One of them in the middle stepped forwards ever so slightly, he was slightly older than the others, and had the occasional grey streak in his hair, although he was tall, and hard muscled. He had cold eyes that bordered between grey and green.
His voice was as icy as his eyes. "Let the girl go, and step away from her now"
I frowned. "I am not restraining her in any way." I held my hands up, "Anna run, go now." She glanced back at me with frightened eyes.
"No way! I'm not leaving you." She faced the man bravely; her voice only shook slightly "what do you want? We haven't done anything!"
He regarded her the way a cat may see an irritating fly."You are free to go, we only want the parasite behind you; she is dangerous"
"She is my friend, she hasn't done anything!" her voice was getting higher, I said quietly, "Anna, get behind me, and run. Go back to the shop or something, they only want me." I raised my voice "Don't hurt her, she doesn't know anything. You can have me" I raised my hands slowly in front of me. Of course I didn't intend to let them kill me, or capture me, but I didn't want them to hurt Anna.
The leader aimed his crossbow; he knew I was bluffing."You have five seconds, and then I will shoot the girl, then the rest of my men will shoot you. You can't dodge all of the arrows," I was shocked I didn't think they would hurt one of their own, but I could see the decision in his eyes, he was willing to go to any measures to kill me. He started counting "Five... Four... three... two..."
I sprang, pushing Anna to the ground before swiping at the nearest man, sending him flying back into a wall. I jumped, and swung my leg, knocking another two unconscious with a single kick, using my momentum I landed on a fourth, and punched the next, breaking his nose, and knocking him out. I twisted in midair to avoid the arrows the three remaining had managed to shoot towards me, a sharp pain burned through my calf muscle. I ignored it, and landed on my hands, bent my elbows, pushed and flipped, and then I punched another two. Ducking I swiped the legs of the leader so he fell back. I heard the air whoosh out of him as he hit the floor roughly. It was all over in seconds.
I stood over him; he glared angrily, and tried to stand, so I pushed him back down. He didn't bother to struggle anymore. Although he was stronger than I expected for a human, even a trained one "Who are you?" he didn't answer, I moved on, "why are you doing this?"
I thought he wasn't going to say anything, but he finally answered."You are a monster, you have to be stopped... we are dedicated to fight for the greater good, we eradicate things like you"
I considered for a second. "Who is we?"
He spat, missing me; "I'll never tell you anything Vampire."
His hatred made me go cold, my voice was sad. "I don't hurt people" then I hit him in the side of his jaw, knocking him out cold. I heard a small squeak and a sharp intake of breath from Anna, but I couldn't tell if it was for his words or my actions. I turned and approached her cautiously, stopping a few feet away.
She was still on the floor where she had landed, although she had sat up slightly, her breathing and heart rate were fast, her blue eyes wide and staring. I wondered if she was going into shock... I made my voice calm and gentle.
"Anna?" I got no response, I hoped she wouldn't faint or anything. "Are you okay?" after a moment her eyes focused on my leg, her voice was weak.
"You're bleeding." I glanced at my calf, the injury was minimal, the tip of an arrow had just scraped the side, creating a long thin cut. It was clean; I could feel there was no silver left in the wound, so it would heal rapidly. I put the pain out of my mind; it was unimportant. "I'm fine" I glanced at one of the men, who was just beginning to stir, "we need to go. Now. Can you run?" she just stared at me helplessly, so I bent, and pulled her up, supporting most of her weight I ran, allowing myself to go much faster than any speed an Olympic runner could reach, towing Anna along with me. Ignoring her squeak of surprise and shock and the faint protests. I wanted to get away quickly and it was too late anyway. She had seen everything.
Within minutes we reached the street where she lived, on a small estate in the west of the town, she was breathing heavily. I paced away up the street a few meters and back again, ignoring the pain in my leg. Anna had been watching me with wide eyes, trying to recover from suddenly being carried across town at intense speeds. I waited, finally she said in a small voice.
"He called you a vampire." It sounded like a question.
My voice was grave, "Yes."
"Is it, is it true?" her voice shook slightly. I sighed sadly; here was the end of our brief friendship,
"Yes."
She gasped "That's not possible."
"Unfortunately it is, it is what I am and what I'll always be."
"But- but David said that, and I thought he was joking, or lying or crazy. I thought maybe he was doing it to be mean to me, seeing as I'm always reading those books..." I think she was bordering on being hysterical, I let her trail off into silence, and then she seemed at a loss for words.
