I ignored him. Using whatever strength I had left, I quickly moved to the shade of another tree. I continued this until we were far from the sanctuary. We fell to the ground and I looked at Finley, finding his beautiful face now blackened and tarnished with small bubbles and cysts. I rubbed them, thinking that'd help him heal faster. “We're safe. We're fine. Don't die on me.”
He grunted again, holding his stomach wound.
I looked back, seeing the dark thick smoke rising from the sanctuary.
“Anastasia led them to us,” Finley spoke in between ragged breaths.
“No, I did. I was foolish to let Ruby go. I was so stupid.”
“They would have come anyway.” He attempted to lift his hand to my face. “You were right. We should've never trusted Anastasia.”
I hushed him and held him close, whispering to him that I would find him a meal as soon as the sun set so he could regain his strength. We had to make it to the ship that night.
He nodded, closed his eyes, and his head dropped into my chest. Anger clouded his thoughts, mixing in with his desire to avenge Branda and Brandy.
Never trust a Deamhan. So much truth existed in that statement, which now became my motto. Under that tree, I broke my bond with Anastasia for good. The only Deamhan I cared for now lay in my arms, clinging to life. I felt belittled and betrayed, watching the only home I knew burn, not knowing if every Deamhan, including Silvanus—who trusted in me—escaped death.
CHAPTER TEN
1898-1910 New York
The blood from birds, mice, and other small animals helped Finley regain his strength. Moments later, we made our way to St. Katherine Docks and I searched for the human, Russell. I found him sitting in a small shack a few feet from the pier, immersed in paperwork. When I told him that Silvanus had sent us, he tensed up and stumbled out of his chair, moving to the corner of the shack.
I didn't question his mortified action but I assumed my appearance at the pier was earlier than he expected. Still this human somehow managed to arrange for us to board the next available ship heading to America. Lucky for us, there was a ship preparing to set sail for New York the next morning. He wasn't much for conversation and after he help to get us on board, he disappeared.
Finley and I made our way to the lower decks and secured an area in the back near the storage area. We used a thin white sheet to separate ourselves from anyone with prying eyes. I covered the small peephole to block out the sun while Finley scoured the area, retrieving a small wooden crate where we could store the rats we caught for the entire voyage. Later we made our way back to the main deck. The next morning the ship pulled away from the harbor and we said our goodbyes to London.
Maintaining our diet while out to sea became a challenge like no other. First we started with humans, using our keen sense of smell to pick out potential meals who had become sick during the voyage. Although their blood wasn't the tastiest, it satisfied us for the evenings out to sea. After we finished, Finley later would throw the bodies overboard and they went unnoticed for a few days. However, when the human crew began to keep record on all passengers, we had no choice but to turn to the rats storing aboard. They were plentiful and we never ran out.
On some nights, when the moonlight glistened over the top of the still ocean water, I stood out on the deck, staring into the horizon. There I found peace and I could allow myself to think without being disturbed. What awaited us in New York should have scared me, but I thought about the possibilities that maybe Finley and I would no longer be involved in this Deamhan and vampire fiasco. Instead of waiting for this Ancient to appear and greet us after our arrival, I wanted to secretly leave the ship and disappear into the city.
My superb hearing picked up nothing but my sight narrowed in on darkened images below the dark blue waters. About fifty feet down, I saw pools of fish, what looked like a shark, and another fish I couldn't make out. A large whale swam underneath us, heading south.
I headed back to our sleeping area an hour before sunset and Finley and I sat across from each other, communicating telepathically about what we planned to do once we reached the American shore. We also thought about how to react if our Deamhan contact found us or if we stumbled upon Deamhan sanctuaries. Finley had had his fill with sanctuaries and he decided that if we ever did run into more of our kind, we would leave the city immediately. Silvanus gave us enough money so we could go anywhere.
As the days turned to weeks, I became bored and befriended a teenage human girl who later joined me on the decks shortly after sunset. She told me about her father's death and how her mother decided to leave London for America in search of a new life. I found her to be relaxing to talk to and her scent addicting. Finley found out about her and angrily he told me to stay away. “They are our food, not our friends,” he said.
I agreed, just so as not to make him angry, and the next night I'd learned that the human girl had died. He killed her but I had no proof and I didn't want to confront him about it.
Our ship arrived in New York City at night with thirty people less than when it left London and with no Deamhan to greet us on the shores. We disembarked at Castle Clinton and in Deamhan speed we lost ourselves through the crowd, bypassing immigration and entering the city. Finley decided to move to the Irish slums and there we found a tiny apartment right smack in the middle of other humans. We could afford the payment but the smell of our food walking around us kept the notion of blood on our already fragile minds. Still, we prepared the small room for morning and that night, with empty stomachs, we left to explore the city.
“This place is bigger than I imagined. I don't like it,” he said to me.
But I loved the city's vastness. We walked along the streets, pointing at the awes and wonders of the tall buildings and the plethora of people. The air smelled of a mixture of smoke, mud, body odor, and human sweat. Humans were everywhere—young and old, short and tall. They came from all walks of life: Ireland, England, Germany. I thought that after a while he would become comfortable in the city, but Finley never did. We came across an intersection of horse drawn buggies and crowds of people.
