Token Huntress (12 page)

“Let’s go home,” she said with a reassuring smile. I was mortified how comfortable she was in the blood war that raged around her.

Before I could stand, the vampire had grabbed her chair and, with lightning speed, they were gone.

Chase turned to me, his fangs not as large as Tythian’s, but I could see he too was a very old vampire. “Esmore,” he whispered. Before I could run for my sword to use it against him, he had already vanished, leaving me by myself.

Kora and Kasey were the reason why he fled. They had advanced on him, trying to entrap him. For what reason he hadn’t tried to kill them I wasn’t sure. He simply hid amongst the dark. I could still feel his presence close by, but it felt as if he were only watching. Not fighting, but just watching how everything would play out. Realizing Chase was gone, they focused on another three vampires, entrapping them as Dillian and Tori covered their backs. One by one, the girls trapped more. There were so many of them.

Teary was fighting off four. Except for Tythian and Chase, they all seemed like younger vampires. You could tell by their strength and speed. Usually we could challenge vampires if they were no more than one hundred and fifty years old. After that it became very difficoven to compete against a vampire who had lived for so long.

James was now by my side. He had gathered my Barnett bow and sword for me. I used my arrows instantly on a vampire who ran for me, piercing his chest. He crumbled to the ground, quickly decaying. I roared in anger at how easily I had been overcome by the previous two vampires. I sliced through another vampire, cutting down his throat and through his belly. I cut across another’s head, slitting their throat and puncturing their chest. I raged again, feeling myself fill with hatred and a need to see their blood. I cut off one’s arm, plunging my sword into its chest, driving so deep into it that after a few steps I had nailed it to a tree. It slumped around my sword, its skin turning a shade of black. I pulled it out, watching it begin to decay.

A huge fire lit behind me. Teary was controlling the flames, sweeping over the ten of them that encircled her. There must have been one hundred vampires. This was a well-thought out ambush. James grabbed one vampire’s throat and then another as it ran from behind him. Smashing both their heads together, they shattered from the impact. James steely skin was impenetrable. He grabbed his sword from the ground. A vampire must have knocked it out of his hand. He punctured both in the chest before they could heal.

In the distance I could feel the presence of many more coming. For that many we would have to use the grenade. It was us against many. As if knowing what I was thinking, James ran to Teary as she continued to sweep her hand containing the fire around.

In the distance a vampire stalked toward Teary. He too was strong and old. I had the feeling that others followed him as their numbers grew. James now had the grenade, and he was pulling the pin. Inwardly I counted the short seconds in my head.
Ten, nine.
Teary continued to control her flames, still engulfing the many around her.
Eight, seven.
Two vampires came at me and quickly I thrust my sword into them, before shooting an arrow into another oncoming vampire.
Six, five
. James threw the grenade at the large army that stampeded toward us.

The leading vampire swept one hand across them both. Teary’s flames were instantly put out as a gust of wind extinguished it. The wind not only pushed James and Teary back but Dillian, Tori, Kasey, and Kora as it smashed into their backs, throwing them forward. It had even taken the Council vampires along with it. This vampire had the gift of control over wind. The grenade was thrown toward my team.

Four, three.

With all the speed I could muster I ran for them, grabbing a hold of the grenade in the air. I ran into the distance so the grenade was nowhere near them, throwing it at the army that charged toward them.

Two, One.

The grenade exploded near the army, but shattered much more than just that. Quickly a burst of dust swept over me. The burning flames of the explosion encased my body. I heard my name whispered by an angelic voice, but noted it was probably the afterlife calling for me. This must now be my time of death.

Hollow Darkness

T
he darkness which was bestowed upon me at birth,

has edged into my very soul.

My daddy whispered those haunting words and lessons,

making sure that I would never reveal that clawing beast.

Daddy, you and mum are gone now. I am now adult.

The world I fight in against vampires is offering a power which we never thought I’d know.

I can feel it rising, and with it I feel the taste of pleasure.

My skin shrieks to be free of this taint, but I can feel the beast within me smiling.

I am Huntress but within me, I can feel this darkness.

Daddy, what if it consumes me?

S
lowly I came to consciousness, realizing that I was in an unfamiliar room. My eyes felt sticky when they fluttered open. I shot up, wincing in pain. I looked down at my body, which was covered in deep cuts. It seemed odd to me that they were so deep, yet they did not bleed. It looked like an animal with sharp claws had attacked me.

              I suddenly realized I was not alone. I reached for my weapons, but they were not there — I couldn’t see them anywhere. I was in a large room. It looked like a basement of sorts. I was on a large king-size bed with a wooden frame. Above me was a small window, but no light shined in. It was now night. There was an odd material hanging in front of me. I tried recalling its name; it was a type of lounge bed from the technology era. We had studied many trivial things like this at the Guild. It was a ‘hammock.’

              I was mortified to notice that many faces were looking at me: tiny dolls. Rows of them on a six-stack of silver shelves. And it looked like there were many rows behind. It was just creepy. “They are called bobble-head dolls,” a now familiar voice said as he crept out of the shadows. Chase walked up to one, lightly tapping its head. It began to bobble.

