by Kate Martin
The pain flared again.
A human.
More ice ran down my spine.
I screamed internally at the sense that never gave me anything useful to go on. “Just tell me!” The window shattered under the force of my fist, but failed to cut me. The others gasped. Someone said my name, and Olivia muttered something rude. Warren came to my side, reaching for my hand.
But the shards of glass about my feet brought back a memory, a time just after my mother’s death, when I had cried and screamed and ranted at the injustice and broken my friend’s window in the process.
Sara.
The icy sensation pulsed with life against me. Sara. Sara was in danger. I knew it as clearly as if I had seen it written out before me. I was the only one who knew, and the only one who could get there in time.
I ran from the library, fast enough that none of the humans could stop me, question me. I wasn’t sure I knew what I was doing, but I would do it anyway. I strapped the dagger on, just below my pajama shorts, in case I needed my hands free. Then, using all the speed I possessed, I shot down the stairs, into the front hall, and through the front door.
Harsh, cold rain pelted my immortal skin, and the thunder and lightning flashed together, illuminating the streets.
I had never seen so many bodies in my life.
The streets were full of lumbering figures and the scent of decay. My new family’s scents wafted by on the stormy wind, and every so often something streaked in and out of the slow-moving failures, leaving limbs and flames behind.
There were other scents as well. Vampire scents. And though the bodies of the ruined creatures burned, the rain smothered many of the flames. Some continued to drag their broken and rotten bodies down the street, smoldering in places, burning in others.
Lightning flashed again, and I could see more clearly the dark forms on the pavement. I wanted to believe they were nothing but these so-called failed vampires, but I knew, knew by the smell of fresh blood and death, that they were not.
They were human.
My fangs stretched in my mouth, and the thirst burned my throat. That primal drive, that desire to hunt rose in my gut. The smell of fear floated above all the blood and death.
Sara, I reminded myself harshly.
I took off down the street.
Boney and flakey arms reached for me. I’d had no time to learn exactly how to use the dagger, but it seemed to cut through the wrists just fine, despite my lack of finesse. I didn’t have any way to burn them, but I also didn’t have the time to stop. The feeling at the back of my neck pulsed and pounded. The cold rain drummed against me, hot compared to the ice that had encapsulated my spine.
Puddles sloshed beneath my feet and the bodies of the dead threatened to trip me if I lost my concentration. In the distance, I could hear steel crashing with steel. For the first time I loved my stupid sense of doom. The lack of change told me Rhys was okay.
I kept close to the edge of the street, moving in and out of decorative trees and stone walls. The last thing I needed was to draw attention to myself. If my sense of smell was reliable, there weren’t any unknown vampires too close, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t smell me. The moment they did, I would surely be their intended target.
Sara’s street appeared.
Something grabbed my ankle. I fell forward, planting my face in the soft grass and mud hard enough to leave an impression. My dagger bounced across the ground, just out of reach. A hand slid its way up my calf, and a moan straight out of a horror movie reached my mud caked ears.
Rolling and kicking with my other leg, just as Cade had showed me, my heel connected with the creature’s skull, and the spine snapped. It thudded to the ground, convulsing and twitching. Its head had a hole about the size of my heel at the temple.
I covered my mouth with my hand and turned away before I could positively identify what poured out from that hole. My imagination did just fine without me.
Scrambling to my feet, I grabbed my dagger and ran the rest of the distance to Sara’s house.
The front door was wide open. Splintered and hanging from the hinges.
There were no burning bodies anywhere in the immediate area. The others hadn’t gotten here yet.
Something crashed and shattered inside the house. Someone screamed.
I had no plan.
I sheathed the dagger and hauled myself up the drainpipe running along the side of the house to the second floor. I kicked in the window and landed inside without so much as a scratch.
Sara had gone to the far corner of her room, standing on her bed, pressed against the wall. She screamed when I came through her window. No lights were on, she probably couldn’t see me. But I could see her, and I could see the two failed vampires that had somehow made their way up the flight of stairs. I hoped Warren and the others were safe on the third floor. Dead-eyed and fully-fanged, the failed vampires reached bruised and battered arms towards Sara, snapping their jaws. One was still in her pajamas, probably taken from her bed at night.
Across the hall, Sara’s parents screamed for her. Their fists and feet beat and kicked against their bedroom door, the hinges broken, and the pathway blocked by a heavy antique china cabinet.
One of the creatures lunged at Sara. I sprang, grabbing it and locking my arms around its neck and head. Repulsed by the scent of decay, I pulled as hard as I could, then gave a sharp twist.
The body fell away, leaving the head in my arms.
For a moment that felt like it went on forever, I stared at it, then, realizing what I held, I dropped it and stepped away.
A bony hand caressed my back. I spun around, grabbed the arm, and pulled. It came off at the shoulder. Since it had worked before, I grabbed this one’s head as well, and yanked.
The flesh of the neck broke, but the spine didn’t sever. I wrapped my hand around the exposed bones and crushed them.
The body fell to the floor.
What the hell had I done?
