“I didn’t know that,” I said, noticing how his eyes had grown dark again.
“But the weird thing is, if we now didn’t go and deliver those letters, she probably wouldn’t remember me at all,” he said as if trying to wrap his head around what he had done already and were about to do.
“You’re not having second thoughts, are you?” I breathed, stepping closer to him and taking one of his hands in mine. “We’ve got to go through with this, Potter. We can’t change anything that has already happened or meant to happen. If we do, then we could destroy everything.”
“I thought that was the point,” he said, glancing down at me.
But before I’d had the chance to answer, there was the sound of sirens approaching from the distance.
Chapter Fourteen
Isidor
“A wolf?” I breathed, leaping up from off the sofa. “You can’t be a wolf. You weren’t a wolf before.”
Melody pounced to her feet too and stood before me, the light of the fire reflecting in her hair. Her eyes sparkled bright, but not blue – a different colour now. They shone hazel; but was that just the glow of the fire reflecting in them too?
“What do you mean before?” she asked. “You said only a few moments ago that being here wasn’t how you imagined it to be when we met again.”
“Because we have met before,” I told her, sensing that this was the time to tell Melody everything. Whether she would believe me or not, I didn’t know. But I had come this far in search of her; I couldn’t just walk away without telling her the truth. I couldn’t walk away again without Melody.
But she’s a freaking wolf! I heard Potter snipe inside my head. How many ways have I got to tell you, kid? Wolves can’t be trusted!
I shoved Potter’s voice from my head and looked across the snug sitting room at Melody. She stood with her back to the fire and it created something close to a halo all around her. I couldn’t help but think how beautiful she looked, and again, I fought the urge to tell her so. I just wanted to go to her, hold her in my arms like I had the last time we had been together as fourteen-year-olds on the shore surrounding Lake Lure. But I couldn’t take her in my arms however much I wanted to feel her against me. I knew Melody – I had all the memories of us being together. But I was nothing more than a ghost to her. A Dead Angel that had crawled from my grave like some damned vampire.
Fighting the urge to leap across the room and take hold of her, I said, “Those humans who you interviewed and wrote about were telling you the truth. This world isn’t how it is meant to be. It got pushed.”
“Pushed?” Melody said with a shake of her head. “What are you talking about?”
“I don’t know if I can explain it very well – I’m not very good with words. But deep down, you know that already,” I said.
“I don’t know anything about you,” she said, placing her hands on her hips.
“Melody, you taught me how to read and write,” I said, running my hands through my untidy black hair. “You taught me as we sat together down by the lake.”
“I didn’t teach you shit,” she said, now sounding suddenly angry. “I don’t know you and the only time I saw you before today was when they carried your body from off this mountainside in a body bag.”
“Why are you getting angry?” I asked her.
“I’m not getting angry,” she said, her eyes now blazing bright.
And Melody was right. She wasn’t angry. She was scared instead. Scared of what?
“You said you had no reason to be scared of me,” I reminded her. “But I do scare you. Why?”
“You don’t scare me,” she said. “I could cut your throat in an instant, Vampyrus.”
“I thought you said you didn’t know that word,” I shot back.
“What word?” she came back just as quick.
“Vampyrus,” I said.
“It was you who taught me it,” she said.
“And it was you who taught me to do this,” I said, pulling off my coat and throwing it clear.
“To do what?” she gasped as I stood stripped to the waist before her. She looked at the black flames tattooed up my arms and over my chest.
“To be myself,” I said, opening my arms and revealing the black wings that hung beneath them.
Melody staggered backwards, hands to her face.
“Together we once discovered how to be ourselves, regardless of what others thought,” I told her. “We taught each other how to do that.”
Melody peeked through her fingers at my tatty-looking and torn wings. “This is who I am, Melody. And you’re right about one thing, you have nothing to fear from me. I haven’t come here because I want to hurt you. I’m here because I’m in love with you and have been for as long as I can remember. And there was a time – in another where and when – in which you were in love with me, too.”
“Not true,” she said. “I could never love a Vampyrus.”
“And there’s that word again,” I said. “You do remember, and that’s what you’re afraid of. Because it makes your whole life – this whole world – one big lie.” I stepped closer to her, narrowing the gap with every step. “But we don’t have anything to be scared of – we don’t have anything to fear.”
“Why not?” she said, slowly lowering her hands and looking at me.
“Because we learnt how to be heroes,” I smiled.
But if that were true, why was I feeling so scared? Why was I so scared of doing what I had wanted to do for so long? Then, mustering all of my courage, I closed my eyes and gently covered Melody’s lips with my own.
Melody let her lips linger for the briefest of moments before pulling away. Lowering her eyes so as not to look into mine, she stepped sideways and beyond my reach.
“I’m sorry for kissing you,” I whispered, dropping my head, and turning my back on her. I was too embarrassed now to look at her. I had made a fool of myself.
“I don’t remember you, Isidor,” I heard her whisper back. “Not how you want me to. All I know is that you were murdered on this mountain with your sister. Your father had been driven mad in the belief that you were some creature from below ground and that you had…”
“Wings,” I finished for her.
