Vampire Breed (3 page)

“I’m not tired!” I barked, screwing my fists together as if preparing for a fight.

They came towards me, the female holding the syringe above her head. The second male lunged at me and pushed me onto the bed, taking hold of my wrists.

I kicked out with my feet striking the approaching female in the stomach. She made a burping kind of sound as I knocked the wind from her. The syringe flew from her hand and somersaulted through the air. She spun around and chased after the syringe as it skidded away across the tiled floor.

“Goddammit!” she shouted. “Keep her still!”

Then, both masked males were pinning me down. The male who seemed familiar took hold of my arm and yanked up my sleeve, revealing veins which pulsated green and purple beneath my skin.

The female came back towards the bed with the syringe. When she was only inches from me, she looked at the male who held out my arm and said, “Keep her still, Doctor Hunt!”

Hearing the name
Hunt
, I glanced up at the masked face, but as I did, I felt a sharp scratch in the crook of my elbow. Looking down, I watched the female sink the needle into my flesh. Immediately, I began to relax and loosen, my eyelids becoming heavy and wanting to close.

Doctor Hunt gently laid my head onto my pillow and stepped away, where he stood looking down at me.

All I wanted to do was close my eyes, but I fought the urge to do so.

I stared past him to the corridor. The girl who’d been struggling with the men wasn’t fighting anymore. She lay on her back – face gleaming with sweat. Her eyes were open and staring at me, but they looked dazed and sleepy and I knew that they had injected her, just like they had me.

“Just let yourself sleep, Kiera,” Doctor Hunt hushed.

I stole one last look back at the girl’s face and my heart almost slowed to a stop as I realised that it was Kayla.

Unable to fight it any longer, my eyes closed, and before slipping into unconsciousness, I heard a scratching sound – like metal being scrapped across stone and as I…

Chapter Seven

…opened my eyes, I was startled to see that huge white paw snaking through the open hatch and dragging the remains of my food and water away.

“No!” I shouted, shaking the sleepiness from my head. “That’s my food and I haven’t finished with it yet!”

I lurched forward, but with my leg not yet fully healed, I fell and landed in a heap on the floor next to the hatch, which had now been hurriedly closed.

“Give that back! You can’t treat me like this!” I yelled. “I’m not an animal!” but all I could really think about was the loss of that red, bleeding meat. The thought of it being taken away from me filled me with panic.

The hatch was forcibly thrown open again and that big white paw shoved two more bowls of fresh food and water into my cell. Once again the food bowl was full of fresh flesh -
meat
. I waited for the paw to disappear and for the hatch to close, and then I took the bowls to the opposite corner of the room and began to eat.

I was so engrossed in ramming chunks of the raw meat into my mouth, that I hadn’t been aware of the heavy footfalls outside my cell door. A set of keys jangled in the lock, and I looked up. The door was flung open and Phillips came striding in.

He eyed me with an air of superiority, and then sauntered forwards, his arms swinging loosely by his sides. He stopped only inches from me and I cradled the bowl nervously in my lap, fearing that he might snatch it from me. He glanced back at the doorway and I followed his gaze. On seeing the wolf standing there looking at me, I dropped the bowl from my hands and it clattered onto the stone floor. The wolf trotted towards me and I could see that its coat was a light grey colour with white flecks that made it look as if it were covered in a fine layer of snow. Its muzzle was black and its head was attached to a long, muscular neck.

The wolf stopped beside Phillips and sniffed the air around me.

“Hello, Kiera,” the wolf said, releasing a hysterical little laugh that sounded almost human. Hearing that laugh reminded me of the nervous laugh my friend Sparky once had. I looked into the wolf’s eyes as it stood on its hind legs and began to twist out of shape. It lurched forward as if in pain, grabbing its stomach and snapping its huge head from side to side. And then it almost seemed to shrink before my eyes. Its arms and legs grew shorter and its snout receded back into its face. The wolf’s skin appeared to blister and stretch as its hair began to shed like a moulting dog, revealing human-looking flesh beneath. With the last of the fur falling away, Sparky stood and looked down at me. Just like I’d always remembered him, the skin on his face was flushed with angry-looking spots, his glasses sat skew-wiff on the bridge of his nose and his hair was sleeked back and greasy.

