The Night the Vampires Came

Chapter 28

Chapter 28

I woke up with my face in the dirt and grass in my mouth. The forest was a hazy mass of blackness. As I blinked and pushed myself into a sitting position, I saw that I was fortunate enough to be lying next to an abandoned flashlight.

How did I end up here? My last memory was of the plane going down.

Picking up the flashlight, I immediately saw Holly. Although Holly was covered with leaves and bruises, at least she was sitting upright. Holly was on a tree stump a couple of feet from me.

Holly didn't notice that I was awake. The whole time I was gathering myself up, she had her head between her knees. As I reached for her shoulder, Holly bent over even further and heaved up her guts. Holly continued throwing up until every last bit of the buttered rolls she ate was lying at her feet in a pile of gastric juices.

"Are you okay?" I asked, brushing myself off. Other than the grass stains covering every inch of my t-shirt and jeans, some scrapes on my elbows, sore muscles in my back and arms from clenching the armrests so hard — I was fine. Holly had a bruise over her temple, and her pants were torn at the knee. She waved at me to leave her alone as she continued to heave up her guts.

I assumed that the horrible sound she was making in the back of her throat meant she was going to live. I started to look around. Where were we?

It looked to be in a forest. There was the smell of fire in the air. Something was burning nearby. It was too dark to see exactly what, and my flashlight only illuminated a couple of feet of foliage in front of me.

The rain had stopped, but the ground was wet with the nighttime dew. As I rubbed my fingers together, it felt like pure and wet like water. Blight Rain felt slimy and a little oily to the touch. I was perhaps one of the few who knew what it felt like and had lived to tell the tale.

The memory of my dream suddenly came back to me in fragments. I remembered an enchanted lake with tear-shaped leaves from the weeping willow tree. There had been a man in my dream. He told me things that I couldn't quite remember. It gave me a headache just to think about it.

"Where's everyone else?" I asked and squinted into the distance. I aimed the flashlight forward and stumbled through the trees until I saw the remains of our plane. With a sense of profound dread, I headed toward the smoldering wreckage—shards of airplane parts laid along the path. I saw a piece of a wing fragment here, a couple of broken porcelain plates there, a part of a window, and shredded seat cushions.

The entire top of the aircraft had been lifted straight off it. It was as though a can opener had been dragged across the roof. As I approached the plane from the pilot side window, I saw the lifeless body of a man sitting at the cockpit. His neck was bent back at an unnatural angle, and his forehead was covered in blood. The poor man, he must have fought until his last seconds to keep us in the air.

A deep, melodious voice echoed in my mind. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to force it out of my mind, out of my memories of that horrible dream.

Jadueriel. He was responsible for all this. What did he want with me now? To kill me?

That would be a mercy. No, if I died, I would simply be reborn again.

These KoRi cells were immortal, and to them, my eternal soul was bound.

The Levarsi scientists would simply inject them into someone else, and then my soul would find its way back from the abyss. Jadueriel knew that. He didn't want to kill me. He wanted something else, something far worse.

Continuing to explore, I noticed one of the emergency doors was open. Retractable stairs led up to it. I saw one of Holly's sneakers caught in the jagged metal of the plane's wrecked undercarriage. Did she make it out on her own? I doubted it. Wandering closer, I saw bloodstains over the handle of the door. Swallowing hard and ignoring my shaking knees, I went up the stairs into the darkness of the wreckage.

I saw another flashlight in the distant corner of the main cabin. I carefully stepped over the shattered glass and metal shards. Unlike Holly, I was lucky enough to be in possession of both my sneakers.

One of the chairs had flipped over. I saw blood under my feet leading up to a puddle where it stained the beige lambskin of the armchair.

Whose blood was it? It wasn't mine or Holly's. As I took another step, I saw a pair of black-rimmed glasses appear among the rubble.

Joseph.

I heard a moan in the distance where I directed my flashlight.

"Sssh, it's just Ailith," I heard a familiar voice say soothingly. That English accent, that once spoke to me of comfort and safety, now filled me with misgiving. He was too calm, too gentle considering our current state. It was like he was talking to a child. I walked up to Livet, who was hunched over in the corner of the main cabin. I saw two legs lying on the ground, a pair of blue Nike sneakers with the laces undone. I recognized those sneakers.

"Ja-Joseph?" I asked as I followed the legs up with my flashlight. Joseph was lying on the ground with a nasty gash in his head. He winced in the light of my flashlight. He was bleeding from a cut in his neck. Livet had his hand over the wound, but I saw blood continue to ooze out from between Livet's fingers.

"Hey, Ailith," Joseph said. His face contorted as he saw me."A-are they almost here?"

I looked at Livet, and the older man shook his head as though he knew that anything coming out of my mouth at that point would only exacerbate the situation.

"You're fine, Captain," Livet said as his free hand squeezed Joseph's and placed it over his heart. "I spoke to Rykirov on the phone, and he says he'll be damned to hell if he lets his star prodigy die. Though, Captain, it looks like we might have to send you directly home to Manna City now."

"Okay," Joseph muttered as his eyes drifted closed. I watched numbly as the pool of blood under Joseph's head continue to grow. "W-whatever you say, Livet."

"When did I ever lie to you?" Livet said with a soft laugh. "Don't be afraid; I never leave a job half-finished."

"There are whispers among the soldiers. They say there's a lake," Joseph whimpered through labored breaths. "A magical lake that can . . .can cure anything."

"Yeah," Livet whispered into Joseph's ear as he leaned in and hugged Joseph's body against his own. "I know, I'll take you there — Lake Tahil. As surely as the weeping willows return every year to shed their lavender leaves in those white waters, it will heal you, and give you another life. One free of pain, suffering, of the Blight. I know it, I've seen it happen. These are not just fairy tales. Trust me. Everything will . . . will be all right."

By then, Joseph's breathing was barely audible. His head turned limply to one side, and he would have looked peaceful if not for all the black clots in his hair. Livet's hand loosened around Joseph's neck, and I saw the bleeding dwindled to almost nothing. Livet laid Joseph's head down and hid his face from me. He sobbed once, twice, then he wiped his nose with his bloody hand. Livet took his jacket off and covered Joseph's upper body with it.

"Stop, you're suffocating him!" I snapped.

"He's gone, Lady Th — my apologies — Miss Ailith."

"No . . .no! Let me go; he could still be alive!"

"No," Livet said and caught my arm in his bloody hand. "Joseph suffered severe head trauma, and no one is coming for us. Come on; we need to get away from this site before he gets here."