Blood bound, p.24
Blood Bound, page 24
part #1 of The Gallows Series Series
She sobbed. “What are you doing to me?”
“Who are you?” He ignored her question, wishing he could ignore the fear she was trembling with.
“I don’t know what’s going on,” she wailed. He frowned. A headache was coming on, and fast.
“You were turned into a vampire,” he started, softening his voice. “Everything’s going to be okay. But I need to know who did this to you.”
“I can taste blood,” she said. At least she wasn’t calling him crazy, he supposed. He took a breath.
“Do you know who might have done this? Did someone attack you?”
“I’m naked.” She seemed to realise without any hint of panic. All the emotion had gone out of her since he’d put on his reassuring voice. He shivered.
“You’re okay. Tell me who hurt you,” he made it sound like an order. She frowned.
“Red. It’s Red. I’m going to die. Oh god, I’m dying. There’s so much blood…” She’d lost it. He wasn’t getting any kind of vision from the touch. He wasn’t sure there was anything left to learn.
“Tell me who you were,” he said, wondering what difference it would make. She’d killed. There was still blood on her hands no matter what.
The vision hit quickly. A flash of disjointed images rushed through his head. She was a black-hole of need. Everything she’d tried she’d excelled at, but it was never enough. Her parents did nothing but push. Everything was too much pressure. She’d decided to kill herself and that’s when the maker took her. She’d never found what she needed and now she never would.
“Shit,” he whispered. Sarah had to be crazy to do this. Everyone had a sob story. The girl cried silently in his grasp. He didn’t know what to do. He relaxed his grip, stake still pointed at her heart.
“Your parents love you. They just aren’t good at showing it,” he tried, feeling like a complete idiot. Like words made any difference now.
“No-one loves me. I’m a waste of space.”
“That’s not true. You’re amazing.” He felt like some kind of creep. Something was shifting though. The atmosphere was heating up. It was time and he knew instinctively when to push the stake home. Her gasp hit him hard. He couldn’t make himself move even when the vampire’s body exploded. He’d forgiven her, he’d felt it. He shook himself off.
She was a vampire, and she’d killed, but she was still someone worth saving. Or she had been. His head felt messed with. Had the vampire just tricked him? He’d probably never know. He coughed up some of the gunk he’d just managed to inhale and he started to leave. The rising ghosts always gave him the shivers. He wasn’t sensing a sixth vampire anymore, though. He went out of the office, blowing his nose and stopping halfway to the door to cough more vile vampire mess up. The smoky presence he barely noticed following him until he was at the exit. He brushed at it, but his fingers didn’t make any contact. Face flushing, he stopped walking.
“You can go,” he said quietly, urging the ghost on. She didn’t seem to want to leave. He sighed.
“Shaun?” Sarah had likely heard his coughing on the way towards the door. He clamped his jaw shut and kept a hand against the closed door.
“You’re safe now. You can go.” Please? He wanted rid before Sarah could see it. She wasn’t shifting. He cursed under his breath and went outside, ghost trailing behind him.
“You had me worried for a second there,” Sarah told him, putting away her sword. He hoped he wasn’t blushing too furiously. He wondered if he’d get away with pretending not to notice the ghost.
“There were only five,” he let her know.
“There was one trying to guard the back door. The idiot was asleep in a chair.” Her gaze took in the old building. She wasn’t marching straight on to the next site. He sighed. Her eyes had fallen on the ghost following him. She raised an eyebrow.
“I was trying to get information,” he explained himself. “I don’t know how this happened.”
“Did you find anything out?”
He shook his head.
She motioned to the ghost. “So get rid of her and we can leave.”
“I… don’t know how.”
“They just have to be lead outside and told to go. That’s all. Try.”
“You can go now,” he told the smoky trail. It spiralled upwards, disappearing out of sight.
Sarah looked at him.
“See? Apparently they’re so grateful they’ll follow you around and take orders but really, what are you going to do with a moving mass of smoke? It’s not like they can communicate.”
