Life Amaranthine
by Bekah See
Prologue
Ringing boot heels sound across the street, echoing off the cobbles, and rebounding from the deserted buildings. Wild ringlets of golden hair fly at the edges of her vision, sometimes obscuring, sometimes framing the road as it rushes by under her running feet. A corner comes into view, and the mad dash slows.
She knows what comes next, and she fights, not wanting to see it. Not again. But resistance is futile in this world of darkness and mists, and the corner of the building comes closer of its own volition. She tries to close her eyes, to turn her head, but nothing stops the onslaught of images. The smell of blood overpowers the mustiness of the city, sharp and metallic in her mind. The street slips by, and she can feel her heels as they strike the stones beneath her, sending jarring impacts up her legs. She rounds the corner, her desperate fight to stop not slowing her at all.
A woman comes into view. Tall and proud, her face smooth and pale, her blonde hair ornately coiled on top of her head. Sobbing silently, she moves closer to the woman, who stands motionless, awaiting her fate. Slowly now, inexorably she is drawn toward the other, and she reaches for her. The woman speaks, but her words are nothing more than a buzz filtering through the terror in her mind. Cold white hands reach out from beneath a black cloak and she looks down at them, her curls, so similar to those of the one before her, once again framing her vision. Her fingers wrap around the other's arms and pull her close. The woman offers no opposition; there is no battle for supremacy.
She screams soundlessly within herself, fighting, clawing, trying desperately to stop this, to keep from doing this hideous thing. But it will not stop, and all she can do is watch, horrified, as she lowers her head to the woman's neck and punctures her throat with razor sharp teeth. Hot metallic blood fills her mouth and she sucks greedily, draining every last drop from the one who gave her life.
Helen Magnus, physician and veteran of numerous gruesome fights to the death, awoke with a scream that rattled the leaded glass of her chamber in its frame. Horrified at the intensity of her dream, she raced to the washroom to lose everything she had eaten that day and significantly more. Terror ripped through her, triggering her fight or flight instinct, but she was too weak and frightened to move. So, shivering, sick with grief and self-loathing, she lowered herself to the cold marble floor and sobbed as memory came crashing over her once again. Memories of what she had done. Of what she had become.
Chapter 1
"He's back," Helen said flatly, walking into the library and dropping a newspaper onto a nearby table.
Dr. Robert Ransome looked up from the paper he was reading and eyed his longtime friend and associate. "Who is back?"
"That bloody bastard who killed my mother, that's who," she spat out, fury lacing her words with venom. "I heard several women down near the hospital gossiping about him and his notorious charms as if he were a knight in shining armour who is going to come and save them from the depravity of their lives." She paced furiously before the fireplace, her arms gesturing wildly as she spoke. "As if he could do anything for their lives but end them."
Ransome put down his paper and removed his glasses, rubbing the bridge of his nose wearily. At sixty five years of age, he was often the voice of caution and reason to his younger associate. Ever since the disappearance of John Druitt a few years back and then with the death of her father not long after, Helen had become reckless and easy to anger. She often took unnecessary chances with her life to capture some of the most dangerous creatures in London and its surrounding areas.
More recently she had begun to calm, and Ransome had hoped she was reverting back to her more level headed self. He feared that the appearance of the man who had killed her mother, however, was going to set her back a long way.
His concern was validated a moment later when she spoke again, "But now that he has returned, he can finally be made to answer for his crimes."
"Helen, please, you must calm yourself." The doctor steepled his fingers and looked at her over the tops. "Think about this. Do you remember how your mother died? Do you know what this man is?"
"Of course," she said, still pacing. "His name is Stephen Redding, and he is a psychotic murderer who was able to evade capture for the murder of my mother, and several others." Her voice dropped and she sat down in a chair, looking at the floor. "I know he killed them in a brutal way that leeched every drop of blood from their bodies." Tears formed in her eyes. "I remember running away, frightened to death, leaving her lying on the street, white and cold."
"Helen, her death was not your fault." Ransome said firmly. "You were very young."
"Perhaps." Helen continued to look at the floor, lost in memories of the nightmare of that night. "But things are different now. And I have the ability and the opportunity to stop him from repeating his crimes."
Ransome stood and came to kneel before her, taking her hands in his. "Helen, please listen to me. You must not peruse this man. He is as dangerous as he is evil, and he will have no compunctions about taking your life the same way he took your mother's."
Her head snapped up and her blue eyes blazed. "He can try. But as I said, I've grown up since then. I'm no longer a helpless little girl. I've taken down monsters ten times worse than this coward." Abruptly she stood, shaking off the gentle support and resumed her pacing. "I need to find a way to track him, to keep an eye on what he does day and night."
Ransome stood as well, and faced her, his hands clasped loosely before him, his head bowed. "Helen, if you are determined to do this, then there is something you need to know about your target."
"And what, pray tell, would that be?"
"Stephen Redding is a vampire."