“He probably didn’t,” Gunnar admitted. “But he could’ve. Stellan was a little hasty with him, but he can do it much slower. Shall I have him show you?”
“No!” I said too quickly, and Gunnar laughed. Jack moved to block both Milo and me from Gunnar, and we stood behind him, holding hands and shivering like two scared little kids.
“Stellan!” Gunnar shouted without looking at him.
Stellan gave up on eating the guy and lifted his head. His face and chest were covered in blood, and he wiped at them absently with the back of his sleeve as he walked over to us.
“What do you want from us?” Jack asked. He was as scared and sick as I was, but he could almost pass for calm and confident.
“How about… a game?” Gunnar smiled.
Stellan returned to his side, leaving the corpse in the middle of the trail like a discarded piece of trash, like a half eaten apple. Gunnar’s eyes moved to something behind me, and when I turned, it was already too late.
A giant vampire had somehow crept up behind us, and he wrapped his massive bare arms around Milo. He yelped in surprise and fought against the vampire, but it was completely useless. He was the largest person I’d ever seen in my life, and he had vampire strength behind it. Milo was still gripping my hand, and I clung onto him tightly, trying to pull him from the vampire.
“Alice!” Jack had his arms around me, refusing to let me be dragged along with Milo as the vampire pulled him away, but I wouldn’t let go. “Alice! Let him go! Alice!”
“Milo!” I screamed, but my fingers slipped, and I let go of him.
Tears streamed down his cheeks, and he was still reaching his arm out for me. His huge brown eyes had never looked so sad or scared in his life. I kicked at Jack, but he wouldn’t let me go.
“Alice, as you can see, my good friend Bear isn’t hurting him,” Gunnar interrupted.
Bear, the gargantuan vampire, had Milo firmly secured in his arms, but he didn’t even appear to be squeezing him. Milo still squirmed and fought against him, but he didn’t look like he was in any real pain, just terrified.
“Milo – that’s your name, yes?” Gunnar asked. Milo didn’t say anything and kept fighting. “Milo, are you in any pain? Is he hurting you?”
“No,” Milo grunted and settled down in Bear’s grip. He was saying it for my benefit, so I would stop fighting against Jack. He looked over at me and nodded. “I’m okay.”
I did finally stop struggling against Jack, but smartly, he didn’t let me go. I would’ve taken off towards Milo the second he did.
“Let him go!” I yelled and turned to Gunnar. “He has nothing to do with this! Just let him go! Peter doesn’t even like him!”
He laughed at that, but I’m not sure how that was amusing. Jack said nothing, but he was gauging the situation. He knew Gunnar had some plan going on, and he was trying to figure it out. I knew that too, but I couldn’t keep my emotions under control.
“Mmm, yes, I’m sure, but Peter might not be arriving for awhile,” Gunnar said with faux sadness. “So I thought we would play a game until he joined us. Can you guess what it is?” I glared at him. “Tag – vampire style.
“You see, it’s just like normal tag, except you have to kill whoever you tag. Since you’re new to this game, we’ll keep it easy and start with two players. How about… you,” he pointed to Jane, “and you,” he pointed to me. “And since you’re the vampire, you’re It, Alice.”
“No! I already told you I’m never going to bite her!” I yelled at him, disgusted.
“But you don’t even know what the prize is yet?” Gunnar smiled widely at me. “It’s that Milo fellow. If you win, you get him back. If you lose, then Stellan gets him, and we all know how he likes to play.” Gunnar nodded to the corpse on the trail. “But since I am such a giving guy, I’ll give you a parting gift. After Stellan eviscerates Milo, I will personally give you his heart.”
I just gaped at him for a moment, unable to do anything but try not to vomit. Either I would have to murder my best friend, or they would murder my brother. The only good thing was that I wouldn’t live very long to regret my decision, no matter what it was.
“No,” Jack said. “Let me play. I’m much quicker than Alice.” I’m not sure if he had a plan to save Jane, or if he was only trying to save me from killing her by doing it himself.
“Well, Jane doesn’t seem much in the running mood, so I don’t think speed is really an issue.” Gunnar had a point.
Jane had tied the tourniquet around her arm but not before she lost quite a bit of blood. Her only consolation is that her body was used to running on less blood, and she had spent the last few days building her supply back up. But she was barely even holding herself up, and she hadn’t screamed or protested when Gunnar told me to kill her. Her skin was completely ashen, and the blood had started freezing on her arm.
“There has to be something else!” Jack shouted.