story rough
Ignore the parts that say "need phrase here" or "not finished" etc.
Also not yet edited, so whatever misspellings there are, ignore those too.
Chapter 1
At three in the morning, the city was at its stillest. Even this side of town, where the dregs of society resided, was mostly deserted. Though the warding spells keeping possible bystanders from wandering in might have helped with that.
One lone figure sat still as a statue and completely hidden within the shadows of a building ledge, like a gargoyle from centuries ago casting its baleful gaze upon all who passed beneath.
Owl hadn’t moved an inch in the last four hours, and he could stay that way for several more if necessary. It was absolutely essential that his target stayed oblivious to his presence or weeks of tracking and preparing would be for nothing.
Owl remembered the first time he’d heard of this particular bastard. The vampire didn’t even have a name, he did at one point, but it had been forgotten a long time ago. Not even the other vampires nearby knew where he came from, but he was already insane when he showed up. The more powerful ones called him Sewer Rat but most just called him the Stalker.
Stalker had been haunting the sewer system for about fifty years and came up a few nights a month to feed on whatever unfortunate victim he could find. This often led city law enforcement to come disturbingly close to discovering the presence of supernaturals, and the vampires didn’t sit well with that. Several attempts to ferret him out ended unpleasantly, as no one knew the sewers like he did.
A few years after Owl moved into town, and earned a bit of a reputation, the Vampires had contacted him through the mage council. In exchange for taking care of their Sewer Rat problem, they would begin discussions of a peace treaty with the mages. Something mages had been working towards for centuries, Owl couldn’t turn them down, the mages wouldn’t let him.
Two Days Ago…
The thunk of steel toed boots echoed loudly against the polished marble floors compared to the soft shuffle of the other mages’ footsteps, but Owl didn’t notice. He focused on the piece of paper in his hand, ignoring the curious stares and disdainful sneers from the people he passed. He was used to those, what he wasn’t used to was being summoned to the mage headquarters via vague and cryptic notes. He wouldn’t have bothered to come if the letter hadn’t been sealed with magic and bearing the sigil of the highest mage on the west coast.
Turning a corner, Owl noted with approval the maze-like quality of the catacombs making up the headquarters, a good defense mechanism. Buried below the city, even lower than the subways and sewers was were the mages had carved their secret society. A labyrinth of hallways and rooms the size of a small village where the High Mages held Council and new mages were trained. Some mages completely left the world above them and lived within the headquarters, but most lived a double life and only visited this place when summoned or in need of magical help. Owl rarely visited.
In fact, the last time he’d been here was when he’d first moved to Reswin City. He’d wanted to train with the Warriors while Marcus had wanted to join the Scholars and Luke needed to finish his Shaman training. Unfortunately, their past had preceded them, and while the Council couldn’t force them to leave, they could forbid any formal training and deem them outcasts.
Stopping in front of a pair of massive doors decorated with a mosaic of precious jewels- a waste of resources in Owl’s opinion- he paused to read the inscription above them. He hadn’t known enough Latin the last time he’d been here to translate more than a few words of it, but now he could read the whole thing.
“I need a phrase”
Owl reached out and yanked one of the doors open, ignoring the voice in his head that sounded suspiciously like Marcus, yapping about proper manners and such. He stepped into the spacious room and took in the main features and escape routes, the room was circular with only one visible door, which Owl had entered through. Near the far end of the room there was a half-circle raised dais with the seven council chairs loomed, one for each of the seven sectors of the United States, the northern west coast being sector six.
No one was sitting in the chairs at the moment, but there were five mages clustered in the center of the room, four of them looking startled at owl’s abrupt entrance, the last looked annoyed. Each wore a gold ring with a colored stone, all but one were red- high ranking mages then- but the man with the angry scowl had a glowing white stone. Sector six’s High Mage, Alzon. He was in his mid-sixties with steel gray hair and a neatly trimmed beard. He was also supposedly quite the fair man, but he and Owl had never quite seen eye to eye.
Alzon spoke, frowning down at Owl as the others composed themselves, “I see that your barbaric manners haven’t changed since we’ve last met.”
Owl was tempted to retort that the high Mage hadn’t learned to lock the doors since they’d last met, but settled with staring back silently. When an answer wasn’t forthcoming, Alzon cleared his throat and continued, “Do you have any idea why we’ve called you here?”
“No.” Owl hated this part, all of the useless questions that everyone knew the answer to but asked anyway.
Alzon hummed thoughtfully, as if Owl’s answer was something meaningful and needed pondering. Owl was debating whether or not he should just walk out when the door swing shut behind him. The man to his left had done it, Owl had seen his fingers twitch, and now noticed that the culprit was staring rather intently at him, a mind reader then. Owl turned to the mage, a brown-haired man in his thirties, and proceeded to imagine vivid scenarios where the mage in question died in various horrible ways. The mage paled and looked away, concentration broken.
Alzon did not look amused when owl looked back at him, but now he seemed ready to actually tell Owl why he was wasting his time here. “We’ve had an offer from the vampires.”
