Chapter 4 Danni
Danni
The world pivots as I frantically search for another exit.
The sandy ground feels like quicksand beneath my feet.
Laughter closes around me as I trip and stumble through the crowd, everyone rising from the bleachers to descend to the front of the ring.
I search the sea of faces, screaming for help, but it’s like nobody can hear me.
An elbow collides into my back, shoving me to the ground on all fours.
My wrists take the brunt of the fall. I hold still, pulling in deep breaths, grounding myself.
I can’t escape if I don’t have a plan, and I can’t plan if my body is in flight mode.
I need to think. I need to drown out the sensory overload—an impossible task when my brain desperately tries to piece this situation together.
I close my eyes and wrap my fingers around the dry sand within the ring, letting the tiny grains fall between the cracks of my fingers.
Breathe in—five, four, three, two, one.
Breathe out—five, four, three, two, one.
Before I can take another breath, the ground beneath me vibrates. My stomach lurches as if I’m trapped in a broken elevator.
The rumbling of the motorcycles gets louder. I grab my bag and open it, rifling through the contents until I grip the cold, wooden stake. I can’t leave. There’s no way out. All I can do now is survive and commit myself fully to the plan.
Get in. Kill vampires. Get out.
I empty my head of all the intrusive thoughts I had about the strange and beautiful man, choosing bravery over desire.
I think of my mother and how her life was taken from me too soon.
I think of the trauma I’ve suffered since then, all because of these vile creatures.
I let years of suppressed rage flood my body, doing untold damage.
I slowly lift my head. A shift in the magic-filled air around me lets me know there is now a new center stage.
At first, I could barely make out the clowns’ features, their faces blurred from the speed in which they circled me on the motorcycles. But when one rides close enough to touch me, I can’t help but scream.
I notice its teeth first, filed to sharp points as it snaps its jaws at me.
Then I see the large red eyes, similar to the vampires, but these are…
something different. Unlike the mystery man and his blonde friend, there’s nothing behind them but rage and hunger.
Flashing lights high above the ring illuminate a sheen of sweat across their dark green skin, revealing bone jutting through the rotten flesh.
These creatures don’t seem to be able to speak, instead screeching and howling like something straight out of a zombie movie.
Is this the true form of the clowns?
I glance around at the crowd. They’re all laughing and pointing at the zombies as if they were just normal clowns performing a hilarious skit.
Why can’t they see them for what they are? More importantly, why can I?
“Kill her! Before she wakes the others!”
The creature circling me whips its head around. I follow its line of sight to see the tall blonde from before, yelling orders from the front of the crowd. This time, she’s alone. No sign of the mystery man and his captivating aura.
Wake the others? Did I already wake someone?
I keep twisting my head around, frantically searching the crowd for someone who looks as terrified as I feel. Finally, I find them. Three people stand away from the crowd, towards the edge of the tent. I don’t think about oncoming traffic or the sea of bodies standing between us.
I bolt.
My stomach flips as I dodge the bikes that refuse to relent. If anything, my running seems to urge them to go faster.
I try to tune out the snarls ripping from deep within their throats as I surge.
Just a few more steps and I’m at the edge of the ring.
I leap forward, soaring into the direction of the crowd, the stake still gripped in my hand.
A creature barrels right into me, knocking the wind out of me as I hit the ground.
With my next breath, an ungodly scream rips from my lungs.
The creature’s mouth twists into a cruel smile.
It holds me down with wet, scaly hands, using unnatural strength to pin me to the dirt by my throat.
Its hot breath smells of decay. Bile rises in my throat.
Breath slips from my lungs. I shift my eyes to the side and see the stake lying within reach.
I grab it, plunging the sharpened wood as deep as I can manage into the creature’s neck.
Thick, oily black blood sprays from the wound as the creature screams, releasing me to clutch its neck.
Using this as my opportunity to escape, I scramble away.
The people I intended on reaching stand opened-mouthed on the other side of the ring.
They were within my grasp just a few seconds ago; now it’s like the arena doesn’t want me to reach them.
Or perhaps the creature’s strength simply put me back at square one.
The rest of the creatures on the motorcycles gather on the other side of the ring as well, forming a barrier between me and the handful of people who can clearly see through whatever magic is at play here.
I glance to my left at the cycle the creature had abandoned to tackle me to the ground.
I’ve ridden a motorcycle only once, and I wasn’t very good at it.
Glancing up, I become all too aware of the vampires watching the encounter with bated breath.
I’ve no choice. There’s no other way out.
I sprint towards the cycle, hastily lifting it up to seat myself on top. I twist the throttle, and the bike roars to life. I gulp back fear as the wall of creatures rev their own bikes, their foul, ragged breaths drowned out by the thunderous sound of the engines.
I push off from the ground, the bike surging forward. It’s now or never. Speeding around the ring, I lead the creatures on a wild chase. Adrenaline barrels through my veins as I fix my eyes on the people who are supposedly “awake.”
I have to save them. I have to get them out of here.
I weave between the oncoming bikes, sending them sliding into the dirt.
But it isn’t enough. My heart sinks as the ring begins to expand, growing wider by the second and moving my goal further away.
The circus lights and the crowd all fade away as I now race through a never-ending sea of sand.
