The Blood Born Tales (Book 1): Blood Collector

by T. C. Elofson

  “Don’t!” he yelled at Jack. “Pull your hand out very slowly.”

  Jack then pulled out a clear glass bottle of water. He held it very still.

  “It’s just water, Kenny,” he stated. “She’s a vampire.”

  “What?” Kenny asked with an unbelieving tone.

  Then Jack smashed the glass bottle over the woman’s face and she screamed as the water ate her flesh like acid. A cloud of steam sizzled off of her. She contorted and stiffened on the ground. Kenny lowered his weapon and watched with amazement as the water burnt her flesh down to the bone. Within minutes, a skinless skeleton sat crumpled at his feet, curled up as if it slept peacefully on the dirty, wet floor of the alley.

  Kenny knelt down to her. Just as he touched the barrel of his gun to the woman’s skull, her head fell apart in ashy clumps and blew away in the wind. His mouth gaped open, the words lost, his hands shaking, his body unable to move.

  “You have to listen to me now, Kenny.”

  The words hit him from above and felt heavy and painful. His world was coming apart.

  “Hands! Jack, give me your weapon now. Slowly,” Kenny demanded, his gun pointed again at Agent Jack Mitchell. He watched as Jack pulled out a Heckler & Koch 9-mm handgun with two fingers and handed it over.

  “All right, Jack. Move.”

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  Chapter 44

  5:00 p.m., November 25

  A frigid wind wreaked havoc with the dark shapes of trees and in the limited light of the rising moon, the terrain looked foreign and menacing. Creatures made their way out of the night to the hiding place of The Origin of Blood. Alastar knew the poorly marked rural route from the house. His perfect vampire eyes could see the path with little effort. He knew what he had to do. It had been made quite clear to him. The decision had been made.

  An hour ago, after the sun had given into the night, The Origin of Blood was called to order. The High Priest stood over The Origin, his arms held out, his head back, his words effortless and clear. The Origin was speaking through him.

  As Alastar looked at his face, at his strong arms and hands, every contour, line, and vein was familiar and wonderful to him. Alastar’s heart ached with emotion. He hated and loved him at the same time. Cerci had made him who he was, not The Origin. Alastar was not allowed to go through the ceremony though. He had not been called by The Origin. He had not been given that honor.

  Cerci had made Alastar out of weakness when Cerci was a new vampire 2,209 years ago. Alastar had never been allowed into the order completely. He was merely a hunter, a collector for the order. And on this night he had been sent off for one purpose: to hunt and kill Tim Anderson.

  Alastar was nothing more than a killer to The Family. His pain was a veil he could almost see through. But Alastar was beginning to feel the hope—and the fear—that Fabiana’s actions might truly bring down all that they had created. It was unclear to him how he really felt about that. He would not let himself think upon it, however, for every waking thought he had was read by those around him. And that was his nightmare. He was simply doing what The Origin wished him to do.

  He took off running as he cleared the trees and everything was quiet except the wind and rain that gushed past his face. Alastar moved with amazing speed down a lonely street, stoplights blurring past him in glowing streams. He could hear the distant barking of a dog. Then it was gone, left far behind him.

  His vampire senses were very keen and sharp that evening. He could smell his victim from miles away. Then he was downtown and his mind was calling out to all blood drinkers. Alastar could see everything about this worthless human.

  Alastar knew that Tim Anderson did not wish to die—he simply wanted the truth no matter what the price was. Tim walked the streets of the most dangerous parts of the city, his gun in hand, soaked from head to toe as the rain pelted down on him. It was obvious that he was waiting for Fabiana. But he would not be ready for what was coming for him.

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  Chapter 45

  5:33 p.m., November 25

  Hart Hammaned walked slowly behind Detective Anderson, careful not to be noticed. The reporter knew that the detective was up to something and he was going to find out what it was. He crept in the darkness, trying to stay close to the golf course that ran along 1 Avenue and out of the lights of the traffic that dashed by sporadically. Then they disappeared into the night.

