Afterlife (Purgatory Series Part Three)

Chapter Nine: A Collaboration of Confrontation

Chapter Nine: A Collaboration of Confrontation

Rain pelted against the house and every few minutes a low rumble of thunder would echo from somewhere in the distance. I sighed at the soothing sound and turned another journal page. I could only read the more recent ones, as most weren't translated into English, so I felt rather useless. We had been at this for three days and had yet to find anything of importance to our mission.

Roran had been a godsend. He had managed to get permission from Kosta to take the journals into a windowless room on the ground floor so that I could avoid getting singed from sunlight. It was just a small bedroom, but it was cozy and private. Kosta had informed the staff that we weren't to be bothered.

I had heard them whispering in the hallway; they weren't happy about my being here. The thing that bothered me the most were the rumors that Kosta's daughter and grandson were on their way here to confront him about my presence. We needed to find something soon and be gone by the time they got here, but things weren't looking promising.

"Listen to this," Roran whispered, and I immediately perked up at the interest in his voice.

"Warsaw, Poland 1743. After receiving reports of vampiric activity in the area I have stumbled upon a very troubling discovery. The vampires in this country are entirely different than those I know how to hunt. These new creatures are fast and strong, unlike the sickly weak vampires who must feed daily on blood to survive. From what I have gathered, these creatures have a blood thirst so immense and insatiable that they will even feed on former friends and family. Some reports indicate these new creatures even have a power that will immobilize its victims."

I nodded. "That's definitely what we're looking for. What else does it say?"

Roran was silent for several moments as he read ahead a few pages. Out of nowhere he stiffened against me and let out a soft gasp.

"What?" I asked, staring down at the book in his lap as though somehow I would be able to read the words if I looked at them long enough. "What did you find?"

"It says," he began, clearing his throat, "...I later found the new vampires to be in association with a witch who was communing with demon-kind. She intended to use the vampires and the new spells she had learned from the demons to make herself more powerful in order to rule over the city. It took my four brothers and myself almost an entire day to eliminate the threat and even now I am unsure if this is the last we will see of this phenomenon. We have no way of knowing if any of them escaped or how many were here originally."

I dropped my head into my hands in defeat. "So you were right. It is witches. What are we going to do?"

Roran sighed and rubbed his forehead. "I'm afraid there's more."

"I'm guessing from your tone, it's going to be something I don't want to hear?"

"Yes, but you need to hear it anyway."

"Great. What are we dealing with now? Mutated giants, three-headed dragons, close encounters of the third kind?"

Roran chuckled but shook his head. "No. The witch's name in Poland? It was Delilah."

I blinked. Rewound the sentence in my head and replayed it. Blinked again.

"Surely not the same Delilah we know, right? She'd be like 272 years old! That's not possible, right? Tell me that's not possible."

Roran shrugged. "Morgana managed to keep herself from aging. She can't be the only witch who knows the spell. But, I agree, it seems unlikely it's the same person."