A Vial of Life

  “Didn’t we shut that?” Arletta murmured.

  “Yes. We left it shut,” Frederick answered, daring to move forward again. We reached the bottom of the stairs and peered cautiously through the door into the open room.

  It was empty.

  My eyes falling to the floor, I noticed clumps of honey brown hair… Braithe’s hair?

  A snarl came from our right. We twisted to see… Hans? A slouching skeletal figure with thin, stark-white skin, and a nose shrunken into its face. He had the same terrifying appearance as my lover and yet he was wearing Braithe’s clothes. He was also slightly shorter than Hans.

  “Braithe?” Frederick gasped.

  His small, dark eyes stared back at us, expressionless. Then he began to shuffle closer toward us, slowly at first, and then picking up speed.

  “Run!” Colin yelled, and even though my legs felt numb with shock, I forced myself to race up the stairs. As the five of us bundled out of the trap door leading to the upper deck, we banged it shut behind us.

  Frederick swore. “That was Braithe,” he said breathlessly. “I don’t understand. How—?”

  His stumbling words stopped short as the trap door beneath us shuddered. That thing—Braithe—was beginning to attack it. From the force of his blows, I couldn’t imagine that it would be more than a minute before he broke through, for it was only made of wood. Frederick and Colin scurried around the deck looking for anything movable and heavy that they could place on top of the door. Apart from the table that they turned upside down and heaved over the door, there really wasn’t much else up here that we could use.

  “What is going on?” Arletta sobbed.

  Wood crunched, and the whole table shifted even as the brothers strained to hold it in place. Sensing what was to come, Frederick yelled toward Arletta and me. “You two, get in the lifeboat and sail away. Hurry!”

  “What about you two?” I shot back. “We can’t just leave you here!”

  “Just get inside and—”

  The table went flying upward, sending the two brothers crashing back. Braithe sprang from the trapdoor and scanned the deck. His eyes fell first on Frederick and then Colin. I wasn’t sure if he’d noticed Arletta and me, standing all the way on the other side of the deck, but he headed straight for his brothers. He leapt first for Colin and dug his fangs into his neck.

  “No!” Arletta and I screamed.

  Frederick attempted to haul Braithe off, only to find Braithe attacking him and biting his neck. Both brothers were now groaning with pain, the same deep, guttural groan that Braithe had let out after he’d been attacked by Hans back down near the chamber.

  Before I could stop her, Arletta had left my side and shot forward. Grabbing a metal pole along the way, she ran toward Braithe, brandishing the weapon in front of her and waving it, as if she hoped to scare him. “Back off, Braithe!” she screamed. “Don’t do this to your brothers!”

  She continued holding out the pole directly in front of her, even as Braithe whirled around and fixed his attention on his sister. Staggering forward, he launched right at her. She screamed as the pole pierced Braithe’s chest, its tip appearing through his back.

  I rushed over and gazed down at Braithe falling to his knees. A thick black substance seeped from his chest, a substance that I could only assume had become his blood.

  “I-I killed him!” Arletta stammered, even though she hadn’t. Braithe had killed himself. It was like he had lost his mind and run right at her, even though the sharp end of the pole had been extended in front of her.

  Braithe’s hands moved to the pole in his chest, and his thin fingers closed around it. With a squelch, he yanked, sliding out the pole from his flesh and sending it skidding across the deck.

  “He’s still alive,” Colin panted.

  Braithe shot to his feet with alarming speed. How can this be? The pole had punctured a hole right through his chest and even through where his heart should have been. He should be a dead vampire.

  Instead he just sprang up as though nothing had happened. His eyes fixed on Arletta, his almost nonexistent lips curving in a grimace. He lunged toward her. Frederick, even in his pain, managed to leap for Braithe and grab hold of his midriff before he could reach their sister. Frederick wrestled him to the ground, but Braithe caught hold of Frederick’s arm and sank his fangs in again. “Both of you, go now!” Frederick yelled. “Escape in the boat!”

