Wake Up, Witch

Chapter 14

If I was dead, I hope it was not in any realm Mertha Krall could enter because I would not have the courage to face her, really. It's the pride, you see. I had more of it than the will to live at that moment.

It was the feeling of nothing that made me believe I was dead. The absence of the headache and the excruciating, scalding blaze of heat were almost surreal and foreign.

However, it was the constant and tiny man-made sounds that made me question my reality. Tinkling of metals, soft footsteps and short whispered words. I almost didn't open my eyes, afraid to shatter whatever illusion my body had summoned to end my suffering.

But I did. The curiosity was too strong. If this meant I was alive and didn't have to meet Mertha Krall in such a terrible state, I'd welcome the suffering again. But that didn't come. I was still painless, however groggy. My eyes took a while to adjust to the bright room. And it took my brain twice longer to remember who found me on the floor in the middle of a bloody vampire trap.

I abruptly sat up in panic, but firm hands stopped me from jumping off the cot. Felix Katz held my gaze firmly. "Relax. It's okay."

"Where am I?" I asked, looking around.

A woman appeared beside him. The beautiful vampire from The Dungeon. Her face was filled with silent amusement and knowing. "We'll have to keep her asleep."

"N-No." But she was already reaching for the clear plastic line of tube, rolling the small mechanism there. As the panic in my chest subsided, Felix Katz gently guided me on my back. There was one more tubing line attached to my hand, feeding my vein with something dark.

I didn't know I had tears in my eyes. Speaking now, I admit I was afraid. Maybe because I knew what was happening. What they were doing.

Yet, despite that, I asked Katz a stupid question. "Are you working for Evensen?" In my head, I was praying he'd say yes. That Evensen sent him and that he was not there to kill me or worse, bring me to the Council.

"I'm not the person to ask," was all he said. Which was the same as yes, I assumed.

"Bring me home. You'll get in trouble for this if we get caught," I said as the vampire increased the dosage of the clear liquid.

"No. We'll both be in trouble."

That's the last I remember. The next morning, I woke up certain of only a few things:

Bellatrix was licking my face.

The fever and pain were gone.

Akira was screaming and blaming Lexie's cat for ruining his experiment.

My pill box was restocked.

And I was a bloody vampire.

***

The anger was most definitely expected, but mostly because I didn't know why I had turned into the creature I hated the most. A vampire couldn't turn someone without consent. Whoever turned me had my permission. Or mayhap forced it out of me.

My thoughts came to a pause when Tiff, with Miles in her arms, was followed by Akira out of the ritual room. He was still angry over the trap, and he was still blaming the cat.

"They were claw marks. You saw them," he said behind her.

Tiff rolled her eyes as she sat across from me in the drawing room. "Maybe it's your dog," she said. "You've been neglecting it."

"It's not my dog, and it had not moved from where it had been lying down the entire night," Akira insisted.

"How do you know?"