All I could think about was the fact that Hans wasn’t dead. That he was standing right in front of me. I threw myself at him, reveling in his embrace as he showered my face with kisses. I’d seen those people snap his neck, even heard the crack of bone. Yet here he was. He pulled me down on his bed and, cradling me in his arms, began to reveal his full history to me for the first time. Everything he’d been holding back since the day we’d met. He told me first that, indeed, there were such things as vampires. He was one, and now I was one too.
He told me that he and his wife had been turned almost two hundred years before, along with his four siblings. They’d all been taken to the coven where we were now, deep in the Taihang Mountains. His wife had been murdered by another vampire over a dispute while living there, and after he’d lost her, Hans couldn’t bear to remain in the coven any longer. He and his siblings had tried to escape together, and while the latter had failed, Hans had managed to. He’d been in hiding ever since, in that old castle buried in the woods in the middle of nowhere, and he’d hoped that they would never find him.
He clutched my head in his hands, kissing me again and again even as he repeated how sorry he was, how he loved me and how dragging me into all of this was the last thing he’d wanted.
I told him that I didn’t care, that I was just grateful that he was alive and that we were together. I told him that, vampire or not, I would follow him anywhere. Because I was his. He held my heart and every part of me.
We spent the next four decades of our lives together in that Chinese coven. Or as together as we could be. Sometimes we were forced to split up and travel with different groups on nighttime excursions. But we were given a small apartment where we could live together and during the day, for the most part, we had each other. The vampires promised Hans that if he attempted to escape again, they would track us down and stake me through the heart in front of his eyes. Even though I suggested that we try it, it was for my sake that he refused. They’d already managed to track him down once, and he wouldn’t take the risk of that happening again.
Even in these circumstances, I couldn’t complain about my life. Hans was the only thing that I needed to be happy.
The nights became our days, and the days our nights. We fell into a mindless routine during the night hours that consisted primarily of procuring fresh human blood and bringing it back to the coven. And during the day, Hans and I could bask in the fire of our love, still burning as strong as the night we’d shared our first kiss.
Then one day our lives were uprooted yet again. The same woman who’d turned me into a vampire all those years ago knocked on our door again. She didn’t attack Hans this time as he opened the door, but the words she spoke caused Hans’ face to pale as I’d never seen before.
She told him that we’d both been selected to be transported to Cruor. She promised that we would both be performing important and valuable service to our masters, the Elders. Masters I’d only heard vague talk of around the coven.
Hans fought against the idea, but in the end, we had no choice in the matter. We were taken to a portal and brought to the desolate red-tinged landscape that was Cruor. The land of the Elders.
We were taken into the bowels of a mountain, where layer upon layer of shadowy chambers had been built. It was there that I discovered the truth about those known as the original vampires. Hans and I had been brought there to be used primarily as vessels, to do their bidding in whatever task they had. The Elders would inhabit us and we would descend into the deepest depths of the mountains, where giant halls filled with pools of shimmering blood were kept. We would be forced to drink liters of it at a time, thus sustaining and bringing pleasure to the Elder who’d inhabited us during the feeding.
Still, even through all of this, Hans and I were granted a room to ourselves, which became our refuge from the Elders’ ghastly abode. We lost track of time while living in that strange place. But I suspected that decades passed. Over time, our bodies became weaker. Although usually the Elders were careful to give us rest after being inhabited, sometimes they didn’t, which left us feeling drained and unwell.
Then, eighteen years ago, the climate between the Hawks and the Elders changed irrevocably. Due to a spiral of incidents that had happened in the human realm, the malice that had been brewing between the two species reached boiling point and our lives changed forever. The Hawks stormed Cruor, entering the Elders’ mountain chambers, murdering vessels, and soiling all the blood supplies that we had collected for decades.
During the first wave of the Hawks’ attack, Hans and I had been locked in our room. A Hawk broke down the door and barged into the room. With a combined effort, Hans and I managed to slit his throat before escaping through the door.
The halls outside belonged in a nightmare. Countless bodies of our fellow vessels were strewn about the floors as the giant birdlike Hawks tore through the halls. Hans and I had to escape the mountain—and go where exactly, we didn’t know.
We had almost made it to the exit at the top, with just one last staircase to climb before we arrived out in the open, when Hans’ hand jerked away from mine. I whirled around, afraid that a Hawk had just caught him within its talons. But no, Hans had torn his hand deliberately from mine. As I stared at him in confusion, the expression on his face made me realize what had happened. An Elder had entered him.
For reasons I couldn’t understand, the Elder made Hans turn on his heel and run back into the chaos of the corridors. I cried out and raced after him, but a Hawk swooped down in front of me and I was forced to dive out of the way. After that, I lost sight of Hans. I had no idea where he’d gone. I searched the halls, corridors and chambers desperately, even despite the mortal danger I was putting myself into by weaving in and out of the battle.
But no matter how much I searched, I couldn’t find Hans.
With more Hawks arriving by the moment, the place overflowing with the birds, I sought out a small cupboard at the bottom of the staircase and squeezed myself inside, closing the door and hoping that nobody would notice me in the heat of the battle. I’d be killed if I roamed around this place screaming out Hans’ name. I had to wait for the battle to die down and for things to become less dangerous.
