by Kate Martin
I sat in the middle of the street, covered in blood and other types of gore. My body ached, and I had numerous cuts, scrapes and bruises. Including a cut on my left hand that burned like someone had decided to use me as a fire-pit. Of course, that was my own clumsy fault. I had gotten myself with my own gold-laced weapon. I really needed some lessons.
One major problem though. The last failed vampire that had attacked me had gotten his mouth around my ankle—and bit me.
I had managed to tear him to pieces all the same, though it had been much more difficult than the others. But now the pieces refused to shrivel up and die.
I kicked at the hand still reaching for me, slamming my heel down against the fingers until each one was broken. It still twitched. The head stared at me, mouth opening and closing like it wanted to talk, flesh falling away from its cheeks and jaw.
Gross.
“Isaac!”
He was there immediately. “Yes, Kassandra?” His dark eyes sparkled with humor and he smirked as he stood over me. “What can I help you with?”
“Don’t make fun. My lighter’s all out and this thing won’t die.” The second arm had crawled closer.
“Did it bite you?”
“Yes. What does that have to do with anything?”
“Since they are creatures who failed to gain our immortality, our blood grants them a temporary life.” He crushed the head under his heel.
I waited for my disgust, that impulse to gag, to turn away—it didn’t come. I barely flinched.
“But it’s bleeding out. Shouldn’t that be enough?”
“It hasn’t bled out yet.” Taking a lighter from his belt, he set the pieces ablaze, then offered me a hand up. “Immortality is a complicated thing. We need our blood, and our hearts. If you can maintain blood supply, you can live as a disembodied head for a time. But these things, these cariosus as the old ones call them, they live on blood and flesh. Without either, they simply fall apart. With our blood, they can survive a bit longer. Neither of us will withstand fire.”
I brushed myself off, but stopped when all I encountered was visceral grossness. Yuck. Mounds of dark ash littered the street, like some perverse art exhibit. A testament to the state of the world! “Ugh. I think I’ve had enough excitement for one lifetime.”
“Unfortunately you will live longer than that.”
“Great.” An uncontrollable shudder ran through me, no doubt brought on by my disgust at everything I felt on my skin. “I can’t believe I did all that.”
“You did well. Your family will be proud.”
“Rhys is going to kill me.”
“I doubt that.”
“Just watch. I can smell him. He’s getting closer.”
And sure enough I was looking him square in the eyes a moment later. A hand on each of my arms, I let him have his moment to freak out before even attempting to stop him. “What happened? Are you hurt? Did they bite you?”
He went on like that for a while. I didn’t really listen. “Rhys, stop. I’m fine. I promise. Nothing major.”
My arms, legs, face, nothing was safe from his search for injuries, and his cataloguing of every scratch and bruise. He lingered the longest at the cut on my left hand.
“Me,” I said before he could ask. “I did it to myself. I’m a total klutz. No one got near me with any gold. Isaac saw to that.”
“I’m glad,” he muttered, talking more to himself than me. He kissed the wound, then looked back at my face. I knew instantly it was time to answer for myself. “What were you thinking? I told you to stay in the house. You could have been killed!”
I poked him hard in the chest. “I may not be the strongest vampire around, but I am not completely helpless either. And, in case you forgot, you may recall that feeling I had just before you left. You know, the one that predicts certain doom? Well, for your information, I managed to decode it, and Sara was in danger. Did you want me to just sit around and do nothing while my best friend got eaten by one of those things?”
“You could have told someone.”
“Who? You were all off playing superhero. My only other options were human. Unless wasting time by looking for you so I could explain myself in the middle of battle is acceptable.”
“What if Isaac hadn’t shown up?”
“Then I would have had to figure out how to manage on my own. Just like everyone else.”
“Things like this are not a game, Kassandra. You do not have the experience needed—”
“You have to go outside to get experience, Rhys. And look! What do you know? I’m still alive.”
