Blood Red

Chapter Three

A silent scream escapes my lips as I bolt upright into a sitting position. Noticing I could now see, I took my time looking around me and what I saw terrified me. All around were tables, some empty, some with cloths hiding human shape bulks underneath. I knew where I was, I was in a mortuary and when I looked down I saw that a cloth, the same as those on the bodies around me was pooled at my hips and I was sitting on a table like the rest. Whimpering, I got up from the table and looked around again for some clothes. I spotted four piles of clothes on a table pushed against the wall. Three sets of men's clothes and a set of women's that I recognised to be mine. I grabbed the cleanest set of men's clothes, remembering how hard it was to run in a skirt. Underneath the sets of clothes was a piece of parchment and as I read them I guessed they were death notices. Mine simply read:

'The deceased: Miss Kelly Witcher,

Daughter of Lord and Lady Witcher, 5th Baron of Salisbury.

Died on this day: 2nd of October 1863

The cause of death is unknown.

Found in Charles Woods upon death.'

I had died? How is that possible when I am standing reading this now? Is this the afterlife? Or was I an apparition?

I had so many questions but no one to answer them for me.

Pulling on a pair of men's boots, I heard a door creak open and looked up. The man, who I guessed was the mortician, stopped in the doorway with his mouth slightly open. I stood up and he backed away still staring at me and then turned and ran out of the door he just came through. Looking at the door I noticed earlier that was opposite the one the mortician walk through, I rushed to it hoping it was open. It was and I ran out into the darkened streets of London.

I was wondering around for three quarters of an hour before I found an abandoned building that I had decided to sleep in for the night. It was cold and dark inside the building, with only a few slithers here and there of moonlight. The building itself looked to be a warehouse of some kind, with its high-ceilinged room and then what I presumed to be offices to the left. Walking into office after office, I finally find what I was looking for. Using the heavy fabric that was most likely used as sacks to transport good, I made myself a makeshift bed on the floor and crawled underneath some of the fabric. It was then that I cried, except no tears were forming in my eyes and that made me cry harder, thinking that I couldn't even cry now was proof that I should not be here. I had died and even my tears had dried up. Why? Why was this happening to me?

This carried on for two days, me only waking up when the sun had gone to sleep, wandering around for a couple of hours and then finding somewhere else to stay and sleep till the next night. On the fourth day I felt starved. I needed to eat and fast. I thought of sneaking into the bakery not far from where I had spent last night but the food in the window didn't appeal to me. I was wandering around again thinking of where I might be able get some other food when my nostrils flared. The smell being carried along the wind was delicious. I drank in the smell but noticed when I had open my eyes that I was in a rougher area of London, where vagrants lurked in the shadows. My feet wouldn't allow me to turn around though, I knew that this part of the city was not suitable for a young woman to be walking around in alone but it was like I was unconsciously drawn to this smell. I finally started walking but it wasn't towards the safer part of the city, no it was deeper into the belly of drunkards and thieves where the truly delicious smell was originated from. I followed the smell till I came to a pub where light was spilling out of it along with drunken men and women and I felt my stomach turn out of hunger. It was like I was stuck in a haze, I moved swiftly toward the door and grabbed a thin drunken man and was about to-. I don't know I never got to find out as I was ripped to the side and around the building into a very dark alleyway. Only then was I pulled out of the haze that clouded my whole body. I felt a body pushed against mine and an arm under my throat holding me up. I tried to feel the ground with my feet but realised that whoever was holding me must have been strong as they could easily hold me a foot of the ground.

"What are you doing?!" A masculine voice hisses. "Do you have any idea what you almost did and what it would have meant for us, Fledgling?!"

"Fledgling? Who are you? Who is 'us'?" I ask the voice; I am a lot calmer than I thought I would be considering this man is holding me by my throat. After my questions the man eases some of the pressure on my throat and brings me down towards his face. I gasp as his face comes into view. Similar to Lord Stoker, this man's iris' are red and slightly glowing and two of his front teeth have elongated. Now my voice turns shaky as the memories of that night fly back to me. "P-pl-please, please d-don't hurt m-me." The glowing in his eyes dim slightly and his face contorts into confusion.

"I am not going to hurt you Fledgling."

"W-why ar-are you calling m-me fledgling?" Even more confusion clouds his face as he shakes his head.

"You must know. Surely you must know? Has your Master not told you any of this?"

"M-my Mas-Master?"

"Jaysus! You do not know do you?" Now I was getting tired of this man's cryptic way of speaking so I snapped.

"I have no idea what it is you are speaking of so would you kindly let me go!" After my outburst the man raises one eyebrow at me as if he is not impressed by my lack of manners and right at this moment I do not care but seeing as I am still confined by his arm at my throat and that he has the same unearthly features Lord Stoker has I added a small please onto the end of my demand.

"I will release you, Fledgling, but I am going to ask that you kindly come with me."

"Pardon?" I ask as I do not believe I just heard this man, no, this stranger to go with him.

"Come with me and I'll tell you how it is that you have died but are still living." This grabs my attention. It is one of the questions I have been longing to ask since my brother carried me in his arms back to the Waterly's where the ball was being held.

"How? How is it possibly?" I ask, desperate to know the answer yet dreading it at the same time.

"I will tell you but I will not discuss it here. Come with me and I promise I will tell you, this and the answers to any of your other questions." I think about this for only a few seconds weighing out my desperation of having my questions answered, the immodesty of being alone with a man and the fact that this man is so obviously like Lord Stoker. My desperation won.

"I will go with you but you must answer all my questions."

"I will. What is your name, Fledgling?"

"Witcher, Kelly Witcher."

"The Baron's daughter? I heard she died, I never realised..." His head drops with a thoughtful expression and releases me before he settles his gaze back on me. "My name is Lord Sebastian Kingsley, Duke of Ainsley." He gave me a sweeping bow that was the norm for a man with a dukedom and I curtsied as well as I could in gentlemen's clothes. I was not used to the freeness that trousers allowed and stumbled slightly only to be steadied by a pair of strong arms. Lord Kingsley looked down at me and breathed out the words; 'let us go', I know that I would not normally be able to heard that, it was so quite. Just another thing I will have to ask about.

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Okay three chapters in one night is a definite record for me!

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