Blood and Beasts Read online

  Blood and Beasts

  By L.M. Miller

  Text copyright © 2014 L.M. Miller

  All Rights Reserved

  To my family and friends for their love and support

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER ONE

  Dawn’s early light slithered under the thick door. Heavy breathing coated the air. In the dim lighting, candles cast writhing shadows on the wall, the fluid movements of the being inside barely detectable. Vicious rows of pearly, jagged teeth shone briefly as the wavering light flickered precariously. Red-rimmed eyes narrowed in anticipation as gossamer threads of saliva dripped from an open mouth. The creature knew the time was near. It knew the time was near, and it waited hungrily. Soon the time would be had. Opening and closing blood-encrusted nails, it waited…

  Sometimes, waking up was the hardest part of the day. Sometimes it was the easiest. Persephone Black, (everyone called her Seph though), sat bolt upright in bed, breathing heavily. It took her a moment to orient herself. She was in her bed. She was in her own bed. Everything was okay. Her ivory hands grazed over the worn comforter, idly tracing a star. What was that dream she had been having? It had been so strange… Usually, in her dreams, she was chased by the monsters, but this time… it felt like she was the monster. She definitely did not prefer being the monster. She’d rather be chased any day.

  The day it was suddenly dawned on her, and she let out a great sigh. It was her sixteenth birthday, and the sun was slicing through the blinds much too sharply already. She squinted against its brightness and rolled over. Her head hurt. Her teeth hurt. Her stomach grumbled. Perfect way to start off her b-day. Her comforter fell to the floor with a thump! She immediately stiffened. Had someone heard that? Five, four, three, two... Tap, tap, tap. The knock was only slight, but it didn’t sound so slight to her. It was like someone had just slammed a sledgehammer against the door.

  "Come in,” she muttered croakily, and the door creaked open, admitting the tiniest slice of light to pierce into her brain. “Close the door,” she ushered Nathaniel’s tall frame inside.

  Her foster sibling, Nate, half a year her junior, entered the bedroom, shutting the door quietly behind him. He had an obvious wrapped gift behind his back. Well, maybe it wasn't supposed to be so obvious. They were in near total darkness. How could she see it so well? Her room was practically pitch-black with the shades drawn. Maybe it was all the carrots she ate…. Whatever, she didn't care for vegetables. She would kill for a nice, juicy steak right now, all red and dripping...

  Nate walked over, knocking into the side of her bed gracelessly before sitting down on the bed beside Seph. They just sat there a moment in companionable silence and, more importantly, darkness. He cleared his throat a little nervously, and she listened to how his heartbeat sped up when he looked at her. That was odd...

  “Last night was pretty crazy,” he commented awkwardly, and she scrunched her face, trying to remember the night before.

  Oh yea… she and Nate had crashed some fellow good student’s birthday party in pre-celebration of her own. It had been a fun night, full of food and drink that wasn't exactly great for you. They had been out so late. Her eyes fell to her bedside clock and widened in shock.

  “It’s noon?!” She gasped, and he nodded, grinning a little crookedly.

  “Ya, you were sleeping like the dead, so I finally just came in. They’re all waiting for you downstairs,” he added, referencing their many foster siblings as well as her two half-siblings and their foster parents.

  "Don't you know not to wake the dead?" She added playfully, and he laughed lightly, blushing a little under his tan skin.

  He cleared his throat again anxiously. What was going on with him? He ran a hand over his jet-black hair nervously. He looked every bit the Cherokee that he was. Pure-blooded, born and raised by his grandmother in the Cherokee ways, after his parents died in a car crash when he was three. Then she had died of a heart attack three years ago, and here he was now. He had found his way to Bill and Janette’s just as Seph had. Coincidence? She didn’t believe in coincidences. Everything happened for a reason, no matter how good or bad it was. You took the pearls with the swine.

  “I-I got you s-something, Seph,” he stammered, and when had that stammer come back?

