THE VAMPIRE UNDERGROUND

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Brin wanted to shout for Chace, but she knew that screaming a word of any kind would likely bring twelve more of those scary creatures to her. 

It doesn’t matter, she thought. They know I’m here. They know it was two people out here, not one.

She surveyed the area, and even though she couldn’t see anyone, she could sense that at least one of those figures had stayed behind.

Brin peeked through the bushes, her feet so close to the lake that she could taste the ice on her tongue. She didn’t hear a figure moving.

She heard a figure growling.

It sounded like the growl of an angry wolf, and not of anything close to resembling a human being. But she knew it wasn’t an animal. She knew it was one of those creatures.

“There’s no use in hiding,” a low, ominous voice whispered, beyond the bushes.

Brin covered her mouth and crept down so that her back was touching the cold ground.

It talks? This thing talks?

She heard footsteps up ahead. The figure was apparently walking away. She kept her hand shoved over her mouth as she breathed through her nose, and she turned her attention to the black sky. She hadn’t noticed until now, but the snow had stopped falling, and the clouds were separating. Brin could actually see the stars.

Then she noticed the footsteps had stopped.

She lifted her head up and looked out beyond the bushes. Dead silence hovered around her. Even the wind had stopped.

The red glow hit her legs first, but she didn’t notice it until it hit her hands. She looked forward. The creature was inches from her face.

“Hi,” the figure said.

He jumped from the bushes for Brin as she screamed, jumped to her feet, and started running across the lake. The figure followed, but slipped and slammed his head against the ice. She didn’t. She always had good balance. And she, unlike him, knew the ice was actually there.

But the figure caught up to her, anyway. As she reached the edge of the ice, the figure leapt for her, all the way from across the frozen lake. She looked back, a wave of shock sweeping across her face. It was like the figure could fly.

“Oh my God!” she screamed as the creature crashed into her chest. She slammed her body against the ice and tried not to scream from the pain.

The figure grabbed her by the neck, and she stared up into his face.

Lit by his red eyes, the pasty white visage was one that only a mother could love. His teeth were yellow and pointy; his ears were large and lofty. 

He didn’t say a word. Instead, he pressed his body against hers, and licked his slimy yellow tongue up along Brin’s neck, all the way up to her eyelids.

“Mmmm,” the figure said. “Tasty.”

He brought the tongue back out again, but Brin didn’t wait to see what he would do with it this time.

She hooked her fingernails against his tongue and ripped it right out of his mouth.

The creature screamed in pain, louder than any normal human being ever could, and limped to his side. Brin scooted back and escaped his grasp.  

She stood back up, her aching feet striking snow again, and started running. She didn’t look back. She raced to the top of the hill behind the lake.