Hunger.
Nothing exists but Hunger.
There is no food here. No food, just stone and steel and darkness. Bars around me, chains on my wrists, pulling me to the wall. Can't move, can't stay here. Need to hunt, need food, prey, blood!
No.
No, calm yourself, Kanin. Think. You felt them, when you woke up. They're here. Both of them. The girl and the lost one. What are their names? Can't remember.
So Hungry.
"Welcome back, old friend."
Movement beyond the bars. He is here; I can feel his cold black eyes on me, sense his smile. I growl, the noise vibrating around us, low and threatening. I hear his hissing chuckle.
"Can you hear it?" His face floats between the bars, eyes closed, as if listening to music somewhere above us. "Can you hear the screams? Smell the fear, the taint of despair? This is only the beginning, you know. Only the first test. And we are in the perfect place to watch everything unravel." He opens his eyes, smiling at me. "Oh, but I can feel the Hunger in you, old friend. It's eating you alive, isn't it? Sadly, your fate is no longer in my hands."
I lean forward, trying to reach him, to pull him through the bars and tear him in half. The shackles bite into my wrists, holding me back. He chuckles again, then draws away, pale face melting into the shadows beyond the cell.
"Goodbye, Kanin. I've enjoyed the times we had, but now, I have a greater purpose. I know you will not think of me much beyond this, but I will remember you. I will remember you most fondly. Farewell, old friend."
I opened my eyes, then jerked back, bashing my head against the concrete. Jackal was crouched in front of me, a faint smirk on his face, his eyes narrowed and contemplative. I brandished my sword in a flash of steel and fangs, but he leaped back, the blade missing him by centimeters.
"Dammit, Jackal!" I surged upright, keeping my weapon between me and the sadistic raider king. "What are you trying to pull? Do that again and I'll cut that stupid grin of yours in half!"
"Too easy, sister." Jackal's smirk widened, showing fangs. "You're far too trusting. I could have twisted your little head right off your neck, and you wouldn't have felt a thing." He demonstrated with his hands, then shook his head in mock disappointment. "You've got a lot to learn, I'm afraid."
"Well, you won't be the one teaching me." I sheathed my sword and turned away, still bristling from having him that close. Sadistic, obnoxious vampire. He got under my skin sometimes, but that was probably what he wanted, to keep me off balance, on edge. A sick game he liked to play.
"Or maybe," Jackal added, "you're just feeling sluggish because you didn't sleep well. Bad dreams?" When I looked at him sharply, he nodded, serious for once. "You saw him, too, didn't you? The old bastard is still hanging on."
"Yeah." I let myself feel that tiny sliver of hope, of relief. "He's still alive."
"Yep. Looks like Sarren brought him out of hibernation after all. Tough old geezer-some of us never come out of it."
"Any idea where he could be? It looked like he was underground somewhere, maybe a prison or a..."
I trailed off, frowning. Jackal started to reply, but I held up my hand, stopping him. Soft shuffling noises drifted to me across the room, coming from outside the barred door. I jerked my head at the entrance just as the handle turned and the door shook, as if something was trying to force its way inside.
Silently, I readied my sword, and Jackal picked up a rusty lead pipe from the floor, not bothering to return to wherever he had slept for his ax. At my nod, he glided up the steps and put his hand under the bar, looking back at me. I inched up, raising my sword, and nodded for him to open it.
Jackal wrenched off the bar and threw open the door. I lunged forward, sweeping my blade down, expecting to see a bloody-faced lunatic on the other side.
Something yelped and threw itself backward, and I pulled my blow up short, barely stopping in time. The body landed in an ungainly sprawl on the floor, a ragged human with shaggy brown hair and huge dark eyes. I felt a brief, faint stab of recognition, like I should know him from somewhere, but I couldn't place it. He gaped at us, fear and horror spreading across his face, before he scrambled away like a thin, ragged spider, arms and legs pumping frantically.
Jackal lunged past me, grabbed the kid by his ragged shirt and hauled him off his feet. "Where do you think you're going, little rat?" He yanked him back into the room. The kid howled, flailing wildly, and Jackal shook him once, hard enough that his head jerked back on his neck. "Hey now. None of that god-awful screeching. You'll attract the crazies wandering around out there. Wouldn't want to have to rip your tongue out through your teeth, would we?"