“It wouldn't make sense if there were no Deamhan here.” He paused and stared at the bustling city and its inhabitants.
“I'd rather there not be.” I held onto his arm. “I'd love it if it was just us.”
“It will never be just us.” He continued to gaze. “How long do you think we should stay here?”
“The Deamhan who wants me was supposed to meet us here.”
“Maris, I've had enough of Ancient Deamhan. I'm asking you. How long do you think we should stay here?”
I thought for a moment. “For as long as we like.”
“Then we should fit in.” He examined his clothes and then he examined mine. “We need better clothing. My trousers are tattered. We look like orphans.”
“We are orphans.”
“Not in that sense,” he replied. “There are clothing shops on every corner. We can break into one and take what we want.”
“Why not steal the clothes from our victims?” I suggested.
“Because for once in our life, we should have the best of things.” He nodded. “We will look our best.”
I'd never seen this side of him and I wanted more of it. As the nights passed, finding a meal became easier and easier. Soon any thought of the Deamhan we were to meet and Deamhan in general faded from our minds. It came to a point that I no longer felt that my life was in danger and I purposely lost myself among the city's architecture, spending hours during the night standing just outside of taverns, listening to human interaction. At one point I followed a large overweight man who stumbled home, drunk and incoherent. After robbing him of his money and his blood, I left his body near an abandoned building next to a stack of rotted wood.
Finley didn't like my nightly activities alone without him. He still stressed the importance of being together, but again, we still hadn't seen any Deamhan in the city. For years I did this and not once d
id I think that the vampires would come to get me and I had long given up on the female Ancient Silvanus told me about. I finally felt free to live my life, but at the price of knowing that at any moment, things could take a dramatic turn and they did.
At the turn of the century, we watched New York transform from a city of immigrants to a bustling metropolitan monster. Machines with four wheels began to appear on streets now paved with red bricks. Street cars appeared attached to a thick cable that covered the city like cobwebs, moving up and down the streets. More humans turned to the subways underneath the city as means of travel. We had no choice but to adapt and intermingle among the humans if we wanted to survive.
We moved from apartment to apartment, with each one being better than the last. We handled our first few kills in the city with care, but after realizing that deaths happened quite frequently in the city, we relaxed and did what we did best. My requirement for a perfect meal consisted of an adult male in his mid-twenties, strong, single, and preferably Irish. If I couldn't find one, I went after young Irish boys. Finley liked the single upper class women. How he managed to get them to trust him proved beyond my comprehension. All I knew was that he'd pick one out, nights later he had her wrapped around his finger, and a week later her body was found drifting in the bay. He took their money and jewelry, offering it to me like some prize. He didn't want me to wear my mother's amulet, but I vowed to never take it off, so he sold his stolen lockets, rubies, diamonds, and emeralds and bought me various things, including a face massager and makeup so that if I wanted, I could cover the scar on my left cheek. He learned from the women he slaughtered that lemon juice worked to tone human skin and perhaps it would work for me. However, I accepted my scar and rarely covered it.
The longer we stayed in New York, the more I noticed a drastic change in his behavior. He began to do terrible things to his victims that could haunt even the strongest Deamhan. He no longer stopped after killing his victims. Later he'd go on to kill their mothers, fathers, and siblings if they had any. He wiped out entire families just because he could. Some of his deeds made the front page news and he kept the articles like trophies. He started to talk about sanctuaries and the thought of siring offspring. I urged him to calm down in fear that his actions would bring too much attention to us, but he didn't care.
After five years of nonstop killing, I begged for us to leave New York. The glitz and glamour had waned. I didn't fear that we would be caught, but that he would go so far that not even I could bring him back. His behavior reminded me of the conversation I had had the night of the vampire hunt with Ruby. My ancestor created Deamhan to keep the vampires in line and vice versa, but in New York there wasn't anyone to do that. Thus, Finley continued to do whatever he wanted without fear of reprisal. No one was around to keep us in check.
He also continued to profess his love for me yet as I watched human couples holding hands and kissing, the concept of love confused me. For him love meant sharing his meal and wiping the blood off my face after feeding. It meant breaking the arms of humans who pointed and gossiped about my scar. That couldn't be love. I remembered love as being unconditional. Love was something that couldn't be proved in acts of violence. But I didn't doubt his attempt. Instead I wished that one day it would just make sense. However, one fateful night in January of 1910, made me realize that it just couldn't happen.
The cold air from the north brought snowflakes clouding the air. I wanted to be out in it so I urged him to join me. I dressed myself in a white hobble skirt with a straight black jacket and a medium size white brimmed hat to match. He lazily dressed himself in dark trousers and a striped navy blue blazer. Walking down the street, I held out my hand and a few flakes landed on my palm. I eyed them, seeing the detailed patterns that made up their little bodies. With every passing winter, the snow count changed, and I loved that not even we, as godlike as we thought we were, could predict it. I cherished the cold fluffy stuff and played in it whenever I could.
