has a weakness, and I bet vampires aren’t all that different.
Either way, I’m not going down without a fight.
Chapter Four
It’s cold. Not that annoying sort of cold, but the temperature that worries me that frostbite is a real issue, and I like my toes where they are. The vamps don’t seem to give a monkey’s arse about us as we walk through the red snow covering the sand, away from the docked boat. My clothes are still wet, and it is odd they don’t care about keeping us alive, considering all they went through to kidnap us. Maybe they do this a lot, and it’s not odd at all. I think of my uncle for a moment...he was right. He said they were out hunting, and he was dead bang right about it all. But how could he have known that?
The dock was empty, with nothing more than a rocky, snow-covered beach and a few trees to be seen after we got out of the boat. There are twenty-four of us in this group—I counted on the boat—and three vamps. I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t the silence of the island in the dead of the night. The forest seems endless, as does the snow freezing my toes off, until we come to a house in the middle of it. The house appears normal, nothing odd about it at all, but it feels all kinds of wrong. The house itself is attached to the bottom of the mountain, and its white-framed windows and brick walls look almost out of place here. There is nothing personalised about the house, and soon the vamp opens the door, and we are ushered inside.
All of us are crammed into this tiny house, and I wonder if there are others like it? There was certainly more than one ship. I consider running away for a brief second...but then the thought comes...where would I go?
How am I going to escape this damn island?
I follow the guy in front of me into the house, which is warm, and my toes are thankful for it as I stand shivering in the hallway, nothing but several doors and a staircase to look at.
“Send one of them up!” a woman shouts down, her very British and almost Cockney, aka London-sounding, voice familiar to my ears. Please pick someone else. Please pick—I’m jolted from my thoughts as a vamp man grabs my elbow and leads me to the stairs, giving me a slight shove up the first two steps.
Pushing down my fear, I walk to the top of the stairs, which opens to one massive room littered with four wardrobes and two dressing tables. Shelves of boxes fill the corner of the room, and there are several white doors. The house creaks in the wind, and it smells like expensive perfume in here.
A woman stands in the middle of the room, and I stare at her as she looks right back. She is pretty and strange all at the same time. With her long black hair, dark tanned skin, and stylish brown leather dress, she almost seems normal, but then I see the tattoos on her cheeks. Two sigils, if I guess right, and they are completely different. One is a circle shape with birds making the circle, and in the middle is a sword with wings behind it. The other one is a dragon wrapped around a dagger with fire in a circle around it. They look burnt on, like she was branded many years ago, as they are fully healed. Why would anyone do that to themselves?
I don’t know how I know it, but this woman is a vamp. I think it’s the way they hold themselves, no crouching or movements like breathing. She is just still, and the more she stares, the more uncomfortable I get, but I still hold eye contact. Her sharp green eyes are a clear challenge.
“Oh, they will like you, girl,” she eventually states, breathing out the sentence in a husky tone. “I can smell your blood from here, and it is different. Delicious.”
She licks her lips. “I might bid for you myself, seeing as I’m not allowed to feed on the new stock.”
“Were you ever human?” I question, crossing my arms. I’m done being frightened of these monsters if they are going to kill me anyway. “Are you all born vampires with no ounce of humanity left to save you?”
She laughs and walks across the room. “Humanity is overrated, as