“I’m sorry”, he said, raising his hand as if to admit his mistake. “It’s been a tough day. I do appreciate your offer, but I’ll go with Erica”, he announced to the knights.
Before they had the chance to raise any more objections, he added:
“Where are we heading now?”
The disappointed look on the knights’ faces told him that he had managed to put an end to this discussion.
They pointed towards the horizon and he began following that direction, without waiting for the others.
The journey back to civilization proved long and exhausting. The vampires were forced to hide, even burying themselves in the sand during the day, in order to avoid the sun. The oases they would find every now and then provided the humans with water and food, while in turn they sated the vampire’s hunger, by offering them a little of their blood. No one complained and eventually, one evening, several days later, they reached a town in Libya. There, they parted ways.
Erica would not leave Marcos’ side. He, on the other hand, tried to avoid her as much as possible. Not because he did not want to be with her; he wanted her more than anything in his entire life. He kept recalling that kiss she had given him. The problem was not the young vampire, but the male voice he kept hearing in his head.
The voice came to him for the first time once he had distanced himself somewhat from the ruins of the Temple of Blood. At first, it was but a whisper, almost imperceptible, so much so that he wasn’t sure whether it was actually a voice or some ringing in his ears. Within a few hours, however, he had heard the first words. Spoken in a language he could not understand, although he was certain these were words.
After the first night, he could decipher their meaning:
“Come to me…”
“Leave them…”
“Come to me…”
“My son…”
“My son, hear my voice…”
He said nothing to the others. He knew he should have said something, but he didn’t.
“Come to me…”
From that Libyan town they were taken at night to the capital, which had an airport and there they chartered a private jet to take them back to the States. Erica asked him whether he would prefer going back to Greece, but Marcos refused her offer. Erica would look at him and gradually, as the days passed, came to realize that something was amiss. Eventually, she would ask him every hour if there was something wrong. No was the only answer he would give.
Once they had boarded the plane, he wasn’t even sure to whom that no was addressed, Erica or that voice in his head.
The airplane took off and the long flight began. It took the three vampires just a couple of hours to be certain that something was definitely wrong with him. He was drenched in his own sweat and could not stand anyone nearby. He had taken a seat at the back of the plane, glued to the cabin. The others were sitting directly opposite him. He could see them glancing at him, whispering. He could not hear what they were saying, but he was convinced it could not be something good.
The voice in his head agreed with him.
“Come to me!” it repeated its demand.
“No”.
“Come to me!”
“No”.
“Come to me!”
“Come to me!”
“Come to me!”
He was reduced to screaming and clawing at his own face.
“No, no, no, no, NO!” roared Marcos, eventually.
Erica ran to him. It was too late. Marcos raised his hand and instantly flames engulfed the young vampire. The other two didn’t get the chance to react. Flaming pillars shot out from Marcos, blasting everything, indiscriminately: seats, tables and panels, trays, glasses, even the aircraft’s cabin.
The aircraft began falling from the sky.
The last they saw of him was the way he was staring at them, with eyes black like bottomless pits, before he disappeared in a wave of flames, taking with him the entire back end of the aircraft.
Each had a mission of their own now.
They had to find a way to survive from a plain missing its entire tail end.
And he… he had to find his father.
To be continued
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