A Fork of Paths Read online

  “And do you think you’re the only one who’s lost everyone?” I roared, a wave of anger and grief surging in my voice.

  The three of us fell silent as I took in a deep breath, attempting to regain composure.

  Then Julie spoke, her voice quieter and calmer this time. “The way to honor Benjamin is not through revenge.”

  I couldn’t believe the gall of her as she craned her neck up to look me in the eye.

  “The way to honor him,” she continued steadily, “is to ensure that the sacrifice he made does not go in vain. He wanted to keep our worlds free from the Elders, and prevent countless more innocent people from suffering by their resurgence. He sacrificed his life to ensure a better one for the rest of us and, although the Elders might be out of the picture now, we must tackle these creatures. Can you imagine the type of havoc that could ensue if they ever found a way into the human realm? That has been your home for the past decades, has it not?”

  It still irked me to no end that she was using Benjamin’s name to get herself off the hook, but her words had struck a chord in me. No matter how pained I was to admit it, I couldn’t deny that her words were true. Benjamin had sacrificed himself to protect the lives of others. If we just sat here and did nothing while these Bloodless slaughtered entire islands, how would that be honoring his memory?

  I gazed reluctantly down at Julie. I could see behind her eyes that she was using up every one of her last prayers to beg that this new approach would work on me. It didn’t work because I trusted her or her motives, it worked only because I knew it was what Benjamin would have wanted.

  The ship was packed with Bloodless and they were expanding fast. Still, we were in the unique position of being able to do something about it while we were at sea again and all of them were contained in the same boat. We just had to find a way to slaughter these creatures, and then—unless monsters like this had already sprung up in other parts of the supernatural world—the infestation would be halted. And I could not do this alone. I was still in the grip of my emotions over being cut off from my family, and I would need help.

  “Where are your other accomplices?” I asked, frowning.

  A pained expression crossed Julie’s face, and by the intensity of it, I believed her to be genuine when she replied, “We lost them.”

  From inside the box, it had sounded like the others had been men. If they were indeed all lost, that left only Julie and this other girl who’d been a part of Julie’s deception. I averted my eyes to the second girl, looking her over. Julie and I could manage this mission… and I was still unsatisfied.

  Dropping Julie into the waves, I darted for the second girl. She appeared so shocked that she barely even had time to react. Clamping my hands around her throat, I lifted her up. I was pleased that she was thin and wiry in build, and she seemed overall weaker than Julie, so she wasn’t too difficult for me to lift. Bringing her to the ship and hovering back over the deck, I did what I’d been dying to do for what felt like the past hour.

  I tossed the vampire into the swarm of salivating Bloodless, and then watched, relishing the girl’s screams.

  The Bloodless piled on top of her, digging their fangs into any part of her that they could reach. They appeared to be ravaging her much more severely than any other vampires I’d watched them sink their teeth into. Perhaps it was all the buildup they’d just endured. Three latched onto her neck at once, while others were forced to resort to other parts of her body; her arms, wrists, stomach…

  Julie was screaming at the top of her lungs, still down in the ocean, but her shrills merged into the background. Just be happy I chose her instead of you, bitch.

  My face hardened as I watched the Bloodless swarm like wasps around the vampire. Watching her demise was gruesome, yet utterly satisfying. Like scratching an itch that had been plaguing me for weeks.

  I waited until the Bloodless had stopped drinking from her, and laid her punctured, blood-soaked body on the deck, where she began trembling—her new transformation apparently underway. I had just created one more problem for Julie and me to eliminate, but, oh, was it worth it.

  I hovered back over the edge of the ship and arrived above Julie. She bobbed in the waves, rigid with shock and horror.

  I narrowed my eyes on her. “Annoy me, or step out of line even once, and the same fate will befall you.”

  Julie

  Arletta!

  I was still in a state of shock. Hans’ siblings were the only family I had, and I’d just lost all of them within days. There wasn’t a single Manson left standing. As tiresome as Arletta could sometimes be, she was like my own sister. Now, I had no one at all. I was too shaken to even cry.

