by Stead, Nick
“You need not be alone.” He walked into my line of sight so I could see that he was the same vampire who had saved me from Ulfarr’s judgement.
“Look at the carnage surrounding us. I destroy everything around me. For all I know, I did kill those vampires last time I lost control. You should leave, before I kill you too.”
His voice grew cold. “Do not mistake me for some weak human or the least of my kind.”
I didn’t really hear him, my train of thought continuing on as though he’d not spoken. “And what would you care of a lowly beast? That’s all we are to you vampires, right?”
“To some, yes.” His voice warmed a few degrees. “Ulfarr is a fool, however. I do not believe you killed those vampires, no more than I believe you are nothing but a beast. Even the mortal predatory animals are more than savage killers. Is it not humans that are the true savages?”
“Now you sound like the wolf part of me,” I growled.
“Maybe you should listen to him.”
“Yeah right, next you’ll be telling me to make my peace with him, like Lady Sarah kept nagging me to do for so long. Is it so wrong to want to cling to my humanity, however little there is left? Maybe eventually I’ve got no choice but to let my mind become whole again and embrace my wolfish half. But I’m not ready yet.”
The vampire raised his hands but there was nothing submissive in those intense eyes, and his face was far from apologetic. “Forgive me, I meant no offence. I offered you the chance of some company other than Lady Sarah’s, if you recall. It seems to me you are more lost and alone now than when last we met. These bodies speak of your anguish. Both wolves and humans are social animals. You cannot endure while you remain alone. Whether in a year or a hundred years, it will eventually be the end of you. Both parts of you yearn for companionship, and I would offer it to you again. Come with me and I can teach you more than Lady Sarah ever could.”
“Why do you care?” I asked again, not bothering to hide my suspicion. The more I was forced to deal with vampires, the warier I became of them. Once again I thought about how it seemed they all had some ulterior motive, as Vince had proven when he’d sought to hand us to the Slayers, and then Lady Sarah had betrayed me to Ulfarr just months later. I might never even know why she’d turned on me, but that didn’t really matter. For some reason she’d seen fit to help me in the beginning, until eventually it had served her purpose to give me over to Ulfarr to abuse and torment as he saw fit. I had no wish to go through another betrayal with this new vampire, or any others of their wretched kind. “Maybe it’s better to die alone.”
“As you wish, but know that my door remains open to you, should you change your mind. And as a show of good faith, I will clean up the mess you created here. You should tread carefully, for the Slayers are sure to have caught your scent. But I can at least take care of any video footage captured of your transformation, so the world at large does not learn of the existence of our kind outside of myth and legend.”
I frowned, but before I could say anything more he was gone. The cold had crept back into my body and I knew I would only grow colder the longer I remained there. I turned away from the body of the girl and loped off on all fours. My thoughts turned to the blanket and the little extra warmth it had to offer, and so I found myself out on the moors once more. The blanket had long since been buried in the snow, however, and for hours I searched in vain for the spot where I might have left it. Finally I was forced to admit defeat, cold and weary. I sat down in the snow and hugged my knees, utterly dejected.
“How many more must die?”
I looked up to find Lizzy had reappeared, but didn’t answer.
The apparition changed as before, this time becoming Fiona, my brain making the image exactly as I remembered it the morning I’d found her dying from the horrific wounds the wolf had inflicted. Her leg was in tatters, scraps of flesh hanging off the bone and dripping blood, her stomach red raw, the muscle beneath the skin glistening as it had in the early morning sun.
“No!” I screamed, rising to my feet. “Don’t appear to me as her, not her!”
“What’s the matter, Nick? You can’t face me?” Fiona said. “Are you going to continue blaming my death on your wolfish half? He might have been in control, but it was still your teeth that ripped through my flesh. It was still your body that murdered me, that murdered them all.”
“No, you won’t do this to me again,” I snarled. “I’m done feeling guilty over you. It wasn’t murder; I needed to feed and you were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. I didn’t choose you as my prey: that was the wolf.”
“Is that all we are to you, prey to your predator? I was supposed to be your friend. If you truly cared you would have protected us from yourself. And you want to go back home, for what? So you can prey on more of us under the full moon and slaughter us in the daylight hours when your anger gets the better of you? Do you even remember the faces of all the people you’ve beaten and savaged in the grip of your own rage?”
My anger flared up again and I roared at her, lashing out with those bloodied claws. My hand passed through her and she disappeared, but a noise from behind caused me to turn and find Luke watching again.
“Don’t feel bad, Nick. There’s nothing wrong in indulging guilty pleasures when the need arises,” he said.
My eyes narrowed into the lupine equivalent of a frown. How could he possibly have just turned up in the middle of nowhere? I was starting to wonder if he was even human. Or could he be some kind of supernatural being as well, one I couldn’t detect as something more than human?
“I was human,” he answered. “Don’t you remember me? That month where you gave yourself so completely to all that delicious rage, and spent the entire full moon in wolf form. I watched in awe as you tore through the town, much like the massacre you committed today. And then you turned on me, even as I begged you to turn me. That wasn’t cool, bro.”