Alzon paused, as if expecting some dramatic reaction. Owl stared at him. Sighing, he continued,
(not finished)
“and after past incidents,” Owl glared as the old man stressed the word and a few others made noises of agreement, “you should be glad for this opportunity.”
Learning how to mask his scent, deceive enhanced sight and move too silently to be noticed were skills few could master but this could not work without them. Owl had jumped into his lessons with a fierceness that took the mages by surprise, despite his dislike of the Council, this was the training he’d been wanting so long for. Opportunities to hunt an elder vampire were once in a lifetime and either the vampire died, or you did.
Finally, the moment he’d been waiting for arrived- two figures appeared around the corner, the first strode with a menacing sort of confidence while the second followed with a dazed, weaving gait- a sure sign of a vampire’s Gaze.
Owl frowned in concentration as he focused his line of sight through the scope of his most prized rifle, keeping the first figure in the cross-hairs.
Almost.
The vampire snatched his victim close, dragging her into a shadowed alleyway and inadvertently shielding himself with her body. Owl bit back a curse, finger frozen on the trigger.
Damn it, he couldn’t risk hitting the bewitched woman but she’d be dead anyway in a matter of moments if he didn’t act.
Owl paused mid-snarl, movement catching his eye as another figure, a man, strode down the sidewalk toward the alleyway. How the hell had this guy gotten past the wards? There was no time to think about it as the man paused, listening for a moment before he stepped directly into the mouth of the alley.
This time Owl did curse out loud as several things happened; the vampire snapped its head up at the intruder who stumbled back in horrified surprise at the blood-drenched and inhuman face.
The vampire ripped out his victim’s throat in one vicious bite before tossing her aside.
Then everything seemed to slow down, the vampire tensed in preparation for a killing strike and the unfortunate stranger stumbled to regain his balance as his mouth stretched into a scream only to be silenced by a single deafening bang.
The rifle’s kickback slammed into Owl’s shoulder as his magically-enhanced bullet reduced the vampire’s head to nothing more than a red and gray splatter across the brick walls of the alley.
The blast echoed ominously through the streets for a long moment before time returned to its normal speed as Owl’s instincts retreated and ration took over once more.
The vampire’s body slumped to the ground and the now very-lucky-to-be-alive stranger made a strangled noise before he staggered to his feet and tore off down the street, knocking over a few trashcans as he did so.
Scowling fiercely as he hurriedly disassembled and packed away his rifle, Owl quickly scaled down the side of the building that had been his perch for the past several hours.
He absolutely hated situations like these. There was one rule and one rule only that vampires had for humans who discovered their secret. Kill them. Now he’d have to find the idiot that walked right into a vampire feeding and make sure he didn’t get himself killed by letting it spill to the wrong person.
Vampires had eyes and ears all over the city and they’d be scouring for information once they realized-and it shouldn’t take long- that one of their most feared had been taken out.
Owl stepped into the alley, moving first to the dead woman. She had been young and probably rather pretty. He closed his eyes and spoke a few words of peace over her body, freeing her soul to move on. He would have to leave her body here for the police to identify.
Next was the vampire’s corpse, which even headless, Owl knew better than to think it was safe. He still had to pierce the heart and burn the body to insure there would be no untimely returns.
Pulling a long, wickedly sharp knife from the sheath strapped to his thigh, he pressed the point between two ribs then pushed in one quick move to stab directly into the corpse’s heart.
Retrieving a tightly folded plastic tarp from his duffle bag, Owl quickly wrapped the headless body and prepared to take his leave. He’d have to burn it somewhere much farther away, besides, his wards would end soon and it wouldn’t be long before someone came to investigate all of the noise. There was a clearing a few hours drive outside of the city where Owl could safely dispose of the body without worrying about anyone noticing the smoke or flames.
Taking one last look around, Owl notice something laying on the sidewalk. Picking it up, he realized it was a wallet. He flipped it open and frowned.
Interesting.
Owl had only been able to capture a few details of the poor sod who barely escaped- a quick profile and dark, ruffled hair. The picture on the ID card matched the features he’d seen.
His name was Daniel. Daniel Hauffner. And Owl’s search had just gotten much easier.
But first, Owl thought as he hefted the tarp covered body over his shoulder and headed toward his car, I have a fire to build.
~*~*~*~*~
Daniel slammed his door shut behind him, fumbling to latch his two measly deadbolts with shaking fingers. Then he stood there, staring at the door and gasping for breath as if that- that thing would burst in at any moment.
But it couldn’t, Daniel reasoned to himself. The monster he’d seen was dead, it had to be. Nothing could survive getting its whole head blown off, right? But that meant whatever killed that monster was still out there, and that it must have seen him too.
Suddenly the locks didn’t look so secure.
Taking a quick look around the sparse apartment, Daniel tried to decide what piece of furniture would be best for holding off whatever or whoever was out there. Unfortunately, all of his furniture was from yard sales and most of it weighed no more than about ten pounds. The only heavy furniture was the couch, and with that in mind Daniel quickly started pushing it toward the door.
A few minutes of huffing and muttered swears later, the couch was successfully in place and Daniel realized that it would probably be a good idea to check his windows as well. It only took a few moments to make a trip around the small space and reassure himself that the windows were locked, curtains tightly shut, and as secure as cheap apartment windows could be.