I wanted to be sick, but the nausea wouldn’t come. I couldn’t be ill over what I had done. If anything, the blood in my veins sang.
I didn’t like it.
The arms of the closest creature began to twitch and move. The detached arm started dragging itself across the carpet towards its body.
I had to burn them.
I went to Sara’s desk and opened the drawer I knew she kept her lighter in. She loved candles. I grabbed the wandering arm just short of reaching its shoulder and set it ablaze. Then I tossed it out the window. I did the same with the first head, then dragged the bodies through the broken glass and up onto the sill before lighting them both in turn and pushing them out. They continued to burn even once they hit the ground.
My mind settled a bit then, dispelling the frenzy that had driven me to tear apart those rotten things, and instead focusing on what I had done. I didn’t know whether to be proud of myself, or afraid.
Screams still carried on through the streets, but the icy sense had left me. No doom lingered in my immediate future. Thank god. The rain blew in through the window, misting my face, calming me.
A crack rang out behind me. The scent of blood, spicy and sweet all at once, rushed over my senses. My fangs stretched just a little bit more, and the thirst raged to life, reminding me that I had used a lot of energy dispatching the failed vampires. I was tired. I needed to feed.
But the sensible part of my mind held onto reason. I knew that scent.
It was time to explain myself.
“Sara, I—”
She was right there when I turned around, standing in the middle of all the broken glass from her window, and holding a large kitchen knife to my throat. Fear rolled off her, and her chest heaved with each breath.
“You’re one of them.”
“No.” I resisted the urge to shake my head and instead forced myself to relax, to lean back against the window sill. To not cut myself, even though it would heal in no time. I didn’t need to scare her any more than she al
ready was. “No, Sara, I’m not like that.”
“How long?”
“What?”
“How long have you been like this?”
Guilt over lying to her consumed me. “Since my birthday.”
The knife shook in her hand. “All this time? You’ve been one of them this whole time?”
“Not one of them, Sara. We’re not all like that. I swear—”
She wasn’t listening to me. “It all makes sense. I can’t believe I didn’t see it. The long illnesses, the not eating. Surviving being thrown through a house!”
“Sara, please.”
She tensed, pressing the knife harder against my throat. The edge bit my flesh, but didn’t break it. “What was your plan? Make me think you were still my friend, then have me as a meal?”
How could she think that? My anger at her accusation was so sudden, I hissed, baring my fangs. The wrong reaction. “I am your friend!”
“You’re a blood-drinking demon!”
“It’s not that simple!”
“I won’t let you drink my blood!”
“And this is your idea of self-defense?” I reached up and flicked at the knife a little in annoyance. “Holding a kitchen knife to a vampire’s throat? Great plan. News flash, Sara, you could cut off my head and we would still be having this conversation!” I leaned forward with each word, letting the blade cut me. My blood slid lazily down my neck.
She gasped and dropped the knife. Whether it was my anger, my threat, or my blood that made her do it, I don’t know. She stumbled back over more broken glass. The new cuts on her feet bled and when the scent hit my nose I had to stop breathing. Losing control would not help my case.
“Sara, please, just listen to me for a minute.”
“No!” She grabbed the knife from the floor and brandished it at me, her entire arm shaking. “You’ll spell me, or, or, glamour me or something.”
I rolled my eyes. “I can’t do that.”
“You’re probably lying.”
“Wish I was. Listen. I am not going to hurt you. In fact, I came all the way here just to save you. Or did you not notice the part where I killed those things before they killed you?” I would have kept going, but I ran out of air, and smelling her blood was not a promising option.
Sara looked conflicted now. “Well, you—you probably just wanted to protect your own meal!”
“This is ridiculous.” I breathed, just enough to speak, forced myself to get over how good she smelled and forged ahead. “Sara, it’s me. Kassandra. I am your best friend. I am not going to eat you!”
The hallway floor outside her room squeaked, and the scent of gunpowder rolled through the room. “But I might,” a new voice said.
I knew that scent, that voice. I knew the red hair that had once accompanied Malachi and Tabitha into the very streets behind me when I was still only days old in this new life.
Henry.
Chapter Five: Monster
He had been arrested after the attack on my class’s graduation party. He was supposed to be locked up somewhere for attempting to expose the vampire race to the rest of the world.
He was not supposed to be here, standing ten feet away from me, his red hair like a portent of fire and doom to come.
Sara screamed again when she saw him, and staggered back until she hit the wall.
Henry stuffed his hands in his pockets and smiled at me like we were old friends. “Long time no see, Kassandra. Did you miss me?”
“Get out.” I pulled my dagger from its sheath on my thigh, and hit the emerald with my thumb. The gold slid up along the blade.
“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” Henry said, shrugging his shoulders as though we were discussing nothing more than last night’s homework. “But I must say, that’s a nice toy you have there. A present, perhaps? From Rhys? He’s so good to you, isn’t he? I would like to pay him a visit as well. So what do you say we have a quick bite to eat here, then go find him.”
“Like hell we will.” I sidestepped to put myself between Henry and my best friend.
“You want her all to yourself? Fine then. I suppose watching you dispatch a human will be just as entertaining as doing it together.”
