The Vampire's Harvest

128

Uncertain how a statue could keep an army of vampires away, you put your trust in magic and remove the heavy weight from your pocket. Holding the statue in the palms of your hands, you cast a similar charm as you used on the jack-o-lantern, hopeful it may conjure something akin to a shield.

The cool marble turns warm as the spell spills from your lips. At the end of your enchantment, the heat leaves your palms and rises up before you as the statue grows and expands. You step back and marvel at your charm as the figures become of human height and their bodies separate from one another.

Like marionettes without the strings, the once lifeless statue becomes two human forms powered by blissful energy. Ignorant of the battle around them, the silent figures clasp hands and begin to dance to a music only they can hear. They sway with a soft, easy rhythm, dancing circles around you while the rest of the world grows taut with tension.

Your little trick has gained notice and though some look on with intrigue, many have taken your bizarre spell as a challenge.

You stumble backwards as the vamps rush past the cheerful dancers. You turn down the alley in hopes of finding the coven close to the end of their ritual. However, as you run through the narrow passageway, you find that they too are being surrounded. The once firm, confident chant of their spell is now a rabble of nervous noise. Ferris finishes with a booming command, but with the others distracted and out of sync, you worry what the result might be.

Will-o-wisps shoot out from the center of the coven's circle and most find their aim in the vampires, however some of the ethereal flames make way to the wolves and soon both nightwalker and moon beast are lit ablaze. Flames of rosy red flicker and dance as the vamps and wolves flail around. Their faces contort with irritation, their eyes darting to you and the coven with clear intent to do harm once they've extinguished these bothersome fires.

And extinguish them they do after some quick rolling in the dirt street.

You and the coven watch as the whole battle comes to a standstill while both sides of the fight take dirt baths. You look back and forth from the others, wondering if this was the intent, if this was the expected result. From the looks on their faces, you aren't sure they know either. So you turn to Ferris and find the color drained from his face.

"Run, all of you," he commands. He beats it down the alley while the coven looks with panic at each other, before glancing towards the battle torn street. The wolves and vamps don't seem quite as concerned with each other anymore, instead they look rather partial to human sacrifices.

Before one mage can even manage to scream, a vamp tears out her throat with his teeth. That provokes enough fervor in the others to send them charging after Ferris. However, neither wolves nor vamps know exactly who is coven and who isn't. They start picking off humans indiscriminately. The innocent bystanders rush to get back into their homes, but many are plucked from their stoops. As for you, you find one particularly angry wolf, who is now missing a large patch of fur on his shoulder blade thanks to the coven's fiery failure, is readying a pounce. Fear and guilt keeps you rooted in your spot and you wonder if the wolf would have the good graces to kill you quickly.

You never find out.

Just as the wolf leaps at you, another blur of fur fills your vision. Fur of golden brown honey.

"Gianette!" you cry as she beats the wolf back. Relief swells in you to a point that you think your ribs might crack, but when Gianette turns with teeth bared, the air quickly leaves your lungs. You ready a plea, but she grabs you in her great jaw and then runs down the street, tackling a vamp here and there in order to clear your path. The jostling digs her teeth into your stomach, though she never breaks your flesh thanks to the thick fabric of your clothes and cloak. By the time you reach the woods, you feel like you'd been soundly beaten in a thick burlap bag.

Gianette drops you to the ground with an unceremonious thud before turning back for town. You reach out and call to her, but she growls in response. You flinch, recoiling at the sight of her curling lips and flattened ears. With that as her goodbye, she races off, leaving you with only the clear message that you are not welcome in the town and that you'd better be gone by the time she returns.

You decide to listen to your sister. You head out into the woods, not knowing where to go or what to do. Only knowing that you'll now be forever alone.

***

You've found one of the unsuccessful endings for this branch of the story... Why not go back and see if there's a way to keep the vamps at bay?