With nothing left to do but wait until morning, Daniel stood in the middle of his living room feeling nervous and paranoid, trying to convince himself that he was overreacting. The things he’s seen tonight couldn’t have been real.
Except that his instincts never lied. His ‘sixth sense’ as he called it, kicked in every once in a while; an icy chill down his spine when something bad was about to happen or the way his skin tingled and the air would smell of ozone sometimes when he was walking through a crowd. Not to mention the few times when meeting someone’s eyes would cause the hairs on his neck to stand on end and it took conscious effort not to growl.
Daniel started pacing, his mind replaying the events over and over in way too much detail.
When he’d felt the sudden chill and heard noises from the alley, he’d expected a simple mugging, not some poor woman having her throat ripped out by a monster. It had resembled a man, but only in the most basic of ways. Long stretched out features with gaunt, hallow cheeks below dark, sunken eyes glittering with malicious intent. Then there were the fangs; long, sharp and coated with blood.
Things like this weren’t supposed to happen in real life, only in sci-fi novels and stupid B-rated movies about vampires.
Freezing mid-step, Daniel replayed that last thought in his head. A vampire? It was ridiculous. Impossible. But so had everything else been that night. If that thing really had been- and Daniel felt stupid even thinking it- a vampire, then he just had to wait until sunrise for relative safety.
And if it was a vampire, then whoever killed it was hopefully a good guy. And maybe, just maybe, whoever fired that killing shot, had wanted to save him.
Or there was a psychopath with some kind of super-weapon on the loose in his neighborhood.
Daniel ran a hand through his hair, his frustration fueled by fear. He wanted to go to sleep, his mind and body both exhausted, but he was too afraid to close his eyes. He wanted to believe that the thing he’d seen hadn’t been real, but he knew it was and that no desperate reasoning would change that.
He wanted someone to hold him, damn it.
Daniel hated feeling needy, but in times like these, though times had never been quite like these, his ‘sixth sense’ seemed to go into overload. His skin crawled, his insides never seemed to settle and his head felt like someone set off a grenade behind his eyes. He needed something to anchor him and human contact had always worked best, although the awkward mornings after usually outweighed most of the benefits.
Finally, feeling that standing in the middle of his living room with a pounding headache was no safer than sitting on a much more comfortable surface, Daniel retreated to his bedroom and curled up on the center of his bed. Eyes falling shut despite his determination to watch both the door and the single window, he imagined a pair of strong arms circling him, keeping him from falling apart. If he tried hard enough, he could almost feel the reassuring warmth of a body behind him and for a moment, he felt safe.
~*~*~*~*~
~*~*~*~*~
Daniel woke slowly, blinking the sleep from his eyes as he stretched out his body. He sat up, looked down at his jean clad legs and wondered why he fell asleep on top of the covers and still in his street clothes. Then everything from the night before came rushing back.
The vampire-thing, the dead woman, the gunshot.
Daniel stared at his bedroom door, almost too afraid to open it, but he’d survived the night and his sixth sense hadn’t picked up on anything. So he scraped up whatever courage he had left and forced himself to move. When the door swung open and nothing jumped out to tear his face off, Daniel quickly strode down the short hallway, paused at the entrance to the living room and scanned for anything amiss.
The couch was still where he’d left it pushed up against the front door, the curtains were still tightly shut and Daniel was still alive. Everything seemed to be in order.
Maybe he had imagined the scene in the alleyway. Daniel took a moment to ponder the likeliness of a co-worker dropping a hallucinogenic into his last cup of coffee, or maybe even a little bit of spontaneous insanity. That happened to people, right?
Well, if it had happened, it would definitely be on the news. He didn’t live in the best neighborhood, but a scene that violent was pretty damn noticeable.
Daniel picked up the remote and even had his finger on the power button before he lost his nerve. Closing his eyes and taking a deep breath before opening them again, he tensed slightly, ready to bolt if anything, you know, crawled out of the television.
“Stop acting like an idiot. All you have to do is press the button, nothing going to happen.” Any other time, Daniel would have been glad that there was no one here to see him talking to himself, but was distracted by the television as the screen lit up.
“-in the high 60s. A slight chance of rain Thursday night and clouds through the weekend.”
The weather. Of course, the forecast always came on about ten after the hour, along with traffic and stock rates. Daniel sat on the floor where his relocated couch used to be and stared blankly at the flickering screen and waited for the actual news stories to start. He had almost drifted off into a light doze when one of the voices caught his attention. A female news anchor had begun speaking in that solemn tone always used for deaths and tragic accidents.
“ In further news, a mysterious scene in the downtown district of Reswin. Police called in to investigate gunshots found large bloodstains, but no bodies. The police department has refused to comment further as of yet. No suspects, but please stay cautious and report any suspicious activities. Here’s Dave with the police.”
Daniel felt as if his stomach had fallen out, been filled with worms, and shoved back in upside-down. His skin broke into goose bumps, a roaring static drowned out all sounds and hi brain seemed to have gone supernova. He tried to stand when a wave of dizziness hit him and the world went black.
~*~*~*~*~