“Yes,” she said.
“But the Isidor from this world wasn’t me,” I said, “He was just a hollow reflection. He lived a different life to me. In this world, he was raised by his father and was brought up with his sister. His name was Isidor Hunt, not Smith like me.” I turned to face Melody. “Me and the Isidor from this world might have looked the same, but we were different, just like the Melody I had once known was different from you. I should have realised that.”
Pulling on my coat again, I picked up my rucksack and headed to the front door. Before opening it, I looked back and said, “I’m sorry I came looking for you. It was a mistake, but one I had to make.”
“Why?” Melody asked, watching me pull open the front door.
“No matter,” I said, a cold blast of air rushing into the room. The flames flickered in the fireplace as if threatening to go out. “One good thing has come out of it, though.”
“And what’s that?” Melody asked, her voice curious.
“You’ve got one hell of a story for your newspaper,” I said. “You can report that all those stories and rumours about the Dead Angels are true. You can tell this world that you met one.”
“But doesn’t the thought of the wolves knowing that you are here scare you?”
“Like I said, Melody, I’m too damn tired to be scared anymore.” I stepped out into the falling snow. Then looking back, I said, “You might have been right in your belief about the Dead Angels, but you were wrong about Kiera Hudson.”
“How come?” Melody asked, standing alone in the poky sitting room, her arms wrapped about herself.
“Kiera isn’t the one you have to fear,” I said. “She hasn’t come here to hurt anyone. Kiera is too beautiful on the inside to want to do that. The only
thing you have right about Kiera is the fact that she is an angel. There has never been a more precious one.” I turned away, and with my head down, I trudged back toward the crop of trees. Just before I reached them, I heard Melody call out my name. I looked back to see her standing in the open doorway. We looked at each other.
“This other Melody – the one from this other world you talk of,” she said. “What was she like?”
“Like I’ve already said, I’m not very good with words,” I told her.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Melody asked me.
“I could search for a thousand lifetimes and still never find the right words to describe how beautiful a person Melody Rose was. And I’d have to search even longer to find the words to describe how much she meant to me.” I turned away again.
“No, wait, Isidor,” I heard her call out again.
I looked back.
“Will you drink more tea with me?” she asked, snow blowing hard all about her as she stood shivering in the doorway.
“Why?”
“I’d love you to tell me all about this other Melody Rose,” she said. “And besides, you won’t get off the mountain without those cops coming across you. I’ll get you safely off the mountain and away from here once the snow has eased a little.”
And however much I tried to tell myself I’d made a mistake coming back and the beautiful girl standing in the snow wasn’t the girl I’d once been in love with, I couldn’t stop myself heading back toward her.
Chapter Fifteen
Kayla
Potter twitched the curtains. “Turn the light out,” he hissed.
I snapped it out, throwing the apartment into complete darkness. I peered over Potter’s shoulder and watched the police cars screech to a halt in the street below. The whoop whoop sound of their sirens screamed into the night. Faces appeared at the bedroom windows of the houses on the opposite side of the street. They looked pale and scared. Cops leapt from the vehicles and crouched behind their cars, aiming up at the window we now peered out from.
“What do you think they want?” I whispered into Potter’s ear.
“Kayla Hunt!” one of the coppers bellowed through a loudhailer from below as if in answer to my question.
Potter looked at me, the flashing emergency lights from below making his eyes twinkle in the dark. “Now who told them that you were here?” Potter whispered.
“Hunt, come out at once or we will use lethal force against you,” the cop roared again. His voice sounded screechy through the loudhailer.
Potter opened the window an inch.
“What are you doing?” I gasped, gripping hold of his arm.
“Ask them why they want you to come out,” he whispered, slinking back against the edge of the wall so he couldn’t be seen.
“I think it’s pretty obvious why they want me to come out,” I said. “I think they want to kill me.”
“But why?” Potter insisted.
“If I get shot, I’m not going to be very happy with you, Potter,” I groaned, leaning close to the window.
“You’ll get over it,” he muttered from the darkness.
“What am I wanted for?” I yelled out through the gap in the window.
“Armed robbery and the murder of a police officer,” the cop barked through the loudhailer.
“Ask him ‘what cop?’,” Potter instructed me.
“What cop?” I hollered out of the window. “I aint killed no copper.”
“Police Constable Hudson,” the cop roared up at me.
Potter’s eyes glowed in the darkness. “Now besides me, who knew that you shot Kiera tonight? But more importantly, who knows you are even in this when?”
“Sam and his parents…” I said, stepping back from the window.
“Never trust a freaking wolf,” Potter whispered.
“Sam isn’t a part of this,” I insisted.
“We’ll see,” Potter said. “Now, what do you wanna do about the Keystone cops down there?”
“We could escape them by flying away,” I suggested.
“Yeah, but that’s kinda boring, don’t you think,” Potter mused. “And besides, they’d only go back and report that they had seen creatures with wings, and we could do without the publicity at the moment. Where’s the gun you had?”
“I left it in the car,” I said. “Anyway, who’s being boring now? Why do we need a gun when we’ve both got a set of these?” I let my claws spring from the end of my fingers and raked them slowly through the air.
