Chapter 24

Prey

In the darkness I heard many voices, some near, some far whispering a single word.

Slayer

I smelled stale cigarettes in a pay phone. I saw snow upon the pavings, grey with dirt. I heard a beep, a rattle of change being swallowed by the machinery within. An older woman speaks, but I do not see her. Her tone hushed.

"The Watcher has her. American. White. Brown hair. Short. This one is dangerous. This one has fire." The woman says.

The vision bleeds away, as if a mere reflection of a puddle of crawling oil.

Then, a violent image flashes up. A grey sky, the sting and stench of sea salt. Hammering fists smash painfully into my skull, arms move fast, a stake- death gripped between four quivering, bloodied hands, a struggle to the death.

Pain.

My scream wakes me as I fall.

...

"Helvete da, Buffy!" Diana groans as she staggers in through my door, her eyes bleary, ash white hair all a tangle about her face. She slumps onto my bed and points the dictaphone at me. "Go. Yes. Recording. Fæn."

I recount the imagery and words as best I can before they fade. Diana paws at her eyes, trying to wake. When I am finished, I try to decipher what I have seen.

"They know you have me." I say. "The many voices. They know."

"Maybe. Maybe. Fæn, you know, this is the seventeenth vision since we got here. They are getting more frequent. Somebody really wants you to know something." She rolls back on my bed and lets the dictaphone drop "or hates me and never wants me to sleep."

She turns to look at me and smiles, her hand warm on mine.

"I was dreaming of puppies. Many, many puppies. Little chocolate ones with cold noses." She says "I will make us breakfast."

"Why can't I dream about puppies?" I shout after her.

I realize my hand is still on my heart, the fabric of my top wet through with cold sweat. I taste blood in my mouth where I have bitten my tongue, but I know it will heal by the time I need to eat. Slayer healing is a marvelous thing.

I strip off my clothes and pad over to the tiny bathroom area. There is no shower, only a claw footed bath and a rubber shower hose that fits the taps. As I rinse down, Diana enters and balances a mug of fresh coffee on the side of the tub. I no longer feel ashamed to be naked around her, which is good because the bathroom had no privacy and the concept of shame seems utterly lost of Diana; I probably saw her as naked as often as clothed.

"Happy Birthday." She said, placing down a small parcel next to the coffee. I must have looked confused. "It is January nineteenth today in America. You made it to seventeen. Go you."

I unwrap the gift, and chuckle. It is a small white plastic pony.

…

Diana and I have breakfast out on the balcony. The sun is shining but the light weak, it is perfectly pleasant. My body feels good from my morning workout.

"How long are we going to be doing this?" I say. "Just training. No slayage."

"Until you are ready." She says, her mouth full of pastry. "The woman in the dream is right about you. You have fire. You just have to learn to use it." she says. "We have very, very important work for you."

"So, what? Out there all the vampires and demons just have a free pass until I am ready?"

"All the more reason to train hard to you are ready, faster. Then they will all pay." she winks and goes back to reading.

"My vision. They know where we are."

"Maybe." she shrugs. "But we don't invite them in. If the come? We kill them. A lot."

It didn't seem like a great plan to me. Sure, The Ward of Saint Dymphna meant that vampires could not enter any home uninvited, but I was pretty sure her spell didn't cover hand grenades.

The fact Diana seemed nonplussed just didn't sit right to me. How could vampires tolerate a Slayer in the very heart of their society?

"Who are The Volturi?" That question gets her attention. She pushes her glasses down and swallows her bite. Then she returns to her novella.

"A vampire coven. The biggest, most powerful. Why?"

"Something a vampire told me once. Said something like 'they had few laws, but the Volturi kept them'."

"You have many conversations with vampires?" She asked, sounding somewhat suspicious.

"Not long ones." I shrug, stabbing my fork into a sausage slice.

Call me a sucker for punishment, but there I was again, on this peaceful morning, thinking about Alice Cullen. Why couldn't I let her go? Was it her thrall? The way vampires where enchanting by nature? Or was I just caught by her visions of us together in love?

It was cruel how the visions had not shared with Alice that I was a Vampire Slayer. Maybe I not supposed to have been called? Did India Cohen, the girl before me, make a fatal decision that would set in motion the events that would shatter Alice's vision? Was I supposed to reach eighteen, like Tove and Erica, only to fall prey to a vampire like Alice had? Was there an angel out there for me too?

If, for the sake of argument, that somewhere, deep inside me, a dark desire lurked. A desire, perhaps, to be turned by Alice into the very thing I was created to destroy. If such a thing ever crossed my mind, I knew it was impossible.

She was sworn to never take a human life. I knew that if she tasted of my blood, she would frenzy- for even the taste of my skin on her lips drew her to ecstasy. Drinking me dry, I would simply die, never to rise. Then could she stop with just me? It was one hell of a wagon to fall off.

I shuddered at the thought of Alice's beautiful face, twisted into a fanged horror with a blood red viper's stare. Shying from the sunlight, her clothes stained and stinking of sewers as she lept upon a terrified infant.

No. I refuse to let her become a monster. To do those things.

And what of me? Would I have the will to fight the burning lust for blood? Would my split-wide mouth glisten with rows of razor fangs? Would I tear out the throats of mad girls in dark places?

Alice. Oh, my Alice. How cruel it must be.

I wonder where she is now. Alaska perhaps? I know she is awake right now. I hope she can forget me.

"Do you have someone, Diane?" I ask.

"A boyfriend? No. Not my thing." She wrinkles her nose.

"Do you like sex?"

"No. Not really. No."

"I do." I say. "I miss it."

Diana doesn't look up from her book.

"Find someone to fuck." She says, matter of factly. "Don't bring them here. Don't get attached. Don't use your real name."

I gaze out over the town, and wonder if Leah Clearwater ever thinks of me.

…

The night calls to me, as it always has, and my lust is rising like a fever. The sounds of distant laughter and music drift in from my balcony. I cannot lay still.

And so, I do what I must, I rise.

My eye makeup is dark, my lips glossy and red. I wear a short black dress with a draped hood, its gossamer layers whisper of the curves I hide beneath. It once belonged to Alice, of course, and I can smell her sweet scent on it. It drives me wild with desire.

I stalk through the dark winding alleys of Volterra, following the sounds and scents to their source.

The bar is small, packed tight with young bodies drenched in red light. Slipping back the hood so it falls around my shoulders, I plunge into the very heart of the dancers.

Their bodies are hot against me, damp with sweat, grinding, wanting. I let myself go to the throb and swell of the music, gyrating my hips slowly, curling my arms sensually above my head. Enchanting any and all that dare look upon me.

I am The Slayer. Fear me. Want me.

I see her then. Her eyes meet mine and she cannot look away. Slowly I close the distance as I dance, so slowly, so confidently, she cannot escape now- she is lost to me. We dance together without speaking, both of us imagining the night that is to come.

Then, when she cannot bear the need I stir in her any longer, she grasps my hand and leads me out into the night, back to her hotel room.

She tells me her name is Erica and that she is backpacking through Europe before heading to college. I tell her nothing. She tells me that her folks are from China, rich, cold hearted and will never accept her sexuality. When she speaks, it is with an English accent and a barely-there lisp I find adorable.

She doesn't know my name when I pull the wine glass from her hand, finish it and let it fall. She doesn't know the name of the girl who presses her to the wall, whose lips on her throat makes her burn with passion. The mystery girl in Italy who made her lose herself over and over and over, until she would never again be so satisfied. I left my mark. I ensured that she would never forget me.

To her my name is Alice.