by Zoe Winters
“Are you over your snit, Syd?” Anthony asked from the couch, pausing the movie they’d been watching. How could they watch the same things over and over? How could they live this way? In hiding, like so many rats. She wondered if they’d have to hide and stay in this one place if not for her. Probably not. They acted like old married people. Maybe in a way they were, but this seemed far removed from her dad’s glory days.
“Hey baby,” her mother said. “Do you feel better now that you’ve fed?”
“I don’t want to talk about that with you, mom.” Inappropriate.
“Sorry,” Charlee said, blushing.
And now Sydney felt bad for making her mom feel bad. But she was about to make both of them feel bad if she managed the nerve to leave. She wanted to scream at the unfairness of it. Why had they let her live? Why hadn’t they killed her at birth? This was no way for any of them to live. In the long run, they’d thank her for giving them their lives back.
Anthony had that look again. “He hasn’t hurt you has he? I will end him if he tries.” This had been his favorite conversation for the past decade.
Sydney rolled her eyes. Surely her father didn’t think she was some unspoiled virgin. How old was he again? Nearly five hundred. Too old for such goofy logic.
“No, dad. He hasn’t hurt me.”
“Oh stop it, Anthony. Jacob is a nice man. He cares about her.”
Anthony snorted. “He better watch how much he cares if he doesn’t want his head removed from his body.”
“Nice visual,” Charlee said, smacking him in the arm then snuggling into him.
Her parents were so sickeningly sweet together.
“I’m going up to the roof.”
Anthony sat straighter, alert. “Do you need me to send someone up there with you?”
“No, Dad! The whole building is warded, even the roof. I’ll be fine up there.” It was the only fresh air she ever got. The very idea that he was so protective that he didn’t even like her on the roof alone had become too much.
“Sometimes you behave like such a child,” he said.
“Oh, gee, I wonder why? Could it be that I’ve never been able to develop any autonomy because God forbid I get into any danger. You’re such a helicopter parent.”
Anthony’s eyes narrowed. “Where did you learn that phrase?”
“Old sites on the Internet.” Cole, The werewolf pack alpha had wired them up for Internet and electricity using the existing infrastructure and bypassing the need to pay many years ago when he and the king had been on tentative speaking terms still. Most of the hub cities used a more advanced but similar technology, but the net as it had been had become a digital wasteland to match the abandoned physical landscape.
Cole still popped by and checked things out and made sure her connection was working when her father was away.
“You don’t talk about yourself to anyone on there… what you are? Who you are?”
“Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous.”
Her father was too paranoid.
Sydney disengaged from her parents and went to the roof. The stars were bright overhead. Not a cloud in the sky. It was breezy out, spring just starting to turn into the earliest sigh of summer.
The roof had lots of tables and an outdoor kitchen. Sometimes when it was nice they ate out there—when her father wasn’t in super paranoid mode. On one end of the large roof was an Olympic-sized swimming pool. She’d had to look up Olympic online. The games no longer took place among the humans.
Sydney barely recalled the penthouse in the main part of town. It also had a pool on the roof. The pool here had been drained. It was too much upkeep in a world where resources were spotty at best. There were lounging chairs and beach towels where her mother and a few of the other humans at the compound liked to lie out in the sun during the day. Her mom got up a few hours before her dad so she could get some sunshine. Sydney envied her the warmth of the sun on her skin and how great that must feel to a human.
On the other end of the roof was a greenhouse hydroponic rooftop garden filled with vegetables. In Cary Town there were many months of cold weather. The greenhouse extended the growing season.
Sydney stood at the edge of the roof, wondering if she could navigate the jump. She’d never jumped that far, but it would be the easiest way out of here.
“Hey Syd!” Reynard called out from the ground. He was one of Anthony’s loyal vampires. He’d been with them since before she was born. He had dark hair and thick eyebrows. With the deer carcass that was draped over his shoulders, he looked even more like a caveman than he normally did.
The vampires hunted and grew vegetables to feed their humans. Once things turned bad and the humans were herded into the cities, the vampires had kidnapped human mates when they could find one that had been banished to fend for themselves. It was how the magic users punished the common humans for crimes. They didn’t bother with prisons. They simply tossed those who wouldn’t play by their rules out to the monsters. No trial. No appeal.
Jacob was the only human boy she’d grown up with who she hadn’t accidentally killed over the years, or who hadn’t escaped and run away. If those boys could run away, so could she. Though she imagined they hadn’t fared any better in the wild than she would.
Sydney went back to her room to grab her bag, the guilt of abandoning her parents clawing at her with each step. She waited until she heard everyone upstairs—except Elise and Jacob. As she passed Elise’s room, the door opened.
“Where are you going?” Jacob asked.
Dammit.
“Nowhere,” she said.
“Nowhere requires luggage?” He stepped out into the hallway, closing the door behind him. Elise was still in there, wrapped in a post-coital feeding glow.
“I’m leaving. I told you I was leaving. I can’t stay here anymore. Just give me a head start, a few hours before you discover it and tell my father. I know you’ll tell him.”
Jacob stopped her. “I’ll come with you. You need someone to look out for you. It’s not safe out there.”
