Revelation

by Tanith Frost

  Violet joins me several minutes later, her wolf form with its ruined ear and shaggy coat familiar and unmistakable. She’s walking slowly, like an old dog worn out from a life on the streets. She coughs again and retches, stretching her jaws wide open, flattening her ears to her skull.

  “You okay?”

  She glances at me, shakes her coat out, and trots off with her nose low to the ground. I guess I’m supposed to take that as a yes. I follow her zig-zagging movements as she picks up speed, heading toward a toppled woodpile, then stops and paws at the logs, whining.

  I resist the urge to give her a pat on the head and instead join her, grasping the logs and pulling them free one by one. It doesn’t take long to uncover her prize—a disembodied arm, torn off at the shoulder. It’s frozen now, but it looks as if it got a start on decomposing before the frost hit.

  “Guess something carried off the rest of the body.”

  Violet tilts her head at me.

  “It’ll be more than enough. I just need a few minutes. Thanks.”

  She sneezes violently before wandering toward the lake for a drink.

  Okay. This is fine. I can do this. It’s just part of a deceased body. Nothing I haven’t seen before. Nothing I haven’t been before if I want to be technical about it. We’re practically related, this arm and me.

  I’m just not sure I want to see what it has to show me.

  I close off my perceptions as I sit on the ground and place my hand on its frozen skin. Is this what I would have felt like if someone had stumbled on me as I slept in that box—cold, clammy, without breath or life?

  I shudder. No. I’ve spent the day with sleeping vampires before, kept watch over them. They did seem like mere corpses, but at least they had the decency to look and feel like fresh ones. And the knowledge of what they truly were kept their lifelessness from being as horrifying as this mangled lump of flesh.

  I open myself slowly, cautiously. This should be easier than it once was. I have a sense of my true gift now—connection to supernatural energies—and have learned a little about how to call them to me, how to cover or suppress those I don’t want others to sense in me. Still, it’s as if a dam has broken when I make the connection. Sights, sounds, even smells assault me in a jumble of seemingly random experience. Fear pulses through me, but it’s unfamiliar. Not my fear, but that of whoever this unfortunate appendage belonged to. I can separate it from myself. Still, the sensations are overwhelming.

  I grit my teeth and let it all come.

  As I sink deeper into the experience, the images start to line up with the sounds. Snippets of perception become more coherent and longer, though it’s like watching a badly cut film. One moment we’re running, the next there’s a sharp burst of pain. Shadows pass, silent monsters that look human. The scent of blood. I’m almost ready to give up—none of this is helping.

  But then I recognize one of the monsters. Not his face. The faces are all a blur. But his movements, as eerily graceful as they are brutal when he attacks a human and takes her down with a knife beneath her ribs.

  How it must have hurt him to spill so much blood and not have had a moment to taste it.

  The rest of the world has faded now. There are only the images and the realization that this is it—Daniel was here, and this disjointed collection of sensations is all the hope I have of finding him.

  There’s no way to control this. I let myself be swept along by the current, drowning in the body’s memory of adrenaline and terror. Moments repeat, starting from the beginning with new focus and purpose.

  The arm’s former owner was keeping watch the night it happened. The remaining Blood Defenders had gathered here to discuss their next steps, and confirmation of their leader’s death had reached them just hours ago. This guy was thinking about giving it all up and going home. He was looking at another member of his group as she passed by. Checking out her ass, in fact, and that’s the only reason he saw the shadowy form that hauled her off the dark path and into the bushes—she didn’t even have time to cry out for help.

  Chaos and confusion follow, but now that I know what I’m looking for, it’s easier to piece things together. I forget about the body that experienced all of this and marvel at the creatures he saw as enemies. Vampires, naturally solitary hunters, moving as a well-coordinated team. A pack, almost, though Violet would hate to know I’d thought as much. Daniel appears again, attacking a Blood Defender who was almost on top of one of the other vampires. He’s in his element, a predator taking down his natural prey, working on a deadly combination of instinct and decades of training and experience.

