She stood on tiptoes, craning her neck up to get the best view possible, but Hana still would never have dreamed she’d be the first to see it. In the distance, a flicker of shiny black in between the trees, and a puff of smoke rising above the highest branches. She leapt into the air, pointing it out to the crowd.
“There! It’s there!”
Her words sparked a storm, as everybody else began leaning, jumping and in a few cases shoving their neighbours in order to get a look. The forest was dense enough that it had disappeared from sight again, but Hana was certain of what she’d seen. And sure enough, it was only a short time before more cries rang out as others spotted glimpses, then not long again before the smoke began showing through the treetops once more. Then, finally, it emerged.
She’d known what to expect, Hana was the daughter of a merchant whose star was on the rise, and had been given the finest education she could ask for. But there was such a difference between pictures and the real thing. No sketch could have prepared her for its sheer presence, the heft of a thousand tonnes of steel thundering towards her at such incredible speed.
The engine itself was painted black, but some bare steel showed through, shining so bright that Hana had to shield her eyes for a moment when the sun caught it at just the right angle. The grille at its prow sliced through the air as it surged forwards, pulling four entire carriages along the track like they weighed nothing, and the thick trail of smoke billowing from it stretched out in its wake like a bride’s gown on her wedding day. But it was the sound that truly enraptured her. Deep and rhythmic, like the wheezing breaths of a giant, ceaseless at first but slowing gradually as the locomotive began to slow. Then, as it finally came to a stop, a high-pitched whistle erupted from deep within it, and the crowd burst into applause.
She couldn’t speak a word over the top of that din, but what was there to say? She turned to hug her father, twisting her neck so she could keep staring at the train while she did so, sharing the simple joy of that moment with him. Onyang was renowned for its wealth and sophistication, but even so, this was truly a momentous day. The nation’s first locomotive connected the capital straight to their city, allowing anyone with a ticket to travel between them at impossible speeds. She’d heard that on a good day with a full head of steam, it could cover twenty five miles in a single hour. The thought of anybody moving that fast was terrifying and thrilling in equal measure.
It was in that moment that she made her choice. She stayed to watch as the noble men and women in their beautiful clothes poked their heads out, prompting further applause from the crowds to congratulate these brave explorers on their maiden journey, but her heart was already back at home. Back with Thomas. He’d asked her a question a week ago, and that whole week she’d been torn between two worlds and two lives. But now, as hope welled up within her, she at last knew what her destiny was to be.
The shouted obscenities told Faith that dinner wasn’t being served tonight. Her parents had been at it for ten minutes already, and experience told her that meant the fight was only going to get worse, maybe even to the point of violence. If it was just her, she’d stay underneath her bed and wait for it to all blow over, but she was the eldest, and that meant looking after her sisters.
“Stay here, I’ll get food.”
They looked scared for her, but didn’t argue. She wished that they would, just once. If they told her not to risk it, said they were fine and she should stay where it was safe, then maybe she’d be able to believe them. But she’d always been the brave one, the fearless one. Even when she was on the edge of tears, she kept them to herself and smiled through it, because if she wasn’t worried, then her sisters wouldn’t be worried either. She was so tired of being okay.
The door’s handle the kind you pulled down rather than twisted, and that made a loud clunk noise every time because it was so stiff that you had to push down on it as hard as you could to make it budge. But the girls had all learned how to leave the door open by just the tiniest hair, so it looked like it was closed but hadn’t actually clicked into position. That way you could pull it open again without having to touch the handle.
The hallways were all carpeted, so she didn’t have to worry about creaking floorboards for now. And the kitchen was in the centre of the eastern edge of the house, so she had two different routes she could use to reach it, one carpeted the whole way, one that involved going through her dad’s study, which was the creakiest room in the whole house. Tonight’s fight was in the living room, which meant the carpeted approach wasn’t an option, but at least it meant they weren’t too close to the study, so only a really loud creak would get their attention.