  Hart had been slowly following the detective for over an hour, his mind wishing that something would happen, that something would occur. He wanted to sink his teeth into something. Some real news. His feet were moving in perfect rhythm as he traced careful steps behind the cop.

  Hart had been a man that always needed to know everything about everybody, even at the expense of friendships and relationships. The story was what mattered most of all to him, and it didn’t matter what he had to do to get it. Walking into danger meant little to him. If he was ever going to make it big in his career, he knew that meant taking risks, and risks were what the public craved. They wanted death and pain and Hart was going to deliver that to them one way or another.

  The story was his validation for his crappy life. People liked him now because of his job. He was finally becoming someone. He was going to show up all those jocks and cheerleaders who had always said he was a nobody. They would never be remembered after high school. He was somebody now, his name was known. He was Hart Hammaned, television reporter!

  All those mean kids who tortured him for four long years throughout high school, they would all know who he was after this report. All those girls who shunned him would soon be calling him, asking if they could see him. Practically begging. He smiled as he thought about it—all the attention he would receive.

  Chapter 46

  5:35 p.m., November 25

  Alastar came to a halt on the pavement of 1 Avenue. He stopped so swiftly that he more or less seemed to appear there out of thin air. In a moment he was walking within sight of his victim. A reporter was following slowly with light steps, trying not to be heard. The weak mind of the reporter was calling out for anyone to hear him. He was in desperate need of attention and Alastar was just the vampire to provide it. The vampire moved close to him, so close he could have reached out and touched the sticky mess of hair on the man’s head.

  Alastar could feel Hart’s insatiable desire for visibility and fame. It poured out of the man like the salty sweat around his face and leaked down his neck. The reporter wanted to be a symbol of truth and knowledge for a shining century. But Alastar felt evil in the man. Hart would lie and cheat his way into any situation and it had worked thus far. But now the vampire would take his sad life from him. He would do him this one favor and send Hart Hammaned to whatever god he believed in.

  The blood thirst was growing ravenous in the vampire, though physically he had no need of it. It seemed more like a strong desire, just an addiction at this point. Possibly he could exist without it. Alastar had reached the age when every vampire no longer needs the blood, but he enjoyed his nightly ritual of killing and drinking.

  After existing for a thousand years or so, an immortal no longer needed to sustain his or her body with the blood of humans. The older vampires had become so powerful and reached such a state of power that there was no longer any benefit from the blood. But still the erotic act of drawing that drink was alluring to the blood born, even after so much time had passed.

  Blood was life and it was sensual, and all creatures great and small desired it in some form or another. Alastar would never stop. The great closeness, the death dance that he did every night with the poor insects of this world… He loved his role in the great play that he performed.

  No death could ever be as giving as life—his life in this world—and that was why he would always continue to kill. To take the weak from their mundane and commonplace existence, just like the vain and pathetic little man walking unaware of him now. In truth, Alastar has been in agony these last few hundred years, which for any human would
be unbearable. But for a vampire of his age, centuries meant nothing.

  He didn’t want to be anonymous among the vampires from city to city. He had begun to realize he was much like this reporter, wanting to be known, to be remembered in this world. Not just as the great killer of petty human lives but for being Alastar, the reader and writer of poetry—a man who desired to be loved like Cerci, whom he hated. Alastar wanted to be remembered like Cerci’s great Fabiana who broke Cerci’s heart so many years ago and had now returned to them to kill them all. Alastar had been forced to listen to the agony bleeding from Cerci’s mind night after night. He could no longer endure it.

  The thought of Cerci suffering angered Alastar and his desire to take a man’s life was now at its height. This self-righteous man could not even imagine the evil that stood behind him, the utter terror that was about to clasp his shoulder. He had no idea that all his plans for fame and notoriety would soon be at an end. Soon Hart Hammaned would only be a name in a forgotten obituary column.

