Bloodlust
Copyright © 2014 Anne McKae

Genre: Vampire, Paranormal

  ✦✧✦✧ 

I was an extraordinarily beautiful woman.

Perhaps that was the problem.

Before I begin, you must understand that this is not a statement bred from vanity. It is a truth, cut from the thread of my past that bound me to my maker—a bitter truth that I could have and would have lived without had I been offered such a choice. I try not to imagine my life as it would have been had I been born of a crooked nose and apple cheeks, of pockmarks and bushy brows. But none was so. For as I have already stated, I . . . was beautiful.

I was twenty-two years old, living in a patch of secluded woods in Northern Pennsylvania when she killed me. To anyone else, it was hardly an event of mass proportions. No one even knew it had happened.

It was the year 1869. Against my youngest sister's wishes, I had chopped ten inches from my charcoal-black locks the summer before my passing. By the following spring, it had grown back in curly waves that danced around my ears. 

My features, as a whole, could have been described simply as sharp. The lines that formed my face were precise: a pointed nose, an angled jaw, contoured cheeks, and thin lips. The features that had sealed my fate, however, were my large eyes, centered with brilliant blue irises, and the dark eyebrows that bowed along an enticing arc above them. 

They had challenged her.

They lured her in.

With nightfall, I would come to life, breathing in a true predator's air. I was a strong and natural-born hunter, even in my incarnate days. My body was lean and muscled; it had to be in order to keep my family alive. I used to scavenge the forest, bringing home deer and other critters for dinner—our father ran away when I was merely eight-years-old, and our mother had been a reckless drunk ever since. It was up to me to put bread on the table, so to speak, and I was exceptionally skilled at tracking and entrapping.

I would like to say that it was necessary for me to hunt at night, and in part, it was. My younger sisters needed me in the mornings, and my mother needed me in the afternoons. The only times truly available to me were the hours after my family had fallen asleep. Yet I know now, as my maker had explained to me in explicit detail, that I chose to hunt at night because I was born to do so. Back then, I believed I had simply sought a challenge. Daytime pursuits were too easy. 

But in truth . . . I was already a monster.

My two younger sisters, Layna and Marian, were beautiful in their own right. Layna was twelve, on the verge of becoming a stunning young woman, and Marian was strikingly gorgeous even in her five short years of age.

Little Marian had a different father than Layna and I, and it was discernible. It was part of why we kept to ourselves in our little cover of woods; the whole town would have frowned upon it. Layna and I had dark hair, fair skin, and blue eyes, whereas Marian's skin was a soft mocha, her eyes a deep, dark brown, so dark they nearly concealed her pupils. We never knew her father. He was someone our mother had consorted with in a drunken thirst one night.

So we kept the secret to ourselves. 

We kept Marian to ourselves.

Hunting for food, taking care of my sisters, and nursing my mother back to some semblance of sanity after drunken spells, was exhausting. My mother would often scold me in a slurred rage, rambling about how I—her unmarried firstborn—had failed her, my father, and the Lord. She would reprimand me for donning my father's trousers instead of a cotton dress and apron. "You are my greatest mistake," she would sneer, and I would nod my head as to agree with her, not knowing how right she was, as I forcibly tucked her into bed. After blowing out the candle on her nightstand, I would walk into the girls' bedroom and hum a bedtime lullaby.

At the time, I paid little mind toward her chatter. After all, I had no time to concern myself with husbands or the Lord. Not when I had two children to feed and look after.

I raised those girls. Perhaps I was more of a mother to them than our mother ever would have been. I worried for their future. Our mother worried about her stash. I secretly hoped Layna would find a good husband and escape our solitude in the middle of the woods, while I was already prepared to live by Marian's side forever. It was Marian's future that I had feared for most. Being half-African, I knew she would have faced more struggles in this world than even I was prepared to comprehend.

Yet despite the constant worry, I loved Layna and Marian with all my heart and soul. My sisters were so precious, so young, and so very beautiful . . .

On the night of my demise, I had thought I was out hunting, just like any other night. My bow, a very extension of my own hands, held secure in my firm grip. I crept swiftly in silence. The brisk wind, complemented by the steady thump of my adrenaline, brought on the rush that I craved each night. The pursuit was intoxicating, matching the animal's dexterity with the will of my own.

