me behind.
Scuffling could be heard, and I warily stepped through the doorway, followed by Alice and Nettie. It didn’t take long for my eyes to adjust to the gloomy room, but once they did, I saw Jameson holding a woman’s arms tightly behind her back.
Her dress was so dirty, I couldn’t make out what the color had been. Mud and something dark stained her front. After closer inspection, I realized it was blood. My eyes searched her, looking for wounds that would explain it all, but I found none. Her eyes were wild as they changed from an average sage to savage red. She jerked her head around, snapping at Jameson, but he managed to keep the woman at arm’s length.
“Marie?” Henry asked, staring at her in recognition.
“Henry,” the woman, Marie, replied. Her lips pulled back in a smile that revealed sharp, pointed teeth.
“Oh, Marie. What did they do to you?” Henry choked out in anguish.
Whoever Marie had been to Henry, she was no longer that person. Anyone could tell by her appearance that she was now a vampire.
“What should we do?” Nathan’s gruff, no-nonsense voice asked, drawing all of our attention.
“You can’t do anything,” Marie purred before lunging toward him, a vicious hunger in her eyes. She was brought up short by Jameson’s tight hold on her. She continued to snarl and buck, but Jameson held her securely.
“We have to kill her,” Nathan announced, drawing closer, studying her.
“What!? No, we…” Henry’s face drooped as he wanted to argue but seemed unable to find a valid reason.
“You know there’s no saving her now. That’s not Marie anymore, Henry,” Nathan said, remaining stoic.
“There has to be another way,” Henry pleaded. “She’s my sister.”
“The woman you knew as your sister is gone. There is nothing left but this demon who would sooner rip your throat out and drain you dry than embrace you as her brother,” Nathan assured, gesturing at Marie who was listening to the conversation with a sadistic smile on her face.
“You don’t know her,” Henry snapped angrily before turning to Marie. “You can fight this, Mar. Don’t let the evil best you. Please.”
Marie’s dark laughter filled the room as she licked her lips greedily. Revulsion had my stomach threatening to divulge its contents, to the point where I had to look away.
If Pierce had succeeded in turning me, I would be just like her—a crazed monster unable to recognize friend from food. It gave me a small hope that whatever new healing ability I was experiencing, had nothing to do with the vampires.
Nettie slipped her hand into mine, hiding her small frame in the folds of my skirts. There was no way I was going to become a vampire. I would sooner die. Resolve, red hot and sudden, coursed through me, and I vowed silently to never become a devil creature. I would find a way to escape, and I would learn how to kill vampires, and I would take the whole lot of them out of existence. There had to be a way for us to survive whatever was happening.
The others continued to argue after I turned away with Nettie. Their voices had increased in volume, and I worried they would attract attention. I twisted toward them, opening my mouth to speak my concern when Marie suddenly gasped in a breath.
The tip of a dagger, with small letters written on the edge, protruded from her chest at the exact spot where her heart would be. I watched as the light in her eyes dimmed, and Jameson withdrew the blade—that I belatedly noticed had a faint glow around it.
Marie’s body collapsed to the ground and, with a heart-wrenching wail, Henry dropped down beside her. He gathered her lifeless body in his arms, holding her close as she disintegrated into nothing more than a pile of ash.
No one moved or said anything for several minutes while we watched Henry mourn the loss of his sister. Tears gathered in my eyes when I recalled the prone body of my aunt, lying on our living room floor as the fire raged around her. My gaze was drawn to Jameson who had taken a step back, tucking his dagger out of sight.
As if feeling my gaze on him, his eyes clashed with mine, and I saw a jumble of emotions flit across them so fast that I couldn’t make sense of them. Tears spilled from my eyes while we stared at each other. His jaw tightened minutely as he watched, and I thought for a moment that he would come to me, but instead, he turned away. My chest tightened, wondering if I should have gone to him, but the small fingers wrapped around my hand made me remain where I was.
Henry began scooping up his sister’s ashes into a spare bucket he’d grabbed from the corner of the room. Once he was done, we followed him outside into the late morning light. Silently, Henry spread her ashes in a field behind the building,
We stood around the location in quiet contemplation, all of us remembering the loved ones we had lost in one night, grieving alongside each other. When the moment was over, Jameson led the way back to the building.
“We need to find a different ship,” Nathan announced, once we were safely back in the room.
I was grateful he went straight to thinking about how to get us out of there. Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to mourn, and staying busy was the only way we would survive the grief until we had proper time to say goodbye to our loved ones.
