Shadow Born: Book 1 of the Shadow-Borne Chronicles (9 page)

“Why?” Alec asked, crossing his arms across his chest.

“Your blood was showing some signs of vampirism and the vampiric strain and your wrists were healing quickly.
 
But, you weren’t affected by the sun like a vampire should be.”

“Maybe I got some of the
gifts
,” Alec said making air quotes, “and not others.”

Schubert shook his head.
 
“That’s not how it works.
 
It’s always been all or nothing.
 
There is not a between stage, at least not until you came along.”

Alec shrugged.

Schubert motioned for Alec to take a seat in a chair beside his desk and he pulled out a needle and one of the plastic bands to wrap around Alec’s arm.
 

“Well, you have a pulse,” he said cocking his head.
 
“I can hear your heartbeat and it’s strong and steady.”
 
Alec reached up to his throat and felt the throbbing as his heart pumped blood throughout his system.

“Okay…” he said confused.

“If you were a vampire you wouldn’t have a heartbeat.”
 
He rummaged around all the files and paper work on his desk until he pulled out a stethoscope.
 
“Here,” he said handing Alec the earpieces.
 
Once they were in his ears, he held the stethoscope to his own chest.
 
Alec didn’t hear anything except the soft slither of fabric as Schubert moved it.
 
Then he held it to Alec’s chest and he could hear his own heart beat thudding.
 

“Damn,” was all Alec could say.

Schubert smiled.
 
“As we breathe in and out, it causes the syphon in our body to contract and expand, circulating blood through our systems.
 
Our veins and arteries are also specially designed to absorb the blood for our use, but also to help move the blood through our system.”

Doctor Schubert drew blood from Alec.
 
He drew several vials and set them aside.
 
Then he pulled the needle out and put a piece of cotton over the hole to dry up the blood. When he finished, there wasn’t a mark on Alec’s arm.
 
“See,” was all Schubert said.

Alec’s mouth went dry and he shook his head slowly from side to side.

“Okay, Alec, get undressed and let’s see if we can’t figure out what’s gong on with you.”

Alec blushed a dark red.
 
“Uh, okay,” he said quietly, unable to meet Doctor Schubert’s eye.

Schubert pulled a paper gown out from under a cabinet and handed it to Alec.
 
He turned his back while the young man stripped and put it on.
 
When he was finished, Schubert led Alec to another room with some devices and had him lay on his back on a table.
 
He lowered a device over Alec and placed a wide cartridge into the table beneath Alec’s chest.

“This shouldn’t hurt you,” he said, “but if it does, you should heal quickly.
 
Now don’t move.”

Great
, Alec thought.

He heard a whirring noise and then a click.
 
Schubert came back into the room with him, moved the device to Alec’s head and repeated the process.
 
Once he was done, he told Alec he could sit up but to remain on the table.
 
He went into another room with the cartridges and was gone for a few minutes.
 
He came back out carrying x-rays in his hands.

“We are in the x-ray room,” Schubert said.

“Huh?”

“Silas asked where we were and I told him.”

“I didn’t hear anything.”

Schubert chuckled as Silas and Marcus entered the room.

Schubert stuck the x-rays into holders on the wall and flipped the lights behind them on.
 
A quick intake of breath was all Alec heard.

“This is…impossible,” Schubert finally said.

“What is it?” Alec asked, afraid that something was terribly wrong.

Schubert shook his head, but finally said, “Alec, you seem to have both sets of organs; human and vampire.”

Silas and Marcus both approached and reviewed the x-rays.
 
Sure enough, sitting on the right side, attached to Alec’s heart, was what Schubert explained was the reservoir that moved blood quietly through a vampire’s system.
 
He’d never seen the like.
 
He finally turned to the second x-ray.
 
“Well Alec,” he said, “You also have fangs.”

Alec studied the x-ray closely.
 
Sure enough, behind his gums was what appeared to be a set of very sharp looking fangs. He put his index finger in his mouth and felt around.
 
He thought he felt something there but wasn’t sure.
 
This was just too weird.
 
Alec had a set of fangs, and vampire organs along with human organs.
 
Sure, why not?
a small part of his brain thought.

Schubert had Silas and Marcus join him in the other room and then got several more x-rays of Alec’s chest from several different angles.
 
He then came back and told Alec he could get dressed.

Schubert was talking quietly with Marcus and Silas while Alec slipped his cargo pants back on.
 
When Alec removed the gown and reached for his shirt, he looked over and found Marcus examining him.
 
Is he checking me out?
he wondered.
 
Marcus didn’t act like he was embarrassed when he caught Alec looking at him, so he assumed it was the whole “male competition” thing.
 

Alec could tell by the tight shirt Marcus was wearing that his chest was better than Alec’s.
 
His pecs were well defined under the tight fabric of his shirt and stood out in stark definition, leaving very little to the imagination.
 
Alec just shook his head.
 
After all he had been told today, he was comparing his chest to Marcus’s.
 
His world truly had gone mad.

When he looked back up, Marcus was smiling that cocky grin of his.
 

“Bring those back to the sitting room,” Silas said indicating the x-rays.
 
“Alec, come with me.
 
Don’t ask anything or say anything until we get back to the sitting room and the doors are closed.
 
Okay?”
 
Alec nodded mutely and then they started off, Silas in the lead, Alec in the middle, followed by Marcus.

When they arrived and the doors were closed Silas explained, “This room is sound proof and swept for bugs on a regular bases.
 
