When Sarah Solomon took refuge in an old cottage in the woods, she knew it would only be a matter of time before the monsters came a' calling.
Cursed with a power she neither wants, nor knows how to harness, Sarah has become a target, but who is he...
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'We got off to the wrong start here, didn't we?' the vampire said, his tone suddenly more appeasing, attempting a smile that looked more like a pained grimace.
'The wrong start?' I replied, incredulously. 'You broke into my house. You were going to kill me.'
His eyes widened. 'No...I mean, yes... I mean, wait! Yes, I did break in,' he said quickly, as I pushed upwards with the knife. He began to yank on his wrist restraints, desperately trying to pull his body up the bed. 'But I wasn't going to kill you, I came here to... fucks sake, please stop doing that.'
'Then tell me!'
He swallowed and took a breath, the sound whistling between his lips. 'At the risk of you skewering me on that thing, I'll tell you what I am if you tell me what you are.'
I cocked my head to one side. 'What? We're not in a negotiation here. You're tied up and I'm the one with the knife about to impale your balls. You clearly know what I am. That's why you're here, isn't it?'
The vampire just looked back at me and for a moment, I saw something indiscernible in his expression. Something uncertain. Almost as if he didn't actually know why he was here, which was ridiculous seeing as he was a vampire and I was his enemy, and if that in itself wasn't the reason, then I couldn't have fathomed what it else it could be.
'How did you find me, by the way? I'm assuming you weren't taking a quiet stroll in the woods at midnight and just happened to find this place.'
He scraped his teeth over the dry skin on his lower lip, almost as if he were mulling over whether to answer my question despite the fact, I still had the knife poised at his crotch.
'I found out what happened in London,' he said. 'Everyone's still talking about it. About the Sensor who single-handedly killed Luther Baines. Truth be told, I wanted to see what all the fuss was about.'
I flinched at the name, but my stomach flipped wildly at the thought I was still the talk of the vampire population in the city. I'd never believed they would forget what I'd done, which was why I'd moved out here, but if six months had gone by and I was still on their most wanted list, how was I ever going to escape from this?
The vampire chuckled. 'Luther Baines, of all people. Do you even have any idea how many times hunters like you have tried to kill him over the years?'
'I'm not a hunter,' I insisted, gritting my teeth.
The knife was sinking into Luther's throat. The blood bubbling from the gaping hole in his neck. Spilling out of his mouth in a torrent.
'Countless,' he went on, ignoring my claim. 'He's survived assassination attempts for centuries. Fucking centuries! He's ruled that part of London since the late 1900's. He's practically as much a part of the city as the bricks and mortar of the Palace of Westminster. He was there when that place was rebuilt, you know, and everyone thought he'd be there living underneath it for many years to come. And then you came along.'