  His vein was ready to leap out of his throat. They were best friends. They were usually perfectly cool with each other. She shrugged it off as he passed her the gift she had already seen. Delicately unwrapping the bright red ribbon, she opened the box to reveal a delicate silver necklace. A crescent moon dangled from the thin, liquid-light strand. She gasped in shock. It looked expensive. It was more than Nate should have spent on her. It was perfect though. It even matched the crescent moon tattoo (that she should never have gotten) on the back of her hand to perfection.

  “Nate…” she murmured, clearly touched.

  He smiled his heartbreaking smile before gently taking it from her hands and moving to fasten it around her throat. His hands brushed her neck, and she tensed. It felt different… Why? She felt very aware of Nate all of a sudden. What had changed since yesterday, except for her age, of course? Delicately, he fastened the jewelry around her neck, his fingers just barely grazing her skin. He paused, his face inches away from her own. She heard his heartbeat triple, saw the vein in his neck leap, and she knew she had to be reacting the same way. Her heart felt like it could hop right out of her chest. Quickly, he retreated, even more nervous now.

  “The boys also got you something,” he said, slowly extricating a small black box too.

  She thought of her several other foster siblings, all boys, putting together their hard-earned money just for her. It was incredibly sweet. She should really go downstairs, but her head hurt. She was so hungry...

  “They didn’t,” she murmured, slowly extricating a matching silver bracelet from the box, crescent moons and little sun charms dangling from it.

  It matched everything so well. She passed the bracelet over to Nate, holding out her right wrist. The boys really shouldn’t have. It must have cost them a fortune! She also had to wonder where exactly they were getting all this money from. Besides Nate, the oldest of them was Lawrence, who was fourteen, and then Dean, who was only twelve. The pair watched the bracelet sparkle in the faint light seeping from beneath the door. His hand lightly caressed the inside of her wrist, his heartbeat filling the room.

  Seph looked up at him intently. His eyes were dark pools, exotic liquid pools of onyx. Darkness was very appealing to her right now. As though cued, they both slowly leaned forward, and their lips just brushed. Pulling apart for a moment, they searched each other’s eyes for uncertainty. Then they were kissing again. His lips were so smooth and so soft, and why had it taken them so long to
do this? After a few minutes, she began kissing his neck as he petted her hair softly. What was that beneath her lips? It kept jumping repeatedly, and for some reason, she had a strong desire to bite it. An incredibly good feeling welled inside her. Something wonderful was waiting for her in whatever was jumping beneath her mouth.

  She bit it lightly (playfully, she hoped) and immediately, whatever it was, broke and began pouring liquid sweetness down her throat. It nearly tasted alcoholic, like chocolate wine. She moved her body closer to Nate, turning her head to better drink whatever it was that was coming from his neck. It just tasted so wonderful, and Nate didn’t seem to mind. He wasn’t fighting it one bit.

  “Seph…” he murmured and pulled her tighter against him.

  She drank from him. She drank more and more. It was amazing, whatever it was, and it was energizing. She had felt fatigue in her very bones this morning. Now, she felt like she could stay up all day and night. Her senses were tingling. Her heart was beating. Last night, the cake tasted like powdered brick. The ice cream tasted like thick glue. This… this tasted like liquid gold. Nate was slowly becoming limper and limper in her arms, but he held her close, so she just kept drinking. Knock, knock. Familiar voices were talking to her behind the door. She didn’t care. She could not stop.

  Creak… the door opened slowly, and she glanced up. Liquid warmth dribbled down from her mouth.

  Her twin half-siblings were in the doorway. They were arguing over something in their hands, thank the Lord. She moved faster than she thought possible, hauling Nate behind her bed with her. Had they seen?! She poked her head up from behind the bed, searching for them.

  “Seph? What’s going on?” Pearl asked, treading carefully into their room and setting something on their shared vanity.

