“She’s plenty comfortable with me, don’t worry,” Zyacus cooed and took my hand from Kyan.
“I’ll be fine,” I said, still wondering what happened when he kissed my hand, and allowed Zyacus to lead me toward Legacy and Aric, who were pushing through the tall grass that surrounded this spot.
Once we were out of earshot of anyone at the party, Zyacus peeked over at me, “You should stay away from him.”
“Why?”
Aric and Legacy, still holding hands I noted, stopped and we circled up. Zyacus nodded at his cousin who answered me. “Look, I don’t know for sure about Kyan but I’m certain that Senica is what we in the North call a ‘vampire’ or ‘blood drinker’.”
I about fell over in shock. Not from the news of what I already suspected Senica was but that Aric just came out and said it. When I asked before he hadn’t given me that information, even seemed afraid to tell me.
“We know what it is,” Legacy said, looking at me then to the boys. “Visteal and I found it in a book at the library.” She paused. “We—I suspected that’s what you were Aric and why I broke up with you. The book said that blood drinkers who can go in the sun are marked on their skin by magic.”
Zyacus laughed and I didn’t think this was something to laugh about, Aric sure as hell looked melancholy. “He’s not one of those things.”
“No, I’m not.” Looking at Legacy, he tried to smile, but it was half-hearted. “I wish you would have told me. It’s the mark of a curse I suspect but not the mark of a blood drinker.”
“So you don’t know what it is?” she asked.
Feeling ill, I looked at Zyacus. If Aric was not a vampire then the vision I saw was for sure a premonition of his death. It could be any day—it could have been tonight at the party. It still could be tonight. I peeked around, the scenery certainly matched. “We should get inside,” I croaked.
All three of them seemed suspicious of my abrupt outburst.
“If Senica is a blood drinker then it’s not wise to linger in the dark.”
“That bastard comes at any one of us and I’ll cut his head off,” Zyacus growled. “Even if he’s harder to kill than a human that will do the job.” Then his gaze searched my face and his voice softened, “But since he has a particular interest in you, we should get inside.”
We started back to the academy, walking faster than usual. “What do you know about them, Aric?” I asked.
Aric shook his head. “I know that many of them have integrated with our society in Collweya, and they know how to blend in. My father and uncles do hunting parties for them but that is only for the ones who hunker in the shadows and come out at night and are savages. The daywalkers… seem to have become civilized. Enough that someone or a group of people has given them the magic to become daywalkers. Some of them might even have magic stones from their families. I don’t know.”
“So this dark magic that created them years ago, do they use it to create more?” Legacy asked.
Solemn and worried, Aric fidgeted with his hands. “I once snuck out after dark, in the North it’s not something most of us risk, but I wanted to see. While out on the deserted streets, I heard something and being on edge, I hid behind a building. I peeked around the corner and saw a blood drinker holding a boy I knew from school against a brick wall. He wasn’t struggling; in fact it almost looked like he was enjoying her biting his neck. She pulled back and I saw the gleam of blood on her lips. He said, ‘I’m ready. Turn me’ and she laughed, bit her own wrist, then he licked her blood. She said, ‘If you die with my blood in your system, you’ll turn. When you do, come find me. Or perhaps I should snap your neck for you now.’ I ran after that.”
I shuddered. I don’t think any of us knew what to say; no one spoke for a few very long moments. Until Zyacus broke the silence. “Did you see him again?”
“Yes, he was gone for a month but then he was back at school. I tried to convince the headteacher he was a blood drinker but since there was no proof and he hadn’t hurt anyone and could walk in the day, nothing was done about it. His father was also a very rich donor. No one died at that academy.”
“So are you saying not all of them are murderers?” I asked, thinking of Kyan. If all of us suspected him, there was at least a chance I’d become acquainted with a blood drinker but I didn’t want to condemn him like we did with Aric so soon. I was just starting to like him. The thought of him biting someone and drinking their blood disgusted me, however.
Aric seemed to contemplate this for a moment. “I’m saying that no students died. Not that they didn’t kill people outside of the academy.”
“One of those things killed Finnick. I know it,” I said quietly. “I would bet it was Senica.”
Aric looked at me, eyebrows furrowed. “What makes you think that’s how he died? They said he fell out of his window and broke his neck.”
“We saw it,” Legacy whispered. “We saw him die and he was attacked by someone.” Then she looked at me apologetically.
But neither one of them asked why we were there, they went along with it. “We need to get rid of Senica.” Aric put his arm around Legacy pulling her close to him.
Zyacus locked eyes with me then turned to Aric. “He threatened Visteal, threatened to hunt her. And drink her blood, now that I think back on it. He needs to die, not simply leave.”
I was inclined to agree but that meant killing a fellow student, and another dead body would mean the closure of this academy. No one would know what he was and how would we prove it?
“Killing a blood drinker is not simple, plus he’ll be a trained fighter on top of it.” Aric let out a long breath before continuing. “And it would have to be quiet. If any one of the professors found out there was a blood drinker here, the academy would likely close. As dangerous as they can be, I went to school with a few daywalkers I knew of and they never killed anyone. It would seem Senica is a rogue. Hell the others might even take him out if he exposes them for killing Finnick.”
The more Aric talked, the more I suspected Kyan. He said I was off-limits. And I didn’t think he meant from a romantic perspective anymore. He must have meant drinking my blood was off-limits. I tried not to appear horrified but my expression probably gave that away nonetheless. “How many do you think there are here?”
Aric shrugged. “I have no idea. Could be just Senica, could be a few, maybe even more. There are three hundred and three of us from Collweya at this academy.”
I swallowed hard. “And you think Kyan is one of them?”
“Yes,” Zyacus answered.
Aric however, tilted his head back and forth as if unsure. “I’ve known Kyan for a long time. We’re not close friends but friends, and all in all, he’s a good guy. If he is a vampire, he hides it remarkably well. I never once suspected him until I saw how fast he moved to protect you two. But that could have been magic.”
“He snarled like… an animal, like a wolf,” Legacy said. “Unless that was magic too, I’ve never heard a human sound like that.”
My thoughts exactly. We needed to come up with a way to test if someone was a vampire and create a hunting party of our own. I then wondered if Kyan was one of these creatures, could I kill him? Should I? He’d only ever been kind to me.