What the hell happened to me?
And then it hit me, all at once, like a freight train to the chest. Gael. The shelter. The attack.
I shot up, swaying as a wave of dizziness crashed over me. My heart, a sound I couldn’t hear or feel, was absent.
Panic seized me. My hands clawed at my chest, searching for a heartbeat that wasn’t there.
“No,” I whispered, my voice raspy and hoarse. “No, no, no.”
It couldn’t be true. Itshouldn’tbe true.
I staggered to my feet, but the world tilted, my heightened senses throwing me off balance.
Every step felt like walking on a wire, the ground too far away and yet too close.
Gael.
The name shot through my mind like a curse, bitter and full of rage. He’d done this to me.
I wasn’t stupid. I knew what had happened. What he’d made me.
A vampire.
The word tasted foul in my mouth. My fists clenched, and I welcomed the flare of anger, letting it burn through the confusion and fear.
He had no right.
He had no right to take away my choice. To take away my life.
For a brief, maddening moment, I hoped this was all some horrible nightmare.
That I’d wake up in the Guild’s barracks or my childhood bedroom, safe and human and whole.
But the nightmare was real. The hunger gnawing at my insides was real.
The too-perfect clarity of the room, the peeling wallpaper, the scuffed wooden floor, the faint dust motes drifting in the air, was real.
And Gael was nowhere to be found.
I stumbled toward the small bathroom, gripping the doorway for support as I caught a glimpse of myself in the cracked mirror.
The person staring back at me was a stranger.
My skin was pale, almost luminescent under the dim light. My eyes… God, my eyes.
They weren’t mine anymore. They glowed faintly, a predatory gleam that sent a chill down my spine.
I turned away, disgusted, and slammed the door shut behind me.
My hands were shaking, my breath ragged even though I didn’t seem to need air anymore.
I hated this. I hated him.
But even as I raged, a small, unwelcome voice whispered in the back of my mind.
He saved you.
I shoved the thought away. I didn’t ask to be saved. Not like this. Not at the cost of my humanity, my soul.