Gashes made by my fangs began to appear on him while he talked, shredding through his clothes and his skin, blood welling up and soaking through the ruined material. Ribs streaked red were visible in his chest and half his face peeled away, revealing bare jaw bones grinning morbidly.
“Don’t feel bad, man,” the embodiment of my inner darkness continued. “Just remember how good it was to embrace your bloodlust, the primal ecstasy of savaging prey with tooth and claw. Don’t listen to the other voices. With me as your guide, you’re truly unstoppable. I’m the only one you need.”
“No,” I breathed, unable to believe my mind had fooled me so completely.
“Come on, there’s more towns just waiting for you to unleash your rage on them. Already it bubbles back to the surface. Time to feed it with more blood.”
“No!” I roared, and again I lashed out at the hallucination. He also disappeared, leaving me to rage and wrestle with old emotions I thought I’d lost. I howled in anguish, overwhelmed with a new wave of guilt and despair, the threat of the Slayers and the vampires forgotten in the grip of my latest emotional turmoil. The thought about how far the sound carried never once crossed my mind. I lost all sense of time while I raged and grieved and indulged my re-awoken conscience, the murders I’d committed still weighing so heavily on it. But my latest breakdown was brought to a sudden end when the sound of a gunshot rang in my ears, just as an explosive pain ripped through my chest. And in the shock of that thud from the impact I felt my heart stop.
There was a moment of time seeming to freeze as I looked down at the crimson wave gushing from my torso. Then the world started to spin and I fell back.
Blood pumped out of my ruined heart and pooled on the ground where I lay. The Slayers had found their mark at last and I knew I would never be able to transform quick enough to save myself. There was a reason we could be killed by destroying the heart or the brain – it was the only wound the change couldn’t repair before death claimed us. But even though my heart could no longer function, my death wasn’t instant. I remained conscious a
s my body grew weaker and the agonised seconds ticked by. And as I lay there helpless and unable to escape the end drawing ever nearer, I was aware of my killer standing over me.
Cold grey eyes gazed into my own. The seasoned soldier raised his gun a second time, now aiming it at my head. It seemed they hadn’t completely forsaken the town I’d brought death to after all. I assumed he’d tracked me from there, though why he hadn’t appeared sooner to put a stop to the carnage was anyone’s guess.
So this is how it ends, I thought to myself. I was going to die alone and unloved, my body left to rot in a shallow, unmarked grave. Maybe it was a fitting end for a monster such as me, and no more than I deserved. But in those final moments I just wanted to see Mum and Amy one last time, to tell them I was sorry for what I’d done to our family and to have the comfort of a hug goodbye. Instead there was only the loneliness and the face of my enemy staring down at me.
Even if I could have somehow repaired the damage from the first bullet, there was no escaping the second he was about to put through my brain. Fast as I was, the older man was disciplined and had mastered his fear. He wouldn’t panic if I found the strength to lunge for him, and there was no hope of him missing his target at so close a range. Even if that first bullet hadn’t sealed my fate, there would still be no way out. My luck had finally run dry and I was going to die at the hands of my enemies.
My vision was growing blurrier with each passing second as my brain struggled to keep its hold on reality, the lack of fresh blood pumping to it starting to take its toll. But beside the hazy form of my killer, the hallucination representing my conscience reappeared, still in the form of Fiona. She crouched over me with a sad smile, the last clear image I had of the surroundings that were fading as quickly as my life. Her injuries were gone again and so was the accusation from her eyes.
“Just let go, Nick,” she said gently. “It’s time to stop fighting now. Let it wash over you and find peace in death.”
I tried to reply, to tell her I couldn’t just give up even though I knew there was no way out this time. But I couldn’t make the words form. There was too much blood in my throat and I was growing too weak from the blood loss.
“Just let go,” she repeated, as I slid into blackness.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Cheating Death
I floated in the blackness, a stream of consciousness seemingly cut off from both the mortal realm and whatever lay beyond. Where was I? Lady Sarah had once explained that some souls made it to an afterlife, while others stayed on the Earth to become wraiths or ghosts, and others faced oblivion. But how could this be called oblivion when I still had some form of awareness? Yet it didn’t seem to fit any kind of afterlife I’d been given reason to believe in, and I certainly wasn’t still trapped on Earth. Even if I’d become a spirit too weak to manifest as a ghost, I would surely still be able to see the mortal realm if something kept me bound to it. But there was just nothing other than my thoughts, as if I’d fallen into my own inner void.
You might think this situation would have been terrifying, but I was surprisingly calm. There was even a sense of peace as I drifted there, and I soon lost interest in trying to fathom where exactly I might be. Some part of me continued to exist, free of the pain life had held, and for that I felt a sense of gratitude.
“Wolf,” came the alien voice.
I wasn’t alone after all. The voice was female and not part of my own consciousness. But it felt like it didn’t belong in that little pocket of reality I’d found myself in – a place that was mine alone to exist in as this small part of me lived on.
“I need you to come with me now. Follow my voice, and I will guide you back.”
Back where, a part of me wondered. I found I didn’t really care, and I continued to float in that peaceful state.