“The vampires burned all the ships but their own. How are we supposed to find another one?” Henry asked in despair.
“Isn’t there some type of record or manifest notice of incoming ships?” I asked, speaking for the first time as a member of their group.
“Wouldn’t that be in the record house down by the docks?” Henry suggested, running a hand over his face. “I’m not sure, though. I’ve only been down there a handful of times.”
“My cousin worked at the docks,” Alice offered. Her voice was hard, and her face had the appearance of someone who had felt too much sorrow in a short period of time. “He is, or possibly was, in charge of posting the weekly port schedule for departing and incoming ships.
We should be able to find a list there. It’s not far from here.”
“Let’s check there and stick together,” Jameson added, straightening and glancing at all of us. “After the commotion from earlier, this place is probably no longer safe. They’ll come check it out as soon as it’s darker or send one of the older vampires during the day. Either option isn’t good.”
I shuddered, wanting to ask more questions about why some could be out in the open while others couldn’t, but we needed to leave where we were, and my answers could wait. When nobody spoke up, we left the warehouse.
The trip to the record house was quiet and uneventful, but that didn’t stop everyone from being on edge. I couldn’t put my finger on what was making my skin crawl, until I realized that everything on the island appeared to be silent. Usually when I visited town, I could hear voices yelling from the market and sailors calling to each other while a captain hollered at their charges, but there was none of that. It was a ghost town.
Jameson led the group and I was grateful. He was the only one with a weapon that could kill a vampire, and he was our best chance of surviving if we stumbled upon one.
We arrived at the record house; it was built from lattice and daub with tar lining the main points of the building to help keep the moisture from the ocean away. The structure was set back off the main path to the port, almost as if nobody wanted it to be bothered. The records inside must have been more important than I realized or included more than just manifest documents.
“Where should we look?” Jameson asked, peering at the stacks of leather-bound books.
“Look for anything that says ‘manifest’ on it,” I said, leaning through the doorway to peek around the office.
Everyone glanced at me, seeming uncomfortable with my suggestion.
“Can any of you read?” I asked softly, not wanting to offend any of them.
“None of us can read,” Alice answered from behind me.
I nodded my head thoughtfully. It wasn’t uncommon for those in the lower class not to be taught how to read. Those in the merchant class usually picked up just enough to be able to hackle, trade, and keep minimal records. I was part of that class through my parents, as well as my aunt and uncle. Aunt May had known how to read and, against my uncle’s wishes, she had taught me.
“I can read,” I stated, stepping further into the room and glancing around at the stacks of records.
“We’ll stand watch,” Henry replied gruffly, making his way out of the room, followed by everyone except Jameson.
The skin on the nape of my neck tightened, and I sensed Jameson was watching my every move. Surprisingly, I found that I liked it. It felt nice to be admired and not seen as an object like Pierce had done to me so often.
“The most recent manifest is up there,” I announced, pointing to a thick leather-bound volume with the current dates. It was marked on the spine with June 1586.
Jameson stepped up to the stack, pulling the volume down before handing it to me. I tried to ignore how my heart fluttered when he was near, and how it sank when he moved away. He seemed to play hot and cold with me. One moment, he kept close, and the next, he stared at me as if I was a vampire.
Ignoring my confused feelings, I opened the book. “It says that there is a livestock ship coming in two days from Port Defiant,” I informed, searching the list for anything else that could be of use to us. “That is our best chance of getting out of here. There isn’t anything else arriving for another week after that.”
“We’ll need to meet the ship out in the bay and warn the captain before they get too close. We can’t let them get within cannon range, or Pierce could open fire on them if he figures out what we’re doing,” Jameson concluded, looking over my shoulder at the list.
“According to this, it should pull into the fifth port and, if I remember correctly, there’s a pier not far from there. If we can find some small boats to get us all out into the bay…”
“We can hole up there and wait for the ship, then intercept it before it can make it to port,” Jameson added, finishing my train of thought.
“Yes, we can stay under the pier tonight. The tide will come in, but it shouldn’t get that high, and the ocean smell should help to mask our scent from the vampires,” I offered, watching as he nodded his head.
“All right, that’s the plan. Let’s get to the pier, then figure out the boat situation,” he finished, giving me a side smile that revealed a dimple.
I grinned in response, but he was already out the door, telling the others what our plan was. Turning, I went to replace the book but hesitated. The manifest seemed like it could be something Pierce would want. It hadn’t been important to him thus far, but later if he realized what the information could do for him, he might come searching for it. He wasn’t going to get his hands on this information. I’d make sure of it.
