To Kiss a Killer | boyxman | (OLD VERSION)

Chapter XXVI - A Vampire

"H-How?" I looked to Dom for confirmation, feeling he'd have most of the answers since I was drawn to him in the first place after rising back at the chambers. "What happened to me?"

He touched my face, his hands just as cold as mine now were, but his coolness seemed almost natural. "You died once before, by the hands of Hamilton. Julius fed you to him when he was lost in his true nature, thirsting for blood. You unfortunately became his only source." I remembered now, I begged him, but still he killed me. Unintentionally, but still I died from his bite. "In that moment, you were bitten by a vampire, but given that he did not stop consuming your blood, you died completely. However, when I showed up..."

He paused, as if bringing up the subject was hard on him, "and I saw you there, lying lifeless, I cried for you, and my tears of blood dripped onto your lips, unknowingly to me, entering your mouth. In taking in my blood, your body recognized that it had been bitten already and was now receiving vampiric essence. The essence gave your body the strength to come back, so it did what all humans bitten by vampires did. Rose as a vampire."

I met Hamilton again, "How come all these years you've been thought to be dead."

He answered for himself, "Well, I am dead. Your grandfather had me locked away for a very long time, Raeden."

"Where is Julius?"

My dad, proudly this time, said, "He is being hauled off to Public authority headquarters to be sentenced for his crimes. If we're all lucky, they'll put him away for life." He let out a breath, moving towards me and rustled my hair. "You be good now, son; I'm going to have to go break the news to your brother that-."

"You're gonna tell him that I died!?"

"If there's another reason he'll no longer be able to see his younger brother... give me another option, because I feel this'll be pretty hard on him."

"But if you tell him I died, he'll automatically think it was a vampire and only want to become more of a slayer than he is."

Slayers.

I thought long and hard about the word. Was I still counted as a slayer? Would my ranks in the Slayer Public still be as popular as it was like Hamilton's? We were both going to go down in history as two of the greatest slayers to ever live, but now we were vampires, living with, and like the "enemy". What if other slayers found out about us? Would we be valuable targets?

"Raeden," my dad interrupted my stressful thought process, "I said, I'll just tell Jackson you were admitted into the Public, alright?"

I nodded, "Sure, yeah. That sounds good."

I watched him leave, fearful of the next time I'd see him. Would he be an old man while I still resembled an eighteen-year-old? The thought of losing the only family I had left plagued my mind, but as he left, I knew it would not be the last time I saw him. I'd keep in touch.

When the front door closed, I felt Dom's arms enfold around me. I turned with haste and wrapped my arms around his neck. "I'm scared, Dom. I don't know how to be a vampire. I'm so confused, but at the same time I can't help but feel relieved. I'm not... dead-dead, and I have you."

Demiesius' voice came then and he started for the door of Dom's suite with Hamilton grasping his hand. "I guess we'll get out of your hair."

"No, wait!" I called, "I wanted... if it's alright, I wanted to speak with Hamilton."

Saying that felt so odd, knowing if I'd said those exact words anytime before tonight, I'd be counted as crazy.

Dom waved Demiesius off, "I can answer any questions; you two go ahead."

When the door had closed I looked up at Dom, "What did you do that for?"

He touched my face, taking a set on the sofa. "They haven't seen each other in thirty eight years... I think it's about time they had some alone time."

Oh...I get it.

"If you can answer all my questions then, tell me what's going on between them? First impression of Demiesius, I thought he hated everything about slayers, but he's in love with one?"

Dom sat back. "Actually, in the years I've been with Demiesius, up until the death of Hamilton, I couldn't get past why he didn't hate them. Slayers to him were just another human, only slightly more dangerous than the others, and then he met Hamilton in 1970. Believe it or not Hamilton fell for him first. He'd become obsessed with meeting Demiesius, to 'get to know him' on another level even though he knew of the consequences. As their relationship grew over the few years, Julius began to wonder where his trainer was running off to all that time, always cutting sessions short. They wrote letters, Hamilton and Demiesius, and when Julius got a hold of one of the letters, he forged another just like Demiesius handwriting and sent it. With his sense of betrayal, Julius lured Hamilton to an unknown location and used the skills he'd picked up over the years. In knowing every move Hamilton would make, he prevailed. Little did Julius know Hamilton and Demiesius planned his turning, to make him into a vampire."

He thought for a second. "A bite doesn't have the ability to fully turn a vampire, so while Demiesius had bitten Hamilton in the past, he also provided a drop of his blood to use for later use. But, the single drop creates the smallest link so the creator or creation can pick up on. Besides, there was no way for my father to know Hamilton had consumed the provided drop of blood. Thus, losing him to Julius."

I grinned, "That's the most complex love story I've ever heard."

"Yes, but I believe ours may've topped the charts since we brought them back together."

I smiled brightly. "We did, didn't we? It took a while, a lot of strange things went on, but... we did, and I'm happy for them."

Dom touched my face again, a spark of violet crossing his eyes, and I suddenly felt a surge go across mine, wondering if they were lavender as well.

I lunged for Dom this time, wrapping my arms so tightly around his neck I thought I might pop his head off. He was surprised by my abrupt movement, but took me as well. "I love you so much," I said, "And even though it'll take me a while to get used to being a vampire, because not a month ago I was bent on protecting humans, I'm glad you did it, made me what I am."

"Don't worry, you can always live off of non-source blood. You'll never have to harm a human if you think it's too much. I'll take care of you, Raeden. I always will."

"Forever?"

"Now that we have it, yes."

I met his eyes, kissing his lips softly, and brushed the silly string of hair dangling in his handsome face. "And where are we going to spend this forever?"

He kissed me this time, and in his eyes I saw something I couldn't get enough of. Love. He pushed my strays behind my ear, and a hopeless gleam of liberation came to him. I wanted to tell him it was real, everything around him. The room, the lights, and merely the sofa we were seated on. I wanted to tell him I was real, and I wasn't going anywhere.

My death was still in the forefront of his mind; I wondered greatly what he must've felt seeing me dead, but I reassured him with a small kiss that I would never let him feel it again.

Letting out a light laugh, I said, "Answer my question, Dominick."

"Say it again," he said though.

I furrowed my brow, but smiled in remembrance. "I'll say it as many times as you want, Dominick Von Kraige."

the end