“I’m sorry.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You need to work on the whole speaking plainly thing.”
“The awakening was painful for you.” His mouth twisted around the word. “Your nature should not have been released so crudely without you knowing what you truly are. It may seem like I’m being cruel with my words, but we don’t have a lot of time and now you have broken the spell you will find it harder to conceal what you are.”
It was like he was speaking dead languages to me. One minute, I understood and followed his train of thought, the next I was being dunked head first into the sea when I’d thought I was standing in a field.
“You’re not making any sense. You talk like I already know what you’re referring to. And I don’t.”
“Your true form was concealed, a powerful casting. It suppressed and hid your fairy nature to keep you safe.”
I bit my lip. “I really am a fairy too?”
“What else would you be?”
I stopped, and my fingers curled under into fists. “You called me a demon girl. I could be a shifter, or have goblin blood or be a witch.” I sniffled. Unattractive, but needed since my nose was running. I was still trying not to cry, and the stinging pressure had to be released somehow.
My voice was muffled and my nose felt thick. “They all look human too.”
“Oh, Rae. You look like a human because of your glamour.”
My frustration was replaced with confusion and curiosity. “My glamour?” I waited for him to elaborate. He said nothing. I did the only thing I could do and applied logic to try and understand. I felt sick.
“Vampires can do what you describe. Glamour a human when they need to trick and feed.”
Was that it? I was I some freaky vampire-fairy hybrid that was going to go mad and massacre a load of people?
“No.” His hand cut the air in a strong motion. “What you refer to is purely mind control. The dead ones dress up compulsion to make it seem harmless. Fairy glamour is a small enchantment allowing us to look completely human.” He placed a hand to his heart, to his lips and reached as if to touch me. “Magic to our being is air to breathe and water to drink.”
The barrier over him rippled again.
“The glamour is that shield over you.” My hand swiped feebly but the curiosity in my tone was evident. “The barrier I can’t see through or feel.” His mouth tugged into a secret smile. Then he looked back over his shoulder, tapped his foot impatiently. I frowned. “You still need to go after the vampire you sensed back there?”
His face smoothed into relief. “Yes, yes I do.”
“Then show me. Prove what you are.” I stopped and crossed my arms over my chest. “The quicker you do the quicker you can go.”
Breandan took a long look at me then glowed with an inner light. His face was fiercely beautiful, the perfect features sharpened. His ears had elongated, pointed at the tips and curved into a slender elliptical shape. He looked different. Other.
The desire to hold him had increased in pressure, and was a force attacking all angles.
“Why do I feel like this?” I asked quietly. “I don’t think I even like you. How can I feel like this? Like I’ve known you my whole life. When you touch me I feel complete. When you speak, I accept everything because you said it.”
“The feeling of dislike is mutual, but I’m beginning to think I was born for you.” He sighed. “This will not be easy. Of course I would be the one to see you first.”
He pointed to somewhere behind me and turned his head slowly from left to right, like he was considering something. I looked over my shoulder. We had reached the Wall and the sudden crackling energy in the air allowed me to sense he was doing something big. The red wires stopped humming and cooled to pewter metal instead blazing red with electricity. The wires pinged and unraveled leaving a hole big enough for me to pass through at a stoop.
He jerked his head toward it. “Go now. Be safe and we will come for you.”
Then he was gone. Apparently fairies didn’t do long goodbyes. He was there then he wasn’t.
I was alone again in the forest but at least I wasn’t lost anymore. The sun was nearly done creeping up too. I slipped through the hole in the Wall, and the moment I did it knitted back together, but not before a dark streak dived through.
Every hair on my body stood on end. This was no fairy or Cleric. The movement was too liquid and quick to belong to anything, but a dead one. All I could think was run. I turned, tripped over a tree root and fell flat on my face. A mouth full of dirt, I crawled forward then decided I wanted to see it coming rather than be jumped from behind, and flipped round to scuttle back.