"Jackal," I snapped, closing the door and stalking back into the room. "Let him go."
He gave me a bored look, then dropped the gasping human unceremoniously on the floor. The kid, probably no more than thirteen, if I had to guess, scuttled backward until he hit a wall, then continued to gape at us with huge, terrified eyes.
"Take it easy," I said, stepping toward him slowly, ignoring the sudden flare of Hunger. The demon within growled impatiently, urging me to pounce on this boy and feed, but I forced it back. I recognized the skinny frame, the rags, the way his eyes darted everywhere, looking for a way out. He was an Unregistered. Just like I had been.
"Relax," I told him again, trying to sound calm and reasonable. "We're not going to hurt you, or...eat you. Just calm down."
"Oh, shit!" he panted, pressing himself to the corner, his gaze riveted on me. "It's true, then! That kid wasn't lying. You're her! You really did become a vampire!"
I stared at him. "How did you-?"
It hit me then, where I knew this boy from. He wasn't just a random street rat, he was part of Kyle's gang, a group of rival Unregistereds who had lived within our sector and scavenged the same territories. I'd seen him in passing a few times when I'd been human; the Unregistered gangs of the Fringe did not mingle and usually left each other alone. We weren't enemies, exactly. We'd warn other Unregistereds of sweeps and patrols, and if another group was scavenging a particular territory, we'd avoid that section for a day or two. But in our section of the Fringe, Kyle's gang had been our biggest competition for food and resources, and the truce between us had been tense in those final few days.
Of course, they must've been thrilled when they heard we were all killed by rabids. Myself included. Even if I didn't truly die, I could no longer be a part of that world. Their competition was gone. None of us had made it back to the city alive.
Except for one.
"Stick," I whispered, and stepped forward, advancing on the human. He cringed, looking terrified, but I didn't care anymore. "That kid you're talking about," I demanded, "was his name Stick? What happened to him? Is he still around?"
Is he still alive?
"That little pisswad?" The boy curled his lip, pure disgust filtering through the terror for a moment. "Nah, he's not around here anymore. He's gone. No one's seen him since the night you attacked our hideout."
I wasn't attacking your hideout, I wanted to say. I was just looking for Stick. But I knew the human wouldn't believe me. And besides, it didn't matter now. Stick was gone. The boy I'd looked after nearly half my life, the person I'd thought was my friend when I was human, had sold me out to the Prince when he'd discovered what I was. Kanin had cautioned me not to go after him, not to see him again, but I'd ignored his warnings and tried to contact my sole remaining crew member one last time.
I really should've known better. Stick had taken one look at what I was, screamed in terror and run away. Straight to the Prince and his followers, apparently. As if all our years of friendship, all those times I'd risked my neck for him, kept him safe, kept him fed and alive at my own expense, meant nothing.
I thought I'd buried that pain when I fled the city, but it ached, a dull, nagging throb somewhere deep inside. Still, I couldn't focus on the past. If this kid was uninfected and sane, maybe there were other humans who had escaped the chaos, too.
"Are there more of you?" Jackal broke in, thinking the same thing, apparently. The kid hesitated, and he added in a perfectly civil tone, "You realize your potential to be useful is the only thing keeping you alive right now, yes?"
"Yeah." The human spat the word, glaring at us with a mix of fear and hatred. "Yeah, there are more of us. Down in the tunnels beneath the city. We moved there when all the craziness started. The bleeders stay topside, for the most part."
"So that was what the mole man was talking about," I mused. "Topsiders coming down into their turf." I looked at the kid again. "Don't you have trouble with them? They're not happy about you pushing into their territory."
He shrugged. "We can take our chances with the crazies or the cannibals. The mole men clans leave us alone if we're in a group. And the boss knows the tunnels pretty well, at least, the ones that are clan territory."
The tunnels. I suddenly remembered that, when I had been here with Kanin, some of the underground passages had led into the Inner City. I'd never seen them of course, never went looking for them, back when I was human. But rumors existed of places where you could creep into the vampires' territory, as dangerous and suicidal as that was. Back when I became a vampire, Kanin had shown me a way beneath the Inner Wall, through a network of old sewers and subway tunnels, right into the heart of the Inner City. But the underground was a maze, stretching for miles beneath the city streets, thousands of tunnels that all looked the same. Even if we could reach the old hospital, I didn't think I could retrace the steps Kanin had used to get past the wall. But, that path did exist, somewhere.
