by Chloe Grey
He sighed. “I know both of you are close. You knew him before meeting me and...”
“What?”
“It’s just... both of you are too close for my liking. I gave you the benefit of the doubt, but sometimes, I mean, the way you look at him... and now you are obsessively thinking about him when he’s gone.”
I shoved his shoulder. “How could you say that? He could be dead, Logan. Or worse.”
He sighed. “I hope he’s safe, and I want him back too. But I just want to know where you stand with him, with us”
I steeled my jaw. “We’re not screwing if that’s what you think. He’s my best friend.”
This wasn’t like Logan at all. He was being irrational and insecure—qualities I had never seen in him. Why was he like this?
“But if he asked, would you?”
I shoved his shoulder, harder this time and shot him a warning look that screamed for him to back down or things would get messy. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
Logan held my gaze. “My girlfriend spends most of her time with her super hot best friend. What am I to make of that?”
I rolled over, giving him my back. “I can’t. We will talk about this tomorrow.”
“You always say that.”
I JOLTED AWAKE, INSTINCTIVELY reaching for my rifle.
“Another nightmare?”
Logan’s gentle voice filled the darkness and I tracked down the light switch by memory, momentarily blinding us.
“No. Someone broke in. I can hear him downstairs.”
“David?”
“He has the keys.”
“Oh, right.” Logan mimicked my movements, and soon enough we were cautiously making our way down the stairs. I gave a silent thanks that our stairs weren’t anything like the house yesterday.
A black figure stood in the corner of the living room, examining one of the picture frames that we took way back when in Hawaii.
Even in the dim darkness, I could make out unusually long and sharp fingernails scratching the glass, creating a sharp noise similar to chalk screeching on a board.
A vampire.
“Nice place,” the figure said with its back turned away from us. Not a male vampire. The voice was soft, feminine, and had an aura of authority wrapped in her tone which fit nicely with her confident stance.
Fletcher and Kevin came behind us, and we spread out, surrounding the vampiress.
The intruder didn’t seem concerned. She put the scratched frame down with unusual gentleness and turned to all of us, studying us with a frown.
I held my gasp. She certainly wasn’t human, but she wasn’t a vampiress either. Not really. The violet eyes, fangs and claws made it clear what she was. But her skin... it was purple, with veins lining almost every inch of her exposed flesh.
“Which one of you killed Talon?”
As if waiting for the cue, we fired.
Then magic, a disappearing act.
First, the monster was there, and then she wasn’t. There was a gasp, and we all whirled around to see her lifting Kevin’s massive frame off the ground with ease.
She leaned in as if to give my brother a kiss, but a purple mist swirled from her mouth and engulfed his face. “Don’t move,” she whispered, soft and hypnotic, then we saw it—a blur, then she was gone again.
Kevin fell to the ground, gasping. “I can’t move. What the hell?”
A flash right in front of me. I had been trained to react to vampires. But this was different. I didn't even have time to register what happened before my gun was knocked away and a sick choking feeling overcame me. I saw spots in my visions, then purple. I tried desperately not to breathe in the mist, but quickly realised I had to.
A strange groggy sensation, like I had just woken up from a dream.
Maybe it was just a dream.
“Don’t move,” was all I heard before my struggling stopped and my hands fell limp to my sides. The voice... so hypnotic and so smooth. I didn’t try to resist. I didn’t even want to.
The pressure left my throat, and I slumped into an unfortunate sitting position on the wall, watching helplessly as the same was done to my friends. They tried their best, firing at the slightest hint of movements and shadows, but one by one, they fell limp to the ground.
Who was she? And who was Talon? It must have been one of the vampires that we killed. Was it the most recent one?
It doesn’t matter, I thought as I watched the monster breathe her hypnotic gas into Logan’s lungs. He struggled, beating and kicking at her, until she moved her lips and he stilled, slumping to the ground just like everyone else.
It was over. We lost.
THE MONSTER POSITIONED us so that we were lined up in a sitting position in front of her. It was then I caught sight of her face. Despite all the purple and the horrifying veins, I could still make out a human’s expression. Her eyes showed a mixture of emotions, and her bottom lip was trembling.
“I understand why you had to kill him,” she said to no one in particular, her voice grim and sullen. “He took one of yours for his personal plaything, right? What was her name? Lily? Laury?”
I stiffened, and I could feel the others do so too. We now all understood who ‘him’ was, and why she was here.
She saw it in our eyes. “Ah, so you finally know who I am.” She started flicking at an imaginary booger at the back of her hand. “It was hard for both of us, you know? Everyone was telling me to leave him. But you know what they say.” She gave me, then Logan a chilling glare, her voice suddenly dropped low and cold. “love is blind.”
The monster made her way towards me, then leaned over and stroked my cheeks, being extra careful with her fingernails so that they didn’t cut my skin.
Tears began falling from my eyes, out of frustration that I couldn't do anything and fear of what she might do to my friends.
“You must be his lover. Such a pretty little thing, and such an unusual choice of hair color.” She grabbed a fistful of my hair and sniffed. “No scent. Smart. Too bad you can’t wash off skin.” She cocked her head at Logan, who was trying his best to break free of the spell. “And yours reeks of his.”