“It’s creepy,” he said with a shudder. Vampire mess fell onto the ground. He shook his hair out and stomped his boots on the ground. “Yuck.”
“Man up, we’ve got a lot more to get through. Ooh, we can take turns!” She beamed at him, skipping over nettles and heading for the hole in the fence. He threw her a dirty look when she turned back.
“I’m not doing that again,” he warned, following with an arm shake to get rid of some more gunk. He really was covered in the stuff. The shower seemed far away now; even the thought of the two hour train ride before he’d get to wash out the stink made him itchy. He sighed and followed Sarah down the street. “Where’s the next nest?”
“I’d say twenty minutes if we’re walking,” she said, shaking her head at him. He frowned, taking a tissue and wiping his face. The tissue came back black.
“Aw, that isn’t even funny.” He dropped the tissue and hauled out another, wiping until he was more or less convinced his face wasn’t totally smeared in the stuff.
“It’s kinda funny,” Sarah disagreed.
“Get running. I’m not spending all day here. And you’re buying the pizza when we get home.”
“Remind me to catch a cash-line then,” she told him, taking off.
He chased after her. The sooner they got this done, the better.
Chapter Seventy-One
The second nest was a basement flat in a dingy apartment. Sarah was tempted to push Shaun into another situation where he’d have to use more of the power he was slowly accepting. The faster he was up to her speed the easier their jobs would get. She spared a glance at his aura. It wasn’t looking any better in spite of the change in him. He probably still had a long way to go.
“How many?” She tested him, getting him to use his senses.
He sighed. “There’s three. Is that how many there should be?”
“It is,” she confirmed, not needing to check the map. Her side of town, she remembered to the letter.
“We’re off to a great start,” he muttered, glancing around the damp stairwell as they descended.
A discarded needle halfway down the stairs she pointed out as she passed. “Watch your feet. We’re entering junkie central.”
“What great company we keep.”
“Straight ahead,” she told him, pointing out the flat at the end of the hall. She stalked forward and pushed her sleeve over her hand to try the door knob. It turned and she pushed the door in. The foul smelling flat confronted them, all soiled carpet and fur-infested left-over plates. Creepy crawlies had claimed the flat as their own and were almost entirely conquering the floor.
“I really wish I’d thought to bring gloves,” Shaun told her wryly.
“Just don’t touch anything, smart-ass.”
“This is without dead bodies,” Shaun said incredulously.
She went inside, bringing out a stake. “I don’t smell any,” she confirmed, squishing bugs underfoot without really trying.
Shaun followed her inside reluctantly. He shuddered but he nudged the door shut anyway. “Let’s make this one really quick.”
“You do realise we’ve got like thirty more to go? Wait here and watch the beasties.”
He gave her a mock laugh and stayed right where he was, looking thoroughly disgusted.
She rolled her eyes. The vampires were sleeping in the farthest room down the tiny hallway. Something with too many legs fell on her shoulder. The place really was infested. She flicked the thing’s hard body off of her without looking and moved on.
The door wasn’t even closed, yet the bugs had forsaken the room with the vampires in it. She hadn’t really paid attention enough to know if it was a common thing, but it did make her laugh to think the bugs were creeped out by the undead.
Three college-aged guys were passed out in the room, two of them on beds, the third on the floor. She staked them without ceremony and left the room before their exploding bodies got a chance to gunk her. Shaun was hopeless with the super-speed part of his abilities. He really had a lot to learn.
She smiled at him. “Done. Let’s go.”
Chapter Seventy-Two
Shaun didn’t like this whole taking turns thing. By the ninth site he was beginning to suspect Sarah was lying to him about her kills. He frowned at her, glancing down at his manky clothes and hands and back up at her practically spotless face.
“How are you doing that?” He shook his arm off in her direction, hitting her with a few loose lumps she laughed at and brushed off her jacket effortlessly. “Come here, I want a hug. I’ve decided that’s the big favour.”