It’s one of the few safe places to talk privately without being overheard.”

Alec remembered Schubert answering Silas’s question of where they were.
 
Alec hadn’t heard a thing.
 
Vampire hearing must be pretty damn good!

They sat back down on the couches as before, this time Marcus sitting to Silas’s left and waited for Schubert.
 
Marcus and Silas talked quietly while Alec pondered this turn of events.
 
He had fangs.
 
Alec Carson, a nobody who had grown up in an orphanage and who had never had anything happen to him in his life, had fangs.
 
And he was a… a what?
 
What did this make him?
 
He wasn’t a full vampire.
 
He also wasn’t human.
 
Something occurred to Alec and he interrupted Silas and Marcus.

“Will I start craving human blood?
 
Will I kill people to feed?
 
What’s going to happen?”
 
It all came out quickly before he lost the nerve to ask.

Silas shook his head and sighed.
 
“Alec I’m not sure if you will need human blood or not. Have you been craving it, or thinking about it?

Alec shook his head no.

“Then I’m not really sure.
 
As far as killing someone, killing humans is forbidden.
 
It’s part of our vampiric law.
 
Feeding on humans is forbidden without their permission.
 
Even with their permission it is frowned upon and only done in the most dire of circumstances.”

“Why?” Alec asked squinting his brow.

“Because humans aren’t allowed to know about us.
 
To get their permission you would have to tell them.
 
We have a very strict code that we live by.
 
It allows us to move around and be a part of the world without being hunted down and killed.”

“If you can’t feed on humans, where do you get your…blood?”
 
Alec felt weird asking that question.

Silas smiled.
 
“We have an agreement with certain agencies that supply us with what we need.
 
Some blood banks are specifically geared towards collecting supplies for us.”

“What do these agencies get in return?”

Silas laughed.
 
“That’s a conversation for another time and not something I can discuss with you right now.”

Alec was pondering this information when Doctor Schubert entered the room.
 
He carried the x-rays in his hands.

“This is remarkable,” he said without preamble.
 
“All of these x-rays show vampire and human organs working in conjunction with one another.”

“How is that even possible?” Silas asked looking dumbfounded.

“I have a theory.
 
Now granted it’s only a theory but it’s all I have at this point.”

“Go on,” Silas said.

“When a vampire turns, there is a moment where both the human organs and vampire organs are both working in perfect harmony to keep the host alive.
 
The human organs have to function while the new ones are being created or the human would die.
 
Once the vampiric organs are whole and ready to take over, then the human organs that aren’t needed are broken down and expelled.
 
The healing process is working at an accelerated rate to keep the host alive while the changes are taking place”

“I understand that part,” Silas said dryly.

“When Clarissa was killed, Alec wasn’t fully transformed, so the process should have halted immediately and he should have died.
 
But what if Clarissa was killed while Alec was in that perfect balance of human and vampire organs working together to keep the host alive and before his human organs could be broken down, the process just… halted?”

“But if the process just stopped because of Clarissa’s death, shouldn’t that have killed Alec?
 
The host vampire strain that he got from Clarissa should have died when she did.
 
If he had been fully transformed and he was a full vampire and he had fed, then he would have survived.
 
The strain would have been accepted and been changed by his body and her death wouldn’t have affected him,” Silas said shaking his head.

“The vampire strain that came from Clarissa
did
die.
 
I’ve checked.
 
But Alec’s body had already changed most of the strain and integrated it into his DNA.
 
His body was in the perfect balance of change.
 
When she died, her strain died, leaving him with two sets of functioning organs.
 
He didn’t need any more changes to be made, except the finishing touches and to rid his body of the human organs he didn’t need.
 
But with Clarissa’s strain dead and unable to make any more changes, and with his body healing at an accelerated rate he survived.”

“Then why can he walk in the daylight?
 
And why was he, a more or less newly formed vampire, able to fight off not one, but two full vampires that were older than he?
 
One of them should have been able to easily subdue him.” Silas looked completely perplexed.
 

Schubert shrugged.
 
“I don’t know. Maybe his DNA didn’t reach that step of the process because of Clarissa’s death and he is capable of walking in the sun.
 
As to why he’s stronger… I have no idea.”
 

“Alec asked an interesting question about if he would have to feed, like we do?
 
Which brings up another question.
 
When a vampire is newly made, they have to feed to
set
the changes and lock them in place.
 
He never fed.”

Schubert chuckled and shook his head.
 
“No, he didn’t feed, but he was given a transfusion of blood in the ambulance and more when he reached the hospital.
 
I guess his body considered that
feeding
.
 
And as for having to drink blood to exist, if he hasn’t felt the Thirst yet, then he might not have to take blood.
 
I’m assuming that Alec’s body uses blood just like ours does to fuel speed and strength, but I’m guessing where Alec is different is that his body is still creating its own supply.
 
And since he has accelerated healing, as he uses the blood for his abilities, it is constantly being replaced at an accelerated rate.
 
If that’s true, and Alec doesn’t exhaust his supply quicker than it can be replaced by his body, he may never need to feed.”

All Silas could do was shake his head.
 
Alec was dumbfounded and Marcus looked like he was thinking.

Silas seemed to have come to some conclusion and raised his eyes to look at Alec.
 
“Unfortunately, until we can work all this out, I have to insist that you remain my houseguest here at the mansion.
 
I’ll have a room prepared for you and tomorrow night we can deal with getting you clothes and such.
 
It would be better that you didn’t leave these grounds.
 
For your own safety.”