The Survivors

Chapter Fifteen: Answers, pt. 2

  I looked at Everett. My pretty purple eyes. "I'm not one of you," I said firmly.

  "I know," he said apologetically.

  "When did you know?" I asked.

  "The second I could smell you," he said. That felt...weird.

  "Where do you get your powers?" I asked. "From what I've read, most vampires don't have powers."

  "Not all of us have them," Anthony said. "I've had the gift of premonition, of foresight forever. Ginny could always mirror to an extent. It got more powerful once she stopped aging, until she could fully mirror powers from all matter of supernatural creatures—from her siblings, from witches, from you."

  "And the rest of your powers?" I asked. No one answered. "You do something," I said. "That's it, isn't it? That's what you don't want me to know. You kill some poor people, do something violent and terrible..."

  Mark answered me, unwilling to play their game, it seemed. "It's called acquisition," he said. He looked to Everett, whose eyes were heavy. He knew whatever they were about to tell me could make me walk away from them forever.

  "Tell me about acquisition," I said.

  "You kill a vampire with the power you want, then their power becomes your own," Mark said.

  And it clicked.

  "You can kill vampires," I said. "You could kill me." All the answers I had been looking for they had known all along.

  "Are you scared?" Patrick asked, misunderstanding.

  "Of course she's not," Everett said, pain in his voice. "She wants to die."

  The family looked up at me, waiting for me to deny Everett's accusation. I didn't.

  "And of course you won't tell me how to do it," I said.

  "No. Why do you think we have to keep you out of our minds?" Everett asked.

  "Don't you think that's my decision to make?" I argued.

  "We will not kill you," Anthony said. "Not with our hands, not with our knowledge."

  "Sweetheart," Adelaide said, approaching me, "we got the bulwark to protect you. We love you." She pulled my face to her, and she kissed my forehead. "We always will."

  Always implied I would always be alive. That I would never find mortality. That I would never be free.

  "Sadie, look," Everett said. "Before you were at our front door in Pacific Grove we knew that you would come, and we knew that you would find a way to love us."

  "So my fate is to live among you and condone your murders?" I said coldly.

  "You have to understand. What we do is about protection. Kills are strategic. The vampire with the mental bulwark that Mark and Anthony killed—he had killed five humans that day. Do you understand, Sadie? It's collateral damage."

  "I don't know if it really matters. How can I trust you? How long will you keep secrets?" I asked.

  "As long as it takes to protect you," Everett responded. I looked at the others. They nodded, confirming this.

  I sat down to think. I had seen Mark be violent, yes, but it had been righteous. It didn't bother me because I understood why he was killing the man he killed. He had saved a girl's life.

  I understood what Everett was saying, that the benefits of their vigilantism outweighed the cost of their bloodlust. The softest part of my heart was urging me to forgive them, but I steeled myself.