  The jinni swooped down once again and roughly gripped my shoulders. She hauled me out of the water and lifted me, giving me a bird’s eye view of the vessel. It was still too early for me to feel hatred for the jinni. I just gaped in disbelief over what she’d just taken from me.

  A part of me now almost wished that she had dropped me into the crowd of Bloodless after all. At least I wouldn’t be alone. I’d be with the Mansons, no matter how horrific it would be.

  Maybe Braithe, Frederick, Colin, Arletta and I could even make our way back to Cruor in our monster forms and be united with Hans again. I guessed that Cruor was where Hans must have still been, because I hadn’t spotted him here. At least Frederick, Braithe and Colin were still among the crowd, and Arletta would soon join them. It was a lance through my heart to see the brothers’ faces, once so handsome, just like their older brother, now deformed into these abominations.

  I shook myself.

  Stop thinking with such finality. There’s got to be some kind of cure, even if it only makes them half the people they were before. There’s just got to be.

  I was shaken from my thoughts as the Bloodless began snarling and leaping up toward me and Aisha, who had started floating toward one of the ship’s masts. The jinni’s hold on me was gut-wrenchingly loose, and I was terrified that she was going to change her mind and drop me down into the crowd after all. Especially when a strong gust of wind swept up, adding to the precariousness as it rocked me from side to side.

  “So what has your little mind come up with regarding how to get rid of these things?” Aisha asked me.

  It was a struggle to even find my voice, still aggrieved by what Aisha had done to Arletta. I still wanted to be silent, left to my own thoughts, but being dangled over a ship of ravenous bloodsuckers had a way of making one find one’s voice in even the most difficult of situations.

  “They can’t be killed like normal vampires,” I stammered, clearing my parched throat and trying to steady my voice. “I watched one get stabbed before, right through the chest. The weapon pierced his heart, but he didn’t die. I don’t know how to kill these things.” Or even if they can be killed.

  There was a span of silence as the jinni surveyed the deck. “Curious,” she muttered to herself. “Well, I would like to witness this for myself. You’ll try it again, and if it doesn’t work, you can always try severing the head—”

  “Wait… Me? I can’t do this all by myself. That’s why I said that we need to work together.”

  “I meant what I said,” Aisha replied, an infuriating smile spreading across her face. She gazed down on me with spiteful contentedness. “You’re going to be our guinea pig. And you’re going to keep experimenting until we find a way to kill them. So if you want to save time, and not lose your life in the process, I really suggest that you think long and hard what the best way is to go about this.” Her attention snapped back to the ship. “So,” she continued briskly, “we need to find you something sharp…”

  Oh, God. Is she really going to drop me back down there all alone again? My stomach twisted itself into knots as she began to descend on the deck. I expected her to continue lowering with me, but she leveled us out—frighteningly close enough to the Bloodless’ claws, but not quite low enough for them to gain a grasp on me and yank me from the jinni’s ca
reless grip. Thankfully, these monsters couldn’t leap as high as regular vampires. I looked toward where Aisha was heading—the front of the ship. I realized now that she had spotted the barrel that we kept there—filled with weapons. Daggers, swords, spears, even a few guns. She moved faster as the Bloodless followed beneath us. Arriving at the barrel, she dumped me unceremoniously on the deck.

  “So, Julie,” the jinni said in a soft, sweet voice—a voice that was entirely at odds with her malicious countenance. “You wanted to honor Benjamin’s memory and fight for the greater good of the supernatural realm. Now you’ve got your chance. Have at it.”

  My hands trembled as I whirled to face the wave of Bloodless surging toward me. It took all that I had to resist the urge to throw myself back into the ocean. That would do no good. Aisha would merely catch me again and bring me right back to the deck—and, possibly, this would irritate her enough to not even allow me to arm myself. So instead, I did the only thing that I could.

  I rushed to the barrel and picked up the nearest two weapons to me—a sword in one hand, a rifle in the other.

