I squirm and struggle, but this thing is way too strong for me. My mind races with all sorts of nightmares from being trapped in a digestive sac to having acid sprayed on me while I’m tied up in vines.
Ben’s knife severs the root holding my left leg.
A shriek like six inhuman voices screaming all at once radiates from the creature’s ‘head.’ A mass of vines lash out at Ben, whipping more than grabbing. He guards his face with his shoulders and continues cutting at the root around my right ankle. A low-lying creeper vine slithers up beside him.
The tendril squeezing my neck prevents me from shouting a warning.
It grabs him, pinning his legs together at the shins, then drags him off his feet, hurling him sideways. He hits the ground with a muddy splat and rolls out of sight into the thick underbrush.
I reach up, trying to get a grip on the bundle of vines around my middle. Maybe this thing’s like a python and it suffocates its prey to death. Sorry pal, you’re going to be waiting a while for me to run out of air. Cody assaults it with a barrage of thrown rocks while dodging around trees to avoid reaching vines. The stones don’t bother it at all.
Ben bursts out of the underbrush, charging at me. It grabs him again before he can run in close enough to cut anything, but he resists being thrown aside long enough to collapse the knife and toss it to me. I manage a clumsy catch in both hands while kicking my left leg at another vine trying to grab me. The creature hurls Ben into the weeds again.
It raises me up higher, like it’s trying to hold food away from an annoying dog nipping at its legs. Cody slashes at it a few times with his knife. He can’t reach me, so he slices and chops at random vines. I open the knife and start sawing at the bundle around my chest. It’s a really damn good thing I don’t need air. A vine whips out and wraps Cody’s chest, picking him into the air, swinging him around once, and chucking him like a catapult stone out of sight into the woods.
Again, Ben comes charging out of the shrubs and hurls himself at the creature. He futilely pulls at the vines holding me. This time, the creature grabs him with roots around the chest and throat. His face goes purple-red in seconds. Pure panic radiates from his eyes as he loses the ability to breathe from a root squeezing around his neck.
I slice two vines around my midsection, loosening its hold. The bundle unfurls, allowing me to slip down. Unfortunately, I wind up hanging by the root around my neck and right ankle, while severed vines wave around above me, spewing sap like out of control hoses.
Oh, this is uncomfortable.
I cling to the root crushing my throat and hack at it with the knife. Somewhere above and to my left, Ben gurgles.
Cody runs out into view holding a burning branch up over his head. With a war cry, he charges at the creature and stabs his improvised torch into the mass of vegetation. The creature shrieks and hurls me to the ground. I land on my side and grab my throat, coughing. Cody raises his hands like he’s pointing a gun at it, and a sudden burst of flames spreads inside the creature. Tendrils waving, it rushes off into the forest, leaving a trail of smoke.
“Hah!” shouts Cody. “Burn, bitch!”
Ben moans and drags himself out of the bushes.
“Ow,” I deadpan, not bothering to get up. I think I’ll just sit here and pluck inch-long thorns out of my neck.
“You okay?” asks Ben.
I take a deep breath, let it out, and sigh again. “Yeah. Just scared. I figured woodland survival would be a challenge, but didn’t expect the forest would literally try to kill us.”
Cody laughs and drags my backpack over to me.
Ben helps me up. “Seriously. You okay?”
“Yeah.” I brush leaf bits off my sweatshirt, then pull my backpack on. “We’re off course. I can’t fly to check the map yet, so let’s just keep going in the right direction.”
“What if that thing comes back?” asks Ben.
“It won’t.” Cody smiles. “And if it does, we burn it again.”
“How’d you start a fire?” I ask. “Rubbing two sticks together or something? Everything’s soaked from the rain.”
He pats a side pouch on his backpack. “Matches… and lighter fluid.”
24
The Sanguine Grove
Once the sun finally sets, I launch myself up past the tree canopy for an aerial view of our surroundings.