We couldn't get into the Inner City through the gates. And traveling the underground seemed a hell of a lot safer than staying topside with the "bleeders."
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Jackal muttered behind me.
I nodded. "You said there is someone who knows the way through the tunnels," I told the kid, who winced, as if he knew what I was going to say next. "Take us to him."
"Show up with two bloodsuckers?" He went even paler, shaking his head frantically. "No, I can't! Everyone will freak out. And then they'll kill me for bringing you there."
I could feel Jackal's fanged smile without even seeing it. "Die then, or now, bloodbag. Your choice."
"Shit." The kid dragged a hand across his face. "All right, fine. I'll take you there...if you promise not to kill me after. There are plenty of other humans down there if you get Hungry-suck on one of them, okay? I'll even point out the stupid, gullible ones. Just don't eat me."
Though I didn't let it show, I felt a flicker of disgust, hypocritical as it was. His answer shouldn't have surprised me. I'd grown up on the streets with the same attitude, the same survival instincts. In the Fringe, it was everyone for himself. No matter what, you did whatever it took to survive. I knew that. I'd lived that.
But then I'd met Zeke and his small group, and everything changed. They'd accepted me, a virtual stranger, as one of their own, no strings, no expectations. With the exception of their hardened leader, they'd looked out for each other, taken care of one another. And the boy whom I'd first thought naive and blind and idealistic must've rubbed off on me, because when faced with the choice to leave or risk my life for the group, my survival instincts had gone out the window. And I'd found I actually gave a damn about them all.
It had been a shock to learn there were other ways of living. It had been even more of a shock to know that I could still care, that I was willing to jeopardize my own existence for others. Now we were back in the Fringe, and the philosophy everyone for himself still held true. But, at least in my old gang, we hadn't sold other humans out to the vampires. Until Stick, anyway. It seemed Kyle's group had no such convictions.
Jackal grinned at me. "Ah, human loyalty. It's such an inspiring thing, isn't it, sister? Makes you wonder how we ever came out on top." He glanced at the Unregistered, who blinked, unaware that he'd just been insulted, and his smile grew wider. "Better hurry, little bloodbag, and lead us to your friends. I'm feeling kinda Hungry now."
The parking lot had a couple bleeders shambling about, muttering to themselves, but we were able to sneak around them without too much trouble. The scent of fresh blood, streaming from their faces and arms, hung on the breeze like invisible ribbons, rousing the demon within. I didn't realize I was staring at the back of our guide's neck until I felt my fangs poking my bottom lip and forced the Hunger down.
"When did this start?" I asked the kid once we were clear of the school. Partly because I was curious and partly to keep myself occupied, to focus on something other than my bloodlust. "The sickness, the craziness. How long has this been going on?"
"Not long." He glanced over his shoulder, as if surprised I was talking to him like a normal person. "Maybe two weeks, give or take a couple days? I dunno exactly-it's hard to tell underground."
"Why hasn't the Prince done anything?"
"He has." The kid snorted. "He's pulled all his pets and guards back into the Inner City and shut the doors on the rest of us. You try to get past the gates, they shoot you on sight. Food trucks have stopped coming, too." He shrugged, a hopeless, angry gesture. "Guess he's just waiting for everyone to die out here."
A human stumbled down the road, dragging a blanket behind him and reeking of blood, and my Hunger stirred restlessly. We waited in the shadows until the human shambled by. "You could get sick up here, too," I said to our guide after the bleeder lurched around a corner. "You're not worried about that?" He shrugged again and continued leading us through the streets.
"Not much choice. Like I said, we can take our chances up here with the bleeders, or starve in the tunnels. What would you do, if there was no food anywhere?" He spared me another glance and shook his head. "Guess you don't understand anymore. Vampires don't have that problem, do they?"
Oh, I understand more than you think.
We slipped through an overgrown street, where weeds, brush and large trees had cracked pavement and grown up through the ancient husks of cars. The vegetation covering the sidewalk and surrounding buildings was so thick it was like hacking through a forest. The Unregistered kid wove through the tangled undergrowth with an innate familiarity; he'd done this before, and often.
