Chapter 3 Injected Escape

VASILIY -

The world smeared around me. Ambulances became streaks of red and white, and the warehouse wall rushed past as I rounded the building faster than the humans could see.

A white cargo van waited behind a row of stacked shipping containers, concealed from the parking lot and the Alliance vehicles. Both rear doors stood open, and the engine hummed, ready to take off at any moment.

A man carried a small girl toward it. She couldn’t have been more than ten years old. Dirt streaked her pale face, and her thin legs kicked wildly while her small fingers clawed at the man’s wrist.

Her nails dug in deep until he cursed and dropped her hard onto the pavement.

She tried to run, but he caught her by the back of her medical gown and slapped her hard enough to fling her into the open van.

Zeyne surged forward at the sight, and red flooded my vision as his rage collided with mine. The concrete cracked beneath my boot when I launched toward them.

The back of my hand struck his face with enough force to collapse the bones in his cheek. His body left the ground, flew several yards, and slammed into the side of the warehouse wall.

I turned toward the child, concern riding me hard, just as something punched through my coat and buried itself in my side.

Fire exploded beneath my skin, and my body locked around the pain. My gaze dropped to the syringe protruding from my ribs as a small hand remained wrapped around the plunger.

The little girl looked up at me, and her lips pulled back into a wicked grin.

Vampiric fangs glistened in the light of the lamps, far too large and sharp for the child’s face. Still smiling, she said, “The Dragomirs send their regards.” Her voice carried the singsong cadence of a child, but something far older stared from behind her eyes.

Numbness spread outward from the injection site, racing across my stomach and down my legs. I reached for her, but her fingers closed around my wounded arm with enough force to grind bone against bone.

She dragged me in through the open doors, and another vampire from inside the van slammed them shut behind us.

“Drive,” he ordered as he made his way somewhere near the front.

The van lurched forward before I regained my balance, and my shoulder struck the metal floor hard, sending fresh pain through the bullet wound.

“They knew you wouldn’t leave a child behind.” The child’s fangs flashed. “All they had to do was give you one to save.” Her voice rose at the end, before a high, childish laugh followed the words.

I pressed my hands against the rough floor of the van and lifted my eyes to her, but fog crowded my thoughts and sent the world tilting around me.

“He’s still moving,” the man said. “The paralytic isn’t taking. Should I dose him again before the poison starts working?”

The child stayed crouched near the doors, her small body swaying with the motion of the van.

“Give him another shot, idiot.” Her childish voice made the command sound even more wrong.

“I can’t survive another one, Vas,” Zeyne whispered, but his voice barely reached me. “I can send you enough strength to escape, but you have to move before the poison reaches our heart.”

Something cut through his words, and his presence jerked violently inside me before vanishing.

The silence he left behind was more terrifying than the poison burning through my veins.

For four hundred years, Zeyne had existed beneath every thought and breath. Even when he slept, he remained a familiar weight inside me, an ancient awareness curled around my bones.

Now there was nothing.

A hand closed around the front of my coat, and the man raised another syringe just as heat crashed through my muscles.

It was the last of Zeyne's strength, raw and brutal, flooding every limb in a single violent wave.

I spun and sank my claws into the man’s throat. Flesh and cartilage parted beneath them, and hot blood spilled across my hand.

The scent struck me hard enough to tilt the van, and my vision narrowed.

I wrenched my claws free before old memories could close around my throat.

The malformed vampire child lunged, but I drove my heel into her chest.

Her small body crashed into the side door with enough force to rip it from its hinges. Metal shrieked as the door tore away, and the malformed vanished into the darkness with it.

Wind howled through the open side of the speeding van.

I didn’t wait. I jumped.

The road slammed into my feet, and momentum carried me forward in a swirling tumble as the concrete ate away at my skin and clothing.

As soon as I could, I lunged to my feet and ran. Buildings blurred into shapeless shadows, and I couldn’t tell whether the distortion around me came from my speed or the drug boiling through my veins.

My body felt separated from me. Every movement came just a heartbeat after I commanded it.

I tried to turn back toward the warehouse, but pressure speared through my skull, and my feet veered in the opposite direction.

I fought the pull, digging my heels against the pavement, but it tightened behind my eyes until my teeth ached. Something drew me through Meridian’s darkened streets with a certainty stronger than reason.

It wasn’t a command, and the thought helped cool my racing mind. Instead, it felt like a summons.

The city changed around me as I ran.

Glass towers gave way to aging brick. Smooth roads cracked beneath my feet, and carefully trimmed hedges became broken fences strangled with ivy. Dogs barked from sagging porches as I passed, their barks rising in frightened waves.

My strength drained with every block.

I stopped long enough to reach into my coat for my phone, but my fingers no longer obeyed me. The device slipped against the lining, and I couldn’t gather enough feeling in my hand to pull it free.

Suddenly, golden light spilled across the darkness.

It shone from a small cottage at the end of the street, too warm and vivid against the neglected houses around it. For one disoriented moment, I thought the poison had distorted my sight.

The wooden door shimmered as though sunlight lived beneath its surface.

Wild strawberry plants crowded the window, their leaves dripping with threads of liquid gold. Every small berry gleamed like a jewel beneath the porch light.

A woman hummed from inside, and the melody passed through the walls, soft and absentminded.

I'd barely made it to her porch when her scent slipped through the cracks around the door. It smelled of strawberries warmed by sunlight and rich soil after the rain.

Something living, sweet, and impossibly clean.

My heart slammed once against my ribs, making the next beat hurt.

I drew in another breath before I could stop myself, and hunger rose sharply enough that my fangs ached, but something even stranger moved beneath it, like a pull I couldn’t explain and no longer had the strength to resist. My body carried me up the steps before I could stop it.

The porch tilted beneath my feet, and I caught the railing, but my wounded arm buckled as the last remnants of Zeyne’s final surge drained from my body.

A wicker couch rested beneath one of the glowing windows, and I reached it before my knees finally gave out.

The humming inside the cottage stopped abruptly, and darkness closed over me. Only the scent of strawberries remained.

For the first time in two hundred years, I fell without Zeyne there to catch me.

The last thing I saw was dark red hair framing the most beautiful face I’d ever seen, peering through the window.