We haven’t veered too much off course. Nothing a slight adjustment won’t fix. After that damn root creature, I’m even more tempted to tell the boys to wait here and just fly to the end. But… it would be easy to lose them in the thick forest. I could spend more time circling around hunting for them than it would take us to simply walk there and back. Not like the boys have flare guns.
Damn.
I snag four apples, two for now, two for the morning, on my way down.
“I’m so damn sick of apples,” says Ben.
Cody shrugs. “You never really liked them. And in here, we don’t have much choice.”
“Yeah. I hate always eating the same thing over and over.” Ben bites his apple contemptuously.
They glance at me.
“Never really thought about it like that,” said Ben. “Sorry. That’s gotta suck.”
Cody groans and throws a piece of apple at him. “That was horrible.”
“What?” Ben blinks. “Oh. Hah. Yeah.”
“It’s not too bad. I can still eat normal food for the taste, and blood has different flavors to me.”
“How’s that work?” asks Cody. “Different flavors?”
As we walk, I ramble about how my perception of the person I bite makes me think the blood tastes like different things.
“What did we taste like?” asks Ben.
“French fries and pizza.”
“Dude. Mom said you ate so much pizza you were going to turn into one.” Cody chuckles.
“So does it count as cannibalism for me to eat pizza now?” Ben scratches his head.
“Guys, he doesn’t actually taste like that. It’s all in my head.”
We walk for hours. The boys ask me random questions about being a vampire, and mostly I’m honest with them. Other than the sun problem, my particular type of vampirism isn’t too much different from normal life. I stray into the topic of being eighteen forever and watching my family and friends grow old around me. Cody thinks it’s awesome I won’t get old, though Ben inherits my somber mood at the idea I’ll eventually be alone. I guess I could adopt new people at some point. People who have cats or dogs are often emotionally destroyed when the pet dies, but they almost always get another one knowing what’ll happen again.
I’m not sure if I’ll reveal myself to any nieces or nephews, assuming any of my siblings have kids. Ugh. That’s so bizarre to think about now. Would they tell their spouses that I’m the younger sister if we ever met? By the time (if) any of my siblings marry, they’ll look older than I do.
Bah. Forget it. I’m eighteen for real. I need to start acting like it. Anything further away than an hour in the future isn’t worth thinking about.
The boys change topics and start discussing things from their hometown: weird neighbors, school friends, teachers, and so on. I get the feeling they’re not exactly in the ‘popular crowd.’ Not that I’m one to talk. Since I didn’t fit neatly into any predefined social clique, I fell through the cracks and became part of the scenery. Whenever anyone took a picture of the jocks, the goths, or the geeks, I’d be one of the blurry figures walking by in the background no one really noticed. At least until Scott killed me. Then people realized I’d been there for four years. You know I still have people occasionally posting memorial stuff on my Facebook wall, like ‘sorry you died, person I never even knew existed.’
I’m so focused on navigating and trying not to worry about everything that might happen over the next sixty years that a warning tingle catches me off guard.
“Crap,” I say, looking up. “The sun’s coming.”
“There’s nothing here but trees,”
says Cody.
“Hang on.” I fly up over the treetops, cringing at the bluing in the sky to the north. A quick scan of our surroundings reveals nothing even close to shelter. Wait. North? The sun’s coming up in the north? Crap. We really are somewhere else. I drop back to the ground and wrap my arms around myself. Dammit. I should’ve done this myself. Should’ve flown. “Shit, you guys. There’s nowhere to go.”
Ben pulls off his jacket. “Worked once.”
“What are the odds we’ll find another cabin?” asks Cody. A sudden look of inspiration comes over him and he shrugs off his backpack. “Idea.”
“I don’t think I’m going to fit in the backpack,” I mutter. “And the tent material is too thin to block sunlight.”
Cody rummages and pulls out a collapsible shovel. “Not what I’m thinking. Sunlight can’t penetrate dirt.”
My mouth hangs open. “Are you seriously suggesting burying me? That’s like total nightmare fuel.”