He wore nothing except his dark-blue jeans, which were torn to shreds. The material hung in threads. I could see his muscular legs through the cuts, toned and strong. A small line of hair trailed from his belly button to below his belt. I flushed in anger at my own admiration. I had to stop looking at him in such a way.

              “You kidnapped me,” I regained myself. I would never show my weakness to a vampire.

              “Pardon? No. I was the only one who tried to save your life,” he corrected me. The glimmer of the blue gem on his ear grabbed my attention as he stepped forward. I was disgruntled by how comfortable I was in his presence. I flushed with fury, knowing I had to kill him. I had to kill all vampires. I searched around me for what I could use as a weapon against him. Perhaps I could kick in the wooden bed, splintering it and using it as a weapon. But assessing it again, I saw that they were very thick posts.

“Esmore, your hunters abandoned you. They left you for dead when that grenade went off. I swooped in as fast as I could, but you had already been gunned down with shards from the explosion.”

              My wounds did look like the repercussions of such an event. When I looked closer, it didn’t look as if an animal had attacked me, but indeed, as if I had been caught in an explosion. The memory painfully came back to me. I remembered my self-sacrificing motions. I had run with the grenade to save the others without thinking. Chase’s torn jeans were much the same as my tattered clothing. My clothes were mostly shredded. Part of my breast, stomach, and inner thigh were revealed. I tightened my jaw.

“If that is the truth, then I should be dead!”

              “Wow,” he mocked. “You are so depressing. I thought you would at least idolize me or something after I saved you.”

              “You kidnapped me!” I spat savagely, hiding my pain as I moved uncomfortably.

              “I saved you, at least admit that,” he said. Once again I searched around, looking for something I could use against him as a weapon. But my body was very fragile and I questioned if I could get anywhere quick enough without him knowing it first. As if knowing what I was thinking, he went serious again.

              “Esmore, yes, you should be dead. Hunters don’t heal like you do.” He slowly walked toward me. I was stiff, yet could not look away from his enticing gray eyes. There was something that nagged at me, as if he did feel familiar. Like we had known one another long ago. My body craved for his touch. My mind was repulsed at the thought of it, yet my body sung out for it. He sat in front of me, on the edge of the bed. “But I am glad you are not.” He reached a hand out toward my face as if going to cup it.

              I was confused by my body wanting him to touch me, but my instinct to kill him. I slapped his hand away from me with a determined look. “I am not your pet,” I said dryly. “You should have let me die.”

              At my words he seemed disheartened and his shoulders slightly slumped. He noticed my hand was now bleeding. The force I applied to hitting his hand away reopened one of my wounds, its burn engulfing my whole hand.

              “You’re so savage, I love it,” he said humorously, changing his demeanor entirely. I couldn’t gather my thoughts on his personality, which turned quickly from intense to well, weird. “Let me wrap something around that.” He walked into a room that was behind me. I looked through the partially open door to see a bathroom.

              “I don’t need your help!” I said angrily, wanting to be anywhere but here. Why couldn’t he have left me in the carnage? I hated how much he rattled me. Never did I feel such confusion, not since my mother died.

              “Oh, I’m not doing it for you Esmore, because I know how much you despise me. For now,” he said with a cocky smile. “But in all seriousness, those are my bed sheets your hand is bleeding on, so I would like you to keep your blood to yourself. It tempts me too much. You smell so sweet.”

              I glowered angrily. How dare he suggest I was food?

“I promise I won’t touch you,” he raised his hands in a defensive manner. His movement caused his jacket to open further and reveal more of his glorious muscles. “Not unless you want me to. I am old enough to fight my cravings, Esmore.” The way he rolled my name in his mouth alone seemed to give him great pleasure. I said nothing, so he continued to fill the thick tension in the air with more talk. “You know if you have a small taste of my blood I can heal you much faster than your hunter blood can.”

              “Absolutely not!” I spat in disgust. Before I could throw further words of reproach at him, a banging on the door began. I refocused my killer instincts. Chase had brought me back to the lair of the Council. Before I could hide, Chase had already grabbed me at lightning speed and hid me behind the door of the bathroom. He covered my mouth with his hand so I could not make a noise. He had me pinned against the wall so I could not fight him. His speed had once again taken my breath away. He was so much faster than me. I could feel that he was aware of his strength, and he held me carefully. Although he had me pinned, I could sense it was for my own protection. “Chase, I know you are in there!” a rough-sounding male vampire shouted, banging on the door again.

              “Don’t leave this room,” Chase whispered to me. His face was close to mine, his hot breath mixing with mine. Suddenly he realized our closeness. His eyes clouded with a very different expression. My body was responding to his touch, even though my mind screamed at me, infuriated. He licked his lips, staring at mine. The lingering feel of his fingers on my skin sent shudders of faint hotness through me. My body wanted more.

The vampire shouted again, breaking the trance we were in. “I will break down your door. You have to report to him now!”

