The Soul of a Vampire #1

by Rachel E Rice

  “I enjoy my death. I enjoy killing and savoring the blood of my victims. I can have all the women I’ve ever wanted forever, and when I’m finished with them, then I can feed on their bodies. Some I let live, some I turn, and some I just discard like trash. He opened his hands and waved them to his side. His expression unchanged. It was like looking at a piece of concrete with eyes.

  “Now where is our sister?” He said with a huff. “Mother wants her back and father is beside himself because you’ve killed one of our brothers, and you have disobeyed him,” Aare said with a smirk. Aare never liked that brother who tried to molest and turn Zoey when she was a child. If I hadn’t heard Zoey screaming, and killed him on the spot, he would have harmed her later. And as for Aare, he would have killed him himself because he had his eyes on Zoey, too.

  “Father demanded that I bring you back to him. He said not to return without you. Do you see what I mean? I can’t go back unless you’re with me.” His voice is calm. But Aare is most dangerous when he’s calm.

  “You could go to him and say you couldn’t find me, and he would stop looking.”

  “Why would I do that?” Aare said standing.

  “I just want to live like a human again.”

  “But you aren’t a human, and you will never be that again. Even if the world comes to an end, there you will be all alone, and the human females who fall in love with you will die, or you will consume them, or try to save them by making them immortal, and you will still be what you are—a vampire who roams at night and turns everything into lifeless dead creatures.”

  It was painful to hear.

  “I’m going to marry Zoey,” I said out of anger and truth. I didn’t want to hear anything from him. I didn’t want to have my brutality laid bare before me where I would have to accept who I am. I had been running from that since Zoey came into my life.

  “What do you know about love or marriage?” He said.

  “I know that even now as a vampire, I still have a soul because I’m still able to feel emotion. I’m becoming less of a monster because I no longer feed on human blood. And I know Zoey is in love with me.”

  “Does she know what you are? Of course not,” he said answering his own question. “She never knew what we were when father kidnapped her on her way to school. Mother saw this little innocent creature and she wanted something to play with. She wanted what she couldn’t have. A human child. Something inside her longed to be human like you’re doing now. Father would do anything for mother then, their love was still young and strong for each other, but after a thousand years together, he was just operating on instinct. Then he brought Zoey home, and me, and then you and I had a sister to play with. Why didn’t you release me with Zoey? I wouldn’t be here now, tracking you to this god awful place.”

  “I didn’t release you because I knew you wanted to be what you are. You’re a killer and you were going to kill Zoey one day.” Aare shifted his head to the right. He shot me a closed smile as if to acknowledge that I had been right all along. He would have either killed her or turned her.

  “I haven’t revealed anything to Zoey because I wiped her memory before I released her. I’m going to tell her everything. I’m going to ask her to marry me,” I said breathless.

  “Do you hear yourself?” He raised the broken neck of the deer, took a bite and threw the body into a tree. There was nothing standing between me and Aare. “I guess you can get to like anything,” he said. “Acquired taste I suppose. Why don’t you just turn her, and have her serve you for eternity?”

  “I can’t do that. If you could see how beautiful and warm she is then you wouldn’t want to harm her. She was a child and now she’s a woman,” I said to him trying to ignite some feeling of empathy for Zoey who was then his sister.

  But there was no light in his eyes. He was as cold as the day he was turned when he became eighteen. I should have known better, Aare is a born killer. I saw it when he was young when father first brought him to live with us. He killed Zoey’s cat and he began killing all the little animals and some children where we lived. It was because of him we had to constantly move about.

  Aare became quiet as if he was wondering what to do with me. I didn’t want to have a confrontation with him. I needed to get back to Zoey. She needed me more now than ever. I quickly turned and bolted down the path, but I wasn’t as fast as Aare.

  The blood of humans gives you inhuman strength. The blood of animals gives you only strength to exist.

  He stood in front of me with a grin. “Where do you think you’re going?” I was always faster than you. Do you think you can out run me?”

  My hands balled into a quick fist, and I rammed it into his chest and it threw him backwards and I started to run once more. I needed to get back to Zoey before more of my family discovered my safe haven.

  He caught me. “Do you think that little blow will stop me? But this will.” He carried something in his hand and threw it at me. It was a ball of silver net with a wooden handle which unraveled as he threw it in my direction. It dropped over me burning my hands as I held them over my head to protect my hair and to lessen the umbrella effect of covering and burning me completely.

  My hands threw it off and I rushed away leaving Aare to deal with the blow I had dealt him. He didn’t look like he was coping well from the shock to his chest. If I wanted I could have reduced him to nothing, but I couldn’t because I still thought of him as a brother and my little human brother. That was my humanity, and it may prove to be the end of me.

  Chapter Six- Sebastian

  When I arrived at the house the moon was still out, but the chill and dew of morning had settled on the grass and trees. The sun would be returning soon. This place had been perfect for me and now I would have to change locations because sooner or later Aare would discover my whereabouts if he didn’t already know. I stood at the foot of Zoey’s bed and she was still sleeping.

