The Vampire's Heart (10 page)

I must have been stood still long enough for them to get to me. The few remaining villagers I dispatch easily, though some more people come to the aid of the massacred but only add to the pile of bodies. The woman I launched hits the ground, slowly. I have left just two alive, they look like twins, but they could just be brothers. One has fallen to the ground in terror and the other is stood, frozen to the spot, not by magic but by fear. I can taste it clearly on the air. I let the magic go and retract my nails. Sound instantly rushes back to me along with the sound of laboured breathing and the cries of those close to death. I lift the fallen brother up by the scruff of the neck and bring him in close to feed. A voice calls out to stop me.

“
Vampire! Do not kill it.”

The Sixth Chapter

- Muzbeth -

89 days until the birth of a god

The 20
^th
day of Winter-Fall, 1537

I turn to see the blackened corpse walking, somewhat shakily, toward me. The voice is dry and cracked, but from the smell of the corpse and way it spoke I know it was once female, though any body parts it once had have been burned off. More of the walking dead; how many of us actually are there?

“
Kneel before your Lys-Karalis, dead creature!” I shout to the walking corpse.

“
I am not dead, just somewhat incapacitated at the moment,” she replies calmly. She continues to approach us.

“
Then I demand to know what you are, and a good reason why I shouldn’t kill you.”

“
I am a witch, and you should not kill me because I can help you. I can teach you things. The people of this village betrayed me, and you have stolen my revenge,” she tells me.

I’m guessing she thinks that because I have killed some of them, and she obviously wanted to do that. I like that.

“
What makes you think I can learn anything from you? I am Lys-Karalis.”

“
Well, for a start, I can make that worthless organism you are holding into a valuable asset if you will allow me to share with you my wisdom.”

“
And how would you do that?” I ask, “they both stink of fear. It is a weakness that I do not abide.”

“
Yet you ask those that follow you to fear you? That is insane demon logic. However, should you make one of them into a creature of the night such as yourself you would be able to see what the other is up to.”

Now she has gotten closer I can see and smell the raw red flesh under her sore and cracked skin. The fingers that she had lost have grown back and those she did not lose now have a new pink flesh covering them. The flesh is slowly spreading up her arms and legs too. Her muscles are growing back as too are the curves of her hips and her breasts.

“
Because they are twins?”

“
Yes. And as I’m sure you realise, the foresight that that could give you would be an immense boon.”

“
True, but I do not need any more foresight.” I snap the head of the boy I am holding and I feel the warm spray of blood on my face, licking my lips I begin to walk toward the quickly reforming woman. As I pass the other twin I lean down to whisper into his ear.

“
Fear me, for I am the destroyer, and I will bring this world to its knees. Now run, before this Karalis changes his mind.”

And that is what he does, and he does not look back. He runs directly for the bridge that crosses the river that swims lazily past the town. I a few hours it will run red with the blood of the dead at my feet.

I continue to walk toward the woman. New flesh now covers most of her body, and only a few places still have the raw redness. Her right breast reforms as we come within reach of each other, the nipple being the last part to re-grow.

She is not exactly beautiful, but she has a grace about her, she has no hair on her body at all, and I notice her finger- and toe-nails have not yet grown back. Now I know that she is not dead; I can see that by the way I watch her chest rise and fall; the dead do not breathe.

My eyes glide down her body, which is fantastic; her breasts are pert and her stomach flat. The lack of hair extends to her groin. Her hips are wide and beautifully curved. My eyes rove further down and I notice a three inch scar on the thigh of her left leg. This puzzles me for it should surely have healed when the rest of her did. I reach out to run my finger along it but she grabs my hand. Her touch is warm, and pleasure shoots up my arm and throughout my body at her touch, stirring my own body into a magically aroused state.

Up close she is not quite as plain as I had previously thought. Her cheek bones are high and pronounced, and she has a small nose and thin but smooth lips.

She brings my hand up to her face and bites my knuckle, not as if to draw blood, but a playful nip. Her other hand snakes down my torso and finds its way into my breeches, where she begins to slide her hand along the length of my magical arousal.

Flashes of memory emerge and a face suddenly flashes before my eyes. It takes a few moments to realise that it is the face of the teenage girl holding the baby that was in my house. She looks terrified and in pain in my memory. I push the sight from my mind, though it makes me stiffen further. This is a woman though, so I do not know why I thought of the young girl with the babe.

Suddenly she draws her hands away to my chest and pushes me over. I land in the muddy dirt of the road, created by the melted snow and the traffic of people, looking up at her. She kneels over my legs and begins unbuckling my belt. Then she reaches up to my blood-stained shirt and begins tearing at it. As she rips my shirt off, something catches my attention and I see Kellum leaning against one of the buildings, he appears to be watching the woman; watching this witch strip me.

Suddenly she backs off, standing once again, leaving me on the ground, exposed. She moves so sensually, which arouses me further. She draws a ring around her in the mud with a toe, then she kneels within the circle she has made and all goes eerily quiet. I stretch out with my mind and vampiric senses to see what she is doing, and my eyes slowly attune to a green light building within her circle. While she is doing whatever she is doing, I decide to remove the remainder of my clothing. I have to wait no longer than a couple moments to see what happens.

As she knelt within the circle, the light had grown considerably, almost blotting out her figure. Now there is a perfect column about twenty feet high of green swirling light, with a vague body at its centre.

All of a sudden the power earths; the column thunders down to about a foot above ground level, and begins to spread along the floor. Just before it touches me, it retracts and the green light is pulled into the witch, who is now standing once again.

