Melabeth Forgive Me, For I Am Sin! (19 page)

Across the room Jason was smashing and tossing the undead zombies. It was time, time for Jason to die. I flashed over to him, and then slashed him a few times. I ripped his clothing as my nails dug into his flesh, but the slits in his flesh closed, with no blood to boot.

Jason swung at me as I slashed at his skin; I was too fast for him to hit me. After I was sure I had his attention, I jumped into the air; spun into a back flip and landed on the bar without a sound.

Now Jason was about thirty feet in front of me, the zombies were still grabbing at him, but it was no more than just a small nuisance to the troll. He eyed me trying to figure out who I was, then he said, “Little vampire, give me your name… then I'll know who I killed.”

I smiled a wicked smile as I stared at him still perched on top of the bar. “What name would you like? The name I go by now, or the name I went by when you killed ME?”

Jason looked confused, and then said, “I don’t recall killing you… wait, you do look like… nope… I don’t remember you, but I’ll tell you what little vampire, after I finish killing you tonight, I will try harder not to forget you.”

“Name’s Melabeth, and I don’t care if you remember me; I remember you, and now you will pay for what you have done.”

Jason smiled as he threw off some more zombies, and then he yelled, “Let’s see what you’re made of.”

David had come back into the bar; his eyes were green, and he was surrounded by his
zombies. He was standing behind Jason, and Jason was too busy watching me to notice David coming in. David held up his arm, and in his hand was the sword. He threw it through the air, over Jason’s head; I caught it with my right hand.

This was not a normal sword; I haven’t had a chance to see it before this very moment. I had practiced with swords with Ezra. The sword was similar to the one I had been practicing with in size and shape, but that is where their similarities ended. The sword was a Viking style sword; it was considered a one handed sword, but I could fit both of my
hands on the handle. The hand guard was small, but it was made out of one thick piece of steel. The blade was only about three feet long; it was straight with a slight taper to the blade and sharp on both sides. The metal of the blade really caught my eye; the blade looked like the grain of wood. One grain was the color of light gray and the other was black with strange green lights flowing through the grain. It looked like hundreds of green boats going down dark rivers.

I quickly brought my attention back to Jason; he was grinning at me like this whole thing was amusing to him, and I flashed forward.

I popped out right in front of him; he swung at me, but I was ready for that. I dropped down and rolled right under his swing; I came up to my feet and spun my sword around into an arc.

Jason was already swinging the same arm back at me; he planned on backhanding me, but my sword was already. I took his hand off at the wrist.

I flashed a few yards back as Jason yelled in pain.

The sword made a sound, kind of like the ringing of a bell. It was strange, but I wasn’t worried about it. David had told me that this was a magic sword, and it would not break.

Jason bent over picked up his severed hand. Troll wounds were strange. There was no blood; instead, his skin was wrapped around what appeared to be red jelly, or maybe Jell-O. And in the center of the Jell-O I could see white where his bone was. Jason put his severed hand back on, and, in seconds, it melted back onto his arm.

Jason laughed, "You may not know, but I am a
troll, little vampire. You can chop me up all day, and my body parts will pull themselves back together."

"I know that; there are other ways to kill a
troll. Chopping them up just helps me feel better." I said this, and then smiled as large as I could.

The look on his face changed from smug confidence to uneasy. He hadn't thought I knew what he was, and therefore he wasn’t afraid of me. He decided to try to play it safe, "Another time little vampire." With that he tried to head toward the exit, but the undead surged to meet him. He grabbed the first few
zombies and threw them out of his way, but he was a fool, because now his back was turned to me.

I flashed the distance between us; as soon as I came out of the flas
h my sword flew through the air and sliced through his left knee. I cut his leg in half, causing him to fall to the ground with a crash. He immediately pushed himself up using his arms and then swung at me.

I jumped straight up and spun upside down at the same time.

I had learned some new tricks from Charlotte since I had learned how to fly. It was more like floating; changing the way gravity pulled on my body. I landed on the ceiling with my feet then ran a few feet forward, pushed off of the ceiling spun around and returned gravity to normal.

I landed behind Jason and with a quick slash of my sword; I took his arm off right at the elbow.

Jason screamed and it sounded like it was between pain and rage. He had managed to pick himself up on one foot, and his other leg that had been dismembered, now moved on its own to reattach back onto the troll.

The leg never made it.

Two zombies jumped on the piece of leg and dragged it away; at the same time, some more zombies grabbed the dismembered arm and carried it off into the crowd.

“Bring that back,” yelled Jason at the
zombies. He turned his eyes upon me, “What do you want? What have I done to you?”

“Still don’t remember me? Let me give you a clue. Last time you saw me it was 1975, and I was still alive. Ring any bells?”

Jason looked confused, and then his eyes narrowed as if he were looking at me for the first time. His face went slack, and then the troll stuttered out, “The girl, the girl in the movie… the one we killed, Alex killed.”

“You raped me; you sa
t there with a beer in your hand while Alex raped and killed me. You talked about how you’d rather have the money than my life…ALEX MURDERED ME, ALL OF YOU MURDERED ME… and now I will set things right.”

The
troll fell to his one knee, and looked as if he might cry. “I know, I know what I did, I have changed. I know you owe me nothing, but I got away from Alex and changed my life.”

“LIAR,” I screamed in rage.

Jason said now with tears in his eyes, “Please forgive me, I will do anything.”

"Anything?" I said with a grin.

"Yes, I have changed."

I smiled, "Then do one thing for me."

"What?"

"Die… and burn in hell, you piece of shit." With that I flashed forward and attacked.

