DOFAB#3

Chapter Seventeen

~ KINLEY ~

Swoosh.

Woosh.

Splat.

Screams, enraged and petrified, ring out among shattering glass, smashes, and crashes. Everywhere I turn, forcible air streams have me spinning in circles. Amplified in the obscurity cloaking my eyes are the sounds of my breath, shallow and quick. Each a reminder I'm somehow still alive.

Cold liquid spews over me, followed by another splatter and another before something heavy and round lands on me. Dense matter similar to mud gets flung onto me. But unlike mud, this matter is squishy and scored with wrinkles.

Voosh.

Whish.

More screams.

"Aaah!"

The hand that grabs me and pulls me through the night sky drenched in death still has a grip on my ankle. Gone is the resistance as I crawl, slipping and sliding on the slick mess underneath. I'm waiting in the darkness, in-between the sprays and splats that fall over me for the final moment I no longer hear my breaths among the carnage. Will my sister forgive me? Is this sacrifice enough to give her the time she needs? One strike, Tristan Darkos. I only need you to kill one and the hellmouth from which you sprung free will suck you back in for a thousand more years.

I don't need sight to know my breaths are puffing out in front of me, the spilled blood beneath is frosting over. The dropping temperature surrounding me crystalizes the liquid in my hair. The air vibrates, charged with oppressive energy. It feels like the Gods of Prey has opened up beneath me and is attempting to adhere me to its ancient pages.

"RRROOOAAARRR!"

What sounds like the screaming vortex of a hell dimension opening shatters the ice crystals clinging to my hair. Before I can cover my ears to stop the ear-splitting fury, something heavy falls over me. The mass covers me before a sonic boom wipes out what's left of my senses.

Suspended in the blast, there are no more breaths, screams, or splats. There's just the silence ringing loudly in the aftermath. Death is quiet. Peaceful. Dar—

White noise rushes me, whatever mass fell over me uncovering my ears. My non-existence, the trip to Naveeden I was sure I was about to partake in, gets snatched from me. I push myself up, the dance floor hard and slippery beneath as fine mist saturates the air.

Surviving wasn't part of the plan.

It shouldn't be possible.

How is it possible!

Deep, rumbling tones break through the unbearable clamoring scrambling my senses. It's as if the after-effects of the blast have finally caught up to me.

"Talrek?" I squint against the scarlet haze still falling, a prominent figure ahead. "How am I still alive?" A room full of nearly three hundred vampires and I'm still here, earthbound.

Whatever part of the mint-green blindfold persisted unscathed becomes covered in the small red particulates as they settle. Black armor comes into view. Talrek not the figure in front of me.

Red. It clings to everything, dripping off the chandeliers, staining the white floral centerpieces scattered among the broken and overturned tables, and spatters the museum walls, becoming its final painting. I'm drenched. My loral so weighted by the rancid sticky liquid substance, the delicacy of the fabric clings to me—a second skin just like the mint-green nightgown at the spring.