Of Blood & Magic: Blood Descent Book 1

by T. L. McDonald

  No! I won’t become that. I won’t. I’ll ram a stake straight through my own heart before I’d ever let things get that far.

  I force the creeping vomit back down and lock away the horrible scenario of becoming a bloodsucking fiend into a box labeled Never Ever Look Inside into the furthest corners of my mind, knowing it won’t stay closed. Not even for a second.

  “The people who took on these traits, what happened to them?” I ask, further torturing myself with things I don’t want to imagine. As much as it scares me, I need to know the outcomes. I need to know what might happen…if it becomes me one day. Because no matter how hard I hold on to the notion it won’t, there’s always that bit of doubt lingering behind whispering otherwise.

  “The ones who developed super hearing, strength, the ability to move fast, or heal, adapted and continued to live mostly normal lives. The ones who could compel could go either way. It depended on how they used it.” He stares at me from the corner of his eye, his face growing somber. “The cases where the victim developed thirst, however, never ended well. The bloodlust was too much to control, setting them all on a path of darkness and destruction. They became monsters.” He studies my face like a map, his eyes following all the emotional roads on display, each one leading to one final destination. Fear. He lays his hand over mine, entwining our fingers. “That’s not who you are, Indi. Or who you’ll ever become.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because I know. Sixth sense, remember? I’d be able to sense it and I don’t sense it with you. You’re,” he trails off, searching for the right word. “Pure.” His eyes meet mine head on, the look held within them holding no doubt. “You’re the purest thing I’ve ever felt.”

  We drive in silence for a while after that with him taking us to wherever it is vampires like to congregate, and me holding onto his words as tightly as I can. I really hope he’s right. I don’t want my mom to have sacrificed herself in defending me only to have it all be for nothing in the end. I don’t want to become some new kind of freak monster Sebastian has to take out.

  “Indi.” Sebastian’s voice carries on the wind, giving it the illusion of being all around me, yet still so far away. He approaches like a mirage slowly coming into focus, a wooden stake held in his hand, eyes pleading. “You don’t want to do this.”

  I cock my head to the side and tighten my grip. At my feet, faceless corpses lie motionless, their skin pale and colorless from blood loss.

  A gurgling sound reaches my ears and I look down at Evan. He’s clawing at my hand wrapped around his throat. Face red from lack of air, I watch him squirm until his movements become slower and his pretty blue eyes begin to bulge.

  “You can still stop this. You don’t have to be a monster, Indi.” Sebastian takes a slow, careful step toward me. But he’s wrong. I am a monster and there is no saving me no matter how much he wants to.

  Reading the look in my eye, he gives up all pretenses and makes a run straight for me. But I’m faster, so much faster. I sink my fangs into Evan’s neck viciously, tearing and shredding as I take the life flowing through his veins for myself. Euphoric bliss spreads through every inch of my body making me feel more alive than I’ve ever been before.

  “What have you done?”

  I drop Evan’s lifeless form to the ground and look up at Sebastian. Warm blood trickles from the corners of my mouth down my chin.

  “What have you done?” Sebastian asks again in a whisper, but it’s the despair and loss of hope in his eyes that gives me pause. The desperate haze of needing to take and take and take filling my body dissipates, giving me full view of what I’ve done in crystal clear splashes of blood and death in all its horror.

  I wipe my mouth with the back of an unsteady hand, my eyes focusing on the smear of crimson now spread over my skin. The bliss raging through my veins simmers to a low hum; the bloodlust satiated… for now, giving me back some semblance of control. I blink a few times clearing the hazy red, clouding my vision. The touch of warm liquid surrounds my feet and I look down, the consequences of what I’ve done staring up at me with lifeless pale blue eyes. Lips colorless and open, throat torn apart, the remaining blood in his body flows out around me.

  Evan is dead, and I killed him.

  I killed him.

  I cover my mouth with my bloody hands. “What have I done,” I whisper beneath them, finally grasping what Sebastian’s been asking me all along. Hot tears streak down my face, their crimson colored drops adding to the red already splashed over my hands. I’m crying blood. I look up at Sebastian. “I didn’t mean to.”