  As Arletta screamed, I had two choices. I could either join her in screaming or obey Frederick’s request to save ourselves. Arletta and I were now only moments away from being attacked. There was no time to lower the boat. Grabbing Arletta’s hand, I pulled her to the railing and with one strong push from my legs, I sent us both tumbling over the side of the boat and down into the waves. Still holding onto Arletta’s hand, I forced the two of us deep under the water before we swam as fast as we could in the opposite direction from the ship.

  I kept looking back over my shoulder every few seconds, opening my eyes even though the saltwater stung, to see if the deathly form of Braithe was following after us. But as we swam further and further away from the ship, my tension eased a little. Finally, after we’d distanced ourselves by at least two miles, I allowed us to resurface to gasp for breath. It was a good thing that vampires could hold their breath for a long time.

  We gazed at the distant outline of the ship, listening to the cries of Frederick and Colin. What is Braithe going to do with them? Will he slaughter them?

  I glanced at Arletta’s face, drained of all color. Her lips were parted and trembling. I could see she’d gotten past the stage of screaming, and now her mind was numb with shock.

  All I wanted to do was curl up in a ball and sob, but we were now adrift in the ocean. We had to reach land before the sun rose, or Arletta and I would burn. Looking all around us, I decided that we ought to head north. Other than Cruor, where we dared not return, the nearest landmass was in that direction.

  I tugged on Arletta. “Come on,” I said in a choked whisper. “You need to follow me. We don’t have long before the sun rises.”

  She resisted my urging for several minutes, her eyes remaining fixed on the ship in horror. I slapped her face hard, and that brought her out of her stupor.

  “Arletta. I’m a wreck, too. But getting fried in the ocean won’t do your brothers any favors.”

  Mention of her brothers seemed to get through to her. At least she followed me as I continued swimming with all the speed my limbs could muster.

  As we swam, the ghastly forms of Hans and Braithe—the same forms that I was now certain Frederick and Colin would soon develop—plagued my mind. My head reeled. What had happened? What has my Hans become? It was like the starvation had caused Hans and his fellow vampires to somehow evolve… into a different species altogether. How is it that Braithe didn’t die when the pole struck his heart? No vampire should have survived that. And whatever his condition is, it’s contagious?

  It was as though they were no longer even vampires… Or at least, not the vampires we knew.

  Chapter 1: Ben

  As I finished downing the blue elixir, a fire blazed in my stomach. I dropped the glass bottle. The burning sensation spread from my stomach to my chest, then along my limbs to the tips of my toes and fingers. The Elder’s shrieking faded into the background. I closed my eyes tight, locking my jaw as the agony consumed me.

  And then, just as I felt that I could take it no longer, it stopped.

  A lightness filled me. I felt myself floating upward. I opened my eyes. The sky above me, previously streaked with red, now looked washed out, its vibrant color faded. I twisted, rolling over weightlessly in what felt like midair, to face downward.

  Beneath me was… me. My body. Curled up in a fetal position, face and fists clenched up in pain. Perfectly still, surrounded by the shards of the shattered glass vial.

  The black mist of the Elder reached my body. He billowed around it, engulfing it completely, even as he continued to screech.
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  I stared down at my hands. They were a pearly, translucent white, as were my feet… and the rest of my form. I could almost see the dark ground below through my limbs.

  When I’d realized my only path lay in taking the potion, I hadn’t been completely certain that it would work. That the liquid would really do what Arron had told me it would—detach me from my body and turn me into… a ghost. Although I had prayed that it would, I hadn’t been in the slightest bit prepared for it.

  I no longer had a body. I was a ghost. A subtle being, trapped in the so-called “in-between” that Arron had described. This was the only place that I could be. I couldn’t remain in my body without putting into jeopardy not just the human realm, but countless others. And at the same time, I wasn’t ready to meet with death…

  Staring down at my body curled up on the ground shook me to the core.

  I am down there… and yet I am not.

  Then what am I?

