The Vampire's Soul

Fear

Naked feet hit a cadenced tempo against the humid ground. Trembling breath, she's blinded by her own sweat that's falling along her temple.
She can hear them as if they were a few inches from her, and disoriented like she is, it's probably the case.She's running away. Fleeing without knowing where to go. In the darkness of the night, the moon is not even on her side. She only has her eyes to see and cry the mud off her face.They get closer, guns in hand.She places her hand on her left side, that's oozing with warm red liquid. Fatigue, hunger, fever slow her down, her own body becoming her enemy. Feeling her legs weaken, the pangs in the muscles of her thighs causing the pain to infiltrate her veins.She's had enough, they've been chasing her for hours. Her vision red of anger, of fear or thirst, she frantically blinks her eyes, pushing branches away from her face. Catching her breath, she leans against the trunk of a tree. Closing her eyes she focuses on her hearing.'C'mon freak, you're gonna lose all your blood if you keep on like that!' A masculine voice resounds in the darkness.'Even though that thing can't really die like that.' He snorts, adjusting his infra-red glasses.They know she stopped running.Straightening up, she tries to slow her loud breathing down. Pressing down even more on her side, that truly won't stop bleeding.Blood. She really needs some blood.'Come out of hiding! We're not gonna punish ya!' Another man laughs into his ultraviolet binoculars.'Pinky swear.' He adds and this makes her close her eyes in pain. Emotional, this time.How could he possibly dare?One of them gets off his horse to observe footprints. Small feet. Smaller than a man's size. The footprints are fresh. They're obviously hers.'Come out...' He commands, standing up from the wet earth in her direction.They're all closer than she had realized. Her abilities are altered by thirst and tiredness.She's got two solutions. Keeping on running, or fighting. One leads to death, a slower death. The other leads to death too. A certain one.When she bites her lip, not to make any noise, writhing in pain, a branch she didn't notice cracks.'There you are.' That one, the worst of the four, almost coos from the other side of the tree. She knows he found her and that not moving is useless, but she can't help the sudden freezing of her body, fear paralyzing her.Her eyes open wide, back sweaty, she turns her face towards the voice to come face to face with him.He smiles. Eyes covered in those metal infra-red glasses. His body covered in leather, a long cross shining even in the night on his torso.'Is the monster scared?' He whispers but she hears it clearly. The woman hears everything she needs to know and at that moment she doesn't want to run anymore. She wants to do something she's been wanting to do for weeks. Months. Rage takes over. She wants to make him eat his smile, make him swallow and regurgitate his zeal.A cruel smile stuck on his face, she knows he enjoys this. It's as if she could taste the vitality on her tongue. He stinks of cruelty and the cross on his torso is a big fucking irony.The sky is starting to roar, clouds gathering above the forest and she doesn't wait for him to look back down on her before she takes everything she's got left in her. She puts all her strength into lifting herself onto the branches and climbing the tree as high as she can.'Wow...' He snickers, moving his arms in the air, pointing the gun towards the sky. He knows she can't escape them. No matter what she does or where she goes. She hasn't had blood in weeks.She can't do anything against them. He hasn't even seen her actual fangs in weeks. Weakness is her new home and he had made sure of that. Day and night.'We've been playing cat and mouse all afternoon don't you think it'd be wise for you to just... Get the fuck on with it and just drop fucking dead. I'm tired of playing.' He yawns, for theatrical effect.'Oh really?' The second man with the ultraviolet binoculars sarcastically jumps in.'Cause she's been pretty entertaining to me, I'm not gonna lie...' He lifts up his bow and iron arrow, setting them up to shoot.He points at a dark silhouette that looks like a human hunched on a branch in between the leaves of the tree.'