Chapter 36
Elina
After another night in the dungeon room, I am emotionally exhausted and beaten down when I awake the following night. My wounds have healed but I am still broken.
I know I felt Bash’s presence last night—he was close by, I could feel it.
Tonight, I awoke right at moon-rise, as though the need to sleep fell away when the sun slid below the horizon. Sitting up in bed, a metallic tang is in the air. Blood. Whipping my head around, I see a half-full glass of crimson sitting on my table. Taking a deep inhale, I realize I can smell the liquid all the way over here. My gums start to tingle and my mouth floods with saliva at the smell.
I stand and approach the inoffensive glass. Next to it is a bowl of gumbo. I lean down and smell it, it smells rich and delicious, but nothing like the way the blood smells, the way it calls to me.
I lift the glass to my nose. I breathe it in like it is life itself. My entire being reacts. My hands start to shake, my stomachfeels as though it is collapsing, hollow and needy. The tingling in my gums becomes a sharp pain. Something beyond my control seems to be happening to me. Something biological, uncontrollable. I bring the bright red liquid to my lips and dart my tongue out to taste.
The lifeblood immediately fuels a frenzy the second it touches my tongue. Newly emerged fangs descend, slicing into my lips causing my own blood to join the feast. My body convulses with need.
Aching, I take a gulp of blood and electricity shoots through me, like the force of the sun inside me. My chest burns with the realization of what is happening.
This is it. My fate, fulfilled.
I moan, a sensual, arousing sound of pleasure erupting between my blood covered lips. Strength invades my limbs, making me stronger and empowered in a way I have never even imagined was possible. I feel every nerve-ending being set on fire. I can hear more than I have ever heard before, the creaking of the floors, the electricity in the walls. And banging. The entire building is filled with the sounds of banging.
Just as quickly as I realize what has happened, I realize the fear and hopelessness I felt yesterday is replaced with a fury that burns as brightly as my love.
Today is the last day I allow Nicolas to make the rules. I am done being a victim. Today, I will devise my own salvation.
I glance down. My camisole and sleep shorts are soaked in blood, clinging to me like second skin. No one brought me clothes. No one came at all.
Blood. I need more. I need blood. The need is acute and eats at me. It pulls my focus from anything but feeding. I yearn for life to flow into my veins. The small glass was not nearly enough to quench my need, the hunger growing within me with every passing second.
I try to listen to anything happening in the hallway, someone usually comes to get me after I wake up, I can't hear anything beyond the banging. Walking over to the door, I put my ear to the wood. It’s muffled but I can hear what sounds like feet pounding across the floor. As I strain to listen, I hear a grating noise behind me and I spin around, looking at the large windows that face out to the street, in time to watch a solid metal shutter slam into place covering the entire window.
What the hell is going on?
Going back to the door, I listen harder, and I definitely hear feet running now. I try the doorknob, locked, of course.
Stepping back, I grab the handle and pull as hard as I can. The door creaks slightly but the locks hold. Lifting my foot, I slam into the door with all my might. The door swings into my room which makes pushing through it almost impossible, but I refuse to stay here at the mercy of whatever is happening, without at least trying to save myself.
Kicking the door again and again, I can hear the wood giving way under my foot. When they locked me in here with the tools for my transition, they didn’t consider that they may have provided for my salvation. I am not the same person they left in this room.
Kick.
KICK.
KICK.
The door cracks down the center as the building shudders under me. I refuse to wait for death to find me.
Pushing the splintered wood out of the way, I climb through the broken door into the hallway. There are vampires running toward the front of the house, others flowing deeper into the labyrinth of hallways. I follow them. I can smell humans everywhere. I know who they are, where they are. Ican smell the vampires too, but I instinctively know they aren’t going to feed me.
I need to drink. I need to bite. I need to escape. Feeding is a visceral call from my deepest consciousness. I search for food—I smell the humanity and look for the source. Following my body, I emerge into a kitchen, a room I have never been in, and see a human man huddled in the corner, fear etched into his body.
Flashing to his side, I grab him, lifting him to his feet, using his hair to hold him in place and bring his neck to my mouth.
I bite and feel the hot, salty blood flood my system with power. The fire that burns inside me flares in response. I feed and feed, filling my body with raw power. His blood is everything. More than everything. I have never wanted anything,neededanything, the way I need this liquid of life. I feel the lightning he houses in his body flow into me. As his heart beat slows, I know I need to stop—he’s going to die—but I can’t. I can not let him go.
I suck at his neck, draining him as the flow slows down, his heart beating slowly, pumping his blood to his brain, right past my lips. He has lost consciousness now, and is limp in my arms, dying. I continue feeding until the blood stops and I drop him.
Tilting my head back, covered in blood, I open my mouth and scream. A loud, long, feral scream of anguish, of power, of fury.