She crept out, going down the left corridor and towards the front door. This part of the house was lined with religious paintings, family photos with everybody smiling, cross-stitched designs saying things like “welcome to our happy home” and “we walk in God’s light”. One turn to the right got her to the lounge room, a second into the study.
The kids weren’t allowed in the study at any time, which normally wasn’t a problem because there was nothing interesting there, just her dad’s old football trophies and magazines, and his laptop. In the past Faith had tried to sneak in and use that laptop, but after several attempts her parents relented and bought a shared computer for the kids to use. And thanks to all that past experience, she knew exactly which floorboards creaked and which ones were safe to stand on. She clung to the wall, careful not to touch anything or disturb the dust on the magazines, then once she’d reached the seventh board across, she walked along it and to the other side of the room. It did creak once, but luckily that happened right her dad shouted “WHORE”, so nobody but her heard.
Finally she made it to the kitchen. Her parents were in the next room, so she had to be extra quiet now, but she also had to be quick. If either of them walked over towards the doorway, they’d spot her. But this was a well-planned maneuver. She pried open the fridge as gently as she could, and grabbed the half-loaf of white bread that sat on the bottom shelf. Taking individual slices out was too risky, the plastic wrapping would crinkle if she tried that, so she grabbed the whole thing and placed it on the counter.
Next, the pantry. It was close enough to the door that her back might be visible, but she could hear that both of them were on the other end of the dining room, so this was as safe a chance as she’d get. She darted over to stand close to it, waited until her mum started a long sentence to cover the noise, then stepped in front of the pantry, yanked it open quickly, grabbed the jar of peanut butter and closed it again. She considered going for the cutlery drawer next, but decided it was too risky. Better to return with what she had while she could.
Her heart didn’t stop pounding until she was safely back in their bedroom, but the smiles on her sisters’ faces once she did made it all worthwhile. She dropped the bread and peanut butter on her bed, and grabbed the comb off her bedside table to use as a makeshift knife. The bread was soft and the peanut butter hard, so it tore as she spread it, but in the end she managed to assemble five sandwiches.
With her mouth half full and stuck together by the peanut butter, Hope asked, “Can you tell us a story?”
“Okay.” Faith had to stop and think. She didn’t know that many stories that she hadn’t already told them, but there had to be something. Then she remembered. Her teacher had been sick recently, so her class had a substitute for three days, and he normally taught kindergarten kids so he didn’t know how to handle a room full of ten- and eleven-year olds. In the end he’d kept them entertained by having them watch a bunch of movies, and one of them had been pretty funny.
“Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there lived a really ugly princess…”
Finding an appropriate suitor for Hana had been a struggle that she knew had put a few grey hairs on her mother’s head. They were caught between two worlds, a humble family with a simple name, but one that grew wealthier and more respected by the day thanks to her father’s wise investments and her mother’s impeccable negotiating. To marry her off to some common man would be a waste, and might cement their status as mere merchants who got lucky, but few matriarchs of grander households would be willing to take in the daughter of such a young and unproven family. Hana had been introduced to a few young men whose families were in similar situations to her own, but for one reason or another, none of those arrangements had worked out in the end.
But her mother needn’t have worried. She’d kept him secret for more reasons than just his being a foreigner, but Thomas was the perfect husband for her, and had already expressed his affections - rather more than was considered appropriate, though Hana certainly didn’t mind that. Warmth rushed through her as she thought about those nights, and she shivered in excitement, anticipation, joy, and a thousand other feelings she couldn’t put names to. She’d blown out the candle and opened her bedroom window; now she sat bolt upright against the wall, waiting for him to arrive.
She didn’t have to wait long. Even with just the moon to see him by, Thomas was more beautiful than any man she’d ever seen. His dark eyes twinkled like they were stars themselves as he climbed in through the window, pulling himself up and through it in a single, perfectly smooth motion. He was strong but gentle, rich but understated, far older than her but brimming with youthful vigour, untidy in a way that took great effort to maintain, and he looked at her like she was the only woman in the whole world. Hana sprung across the room as quietly as she was able, careful not to wake her parents or her brother, and kissed him.