I had been tracking a hefty buck for two days, a stag red deer, and I was determined. This would be the night. Normally, I aimed for a much younger game—the girls preferred the taste, and it was my only means of spoiling them—but we hadn't seen a fawn in months, and I was certain the girls had eaten enough squirrel to last a lifetime.

The hart paused in a clearing to graze; only a thin creek streaming down a path of large pebbles stood between my prey and me. I thought about how difficult it would have been to haul the large load back to the cabin. A challenge—I enjoyed that. Tonight was the night. In the morrow, my girls would feast like royalty. I had plans to travel into town the next day and trade a good chunk of meat for a large bag of saltpeter in order to preserve the venison for as long as possible. 

This was it.

I readied my arrow, aimed directly between the buck's eyes, and—

A twig snapped in the distance. 

My reaction mirrored the deer's: we lifted our heads tensely, following the sound.

I hadn't realized it then, but she was toying with me.

The deer carefully dipped his head to feed on the greenery once more. I brushed off the noise as a small animal, probably a squirrel or rabbit, or perhaps even a feral cat, something large enough to break a stick, but small enough not to startle my prey.

I raised my bow, pulling back my arrow.

Crackle, crunch. 

More twigs snapped. 

Much closer this time. 

An animal could not have produced such a noise; this was the sound of several sticks crunching beneath the bulk of something large and heavy. Like boots.

The stag leaped from the clearing, and I muttered a silent curse before crouching down into a ready position. My bow was set.

That was when I knew I wasn't alone.

A vigorous wave of laughter echoed off the trees, and a woman's voice boomed seemingly from nowhere. "Pitiful," she sneered. Her voice was deep and smooth as silk, but there was an edge to it that sent chills down my spine.

I found my center, rooting my spine along the wide trunk of an Eastern white pine. "Show yourself," I demanded. 

"Lower your weapon, and perhaps I'll consider."

I smiled. "I don't have a weapon." My grip tightened.

"Oh, your distrust is hurtful," whined the woman, just before bursting into a malicious laugh. "Darling, if I had wanted you dead, your existence would have come to an end weeks ago. Lower that filthy thing, and let's talk."

"You underestimate my skills," I said warily, scanning the trees with my bow.

The hair on the back of my neck stood to attention. I felt her breath hit my ear before I heard her whisper, "You underestimate mine."

There was a loud boom behind me. I turned in time, bow set, to see the large tree I used to guard my spine topple to the ground. I staggered backward, and something the woman said suddenly clicked a revelation into place.

"Weeks?" I asked breathlessly. "No, it can't be. Have you been . . . ?" 

"Tracking you?" she supplied. "Yes . . . I have. You are quite the tracker yourself, I've noticed. Rather impressive for someone with your . . . disadvantages. It's amusing."

"Who are you?" 

"Wrong question," said the woman, emerging from shadows. 

She was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen, far more beautiful than I. Her skin was dark, darker than Marian's, and it had a rich, leathery quality to it that made it seem flawless. The whites of her eyes and teeth stood luminescent against her skin, and the red of her lips shone brightly under the splintered moonlight. I had never witnessed a woman of her color in such lavish attire. She wore a crimson evening silk dress: long-sleeved, the collar buttoned just above the dip between her clavicle bones. Tighter than most Victorian dresses of the era, it cinched around her waist and followed the curves of her hips in a trickle of heavy ripples down to her high-lace Balmoral boots. 

I wondered how she'd been able to move through brushwood in such heavy garb, but then again, I had not yet known the extent of her capabilities. 

The woman stepped toward me. "The correct question," she began, opening her mouth with a slight hissing sound, "is what am I?"  A row of sharp teeth slipped through her gums, emerging over her normal set.

I knew the answer instantly. 

Demon.

Within seconds, I pulled my bow and released the arrow into her chest. Perfect hit. Dead in the center.

She didn't even falter.

Her laughter broke the air. In one slow and subtle movement, she gently pulled the arrow from her chest. The blood coating the tip was thick, gooey, and so very black.

"Your bow cannot save you."

"Then what can?" I asked absent thought. The only concern I held was for those girls. If I did not return home that night, then Layna and Marian would have been on their own, and I could not allow that to happen. They needed me. I had to stay alive at all costs, even if it meant making a deal with the Devil himself.

Who knew I would sooner believe in the Devil than the Lord . . . 

"Join me," said the woman.

"You mean, sell you my soul."