  Throughout my existence, since the day I was born, I’d identified myself with that body, the body I now saw lying on the ground, a corpse. Although the Hawk had told me that I had an existence separate from it, being told such a thing and actually experiencing it were two different matters entirely. Arron was right. Although devoid of my physical wrapping, I still possess thoughts. Mind. Consciousness. There is more to each of us than flesh and bone.

  The Elder, still swirling around my body, was apparently trying to enter it. But he remained outside—it was no longer habitable to him. They couldn’t inhabit corpses. They could only hijack bodies that were still living.

  The Elder tried in vain for several moments before, letting out another scream of frustration, he moved away from my body. Apparently having accepted that there was no way I could be of use to him anymore, he began to glide away toward the edge of the cliff… when another presence arrived—another veil of black mist, followed by a voice.

  “What happened to the boy?” the hiss asked Basilius.

  “This is all a result of the girl vessel’s incompetence.” Basilius’ voice dripped with rage. “She allowed him to carry an elixir all this time. He took it moments before I was able to enter him, and now… Now he is lost to us! All those years we waited, gone to waste! His corpse lies there, frozen and useless. Julie Duan is not to be shown her lover. She must be punished for this grievous error.”

  “It is too late for that. I have already taken her to him,” the second voice replied.

  Basilius screeched again.

  “However,” the second Elder continued, “I assure you that her visit to the mountain chamber just now was indeed a punishment.”

  “What?”

  “I had taken Julie Duan to see her lover, as you promised her, and she was met with anything but relief… We discovered something… peculiar and wondrous.”

  “What did you discover?” Basilius asked, his voice anxious.

  “I wish to show you rather than describe it. Let us go now.”

  The two dark presences lingered a little longer, as Basilius roamed over my body once more, before both of them vanished.

  I didn’t understand half of their conversation, though the Elder’s words regarding Julie reuniting with her lover registered in my brain. Still, I couldn’t pay much attention to it. My mind already felt close to explosion, if it had not blown already.

  I reached out my hands, then tried to shift my legs, in an attempt to discover how much control I had over my movements. I willed myself to drift downwards, moving my legs as though I were walking, and effortlessly, I descended to my body.

  I extended a hand down to touch my shoulder. My fingers sank right through it. I tried to push against my side, roll my body so that I lay on my back. Again, it was like trying to push air.

  My mind was in a state of shock as I tried to process this new state of being. I drifted upward again, regaining a bird’s eye view of my body.

  What do I do now?

  I cast my eyes over my pale surroundings in desperation.

  Although I understood that I had separated from my body and now had a new existence outside of it, I still felt somehow… tied to it. Bound by some kind of invisible rope.

  How can I just leave my body here? What will happen to it?

  Will it rot like a regular human corpse? Will it become nothing but dust, leaving me trapped in this subtle existence forever?

  I felt frozen, my mind in a state of paralysis.

  I couldn’t have known how much time I spent hovering over my body. Time had lost its meaning. It could have been hours, days, or possibly even weeks that I haunted that spot, held hostage by a chain I was too terrified to sever.

  This body beneath me was the last link I had with my former life. With any life. It felt like I was hanging onto the edge of a gaping black hole—this body being the last grip I had before slipping into an endless oblivion.

  I hovered, feeling no sensation. No coldness. No heat. No pain. I just felt numb. All the while, my body remained stiff and still, showing no signs yet of deterioration.

  Eventually, I came to terms with the idea that I couldn’t stay here forever. I had to leave, even though it felt like leaving half of me behind. I couldn’t stay haunting this ghastly realm for all eternity, as though I was an Elder myself. I had to break away, even though I had no idea what that would mean for me, what was to become of my life—if what I was experiencing could even be considered a life.

  Summoning up every ounce of willpower that I possessed, I drifted away from my corpse. My form floated away from the clifftop and over the steep drop. Even as I moved toward the shore, my eyes remained fixed on my body until it was nothing but a speck in the distance.