Their lips finally parted, but he still held her close as he whispered in her ear. “My love. I’ve barely been able to sleep without you.”
Hana kissed him again. “I’m sorry. I needed some time.”
“Have you made your decision, then?”
She hesitated. She was still just as sure as she had been that morning, but there was such a difference between making a decision and acting on it, and in the moment she found that she couldn’t speak, couldn’t even move. Thomas sensed the struggle going on within her, kissed her brow, and arched her head up so he could look directly into her eyes.
“My sweet, I have loved you since the moment I first laid eyes upon you. I am a stranger to these lands, but you have made them feel like home. In all my years, I have never met anybody with a spark like yours, who makes me feel the way you do. But it is your strength and your passion that make you who you are. If the answer is no, then say the word, and I will love you all the same. I promise you this: no matter what your choice is, I could never think any less of you for it.”
A single tear rolled down Hana’s cheek, and her mouth quirked up into a half-formed smile.
“I saw the steam engine today. It was amazing, better than I’d ever imagined. Did you ever think something like that might exist when you were my age?”
“I couldn’t even have dreamed of it. The world has changed so much, and every day it finds a new way to surprise me.”
Hana nodded, and Thomas wiped the tear off her cheek. “I want to see a hundred of them. And I want to see what comes next. I heard some scholars say they might be able to use the same engine to make a flying machine, that flaps its wings with the power of steam and soars into the sky with passengers aboard. Can you imagine that? Flying through the sky like a bird, feeling the wind in your face and seeing the world stretch out beneath you? And I want to see Onyang grow. People are going to come from all around now that we have this train station, and they’ll see how beautiful my city is. And I want to see all these places you talk about. I want you to show my your homeland one day. I want to see history happen, and I want to be right in the middle of it.”
Hana’s whispers grew more fervent by the second, until she could barely contain the excitement in her voice. Finally, she knew she was ready to say the words.
“I want this, Thomas. I want to see everything, and I want you by my side, watching with me. I want to be with you, forever.”
His eyes blazed with an intense desire as he ran his fingers through her hair, pulling it to one side. Then without ceremony or hesitation, he sank his teeth deep into her neck.
The hospital walls were just as cold as last time. No wonder people never really got better, when you stuck them in places like this. Faith had a needle stuck into the back of her left hand, which hurt more than it should have. Weren’t they meant to give you painkillers when they did stuff like that? Whatever they’d hooked her up to, it wasn’t working.
One of the nurses noticed her moving and waddled over. She looked concerned, but that wasn’t going to fool Faith. She knew that people like that only looked like they cared because it was their job, and she wasn’t interested in hearing whatever the nurse was about to say, so she spoke first. “I’m fine. Can you take this thing out now?”
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“No, you need to stay in bed so we can monitor you. You look healthy for now, but we still need to know whether the treatment worked properly before we release you.”
“You can’t keep me here. Where’s my stuff? Where’s my clothes?”
Looking exasperated, the nurse pointed to the floor beside the bed, and came closer so she could read the chart properly.
“Miss… Faith. You could have died today. You need to stay here for more testing.”
Weasel words. If the nurse had any power to keep her here, she would have said so. Faith yanked the needle out of her hand, ignoring the stab of pain and the spot of blood when she did so, and flopped off the bed to pick up her clothes. The nurse and some other hospital staff flocked around her and tried to convince her to stay, but she ignored them. She was fine. And if she wasn’t fine, she didn’t care.
Once she’d made it past all the ‘helpful’ people, she used the payphone at the front of the hospital to call her dad so he could come pick her up. It rang out for long enough that she almost gave up, but eventually he answered.
“Hey, it’s Faith, can you come -”
He’d hung up on her. Fucking typical.
She’d been thirteen the first time she ODed, so the hospital had called her parents for her. They were furious when they arrived, but they didn’t say a single word. Just stood there, staring at those sterile yellow-white walls, pretending she didn’t exist, until eventually she got the message and followed them back to the car. The drive home had been silent. Once they got back, they acted like nothing had happened at all, asking her how school had been that day and putting on even faker smiles than usual. As far as they were concerned, it had never happened. She should’ve known they wouldn’t be so lenient this time.
