Captured

 1148 words

‘What are you going to do now? You filthy bloodbag’ He hissed to the woman in front of him. I understood what he said, I spoke this language. I couldn’t understand him before. When he spoke to the other vampires in his clan he had used an accent that I couldn’t place or understand. But this, this was the language my mother had taught me. It was in fact, until my 30^th year the only language I could speak. The male vampire spoke classic vampyr to the human in front of him, she couldn’t understand it.

This was most definitely something he didn’t care about. She could pick up in his voice what he meant. This change gave me a chance to escape. At least to survive a little longer. The dark skinned vampire who was holding my right arm had difficulties with hiding his excitement. His grip tightened on my upper arm and I heard the speed of his heartbeat increase.

My brain was working overtime and I tried to shut out everything around me. I needed to make a plan and I only had one shot. It was hard to shut things out, especially the smells. I smelled the vampire next to me, this was a scent I would never forget. Every time in the future, if I had any, I would associate this smell with his ugly and beaten up face. Also, I smelled the presence of the four other vampires. The loudest smell was the fear of the human woman and her child, a girl not older than 4.

I tried to shut it out, but it was simply not doable. All the instinct that was left in my kept senses on edge. It kept me on the little field surrounded by trees. The forest around us was dark and quiet. Forests were usually quiet when there are vampires near. I couldn’t see much outside of the ring of light casted by the fire. I also knew the woman could see even less. I felt pity for her, but I couldn’t do anything. Technically, I could but it would decrease my chance of survival to zero. It was me or her at this moment, actually her or me and her. If they ended me she would follow right after.

I opened my eyes again. The leader of the clan was standing close to the woman. He had placed his hand on her neck and held her in place. He was leaning slight over her to intimidate her even more. He had called her bloodbag and I felt an anger swell in me. Maybe bloodbag isn’t the right word, but I can’t find any word in English as insulting as the one he spit out in classic vampyr. Bloodbag is used for humans and only the ones you don’t want to sank your teeth in. It is from origin used for humans, usually women, that are handed from one vampire to the other in a clan. They are bitten so many times that their heads almost falls off, they are drained so much that it becomes dangerous to drink from them. If the last drops of blood are sucked out by the vampire with the lowest status, then, only then, they are referred to as bloodbags.

This ritual is nowadays only used by very old school vampire clans and is highly frowned upon. Even this old school killing and robbing nomad clan didn’t use this ritual anymore. I could hear it on the way he spit out the word bloodbag.

I looked at the child. The little girl clamped herself to her mother’s skirt. She was crying intensely but silent. She was scared and held on to the only thing she knew was safe, her mother. A wave of pity for the girl flushed over me. She was so young and innocent. The leader pulled the woman closer and a vampire behind her pulled her daughter away from her skirt. The little girl clamped to the vampires legs. Her blonde hair sticked to her wet face. Her eyes were red and her nose was snotty. The vampire lifted her up with great ease. The little girl let it all happen and obviously thought she was still safe with the man, not knowing what he was. She threw herself at him and buried her face in his shirt. I could see he was fighting his instinct. Her mother moaned shortly and it trigged even more fear in the little girl. The vampire holding her opened his mouth to smell her better. The leader growled at him and he abruptly closed his mouth. I could see he tried to breath as little as possible. I could see how hard he had to fight not to bite her, I could smell her sweet scent from over here.

Apparently the leader had tightened his grip on the woman’s throat. She had her head tilted to the sky and her eyes closed. She prayed soft but passionate.

The leader laughed mockingly at the desperate woman. His clan laughed with him, this made the woman pray louder. ‘Quiet, bloodbag.’ The vampire man hissed in classic vampyr ‘This never helped any human’ He stopped his laughter and his clan followed him abrupt. The silence that followed was frightening. It felt for a second as if I had gone deaf.

I just looked at the girl when I heard a well know crack. The scent of blood that followed was overwhelming. I could handle it because I trained myself but I felt the intense excitement of the vampires around me. The vampire holding me tightened his grip even more and it started to hurt.

The leader had ripped out the woman’s throat. She was bleeding heavily and was very dead. She had chocked on her own blood but her heart was still beating. The leader drank for a second and then threw her off to the vampires standing by. He focussed his eyes on the little girl and stretched out to grab her. The vampire holding her handed the girl to his leader.

‘She is ill, you know.’ I hissed as casual as I could in classic vampyr. I couldn’t let him end the little girl. My voice was soft, but I knew he would hear me. Before I could blink he stood close to me and leaned over trying to intimated me. It worked. I was scared but if I showed that it would mean the end of me. His breath had the scent of the women’s blood. This instinctively awoke a hunger in me. I bit my jaws together to behold my stomach from rambling. I could see the confusion on his face. ‘I’m a healer.’ I said. I truly was. Kind of. ‘I can fix her op for you.’ He seemed to agree. She was saved, for tonight at least.