“Really, children, you’re embarrassing.” Madge strolled towards us, her normally impeccable attire torn and stained, and her perfect bob not so perfect. The sword that hung from her hand was covered in blood. “The humans will venture out now that the sun is rising. We need to clean up what we can and get back home.” She glanced to her left and smiled at Isaac. “Hello again.”
“And to you.” He nodded his head to her in a sort of bow.
Madge smiled more.
How cute.
I sighed and went to cross my arms over my chest, stopping when the action squished more grossness against me. “Look, Rhys. I really don’t want to fight about this. What’s done is done. Sara is safe, but knows what I am and hates me. I killed too many things to count and that scares me. I don’t like knowing I’m a monster, and I’m covered in blood and guts and god knows what else. I want a shower, and I want to forget a lot of things.”
He was quiet for a while, then nodded. “All right. Madge, can you help Isaac with things here? Kassandra and I will burn anything else we see on our way home.”
“I think Isaac and I can manage,” she said, still all eyes and smiles for the dark vampire.
“Thank you.” Rhys took my hand and we started walking.
I broke the silence that started to stretch between us. “What about you? Are you hurt?” He was just as beat up as I was, if not more, his flesh crisscrossed with cuts and bruises. Dirt caked most of his larger gashes. Blood was nearly everywhere.
“Nothing serious.”
“Anything moderately serious?”
“Not much more than you.”
“Promise?” I had a feeling if he had a huge cut or something he wouldn’t tell me.
“I promise.”
“Good.” I said, thankful my fangs had finally retracted. “I’m sorry I worried you.”
“I know. I understand your reasoning.”
“I did pretty good though, huh?” I tried to smile for him. I hoped it didn’t look as forced and fake as it actually was.
“It seems that you did. But something’s bothering you.”
Dammit. “I don’t like knowing I’m a monster.”
“You are not a monster.”
“Yes, I am. I liked it, Rhys. The whole tearing them apart and hunting them down, it felt good, deep down, in this place I hadn’t known existed before. It was almost like I wasn’t me.”
He lifted our joined hands and kissed the back of mine. “As a vampire you have instincts you did not have as a human. The thirst is the most obvious, but there are others. Above all we are predators, Kassandra. What you felt was probably the hunting instinct.”
“What about you? Don’t you need to deal with yours?”
He smiled a little. “I spent the last five hundred years searching for one very specific person. That kept my hunting desire fairly occupied.”
“So you never had to hunt?”
“Not never, but I admit that having an obsession overruled it at times.”
“But then what did you do when you needed to hunt?”
“I hunted. Unlike you, I have no problem biting a human.” He nipped at my neck. He was trying to sound teasing, but I knew there was little to joke about. I didn’t bite. Wouldn’t. Going out at night and finding some unsuspecting human to drink from was out of the question.
“So what do I do?”
“Let’s just deal with
that when we need to.”
“Fine.” I waited while he stopped to burn a stray vampire body on the street. There was a hole through the chest. “Hey, Rhys, there’s something I should tell you.”
“What’s that?” He watched the body to make sure the fire took.
“Well,” I hesitated, not sure how he would react. “Henry was at Sara’s house. Isaac tore out his heart.”
“Henry?” He walked back to me, his face less surprised and more angry than I would have suspected.
“You don’t seem surprised. Isn’t he supposed to be in prison?”
“We received word he had been released two days ago. We never imagined he would come straight here.”
“Released? Why?”
“Some grand plan the Council had for following him to the VFO’s leaders. Clearly it did not work.”
“Will Isaac be in trouble for killing him?”
“No. War negates the need for a sanction.”
“Oh.” We started walking again. “Where is everyone else?”
“Aurelia is interrogating a vampire we captured. Cade is patrolling the city with a few allies of ours who showed up to help, making sure there are no cariosus left hiding in the shadows.”
“Would they really hide like that? It seemed to me they only thought about eating.”
“The sun is rising. They have enough sense, usually, not to be caught in the sunlight.”
“Let me guess. They do burst into flames?”
