Chapter 32: Vol 2 – Chapter 12 – The Pie is a Lie

The menacing looking street only got worse the further down we traveled. There was blood everywhere, almost like the vampires had put their human prey in a grape press and squeezed every last drop out of them so they could use it to paint their hideous scene. The intense scent filled my nose despite my attempts to ignore it and the slamming headache I was still dealing with dialed up all my other senses to 11. 

Body parts were strewn liberally throughout the street and on top of buildings. I continued to notice there were no heads, but the body parts were so frequent and mangled that it was impossible to tell the age and gender of the victims, nor how many humans were culled to make this trap.

However, the appalling sight that accompanied us as we trotted on the street back out of Rosethorne was not the only difference from the previous day. Where the buildings and village appeared untouched the day before, now there was evidence everywhere of a huge raid. Doors were smashed in or torn apart. Any decorations or small furniture on the street or in houses was destroyed. Not a single window was left intact. Destruction was everywhere. 

“If I’m not mistaken, this was the street we came down yesterday, correct Duncan?” Julius asked. 

Duncan nodded. “I noticed that myself.”

“I don’t imagine it looked like this yesterday, did it?” Ash asked, the concern in his voice notable.

“No. Someone has taken great pains to paint a new picture of what happened to this town. The fact that it was accomplished in barely half a day is also concerning.”

“You don’t think it was magic, do you?” I asked.

Everyone turned to look at me, confusion on their faces.

“I mean like, do you think it’s possible it looked like this yesterday, and someone used magic to veil the truth? Then, when they knew we would return, just lifted the spell and finally let us see what had happened all along?”

“You mean the pie was a lie?!” Kit exclaimed.

“Will you get off your damn pie?” Dorian shushed him. “I feel like that kind of question is your area of expertise, Julius. You think she’s on to something?”

Julius quirked his mouth in thought. “It’s possible. As most of you know, magic amongst humans is extremely sparse and limited. I humbly suggest that I am likely one of the more capable humans of our age, and even this sort of deception would be well outside my capabilities.” He continued to think as he rode closer to a large blood stain on the side of a building and stared at it intently. 

“I might be able to veil something for a few minutes at most, but definitely not something the size of a whole township. That being said, the Gods saw fit to bless our enemies with more magical prowess than we humans possess. And a vampire’s true abilities are all but a mystery now. It is possible we could be facing a foe with that magical potential, however horrifying that may be.”

He reached out and let his fingertips rest a hair’s breadth from the side of the building and the swath of blood. He closed his eyes and grunted in concentration for a few moments, then gasped for air and wiped at some sweat that had gathered on his brow.

“I regret that I am unable to determine if any magic has been used here. I do not sense any, but that doesn’t mean it was never there.”

“Great. I’m liking this less and less.” Chad muttered.

“No use dwelling on it.” Duncan ordered. “We see what the state of the village is now and that is all the evidence we need to move forward.” He kicked his horse and rode it into a faster trot, eager to get out of the grisly street. We urged our horses along to match and rode until we spilled out of the borders of Rosethorne.

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The bloody display continued out of the town and off in a direction further north into the pines. The body parts started to ween off as an addition to the trail once we got out of town. Unfortunately, we now did not have the numbers to effectively stay alert as well as methodically cut through the forest to follow the trail effortlessly. The horses had to be abandoned early, as we were sure our enemy intended, as we followed our breadcrumb trail towards what I hoped was a house made of candy. 

Pushing a witch into an oven would be a much less daunting task than fending off the hungry vampires that no doubt awaited us at the end.

“I hate this. I hate it, I hate it.” Dorian complained as he hacked at yet another pine limb that snagged at his sleeve. I reached over to assist in freeing him and he nodded in thanks.

“They’ve planned all of this. Maybe not our initial split, that’s on us. But I wouldn’t put it past them to expect us to have split up to cover more ground anyway. Now we’re fewer in numbers and on foot, with no choice but to follow this wherever it leads. Our only other option is to give up and turn back around.” 

