“Did you feel that?” she asked.
“It wasn’t you?”
“I don’t scream like that,” she said, aghast.
“Scream?” Wayne blinked. “That whining sound?”
One of her hands gripped the opposite elbow, rubbing it lightly. “It was a kid. In trouble, I’d reckon.” After giving a light shudder, she pointed off in the direction they had already been walking. “That way. And I,” she sniffed before dropping her voice to a murmur, “smell blood too.”
Wayne didn’t bother to point out that Serena was a kid as well. “Come on, let’s look into it. Stay behind me.”
“I’m a vampire, I can help too.”
Wayne ignored her, turning his brisk walk into a light run. He scanned every bush, every roof, and every window that he could see for any kind of movement.
It didn’t take long to find the source of the disturbance. A small, single floor home had its doorway kicked in. The tell-tale illuminated circles of a flashlight danced around through the windows.
Wayne pressed himself against one side the door. He almost jumped out of his shoes as Serena pressed up against him. She had followed so silently that he had been certain that she had remained behind.
Serena had the audacity to let out a short giggle.
Narrowing his eyes behind his mask, he pressed one finger over his lips in the universal gesture for silence. At her nod, he leaned around the entryway, peeking into the front living room.
There was a short and rotund man standing over a fireplace that had its covering grate thrown to one side. “Master will be so pleased we found another one.”
“And this one,” a female standing at his side said, “looks so tasty.” Her tongue darted out of her mouth, licking her lips. She was notably missing any sign of elongated canines. Merely a deviant thrall.
“Go away,” squealed a third voice.
As before, the air rumbled. Here it was far more violent than before. It was unmistakably a sign of magic, though likely performed without a focus. The slight rumbling of the air didn’t use nearly enough magic to do anything of any use.
Neither of the thralls seemed very concerned with the possibility of a mage around, likely because of the impotence of said mage’s attacks. They glanced at one another with mocking looks.
“You already killed the hag,” the male said. “If Master finds out you’ve been toying with his food…”
The woman moved fast, though not so fast as to make Wayne reconsider her thraldom. Her arm wrapped around the man’s neck. “Master won’t find out,” she said, pulling her arm tighter. “Will he?”
Gasping for breath, the man kept smacking his hand into the woman’s arm.
“Thralls,” he hissed towards Serena while they were making a good amount of noise.
Serena had moved to look in through the front windows. “I can take them,” she said.
Before Wayne could object, she vanished. For a moment, he thought she had teleported. Feeling her brush past him threw that idea out the window. His eyebrows crept up his forehead. Invisibility?
He didn’t have time to consider the implications. Inside, the woman had released the other thrall.
“Now that we understand each other,” she said, turning back to the fireplace. “Come out, little girl. I won’t hurt you, I just want to play a little.”
“Play with this!” Serena reentered the visible spectrum of light just behind the thrall. Before either could react, she jumped up on the female’s back. Her legs wrapped around the waist while her arms kept the woman’s arms from interfering, much the same way she had initially attacked Wayne.
Unfortunately for the thrall, she lacked the fireball in her hand to keep the short vampire from biting down.
The thrall back-stepped and tipped over the side of a chair, all with Serena’s teeth plunged deep within her neck.
Panic on his face, the male thrall lifted up a gun.
Wayne moved to act. He threw out a shield immediately in front of the gun, catching the bullet before it left the barrel. With no place for the gas to expand to, the barrel split in two, sending shrapnel into the man’s hand.
He sank to his knees, cradling his hand as he cried out in pain.
Wayne strode across the room in three large steps, barely paying attention to the broken-necked corpse of a woman lying on the couch. He kicked the thrall upside the head, knocking him out cold on the floor.
“Serena,” he said, “are you alright?”
The child-like vampire was still beneath the female thrall, teeth sunk deep inside the withering woman’s neck. Their fall had torn open her neck, spraying blood around the room.
Serena appeared to be reveling in it. She gave a thumbs up without removing her mouth from the thrall’s neck.
Going to have to burn it later, he grumbled to himself. Couldn’t have ghouls wandering around, even if they were subject to the whims of his current ally.
He turned his attention to the brown-haired woman lying on the couch. There was no hope for her. Her neck had been quite thoroughly snapped along with several knife injuries on her person.
Wayne gave the thrall at his feet an extra kick before turning to the fireplace. Kneeling down, Wayne found a soot-covered girl with hair matching the older woman on the couch. It was hard to tell what the rest of her looked like; ash obscured most of her features. All save for her deep green eyes.
“Go away,” she said, pressing herself against the back wall of the fireplace.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” Wayne said, wincing as soon as the words were out of his mouth. Those were the same words that the thrall had said in a far less convincing tone of voice.
He reached up to his mask and lifted it off his head. The air wasn’t quite as bad inside, but he still felt an uncontrollable cough bubbling up in the back of his throat.
Pushing the feeling down, he gave the girl a small smile. “See,” he said, “regular teeth. I’m not a vampire and I’m not one of their minions.”
It struck him that she likely wouldn’t know about vampires or their teeth. If she had seen a vampire’s teeth up close, she probably wouldn’t be alive anymore. Or she’d be a thrall.
“Like her?” Came the unexpected response. Her finger stretched out, pointing over Wayne’s shoulder.
Glancing over his shoulder, Wayne’s eyes went wide.
Serena stood just behind him, slightly leaning over his shoulder. Her entire front was soaked with blood, especially around her wide smile.
It took a great deal of will to keep from conjuring a fireball then and there. After suppressing his initial instinct to fight, Wayne decided that Serena’s smile was of an encouraging sort. Like she was trying to help coax the small girl out from her hiding place.
Blood put a small damper on that.
Wayne slid between the two girls, blocking their lines of sight. As he moved, he mouthed to the vampire, ‘wipe it off,’ with a gesture around his own face.
Rubbing her wrist across her mouth and glancing at the liquid covering it, Serena had the decency to look shocked. She started furiously rubbing away at her face and neck, but stopped as a thoughtful expression crossed her face. Leaning in, she whispered into Wayne’s ear. “Can I have him first?” Her finger pointing towards the male thrall lacked the discretion of her conspiratorial whisper.
Sighing, Wayne rubbed his forehead. “Do whatever you want. I’m not your mother,” Wayne hissed back. “But do it out of sight.”
Again, Serena put on a bright smile. She skipped over to the thrall and started dragging him through a nearby doorway.
Wayne turned back to the little girl only to jump back at how close she was.
What was with everyone being able to sneak up on him?
“She’s going to eat him?” she asked with a strange mix of horror and curiosity. Immediately after her question, the girl seemed to realize that she was half out of the fireplace. Without delay, she threw herself back against the wall.
A fresh cloud of soot exploded out from around her, sending both the girl and Wayne into a light fit of coughs.