Hunted

Chapter 9

A figure well hidden under a black hood floated soundlessly over the pavement. It reached a mud trail and followed the road until a small clearing appeared amidst the trees.

A young boy stood in the middle of the clearing. His eyes were wide open but clouded almost as if someone had blown the soft morning mist over him. He was only dressed in a low-collared shirt and a pair of shorts against the chilly wind.

The figure yanked back its hood. Fangs glistened brightly in the light of the half-moon.

Luce smiled.

"Hello, little boy."

''''''''''''''

The sound of the kettle boiling was the first thing she heard. Rubbing her eyes, Luce sat up slowly and blinked. Once, twice.

And then nothing.

Had she fallen asleep? Strange. Vampires did not seem to have the habit of sleeping at night. Weren't they supposed to be more active during nighttime, anyway? Children of the night and all that?

Whatever. Being a new vampire didn't come with an instruction manual, especially if you had shut the door in the face of the one who turned you.

She took a cautious step, waiting for hunger to strike when it didn't. Even stranger. Three days of going on without any food - blood, had nearly rendered her unconscious the night before. So why hasn't her stomach growled now?

(That was a figure of speech. Her stomach hadn't made any noise since her lips last tasted blood.)

Blood. Just thinking of the word made her lick her lips in anticipation. Some kind of metallic taste clung to them, but she hadn't had anything in over seventy-two hours. Not since he left.

At first, she had been a mess of tears and angry fits, even trying to strangle herself once. It hadn't worked - and it wasn't likely to work now - but she had calmed and pushed every other thought to the back of her mind. She would deal with them later, or maybe never at all. Not if she could starve herself to death - or whatever death would be for her.

Did vampires magically recharge their energy when sleeping or something? She wasn't famished at all now. Uncanny things were happening all over the place. Damn it.

She turned off the kettle; pouring the boiling water into a glass that steamed immediately, she threw back her head and drank it in a gulp. The water ran down her throat in a fast rage but only felt imperceptibly warm inside her cold body.

It didn't fill the empty hole she felt inside.

Or was that just the absence of her soul?

In reality, there was no way for her to escape reality. Now she was basically a soulless void sucking in the very foundation of life, functioning on bits and fragments of stolen life sources, a crudely made robot model that had to hijack car batteries for power and didn't even know its own blueprint.

How come she had to exist this way? Why hadn't he killed her??

Why? WHY?? Why couldn't you have left me alone?!

Something hard shattered on the floor. The whole house echoed her fury, her disappointment, her sorrow that no one else would know.