Angel's Messiah

2. Sickness-1

2. Sickness

I found I needed very little sleep as the days wore on. Some nights I didn’t sleep at all. While Danny went to visit Michael, to discuss some activity to the far south, I returned to the savannahs to hunt for a female vamp. I’d never done much in the way of night hunting before.

The night was overcast and starless, very dark indeed. For a first-world mortal to be out here, in the middle of nowhere, would have been a scary experience — no street lights or light from the moon or stars. For me the lack of light created a certain mood — a dark and sinister atmosphere — just the thing for a hunt.

It seemed I wasn’t the only one who felt it was a wonderful night for a hunt. Two vampires — female from their scents — were crouched over a body, presumably a mortal. I stealthily ran the short distance to where they were, coming up behind them. One vamp I threw face first to the ground, and sat on her back, pinning her down. The other I pulled to me, holding her bare arms. I’d finally developed better control of my fingers, and could now hold someone without their melding into the flesh until I willed it. Detaching, however, was a different matter. Once my fingers were doing their thing, they were greedy for every last drop. I had to keep working on being able to detach from my prey before they were drained.

I let my mouth find her neck. She tasted just as foul as the males. The vinegar taste was apparent as soon as her blood touched my tongue. I pulled back — it was getting easier to disengage every time I did it — and let my hands finish her off. Her companion made strange guttural and clicking noises — as well as the usual hissing — and tried to buck me off her back.

The body slumped to the side as my fingers detached. I pulled the remaining vamp’s head back, leaning into her, and latching onto her neck. Foul-tasting blood touched my tongue and my stomach heaved. I wrapped my hands around her throat, squeezing as I drained her, willing my stomach to settle down.

What a bitter disappointment this trip had been. Why had the first vamp I’d tasted here, after one of my training sessions with Rahab, tasted okay? Was she the oddity here and the rest the norm?

You know what you have to do, the little voice in my head said.

Yes, I thought. I’ve got to go back to familiar territory, where I know what they taste like, to be sure.

I hated the thought of going back on what I’d said to Danny, and taking a vamp from Drake’s clan — one that may have helped me in the fight against corrupt angels. I hoped I could find a vamp whose scent I didn’t recognise — someone who hadn’t been there during the slaughter of angels.

There was no way I was going to the much-used above ground meeting area — the temple. There was a possibility Drake would be there, and I didn’t think I could face him yet. His pain at my rejection would still be too fresh and I needed no reminder of what we’d done.

The treetops near the corridor then, I told myself. The corridor was the name given to the long row of trees that marked part of the boundary of Danny’s territory. Let your vision range and see who’s out and about.

I blinked when I arrived at the treetops so that no one would know I was here. It was one of the better abilities I’d inherited from Danny. I pushed the invisibility barrier to just under three hours, a far cry from the few minutes Danny was able to remain invisible for. As I kept telling him, if he practiced more he’d be able to extend himself further. He believed the amount of time I could remain unseen was not to do with practice, but was something within me that I’d brought to the party.

I let my eyes lose focus and my vision ranged out somewhere in the vicinity of five kilometres in all directions. It was something else Danny wished he was able to do. I’d promised him that if I died I would gift him my abilities.

I had to admit that I laughed every time I thought of him being able to put to good use my skills and abilities at pole dancing and lap dancing. It would be worth coming back from the dead just to see that. It also reminded me I’d promised to show him what a lap dance was one day. Maybe tomorrow, when he was back from visiting Michael …

Which hunger are you here to satisfy, Helena?

“Shut up,” I mumbled. “A girl can daydream, can’t she?”

“Who’s there?” someone yelled from ground level.

“Ah, s**t. Why do you have to talk to yourself so much?” I mumbled, shaking my head.

“Come on down, whoever you are,” the voice said.

I drew a deep breath through my nose and picked up the scent of the male vamp below. He seemed quite new. There was a freshness to his sickly-sweet scent that most vampires didn’t have. Somewhere in the back of my mind it registered that he hadn’t tasted mortal blood yet. He was very new indeed.

I walked to the edge of the tree and let my body drop, landing on my feet in front of him. He was very young, possibly only eighteen or nineteen, and his face screamed little boy lost.

“Hi,” I said and smiled. “You’re new.”

He sighed, “You can tell?”

“It’s in your scent,” I said.

“Really? No one else has mentioned it.”

I tapped the side of my nose. “I have a particularly good nose.”

He put his hands in his pockets and kicked a stone.

“I don’t even know what I’m doing here. I was promised I’d never die, but I’d have to fight. I don’t really like fighting, but I didn’t want to die either.”

“You were recruited willingly?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said.

“What was wrong with you, if you don’t mind me asking?”

He must have been very sick to have so willingly agreed to this type of life.

“It’s okay. I had leukaemia. By the time we found out, secondary cancers had spread to my stomach, kidneys and liver. The doctors gave me six months to live. I’m only eighteen, I haven’t even begun to live. I didn’t want it to end so soon. What about you?” he asked.

