Page 32 of To Save a Vampire
Ky nods, turning toward the fire to stoke the flames with a dry stick.
My question kills their intimacy immediately. It wasn’t my intention. I just had never thought about it before. I’ve shot this gun plenty of times with Ky and my mother, but it never felt like it was practice until this moment. Do they think I’ll need to defend myself?
“It’s hard pulling the trigger at first. It feels like your body is working against your conscious. An emotional part of you at war with a physical instinct.” His voice is even as he speaks, devoid of any emotion. “It’s surprising how easy it becomes when your life depends on it.”
My mother looks hard at him like she could pull the pain out of him with just the love in her eyes. Time pauses for them as Ky reflects on his past.
Asher sits across from me. The flames dance against his somber features. He opens his mouth to speak and then quickly closes it. He rolls his shoulders and then finally speaks. “When I lost my brother,” Asher whispers, his chest heaving for a breath he doesn’t fully find, “it hurt. The worst pain I’ve ever felt, actually. Like my heart was ripped from my chest and pushed back down my throat. Still there, still functioning, still beating, but never quite the same.”
Everyone is quiet. Even nature has fallen away from us. All I hear is his melancholy, haunted voice.
“It’s true. You don’t realize what you’re capable of until someone tests you. You come to realize you don’t know yourself at all. You might really be the monster everyone claims you to be.” His focus is on the flames, his eyes never meeting mine. “There was a warrant out for a pike that lived just west of here. A malicious man at a compound I’d never heard of sent armed guards out to bring him a new pet.”
My mouth falls open slightly in understanding, but my mind refuses to connect his story, needing to hear it in his own words.
“They shot my brother by mistake with a pike paralysis so strong it killed him. They hid his body to conceal their error. I specifically remember thinking how strange his lifeless eyes looked staring up at me, so different from my own. He was no longer the boy I had grown up with nor the brother I would grow old with.” His face is shadowed by anger as he looks into the flames of the fire like it’s the hell he’s lived. “When they realized their mistake, they tried to harness me. Two guards held my hands out at my sides, and one tried to inject a needle into my neck. Rage controlled my thoughts and actions.”
He pauses, looking out at the river. His arms rest on his bent knees. His words hang in the air for all of us to grasp.
“Then what happened?” I ask quietly, not fully wanting to hear how the story concludes.
“Then I ripped his throat out with my teeth, and he bled to death at my feet. A feeling of contentment filled my mind just before I fell unconscious,” Asher says, his steely gaze pinning me in place, his jaw locked tight as he waits for my judgment.
My mother and Ky remain silent. My eyes never stray from his.
Asher’s been punished his entire life. They tortured him before he ever stepped foot in the compound, doing more damage than they ever could within those walls. But he fought for his life. For his brother’s loss of life.
But he lost.
“Physical strength prevails when your mind is weak,” Ky says, nodding to Asher. An understanding passes between the two men.
“Do you think you could have killed them all if they hadn’t drugged you?” I ask, still wondering if I would have the courage to defend myself that way.
I see his chest rise and fall heavily. His eyebrows rise a fraction of an inch toward his hairline, my question surprising him.
“I guess I don’t know.” He searches my face, probably trying to find disgust in my reaction from what he’s admitted, but I have nothing but curiosity. “I think anyone would try, though. I would have tried and it would have ended one of two ways. I could have been locked away in a smothering sedation until a beautiful mortal helped me escape,” he says as a small, shy smile pulls at my mouth. “Or I could have killed them all and lived a life in hiding, more so than I already was.” He tilts his head away from me. His gaze settles on the flames again.
“Sometimes you don’t see the gift you're given. You count your losses, not knowing there are more things out there worth gaining.” His voice is quiet, little more than a whisper.
The weight of the gun seems to dissipate as I think about what they’ve said. Asher’s story circles my mind on repeat.
Maybe I’m not as powerful as Asher or as courageous as Ky or even as confident as my mother. I am compassionate and intelligent and driven, traits that do not make me more capable of killing someone but make me human. And we all live off of that same basic instinct …
Survival.
Nine
Ditch The Pack
The nightsand days pass in a blur. My hand has finally healed, leaving a thick, fresh scar across my palm, a reminder of how far we’ve come.
Sleep occurs in spurts, but we eat well, devouring meals Asher easily provides. Ky makes sure our water bottles are filled from the river and that we are always well hydrated. Asher has been insisting on more breaks. He doesn’t say it, but I know it’s because of how unsteady Ky’s running has become.
With easy, rapid moves, my mother signs something to Asher. He glances down at me. We’ve become comfortable with one another and developed a strange friendship I never would have imagined weeks ago. Asher and I have spent every day together, working together as if we’ve been friends our whole lives. He’s patient and teaches me to hunt, and how to hold a sword, a few techniques here and there. He’s even taken the time to show me edible food sources that we pass on our way, explaining their identifying traits to me.
I don’t know where his knowledge comes from, but I never doubt him and he never gives me a reason to.
My mother’s eyes narrow, looking from me to Asher, waiting for his reply.