  “I know.” In front of me now, Sebastian pulls me into a hug. I reluctantly wrap my arms around his waist, wanting comfort when I deserve none. His body trembles in my arms and I look up into his face. The infinite sadness held in his gaze spills over with a blink of his eyes, his lashes dark and heavy with the weight of his tears. “I’m sorry.” The sting of a stake penetrating my chest steals my breath and I gasp for air I’ll no longer receive.

  I reach up for him, placing my hand against his cheek. “It’s okay.” And it is because this is what I truly deserve.

  He lowers himself down to his knees, keeping me held in his arms. He holds me close to his chest, his cheek pressed against mine. “Wake up,” he whispers in my ear.

  “Indi, wake up.” I hear Sebastian say, but I can’t yet distinguish reality from the horrors of my nightmare. On pure instinct, I lash out when he reaches for me, hitting him in the process as I scream and scream and scream.

  Getting nowhere, he gets out and comes around to my side of the car. He opens the door and takes the hits I dish out as he unfastens my seatbelt. Gripping me by the upper arms, he pulls me out of the Camaro, then holds me tight against his chest, pinning my arms between us.

  “It was just a nightmare. You’re okay now. I’ve got you.” He runs his hand down the length of my hair as I fist my hands over the opening to his jacket, crying into his shirt. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  I can’t form any coherent words yet, my nightmare still too vivid in my mind for anything other than slobbering wails to come out of my mouth. The only thing I can do is shake my head.

  “If you change your mind, I’m here.” He kisses the top of my head in a gesture of comfort as he rubs circles over my back. It only makes me cry harder because all I can see in my mind’s eye is the look on his face when he pressed a stake through my heart. Dream or not, it doesn’t change the way it felt. The pain. The joy. The anguish. The bloodlust. The power. The desperate wish for freedom from an existence out of my control. The release of life in blood from all those I took it from, to the release of my own life by Sebastian’s hand. It all felt so real and it’s not something I’ll ever be able to forget.

  Maybe remembering it in all its horrible detail is a good thing in some sick, twisted way, because it’ll keep me from ever becoming the monster I saw myself as. My future is still being written and I’ll be damned if I let it become what I dreamt. Nor will I let it be manipulated by other people’s fears of who they think I’ll become. However long it takes, I will free myself from all of it. The vampires who want me dead for whatever reason, the angels who are afraid I’ll become too powerful, the dark witches who… I don’t even know what they want, but they’re not going to get it either. None of them are. It’s my life and I will fight for it. No more suppression spells. No more memory wipes. No more hiding. If it’s a fight they want, it’s a fight they’re going to get.

  I push away from Sebastian and wipe the tears from my eyes. No more tears either.

  I spin in a circle, taking in my surroundings as I shove everything but the task at hand down. I can do this and I will do this because I have to. “We’re going to find a vampire at a seedy motel in the city?” I shrug my shoulders in consideration. “I guess it makes sense. This place seems like it’s of the don’t ask, don’t tell variety.”

  “Don’t let outside appearances fool you. Not everything is always as it see
ms.” The look he gives me makes me wonder if he’s partly referring to my emotional one eighty and not just the dump we’re standing in front of. “Follow me.” He heads toward the last room on the corner. I follow close behind, cursing my heart inching it’s way up my throat. At the door he reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a keycard. “It’s nicer on the inside.”

  “This is your motel room isn’t it?” I don’t know if I’m mad or relieved, or both.

  16

  “If we’re hunting down vampires, we’re going to need provisions.” He unlocks the door and swings it open. “After you.”

  I step inside; he turns on the lights. If he seriously thinks the inside is nicer looking than the outside, he needs glasses. The walls are papered with images of large hideous flowers that have faded into orangish yellow blobs. The carpet is made up of striped shades of browns, greens, and oranges, with a few dark stains of unknown origins added in, and the bedspread looks like mustard vomit. This is by far, the ugliest room I have ever seen, and possibly the saddest.

  “You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to, but why are you staying in motels? Where are your parents?”