“Yes. Most likely why most humans think we will.”
I stopped over one mostly burned body and watched the rays of the sun travel over the pavement towards it. “Even when already dead?”
“Even then. The sun will do most of the clean-up for us.”
“How nice.” I moved on when the remaining leg began to smolder in the daylight. “What about Millie? Where is she?”
“Home. Checking on Brody and the others.”
Ah. Guilt sank in. “Warren and everyone, they’re okay, right?”
“As far as I know. Millie never got far from the house.”
“Good.” I toed at the ground a little as we walked. “So, was Isaac the only one who showed up to help?”
“No. We had others as well. They nearly doubled our numbers, but containing the force was still time consuming. And that time meant casualties we would have preferred to avoid.”
“A lot of casualties?” I thought about the bodies I had seen on the streets. The ones that smelled human.
Rhys wasn’t looking at me. “Too many. It will stir the humans, and the Hunters.”
“Did you lose any vampires? Allies, I mean.”
“Just one.”
“So why would the VFO do this? Why go to all the trouble of attacking when you could handle it all easily enough?”
“It wasn’t that easy.”
“Well, it wasn’t epically difficult either. We survived. I managed even.”
“There were only a handful of vampires, so with the help we received they were not much of a threat. The vast majority of what was sent in were cariosus. The VFO isn’t trying to take us out, not yet. All they want is to give the humans more reason to fear us. If some of us die in the process, it is simply a perk.”
I walked up the steps to our front door. “This really sucks.”
“That’s putting it lightly.”
“The VFO has this pretty well planned out, don’t they?”
“We will out-plan them eventually.”
“I hope so.” I opened the door and stepped inside, going straight to my room and kicking off my shoes. The house was calm, so I assumed everyone was all right. I would check on Warren as soon as I got these disgusting clothes off. Rhys came in right behind me. Peeling off my shirt, I headed towards my bathroom. I dropped my ruined clothing on the floor, then reached into the shower and turned on the water. “When I first went outside last night I noticed something. Do you know what it was?”
Rhys leaned in the doorway. “Other than the decaying failures?”
“Humans,” I said, turning to face him. “I noticed the humans, dead or injured on the street. You know what my reaction was?”
Rhys frowned.
“It made me hungry. My fangs came down and everything. The only thing that kept me from going after them was knowing I had to save Sara.”
“That’s a good thing.”
“How? How is wanting to prey on helpless humans a good thing?”
“You didn’t prey on them. You remained focused on what was important and you didn’t lose control. That’s a good thing.”
I twirled a finger in the air. “Yippie. Let’s throw a party.”
“Don’t be sardonic.”
“That word is a little big for me, Mr. Sixteenth Century,” I said, picking away a chunk of unidentifiable gore from my arm and flicking it into the trash.
“You know what it means.”
“I’m wasting water.” I stepped into the shower, underwear still on. My bra straps had actually come to rest in various cuts and gashes, and I was a little afraid to pull them out. “I don’t suppose you'd be willing to give me a hand in here?”
Rhys looked at me like I was the most mischievous child in the world. After all, we hadn’t done anything like this before. Just sleeping. Just kissing. “You are going to tarnish my honor.”
“That would be the idea.”
“I have a reputation.”
“For being stubborn and old fashioned. You’re gross, too. Let’s conserve water.” I gave him my very best come-hither look. How far could I push this? How far would he let it go?
How far would I let it go?
“I’m sure the water is your biggest concern,” he said.
“Don’t make fun of me for being environmentally conscientious. Besides, I need help.” That much was true. I pointed to where my strap was more or less inside my shoulder. “You wouldn’t leave a lady without needed assistance, would you?”
“Is there a lady here?”
“Now who’s being mean?”
Rhys shook his head and said something once again in that ancient language I didn’t understand.
“What was that?”
“Something my father used to say.”
“All right, but what did you say?”
He shrugged, stepped all the way inside the bathroom and shut the door. “Does it matter?”
