The Grey Sight: An Erotic Novella (5 page)

              “Riggor and Sappho were here. They came after me, for you! Now, doesn’t that just seem a little unfair? After they had their way with me, they held me down, and she stabbed me, over and over again.  And just when I was on the brink of death, Sappho pressed her gorgeous lips against mine and now I’m a grey-walker, just like Chase, your boyfriend.” 

Lily focused all her attention on Jess’s black eyes.
Maybe there was some remnant of Jess left, the gentle and funny Jess who had so worshipped and adored her. 

“You don’t have to hurt me, or Chase.” 
Oh Chase
, she thought, where
are you? Are you alive? Did you leave me?  Are you unconscious?

Every fiber in her body yearned to s
ee his face.

 
              “I told them that I would keep you here until they come back with reinforcements.  I was going to try to be nice about it, but then you brought that stupid graveyard lurker home with you and I knew it wouldn’t work. What is so great about him, Lily? What does he have that I can’t give you? Can he fuck you better? Can he love you better? I have ALWAYS loved you, and you have never once looked at me the way you look at him, you stupid bitch.”

  
              She ripped Lily’s shirt open, exposing her right breast.   Jess ran her finger over Lily’s nipple.  “Pink and raw. Looks like someone has been playing with it recently.”  She gave it a single lick. Then she sat up, angry passion smeared across her face.  “I
will
have you before they come.  They’re almost here.  Did you know that I can feel them now? Being a grey-walker is amazing, way better than being alive.  And you, being a mortal...” she gave an orgasmic shudder.  “I can’t even describe how good it will be to taste you living and then see you dead.  And when I bring your body to the Great Houses with my new friends, we will all be richly rewarded.  All for the cost of one indifferent roommate.” 

She gave an evil laugh, and a new grey light began to glow from underneath her skin.

“Do you like that?” she asked. “It’s new.”

              Jess reached above the dresser and pulled down a single blade. The handle was a red garnet laced with silver and the blade was stained a rust color.  

“About an hour
ago, this knife ended my life. And now it’s going to end yours as well.”

              She traced it down Lily’s neck.  “Don’t worry, I’ll be merciful. Quick and painless, a thank you for the hours that it brought me ecstasy to fantasize about you.”  

The knife edged up to her heart
.  Jess’s other hand was still held Lily’s arms above her head. Her mouth trembled.

“I’m
truly sorry Lily. But I see no other way.”

Lily took a deep breath, and let her last thoughts linger on Chase. 
Oh grey-walker gods
, she thought,
please keep him safe
.

              There was a faint scratching sound, and suddenly glass was flying everywhere. Lily covered herself with her arms.  Jess was not so lucky.  Sharp pieces had tucked itself into her chest and cheek, black blood flowing freely.  She looked up at the window and bared her teeth.   Chase rose from the floor, bleeding from a dozen tiny cuts. 

              “Get off her.  You don’t understand any of this Jess. I can help you adjust to this new life, we can explain everything.  You aren’t yourself right now. Those two people…”

“The people who murdered ME?
”  Jess gritted her teeth.

“They sta
bbed me, crying out Lily’s name. And yours. Everything in my life has revolved around her and now, I finally have her undivided attention.”  She looked down. “Don’t I, Lil?”

              It was the moment that Chase needed. He launched himself across the room at Jess, slamming her back into the dresser.   He was quicker than her, and much more skilled.  Blinding grey light shimmered off both of their bodies as they danced together, fighting to the death.  Jess managed to slice open his shirt with her blade and left a thin trail of black blood across his chest.  Chase was breathing heavy, his bare chest glistening in the window light.

              “Jess, I’m begging you. This is your last chance! You are Lily’s friend.  Stop this and join with us.  You do not have to bow to those who murdered you.  I will help you! Please! I do not want to kill Lily’s friend, but I will if you try to hurt her again. Being changed into a grey-walker can affect your personality – I know, I have been there! Don’t do this!” 

Jess’s eyes glittered
with black hatred.  “Oh that’s not it at all.  I don’t care about them.  I care about her!  If I can’t have her whole heart…”

She looked
over at Chase with pure hatred.

“The
n you certainly can’t.”

              With that, she threw herself towards Lily, her bloody knife outstretched.  Chase was much faster, and stronger.  He hit Jess while she was still in midair. The force of his body slammed against her, and they both flew through the air, screaming and cursing.  Jess had managed to wrap her hands around his neck, her legs around his waist. 

Jess gave a scream, and without a shred of emotion, Chase hurtled himself towards
the wall.  He slammed Jess against it once, and then again, before hurtling her body out of the window. Jess flew through the air, landing with a sickening splat on the iron picket fence below.  Her black eyes turned a bright green before she shut them forever.  Lily ran to the window.  Chase was crouched on a narrow window ledge.  Lily covered her mouth with her hands and let out a tiny sob. 

“Are you okay?” he asked, “Did she hurt you?”

Chase shook his head.
  “I’ll be fine. I heal quickly.”

He looked down at Jess and back up at Lily before shaking his head.  “That was her second death.
She won’t survive that.”  Lily barely had time to raise her hands to her face when the front door slammed.  Chase froze.

              “They’re here.” he said, and pulled her out the window into empty space.

Chapter Seven

As Lily inched down the drainpipe, she wondered how she had ever gotten to this point.

              One week ago, she had been sitting her office at the National Ancestry Registry, daydreaming about a man who would one day come and awaken her passions…and now he was right below her, climbing down a drainpipe, fleeing from some black-eyed demons that wanted to kill her. 

“Almost there.” Chase said, his lilting accent like a song in her ears. 