  There aren’t many humans out here. The vampires probably killed those who were sleeping before they risked alerting any who were still awake, raising no alarms as they approached and waited for the right moment.

  I don’t get much time to enjoy the show. These are only impressions, and I can’t direct this guy to stand his ground to watch more. The memory is jumping, cutting around, getting crazier as his terror grows. Someone screams. Not him. He should be fighting, looking for survivors, but he’s hiding in the shed next to the woodpile, trying to stifle his own breath. He can’t help peering out the window, though. He knows he won’t hear them coming if they find him, and that they inevitably will.

  A vampire approaches. I still can’t make out the face, which this human only perceived as vague and monstrous, but his familiar posture and gait make my chest clench with excitement. He stops, listening, then crouches and braces himself. A piercing whistle cuts through the air, and he disappears into the shadows.

  Another group of vampires has arrived. The human who made these memories didn’t realize they were different when they stepped into view—they were all the same monster to him. I see it, though. These vampires are openly excited, fresh, their clothing untouched by human blood from tonight’s kills. New arrivals, but ready to hunt nonetheless.

  Another jump. The new vampires have one of the first group. They lay her on the path, arms and legs held down by her captors, and drive a stake through her heart. They’re laughing. My host is confused. I want to puke. The moment she’s turned to dust, the vampires race off again, searching for their next victim.

  All seems quiet. The human creeps out from his hiding place. He’s examining the empty clothes laid out on the path when cold hands close around his throat. Pain fills his body so quickly and completely that I can’t tell where it began.

  And everything goes dark.

  I release the arm and crawl away from the woodpile, not trusting my legs to hold me up. I only make it as far as the path before I collapse, crushed beneath emotional and physical reactions that overwhelm me now that I’m fully back in my own mind—panic, trembling limbs, a nearly unbearable urge to scream even though I know the danger is long past.

  Daniel was here with his team. They did the job assigned to them. They should have come home, but the vampires of Tempest knew they were here. They let Maelstrom’s best hunters do the dirty work, wearing themselves out before Tempest attacked.

  My stomach clenches again.

  I know from listening in on Viktor’s meeting with Bethany that they captured Daniel and his team. The only thing I know now that I didn’t before is how excited Tempest’s vampires were by the chance to hunt their own kind. How cruel and coldly efficient they were at it.

  … How far up shit creek I am. How the hell am I supposed to infiltrate this clan if they attack outsiders on sight? But I can’t give up now. Not when I’m this close.

  Violet approaches and nudges me with her nose. I push myself to sit up in the exact spot where that vampire met her end. Someone must have taken her clothes.

  “This is where we part ways,” I tell Violet. “Tempest’s vampires tracked Maelstrom’s here and captured them. Not one member of Daniel’s team made it back to tell us what happened.” I wrap my arms around my legs, pulling myself into as small a space as I can manage. “Tempest’s hunters are good at their job. And if things go as I expec
t they will, I’ll be their next target.”

  Violet whines and rests her chin on my shoulder for a moment, then paces in a circle and points her nose eastward.

  “I can’t come with you. My odds of survival are no better back home than they are here.”

  Violet backs away slowly toward the garage, her eyes locked on me. She can’t speak, but the message is clear. Stay.

  The change must be difficult. I have plenty of time to replay a dead man’s memories in my mind before she returns, shivering in spite of her warm coat and scarf. I’ve never seen the cold bother her or any other werewolf like this.

  She sits beside me, her arm pressed against mine. “Come back to Nova Scotia if you’re not safe on the island. Or hide out in New Brunswick. No one will find you if you stick to the edges of your territory.”