I nodded in agreement. “I know. I’ve been trying to think of ways to be more proactive about this, but nothing has come to mind. We’re kind of at their mercy. They know when everything is going to happen.” I brushed at a pine that grabbed at me and succeeded in ripping through my blouse sleeve, leaving a small tear and a scrape on my arm underneath.

“These stupid trees!” I raged at the limb and shoved at it angrily, only to have it whip back and hit me again. I grabbed at the spot on my arm again and noticed what looked like droplets of blood. I started to paw at the area, looking for another tear in the sleeve and where I might have been cut, only to realize none was there. 

Suddenly, I saw red flakes falling across my vision and landing on my white blouse, staining it. I looked up and noticed more of them falling through the sky. I held my hand up and let one land in my palm, which immediately melted, leaving it wet. I looked back up at the red cloudy sky overhead.

“You have got to be kidding me.” 

Dorian and Ash noticed heard me and noticed my distraction.

“What is it?” Ash asked. He too, looked up for a moment just in time for a red snowflake to hit him on the nose, forcing him to blink in surprise.

“It’s red snow. It looks like blood, but it’s red snow!” I exclaimed. I looked around and saw the snow wasn’t falling hard, but it was staining wherever it landed. It wouldn’t be too long before the trees and any exposed ground would be stained with the appearance of blood.

“Such foul sorcery!” Duncan hissed. 

“Such a flair for the dramatic! If they weren’t so keen on eatin’ me, I’d rather like these creatures!” Kit laughed. 

“Come on. If this weather keeps up, it will only make this more treacherous. We have to keep moving and hope we find them before this weather makes a turn for the worse.” Chad urged. 

“I say we turn back.” Julius suggested. “As our prince has so kindly pointed out, the weather has turned against us, and we are already in unknown enemy territory. Our blood trail will soon be lost amongst this snow as it is, and we will neither know the way forward or back. As Duncan has implied, our courage in this moment is more foolhardy than anything else. This is as good a sign as any that it is time to abandon this task.”

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Before anyone could comment or object, burst of energy shot through our group between each of us and skewered Julius in lower right side. He screamed in agony as he collapsed, gloved hands grasping at the wound, blood starting to pour out of it. 

Ash immediately jumped to action and put his hands on Julius and started working on the wound. It looked bad. It had ripped through his side, and I could see the large gaping hole in his side that they were desperately trying to cover and hold closed. Julius wasn’t making any further cries of pain but the strain on his face said plenty. 

The rest of us whirled to face the direction of the shot and unsheathed our weapons. For a moment, there was nothing to be seen. Only the sound of scraping on trees and whispered snarls. 

“Me thinks they heard we weren’t plannin’ on stickin’ around.” Kit mumbled. 

“Indeed.” Duncan agreed. “Dorian, stay with Ash and Julius. Give Ash the time he needs and, if it comes to it, get them out of here. The rest of us will advance and at least start this skirmish away from your position.”

Dorian nodded and the rest of us started to move towards the menacing sounds ahead. Dorian grabbed my arm and whirled me to face him.

“Stay close to Duncan. Or Chad. Or, hell, even Kit, alright? Promise me! And if things get bad, do as Duncan says and run. I’ll leave a trail or something for you to follow.” He reached up and held my face gently in his hands and stared into my eyes. It had been a while since we had prolonged close eye contact like this, and I had forgotten how striking his green eyes were. Like polished shimmering jade, only now they were wide with worry. 

“I can’t lose you.” he breathed. 

I felt my face growing hot, and I merely nodded and hurriedly turned away. 

“Amelia, please be careful!” Ash called out from behind me as I dashed through the light snow and pine to catch up with the rest of the group.