  Hart walked slowly, then felt something on his shoulder. He turned his gaze and noticed three thin white fingers grasping at him. Suddenly he was thrown against a chain link fence. The fence rattled. A wave of racketing noise fluttered down it as his body collided with links. A man stood in front of Hart and Hart feared him at once. He pleaded with the stranger, this pale attacker.

  “Please! I have money. Don’t hurt me. I’m Hart Hammaned. You know me, right?”

  The vampire stood in front of him with his head down for a moment, then turned his eyes up to meet Hart’s fearful gaze.

  “Oh yes. I know you, Hart,” Alastar said coldly. His tone chilled Hart to the bone.

  “You do!” he said. “I’m a reporter! I’m famous! I could give you money!”

  Hart implored him for mercy. Normally Alastar would never have even let his victim utter one word, but he enjoyed the fear in this one. He was a cat playing with a mouse. And no mouse ever talked a cat into not killing its prey.

  “I don’t want your money. I want your life.”

  Alastar smiled an evil, chilling smile, showing his sharp fangs to Hart. Letting him get a good look at what was coming. And before the reporter could scream, Alastar was on him. Teeth were sunk into soft, sweaty flesh in an instant, and Hart’s blood was free-flowing. The warmth filled Alastar’s body like a strong drink and his mind awoke. Now he wanted more. He wanted the blood of the cop.

  Alastar walked with delicate steps through the rain which washed over the city. It was later now, but he was uncertain as to how late. The cop moved toward the rumbling of the overpass and the deepening blackness under the stars. Alastar could hear and see the man’s breathing up ahead. Alastar had always been strong, even before he was turned into an immortal—a god in a human form—which is what drove Cerci to him so long ago. He had no fear as he stared beneath the hood of his cloak. Alastar scanned the policeman up ahead. Tim Anderson was unaware that in a moment he would be mere food for the immortal.

  Alastar could hear the man’s heart beating under his flesh. He could feel the blood pumping through Tim’s veins. He could smell Tim’s scent. He would taste good. Far away from the drench of electric lights, Alastar moved with soundless steps, thriving and saturated with anticipation of the mortal death soon to come. Alastar let his fangs grow long again.

  Although Tim could not see Alastar, he stood motionless, displaying his muscular physique for the vampire almost as if he were enticing Alastar to bite him. Cars sped along the busy road and disappeared into the night, their windshield wipers unable to counter the mighty downpour of the Seattle rain. This willing morsel would soon give up his life blood for the nourishment of a vampire, as Alastar would drain his memory and his blood and dump his lifeless corpse into the blue waters below.

  Alastar thought he should take Tim now, but this feeling would not come again, and it was the feeling of the hunt that Alastar truly loved. He wanted to prolong it.

  Suddenly, the night lost its alluring incandescent glow. Without warning, Alastar was picked up from behind and thrown several hundred feet into the night sky. Heavy rain beat down upon his body. His limbs struggled to find earth, flapping like a fish out of water. His eyes widened as he could see the lights of the city below him. Next, he was grabbed from behind and pain seared throughout his body. His bones were crushed and fractured under the grip of something supernatural. Then the angelic features of Fabiana appeared to him. She held him motionless, high over the city, and her long fangs bit into his flesh.

  Blood bled from his veins and filled her body. He was getting weaker and weaker by the moment, but still she held him high over Seattle.

  “I will kill you all if I have to,” she told him.

  Then she sank her teeth back into his neck.

  It’s blood worth having, she thought.

  He was powerful and warm in her arms. She sensed the great power that came from the old ones. The smell of his blood filled her senses. It pulsed through her veins and arteries—every inch of her body was saturated with warmth. She let her teeth clamp down on the flesh of his neck. His blood was rich. His blood was good. Alastar’s power was hers. She released him and his lifeless body fell from her grip.

  The dead body of Alastar plummeted back down to earth. Rain beat down upon it and then it crashed into the ocean with such great force that it splashed water thirty feet high onto the docks below. Fabiana stood motionless, hovering above the city, feeling the blood pump through her veins like a drug. Her body was on fire. She had power and strength like no vampire her age had ever felt before. She was a god.

