The Truth of Vengeance: Vampire Formula #2

Chapter 2

"So when did you organise the meeting with Cassius?" I asked as she drove us to the airport.

She smiled and turned the music down in order for us to talk.

"While you were busy skiing or down the gym. I don't just sit around pining for you. I have many fake lives to keep running and vampires to find."

"Okay, but how, where and when?"

"About a week ago, I finally had some luck on one of the web forums we use. I found his name and we exchanged messages until we were happy we had the right persons. Then we arranged the meeting place and time."

"Web forums?"

"Yeah, fantasy role playing web forums. Vampire role playing."

I looked at her wide eyed and laughed. Surely she couldn't be serious.

She matched my laugh with her own. "It's the best way. Hide in the open. Who is going to suspect we are two real vampires and that our story isn't just a game? We even use our real names. Makes it a bit easier to find one another. Although I was annoyed at having to be Thorn69."

I shook my head. "It's a bit cheeky. Meeting at a vampire convention as well. Why not tell the world and have done with it."

"Again, hide in the open. You will learn. Who is going to spot us in amongst the costumed fans. I have bought us some costumes by the way so we can blend in and act the part."

"Act the part," I said in disbelief, "you are the part."

"No, act the part as in a fan, silly. I am going as a gothic seductive vampire."

"Really. Do you actually need a costume?" I retorted back.

"Oh V, you've no sense of adventure. You're going as a brooding teenage vampire, full of angst," she said, and stared over at me for a moment face frowning, "actually, maybe you don't need a costume either."

"Ha ha," I replied, mocking her joke.

She smiled back revelling in her little game and turned the music back up.

I sat quietly in the passenger seat looking out at the snow on the sides of the road. I was sad to be leaving the slopes behind, but excited to be meeting another vampire, getting the truth and visiting Las Vegas.

Life at the ski resorts had been great. No complications of gang members and Hunters. I had a new life and a new identity. No one judged me as the bullied kid at school. I could be whoever I wanted to be. I had spent most of the daylight hours alone, skiing. I loved it as it pushed my body to its limits down the slopes, cutting in the bends and hurtling down the hills. The cold wind on my face and whistling in my ears. The force of the turns bracing through my legs. I couldn't believe how quickly I had learnt and how good I had become. I loved showing off and racing past other skiers and snowboarders. On the days Thorn joined me on the slopes, when cloudy and her body fully covered head to toe to block out the UV, we would race each other down the hills daring one another to go faster. Other days I would have to wait for the day to darken and Thorn to a wake, but it was worth the wait. Thorn was a passionate woman and hardly a night went by without her showing it. At night we would drive off to the neighbouring towns for her to feed and party. Other nights we spent training in physical combat or other skills. A few nights she went off alone as I slept tired from the day's skiing. We had slipped back into our regular patterns of behaviour we had formed in England.

The sadness I felt to be leaving was matched in excitement by the thought of meeting another vampire and going to Las Vegas. Thorn promised me the answers I had craved since my psychic skills had picked up her memories of other vampires.