It was a two hour walk back home, and she was still shaky on her feet, but she had to get started right away. The sun had already set, so if she took too long then she wouldn’t be getting back home until morning. She took one final deep breath, steeling herself for it, then walked outside into the cold winter evening. It was just two hours, she could handle that.
An hour in, she even started to wonder whether she should start dawdling. Her hands and nose were numb and her feet beginning to blister, but the city streets were alive. Music, people, blasts of warm air and delicious smells as she walked past the open doors of restaurants, bright lights everywhere at ground level. She felt herself melting into the crowd, becoming just another person. It was liberating. A drunk guy offered her a high five as she walked past, and she hit his hand as hard as he could. He yelped in pain, and his friends laughed raucously and yelled indistinct but encouraging words at the “strong girl”. But she had to get back, if only because she’d get in even more trouble if she took too long. She took one final look at the club the guys had staggered out of, then fell back into the long trudge home.
She was limping when she finally reached her street. Her left foot had started to hurt half an hour ago, and was getting worse by the minute. It was what people called a nice suburb, full of houses with white picket fences, two kids and a dog, and while all the lights of the house itself were off, the street lights illuminated the place well enough for her to see her school backpack, most of her clothes and a handful of her other possessions all sitting out on the driveway, thrown together in a pile. She knew what it meant, but there was a little voice in the back of her mind telling her to at least check, so she walked up to the door and tried her key. It didn’t fit.
Her dad was a locksmith by trade, but still, that was a fast job. She should have been mad, probably, but somehow she ended up laughing instead. She gathered up most of her stuff and shoved it into her bag, leaving behind the less important stuff that wouldn’t fit. Then she went further up the driveway, brandishing her now useless house key, and carved the word FUCKERS onto the side of her dad’s car, big enough to stretch across both doors.
Satisfying, but it was still missing something. After some consideration, she carved a few dicks onto the hood, and let the air out of the back tires.
Now she was ready. Still limping, she set out into the night.
It was unmistakably night when Hana awoke, but the darkness didn’t conceal anything. She saw the world like she never had before, her eyes picking out every detail in the wooden slats on the ceiling, every bump and irregularity in its grain. But she couldn’t focus on that for more than a moment. Moving out of instinct more than conscious desire, she rose to her feet in a single fluid movement as soon as she woke, following her nose out of her bedroom and into the dining room, where -
It was a scene from her worst nightmare. Thomas, reclining on the floor like a lazy cat, licking one finger as he stared off into space, and strewn around him, her parents and her brother. Their throats were torn open, their limbs twisted and snapped, their faces twisted with pain and terror. And everywhere, blood. It matted their hair, stained their skin and their clothes, pooled around them. There were handprints on the walls, flecks of it on the ceiling. But not one drop on Thomas himself, other than those fingers that he was carefully sucking dry. A cacophony of horrors rose up through Hana’s chest and into her throat. She needed to scream, to cry, to beg, to collapse, to rage. But each of those emotions paled in comparison to the hunger that surged through every inch of her body.
“What are you waiting for?”, Thomas asked. “I prepared this for you, my love.”
“You…”
“There’s no sense in acting all shocked, I told you exactly what I am.”
“You said you don’t hurt people!”
There was no hint of mirth as Thomas laughed. “And you believed it! You poor, innocent idiot. An immortal, soaked in the blood of thousands, tamed by his love for one utterly unremarkable girl. Such a pathetic story. And yet you were so desperate to think that you were special that you gobbled the whole thing up. Do you feel special now, Hana?”
She fell to her knees, her hand landing in a warm smear of her father’s blood. Everything boiling up inside her burst out in a single question. “Why?”
Thomas pushed himself up to his feet and shrugged. “Something to while away eternity. Jumping people in alleyways is too quick, too easy, too impersonal, you’ll find it becomes rather tedious in time. Or perhaps you won’t. Either way, watching you’ll be an amusing way to pass the next decade - if you make it that long.”
