Authors: M. R. Merrick
I sat back on the floor and stared at my blood-soaked hands. The towels littering the floor were now all dark red. I moved my fingers over Rayna’s neck and felt her pulse pounding harder against her skin. Though her arms were still bloody, the wounds had disappeared, but I didn’t feel the satisfaction I should have. Instead I felt anger, anger that Rayna had almost died, anger that the answers we searched for nearly cost us our lives. Now that the hunters knew who they were looking for, all their energy would be focused on Rayna. We had been lucky, but our troubles had just begun. Only answers would rid me of my anger and guilt, and only one person could provide them.
~~~~~~
I couldn’t leave Rayna alone while the hunters were after us, and she couldn’t come with me. Her wounds were healed, but I couldn’t put the blood she’d lost back in her body. She needed to rest. I refused to call Marcus, so I called the only other person I could trust.
Willy said he would help, his only condition being that he didn’t have to see, talk to, or be anywhere near Vincent.
Before he came over, I threw the soaked red towels into the laundry room and closed the door. I had a feeling Willy wouldn’t react well to large quantities of blood. I’d moved Rayna to the couch, cleaned her up the best I could and tucked a blanket underneath her. I didn’t want to explain to Marcus why his couch was covered in blood, and I wasn’t going to try to change her clothes.
The buzzer sounded and I let Willy up, but his barrage of questions upon seeing Rayna forced me to tell him what had happened. I tried to be vague, but there was no way to keep out all the details. After the update, he looked like he wished he had never agreed to come.
“Is she in danger here?” he asked, on the verge of panic.
“I don’t think so, not yet anyways. They don’t know who she is, only what she looks like, and they don’t know where she lives. I just need you to watch her for a while. I won’t be gone long.” Willy nodded and looked over at the couch awkwardly. “You can watch TV or something, okay? I just don’t want her to be alone when she wakes up.”
“I can do that,” Willy replied.
“I’m taking Rayna’s cell phone with me. The number’s on the table. If she wakes up, call me right away.”
“Okay.”
“Thank you Willy. I owe you one.”
Willy laughed “With all the ones you owe me, I should be living in a place like this.”
“Yeah, I know it.”
I had taken the time to change my clothes and shower, since the last thing I wanted to do was walk into a vampire nest covered in fresh hunter’s blood. I checked to make sure I’d wiped all the blood off my shoes and slipped out the door.
~~~~~~
The sun was still low in sky and I took the Jeep to save time. Vincent’s warehouse looked worse for wear in the daytime. The windows on the upper floor were boarded up and the chain link fence surrounding the building was falling over. I wondered again why he lived in such a ramshackle place. For someone from a family so rich and powerful I’d expect a mansion of some sort, but who was I to question the living habits of the sunlight deprived?
I slipped inside the grounds through a hole in the fence, and my anger grew the closer I got to the building. I could feel the blood coursing through my veins and it felt like it was boiling under my skin.
The doors we’d gone through before were locked, but this time I’d come prepared. It took me a few minutes but I was successful with my lock picks. I didn’t have the same kind of magic as Rayna, so I had to resort to more mundane methods.
The warehouse was empty, which made me nervous, and the air smelled of stale blood. I knew the majority of the vampires would be sleeping, but the vamplings should’ve been watching the doors. I made it to the middle of the open space. Though it seemed eerily quiet, my anger fueled me onwards.
There was a balcony above the main floor, and multiple stairwells all led to metal doors with no handles. The only way up was an elevator, but it was key-operated and my lock picking skills wouldn’t help me override that.
My anger swelled and I let out a scream without fear of waking the dead. Vampires were strange compared to other demons. They drank blood to keep their bodies alive. They could reproduce, they had a pulse, and they breathed, but every sunrise their body died. Their eyes sunk into their heads, their skin sagged and decayed, and occasionally even their hair would fall out. It was one of the less glamorous things about being a vampire. But still, every night their bodies reformed anew.
The scream echoed through the open room and finally I got the attention I sought. The sound of multiple guns being cocked back made me to turn to face the five vamplings who stood behind me.
“Well, well, well, I didn’t think you’d be quite stupid enough to come back,” the blonde said, with a rather disturbing smile. She and her companions formed a circle around me.
“What can I say? I’m a sucker for blondes.”
“Cute, but you’re not my type.”
“It’s the teeth, isn’t it?”
She lowered her gun slightly. “Because you kill our kind.”
I couldn’t contain my laughter. “Your kind? You realize you’re a human, right? I know some of you have this misconception that you’re one of them, but you’re not. Do you know how often one of you gets your wish to be turned? You’re an emergency snack, nothing more.”
“Shut your mouth,” she snapped.
I smiled. She did all the talking, which meant she was my ticket to the second floor. I scanned her body and saw the short chain with a single key around her neck.
“You and your group here are a snack. If the vamps were to turn you, they’d have to find new lackeys to watch over them, and that’d be too much work. If they were going to turn you, they’d have done it already. The fact that you don’t see that confirms that you’re frigging insane,” I said.
“You know, I’m going to enjoy this. It’d be too easy to shoot you, so I think I’ll hurt you first,” she said. She put the gun back into its holster and lunged at me.
I fell with her on top of me and she grabbed my neck, nails digging into my flesh. I held her hands with one arm and gripped her against me with the other, to shield me from the others’ guns. I rolled on top of her and let her roll back over me until we’d gained some distance from the rest, breaking up the circle.
