by Morgan Rice
Kyle snapped a chair leg from the table and chucked it to Shady.
“When he turns, kill him,” Kyle said. “I don’t want guards in my army. They don’t deserve it.”
Shady nodded.
“I want to see the sky, Kyle,” he said. “I want to remember what freedom feels like.”
Kyle led Shady to the open door. Several convicts had already escaped this way and the wire fences ahead had been shredded. Vehicles had been destroyed, turned upside down and smashed.
Kyle and Shady walked out into the courtyard. The younger man seemed in awe, as enthralled by the sight of chaos as Kyle himself was.
“You have powers now,” Kyle said. “Strength. Agility. You can fly. You can kill.”
Shady was taking the whole thing in his stride. He went over to a police car, one that had just been transporting a recently arrested man to the overnight cells when it had been surrounded by escaped convicts. Shady elbowed them out of the way and grabbed the car. He held it high above his head, spinning it round and round in circles. Then he threw it the length of the courtyard. It hit the ground nose on, crumbling.
Shady turned to Kyle, his eyes wild with a desire for destruction.
“Thank you,” he said, his voice filled with emotion.
Kyle slung his arm around his old friend.
“What do you say we go paint the town red?” he said. “Red with blood.”
Shady nodded, and the two men waltzed away, leaving the prison in utter chaos. What they didn’t notice as they went, was the man in the back of the police car that Shady had thrown. It was Sam.
He survived the impact and crawled out of the crumpled wreckage, slipped through the gap in the wire, and out into the night.
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
Scarlet ran down the stairs of the tower as fast as her legs would carry her. She held the precious vial of immortal blood tightly in her fist, and prayed that when she found Sage he would still be alive.
Her mind was swirling from her encounter with the three sisters. The experience was like nothing she’d ever had before and it left her reeling, feeling disconcerted and confused. Part of her felt like she couldn’t trust the women but the other part of her felt she had no other option. If she didn’t get Sage to the vampire city then he would die anyway, so she may as well cling onto the last sliver of hope the women had given her.
When Scarlet burst out of the tower door, she found that the forest was in complete disarray. The storm had torn up leaves and branches, strewing them haphazardly around. It was almost impossible to find a path through the dense foliage, and Scarlet was frequently blocked by a fallen tree. The stream she’d leapt over on the way here had burst its banks to become a swollen pool of dirty water and she used her vampire strength to leap over it. She landed in the mud on the other side.
As Scarlet raced through the thick foliage, her clothes were torn on the branches and her sneakers grew soggy, drenched with mud. Hair struck to her face.
Finally, she made her way into the clearing where she’d left Sage. Everything was exactly as she had left it. All but for one crucial thing.
Sage was missing.
Scarlet felt a scream of despair rip from her chest but she was so distraught she hardly even heard it. She raced forward and dropped to her knees, touching the empty space where Sage had been lying, running her fingertips across the muddy ground as though searching for clues. There were no footprints to be seen, which told Scarlet that Sage hadn’t wandered away to die.
As she stood, she noticed that the ground had been disturbed. She spotted a drawing in the mud.
She stepped back to survey the image more clearly. Her heart fell as she recognized a drawing of Sage’s estate on the Hudson river. The picture was so intricately drawn it couldn’t have been made by Sage—he was close to death when Scarlet had left him. There was no way he could have had the strength to draw this picture.
Scarlet realized that someone else had been on the island. Someone else had drawn this picture, someone who knew what the estate looked like in finite detail. There was only one person who fit that description.
Lore.
Scarlet felt waves of desperation crash over her. If Lore had taken Sage back to New York then surely all hope was lost. Sage would never survive the journey. Even if he did, the Immortalists would torture him to death for his deception.
She looked down at the vial of immortality in her hand and growled with frustration. She’d come so close to saving him, and now all hope was lost.
Scarlet collapsed to her knees and wept. It was all over. Sage was gone, undoubtedly dead. Unless…
She sat up and wiped her tears away. Why would Lore take Sage back to the estate and leave a clue for her? She, Scarlet, was the one Lore wanted. Not Sage. Sage couldn’t save the Immortalist race—but Scarlet could. It was her that they needed. Lore had taken Sage to lure her there. Even Lore was smart enough to know she would never come if she thought Sage was dead. If anything, they would go out of their way to keep him alive, knowing full well that as soon as he was dead they’d have no power over Scarlet, no way to make her give up her life in order to save his. Sage was a bartering tool, a hostage, and his well-being was now in their strategic interest.
Scarlet slipped the tincture in her back pocket. Her feet were soaked to the bone, her clothes ripped, her hair caked in mud. Tears stains had made clean lines down her dirty face. But no matter how destroyed she felt, she knew she couldn’t give up. Sage needed her, and she was going to save him no matter what.
She took to the sky. She would save him—or die trying.
*
Lore paced back and forth, his heels clicking on the marble floor, feeling anxious. Lyra sat on one of the plush velvet sofas, tending to Sage.
“He’ll be alright,” she said. “Once Octal arrives he will heal him.”
