Half Blood: Chapter Four
January 06, 2015
Four
Nox’s feral diamond eyes swept
over the street he’d tracked the half blood to once more. From his vantage
point, he could see the entire length of the main street of this hell forsaken human
city. He sucked in a hiss when the tattoo that ran along his chest, back and
neck burned with his queen’s need. The blood bond he’d submitted to made his
blood heat with her desires to suck and fuck, calling him to her—tormenting him
because he couldn’t leave yet. His cock hardened with her need for sexual
gratification, but he had to ignore it. He had been tracking the half
blood—this abomination of the species—for too long. He needed to end her
parasitic life before he could return to the sithen and his queen.
The cold wind
whipped past his still form perched on the edge of the roof as the first
snowflakes of the season fell around him. His hunger stabbed at him like a
rusty knife in his gut, making his fangs ache and his bloodlust bubble
dangerously close to the surface. He hadn’t fed properly in three months now. He’d
held out for as long as he could, but a couple of nights ago, his need to feed
had won over.
He’d found a
Goth bar named The Imp and Impaler. It was tacky as fuck, but there were a lot
of Renfields willing to believe that he was only pretending to be a vampire
until his fangs pierced their skin. The little mind-fuck after made them forget
he had even been there.
The only
drawback to feeding on humans was that too much of their blood weakened him,
and he had gorged himself when he really shouldn’t have. Their blood was still
in his system, dulling his abilities like a strung-out junkie. Out of habit, he
touched the throwing knives that criss-crossed his chest, fingering the handle
of one of them softly. A soft curse carried on the wind brought his attention
back to the street below. Another icy gust blew up into his nostrils and he
caught the scent––the scent he had been tracking for so long. It was the scent
of the half blood.
* * *
Indi’s boots pounded against the
pavement as she walked back towards her apartment after waving Beth off in her father’s
Mercedes. Beth had wanted to drive Indi home, but she’d received another
check-up call and a hurry-up text message from her mother while in the store. Beth’s
mother would start foaming at the mouth if Beth was late, so Indi sent her on
her way, reassuring her best friend that she would be okay on her own.
Rounding a
corner, a blast of arctic air seized her muscles, forcing her to hug her arms
around her torso a little more securely. She cursed, watching the first snow of
the season fall softly to the ground around her and melt.
Darkness arced
over Indi’s head, stretching its long fingers over her face as she passed under
the huge rail bridge that marked the entrance to Hell. The welcome mat of used
syringes and broken liquor bottles littered the gutters, adding to the overall
feeling of revulsion that prickled over Indi’s skin every time she went home.
Walking farther
and farther down the dark streets, whispers of drug deals and sexual favors
were exchanged in the shadows between the buildings. The already dark shadows
that lurked at the mouths of the alleyways shifted as she walked by, retreating
deeper into the black maws that spawned sex and drug overdoses.
Indi’s
fighting instincts kicked up a notch when she heard a popping noise coming from
down one of the backstreets. Glancing around the corner of the alleyway, she
saw the lick of flame from a barrel fire about half way down the length of the narrow
space; four vagrants were huddled around the warmth from the fire. She walked
past them without any of them noticing.
But her steps
faltered when a familiar sensation suddenly crept up on her, flushing her skin
with goose bumps. She was being watched, and it was the same person who had
been watching her since she moved into Hell. She ground her teeth together,
agitated that she hadn’t figured out who it was and why they were going all Neighborhood
Watch on her. She spun around, searching the darkness through slitted eyes. A
shadow shifted nervously about twenty feet away from her. Her back straightened,
sending a lick of fear up her spine and dumping adrenaline into her veins.
Without taking
her eyes off the threat, she reached down for her knife, unclipping the metal
snap and pulling on the handle. Holding the knife in front of her, she moved
with stealthy grace towards the shivering shadow that had just slipped back
into the darkness. Closing in soundlessly, quiet murmurs trickled out from the
inky alleyway. She skirted a little closer to the entrance, peering around the
corner to see a hooker with a john exchanging cash.
“What do you
want?” the whore asked, blowing out a pink bubble from the gum in her mouth as
she stuffed the green down into her bra.
Looking at the
prostitute’s chest, the john licked his lips and said, “A rim job.” The whore
nodded and began unbuttoning his pants. He moaned and that was just about as
much as Indi was willing to see. Turning on her heel, she took two quick steps,
but stopped to tuck the blade back into the sheath at her ankle. It was only
when she stood up again that a familiar pain skewered her entire body.
“Not again,”
she groaned, dropping to the ground. She didn’t know why, but she’d recently
started having episodes where she blacked out for a few minutes at a time.
Right on cue, the edges of her vision grew dim and fuzzy. Shooting pain
ricocheted around her body until she was reduced to a mess on the sidewalk,
curled up in the fetal position. Every inch of her body was on fire like she’d
had acid poured directly into her bloodstream.
For two long
minutes she barely held onto consciousness as the agony traveled up and over her head in a
searing wave, her whole body aching with the torment. Another minute passed
before the pounding began to recede. Every muscle and bone in her body
throbbed, rendering her immobile. She swallowed down convulsively on the vomit
that was threatening to come up her throat, hating what was coming next. Her
eyelids grew heavy, drawing down over her eyes against her will until finally
darkness swallowed her vision...