"It is true, I am not joking, or whatever, I really am a vampire" She flinched slightly at the word. I stood in silence for a while, allowing her to process what she had seen in such a small amount of time. I understood she had to shift her entire view of the world; this one little event changed everything... I let my mind drift back to the encounter... how had they known where I was? How had they even known what town I was in?
After a while she looked up, there was a new calm in her eyes that I wasn't sure what to make of, her voice was surer.
"Who were those people?" The question caught me off guard.
"I'm not sure... hunters. But there is never that many, a large group of them attacked Julia a while ago, as well, they are never this well organized, I don't know where they came from..." her eyes widened again
"Julia and... Chris are... like you as well?" I nodded and her forehead creased, "although I suppose I'm not surprised... there's something about you guys... I couldn't understand it before. You are different."
I snorted, causing her to jump slightly. "That's a good way to describe us, different. David would find it amusing."
Abruptly she got angry, her eyes flashed. "I thought I was your friend, you have been sitting with us for months now, and you didn't trust me enough to mention this little detail to me? Why not? How come you can trust David, but not me?"
"I'm sorry... I never trust anybody, not completely, and I didn't tell David, I never wanted anyone to find out, he guessed."
Her eyes were disbelieving, "There is no way David would guess, he doesn't even like any of this stuff. I'm the one who always reads about this, I'm the one who has always wished it could be real, even though I never believed it was possible, why him?" I hesitated I knew he would be upset if I told her his story, I decided it would be better for him to do it himself.
"It is not really my secret to tell, if you want more information you'll have to ask him... he had a... run in with my kind in the past, he is not fond of the memory." Her anger faded as suddenly as it had come.
"I never would have guessed..." she focused on me "so what are we going to do now?" I frowned.
"I am going to leave, you are going home, and you are going to forget that you ever witnessed any of this" she got angry again, I could see a new determination in her eyes, although they were wet.
"There is no way I am going to forget any of this, ever! What I have seen tonight, it changed everything I have ever understood, but it was amazing! You cannot ask me to just forget everything. That's not fair."
"I don't have to ask you to forget, I could make you forget, nobody ever said that I was fair." She went quiet for a moment, when she spoke her voice was slightly unsure.
"I am you friend, you wouldn't do that to me."
I could tell my expression was incredulous, but I didn't care. "You still consider me your friend?"
She blinked "Of course I do, so what if I'm really angry with you? You're still my friend..."
"You still want to be my friend even though you know... what I am?"
"Of course! You may not realize it, but this is the coolest thing that has ever happened."
I immediately went back to being cold. "This is not a game, even if you may think it is, this is real life, it's dangerous."
"Of course I know it's not a game! Do you think I am blind? I saw all those- those arrow weapon things!"
"Crossbows" I corrected her automatically, she frowned for a second.
"Whatever, you are not making me forget"
I softened. "You have to promise not to tell anybody, under any circumstances."
"Of course I won't! Friends, remember?"
I inclined my head slightly, and sighed. "Go in your house where it's safe." She looked about to argue so I added "don't worry you'll see me again, but go now."
She nodded and went round to slip into the side door of her house, no doubt trying to avoid her parents; it was quite late. I waited until she appeared at her bedroom window and waved, before disappearing into the night.
I told Julia and Chris the whole story when I got back. Chris was the most alarmed, and wanted to leave immediately. But I disagreed, I thought we should stay, it is not in my nature to run away, Julia agreed with me. Chris argued.
"But there is a lot of them, and they are obviously well organized, how do you know they don't already know where we are?" I had already thought this through.
"Because if they knew where we were, they would be here now, they wouldn't waste time attacking in public. Or they are not going to attack us here, maybe they consider it to be too dangerous, either way we are relatively safe here for the moment."
"I still don't like it, they may take us by surprise." Julia stepped in.
"Even if they do find us, which one of us is at a disadvantage? Them, or us? They have already attacked us twice, when we were alone, and still, who came out worse? Them! They can not harm us!" I gave her a disproving look.
"It is foolish to under estimate them, that way they may get us. However I believe we should be safe enough here for now, as long as we are careful, and take precautions so they don't surprise us again."
"What type of precautions?" His voice was cautious but I could tell he was over his initial panic and coming round to the idea.
"Well, I don't think we should go to school for the time being, there we get separated, and we may put the students in danger, I'll call in and tell them we're ill. Also, we could have one of us on watch all the time, just to make sure we are not all asleep at the same time or anything, don't want to make it easier for them do we?"
So it was settled for the time being, we were going to take time off school, and make sure at least one of us was completely alert at all times, we would not go out alone unless absolutely necessary.