  He clicks the door shut behind him. “My mom left when I was thirteen and my dad is a bastard who thinks everything is my fault.” It’s the most honest thing about himself he’s ever said, and I have absolutely no idea how to respond to it. “It’s no big deal,” he adds with a shrug. “I got over it a long time ago. Besides, motel rooms are pretty much what we chasers call home anyway since cases can take us all over the place.”

  “What about siblings?” I ask, remembering he had a sister. It’s one of the reasons younger me brought him back from the brink of death. I wonder what happened to her.

  “I had a sister once.” A deep sadness drenched in tinges of anger, ripple across his face. Without elaborating any further, he moves past me to the mini fridge situated underneath the TV stand. I want to ask him about her, but I get the feeling the topic is off limits. He pulls out a can of Mountain Dew, pops the tab, and downs it in a matter of seconds. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand as he crushes the can. “Want one?”

  “Sure.”

  While he’s busy getting me a beverage, I can’t help but notice how the room doesn’t look lived in at all. There’s nothing personal, except for maybe the laptop on the table. No clothes on the floor, nothing on the dresser top or on the TV stand. Nothing that would indicate someone is actually staying here. Maybe he’s just recently checked in? It is a different room than the one I woke up in after being attacked at club Night Life. Still, seeing the emptiness of the room makes my heart ache. I can’t imagine what it must be like to live the way he does. No attachments, no real family, always bouncing from place to place, following cases. It must be so lonely.

  The fizzy sound of the can opening pulls my attention back to Sebastian. He hands me the soda, then leans back against the TV stand, arms crossed over his chest. “Still determined to hunt down a vampire, or have you finally come to your senses and are ready for me to take you home?”

  I sit down on the edge of the bed, remember where I am, and quickly stand back up. He smirks; my face turns a shade of tomato.

  “I can’t go home.” I stare at the soda clutched in my hands, completely uncomfortable in my resolve. If he would have asked this question earlier I might have caved, but after the nightmare I had, I know I can’t back out now. “I’ve got to do something to get my life back. I feel like everything is spinning out of control and all I want to do is make things still again. If I confront it head on I can…” I trail off unsure of what it really is I’m hoping to accomplish. I’m just a girl with limited access to magical powers I didn’t even know I had, and the enemy is a horde of undead bloodsuckers thirsting for my death. What chance do I really stand against them? I sit back down on the bed no longer caring whether it’s appropriate.

  Sebastian sits down beside me, the side of his body pressing up against mine. He takes my hand, our arms resting on my leg. “If you’re really determined to do this, I’ll help you, if only to keep you from doing something stupid on your own. But first we have to go somewhere.”

  “Where?”

  “To the command center.”

  Small rocks and broken glass crunch beneath my Chucks, the sound loud in the otherwise silence of the area. The warehouse Sebastian leads me to is the last in a long line of forgotten structures left to waste away in a part of the city long abandoned. Situated the furthest away, overgrown weeds have taken over most of the premises with the exception of a broken strip of sidewalk leading up to the building. The soles of my shoes slap against the pavement creating an eerie echo.

  Dingy red bricks covered in years of grime and ivy growth make up the single story structure, most of its arched windows, busted and covered with mildew stained wooden planks. It looks condemned and ominous with the backdrop of nightfall and the lights of the city in the distance, casting shadows all around it. A large transformer near the corner hums with electricity, indicating it at least has power.

  “This is your command center?” A cold chill creeps up my back, sending a shiver throughout my body. Goose bumps rise along my arms. It looks like a place straight out of a horror movie, full of ghosts tormented by a tragic past who are waiting to take out their grievances at having been trapped here on unsuspecting idiots stupid enough to go inside.

  “It’s nicer on the inside,” Sebastian says with a sly grin. A teasing glint sparkles within his eyes.

  “Right. Nicer on the inside. Just like your motel room,” I say, ignoring the uneasy feeling creeping into my bones. It’s a good thing I trust Sebastian, or I’d be running away right about now. Couldn’t he have brought me here in broad daylight instead of nightfall when everything is covered in darkness and a lot scarier than it actually is?

