A Dance at Midnight

Everything hurt.

It had felt nice in the moment - the burst of energy in her limbs, her hair scraping back from the wind, and the scenery blurring past her - but now, with pain shooting at her every which way, she just wanted to go home.

Easy enough: all she had to do was get out of this neighborhood and onto the main road where Henry awaited, after which they would silently drive off.

Senar crept down the sidewalk, sticking to the darker shadows that the houses and lampposts created. Blood scents swirled in the air; she held her breath. Vomiting now would only have the vampires descend on her.

A couple of houses over, a vampire - a Master by the look of his stature - was dragging something across the lawn. He bent over. She didn’t see but heard the blood flooding out of the human’s neck.

Across the street, under the direct glow of a lamppost, two vampires fed on a fallen human. He was large, and based on the bruises on his body, he had put up a fight. Now, though, he was nothing more than a broken corpse, his body food. His eyes were glassy and vacant, and a tear rolled down his cheek.

Senar turned away quickly. She darted toward a house where all the windows were dark. She pressed herself against the wall and inched forward until the backyard opened up. She made out the subtle zing of lemon laundry detergent. She moved to stand under the back balcony of the house.

She stared out at the dark, listening, waiting.

After confirming that she was indeed alone, she slumped and leaned her head against the wall of the house. She neither sat nor closed her eyes; she was resting, yes, but she didn’t need to surrender all her senses.

As a vampire, she didn’t need to breathe: her heart never pumped, and her lungs stayed deflated. As a bloodwoken vampire, her breaths came out in gasps, her heart pounded, and her lungs expanded until her chest felt like it would crack open.

Though there wasn’t much discourse on bloodwake, since anyone with it was immediately decapitated, there was a reason “bloodwake” was referred to, in hushed tones, the “turning human disease.”

She certainly felt human right now. Her blood had all but rushed to her head, and the aches stabbed her everywhere.

She pressed a hand against her chest now, feeling the frantic thump-thump-thump of her heart. The image of the prone man, the tear not yet dried on his cheek, flashed in her head.

Senar released her hand from her chest and pressed her palms against her eyes until the kaleidoscope of colors on the backs of her eyelids made her dizzy. She breathed.

In. Out.

Pain everywhere.

In. Out.

Dead humans. So much blood. I want to throw up.

In...Out...

I made it. I’m fine.

Slowly, she released the pressure of her hands. Several more minutes passed before she dropped them entirely. She blinked. Her night vision was growing worse, but she could still make out the paved path, the cluster of bushes bordering the lawn, and the swing hanging from the branch of the tallest tree in the far corner.

Back out on the street, screams sliced through the night. Laughter followed.

If Senar screamed now, would they notice? Or would they be too busy with the carnage to make out the difference?

She swallowed. She opened her mouth.

She screamed.

The sound pierced the silence of this house, but she didn’t stop.

She hated being bloodwoken.

She wanted to stop hiding.

She wanted to stop hurting.

She wanted to stop being bloodwoken.

That was her one and only wish - an impossible one, she knew. She didn’t believe in any gods, but for a split second, she hoped there was one now, listening to her silent plea.

Senar screamed until her voice cracked, and her throat stung. Afterward, briefly, she felt lighter, her mind empty.

Until another scream punctured the air, and then she remembered that she was here, out on the hunt, hiding from her kind.

She remembered that she was bloodwoken.

She scrunched her eyes shut. She stayed against the wall, breathing deeply and trying to ignore the absoluteness of her fate. Before long, the blood in her head drained back to where it belonged. Her tears, threatening to spill, dried up. The aches faded ever so slightly.

She straightened up off the wall.

Then froze.

Moss and amber.

Senar whirled around for Master Solomon, but as she tried to make out the darkness, screams erupted from inside the house.

A moment later, the smell of blood, heavy like burnt brass, billowed out. The bile in Senar’s throat rose. The home hadn’t been empty: the humans inside had been sleeping, deeply, and she had alerted vampires to their existence.

She slid away from the wall quickly, before Master Solomon could smell her scent and track her out here.

Back out on the street, blood scents clogged the air. Senar closed off her senses, but it was too late: the blood scents had gotten ahold of her. She coughed. She could feel them seeping into her pores. Her eyes stung. Her aching body protested. Her steps were slow as if she were wading through mud.

The blood scents slid against her skin, whispering in her ear, taunting her to -

- drink me -

- taste me -

Their voices were like those of sirens, but she ignored them all. She walked away from the blood scents, away from the peals of laughter, away from the screams.

Henry waited for her somewhere farther. She just had to keep walking-

- the hairs on the back of her neck lifted.

What now?

She may be a vampire, but human, and more specifically, woman, intuition had yet to disappear even after so many years.