  “I can only go without feeding for so long, and eventually I’ll catch someone’s attention. If I’m going to spend the rest of my nights looking over my shoulder for enemies, I’d prefer that it be for a good cause.” I lean harder against her, nudging with my shoulder. “Like keeping my friends safe. You should focus on that, too. Go back to your pack. Take care of Irene. Get healthy, and get ready for a fight. I’ll do everything I can, but if I fail—”

  “Shut up, you’re not going to fail.” Violet rests her chin on her knees. “You’re going to lose contact with me again, and you’re going to piss me off when you come looking for another favour. Which you won’t get because we’re doing our damnedest to get away from vampires and all your bullshit.”

  “Maelstrom’s vampires might actually be the lesser of two evils now, even for you.” I pull Imogen’s phone from my pocket and hand it to her, along with my labradorite necklace. I’m already without ID, without access to funds or my home or our stock. Might as well be stripped of everything. “As of right now, I can’t be Aviva of Maelstrom. I have to be a shadow. A nobody. I’ll be in trouble anyway when they find me, but if they find out who I am and what happened with Viktor, I’m doubly fucked.”

  Violet squeezes the phone tight in one hand. “So what’s your alias?”

  “I don’t know. Guess it’s time to decide.”

  She turns to look at me with narrowed eyes, then stands and reaches down to help me to my feet, though she seems unsteady on hers. “Ava would suit you, and would be easy to course-correct if you start out wrong.”

  I like the name, but it doesn’t fit right. I’ll have to work to make it come naturally to mind and hope they don’t have connections in Maelstrom who can tell them Ava doesn’t exist.

  We walk back to the vehicles in silence. Nothing really happened here tonight, but I feel as if I’ve been through a war, and Violet doesn’t look any better.

  She climbs into the van and rolls down the window as she starts the engine. “Take care, Ava of Maelstrom.”

  “You, too. And listen to Irene, will you? Get the hell off the island. Soon. If shit gets bad—”

  She cuts me off with a deadpan eye-roll. “You’re talking to a werewolf. Shit’s always bad. Don’t worry about us. Worry about getting my damn rental back in one piece.”

  She waves out the window as she drives away.

  “Stubborn bitch,” I mutter, then do my best to put her and her pack out of my mind. I can’t afford the distraction.

  I have a long drive ahead of me tonight. I kind of wish it was going to be longer. Neither Aviva nor Ava of Maelstrom is ready for what’s waiting at the other end.

  5

  I forgot how much I hate big cities.

  Maybe it’s great for the people who choose to live here, who see something in it that I never have. All I ever got from Toronto was overwhelm—the crowds, the smells, the impersonal busyness of it all. And that was when I was alive, my senses dull.

  Every city is made up of humans and all of their combined imperfections, but over the past few nights, I’ve come to loathe this one as I never have any other. There’s no brightness. No spark. Just a sea of humanity, their individuality lost in their sheer volume. I’m a predator surrounded by prey, yet I feel as if I might be crushed by them. It makes me want to crawl into a dark hole and sleep until it’s time to feed. That, or go on a rampage and drown myself in their bland, anonymous blood.

  Its only saving grace is that no one who’s out at night seems eager to make eye contact or conversation. Zero chance of any humans looking close enough to figure out what I am.

  But someone should have by now. I haven’t risked feeding yet, but I’ve been walking the streets from dusk until dawn, searching for signs of vampires. I haven’t found anything, which hardly surprises me. Vampires are by our very nature secretive, and the only reason we chose to form clans was to better keep ourselves and our supernatural world hidden from our prey. I’m not going to stumble into one of their clubs by chance or spot a human wandering around in a state of post-feed bliss with bite marks on her throat.

  The city is huge, bright, loud. Everything about it feels rushed, hyper-focused on what comes next—the people walking with their eyes glued to their phones or the sidewalk straight ahead, the overcrowded buses, the shining glass towers built over the destruction of an older, less relevant version of this town. It’s vast, relentless, limited only by the goose shit-spattered shore of a lake that holds none of the saltwater charm of the ocean I’m accustomed to.

  And there are so many places for my kind to hide.