  “W-What?” She stammered, sounding for all the world like Nate as she hastily wiped at her mouth, her chin, her entire face.

  Nate… Oh, no… Nate! She stared at him, appalled by what she had done. Was he alive? Somehow, she knew he was, and that he was fine. How did she know that? Had she just… had she just drank his blood? What the hell was wrong with her? That was shit vampires did, but there was no way she was a vampire, no way! That was what Monster Academy was for, for rooting out vampires before they did shit like this and taking them away to the boarding school. She was cussing a lot more in her head as she freaked out, she vaguely noted. The twins slowly walked towards her bed. Shit. Shit! SHIT!

  “What’s wrong, Seph?” Pearce called, sounding a little annoyed with all his eleven-year-old importance. “It’s 12:30. Everyone’s waiting downstairs for you, you know,” he stated, crossing his arms haughtily.

  “Pearce! It’s her birthday. She can do whatever she wants,” Pearl piped up, drawing nearer.

  “Don’t come any closer!” She shouted, more than a little hysterical now.

  What was she going to do? What was she going to do?? Nate wasn’t stirring, and he had a gash in his neck that wasn’t stopping. She was covered in his blood. She looked up just as Pearl rounded the bed, and Pearce flipped on a light. Frozen, they locked eyes.

  “Hey,” she was in her closet now, looking at them.

  “What? I thought you were behind the bed,” Pearl said, glancing back and forth rapidly.

  “Must’ve been just a trick of a light. I was in here the whole time,” she stated, ruffling her shining red hair absentmindedly. “Speaking of the light, it’s really bright in here, isn’t it?” She suggested, diverting the conversation expertly.

  “Are you wearing lipstick?” Pearce asked in displease, and she hurriedly rubbed at her mouth.

  “Maybe…” she muttered, and he shook his head.

  “Whatever. I’m eating some cobbler before it gets cold. Hurry up and get dressed, you know,” he added before vacating their room.

  “I could’ve sworn you were behind the bed,” Pearl said softly, and Seph just pegged her with a beaming smile.

  “Obviously I’m not,” she started riffling through her closet.

  “Well then, good morning, sleepyhead!” Pearl’s bright and perky voice shattered the morning’s blessed silence as she greeted her as she always did when she woke up.

  Pearl had the very uncanny ability of always knowing what to say to annoy her big sister, unintentionally surely. It was a very annoying ability. She sighed again, sending a piercing glare over her shoulder. Her pretty little sister, five years younger than her at the age of eleven, bounced around the room like a captured butterfly, flitting this way and that. She nervously glanced at her bed, where Nate had hurriedly been stuffed under. There was probably still some blood on the floor too.

  “So… what are you gonna wear today, Miss Persephone Black? Now that you’re at the great, old age of sixteen, I say you wear something different for a change, like the color yellow,” she stated, throwing open their shared closet door exuberantly as she bypassed her sister.

  “Why yellow?” She asked her sister carefully backpedaling to stand in front of a red spot on the floor.

  “Because it’s happy and sunny and not like you at all, Seph,” she responded cheerily.

  “Thanks, sis,” she grumbled.

  That girl had way too much energy this early in the morning. Half the day was already gone. Hmmm… when had she become such a morning bird? To be honest though, she was feeling positively energetic after drinking Nate’s blood. Nate… That was a subject sure to depress her. Her eyes flit to the bed briefly. Pearl tapped a foot impatiently for her sister’s attention although she knew very well that Seph could care less what she wore. She pulled on some dark clothes, as usual.

  “Seph, you’re so pretty. Why do you dress like you’re some Goth wannabe vampire? Why do you have to wear that black shit all the time?” Pearl complained, and Seph gasped, whirling on her younger sister.

  “Pearl Black! Don’t let me ever catch you cussing like that again!” She said sternly, and Pearl flinched. “I’m sorry,” Seph said hurriedly. “I’m just having a really weird day,” she stated lamely.

