The Bad-Ass Vampire Girl (if vampires existed!)

Chapter Seventeen - To The Victor The Spoils

Really tired tonight, so if there are any mistakes, sorry!  Enjoy. x

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Chapter Seventeen- To the Victor The Spoils

We did a careful sweep of the area around the house, but could find nothing.  It was as if he had vanished into thin air.  I closed my eyes this time scanning the area, concentrating hard on any anomalies.  There was a slight vibration, like the backwash an aeroplane or boat might make, so faint I'd almost missed it.  The wash had practically disappeared, any later and I would have missed it.  I sniffed the air, the faint smell of diesel reached me.

"He had a car waiting and could be anywhere by now.  Lets concentrate on what's in the cellar, maybe whoever is down there can tell us where he's run to."

Cursing as we walked back, if I'd been aware that he'd escaped, I wouldn't have ripped the head off the vampire I was fighting. Our only hope was the prisoners in the cellar.  They might have some valuable information.

Back in the kitchen, we started dismantling our handy work.  It was noisy business and there would be no chance of surprise.  Finally we could open the door, warily.

"You're leader is dead.  If you give yourselves up freely, we will not harm you."  I shouted the lies with confidence.  The walls were thick stone here, cold and damp and the smell of decay stuck in our throats.  The sound of chains moving across stone reached our ears.  Although every sign pointed to this being a prison, I hadn't reached my age by assuming anything. 

A wiry man moved forward with a make-shift shield, he was one of our best hand to hand fighters tonight and he cautiously started to make his way down the narrow stairs.  His dagger was tucked into his belt, easy to pull out if needed, but keeping his arm free to fight.  There wasn't enough room in the stairwell to swing weapon so it would have to be hand to hand should we encounter any resistance.  We slowly followed him down, giving him enough room to move and fight should he need to, but near enough if we were needed to give him back up.

As he got to the end of the stairs, he carefully pulled his weapon and edged round the corner and out of sight. 

"All clear" he bellowed out.

We followed him round, stopping to stare at the sight before us.  Compared to Than, Eric treated his prisoners with some humanity.  These sorry humans huddled in their own filthy mess.  I counted two men, three women and in a corner by himself, trying to hide his fear was Jay.  There was one dead woman, still shackled to the others, although they had tried to move as far away as the chains would allow them.  I gestured to my men to release the prisoners that were alive, they would be moved to Eric's house so we could see if they were any use to us.  They looked like they were just living blood donors, but there might be a chance....

My eyes flicked back to Jay, whose face had lit up when he'd recognised me.  A smug smile tugged at my lips, he wouldn't look so cocky for long.

Once he'd been released, I escorted him upstairs while he babbled on about how he was so glad we'd rescued him, that he knew Eric would make good his promise.  The euphoria of being alive carried him past the dead bodies without a backward glance and stopped him from wondering how on earth we knew he was there.  The arrogance of the man would certainly be the death of him, and I hoped that I would be the one to do it.

I showed him into the main room where Eric now sat, looking every inch the king he was, the cleaning-up process in full swing all around him.  He'd some how managed to change his clothes to hide the damage that Than had done to him.  It was not good to be seen to be weak, even in victory.