Hana couldn’t bring herself to respond as he slowly wandered out of the house. Everything she was feeling was still there, but it was dull and distant, crushed under the weight of defeat. This was her fault, all of it. They were dead because of her weakness, her stupidity. Even if she did try to stop him, she’d only end up making things even worse, somehow.
She had no will left to fight. Haltingly, one jerky inch at a time, she raised her blood-stained hand to her mouth, and gave in.
Retail fucking sucked, not that that was a surprise to anybody. Faith had bounced from one job to another for the past ten years of her life, never managing to stick with one for more than six months before she got sick of it and quit, and most of them had been retail. Customer service voice was just how she spoke now, always appeasing and apologising and agreeing with everything, because if you told some little shit to stop trying to steal from your store, he might - gasp - stop coming to the store to steal from it.
She was coming up on her record for continuous employment this time, and had a sinking feeling she might even beat it. Having money was good, and working at Farm to Table was more bearable than any other shithole she’d put up with because her manager was the kind who understood that the customer was pretty much always wrong and didn’t mind telling them that. He’d even let her shut down some of the really annoying ones all by herself, though he still didn’t let her swear at them.
The only problem with it was… all of that. She was starting to almost not hate her job. She could settle down here, beat that record, and end up bagging groceries for the next twenty years of her life. She’d be just another cog in a giant shit-stained machine until it ground away everything that she was, letting Gary train her like a dog because he was slightly less of a fuckboy than every other manager she’d ever had.
She was meant to be the strong one. She was the big sister. But somehow after all this time, she was the one who’d broken under the strain. Hope had an actual career, a fiancé, a wonderful happy life; she even somehow was still on speaking terms with their parents. Even little Charity had made something of herself, getting into a good university in Summerview and making enough money to move out and support herself. But Faith? All the battles she’d fought, and this was how she ended up. Pathetic, lonely, and trapped in a cage. Couldn’t even drink to forget the pain, not after promising Hope she was going clean.
Despite everything, she’d always been an optimist at heart. She’d always believed that there was a better life out there, that she just needed to reach out and grab it. But every day now, it got harder and harder to hold onto that.
Despite the late hour, the carpark was packed. It had been a sold-out show, and with good reason - Fred Ainsley never disappointed. He’d had the whole crowd rolling in the aisles, and that left a buzz in everybody that kept them smiling despite the chaos of the ensuing traffic jam. Many of the more experienced audience members had run over to their cars as fast as possible to make it out before things got too messy, but Hana wasn’t in a hurry. She took her time, enjoying the song of a thousand heartbeats around her as much as she’d enjoyed the show itself.
Inviting as that sound was, she was only listening tonight. There was a fridge full of blood waiting for her at home, and though it wasn’t nearly as satisfying when drunk reheated from a glass, it was much more convenient. Discretely plucking people off the streets and disposing of the mess afterwards was more of a hassle in this day and age than it had ever been, so she only bothered if there was something to celebrate.
Her good mood soured when she finally did reach her car, and saw who was standing next to it. She made a disgusted noise, making sure it was loud enough for him to hear it.
“Please don’t touch it, I only just had it washed.”
Thomas held his hands up, showing that they were nowhere near the car’s sleek black exterior. “Wouldn’t dream of it. Cyrix Argent, is it? Very fancy. Very you.”
“You might have heard of something called a ‘telephone’, perhaps even ‘email’. Civilised people these days use them, rather than dropping in uninvited and unwanted.” Hana stopped once she reached the car. If she unlocked it to get in, she’d only be giving him a chance to get in too, and that was the last thing she needed.
“I just wanted to catch up. It’s been a while.”
Hana stepped to the side to allow a couple to pass by, holding her response until they were safely inside their own car. “Fine. Hello Thomas, hello Hana. Good to see you, good to see you too. There, we’ve caught up. Now unless you want to continue this conversation someplace where I have a stake within arm’s reach, I believe we’re done here.”