She laughed again, and quickly, I realized how much I hated the sound. Its deep, throaty timbre mocked my every word. "I have no interest in your soul, human. I need numbers."

"Numbers?"

"Yes."

I realized: "You are building an army." 

She lowered her chin. "Why, yes."

That was something I could not allow. "Layna, Marian, forgive me." I swiftly reached for another arrow and lined my bow. "I will not join you!" I shouted, freeing the pointed weapon.

The next moments happened so fast, I can barely recall them even now, nearly one-hundred-and-fifty years later. She moved with such speed, such agility, her body was nothing more than a blurred line before she stopped at my feet. 

I registered the look on her face first: penetrating anger, a lifetime of impatience, and somewhere flickering in the surface of her irises, I saw pure joy.

She had not only caught my arrow, but she had turned it on me. Slamming it into my heart.

"You belong to me," she spat through clenched teeth. 

My vision went black.

✦✧✦✧

When I awoke, a thick layer of dirt caked my skin. I could not explain why, but I suspected I'd been half-buried for days. Somehow, I managed to claw my way to the surface. Her voice sang from somewhere in the distant branches above. "You belong to the night now. Search for me when you are ready."

And finally, I was alone.

I will never forget it.

My first battle with Bloodlust. 

It wasn't much of a battle. 

I gave in almost instantly. 

That was what she wanted.

My memory of it is mostly colors: reds and blacks smeared together. I could not make out my surroundings. In my mind, I recognized my home, although the logs of the cabin had become a deep dark red, and all the shadows gathered in a color that seemed darker than black. The cabin, the sky, the large pine and oaks surrounding me—everything was red. Even beneath the murky blanket of night, the reds glowed against their shadowy counterparts.

Sound propelled me forward. Not sight. The sound of my family's heartbeats thumping in their chests still rings raucously loud in my recollection. I remember the way it pulled me toward the cabin, pulled me into our home—my feet were no longer my own.

That night, I killed my family.

I had not meant to. I knew who they were, and I knew it was wrong but could do nothing to stop it.

My mother was first. She had been passed out on the couch for two days and was too drunk to fight. The thuds from her body drumming the floor as I hurled it around like a shredding ragdoll woke my sisters.

The panic in their eyes. The hunger in mine. In my mind, I was just as frightened as they were, but I was no longer myself.

I heard their screams, their cries, and I screamed and cried with them as I bled them all dry. Trapped within my own body, unable to control my movements, barely able to make out their faces in my newfound sight—oh, how I wept when it was over! 

The concept of Bloodlust and its effect on my vision often confused me in those days. I did not even know it had a name. The final image of my sisters, through my Bloodlust's eye—gaping red jaws contorted into shrill and violent screams that fell from their lips in a black puff of smoke—still haunts me even now, over a hundred years later.

When the Bloodlust had ceased control, my vision gradually came back to me. The blacks seemed less intense, slowly fading to dark browns, blues, and greens. And the reds burned away, revealing an overabundance of colors the small candlelight barely illuminated. I sat shaking in pools of crimson beside drained bodies. Now that red was no longer the only color I could see, my family's blood almost seemed to glow against the hardwood flooring, and it was all the more terrifying. I wailed and howled my heartache, sounding more like the monster I was than the grieving sister I should have been.

I staggered to the locked closet in my bedroom.

I reached for my father's pistol.

I shot myself in the head.

And that was when I learned that once I had died, I could not die again. I was the living dead, and no gun could answer my prayers. 

Funny, how in death, I had finally gained the will to pray, only after losing the stature to do so. 

I would never be worthy of prayer again.

Something else, however, could alleviate my sorrow—if for only a moment. The bullet from my head wound pierced through my skull and to my brain. Dead or not, I felt every ounce of pain. 

I was still young in those days—it would take but a minute to heal from such wounds now, but back then, it took five hours to regenerate completely. Our kind is so much more fragile at the start of our revival.

It was a long and excruciating process as the fibers of my skull slowly weaved themselves back together. 

Five hours later, I shot myself again.

And again.

Three times, total.

Once for each victim.

There were three rounds left.

And I made the most of them as well.  

  ✦✧✦✧ 

If you enjoyed my take on vampires and want to see more, let me know by giving this chapter a vote ★ Maybe I'll write up a part 2! Let me know in the comments below if you'd like to see that or not!