Worth it,
she thought. 
Worth climbing down a million drainpipes
. 

Chase slipped his hands around he
r waist, lifting her to the ground. 

“Come on” he said. “My car is parked around the corner.”

              Lily gave him a bemused look. “I thought you weren’t stalking me.”

 
              Chase wrapped his hand around hers as they ran through the yard, his other hand shielding Lily from the gruesome sight of Jess’s body. 

              “Stalking and protecting are different.  I followed you this morning, and I’m glad I did.  Otherwise…” 

The man in the khaki suit
would have killed me
.  Chase pulled her around the corner, where a grey Aston Martin waited.  Chase practically tossed her in the car and gunned the engine.  The car shot past the house.  Lily watched through her wide grey eyes as Riggor and Sappho and two other men burst through the front door, new daggers at Sappho’s side, their clothing smeared with blood.  Lily ducked down as they passed.  Hopefully they hadn’t  seen them.

“Will they follow us?” She asked.
“Can they fly?”

Chase shook his head
and gave an empty laugh.

“No. But t
hey know where I am going.” 

“And where is that?”

                “House Fury.” He answered.   Lily sat back against the seat.

              “House Fury.  Perhaps I’m new to this grey-sight thing, but isn’t that the LAST place we would want to go?   We should head to my parent’s cottage.”

              Chase shook his head.  “No.  If Jess knew about it, so did Riggor and Sappho.  We will be safe at House Fury. I plan to plead your case before the council.  You will be safe while I do.  Hopefully, I’ll win.”

              Lily stared at him.  “And if you don’t?” 

He grima
ced.  “Than we will both be put to death.  I meant it when I said I will never live without you again.”   Lily stared out the car window. 

“NO.” She said.

              Chase tilted his head at her.  “I’m sorry?”

His polite
accent betrayed his surprise.  “NO.  We can go to House Fury in the morning.   But tonight, I can’t.  I won’t.” 
Say it
, she thought.  “Tonight I want to be with you.” 

Chase ground his teeth together and revved the engine.  “I want that as well, Lily.  But the grey-walkers can feel each other. 
Riggor and Sappho and a thousand other grey-walkers are on your trail right now. It wasn’t as grave a situation when they didn’t know your name, but now I guarantee every grey-walker from here to Canada knows who you are, where you live and what you look like. No matter where we go, they will find us.  I was stronger than Jess, and I will kill anyone who even so much as looks at you the wrong way, but I am no match for ten of them. Grey-walkers are unnaturally strong and quite fast. Our best course of action is to go to House Fury. We will have sanctuary there until the trial.”

              Lily closed her eyes.  “Okay.  I trust you.”

Chase reached over and touched her cheek with the back of his hand.  “You have had quite a day.  I’m sorry about Jess.”

              Lily gave a nod as her eyes welled with guilty tears.

“She wasn’t perfect but, she was a good friend when I needed her.  I hate that she died afraid and angry.” Chase grabbed her hand.  “Sometimes becoming a
new grey-walker increases certain, how shall we say
, aspects
of your personality.  Jess had some possessive issues with you, and when she became a walker, it amplified it a thousand fold.  Tell yourself that that wasn’t truly Jess.  She hadn’t grey-
walked
long enough to truly understand it.  Once you’ve been a grey-walker for a few years, you learn to either overcome whatever you struggle against, or you let it rule over you.  Riggor and Sappho are driven by ambition, the bloody kind.  Lust, depression, anger, suspicion…if any of these feelings are lying dormant under the exterior, they will come roaring out once you are changed into a walker. You didn’t kill her. They did. And we will have justice for her. I promise.“

Lily
wiped tears from her eyes, choosing to remember Jess smiling and laughing at a bar.  She would make it up to her someday. Somehow.

“What about you? What was amplified in your personality
?” 

Chase gripped the steering wheel.
Lily’s grey eyes lingered one the way his hands wrapped so strongly around the leather cover.

“Manipulation. It was what I was good at when I was a full mortal.  When I became a grey-walker, I found that I could manipulate everyone, every SINGLE grey-walker I met. I could even do some minor manipulation with mortals, even though they couldn’t see me.  It became an addiction, to see how many people I could play with like puppets at one time.”  

Lily watched out the window as the city fell away building by building until they were flying past a sea of green pastures and abandoned towns. 
She recognized the road – they were headed for the coast.

“What changed you?”
 

“You did.”  That made her forge
t about the scenery.

“What?”

“20 years ago, a tiny six year old blond girl stumbled into my graveyard. I don’t live in a grave or a coffin, as your silly vampire lore would have you believe, but I liked to go walking there, just to sit and watch the world pass by me.  It’s a beautiful place. One day, I was sitting there, and you ran in, your blond pigtails bouncing behind you, wearing a purple gingham dress and carrying a tiny doll.” Lily remembered both: the dress and the doll.  The dress had been her mother’s favorite.

“You were run
ning around, chasing shadows.  Then you buried your doll and had a mock funeral for her.  I laughed at that, and was completely drawn in to this world you created with your imagination. And as I watched you, I realized that you had everything I didn’t – happiness, freedom and purpose.  Your joy didn’t come from manipulation and games, it came from embracing LIFE – even if my life could never be like yours.  I vowed to make a change that day, that I would stop playing games with people.  I’m not perfect, but I hardly ever say anything other than what I mean anymore.  Every time I saw you in the graveyard after that was a reminder of my promises, and the hope that someday maybe I could introduce myself to you. I wanted you to
see
me.”   Lily clutched his hand tightly as she turned to gaze upon his face.