“Stop!” I screamed the word over and over again, as if saying it loud enough would make the man in my head actually follow my orders. Where was Gavin?
I stopped the shower and wrapped myself in a towel. Dripping wet I stumbled out the back door into the wintry night. Perhaps if I called to him he would hear me and come to help. Not knowing what else to do I began to scream at the top of my lungs desperate for him to hear me. Desperate for someone, anyone, to come and stop the pain. I had to find him.
I ran toward what I thought were the woods, hoping to get to a place he might be within earshot of. Then suddenly out of nowhere I heard a honking sound. Turning I saw a pair of headlights zooming toward me. They swerved at the last second as the sound of tires squealing in an effort to stop filled the night. Nearby the sound of twisting metal screamed, followed by a sickening crash half a second later.
Then I smelled it. Just that one smell was all it took. An intense heat flooded my eyes and my vision sharpened and I saw the car. It was a few hundred feet ahead of me and buried in the trees. In that brief moment my sickness and anguish disappeared and had been replaced by want…need!
A strange serenity came over me as I walked slowly toward the car, savoring every moment. That smell, that beautiful sweet smell was coming from the wreckage and I wanted whatever it was. I looked inside the vehicle and saw a young woman unconscious at the wheel. The car was just an old beater, no airbag, and there was blood all over her. I opened the car door, and got as close to her as I could. That sweet and tempting smell… blood.
I put my fingers on her injured forehead and brought some of the blood to my lips. It was wonderful. I felt like a child sneaking frosting off a forbidden birthday cake. I wanted more and felt the siren song of a new addiction pulling me close into a comforting embrace. This woman was mine.
She was quite beautiful, perhaps nineteen or so with small delicate features. I focused in on the slight pulse in her neck as a shudder ran through me. Her beautiful, fragile pink skin along with that lovely blue vein was in my reach.
I could smell her so distinctly now, a mix of blood and perfume. My emotions took over and I felt a tangle of hunger and sexual desire. I wanted to be as close to her as possible. I took off my towel, and taking the stance of a deadly python, coiled my limbs around her. Lowering my head and smelling her neck I felt drunk on just her scent. My mind was spinning, she was glorious.
The need to taste her delicate pink skin overtook me. I parted my lips and lay my tongue against her. Slowly and carefully I licked the length of her neck, up down, up down. I wanted to taste her. What I wanted more than anything was for her to wake up. I wanted to taste her fear. To know what she tasted like the moment I took her life. I felt like a cat that plays with a mouse before eating it. My sadistic desire amped up from zero to ten and I laughed at the thought of toying with this fragile young thing. Perhaps giving her the chance to run, to think she was safe before pouncing and killing her. I had never wanted anything so much as to feel her fear when the light went out in her eyes. Perhaps even to hear the bitter sound of her begging for her life. Unfortunately for me she was out cold.
I couldn’t wait any longer. The moment I made the decision to bite I felt a sharp pain in my mouth as my fangs grew with excitement. I threw my head back and growled.
Mine!
In that moment I was more animal than human and I realized the full extent of my power and lethalness. Tearing hungrily at her neck I opened her jugular vein and let the blood fill my mouth completely. She was so lovely, delicious and sensual I thought I might actually orgasm. I writhed naked on top of her as I fed, feeling like I would never be able to get enough. I had never reveled in anything so much. Even though I had been living for twenty four years it was only just now in this instant that I felt alive. I pressed our bodies together and bled the beautiful delicate creature until there was nothing left and I was finally satisfied.
I leaned back for a long moment and closed my eyes in satiated bliss. The voices were once again gone, the sickness and burning only a memory. I slithered out of the car and found my towel. I felt a surge of physical strength race through my body so hard that I literally shook. Looking at the wreckage I knew the humans would never believe this was a normal accident. A never before used instinct told me I needed to cover this up somehow. My eyes darted around in the dark looking for somewhere to hide the woman.
I found myself wishing that the car had caught on fire. They’d never be able to tell what actually killed her if she was burned beyond recognition. Staring at the car I pictured the flames for a moment. I was only fantasizing about it but a second later there was a spark from underneath. The gas tank ignited and then the car was ablaze in a hail of bright blue flame.
Had I really just wished for fire and then had that wish granted? I didn’t want to take too much time to think about that. For the moment I was just grateful the evidence of what I had done would be gone and my soul flooded with relief.
I ran back to the house as fast as I could, which was faster than I thought possible for a person to move. I remembered how fast Angus had come at me that night in the woods and was sure I could now probably match or better his speed.
Nothing existed inside me except peace and silence, and for the moment it was all I cared about. The miserable way I had felt when I woke up was gone. I strode back to my bedroom, dropped my towel on the floor and crawled naked into bed to sleep a deep and dreamless sleep.
Chapter Seven
Yet another whole day had passed when I opened my eyes again to see Gavin sitting on the edge of my bed. I pulled the covers up over me realizing I was naked and resenting the intrusion. He had never just come into my house before.
