by Mark Woods
“But…but…you knew something was going to happen back on the ship,” Jaqueline insisted. “Back on-board The Bellastaria. You knew even before anything happened, you warned me…”
“I know,” Wilfred told her. “But I was only able to warn you because I was partly responsible for what happened. I helped set some of the explosive devices that helped blow up the ship. I was working for a secret organisation that calls itself ‘The Hunters’; they learnt about The Bellastaria, learnt that it was going to be sailing on its maiden voyage with a whole host of Vampyre and Lycanthropes on-board, and sent me and some of my fellow Hunters on-board to blow it up shortly after it set sail.
“I never wanted any human casualties, but after arriving on-board wasn’t sure how I was going to be able to save everybody who wasn’t Lycanthrope or Vampyre without putting the mission at risk. And then I met you, and the minute I met you, I knew I just had to try and save you – stop you from going down with the rest of the ship even if I could not save anybody else.
“You know everything that happened after that…
“This, this is my chance to atone – to help set things right – not just to you, but to all those others, all those countless other innocent lives I failed to save, and who perished because of me when The Bellastaria went down.”
“Don’t say that,” Jaqueline said. “Don’t say that, it wasn’t your fault – none of it was. You were a soldier, and you’re still a soldier at heart; always will be. You were given a mission, and you were just following orders like any good soldier would. It wasn’t your fault – none of it was.
“Hell, look at it this way. If you hadn’t been there on The Bellastaria, if you had turned your mission down, then the two of us would never have met and I would not still be alive now.
“I’m not leaving,” Jaqueline repeated again. “I won’t. I won’t leave you here to die alone. If you’re staying, I’m staying, right here with you, right up until the end.”
“No,” Wilfred said. “No, you’re not. You’re going to escape off this ship with the others. You’re going to forget all about me, go live your life and in time, hopefully even move on. If you and I were truly supposed to be, then who knows? Maybe we might even meet up again in the next life…”
“You really believe that?” Jaqueline asked and with a laugh, Wilfred shook his head. “No, not really,” he admitted. “But if I’m honest, the words sounded a lot better in my head.”
They both laughed this time, but Jaqueline’s laughter, he saw, hid tears in her eyes that she obviously didn’t think he could see.
“Seriously,” he told her. “You need to go. I need you to do this for me…but not with her…” Subtly, he nodded over towards Viktoryia.
“If you can, travel with the wolves instead – from everything I know from past experience, they’re much more loyal and trustworthy, and far less likely to want to do you harm. I wouldn’t trust that Vampyre, any Vampyre, as far as I could throw it - let alone that damn Vampyre child…”
He lowered his voice as he said this, all too aware that both Vampyre – with their preternatural hearing – could probably still overhear every single word he said.
“Come on,” one of the older of the four wolves, Scott, said, taking her by the arm and leading her away. “We really need to go if we’re going, before those things, those experiments, start making their way up here from down below on the lower decks. I’ll keep her safe, I promise,” he said over his shoulder, saluting Wilfred as he did so, headed back towards the lifeboat they’d first arrived in while Jaqueline, sobbing, simply gave in, and allowed herself to be gently pulled away.
Wilfred pulled himself to his feet and with a bit of help from Roman and Toneye, slowly started to make his way up to the bridge to activate the explosives that supposedly were strategically placed all about the ship, just as they had been on The Bellastaria.
There was a curious symmetry to all this, Wilfred thought, as the two wolves helped him.
Almost as though everything had come full circle.
His day had all started with a bomb, and now here it was about to end almost the very same way. He looked across the bridge and quickly spotted what he assumed must be the controls to activate the countdown for the explosive devices set to blow up the ship.
“You know what you’re doing?” The eldest of the two wolves, Roman, Wilfred thought his name was, asked him.
Wilfred nodded.
“It all looks pretty straight forward,” he said. Both wolves shook him by the hand and Wilfred gasped. He didn’t have long left, he realised, and it was a miracle he was still just about standing now.
“Then God speed, Brother,” Roman said as behind him, Toneye nodded.
“We’ll look after your girl, get her to safety, we promise,” Toneye told him.
“Then go, just go…” Wilfred said, and waved the two wolves off.
Lukaas, meanwhile, down below on deck, attempted to approach Lottie one last and final time.
“Please,” he said to her. “Please, Lottie. I’m sorry about what happened, please…please believe me. Please, please – it’s not too late, come with me; come join me on the boat with myself and my fellow wolf-brothers. Let me try and make things up to you…”
He reached out a hand to touch her.
“Get the fuck away from me,” she practically screamed at him, yanking her hand away. “Don’t fucking touch me. I swear, I will NEVER EVER forgive you for what you did to me, NEVER, you hear me? Not just last night, when you killed my husband – MY HUSBAND, LUKAAS; MY FUCKING HUSBAND – but also all those years ago when you abandoned me; left me with your devil seed still burning inside of me; slowly growing into a monster, turning ME into a monster…”
“I’m sorry,” Lukaas said, all too aware it was too late now, he could never turn back the clock. “I didn’t know, I didn’t know, I just didn’t know – I didn’t know you were pregnant with my child; I didn’t know what my mark, combined with that of the Vampyre, might do to you; how it might change you – alter you and your body chemistry. Such things are practically unheard of.