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  Chapter 47

  5:40 p.m., November 25

  There was something there. I was sure of it. I had felt a presence a moment before. Then it was gone. I waited for something to happen in the growing dark under the overpass, watching the people flow by me. I was suddenly stunned when a dark figure crashed down onto the pavement, sending huge cracks splintering out in several directions.

  Fabiana stood as if the impact that she was just dealt was nothing to her small frame. Her hair was soaked with water as the rain poured around us. She looked out to the horizon. Though she could not see it, Fabiana could always sense the placement of the sun. While she knew there would be hours of darkness left, she felt concerned all the more. The vampires were on the move now.

  In real life, Fabiana of Olisipo was just as lovely and delicate looking as she was in the picture I had folded in my pocket. She stood before me and, looking into her beautiful eyes, I could tell that she was tapping into my mind. Her eyes told me so, and then words hit me like a ton of bricks.

  I found my feet moving as fast as they could carry me. Fear took over me and I fled as fast as I could. My thoughts were darting around in every direction and I didn’t know what I could do but run. Then, in a moment she was there again, standing before me, her words in my mind once more. I tried to fight it. Tried to shut her out.

  When I closed my eyes, I could hear her talking to me but the substance of her words was gone. Gone without a trace. My mind was unable to hold onto her thoughts for more than a second or two. For a long time, we simply spied upon one another, sizing each other up like animals. I loved it, that precious moment.

  The modern world meant very little to her as she walked its streets like an unseen ghost, soundlessly, drawn slowly throughout history never again to leave her mark. Except on the dead. It was tantalizing to see her so full of life as she stood before me. Her beauty was maddening and alluring. For a moment, I had forgotten about how dangerous she was. And then she reminded me.

  “We have to go. They will come now and I cannot keep them from you here,” Fabiana said as she gently grasped my arm, careful not to crush my bone with her powerful grip. I was about to protest when her mind opened to me. A calming sensation flowed into me like a sedative. She lifted me up and we soared together over the metropolis. My mind raced and my heart pounded. I dropped my head down to see the city below me. My eyes bulge
d and my mouth gaped. A wordless scream slipped from me as my arms struggled around her, and in an instant, her grip stopped me and her words calmed me.

  “Tim, you are safe with me. Be still.”

  The night seemed to breathe with the soft, lovely rhythm of lights and fragrances that danced below me in a mist of beauty. A veil of stillness was painted across Fabiana’s milky white face as she held me, the cool breeze blowing over me, soothing me. We moved high over the hills—above the thick clouds—and my face cooled and dried, no longer wet from the rain. I looked at the clouds speeding so quickly away from the light of the city. Stars were specks of glitter in the night sky glow.

  I drew close to her, loving the hardness of her flesh on mine, letting her scent fill my senses and awaken desire in me which I could feel pumping between my legs. I imagined myself with her, on her, in her, and I knew she was reading my thoughts. She smiled at me as if she knew every word I was thinking. At that moment, she let me go.

  My face stiffened all over. The great force of the wind pushed against my body as I plummeted downward. My eyes became smaller, squinting in terror. My mouth stretched in what must have been a grimace. Everything was wrong in that moment. The world was coming into focus. Soon I would be dead.

  Goodbye, Merric and Kenny, my child and my good friend. I will miss you.

  An overpowering red light exploded around me, filled the air and took over my mind. Then Fabiana caught me in a firm, skillful embrace. There came that fear again as I wrapped my arms around her thin frame.

  I froze. I savored that moment, that lush physical intimacy. I let my lips move over her neck, just under her chin, and the smell of lavender and jasmine filled my nose. Did all vampires smell of lavender and jasmine?

  “That is what you would feel if you made love to an immortal. My power and strength are far too great for your weak body to withstand, human,” she said into my mind.