A door of rock slid across the opening, effectively trapping me in the cave with three vampires.

My breath halted as I stood completely still, Sasuke's name trailing off unfinished on my lips.

"Great things, witches are," Kane cooed. "Lovely partnerships to make with them. One helped us craft this little trap inside this cave."

"You've been behind the missing people around here then?" I asked. "Not him?"

Kane followed my gesture towards the blond vampire. "Garnet? No. Although he has been useful in dragging them in here. But he answers to me."

"Enough explaining, Kane," the female snapped. "Time to eat."

Kane flipped his wrist. "Very well, Mina. If you want it so bad, you can have the first go at it."

The female, Mina, wasted no time in rushing at me in attack. I threw my leg out and connected with her jaw, sending her head snapping back with a sickening crunch.

She held her jaw for a second, looking at me completely stunned.

I lashed at her legs, ducking low and swiping at them with a kick aimed to knock her off her feet. She easily jumped out of the way and then made to grab at me with her long, spindly hands.

I grabbed onto her wrist and yanked her towards me. She lost her footing and I did not hesitate to drive my stake through her heart. She looked normal for a second before her skin began to darken, her eyes rolling up as she let out a piercing screech.

I yanked my stake back and she slumped to the ground, the sound of it echoing against the cold stone walls.

A growl came from Garnet, and Kane looked livid.

Garnet rushed me first, his face crazed and unfocused, letting his instincts take over for this fight. I blocked his oncoming strike by shoving my arm against his, sending him falling past me where he was met by my knee.

He grunted, the wind knocking out of him, and I slashed at his neck with my dagger. I managed to get a good cut in before Kane appeared next to us. His face came in close to mine, making me take the dagger out from Garnet's neck and right into Kane's oncoming hand.

Kane didn't so much as wince when his fingers encircled the blade rather than my neck. He just took it and threw it to the side, his blood spraying everywhere with the action.

I kicked him in the side, hearing his ribs crunch under the impact. He went down as Garnet jumped at me, pushing me to the ground, close to where my first dagger had been thrown.

The jagged cave floor bit into my back, ripping my shirt in a few different places there. I could feel my skin breaking as well, my blood would no doubt be soaking through my shirt any second.

Garnet seemed to smell my wound because he momentarily became so overwhelmed with the scent of blood that he ceased attacking. His arms settled against my shoulders, pushing me further into the ground as he continued to smell at the air around us.

Big mistake.

I snapped my head forward, crushing it against his nose. He reeled back, and I grabbed at my dagger lying just a foot away from me and slashed it across his throat.

Blood spurted from him, getting all over me, and I watched in horror as his head toppled from his body and landed on my stomach.

I would have thrown up if there hadn't been another vampire waiting around to kill me.

Swallowing the rising bile, I shoved Garnet's head and body off of me, snapping back to my feet, the dagger and stake held up in front of me as I faced off against Kane.

He looked to Garnet's body and then to Mina's before his eyes found mine again.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"Obviously not someone you had expected," I said, circling around the area, eyes never leaving him.

I took the offensive, charging at him first. My body running on instinct as all the lessons with Sasuke had already been paying off. The two vampires I'd just killed were because of all the sparring we'd done. I didn't think that I would have been able to pull that off from just my academy training alone.

Kane blocked my kick, holding his arms up to the side, and then grabbing at my ankle when I made contact. I winced at his tight grip, and then he threw me against the cave wall.

I could feel the blood crawl out from the corner of my mouth, running down the length of my chin, but didn't have time to wipe it away as Kane was upon me once again. He clasped his hand around my throat, hauling me up against the wall, my back stinging from the previous injuries being scraped against the unforgiving stone.

"No, I hadn't expected anyone so skilled to find their way into my trap," he said. "Foolish of you."

"You...think so?" I rasped out, the words barely forming from the pressure of his hand against my throat.

He gave me a toothy grin. "You're a spunky one, I'll give you that."

And I spat at his face.

His eyes closed then, and I brought up my legs, pushing both of my boots into his chest in one swift motion. He dropped me, and I fell to the floor with a crack.

Something was broken, but I refused to feel any of it. Not yet, not when he was still alive.

My adrenaline lifted me from the floor, diving at Kane while he wiped the spit from his eyes.

I unsheathed my sword and swung it at him. Hard. It went right through his waist, cutting him completely in half.

A shocked expression came to his face, but then it went completely slack as his split body crumpled to the floor, blood pooling furiously around him.

I stood there breathing quickly, my lungs couldn't keep up with how much I needed to breathe.

The girl near the fire cried out as she stared at me. She must not have been more than thirteen years old. It was an effort to tear my gaze away from the carnage before me, but I managed to make my way over to her.

"It's all okay now," I said. "Let's get out of here."

She gave another incoherent cry, but then wrapped her arms around me in a hug. Sobs bubbled from her in frantic breaths, but I couldn't find it in me to hug her back.

I unlatched her arms from me and pulled her into a standing position. I kept hold of her hand as we both walked back to the cave entrance. When I pushed my hand over the notch in the stone wall nothing moved, the exit remained blocked off.

I brought my hand off of it and tried again.

Nothing.

A groan escaped me as I dropped the girl's hand. She gave a squawk of protest, but I ignored her as I walked over to Kane's cut up body.

I gripped my sword and slashed it down at his wrist. The thunk was jarring, and I tried not to think too hard about picking up the severed hand and bringing it over to the stone wall. I put it up against the notch, and this time the stone wall slid away.

I dropped the hand to the ground right there and grabbed for the girl.