“What should I do with you?” She put a finger to her chin and stared at nothingness while twirling my hair absentmindedly. “I’d thought about it and I came up with three choices.” She looked at Logan with her deep violet eyes. “And you will choose.”
The vampiress put out three fingers. “Number one: I kill her now. My personal choice, by the way. Quick and easy.”
Logan couldn’t say anything, but his burning gaze told us everything.
She dropped her ring finger. “Two: I torture her while you watch. I will make you watch until she begs for death.”
The index finger came down next, leaving her middle finger. “Three: I enslave her. You will watch as I make her murder your little family over here.” She waved a dismissive hand at Fletcher and Kevin. “Then she will kill you, then herself.”
Enslave. So she was a vampiress after all. But she was so different, so strong...
Her middle finger went down, leaving her fist, on which she rested her chin. “So which will it be, human? Choose.”
When Logan did nothing but stare hard at her, she slapped herself in the forehead. “Oh, I’m a dummy.” She clicked her tongue.
Logan shot his head forward. He tried to move the rest of his body, but it wouldn’t budge. “Fuck you.” I couldn't recognise the voice. There was so much hatred, despair, coldness...
The vampiress rolled her eyes. “You’re pretty handsome, I give you that, but still not in my league. I don’t prefer human mates anyways.”
Logan turned to me. “It’s going to be alright, babe. I promise.”
“Don’t lie to her.”
She shifted her attention back to me and wiped away some of the tears that were wetting my cheeks. “So what will it be? One, two, or three? She is waiting.”
“Go to hell.”
I screamed. The pain... Dots of black flashed
in my vision, and everything became a blur.
“CASSANDRA!”
Logan sounded miles away, and he sounded even further still until his screams were drowned out by the thundering droning in my eardrums.
The droning... it was becoming overwhelming.
I needed to cover my ears, but my hands wouldn’t obey me. The spots in my vision grew larger until they covered it, leaving me with nothing but pitch black and the stillness of death.
I blinked. I was in a field now, the sun bathing me in all its glory, the birds singing and the clouds puffy. One of the clouds looked like a unicorn, and I smiled, strolling through a sunlit wood.
A familiar voice called out to me.
In the far distance, Mom and Dad. Oh god. I missed them so much. Hearing the buzz of television after I came back home from classes, then plopping onto my bed to text friends and browse Instagram, waiting for the familiar shout from Mom to get my ass to dinner.
I missed those times.
I waved. They waved back. I walked forward, unsure if it was really them. Dad stepped forward, arms opened wide for an embrace, and all doubt slipped from my mind.
I ran.
The wind whipped against me, blowing my hair back as I picked up my pace, my bare feet sinking into warm soil, short grass tickling my ankles.
The world started to spin. I wasn’t getting any closer to them anymore. The sky surged forward and I was going backwards.
Dad. Mom.
No.
My parents became smaller and smaller until they slipped under the horizon.
I shouted after them. But it was too late—they were gone.
“Cass.”
My eyes flew open. This first thing I noticed was an intense coldness.
Was it snowing?
I smiled dumbly, remembering my pleasant trip in Korea, playing with the snow.
The moment was short lived when I felt the pain.
Oh God, the pain. It radiated from my stomach to the rest of my body in thundering short bursts.
Everything was a blur. The next jolt of pain was the worst. I screamed, spitting water out.
Wait, water?
“Relax. Keep drinking.”
The figure holding me wasn’t the vampiress or Logan. I couldn’t make out his face, but the two intense blue dots that stared back at me and the sex god voice that I was so used to hearing...
“Dave.”
“Shh.”
Despite the excruciating pain that threatened to pull me back into dreamland, or the gaping hole in my stomach, or my lungs that crackled at every short, painful breath—despite all that, I felt safe, here, in his arms.
“Dave...”
Droplets of water hit the edges of my lips and I lapped them up. It wasn’t water. It was sweet, remarkably so, with a fine and distinct taste, like the hard candy that I use to eat when I was a little girl, but in liquid form, mixed in with a splash of red wine.
“Yes?”
Another drop of the sweet vintage, then it came pouring down in small waves.
“You... you came back...”
He didn't reply. But the waves of sweetness stopped, and I felt my right arm being raised by delicate fingers... Then pain again. A sting. Something sharp was being inserted into my forearm. A pause, then something soft and wet... suction...
Everything became blurry again before fading to black.
Chapter 6
-Cassandra-
I saw her first. Laura.
I almost rushed to her, but then I noticed her eyes.
Then Fletcher came, and Laura attacked.
We did nothing. Just... stood there. The reflexes we had, the instinct we developed, the years of our training... all of them... just vanished into thin air. Gone. Forgotten.
But I would never forget that moment. Fletcher gasping for air, for help. The awful choking noises. His eyes going white, the hand on his throat tightening, his body slumping forward. His hands as he clawed at his lover’s grip...
Move. Do something.
I pulled out my pistol and raised my hands, my fingers trembling around the trigger.
