So Sacrifice Yourself, and Let Me Have What's Left

I was running, panting, screaming, crying, and looking back at the dark figure chasing me as I ran barefoot through the lush forest. I was surprised of how well my footing was, but didn’t take the time to wonder why. Anything that could help me continue running away from the creature was fine with me. My hair whipped my face and neck as everything around me was a blur of green. I cried for help, but it seemed as if the dark figure and I were the only things inhabiting the forest. My feet scraped against the rough texture of rock and twigs pierced my skin as I stepped on them. I winced at the pain, but I had to take it if I wanted to live.

Candace, don’t be afraid. I only want to help you. My eyes widened as Kala’s soft voice rang in my ears. I want to help you escape.

My conscience told me not to trust Kala and her words, but something came over me. I felt weak, fragile, and exposed to this world. I felt as if my body was no longer protected by an invisible shield. I continued to run, and felt the cold morning wind rush past my skin, which felt tender and breakable. I noticed something was wrong when I tried to confuse the creature still chasing me by changing courses. When I placed the palm of my hand on a rotting tree in hopes to slow myself down just enough to tell my body to turn and run down a different route, it was then that I saw something missing.

My mark was gone.

I then realized what was wrong with me. I felt fragile and exposed because I no longer had an invisible force protecting my body. I was no longer a Hybrid, but a human. Kala was stronger than me now, and would no longer see me as a threat had I still been a Hybrid.
Lost in my thoughts of being shocked of how I was now a mere mortal, I wasn’t paying attention to my footing. I let out a small cry as my foot got caught under a twig, causing me to lose my balance and fall face first into the cold hard ground. I tried getting up as quickly as I could, but was pinned down back to the ground by the dark figure that was now hovering over me.

Forgive me, Candace. Kala’s voice whispered into my ear once more as I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder.

I cried at the pain, only causing it to increase in my tender, human skin as Kala’s teeth sank deeper. I felt cold blood run down my body, and screamed as a chunk of my shoulder was ripped form the rest of my body. Blood spewed from my insides as the red liquid increased in flow. I saw Kala’s gleaming white teeth holding part of my shoulder in her mouth, her eyes black as night as they had a wild fire burning from the inside when she tasted my blood that only caused her to crave more for the red liquid found locked in a human’s body, which I now contained.

“Please don’t cry.” A soothing voice whispered, and by the way it muffled I could tell the owner of the voice said it in my hair. I felt rough, calloused fingers run through my hair which strangely felt damp against my skin. I felt the vibrations from the owner of the voice humming in my hair and, for some reason, it soothed me. I was caught in the realm of being in a daze of coming out of my nightmare and entering reality.

I was caught in this realm because I couldn’t make myself believe that it was a nightmare. It felt so real. I felt Kala’s teeth sink into my skin, I felt the pain, I felt the wind rushing through my hair as I ran for my life, and I felt my cold blood run down my tender skin as Kala feasted on me. I let out a small whimper as I felt the pain in my shoulder at the memory. I don’t know why I dreamt that, or what made me dream about Kala basically murdering me, and there was nothing I could do about it. I found myself shaking at the thoughts of thinking that maybe the dream wasn’t just a dream, but a vision. Maybe my heart was telling me something. Kala said she was assigned to kill me, so maybe that was what my heart was telling me? My heart was telling me to run away before I was killed. That thought put me into hysterics. I started fidgeting; my breathing became uneven as I started to cry uncontrollably. I felt my fingers tighten against a bare chest and I felt a man’s arms wrap themselves around the small of my back.

“You’re dreaming, it’s not real,” The voice whispered into my hair. I felt rough fingertips tracing patterns into my back, which caused me to unwillingly relax. “There, there, don’t cry.” I knew that voice. It was all too familiar.

I continued to relax at the voice. It was very soothing for some strange reason. My body sank against the one next to me, and I noticed that there wasn’t an inch of fat on the body. I exited from the realm I was in for what seemed like eternity, and I slowly opened my eyes. I was right; it was a bare chest my fingers were pressed against.

I lifted my head, my eyes traveling up the man’s body that was strangely familiar and locked with a pair of warm brown eyes. Brian looked at me, a smile creeping upon his lips as I stared at him in wonder.

“Morning.” He said with his voice barely above a whisper. My brows furrowed as I realized we were lying together in a bed. I could see in the corner of my eye that I wasn’t in my room, and I guessed I was in Brian’s room. But the real question was, why? As if he could read my thoughts, Brian shifted a bit, causing my gaze to return back to his chocolate brown eyes. “Zack’s at his parent’s house, and he told me to take care of you just in case you started to have nightmares.” He stated.

