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“Swear it, please. You’ll tell no one. Swear it on everything that matters.”
And Shelby swore.
After that, well…
It was blinding, the pain. Fangs digging into his neck from behind, ripping skin like paper ripped by a toddler.
He was loosing blood, a lot of it, and fast. His head was getting lighter, and his mind hazy, until it all stopped with a snap. In the same moment he was alive again, and the night was far brighter than it should have been.
Avid gasped at his now released neck, stumbling for a moment as he looked behind at Shelby. She looked almost guilty, saying something about how she had tried to make it quick.
“You should know, if you don’t want the others to know about you, they’re gonna sense something over here, so they might come here. You should probably leave.”
Avid nodded, already moving towards the water, Shelby calling after him on how to turn into a bat. Taking her advice, he tried to channel the vampire-y-ness. Just this once, he told himself.
It worked, surprisingly, and then he was flying, albeit clumsily.
Shelby yelled something after him, about raw meat? But then he was out of range.
And just in time, as a larger bat swooped infront of Shelby. But just as quickly as Shelby started into a swarm of bats, the new bat started chasing after him.
And it was fast.
Avid tried to dodge below it, feeling the bats talons above him as he quickly scrambled into the roots of a tree. The bat followed him, and Abid was suddenly grateful for his currently smaller size as he scrambled into a small burrow like hole under a root.
The bat transformed as it hit the ground, revealing a familiar read head. It was Apo.
Something deep in Avids head told him that she was safe, that she was Coven. Something far more to the forefront of his head told him to dig deeper into the earth, away from her.
Avid decided to listen to the forefront of his head, clawing at the ground with small paws.
Apo was talking to him, their voice betraying the anger and concern.
“Come out, please. We can talk, I know how you feel.”
The sound of a second pair of wings reached his ears, as the older vampire tried to lure him out.
“Who is it?”
That was Cleo.
“I don’t know. I only saw them as a bat. Whoever turned them went in the other direction.” Apos hand was reaching into the little tunnel Avid had frantically dug. Her elbow got caught just as her hand grazed his wing.
He let out a startled squeak at the contact, while Apo let out an annoyed grunt. Cleo seemed to join Apos attempt at catching Avid, clawing at the ground around the entrance of Avids escape tunnel.
Eventually, when the dirt started getting to a dangerous level of dampness, he started trying to move back toward the surface. The adrenaline was still beating through his no longer beating heart, but his claws were getting sore.
Luckily, the dirt was softer than it had been at the beginning.
Unluckily, Scott showed up.
“What happened here?”
There was a fourth vampire there, but whoever it was hadn’t spoken yet.
“Someone got turned. It wasn’t by us, but whoever it was won’t come out.” Cleo said, their voice giving way to an aggravated tone. “What happened with you two?”
“We didn’t turn whoever this one is, if that’s what you’re asking. Scott did turn Drift though.” That was Owen. Owen. The one who said he would kill him.
“It was an accident!” Scott sounded as if he was taking mock offense to Owen’s words.
But they got Drift.
Cleo seemed to share his surprise, although much more laid back. “Oh, Avid won’t like that at all.”
Avid did not like that at all. He also did not like the small growing part in the back of his brain going on about a coven. But it did remind him that that little bond needed to go.
He rammed his mind into the bond that connected him with the coven, feeling the currently newborn bond quake. He could tell the vampires above him could feel that too, as the movement above had paused before returning with renewed vigor.
Slamming into the bond again, it frayed further, and Scott let out a soft curse. It was uncharacteristic of the distinctly noble vampire.
“What are they doing?” Even Apo had a concerned tone, and their arms were reaching further down the tunnel. Avid would bet that their shoulder was nearly touching the earth.
Luckily for Avid, his nose breached the surface, and he prepared himself to flee.
Just as he leaped into the sky, he slammed into the coven bond one final time, feeling it crumple like paper.
And then he flew, launching himself into the sky and through the dead leaves as the vampires let out sounds of surprise.
The sounds of them transforming behind him only spurred him on faster, but now they wouldn’t be able to track him through telepathy alone.
He had enough of a head start, mixed with his small size, he was able to navigate through the branches as efficiently as them. However, his clumsiness at flying hindered him.
Ducking into another small cavity when he was sure none of them could see him, he saw the four blow past where he was hiding.
He stayed there for longer than he would like to admit before returning to town.
By then the town had already gathered for their meeting, and Avid returned to an admittedly muddy human form behind his house.
Scrubbing at the dirt, trying to look atleast semi ok, he walked out towards the others.
Pearl noticed him first, calling out to him. “Avid! Where have you been? What happened to you?”
Avid let out a nervous laugh at that, wiping at the dirt again. “I fell! It was really muddy and the ground was slippery!”
Quite a few of them seemed to believe his clumsiness, nodding or muttering in agreement. It was only mildly embarrassing to realize the others thought of him as that clumsy. But Cleo was watching him.
“Were you alone?” Pearl was like a dog with a bone, and at Avids avoidant look she groaned in exasperation. The others picked up on it aswell, with their barrage of asking why he went alone.
He tried to salvage it, bringing up the fact the vampires very specifically didn’t want to turn him.
