I Kill Monsters: Fury (Book 1) (35 page)

After what seemed like several minutes of
desperate, futile struggle, the vise-like jaws did succeed in
dragging me from my concealment. I was beyond fear in those moments
and my cries of terror had given way to the imprecations of the
damned. I recollect clearly that which I mistook as the dew of the
coming morning covering the ground, a wet coverlet. As one beast
dragged me bodily across the soil and rock, my lower leg clamped in
its jaws, its companion swallowed my hand nearly to the elbow. As I
felt its teeth sink into the flesh and muscle of my forearm I
fought the urge to pull back, to snatch my extremity from the
masticating jaws. Instead, I thrust the aggrieved member deeper
into its maw, burying my entire arm clear to the shoulder in the
beast’s orifice.

It was as though I had corked a bottle. The
creature began shaking its head and body violently, attempting to
dislodge my stoppered appendage. Deep within its throat I forced my
fist open and felt around, scraping and ripping what I could
until—with one mighty twist of its head—a reverberating crack and a
bolt of agony let me know my arm had been broken. But it was still
deep within the beast’s mouth and the wolf was strangling, its
airway closed off.

I had little time to relish my success. Its
friend was upon me. With one arm broken and outstretched, buried
within the cavity of a dying wolf, I was more vulnerable to assault
than I had been previously. As a sign of submission, dogs often
offer their bellies to other dogs or humans. The stomach is
exceedingly vulnerable, housing as it does many of the mysteries of
the human machine. The wolf easily ducked my sole fending hand and
buried its muzzle deep in my abdomen, goring me. The breath left
me, and certainly life itself would have next, had not the latest
form interposed itself between myself and my attacker.

It leapt from the sky like a meteor fallen to
earth, the ferocity of its attack outshining that of the wolves. It
was a form large, dark and immaterial, faster than anything I could
imagine. I thought it was another four legged foe answering the
cries of its rout. I was incorrect in my estimation. This brute had
come to my aide. I watched wide-eyed as it ripped the wolf from my
stomach and buried its own fanged mouth deep in my assailant’s
neck. With a brutal jerk it tore the throat from the wolf. The
creature stood there, ensanguined with the blood of combat, the
dying wolf held at arms’ length.

It looked down on me and I knew it. The lord,
Vinci. He tossed the body of the wolf from him, the creature
wracked in its dying spasms. Immediately he came to me, dislodging
my arm from the other lifeless creature. He knelt over me and spoke
to me but I heard him not. I knew that I was dying. The rush of
adrenaline as I fought for my life had kept me from realizing that
what I had thought was dew on the grass was in fact my own
lifeblood running out.

I looked up into his magnificent,
blood-stained visage and felt reverence. This man had done more
than survive in a pitched battle against superior numbers, he had
prevailed, conquered. And he had come for me,
to
me. He
cradled my ravaged flesh, holding me tight and dear. He had not
forgotten one as insignificant as I. Peering into his depthless
eyes as I lay dying, I could think of none other I would emulate,
none other I would live so as to serve.
M
-
My
Lord
, I stammered,
I
would
to
be
…
to
be
like
you
,
to
be
as
y
-
you
are
. His comforting,
loving gaze gave way to a hard, considering stare. I remember
thinking it was an honor to have known one such as he.

Vinci looked down on me and then to the sky
and the moon and the places beyond the moon. And he spoke. The
entirety of his words were lost to me, fading as I was.

I
am
that
which
imbues
fear
for
the
shadow
…

He turned his eyes back to me, sighing.

I
am
that
of
which
men
speak
in
hushed
tones
,
about
the
fire
…

My Sasha. That I might never see her
again.

I
am
the
nexus
at
which
myth
and
reality
coincide
…

I heard his voice but could no longer see
him. When had I closed my eyes?

I
am
vampiro
,
child
of
the
night
.

I felt pain as he latched his mouth to my
throat, but as his bite pierced my flesh I knew agony and ecstasy
simultaneously, in equal measure. Immediately I felt different.
Though I was weak in body, my thoughts were once again coherent,
lucid. I was aware as he propped me against the tree. I beheld the
coming of the day, the dissipation of shadow on the ground around
us. Vinci was burning in the dawn. There were vapors rising from
his tunic. He buttressed me there against a trunk and quickly
buried himself at my feet beneath bracken and branches. A poor
cover it afforded, but it was cover nonetheless.

As the sun rose, he counseled me from his
camouflage to savor my final day. I would have my wish come the
eventide, he vowed. I would know what he knew. I would come to know
the hunger. And then he was silent, hidden. The sun was upon us in
all its effulgence.

As I rested in the shade cast by the tree, I
felt at once that I was healing and yet…there was a new perception,
one unknown before that day. I knew not what it was then, but I
would learn shortly it was the hunger of which he had spoken, full
fledged and exacting. I sat there, and I pondered my situation, the
circumstances, the course of the blazing orb in the sky, the
possible whereabouts of Sasha and my other family. For all this, I
was oddly and suddenly untroubled.

Feigl stepped into sight. He looked all the
worse for wear, exhausted and thwarted. I knew he had followed no
trail, spied no sign of my passage. Mere serendipity had crossed
our paths. He looked at me with disbelief and then something far
more sinister. No doubt he thought his revenge was at hand. He
stepped to me purposefully, driven. As he tread towards me he spoke
of the torture and agony he would inflict on my mortal form, of
death as the only release, but of a death that would be long in
coming. I sat there quietly, oddly unperturbed by his threats, by
his foaming mouth, by his determined step.