“Hey!” I said. “What are you doing?” He eyed me with concern. “What’s wrong?”
“I should have been here. I should have come for you sooner.”
“What?” I said confused. Then I remembered the woman in the car. A sickening revelation overcame me. I was a murderer. I wondered if everything I had heard about vampires being damned was true because if I wasn’t condemned to hell before, I undoubtedly would be now.
“Oh no.”
“You killed an innocent.” Gavin lowered his head in his hands, rubbing his forehead in anguish. “Now there are going to be consequences for you...and me. I’m going to take responsibility for it but I don’t know if it will be enough.”
“What do you mean?”
“You have to go before the council tonight. They are going to decide what should be done. There’s very little tolerance for something like this. We have survived in Cape Breton for hundreds of years by being very careful. There are rules against killing indiscriminately. You broke that rule last night. Of course, if I had been here I could have stopped you.”
I was so focused on that woman’s blood at the time I couldn’t think of any way that anyone on earth would have been able to stop me, not even him.
“I’m sorry. I woke up and I was so sick, and the voices were back. They’re gone now but they were back just like they were before. I took pills but it didn’t help. It was an accident.”
“I know,” he said. “James and I got here just as you were finishing up. You’re lucky that car caught on fire. That might help you since she was so badly burned people will just assume that was how she died.”
I remembered how I had wished for the fire in one moment and in the next it was a reality. “I’m not sure it was luck,” I said.
“Trust me it was very lucky.”
“No. I wished for fire. I wanted it, and then it was there. Maybe it was a coincidence but I don’t think it really was. I looked at the car and pictured it in flames and then suddenly the fire was there.”
“That’s impossible Rachel. You’re telling me you started that fire with your mind somehow?”
“Maybe...”
“Ok, think very hard. Before the car caught fire did you smell smoke or see anything leaking from underneath?”
; “No, but if I had I don’t think I would have noticed it. Once I smelled the blood that was all I could focus on.” It was true. The entire forest could have caught fire around me and I wouldn’t have cared. The smell of the blood had flooded my mind and turned me into some kind of crazed animal. I doubled over sick with grief.
“Don’t be too hard on yourself. Those are your natural instincts. You’re new at this so you might be shown mercy. I should have been here for you.” The thought of something happening to me was frightening but it was also equally frightening to think of something happening to Gavin.
“What will they do to me?” I swallowed hard hoping he’d say something that wasn’t as bad as I was thinking.
“If they decide not to show you mercy they’ll stake you. Me as well.”
“I want to try something,” he said after a long silence. Gavin got a piece of paper and crumpled it up. He grabbed a bowl out of the kitchen and placed the paper in it. “If you actually did start that fire, it could help you. My god, if we had somebody who could do that the fight with Samuel might be over in a matter of minutes. Try it.” I saw the hope in his eyes but it did nothing to quash the fear that was settling into the pit of my stomach.
I looked at the bowl in the same way I had looked at the car. I pictured the paper within it sparking and catching fire. There was nothing. Gavin tried to hide his disappointment but it showed for a brief second, long enough to make me doubt myself.
“Take a deep breath. Let every other thought or worry in your mind go and try it again.” That was easier said than done. Picturing yourself being staked was proving to be a bit of a distraction.
I closed my eyes and took a few moments to empty my mind. I tried again. I imagined the paper inside the bowl in flames in as much detail as I could. From the corner of my eye I could still see the look of doubt on Gavin’s face. Something about that made me angry. I was angry that he would doubt my ability to do this even though he had every right to, seeing as how I doubted it myself.
Why the anger came I couldn’t say, but a second after it crept in the paper sparked and burst into flames. Gavin’s doubt turned to amazement and then to relief. He looked at me and smiled his biggest smile. “Amazing. You have a chance to live perhaps.”
“I won’t let you take responsibility for what I did,” I said. “If they are going to kill you I won’t help them. I won’t do anything at all. If they kill you they may as well kill me too.”
Gavin raised his eyebrows in both confusion and shock at the proclamation. “Rachel, that’s not how it works.”
“No, I mean it. They’ll either show both of us mercy, or none at all.” I could see he was truly touched. As the paper continued to burn the rims of his eyes grew red and he blinked as tears began to sting them. Moving closer to me he took my face in his hands.
“Don’t do that,” he said, “I’m not worth your death. My fate may have been sealed a long time ago. They’ll give you a new guardian.” For some reason I couldn’t wrap my mind around I didn’t want to think about a life of immortality without Gavin in it. It seemed empty and pointless. It would be more of a hell than the hell I had lived in with the mental illness.
“I only want you,” I whispered. He pressed his forehead to mine and held it there. Suddenly I was desperate for him to kiss me, but he pulled away.
“We’re expected at the sanctuary,” he said, “I’ll be waiting for you outside.
Chapter Eight
There were four council members. Angus was one, old Ellie MacNeil was another and James was there as well. I didn’t recognize the other but they called her Mariah. It didn’t give me any great comfort to know that two vampires, one who wanted to behead me and one who had spat at me were sitting there. Angus looked as though someone had taken the wind out of his sails, as if he were resigned to something he didn’t want to happen. That something was probably my execution.