The clack of her heels on the sidewalk faded as she came to a halt. She lifted her head. Her nose was shot - she couldn’t smell anything distinct, there were too many blood scents - but she still had her ears. Not even a hair on her head moved as she listened.

Human conversations. Their screams. The scuffle of footsteps. Bodies falling to the floor. The squelch of hot wetness - blood - against cold flesh.

Underneath it all, the slight scrape of a hard-soled shoe against concrete.

Senar sighed. She was so tired. All she wanted was to go home, but now she had to deal with him.

She began walking again. It was silent at first until, after several beats, footsteps - nonexistent to the human ear but faint to a bloodwoken vampire’s - echoed several meters behind her. She stopped again. The footsteps quieted as soon as hers did.

She quickened her step. She was at the end of a block; the road curved upward a hill where another row of houses - and Henry - stood. The last house on this block was quiet, its windows closed and curtains drawn. She didn’t hear anyone inside either, but she wasn’t going to make that mistake again.

Her eyes caught on the trail, stamped down by human feet, curving around to the back of the house, toward a densely wooded area.

She took the trail, following it all the way down toward the cluster of trees that separated this neighborhood from the one behind it. Blood scents still lingered in the cooler air, but for the first time in the past hour, Senar could finally breathe without having the need to retch.

Here, she smelled him: spring water and wood smoke.

She waited, breath held, behind the tallest tree with the thickest trunk. When the echo of his footsteps were a mere meter away, she conjured up the last remaining ounce of strength she had left and arced past him. In a span of milliseconds, she came up behind his solid body, one arm squeezing his throat.

“You should know by now that I don’t like being followed,” she hissed.

Adrian, despite being choked, laughed. “And you should know that I know that you’re lying to everyone.” He threw back a fist, and with a force that could crack bones, landed it against the side of her knee.

She fell.

“Now,” he said, turning around and smoothing down his suit, “what you’re hiding, I haven’t the faintest idea.” His eyes sparkled as he looked down at her. He offered a hand.

His fingers were long and slim, the nails trimmed neatly. They looked gentle, but she knew they could break entire bodies as easily as he flexed his fingers.

She grasped it; his palm was calloused. As he pulled her up, she used his weight against him and flipped him on his back.

He landed with a crackly thud as the twigs and branches on the ground snapped under his weight.

She looked down at him. “That,” she said, “is none of your business.”

She began to walk away. She had enough of this; Henry had probably driven home already because she hadn’t shown up.

“So you are hiding something,” he called after her.

Keep walking. Don’t engage. He’s not worth it.

She stopped walking. She cursed under her breath. She craned her head to peer back at him. He had stood up already, looking as if he hadn’t just been thrown on the ground in a way that would’ve surely severed a human’s spine. The ghost of a grin played across his sharp features.

Senar suddenly wanted nothing more than to wipe it off his face, consequences be damned.

Before either of them knew it, they were flying through the air. She had no strategy, no plan - she just kept advancing on him, hitting flesh and bone. They rolled on the floor, leaves tangling in their hair, bugs crunching under their weight. She caught him square in the chest; he caught her near her eye.

She swung her leg, but he ducked and delivered a jab on the side of her gut. She stumbled; pain radiated outward. She let out a frustrated cry and threw a hook across his face. His head snapped back. The bones in his neck cracked. He flexed his jaw.

Triumph bloomed. Fucking finally, she thought. She took up position again, ready for his attack, but it never came.

Instead, he gazed at her, a strange look in his eyes.

“What?” she snapped at him.

He was silent.

“Come on,” she yelled. “Don’t tell me you’re a coward.”

He doesn’t want to fight you, her inner voice argued.

He’s been fighting me this whole time, she argued back.

Adrian kept looking at her with that odd expression on his face.

“It’s...” he began but stopped. She saw his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed. “Senar, you’re...”

“Spit it out, or I’m going to make you.”

“You’re bleeding,” he said.

The words rung in the cool air. The words rung in her head.

You’re bleeding.

“Stop lying.”

His eyes bore into hers. “I’m not lying,” he said. There was no venom in his voice and that, somehow, made it worse.

At that moment, hot liquid oozed down her cheek. Whether it was oozing now or had been oozing for the past few minutes and she was just now feeling it, she didn’t know.

Slowly, Senar raised her hand up to her cheek, by her left eye. Her fingers found the cut quickly: the edges of the skin had puckered, and a wetness coated it.

She brought her hand back. She stared at it for a long time.

Blood, red and glossy and hers, covered her hand.

The adrenaline fled from her body. Her shoulders slumped, and the aches reappeared, their intensity tenfold.

“Oh,” she said.