The explosion of screams that echoed from outside sent a violent jolt of panic through my body, and I quickly pulled away from my mother.
Her eyes went wide, and so did mine.
"What was that?" I whispered, though deep down, I already knew the answer.
More screams filled the air, growing louder and more frantic. Then came the sounds underneath: the crack and crash of things being broken, inhuman sounds that were not quite a growl and not quite a voice.
Vampires.
We were under attack.
My mother's face drained of color. Panic filled her eyes as she stood abruptly. I watched her shift, the Mother leaving her face and the hunter taking over. It happened in under a second. I had seen it before, but it never got easier to witness.
How did they find us?
For God's sake, we were literally in the middle of a forest.
We had moved three times in two years, each time going deeper, choosing locations that took days to reach on foot.
How could they have tracked us here?
We had been so careful. We had always been so careful.
"Stay here, Kira, " my mother instructed and turned to leave.
I grabbed her arm, halting her in her steps. "Mom, please don't go."
'I can't lose you too.'
The thought hit me so hard I could barely breathe.
I could smell death. I could see it reaching its merciless claws to our small village. It was outside, and it was hungry.
But I knew I was kidding myself. Hunters had a code — you never backed away from a fight, even if it cost you your life.
My mother had lived by that code longer than I had been alive. She believed in it the way she believed in everything else: completely, and without room for negotiation. Knowing that didn't make my hand release her arm any faster.
She placed a soft kiss on my forehead, lingering a little longer than usual. "I love you, Kira. Don't leave, no matter what you hear."
She turned before I could say anything else. The door shut behind her.
I stood there for a second, frozen.
Then another scream made her heart drop.
Somehow, I managed to move my shaking form to the window in my room. I parted the curtain slightly and looked out.
Chaos. Absolute chaos.
I couldn't see my mom, but what I saw shook me. There were bodies, too many bodies, both vampires and hunters strewn across the ground.
This wasn't the first time I had seen death. I was prepared for it. It was expected. But these weren't strangers. These were people I had sat around the bonfire with just hours ago. People who had gasped at the same story I had, who had gone home afterward and presumably eaten, and slept, and expected to wake up tomorrow.
My breath hitched as my eyes landed on a familiar figure in the middle of it all, the village head.
For a woman her age, she was a force. She was fighting against two vampires at once, moving with the strength and ability of someone half her age, wielding swords of fire itself. Each movement was precise. Each strike deadly.
Relief washed over me. She was alive. She was winning. But then, from the corner of my eye, I saw a third vampire approach her from behind. She was consumed with the other two that she didn't notice.
I pressed my hand against the window frame. There was nothing I could do. I couldn't shout, it would give away my position. I couldn't go out there. I couldn't do anything at all, which was not a new feeling but had never mattered this much before.
The vampire seized her with brutal force and, in one swift motion, ripped her head off her body.
Time slowed.
Her body collapsed in one direction.
Her head fell another.
The fire from her blades extinguishing instantly.
I gasped, stumbling away from the window, my chest tightening. I covered my mouth to stifle the scream that threatened to break free, but the tears came.
I thought of the way she had tucked my braid behind my ear just hours ago. The way she had said we wait on the savior. I thought of the fire in her eyes, the way she sat at the center of the bonfire and held the whole village's attention without raising her voice.
That was gone now. All of it, in under a second.
I sobbed silently, my back against the wall.
What did we ever do to deserve this?
Where were the gods when we needed them?
Suddenly, my door was ripped open, and I shot to my feet as my mother stormed in.
Her hair was wild, and blood, some of it hers, caked her dark skin. There was a cut along her jaw and another across her collarbone, both still fresh. She was breathing hard in a way that told me the fight had been closer than she would ever say.
She crossed the room in three strides and went straight to the corner where our bags sat. She had always kept our bags packed and ready, right there, same corner. I understood it now.
"You're leaving, Kira," She said, her voice cold and stripped of everything except the instruction itself.
"We're..." I stammered.
"You're leaving!" she repeated, louder this time, her eyes locking with mine.
"You're not coming with me?" The realization arrived fully and all at once. More tears rolled down my cheeks. "Mom, how can you not come with me?"
She threw my bag at me, and I barely caught it before she grabbed my arm and yanked me toward the door. I let her lead me. My legs moved without any real decision behind them.
The world outside was worse than I had prepared myself for.
The air was thick with the smell of blood. Fires burned in two huts across the clearing. The sounds that hit me were impact, shouting, crying.
My mom scanned the area in one sharp look and then she ran, pulling me with her. My legs found the rhythm after a few strides. I kept my eyes on the back of her head and tried not to look at what we were running past.
I failed.
As we sprinted through the chaos, I caught sight of the earth elemental who had asked the question at the bonfire — the girl with the green-tipped hair. She was in the thick of the fight, completely alone against a vampire that was incredibly fast.
She wasn't retreating.
She wasn't looking for backup.
Her arms showed no weakness; her legs never faltered. She raised her right hand, and the earth beneath the vampire shifted. He sank waist-deep into the ground in seconds, the soil closing around him. Before he could orient himself, she ripped a massive chunk of earth free and drove it into his head. It was over before he understood what was happening.
She was everything a hunter was supposed to be.
She saw the threat, assessed it, and ended it. No hesitation or wasted movement. And me? I was running with my mother's hand around my wrist, moving as fast as my legs would carry me and contributing nothing.
I had always been powerless, but knowing it in the abstract was different from watching someone my age fight and kill while I fled past her.
I turned my gaze forward. But not before I saw another vampire slam into her from the side.
My knees nearly gave out. My mother's grip tightened and kept me moving.
We reached the edge of the clearing where the forest began. The tree line that had always felt like shelter, now, it just felt like the next point we had to reach. My mother pushed me forward, placing herself between me and everything behind us.
"Run, Kira. Don't look back, don't think. Just run. You need to survive. We all need you!"
The words didn't fully land. Only the meaning beneath them did. She wasn't coming with me.
NO.
I refused to accept it. "Mom, I'm not going anywhere without you. That's final."
I had already lost my father; I couldn't bear to lose my mother as well.
Sadness flooded my mother's eyes. "Kira, please, run." Her voice trembled with a pain I couldn't bear to hear.
Those were the last words I heard from her before a vampire appeared from the shadows and snatched her away.