Great dunes erupt all around, and the lurching, dropped-elevator feeling in my stomach returns tenfold.
How can this be happening? I need to get out of here.
As creatures snarl and snap behind me, another motorcycle pulls up on my left side.
I glance over to see it’s him. My eyes widen as the mysterious man with gleaming red eyes edges closer towards me, hand outstretched.
My body yearns to give in, to reach out, take his hand, and feel his skin on mine.
Instead, I clamp my jaw tight and focus on the weight of my bag still slung over my body. Two stakes left. He is a vampire, after all. He may not have killed my mother, but he deserves to die simply for being the abomination that he is.
“Trust me,” he yells over the sound of the engines. “You can’t outrun them. Take my hand!”
I squint, sand irritating my eyes, and search for another way out of the never-ending desert.
He calls out again. “Come on! We don’t have much time!”
He scoots forward on his seat. My stomach clenches, realizing what he wants me to do. The thought of my body being flush against him sends my head into a spin. I stab the mental image the same way I want to drive a stake through his spine.
“You can’t be serious!” I yell back, just as another sand dune erupts from the earth directly in my path.
I brace myself to go straight through it, but luck is on my side as I pass over it.
My bike drifts away from the hot vampire.
I squint into the distance; the spectators have disappeared.
Fear trickles down my spine at the thought of them all being swallowed up by the wasteland, claimed by the vampires.
Nothing but miles and miles of endless dry sand stretches all around. Sweat beads on my temple despite the wind whipping around me.
I have to make it through. There must be an end to this madness.
I don’t know much about magic, but it can’t be infinite.
In all the myths and legends surrounding vampires, magic was scarcely mentioned and never in detail.
Now I know those myths barely scratched the surface of the truth.
The thought of these disgusting monsters having access to more power than I ever imagined makes my task ahead seem impossible.
It’s even more chilling when one of them chases me down, riding close enough for me to smell his cologne.
Leather.
Musk.
Red flags.
I burn for him, hotter than the Sahara sun at its peak. No, that’s not concerning in the slightest.
Once I reach the bottom of the dune, the mysterious man pulls up close enough for me to see the desperation in his eyes. That damn intoxicating smell of his clouds my judgement. I can’t think about anything else when he’s this close to me.
“It’s now or never!” His deep voice has the hairs on my arms standing at attention.
I frantically weigh my options. I can keep going, eventually running out of gas and being eaten by the creatures. Or I can jump on the back of his motorcycle. Both are equally as scary.
My mind is made up for me as a canyon abruptly splits the desert directly in front of us.
I don’t hesitate to grab his hand and propel myself off my bike and onto his.
I cling to his leather jacket. Wind and sand whip through my hair as he angles away from the canyon.
I glance back to see my bike turn to flecks of ash.
“What the fuck?” I mutter.
“That’s what happens if you die in the inbetween. Now hang on tighter or you’ll send us both to hell.”
Reluctantly, I do as he says, all while trying not to touch him too much.
The sound of the creatures’ motorcycles begins to fade.
I take a few moments to close my eyes and steady my breathing before looking behind us.
They’re all falling back as if they’ve been given a silent command to cease their hunt.
Relief floods me, until I realize I’m on the back of my enemy’s bike with zero control over where we’re going.
As stealthily as I can, I reach into my bag still strapped tight across my chest.
I close my fingers around the stake.
I can do this.
I can stab him in the back, then throw him off and leave him in the sand. Maybe he’ll turn to ash just like the bike.
But where are we going? Does the desert ever end? If I leave him behind, what will happen to me?
I’ve come too far to die of starvation. I won’t let that happen.
My grip on the wood loosens. Perhaps the best foot forward isn’t violence. I’m a journalist, after all…
“What’s the ‘in between’?” I ask, my throat cracked and dry.
“A place where humans shouldn’t be.”
No shit! This is like getting blood from a stone.
“Then why did those things chase me here?” My words lose their potency on the wind.
“To eat you. Obviously!”
I roll my eyes at his haughty sneer. This man is irritating as hell already.
“Do you have to be so condescending? Not everyone is used to magical circus tents.”
Yet my enemy still helped me. Those creatures backed off as soon as I leapt onto the back of his bike.
Why did he help me? Is he trying to lure me into a false sense of security or something? Or does he feel the same burning desire as me?
“Why did you help me, then? Why not just rip a chunk out of my neck before I could escape?” I shift uncomfortably on the seat, wishing I hadn’t asked just because some delusional part of me wants him to tell me he feels the same.
“Who says I still won’t?” He throws me a devilish smirk over his shoulder. “Hold on!”
I hardly hear him over the roaring sound of the bike. I peek over his shoulder and see a huge sinkhole appear in the ground. First a canyon, and now this?
“Please tell me you’re not doing what I think you’re doing?!” I throw caution to the wind and wrap my arms around his waist. The feeling of having him pressed against me brings me warm, fuzzy sensations that I can’t even begin to understand.
With a voice full of mischief, he says, “I’m doing exactly what you think I’m doing.”
Before I know it, we’re plunging down into a pit of eternal darkness. There’s no light. No air. It feels as if I’m being squeezed tightly by a giant snake, my ribs threatening to crack beneath the pressure.
And then it’s over as quickly as it began.