The Vampire & the Rebel (Completed)

Part 3: Chapter 7

My days had fallen into a steadying rhythm. Assisting Connor, training, teaching, broken up by the little tasks of life and small interactions with various people throughout my busy days.

Sometimes, I longed for my former solitude, but other times, I almost found myself finding satisfaction in those unfamiliar moments.

It was noon, so I was taking a break to eat as were many of New Haven's other occupants. Lucas was there along with Rene, and he was carrying around his squalling child like a trophy.

"You're going to be quite the fighter when you grow up, aren't you, buddy?" he asked, while he balanced the child on one shoulder while feeding himself with the other.

Rene smiled, although the idea of her child struggling against our bloodsucking oppressors clearly terrified her.

When I had returned, I was relieved to learn that both Rene and the baby had survived. Braydon had lost his wife and son in childbirth, although that had been before I had known him. Grief and suffering were surely what the future held for the week's old child in Lucas's arms, and yet Lucas seemed so incredibly enthusiastic about his future that I could not understand it. The baby was so fragile and so vulnerable.

The world was dangerous and tentative. The fight against the leeches' regime had always seemed a worthy—if losing—battle to me and this attempt was by no means assured of success. I would fight because there was no other choice, regardless of the outcome. I could barely bring myself to hope that someday the world might actually improve for us humans.

"Want to hold him?" Lucas offered, apparently noticing the direction of my attention.

Hell, no. The little thing looked like it would snap if a breeze touched it. "No, I've got to get going. Training, you know?"

Lucas grinned at me as if he could see right through me. I shrugged it off as I left the dining hall. I really did have other things to do, already I was being given more responsibility and I did not have time to waste on happiness.

Her face while we were entangled wandered through my mind and shook it off. That wasn't happiness, that was contention, satisfaction, completion.

I wanted to believe it was simple lust, but the cold truth was she had been in my mind since before I liked anything about her but that entrancing body. Probably she had already been winding her tendrils around my mind while I still hated her.

And worse, here I was, analyzing feelings like one of the youth I now trained, when there were more important matters at hand. She was probably busy tormenting whatever human was nearest at hand while I was gone without a care in the world.

I wasn't good enough at deceiving myself to actually believe any of my own nonsense.

Simple truth, my interest in her ran deep and she had never hid hers in return. It was a losing battle. I didn't know when I would see her again, but there seemed no point left in resistance for the sake of resistance. Maybe she would bore with me, maybe she would not, but I was a rabbit in a snare and struggling only tied the noose tighter with each movement.

I smiled grimly. I was coming to enjoy my ensnarement, so there were better ways to spend my time and energy than worrying about what I no longer even truly wanted to change.

Out in the training field I was put through my paces and I enjoyed the feeling of pushing myself as far as I could go. There was satisfaction in the gains I had made in the last year. Lucas and I sparred, and as much as he had his head in the clouds while he was holding his offspring, he maintained or maybe increased his determination to defeat the current order.