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Once again, I could feel a hammering rhythm in my skull, only now it was the steady beating of my heart, pounding with every step I took. Adrenaline had done me a favor and all but washed away the painful reminders of last night, and now my head just throbbed in sync with the drum in my chest. What time was it? The thick red clouds above concealed the position of the sun in the sky, but I couldn’t imagine it being past noon already. 

There was still time.

We could finish this and be back at the fort in time for supper.

It’s either that or we end up being supper.

The blood snow at least seemed to have stopped, but enough had fallen that everything was dusted with the red tint. It made the trees themselves look hungry, which wasn’t necessary since they continued to grab at us as we pushed by. The air still had the sinister chill, beguiling the summer season, and I could see my breath heavy in the air. Luckily the adrenaline forcing blood through my body was keeping me warm too, otherwise I would be freezing with my now damp clothes.

I had caught up to the rest, but we were loosely arranged in the dense forest. Without a steady path before us, we couldn’t stay in a tight knit group at the speed we were now moving, and instead were loosely spread out. I bounded up next to Chad and Duncan, per Dorian’s request, and tugged on Chad’s arm lightly to let him know I was there. 

He turned abruptly in surprise, but immediately calmed and lightly smiled when he saw it had just been me. 

“Stay as close as you can, my star.” he whispered.

The blood rushing to my face for a whole different reason, I started darting my eyes back and forth for the signs of our impending threat. My ears were alert, listening for any surprise. But there were so many sounds now, where for so long there had been silence. The sounds of metal feet crunching through the layer of snow on the ground, the scratching of claws or something else just as sharp on the trees. 

Suddenly Duncan raised a fist and, despite how spread out we appeared to be, everyone took notice and stopped, the crunch of snow abruptly halting.

I narrowed my eyes to look through the trees to see what Duncan had sensed. For several moments, I saw nothing. The trees were still dense enough that I couldn’t make out farther than a dozen or so feet in front of me but darting my eyes between the available spaces between then yielded just more red dusted black limbs. 

Then I saw them.

It was like they appeared out of thin air, as once I had them in my sights, I was sure I had glanced that direction before and had seen nothing. They were maybe 20 feet or so ahead of us, standing waiting in a rough line in a small clearing. Unlike the thralls from before, these vampires were clearly a cut above. Duncan slowly moved forward, signaling for the rest of us to follow behind. Once we passed the line of trees into the clearing, I got a better look at them.

There were ten of them that I could see, and I had to assume they were vampires, but they looked nothing like the transformed monstrous human villagers from Rosethorne. Nothing about them looked human at all.

They looked like dark elves more than anything else, elegant, and evil. They were very handsome, with sharp thin features. Each of them had a skin tone varying from very dark black to purple or a lighter grey. Their ears were pointed and most of them had some loop or piercing in them, and their hair colors were all a variation of silver to grey. Their hair styles and lengths also varied wildly with most just being slicked back, but with a common trait of looking clean, soft, and straight. Their eye colors were also varied unnatural shades, all over the darker or menacing color spectrum. Not a brown or blue eye among them.

Their clothes were all well kept and almost regal. They wore straight pressed pants and had button-down colored shirts and vests over them. An occasional vampire also had a cloak or cape draped over their shoulders, but most of them wisely went without as the draped clothing sported the occasional tear in the fabric where a tree had marred their fashion. Their clothing matched the rest of their color schemes: dark and deep colors of black or some variation, with purple or red trim here or there. They all carried the same bored emotionless expressions on their faces, and were all armed, mostly with bladed weapons, but none had them drawn. 

If looks could kill.

Once we had all crossed over the trees into the clearing, the tallest one in the middle of the line spoke, a deep rumble with a hard edge to his voice.

“Finally! It’s about bloody time! I would say it’s getting cold out, but I’m sure you are aware we don’t care about the state of the weather. Instead, I’ll show you the courtesy of complaining about something we can all relate to.”

He smiled wickedly and a tongue flicked over his sharp teeth.

“I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’ve been getting hungry.”

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