Smother - Sire #1 (Patreon Book)

Chapter 4 - Part 1

The next morning Silas opened my door.

I didn't like how his presence unnerved me, tying my stomach in knots. He gave me a questioning look and I remembered his words from the night before. Get your shit together.

I stood up and soothed my clothes. "I'm ready."

I wasn't but I couldn't exactly tell him that. I had to find a way to pull myself through this. It wouldn't be easy but I kept trying to tell myself that if I put my mind to it I could succeed despite the odds against me.

He watched as I approached him. It was only when I got closer I saw the strangest thing. I stopped as I stared wondering if I was seeing things.

"Your eyes..." I lifted my hand to almost touch as his face as I watched the shimmer of gold in the iris of his eyes. There had been once or twice I swore I had seen it before but I had believed it was impossible. That had been before I had discovered Vampires were real. At this stage nothing was impossible.

They were hypnotising and I couldn't look away.

"Why?" I managed to murmur stopping myself from actually touch him. I made a point of lowering my hand so I wouldn't be tempted to touch him.

"Humans are unable see us as we are. Once you're infected the veil disappears."

I touched my hand to my face, wondering if my eyes would look the same. "Will mine look the same?"

He shook his head. "Yours shimmer white." His eyes held mine and I swallowed nervously.

He said it like it was happening right now. I wanted to be able to see it but I didn't have a mirror.

"Let's go," Silas commanded before turning his heel. I hurried behind him trying to keep up with him despite the urge to run in the opposite direction.

Every step closer the training my panic rose and any encouragement I had given myself went up in smoke. I couldn't do this.

I couldn't get over how white the hallways were, airy and light. It was the opposite to how I expected Vampires to live. Didn't they sleep in coffins in the dungeon?

I still had so many questions about Vampires and my own kind, Sires. Did sunlight harm us? What about garlic and holy water? If we had different eyes to Vampires did that mean we had other differences? I tried to think back to anything else I could remember but it wasn't like I had extensive knowledge on the vampire myth. I stored my questions for a time I would be able to get some answers.

I was jumpy and nervous as Silas entered the room before me. I stepped in hesitantly gazing at the faces of Sires and Vampires. I couldn't see my own eyes but I saw six Sires with shimmering white in the iris. Silas moved to the front of the room beside another girl who had the same gold shimmering in her eyes. She was a Vampire like him.

She was beautiful, her skin flawless. Long dark hair cascaded to her shoulders and I stared unable to look away. Her beauty was entrancing. Were all Vampires genetically gifted to be jaw droopingly gorgeous? Or was it only the two in front of us?

Although thinking back to my encounter with Bryce, he was also handsome in a cruel kind of way. Not my type. But I doubted I was anyone's type.

I had been told I was pretty in a girl next door kind of way but I felt frumpy and ugly compared to the female Vampire.

"Avery," Silas called out harshly prompting me out of my daze.

I hurried to join the other Sires. I mimicked how the others stood with feet slightly apart and their hands behind their backs as they looked forward to the Vampires.

The female vampire looked to Silas and he gave her slight inclination before he stepped back giving her the signal to start.

He put himself in the background but I bet he was the one who was really in charge.

"It doesn't matter how you got here. What will count is what you do from this point on." She surveyed us all one by one as she walked the length of our line facing to the front of the room.

"My name is Eve and I'm here to train you." She shot a look at Silas. "Silas will oversee the training and evaluate who passes...and who fails."

She gave a few moments of silence to allow us to process her words.

"As a Sire you'll be expected to hunt down and kill Scavs." She paused and turned to face me. I swallowed trying to mask my ever increasing nervousness.

"Has anyone here taken a life?" she asked looking straight at me. I bet she could tell my answer would be a no.

I swallowed nervously.

Everyone remained silent, signalling I wasn't the only one. I, like the others had never been put into a situation where that might have been necessary. It showed the vast differences between this world and the one we had been oblivious in.

"You will have to kill. In a fight it will either be your life or theirs." When her attention moved from me I shot a side glance to the other Sires. They looked like I felt. Scared. "Hesitation is death."

Would she reveal how Sires could be killed?

I had never ever thought of taking a life before and I didn't think it was in me to do it even if it was for my own survival. I bet this was a condition of passing the training. If I couldn't take a life then I wouldn't be able to kill a Scav and that would make me a pretty useless Sire.

Any hope I had harboured to get through the training vanished. I gritted my teeth to stop myself from getting emotional and tried to concentrate on what the Vampire was saying. I felt Silas' gaze but I refused to meet it. I was scared he would see how weak I was even when I was doing my best to hide it.

"First we are going to have a look at one," she explained.

I didn't know how I felt about actually seeing one.

Eve walked over to panel in the side of the wall to the back of the class. We turned and watch as she pressed a combination of buttons and the wall slid apart revealing a glass cage. The Scav was a girl just like us except the only physical thing that was different was the shimmer of red in her eyes.

Her short black hair was disheveled and she wore a dress with blood stains. I bet it was what she was wearing when she had been bitten.

She looked distressed as her eyes shot to mine. I didn't care what they said she was, all I could see was the young girl who was frightened and scared. The same as I had felt when I had first worked up chained to the wall.

"She is hungry and very dangerous."

I wanted to laugh out loud but I dared not. Dangerous. She didn't look like she could hurt a fly, let alone any of us. There was something in her eyes that resonated with me.

"Don't be deceived by her size." Eve told us. "She is strong."

"How do we kill her?" a guy who was at least a foot taller than me with a short buzz cut asked. He had a grim look in his face as he watched the Scav.

"An adrenaline shot to the heart is the fastest way to kill a Scav."

Eve walked up to him with her arms crossed. "Unfortunately due to the complicated nature of the injection and release of adrenaline it cannot be shot from a gun."

I bit my lip. Not that I even had the capability to do what she was saying there was no way physically I could do what she had described.

I felt like I was an extra that had been dropped in an action movie with none of the skill set to pull off the part.

My attention moved back to the girl who stood against the glass with her hands flattened against the glass. She was staring at me like I had another head and I wondered why she was paying more attention to me than anyone else.

Her eyes watching me made me uncomfortable and I wished I could disappear into the background.