by Sophie Stern
What?
What the hell is he talking about?
There’s no such thing as vampire hunters.
The shock and horror must show on my face, because he sighs.
“Why do you live in a little tent, Tyana?”
“Because Edna’s children didn’t want me in the house?” I ask quietly. It’s embarrassing to know I was kicked out.
“Because you aren’t one of them. You aren’t a hunter. Hunters keep their secrets close to their chest. You lived with her, did you?”
“Yes.”
“Were raised by her?”
“Yes.” Once my parents died, anyway. I fully consider Edna to have raised me even though the reality was that I was only in her home for several years before she passed away.
“And tell me,” he asks, leaning forward. Shadows dance on the walls of the carriage, but I can’t look away from him. “Did she ever disappear for days at a time with no explanation as to where she went?”
I swallow hard. I don’t think I need to say anything. She always told me she was going hunting with her children, but I thought they were hunting for food. I didn’t know...
I didn’t realize.
Vampire hunters?
How could they be?
And more importantly, how could I not actually know?
How could I live in a place for my entire life and not know what kind of creatures the people really were?
No, nobody really liked me much.
Yes, I spent most of my time playing in the village or just outside of the gates in the closest parts of the woods. I never wandered. I never explored. I never went very far. I was weird, and the Eagleton residents didn’t like me, but that didn’t mean they were monsters.
Vampire hunters?
It doesn’t seem possible.
“Ten years ago, we destroyed another town that was slaying vampires. The town you’re from.”
“What? My town didn’t...they wouldn’t have...”
“How old were you when you left?” Matthew asks gently.
“Twelve.”
Too young.
Not quite a teenager, but damn, I felt like one.
“That’s why you never knew,” Eli says, as though this revelation clears everything up. “Vampire hunters don’t initiate their young until they turn 13. You left your home village before your birthright could be passed to you.”
“Then, when you went to Eagleton, they didn’t accept you as one of your own,” Matthew finishes.
Is this true?
Is any of this true?
Before I can question things anymore, Matthew continues speaking.
“When we were at that town...the one from ten years ago...we didn’t just slay the city,” he says.
“No?”
“We were there, and we scented something interesting as we were burning it to the ground.” Matthew pauses long enough that I realize he doesn’t want to tell me whatever he’s going to say next.
In the end, it’s Eli that speaks.
“Our mate. We scented our mate. We’ve been hunting her for years, trying to track her down. In the end, Tyana, we finally found you. Apparently, we just showed up early the first time.”
“Your mate?” I whisper.
It can’t be real.
A vampire mate?
As in, a mate for the three of them to...share?
“Yes,” Benjamin says. “Don’t worry, I’m not too pleased about it, either.”
“Well, excuse me,” I finally snap. “In case you didn’t know this, asshole, I didn’t exactly asked to be kidnapped.”
Benjamin dives across the aisle and this time, it’s his hand on my throat: not Eli’s.
“What did we tell you about bad girls?”
He hisses at me, and he’s so close that I can’t take it. I don’t think. I don’t try to talk myself out of it. I just push myself forward so my mouth crashes against his, and I kiss the vampire who hates me more than anything else in the world.
Chapter 4
He kisses me back without hesitation. I can taste his anger, his frustration, and his need. I can taste all of that and more. It’s strange to me that a kiss holds so many different things, most of all, desire.
Eli laughs as Benjamin finally pulls away and moves back to his side of the coach. I don’t say anything as I slide back against the seat. Eli rubs my shoulder, pulling me close to his side again.
“Well,” he says. “I think that settles things.”
I don’t know what it settles, if anything. They still don’t want me here. They definitely don’t like me, but kissing Benjamin was...
Well, it was incredible, and I hate that I feel that way.
“You should try to sleep,” Matthew finally says.
“Close your eyes, Tyana,” Eli agrees.
Benjamin stays silent, and I want to ask him what he’s thinking about, or if this changes anything, but I know that it doesn’t. I know that no matter what happens next, everything’s going to change.
From here on out, things will be different.
Wilder, maybe, and perhaps they’ll be more painful. I don’t know. I reach for my lips, though, and I touch them. I kind of can’t believe I did that.
“Sleep,” Eli says again. This time, there’s a bit of an edge to his voice.
“Why won’t she do what you say?” Benjamin asks. His voice sounds louder than usual in the darkness.
“I don’t have to obey him just because he’s bossy,” I snap.
“No, you have to obey him because he’s a fucking vampire,” Benjamin says.
“Do humans usually just do what you say?”
I think about the people of Eagleton. They were running around wildly, trying their best not to let the vampires capture them, but in the end, they were taken. All of them. I can’t imagine any of them just doing what a vampire told them to do.
“In an intimate setting like this? Yes,” Eli says out loud. “Generally speaking, vampires have a bit of...sway...when it comes to getting humans to obey.”
“I’ve heard about this.”
Then again, I’ve heard a lot of things about vampires.
“I’m sure you have.”
“So why isn’t it working?” Benjamin asks again. “She hasn’t listened at all.”
