Chapter Thirteen
~Revelations~
They sped down the freeway, away from the city where Laura had grown up. Where she met all her friends, where she had her first crush. Where she got her first kiss. Where her family still was – her mother and father, her younger sister, her big loving dog. They sped away, and Laura looked sadly out the window. She wasn’t sure if she was ever going to be back.
When Logan said he was going to tell her everything, he meant it. Laura still wasn’t sure how to take what she had just learned.
“Where do you want me to start?” he asked her.
“Start with who you are,” she replied. “Tell me who you are. I barely know a thing about you.”
He sighed, and looked forward at the road. When he spoke, he didn’t look at her once. “I’m not like you, Laura,” he began. “Not entirely. I’m not… human.”
“What?” she exclaimed. “What do you mean?”
“I’m something else,” he said sadly.
“Are there others like you?”
“Yes, there are.”
“Those men chasing us… are they like you?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me.”
He sighed again. “If I do, you’ll want to run from me. You’ll want to run and hide forever. But you can’t, now. I wish I could let you go, Laura. I wish I let you go before. But if you go now, they’ll find you. No matter who you’re with, no matter where you go, they will find you. And I can’t let them do that.”
“Logan.” She reached over to take his hand in hers. She held it tight. “You can tell me.”
He paused for a long moment, and took a deep breath. “There’s folklore about me. About… things like me. Legends and stories that are told to scare children into behaving. Tales about things that go bump in the night.”
“Would I know them?”
“I’m sure you would.” He tried to pull his hand away, but she wouldn’t let him. His skin was ice cold silk.
“Tell me. I’m not afraid.”
She felt afraid, now. She was afraid she would never see her family again. Afraid she would never come home again. Afraid of what her parents might think when they found out she ran away.
“The dream world I showed you,” he said, “is restricted to those of my kind. We’re the only ones who have direct access to it, who can go there at will. Humans… they can only drift in and out without realizing it.
“But I discovered that I had the ability to draw humans in. To explore their dreams, together with them. Like I did with you.
“When I learned I could do it, I thought I was unique. I thought I was one of a kind. But it turned out that every one of my kind could do it. Everyone could draw humans in like that. Except… it’s prohibited. By ancient creed, we’re forbidden from doing that.”
“When I brought you in, I thought we were safe. I haven’t had contact with any of… my elders… for a very long time. I had hoped most had thought me dead, or dying. Or had long forgotten about me. I still don’t know how we drew their attention.
“It shouldn’t have even worked that way. We entered your dream. They couldn’t have been watching. They know the rules, too. They abide by them better than I do. For them, the creed stands above all else. Above their own lives. They weren’t allowed to be there, either. But they were – or at least, one of them was – and they saw us.
“And for that, I’m sorry, Laura. I’m sorry for dragging you into all this. I’m sorry for my carelessness. I know I should have never done it, should never have shown you what I did. Believe me, I fought the urge as much as I could.
“But there was something about you… something that tugged at me and begged me to show you. Maybe I was imagining things. Maybe I wanted to believe that you needed to see that world. Maybe I needed to believe it. But it was my own shortcoming, my deficiency that put us in this situation. And for that, I’m truly sorry.”
She looked over at him. She pulled her hand away when he told her the truth, and hadn’t moved it back since. He looked hurt when she did that. But he drove on, looking straight ahead.
“And what is ‘your kind,’ exactly, Logan?” she asked.
“My kind.” He laughed softly. “Those who are like me, of course. Those who the stories are written about, and legends are twisted from. We are a separate race, Laura, removed from humanity long ago. Each of us is given… abilities… that transcend that what a regular human can do. But it goes both ways. We have weaknesses unique to us. Some of them, I’m sure, you can even laugh at.”
“I won’t laugh,” she promised him. “Just tell me the truth.”
“That’s what I said I’d do, isn’t it?” He sighed again. She could see he was struggling to form the words. “I’ll start with the physical. We’re usually taller than your kind. By a head or more, at least. I’d actually be considered fairly short.” He laughed, but it was an oddly forced laugh.
“Our skin is also much lighter. ‘Elven skin,’ some call it, but that gives it unnecessary embellishment.”