  Drawing the blade from its sheath, I scanned the Bloodless closest to the front of the crowd to make sure none of them were Mansons. Then I raised both weapons in front of me and began firing the rifle. The bullets had little to no effect. If anything, it only agitated them further and made them speed up. Even when I shot one straight through the head, or in the eye, they continued running regardless. By the time they reached within six feet of me, I had urinated on myself.

  Discarding the rifle while cursing it for its uselessness, I grabbed hold of one of the ropes hanging from a mast behind me and managed to elevate myself just in time before one of them could grab my ankles. I climbed as high as I possibly could, perching right at the top of the mast, and gazed down at the Bloodless following me up. At least from this vantage point, I could see them coming and could better angle my sword at them. That, and Aisha could more easily come to my rescue if things got really bad. I had to pray that she would do this for me and not leave me to my fate.

  As the first of the Bloodless reached me, I scanned his terrifying face to check once again that he wasn’t one of the Mansons. Seeing that he wasn’t, I hit him with my sword, plunging it deep into his chest, even though I had already witnessed such a method not doing a thing. Aisha had seemed to doubt me when I’d told her though, so this was mainly to demonstrate to her that I’d been telling the truth. I dared glance upward for a split second, to catch sight of her hovering several feet above me in the air, watching intently.

  With a strong thrust of my foot, I kicked the Bloodless in the head, causing him to lose balance and tumble down to the deck… Only to make way for the next one.

  This one was stronger and had much faster reflexes. Horrifyingly fast. Before I could even plunge my sword into his body to create a distance between us, he’d leapt at me, his hands closing around my throat. His claws sank in, puncturing my flesh.

  “No!” I let out a strangled scream.

  Aisha swept down. Grabbing the sword from my hand, she plunged it into his neck—the force of the motion sending him reeling, and also, inevitably, losing his grip on me. He tumbled down to the deck with the others. Sliding one arm around my waist, the jinni jerked me upward. I whimpered as I clasped my hands around my neck. It was soaked with blood, and the wind stung like hell. However, I should’ve been grateful. His claws hadn’t dug into me nearly as deeply as I’d imagined. I guessed that he’d been saving that job for his fangs.

  “Thank you,” I breathed, barely even aware of what I was saying. I was just so relieved to be carried away.

  “Don’t thank me,” Aisha snapped. “I only saved you because you’re still of use to me.”

  My heart hammered against my chest as she stopped ascending and hovered, still in one spot. She flashed her eyes at me, indicating that I take the sword. I took it from her cautiously, with half a mind to attempt to stab her in the gut and escape this nightmare. But I didn’t know if jinn could be killed by stabbing—they were ethereal creatures, after all—and I was too afraid to risk finding out.

  “Let’s try again, shall we?” Aisha continued, her tone almost bored. “I think we’ve verified by now that it’s not possible to kill one of these things by stabbing them through the chest—or the neck, for that matter. This time, I want you to try chopping off a head.”

  I choked as she lowered me back down again. This time, she didn’t even bother to take me to an empty part of the ship. She just dumped me down on the railing, right next to a crowd of Bloodless. Now I was sure that she intended to kill me. She was just having a little fun with me first. Curse the bitch.

  They came rushing at me again, and, the hilt of the sword slippery in my sweaty hands, I lunged at a Bloodless’ head with all my strength. The edge of my sword sliced through flesh, but then it was met with a dull thud. Metal against bone. Tough bone. Very tough bone. I stared at the Bloodless’ wraithlike face. It barely even registered pain. Just hunger for my blood. The sword dislodged and clattered to the floorboards as he lunged at me. I thanked my stars that Aisha had planted me by the edge of the ship. Knowing that the jinni would have been observing my attempt closely, I leapt off the ship before the Bloodless could grab me.

  Splashes came from behind me. During previous encounters with the Bloodless, I had noticed that they appeared to be somewhat averse to water, and so I’d hoped that they wouldn’t follow me. But it appeared that by now, Aisha and I had riled them up far too much for them to care.

