Knight of the Hunted (Born Vampire Book 1)

by Elizabeth Dunlap

  She trotted out of the room to get the hotel phone, leaving me in utter shock. Did I just influence her thoughts? Wicked!

  Knight was equally surprised, but for a different reason. “I didn't know she liked pizza. I thought she hated it.”

  I needed to test this. I focused on where I knew Sara was standing in the other room and sent, “No mushrooms or peppers, extra meat, and bread sticks” to her.

  She walked back into the kitchen and said, “I got extra meat, no mushrooms or peppers, and some bread sticks!”

  That was the seal on my assumption. I'd influenced her thoughts. Knight was happy to get the pizza and didn't notice anything was off. I decided to not tell him what had happened. He’d just lecture me anyway. I didn’t like lectures.

  After we ate, I drank from him again. I had to hold his arms to steady myself as a sonar pulse suddenly burst from my head. I knew where everyone in the town was without even thinking about it. I could tell their gender, and smell their scent. It overwhelmed me and I whimpered slightly, wishing it would stop. Knight's fingers gently brushed through my hair.

  “It's getting too much, isn't it,” he asked me softly.

  I gasped and tightened my grip on him, willing myself to focus on only what I could see with my eyes. I lost a little of that giddy feeling I’d had before. “I have to keep going. I can handle it.” My senses snapped back and the room became clearer. I could still sense everything at once, but it was dull, like a slight headache. “I just have to stay focused on my surroundings.”

  His hand slipped through my hair to rest on my shoulder. “Remember, I'm here.” I felt so warm, from his blood or his hand on my shoulder, I wasn't sure which.

  By the next morning, I’d gone back to being giddy again. When I went to James’s, I truly had a full conversation with him without getting bored once. I still didn’t want to stay here with him forever, but I couldn’t remember why I didn’t like being around him. I was careful to not act too weird though. I didn’t want him to know what I was up to. He checked his bite again, and despite the enormous amount of blood in my system, it hadn’t faded. Not even a little.

  On the way back to the hotel with Drake, I chatted him up with questions about his parents, which was completely inappropriate, but I didn’t care. I even mentioned how he was not-human and human at the same time and that it weirded me out. He ignored me.

  Poo, poo on you, Drake. I don’t need to know your secret. It’s probably boring anyway. Like you. You don’t even go by your real name.

  Knight isn’t boring. Knight tastes good. He makes me laugh. I might keep him. Provided he stops being such a Debbie Downer all the time.

  My mind control powers worked on every human. They didn’t work on Knight. Maybe it was a Lycan thing, or maybe I just didn’t want to control him.

  He was so bossy. We went to the movies after I’d been binging on his blood for almost a week. I wanted to control the humans serving food but noooo he told me to stop talking and stand in the corner like a little toddler that had stolen cookies. He paid for the food, like a moron. I could’ve saved him ten bucks, but whatever. His loss.

  He wouldn’t let me take someone else’s seat. It’s not my fault that the seats I wanted were already occupied!

  “There’s 32 people in here,” I informed him once we’d settled in our seats and I’d stolen the popcorn from him. He stole a few handfuls when I was distracted by the smells and sounds in the room.

  “Fascinating,” was his response. Humph. He can’t even appreciate how awesome my powers are. What good are you? You’re supposed to be impressed. Cameron would be impressed. He’d be like, ooo Lisbeth, you’re so awesome, like some superhero I forgot the name of. I needed a cape. People with powers have capes.

  “Stop talking out loud,” Knight bossed. Like I said, so bossy. “I am not bossy,” he added. Oh. I was talking out loud again. I stuffed my mouth full of popcorn before I could reveal the location to my secret superhero bunker.

  Twenty-two

  The next day, I could feel the emotions of everyone near me. Sara enjoyed the taste of guacamole far too much. James thought my smile was pretty, but he also thought windows were too flat. The ice cream man hated the smell of dairy. And Knight. He was worried about me. So worried. Also annoyed that my internal monologue kept spilling out of my mouth and most of it was about how fluffy cotton candy was. I patted his cheek and told him to stop fussing over me, and also to learn to appreciate fluffy things.