She backed away, running out the back door of the terraced house with another laugh. He shook himself off. A third of the way through the vampires in town and they hadn’t come across the girl yet. Sarah had insisted on stopping and double checking every short brunette girl they found, just in case. Still, three hours for just short of fifty kills had to be some kind of record.
“Sarah, wait up,” he said, putting his serious face on. “I’m getting a bad feeling about this.”
“Don’t be a Polly-precious-pants,” she scoffed.
He sighed. She couldn’t take anything seriously for very long.
“How do you think the Council’s going to take this?” He really couldn’t think how they might respond. None of what they’d been doing was sanctioned. They’d done a lot. His stomach turned, and didn’t think it was just the vampire gunk he’d inhaled.
“Who cares? We should get, I don’t know, awards or medals or something for this. They were vampires, Shaun. Killers. We’ve done the locals a favour.”
He wasn’t convinced, but it wouldn’t sway her. He tried to forget about it.
“We’re burning daylight here. Let’s hit the next one and then you can start leading. We’re almost done with my part of town.”
“Woah,” he said, “you’re saying two thirds of the nests were on my side of town? That’s a pretty uneven split, especially considering the maker was on your side. Wouldn’t he want his vampires close by?”
“How should I know?” She was getting impatient. He motioned to her to go. The next site wasn’t all that far. They ran there in less than five minutes. He looked at the closed down shop front and he knew he’d had enough.
“Go on then,” he urged, rushing her on. She frowned at him, digging the map out.
“What?”
“How many?” She looked at him.
“Eh, three. Aye.”
“There were two before. Fingers crossed, Shaun.”
He leaned against the wall when she started heading around the back of the shop. He would be happy if they could just go home soon. She came back down, hands on her hips.
“Shaun!”
“Don’t care,” he called back. “It’s your turn.” It was her stupid idea to take turns. He’d had enough. She made an irritable noise and disappeared again. He took a breath. Something caught in his throat. He coughed up another wad of gunk onto the pavement. “Fucking vampires.”
Chapter Seventy-Three
Sarah broke a window to get in. The vampires seemed to have keys for the place, or else there was an entrance she couldn’t find. She tossed a rock in the window to check for traps. Nothing sprang out at her. Taking a look into the murky interior she realised they were hiding someplace deeper inside; the usual story. She clambered into the old shop’s back store. A sneeze burst from her. The dust was pretty thick. Not much bother for things that didn’t need to breathe. She tracked the vampires down a hall to another door that looked locked. Coming closer, she saw it was padlocked.
She glanced around. This wasn’t something she’d ever come across before. Vampires locked in by something else. Were they prisoners? She couldn’t think why anyone would do that. It didn’t seem to make sense. She looked around and found something to break the lock. The brick would be a bit heavy handed but she didn’t think she was going to find any crowbars just lying around, not after someone had gone to all the hassle of locking them up tight.
Her hand got scraped when the latch broke but it did at least break. She breathed a sigh of relief and checked for any traces of magic before she pushed the door open. Nothing else was protecting them. She stopped. They’d been locked up to stop them from getting out. If they were just trying to keep someone from getting in, the locks would be on the inside. Something really wasn’t right. She wished Shaun had come in with her. For a second she almost went back for him. Sighing, she stared into the darkness of the basement. He was done for the day. He’d be less help than a clueless human at this point.
Stepping forward she realised too late the basement was missing stairs. The plummet wasn’t even ten feet but it hurt like hell when she smashed into the concrete. Something was broken. She groaned, lifting herself and touching her aching left arm. Looking never helped. She could feel the bone sticking out and it needed to go back. She gritted her teeth and pushed it back into place. Pain made her head swim but it wasn’t the first time she’d broken a bone and she suspected it wouldn’t be the last either. She stared into the darkness. Her enhanced vision locked on the vampires, their glowing amber eyes fixed on her.
