One Of A Kind

The first thing I noticed when I came to was the horrible pounding pain that was the right side of my face. I took in a slow hitched breath, tasting the dank mildewy scent that hung heavily around me. I opened my eyes (my right one squinting from the pressure of my bruised and swollen cheek) and took in my blurry surroundings. The windowless walls were made of dark gritty cement, the floor covered with fine black dirt. The walls and surfaces were covered with candelabras all fitted with burning white candles. It looked like I was in someone’s wine cellar, one without electricity.

I went to touch my neck to see if I’d been bitten, but my arm wouldn’t move. I looked up, my head still swimming, and to my horror saw my wrists were chained to the wall. The wall was slanted slightly so I wasn’t standing straight up, but leaning back against it. I looked down and saw that my clothes were replaced with a thin white nightgown. Terror filled my shaking body.

I heard the cellar door open with a creak, and I swung my head around to look at it, my face throbbing painfully. My heart pounded when the vampire who attacked me came into view, followed by two others. His lip had healed, unlike my face. The orange light from the candles made him look even more menacing as he and his friends swept towards me.

“Have you tasted her yet, Ira?” Asked the woman behind him, her eyes skimming over my body.

“Not yet. She put up such a fight that I wanted her to be awake for it.” My heart skipped a beat as Ira grinned from ear to ear.

The woman strode up to me and slid a cold finger down my bruised cheek, making me wince in pain. “It’s a shame to bruise such a pretty face.”

“She made me bleed.” Said Ira, stepping next to her.

“Please...” I whispered, icy cold fear paralyzing my body. “Please let me go.”

He grabbed my chin, yanking my face towards him, and licked the cut on my forehead where it smashed into the sidewalk. He shuttered, his breath hitching, the other two looking at him curiously.

In the blink of an eye, Ira had yanked my head to the side, his hand smashing my bruised face into the gritty wall, his fangs buried into the curve of my neck. I let out a screech of agony, a sound the other two took as encouragement. I watched in horror as their eyes darkened to black spheres and their fangs growing long and sharp. The woman sank into the flesh of my upper arm and the man dropped to his knees to tear into the inside of my thigh. Pain racked my body, the shriek dying in my throat, my mouth still open in a silent scream. There was nothing I could do but endure as all three of them bit deeper and more viciously into my flesh, draining my body.

My vision started to get fuzzy when they all suddenly pulled away, blood dripping from their mouths. My legs gave out, but the chains kept me upright, the slant of the wall supporting most of my body. All of them were panting heavily, a wild and savage look in their solid black eyes.

“I’ve never.. tasted anything like it.” Said the man, obviously struggling to keep from pouncing back onto me.

“She tastes... amazing. What... what is she?” The woman said, wiping my blood from her mouth and licking it off her fingers.

“...Too rare to lose.” Ira said, his black eyes locked on me. “Leave us.” The two other vampires backed away instantly, leaving me alone with Ira.