Page 67 of Blood Moon
My head throbbed, and I released the letter before I crumpled it in my fist. All I could see was a scorching red as I tried to untwist what was happening to me. There were too many questions. Too many coincidences, and Rena wasn’t here to help me make sense of it.
I threw myself onto the bed, screamed into the hollow of my pillow, then in a sudden breath, I stopped. I forced away the tears, and that feeling burrowed in my throat, swelling. In a second move, I grabbed for my caddy, wrapped my hair, and stormed toward the showers.
After, I dressed in loose sweats, bundled myself in a fleece blanket, and curled onto the couch in front of the TV. Stevie and the girls were on the road for a performance; Naomi was in Chicago visiting her relatives for the first time since classes had begun, and Sev had an away football game. A while ago, he’d texted a photo of him on the bus with his teammates. I’d told him I was rooting for him, but once the text was sent, I knew it was going to be a long and very lonely weekend.
At some point, I fell into a deep sleep.
Nearby, a stream bubbled over slick rocks, curving gently along the bend of the forest. Dew slipped on sharp blades of glass, sparkling in the sunlight. A breeze rustled the leaves, and in a quickness, Rena was there.
This was reminiscent of a dream I’d had a few weeks ago. Only, in this moment, she pressed into the damp soil with bare feet, staring at me with an impish smile.
A blink, and her eyes were painted black. One foot before the other, she came forward, arms wide open, and I stumbled away. Aclick, click,sound arose from her throat, like that of a rattlesnake. I shrunk into myself, falling to the ground and crawling backward.
“I’m coming for you,” she hissed, and I gripped the soil between my hands, scaling the supple terrain as swiftly as I could. “Where are you going, my sweet Mirabella? I thought you missed me?”
I was able to flip onto my knees and pull myself up, running until I was caught by the shoulder and yanked in the opposite direction.
Rena had a handful of my hair, and when I turned around, she smiled, revealing two pointy fangs. I screamed, and she laughed long and wickedly as identical versions of her emerged from the earth, surrounding us. There were more of her than there were trees, and each form of her had sharp teeth.
“I’ll never leave you again,” she declared, and it was the last thing I heard before she—and every version of her—tugged me to the ground and drank all the blood I had in me.
A gasp met me when I woke.
With the discovery of werewolves, I’d had no time to thread in the remainder of the legend. Because in the stories, werewolvesweren’tthe only immortal creatures that were mentioned.
So were vampires.
CHAPTER33
Together, we gave life to immortality.
Your blood, my blood, our blood.
Article VI, Lost Letters from Aadan the First
There was no promise of safety between these four walls. My dorm felt like an echo chamber, reverberating my nightmare back to me. I paced and paced, chewing on this new realization. Vampires. Bloodsuckers. Demons from Hell. They were the entire reason the werewolves settled in Timber Plains to begin with. The book listed them as the Nosferatu, with an irresistible beauty and an endless thirst for blood.
I slipped on my shoes and checked the time. It was a little past ten in the evening. With that, I grabbed my things and entered the brisk, dark night.
Apart from the laughter of two students nearby, the university felt out of place. An eeriness tied itself around the nearly naked branches, pushing the dead leaves to the ground. With it, a smell of musk and ash. A piece of paper tangled in the wind, catching on the edge of an iron bench, and the lack of warm bodies urged me to look over my shoulder as I walked toward the rose garden, a small area located on the edge of Hester Hall.
I folded my arms across my chest as a means of security, and knowing what I knew now, I wouldn’t ordinarily find myself in the darkened night alone, but I wanted to try something.
A gust of cold air pushed my hair away from my shoulders. “Julian,” I said quietly, but the night breeze chewed at his name and swallowed it. “Julian?” I said again, only now, I felt asinine.
I was realizing that he’d probably left campus after our conversation earlier. The likelihood of Julian having duties more essential than being a college student made sense, and it felt a little egotistical to think that, perhaps, he’d stick around because of me.
I grumbled, considered ripping a petal from a rose to manage my anger and accept the fact that I’d be cooped up in my dorm, with the blinds closed tight and the sound of the TV turned up so I wouldn’t feel so deserted.
But on the way back to Hester Hall, I froze in my path. Walking beneath the pale moonlight with a crooked smirk plastered on his face was Julian Santos.
At the sight of him, I was breathless, unable to move from where I’d embedded myself. He’d come. I didn’t expect him to. To some extent, I was unsure why I wanted him to come. I knew some of it was the loneliness—the inability to sit with this new information, knowing I couldn’t tell a soul. Some of it was pure curiosity. He was a man that could shapeshift into a wolf whenever he wanted, and Iknewhim. I could talk to him. But most of it was the simple fact that Julian and I had never been cordial with each other—and now that the door was open, I felt this gravitational pull toward him. A feeling that was nauseating until he was a few feet away. Then, all of it subsided.
Julian tucked his hands into the pockets of his cotton shorts and looked down at me with a mesmerizing stare. I tore my gaze away. “You called?” he said, his voice raspy, and I inspected the university logo printed in the center of his long-sleeved shirt while I collected myself.
“I didn’t expect you to come,” I said, still avoiding eye contact. It was a half-truth. I’d hoped he’d come. I’d hoped it would work, but I couldn’t be certain.
Julian moved a step closer, and I could hear the twisting of a smile cutting at his words.
