Blood Rebel [COMPLETED]

Chapter Five - A Fight in the Theatre

“I should kill you now,” she said, tightening her grip, feeling truly murderous for the first time in her life.

“Just don’t shed any blood in here.” The voice was familiar, stern: Diana. Selene released Jackie’s neck in horror and looked around, trying to work out where the noise came from. In that moment, Jackie pushed her off and got to her feet, wiping the dusty patches from her tracksuit. She too looked up to see where the voice had come from. Selene pressed a hand to her cheek. It was swollen and red hot, and probably red in colour also. Hector would want to know what had happened, how she had allowed someone to mark her face.

“What on earth are you two doing? You’ve disturbed my beauty sleep.” Diana’s voice was restrained, but they both knew there was real anger just beneath the surface. 

“Nothing.”

“That didn’t look like nothing to me.  But let’s make it something.”  She smiled a taught, false smile.  “Do the ceremonial dance. Now. Go.”

“Just the two of us?” Asked Jackie.

“Why not. See if you can do it right. Without the music. Now. Now!”

The ceremonial dance was the hardest there was. They only performed it once a year, and it really needed at least ten dancers. It was pretty much impossible with only two. But both girls knew Diana was serious, as she took a seat in the front row and crossed her long muscular legs. And then she made them dance, over and over and again for five hours, while she sat and watched.

*

After Diana released them from the dance both girls were exhausted. Their legs ached and they could barely walk. Over the next few days, with the ache still throbbing in their limbs, they barely spoke to one another at all. The others could feel the tension, but no one questioned it, assuming it had something to do with Emma’s death. Besides, Jackie and Selene were the two most intimidating girls in the troupe; the younger ones were scared of them, and the older ones just kept quiet because it was easier than making a scene. 

Selene put the girls through intense rehearsals, changing the routines, making them more complicated, and giving Jackie the hardest solo dances, making her repeat the steps over and over again until sweat was dripping down her face, and falling on the stage beneath her feet. If Diana could inflict pain through dance, then so could she. 

“Don’t you think you’re being a bit harsh on her?” Whispered Cecily, after about a week of this treatment. “We’re all tired. Imagine how she must be feeling.” She nodded in the direction of Jackie.

“She deserves it,” was the response. Selene didn't want to talk about it, and she set her features in such a way that Cecily would know nothing more was forthcoming. But, irritatingly, Cecily didn't give up that easily, and she entered Selene’s dressing room after the rehearsal.

“What’s wrong, Selene?  I know something’s up.”

Selene wanted to tell her to mind her own business, but at the same time she needed someone to speak to. She let the tension fall from her shoulders, allowing them to droop, and realised Cecily had caught her at a moment of weakness; she didn't want to fight it anymore. Cecily pulled a chair over to the dressing table, where Selene was sitting, and sat down next to her.

“What is it?” She repeated.

“Oh everything. Jackie’s infuriating. I think she took pleasure in seeing Emma die.”

“I’m sure she didn’t. And anyway, we’re all so immune to death now. We see it all the time, and we’ve seen far more gruesome deaths than Emma’s; she was lucky really. So you can’t expect Jackie to act as a normal person might; whatever a normal person is nowadays. No matter how much you wanted Emma to survive, you must have known it would never have happened.”

“I know, but I hoped Jackie would have shown some kind of remorse, or pity perhaps. But there was nothing. She’s awful.”

“She hardly knew Emma. I think you’re being too hard on her.”

“Can I tell you something?”

“Sure.”

“That night, the night they killed Emma’s lover... well, he spoke to me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Before they bled him, he said something to me, but I didn’t know what it meant.”

“What was it?”

“Blood Rebel.”

“Blood Rebel? Like what Jackie was talking about? The men who try to get women into bed with promises of creating the ‘Blood Rebel’?”

“Yeh. But there was something about him. About the way he said it. It felt serious, you know? Not like some cheap trick to allow him to fuck a woman. I really thought that Emma’s baby might have been important in some way.”

As Selene spoke she began to cry, and only then did she realise that she had put a lot more faith into that man’s words than she had known. She had wanted to save that baby so that it could become the Blood Rebel: the saviour. Until that night she had never considered what life might be like without the Vampires, and now she wanted it more than she had ever wanted anything before. She put her elbow on her dresser and raised her hand to support her forehead as she wept.

“Oh Selene, you mustn’t cry! It’s not worth it. He was just a man you never even knew. He was probably just hopeful; or maybe he didn’t want to think his death was for nothing. But it doesn’t matter now anyway, they’re all dead. If there is a Blood Rebel, it’s not that man, or Emma, or her baby.”

“But do you think there could be someone out there who could save us?”

“Honestly? I doubt it.”