Bloodfang

The Bloodfang

Feral

Feral chuckled as the boy jumped to his feet. "Do you want to take a look?" he asked the wolf, pointing toward a mirror that set above the dresser. "Jump up on the bed," he instructed. "You'll be able to see your reflection," he told him before suddenly pausing to ask, "You do have a reflection right?"

"I have a reflection," Feral assured him with a mock-growl making the boy laugh.

Leaping up onto the bouncy mattress and stepping carefully on the give-way surface he looked at himself in the mirror. Though Feral could not see all hues of colors he could tell the fang shaped pendant was red. It barely dangled from around his neck. It... looked...nice, he thought. And the boy had been right. It did look appropriate hanging around his neck.

"Very nice," he complimented. "Thank you, human," he murmured. "I shall wear it always."

The boy grinned his pleasure. "Shoo," he said, pretending to wipe at nonexistent sweat. "I was worried there for a minute. I am so glad you like it!"

"It is fitting," Feral said, springing lithely from the bed to land with a soft thud back onto the floor. He stepped toward the door. "Shall we go back down?" he enquired. "Your uncle will return soon. It is best that we stay in the living room, closer to the basement," he suggested.

"Yes, you're right," the boy agreed, following behind Feral as they made their way back down the stairs.

The boy immediately sat back down on the sofa but Feral walked over to the boarded up wall. It looked peculiar to Feral. He had never been inside a home before but he had looked in many over the years. Never had he seen this particular type of decoration. He turned to the boy and asked, "I have wanted to ask you," he said. "Why is this wall different? It seems an odd decoration."

Feral watched as the boy turned towards the chimney. He noticed how the boy's eyes widened an awkward expression came over him before he began lightly gnawing at his lower lip. The lip biting always indicated that the boy was experiencing a heightened state of anxiety. Feral wondered why such a simple question would cause the boy to react so uneasily.

"You do not have to tell me, human," Feral said quickly, walking over to stand in front of the boy. "I was only curious. I have not seen such a setup in other homes. I only wondered at its meaning."

The boy glanced down at Feral before looking back up and staring at the boarded up chimney. "It's really not my story to tell, Feral," the boy said looking back down at him. "It's my uncle's really. But you're not just anybody," he said, apparently coming to a decision. "Let's sit down and I'll tell you what my uncle told me."

They both sat down on the couch side by side. The boy lifted up his leg and rested it on the sofa cushion, twisting his upper body so that he could face the wolf. "Before I tell you," the boy prefaced, "I want to remind you that I heard this story before I met you." A second later he began recanting the tale his uncle had told him.

"I didn't really believe him when he told me," the boy confessed. "I mean, I believed he had seen something but not what he had said he had seen," he tried to clarify, shaking his head. "He said it had pale white skin, claws, fangs, and blood red eyes. It was nothing Uncle Steve had ever seen before."

"What happened next?" Feral asked with trepidation. It was clear from the boy's words that his uncle had encountered a vampire but he wanted the boy to finish telling the story before he responded.