A Vampire's Christmas Carol Read Online Free PDF Page B

scratching, they got her
spread out on the bed and shackled her hands and feet to the posts.
Michael stared in horror as he realized she was human, not
vampire.
    He turned to Antoine. “What are they doing to
her?”
    “Watch and see.”
    “No.” He moved toward the men binding the
girl to the bed, intent on fighting for her release.
    Antoine snagged his sleeve and dragged him
back. “Don’t interfere,” he warned. “Just watch.”
    Michael didn’t catch any signal, but moments
later four others had latched onto him, holding onto his arms,
shoulders, hair and waist, pinning him securely among them.
    They held some kind of lottery to be the
first in line. A heavyset, fortyish woman, who looked like she
might be a teacher at your local school under other circumstances,
won. She approached the terrified girl on the bed, eyes narrowed in
evil concentration. She opened her mouth to show canine teeth
elongated into razor-sharp fangs.
    The girl on the bed screamed. The smell of
her fear permeated the room. “Help me,” she begged, staring wildly
around the room. Her eyes met Michael’s and lingered. “Please,
please, help me!”
    He lunged forward, hoping to wriggle free of
their grasp and get to the girl, but hands tightened around him,
holding him fast.
    Antoine spun him to face him. “Look at
me.”
    Unthinking, Michael looked into his eyes.
    “Watch and don’t move again until I release
you,” Antoine ordered.
    To his shock and horror, Michael realized
Antoine did have that much control over him. Against his will, he
found his gaze locked on the girl and his body unable to move.
    The girl looked around wildly, saw the woman
advancing on her, fangs at the ready, and screamed again and again
in increasing terror and desperation. She struggled wildly against
the bindings, tearing the skin of her wrists in her frenzy to
escape.
    The smell of blood incited the crowd, who
began to yell encouragement as the fanged woman stood over the bed.
The girl’s screams died down. She moaned and began to cry. The
crowd cheered the appearance of the tears.
    Michael felt sick to his stomach. He didn’t
know if he could still throw up, but he could certainly feel
nausea. He couldn’t even move enough to struggle.
    The older woman dipped her head cautiously.
The girl wriggled, moaned and cried harder. The woman almost made
it to the girl’s neck, but tears dripped down that side of her face
and the woman pulled back to avoid them. She reached out and
grabbed the girl’s hair to pin her head in place. Holding her face
to one side, the older woman went for the throat again, but didn’t
manage to avoid the tears entirely. She got one fang embedded and
drew blood, but then she suddenly reared back, shrieking and
holding her face, and ran from the room, still yelling curses.
    Michael breathed a sigh of relief, thinking
they’d let the girl go.
    Wrong.
    They drew lots again and a slim,
lethal-looking young man stepped up next to the bed. Within
moments, he’d sunk his fangs deep into the girl’s neck, easily
evading the tears, and began sucking the life out of her.
    * * * * *
    “They killed her.” Michael sighed and looked
at Carol. “Right there in front of me, while I watched. Not fast.
At least half a dozen of them drank from her before they took too
much and she died. I wanted so badly to do something, anything, to
save her. I couldn’t do a damn thing about it. They’re monsters.
You see why I don’t want to be one of them? I won’t be one of them.
No matter what it costs.”
    “It’s going to cost you your life, isn’t
it?”
    “I died one hundred years ago. This isn’t
life, it’s not-death. I can’t go out in the daylight and I don’t
dare spend too much time in the presence of other people for fear
the blood hunger will overwhelm me. Or they’ll ask too many
questions about who I am. I don’t want to go on this way. I can’t
anyway. By tomorrow I either drink human blood and become full
vampire or I truly