Vampire Wake (Page 13)

Instead of going back to my room, I crept down the stairs to the next landing. With the candle flickering in my hand, I looked at the stairs leading up into the 'forbidden' wing. Crouching forward, I looked only to see that the stairs and banisters had now been cleaned.

Any trace of Marshal's footsteps had been wiped away.

"Have you lost something?" a voice said from behind me.

With a gasp of fright, I leapt up and spun round.

Peering through the flame of the candle that she held in her hand, Mrs. Payne gave me a distrusting look.

"Erm, no...wel yes," I said, sounding flustered.

"Oh, yes?" Mrs. Payne said without taking her beady eyes off me. "What have you lost"' "My earrings," I blurted out.

"Realy?" Mrs. Payne said. "Wel, you couldn't have lost them here."

"How come?" I said, looking down, pretending to be searching for them.

"You weren't wearing any earrings today as Marshal carried you back into the house after your fal,"

she smiled through the candlelight at me.

"That would be it then," I said sounding relieved.

"They must have come off when I fel."

"Perhaps," the housekeeper said, moving around me so as to block the stairs leading up into the blackness. "I'l get Marshal to have a look for you tomorrow."

"No, its okay," I said. "They weren't very expensive - just forget about it."

"Whatever you wish," Mrs. Payne smiled, but it was false. For a moment we just stood and looked at each other in the gloom.

"Any idea on when the lights are going to come back on?" I asked her.

"Very soon," she said her fake smile fading.

"When would that be exactly?" I pushed.

"In a day or so - when the builders return. Why?

Is there a problem, Kiera?" she asked.

"No, no problem," I said, turning away and heading back up the stairs to my room.

"Goodnight then," Mrs. Payne's voice echoed up from the darkness.

"Goodnight," I said, and climbed the stairs.

Back in my room, I closed the door and went to the bathroom. The bath looked inviting; so, taking off my jeans and jumper, I put my hair up and ran myself a bath. While the water was tumbling from the taps, I lit a few more candles and went to the windows, opening them just enough to let the cool night air into my room.

Turning, I went back to the bathroom, took off my underwear, and climbed into the bath. I sunk right to the bottom of it and the warm water almost came up to my chin. Leaning my head back I closed my eyes. I wished that I had my iPod with me; to be able to listen to Adele while I relaxed in the bath surrounded by candlelight would have been perfection. But Kayla stil had it and I guessed her need was greater than mine. I liked Kayla and she was nothing like her mother had portrayed her.

Sure she could be a little cocky, but she had a lot to deal with. Not only had one of her parents recently disappeared (and I knew how that felt), she had been left knowing that she was different from everyone else.

Although she knew that her father had been a Vampyrus, had he ever realy talked to her about that?

Had she ever seen his wings? Surely he would have tried to have comforted her, made her feel as normal as possible. No wonder she was bitter and angry at times.

And where was her mother now? Why had she realy gone away? Was it in search of her husband?

I could understand Lady Hunt believing I might be able to protect her daughter; after al she told me herself that she knew I'd managed to survive in The Ragged Cove. But who was I protecting Kayla from, and did she realy need protecting? I knew that Kayla was in contact with someone on the outside of the manor, I could see that when I looked out of her bedroom window onto the balcony. There was a torch hidden in the corner. If she had a torch available to her, why wasn't she using it to light her way through the house at night instead of a candle? No, she was using the torch to send a signal to someone at night on the moors. She flicked the torch light on and off to send messages to him. A candle would be no good; the wind would blow out the flame. There was also a sprinkling of earth on the stone floor of the balcony and some had dirtied the windows. Directly below her balcony was a flowerbed, and this is where the man stood and threw earth up at her window to get Kayla's attention. How did he get up onto the balcony? Kayla would unfasten the bel pul.

She would tie a knot in one end to secure it between the balcony railings and the male would hoist himself up.

He wasn't a Vampyrus or he would have flown onto her balcony and there would have been no need for the mud-slinging or frayed looking-bel pul.

Whoever it was, he was just a friend to Kayla.

There was no romantic interest as she wasn't trying to impress him. Any young girl wanting to grab the attentions of a young man wouldn't dare let him into such an untidy room, where used face wipes were discarded on the dresser, and dirty clothes and underwear sprawled across the floor. But this did show that whoever it was, she felt comfortable with him - comfortable enough not to put on a show.

My head spun with so much information. So splashing some water onto my face to waken myself, I climbed out of the bath. Wrapping a towel around me, I peered into the mirror fastened to the wal above the basin. With the forefinger of my right hand, I touched the tear duct of my left eye. I couldn't see any blood and my eye didn't even look bloodshot. I stil didn't understand why my eye bled when I had those - visions - when I saw things.

What, with me seeing things and Kayla hearing things, nothing would ever get past us. What a team we would make! Then as if being punched in the face, I staggered backwards - nearly stumbling back into the bath. How had I not seen it? Kayla had been going through changes since the age of fourteen. And since that age she had been hearing things. I tried to remember at what age I had started to see things - probably about the same age I guessed. But just like her hearing, which over the years had started to develop - change - so had my sight. No longer was I just able to see things that anybody else would if only they looked for them, but now I was seeing stuff that either had yet to happen or had happened. But Kayla had gone through other changes too - she had started to grow wings. Although smal at the moment, they were sure to develop into ful-sized wings as she grew older.

With my heart pounding in my chest, and my mouth turning dry, I lowered the towel that I had wrapped around me. Glancing back over my shoulder, I looked at my back in the mirror.

"What am I doing?" I shouted aloud. "Kiera Hudson, you need to get a grip!"

Then I started to laugh, there was no way I could be some kind of half-breed human-slash-Vampyrus.

One of Kayla's parents had been a Vampyrus; mine had just been plain old - ...then I screamed in horror and puled the towel tight about me. Reflected in the mirror was my bedroom window, and in its reflection was the bandaged face of Marshal staring back at me.