Chapter 5 – Silas
CHAPTER FIVE
SILAS
PRESENT DAY
Sitting alone on the roof, I drink under the eerie wash of moonlight over the forest, that silver glow turning the trees into something out of a ghost story.
I bring the bottle to my lips and take a long pull, grateful to whoever this blood belonged to before it was bottled.
They’d clearly drunk enough alcohol to sedate a horse.
“They say it’s a slippery slope to depression when you drink alone,” Evelynn says softly as she approaches.
Her dark hair is pulled to one side, her pale skin like satin in the moonlight.
Being a vampire looks good on her.
I offer her the bottle. “Then join me, and we can be depressed together.”
She smirks, takes the bottle and takes a sip. Her face scrunches, and she coughs hard.
“Is there any blood in that? It’s just pure alcohol,” she winces.
“Just how I like it,” I mutter, reclaiming the bottle and taking another pull.
She sits beside me, drawing her knees to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. She watches me, those once-human, assessing eyes now sharper, dissecting my every move.
“Just ask it,” I prompt, giving her a sidelong glance.
“Oh, thank god. What the hell happened between you and Lilith?” she blurts.
I look down at the label, picking at its corner with my thumb. “She dated my brother. I liked her. She liked him. It ended badly, and here we are.” I shrug.
“She dated Morbius?” Evelynn asks, disbelief thick in her tone.
My jaw tightens, like it does every time someone says his name. Seeing him again ignited a rage I thought I’d buried decades ago.
“You’ll have to ask her the rest,” I mutter, shutting the door on the topic.
“Why is she so angry with you?” she presses.
I stand and look out through the trees. “Because he is my brother, and she believes I’ve known all this time where he went and where he is.
That I’ve been covering for him,” I grit out, hurling the bottle into the forest. Glass shatters somewhere in the dark.
“Tell Lucian I’m going to feed,” I mutter over my shoulder before leaping off the roof.
I run at full speed through the forest, twigs snapping underfoot, cold air cutting into my lungs even though I don’t need to breathe. I stop in front of the old bird-watching shed, now run down and barely standing.
I carefully open the door and step inside. Memories of Lilith flash through my mind; her laugh, her eyes, the gift she gave me.
I sit in the darkness, surrounded by spiders and the creatures of the night.
The door creaks, and my gaze snaps to it. Lilith stands there, surprise flickering across her face at seeing me.
I stand, moving towards the doorway, towards her. “I will go,” I mutter.
“It’s seeing him again. After all these years.” Her words waver, her emotional restraint cracking.
I open my mouth to say something, to agree, but quickly close it. It’s better that way. I move to walk past her.
“Walk away just like him,” she seethes.
I halt. My back to her, fists clenched at my sides. “He chose to leave, and he chose them,” I grit.
“And you knew!” she explodes.
I whirl around, jaw tight. “It’s easier to blame me because I’m fucking here, still having to deal with his fucking mess,” I bite out.
Tears sting her eyes. “You’ve done nothing but ignore it.
Brushed it aside. I lost my entire family that night.
I watched the Dominion slaughter my entire family before my eyes and then slit my throat.
If it weren’t for him changing me, I’d be dead too.
” She chokes on the words, swallowing them back.
The hard exterior she’s built around herself is starting to crumble.
My fingers twitch with the urge to touch her, to hold her. I force myself to stay still.
“I’m sorry,” I murmur, watching a single tear slide along her freckled cheek.
She angrily wipes it away. “I’ve told you before, your sorrys mean nothing to me. You mean nothing to me.”
Every muscle in my body tenses. Each word cuts deeper than the last.
“You done?” I ask.
She lets out a bitter little laugh. “Maybe I could almost forgive your brother for disappearing; for leaving me to deal with the loss of my family, for changing me. But for finding out he became one of them—the very thing that destroyed my life—I will never forgive him that.” Her voice drips venom at the word Dominion.
“And you are just as bad, protecting him. Hiding him.”
She steps closer, leaning up until her face is an inch from mine, her murderous gaze slicing through me. “So no, I will never be done. I want you to feel bad. I want you to feel the pain, the suffering I do each day.”
The sheer hatred and raw, agonising pain in her voice nearly breaks me. I force myself to remain a statue.
She slams her fist into my chest. “You feel nothing! Nothing!”
I don’t stop her. I let her hit me, taking every blow, every ounce of her loathing, resentment, agony. Eventually, she slows and stops. She steps back, meeting my eyes.
The vibrant green in her gaze is dulled.
“Befriending you and your brother was the biggest mistake of my life. I fucking pray one day you too will suffer and feel pain like this.”
She spins and vanishes into the forest, just a blur in the dark.
Little does she know I feel it every single fucking day.
Rage surges up, hot and violent. I whirl around, wrench the door off the bird-watching shed and launch it into the forest. A roar tears from my chest as my fists slam into the wood, smashing and splintering it with vampiric strength. I don’t stop until there’s nothing left but a pile of rubble.
“He looks sad. Go say something,” Evelynn whispers.