  Knight and I had started at three feedings per day. Then four. Then five. By the time we were up to six times per day, it had been almost two weeks, and the giddiness I'd felt at first was gone. Now I just felt powerful. Sara automatically cooked foods I wanted. No one in town charged me for anything. Men didn't flirt with me. Women didn't stare at Knight. And James. Dear James. Seeing him was easy. His bite was still there, but even though I’d grown considerably stronger, it wasn’t enough to tip him off. Or I’d just gained the ability to fool him.

  But the cost. The cost of the blood binge was starting. I became short tempered if someone messed up what I'd asked for. Sara had a constant stomachache from the rich food I enjoyed. I didn't care about anyone's feelings. I was the only one that mattered.

  I’d reached that level of power that I feared so badly. I was uncontrollable and unstoppable. And I wasn’t afraid of it anymore. I liked it. I wanted more. I never wanted to come down. With this much power, I could stop Arthur and the Hunters. I’d be free. Maybe I’d start my own little town somewhere with nice humans to do my bidding. With my powers, I’d be able to tell exactly what they were doing at any moment of the day. There’d be no crime, no insurgency, only me and my whims. And they would all obey me. I had no doubt about that.

  Knight questioned me every day to check on my mental state. I knew he could tell I was getting worse, so I had trouble understanding why he kept bothering me with the constant questions. The irrational part of my brain that was taking over didn’t want to care what he thought about all of it, but somehow, I still did. When he got mad at me, I felt sad, and all I wanted was for him to forget whatever I did to anger him and say he liked me again. I hated upsetting him. Even so, it didn’t make me stop. Not even a little.

  On day fifteen, I'd decided to stop humoring him and his little check list.

  “Enough,” I told him. We were sitting in my hotel room, and he was trying to ask his daily routine of questions. “This is stupid. I’m fine. It's time for more blood.” I didn't crave the blood, no. I wanted more power. I wanted to reach into the sky and bring the stars down.

  He ignored my complaints, so I got up from the floor and sat down on his lap. Feeding meant we had to be very close. But we'd done it so many times, it wasn't weird anymore, sitting on him. He didn't even react, he just shifted so it was more comfortable.

  “Okay, next question. Is your tongue numb?”

  I traced his jugular with my finger and thought about licking it. “Nope.”

  “Do you smell fudge when there is no fudge?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Have you always been such a nerd?”

  “Answer.”

  I planted a long lick on his neck. “The grocery store down the street has some fudge bars for sale; they smell good. Other than that, no.”

  “Stop licking me,” he ordered. I still couldn’t control him. I’d dismissed it as a wolf thing, but sometimes I tried just for fun. Bring me tea. Teeea. Nope. He stood up, carried me to the bed, and sat back down on the edge of it. I could’ve drunk from him in the chair, but he preferred the bed so he could collapse on it if he needed to. “Drink. I'll ask the questions later.”

  I sunk my teeth into his neck and oh God did it taste good. His blood was the best I'd ever had. Other blood tasted too salty or like a cup of dishwater. His was like honey wine, deeply satisfying and crisp. Crispy blood. More crispy blood.

  “Lis...” his voice was strained and his hands gripped my rib cage tightly. What did he want? I was busy. “Lis please,�
� he begged. I liked begging. Maybe he'd bring me my tea now.

  Something clicked in my head and I registered what was happening.

  I was draining him.

  I shrieked in horror and pulled away. His body slumped down onto the bed and he struggled to breathe. I'd drunken so much of his blood. Clarity slapped into me and I felt my body go cold like someone had dumped ice water on my head.

  “Knight!” I screamed. His hand reached up and he took mine, squeezed it, and then he closed his eyes.

  It took Knight over an hour to recover. I felt his heart almost stop once, but his body worked quickly to keep him from dying. He held my hand the entire time, squeezing it like it gave him strength. When he could finally sit up, I threw myself into his arms and started crying.

  “I almost killed you,” I sobbed into his shirt. His arms went around me and he held me close.