A gunshot in the air.
But I never pulled the trigger.
I woke up screaming. At least I tried to. All that came out was a throaty gasp. A layer of sweat blanketed my entire body, and drops trickled down my forehead.
Another nightmare. When can it ever end? I reached for Logan for comfort. He wasn’t there. I frowned.
I wasn’t in bed. I was lying on the ground and I instantly jolted up, surveying my surroundings. I was in a brightly lit cave that had an old, musty smell to it. There was another scent—something familiar, something masculine...
“You should have listened to me, Cass.”
I whirled around and saw Dave sitting at the far corner of the cave, hugging his knees and rocking his body.
Everything came flooding back to me at once, hitting me like a sledgehammer. Kevin, Fletcher, Logan... The vampiress.
My hands instinctively shot to my stomach. I expected blood, pain. Lots of it, but when I felt the smoothness of my stomach and no expected stab of pain, I was confused.
Looking down, I saw that I was not wearing the robe anymore. I was in a plain white shirt. I pulled it up, and everything looked normal, as if nothing had happened.
And... I felt good—the best I had felt in a while. Strong, clear-minded, my joints well-oiled, like I had just woken up from a good night’s sleep—and a very good one at that. I had to be dreaming. That was the most plausible explanation. Except it’d seemed so real. Too real. The pain, the choking feeling.
Logan’s screams.
Another thought came to me.
Am I dead?
“You aren’t dead, Cass.”
I shifted my attention back to Dave. He was eyeing me suspiciously, studying me from head to toe the same way he had when we first met almost two years ago.
“Dave... what happened?”
He sighed and looked away, running a hand through his inky black hair. I waited, but when he didn't answer me, I started towards him.
“No, wait.” He looked back at me, his gaze alarmed and... fearful? “Stay there.”
Why was he acting so cold?
“Dave... I don’t understand.”
He buried his hands to his face and went silent. I thought he wouldn’t answer me again but he finally let out another sigh, this one heavier and drawn out, before looking back at me, the blue flame of his intense gaze nowhere to be seen. “Can you feel it, Cass?”
“What?”
“The feeling.”
I was about to snap at him when I felt it. A drawing pull towards Dave. Like a magnet, but much, much stronger. I felt my body heating up, my breathing becoming ragged, and I realised that I was becoming... wet. Ready.
“Dave.... What is this?”
He paused a second before replying to me, and I realised he was breathing heavily too.
“It’s the bond.”
“What bo—”
“I bit you, damn it.” The intensity of his gaze was back, and I shivered. “I—damn it, Cass.” He looked down at his feet, suddenly ashamed. “I thought it would be all over when I left you. But I had no choice. You were dying, going to die. What choice did I have then?”
I shook my head. He wasn't making any sense. “What do you mean you bit me? Where is Logan? Fletcher, my brother? What happened to the vampiress?”
“They are fine, alive. That’s all you need to know.”
I balled my hands into fists and took a step forward. “Dave...”
His voice was cold and low. “You can’t go back to them if that’s what you are asking. Not until the bond is broken.”
I took another step forward, then another. It was all starting to make sense now. Dave must have gotten bitten when he left us, turned into a monster. That explained his weird behaviour—and it was all my fault. I needed to find a way to break whatever hold the vampire held onto him. Except no one had found a
way yet...
“You’re wrong, Cass. I’m a vampire, yes. Always have been. But no one bit me, and it's not your fault.”
I stopped. “How did you...”
“Reading your mind. Sorry, can't control it yet.”
He pointed to a large slab of rock to his right, a considerable distance away from him. “Sit. We have a lot to talk about.”
PLIP.
Plop.
Plip.
Plop.
I turned my gaze away from the stalagmites and the droplets of water dripping off them.
“I don't understand. How are you a vampire? You don't have the eyes, and you bleed normally...”
Even as I said those words, I realised I have never seen Dave bleed. He had almost always come out unscathed. He was the best of us, the quickest thinker, the most accurate shooter, the most agile.
Dave gave me a lopsided shrug. “I’m not sure why my eyes are still blue. Maybe it’s because the curse hasn’t fully consumed me yet.”
“So you are not a full vampire yet?” Hope surged through me. “You have to fight it. We will find a way to—”
“I told you, Cass. I have been a vampire ever since the beginning. Even before I met you.”
I stared at Dave. Just a day ago, I thought he was my closest friend, someone I trusted with my life. Now he was telling me that he had been a vampire since the beginning of the outbreak. That meant he was one of the originals—corrupt humans who willingly drank His blood in exchange for power.
“I don’t care for power, Cass. If that was the case, I wouldn’t have joined you.”
I scowled at him. “Reading minds is one of your powers?”
He shook his head. “I only can read yours, and only what’s on the surface.”
“Why?”
His glare darkened. “You know why.”
I was jolted back to the feeling I’d had before passing out: a prick on my right forearm.
My forearm. He bit me. I looked down and saw it. Very faint fang marks.
“It is healing, so has your stomach. That’s why you are alive now.”
“You’re a vampire....” The realisation finally started to dawn on me.
Dave, a vampire.