“You know if we go down there we’re gonna have to kill them,” Potter said, his claws now springing from his fists.
“Every fucking last one of them,” I smiled, showing him my fangs.
“Can’t afford to leave any witnesses,” he smiled back.
“That’s exactly what I’m thinking,” I said, a nervous excitement now rushing through me. “Oh, my God, I fucking love this so much.”
“Love what?” Potter asked.
“This,” I snarled, suddenly releasing my wings from my back and crashing through the window and out into the night. Shards of glass rained down on the surprised, upturned faces of the cops below. At once, the sound of gunfire thundered through the night as wave after wave of bullets screamed past me. I banked right, then left, followed by a backflip. With my fangs dripping with a hungry lust for blood, I dropped out of the night like a rock, tearing the face from one of the cops. He screamed, throwing his hands up. Jets of blood shot between his fingers. I sucked his flesh up into my mouth and swallowed. It tasted sweet. Arching around high above them so I could go in for another attack, I looked down to see where the cop once had a face, now had a protruding, long, bloody snout.
“Skin-walkers,” I smiled to myself, swooping back out of the night sky. Nothing made me happier than executing some of those fuckers. The cops below looked up at me, tearing their human skin into bloody strips. Hair bristled beneath the bloody flesh they tore from their bodies. The Skin-walkers howled up at me. Two of them sprang onto the roofs of the police cars and tried to swipe at me with their huge claws. I raced teasingly close above their heads. They were so fixated on me; they failed to notice Potter leap out of the broken window. His wings stretched out on either side of him as he scurried up the front of the building and perched on the roof. I knew Potter was waiting for the right time to attack. It was like he wanted to savour the moment. I raced around and around in a circle above the wolves’ heads as they barked, snapped, and leapt up into the air to reach me. Their thick, bushy tails wagged back and forth. Watching them from above, I’d actually forgotten how big these wolves were, once free of their human skins. They were the size of freaking bears. One of them leapt onto the bonnet of a police car, and at once it started to buckle out of shape beneath the weight of the wolf.
I glanced up at Potter, who was still unseen by the wolves. Then screaming at the top of my voice, I raced out of the sky. I felt the cold night air slam against my face, and my cheeks ripple as I moved at such a terrifying speed. To the wolves below I couldn’t have been anything more than a blur. Without the wolf even knowing it, I had sliced its giant head from its shoulders. I flew back up into the night with it clutched between my claws. The smell of the blood pumping from the arteries that trailed from its torn neck was intoxicating. My stomach lurched with hunger. Unable to resist, I sunk my face into the throat of the wolf and began to suck the hot, black blood from the arteries as if I were sucking on a straw. The blood gushed into my mouth and down the back of my throat. It felt so good. Once I was done, I tossed the wolf’s head away into the night. I didn’t know where it would land and I didn’t care. I spun around, my wings beating on either side of me.
“Now let me see,” I mused, looking down at the snarling wolves’ way below in the street. “Which one shall I have next?” I was still undecided as I raced back toward the ground.
As I approached, one of the wolves leapt from the roof of the police car. The blue and red flash of the emergency light
s lit up his giant fangs. With my claws outstretched, I swooped low, dived beneath him, and opened up his belly. I heard the splatter of his innards as they cascaded onto the roof of the police car as I sped away.
“Yes!” I cheered, punching the air. The sense of joy I now felt was exhilarating. The wind rushed through my long, red hair and rippled over my wings. I soared over the houses that lined both sides of the streets. I watched the upturned snouts of the four remaining wolves as they looked at me swoop high above them. Still they hadn’t seen Potter crouching on the roof of Kiera’s apartment. But they would any time now, as I watched him drop from off the roof. His wings were closed behind him and he dropped so fast, I wondered if he would have time enough to open them and swoop away before hitting the ground. But flying away wasn’t his plan. He crashed into one of the wolves that had climbed onto the bonnet of the car. The wolf seemed to disappear into the engine block, as Potter pounded down into him. With his arms thrashing through the air, Potter tore the wolf to pieces. Chunks of flesh and matted fur sprayed up into the night, spattering the windows of the nearby houses. The wolf hadn’t even had the chance to let out a howl before Potter had ripped out its throat.
Licking his claws clean, Potter sprang toward the next wolf that was only just figuring out what had happened. He clattered into the creature, his claws like giant fists as he went swinging in. This wolf did howl as Potter tore out its tongue. It flew into the air looking like a thick, long, purple snake. The wolf threw its paws to its throat and made a gargling sound. Potter crushed its giant skull between his fists. The wolf’s brains spurted from its ears, spraying the windscreen of a nearby police car. It collapsed at Potter’s feet, its tail jerking back and forth. He stamped on what was left of the wolf’s head, and the tail fell still.
Potter glanced up at me, a grim smile on his ashen face. He brushed his fringe from out of his eyes. “One each,” he said, referring to the two remaining wolves.
“Sounds good to me!” I cried, rocketing out of the sky and back toward the ground. I landed in the centre of the road next to Potter.
Dead Lost (Kiera Hudson Series Two (Book 8)) Page 7