Ducking around the skeletal remains of a van, he stopped and cast a wary look around the shadows before dropping to a crouch in the bushes. Shoving a tire away, he brushed back a clump of weeds, revealing a small, perfectly round hole in the middle of the road. Another entrance to the maze of tunnels that ran beneath New Covington. I wondered how I-or rather, how Allie the Fringer street rat-had missed this one.
The Unregistered kid dug in his grimy pockets and pulled out a tiny flashlight, the beam barely visible as he poked it down the hole and peered around. "Looks like it's clear," he muttered, pulling it back out and inching close to the hole, preparing to drop inside. "Wait here a second, I'll make sure it's safe, then give you the heads-up when it's clear."
"Not so fast." I reached out and snagged the kid by the shirt, dragging him back. "Don't think I'm stupid. I was one of you once, remember?" He started to protest, but I shoved him toward Jackal, who grabbed him by the collar. "I'll head down first, and the two of you can follow."
The kid looked back at Jackal and paled. "You're leaving me alone with him?"
"He won't try anything." I narrowed my eyes at the other vampire. "Right?"
"Me?" Jackal smiled, showing fangs. "I am the epitome of self-control and restraint, sister. Your bleeding heart must be rubbing off on me."
I rolled my eyes, drew my weapon and dropped into the hole.
My vampire sight adjusted almost instantly to the pitch blackness, showing me an endless concrete tunnel, dripping walls and crumbling bricks. Something small and furry skittered up a pipe and vanished into a crack, but other than that, the sewers were empty and still.
"Clear," I called back, sheathing my katana.
The kid dropped quite suddenly from the opening, as if he'd been shoved, and sprawled out on the concrete with a yelp of pain. I scowled and glared at Jackal as he dropped through a moment later, landing lightly and brushing off his sleeves.
"All righty," he announced, ignoring my glare. "Here we are in the sewers again, my favorite New Covington vacation spot. So thrilled to be here." He fixed the Unregistered with a dangerous smile. "Well, don't just stand there, tunnel rat. Give us the tour."
"Uh. Yeah," the kid said, rising warily to his feet. His eyes darted about, constantly alert in a way that was far too familiar. "Follow me."
We walked in silence for a bit. I stayed close to the human, watching him carefully, ready to grab him if he got the idea to bolt. Though he'd promised to lead us to the other Unregistereds, I had no doubt he would dart into the nearest drain or crack or dark hole if he got the chance. Unregistereds were opportunists, and the ones who survived did so any way they could. Stealing, lying, making promises they never intended to keep, just to stay alive. I would've done the same thing, if I was still human, still a street rat like this kid.
Kid? Street rat? I realized I didn't even know his name. Not that I particularly cared; I doubted he would've asked my name if the roles were reversed. But thinking of him as just a human, just a nameless street rat-that was something that the vampires did.
"You never told me your name," I said, surprising the kid, who looked back cautiously. "You know me-it seems all the Unregistereds know my name and what happened to me. What do they call you?"
"Roach," muttered the kid after a moment. "They call me Roach."
Jackal laughed. "Well, isn't that fitting."
"Are Kyle and Travis still around?" I asked, ignoring Jackal. They'd known me before I'd become a vampire-not well, but they would still recognize me when they saw me.
But Roach shook his head. "Nah, they're both dead."
I wasn't shocked at his bluntness, or his casual shrug, but it was sobering to hear yet two more people I knew were gone. "What happened?"
"Sickness took them. This way." Roach ducked down a narrow, half-circular tunnel, low and claustrophobic, sludgy water oozing across the floor. His voice echoed in the small space around us. "Travis died first, but Kyle turned into a bleeder and went crazy on us. That's when we knew we had to get off the streets. The new guy moved us all into the tunnels to avoid the crazies. He's probably gonna be pissed I went off alone again. Hang on a second. We're here."
A rusty grate covered the other end of the tunnel, and flickering yellow light filtered through the slats. I could see a form silhouetted against the grate, ragged and thin, probably on guard duty. He spun as our footsteps echoed down the tunnel, shining a flashlight through the grate. Roach flinched, throwing up an arm as the beam hit him in the face.
"Just me, stupid! Open the door."
The light flickered to me and Jackal. I peered through the haze and saw an older boy, lean and black, his dark eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Who are they?"