He was nearly upon me when my master struck
from his refuge. An arm lashed out, much too quickly to be seen
clearly, and Feigl staggered back, clutching his eyes, wailing. My
master’s arm retracted as quickly as it had appeared, the only
evidence of its existence the fumes dissipating in the air. Feigl
screeched and covered his face, blinded. I watched him stumble and
trip over his own feet and crawl when he could no longer stand. I
viewed him with disinterest as he was no longer a threat. He
dragged himself to a tree stump and huddled there, burying his
wounded face, bawling.

I sat there patiently and watched the shadows
grow long and then disappear into the dark. Feigl had grown silent
after some time. With a rustle of twigs and pine my master stood,
brushing sprays and sprigs from his shoulders. He beckoned me and I
rose, ravenous. My garb was stiff on my frame, my own blood dried
upon it, yet I knew no pain from any wound, as there were no longer
any wounds of which to speak. Even my arm had healed. In place of
my injuries, I was wracked by a craving, voracious.

Feigl had heard my master rise, had heard us
converse, and he tried to scuttle away on hands and knees. My
master stood above him and drew the Ashkenazi to his knees by his
hair as he begged and cried. Vinci summoned me near and as I
approached he bent down and champed on Feigl. He drank for some
time, Feigl struggling and sobbing the entire time, and then he
invited me to partake. I did not hesitate. In life, Feigl disgusted
me. He was a miscreant, scum, and a progenitor of miscreants and
scum. A more disagreeable person one would be hard pressed to find.
Yet as he died, I could not help but think how savory was his
taste, how delectable his blood.

We left him there, drained. My master
promised me he had much in which to instruct me. He asked me to
accompany him and I did so willingly. The night had just begun, he
explained, and with it our vengeance. I did not question my master,
I followed. We walked for several hours, a trail familiar to me.
When we stopped it was immediately outside the village where I had
spent my nine human years. Vinci told me to wait and observe as he
entered the village, and I did.

Nearly all the able-bodied men and women of
our village had died in their pursuit of us the night before. Most
of those who were left were too old, too young, and infirm. I
listened and watched as my master went from cottage to cottage,
destroying those he came across. I saw him visit a nightmare to
their waking lives. The night was rent by the screams of the
doomed, beseeching mercy, finding none.

My master was a cruel and terrible lord in
his vengeance. Some he dragged from their cottages, ripping their
throats out, tearing limbs from torsos. The wounded and delimbed
staggered about, benumbed. He killed young children in front of
their parents and elderly parents in front of grown children. Doors
were locked and barred to no avail. My master moved in the shadows,
a shade himself. He set cottages alight and when their inhabitants
sought escape he either tossed them back, so much kindling for the
inferno, or dispatched them at his leisure. The few who stood to
fight died the worst, shorn limb from limb.

If a history of my village were ever written,
its demise would be chalked up to some pogrom, some plague. The
true nature of its denouement was inconceivable and must remain so
for my master’s survival. Hence he took no prisoners and allowed no
survivors. Not even the infants were spared.

A few hours later, well before the coming of
the sun, my master returned to where I waited. He dragged an old
woman along by her hair. Maleva. She screamed and cried and begged
for mercy, but none was forthcoming.
My
lord
, I
protested,
this
woman
saved
my
siblings
and
I
.
She
warned
us
and
led
us
from
this
accursed
village
.

Do
not
be
a
fool
,
child
, my master warned.
This
woman
led
the
crowd
to
your
father
.
She
is
responsible
for
your
orphanage
. I looked upon Maleva, but
she did not deny his charge. She stopped crying long enough to look
up at me, yet whatever she saw made her sob so much more strongly.
Is
this
true
,
Maleva
? I demanded.
Is
what
he
says
true
? She could
not bring herself to answer me. I took her reticence as
confirmation.

My master ordered me to end her and I did,
pinning her arms to her sides as I latched onto her neck. It was my
first kill and I was clumsy. I opened up her esophagus and had to
readjust my bite. She struggled for several minutes, wailing aloud
in her native tongue. The resistance made her fluids taste that
much finer.

When we were finished we stood looking down
on the conflagration. The moon above us was full. I turned to Vinci
and, earnestly, I thanked him. His smile was wry and I would not
understand the reason for some time, convinced as I was that he had
saved me, that he had granted me access to something great,
something mighty. I asked him to teach me all he knew, to instruct
me in all there was to know. He agreed, though even then his assent
seemed reluctant. He had saved me from death, staved off my
non-existence.

Though my master, Vinci, was no longer human,
I considered his a great act of humanity.

Together we walked off, seeking a suitable
haven for the coming day. He was my lord, my master. He would be
the teacher of my novitiate. I had years of training ahead of
me.

Thus was my genesis.

The blood had dried and crusted, a red smear
on the floor of the corridor. It emanated from a dark room and
ended under a man crumpled in a heap. There were things in the
dark, things that watched the man and welcomed the shadows
spreading in the hallway. The shadows consumed the light and all in
it, their reach presaged the coming of the night, and with it,
death.

Boone blinked. His eyes focused. Across from
where he lay the doorway loomed, its frame bullet-splintered. The
sun in the passage where he lay was weak and forbidding murk crept
down the passage. The space in which he lay, under the blown out
window, was darkening. A lone shaft of light, a last remnant of the
passing day, separated him from the door and the black that lurked
within.

“Still alive, then?” Rainford’s voice called
from the dark. “Very well…”

Another thing in the room with Rainford
cackled in anticipation.

Boone felt…he didn’t feel well, not well at
all. But he felt much better than earlier. He had one hand on his
stomach, under the flannel. He flexed his fingers to bring feeling
back to them. After a few moments he could begin to feel again and
when he could he was thrown for a loop.