No one said anything when I walked out of the record house with the thick volume under my arm; nor did they mention it while we made our way toward the deserted pier. Nathan and Henry found a small selection of rowboats. Not all of them were in the best condition, but hopefully at least a couple of them would be sea-worthy.
While Nathan, Jameson, and Henry pulled boats to the uninhibited pier, Alice, Nettie, and I raided the small shops for fresh food and water. I took that time to get to know Alice a little. If we were going to be traveling together, I didn’t want things to be awkward.
“Alice, how long did you work for Pierce?” I asked when we entered an abandoned shop.
Her emerald eyes slightly widened in response. “A few years. My mother died when I was sixteen, and my father sold me to Pierce at eighteen.”
My hand reached for her. “I’m really sorry.” I wanted to say more, but I knew it wouldn’t make the pain any easier. I understood her, though. I had almost been sold to Pierce, and I hoped to never see his face again.
We changed the subject and brought Nettie into our conversation. She was a bright young girl for being only six.
When we began to struggle carrying the items we wanted to take back with us, Nettie had the great idea of loading up some fruit in the top layer of my skirt, so we could carry more. My skirt was weighed down with supplies and I was pretty sure I saw Nettie slip in a doll, but I didn’t mention it. She deserved a bit of happiness, and if a toy put a smile on her face in the darkest of times, then she could have all of them.
We had a sandy area under the pier stocked with food and other supplies by the time the men pulled two charred rowboats onto the beach. They threw canvasses over both of the boats and slathered them with seaweed and other debris to camouflage them. Hopefully, it would also help cover our scent from the vampires.
“We found food,” Nettie announced proudly as all three men plopped down in the sand.
“That’s wonderful,” Nathan said, accepting the apple and canteen of water she handed him.
“Nettie was brilliant. She had the idea to load up my skirt with everything, and carry it all here in one trip,” I stated, praising her cleverness.
“My mum said that I’m as smart as a scholar.” Nettie’s smile faltered a bit at the statement.
“Your mum was right.” I leaned forward, cupping her cheek.
Without warning, she threw herself at me and wrapped her small arms around my waist. I held her close, knowing firsthand how much a hug meant after losing someone. I had lost my parents around her age, and, though I didn’t remember them much, I did recall the love and affection that I received from my aunt. She had been like a second mother to me, so if I could be that to Nettie and bring some small comfort to her, then I would. She withdrew from me and headed over to Nathan to show him her new doll.
I grabbed a loaf of bread and a canteen of water to bring to Jameson. “Here, you need to eat something,” I offered, pushing the items toward him.
“I’m not hungry.” His voice was clipped as he avoided eye contact.
“But you must be. You haven’t eaten or drank anything since you
found me,” I replied, sounding like my aunt when she’d admonish my uncle.
“I said, I’m not hungry,” he growled before stalking off.
I watched him walk away before adjusting the items in my hands and turning back toward Nettie and the others, trying to ignore the sting.
While some of us rested, Jameson stayed gone for several hours, not coming back even when darkness fell. I had worried for the first hour or so, but if he wanted to risk his own life by venturing out on his own, then so be it. I wouldn’t be the one to stop him.
As time continued to pass, screams and cannon fire could be heard all over the town. Others hadn’t been as lucky in finding a better place to hide from the vampires. We stayed hunkered down beneath the pier and tried to get some rest, but it was impossible with the sounds of death and mayhem.
Carefully, I extricated myself from Nettie, placing her head gently onto the blanket beneath us. Henry was still awake and watching over everything. He nodded to me, acknowledging my need to stretch my legs. I stepped out from beneath the pier and glanced at the town as the fires from the previous night reignited and blazed brightly against the night sky, making it change to an eerie crimson.
In a different circumstance, it might have been beautiful, but not tonight. Not there. Not in Port Victory where the town and surrounding islands had been overrun with vampire pirates. I shuddered at the thought that the surrounding despair was Pierce’s fault. If he hadn’t been so selfish… I let the thought go. Ifs weren’t going to make any of it better.
I walked a little further up the beach, my eyes locked on the light coming from town. Tears pricked my eyes again, but I pushed the urge to cry aside. I had done all of my crying and had no desire to resume weeping.
Suddenly, rough hands grabbed my shoulders, pulling me against a hard chest. Panic seized my body until I caught sight of Jameson’s face and relaxed.
“What are you doing out here?” he hissed, pulling me closer to the pier wall.
“I couldn’t sleep.” I waved my hand toward town.
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