The vampire loomed over me, silent and deadly. He was dressed all in black and the space around him pulsed with darkness. Gesturing to me, his fingers were palm up and they curled around the air.
“Quiet, now,” he said. “It is not what you think. I would have revealed myself in a less dramatic manner, but the tear the fairy made was closing, and I did not have another way.” His somber expression lightened and his eyes twinkled. “I have already eaten, a skinny girl, bitter.”
I shrieked and scrambled back some more. My hands were scraped and gouged by stones and bracken, but the flares of heat a second after told me I was healing. The vampire followed me, human slow so my eyes could track his movement. I’d heard they liked to torment their meals. Make them beg and scream for death before putting them out of their misery.
“You are being rude,” he said shortly. “Will you not talk to me?”
I blinked, astonished, and stopped moving. “Huh,” I grunted, incredulous. “I’m about to die and you think I’m being rude by not talking to you?”
If I was in my right mind I would never back-chat the living dead, but I was shaking with fear and pretty sure I was about to pee myself.
Back-chat didn’t seem bad anymore.
His face remained passive. “I am death to those who cross my path.” My heartbeat picked up as if to emphasize the point. His mouth pulled into a grim line. “I do not deny what I am. I embrace it, but I have not come here to hurt you. I told you. I have already eaten.”
I started backing up again. It was stupid me crawling back and he walking after me, but now I was over the initial shock, I couldn’t get my body to stop. “Forgive me for not wanting to trust you, but your kind and my kind haven’t exactly seen eye to eye.” As I spoke I wasn’t sure if I meant humankind or fairykind, but I was sure the relationship with the vampires was about on par.
His lips quirked then fell straight. “No. I suppose not. Would it help if I gave you my word?”
He stopped and held out a hand to help me up.
I thought about it and managed to stop crawling. My arms were tired, my ass was damp from being dragged across the forest floor, and I was pretty sure I had a spider crawling up my back. I sighed and tossed my head to get the hair out of my eyes.
“No, it would not help, but I’m tired of being on the ground, and if you’re going to eat me I’d rather be upright with my head held high.”
I clasped his hand and curled my fingers around his. They were rock solid, cold. He pulled me up and my legs wobbled, so his other hand snagged my waist to steady me. For a moment I stood, but was weightless. The sensation was unusual. I scowled and stared into the face of my vampire. He was older than me, not by much and he was ugly. Swept back from his forehead and longer than fashionable, his hair was coal black, and cut close at the neck. His eyes were red ringed, like he was sickly, and had a peculiar stillness about them. He hadn’t blinked, not once since he’d first revealed himself to me. His eyebrows were thick and dark, as was the smattering of hair on his chin, which had a deep cleft. His brow jutted out from his face and his cheeks were gaunt, giving him a look of the starved. It was a strong face but one that did not appeal to me.
Straightening, I pulled myself from his grip and knocked his hands away. A faint, dry scent hit the back of my throat and my hackles rose. Swallowin
g hard, my eyes left his as I controlled the sudden urge to launch myself at him. To rip, bite and tear. A manic giggle bubbled in my chest. The thought of launching yourself at a vampire was ridiculous and suicidal, but my body was seriously contemplating it. He brushed the hair out of my eyes and I recoiled. He hadn’t made a move for a vein yet, but he was a blood drinker, and I was full of blood. He flashed me a smile, and his chalky lips framed pearly fangs flanked by two smaller canines. They had run right out as he’d touched me. For a moment I was overcome. I stared at them, the spiky tips resting on his lower lip, a startling shade of ruby red. Everyone knew vampire fangs ran out when they were mad or bloodlusty. Which was he? Probably the latter, if he was mad my limbs would be scattered across the forest floor by now.
“You’re going to kill me now,” I said steadily.