Jason caught me with his large arm throwing me through the air and against the wall.

He said with rage in his eyes, "Have it your way, vampire, I didn’t have to destroy you, but I will."

I flashed forward again, only this time I sidestepped his swing from his one good arm. Then I followed through with a swing from my sword taking his last arm right below the shoulder.

The sword rang again as the
troll screamed in pain.

As fast as I could
, I spun the sword into a large arc then brought the sword fast and smooth right across his shoulders. His head slowly fell off and dropped to the floor as the sword rang even louder.

The
zombies quickly picked up the head and carried it off. David motioned to a group of the undead, and they started to pick up the mass of the troll’s body. A couple of zombies held out his last leg; then I cut it off so that the peace of Jason could be moved out to the trucks with ease.

"Let's go,"
David barked at me. All the zombies headed out of the building carrying pieces of the troll.

We needed to get out of here before friends of Jason show
ed up and tried to stop us. Trolls merge back together easily, and Jason was not dead, yet.

I headed outside to where the truck was and jumped into the passenger seat. A
zombie sat in the driver seat ready to drive. We had three box trucks, one for the head, one for the body, and the last one for all the legs and arms. We were on our way before I knew it. I was in the second truck as David drove the first truck.

It amazed me how the
zombie driving my truck and the one behind me could drive so well, but David had explained that he could control them and make them work with him. I didn’t understand how these zombies David had been making were different from the undead he had risen from the cemetery over a year ago. David had done nothing but practice his art and magic. He had been developing new Necromancer magic, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about it, but Alice and the rest of the Whites had no problem telling me that David was bad news.

We had been in the city of Albuquerque
, New Mexico.  We were heading back toward Las Vegas on I-40. I stared out the window into the vast open desert as we left the city behind. With my eyes the stars cast enough light for me to see the desert and its plants. It still looked to be an alien world with the strange shadows and colors that didn’t exist when I was alive. If the moon would have been up, it would be like day, but without the moonlight, it looked more like a cloudy day, gray and mysterious, with its own beauty. I can't say that being a vampire I miss the sun, because I don’t.

We would be stopping soon, and there were only a few more hours before daylight. It wasn’t long before we got off the highway, and then traveled for a little ways down some old forgotten road. The trucks found their way onto a dirt road. After another twenty minutes we came to a clearing; in less than an hour the sun would be up. I could already see the light in the sky.

I watched David get out of his truck and start to command the zombies to unload the trucks. That is when I took notice of my zombie driver. I hadn't really looked at him; I mean who would, and it's just an animated corpse. It was Aaron Reite; just looking at him was like ripping off a scab.

It was one of those vampire things that I didn’t find out about until after it had happened. Apparently, when we feed on blood from some people we also get some of their last memories. I killed this man, and, when I did, I remembered the last hour of his life; I remembered it like I lived it, and it gave me nightmares for weeks. David was being a real dick; he had done this on purpose.

I got out of the truck slamming the door shut; I was still carrying my sword. I walked toward David and came to a stop; I was standing next to him. I didn’t look at him; I just stared in front of me at all the zombies holding pieces of Jason.

The pieces of Jason were trying to come back together, but the
zombies had a good hold. It was kind of funny watching the zombies sway back and forth fighting the invisible tug of the troll’s body parts; it kind of looked like a strange dance.

The sun was almost up and the sky was full of light, enough to make me put on my sunglasses. They were the sunglasses Michael had given me for my birthday. I didn’t wear them around David, but, after seeing Aaron the
zombie as my driver, well, I didn’t care if David liked it or not.

I looked over at David; he was staring at the
zombies with a smirk on his face. He said, “Looks to be a beautiful day, wouldn’t you say?”

“I hate you… how could you? You know how many nightmares I have about that man.”

David chuckled darkly, “All these zombies are your kills. Why cry about just one?” I looked over the crowd of faces and remembered none of them. Before I could think about it too much, the sun rose above the horizon, and two things happened at the same time.

First, my sword turned into a black cloud and quickly blew away, leaving me nothing but the hilt. Second
, the parts of the troll stopped moving and a gray color washed over them as they turned to stone.

The
zombies dropped the different pieces onto the ground. I walked over to the body and kicked it with such force it exploded into dust and smaller fragments. I had hit hard enough to break my leg, but my leg quickly healed. After that I took each piece and smashed it in turn, saving the head for last.

I picked up the stone head and looked into the monster’s eyes that had so coldly raped me, who had watched me die, with a smile and a hard on. I cr
ushed his head into the ground and then headed towards the truck.

David called out, “Do you need help finding your way home?”

“I know my way back.” I pulled the Aaron zombie out of the cab of the truck and onto the ground. I drove away without a backward glance.

I drove to the highway then headed west toward Vegas. I stopped at the first hotel and checked in.

I was tired and emotional; I was too tired to work through all my emotions... the rage of seeing Jason, the horror of seeing Aaron and the pain that David made me feel. I kept on thinking that I should feel some relief from all this. Shouldn’t the death of Jason bring me some joy, inner peace maybe? Yet, right at this moment… I needed sleep, that’s what I needed, sleep.

In my hotel room, I showered
, put on some nice pajamas, closed the drapes as tight as I could, then crawled under the sheets. As I lay there quietly my mind wandered back, back to when I killed Aaron.

The memory was fresh, even though it was eight months ago. I had nightmares afterwards, reliving Aaron’s last hour over and over again. Me and David had killed so many Order members. Until David had pointed out that all the
zombies were my kills, I had no idea how many. I knew before I fell to sleep, I knew what I would dream about. Damn David, didn’t he know how cruel he was being.