  I turn to walk away satisfied that she’s OK. “Where have you been?” She said in a small voice. I spun around to face her and walked to her bed. She watched at me with an innocent smile which reminds me of when she was five.

  “Where have you been? You look like you’ve been in a slaughter house.” Glancing down, blood covered my shirt, and dry blood mixed with dirt smeared on my pant legs appeared to be just that—I could have been in a slaughter house. It wasn’t too far from the truth so I gave her some of the truth.

  “Hunting. I like to eat deer meat and I have this camp where I make sausage and cut the meat up for later.”

  She stared at me as if she didn’t believe me, but not saying a word. “Next time try not to burn yourself.” My eyes fell to my hands, but they were healing as she spoke. I cupped them behind my back. I pivoted around, happy I had distracted her, and she didn’t ask too many questions.

  “Tomorrow I have to see my father. I need him to know that I’m alive and to tell Detective Cole that he shouldn’t look for me,” Zoey said.

  “Have you accepted that I can protect you from my family?”

  “No. I’m not fully convinced.” Her eyes flashing to me. Her long lashes covering the bluest of eyes.

  “You cannot see your father,” I said my voice demanding and urgent. I strode to the bed and sat near her. Her eyes glowed with anger.

  “Why not? I’ve agreed to go with you, a stranger, and put my life in your hands, and you can’t allow me to have one day with my father?”

  “What if someone tracks you to your father’s home? You will be putting him in danger and he could die as a result of your childish desires.” She twirled a strand of hair as she did when she was a child.

  Her gaze turned to me. “You know something you haven’t told me.” She narrowed her eyes. I turned away from her gaze to prevent her from reading me.

  “What good would it do to tell you? You won’t understand,” I said to her.

  “How about trying to make me understand.”

  “Because you’re just a...”

 
“A woman.”

  “That’s not what I wanted to say. I have to get some sleep and I need you to stay in the house while I get some sleep.” She crossed her arms and I thought I could rest because there was sure to be a retaliation from Aare. He wasn’t the type to let this go and this time, he would bring someone with him to help capture me.

  When I left to go into my chamber, Zoey was pouting but roaming around the house. Maybe I should get her a wide screen television and stream movies to keep her entertained. I understand young women like those things. Maybe take her shopping. I amused myself with thoughts of doing some human things as I fell into a deep sleep.

  I woke and the darkness had surrounded me with thoughts that something had gone wrong. I didn’t hear Zoey’s heart beat. I didn’t smell her scent. I sat up. She wasn’t here. How had I managed to sleep all day and part of the night? Never had I permitted myself to do that.

  Knowing I was forever hunted, I allowed myself an hour of sleep during the day even if I remained in my chamber hidden away in the walls.

  I stood looked around and searched for a sound, and rushed to where Zoey had been sleeping, and she wasn’t there. Where had she gone I questioned myself. And it came to me—to her father’s home.

  For seven years I had hidden in the shadows never revealing myself. Hunting in the forests and parks surrounding Seattle never leaving her side, and now she has put both of us and her father into untold danger and everyone in his neighborhood.

  I had my fill of the elk and I wouldn’t be hungry for a few days. Because I wasn’t around Zoey and covering her scent, Aare would soon find her. I wasted no time in getting to her.

  When I stood at her doorsteps, I could see through the picture window into her home. She was sitting at the fire in a chair across from her father. Her father had been reading and he held a book on the blanket which covered his legs. He leaned forward, and then sat back with an uneasy tightness in his body as if Zoey had given him bad news.

  Then I realized she probably told him she had to go away.

  When Zoey looked up I was standing in the dining area. “You should lock your doors,” I said looking at a startled Zoey and her father.

  “What are you doing in my house?” her father asked. A youthful looking man with worry lines dotting his face and a full head of white hair. When he tried to stand the youthful face belied the age of his body. His reflexes slow and his knees weak. His body showed the wear and tear of working out in harsh weather. His face showed many sleepless nights with large bags settling under his eyes.

  “I came for Zoey.” I looked to her. “It’s not safe here.” I think she understood. I had warned her and she disobeyed my wishes.

  “But she just got here. I worried myself over what had become of her. Just like when she was a child, and now you’ve come again to take her from me.”

  “I came to protect her not take her from you. I would never do that,” I said. He sat back, his face smooth with relief.

  “When will I see her again?” Her father asked. Zoey stood and walked near her father and leaned down and kissed him on the forehead. She sensed that she had to leave with me.

  “Do you understand that she will never be safe in your home? She may never be able to visit you again.” He ignored my plea and Zoey’s eyes wandered from her father to me. Zoey’s father turned on the television as if that would drown out his thoughts and the memory of her disappearing on her way to school.

  It had been his job to see that she got to school and because he was sleepy from working all night, he let a bright little girl convince him that she could walk to school alone. For that he blamed himself and caused resentment between him and Zoey’s mother. But he wouldn’t know that he was dealing with a force much greater than just a sleepy inattentive father.

