“You seem smart enough, Duncan,” the tall vampire taunted. “You know this is already over. We can do this a multitude of ways, but please note I have a preference. The less blood I have to wash out of my clothes, the better.” he sneered.

Duncan brandished Minerva menacingly, “Quite arrogant of you to assume you will walk away from this encounter only suffering some dirty laundry.”

The vampire smiled again, his sharp teeth glistening, “We were told you had a spine. I look forward to beating some of your foolish human friends here to death with it.”

I gulped loudly, but thankfully no one noticed. Despite the verbal threats, none of the vampires were stirring. They stood calmly, unblinking, and unflinching. I still didn’t see more than ten of them, but with how dangerous I assumed them to be, ten was plenty. Ten thralls would have been difficult enough, but this was way worse than that. I felt my heart beating faster as I realized we weren’t all going to walk away from this.

“So, which will it be? Can we get on with the feasting or are you going to make us work for it? We weren’t given instructions on explicitly how to deal with you, just that it resulted in your death.”

“You are all just well-dressed lackeys then?” Duncan laughed. “Run along and summon your master. I’m on a deadline and have bigger fish to fry than you.”

At that, the tall vampire bristled, with some of the others snarling and baring their teeth. They weren’t pleased with being so easily brushed aside.

“I see humans have gotten even more arrogant these past few centuries. You have forgotten whose boot was on your neck and it has become apparent our absence in this world as pest control has been sorely missed. It’s time you remember who the rightful rulers of these lands are!”

With a snap of his fingers, the vampire on his left vanished for just a moment before reappearing, holding a still beating heart in a bloody fist.

I gasped in shock as one of our soldiers suddenly fell forward, collapsing hard on the rocky ground. I watched as thick blood started pooling underneath him, soaking the ground and red snow in an even deeper red hue. I choked as I saw the fist sized hole ripped through the back of his leather armor, the vampire reaching in effortlessly through the soldier’s defenses to claim his prize. The man had not made a sound or even cried out as he was killed, his death instantaneous.

I turned back and shivered as the vampire bit into the heart like a fresh ripe apple plucked from a tree, the blood staining his purple lips. Satisfied with the treat, he tossed the rest of it behind him. The nearby vampires eyed it greedily but none of them moved to claim it as the heart plopped wetly away. I gripped Lily tightly as I watched it roll in the snow, realizing my hands were starting to get clammy with sweat.

“Satisfied? I can do it again if you need another demonstration. Surrender, and I can assure you will be killed before we feast. I can’t guarantee the alternative if you struggle.” He eyed us hungrily, one by one, and I unconsciously took a step back as he swept his gaze past me.

Duncan was undeterred. “You seem to have forgotten how resilient humans are. We outnumber you and are more than capable of forcing you to render your immorality!”

The vampire ran his hands through his slicked back hair and laughed loudly. “Outnumber us? You should learn to count, old man. Or have you gone senile as well as delusional?”

I paused at this and looked back down our lines for a quick headcount. The vamp was right. Of the seventeen soldiers that accompanied us after leaving Rosethorne, six of them were missing. Seven, if you counted the one they had just made an example of. I then held my breath and double checked as I realized someone else was missing. Kit was also gone!

Focus! Kit is fine. He has to be!

I shook my head to quickly bring me back around. I had to pay attention to what was in front of me, what I could control. However, despite my attempts to get ahold of myself, I couldn’t ignore the sinking feeling in my stomach. This was going to be messy. The vampire wasn’t stupid. He understood we had all done the math and was enjoying letting doubt and fear set in on our faces, but we weren’t prepared for his next move.

He snapped his fingers again, and we heard movement behind us.

Several of us risked turning to see our missing comrades stalking towards us slowly. They were still wearing their gear, but their helmets were gone, and their skin was pale and pulled tight around their gruesome faces, each frozen with an expression of terror as they had died. Each pale neck had puncture marks with crusted blood trails from a lethal bite. Their eyes were glossed over, their hands were deformed and clawed, awkwardly gripping whatever weapon they had brought with them.

They had been turned.

My eyes widened at this new threat. I checked each of them and breathed a sigh of relief that none of them were Kit. He had to be ok, but where had he run off to then?

“I believe the odds are heavily in our favor now, Duncan, but it’s clear you want to die a warrior’s death. Such a shame you’re choosing violence for your companions as well.”

Duncan roared, spit flying angrily from his mouth, and he charged the heart of the pack of menacing monsters in front of us.

Another snap.

Several hands exploded from the ground beneath us and started clawing at our legs, attempting to pull us to the ground as hungry thralls pulled themselves out of their hiding places for the ambush.

I leaped back in surprise and hacked at an outstretched claw.

This was very bad! We were surrounded and had even lost control of our positioning. I glanced back up at where the vamps had been standing, but just as suddenly as they had appeared, they were gone. I whirled my head left and right, expecting to catch a glimpse of color as they ran through our group or saw them pounce on one of our soldiers, but I saw nothing. Were they that determined to not get their clothes dirty? Or maybe Duncan’s threats of our group shook them more than they let on and they retreated until our numbers had been further thinned?

Either way, our situation drastically improved with their sudden disappearance. The surprise from the thralls caught us off guard, but it seemed there weren’t even that many, and our soldiers had been alert enough that the surprise attack had not cost us. I saw none of our soldiers falling, and Chad and Duncan were venting their frustrations effortlessly on any foe within reach.

I turned back to face our fallen six and saw them lumbering in. They were moving very slowly, slower than I had expected, despite being newly turned. Duncan had mentioned the turning happens at nightfall once bitten, but he referenced a bite from a thrall, not from something more powerful. Also, who was to say we knew the full extent of what vampires could do? We hadn’t fought them in centuries after all. But whatever influence the more powerful elf vampires had used to quickly turn our guys, it had made them a shell of what they might have been if the vamps had more prep time. They swayed clumsily as they continued towards us, almost as if they were zombies instead of some weaker vampire thrall.