“And what could you do to protect me? Besides, the claim Elise has on you would lead her and my father right to me. This isn’t the act of a rebellious teenager. It’s the act of a desperate woman. I have to be free. I don’t care if I die out there. I can’t stand another minute here. Please understand.”
“I understand I’m coming with you,” Jacob persisted.
“Didn’t you just hear me about Elise? You can’t…”
“What about Elise?” The vampiress opened the door, still nude, like there had been any question of what she’d been doing while feeding. Her face held smugness as if Sydney would be jealous. What did she have to be jealous of? All she felt with regards to Jacob was guilt that she was using him to scratch the itches there was no one else around to scratch and feeding off him like he was some blood slave.
Faster than any human should be able to move, Jacob bent, removed a wooden stake from his boot, and plunged it into Elise’s heart. His hand moved swiftly to his mate’s mouth to cover the sound of her scream, and then she began to melt away.
Sydney’s shock was quickly followed by a dark satisfaction that the bitch was gone, followed by a pang of guilt at the previous unsolicited feeling.
Jacob collapsed with the melting vampire, and for a moment, Sydney thought that the link between them, rather than freeing him and making him mortal again, had killed him as well. But he wasn’t dead. Instead, he sobbed, clutching at the quickly decomposing vampire.
“Jacob, be quiet! They’re going to hear and come down here!” While the walls were reinforced steel and the rooms and hallway were said to be soundproof, Jacob was having a fit over Elise, and vampire hearing was impressively good. Soundproof by human standards might not be exactly the same as soundproof by vampire standards.
He got himself together, and then Elise was nothing but bone and ash. Sydney ran down the hall to a supply closet and returned with a broom. But Jacob was too much of an emotional w
reck to do anything, so Sydney swept Elise’s remains under the bed. It wouldn’t be long until someone needed her for something or discovered her missing.
“I thought you didn’t love her?” Sydney said.
There was hope in his eyes as if her question had been fueled by jealousy instead of mere curiosity.
“I don’t. But that link… it does something to you. I don’t think these are my real feelings. They aren’t very deep. They just scratch the surface.”
If this display was just scratching the surface of Jacob’s feelings, there might be issues there. Because it seemed pretty intense and epic to Sydney.
Jacob wiped his face with the back of his sleeve. “I’m fine now. There’s nothing anymore. It was just the claim breaking.”
She was skeptical, but his face seemed to have cleared of the mild hypnotism. Suddenly an awful thought occurred to her. “Oh God, do you think my mom doesn’t love my dad? That it’s just the claim?”
Jacob touched her arm. “No, Syd. It’s not like that, I promise. I never wanted to be around Elise when she was alive. I didn’t even like her. It was just the effect of the bond breaking. Your parents aren’t like that. Charlee loves him. The claim can’t create those feelings she has all the time, all it can do is create that brief surge of loss when the claim breaks. It’s not even grief. Grief is deeper. It was just this brief panic and… I don’t know… loss for the sake of loss. But I’m fine now. If it was your mom, trust me, she would not be fine in five minutes.”
Sydney wasn’t sure if Jacob just said it to make her feel better about what could be her mother’s unremitting Stockholm syndrome. But it was true that Jacob hadn’t ever followed Elise around like a lost puppy. He avoided her whenever he could, preferring to spend his time with Sydney, unlike her parents who were nearly inseparable. And just a bit icky with their public affection.
“Let’s go,” Jacob said, having turned an emotional one-eighty in the course of a few minutes.
“You aren’t coming with me. You’re too vulnerable now.”
“You need someone to watch out for you and feed you.”
Sydney shook her head and retreated several steps. “No. I might kill you. I don’t have the greatest track record with that. Now that Elise is gone, you can die. I can’t… I can’t.”
“You won’t kill me, Syd. I have faith in you. It’ll be fine.”
But Sydney knew it wouldn’t be fine. She might be able to control herself, but even so, she couldn’t feed from him every day without him growing weak and sick. And there might not be enough out there for him to eat to help him stay strong.
“I’m eating wildlife.” She pushed past him.
“I’m still coming with you,” he said. “I’m dead anyway if I stay. You know the king will get into my mind. He’ll kill me for letting you go.”
Jacob could easily stop her. He might be only human, but he was strong for a human, and Sydney was… well Sydney. Thankfully Jacob’s loyalty was with her, not her dad. Even so, she knew she had no choice but to bring him. No matter how loyal he was to her, Anthony would get inside his mind the moment they realized she was gone.
She sighed. “Fine.”
He grinned. “Awesome. Let me just pack a bag real quick.”
Sydney waited in the hall while Jacob packed. She didn’t want to stand in Elise’s room thinking about how he’d just killed a vampire without hesitation. Sure, they both had hated the bitch, but Sydney had never been faced before with the obvious moral gray Jacob had developed in all his time with vampires. Surely he must harbor some disturbing impulse toward revenge for being stolen from his family. And here he was, running off into the wilderness with the king’s daughter.
Could she trust him? Maybe she should drain him the first chance she got, for her own safety.
A few minutes later he joined her, an excited, happy look on his face like they were going on a fun road trip instead of running into God only knew what was out there. “Ready?” he said.