“It shines, though,” she said gently. “Sometimes, I’ve seen yours absolutely radiate in the light.”
“That’s when you should have stayed away. We’re most dangerous, then.”
“Tell me,” she pressed. “Tell me why you say that.”
“We’re stronger than humans. More agile, too. Our bones are nearly unbreakable, but they’re unbelievably light. It gives us a certain… grace. Our balance is better because of it. I’m what, nearly a foot taller than you? And yet I can guarantee that I weigh less than you do.
“Our vision is also better. When I look at your face, I can see every imperfection that makes you so unique. Every flaw that makes you so beautiful.”
“You… find me beautiful?” she stumbled, amazed.
“Of course I do, Laura. Of course I do.”
Her heart fluttered.
Maybe she was developing feelings for him. It was the only thing that would explain her sitting here. If she were sane, if she had any shred of common sense, she would be clawing at the door, desperate to escape. She would be calling the police, telling them she’d been abducted, and have fifteen cruisers chasing them down the highway already. But instead she just sat there in silence.
“We’re here,” Logan announced. It was the first time he spoke since she pulled her hand away, nearly an hour ago.
She looked across at him. He still looked straight ahead, and despite having parked the car, kept his hands on the wheel. His shoulder slumped, and he looked tired. Maybe as tired as she felt. But she knew it wasn’t a physical weariness that touched him. It was an emotional one.
She studied his face. His skin looked so smooth, so delicate. So white. His dark eyes made a perfect contrast, as did his pitch-black hair, which was styled up so exorbitantly. She realized for the first time that he had near-perfect cheekbones, not too high and not too low, and that his nose and jaw were both strong and handsome. He was handsome. But he was also something else.
“You’re a vampire,” she whispered.
He cringed. “I hate that name. Hate that title. And it’s not who I am. It might be a small part of what I must do to survive, but… it’s not me.”
A vampire. He had told her that’s what human folklore would call him. A bloodsucker, a monster, a predator, a killer. And he was sitting right beside her, close enough for her to reach out and touch.
“You feed on human blood.” She should be terrified, saying that. She should be terrified, sitting so close to him. She should be terrified, except that… she wasn’t. All she felt was a cool, dark calm.
“Yes,” he admitted. “Every time, I try to fight it, but… I can’t. Morals and ethics mean nothing when you’re starving. We battle depression between feedings. The longer we go without blood, the less confident we get. The less graceful we get, the less powerful we get. We become shells of our former selves, and we become obsessive about finding food. My only solace is how infrequently I need to feed.”
“How often do you do it?” she asked.
“Twice a year, only.”
“And…” she gulped, “…when was the last time you fed?”
Despite himself, he smiled. “Less than a week ago.”
All of a sudden, all of it clicked into place for Laura. All of a sudden, everything made sense. His arrival here. The unusual murder. The animal warning. And his transformation after.
“You’re the animal,” she breathed. And for the first time in his presence, she felt a shiver run down her spine.
He nodded. “I am, aren’t I? And you’re the only one who knows. Usually I don’t leave my prey like that, for people to find after, but I was careless.”
“The hitman,” Laura continued. “You’re the one who killed him!”
“Yes. You see, I try to balance things out in choosing my targets. The man had a body list at least twenty long on him. A contract killer, he would have struck soon had I not acted. And then some time again, thereafter. It’s a small solace I can take in thinking I might have prevent some deaths.”
Laura understood. She understood what he meant. She identified with him.
“Logan,” she asked suddenly. A question had occurred to her, one that she wanted to know the answer to. “Are your kind born that way, or can they be transformed?”
“Both,” he answered.
“And you, then?”
“I was born a human.”
Everything clicked again. She understood his struggle, understood his morals. Understood why he tried to fight something that came so naturally. She had one last question, though.
“How old are you?”
In reply, Logan smiled sadly, and turned his head. For the first time in what seemed like eons, their eyes met. “Do you want to know my age, or how long ago I was born?”
“What’s the difference?”
“We stop aging once we’re transformed.”
“Tell me both.”
“My human age,” he said, “is eighteen years old.”
“And how long ago were you born?”
“I was brought into this planet four hundred and twenty-nine years ago.”
Too much blood rushed to Laura’s head, and she passed out.