“Chad! I need you!” I yelled, and I dashed towards a couple of them, hoping to cull some numbers and prevent us from being overwhelmed. My breath hot in the cold air, I paced my breathing to steady my nerves and slid low under a slow swing from my first obstacle. I immediately stood and jabbed Lily into the side of his skull and he jerked awkwardly on his stiff neck as I yanked the dagger back out.

“I’m sorry.” I whispered.

I had killed before today, many times in my early Bronzemead patrol days, but this was different. I had never killed someone I had known. It felt wrong. For a split second, time slowed down as I watched a familiar face fall to the ground, and I tried to make it easier by telling myself I did him justice by ending the cruel state the vampires left him in.

“Amelia! Watch out!”

I blinked and raised Lily just in time to block an incoming swipe from my next foe. The blow may have been slow, but the strength behind it was still unnatural, and my legs gave way as I fell to one knee. I grunted and my arms started to shake with my efforts to stop the blade from following through down into my neck. Chad arrived not a moment too soon and separated the head from his shoulders, immediately freeing me from my desperate situation.

“Are you ok? Are you going to be able to do this?” he asked, a serious look on his face, but a flash of concern in his eyes.

I nodded as I stood, “I’m ok. It just…. took a second. We knew them, you know?”

He nodded back in understanding, then turned and leapt to the next stumbling turned soldier. I turned the opposite direction and ran to catch up to the couple that had wandered past me towards the skirmish in the clearing.

We were scattered everywhere. I only saw a handful of our soldiers still fighting. I didn’t immediately notice more of us lying dead on the ground, but the confusion from the surprise attack had further separated us and had taken away the one strength we’d had. I saw a soldier still dealing with a thrall that had snagged him from the ground ambush and had his back turned to the former soldier thrall he had once called an ally, who was about to attack him from behind.

Not today.

The soldier thrall had dropped his sword and was reaching out hungrily to grab his victim, only I got there first, and rammed my dagger into the back of his head. I then heaved my shoulder into his back and shoved as I pulled Lily away, forcing my new paperweight to fall onto the other thrall. It screamed as the heavy corpse fell on top of it, forgetting its hunger for a mouthful of the living and thrashing at the dead body now collapsed on top of it. The soldier I rescued wasted no time and took advantage of the distraction to cut the thrall’s head in two.

He turned to salute with a wave of his sword, only to pause in confusion as he realized his rescuer. I just grinned and waved, then pointed behind him at his buddy who needed some help. I turned to look for Chad and found that he had finished hacking away at our remaining fallen. The turned soldier threat was now dealt with and I didn’t see more than a couple of the ambushing ground thralls remaining either. Unfortunately, I didn’t see Duncan or half of what was left of our forces either.

And still no damn Kit.

I ran up to Chad as he finished up. “You see where Duncan ran off to? And I haven’t seen Kit since we made it into the clearing either!”

Chad huffed and steadied his breathing as he looked around.

“Damn it, Kit!”

I’ll take that as a “no” then.

So, where was Duncan?

As if to answer my question, one of the elf vamps suddenly flew past us, hurtling into a thick tree trunk. He was bloody and beaten, one of his arms were missing, and his clothes torn and disheveled. As it struggled to get up off the ground, I saw it wasn’t the taller vampire who had been running the show. Duncan thundered past us at a speed I hadn’t ever seen him use, one that should have been impossible for someone his size and as heavily armored as he was.

Still in a prone position, the vampire didn’t stand a chance as it lifted its remaining hand attempting to catch Minerva’s falling axe head. The axe cleaved through hand, arm, and bone on its way down and through the vampire’s head. Duncan then kicked the corpse off Minerva and tossed another vampire’s head he had clutched in his grasp down on the ground next to it before crushing it under his boot angrily.

He had taken out two of them? By the Goddess!

Chad and I stood dumbfounded as we watched Duncan finish his outrage against what remained of two of the more powerful vampires that humanity had seen in hundreds of years. I leaned into Chad and whispered, “One of these days, you’ll need to tell me more about that thundering mountain of a man over there.”

Chad raised his eyebrows in agreement from my shock of the situation and blew out a breath. Despite the humbling losses Chad had endured against Duncan during their sparring, this appeared to be the first time he had seen this side to Duncan, and he was just as taken aback as I was.

Duncan seemed completely unphased, as he walked back and looked us both over. “Good, you’re both still alive. Kit is also hunting them in the trees, so we have that going for us as well.”

I closed my eyes and mumbled a thanks to the Goddess that Kit was safe. I had refused to let my mind wander to the alternatives.

Duncan surveyed the remnants of the fighting in the clearing, “We’ve all been scattered, and the rest of the vampires still have us caged in. They fanned out and encircled us to make certain we had nowhere to run, which was their mistake. We may be more vulnerable while separated, but so are they. I pursued those two to thin their numbers. If we move quickly, the three of us can work together and eliminate more of them before they regroup and attack as one. Hurry!”

Without another word, he rushed off, expecting us to follow. Chad did so without hesitation. I looked around again, concerned that we weren’t attempting to regroup ourselves and attack in a larger force. While it looked like our remaining forces had survived the ambush, leaving them lost in the trees felt almost like leaving them for dead. I wondered if we had gotten far enough away from Ash, Dorian, and Julius to ensure they were safe. I also desperately hoped they hadn’t been dumb enough to try and follow after us.

I couldn’t dwell on it long. I hated it, but Duncan and Chad were already getting away from me and I didn’t want to lose them in the forest. I said a prayer to the Goddess for our soldier’s safety and turned to give chase.