"What the hell does it look like?" Roach continued without missing a beat. "Fringers I met topside. People who aren't ripping their faces off. I figured the boss would want me to bring them down here."
"He's pissed at you, Roach." The beam slid back, and the guard lifted a heavy iron bar that had been placed across the grate cover. "You know we're not supposed to go up there alone, especially now."
"Yeah, yeah. Tell me something I don't know."
With an earsplitting screech, the grate opened. Roach passed the guard, who eyed me and Jackal warily but didn't say anything, and led us to a rusty staircase beyond the tunnel. The rickety-looking stairs rose from the concrete floor, spiraled up a narrow shaft and continued into the black.
"Um, they're pretty shaky," Roach said, glancing hopefully back at us. "Probably best we go one at a time-don't want 'em collapsing underneath us, right?"
Jackal chuckled. "Devious little bloodbag, isn't he? I don't know whether to be amused or insulted."
"Nice try," I said, and gestured him forward. "Keep going. We'll be right behind you."
Roach shrugged and continued up the stairs.
The steps were pretty shaky, creaking and groaning under our weight, but they held. We came out of the hole into a large room with cement floors and walls. Crumbling posts held up a low ceiling, and massive cylindrical machines, completely encased in rust, created a narrow corridor down one wall.
"What is this place?" I mused.
"Sub-basement," Jackal echoed behind me. "Or an old boiler room. We're probably below a factory or something." He took a long, deep breath and smiled, showing his fangs. "Ah, the stench of human misery. Can you smell it, sister?"
I didn't know what a boiler room was, and I wasn't going to ask, having bigger worries right now. Jackal was right- the scent of warm-blooded humans was everywhere, even overpowering the smells of rust and mold and greasy smoke. The hot smell of blood, wrapped around the scent of fear and hopelessness and despair, roused the Hunger from its restless hibernation. It made me want to melt into the darkness, to slide between the aisles and wait for an unsuspecting human to walk by, then yank it back into the shadows, never to be seen again.
"Keep it together," I growled, as much to myself as to the vampire next to me. His eyes shone a luminous yellow in a way I didn't like at all, and I glared at him. "We're here for their help, not a snack."
"Perish the thought." Jackal waved a hand in a vague gesture. "I was simply making an observation. What were you thinking of?"
Ignoring him, I trailed Roach down an aisle, the squat, rusty machines lining either side like rotund guardians. Flickering orange light danced over the floor between them, the low crackle of a fire echoing off the barrels. Leaving the maze of machinery, we entered a large open space, where a scattering of blankets, boxes and rag piles surrounded a dying fire.
Half-starved humans milled through the shadows cast by the flames, or huddled close to the fire, shivering. The cold had stopped affecting me long ago, and I didn't think about it anymore, but I realized it must be freezing for them down here. The Fringer that I had been, however, approved. Well hidden, underground, a lot of places to hide. Yeah, Allie the street rat would've liked this place. Whoever had chosen this secure little haven knew what they were doing.
Of course, that didn't account for vampires being allowed past the gates.
"Okay," Roach whispered, glancing at me over his shoulder, "I got you here. You'll let me go now, right?"
I scanned the shivering crowd of humans and frowned. "Who's in charge?"
"Um..." Roach gazed around the camp, too. "There," he said, pointing to one side. "Our fearless leader."
I followed his hand to where a pair of humans stood at the edge of the light, talking in low voices with their backs to us. One of them was unremarkable, thin and ragged and dirty, like all the others. The second human, however, wore sturdier clothes, boots and a black combat vest like I'd seen on some of the Prince's guards. A heavy pistol was holstered to his belt, and across his back was a strange weapon I'd never seen before. It looked like someone had taken a bow and arrow-something I'd only read about before-and attached it to the end of a gun. A long wooden spike lay nestled in the strange weapon, and it sent a chill through my stomach.
"Son of a bitch," Jackal muttered behind me. "The bastard has a crossbow. Well, someone is prepared to run into vampires, aren't they?"
Something clicked in my head, and the world seemed to stop. No, I thought, dazed. It can't be. He can't be here now. It's not possible.
But it was, and I knew who it was, even before he turned around. Blond, blue eyed, lean and tall, like he'd stepped right out of my memory, out of my dreams, and into existence.
"Zeke," I whispered as his piercing, familiar gaze met mine across the room. "What the hell are you doing here?"