  “I know,” he soothed. “But to be fair, I almost killed you once.”

  I beat a fist against his chest. “You should've stopped me!” I was talking about me almost draining him, but I also meant everything else. He should’ve stopped me. He promised me he would. And he didn’t.

  We sat like that for a long time. I could feel every muscle in his body, every sinew. It was all too much. The smells, the sounds, the emotions. I started to sob and grab my head.

  “Knight,” I whimpered. “This is too much. It's my limit. I can't do this anymore.” The overflow of Knight's blood was working through my system. I started to get flashes of things going on around town. Make it stop. Please make it stop. In the midst of it all, I felt something snap. The hold James had over me dissolved and the bite on my neck slowly closed over. I was free.

  I passed out.

  When I woke up the next morning, Knight was sitting next to me on the bed eating a bowl of kimchi and eggs and watching something on the flat screen tv about the Civil War. One of my many orders to Sara had been buying a tv. He saw me stir, so he handed me a glass of water he'd had waiting for me.

  “Morning,” he said simply. I took the water and downed it in long gulps.

  I wiped my mouth on my sleeve when I'd emptied the glass. “Are you okay?”

  “I'm fine,” he said simply. He went back to watching the tv, so I put a hand on his knee.

  “Knight,” I said slowly. “You didn’t stop me. You promised me you would. And you didn’t.” I felt tears form in my eyes. “I went into this trusting that you’d be there to pull me out of it. I was there. I was on the precipice, and you let me go over.” I knew blaming him wasn’t entirely fair. But I couldn’t help it. I’d been so scared seeing him almost die. And I couldn’t shoulder that blame on my own or I’d never be able to live with what I’d done.

  He set his bowl down on the nightstand and took my hand in his. “Lis. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I know you trusted me, and I broke that trust. I’m so sorry.” I heard tears in his voice, but I couldn’t see past the tears in my eyes. “But you couldn’t see yourself like I did. Pulling you back wouldn’t have worked. Not with how far you were gone. Sara and I talked it over. I had to let you almost kill me. It was the only way to bring you out.” He sniffed and I felt his fingers swipe the tears off my cheeks. “I’m so sorry.”

  I fell into his arms, the only place I felt safe anymore. We both cried. He cried because he knew how much he’d hurt me, and how he’d broken my trust. I cried because I’d never felt so scared in all my long life. What if I had killed him? I would’ve still been high on blood, and there’s no telling what crazy notion would’ve gone through my head. Maybe I would’ve tracked down and killed the Hunters. Or run away to start my own slave town. Or maybe I would’ve killed James and kept this town for myself. If I had killed Knight, no one could’ve stopped me.

  What I’d become, and the things I’d done, even the things I hadn’t done but wanted to. It violated almost every moral code I had. I felt so ashamed.

  I wanted to die from the shame.

  Knight was my lifeboat. I clung to him until I ran out of tears. He’d long since stopped crying and was gently stroking my long brown locks. We’d been silent for several hours, just sitting there together, until he spoke.

  “I’m sorry I left you.”

  “What?” I asked, confused to say the least.

  “When I shifted and attacked you. I was so mortified at what I’d done. I know I can’t control myself when I’m shifted, but…I was still ashamed. I hurt you. I’m supposed to protect you.”

  “Because of the bracelet, right?” Somehow, I was let down at the thought, though I couldn't say why. Before he could answer, I remembered I'd broken James's hold on me the night before and I pulled away from Knight. “Wait, why haven't we left yet? James will know I'm not under his control anymore. He'll come after us and bite me again, and all of this will have been useless.”

  Knight wasn’t concerned. “Sara's handling him right now. He's too focused on her list of complaints to be bothered with you for the moment. We needed time to recover.” I felt Sara at James's house and a turmoil of emotions going on there, most of which were coming from her. He was truly occupied. “Are we…okay?” Knight asked me. I doubted he meant in the feeling okay kind of way. I nodded and got up.

