The Blood Bracelets #1: Blood Bound

Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine

Eljae knew her apartment was empty before she even stepped inside it, but it didn’t fill her with joy and self-satisfaction like her other apartment had. This one was basic and generic to all the ones on the same floor, considered almost like a safe-house for her since the apartment smelt heavily of dog. As much as she hated it, if anyone was tracking her then the canine smells would surely cover her own scent.

The door sprung open when she clicked over the lock with her key and she moved easily through the dark interior, her eyes adjusting almost instantly. The apartment was a simple one, with a bedroom and bathroom adjoining from the living area, which opened up into a kitchen. It was all murky-cream walls and brown carpet, then linoleum floors for the kitchen and bathroom. The plastic shower curtain was probably the ugliest thing in the apartment, second to the pastel green bed sheets of course.

The only safe place in this apartment to keep her valuables was right under her pillow, so she intended to hock them tomorrow morning and secure a new apartment somewhere in South Yarra, where new rich people awaited her to be robbed. She had considered offering herself for hire, since everyone needed a good thief every now and then, but decided against it. She had enough attention on her already by the sounds of it.

Eljae hadn’t bothered to search for whoever put the bounty on her head, despite what she had said to the lupine. Finding a wraith was hard enough and tracking someone that had used a wraith was even harder. She knew the lupine hadn’t been lying either, since she was able to pick up the way someone’s smell changed when they lied and how their heart beat quickened, making their blood rush. She couldn’t explain the smells if anyone asked her to, but she could catch them easily enough.

She walked into her bedroom and kicked the door shut. There were no windows in her room to let any light, so her eyes quickly adjusted again to the silhouettes of her bed and nightstand and the pile of clothes in the corner since she didn’t have a wardrobe, only an old chest of drawers which struggled to open properly.

Dropping her keys on to her bed, Eljae’s stomach grumbled in hunger, making her press her hand to it until the rumbling subsided. She realised she hadn’t eaten in almost twenty-four hours.

Eljae turned and opened her bedroom door. She took a step forward, reaching around the wall for the light switch to the living area – and something snagged her arm.  She spun around and gasped, finding a smoking black hand wrapped around her wrist, wispy tendrils crawling up her arm like spiders legs. She looked up but saw no one behind her, just darkness.

But the darkness was moving. Moonlight wasn’t penetrating through it, wasn’t banishing it to the corners of the room. Suddenly more tendrils, like vines, shot out from the dark mass, latching onto her arms and legs, snaking around her neck and shoulders.

As the black mass began to envelope her, swallowing her whole, Eljae realised she hadn’t needed to find the wraith at all. It found her.

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It was raining by the time they reached Jerry’s location, the clouds thick and dark in the night sky, releasing a shower of misty, light rain that coated Taryn but didn’t quite soak through. She didn’t know what time it was now, but her fatigue was slowly creeping up on her, making her mind wander, her eyes intermittently focusing as they walked, even her feet scuffed the ground, too tired to step properly. 

Taryn tried to stifle her yawn but Kael heard it, glancing back briefly over his shoulder. She looked away, avoiding his gaze so that he wouldn’t say anything. It seemed as if these people she was suddenly surrounded by could go on forever, never needing sleep, always active, focused and energised. It made her feel somewhat inferior, like the new, unexperienced player on an expert sports team – always slowing down everyone else, fumbling the ball, getting in the way.