  As I sensed the ocean miles beneath me, it took all the strength I had to turn my back on the mountains and face the wide-open water.

  I tried to calm my mind and focus my consciousness on the only question that mattered anymore:

  What now?

  Chapter 2: Sofia

  I was surprised to discover that Cyrus was the leader of the Drizan jinn. I hadn’t expected that a person of such importance would come to meet us outside personally, rather than some lower member of the family.

  Jeriad apparently shared my surprise, and he voiced it to the formidable-looking jinni. Cyrus replied with a gracious smile that he had sensed the presence of dragons, and that it was right that he should come to greet them personally—since, after all, they did have a history together.

  Although I didn’t trust anything about this jinni, at least we could be sure about one thing—he and his clan clearly still held respect for the dragons and didn’t see them as a threat. And consequently the rest of us were also welcomed in. Derek and I—along with Rose, Caleb, Aiden, the Novalics, Ashley, Landis, Zinnia, Gavin, and other close companions who’d traveled with us—found ourselves descending the jeweled staircase, which led down into a grand entrance hall. The luxury that surrounded us was similar to that of the Nasiri jinn’s abode at the bottom of The Oasis—no expense had been spared, and if it was possible, this place held even more extravagance, at least what we’d seen of it so far. The hall’s floor appeared to be made of solid gold, covered every now and then by rugs so soft they felt like pure cashmere. Gem-studded mirrors adorned the walls and diamond-encrusted chandeliers hung from the ceiling in abundance.

  We moved out of this room and entered a corridor, similarly decorated. It was wide, with grand pillars lining the walls every few feet. There was a scent of burning incense, subtle yet heady.

  Although it shared its luxury with the Nasiris’ abode, the Drizans’ was not an atrium. It was more like a palace, built underground.

  Finally, the jinn stopped outside a tall, open doorway. We entered to find ourselves in some kind of old-fashioned courtroom, lit by beacons of fire. Opposite us was a raised platform upon which sat a silver throne embroidered with crimson silk. Above this throne, hanging from the wall, was another large golden medallion with the symbol of a scorpion—like the one that served
as the entrance to the Drizans’ lair. Its shiny surface glimmered in the firelight. Cyrus glided up to the throne and planted himself down on it, eyeing us all from his vantage point.

  “Take seats if you like,” he said, his deep voice booming around the chamber. As soon as he uttered the words, dozens of chairs manifested and lined up on the floor beneath his platform. The dragons—having already shifted back into their humanoid forms in order to fit through the entrance—remained standing, as did the rest of us. It appeared that our nerves didn’t permit any of us to sit.

  “We will stand, but thank you for the offer,” Jeriad replied.

  “As you wish,” Cyrus said. “So, what exactly have you come to tell me?” Cyrus folded his fingers around the arms of his chair. “Our fellow jinn, the Nasiris. You say that they have settled in the human realm?”

  “Indeed,” Jeriad replied coolly. “The Nasiri jinn have formed a bond with a friend of mine. He is a vampire, and they have managed to bond him to them permanently. We seek your help in freeing him and in return, I will inform you of their location and anything else we know about them that could be of use to you.”

  The jinni’s eyes glinted with interest as he raised a hand to his chin and stroked it. “I guessed that Nuriya had fled to the human realm… In fact, some years ago I even sent out a search party looking for her. But they returned unsuccessful. I always wondered where she’d managed to hide out so successfully all this time…” He stood up, his hand still against his chin, and began pacing thoughtfully along his platform.

  “You see, Nuriya and I… we have something of a history together,” Cyrus continued. “Once upon a time, she was my betrothed. Her father, the noble Harith Nasiri, had gifted her to me as a gesture of goodwill between our two dynasties. However, Nuriya was a treacherous woman. She slighted not only her father’s will but also mine, and fell into the arms of another man. A lowly slave, at that. The disgrace she brought upon her father caused him to disown her, and of course the offense caused to myself and my own lineage meant that I was bound to mete out my own punishment on her… For you see, these are the ways of the jinn.”