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The ground trembled beneath my feet—the brief contact was enough to feel the path shudder as the creature approached. I had never seen a vampyre before, they never showed us pictures or sketches, but I was pretty sure my worst nightmares could not have created the demon lurching from behind. I stopped dead, midstride, and crouched low to the ground out of fear and stealth as its body landed in front of me.
It slowly stood to its full height, preventing my way forward and blocking the view of the towering citadel. The vampyre was almost human-like, with a head and four extremities, its stature only slightly taller than the tallest human I'd ever seen, but that was where our similarities ended. The thing was rotten from the outside—the skin on its sickly frame was black and sunken between the old bones that bulged at the joints. Gangly arms dangled low in front of its hollow chest, with splinters as nails curving harshly on its predatorial hands.
It took everything in me to look at its head, to let the face of a monster forever plague my memory. I would not soon forget the abyss behind empty eye sockets, nor the chasm of its wide mouth housing hundreds of pointed, black teeth inside. If I ever dreamed again, it would be of this demon and the blood-curdling hiss escaping from long-decayed vocal cords.
The creature took large breaths that crackled against stiff skin and stretched it noisily from the unnatural movement. No, the heaves weren't rhythmical like breathing. It was smelling me, tasting me on its palate, enjoying the thrill of the hunt and the sound of terror manifested by my pounding heart.
Neither one of us moved for the longest minute of my life. Both of us waiting for the other to jerk, to give some hint at our next motive. I pressed my fingers into the warm dirt, letting their fingertips connect with the veins of the earth, but there was nothing. No life energy from the beast before me, nor the shudder of any hint of it anywhere else. I was alone and needed to think of something quick, or I would never reach the citadel alive.
My gaze flickered around me for half a breath, taking in my surroundings and committing them to memory. I needed to hide from this creature, but hiding was only necessary when your hunter could see. There were only two things allowing the vampyre to visualize me in its mind's eye—the sounds I made and the copper smell of my blood. Both of these things, I could control, both I would use to my advantage.
The path continued to carve through the dead forest, and the tree line on either side was dense with pale trunks and their shadows. I brought a hand slowly to the bleeding site on my forehead once more and wiped as much blood as possible against my palm, painting it crimson. The creature screeched in delight, and a sharp clicking sound followed the raspy squeal as I shuffled to the side. The packed sand under my foot barely moved as I shifted my weight in stealthy silence.
The vampyre's head followed me as I sidestepped, its senses even more developed than my own. It was a seasoned hunter, an experienced killer, but I wouldn't let that intimidate me. I didn't have to be quicker than this creature. I only needed to be smarter.
The first tree came within my reach, and I stretched out a bloody hand to touch its base. The decomposed bark fell apart under my fingers, and dust floated in the air between us and twirled in the constant breeze. I marked the tree with my blood, stained the white wood red, and left my scent forever manifested on the trunk. The creature only listened, waited, as if curious about what I was doing. I stepped sideways again, careful not to disturb the fallen twigs and stray debris to tag another tree. Then another. Then another.
I finally crossed the expanse of the tree line, carefully navigating around the creature through the forest and hiding behind the spread of my aroma. The vampyre tensed with every marking, more confused as its prey duplicated and grew. It whipped its head around viciously in each direction, bone-splitting ticking sounds scraped against its throat as it tried to find me. But my blood disoriented the creature. The one sense it relied on to hunt was now overstimulating, overwhelming—and now overcoming.
I reached into a leather pocket and found the wrapped candy, carefully unfolding the paper in the pocket to muffle any sound. I popped it in my mouth, instantly tasting the sweetness and the medicinal effects with my tongue. Whatever these candies did, Fenris told me to use it in the event I was hurt, and I was pretty sure this counted as one of those situations. As I sucked the hard sugar around my tongue, I retreated from the creature, letting my feet find the trail once more to escape.
I was going to make it. I would be one of the only runners in history to see a vamp face-to-face and live to tell the tale. The creature dashed between the trees, thrashing its massive hands and shattering the withered wood like they were twigs between its dagger-decorated grasp.
Something changed inside me as I watched the monster frantically destroy the forest in search of me. The results of the sweet candy coating my tongue claimed their effect on my body, and I was instantly refreshed. The throbbing in my head ceased entirely, the ache in my legs replaced with a scourge of energy. My hand fingered the cut on my temple, expecting to feel the slickness of new blood pouring from a fresh wound, but there was nothing but smooth skin beneath my touch.
