Elle Jasper - Eventide

For my best friend, Kim Lenox, for always

believing in me

I can still hear the human screams inside my head. Demented, painful screams of pure torture and desperation. Behind my closed eyes, the slaughter at the Tunnel 9 Club rages red with human blood. Itll stay with me forever. All of this will.

With my strength weakenedeven the tendencies Ive acquired from being bitten by vampires arent enough right nowI can do little more than open my eyes and rest my forehead against the window of Victorian Arcoss Jag. Pitch blackness stares back at me. Were on I-16, heading north out of Savannah to Atlanta. A sign that says DUBLIN, NEXT THREE EXITS flashes by, so I know weve been on the road for about two hours. Is that all? Seems like a lot longer. Theres nothing to look at except billboards, so I stare blankly into the night. My other tendencies are still present, like my sense of smell, and I can detect the burnt grease from a truck-stop grill permeating the air. The pungent musk of perfume wafts on the wind. And it must have recently rained because the scent of hot wet tar rises to a choking pitch. I concentrate and turn my high sense of smell off. It irritates me. Right now, everything irritates me. Victorian has me under his control. Ive been taken against my will. So I do nothing but stare mindlessly into oblivion. It seems to help.

Time passes. Everything becomes a blur. I want to throw open the door and jump, but my limbs are numb, limp, lifeless, as if Ive sat in one position for too long and theyve fallen asleep. Hes incapacitated me with his freaky vampiric mind control, and it royally pisses me off. There isnt a damn thing I can do about it, despite my own powers. I still try to move other parts of my body; nothing works except my head, my eyes, and eyelids. Involuntary muscles, like the ones for breathing, work to keep me alive. I am totally paralyzed. And not at all surprised.

Victorians knuckles brush my jaw, and his hand lingers against my skin in a caress. I want to slap it away. But strangely, it comforts me. Im sorry, he says, and his voice is so heavy with regret, I almost believe him. I dont like holding you against your will, Riley. I look at him, and he glances at me as the headlights of an oncoming vehicle flash across his beautiful young face. Truly. Nothing would please me more than for you to come willingly. To trust me. But youre as predictable as you are beautiful, Im afraid. He smiles, and his teeth radiate an inhuman whiteness in the shadows of the Jag. Only the fluorescent glare of the stereo illuminates his features. Besides. I have to drive.

Victorian Arcos. Moving my eyes in his direction, I stare at him. Sharp, aristocratic features and long black hair pulled back into a queue remind me of someone whod once dueled with pistols long ago. I want to hate his guts. A centuries-old Romanian strigoi vampire, he and his brother, Valerian, were once entombed in a grave by my Gullah grandfathers ancestors. Now theyre free, thanks to my brother, Seth, and his rowdy friends, who inadvertently set loose the dangerous vampire brothers. Valerian is pure evil, and hes taken Savannah and Charleston by murderous, bloodlust-fueled storm.

Vic, thoughHes a bit different. I dont particularly trust him, but hes not a psychotic killer like his brother. And for some reason, even though Victorian has used his strigoi mind powers to force me to leave with him, I cant hate him. I know that hes trying to protect me.

I left behind pure carnage at the club. If Victorian hadnt come for me, I would have stayed and fought. I left behind a lot of loved ones, left them to fight without my help, and I feel like shit about it. I shouldve been there. Period. But Victorian wouldnt hear of it.

Why would Victorian want to protect me, you ask? I still dont know the answer. There is a connection between us, live and palpable, and he knows it as much as I do. I think it goes beyond the DNA we share. He and Valerian bit me and injected me with their toxins, connecting me to both of them. Its what gave me these tendencies. Their rare strigoi vampire bloodline makes me even more unpredictable than your average human with tendencies. Dont ask me to explain it any more than that. All I know is that I now have crazy superhuman powers, which Preacher, my Gullah surrogate grandfather, says will evolve over time.

Howd you get a Jag, much less learn to drive? I ask, curious.

I taught myself. Not much to it really. As for the car, I obtained it the same way that I got you to sit so polite and still, he answers. Power of suggestion.

I glare at him. You stole it.

Victorian sighs and gives a single nod. I stole it.

A few moments pass in silence. I try to move my hand toward the door handle. I summon all of my strength, so much that I shake inside, but its no use. Still paralyzed. The thought crosses my mind that Victorian could totally take advantage of me in my motionless state. He could touch me, rape me. No, wait. He possesses the power of suggestion. He could make me want to have crazy nasty sex with him, and Id do it. He could even drain my blood. Yet, he doesnt. Why is that? Why is he taking me away? And more to the pointwhere? Id asked him earlier, and hed simply said, When the time is right, Ill tell you. Those questions and more pull at my brain as weariness overcomes me. The world fades away as my lids close over my eyes. For a while, I rest. As I drift off, I feel Victorian smoothing back the hair from my face.

I dont know how long I sleep before the visions take over, but they, too, trap me just as easily as Victorians mind control. Behind my closed lids I lie awake, once again envisioning the macabre bloodbath wed left behind hours ago at Tunnel 9. With a forceful jab, my senses kick in, and in my dream state I slip under just enough to return to that place of horror. Just outside of my dream state, I can hear 24 by Jem filtering faintly from Victorians stereo through my auditory senses. Soon the music shifts within my dream state, my body seems to float, and I know the music now comes from the surround sound at Tunnel 9. Its sifting through the hazy room filled with humans. They dance, moving to the music, rubbing their bodies seductively against each other. Invisible, I look around. Most are high as a frickin kite. Some are just sex-crazed, hormonal twenty-something-year-olds trying to get laid. Others are partying, drinking. All are being hunted. I am nothing more than an invisible bystander. Watching.

The first drop of blood is shed as a newling attacks a human. Newlings are nasty, out of control, brand-new vampires with a voracious appetite. They have no decision-making skills and zero self-control. With an involuntary inhalation, I smell it. Taste it on my tongue. I even lick my lips. A scream breaks through the music, and I turn to see the owner of that first drop of blood. A not-so-young guy, maybe thirty. Pale skin, black eyeliner. Thats as far as I get in my inspection because his head is now literally hanging on by a flap of skin at the side of his neck. He just stands there, teetering, alive but not, his body in shock after a newling chewed through his throat, spinal cord, and bone to get to his artery. Thats the thing about newlings. Inexperienced. Starved. Fucking messy. They havent learned yet to go straight for the heart.