I nodded, understanding why I had woken up in Brian’s room instead of my own. But still, why did Zacky tell Brian to look after me? I thought Zacky knew Brian liked me? Surely he would’ve thought about that before leaving me, right? My eyes widened. What if Zacky wants to kill himself? Maybe being around me made him suicidal. Perhaps we switched personalities, and Zacky turned into the person I used to be, and he thought—since they hate him—he could have his parents kill him so they could be happy without him and Zacky would be gone forever.

Yeah, that makes sense.

“If you don’t mind me asking, what was it about?” I knew Brian was talking about my nightmare. I guess it would be better to get it out rather than have the images bottled up inside of me. But I knew that if I said who was in the dream with me, Brian would surely go crazy and kill Kala with his bare hands.

“Well…I was running through the woods.” The story played in my head as I narrated it with words. I looked at my hands on Brian’s chest instead of looking him in the eyes. “I was being chased by something, someone. I tried getting away, but the thing was much faster.” I remembered hearing Kala’s voice ringing in my ears, but decided to keep that detail a secret. “Eventually I tripped.” Brian chuckled, and I playfully hit his chest. I knew that it didn’t hurt him one bit. “And the thing that was chasing me…well, it, uh…killed me.”

Brian was quiet for a few moments, and I guessed he was thinking about what I told him. “When you say it killed you, do you mean it…Turned you?”

It surprised me how serious he could sound. I looked up to see his eyes filled with concern. Unable to say anything, I nodded, waiting for Brian’s reaction. That time never came, because soon enough Brian turned back into his overly crazy self by jumping off the bed and pulling me to my feet. “I’m hungry.” Brian stated, grabbing my hands and leading me into his kitchen.

I sat down on a bar stool, making myself comfortable, while Brian looked for something to eat. I looked out the window that exposed the beach. The morning sun wasn’t rising on the horizon the water made up, but somehow the ocean managed to sparkle in the dim light that was provided for it. There were days where I wanted to go into the ocean and swim into the unknown, just to see what I could find. I actually felt the urge to stand on my feet and walk out the patio, through the wind sand that made the perfect beach, and dive right into the cold murky waters. I wanted to escape from everything. I wanted to escape from the Hybrids, the Lycans, and the vampyres that were on the hunt to kill me, The Forbidden One. I was too sensitive and young to experience these things, and to know that there were people out there that wanted me dead. In fact, one of those people was standing right in front of my with a box of Cheerio’s in his hand, the other eating out of the box and shoving it into his mouth.

“Brian?” I asked, not thinking about what I was about to say. Brian looked up at me, and I continued. “You know about The Forbidden One, right?” my heart slowly came to a stop as I watched the glare form in Brian’s face, causing my eyes to widen as he looked like he was about to kill something.

“Where did you hear that?” he spat with pure venom in his words. It scared me to see him this way. He was usually so happy and care-free, now what? I immediately began to regret bringing up the subject.

“Well, you know, living with a bunch of werewolves brings up that kind of subject.” I mumbled, very impressed with myself that I didn’t stutter. Brian knew that Devin was a Lycan, and he understood what I meant by ‘living with a bunch of werewolves’.

Brian nodded, the anger starting to calm down. “What about her?” this surprised me. He actually knew that The Forbidden One was a girl? Well, I’m pretty sure that this girl is famous, what with everyone wanting to kill her, so they have to find out every detail about her. I shivered at the thoughts of using myself in the third person. I think I might be going crazy again.

“Well, uh, what do you think about her?” I knew it was a stupid question. The look on Brian’s face said it all. He wanted her dead just as much as the rest of the guys and Kala did.

“She’s a terrible person, Ace.” He grumbled, his squinted eyes aimed directly into mine, which scared me. I wasn’t used to this side of Brian, and I didn’t like it one bit. “She’s the reason why this damn war is going on, and it’s taken the fucking army three hundred god damn years to find her!” I jumped at his yelling, and hoped it was going to be over soon. “I mean, is she really that good of a hider? You would think that she would just, I don’t know, pop up somewhere, right?” I knew that was a rhetorical question, and I didn’t answer. I could only hope that this little outburst would be over soon. “There are days when I think that it’s all made up.” Brian’s voice softened a bit, which made me somewhat happier. “There are days when I think that the Count just wanted to start shit with us so he said he had a daughter with Abigail. I think he just wanted to see what would happen. Well, something did happen.” His voice rose a bit, as did my heart beat. “Because of the Count and that god damn Forbidden One my fucking brother is dead!” my eyes widened. I knew Brian had a brother, his name was Brent, and I met him a few times, but that was weeks ago. He couldn’t possibly be dead yet, could he? “No, Ace, not Brent.” It didn’t surprise me that Brian could read my thoughts. I looked down to see that I had placed my hand on his for support in hopes of getting him to calm down a few moments ago, and he could read my thoughts when he touched me. That was his ability. “I had another brother. His name was Bryant. He wanted to kill The Forbidden One, as most of us do, but he was the only one with enough balls to actually do something about it, so he joined the army a few years back.