“You know, you act awfully high and mighty for someone who’s just as despicable as me.”
“Really.”
“You’ve held this petty grudge for centuries because I turned you, but I’ve seen you do the same. Don’t you have another young protégé right now, in fact? At least I have the decency to get permission beforehand.”
Hana drummed her fingers against her side in irritation. “I ‘hold a grudge’ because you are a lying, manipulative psychopath who sees vampirism as something to inflict on others for fun, all so you can play out the same tired fantasy over and over again. I give it to people I care about as a gift, even if it sometimes takes them time to appreciate that. Now if you’re done throwing cheap insults, I’m sure you have some poor innocent girl to torment.”
“Oh no, I got bored of the innocent ones a long time ago. None of them ever turned out as well as you. But if you insist, I’ll take my leave.” With that, he turned and strode off into the night.
Hana was fuming the whole drive home - a long time, it had been a two hour drive to Fall’s Bay. Thomas had an uncanny ability to show up every single time her life started to take a turn for the better, and he always ruined something. None of her past attempts to kill him had panned out, but maybe she could do some stalking of her own, find out who his latest project was, and ruin that for him. A petty form of revenge, but sometimes that was the most satisfying.
But no, she had more than enough on her plate already. Better to keep her nose in her own business. Whoever this poor new girl might be, she was on her own.
Another exhausting day of accomplishing fuckall was finally over. Owning a car was too expensive, so Faith walked home. Normally she didn’t mind that, it was only half an hour, but on a cold autumn night like this, half an hour was a very long time. She needed to talk to Gary sometime about changing up her shifts, working til 11 sounded like a fine idea until you had to actually do it.
She half-turned and saw that guy behind her again. There were always plenty of people around, even at night, but Faith’s instincts told her something was off with that one. He was always just far enough behind her that she couldn’t accuse him of being in her personal space, and she’d taken enough turns that he should have split off at some point, unless he was deliberately following her.
Not that she was worried. He wasn’t the first idiot who’d tried to fuck with her, and he wouldn’t be the last. Her thick winter coat kept most of her body warm, but it also had pockets big enough to hide a knife in. She stuck her hands in those pockets, looking to anyone else like she was just keeping them warm, and wrapped her fingers tight around the handle. If he was dumb enough to try anything, she’d be more than happy to let out a little stress.
Five minutes passed, and he was still trailing behind her. A little further back now, but that didn’t make him any less of a creep. She decided to force the issue, and not lead him all the way back to her house. She stopped at the edge of Hayam Park, where it was well-lit and plenty of other people were in sight, and leaned against a tree, watching him to see what his next move would be. She didn’t get to find out.
Before he caught up with her, she heard a cracking noise from above, and instinctively looked up to see one of the largest branches of the tree falling, straight down on top of her. She tried to jump to the side, but that moment of looking instead of acting had cost her all the time she had. There was no way she could dodge it.
Then she felt sudden motion, and strong arms around her, and saw the branch crash to the ground beside her. The man set her back down immediately, and she could only stare at him.
“Hi. Sorry if I creeped you out earlier, I live just around there and we kept making all the same turns.” He pointed further down the street.
“It’s cool. Hey, if you’re gonna save my life you can creepily follow me any time you like.” Faith was staring at the branch. She was aware of a lot of other people staring at the pair of them, too.
The man laughed. “I might have to take you up on that offer. I’m Thomas, by the way.” He extended a hand.
Faith looked him up and down. He certainly wasn’t unattractive, the kind of guy she would have crushed on hard back in high school. She was past those naive days of thinking that anybody handsome must be a good person, but Thomas had just saved her life, that counted for a lot of good guy points. Besides, hadn’t she been wanting a better life? Maybe he would turn out to be a shitty person, maybe he wouldn’t, but nothing was ever going to change if she didn’t take risks. His story was flimsy and trusting people was scary, but was it scarier than bagging groceries until she died alone, and got eaten by her twenty cats?
She took his hand and smiled. “Faith. Wanna go get coffee sometime?”