Page 26 of Of Faith and Fangs
I stared at him, seeing the conviction in his eyes. He truly believed what he was saying—that I could somehow atone for what I’d become by killing others like me. “What about the crucifix?” I asked. “The one Mr. Brown had, the one that glowed blue-white. Why did it work for me then, but crosses hurt me now?”
Silas’s expression darkened. “That particular relic is... complicated. And unfortunately, it’s been lost—we believe Mercy or her companion took it after they killed George Brown.”
“But what was it? Why did it respond to me?”
He sighed, running a hand through his close-cropped hair. “Celestial power infuses this holy relic. An angel forged it and gave it to us. There are seven of its kind, held by different chapters of the Order. The cross responds to true faith—which you had in abundance. Eventually, we’ll need you to retrieve it. When you’re ready..”
“And now?” I gestured to myself, to what I’d become.
“Now, even if we recovered it, there’s no telling what it would do to you. Prayer causes you pain. Common crosses burn your eyes. That relic might destroy you entirely—or it might do something else, something unprecedented.” He shook his head. “Until we find it again, it’s moot speculation.”
I clutched the clothes to my chest, a shield against a world that had become too sharp, too loud, too much. “So that’s it? I hunt for you or face damnation?”
“Not for us,” Silas corrected. “With us. And your alternative isn’t just damnation—it’s becoming like Mercy Brown. Losing the last shreds of your humanity until you’re nothing but hunger and cruelty.” His voice softened slightly. “This is your only indulgence, your only clemency. One opportunity to redeem yourself, even though you walk quite literally only in the shadow of death. I want to see you prevail. I don’t want to see you fall prey to your nature, to become the monster that most of your kind devolve into. And every vampire will, without a mission, without a proper penance.”
I snorted. “I thought we were puritans. We don’t believe in penance.”
“Not for the human faithful, that’s absolutely right. You’re less than human, Alice. To become again for whom Christ’s atonement applies, you must become as the cross itself. Standing alone, an instrument of death, a vile thing meant to evoke fear, but when joined to Christ, the choicest instrument of the salvation of the world.”
The honesty in his voice surprised me. For all his clinical detachment, there was something like compassion in his eyes—or at least, the memory of it.
“I don’t know if I can do this,” I admitted. “Hunt. Kill. Even if they deserve it.”
“You can,” he said with quiet certainty. “You will. Because the alternative is unthinkable.” He moved toward the door, stake still in hand but held loosely now. “Get dressed. Your training begins tonight.”
As he reached the threshold, I called after him. “Silas.” He paused, looking back. “What if I run? What if I just... disappear?”
His smile was thin and joyless. “Then I will hunt you down myself, Alice Bladewell. And I will not fail.” He closed the door behind him, leaving me alone with my borrowed strength and the taste of blood still fresh on my tongue.
Chapter 12
Silas led me through a maze of stone corridors, each twist and turn mapped instantly in my mind. The scent of earth grew stronger as we ascended, damp giving way to frost, until finally a heavy iron door groaned open and the night air rushed in like a living thing. I stopped at the threshold, overwhelmed. The world I’d known all my life was gone, replaced by something so vivid, so raw. It might have been an entirely different reality. Stars weren’t just pinpricks of light—they pulsed and sang. The wind carried stories from miles away—pine sap, deer musk, wood smoke from distant hearths. The moon bathed everything in silver that my new eyes perceived as clearly as daylight. This was the night as I’d never known it—not as absence, but as a realm of its own, vast and vibrant and waiting.
“Come,” Silas said, his breath clouding in the winter air. “The night won’t hurt you anymore. It’s your domain now.”
I stepped outside, feeling the crunch of frozen ground beneath my new boots. We stood in a small clearing surrounded by dense woods. No buildings were visible beyond the stone structure we’d emerged from—a root cellar entrance, I realized, disguised to look abandoned.
“Where are we?” I asked, my voice sounding too sharp in the quiet night.
“About five miles outside of Exeter,” Silas replied. “The Order maintains several facilities like this one throughout New England. Places to train, to prepare our members to fight the evil that lurks in the night. In this case, to shelter those who need... special accommodation.”
Like vampires, I thought. Like monsters.
I turned slowly, taking in the surrounding forest. The trees were winter-bare, their branches reaching toward the sky like supplicants. I could hear the heartbeats of small animals hidden in burrows, the rustle of an owl’s wings a quarter-mile away, the slow drift of clouds across the star-field above. The sensory richness was intoxicating.
“It’s beautiful,” I whispered, horrified at my own reaction.
Silas glanced at me. “Beauty is irrelevant. What matters is utility.” He pointed to the woods. “Your senses are heightened. Your strength and speed are enhanced. Tonight, you learn to use these abilities to hunt.”
My stomach twisted at the word. “Hunt? I’ve had enough blood for now.”
“Not for food,” he clarified. “For tracking. For killing those who would prey on the innocent. The skills are the same, regardless of the purpose.”
He reached into a giant wooden box near the door of the facility and withdrew a small cage. Inside, a gray opossum hissed and bared its teeth. Its eyes caught the moonlight and flashed red—the same unnatural hue that now colored my own gaze.
“What happened to it?” I asked, taking an involuntary step back.
“Vampire blood.” Silas held the cage up, allowing me to see the creature more clearly. “When ingested, it can create a lesser form of infection in animals. Not a true vampire, but something in between—vicious, blood-seeking, a shadow of the real thing.”