“None of us heard from him for the longest time, so we just assumed the positive things. We thought maybe he just was too busy to check in and tell us he was fine, but I knew better. I knew Bryant, and I knew he would get himself killed by trying to find her. I started to have dreams, weird ones, about Bryant. I dreamt that he had found this girl when he separated himself from the army by accident, and she lured him in. I knew that was her. She fucking used him for her own damn pleasure, and killed him once she was done!”

My eyes widened. No, that couldn’t have been him. That was an accident. I didn’t mean any harm by it. I thought he would’ve found his way back, but he was too drunk to walk straight, so he fell. I didn’t push him. I didn’t even want to have sex with him at first, that is, before the shots kicked in. I saw him as a fairly attractive man. His beard kind of annoyed me, but I was too wasted to care about little things like that.

I was sick of being a virgin at the time, mainly because I would always have to be considered the ‘good girl’ compared to Leana and Danielle, and I wanted to change that. It was a party that Danielle ended up dragging me to because I had to be the designated driver for her. Eventually she left me, and I saw him. He looked like he was lost, which I now know he was, and he seemed to be in the army to me, thanks to his uniform that was dirty and clearly hadn’t been washed in many days. He was nice to me, and he offered me all the shots he could buy, which was plenty enough to get the buzz running through my veins.

The room started spinning, and his head ended up looking like a big smiley face that was just too adorable for me not to kiss. I didn’t lure him in. I didn’t and still don’t even know how to be like that to make any man want me. The kiss led to makeout, the makeout led to walking up the stairs, the walking up the stairs led to finding an empty room, the finding the empty room led to sex, and the sex led to his death. I hardly even remember what it felt like, but I remember the next morning perfectly. He was too drunk, and was suffering from a hangover on top of being ditzy from the shots he drank with me from the night before. I helped him down the stairs as I looked for Danielle, who was cuddled up next to some random guy on the couch, so I decided not to disturb her. I was going to let him go find his way back wherever he came from, but he kept on looking at me funny and telling me I was beautiful. I stopped him, telling him that he needed to leave me, and I didn’t think anything of what he told me until now.

“No,” he whined. “I have to…” he burped. “Show them that…you’re real…” he slurred and lost consciousness for a moment, but I shook him a bit, causing him to wake back up. “I’d be a…hero…and you’d be…” drool started to dribble from the corner of his mouth, but I didn’t bother to wipe it away.

He didn’t get to finish his words. It wasn’t because he started to walk away, oh no. He passed out, and started to tumble down the hill that made up the front yard. I watched as he flopped onto the sidewalk, and laughed. I know it was wrong not to help him, but I didn’t care about this man. I wasn’t a virgin anymore, which was fine with me, so I was technically ‘done with him’.

Well, at least Brian got that part right. The next part, not so much.

He woke up, and I was a bit surprised. He sure did know how to knock himself back into consciousness. I now know why. He was in the army, meaning he had been trained to be able to wake up and be prepared just incase of an attack. He began to stumble a bit across the road, and I was hoping a car wouldn’t come speeding by. It didn’t, and I sighed. I wouldn’t want to be the witness of a murder.

If only I knew what was going to happen next.

My brows furrowed as he walked past the sidewalk and towards the cliff. My eyes widened when I realized that he wasn’t aware that there was a drop-off right there. I had looked down in the previous night before walking into the house for the party, what with me being suicidal at the time, and thought about what it would be like to jump off that cliff and surely end my life. I wanted to call to him, telling him that he was about to fall over a very large drop-off, but somehow I couldn’t make my voice work. I watched in fear as his body stumbled over the last bit of land, and my impeccable hearing heard his body plop against the sharp rocks. I wanted to run back into the house and find a phone to call 911 and tell them that a person had jumped off a cliff, but something went off inside of me.

I felt…happy.

I felt like I had succeeded in something by watching him die. It now occurred to me why I felt that way. I was part vampyre, and I watched a Lycan die, and I was partly the reason. My vampyre side was happy that I had accomplished in having a werewolf die before my very eyes. When it happened, I shook the thoughts away, trying to tell myself that I wasn’t the reason why he died, and that eventually someone would find him, and they would have no idea that I was around for that man’s last seconds alive.

“I know she’s a cold hearted bitch.” Brian shook me out of my flashback, and I looked at him. My heart dropped at the sight of a silent tear falling down Brian’s angelic face. “I know she planned to kill him. I hate her.” He growled, causing me to grow worried. “She killed my brother, and she’s probably killed so many people that Lycan blood doesn’t even faze her anymore. I bet she’s just a whore that gives men what they want and then kills them. One day I will find her, and I’ll be the one to say that I killed The Forbidden One.”

It killed me enough knowing that one of my dearest friends hated me, and he didn’t even know it.