Page 48 of The Forty-Year-Old Virgin Witch

Varos just stared at me, and I realized his world was crumbling just as much as mine was. Elders were supposed to mentor you, to shelter you … to care for you. Being chosen to be in an Elder’s family was supposed to be an honor. To find out I was created only to be a glorified errand boy hurt.

“You can’t leave me here. I haven’t dealt with the outside world in decades—”

“YOU’RE A GODDAMN IMMORTAL BEING! FIGURE IT OUT!”

My face flushed, and Varos’s eyes narrowed. My undead heart fluttered. Holy fuck, I’d just screamed at someone hundreds of years older than me. He was going to slowly peel the skin from my body as a warmup.

Wait. He was hundreds ofyears old. I held up my hands.

“Sorry. I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair.” I kneeled on the ground, missing the feel of a pulse racing through my veins. Sometimes it would be nice to feel the physical effects of emotions again. “Do you know of Seth?”

Varos twitched. Never a good sign.

I stood again,on edge.

“If you’re in league with him, leave immediately,” Varos snarled.

“I just wondered—”

The second jug flew, but I was already out the door and running. Back to the south, back to Aggie. Back home.

???

A few counties over, I admitted that home would have to wait. I should have swallowed my pride and taken a few blood bags from Varos, but my stubbornness was almost as bad as Aggie’s.

Now I was in the woods, scouring for food like a goddamn animal. I was not going to hunt a human. I wouldn’t.

A deer would have been perfect, but there was nothing around except for rabbits and crows. I’d stake myself in the heart before I’d eat a crow. I closed my eyes, feeling the heartbeats of a small family of rabbits in a burrow, about ten yards to my left and buried a yard underground. I grit my teeth.

I could not go back to Aggie without feeding. I’d likely kill her.

I stood over the burrow and punched down into the ground. The rabbits fled through the hole. I snatched three of them, grabbing them by their ears and quickly snapping their necks. It took less than a minute for me to bite down and drain them all. I tossed their bodies to the ground in disgust when I finished.

Animal blood would only get me so far, but it would have to do for now. I took a breath, wondering if it would be better to stop by a city with a blood bank. I hated resorting to petty theft, but it was better than outright murder.

Alright. One more stop, then home to my witchling.

Then I smelled it. Fresh, young, and stumbling unwittingly into my path.

Human blood.

The last threads of my control snapped, and I lunged.

---