  “Help!” I screamed up at Aisha, who was still keeping track of me from above.

  I didn’t have the nerve to stay above the surface and wait for her to descend. Taking a deep breath, I dipped under the waves and began to swim manically away. But it wasn’t long before the jinni’s warm hands closed around my calves.

  “Trying to escape again, are we?” she drawled, hoisting me into the air.

  “No!” I spluttered. “In case you didn’t notice, if I hadn’t jumped that Bloodless would have torn into my neck.”

  “Oh, of course you aren’t,” Aisha replied, patronizingly, as if she were a teacher talking to a school child. “It would be rather stupid of you to try that again after the warning I gave you.”

  As she was about to drag me yet again to the ship, I craned my neck up to meet her eyes and begged, “Aisha, I don’t think this is the best way to do this. I really don’t.” I gritted my teeth. I really, really don’t. “I couldn’t even cut through that monster’s neck with the blade. The bone was hard as a rock.”

  “Perhaps all we need is a sharper blade,” Aisha said, almost nonchalantly.

  “Maybe,” I said, trying to not spiral into a nervous breakdown at the thought of the jinni dropping me among the Bloodless yet again. “But we’re going into this blindly. These are clearly nothing like the vampires either of us know. We need to try to figure out what these things actually are before we have a chance of ending them…” I paused, drawing a rasping breath. “Look, I’m shaking and weak, and if you drop me down there again, I don’t think I’ll survive. I-I can’t handle it.”

  Aisha paused mid-air. “Aww,” she crooned, the fakeness of her concern biting. “Maybe you should’ve thought about that before volunteering to save the world?”

  “Please! This isn’t working.”

  The jinni’s expression turned stone cold. “And what do you propose exactly? That I just forget about what you did to Benjamin and let you go free?”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head fiercely. “You may not believe me, but I meant it when I said that I want to help solve this.” My words were true. I wanted to solve this problem… just for a different reason than I’d revealed to Aisha. I didn’t want to slaughter them, at least, not Hans’ siblings. I needed to find a way to cure them, or find some way to get them back to a state where they were at least semi-recognizable. Hans was still trapped in that dark cave in Cruor, but if I could just figure out how to fix his sibling
s, it would be a step closer to reuniting with him again. The real him.

  “I just think that we should know what we’re doing before attempting it. Is that so unreasonable?”

  Aisha paused, and I even dared get my hopes up that she was considering my words.

  “Well, what exactly are you proposing then?” she huffed. “I have a suspicion about what these creatures are, but I’m not aware of how to eradicate them. That’s why I said we need to experiment. You don’t have a clue about them either, and heck, even the Elder was tight-lipped.”

  Here, I had to be cautious. I held my breath, bracing myself for her reaction. “I, uh… I think that we should go see a witch.”

  Aisha’s nose wrinkled. “A witch? What witch?”

  “I was thinking that we could return to the witch doctor’s island… Uma’s island. She has vast medical knowledge about all types of supernatural creatures because she treats them. She may not have encountered one of these creatures before, but I’m sure she would have more of an inkling than us about them and how one might be able to kill them.”

  “I still think decapitation is the way to go,” Aisha said, still on edge at the mention of seeking help from a witch. It appeared that jinn and witches were reluctant about accepting help from each other. “It’s probably as simple as finding a sharper blade to cut through the bone. We don’t need a witch.”

  “I think we should at least try Uma,” I said, desperate to get through to her. “We’re not even that far from the island. With your powers, it wouldn’t take us a long time to get there.”

  Aisha shook her head. “That snotty witch won’t even see us unless we scout some impossible list of ingredients for her. Seeking her out is a stupid idea.”

  In my desperation, I’d forgotten about Uma’s ridiculous demands. Of course, the witch would expect something in return.

  “I-I still think that we should try,” I persisted. “If we bring a specimen with us, she might just see that as valuable enough an offering to grant us a visit… I mean, this is an entirely new species of creatures. I’m sure that we would be able to arouse her curiosity enough for her to agree to take a look.”