Sasuke was upon us in an instant.

The girl screamed, but he paid her no attention. Instead, he took my face in his hands, eyes frantically looking over everything.

He let out a short breath. "You're all right."

I pushed his hands off of me with a single motion. "Yes, I'm all right. I'm alive, and it's a miracle, Sasuke. What happened? I thought there was only supposed to be one vampire!"

He was puzzled by my words, but then he looked around, taking note of the three very dead vampires around us.

A glimmer of something flashed in his eyes, but then it was gone, and he couldn't bring himself to look at me. "I had no idea-"

"No idea? Really?" I said. "I thought you were scouting out the perfect test for me to start out with. You know, whatever, Sasuke. I'm fucking alive, so you did your job in training me, but this was a mistake on your end. A big one."

I yanked on the girl's arm probably a bit too harshly, but I couldn't help it. The rage was finding its way through every vein in my body.

We made it out of the cave, but Sasuke once again stood before me, effectively halting my footsteps. He grabbed my chin, tilting my face up so that our eyes may meet, but I did not dare. I looked anywhere but him: the forest to the right, the starry sky above.

"Sakura," he said. "Please look at me."

I felt it then, felt my own body want to betray me. All our time together had made me trust him, had made me feel safe around him. And where had it gotten me?

I did not look at him. "Get out of my way, Sasuke. I have to take this girl home." And then just thinking about it, I turned to her. "Where do you live?"

She pointed to the left, a path winding down a bit before curving off to the right, out of sight behind the outskirts of the forest and a large hill. I headed in that direction.

Sasuke walked beside me. "Sakura, I had no idea there were so many of them. I've been observing that one for days now and he has always been alone."

I kept walking.

He let out a frustrated sigh, and then I was lifted from the ground, as was the young girl I'd saved. Sasuke had scooped us both up, travelling the rest of the way using his superior speed. I could feel the irritation rolling off of him in waves, and glancing up at him had me feeling only a bit remorseful.

His mouth was set into a slight frown, his eyes glossed over. It was all so distant, pensive even. He looked like he wanted to say many things, but was unable to find exactly how he wanted to phrase it all.

The sudden stop he made had my stomach feeling queasy, my hair rushing forward as his arm gripped around me tighter before he set me down. He turned to the girl and was no doubt about to ask if that was her village up ahead, but she ran ahead of him before either of us could say another word. Her frantic gasps filled the night's silence as we watched her become smaller and smaller the closer she got to the village in the distance.

Sasuke turned to me then as she took a corner and disappeared behind a building. He looked like he was going to say something along the lines of everything else he'd been saying, but instead he said, "Let's go back."

He pushed back his sleeve, revealing a tattoo that twisted up with forearm, finishing up at the inside of his elbow. It was a simple design, and I watched with stilted breath as he bit down on his finger and ran the bloody thumb along the inside of his forearm.

Before us, the air began to shift, lines began to make themselves visible. Slowly, a doorway appeared - the same doorway that we had left through earlier.

When it had settled, I walked down the short brick hall and then walked jarringly into the familiar hallways of Sasuke's mountainside home. As soon as I took one step inside, I had to lean against the wall for support. The pain rushed at me then. As soon as I had felt a tiny bit of relief from being inside, my body screamed out. The fall I'd taken in the cave, the crack I'd heard echoing inside my head, finally caught up to me.

A groan passed my lips, followed by hissed breaths.

Sasuke reached out, putting his hand on my shoulder. "What's wrong?"

I wanted to throw his hand off me, but I physically was unable to do so. I bit the inside of my cheek in an attempt to stop moaning from the pain, but the sounds still came through.

He bit into his wrist and then held it up in front of me. "Here, drink it. It'll heal you."

I glared at it. "Never."

"Stop being stubborn," he said, leaning over so that our faces were on the same level. "Let me help you, I don't want you to hurt."

I finally looked into his eyes then. Even through my pain, I could see his sincerity, the honesty that rang throughout his every word, his every glance.

"Take me to my room," I gritted out between my teeth.

He measured my stubbornness, but whisked me away in another heartbeat. Pain shot down my side, but I was on my bed in the next instant.

He stood at the side of my bed simply staring down at me, but then he shifted spots to stand beside my bedroom door. "I'll be back. If you won't take my blood to heal you, I will find something else." Then he left.

No, I would not drink his blood, not when it meant I would be one step closer to becoming a vampire just like him. A monster of the night, a being who survived on drinking blood from humans.

Someone who had to battle for control, otherwise risk killing each and every living thing that crossed my path.

No.

I would rather die.

XXX

Thank you to my reviewers, followers, and those who favorited this story!

To those who I can't personally respond to their reviews:

Kurouchi: Thank you for your kind words! :) Also, Sasuke's soft spirit is what I live for, he's just my cinnamon roll. ^_^

Angelicfrosty: Haha happy dayyyy, I'm posting another chapter so soooooonnnnn! I just can't wait to update, I'm writing this story like a crazy person. Seriously, I get into this mode where I type so fast and hard, and then my face is just inches from the computer screen. It's like I'm in a trance! Also, good luck to you too! I hope that they call you back and you get that job! :)

Now, onto my Q&A portion:

Q: What are you most looking forward to in the next 10 years?

A: I'm really excited to marry my best friend! :) And then starting a family with him, ooohhh you guys they are going to be cute, lil babies! Plus, I am hoping to have a few published books during that time as well! Also, moving down to Texas will be fun, getting away from this crazy midwest weather. XD