Gavin and I were kneeling on the floor in front of the long table which the council members sat behind on wrought iron throne like chairs. Upon entering the sanctuary the vials were taken from around our necks to prevent us from leaving as well.
I wondered what would happen if I were to suddenly go missing. Would anyone look for me? I had no family to speak of, except of course my aunt, who would not notice I was gone for at least another week. I had no friends either who would be checking in on me. That was the thing about mental illness. People either thought you were too crazy to be around, or not crazy at all and faking the whole thing for attention or to justify some type of bad behavior. Either way they had an excuse to dismiss you entirely. I hoped Gizzy wouldn’t starve.
“This is precisely why we have a process we need to follow,” James said to Angus, his muscular frame leaning forward against the table. His long dark hair was tied back and his mouth curled up in the corners ever so slightly, as if trying to hide a smile. He seemed to be more elated about the fact that he was right and would get his chance to behead me than he was about any type of impending challenge of Angus’ authority, or the destruction of the island.
Mariah, an older but very stately looking woman held up her hand in James’ direction. He fell silent. She turned her deep black eyes toward me. Her expression was formal but something in her voice was kind.
“Tell me young one,” she said, “why did you take the life of the innocent?” I was twenty four years old but in the last few days I felt as though I was being treated like an infant.
“I woke up and I was so sick.” I swallowed hard. My fate, I was certain, was already sealed. This was just a formality. “I felt like I had knives in my stomach and the voices were so loud. I didn’t mean for it to happen. I smelled the blood and all of a sudden it was all I could think about.”
“And when was the last time you fed before that?”
“I don’t ever remember feeding before that,” I said.
“She had not fed since the night of her transformation four nights before,” Gavin said. “The only blood she had up until then was mine.” That must have been what he meant when he said I was ‘quite the little eater’, although I had absolutely no memory of that at all.
The woman met Angus’ gaze. “This child had not had a feeding at all and then smelled blood and went into frenzy. I don’t think it’s her fault.”
“Of course it’s her fault,” James said sounding like a spoiled teenager. He was obviously in a position of some authority here, but just why I didn’t know. “She couldn’t control herself. We can’t have someone like that running around, it risks us all.”
“The blame is mine,” Gavin spoke up. “I was on my way to get her and go hunting when this happened. I thought we were safe to wait one more day. I was wrong.” I didn’t want to think about what he meant by hunting but I’m sure it didn’t involve deer and a rifle.
“So we punish him too,” James whined.
“No!” I screamed. “If you kill him you may as well kill me along with him. If he dies I don’t help you.”
“That’s hardly a loss,” James shot back.
“It might be more of a loss than you realize brother.”
Angus seemed to sense the impending revelation and leaned forward. “What do you mean?”
“The fire that consumed that car, the one which I might remind the council covered up the evidence of how the innocent died, I believe she started that, and not with a match.” Now they were all leaning forward along with Angus.
“She controlled fire with her mind last night when I asked her to. I think her mental abilities are far beyond any vampire that’s ever been recorded.” He finished and lowered his head.
“Is this true?” Mariah asked. Even though I doubted my ability to do it again I didn’t want to tell her that. If it was going to save us I at least wanted a chance to try.
“Yes,” I said.
Ellie was looking at me with a mix of what was perhaps wonder with a little bit of fear mixed in. “Show us,” she said.
I looked around the room quick
ly for something that I could use. A pile of papers was sitting in front of James. I fixed my attention on the paper and closed my eyes. I was struggling under the pressure however. Emptying my thoughts like Gavin had suggested I tried once again. Then there was a crackling sound and when I opened my eyes everyone was staring at the flames. Everyone except for Gavin who was trying to cover up the fact that he was smirking by lowering his head even further.
James seemed genuinely frightened which I can’t say I didn’t find amusing. He slid back from the table to be as far away from the fire as he could. Fortunately he got out of the way just at the last second because it was then that the table exploded.
The council members dove down onto the floor.
“Pull it back,” Gavin said calmly grabbing my hand. I closed my eyes again and pictured the fire dying down and smothering out. When I looked again the table was a pile of ash.
Silence filled the room as the council members eyed each other. Finally Mariah spoke once again; her calm and steady voice more rattled this time. “I believe we should take twenty four hours to decide what to do. After all we want to be sure the right decisions are made to benefit all of us.”
“Agreed,” said Angus standing up and brushing himself off. He motioned to a vampire that had been standing by the door to the room. “Take them to holding and return them to us in exactly twenty four hours.” The vampire bowed to the council as Gavin and I rose to our feet. He opened the door backing up just a little when I walked toward him.
We were led down a long hallway until we got to a large rounded door that opened with a skeleton key and stepped inside to wait out the long day and night that was ahead of us. There were blankets and pillows laid out on the floor and a pitcher of water with two glasses on a side table, but not much else.
The Vampires of Soldiers Cove Page 4