The Sacred Night, Chapter Four
It was my fourth night traveling with Misao. There was no moon, so it was abnormally dark. This wasn't a terrible inconvenience for me, but Misao was having difficulty seeing a foot in front of her face. She occasionally wandered off the path in the darkness, and I had to go fetch her on these occasions. This night, the new moon, was also most vampires' favorite time to go on rampages through human villages and have 'fun.' They would sometimes torture and always kill as many victims as time allowed, only feeding on one each. I had never participated in one of these, but I had gone along on one once because I'd been invited. Even then, before I'd developed this non-killing philosophy, I'd found the practice shameful. Value of their lives aside, it would still be a waste of perfectly good humans, though that wasn't why I didn't do it now. I cared about their lives for their own sakes, though it seemed I was alone in this.
I was not especially worried, since there weren't many vampires about in general. This was my island, after all, and other vampires respected that. I ran across the occasional one in my travels, and although I never told them to leave, most never ventured in for fear of my wrath. As much as I might be tempted to order them all out so my island would be safe, I couldn't do that at the expense of other areas. They had to feed to exist, and if they didn't do it on my island, they would do it somewhere else. This night would bring out any that were here, however, and I hoped they would overlook Misao.
This wasn't an entirely futile hope, because any vampire who could sense Misao could also sense me, and the fact that I was with her might lend itself to the assumption that she was mine. She wasn't, but the other vampires didn't need to know that. She would also carry traces of my aura after traveling with me for a few nights as she had, which would also serve to brand her as mine, or after awhile, might even make her aura read like that of a weak vampire. Then she wouldn't be in any danger.
"Stay a little closer, Misao-dono," I requested, and she smiled as she did. She probably thought I was being affectionate, but I was actually nervous for her safety. I didn't want to disappoint her, so I let her believe what she wanted. It wasn't that I didn't have affection for her, but that just wasn't on my mind at the moment.
Soon, my fears were realized as I sensed a vampiric presence popping up nearby. It was nowhere near the edge of my range of senses, so he or she must have just teleported in. The presence flickered and popped up somewhere else. It did this several times, and I surmised that this was a newly changed vampire, just realizing he or she could do that. It was kind of funny when I thought about it. It was no longer funny when the young vampire popped up in front of us. He was tall, muscular, and clear complected- the kind of person who I'd venture to say was popular with females when he was alive. Maybe he still was.
"Is he..." Misao whispered to me while the man was still out of earshot, or so she thought, anyway.
"Hai," I replied, not bothering to whisper, as I knew he had heard her question.
"So you picked up on my little secret, bishoujo?" He asked playfully, smiling at Misao. Yes, definitely popular with females.
"H-Hai. I know you're a vampire, so leave right now, because I don't intend to bleed for you," she replied, increasing in confidence as she spoke.
"How can that be, when you've probably bled for this man standing next to you a hundred times, or didn't you know he was one as well?" The man asked coolly.
"I knew. You know how I found out? I saw him drinking his own blood so he wouldn't get too hungry to keep from feeding on me. That's why I'm willing to bleed for him," she spat. What was she talking about? She'd never bled for me, and if she wanted to do so, I wouldn't let her.
"Is that so? Drinking his own blood... it seems the legendary hunter has gone soft. What a pity, he's not even old yet," the tall man continued.
Leave. This is still my island, no matter what I choose to do with the humans on it. I want them safe, so leave them that way, I mentally scolded the other man.
"Oh, asserting your claim finally, eh? You're not the hunter I've heard about, mister. If you're not going to feed on your humans, let a real vampire do it!"
"His humans? Not such a bishoujo now, am I? I'm just a meal to you, and that's why you're not getting near me!" She punctuated her last sentence with a sweeping gesture and four kunai embedded in the other vampire's throat.
Leave now, Misao-dono. He'll try to chase you, but I'll take care of him, I told her mentally.
Is this the mind stuff you were telling me about earlier? She thought, assuming correctly that I would be reading it.
I'll explain later, go! I commanded as the other vampire picked the kunai out of his neck, royally ticked now. Misao seemed to see that her strategies were not going to work, because she did begin to run. The vampire lunged after her, but I barred his path. He went around me, and I couldn't get in his way fast enough, so I drew my sword and hit him in the back, knocking him to the ground. This was one rare time when I wished I had a regular sword, because I knew there was nothing I could do to kill this vampire anyway, short of decapitating him.
