Chapter 5
I chose a circuitous route back to the convent, my footsteps silent despite the elegant evening shoes that peeked beneath the hem of my gown.
The recent rain had left the cobblestones slick and gleaming under the gaslights, mirroring the stars that struggled to shine through Manhattan’s veil of coal smoke and fog.
A distant clock tower struck midnight, its deep resonance carrying across the quiet city.
Most God-fearing souls were safely abed at this hour.
Not so for creatures like me. The night had always been our dominion, though I had learned to walk through it with purpose rather than predatory intent.
My senses stretched outward, cataloging each shadow, each subtle movement in the darkness.
Something watched me—had been watching since the opera house—and I preferred to confront such attention directly rather than lead it back to my flock.
I turned down a narrower street where the buildings leaned inward, their upper stories nearly touching above me like hands joined in silent prayer.
The familiar weight of my silver locket pressed against my throat, a reminder of my mission, my purpose.
The small pistol nestled in my handbag offered reassurance of a different kind, though I hoped not to need it.
Three blocks from the convent, I caught their scent—the unmistakable signature of my kind, but rawer, more feral. Recently turned, if I had to guess, and unfed for too long. My muscles tensed in preparation, though I maintained my unhurried pace.
“Good evening,” I said calmly, addressing the seemingly empty street. “I know you’re there. Three of you, if my senses don’t deceive me.”
A harsh laugh echoed from the shadows of an alleyway to my right. “Clever lady,” a male voice rasped. “All dressed up with nowhere to run.”
They emerged like smoke made flesh—two men and a woman, their clothing torn and stained, their movements jerky and uncoordinated in the way of the newly turned who hadn’t yet mastered their enhanced bodies.
Their eyes gleamed red in the dim light, fixed on me with the singular focus of predators.
Once, they had been human; now they were consumed by hunger that obliterated all else.
“I’m not running,” I said, turning to face them fully. “Nor am I afraid.”
The woman tilted her head, confusion briefly breaking through her predatory stare. She couldn’t have been over twenty, with blonde hair matted with blood. “You should be,” she growled, but uncertainty threaded through her voice.
“Catherine,” I said softly, addressing her directly. Her eyes widened in shock. “That is your name, isn’t it? I can still see it in your face. You worked at the textile factory on Houston Street.”
“How—?” she began, then shook her head violently as though trying to dislodge the human memory.
Her question wasn’t one I could answer. Over the last two years, I’d gained something of a sight into the souls of the turned.
I didn’t know how it had come about, only that it had helped gain new aspirants to our convent and monastery.
It only seemed to work with vampires my junior.
Those like Desiderius remained a closed book to my gift.
“And you,” I turned to the older of the two men, whose beard couldn’t hide the gauntness of his features, “are James. A dockworker, before whatever tragedy brought you to this state.”
The third vampire, younger and more feral than his companions, circled to my left with predatory intent. “Doesn’t matter who we were,” he snarled. “Only what we are now.”
“You’re wrong, Michael,” I countered, using the name I sensed rather than knew. Names held power; they anchored the soul to its humanity. “What you were matters enormously. And what you can become matters even more.”
I took a deliberate step toward them, my hands open at my sides in a gesture of peace. “I know what you’re experiencing. The hunger that burns like fire. The confusion. The fear beneath the rage. I’ve walked that path myself.”
“Then you know we need to feed,” James growled, his hands curling into claws.
“Yes,” I agreed. “But not as you think. There are other ways. Ways that don’t require you to become monsters.”
Catherine’s expression flickered between hunger and something more human—hope, perhaps, or simple curiosity. “What are you talking about?” she demanded.
“Sanctuary,” I said, the word hanging in the damp night air between us. “A place where others like us have found a path back to humanity, back to grace.”
Michael barked a harsh laugh. “She’s mad. Or lying.” He edged closer, muscles tensed to spring.
“She speaks the truth.”
Ruth’s voice came from behind me, and I closed my eyes briefly in both frustration and resignation.
Of course they had disobeyed. I hadn’t compelled them to return to the convent—which I could have done given I was their sire—I’d requested it.
They must’ve sensed something was amiss, an instinct many of us had honed since we’d become what we were. Of course they had followed me.
“We once stood where you stand now,” Rebecca added, her calm voice belying the danger of the situation as she and Ruth moved to flank me. “Consumed by thirst, convinced we were damned beyond salvation.”
“Yet here we stand,” Ruth continued. “Not as monsters, but as women of faith. Still vampires, yes, but in control of our nature rather than controlled by it.”
The ferals exchanged confused glances, their attack momentarily delayed by this unexpected development. I seized the opportunity to press forward.
“At our convent, we have created a community for our kind,” I explained. “We provide donated blood to ease the transition. We teach control, prayer, purpose. We offer a future beyond endless hunting and hiding.”
“Impossible,” James muttered, but doubt had crept into his voice.
“I thought so too, once,” I admitted. “Until I discovered that even the damned might find redemption through faith and sacrifice.”