But Lore couldn’t settle down. Everything felt too close for comfort. He’d called for Octal as soon as he and Lyra had reached the estate, but time felt like it was dragging on and on. Each second felt like it was bringing them closer to death, to extinction, and Lore couldn’t bear it.
Just then, Lore heard the doors to the manor slam open. He raced into the hallway and saw Octal standing there, staff in hand. Beside him stood Lore’s mother.
“You came,” Lore cried, relieved to be reunited with his leader.
He looked his mother up and down, then raced forward and embraced her. She stroked his hair, making Lore feel like a child rather than the two thousand year old Immortalist he was.
Octal spoke, his deep voice booming through the mansion.
“You’ve done well,” he said to Lore. “I knew I was right to entrust you with this mission.”
Lore felt humbled. He nodded his thanks to his leader.
“Sage is through here,” he said, leading his mother and Octal through the corridors and into the sitting room.
Lyra looked up, poised with a flannel above Sage’s forehead. Sage looked close to death, as though he were barely hanging on by a thread. His skin was pale but glistening with sweat. His breath was shallow.
Octal got to work straight away.
“Move aside,” he said to Lyra.
She immediately obeyed. Octal sat his huge frame on the sofa beside Sage. He raised his staff and pressed the wooden cross on the tip gently to Sage’s heart. In a matter of minutes Sage’s skin began to heal itself, the wounds that Octal had initially inflicted on him beginning to knit themselves closed. The red, gaping wounds turned into thin, silvery scars. Though Sage remained unconscious, his breathing became more steady.
Octal looked up at the three faces staring at him.
“That will give him enough energy to survive until the girl gets here,” he said. Then he stood. “Now tell me what preparations you’ve put in place for her arrival.”
Lore hadn’t even thought about what would happen when Scarlet got here. His whole focus had been on saving Sage’s life long enough to lure her here, and maki
ng sure Octal arrived to take over his leadership role.
“I have no plans yet,” Lore confessed.
Octal did not seem impressed.
“Where are the others?” he asked.
When he’d last seen Lore, the boy had been leading an army of Immortalists into the night. Now only he and the girl remained.
“I sent them off to follow the Scarlet’s parents,” Lore said. “We knew they were trying to find their daughter and hoped they would lead us straight to her.”
Octal frowned.
“What about you two?” he said. “Why didn’t you follow her parents?”
Lyra spoke up.
“We followed a different lead, my Lord,” she said, evasively.
Octal could tell something had happened that the two younger Immortalists weren’t telling him. He looked from one to the other, sternly.
Lore’s mother placed a hand lightly on her son’s arm.
“Tell Octal what you have done,” she said, sensing too that Lore was concealing something. “He is your leader. He needs to know.”
Lore nodded.
“A number of Immortalists lost their lives in pursuit of the parents,” he began. “I sent the remaining army away to continue the chase.” He paused and breathed deeply, trying to calm the emotions that were surfacing. “Lyra stayed with me.”
Octal and Lore’s mother turned their gazes to the Immortalist girl with the striking features and dark black hair.
“We saw the sign of the trinity,” she said, taking up the story. “A column of light breaking through the clouds. We thought that they must be helping Scarlet and so we followed.”
“That’s how we found Sage,” Lore concluded. “Scarlet was in council with the trinity and Sage was just lying there.”
Octal’s expression was unreadable. But when he spoke, there was no doubt that the revelation was about the last thing he’d wanted to here.
“The Trinity are involved?” he said. “This changes everything. They’ve deemed the vampire girl worthy of their help. They know that we need her to save our race. They had determined that the Immortalists will fail.”
The news hit Lore like a punch in the stomach, winding him. He looked at Lyra desperately. Her expression matched his own.
“But they exist to help all non-human species,” she insisted. “I’ve read it in the ancient texts. Why would they protect the vampire race if it meant the Immortalist race would become extinct?”
Her voice grew desperate.
“The sisters have seen everything,” Octal replied gravely. “They don’t show themselves for nothing. Whatever future they are hoping to prevent, it involves helping the girl. And that means destroying us.”
Lore felt his heartbeat increase with anguish. After everything he had been through, could it really end this way? Because the trinity, or mothers, or sisters, or whatever the ancient texts called them, had decided that it must be that way?
“Then you are just giving up?” he said, his passion bursting from his chest. “Because three powerful witches say that one vampire is more important than the whole great race of Immortalists?”
“Lore,” his mother warned him, but Octal held up a hand to stop her.
The boy’s words had clearly humbled him. His unflagging determination in the face of certain defeat was admirable.
“Good people have lost their lives for our cause,” Lore continued. “I will not let their deaths be for nothing. I will not let people I love die!”
As he said the words, his gaze flicked to Lyra. Octal and his mother noticed and both understood what that meant. Lore was in love, and a man in love would never give up.
Finally, Octal nodded.
“Let us prepare for the vampire’s arrival.” He surveyed the faces of each of them, and added: “This isn’t over until it’s over.”
*
Sage felt nothing but pain. Pain in his body, his head, his soul. The absence of Scarlet was like a knife slicing into his heart.