  Sebastian chuckles as he comes to a stop outside a set of towering blue doors. Like the rest of the building they’ve spent years, maybe even decades, in neglect. Made up of nothing but old wood and chipped paint, it barely looks sturdy enough to remain on its hinges. A series of painted over locks line up along the center edge just above a huge rusted handle. As Sebastian reaches for it a string of softly glowing blue shapes take form. He closes his eyes. “Transiet tantum ii qui mundo sunt corde.” The shapes fade out the moment his hand makes contact, and with a twist of his wrist, the door swings open. A hint of a relieved smile graces his mouth. His shoulders relax with the release of a soft sigh passing through his lips as he pushes the door open. It’s almost as if he were afraid it wouldn’t have opened.

  “What did you say?” I ask.

  “Only the pure of heart shall pass.” He steps inside the dimly lit space of the doorway, holding out his hand.

  I stay where I am, leaving his outstretched hand hanging between us. “What happens if you don’t have a pure heart?”

  “Then you won’t be granted entry.” He wiggles his fingers. “Don’t be afraid.”

  “You were,” I say out loud, catching him off guard.

  He clenches his jaw. The blue of his eyes darken a shade. “I have my reasons.”

  “So do I.” I may be determined to not become what I was in my dream, but it doesn’t mean the fear of it isn’t still buried deep inside. What if my heart isn’t as pure as he thinks it is and going through this door proves it? I don’t know if I’m ready to find that out. Holding onto not knowing is sort of comforting. It at least allows room for hope whereas walking through the door will give me a definitive answer.

  He grabs me by the wrist and pulls me inside so fast I have no time to react until I’m already past the threshold. “See. No reason to be afraid.”

  I slam both hands into the center of his chest, knocking him back several steps. “What the hell, Sebastian. You had no right to do that. What if my heart wasn’t pure? You could have… have… I don’t know. Set off whatever happens when someone’s denied entry.”

  “I already told you, Indi, you’re the pure
st person I’ve ever met. There was never a cause for worry with you.”

  I cross my arms over my chest. “But there was for you?”

  “Someday there might be.” He closes the door, igniting a ring of blue symbols. They trail around the edges then disappear.

  “What do you mean ‘someday there might be’?”

  “Nothing. Forget I said anything.” He walks off.

  I clench my hands into fists. “No. You pulled me through the door without any considerations for my worries why should I have any considerations for yours?”

  He turns around and stalks back, invading my personal space. He’s so close I can see the spot of brown in his iris, surrounded by a narrowing eye. Clearly, I’ve hit a nerve. His jaw ticks. “I said forget it, Indi. We all have things under the surface. This is mine, and it has nothing to do with you, so drop it.” Voice low, every word comes out controlled and loaded, his tone screaming back off.

  The flicker of pain that ripples across his face beneath the anger makes me waver. Besides, he’s right. We do all have our things. I have mine, and he has his and it’s nobody’s business but our own unless we decide to share, which clearly neither of us wants to do. “Whatever.” I push past him and head further into the building.

  The inside isn’t much better looking than the outside. I’m starting to think Sebastian doesn’t understand the meaning of the words it’s nicer on the inside. Crunchy leaves, dirt, and crumbling pieces of the building cover the floors. There’s a giant hole in the roof with a pile of debris directly below it, and a tree growing in the corner off to the side. Every other crack in the foundation sprouts weeds and grass, as though nature were trying to claim the building as its own.

  The only bright spot in the place is the amazingly artistic graffiti decorating the walls. It’s beautiful and I find myself staring at someone’s rendition of an angel, descending from the heavens. I wonder if this is what my dad looks like? The traditional views we have of angels with their white wings and halos, or being an angel of death is he more inclined to be dressed in a hooded black robe with a scythe like the Grim Reaper? Maybe both views are wrong and he looks like none of those things. Maybe he just looks like an average man. I catch a reflection of myself in a broken piece of glass on the ground. Maybe he looks like me. If I were to pass him on the street would we recognize each other?