  But they are good at hunting. So if I can’t find them, I’m going to have to make it easier for them to find me. It’s a daunting prospect after what I saw at the Blood Defenders’ camp, but the fact that they apparently captured most of their enemies when they could have slaughtered them all gives me some hope that they might do the same with me.

  If they catch me, that is. I could still draw them out and escape, follow them back to wherever they’re hiding and carry on from there. It’s not likely, but I have to watch for any opportunities that will keep me out of their clutches.

  I sit in the rental car and look over Jia’s notes again. Hamilton is listed as a location where one of the Agonites operated when he was still one of Tempest’s lowest-ranking vampires. That was thirty years ago, but I guess it’s my next logical stop if no one’s coming out of the woodwork here.

  Weight seems to lift from my shoulders as I leave the city’s core behind me, but this entire area is a relentless sea of human development. I’m heading to a slightly quieter place, but I’d have to drive for hours to truly get away from the noise and light.

  I glance upward through the windshield. Can’t even see the damn stars here.

  The species I feed on is a fucking cancer on the planet, I swear. Maybe Gideon’s story about the origin of my kind was right and vampires really are here to balance the scales. Spending a few nights surrounded by millions of people has made me think it’s not a crazy idea.

  I can’t let myself think that way. I have to remember Imogen, Susannah, any humans I’ve met since my death who in their small ways make the world better. If masses of humans tempt me to despise them, it’s focusing on individuals that will help me remember that I’m fighting for them almost as much as I am for my own kind.

  Or at least, that’s what I’m telling myself.

  The sights along the highway become more familiar as I drive, but I don’t feel connected to any of it. I remember when this was my world—when I lived and breathed and got caught up in the little dramas that are no doubt unfolding in the buildings and vehicles I pass. Now it’s like being in a foreign land where I understand the language and customs but don’t identify them as my own. That’s as it should be. But as I travel on, my mind starts to wander. Memories I was encouraged to abandon after I ceased to be human flicker through my mind. Not specific events. Just a sense of déjà-vu, though it feels as if these memories belong to someone else entirely.

  That feeling of weirdness intensifies as I get closer to my old hometown, passing through the seemingly borderless mass of Mississauga-Oakville-Burlington.


  Maybe it’s because I never got to say goodbye to myself. Every part of the person I used to be was ripped away so suddenly after my death. My soul, my connection to the light, life itself… my family, my community, the world I knew. I wasn’t allowed to see news reports about my death or to know what became of my sister after that night. It’s all been waiting here for me, unacknowledged and unexamined. Now that I’m back, the past is haunting me, and it’s a distraction I can’t afford.

  I jerk the wheel to the right as I’m about to pass the next exit and head toward the Lakeshore route. Nicer scenery down here, tall trees and downtown shops all closed up for the night. I’m still heading for Hamilton, though.

  At least, I am until I turn the car away from the lake and head up a street lined with fine houses and tall trees. It wasn’t a conscious decision, but I know where I’m going.

  Most of the questions that are coming to mind in these familiar surroundings will have to remain unanswered. I’m not going to track down any of the people I left behind, and I’m not going to hang out until tomorrow evening so I can bother some poor librarian to look up my obituary for me. But I am curious. And if I’m being honest with myself, I’m hoping that a taste of the closure I’ve been denied for so long will clear my mind.

  And what better place than a cemetery to finally say goodbye and lay the past to rest?

  I glance in the rearview mirror. There’s been a white Volkswagen behind me for a while now, but it’s turning down a side street. This only eases my mind slightly. I may be away from the most concentrated potential food sources in the area, but even these smaller cities and towns have populations larger than that of St. John’s. More humans might mean more vampires.

  I park on a side street and climb the fence, the tire iron from the rental car’s trunk clutched in one hand.

  The cemetery is as I remember it, though I only ever visited during the day when I was alive. It’s a nice enough spot to be buried, even if the pond and carefully maintained garden beds are entirely for the benefit of the living. There’s no church here. I’m not stepping on holy ground, and there’s no sense of light threatening to crush me.