I’d been through too much to deny that I was living on borrowed time. To be honest I was waiting for the hammer to fall. I would die there, food for the vampire-boy the fairy-boy was hunting. Breandan would return eventually, like he promised and find my rotted corpse. Would he be sad? Would he and the ‘we’ he’d referred to, lament over my body. Would they give me a proper burial? After all he had said I was like him, fairykind too. In my last moments of life pondering on how I felt about being named a demon, I did not feel disgust or fear, but sort of a resigned relief. I was no longer a freaky human girl, but a demon. My strangeness made perfect sense now.
“I am not going to kill you.”
The vampire had spoken. It took me a while to realize he had, because my last words had been a statement not a question. And even if he’d interpreted it as a question, it was clearly rhetorical. I was living my last moments and the flashbacks of my life were about to commence, so the interruption was not appreciated. But since he’d spoken again I felt obliged to say something back, and I was getting used to conversations with strangers.
“Why?” I asked genuinely puzzled. “You didn’t dive through that hole for fun. If the wires had caught you, you’d have set off the klaxon and had Clerics with stakes and silver on your ass until you were ash. Vampires don’t seem the self-sacrificing kind to me. Plus, the sun is rising.” I pointed east. “You don’t have much time, and to be out this early, or late, you must be super hungry to risk the true death. Or suicidal. Which brings me back to the fact you guys are big on the self preservation.”
He made a low rumbling noise and his shoulders shook. It was laughter, and it was gruesome and wretched. “I have been looking for you.”
I thought about this. For a vampire to be looking for you and not hunting you, was unheard of. It was intriguing and I knew then curiosity was about to get me into more trouble.
“You’re not the first to try that line today. You demons know how to flatter a girl.”
He growled a little. “Fairies.” He said the word like a curse.
I sighed again, exaggerating the rise and fall of my shoulders. Fine, my tribulations for the morning were not over. I could deal with that, but I needed the safety of Temple walls. The forest was no longer comforting, but alien and hostile.
“If you’re not going to eat me would you mind if we walked and talked? I’m tired but have to keep going, or I’ll be late for class.”
He remained still and peered past me into the trees. I found it hard to read his face. His expression was not worried, but I thought it brooding, or rather, preoccupied with being anxious about something.
“I need to find a dark place. A safe place.”
The dead and the sunlight didn’t mix well. They burned, badly, and burst into extravagant blue and red flames. Then their blackened corpses flaked into ash. I could see why he might be anxious to find a ‘dark place’ as he put it.
“My wardrobe is dark.” The words popped out of my mouth before they registered. “Wait,” I said, and held up my palm. The standard cracks in my judgment were now gaping canyons, and there were all kinds of crazy ideas flying around. “You’re friendly, right? If I help you, you aren’t going to turn on me. Or turn me.”
“As you rightly pointed out, the sun is rising and I weaken by the moment. I need to talk to you. Hear what I have to say then I’ll go.”
“Okay,” I said slowly. There did not seem to be too big a downside to this arrangement. “I can do that, hear you out. But tell me, the fairy-boy I met is hunting you.” I watched his face carefully. “Why? Did you do something bad to him or his kind?”
He looked me over so intently I squirmed in my skin. He made a quick movement with his hand that said ‘so what’.
“If they find my resting place they will kill me, and they won’t listen to what I have to say, which is why you must.”
I mouthed my next words silently before I spoke them aloud. “I’m a fairy too.” It was easy to say and I smiled. “It’s important I know if talking to you will get me in trouble.” I paused then grunted. “In more trouble than I already am, I mean.”
His eyebrows rose and he focused on me more intently. I backed up a pace and couldn’t help cupping my neck with my hand. He tilted his head and narrowed those bottomless eyes of his.
“I smell magic, but you seem human to me in every way.”
“You seem to know a lot about me and what I’ve been doing. But then if you knew a lot about me you would know I have only just found out I’m a fairy.” That sentence was convoluted, and I had confused myself. It made some kind of crazy sense, so I stood my ground and waited for his answer.
The vampire did not seem confused. “I can explain. But at night.” His eyes darted to the east and his mouth pulled down.