“No. He’ll talk when he’s ready,” Lucian counters.
“You’re his friend, and he’s your VP. Go and be there for him,” she hisses.
“Evelynn, I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Vampire hearing,” I call out over my shoulder.
She approaches and takes the seat beside me at the kitchen table, her sympathetic eyes searching my face.
“Sorry, I forgot. You sure you’re okay?” she asks softly.
Her sympathy is almost too much. “I’m fine,” I snap.
“Silas,” Lucian snarls in warning.
“Sorry. Just stop looking at me like I’m some lost cause,” I sigh. “I preferred it when you didn’t like me.”
Evelynn smirks. “Fine, asshole,” she says, nudging me with her shoulder.
“You know what would cheer him up?” Clutch grins as he joins us, dropping into a chair.
“Not happening,” Lucian dismisses before Clutch can say another word.
“Oh, come on. We fought the Dominion and Anathema. That deserves a celebration,” Clutch argues. He flutters his lashes at Lucian.
“I’ve seen men beg, plead and perish. I have never seen one flutter their fucking eyelashes at me,” Lucian says flatly.
“That’s because I am unique. C’mon, what do you say?” Clutch presses.
Lucian looks to Evelynn. She gives him a soft, encouraging smile.
“Fine,” he relents.
Clutch launches himself across the table and plants a quick kiss on Lucian’s cheek. “Fucking best President ever.”
Evelynn bursts into laughter, while Lucian looks one second away from ripping Clutch’s head clean off.
“We need to discuss how she turned,” Cain says as he walks in and takes a seat.
I glance at Evelynn. Her eyes flick between us.
“Lucian bit me,” she murmurs, brows knitting.
“Prez,” I warn.
He takes her hand, presses her palm to his lips. “They mean because you were dead,” he says.
“Yeah, and then you bit me, and I turned into this,” she says with a shrug.
“It’s not how it works,” I explain. “You can be near death, you can be alive, but not already dead.”
Her lips part, eyes widening. “Then why did it happen?” she whispers.
“It has to do with the nun, what she said. You are more than a human-turned-vampire. You defeated Anathema. Those blades were made for you. They were made to be used only by you.” Viktor dumps an old tome on the table and jabs a finger at some text.
“Only the blessed can continue on to a different life after death.”
“Petal?” Lucian says softly. She looks at him. “Did the nuns baptise you? Anything?”
She frowns. “Well, no. They often said I was in their prayers.” She stares at the table, digging through her memories.
“On my sixteenth birthday, Sister Mary Joan did this thing where I had to stand in the centre of the circle and make quotes to the elements. Er…” She closes her eyes, frowning.
“Something like ‘I call upon the winds of the west?’” She pauses. “No, east,” she corrects herself.
“Paganism,” I say.
“Wait a minute, I thought they were Christians or Catholics or whatever. Why would they be practising paganism?” Cain asks, frowning.
“They do say certain holidays the Catholics celebrate come from pagans,” Clutch says with a shrug.
We all stare at him.
“What? You think I don’t know shit? I had a life before you lot,” he mutters.
“You were a maniac in the fifties. How the fuck do you know about Catholicism and paganism?” Cain voices what we’re all thinking.
Clutch smirks. “There was this chick who lived across the street from me. Her folks were religious as fuck. No sex before marriage and all that. I fucked her.” He grins at the memory.
“Her daddy tried to force me to marry her. To avoid it, I became pagan for a few weeks.” He shrugs like he just joined a gym.
We all blink at him.
“You were a real dickhead,” Evelynn says.
“She married some local guy from their church. He’d never had sex before her, so he didn’t know she wasn’t a virgin.” Clutch shrugs, rolling a toothpick across his tongue. “It all worked out in the end.”
“Wow. I thought you were an old-school gentleman,” Evelynn tuts, shaking her head.
Clutch grins. “I am. I always make sure the lady cums first.” He winks.
“Fucking Christ,” Viktor sighs, disgusted.
“The more I get to know you, the more I realise you were a fucking dog,” I say.
Clutch’s grin widens. He leans back in his chair, lacing his hands behind his gelled, slicked-back hair. “Yeah. A hound dog.”
We all groan.
“So, can we get away from the conversation about what Clutch’s dick got up to in his past life and focus on what this could mean?” Lucian cuts in.
Viktor shrugs. “All I can do is keep researching. At least now we have time on our hands with Anathema gone.”
“Anathema may be gone, but Morbius is out there, in charge of the Dominion. Hell, he is the fucking Dominion,” I grind out. “I don’t know what he’s up to, what he’s planning, but I do know not to trust the quiet.”
“How are we supposed to prepare and brace if we don’t know what’s coming?” Shade asks, stepping out from the shadows. I swear he morphs into them.
Lucian rests his hand on the back of Evelynn’s neck, thumb stroking her skin. “We can’t. The only thing we can do is be cautious. Watch out for anything and everything. Tonight we party. Have your fill of the fang bangers, because it’ll be a while before it happens again.”