“Mad I kissed you, huh?” I ask, and he growls in the darkness.
“Brother, relax...” Matthew speaks now.
“Are you actually brothers?”
“It’s a term of endearment,” Matthew explains.
“The reason she’s not obeying is because she’s our mate,” Eli tells Benjamin. He speaks as though I’m not even here, and I’m not sure whether that’s sexy or horrifying. I think it might be a mixture of both things.
“I didn’t ask for her,” Benjamin says, and somehow, that fucking hurts.
Okay, well I didn’t ask for them, either. I definitely didn’t ask for a vampire mate. I certainly didn’t ask for three. So why don’t they just turn me and release me into the wild? They don’t have to keep me. I’m not the kind of girl who needs to be babysat.
Besides, being in the wild will be totally fine.
They can release me and let me go, and that’ll be just totally okay. I don’t need them to promise me anything. They don’t need to pretend to take care of me. They don’t need to tell me that I’m going to get some sort of happy ending. I’m not asking for any of that.
All I want is my own damn freedom, but somehow, I get the feeling that that’s what these guys want more than anything else-.
“A vampire’s mate is never asked for, but destined by the gods,” Eli says.
“But we can’t even control her,” Benjamin says. “What’s the point?” He slumps back against the carriage. I can’t really see him, but I can hear him, and besides, his shitty attitude is permeating the space we’re in.
All I can think about is how damn disappointed he is that out of all of the mates in the world he could have landed, he got stuck with
me.
And that kind of hurts like, so much more than it should.
We ride in silence for a long time. None of us has anything to say. There’s not really anything to say in a moment like this, is there? I’m thinking about how lost I am, and how much it hurts to be so totally unwanted by these vampires, and they’re thinking about how much they should have gotten a different girl.
Someone better.
Stronger.
Prettier.
Maybe they want someone sexier.
Apparently, they all want someone who is more easily controlled than me, and how horrible is that?
How awful is it that the girl they got won’t even do their bidding?
Shit.
At some point, I must drift off to sleep, because when I open my eyes again, we’re pulling up to a large, oversized castle, and the sun is rising.
“Oh no,” I whisper, pushing myself off of Eli. Apparently, I passed out on him, but he doesn’t seem to mind. If anything, he’s looking at me with a sort of wry satisfaction on his face.
“Sleep well?”
“I mean, yes, but,” I gesture at the window.
“What is it?” He asks. “The castle? That’s ours.”
“No, I mean, that’s great,” I say, flustered. “But the sun. It’s rising.”
“Yes, that’s what happens in the morning,” Benjamin says in his surly way. Okay, so apparently Mr. Crabbypants is still irritated with the fact that I kissed him yesterday. Tough. He’s definitely just going to have to get over that.
“Aren’t you...won’t you?”
“What?” Matthew asks, confused.
Benjamin gets what I’m trying to say, though, and he gets a strange look on his face. I can’t tell if he’s amused or if he thinks I’m an idiot.
“She thinks we burn in the sun,” he says.
“Don’t you?” I whisper, but now I suddenly feel like someone who has been completely left out of a cruel joke.
“You’d like that,” Benjamin mutters, and he looks away. Even now, in the early morning light, I can see that he’s a beautiful man. I didn’t get the best look last night. Not of any of them. Now, though, I can see that they’re each wildly handsome in their own ways.
Benjamin is definitely the broody vamp of the group. He’s got dark, bright eyes that seem to see right through me, and his chiseled jaw line is ridiculously perfect. I want to lick it, but I shouldn’t.
Right?
I shouldn’t try to lick him?
Somehow, I know that I shouldn’t.
I fucking want to, though.
Then there’s Matthew. He seems like the quiet one of the group. He’s a little more pensive than the other two, but no less gorgeous. Matthew has a long scar on his face, but I don’t care about that. It doesn’t do anything to diminish his beauty. It doesn’t take away anything about the way he looks.
And finally, there’s Eli.
Perfect Eli.
He’s the ringleader. I don’t have to be a vampire groupie to know that he’s the one in charge. The other guys might share a mate with him, but they look to Eli for comfort and for guidance. I guess he’s kind of like the big brother of the group, but I’m not sure if that’s an appropriate assessment or not.
I know that the three of them rule. They’re some sort of royalty. They live in a fucking castle, after all. Besides, if what they taught me about the other humans in Eagleton was actually true, then there’s a lot more to the world than I could have possibly guessed, and I have an idea that I’m not going to like what I find out about the world.
“We can’t burn in the sun,” Eli says finally.
“Okay.”
“Don’t ask how we can be killed,” Benjamin says, obviously bored.
“I didn’t.”
“Good, because we won’t tell you.”
“Good, because I didn’t fucking ask,” I snap, tired of his shitty attitude. “And for that matter, I didn’t ask you to kidnap me, and I didn’t ask to ride in this smelly carriage, and I didn’t ask you to bring me here.”
“Are you finished?” Benjamin asks. I’m out of breath, tired and parched from the talking and the lack of hydration I’ve experienced since getting in the carriage. The ride was long, and the air is dry. I need some water, and I think he can tell.