“Bloody brilliant,” she swore, jumping to her feet with slightly less stealth than usual. Her arm was useless and she ached all over from the fall. The vampires just stared in the dark, enclosed pit like vipers ready to strike. The blood dripping from her arm probably wasn’t helping things any. She grabbed her sword, letting go of her broken arm to do so. “All right then. Come get some.”
They shot forward all at once, attacking her from all sides. Her back to the wall where the damned stairs should have been, she fought them off with the blade, determined to keep the girl from biting it until she could talk to her. The only trouble was they were all young-looking short girls with dark hair. She cursed, trying to find something to identify her before she could get rid of the others. The one on her left seemed a little taller than her so she sliced off the girl’s head and turned back to the other two, stepping back before the one on her right snapped at her neck again.
“Don’t you idiots know who I am?”
The one in the middle laughed; a grating sound from a vampire. Sarah frowned at her. She had the right hair-cut, she thought. With a move that left her back vulnerable to the laughing vampire she twisted around and cut the other’s head off.
“Sarah Gallows,” the last girl named her, finishing her amused chuckle and standing back with her arms folded. Sarah frowned at her, sword at the ready.
“So you have heard of me.”
“The mighty Gallows, always rushing elbow deep into trouble. One of you always has less sense than the other. I see you’re the irresponsible one, taking after your namesake.”
“Who are you?” She didn’t like this. The girl was talking like she knew the family. She knew that wasn’t likely and it left one other option; the vampire. Frowning, she tried to pull something that made sense out of the information she was being fed.
“The root of all evil,” the vampire mocked, baring her fangs. She wasn’t attacking and that told Sarah she had some other agenda. Either that or she knew full well Sarah could take her head off without a second’s hesitation and she was trying to talk her way out of it. She wasn’t making a very good job of it.
Sarah would have to drop the sword to touch the girl. Her arm was starting to heal, but it wasn’t happening fast enough without her hand holding the bone in place. She realised painfully she was probably going to have to break it again if it healed wrong. She cursed Shaun for not coming in with her.
“Somehow I doubt that,” she said, with a snort. The vampire cocked its head at her. It grinned. The vampire face disappeared. Now was probably her chance. She hesitated. The girl drew her a nasty look.
“Where’s that brother of yours?”
“None of your business.” Sarah launched forward with the sword. The girl zipped out of her way. She wanted to curse, but this monster wasn’t getting the better of her if she could help it. Her arm didn’t feel right, but she could at least move it now. She threw the sword at the vampire, catching it in the stomach. It was forced against the wall. She grabbed the hilt with the arm she could barely move and kept the vampire pinned with a grin.
“You don’t know me,” she told it. “But I’m going to know you.”
She grabbed the girl’s jaw with her good hand. The vampire clamped her eyes shut. Sarah didn’t have time to wonder how she knew to do that. She moved her hand, narrowly escaping a snap of the creature’s teeth. Forcing an eye open, she stared, willing the girl to show herself. When she did, the girl pinned against the wall was awash with shock. Sarah slid the sword out of her. Numbly she held onto the sword, letting the blade rest on the concrete. The girl drew pained, gasping breaths.
“What’s happening?” The girl was seriously freaked and Sarah didn’t blame her.
“You’re okay,” Sarah told her soothingly, moving her hand down to her neck.
“I don’t feel okay.”
“Tell me, what happened to you? What’s the last thing you remember?”
“A man was chasing me. I was so scared. Then his face did this thing and changed and I think I passed out.”
“What did he look like?” The girl’s mouth opened but she didn’t speak. Alarm rang in her stare. She made strangled gasping sounds, choking somehow. Sarah backed off, moving the sword to take it in her good arm. The vampire laughed and launched at her. She took off its head in a sweeping move that sprayed vampire gunk everywhere. She shook globs of it off her sword. At least the state of her would make Shaun happy. She sheathed the sword and took her phone out. He had his on for a change and he actually picked up within a couple of rings.