              Doing the only thing I could to remove his grip on me, I bit Chase’s hand hard, drawing blood. He loosened his grip on me, slowly taking his hand away from my mouth with a small smile. “Please Esmore, do not leave this room. No one can know that you are a hunter. They will kill you.” Hesitantly he stepped away from me, assessing me carefully like I was an animal ready to break free. But I couldn’t move; he had stunned me. A smile came across his face as he licked the small bite marks on his hand. Already they had healed. “Well, looks like you did have a taste for my blood after all.”

              Before I could voice my repulsion, he was gone. I heard the slam of the door behind him. And suddenly I felt very alone. The bathroom had a claw tub in the left hand side, on the right a toilet, and a long marble white bench with two basins. I hurried over to it, looking at the large mirror. Gasping at the single droplet of blood I had on my lip, I wiped it with my hand, hoping I hadn’t ingested any of it. Looking down at my hand in amazement, I saw my wounds had begun to heal. The pink scarring vanished and my skin returned to its plump state.

              My hands shook from anger. I had never felt so powerless in my life. Never had my mind and body been so at odds with each other. On that thought, never had my body desired anything so desperately. I pressed myself to the basin, looking at the claw bathtub, deep in thought. I questioned what happened to my team.
Please let them be alive
. I measured the distance between them and the grenade. It was far enough for them to have escaped the explosion. And it should have been large enough to wipe out the majority of the vampire Council army.

              But after that I could not remember anything, I thought myself dead. I recalled an angelic voice calling to me. But that was only the whisper of my name from Chase’s lips as he collected me into safety. Well, his version of safety. He had, after all, taken the brunt of the blow, heaving me out of there in time. Anger flushed through me again. Darkness was rising from the pit of my stomach. I closed my eyes, calming my thoughts so I could push back that vile darkness that so quickly rose to the occasion when I was angry.

              I stood tall against the basin. So if Chase was now reporting to someone, it was probably that vampire who had the ability to control wind. He was the leader who led that army, perhaps he was this district’s Council leader. Why had they gone to such great lengths when we were only a small raid team? And what of Dillian’s foresight? How did he get it so wrong? Perhaps all this needed to happen so then I could infiltrate the Council. I decided to follow Chase, to see who it was he was reporting to.

I looked down at my exposed body. It would only bring further attention to me if I walked around. I planned on being a shadow that no one would notice, but if I were spotted, it couldn’t be obvious that I had been involved with the explosion. Humans were brought into the Council all the time. If a vampire smelled me, they would assume I was a human. I wasn’t yet sure what they did with those humans but in any case, my smell wouldn’t be unfamiliar to them. Since hunters were derived from humans, we smelled like humans to the vampires. It was our eyes that so easily gave us away as hunters.

I surveyed his room. In front of the bathroom was the king-size wooden bed. In front of it were the hammock and the rows of bobble-head dolls. There was a wooden desk and a leather black chair in the corner. Beside it on the right was a small room, which looked to be a closet.

I jumped over the two steps leading into the room. I was correct. There were many leather jackets and many other clothing neatly folded in their allocated spots. I snagged a long leather black coat, throwing it over me and strapping it shut. This way, if anyone found me, they would not see my torn clothing. I could go freely. I had no intention of being caught.

              Looking around, I could not see any weapons. I kicked in the closest leg, snapping it in half. The wood moaned. Luckily there were only a few notepads and pens on the desk, so the lost leg was no strain on the desk. Preparing my tracking skills, I went for the door handle, only to be quickly surprised. I didn’t need my tracking skills, oddly enough. For some reason, I just felt and knew where Chase was. I furrowed my eyebrows in both infuriation and confusion. What had he done to me? He hadn’t even yet told me his name was Chase. I was just assuming that from the dream I had. I breathed in and out harshly, trying to contain my rising anger as once again I felt that darkness stir within me. I counted slowly, like my father had raised me to do if my anger or anxiety became too overwhelming. I didn’t know what it was that tried to appear on the surface, but it was not something I could deal with now. It was something my father made me promise to never let surface. Whatever it was, it needed to disperse. And so I thought of it doing exactly that and almost instantly I was relieved, now able to focus again with a sharp mind.

I opened the door slowly, peeking through the small gap between. No one was out there, but it was awfully bright. The walls were painted white and very bright white lights shone from the ceiling. This was not at all what I had expected from the gloomy, dark vampires. There were a few blue vases with plants in them against the walls.

Looking to my right, I saw with relief that there was no one there. There were many doors though. Were these other vampires’ rooms? Chase’s room was at the beginning. He was one of the first in this corridor I now stood in. I scurried out, wrapping myself against the wall of Chase’s room. In front of me was an open space of white marble floor with a running water fountain. It was the first I had ever seen. It was beautiful. Down my left was another hallway with more doors. Perhaps more rooms? I wanted to walk down that hallway and inspect them but knew I couldn’t. I had to remind myself what I was here for, and that was to find who Chase was reporting to.