Heather Brewer - Tenth Grade Bleeds

The man leaned closer, but Vlad could not make out his face. His words weren’t a voice so much as a sizzle, like bubbling liquid on hot steel. “I will never stop.”

At his final spoken word, he twisted the blade again, this time wrenching it until it pulled through Vlad’s flesh.

Vlad shrieked, and edged ever closer to the thin line between sanity and madness.

Vlad gasped and sat up in bed, bathed in sweat, his throat raw as if he’d been crying out in his sleep. The nightmares were getting worse.

He sat there for a few seconds, shuddering breaths shaking his already trembling body. It took him a moment to realize that he wasn’t tied to a table somewhere but in his soft, warm bed, safe and sound. He turned on the lamp beside his bed and glanced around the room, just to be sure. But somehow, knowing that his dreams were not his reality didn’t make him feel any better.

Before the details slipped from his memory, he grabbed his journal from the nightstand and scribbled down every last moment he could recall of the horrific nightmare, as he had almost every night since his birthday party. As he scribbled the last words down, a picture flashed in his mind-too similar to the weird, external camera view he’d experienced with Otis. A dark figure, standing outside in the snow, watching his house. Vlad tensed as the image left his mind.

Vlad moved to the edge of his bed and slipped on a pair of jeans. Shirtless, he moved out his bedroom door and down the stairs as quickly as he could. Pulling back the curtains, he searched the scene outside, but no one was there. Vlad frowned. Maybe his vampire abilities were on the fritz. Or maybe it had just been his imagination.

He walked into the kitchen and pulled open the freezer. For some reason, he was famished. He grabbed three blood bags, bit his lip, and reached for a fourth, then a fifth.

As he sat at the table, biting into the bags with his razor-sharp fangs and gulping down mouthfuls of blood, Vlad’s thoughts turned to Henry. Could it have been him lurking outside in the blowing cold? Maybe he had changed his mind. After all, Vlad could slip into Henry’s thoughts… Perhaps the bizarre camera trick wasn’t a vampires-only kind of thing. Maybe he could see anyone with it.

And on the chance that Henry hadn’t come to his senses, Vlad desperately needed to read through the Compendium of Conscientia and see just what lay in store for him and his drudge.

Tossing the empty bags into the biohazard container beneath the sink, and ignoring the still-hungry rumble of his stomach, Vlad hurried to the living room and slipped on his sneakers, tying them haphazardly. He was just slipping his coat on over his bare torso when he noticed a parchment envelope lying on the small table next to the front door. His heart jumped with hope… hope that he would spy Otis’s familiar scrawls when he flipped it over. It didn’t surprise him that Nelly would forget to give him his mail when she was working double shifts all week, but it did fill him with disbelief that she wouldn’t give him a call to say that Otis had written.

When he flipped the envelope over, his hopes swirled down the drain, but not for long. The postmark was Siberia, and the handwriting belonged to Vikas.

That was something, at least.

He pocketed the letter and opened the front door, stepping out into the bluster of a midwinter night.

VLAD SANK DOWN IN HIS CHAIR in the belfry, shivering. It had been a quick walk to his secret sanctuary, and one ended by the horrible task of learning just how to release his drudge. He stared, bleary-eyed at the tear-spotted page, rereading the words he’d hoped to never find.

To rid oneself of one’s drudge, one need only perform a blood cleansing. This can be accomplished by administering a second bite and feeding the vampire’s intent into the wound. However, it is crucial that the vampire restrain him or herself from imbibing any of the drudge’s blood, lest the ritual become tainted and ineffective. It is important to remember that once a human’s drudge status has been removed, it can never be successfully restored.

Beyond anything, he wished that he hadn’t been able to locate the passage, or that it had ever been written. But there it was, in black and white. Henry’s salvation.

The temptation to ignore the page, or even to rip it from the book and burn in it the flickering light of the candle, overwhelmed Vlad, but he remained vigilant and reread the passage so that he would know exactly what he was doing the next time he and Henry had a moment alone. After all, he had sworn last year never to treat Henry the way Vikas treated his drudge, Tristian. Henry was more than a servant. And Vlad had vowed that cold, crisp night in Siberia that if Henry ever asked for his freedom, Vlad would find a way to give it.

And here it was. On a piece of parchment. Ripping Vlad’s soul to shreds.

Candlelight flirted with every corner of the belfry, brightening his gloom against his will. Vlad pinched the wick, dousing the candle’s flame.

So this was it. With a bite, Henry would be free. And Vlad would face the world alone.

He couldn’t be angry at Henry anymore. After all, finding out that your will is lost to that of your vampire master would put a damper on anybody’s day. So anger was no longer a part of what he was feeling. Just sadness. Deep, immense sadness that he was losing his best friend, that Henry didn’t want to share that bond with him any longer.

It was agonizing. And Vlad’s heart felt like it had shattered into a million pieces, only to break away within him, jabbing at his insides with every splinter.

And because that pain couldn’t be made any worse by any other, Vlad withdrew Vikas’s letter from his pocket and read it over again.

Vladimir -

I must say that I am greatly confounded by your recent letter, as I have not shared the company of your uncle in many months. Nor have I received any sort of communication from him since August. It is deeply troubling to me that you cannot seem to reach Otis by telepathy, as I am experiencing the same troubles. Please stay in touch, Mahlyenki Dyavol. I will do all that I can to locate your uncle.

In Brotherhood,

Vikas

Vlad sat back in his chair, sinking deeper into the soft, worn leather. It was bad enough that his uncle had been missing in action for over five months now, but losing Henry as a friend and a trusted drudge was unbearable. What’s worse, Vlad had absolutely no one to turn to for advice. Nelly wasn’t aware of Henry’s drudge status, and Vikas didn’t share his view of drudges. Vlad was alone in this. Alone and confused, with no way out but through.

He had to release Henry as his drudge, and trust that their friendship would be strong enough to survive the change. And if it wasn’t… well, then he’d deal with it. He had no idea how, but he would. After all, he didn’t have much choice in the matter.

He trusted Henry… or rather, he had, before he’d mistakenly thought Kylie had insinuated that Henry had divulged his deepest darkest secret. He’d just have to trust him on that too, and maybe everything would turn out all right.

Or… it would all go horribly wrong, and Vlad’s world would fall into a dizzying array of pain and loss.

Either way, it had to be done. Vlad would have to release Henry, and soon.

At the thought of once more tasting Henry’s blood on his tongue, two things happened almost simultaneously. Vlad’s heart shrank with guilt and sorrow and his stomach growled. In a burst of self-directed fury, he threw the Compendium across the room with all the force he could muster. The tome slammed against the wall and dropped with a loud thud to the floor. Vlad glared into the darkness, wishing it away, wishing it all away.