...But you're right, it's getting late. And it's time for her to go home.' He whispers before shooting.No sound. No grunt of pain to signify she's been struck. No scream or determined animalistic roar like the ones she's graced them with in the past. No red rage, red eyes bulging out of their sockets, black veins around them protruding, and her jaw opening from natural instinct.None of that known anger of hers they've experienced.Just straight up silence. Only the sound of leaves whipping the air.'Oi freak, get down now... Enough playing around.' The one who didn't speak finally says, the ominous silence itching him behind his ears.It's calm. Way too calm. Something's here but they don't know what.Droplets of water are starting to wet their sweaty heads when the four of them groan.'Fucking hell!' One of the hunters throws his hands in the air, exasperated by the start of the rain.'Get her before it's too late, we're not losing her!' He yells brandishing his gun towards the trees, branches starting to agitate with the wind.'Where the fuck is she, somebody got a visual?''I can't see shit with this fucking rain!' He swears, wiping water off his night vision glasses with a furious hand.'Well it's now or never guys.' He warns. Rain is a natural defect to their night equipment.'Wait! I think I saw something move.''Where?!' They gather in a circle.'There! The oak tree to your left!'They all fire without a beat of thinking. Apprehension, stress and fear mix in their vein to create an obscure cocktail.Still nothing.'She can't have disappeared into thin air. Fire at those damn branches!' He yells and they fire the leaves in unison following orders.The wind is beginning to blow, and dead leaves spin around them. They disperse again, aiming in every direction. Crosses banging against their chests, sweat sticking their hair to their foreheads. They're scared. For the first time in months, they're scared of her.She's got fear back into their systems using only silence. And the shadows.And indeed they should be scared.'What if she fell unconscious up there, or died?' One whispers to his nearest colleague.'Her body would have fallen down the tree you dumb ass.' He whispers back.'I know but what if -'From the shadow she rises and it's too late for him to realize what just happened to him. Naked feet meet the wet earth with a quiet thumb. Claws fend through clothes. She grips his guts with a firm hand and butcher him with her bare hands.Red liquid dripping down his mouth, white eyeballs frantically moving from side to side, life leaving them by the second, he gargles on his own blood. Rosie moves her fingers inside his stomach before bringing them to her mouth and sucking on them. She grimaces.He could taste better.While the three others look for her in the dark with defective equipment due to the rain, she drags the agonizing man behind a tree before digging her fangs in his carotid. He lets out a lame scream. It's more of a whimper, a grunt, real sound unable to leave him due to the liquid drowning his throat.Teeth sunk into his neck, she closes her eyes and deeply sighs in content, feeling life run back into her veins. She hasn't had it in too long, she almost forgot the taste. But she's conscious that he won't ever be enough for her to fully recover her strength. She needs more. Way more.She's about to sink her fangs back into him when she hears the first shuddering, blood curling yell. She's been spotted. Arrows fly past her ears when she ducks down, letting the dead man to the ground. His blood is not enough, but it'll let her run a bit longer. She has to let him go down and flee or she'll really die.'Kan!' The shorter one ,who's wearing the ultraviolet glasses yells, and sees the beast as a violet silhouette. He aims at her, but she fends air. The rain is her new ally.'Shit! That bitch got Kan!''We need to get him back or he'll... Fuck!' He sees what's left of his friend. Guts, blood, eyes petrified. There is no more Kan.'Alright boys... It's her head or ours.'He's barely done speaking when Rosie starts running again. Suddenly she's falling though. Her body is flung in the void, and gravity pulls her down. She falls and falls till the icy water comes in contact with her weakened body. The only sound she hears are those of the waves taking her down stream. And her sister's voice telling her to hold on.In the blink of an eye, Rosie regains consciousness. As soon as she wakes, she's already on the lookout. The light of the day is softened from the curtains throughout the whole room and on her face. She has no idea what the time is or where she is. She blinks her eyes in a robotic manner, the nature of the motion forgotten.The room where Rosie's laid down is small and tidy. The smell of the clean bedsheets go up to her head, then it's the smell of blood. Always blood. Hers, sipping out of wounds that she sees are bandaged with thin white cotton. Then the smell of different species of animals. And finally the smell of one human in the house.A woman.