For a human, it might have been a disconcerting sight to see the handsome young man morph into a large, black panther while lunging up toward me to strike, but I had seen similar things, even done them myself, on many occasions. I didn't really know why, except maybe that we're vain, but for some reason, when we changed into other creatures, they usually reflected our natural forms. My animal of choice was usually a red dragon, or sometimes simply a red lizard.
I blocked him from coming too close with my sword, but his teeth still clipped the side of my face and his claws tore far into my arms. I threw him off, but not without dragging his claws farther through my flesh. Of course, being a cat, he landed on all four paws and tensed to run at me again. This time, I rushed to attack first so I could end this fight and take Misao somewhere far away from this person. I struck right in the middle of his skull from above, and hoped that would put him out for awhile, but he had fed much more recently than I had. He hesitated, but swiped at my legs with a front paw and, seeing my opportunity, I removed said paw.
He howled, but began to lap at the blood coming out of the stump where his right forepaw had been. He slowly changed back into a man, and I saw that his right arm was cut off just below the elbow. I briefly wondered what that blood tasted like, since it varied from person to person, but dismissed the thought quickly enough to begin running in the direction Misao had gone a few moments ago. I caught up to her, still running, and swept her up to bring her along at my much faster pace. I felt dizzy already from the fight and the running was worsening it, but all I had to do at this point was get Misao as far away from that vampire as I could.
I ran as fast as I could even though my legs felt ready to melt from under me and I was beginning to see spots in front of my eyes. I felt oddly hot, and if I'd been human, I would have been sweating profusely and breathing painfully. As it was, I was not breathing, my heart was not racing, and I was not sweating, but I still felt like I was going to lose consciousness any time. I tried breathing to see if it would help, and it did help some. I didn't usually breathe, since I didn't need to do so to survive, but apparently it did help with physical exertion. I could also cause my heart to beat if I wanted it to do so, but I had never seen the point until now. It would have to distribute the products of my breathing.
With the breathing and the heartbeat, I was able to continue twenty minutes before my vision started to go black around the edges, and it continued to worsen until I lost all awareness of the world. I didn't even feel us hit the ground.
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hmm, this chapter's sort of short, isn't it? Oh well, i think it was a good one.
PraiseDivineMercy: glad you liked the name. i keep forgetting to name them until i get to ff.net to post them and there's that little box i don't know what to put in... glad you agree with me about how ken makes a good vamp. I wouldn't be so disgusted, because i like vamps, but i suppose somebody who has seen one might think otherwise... no, he will not be dying. I suppose there is cause for suspense on how he will survive, but lucky for you, that's coming up in the very next chapter, finally! Moreover, i'm glad you see the impropriety of a ken-misao pairing... she's WAY too young, and too obsessed with Aoshi, and just plain not ken's type, nor is he hers. Thank you for best wishes, mine to you as well!
Houndingwolf: thanks! What is "no da"? in spanish, it would be "he/she/it/you formal doesn't/do not give" so i am highly confused. In any case, glad you're enjoying!
TYDYEgirl: yes, he can! He can, and he is! You will see more of her reaction in the next chapter, and i think you'll like it.
Crazy Girl Person: *almost explodes with information that will ruin the suspense* you are so smart, but i can't tell you why! And of course she will help him find a way, but really someone else is of even more help than she is.
Maeve Riannon: i think you're right that their relationship is not all that strong to withstand that kind of information, but how long can one really hide that sort of thing? I had thought about making her so against suicide because that was how she was orphaned, but i thought maybe there actually IS an explanation of how she became an orphan that would contradict it, so i left it out. besides, she didn't let Kamatari commit suicide, and she'd only known him the length of time the fight took. Thank you for saying ken is well explained as a vamp. I knew i'd have to do a lot of explaining, because these kinds of vamps are sort of rare. I purposely made the problem difficult, because it seems like every author that writes about pacifist vamps always makes them just feed on animals instead of humans, but as a vegetarian, i don't think that is a viable solution, just to kill a different group. He will be living in a way that involves no killing whatsoever in order to feed.
Yuhi-thedoerofevildeeds: glad he's so IC. I thought that since he has to deal with an internal killer anyway, a vamp would not be such a big stretch, since vamps generally kill to survive. Kenshin, though, as always, will be totally unconventional.