“More than roasting in the sunlight?” asks Cody.
I fidget.
“And you technically are dead. Sorry.” He scratches his head.
“I dunno, man,” says Ben.
“Look… we just dig out a shallow hole. She lies down in it, we cover her with one of the tents and some dirt. Not deep enough that she can’t sit up and get out herself. I’m not saying we bury her way down.”
I chuckle. “You couldn’t dig a proper grave in the time we have with that little thing anyway.”
“Maybe you should do it?” asks Cody. “You’re super strong and don’t get tired.”
“Dude.” Ben stares at him. “You can’t ask her to dig her own grave. That’s like totally dark.”
“It’s not a grave. It’s a shelter. Graves are one-way trips. This is temporary.” I walk over to the trunk of a thick tree, hoping the branches will add some protection from the light. “Right here works.”
Between my claws and Cody’s shovel, we hollow out a roughly one-foot-deep pit just big enough for me to lay down in. This is so messed up. The boys arrange one of the bright orange tents over me like a blanket, then start tossing dirt on top of it.
“Guys, watch for smoke, okay? If I start roasting, please do something.”
“Sure. We got’cha covered,” says Ben.
“Dude.” Cody laughs. “Wrong.”
I might’ve been scared when that plant thing chased me, but that really has nothing on being buried alive. Holy shit this is terrifying. I can’t imagine being buried ‘for real’ like six feet down, or shut inside a coffin. The more dirt that lands on top of me, the closer I get to a panic attack—but paradoxically, the less anxious I am about the sun.
“Dude, what’s that for?” asks Cody. “Dead leaves aren’t going to help.”
“Camouflage,” says Ben.
“From what? There are no people here.”
“Umm. Whatever.”
I imagine the ground is damp and cold. Well, I don’t have to imagine the damp part. I’m fully aware of that. One thing I learned from camping as a kid was to avoid sleeping in direct contact with the earth since it sucks heat out of you. What I’m doing now is the exact opposite of that wisdom. To distract myself from the sensation of being buried, I picture Ashley’s bedroom and all the unicorns.
No, I’m safe at home in bed. Not lying in a shallow grave in some alternate dimension.
A leaden sensation rolls over me—and disappears as fast as it came on.
Okay, weird.
Did I sleep and wake up?
“Guys?” I ask.
No answer.
Damn. Do I risk moving and potentially incinerating myself? This stirs up a very important yet esoteric question in my mind. Would an Innocent vampire’s habit of waking up during the day continue whilst said Innocent lay in a shallow grave where a small amount of motion would trigger imminent foomage? I really don’t like the idea of being stuck awake and buried not-quite-alive with nowhere to go until the sun sets. I even have to keep my head rotated to the side or the tent mashes my nose in.
“Guys?” I yell.
“Yo?” asks a bleary Cody.
“Did I sleep?”
“How should I know? You’re underground.”
I growl. “No, dork. I mean… is it still only a few minutes after you covered me, or have hours passed?”
“Oh.” He coughs and yawns. “Hours passed. Yeah you probably fell asleep and woke up.”
“How is it out there?”
“Still gloomy.”
“Gonna test a finger. Help me out if I catch fire?”
Footsteps crunch closer to my head. “Yeah. No problem.” Cody yawns again.
I work a hand out from under the tent and poke one finger into the air. No pain, so I sit up. Air is awesome even though I don’t need it. My stomach grumbles. I need blood from this day-trekking, but I can’t risk taking any more from the boys. They’re already down a little over a pint each.
“Guys, I’m getting a little hungry again but I can’t feed from you. Our trip back might need to take longer. I gotta save energy, so I should avoid daylight as much as possible. It takes a lot out of me to tolerate sunlight.”
Cody picks up the shovel again. “Okay.”
“Not the grave…” I hold up a hand. “I’ll risk it now, but if we find a shelter, I’m gonna go for it.”
“Okay.”
Ben yawns and forces himself up.
I stand and dust myself off before folding the tent up and stuffing it in the backpack.