I had to wait in that tiny, cramped cupboard for days before the Hawks had drained the place of all vessels. When I finally stepped out of the cupboard, the wrecked chambers were deserted. I had no idea what had happened to the Elders. I raced around the corridors, tears stinging my eyes, as I searched once again for my love. Even though I knew it was hopeless—there was no way that he would be here—I had to find him. Even if it was just his body. I had to see him again.
But even his corpse I could not find. He’d disappeared without a trace. I spent the next few weeks wandering those bloody mountain chambers like a spirit. I felt bound to that place, the last place I’d seen Hans, hoping against hope that somehow he was still alive and if I only waited long enough… he’d return.
I lost myself in the darkest depths of depression. After weeks without blood, my stomach hurt as though it was starting to eat itself. Eventually, I was forced to leave in search of nourishment.
It was as I exited the mountain and began clambering over the rocks toward the shore that I sensed an Elder’s presence. A voice, weak and strained, hissed in my ear. “We have your lover,” he said.
His words were like an electric jolt to my chest. My mind, previously dulled with mourning, sprang to life.
“Where?” I gasped. “Take me to him!”
“You go too speedily, girl. During the Hawks’ siege, we selected a number of vessels to hold back from the battle and keep safe. Hans was one of them. He is quite secure, within a secret chamber in Cruor that you will never find unless shown.”
“Show me!” I said, my voice cracking. “Please, take me to him!”
“Certainly, you can see him again,” the voice rasped. “But not until you fulfill your end of the bargain.”
“I’ll do anything.
What do you want from me?”
“You must help us fulfill a prophecy,” the voice hissed. I listened with bated breath, scared to even miss a word he said. “I and your other Elders have lost strength, too much strength, as a result of this battle. Even if we had pure human blood within reach, we could not gain sustenance from it sufficient for recovery, because we are too weak to inhabit these vessels… However, there is a hope for us. Basilius imprinted upon a certain human infant in anticipation of the battle. A human child with… unique blood. Unfortunately, he is now returned to earth, but his time will come to rise and help us. That much we know. The day his parents turn him into a vampire will be the day he starts his journey back to us. His name is Benjamin Novak. If you wish to see your lover again, you will play a part in helping him along this journey.”
“When will he turn?” I stammered. “You said that he is just an infant now.”
“Just short of eighteen human years from now, he will be turned.”
“H-How do you know that?”
“ ’Tis the prophecy.”
It felt as though someone had bored a hole in my stomach. “Eighteen years?” I breathed, winded. “I cannot wait that long. Hans cannot wait that long. How… How would he even survive without blood for all that time? You have no blood, and you are too weak to procure even animal blood, it seems. How will—”
“Silence.” The voice sliced through my protests. “You have heard what your task is.”
“Can I just see him?” I begged. “Please, just let me see him. I promise I will—”
“You have heard my terms, Julie Duan,” the voice said, and then the chilling presence left me.
I sank to my knees on the sharp rocks. I breathed heavily, my mind working furiously as to where the Elder could possibly be keeping my love. Although I’d spent what felt like an age in this barren wasteland, I still didn’t know it well. Hans and I were usually kept in our quarters in the mountain and we didn’t often venture out except on the Elders’ bidding.
In spite of my weak limbs screaming for blood, I spent the next three days roaming about the landscape, desperately trying to discover the hidden chamber. Being unsuccessful, I was forced to go to the shore and feed myself with the blood of sea animals before resuming my mission with more strength. I was so determined to find it, I searched for an entire month.
When I still didn’t find him, I lost hope that I ever would. Indeed, as the Elder said, the chamber was hidden so well that I would never find it no matter how long I searched for it. And so, my heart weighed down by the Elder’s prophecy, I left that island on a rickety boat I found abandoned on the shoreline. It had a tiny covering over it to keep the sun from burning too severely into my skin, and I set off, drifting out into the ocean.
Eighteen years. The word played over and over in my head like a nightmare. How could my love even be alive by then without blood? That was my foremost concern. Although eighteen years was a horrific amount of time for me to be away from my soulmate, we were, after all, vampires. Immortals. In the grand scheme of things, eighteen years was but a blip in time. And if I managed to free him then we could be reunited again. It was the thought of Hans starving that sent me into a panic. During my search of the mountains, I had screamed at the Elder countless times to at least allow me to bring blood for Hans. But the Elder never returned.
I had no choice but to pray to the heavens and hope that somehow, Hans would survive.
I ended up reaching The Tavern and stayed there for a while. It was on that island that I happened to come across Hans’ siblings. Unlike Hans and me, they hadn’t been chosen to go to Cruor. They had remained in the coven in China, but since the Elders had been forced back through the gates, his siblings had been freed from the coven and found a gate leading into the supernatural realm, where they had become wanderers.