“Where are my friends?” I snapped at him.

Ignoring my question, Phillips grunted and then said, “Show me the leg.”

I just sat there. Before I’d the chance to comply, Phillips impatiently grabbed hold of my right leg and pulled it towards him. I flew backwards and smacked my head against the wall behind me.

“Ow! That hurt!” I shouted.

“Silence!” Phillips warned, meeting me with his hard, red stare.

Sparky grinned and loomed over my leg.

As if I wasn’t there at all, Phillips said to Sparky, “What do you think? Is the infection clearing up?”

Sparky glanced at me, then turned his attention to the cut that ran down my leg. Dropping to his knees, he jerked his head forward and rubbed his nose into the wound. I cried out in pain and disgust, not believing what I was seeing. He then ran his tongue down the length of the gash and it felt as if it was being cleaned with sandpaper.

“Get off me, you animal!” I roared and kicked him away.

Licking his lips, he looked away, seeming to savour the taste of my leg. “Mmm, I’m not too sure. Maybe we should get Doctor -” Sparky started.

“No! Not him!” Phillips growled. “Lame is no good to me. I need her to be healthy!”

I looked at the both of them as they stood and discussed me.

“Like I was saying,” Sparky said, “We should get her to the doc…”

“I don’t know if I can trust him,” Phillips said.

“But if the infection doesn’t clear up, then -” Sparky said.

“Then, what?” I asked, cutting over him.

“Then you will be put down,” Phillips barked.

“What do you mean,
put down
?” I asked, but I knew exactly what the Vampyrus meant.

“Destroyed,” Phillips replied. “Got rid of, killed…”

“You can’t just destroy me because I’ve got an infected leg!” I protested.

“You’re no good to us in this condition,” Phillips insisted, as he took hold of my leg again and yanked it from side to side.

“Well it won’t bloody get better if you keep prodding and licking it every five minutes!” I snapped.

“Just as feisty as ever,” Sparky grinned. “Lame or not, she still has that fighting spirit!”

Phillips grunted thoughtfully again and eyed me carefully as his wings flapped behind him. Then, without warning, he let go of my leg and slammed it into the floor. I shrieked in pain and fought the urge to puke as Sparky yelped in excitement.

“We’ll come back in a day or so and I’ll make my decision then,” Phillips said. Turning away, he headed back towards the door. Sparky grinned at me again then went after Phillips.

“What do you want from me?” I cried out in frustration and anger.

At the door, they both turned to face me.

“You’ll find out all in good time,” Phillips grunted as his turned-up snout twitched. “Just pray that leg of yours starts to get better.”

Sparky looked at my leg then back at me and said, “You’re useless to us with an infection and the only way of killing the infection will be by killing you.” He then licked his lips slowly and purposefully.

Slamming the cell door closed behind them, they left me alone again in my cell. I guessed that Sparky had once more changed back into a wolf as I sat and listened to the sound of his howling echoing off the stone walls outside. Throwing my hands over my ears, I fought back the tears that burned in the corners of my eyes.

Chapter Eight

I sat like a statue until the day grew dark outside. My leg still hurt and I continued to wonder where I was and what the Vampyrus and Lycanthrope had planned for me. What would be the point in killing me? Didn’t they need me? Wasn’t the whole point of this to extract my DNA somehow – for them to find a way of breeding more like me – more like Kayla and Isidor?

And then as if a bright light had been switched on inside my brain, I could see the girl in the room at the monastery – the one who looked like Kayla – the one Isidor had killed. But there had been something wrong with her. The girl in the room hadn’t bred properly – there was something missing. Perhaps my DNA was the missing key? But they had me now – they could extract as much as they wanted. In my mind’s eye, I could see the unfinished email that I’d read on the computer at the monastery. It had said something about me being delivered dead or alive. But delivered to who, and where?

