After The Awakening | ONC 2023

Chapter Thirteen

Ray stopped at a fork in the road. There may have been a signpost in the past, but the harsh rain and wind had scrubbed the weathered remains clean. Not a single letter was legible.

'Xavier?' She patted his shoulder, but he didn't stir. 'Xavier?' she said louder, but his eyes remained closed.

His head rested against the car window and if it wasn't for his hot breath fogging up the glass, she would worry that he'd died. His skin had lost all its colour and his body shook uncontrollably. The smell of blood was all consuming.

She'd driven the last hour with the window open and a bag of blood tucked into the car door next to her. She didn't want to admit it, but the smell of Xavier's blood made her head spin, and her jaw was tight as she refocused back on the road.

Her hand twitched to grab at the bagged blood. It was only her revulsion at the very thought of drinking it that stopped her. It was like an invisible line. If she drank it, then it meant that she really wasn't human. Her life as she knew it would be over.

It was easy to overlook the blood she'd been consuming from Mari's flask. She had done that without knowing the truth, but picking up the bagged blood and tearing through the plastic was something she couldn't write off. That would be proof that she was a vampire.

'Shit,' she muttered.

She rested her head against the steering wheel, taking shallow breaths. Xavier moaned, the first sound he'd made in over an hour, and she looked up hopefully, but her heart sank as soon as she saw his closed eyes. For the last hour, she'd pretended to herself that he was sleeping, but deep down she knew he'd been lapsing into unconsciousness due to the loss of blood.

Fixing her gaze on the road, she tried to remember the directions he'd told her.

The fancy Bureau car had been equipped with all the modern technology, including a built in SatNav, but that car was long behind them. Instead, she was parked in a beat up old junker that she was sure the owners wouldn't miss. The springs in the seat dug into her bum and the fuel gauge had a suspicious trick of falling to red before soaring above the halfway point.

Thinking quickly, she turned left, and drove slowly down the one track lane. Hedges penned them in with only occasional gaps. Having grown up around London, she'd never seen so much green all in one place.

The darkness pressed in on them as they travelled through the inky blackness. Lonely farmhouses were the only pinpricks of light that she could focus on. They were her lighthouses in the unfamiliar land. Surely Xavier's friend had to be in one of them?

The track wore on as they climbed until there was only one shining beacon of light that remained.

'Please let this be it,' she prayed.

Pulling into a gravel driveway, the car's headlights shone over a man wearing patchwork pajama bottoms and an old music t-shirt. His curly hair was flat on one side and he was missing his left slipper.

'You lost?' he shouted when she cut the engine, but left the lights on.

'I'm looking for someone?'

'Ain't a lot of people on this mountain.'

'Do you know Krish Bakshi?'

The man pulled a long gun from behind his back and trained it on her.

'Who's asking?'

Ray put her hands up instinctively. This wasn't quite the welcome she'd been expecting.

'My name is Ray. I'm here with Xavier Kowalski. We need your help.'