I tore her fingers off my neck and forced one more roll so I was on top. I pulled her up with me as I stood. I kept one hand on her throat, pulled her gun from its holster with the other, and held it against the side of her head. A whine of pain escaped her lips and the other vamplings were on their guard. I kept my body behind hers and walked us back to where we’d started.
“Tell them to stand down,” I said. She struggled at first, but I pushed the barrel harder against her temple, cocking back the hammer. She stopped squirming at the sound and I loosened my grip on her throat.
“Stand down,” she said. The group watched her, but didn’t react. “I said stand down!” They lowered their weapons. We backed up to the elevator and I grabbed the key from around her neck.
“Open it,” I ordered. I had my eyes on the others as she turned the key. The elevator dinged and the doors opened. We both walked backwards inside and I took the key from her hand. I pushed the number two and waited. As the doors started to shut, I dropped the gun and shoved her through. They closed as she hit the cement floor and the elevator jolted upwards.
It rose slowly before the doors slid open again. To the right, the balcony wrapped around and overlooked the main floor. There was single metal door with a chain and padlock on that side. To the left was another metal door with a lock and handle. I slid the elevator key into that door and turned, and to my surprise it opened.
The room was pitch black and I felt along the wall until I found a switch. As the lights overhead sparked to life, they revealed a long room full of coffins and a single wooden door at the far end. Each coffin was a different size and style. Some had designs engraved into them while others were covered with stickers, and some were plain wood. Hundreds of coffins filled the room and at first I thought I’d never be able to tell which one was Vincent’s.
I made an effort to be silent as I walked through the room, even though I knew none of the demons would wake. I turned the brass handle of the wooden door and opened it into a separate room.
Inside were three coffins, lit only by the dim light from the larger room. Two made of a solid, dark wood matched, and between them rested a single pearly coffin. It seemed like Vincent’s style to have such a standout coffin. I was betting those to the left and right contained either his lovers, or his bodyguards. Maybe both.
I stared at the pearl coffin. In a moment, my bubbling anger would have the chance to escape. I closed my eyes and took a breath. Dagger in hand, I raised the lid. I started to bring my blade down, but the coffin was empty.
Smooth, soft, white satin lined the interior and a small white pillow with ruffled trim rested at the head. The light from behind me darkened and a chill went down my spine.
“You didn’t honestly think it would be that easy, did you?” Vincent’s voice echoed in the dark room. He stood shirtless in the doorway, arms crossed, his body so pale it almost glowed. He had a more muscular build than I’d expected. His golden eyes looked at me with curiosity, and the oddest smile tugged at his lips.
I focused all my anger into my stare, imagining the release I would have if I pulled my blade across his neck. I pictured the blood flowing over the milky white flesh whose perfection I would mar and watch explode into ashes.
“Really, hunter, I’m not that easy to kill. You don’t survive for centuries being this easily found. You thought I would sleep in a stale dungeon like this? Tsk, tsk, I expected more from you.” Vincent’s eyes flickered as he stepped into the darkness and ran his hands along the white satin lining of the coffin. His golden orbs glowed in the light and I followed him with my eyes, my knuckles turning white as I clenched my blade.
“The hate in your eyes is great. What have I done to deserve such attention? I gave you what you requested, so have you come here to thank me?”
He acted like he hadn’t set us up, and the smile that crossed his lips was the final straw. I twirled the blade in my hand until I held it by the tip and put all my effort into being faster than him. I moved my arm in an arc and released the dagger at the perfect point.
The blade spun end over end as it shot towards him, and I was close behind. I had almost closed the distance before Vincent’s expression changed to shock – I’d succeeded in catching him off guard. The blade finished its last rotation and slid into his chest above his heart. I wrapped my hand around the handle and twisted the blade.
Vincent screamed in pain as his yellow orbs lit up with fear. His pupils expanded as his eyes turned to straight black. His skin went translucent, the red veins coming to the surface and running black as his inner demon came out. He fell onto his back with a muffled scream and pulled me down with him. I could see all the veins, bones, and muscles of the hand wrapped around my wrist. He squeezed hard to stop the dagger and cut off his own scream with gritted teeth as fangs dropped from his gums. His free hand reached for my throat but I pushed it away and pinned it to the floor.
“You set us up,” I screamed in his face.
Vincent was strong and his hand squeezed my wrist so hard I should’ve been writhing in pain, but my anger overrode everything in that moment. “I should’ve done what you did to us, and put this blade in your back. But I’d much rather look you in the eye while I kill you,” I said.
Vincent stared at me, more shock than anger showing on his clear veiny flesh. “If you plan on killing me…next time, go for the heart,” he said, wrenching himself away from me. He brought his knee up hard into my gut and pushed. I lost my grip on the dagger and tried to turn as I rolled onto one knee.
Vincent stood, and the blood dripping from the blade looked black and silver as it ran over his veiny chest. I could see his heart beating through his skin and his muscles twitching and contracting. His body was working overtime to fight the silver that poisoned it. He didn’t take his eyes off me as he pulled the blade from his chest, maintaining a neutral expression.
“How dare you accuse me of such treachery. We had a deal and I kept it. I gave you the location where you could find your answer.”
“Oh, we got the information alright, after Rayna almost got killed by hunters. All thanks to you holding up your
part of the deal
. Sending us into mortal danger was not part of the agreement.”