I shrugged my shoulders. “I wasn’t recruited willingly, but it’s no big deal. It’s not like I can go back and change what happened, and I wouldn’t even if I could. I’m happy now.”

“You’re happy, living the way you do?”

“I don’t live like the other vamps. I don’t prey on mortals. I only prey on immortals.”

I saw the Adams apple in his throat move as he swallowed nervously.

“Please don’t kill me,” he whispered.

I really felt sorry for this kid. Eighteen wasn’t very old at all. I’d find someone else to pick on.

“It’s okay. I’ll hunt other prey today.”

I turned to walk away. As I did so I felt something sharp on my left shoulder. I looked back and saw that he’d seen fit to try and make a meal out of me. He may not have tasted mortal blood, but he wasn’t averse to a bit of immortal blood.

So much for the little-boy-lost look. They must be training them in the art of deception now … another thing they learned from me.

I reached around with my hand to touch his face and heard a muffled scream. His body twitched erratically and I could feel energy flooding into me, though not through my hand.

My fingers haven’t even fused to his flesh yet, I thought. What’s going on?

When he stopped I twisted out from underneath him, which resulted in his teeth tearing through my skin.

Ouch!

Why was he standing so still? I turned around and nearly fled when I saw what stood in his place — a dehydrated husk that resembled a mummified body, grey in colour. His paper-dry skin clung to his bones, and his teeth, when I touched them, felt like rock rather than bone. I couldn’t grasp what had happened to him, and it scared me. Was he some sort of experiment gone wrong? I touched his cold, hard hand and sent him to the cavern. Perhaps I’d take Danny there later. He might be able to shed some light on it.

I shivered and returned to treetops, this time above the temple, to listen in on anything that might be going on. I was hoping for some clue as to what had happened, but the temple was silent and empty.

I detected movement a few hundred metres west of the temple and sniffed the air — a sole female, running swiftly.

I was so hungry. I didn’t recognise the scent, just as I hadn’t with the young vamp whose life had ended at the age of eighteen. If he hadn’t attacked me he probably would have lived a few more years at least. The world was a difficult place for new vampires, with many challenges to face — only the quickest, smartest or strongest survived the training ground.

This time I wouldn’t make small talk. A straight out kill, that’s all it would be.

Don’t get close to them, on an emotional level. It doesn’t make it any easier.

I dropped to the forest floor, blinked and ran. The leaves in the trees and the grass on the ground stirred as I ran past. It could have easily been attributed to the breeze, if there had been one.

I caught up with her easily and leapt through the air, knocking her to the ground. I drank greedily — why am I so hungry all the time? — but pulled away when my brain registered her taste as being slightly vinegary. I’d drained half her blood before I realised she didn’t taste right, just like her African cousins. I used my hands to finish the job before turning her to ash and blowing her remains into the air.

I felt sick. My stomach was both cramping and roiling at the same time. My legs began to shake. Perspiration began to form on my forehead and I thought I was going to pass out.

Take me home.

I must have fainted, because I woke to find myself in bed. The world started to spin and my stomach protested.

“I’m going to be sick,” I mumbled.

A bucket was thrust in my face. “Try and get it in the bucket this time.”

Had I thrown up already? My mouth was dry, my head was spinning, and waves of nausea assailed me.

Hearing someone heave up the contents of their stomach is not something I enjoy listening to. It’s even worse when it’s yourself — you have front row tickets to the disgusting. Tasting it on the way back up, then hearing it slosh around in a bucket, or splash over the side — damn, got some on Danny’s shoes — is none too pleasant either.

“What have you been eating?” Danny asked between heaves.

My eyes were tearing from all the heaving and blood ran down my cheeks, courtesy of my red eyes. Will my eyes ever go back to their normal colour? I asked myself.

It took a good couple of minutes before I could reply.

“Nothing but vampire — a few Africans and a local. They all tasted horrible though, like vinegar.”

“Did you check if they were poisoned or drugged before you fed?” he asked.

I rolled my eyes and instantly felt sick again. “Of course I did. I’m not an idiot.”

“I’m not saying you are, Helena. I’m just saying you’ve been so hungry lately that you could easily have forgotten in your eagerness to feed.”

Danny patted the bed in a number of places and I wondered what he was doing. I was sure he’d hit me gently a few times, but I couldn’t feel it.

“Helena, are you still there?”

“Of course I am,” I snorted, “are you blind?”

“You’ve blinked,” Danny said. “I can’t even see your outline under the cover. How are you doing that?”

Danny had taken to calling our ability to become invisible blinking. It was a term I’d coined some years before, when he was dead and I thought all hope was gone.

“Have I? I’m not doing it deliberately. I don’t know why you can’t see the outline of my shape in the bed, but then I’ve never blinked in bed before.”

I concentrated on making myself visible again and Danny smiled, indicating I’d been successful. My head hurt and my stomach churned again.

“Bucket,” I yelled, waving my hands in the air.

As I continued to empty the contents of my stomach — how much fluid can the stomach hold? — Danny held my hair out of the way. With tears of blood running down my cheeks, and the splashback from the bucket, I didn’t need my hair to be sullied as well. I’d need a good shower after this.