Page 17 of Ashvale: The Vampire's Kiss

Cal’s nose was bleeding from a blow the vampire had gotten in, but he wiped it away grimly, snapping his finger to stop the magick and the vampire slumped to the ground.

The dusky brown skin was familiar, as was the dark, wavy hair. This was the vampire we’d come in search of, the park was his hunting ground and the other vampire?—

My brain stuttered. The other vampire.

I looked up in time to meet the fist barrelling towards my face. I caught it, which surprised both of us, but then I’d been wrong earlier—this vampire, young and dimpled, was not undead.

“A fair fight then,” I muttered as I stood and struck, my knuckles smarting as they hit the living vampire’s cheek and I felt something crack beneath. Cal could take care of himself, but I still threw a glance his way as I exchanged blows with my opponent. The glance cost me and my head snapped back with the force of the strike that caught my chin. “Well, now you’ve pissed me off,” I snarled and came back with two vicious punches—one to the stomach and one to the ribs. They fell, their slight form barely making an impact on the ground. They stayed down, unconscious, and I prowled over to the undead vampire, still twitching on the floor.

The honey-hue of his skin had paled from the pain and his eyes seemed foggy, glazed, when they met mine.

“Hello,” I said pleasantly, like this was a charming walk in the park. “I have a few questions for you.”

“Fuck… you.”

Creative. I rolled my eyes as I grabbed him by the hair, lifting his head up off of the ground so I could better assess him. “See?” I said, raising an eyebrow at Cal. “Honey doesn’t work.”

“That’s not quite what?—”

The sound of the living vampire stirring behind me, leaping for my back, cut off the stream of Cal’s words as I let the undead vampire thunk back onto the ground. I had to admire the fledgling’s tenacity. I could only imagine that they were bonded in some way to the undead vampire still slumped on the floor. But, unfortunately for them, my patience had finally given out.

I caught him by the chest, my hand pressing through bone and muscle easily as I closed my fingers around the living vampire’s heart and pulled. The heart dripped red as it fell to the grass with a squelch that made Cal grimace as I cleaned my bloody hand on the now-dead living vampire’s T-shirt. It was possible he could wake up, even without his heart, but it was rare. Even Rowan hadn’t stirred yet, caught between death and undeath.

“Was that necessary?” Cal looked less than amused, probably thinking about how we’d now have another body to dispose of, but I was past caring. Let them find it. They should know that I was coming for them, if they didn’t suspect already.

“Shall we try this again?” I murmured softly, closing my hand around the undead vampire’s throat and lifting his head so he could see the dead fledgling on the ground. He swallowed and I nodded, satisfied. “If you’d like to avoid the same fate, then tell me what you know.”

“About what?” The words were sharp but belied by the tremor in his voice. It was the eternal joke, the simplest just-dessert, that the undead feared their own ends.

“I want to know what happened to my family,” I said easily, and the vampire let out a wheezing laugh until my eyes glowed silver and he choked on his mirth. “I think you can help.”

“It wasn’t me! I was just?—”

“Is this how you’ve made it so many years as an undead? Squealing at the first opportunity? An interesting method of survival.” I dug my fingers in deeper and the vampire whimpered, all sense of bravado vanishing as his pupils widened in fear. “I don’t want to hear your excuses.”

“I don’t know where he put them,” the vampire whined, voice tight under my hand. “I swear! He wanted my support, my money, but I wasn’t important enough to learn all the details.”

“Who?” My voice was softer than the breeze brushing past us, deathly quiet and made of ice and steel. “The name.”

“A-Adrian.”

I let the vampire go and he gasped out his thanks as my hand left his throat.

Adrian. I’d suspected as much, but I’d needed the proof.

“Thank you, you’ve been very helpful.”

“No, wait?—”

For the second time that night, my hand closed around a heart, one that no longer beat, tearing it free of the chest as the vampire continued to beg. But this was no time for mercy, not when I finally had the confirmation I needed.

I let the change shiver over my skin. My wolf form constantly lurked beneath the surface and when I could finally let it out, I felt free. It was an almost instantaneous change, silver fur appearing across my body, my form tripling in size as my heavy paws thudded down in place of my hands and feet.

The smile on my face was more teeth than anything else, monstrous and deadly as I leapt on the vampire and closed my jaws over his head. My teeth were sharp enough to sever it from his neck easily and I shook him like a ragdoll before letting the head drop from my mouth quicker than the undead could even scream.

Cal grimaced, content to let me handle things, but when I stayed in my wolf form instead of changing back, he sighed. “I suppose you want me to collect the head then?”

I let my tongue loll out and he muttered under his breath as he reached into his pockets and removed a bag, scooping the head up by its thick hair and dropping it inside so we could make sure we’d retrieved all the possible info from the vampire.

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