“One journey with me and you think you’re invincible!” Pearl was still noticeably exasperated.
Avid tried to joke, lightening the mood if you would. “Well, nothing bad ever happens around you!”
After that the others quickly caught him up to speed, before they returned to the previous topic.
At the revelation of Drifts vampirism, which avid had already known about, the others exploded into noise.
When the humans and vampires split apart, Avid went with the humans.
The rest of the meeting passed in much a blur, with Cleo’s threat ringing in his ears.
“The second you get turned, Avid. I will tell everyone.”
Now here he was, looking into the jail cell with a forlorn expression. Stepping in, he closed the door behind himself.
He would only stay for the night.
When the morning came he only rose from his sleep by the sound of someone moving outside. It would be an opportunity for him to get out.
“Help! Help! I’m stuck! I can’t get out!”
The sound of heavy footsteps on wood greeted him, along with Rens heavy accent.
“Avid? How have you gotten yourself trapped within there?”
Avids face blushed as red as it could with its near lack of blood. “I.. I fell asleep.”
Ren chuckled a bit at that, and the sound was comforting and familiar. The iron door banged open as Ren stepped on the pressure plate.
Avid stumbled onto his feet and out the door, Ren giving him a heavy pat on the back.
That was the last day of peace, the remaining townsfolk laughing and collecting supplies together. It was as if both factions had taken a day of rest.
The next day they lost the town vampires.
Scott had shown up at the edge of town, with a furrow in his usually carefree brow. He told them it was time to come home.
And they listened.
Avid wanted to too.
The town was quiet after that, mournful.
Avid was already regretting his decision. He should have stayed human and risk dying as one then live as a monster.
The next day Sausage left. Not willingly, as far as Avid knew. The elder had been taken when they were out of town, Sausage the only one left behind.
The day after was Abolish and Legundo. The duo had been out in the woods, and they had not come back.
Avids hunger had grown by that day, but he refused to drink blood. The only ones remaining were him, Martyn, Ren, and Pearl.
Pearl was gone the next day. Cleo had shown up, and Pearl had gone with her. It had been a silent exchange. Avids arguments had been ignored, and he didn’t have the guts to go after them.
At that point they refused to split up. It was just the three of them, and not one would go willingly.
They didn’t.
The vampire attacked the town three days later. Avid was in his house at the time, sleeping. Or well, the closest he could get to it.
He woke up to a knock on the door. He was already scrambling out of the now drained tub, before he remembered that Martyn and Ren didn’t knock anymore.
“Who- who is it?” His voice was rough from sleep and hunger. The raw meat hadn’t stayed down, no matter how long he tried to hold it down. His stomach had started to burn, to the point where he coughed up blood with his food.
“You know who it is Avid.”
Scott. Because of course, it was Scott.
His voice was quavering, whether from hunger or fear he didn’t know. “Your- Your not welcome!”
Scott just gave a rich man’s chuckle, and Avid could imagine him shaking his head. “Come out Avid. If you stay in there you’ll starve.”
Avid already was starving.
Then another day passed. The same interaction, the same denial of Scott. Then again. Then tenth day since he became a vampire passed. Then the thirteenth.
On the dawn of the fourteenth, Avid couldn’t get up from where he had collapsed against the wall the night before. When Scott knocked, he didn’t answer. He couldn’t move.
Scott knocked again. And again. Then he banged on the door. There was muttering at the door, before Ren and Cleo shouldered the door down together. Ren would have rushed over to him, but Scott shoved him back, rushing towards the starving boy.
“Avid? Avid? Are you there?”
Avids eyes were half-lidded, clearly barely there. Scott leaned towards him, fangs already visible, before he paused.
His brow furrowed, the now white hairs scrunching together. Then his eyes widened, just as quickly Avids door had been knocked down.
“Avid… Your already a vampire…”
Scott’s eyes were red and wide. “You should be dead.”
They were both coming to the mutual realization. Avid was the fledgling from that chase in the woods two weeks ago. Scott knew that Avid was that fledgling.
The older vampires hands retreated, as he brought his wrist infront of himself and slitted it with a clawed hand. The blood was already oozing when Scott shoved his wrist into Avids mouth.
Avids mind, however sluggish, quickly latched onto the fact he now had a bloody wrist in his mouth. He tried to push it away with his sluggish limbs, but instead Scott just shoved his wrist further into Avids mouth.
The next step is usually to bite, but avid only remembered too late that biting meant more blood readily available for hungry fangs.
The back of his mind, the part the got stomped into the ground until it was only whimpering from the corner in hunger. That part of his mind took over with a vengeance.
He dug into the arm, mind now focused on the surprisingly warm blood. On any other occasion he would have thought it tasted bitter, but to his starving body, it was a delicacy.
There was murmuring, footsteps and voices. One of them was Scott, but he only could barely recognize it. What had been at the back of his mind was crashing to the forefront. He was Hungry, and there was food. Food he could eat without burning his stomach that his Sire gave him.
When he started slowing down, eyes drooping and releasing his grip on Sires arm, he felt a certain burn in his mind. It was like a cacophony of voices, with mutual amounts of panic and relief throughout all of them.
It was his coven.
It felt like home.