To think of those things made me think of my friends - Luke and Potter
. Where was Luke now? Was he still alive? And why hadn’t Potter come for me? Was he dead too?

The only way to know for sure would be to get out of the cell and find out for myself.

But how?

I looked around my cell in the gloom of the dying light which spilt in through the square hole above me. Somewhere inside me, I knew that I used to be good at seeing things - like really
seeing
things, so I should be able to
see
a way out of my cell. Sitting back against the wall and taking a deep breath, I saw there were only three exits available to me.

Firstly, there was the most obvious – the cell door, but that was always locked. Secondly, there was the hatch that my food and water was pushed through – but the big white paw lived on the other side of it. And finally there was the square hole in the ceiling, but that was covered with wire mesh and well out of reach.

I sat and looked up at it and tried to work out if it were big enough for me to fit through. It was hard to tell from where I was sitting on the floor. It seemed so far away. But even if I could fit through it, there was all that wire mesh that would need to be removed, and I had no cutting tools, nor could I reach it. Even if I could, what would I find on the other side?

My mind see-sawed with a million questions and doubts. The whole escape idea seemed impossible – but what other options did I have? Phillips and Sparky would be back in a few days and I feared that if my leg were not healed, I was going to be in serious trouble. But then again – even if my leg did heal, what was it they had planned for me?

However impossible my escape seemed – I had to try something – I had to get out of my cell.

But if I left my cell – escaped from wherever it was they kept me, what would I do about the…the blood? How would I get more? To think of it again made me want it. So picking up the bowl, I closed my eyes, and put some of the flesh inside my mouth.

It was dark when the cell door creaked open and Nik came trotting in. He stood in the wedge of moonlight that illuminated the middle of the cell, and looked at me.

“I’ve brought you something,” he purred and then quickly turned away and disappeared back into the shadows by the door.

I could hear a scraping sound as he dragged something into my cell. Nik came walking slowly backwards towards me, pulling a chair between his wide jaws. He stepped into the pool of moonlight and let go. The chair tipped over onto its side and the sound of it hitting the stone floor echoed off the walls like cannon fire.

“I thought you might like to sit on this, instead of being on the floor all of the time.”

I was momentarily touched by his kindness but then wondered if it was not some sort of a trick.

“Why?” I asked.

“It will be more comfortable,” he simply added.

Sensing my unease, Nik backed away from the chair.

I got up slowly and hobbled over to the middle of the room. I righted the chair and sat down on it. The chair wasn’t particularly comfortable with four straight aluminium legs, a green plastic seat and cushioned back – but Nik was right, it beat sitting on that hard stone floor.

I looked at him, as he waited on the outskirts of the moonlight.

“Thank you,” I said.

There was an uneasy silence between us, as I sat on the cheap plastic chair and he stared at me. I eventually broke the silence.

“You‘re Lycanthrope, right? A werewolf?”

“Yes,” he said, sounding a little confused.

“So why did you struggle in here with that chair between your jaws when you could’ve simply done it in the form of a man?”

“I’ve been captured,” he said.

“So you’re a prisoner like me?” I asked him, shocked at the thought that perhaps there were Lycanthrope imprisoned here.

“Not that kind of
captured
,” he started to explain. “I’ve been captured in the form of a wolf, like frozen – stuck like this.”

“How come?” I asked, confused. “If I remember rightly – and to be honest I could be wrong, my memory seems a little fried at the moment - you can change form at will.”

“Not me,” Nik said, dropping to the floor by my feet and resting his giant head on his paws. “My father is punishing me and until I make amends – I’m stuck as the big-bad-wolf.”

“What did you do that was so bad?” I asked him.

“It doesn’t matter now,” he barked, his tail snaking back and forth across the ground. He licked one of his massive paws and then rubbed it softly over his face. Knowing that he didn’t want to talk about what it was he had done to be so cruelly punished, I changed the subject asking, “How did I come to be in this cell?”