“Yeah. No, wait.” She went back to her room and took a sheet of paper and pen from her desk. She stood there, trying to come up with something that didn’t sound stupid. This would kill her parents, but she was a fucking adult! Wasn’t it normal for adults to move away from their parents and start their own lives?
If the old movies she’d had to sit through repeatedly were any indication, it was normal.
After a few more minutes thought she scrawled what could possibly be the lamest running away letter ever penned:
Dear Mom and Dad,
I’m sorry I left. I know you’ll try to come after me. Don’t. Please just let me go. I can’t be a locked-up princess anymore. What kind of life is that for me? I don’t know how you guys stand it, but some day you’ll want to be free, too. And in some small way, now you are.
Love, Syd
Sydney felt the glow come to her eyes and her fangs pop out as she growled staring at the letter. She sounded like she was fifteen. She had to get out of here before she regressed back to toddler. She folded the paper and left it on the desk and followed Jacob down the hall. The blue LED lights clicked on as they approached and clicked off as they receded.
They climbed the steep stairs and went down a couple of other hallways. She heard her mother laughing at something stupid her father said and almost lost her nerve. But her life might be measured in centuries, and eternity here wasn’t an option.
“Syd, you okay?” Jacob whispered.
“Fine. Let’s go.”
Jacob led her out a back door on the main level, away from the sounds of the deer being dressed and prepared in the large kitchen. A lot of that meat would be stored for winter.
The two of them stood outside under the bright moon with the mild near-summer breeze blowing over them. Thousands of stars were visible, all twinkling and unassuming. This was the same view she’d had on the roof more or less. But down here, outside the protection of the compound, it felt different. More wild. More free.
With each step they took farther from the big metal building, Sydney’s guilt grew. She’d get Jacob killed, and herself as well. But she kept walking, and he kept walking.
“I know where there’s a car. We can travel more safely that way than on foot,” Jacob said.
Sydney had never ridden in a car—that she could remember, anyway. She was sure at some point in her babyhood before the world had changed that she must have, but it was too long ago.
“What will we do when the sun rises?”
“We’ll find a place. There are a lot of abandoned houses now from when the people moved into the cities. Some of them have basements. We’ll be fine. We just need to get on the road.”
“Jacob, why are you helping me?” He seemed too eager. What if he was leading her to danger? Could she trust him when she fell dead for the day unprotected? He’d put the stake back into his boot after killing Elise, as if he might need it later. For her?
“You know how I feel about you,” he said. “You know I’d do anything for you.”
His hand was warm in hers as he took it and led her off to the car that would take them far from everything that had ever been safe.
Chapter Two
Noah paced in the glass magic-reinforced cage. It was a hundred square feet, not nearly enough room for a wolf. The door slid open and raw meat was shoved in. He felt the glow come to his eyes, and he shifted. Raw meat was better in wolf form.
He shouldn’t shift. Any time he did, they just took more blood to use in their magic. The meat was drugged to sedate him so he wouldn’t struggle or hurt them when they brought out the needle. But sometimes oblivion was a good thing. It allowed him to dream about the good times when he was a pup.
He ripped into the meat, barely tasting the drugs. Whatever it was, it didn’t seem to have long term effects on his strength or health. Maybe it wasn’t a drug. Maybe it was a potion. It had an herbal flavor.
When the plate was clean, Noah drifted to the corner, the lethargy overtaking him. And he d
id dream.
He was seven or eight, right before he’d been taken. He’d been born in his fur and had only had a human form for about three years by that point. He still felt gangly and awkward as a human. It felt unnatural after spending so long living on four legs. It was as if the wolf was him and the human was what he shapeshifted into. Instead of the reverse.
He played under the sun with his den mates. The war was going on. It had been going on forever. But the hive and the surrounding forests and fields had been well-protected by a witch called Tam and a sorcerer named Dayne, along with a few others of their kind.
They were the only magical beings that reminded Noah that not all the magic users were bad. They weren’t all on the human side in the war.
Noah laid in the sun stretching his arms way out so he could be more tan like his dad. “Hey Mom, where’s Sydney? Why can’t she ever come out and play with me?” He didn’t understand why Sydney didn’t go in the sun like he did. The sun was great.
“She can’t, honey,” Jane said. “She has an allergy. You can see her when the sun goes down.”
“Great!” He ran to the stream to watch his den mates to see if they could catch a fish right out of the water with fangs and paws.
Syd was his best friend. He was going to protect her and take care of her forever.
His dad had seemed skeptical of that but wouldn’t tell him why except that, “The king would never allow it.”
Well, he wasn’t Noah’s king, so screw that. Sydney was too awesome to have that big angry vampire for a dad, anyway.
A black cat came out of nowhere and pounced on him, then ran back into the woods. Aunt Greta. One of these days he or one of the others might accidentally hurt her. But the werecat was fast! So maybe not. His dad chuckled from under a nearby tree.
Moments later, Greta emerged from the forest in some jeans and a T-shirt. She had clothes stashed in the woods all over the place. None of the wolves cared about being naked, but Aunt Greta was different. His mom called her reserved.