As the last of the green light vanishes into her, I observe with a small air of wonder as her hair grows from her head. When it has finished growing it reaches down to her waist, cascading down the front of her body, covering her breasts, her groin is now also clad in pubic hair, which I must say is a little disappointing. Magic is such a useful tool.

She strides forward from her circle and straddles me, my erection and her vagina coming within scant inches of each other. She leans in close and kisses me. It is a sensual kiss in which her tongue enters my mouth and plays with my own. Then she quickly stands and regards me, smiling.

“
Not so fast vampire, I think you should wait a while for this. It will do you good.”

And then she turns and stalks away down the street, my erection hardens as I observe her buttocks swaying as she walks. I want her. I get up and put on my trousers again, though I don’t bother with the ripped and torn shirt, it is nothing more than rags now.

Kellum comes to stand by me in the middle of the road, and gestures that we should walk down the street after her. The witch enters a two storey building and we begin to follow her in.

It is a wooden construct, which seems to be on the verge of rotting. Above the door is a shingle depicting a pitcher of ale, clasped in a rough hand. I had worked in a publican house when I was a boy, I think. I’d serve drinks and prepare the foods. But I’ve not been in a pub for many years now, according to Kellum, though it only feels like a few days to me. I’ve probably forgotten what ale actually tastes like anyway.

We walk into the pub, pushing its surprisingly sturdy door aside. Inside the structure it is dark, but my advanced senses allow me to see perfectly well in these situations of lacking light. There is a bar along the back wall with three pitchers clustered at one end – they are unclean, probably containing the remnants of this evenings drinking. In the remainder of the room are several chairs arranged lazily around circular tables, which also, I notice, are scattered with drinking bowls. At odd intervals around the edge of the room, stools are placed.

The most striking thing about the room is the smell. I can smell blood, but it smells bitter; it smells vampiric, not human.

“
Kellum, are there any vampires about?”

“
Not to my knowledge. Let me just consider the events to come.” As he does, Kellum’s gaze becomes distant for a few moments before he snaps back to reality.

“
No vampires and no imminent attacks,” he tells me, “though the witch will be back soon – it would seem that she has gone into one of the back rooms to find some clothes. She’s trying them on.”

“
Is she really a witch?”

“
Yes, she has magical powers granted to her, possibly from her parents, from her religion, or directly from her gods. She is a Pagan, which is the religion of a witch.”

“
How can she get magic from her parents?”

“
If they too were witches, their offspring could be an innate witch, having magical powers naturally, similar to our magic granted by the demons that inhabit us.”

“
How is it possible for two witches to mate?”

“
What do you mean?”

“
Two women. How can two women have children?” I pull aside a chair and sit at one of the tables. Kellum continues to stand.

“
Oh, erm, throw away what the church taught you of witches; they aren’t all women, there can be male witches too. Admittedly there are more female witches. All they have to do is believe in the Pagan gods, and use the magic they give them, and they’re a witch.”

“
I thought that male witches were called warlocks?”

“
It all depends on viewpoint really. From my experiences, a corrupted witch calls herself a warlock. Obviously a corrupt male witch would also be a warlock.”

“
This is all a bit confusing. Do you want a drink?”

Kellum shrugs, so I get up and head over to the bar. Arrayed on a shelf set above the countertop are a few clean pitchers and some stacked drinking bowls, the bronze they are made from is dull in the darkness.

Hopping over the bar I find several barrels, each labelled differently. I run my hand over the dots and lines that identify them as differing ales. I pry the lid off a barrel of ‘Vested Interest’, whatever that means, and take two of the pitchers from the shelf. I fill them and head back to the table, going around the bar this time, not jumping it. I hand one of the large jugs over to Kellum, who takes an experimental sip, cocks his head to one side and then smiles. I can still smell the vampiric blood. I decide to ask about it.

“
Kellum, why is there vampire blood here?”

“
I can smell it too, but it’s not a vampire’s blood; it’s just dead blood. There must’ve been a bar fight here recently, and they obviously didn’t clean up after it very well. I think that’s the most logical answer.”

Then he drinks again, but deeply this time. Satisfied with his reasoning, I taste the ale myself and find it to have a bittersweet taste; though nowhere near as nice as ‘fresh’ blood.

“
So okay, I think I understand some of the warlocks and women and magic stuff. What happened to you out there?” I ask. Kellum takes more of his ale before he answers.

“
To be honest I’m not exactly sure, my head felt as though it was about to explode. It must have been some sort of vision kick back. It’s never happened before, mind you. I wonder if something big is coming.”

“
Big?”

“
Big, as in world changing.” he says with a dark look on his face.

“
Oh, so quite big then. What can you see of it?”

“
That’s the odd thing, nothing. My sight of it is blocked for some reason. And that gives me cause for extra worry.”

As if at the mention of trouble, the woman walks into the bar area through a door situated in the corner of the room.

Now she is wearing a long green dress over a white blouse, giving her a mighty cleavage. Her hair is tied loosely back in a tail, and she is booted in leathers, which rise up her legs, past the hem of her dress. As she walks up to the bar she had her hands amongst her hair, seemingly tightening the knots that hold it loosely.

“
So, ‘woman’, what are we supposed to call you, being as you seem to be sticking around with us?”

“
Vampire, what makes you think I’m going to stay with you?”

“
Well, you seemed intent on making me wait earlier, and if you think I’m going to let you off, you’ve got another thing coming,” I say through a smile.