Catherine took a hesitant step forward, something human awakening in her eyes. “I don’t want to hurt anyone,” she whispered. “I didn’t ask for this.”
“None of us did,” Rebecca said gently. “But we need not be defined by how we were transformed, only by what we choose to become.”
For a moment, I believed we might succeed. That these three lost souls might join our flock, might find their way back from the edge of monstrosity. Then Michael’s face contorted with rage.
“Lies!” he screamed, lunging toward me with inhuman speed, fingers curved like talons aimed for my throat.
I sidestepped with the practiced grace born of decades of both hunting and being hunted. My hand found my hatpin—pure silver, its end sharpened to a point—and drove it into his shoulder as he passed. He howled in pain, the blessed silver burning his corrupted flesh.
“Please,” I implored them all, “we don’t want to harm you. We want to help you.”
But the scent of Michael’s burning flesh and the violence of his attack had triggered the predator in James. With a guttural snarl, he charged at Ruth, who defended herself with reluctant efficiency, using her rosary’s silver cross to sear a defensive line across his advancing form.
Only Catherine hesitated, her expression torn between hunger and horror at what she was becoming. “Is it true?” she asked, her voice breaking. “Can I be saved?”
“Yes,” I promised, even as I positioned myself between her and my companions. “If you choose it. If you fight for it.”
“I’m so hungry,” she whispered, tears of blood streaking her pale face.
“I know,” I said gently. “We can help with that. Donated blood at first, then gradual weaning, then—“
Michael recovered faster than I anticipated, his newfound strength amplified by rage and hunger. He tackled me from behind, his weight driving me onto the wet cobblestones. His teeth snapped inches from my throat as I fought to keep him at bay.
“Run!” I called to Ruth and Rebecca. “Get back to the convent!”
Neither obeyed. Instead, Ruth grappled with James while Rebecca moved to help me, her face a mask of grim determination.
Catherine stood frozen, watching the violence unfold with growing horror. Then, with a cry of anguish, instinct won out over hope. She launched herself at Rebecca, fingers clawing at my companion’s habit.
I knew then that our chance for peaceful resolution had passed. These souls were too newly turned, too consumed by bloodlust. They needed to be subdued before they could be saved—if they could be saved at all.
My hand found the handle of my umbrella, the wooden shaft tipped with a silver point—a weapon disguised as a fashionable accessory. With a desperate plea for his protection, I drove it into Michael’s chest as he lunged for me again.
His expression registered shock, then confusion.
His pupils blew wide, swallowing the irises in blackness as his soul was violently yanked from the physical plane, cast down into the temporary hell that awaited the staked.
His body went instantly rigid, then slumped onto me, a heavy, lifeless weight.
I shoved him aside, gasping for air, but I did not reach for the handle of the umbrella. To remove the wood now would be to invite him back to the fight back before we were ready. I left the shaft protruding from his chest, and scrambled to my feet.
My hands trembled as I hiked up the heavy fabric of my dress, fingers finding the familiar leather straps against my skin. It wasn’t the first time I’d been forced to silence a feral soul only to wake them later in a cage. I drew two short, thick stakes of hawthorn from the holsters on my thigh.
I turned to help Rebecca. Catherine had her pinned against a wall, but Rebecca’s discipline gave her an advantage the feral vampire couldn’t match. With a controlled movement, Rebecca broke Catherine’s grip and spun her around, exposing her chest.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, stepping into the opening. “Custodi animam eius. Guard her soul.”
Catherine’s eyes met mine in the instant before I drove the short wooden point home. Something human flickered there—recognition, perhaps, or gratitude—before the light vanished from her eyes.
“Keep her safe in the silence, Lord,” I prayed, “until she can choose the light again.” She went boneless in Rebecca’s grip, sliding down the wall to rest like a sleeping doll on the cobblestones.
James, seeing his companions fall not to dust but to the counterfeit sleep of the dead, fought with renewed desperation.
Ruth had him on the defensive, but his wild strength made him unpredictable.
I approached from behind, my heart heavy with the knowledge of the difficult rehabilitation that lay ahead of us.
“Sustain him in the depths, O God,” I prayed, gripping the second thigh stake. “And prepare him for the rebirth to come.”
James sensed my approach and whirled to face me, his face contorted with rage and hunger. “What are you?” he demanded, eyeing the bodies of his friends.
“Someone who once stood where you stand,” I answered sadly. “Someone who found another way.”
His attack was clumsy, born of fear rather than strategy. I side-stepped his lunge, and the hawthorn point found his heart. He gasped, the sound wet and sudden, as his consciousness was severed from his form.
As his knees buckled, I caught him, lowering his heavy, dormant body gently to the ground beside the others.
“Guard their going out and their coming in, from this time forth and forevermore,” I finished, smoothing his hair back from his forehead.
I looked over the three quiet forms, the wooden stakes serving as the only locks keeping their souls from their bodies.
“Bring the cart, Sister. We have work to do.”