With a gasp, Indi came around.
Her heart was tachy as she blinked the last of the darkness away. Her teeth
were chattering violently. While she’d been out, winter’s bitterly cold fingers
had wrapped around her, seeking out her exposed skin to steal her warmth. Her
hearing was fuzzy, like her ears had been packed with cotton wool. Her body was
reacting to a threat she was yet to realize was there, her heart hammering
against her ribs as the sound of pounding footsteps registered through the
black haze of her subconscious.
“Fuck,” she
muttered. This was the last thing she needed, being laid out like some goddamn
sacrificial offering. Her body was aching to the point where tears had started
creeping from the corners of her eyes, debilitating her and leaving her armed
yet defenseless.
“Hey, are you all
right?” a deep voice asked above her head. The hairs on her neck stood on end.
She strained to see the man’s face, his features in shadows until a car sped by
hastily—its headlights swinging onto his face like a strobe light. He was an
ordinary looking man with a shock of oily-black hair and a pair of dark brown
eyes. He could have been anyone, but anyone walking around the streets of Hell
after dark was not the kind of person you wanted to meet.
Indi’s mind
automatically skittered back to the news report she’d seen earlier that night.
Could she be staring into the face of the Buxton rapist? It was possible. The
most successful predators didn’t even look like they wanted to eat you alive
until their jaws were around your jugular. She swallowed. Hard. She wanted to
move, but her body protested painfully. As he crouched beside her, the heat
from his body pushed against her skin.
“I’m fine.
Just don’t touch me,” she said, trying to keep her voice even. She didn’t know
how much longer the pain was going to go on for. She just hoped that it wouldn’t
end up getting her killed. While she waited, she looked over the threat, taking
stock of his potential weaknesses. He was probably a good five inches taller
than her, built like Rhett through the shoulders, but much more solid around
the midsection. She couldn’t see a weapon, but that didn’t mean that there wasn’t
one. Underestimating your enemy was a sure way to get killed. She was just
hoping that he was underestimating her.
Without
warning, the aching roll of pain stopped as suddenly as it started and Indi got
to her feet unsteadily, palming her knife in the process, and concealing it behind
her thigh.
She was
swaying where she stood, only staying upright when he took her by the elbow.
She shrugged out of his grip with a snarl on her lips.
“Don’t touch
me,” she spat.
“I’m sorry,”
he said, holding his hands up in front of him to show that he was unarmed. “Where
are you hurt?” His brown eyes gave her a quick once over, setting her on the
corner of Edgy and Pissed Off Street.
“I’m fine,”
she replied through gritted teeth. He stared back at her for a moment before
looking around, checking to see if anyone else was about. Fear crawled up over Indi’s
skin like a thousand insects.
“I’m Sam,” he
said, stretching his hand out to her. She stared at it until he took it back. “I’m
not going to hurt you. I just wanted to see if you were okay,” he added
quickly.
“Pretty words,”
she muttered. But she’d heard them all before and she wasn’t prepared to stand
there and put them to the test. “I have to go,” she said, shoving the excuse at
him and walking off.
Indi moved away from him as quickly as she
could without making it look like she wanted to bolt. If he was the rapist, he
would give chase; the faster the prey ran, the more excited the predator got.
With conscious effort, she walked at a pace that wouldn’t be considered running
and border-line represented walking.
Indi had had
brushes with danger in her life. In fact, her entire life was one big brush
with danger. But the rapist doing the rounds of Hell was by far the scariest
one she’d ever had to encounter. The men that had come before him were known to
her. She knew how their eyelids would droop when sex was on their minds. She
knew how they would gently touch her, trying to make her pliant to their needs
in a time before she knew what they were really doing to her. The amount of
times she had heard the phrase “I’m not going to hurt you” were infinite. But
the rapist, he was something different. He was nameless, faceless and scary as hell.
After a city block,
Indi started getting that itch-between-your-shoulder-blades feeling again.
Faking having to tie the lace on her boot, she slowly sank down to her haunches
and put her back to the wall of the closest building to cast a covert glance
behind her. There was nobody there, but the feeling of being eyeballed wasn’t
going away. After waiting a few more unnecessary minutes, she growled and stood
up again. With cold air sawing in and out of her lungs, she gave up on waiting.
The fucker could come to her if he wanted a piece of her. Turning, she stalked
away, her senses on high alert.
The rhythm of
her steps pounded in time with the thump of her pulse. The sound was so
rhythmic that she hardly realized when it changed. It was a subtle change—nothing
you would notice unless you were really listening for it, but it was there all
the same. This new beat was heavier than hers—a male’s thumping gait. Her head
snapped around before starting into an unsteady jog.
The trailing
footsteps became heavier and faster as she ran. Even though the cold wind
whipped past her face, a fine sheen of sweat broke out on her brow as the cold
air rippled through her lungs with a near-lethal sting. She forced the cough
that was aching to break free from her throat down, not wanting to give the
sonofabitch following a better indication of where she was.
As she rounded
the final corner to her apartment block, her steps faltered and she stood
frozen on the spot. There was a dark figure huddling against the front of her
building, one heavy foot resting on the brickwork at a ninety-degree angle, the
hands fisted tightly under crossed arms. And it only took her half a second to realize
who had come to pay her a visit...
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