“Maybe.” I pushed my hair back so it would stop dripping water in my eyes. I couldn’t believe he had actually shut the door.
“You’ll have to learn the language then.” He stepped up to the shower and I turned so he could reach my right shoulder.
“You do know the old joke, don’t you?” I said to distract myself from the tearing feeling of him pulling the strap from my flesh. “Americans only speak one language.”
“Vampires speak many.” He let the ruined bra strap hang along my arm, his fingers tracing its path.
His touch felt like a million little sparks, and sent a shiver up my spine. I swallowed hard. “That’s not part of the joke.”
Rhys just shrugged. He was still outside the shower, but now his arm was wet, glistening with drops of water that streaked through the blood and grime, making his muscles look like rolling hills whenever he moved. I couldn’t stare at that; it made my brain turn to mush, and my tongue go dry and forget how to speak. So I looked at his face instead.
He looked back at me, all gorgeous blue eyes and tumbled black hair. The corners of his mouth were upturned ever so slightly, almost undetectable. But I saw it. I saw it, and I knew it for what it was. Here we were, me in the shower almost naked, him just outside the spray of the water. I had invited him in—and he didn’t think I would actually follow through.
So he wanted to play chicken, huh? I could play chicken.
“So,” I said, putting on my very best grown-up woman-who-knows-what-she-wants air, “are you coming in, or not?”
“I still have all my clothes on.”
“That can be
fixed.” I tugged at his shirt a bit.
He pulled it over his head and threw it on the floor. “Yes, it can.”
Good god, staring at his chest was worse than staring at his arm. Focus, Kassandra. “Well then, you’re halfway there.”
“Seems so.”
“Yes, it does.” My hand found its way to his belt loops, then the button of his jeans. I realized I was breathing rather hard, so I stopped altogether.
Then his hand joined mine at the button.
My heart thumped so hard in my chest I was sure he could have seen it. But I would not lose this game. I would not be the one to break first. Not me. Nuh uh. No way.
With a flick of his fingers, the button came undone.
Holy crap, he was good at this. His eyes were still so steady, so sure. There was no way I looked relaxed, no matter how hard I focused. His hand moved to his zipper, and so did mine—but whether that was to help or to stop him, I don’t know.
A knock on the door broke our concentration. I jumped back, as if I had been caught with my hand in the cookie jar. My cowardice was pacified only by the fact that Rhys had scrambled back away from the shower as well.
The door cracked open an inch, and Gianna’s voice came through. “Kassandra?”
“Yes?” Dammit! My voice wasn’t supposed to be all squeaky like that!
Gianna chuckled, that sweet, motherly, all-knowing sound. “I am sorry to interrupt, but I was sent to find Rhys. Aurelia insists on seeing him right away. Do you know where I might find him?”
Do I know where you might find him? Ha. Very funny. What color was mortification? Because that’s definitely the color my face turned.
Rhys swore again in Irish, opened the door the rest of the way, and walked past Gianna without a glance.
I yanked the shower curtain closed to the sounds of Gianna's laughter. "Sorry," I said, trying to sound unaffected, "Rhys isn't here right now."
"Thanks anyway," Gianna called, her words ringing with more laughter. "I'll check somewhere else." The door closed with a thump.
Great. How long would it take this story to spread all over the house?
Chapter Six: Act One
The streets had never seemed so dark before. As if every light had been put out, when in reality each and every streetlight had been lit. The humans feared the dark now. Silly, really, since so did I. What came after them came after me as well. The city was supposedly ours again, and so I should have felt safe sitting these scant few blocks down from my own house, watching the repaired bedroom window of my best friend. All I wanted was a chance to explain. I don’t know what salvation I thought her darkened room would offer me. She wouldn’t be coming out, and I wouldn’t be going in. When the sun rose in the morning, I would face the hardest decision of my life; stay and risk the bloodlust, but possibly prove my good intentions, or leave and let Sara think I was her worst nightmare.