After I showed Finley my captured snowflakes, he swiped them off my hand. “You do that every year. Don't act like you haven't seen snow before.”
I caught another snowflake. “I like it when they don't melt against our skin.” I showed him the tiny flake as it sat still in my chilled hand.
Again, he slapped it out of my palm. “Just like every other cold thing in this world.” He caught one himself then made a fist, crushing it.
I stopped walking and I looked up at the cloudy sky. “Do you think it also snows in other American cities?”
He dropped his hand. “Perhaps.”
“I'd like to go to one of those cities—soon.”
He pouted. “Please, Maris. Don't bring up this subject again.”
But I wanted to bring it up. “We've never been to San Francisco. We should go.”
“All of these human-made cities are the same.” His facial expression turned stark.
“How would you know that? We've never been to any city but the one we are in now.”
“Although I couldn’t care less for New York, we're safer here,” he replied. “We're the only Deamhan in this city. For years we haven't had any problems. Why would you want to risk that now?” Before I could reply, he grabbed my hand. “I know what will make you feel better.” He led me down the street. “The other night I saw these human males standing about a tavern. They're different from other German immigrants we've seen. We should taste a few of them. Maybe they're more to our liking.”
I pulled away. “I like Irish.”
“You might like German as well.” He motioned for me to follow him and I had no choice. We continued to walk down the street and turned the corner, coming upon two males standing in the alley. They didn't look German. They looked back at us, surprised that we had encroached upon them without noticing. Finley also seemed surprised at their appearance and he stood still. These are not the humans from the previous night.
Well, then, let's be on our way, I replied back through our telepathic connection. However something did not seem right about them. The way they stared at us was different from the way most humans stared at us.
They look interesting enough, his thoughts answered mine. He moved forward then, in a movement that amazed me, and then he took quick steps back and away from them. Maris, they're blocking their thoughts from me.
It didn't resonate with me at first but I thought about the situation a little more. Humans didn't know anything about Deamhan so why did these two brace themselves for our mental attacks? I stared at the bulkier male with short brown hair while he looked at his partner. I tried pushing through his thoughts but he fought back, pushing forth an image of a brick wall.
Finley rushed at the thinnest male and he slammed him against the building by his neck. “Who are you?” he growled.
The bulkier male had turned and began running from us.
Finley quickly yelled at me. “Stop him!”
I didn't know what to do and without thinking I moved fast, blocking his way out. He stumbled and fell back in fear.
Finley returned to questioning and threatening the other human who remained quiet, refusing to answer his questions. “I'll kill you slowly if you make me ask again!”
The thin human trembled and he reached into his pocket, pulling out a stake. This angered Finley and he bit into his neck, pulling off bits of flesh. The human screamed but Finley quickly snapped his neck and the human's lifeless body dropped to the ground.
I stood still in front of the other male who now started to plead for his life.
“They aren't vampires and they aren't Deamhan.” Finley moved toward him. “How do you know about us? Are you following us?!”
The human whimpered. “Please, don't kill me. I beg you.”
Finley pushed him to the ground. “They have to be working for the vampires. I know it.” Finley knelt next to him. “We should kill him now—”
“Finley, not just yet.” I aimed to calm him. “It would be stupid of us to kill him without knowing w
ho sent him.”
“No one sent me.” The human nodded frantically. “They said she was dead,” he whispered and looked at me.
Interested, I approached the human. “Who said I was dead?”
“Dorvo vampires. They said you were killed in the fire back in London.”
“I told you. He's working for them.” Finley quickly stood up.
“No, I'm not working for them. I swear.”
“Then who are you working for?” I asked.
The human hesitated, but when he looked at Finley again, he spoke up. “I'm a researcher from The Brotherhood.”
“The Brotherhood,” he said in a low growl. “Disgraceful humans who think they can control us.”
I didn't waste any time letting the realization sink into my brain. I wanted to know how long the human had been following us and if there were others. “How long have you been here?”
“A few months.”
I asked the human, “Who else in this city knows about me?” He didn't answer so I asked again, but with a deep and more threatening voice. “Tell me.”
Finley placed his foot on the human's chest. “Answer her!”
“N-n-no one, I swear.”
Finley turned to me. “He's lying.”
“Of course he's lying,” I replied back.
He quickly snapped the human's neck.
We stood in the alley, contemplating our next move. We knew what we had to do. We had to leave New York. Any relief about being able to live my life without the thought of Deamhan and Dorvo vampires hanging over my head faltered in the wind. Years of joy and the thought of being alone in New York disappeared quickly, replaced with the thought of survival.
“Those damn Dorvo vampires are here,” Finley said. “They will find us soon.”
“Then we leave. Tonight if we must.”
“Where?” he said to me in a sarcastic tone. “San Francisco?”
“Right now, I don't care where, Finley. We just have to take what we can and leave.”
“If they are this resilient and can hide among us for months, there's no telling what else they can do,” he replied and nodded to his own statement. “We need to send them a message, Maris.”
Deamhan Chronicles, Books 1-5: Deamhan, Kei. Family Matters, Dark Curse, Maris. The Brotherhood Files, Ayden. Deamhan Minion Page 62