“No one is going to hurt her.”
“No? Are you sure about that? You look awfully hungry. Your fangs are out, your eyes are red. Your lips are very pale.”
“Shut up. Get out of here before I kill you.”
“I would love to see you try.” He took a step towards me. “After all, you’re the vampire who won’t even bite her Feeder. Everyone knows it. Everyone knows you’re weak—”
His last word choked out. It happened so quickly I didn’t really see it. A huge shadow loomed behind him, and blood trickled out the sides of his mouth. A hand protruded from his chest, clean through from the back, fingers wrapped around the heart that no longer lay within Henry’s ancient body.
Sara started screaming again, and didn’t stop.
Henry didn’t move. His mouth hung open, dripping blood down his chin. His eyes lost that spark of life, that hint of intelligence. The hand holding his heart retracted, back through his body, heart still within its grip. Without the arm to hold him up, Henry collapsed in a heap on the floor. The blood leaked out of him at an astounding rate, then his body shriveled and dried up.
The shadow let the heart fall to the carpet beside the body, then stepped through the doorway. Amidst all the blood and fear in the room, the breeze from the broken window caught the crisp, clean, and salty aroma of the ocean and carried it straight to me.
“Are you all right, Kassandra?”
The deep voice, like something that had come from the bowels of the earth itself confirmed the shadow’s identity. Isaac. One of Bartolome Cordoba’s initiates. A friend.
I didn’t answer him. His question simply tore me from my own stupor and forced me to face reality. And my still-screaming best friend.
“Sara,” I said as calmly as I could as I approached her. “Sara, you’re all right. It’s over now. You’re safe.”
She went quiet, but stared at me instead, her expression making me want to curl up and die. I could see all her thoughts in her eyes. I was a monster. A monster bent on killing her.
“Stay away from me!” She scrambled back, up onto her bed, and pressed herself into the corner again. The sleeve of her tee ripped. “Both of you. Stay away.” Her voice was hoarse and strained.
“Sara, we’re not here to hurt you. We’re here to help. Isaac just saved us both.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Sara.” I reached for her.
Tremors shook her, so violent she knocked her head against the wall.
Isaac was there in an instant. He touched her neck gently and immediately she ceased all panic. Her eyes rolled a little, and she collapsed into his arms.
My turn to panic. “What did you do?”
Isaac calmly lifted Sara and placed her on her bed in a more comfortable position. She looked so tiny and pale against his giant, dark self. “She is unharmed. Asleep. If we allowed her to carry on she would have only exhausted herself, or died from fear.”
“She’s really all right?” I crept closer and listened for her breathing. It was even and relaxed, like she was asleep. “What did you do?”
“It is a simple matter of understanding human anatomy.” He grabbed Henry’s body, moving towards the window. “Do you still have the lighter?”
I didn’t. “Uh, I must have dropped it. Check the floor. How long will she be asleep?”
He found the lighter just below the window and used it to set Henry’s body aflame before tossing it outside. “A few hours.”
“Will she be safe here? What if more come back?”
“You and I can patrol these streets. She will be safe.”
I trusted Isaac’s word on that more than I trusted my own. I sheathed my dagger and tucked Sara in. “Are Cordoba and Viviane here too?”
“No. I came alone.”
“How come?”
“I knew your family would need help. Viviane is busy elsewhere, as is Bartolome.”
“So this is happening in other places too?”
“It seems to be.” He grabbed onto the window sill and jumped out into the rainy night.
I followed, landing rather gracefully in a crouch. If only Cade could have seen.
About half a dozen failed vampires wandered closer and closer. With my sense of doom gone, I had no more blind drive. Fear welled up inside me. When I tried to crush it, something else rose in its place. A hunger—different from my thirst for blood. A desire to chase, to pursue, to hunt. At the thought of going after those creatures in the distance, of ripping them apart, my blood felt charged, as though my pulse were racing.
My eagerness for destruction frightened me more than the possibility of not being able to defend myself.
“What do I do?”
Isaac had a belt full of knives, daggers and god knows what else around his waist that now glimmered in the moonlight. His hands remained empty. “You seem to have done well enough before.” He handed me Sara’s lighter. “Tear them apart.”
I traced the vines and leaves that had been etched into the metal. “What about the other vampires? I know they’re out there. I can smell them. I know I’m too young to have a good chance.”
“That is not true.” He pulled my dagger from its sheath and pressed the emerald, exposing the gold. “This is a good weapon. It will slow healing, and cause illness.” Taking my free hand, he set the hilt against my palm and wrapped my fingers around it. “But if you have a real problem, call for me.”
I nodded, having every intention of staying close enough to Isaac that I wouldn’t have to call very loudly.
He clapped a hand down on my shoulder. “Be ready.” He stepped up ahead of me, ready to take on whatever reached us first.
The wind shifted and the scent of fresh earth washed over me. Not close, but not far. He would know I wasn’t where he left me.
Crap. If I survived this, Rhys was going to kill me.
Sunlight glowed on the horizon by the time Isaac declared everything in the immediate area either dead or fled.