“I know you can hear me, wolf,” the voice said again. “This is not your path. Come to me and I will help you rise up, to face your true destiny.”
My curiosity got the better of me and mentally I reached out to her, wanting to find out more. There was a brief sensation as though our thoughts had touched, and the next thing I knew, that blackness turned to a blinding white light, pain crashing back over me as nerves reconnected with my mind. It was as much of a shock as the initial impact of the bullet had been, and a part of me wanted to fall back into the darkness where I’d been blissfully free of the agony of my flesh. But instead my eyes snapped open to find a blonde haired woman leaning over me. I was still lying on my back and my heart was just as ruined as it had been before I’d lost consciousness. The woman was speaking, but I struggled to make sense of her words through the agony of my damaged chest.
“I have to take the bullet out now, then you must transform or you will die.”
I didn’t know it at the time but the bullet had ricocheted, causing damage to more than just my heart. It was still lodged somewhere in that mass of screaming nerves and ruptured tissue, and had embedded itself in such a way that it no longer lined up with the entry hole. The shifting flesh wouldn’t be able to push it out like the last few times I’d been shot.
I’m not sure I was even truly aware of what the woman had said, and whether I willed the transformation, or whether it took hold regardless, like any of the body’s natural survival mechanisms. But as she drew the bullet out, the fur began to sprout along my skin and flesh and bone started to shift and become lupine. And as my form grew more wolfish, the bomb site the bullet had made of my torso began to rebuild.
Tissue knitted itself back together, my heart becoming whole again and fully functional. That first beat of renewed life felt like an explosion. Blood rushed through my arteries and fresh oxygen carried to my brain. I was relieved to feel the cardiac muscle pumping as strong as ever in the wake of the damage.
The last of the pain faded as the change completed, and I lay on the luxurious softness of a proper bed, panting and shaking with exhaustion. I tried to growl questions at the woman, like who was she, and how was it possible for me to have survived a mortal wound to my heart? But I couldn’t form the words with my lupine vocal cords, and even though the transformation had healed the damage, I was still weak.
“Easy, wolf. There will be time for questions later. Rest now, and recover your strength.”
Drowsiness crept over me, giving little choice but to do as she’d said. I gave in to the beckoning darkness once more and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
I don’t know how long I laid there, slipping in and out of consciousness, but when I opened my eyes for long enough it was to find the woman watching over me. Now I was no longer dying, I took in more of my surroundings, and my questions grew.
Stone walls rose around us to create a modest sized room. Wooden beams ran across the ceiling and an old fashioned window let a stream of daylight in. There was little in the way of decorations about the place – no personal touch. It was as if I’d gone back in time to the past Lady Sarah seemed to be stuck in, for this was surely an ancient cottage like the kind peasant farmers would have once lived in. But this woman was no vampire. Her scent was human and the daylight fell across part of her face, giving her skin a healthy glow. There was none of the paleness that characterised most of the undead.
Turquoise eyes looked on me with all the warmth of Mediterranean seas. She had a chunk of raw meat in her hands, and she offered it to me with a kindly smile on her pretty face. I eyed it with wariness. Why would a human want to help a monster like me?
“Eat,” she said.
Hunger overrode my sense of caution. I nearly took her hand off as I latched onto the meat, swallowing it down in one big gulp. A rush of energy went through me, but it was swept away by another wave of tiredness. My eyelids were still heavy and I couldn’t keep myself from falling back into darkness. Except this time I wasn’t alone.
I found myself back out on the moors. A dark shape stalked through the gloom, tall and foreboding. It wasn’t the Slayers. They didn’t fill me with the same sense of dread as
this new threat.
Instinct told me there was no fighting the figure. I tried to run, but every time I twisted my head around, the thing had drawn ever nearer. No matter how hard I pushed myself, he kept on closing in.
I turned around again but the figure had gone. Had I escaped it? Relief swept through me and I faced forward, only to come to a shocked stop. There it was, blocking my path.
Robes concealed its identity. I gaped at it with wide eyes, feeling my heart thudding in my chest and fear stabbing through my gut. A beam of sunlight fell on the shadowy cowl and a scream tore from my throat.
The grinning skull was no worse than any other horror I’d faced over the last year, and yet the sight of it turned my blood to ice. Sockets empty of eyes somehow still held the weight of time, and a force so utterly unstoppable that none could hope to stand against it. My despair returned, stronger than ever.
“I will not be cheated!” Death thundered. His voice was like a physical power, one I had no hope of fighting. My heart came to another sudden stop and there was nothing I could do about it.
I fell to my knees, clutching my chest with one hand and reaching out for help with the other. But there weren’t even any hallucinations to accompany me now. Was I to die here, truly alone this time, cut off from everyone and everything I’d ever loved before the curse robbed me of my human life?
Again I felt that longing to see my family just one last time before I slipped away from the mortal coil, but Death’s skeletal fingers were reaching for me and there was no escaping his grasp this time…
I awoke with a pitiful whimper. No sooner had my mind cleared of that terrible image, than the voice returned, thundering inside my head again.