“I’m sorry, Lottie. I truly am, truly sorry, but please come with me, and at least let me try and make it all up to you.”
“It’s too late,” Charlotte said, and meant every word. “It’s too late. Too. Late. I don’t even want you to come near me, let alone touch me, and I certainly don’t want to share a lifeboat with you for however long it might take until we are rescued; knowing, all along, that you, you there, sitting beside me, you are the one responsible for killing my husband, my sweet innocent husband.
“I’m going with them,” she said, indicating Viktoryia and the little girl Vampyre standing beside her. “I’m going with them, and I never want to see you or your kind ever, ever again…”
“Lottie, please…don’t do this…please…” Lukaas begged, but Charlotte had already made her mind up.
She moved, with the two Vampyre, towards the other boat – the one she and the others from The Bellastaria had arrived in.
Lukaas made to try and stop her.
“Don’t,” Toneye said, stepping between them having come back down from the bridge. “Just don’t. Time to let her go, man…it’s like the old soldier up there said. If the two of you are meant to be together, then somehow Fate, Destiny, whatever, will find a way to bring you back together, but for now you really need to just let her go.”
“Toneye’s right,” Roman said, for now reluctantly agreeing with his wolf-brother as he stepped up beside him. “Meanwhile, we really need to start seriously thinking about getting the hell out of here. Wilfred’s now starting the countdown for the bombs on-board to go off, and time is now really of the essence. If we don’t leave soon, like now, none of us will be able to and Wilfred’s sacrifice will all have been for naught. Besides, Lottie still carries your mark, right? That means wherever she ends up, the two of you will always be able to find each other – you know that, right?”
Lukaas nodded
. He knew it made sense, but still…to have come this close to being with her again, only to lose her…
Toneye grabbed him and together, the three of them ran back towards the lifeboat they’d arrived in where even now, Scott was waiting with Jaqueline for them to join them. Lukaas quickly risked one last glance back at Lottie before he lost sight of her again – for good this time – but if she saw him, she did not acknowledge him.
Viktoryia did though, and Lukaas did not like the smile he saw upon her face as though she knew she had gotten one over on him and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.
I was just one of the reasons, Lukaas thought, that he fucking hated Vampyre. They were always so fucking, goddamned smug.
Scott waited until they were all safely on-board, and then released the life-boat from where it was tethered to the side.
The five of them dropped down towards the ocean…
***
“I am going to need you to pilot the boat,” Viktoryia said, escorting Charlotte towards the other life-boat, Sacha following close behind the two of them. “The sun is coming up fast and whilst contrary to popular belief sunlight doesn’t actually kill us, it does weaken us. Until night falls again, I am going to need you to help sail us to safety.
“You did the right thing, you know,” she added. “There is nothing more treacherous than a wolf – I, on the other hand, will help keep you safe. I made you a promise when we first left The Bellastaria, and I fully intend to keep it.”
“And what about me?” The little Vampyre child, Sacha said, suddenly speaking up as they rapidly approached the boat. “Where do we stand? Are you going to kill me when we eventually reach land, or are you intending to try and keep me safe too?”
“The Vampyre Council may have an issue with the creation of Vampyre children,” Viktoryia said, turning towards her, “but I do not. For now, until we reach safety, I promise you I will do you no harm, but once we reach shore, I can make you no assurances that other Vampyre will treat you so leniently. I suggest until then, we combine forces, work together, but after that – once we are picked up or reach land – then I suggest the two of us go our separate ways.
“I do not play well with others, and I kind of get the feeling that you are the same.”
“I hunt best alone,” Sacha said.
“I do too,” Viktoryia responded.
The sound of howls and screams could be heard drawing closer, coming up from the decks below mixed with the sound of gunshots.
“I think that might well be our cue to go,” Viktoryia said, and as soon as they were all in, released the lifeboat.
***
Wilfred waited until he was sure both lifeboats had launched and were safely away, and then finished activating the countdown for the explosives rigged throughout the whole of the ship.
Second time in twenty-four hours, he thought, though this time, for him at least, there was not going to be any escape nor any hope of him surviving the blast.
The bomb activation controls were a fairly standard set-up, and it hadn’t taken him long to figure out how to make them work.
Now, all he needed to do, he thought, was sit back and wait.
A part of him wished it all could have ended differently – preferably with him sailing off safely into the sunrise with Jaqueline by his side – but if one of them had to die, he was glad it was going to be him.
He had kept his promise though, he thought. The one he had made to himself, back on The Bellastaria, when he had first met her and vowed to himself that he would help keep her safe.
If there was one thing about him, he thought, it was that he always, always kept his promises.
The intense agony from where he’d been stabbed was getting worse, the adrenaline in his system now finally wearing off allowing shock to finally kick in. By now, the temporary bandages Mengele had administered to help keep his guts in were sodden with blood.