I should have been relieved or maybe grateful at the miraculous healing the candy provided. But instead, I was sick. This waswrong, like I had just swallowed my death instead of prolonging my life. The pill left a sinister aftertaste in my throat, a bittersweet reminder of how little I really understood concerning Eivor and hergifts.
Snap.
A gut-wrenching crack—though any sound was cringe worthy in the wastelands. My concern over the candies had made me ignore my footing, and a sharp snap beneath my heel betrayed my retreat as I took a step away from the creature. It tore its attention from the bloody tree line and whipped its ghoulish face around. Every hair on the back of my neck stood on end as it huffed a breath in my direction then wailed a cry so terrible the night itself seemed to darken at the sound.
I turned sharply on my traitorous heel and ran. Out of ideas and out of my mind, I fled with little hope of getting very far before it caught me and a greater hope it would kill me quickly. The shrieks deafened my ears—it was nearly on top of me now. I was just a breath away from certain death, a moment from being ripped apart by claws of ebony, a step from becoming another nameless fatality of the wastelands. The fight inside me surrendered, and I looked up one final time at the night sky.
It was a good moment, my final one, and I savored the fresh air in my lungs and the burning of my calves. There was no place else I'd rather die than running through the wastes of my world, nothing else I'd rather consume me than the eternal night. I closed my eyes and let the darkness welcome me home.
My feet kicked against free air as I was lifted by the shoulders. It was the wrong sort of welcome I expected—no twisted talons piercing my skin or snarling lips tasting my blood. Strong arms gripped my shoulders from behind, and I brought my own hands instinctively around them to find their grip on me. The skin beneath my touch was smooth but cold, soft over firm flesh. My body was sent sideways as arms embraced me, and the air was stolen from my lungs as they whipped me away from the ground with ease.
My eyes flew open, not comprehending how a creature so terrible could feel so comforting against my frame. The world around me morphed as I was yanked into the air, so disoriented I couldn't tell which way I was spinning. The sky was at my feet and the ground above me, then it all turned around again as the figure behind me straightened.
Death must be a tangible being. He was behind me now, lifting and holding my soul in his dark, bronze-colored arms. The shrieks were reduced to distant cries as he carried me away from the monster below, who sounded furious death had taken its kill before it could claim it. I relaxed in his arms, let the rhythmic sound of rushing air push us higher into the night. He pulled me tighter against his chest as the tension slackened in my muscles. Death was strong. I knew by the way his chest flexed against my back and how he effortlessly carried me through the darkness and beyond.
He smelled…different than I expected. Not that I’d imagined smelling death before, but I would have thought it to be foul or rotten at least. But this smell was smoky, like a fire burning a tobacco leaf. Like the smoke Loren and I used to blow in our secret room when we stole sticks from the trainers. The forbidden indulgence burned our young lungs and made us choke, but I loved the taste it left on my tongue. Death's scent created the same wave of pleasure in my chest, and I let it engulf my senses and wrap me in its smoldering heat.
"I do appreciate your cooperation," a husky voice mumbled behind my ear. A cold trickle crawled down my spine at the raspy sound. "It makes saving your life much easier."
I suddenly snapped out of my romantic mood, letting the instinctual part of my brain send raging alarms through my head. "But… Do you mean I’m not dead?" My words floated on a breath, barely loud enough to hear above the wind roaring in my ears.
He dipped his head lower, cold lips skimming my ear as he spoke. “Do you feel dead?”
“I have little experience with the feeling, I’m afraid.”
Death laughed behind me, evident by the tremble of his chest at my back and the coarse breath tickling the sensitive part of my ear. Judging by the way the sound made something quiver in my stomach and my heart skip a few much needed beats, I was very much alive.
“But if I’m not dead, and you aren’t Death, then how are we flying?” I asked, not sure if I was prepared for the truth. I twisted my shoulders to look behind me, to sneak a peek at the face of the being holding me snugly against its very well-defined body, but he squeezed me tighter to prevent my movement.
“If I let you turn around, do you promise not to panic?”
I squirmed against his grip, feeling increasingly uncomfortable in the arms of a stranger—even if he did save my life. “If a vampyre didn’t freak me out, I’m pretty sure I can handle you.” A scoff blew another breath in my ear, but he relaxed his clutch on me. I twisted my shoulder and flipped in his arms, letting my chest graze his and my lower back fall across broad hands.