But I don’t want to give Benjamin the satisfaction of thinking he’s bested me somehow.
“No,” I snap. “I’m not finished. Not by a long shot.”
“Yes, you are,” Eli says. He reaches across me and opens the door to the carriage. He gestures for Matthew to go first. Benjamin follows. I start to move, ready to exit, but Eli grabs my arm. I look at him, confused.
He waits until the others are completely out of the carriage, and then he reaches for me.
“Benjamin got to taste you,” he says. “And I’m entirely jealous. It’s my turn.”
He kisses me then, long and hard. It’s deeply passionate, deeply wonderful, and deeply perfect. It’s the most perfect kiss I’ve ever experienced in my life, and I don’t really know what I’m supposed to do when he finally pulls away and looks at me.
I stare at him, completely awestruck, and then to my utter horror and complete shock, he slaps me in the fucking face.
Hard.
Then he grips my chin, and I look up at him.
“If you ever speak to Benjamin, Matthew, or myself with that level of disrespect again, don’t expect to sit for a week,” he says.
His voice is even and cool, but I can tell that he’s not fucking around with me. I don’t respond to him, and somehow, I don’t think he expects me to. I just get out of the carriage and follow the other men into the castle. I try to ignore the humans who are tied up in the other carts.
I don’t want to know what’s going to happen to them.
Chapter 5
AT CASTLE ROSE, I EXPECT to be something of an underpaid maid. We pass several other house humans as we walk through the castle. They all turn and stare at me, but I don’t really know why. I don’t really want to know why, either. The women here are beautiful, and most of them aren’t wearing very much clothing at all.
Do the vampires feed on these girls?
Is that what they’re going to do to me?
Only, they don’t take me to a cell or to a tiny tower room or anything like that. Instead, they lead me up, up, up through the castle and to a huge, oversized bedroom with a giant bed in the center.
“You could fit ten people on there,” I say, awed.
“And we have,” Benjamin says, obviously bored.
I blush, not missing what he’s saying. So they’ve bedded people before: shared women. That’s what they’ve done, is it? And they’ve done it here. I try to push the images away from my mind, but thinking about the men and their orgies turns me on so much more than it should.
I don’t think I’m supposed to like the idea of them sleeping with people. If we’re supposed to be mated, then I guess I’m supposed to want them to be virgins, to be untouched, but I don’t really want that. Somehow, that’s never been important to me.
I just really don’t care.
Is it because I’m a virgin?
Is that why I don’t understand?
Maybe once I’ve had sex, it’ll be different. Maybe then I’ll feel like people should be pure and chaste and wholesome, but as of right now, it just seems...incredible. I picture the men on the bed with women crawling on top of them and under them. I picture the touching, the kissing...the sucking.
Have they bitten any of the women they’ve bedded with?
Can a vampire even actually turn a human?
Do they do it while they’re having wonderfully intense sex with them?
Although I don’t say a word, I notice that Matthew is watching me carefully. He’s gauging my response to this entire situation. I try to stay focused and look around the room, but I can’t take it any longer. Finally, I sneak a peek to see what he’s thinking about.
“She lik
es that idea,” he says.
“Does she?” Eli looks at me. He looks me up and down, and then he fucking sniffs the air. Is he serious right now? Is he trying to smell whether I’m actually aroused? So vampires have a good sense of smell. Okay. I’ll keep that in mind for the future, but it’s pretty damn weird, if you ask me.
I don’t want anyone smelling me without my permission.
Benjamin follows suit, sniffing the air, and a sly smile spreads across his face.
“So she does,” he says. “Don’t worry, little warrior. There will be plenty of time for your feisty antics later.” He looks at the others. “For now, we have hunters to attend to.”
“What are you going to do with them?” I ask, suddenly anxious and uncomfortable.
I can’t help myself.
They’re my people.
Only, I don’t know if they’re actually my people anymore. So much has changed in just a few hours. Yesterday, I thought I was doing my part to protect the people of Eagleton from invaders and today...
Well, today is an entirely different world altogether, isn’t it?
“That’s not for you to concern yourself with,” Eli says.
“I need to know.”
“You shouldn’t know.”
“Just tell her,” Benjamin says. I don’t really know why he’s so callous and uncaring, or at least, I don’t know why he comes across that way.
“No.”
“Fine,” he sighs, and somehow, I feel like that’s the only sound he seems to know how to make. Then he looks at me and says very plainly. “We’re going to kill them.”
I swallow hard. Of course, they’re going to kill them. That’s what has to happen, isn’t it? The vampires aren’t nice people. They aren’t people at all, really. They aren’t polite and they don’t have the same code of morals as humans do, but then again, I’m starting to think that humans don’t have the same code of morals I thought they had.
“What do you think about that?”
“Why did you call me your little warrior?” I ask in response, but my voice is very quiet, and it catches him off-guard because he stills, looking at me.
“We’re going to slaughter them.”
“Is it because you think I’m brave?” I whisper.
“They’re scum, and they deserve to die that way. They’re cowards.”
