You know what? I'm miffed. Yes, miffed. All teh archery tournements I can enter are on Sundays. Screw them! Oh well, Ski season has started, so I'll be gone most weekends anyway. By the way, REVIEWS! Please, i beg you. Becca, i comand you to join for the sole perpose of reveiwing me. Untill you do I will continue to say things about you online. Like, you laugh alot, which isn't a bad thing, but now everyone will know you as 'Becca the Giggler'
Changes
Van Helsing awoke with a feeling that something wasn't right. In fact, the feeling was so sharp that at first he thought it had made his arm go numb. No, his arm was numb because Ashian had fallen asleep on it and then gotten up suddenly. He picked up his hat that Ashian had rested on his chest and gasped in surprise as he massaged the life back into his arm.
"Hush." Van Helsing looked up at Ashian's silhouette, and noticed with a twinge of dismay that both her pistols were in her hands, ready to fire at anything that would have been brainless enough to move. She had her head cocked to one side, as if listening to something. Van Helsing heard nothing, and that enough put him on edge. But Ashian didn't look like she was listening to the absence of noise, but rather to something only she could hear. Abruptly, Van Helsing remembered that Ashian was a vampire, or would be soon.
Getting up, he walked slowly down the hill where Ashian stood vigilant. "What do you hear?"
Ashian's head was cocked to one side as her eyes darted around the clearing. "Something big. I suggest you be careful." Van Helsing would have been slightly annoyed at the useless information, but he finally heard a little of what Ashian was so diligently listening to. She was right, though.
Something big was circling the hill top just out of sight. Van Helsing motioned to Ashian, indicating with a small flick of his wrist that he would draw the creature's attention to the north side of the clearing, giving Ashian the opportunity to enter on the east or west sides and sneak behind the assailant. You might doubt that Van Helsing could have communicated all this with a flick of his wrist, but it was a predetermined signal the two had during their previous years of monster hunting.
Ashian was a little surprised that he still remembered their old hands signals, but immediately nodded and slipped away. She moved like a ghost, but as soon as the thought crossed Van Helsing's mind, he quickly tried to block out what he knew would come. Nope, not fast enough. She didn't move like as ghost, she moved like a vampire.
Van Helsing ordered himself off that path of thoughts and walked noisily over to the north side of the rise. He grinned in grim satisfaction as the rustlings followed him. He stood back from the line of trees about twenty yards and bent down as if examining something. He waited patiently for the stalker to jump out at a moment's notice, but need not have. The instant his hand landed on the ground a large beast burst from the underbrush. Van Helsing swung a pistol up in one hand and a silver stake in the other, missing with both.
The creature's momentum slammed him hard into the hill top, both weapons dropped. His assailant crouched over him, removing all possible escape. Dizzy from the impact, Van Helsing shook his head, and when his vision cleared he saw a great brown werewolf gazing back at him. Its mouth was open slightly, not barring its teeth. What little human intelligence survived the curse of the werewolf was smirking at him as if to say he was no threat. Van Helsing's hands shot to his coat where he could pull out a cross or stake, or even a bottle of holy water, but in a movement even faster than Van Helsing's the werewolf pinned both his arms. Where was Ashian?
Just as the thought crossed his mind, the werewolf bent its head towards Van Helsing's chest. It was going to eat him alive. Van Helsing writhed as much as possible in a feeble attempt to get away, but not only did the monster have his arms pinned, but was sitting on his waist, rendering everything beyond his belt immobile and useless. The beast was certainly enjoying the drama of the moment, because it took extra time to lower its head.
Parallel in time to the moment that Van Helsing felt the first gasps of pain that was the bite beginning, the creature's mouth slipped, tearing flesh away from his body, but not actually doing fatal damage. The creature howled in agony and turned around. The poor beast was too late. Ashian had snuck up behind it while it tormented Van Helsing. She had leapt forward at Van Helsing's first gasp of pain and slammed both Van Helsing's and her own silver stakes hilt deep into the heart of the monster. As the beast continued to thrash about in pain Ashian emptied several rounds of silver bullets into the beast. As a last dying attempt to do its master's bidding it threw itself on Ashian. In the heat and anger of the moment an inhuman strength gripped her, allowing her to swing the dead animal into the forest even as the body began to change back to its human form.
Van Helsing had propped himself into a sitting position and watched the whole spectacle. He could have sworn that Ashian's eyes had glowed blood red when she threw the werewolf into the forest. It was obviously a display of vampirc strength, but he had never seen another vampire's eyes ever actually glow. What new omen was this? Before he could further his ponderings, he felt spasms shake his body. It was a full moon, and he was a werewolf –again.
He need not have worried, because as soon as Ashian had discarded of the body she rushed up the dale to inspect Van Helsing. Upon seeing his wound she quickly grabbed a syringe out of a coat pocket. It was the poison antidote that she had been taught the making of in Istanbul. In the fray the tip of the needle had been broken, but Ashian just cut a small slit on Van Helsing's arm. (He had quickly discarded his coat as the spasms began.) She gently guided what was left of the snapped needle into the cut and let the antidote into his blood. The spasms quickly stopped, to the relief of both.
"That was, um, exciting." Ashian sighed in the tension. "No, it was stupid. I should have known that Dracula was after me again. I shouldn't have even left the castle. What if there had been two of them, and you didn't get the antidote in time? What if you had been killed? What if -?"
Van Helsing put a hand over her mouth to stop the rambling. He didn't enjoy being talked about like he was helpless. "Ashian, shut up. You were upset and had every right to leave, there weren't two werewolves, I did get the antidote in time, and I have yet to be killed. We need to get to the castle and decide which course of action to take, alright? Let's go." He got up first and helped Ashian to her feet.
In the quick battle the moment of tenderness had been completely forgotten, but as his ungloved hand touched her own, a violent shudder shook her body. Unrecognized passions coursed through her slow moving blood like a wolf among the guard dogs. It was akin to that which she had felt briefly before, but wilder, superior, and it ran about causing havoc while it could not be stopped. Frightened by the total lack of emotional control, Ashian dropped his hand and sprinted to where she had tied up her mount. Not pausing to wait for Van Helsing, she sent her horse into a wild gallop and sped for the Valerious Castle, completely unaware that Van Helsing stood forlornly on the hill, wondering, not a little hurt, at what could have sent her bolting at his touch.