(Seth, The night prior)

Well, this is a first for me, being in handcuffs that is. As Gino guides me into the jailhouse, he turns on the light, guides me down a long hallway to where the cells are, takes off the cuffs, and pushes me into one of the open cells and locks me in.

“You better make yourself comfortable in there. I’ll deal with you tomorrow.”

I did not respond to Gino, I just stared him down as he left, his heart sounded savory to me. He would be one of the many that are on my list, but he never laid a finger on Talia throughout her life. So, I cannot do anything to him until he gives me a reason to. As the lights turned off and Gino left out and locked up for the night, I guess getting comfortable is my only option… for now. I can hear everything that is going on outside. The whistling wind, the rustling trees, and the footsteps of the townspeople walking out of the town hall as they walk on the gravel and grass and into their homes, even the hearts that beat in their bodies. Hearing those sounds make me smile because I know which ones I am going to take.

I hear someone’s footsteps, someone’s heartbeat that I am very familiar with. It was Talia’s, she was walking home and how her heart sounds, she is ready to sleep. I heard those footsteps as they slowed, indicating she is now home, then her footsteps stopped indicating she is now in bed. Good. She is home, she is safe. I decided to focus on other sounds, but there is nothing out of the ordinary. Since I hear nothing abnormal, I will just lay here in this cell and wait for the sunrise.

…

…

…

…Hmm?

I hear footsteps, six of them, and rustling outside. They are going in the same direction… of Talia’s home. Hearing their heartbeats, they want to cause trouble, and this is my cue to leave. I pass through the cell bars, float up the hallway and out the door in my smoke form. I see the six men running into the woods. As I materialized, I noticed 0ne of those heartbeats belong to Sampson Belle. His heart is having trouble due to him running along with his followers.

Hearing those beats, I am feeling ravenous, and I am beginning to follow it. My instincts are making me move my feet. I feel my fangs growing out along with my nails as I hear those rhythms. It must not take me over; Talia must come first before my bloodlust. I see from afar that they are holding rocks and branches as they continued running through the woods. Those must be their weapons once they reach Talia. They made it to a clearing and turned to the left, leaving my sight.

Even though I cannot see them now, I hear them, then I hear glass breaking, it was one of Talia’s windows. I then hear them banging the branches on the house, then another window breaks. There was a brief silence then I heard a slam, they were trying to break down her door. Oh no… they succeeded. I heard another brief silence as I continued to walk through the woods and into a clearing. I hear a scream, but it was not from Talia, it was from one of the men. To my left, the house was in my sight. With my enhanced hearing, I can spot everyone in the house. The men surrounded Talia with one holding her and another holding a knife, it was Sampson.

I turned into a haze and made my way to one of the broken windows to get a better view. When I see Sampson hold the knife near Talia’s neck, it triggered my sight intensely to where Sampson’s hand was sliced off and the man that Talia attacked, had his head sliced off. Sampson screams along with the other men. Oh, the joy that I feel to hear those blackhearts scream. The remaining men tried to run out of the opening where the door was until I propped the door back. They tried and tried to pry it open, but to no avail. Then, one of the men decides to climb through the broken window where I was. Fatal mistake. I materialized one of my claws which impaled him through his head and sliced him in half to where the heart fell out. I came through the window back in my physical form and I. Am. Famished.

I am ready to sink my teeth into something and I have not eaten anything ever since Solomon’s body was taken to the morgue. With my claw, I picked up the heart and placed it in my hand. I look to Sampson and the rest of his men.

“I told all of you this would happen. You should have heeded my words and took them as gospel.”

I warned them beforehand, yet they did not listen to me. They. Should. Have. I looked to the heart and bit into it. Oh, the taste of blood on my tongue… fresh blood of the heart that I needed. The taste is so intoxicating, and the rush is coursing through my veins. I am ready for a blood thirsty rampage. But before I can, I look at Talia.

“Turn away, Talia. You do not need to see this.”

She truly did not need to see; she had seen enough from me. The moment she hid under her bed, I began slashing away at the remaining chaff. Bodies splitting apart, blood splattering and drenching me. Every heart I took out, I drained dry. I am getting caught in my bloody rapture. I am ready to give in to my bloodlust, but I cannot, not in her presence. I turn to see Sampson on the bloodstained floor, grabbing Talia’s ankle and pleading for his life. I walked toward him and grabbed him by the back of his neck, pushing his face down on the floor.

“Why should you be spared?” I asked him. “Is it because you want to forget this ever happened? Is it because you do not want to die? Or… you would like to report this to Denby?”

By looking into his heart, that is what he intended to do. Like a coward, he did not answer me and continued to whimper and keep holding on to Talia’s ankle.

“Let Talia go, Sampson.”

As he tightened the grip on her ankle which is hurting her, I tightened my grip on his neck.

“Let go of Talia!”

My patience is very slim, and he knows what is coming to him. Talia kicks his hand off which urges me to drag him out the house. Once I dragged him into the grass outside, I sliced off his limbs one by one almost leaving nothing but a head and a torso as Sampson screams. The agonizing pain on his face and the screams as he gets sliced to bits is wonderful to my ears. He should not have threatened Talia; he would have lived… to a degree. He is a detriment; it is in his nature. The excruciating pain that I feel from him is my indulgence. He means nothing else to me except for sustenance.

I impaled my hand into his chest to where he stopped screaming and started to gurgle in his blood. I pulled out his heart and drank the blood out of it while Sampson left the physical plane. Even though my hearing can pick up on the souls in the afterlife, he is cursing me as his soul becomes trapped within my realm along with the others I have taken. Satisfied from my intake, I begin walking back to Talia’s home to check on her. I went inside and saw her still under the bed, she fainted; I can understand how her mind could not stand what had just happened. As she is sleeping, I clean up my mess, taking all the body parts of Sampson and his men away from the premises. I carry them several miles away from the town into a dirt lot located to the south.

With the snap of my fingers, the pile of flesh and its contents were set ablaze, and I walked away to go back to Talia. As I am absorbing the blood trail that was left over from the pile and leading all the way back inside the house, I realize that Talia was no longer safe in her home. The townspeople would try to harm her and kill her if they are given the chance. There is only one place I can take her to. It is not much, but at least Talia will have something over her head, and it was a couple of miles away to the southeast. I must continue protecting her until she gives me the word.