  She felt awkward in her skin. It was tingling with energy, crawling with vim (a synonym for energy, she had recently learned). Seph caught Pearl shaking her head in the mirror and absentmindedly compared their reflections. The half-sisters could not have looked more different. Just more evidence that Seph never quite fit in anywhere…

  Seph was fair-skinned while Pearl’s skin was the color of coffee with too much cream in it. Seph had rich, red hair that fell straight down her back. Pearl had frizzy, dark-brown hair usually pulled up into twin pigtails. Seph was short and slender. Pearl was already nearly taller than her and still growing. They looked nothing alike. However, upon closer examination, one saw the same winged brows, the same shaped eyes, the same strong jaw. They were related.

  They had the same mother but not the same father. Seph had never known her father, and she accepted that. Pearl and her twin brother, Pearce’s, dad had been the man that Seph had always considered her father. Her mother had been with him for six years, and he had treated Seph like she was his own flesh and blood. She could still remember his smiling eyes…

  She could also still remember his receding back when he left her mother during her third trimester. The twins had never even known their father, and Seph could not exactly paint a proper picture of him because it waxed and waned with her moods. She went from extreme anger at his abandonment to extreme warmth at his love and care before the twins. Did she secretly resent them for being the reason her father figure left? No… She would take them over his abandoning ass any day. Sometimes though, wonder would creep into her mind…

  “Why are you staring at me? It’s kinda creepy. And your eyes look kinda weird,” Pearl’s voice piped up and snapped Seph back to reality.

  She immediately looked away, wondering if her eyes were going to change like other vampires’ did. Was she really a vampire? This was so insane!

  “Sorry, just… thinking,” she sincerely hoped her sister was not going to get one of her intui
tive little thoughts and figure out that she had been brooding over the past.

  “Thinking about what?” Pearl propped herself up on the edge of her own unmade bed, targeting Seph with her perceptive eyes.

  Seph sighed, sitting at the little stool in front of their mirror. She began methodically putting on her make-up and trying exceptionally hard to ignore Pearl’s penetrating glare. She also kept trying not to glance at the bed, hoping against hope that Nate wasn’t bleeding out there. She lightly tousled her vibrant hair as Pearl just stared and stared and stared.

  “Are you thinking about your last birthday with Mom?” Without warning, Seph was assailed with visions of her mother swinging at her as she protected the twins.

  She felt her outer shell harden, and her teeth felt sharper in her mouth. Aggression spiked in her, and bitterness laced her voice as she addressed her sister coolly.

  “Pearl, Mom beat us nearly every day with just about anything she could get her hands on. Why would one of the many birthdays I had with her, which always ended the same way, matter to me now?” She snapped back, unable to keep the rising resentment out of her voice.

  An awkward silence passed between them as she finally finished with her hair and make-up and slipped on her shoes. Pearl’s honey eyes sparkled with tears, and Seph was taken aback. She whirled around. Had she been that mean? It was her birthday! Why did she have to deal with this? Shouldn’t everything just go fine and dandy today? First, she bites her best friend (after kissing him!); now, she was causing her little sister to fall into tears. She was just… hungry. How could she still be hungry?! Her eyes briefly fell on Pearl’s neck. What she wouldn’t do for a chocolate bar with some raspberry filling or a really rare steak… Or some blood.

  “Pearl, I’m sorry,” she moved forward and pulled her sister into a hug. “I wasn’t thinking about Mom and the day we finally got taken away from there. I was just thinking about Dad…” she stated, tucking her head against her sister’s neck.

  She smelled… good. She smelled like food. Were they cooking downstairs? She was so hungry. She was surprised her stomach hadn’t started eating itself yet. She just wanted some food! Was she really considering biting her little sister? This was terrible! She pulled back from her little sister a little forcefully. Pearl glanced up at her, eyelashes wet with teary diamonds.