It wouldn’t be long, he thought again, repeating his earlier thoughts, and then he – like so many others who had died tonight – would be dead.
But at least I did one last, good thing before I died, Wilfred thought.
He thought he heard the sound of gunshots drawing close, and then suddenly someone burst onto the bridge.
Wilfred thought he heard whoever it was cursing him, as they looked over and saw what he had done…and then suddenly, everything exploded in a white hot blast of light…
Epilogue
Lukaas and his wolf brothers were several miles out, when The Daedalus exploded somewhere far behind them.
Jaqueline turned and looked back at the slowly sinking vessel, and then promptly burst into tears. Roman, the oldest of the four wolves on-board the lifeboat, put his arm around her and did his best to try and comfort her, but it was no use. In the end, all he could do was hold her.
Lukaas, meanwhile, turned away from the sight of the exploding vessel, and scanned the nearby ocean for any sign of the life-boat Lottie had disappeared in, along with the two Vampyre.
He thought he could make out a small speck, slowly disappearing into the distance in the opposite direction, but couldn’t be one hundred percent sure it was them.
It isn’t over, he thought to himself. This thing, whatever it is, between myself and Lottie – this connection, this bond we both share; I’m not prepared to just let it go. She just needs some time is all, he thought, just needs some space, and then eventually the two of us will be together again, I’m sure of it.
Wherever she goes, I will find her.
This isn’t over yet, he thought again. Not by a longshot…
Fate had brought them together twice now, and would do so again.
He was sure of it.
***
Viktoryia felt the struggle Charlotte was fighting, deep down inside, even as the girl attempted to steer them far away from the burning wreckage which was all that was left of The Daedalus far behind them, and reached out a hand to stroke the younger woman’s hair.
The inner conflict Charlotte was fighting as she battled to try and repress the beast deep inside of her – fighting to break free - was a fight she was never destined to win, at least not without any help.
“I can help you, you know,” Viktoryia said softly – not wanting to disturb the little girl Vampyre, Sacha, who had fallen into a deep sleep beside them. The child was more prone to the weakening effects of the sun due to her being no more than a few centuries old and thus much younger than Viktoryia, and the older Vampyre had covered her with a blanket to help protect her from the harmful ultraviolet rays. Though weakened herself, those same rays would do less harm to Viktoryia, but were no less debilitating.
“I can teach you breathing exercises, and meditation techniques that will help you better control all the changes you have experienced since you were marked,” she continued. “I can help you in more ways than you can possibly imagine…and in time, you might even learn to control the inner beast inside of you.”
“I don’t need your help,” Charlotte snapped back.
It was the wolf inside of her that was talking, Viktoryia thought. Doing its best to try and break free, rip through her skin. Of the two marks, the Lycanthrope mark was stronger and more prevalent, but only just, but Viktoryia was sure in time she could help the girl’s Vampyre side take charge.
It would just take some training was all…
“Fair enough,” Viktoryia said. “But if you change your mind, know this – I can help you to embrace this new creature you have become, instead of trying to fight it all the time. I can help you find yourself again…and something tells me you haven’t felt yourself in a very, very long time.”
A strange sound came from the young girl in front of her, and it took Viktoryia a second to realise Charlotte was crying.
The girl was more broken, Viktoryia thought, than even she had realised, and suddenly she began to rethink her earlier decision to take her in front of the Council. Maybe they could go somewhere else, Viktoryia thoug
ht, hide out somewhere until she could teach Charlotte; train her to take the inner beast that was a combination of both Vampyre and Lycanthrope deep inside of her and make it her slave, instead of the situation being reversed and it being the other way around.
Somewhere like…oh, she didn’t know…Italy perhaps.
Viktoryia had always wanted to revisit Europe.
Maybe the two of them could even find somewhere there to stay a while….
The more Viktoryia thought about it, the more it appealed to her.
But first, she thought, she needed to decide what to do about Sacha.
***
Safe under her blanket, Sacha opened one eye.
She had only been feigning sleep, faking how weak the sun had made her, and had been silently listening to Viktoryia’s thoughts all along without her knowing.
Interesting, she thought. So, the girl with them was some kind of hybrid…
Thar changed things.
That changed things entirely.
She felt Viktoryia brushing her mind, as though somehow sensing her eavesdropping the older Vampyre’s thoughts, and closed her eye again and went back to feigning sleep.
The older Vampyre had underestimated her, Sacha thought. Had underestimated just how strong a Vampyre she actually was – and if anyone was going to be deciding Sacha’s future, she decided, it would be her not Viktoryia.
Things were about to get very interesting indeed, Sacha thought…all this was far from over yet.
FIN (for now…)
Author’s Note.
Some of you eagle-eyed amongst you, who have read some of my other works, may have spotted the appearance of Viktoryia in this book, who first appeared in the vampire collaboration I was involved in, Feral Hearts.
Viktoryia was never supposed to be a part of this story, not originally, but contrary to popular belief, Vampyre seldom wait for invitations.