They choke down apples while walking, and drink from the canteens they brought.
“Why were you about to risk stream water when you have water already?” I ask.
“Rationing,” says Cody, like it’s the most obvious thing. “It doesn’t make sense to use up limited supplies when there’s a ready source available.”
“Even if it’ll make you sick?”
“We’re not on earth anymore. This place might not even have microbes.” Ben tilts the canteen back, gulping down several mouthfuls.
“It’s got trees, rabbits, plants… it has to have microbes,” I say.
“Well, it definitely does now.” Cody wags his eyebrows.
Ugh. Boys and poop humor. I don’t want to know what they used for TP. Another check mark in the ‘it’s awesome to be a vampire’ column for me. I never have to worry about an embarrassing bathroom situation cropping up while stranded in a parallel dimension again.
Less than an hour after we resume walking, we find a huge burrow big enough to walk into that appears to be the work of a large animal. A short tunnel leads into a subterranean chamber with a scattering of leaves and twigs on the ground. It’s fortunately empty, and provides a welcome break from resisting the sun.
The boys take the opportunity to sleep some more, spending a few minutes insincerely complaining about their day-night cycle going to hell. I hate wasting time like this, but nothing burns my energy faster than resisting sunlight. With zero sun exposure and no supernatural ass kickings, I can go about a month on a single feeding. Even a short period of tolerating sunlight makes me hungry every day.
To avoid boredom, I doze off as well. I can sleep during the day if I want to, and manage to catch a few hours’ worth.
Once the sun sets, we resume our trip after a quick flight to compare surroundings to the map. I think we’re going to find this grove pretty soon based on where I think we are. Again with the compass out, I take the lead and we walk onward. This part of the forest has slightly different trees, not as tall, with twisty trunks and no apples. The boys’ stomachs protest in earnest, though they don’t say anything.
A few hours after we leave the burrow, a patch of glowing pale blue light becomes visible in the distance. Hoping that’s what we’re here for, I alter course slightly to the left. We soon approach a ring of dark blue leaves and blood-red vines with four-inch thorns woven together into a giant wreath. The top is as tall as the troll, and it’s way too thick to even consider trying to
climb through it.
I pop up off the ground to check it out from the air. It’s not a ring, more of a C. A gap about a third the way around to the right opens to the clearing in the center. The same shiny bright-red thorny vines connect the outer wreath to a big flowering shrub in the middle, like spokes to a wheel, only they’re as thick as pipes. An interconnected ‘cage’ of vines forms a dome over the center. I could probably force my way in, but I’d tear myself to bits on the thorns.
Strong cyan light glows from multiple flowers on the central plant. They kinda resemble lilies. Two long petals stretch downward and to either side while a shorter one extends upward. The petals appear to be made out of pure energy, glowing an iridescent moon-blue at the edges with a strip of dark non-glowing violet down the middle. The inner bits are also deep purple.
“That’s it!” I land between the brothers. “We’re almost done. Just gotta pick one and head back.”
They follow me around to the opening. The overhead dome forms a ceiling over the gap in the outer wreath—which is at least twelve feet thick—making it feel like a corridor. Smaller pink and white flours nest here and there in the indigo leaves, like babies hiding behind the thorns lest something evil grab them. Dark crimson grass covers the clearing inside between the giant red vine ‘spokes.’ Thorns as big as daggers jut out along the length, progressively longer toward the main plant in the middle. Something tells me this entire thing is one gigantic plant.
As soon as I pass the inner edge of the wreath, I become aware of a pleasant floral smell that, in defiance of all logic, isn’t noticeable outside the middle area. A sense of eeriness pervades the place, heightening my already strong urge to go the hell home.
I approach the central bush, eyeing one of the glowing flowers.
“Umm,” says Cody.
Two soft thumps come from behind me.
I pause and look back.
The boys lay flat on their faces, out cold.
The Last Family Road Trip (Vampire Innocent Book 4) Page 18
