Lilah by Gemma Liviero

Author:Gemma Liviero
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Florence Publishing
Published: 2014-03-20T00:00:00+00:00

Gabriel

I tracked her through the forest listening to her growl like an animal.

When I had taken her blood I had seen things from her past that I did not like. I saw what her father did to her, how he beat her and made her do things that not even a wife should endure. I saw her time at the monastery and images of little Lilah always in her wake. I was exposed to her innermost thoughts and these disturbed me. There was blackness there: a dark muddy infection inside her that had been distant and hidden deep within her. I could see when I drank her blood that this sickness was unlike the physical kind; not apparent even to herself.

I also saw her need for greatness. I saw possession towards me and jealousy of Lilah. In the early days there had been a strong desire to parent the small child but this had been replaced by rivalry. I feared for Lewis’s young protégé.

I followed the tracks. She had already torn apart a small rodent, the remains of which were scattered across the forest floor. She was faster than normal for someone new to the craft. Had I made a mistake? Could she have been touched by something out of my control? And in the back of my mind I wondered whether I could really kill her if it came to it. I had never killed another of my own kind before, witch or otherwise. Such tasks were left to others.

She led me to a stream where ice had begun to form along its rim. An ear piercing cry cut through the still air and I ran along the bank of the creek towards the sound. Arianne was bent over a man while his wife and baby stood helplessly by. She was draining every vestige of life from the man and, by the time I had reached her, leaving just an empty shell. She still held tight to him as if I might take him away.

‘Enough,’ I commanded, and as I approached she crouched like a wild beast, her fangs exposed.

Never in my two hundred years had I seen such an instinctive violent response from my own kind, much less my beloved. Most started with animals, tentatively adjusting to the new hunger in their bodies. She tossed the remains aside and turned towards the woman who stood in the shallow part of the creek, her skirts drenched. The woman had thought to cross the creek to run but could not find it in her heart to leave her husband.

Arianne was about to step into the water when she suddenly collapsed onto the ground in a still heap. Believing me to be an accomplice, the woman turned her attention to me and screamed in terror, this time attempting to cross to the other side of the creek. The child in her arms made it difficult and she fell forward into the water. Torn from her arms, the baby was cast further along in the freezing rapids.

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