Blood Luster

Chapter Nineteen

Magnolia leaned against a tree, fighting back the urge to attack the man running down the trail. Her mind raced with impulses to rip him limb from limb and devour him, but the human part of her couldn't consciously allow herself to let loose. As she stalked him, every time she'd get close enough to touch –her body fought and resisted her urges. The smell of his blood filled her nostrils, the sweat seeping through his pores alerted every nerve in her body. Her fangs protruded, resting uncomfortably on her lips. A hand on her shoulder forced her to turn around and she was confronted with a familiar face.

"Ricky?" she whispered.

"Magnolia, this isn't you." He nodded toward the man. "You don't want to do that."

Her fangs withdrew, the heat in her face drained, and the pounding in her chest slowed. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm working to find a cure for you. I don't want this for you. Until I can find a cure to fix you, I'm going to sabotage all your feedings."

Tears brimmed on her eyelids. "What is wrong with you? Do you really think this is what I want? Do you think this is what any of us want?"

"You're not one of them, they made you this way."

"No, he didn't," she shouted, certain the man was out of ear shot. "I was like this before Benjamin came along, you don't have any idea what you're doing. If you want to make my life easier, stay the hell away from me."

His eyes sank. "You don't mean that Magnolia."

"I do. You can't just come into my life and try to turn me into something I'm not. This is who I am, if you can't accept that then you need to stay out of my way."

"They have you brainwashed into believing you're something that you're not. I'm just trying to show you that you're not a –" The words seemed bitter as they rolled off his tongue. "A blood luster like them."

"What would you know? We haven't spoken in seven years," she said abrasively.

He crossed his arms over his chest. "I can't support you in this decision."

"It's not a decision Ricky, it's who I am."

"No. You're not my Magnolia."

"I never was."

"That's not fucking true, and you know it. How are you going to stand there and act as though we never happened?" His fists clenched at his side.

"We were kids. Just two kids lost and finding their way in the world that became comfortable in the comfort. You should never have to convince someone to love you, that's not love –it's entrapment."

"That sounds like that dirty blood luster talking, not y—"

She grabbed him, knocking his feet from him. He tumbled to the ground and his head slammed into the dirt.

"This is who I am. If you refer to him that way again –" Her fangs protruded as she leaned closer to his neck. "I'll do it."

Her vision blurred and her chest felt as though a vacuum was pressed tightly against it. Panic rose in her throat as her eyes flew open. She instantly raised up in the bed, gasping as she attempted to catch her breath. Her hand lay resting on her knee, trembling.

Benjamin appeared in her peripheral and was in front of her faster than she could blink. "What happened?"

"Ricky was in my dream again," she choked out.