  Nothing would have prevented my father from kidnapping Zoey.

  I looked away to the television. The nightly news was reporting on a series of murders. I recognize the lake house where I had hidden Zoey. The news reporter and cameraman panned to a shot of two people lying on the floor of their home. A blood trail leading from the upper bedroom down to the foot of the stairs and ended with the death of their dog.

  “There are no footprints. Just blood everywhere,” the police chief said to Detective Cole who paced around out of camera range. Then back again into frame, as he kneeled to examine the woman’s neck and then he said, “There are two bites on her neck. And then he stood and kneeled beside the man and checked his neck, “The same kind of bites here,” he said into the camera.

  “And the dog too?” the sheriff asked.

  I turned to Zoey as she watched at the television with her father. “We have to leave now.” “Your father will have to come with us.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Zoey’s father said. I handed Zoey my hand. She glanced at her father.

  “Please come with us. Sebastian will take care of us,” she said to him.

  “This is my home, and this is where your mother died and I’m staying here,” he said to Zoey as she rushed to his lap holding him, and he held her.

  She stood looking sad. “Take care of yourself, Father,” she said with tears welling in her eyes and then streaming down her cheeks.

  “Where is the car you took? We need it to get away from here, now and it has our passports.”

  “I hid it in my father’s garage. You said passports?”

  She led the way through the kitchen looking back hoping her father changed his mind. We stood out back and I raised the door to the garage. It had no automatic door opener. That wasn’t a worry. I could raise it with my finger or just looking at it, but I didn’t want to frighten Zoey. She had been through enough. She hopped into the Land Rover and I started it and backed out. I jumped out of the car, and pulled the door down.

  When we were on the highway headed out of town, she asked me, “What next and where are we going?”

  I had scouted out a place just for this occasion. “We’re going to Canada.”

  “Why Canada? Don’t we need passports?”

  “I have them in here. They’re in the car.” I reached for them and handed one to her.

  “You think of everything. Well, have you thought that I don’t want to be with you?”

  “You don’t have to be with me. But you do have to live with me.”

  “Isn’t that the same thing?” She asked her eyes fading on me and then turning looking out the window into the night.

  “We will have to act like a couple. You don’t have to be in love with me, but you do have to pretend we’re married.” She glanced at me with a furrowed brow.

  “Why would I marry someone like you? You have no warmth. You don’t have a personality. You don’t laugh, and from what I’ve seen of you and it isn’t much, you have no sense of humor. And besides you’re a night person and I’m a day person, and if you think you’re going to keep me in prison while you sleep all day you can go fuck yourself.”

  “I don’t curse. It’s a nasty habit.” She eyed me.

  “But I do,” she said with a huff and crossed her arms over her chest. “I guess adding cursing to all your nasty habits would be too much for even you.” I shook my head and didn’t respond. She was looking for a fight.

  “That’s why they say opposites attract,” I smiled trying to dispel her notions of me, “now can you at least accept this situation for now?”

  “And another thing, I’m not eating that deer meat.”

  “You don’t have to. There will be enough for me.” I said glancing at her with a smirk.

  “You don’t look very prosperous, except for this SUV. Did you steal it and that house?”

  “Is that all you want me for, my money?”

  “If I can’t have anything else, I guess settling for money would be nice.”

  “Do you mean that you aren’t attracted to me?”

  “You are handsome and you’re tall. You have a nice nose and a hard body and ass, but aside from that you are just a pretty
box with ribbons and bows and nothing inside.”

  She didn’t know just how true that was. I couldn’t answer her because I had nothing to counteract what she had just said. I kept my eyes up front and somehow she felt my pain.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. I say things when I’m hurt.”

  “I know. You were like that when you were a child.” Her eyes shot to me and she turned.

  “How do you know that? What part did you play in my disappearance?”

  “None.” She sat back and relaxed because she did want to believe me. But I had played a great part. I didn’t have to wait until she was fifteen before I took her away from my mother, father and brothers. It was just that I loved her from the time I met her. First as a sister and then as someone I wanted to protect. And now as a woman I fell in love with.

  Chapter Seven- Zoey

  When we arrived in a small town in Canada, the snow fell silent, but the noise of the silence in the car and the coolness between us was greater than what was happening outside. It had been in the middle of the night when we entered the quiet little town of Burnsville. I woke from a light beaming on my face after driving through miles of darkness.

  I looked up and saw one street light. Oh great. I thought. This was a small town indeed. I wondered how long I would have to live with Sebastian here in this isolated village. And under the circumstances we didn’t talk much to each other. We didn’t even like each other, I thought. He wasn’t the kind of man I would like. I was looking for something, but nothing like him. A brooding, gloomy, miserable authoritative man I didn’t need.

  I had enough gloom and doom in my personality to last a life time.

  However, if I were looking for a man to make me feel safe, he was the one. I felt too safe. I was like choking on safe.