Page 22 of Bitten Vampire

My mind stays carefully blank as I drive. Eyes forward; nothing to see here. Nothing at all. At the border the tag chirps; the lane light flashes green. The tyres bump onto the rougher Human Sector road.

Five minutes later, I park and stagger to the front door.

The house shudders, doors rattling in panic. Frightened. The house is frightened.

“I’m all right,” I rasp. A lie. The hospital would be sensible, but it’s too late. I knew it when I crawled from the bin, when I felt the stillness in my chest.

I’m not breathing.

Kicking off my trainers, I head for the stairs, miss the first step and crash to my knees, terror ripping a sob from me. Hand to chest, no heartbeat.

The vampire killed me, yet I’m still here.

It’s not possible. I was not a living vampire—the tests when I was fifteen proved that. I lack the necessary DNA.

I should be dead—or worse, mindless—yet my thoughts are clear. Newly dead vampires lose themselves for months, their minds dulled to nothing but hunger.

The hallway door creaks, and Baylor bounds out, taillow. He halts, nostrils flaring, ears pinned flat, a thin whine escaping him.

Oh God. “Hi, buddy. It’s okay, I know I smell funny, but it’s just me.” He slinks towards me. I sink my fingers into his fur. I can feel him. I can think.

I’m not mindless.

But I have no idea what I am.

I stay crumpled on the floor for so long that the house lifts me off the floor and carries me to my bedroom. Magic crackles over my skin, scrubbing away grime and knitting the torn flesh at my throat. Unseen hands guide me into my pyjamas.

Baylor hesitates in the doorway, most of his bulk still outside, panting in ragged bursts. I haven’t seen him this anxious since Amy died. He whimpers, and I try to soothe him, but no sound comes out. I don’t know what to say.

I sink into the mattress. “What about the windows?” I whisper. “What about sunlight?” Dawn is only a few short hours away.

A gentle pulse of magic strokes my cheek.You will be safe,it seems to say.

“Your wards can really stop it hurting me?” My voice is a croak.

Part of me almost doesn’t care; let the sunlight take me. But the thought of burning like that vampire’s arm—charred skin, living agony—terrifies me. I always pictured dying old and grey, holding the hand of someone I loved, not like this.

Not like this…

“I don’t understand. I was tested. I’m a derivative mutt with traces of every creature’s DNA. I barely carry anyvampire, not enough for thrall status, let alone a full turning. How did this happen?”

I bury myself beneath the covers, hugging the pillow.

“I don’t want to be a vampire.”

Becoming a vampire is supposed to be a bureaucratic circus—licences, paperwork, permissions. Clearly, I’m a clerical error, a freak tossed in a bin like rubbish.

No one—least of all the vampire who treated me as a ‘takeaway’—expected me to walk out alive… undead.

“I’m so frightened,” I breathe. “How do I work like this? Do I keep delivering in the Vampire Sector and pretend I belong, or go back to the city and fake being human? What happens when I get hungry?” The idea of hurting anyone makes me shudder. I’d rather be dead. They hurt Amy, they hurt Max, they hurt me. I don’t want to die, but I don’t want to be this.

Magic fingers comb through my hair.

The mattress dips. Baylor climbs up and drapes himself across me like a weighted blanket. I wrap my arms around him—gently. Do I have super-strength now? I don’t know.

Apparently vampires can cry. Tears slip hot and steady down my cheeks.

Just when I thought I was getting my life back, thought I’d turned a corner, the ground opened beneath me and dropped me even deeper.