  Twenty-three

  The enormous amount of extra blood in my system was making my head pulse with every heartbeat, and every pulse brought random information about the town around me. People were fighting, loving, eating, and walking their dogs. It was hard to focus on getting packed, but every time I stopped moving, Knight would toss something at my face to wake me up again.

  Thanks to Sara, Excalibur had been sitting in her garage this entire time. We loaded it up with our bags and Knight drove us out of town. We didn’t talk much. It had been a very long seven weeks. The longest of our lives. I couldn’t help but wonder if we’d ever recover from it all. I didn’t have high hopes on the matter.

  The further we got from the town, the less people I could feel, until I could only feel Knight. He was tired. Sad. Angry. Hungry. And relieved. So relieved that we’d gotten away. But he was scared. Scared for me and how I would come out of this. I tried not to delve into anything related to me in his feelings, as curious as I was. I’d already violated too many boundaries.

  “Hey,” I told him drowsily, my sleepy state keeping me from blocking out my powers. “In the interest of full disclosure, I can still feel your emotions. But don’t worry. I’m not going to invade your privacy. All your secret thoughts are safe. But don’t focus on them too strongly or I’ll feel them.”

  He nodded and smiled slightly. “Good to know.” I leaned against my window and shut my eyes. “Lis,” he whispered. “Thank you for telling me that.”

  “Least I could do,” I mumbled. “Since I’m such a horrible person now.” I drifted off to the rhythmic thumping of Knight’s heartbeat. I slept until Knight pulled into a motel and got us a room, with two beds this time.

  The room smelled like air conditioner and carpet fibers. I shuffled over to the bed closest to the bathroom and flopped down on my stomach with my cheek pressed against the scratchy comforter. My head was pounding and my stomach was rolling. My body was used to having several pints of new blood every day, and it was not pleased that I hadn’t drunk since the night before.

  Knight sat down on the other bed and studied me carefully. “Withdrawal?” he asked. I nodded. I felt horrible.

  “I’ve wanted to die several times recently,” I groaned. “But right now…I really, really want to.”

  “Tomorrow will be worse,” he said, not even trying to sugar coat it. I glared at him. Whatever else I could say about him, he never babied me.

  I finally fell asleep after sharing a pizza with Knight. I drifted straight into nightmares. My dreams took me back to James’s town, forcing me to relive the pain and agony I’d felt under his control. I woke up sweaty and shaking. My hand automatically went to where James’s bite had been. I got up and went to the large mirror on the closet door. The bite was
still gone, with only a light red mark to indicate it had ever been there.

  It was the only scar I had that was visible.

  I was still running my fingers over the scar and wondering how my life had come to this moment, when I smelled lilacs. Balthazar was behind me when I looked up and I turned to fall into his arms.

  “Where have you been, you jerk!” I sobbed into his dark blue suit. His hands came around me and he hugged me close.

  “My apologies,” he said softly. “I couldn’t help you, and I thought my presence might distress you even more.” He was right. I couldn’t bear the thought of him seeing me drunk on blood and power.

  I softly pounded my fists on his chest and whispered, “jerk,” for good measure. He kissed the top of my head.

  “You’ve still got the dog, I see,” he said with disapproval.

  I smiled. “He came back for me. He stayed with me and helped me escape.”

  “He’s a dog. He shouldn’t want to be within ten feet of you.” Balthazar let me go and turned to study the sleeping werewolf. “Does he have feelings for you?”

  I couldn’t comprehend such a question. That was ludicrous. “Of course not. Don’t be stupid.” I put a hand to my temple as my headache suddenly became apparent.

  “Boys fall for girls,” Balthazar said simply, like it was a no brainer.

  “You’re ridiculous.” I poured myself a glass of water and gulped most of it down.

  “Your blood count is high. You could see his feelings for you. Easily.”

  “You can tell?” Balthazar nodded. “No, I won’t do that. He knows I can delve into his mind, and I promised him I wouldn’t.” That made me smile. Not the promise part, the fact that I hadn’t lost my clarity, even though my body was raging with powers. Balthazar made a humph noise and stared at Knight again.

  “I can see his feelings,” he declared. “Would you like to know?”