Though he was too weak to open his eyes, he could just about make out his surroundings. He was lying on something soft, not a forest floor anymore, but velvet. There were voices echoing all around him, voices he recognized as Lore and his aunt’s. Then he heard Octal speaking and recognized the man’s booming voice with a shiver. He was back in the hands of the Immortalists. Surely, they were going to finish what they started. They were going to torture him until he gave up Scarlet. He prayed that Scarlet was strong enough to stay away, that she would let him die, let them all die, for her own good.
There were only a few hours left of pain to endure, then it would be over. Once the sun rose, the Immortalists would cease to be and his love, Scarlet, would be able to live out the rest of her life in peace.
The sunrise could not come fast enough.
CHAPTER TWENTY THREE
Caitlin made her way down the cliff path, towards the vampire city. She’d never seen anything quite like it. In all her travels back in time—the memories of which kept flashing back at her in waves—she’d never seen anything like this.
The architecture was unworldly, a combination of ancient Egyptian mud-brick temples and vast columns, all carved into the cave sides like the lost city of Petra. It was breath-taking, and Caitlin felt a strong sense of belonging. This is where her people came from, where they had lived and thrived unharmed for centuries. Along with her flood of memories, Caitlin had realized that the vampire race was not necessarily cruel or evil. There had been good people amongst the vampires, herself included, and she felt a great sense of loss over their extinction.
As Caitlin wandered through the streets of the city, this place felt abandoned, like a giant tomb, an ode to another time. Glancing in awe at the tall buildings, one in particular caught her attention. Something about the vast columns either side of its wide, arched doorway, and steps leading up to it that had been worn away by centuries of footsteps, told her that this was a place of great importance. She felt a pull, a sensation telling her to enter.
The moment she did, she laughed out loud. She’d found herself standing in the large atrium of a library. Of course her body had been pulling her to this place—there was nowhere she felt more comfortable than within the sanctity of a library.
She could hardly believe that there were still books here in one piece. Many, she realized, were made of ancient Egyptian paper, thick and rubbery. As she pulled down volume after volume, she noted that every different type of alphabet was represented, from Arabic to Cyrillic script, to hieroglyphics. It was like her dream come true, stumbling across a forgotten library filled with books that hadn’t been touched for centuries. It made her think of Aiden; he’d love to get his hands on a place like this.
But Caitlin could not bask in the moment. Images of Caleb struggling with the Immortalists as they’d burst into her grandmother’s attic kept surfacing in her mind. She had to find a cure for Scarlet, and find it fast; it was the reason she’d been transported to the lost vampire city beneath the Sphinx in the first place. Something told her the cure would be within the walls of this ancient and forgotten library.
Caitlin looked at the marble shelves, stacked with books. If the cure was in one of these books she would surely die of old age before she found it. Unless…
Caitlin closed her eyes and slowed her breath, trying to put herself into the same sort of meditative state that always helped her sense Scarlet. There was no denying that Caitlin herself possessed some kind of ability to sense things, and now that her journals had been proven correct, Caitlin realized why: because she, too, had once been a vampire. All along, her dormant vampire senses had been guiding her, first to the castle where Scarlet had fled, then to contact Aiden and crack the code of the sphinx, then to her grandmother’s attic and the patterned leather box. It was almost as though Caitlin’s actions had been written in the stars, as though they were being dictated to her by some force beyond her control. All she had to do was stop and listen, and the world would guide her in the rig
ht direction.
And so she did. She stood and breathed, and cleared her mind of all thoughts. She listened to the empty spaces around her and waited for that tugging sensation that told her in which direction she should go.
There it was. A pull like a magnet, weak but just about perceptible.
Caitlin opened her eyes and followed the pull as it led her to a shelf of dusty books. Her eyes skimmed across the spines, unable to read any of the languages. But then she saw one book in English and knew, deep inside of her, that she had found what she had been sent here for.
She pulled the book down and a cloud of dust flew into the air. The book had clearly not been touched for centuries. She had to be careful with it in case the pages shattered on contact with her skin.
She set the book down carefully on the floor and wiped the dust from the front. Immediately, she jumped in shock. There, on the cover, was the same image she’d seen on her grandma’s leather box, and in the Voynich manuscript. Only this time the strange face on the front of the book wasn’t so surreal—it was as clear as day. It was an image of Scarlet’s face.
Caitlin felt her stomach roll with anguish. How had her daughter’s face come to be on this ancient text in a lost vampire library? Once again, she thought of destiny. It was as though everything had already been decided. No, it was more than that. If felt as though everything that was happening now had already happened before, as if they were living in a constant loop with history swirling round and round, repeating ad infinitum. The life she was living was just one cycle, one in which the outcome had been predicted before, but was not set in stone. She could change the premonitions and prophecies. Whatever was supposed to happen, she still had control over whether it did or did not.
Caitlin opened the cover and scanned the title page of the book. Looking at it made her heart stop. The title was: The Last Vampire. And the author of the book was C. Paine.
Could it really be true? Had she, Caitlin, written this very book in a different time and place, during one of the world’s many different cycles of history? Had she been the very person guiding her all this time?
