NO-vember
Eamon
His blood drips from my fingers, just another victim in a sea of faceless donors.
Though, the word donor implies consent. And this is anything but that.
I wish I had the excuses that other Biberé have—the bloodlust, the lack of critical thinking, the endless hunger. But I don't. What I have is far worse.
This man's thoughts had almost been too loud as he wandered into the dive bar an hour ago, convincing me that he was begging someone to stop him from doing what he planned. He didn't care who his victim would be, any woman in the crowd, just in the wrong place at the wrong time. In a move he's probably perfected over the years, he dropped the tablet under the guise of squeezing by her to order himself a new drink. Rather than watch the tablet and give himself away, he directed all his attention to the girl herself, oozing false charm.
Before the damned thing could reach the liquid in her glass, I let a small piece of the Aether open up, the tablet falling harmlessly through it and into my waiting palm.
The rest had been too easy. Pretending to be drunk— well drunk-er. Bumping into him and letting the thing fall into his own glass of dark liquor. I waited until his mind was fractured and searching for help, letting him believe my guiding words were his own thoughts and telling him to wander into the back alley.
Even in the bright light of the afternoon, no one with any survival instinct would wander back here. The shadow cast by the building and the trash cans would hide any sin, the discarded cigarette butts and used condoms on the gray concrete being proof of it.
The moment he spotted me leaning against the wall in the only spot that didn't seem obviously stained, the small rational part of his mind told him he was already in danger. Still, he ignored it, begging for the fight. He glared up at me, a mumbled "The fuck you lookin' at?" escaping him as he used the wall to remain upright.
No need for further stalling; my eyes turned red at the prospect of feeding, and my canines turned feral and sharp. The man didn't even have a chance to scream or fight before my jaw was around his neck, pulling the sustenance from his artery. He feebly pulled his arms up, pushing uselessly at my chest as I held his head and shoulder apart to drink the powerful liquid.
Sated for the moment, I allow him to fall onto the oil and trash-laden alleyway, and he stares up at me with a dazed expression, his mind so twisted by the drug he isn't sure what he's looking at.
Most mortals will see the impossible and fill in the blanks with something their mind can comprehend. An animal attack, a robber, whatever lets them continue living in the delusion that they might be the worst thing going bump in the night. And he would have been today had I not been here.
I should kill him, should end the suffering he planned to bring into someone's world. But I don't need to add to the body count I've amassed. Leaving him here, nearly unconscious, with excessive, ostentatious wealth dangling from his wrist in the form of the ugliest watch I've ever fucking seen will bring more trouble than he can survive anyway.
A vibration in my pocket distracts me from the pathetic piece of shit before me, and I answer without looking, "Yeah."
A panicked breath escapes my phone, followed by the voice of the whiniest motherfucker I've ever met, "Eamon!"
"Yeah," I repeat.
"Eamon, something terrible's happened. The Sanctum has my- my girl, they got her!"
"Your girl?" What the fuck? The last time I spoke to Fritz, the only person he ever consideredhiswas long since dead. "What are you talking about?"
"My Bel- well, our Bel. The Sanctu-cunts have her, Eamon. They have her and I don't know where they went and I need to get her and—"
I pinch the bridge of my nose, ignoring the smear of crimson it leaves behind. "Slow down." I don't care about the details of who this girl belongs to, but if Sanctus Sculitis has an innocent, that needs to be dealt with. "Where are you? Why do you think they have her?"
As he relays to me the small desert town he's in and what they've discovered on her phone, another voice interrupts him in the background, "Her last text to anyone else was Thursday night. She's ignored her parents and Isla for two days?"
Fritz's incessant whine radiates through my head again, "They only knew when we would be back because I texted them last night. Fuck!"
So, she's been with the Sanctum's men for at least two days. "Why did they take her?" I ask.
"Because she's Caspian's sacrifice," Fritz's voice wobbles frantically, and I groan.
"The dead Caspian?" my brows furrow in confusion.
"The recently back from the dead Caspian." Fuck.
As much as I wish I could leave this alone, tell them to mourn their toy and move on, in this situation, I cannot. A sacrifice being killed is the worst torture that can ever be leveled on one of our kind, and the backlash is almost always catastrophic. Entire cities burning to ash, massacres so violent they're blamed on nonexistent wars, cover-up stories of sadistic serial killers.
"Send me your exact location, and I'll be there in about 40," I tell him before abruptly disconnecting. 40 minutes will give me enough time to get home, clean up, and change into something that isn't sticky with blood. I give one last look to the vile man languidly trying to staunch the flow of scarlet coming from his neck, wishing I could inflict far more pain than he's already endured.
Drunken voices drift around the corner, alerting me to their approach. I probe their minds, gently sending quiet messages to walk this way so they might find my latest drink. Just before they reach us, I take a step backward, easing into the dark of the Aether, my room opening up to me on the other side. The last thing I register before the Aether closes is the sadistic laughter of the group upon finding what I've left for them, chuckling over their fortune at procuring a shiny new watch.