I told them everything that had happened to their brother and they shared in my devastation. As painful as my longing for Hans was, his siblings gave me strength. We stuck together from then on, trying to survive, keep each other safe as we waited for the years to pass. I returned to Cruor on a regular basis, clambering over rocks, just in case that human boy had turned into a vampire sooner and we could complete the task earlier. I was sure that the Elder would sense my presence and inform me. But even though I spent days at a time in that desolate land, giving the Elders ample opportunity to connect with me, none did. So I could only assume that eighteen years would indeed be the time that we all had to wait to see Hans again.
His siblings also had no idea how he was going to survive without blood, or if that was even possible for a vampire. We asked others also, but nobody seemed to know what truly happened to a vampire when they starved, how long they could survive, and if they ever died from starvation. I guessed that vampires never went that long without blood. They always found a way to get it somehow—by murdering either a human or animal.
And so we waited. And waited. Until finally, as the eighteenth year was on the cusp of arriving, while I paid my routine visit to Cruor, the same Elder spoke to me. I’d never thought that his frightening voice could be such a welcome sound, but relief washed over me as his hiss met my ears.
“You have been patient, girl,” he said. “And soon you will be rewarded. The time has come. The human boy has been turned and is closer to reaching us now than ever before. Go and wait in The Tavern, and keep an eye out for him.”
The Elder gave me a description of Benjamin Novak’s physical appearance, and warned me that he was stronger than most vampires. He also told me that he was being accompanied by two jinn—creatures I had thought were merely a myth. Other than that, he didn’t offer advice as to how I was going to pull this off. I guessed figuring this out was part of earning my right to see Hans again.
I hurried back toward the ship where Hans’ siblings waited for me. We left Cruor and sped toward The Tavern. The only thing on my mind was Hans. How he had been keeping all these years. How it would feel to touch him once again.
Hans’ siblings and I spent the following days in The Tavern. I figured that if Benjamin Novak arrived here, he was bound to visit the pub in the town square, since that was the central hub of this island. I decided that I would spend most of my time there. Hans’ siblings positioned themselves in other strategic points to keep a lookout.
It was on one such occasion that Hans’ youngest sibling—his sister, Arletta—spied two other members of our Chinese coven, brothers. They too had escaped and become wanderers in the supernatural dimension. Arletta reported that they were just passing through The Tavern, and she had overheard them speaking of a special box they had managed to steal from a warlock. It purportedly had the ability to contain ghouls and other subtle beings. I didn’t know whether it was true, but my instinct told me that this box could be useful for the task ahead of me.
And so we plotted to steal it. I recalled that those brothers had harassed me once in the coven. Soon after Hans and I had arrived, they’d tried to make an approach. That was before they’d been aware that Hans was my lover. Now I figured I could use their attraction for me to my advantage. I caught the two alone near The Tavern’s port one evening. Of course, they were shocked to see me at first, but I soon eased them into a conversation after explaining I’d split up with Hans. I seduced them into joining me for a walk along the beach, and in the meantime, Hans’ three brothers stole the box from the brothers’ ship and transferred it to ours.
I slipped away from them gracefully and returned to the pub where I sat facing the wall, looking back over the room every time the door opened.
That night, Benjamin Novak finally arrived. Since mine was the emptiest table, he headed straight for me and took a seat. My act had begun. I had to clutch my glass tight to stop my hands from trembling with anticipation. It felt like I’d waited an eternity for this young man. I didn’t know anything about him yet, but I did know that in order for me to bring him back to Cruor, I needed to be smart. The Elder had said that he was protected
by jinn—and I didn’t know much about the creatures other than they were to be feared. I figured that the easiest way to gain his trust would be to begin by offering him casual, unconditional help, and later, make myself out to be a victim.
Two happy coincidences came along that very night.
First was the presence of humans in the guesthouse—not just the cleaner downstairs but also another apparently staying in one of the rooms near Benjamin’s—which forced Benjamin to come upstairs. And second was the two brothers smashing through my window. I’d known they’d be angered when they realized the box was missing and they’d probably suspect I had something to do with it—but I’d never dreamed that they would attempt to murder me for it.
This incident brought Benjamin to me yet again, and this time in a much more permanent way. I had an excuse to insist that we both leave the island immediately. I’d considered suggesting from the start that we travel together, but that might be coming on too strong. He would wonder why I couldn’t just travel in my own boat. So, as we arrived in the harbor, I stopped at a random boat and told Benjamin it was mine. Then I had a few moments to destroy the boat, leap into the ocean and slaughter the sea creatures. I’d worried he’d think it odd that my clothes were drenched, but I’d figured by now that Benjamin was a gentleman and probably wouldn’t pay much attention to it when he saw me “stranded” and calling for help. And that was exactly how it played out as he raced away with me on the boat he’d stolen.
After that, slowly but surely, I worked toward getting to know him and building myself up as someone he could confide in. When we went to meet with Arron for the first time, Benjamin revealed the level of trust he already held for me by defending me from the jinni who intended to kill me for my heart. I sensed the incident was a pivotal moment. From then on, I just had to keep sowing the seeds of my loyalty and concern for his well-being… all the while trying to figure out how the hell I was going to put a wrench in the works of this surgery Arron had suggested, get rid of the jinn’s protection over him, and deliver him safely back to Cruor.
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