The sky was much lighter now, but the clouds gave extra cover. Time was running out, I was beyond terrified, the curls of fear in my stomach were tornadoes, and I felt a responsibility to protect this vampire from bursting into a firework display.
“My cupboard it is.” He placed a hand on my lower back and I jerked away. “Watch the hands,” I said and eyed him.
“I’m going to carry you,” he explained. “It will be faster and we will not be seen.”
He was not much taller than me or bigger in size. No doubt he could carry me, but still, the thought of being so close to death itself was worrisome. His presence still rubbed me up the wrong way. I was strong willed, not infallible, and me losing control would be fatal.
“No funny business. I’ll scream and dead or not, it will hurt your ears.”
He shook his head, face serious. “No funny business,” he promised.
“Could you put the fangs away?”
“I like the way you smell.”
“That is creepy,” I said and plucked at my bottom lip. “You’re creepy.”
His body kind of vibrated, and a strange grizzly sound came out of his mouth. I guess since vampires didn’t use air to talk or breathe they sounded, moved and even laughed differently to normal beings. I jumped, but thankfully he was too preoccupied with laughing to notice, or to comment on noticing.
“No biting. I swear.”
I was having a hard time. Vampires were more often than not attractive in a scary, dead, don’t look them straight in the eye, ripping throats out and wallowing in ‘top yourself’ amounts of despair, way. This vampire-boy was positively spritely. It was such a stark contrast to my preconceptions cultivated by years of Sect reports, I kept having mini flashes of the different ways he would grab me, and sink his fangs into my flesh.
“Can’t get much crazier than I already am,” I said finally, and shuddered. Another flash of watching him drink me to death had me wishing I’d stayed my ass in bed.
The vampire picked me up and broke out into a ground-eating run. I noticed then that he was not breathing and wondered if that was by choice? It was strange to be so close to another person and not sense the normal rise and fall of the chest. There was no heartbeat either. No body heat. Just this animated body walking and talking and carrying me. People said vampires were soulless, and I did not agree. They had souls, dark ones. Here I must say I also believ
ed there were different kinds of dark. There was a dark that was evil and cruel, and there was a dark that was solitary and simply absent of light. Maybe this boy was the clear dark.
I kept thinking nice fluffy thoughts of flames that didn’t blister the skin because they looked pretty, and bolts of lightning that wouldn’t kill you dead because they were a gift from the sky. Making bad things good helped me to not freak out, and start bawling in this demons embrace. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t stop the thought that really mattered. This vampire needed something from me. That was the reason I was still alive. And, I concluded he must be cunning. Breandan seemed a good tracker and he’d been fooled. I was sure he would not have left me if he’d thought there was a chance I’d be in danger.
Thinking of the fairy-boy had me thinking on a new problem I had created for myself. What did I do and say the next time I saw him? Did I tell him about the vampire-boy in the wardrobe? Breandan had said he’d come back, but not when so I figured he’d probably give me a few days to adjust. He’d seemed very conscious I accept what he’d told me, and he’d made an effort to ask how I was feeling and if I’d wanted to talk about it. The vampire could die for the day in my wardrobe, ask me his questions after sunset then go on his merry way. Problem solved, because then I would wake up.
I had decided right around the time I saw the green fairy-girl that I was dreaming.
We ended back on the Temple grounds in a few blinks of the eye. At first it looked like he was going to run through the brick wall that surrounded the Temple, and I squeezed my eyes shut. I felt a jolt. Air whistled past my head and other sounds drowned in a loud whoosh. The vampire-boy did a fast movement, another bigger jolt then the wind was blowing the hair back from my face again. It was hard to figure out the speed he ran at in the dark, but the wind on my face gave me a little thrill. If ever I needed to run away from him I’d be faster. Something struck me as a little odd. He seemed to know exactly where he was going.
I said, “You’ve been here before.”
This was more evidence I was still sleeping safely in my bed.