The Reborn (The Reborn trilogy book 1)

Chapter 14

Do I stay or do I go?

I spent the night planning my next move. My butt was sore and my joints aching when I finally moved from the floor. Sandra had gone to bed hours ago. I still have a few hours til sunrise, what with it being early February, that gives me a little more wiggle room of darkness. Because there is only one option I can settle on, the one method that has kept me alive for thirty years.

I need to run.

For thirty years I kept moving, not staying in one place for too long, keeping ahead of the vampires out to find me. Turning human made me complacent. Eight months I've spent here. Eight months. I've never stayed in one place that long since I escaped. I thought I would be safe as a human. Instead, I've just become a target for another vampire threat.

The mistresses.

I'd never met them, heck I hadn't met most of the original vampires. Only two stopped by my master's den, Gerard and Avery. I was from the Gerard line, albeit very low down the ladder of that line. The fact that I hadn't succumbed to bloodlust also meant I was mainly kept out of sight during those visits. Something that gave me strength during tough moments was knowing they were failing. If the original vampires knew I wasn't being kept in line it would have reflected poorly on my masters.

I was an embarrassment to the masters but the mistresses were something of a major sore spot with the original vampires.

The original vampires were siblings. Seven brothers and two sisters. The brothers were always fighting over territory, ruthless in the way they slaughtered anyone and everyone. The story goes that a witch had enough of the carnage so cursed them to live in the shadows. Unfortunately, it had a side effect that turned their thirst for carnage into actually blood thirst. The witch's attempt to hinder the brothers only made them stronger and deadlier, not to mention immortal.

Caught up in the tale is the two younger sisters. The twin girls learnt from a young age how to outsmart their brothers and keep themselves safe. When the curse was cast, they also became vampires and seeing this as an opportunity, sort out the best of the best to join their sire lines.

The brothers were careless in who they sired. Hence the human's knowledge of vampires. Yeah, they may be something of myth now but the stories started because of detection. The sisters meanwhile stayed in the shadows from early on, gaining dedicated followers that they then gifted immortality. The brothers knew the sisters were their biggest threat now, and it rankled them that they didn't see it until it was too late.

Now they want me to join the ranks, all because I'm not some blood thirsty monster. I'm so far from being blood thirsty that the sight and smell of blood makes me queasy and faint. Yet the twins have reached out to me, will they do it again?

I won't stay and find out, I can't.

Packing a bag with a few changes of clothes, I sneak out of the house that has been the closest thing I had to a home in over fifty years.

-_-_-

I walked away from Sandra's without a destination in mind. If I planned things out there would be trails, whereas keeping it random makes it harder to be followed. At least that's the theory I've worked with all these years. It'd worked so far, so why wouldn't it now. My body stops before my wandering mind catches up with it and I look up to find myself in front of Lola's house. Why did I bring myself here? I'd decided to not leave any message, I was just going to leave. Of course, this very reason was also why it took me longer to leave the house than I would have liked. Sunrise which was hours away when I started packing my bag was almost upon us.

Leave. Don't make this harder than it needs to be.

But my feet won't move.

"Connie?" Lola's voice floats on the air from the now open front door.