After Daybreak

have such a terrifying presence on their side, watching over them. And I have extensive knowledge of vampires, more than most will possess in several lifetimes. After all, it’s supposedly in my blood.

We would build our own house, and in that house we could be like this every night, watching the sun slowly descend, its rays a beautiful theater for us to enjoy. And the sound of rare desert rains on our roof, the feel of it on our skin . . .

I want that so badly that it hurts sometimes, because it can never be. Not with Sin so close.

I can’t put into words the anger I feel toward that monster. He took Brady, he killed my parents. Now he’s taking my future. This new war has just begun, and I’m on the front lines with no guarantee I’ll make it back. There’s even less of a guarantee that all those I love will survive.

Those are the infinite possibilities in the sun painting across the floor, slowly disappearing from sight. The possibilities of victory over Sin. The possibilities of death for all of us. It’s real and tangible now, and as Victor squeezes me, I know he’s realizing the same thing. This moment, so precious and rare, must be enjoyed because it may never happen again. Once we step outside, once we go to Denver, what awaits us?

The sunlight disappears and softer light takes its place, the glow provided by the kerosene lamps in the house.

“I like it here,” I say quietly.

“Maybe we’ll come back someday,” Victor says.

“They’re an example of how humans and vampires can live together. We can learn from them, Victor.”

“The lessons will have to wait until we’ve dealt with Sin.”

Rolling off the cot, Victor takes my hand and pulls me to my feet. He touches my cheek, gazes into my eyes. “I’ll do everything I can to give you the kind of world you dream of.”

Before I can respond, he’s walking from the room. I’m not sure what I would have said. His words have left me speechless.

Outside, Michael and Jeff are waiting by the car. Dr. Jameson and George are on the porch.

“Here’s some food for your trip,” Dr. Jameson says, handing me a box. Inside, I can see some fruits and vegetables. And a bag of blood.

“Thank you,” I say. “We really appreciate your kindness.”

“Well, you certainly brought some excitement to our town,” George says.

“Sin might bring more,” I warn them. “Day Walkers, the Infected.”

“We’re already preparing,” he assures me, gesturing with his head toward the edge of town. I turn to see several men laying down the first boulders of what will become a wall.

Sadness sweeps through me. I long for a world that needs no walls.

“Thank you so much for everything,” I say again, not certain I can ever thank them enough. “I’ll think about you often.”

“Oh, don’t get mushy now and say things you don’t mean.”

“But I do mean it,” I say with conviction. “More than you’ll ever realize. This place . . . it’s the beginning.”

“Of what?” Dr. Jameson asks.

“Of a new world.”

Chapter 5

We head off into twilight, Victor confident at the wheel. With a vampire’s reflexes, Victor is able to push the speed until it climbs over a hundred miles an hour. Jeff and Michael are sleeping in the back. Every now and then I can hear one of them snore.

“You’re awfully quiet,” Victor says. “What are you thinking about?”

“The darkness,” I say. “And how I used to be so afraid of it.” Because it brought out the monsters.

“And now?”

I shake my head. “Now I feel safe in it. I was trapped in that closet for so long, hearing Brady’s screams when he was taken from me. He didn’t want me to be afraid of the dark. It took years, but now I’m not.”

Victor puts his hand on my leg and I feel his warmth.

“I’ve been thinking about your brother a lot,” Victor says, and it catches me off guard. Sin turned Brady into a vampire, but he refused to drink human blood. He became infected with the Thirst. Is he going to talk about the monster that Brady became, how Brady attacked him and we had to kill him? “All I see are his eyes, and that little sparkle of humanity still in them.”

My throat tightens with unshed tears.

“That tiny part of Brady was the one that saw you, Dawn. It was the part that gives you strength to this day. And it was the part that finally surrendered, knowing it was all so that you could carry on and make this world a better place.”

I remember my hands, and Victor’s, holding the stake over Brady’s heart. Pressing down was the hardest thing I ever did. But it was the only way to free him. He hated what he’d become.

I turn to the landscape passing by almost as a blur. Yellow desert made gray by the moonlight, patches of blackened craters where the bombs fell years ago, our attempts to eradicate the vampires from above, to do what the sun hadn’t. Now they’re simply reminders of our failings, our reliance on technology and its inability to defeat the creatures older than us, creatures who were already at their prime during our infancy.

No one knows, not even the vampires themselves I imagine, how they came to be. But they’ve always drawn power from their immortality. What would take generations of mortals to learn and remember could be done so easily by their fanged counterparts.

The desert stretches forever, low-lying hills and mountains far off in the distance, so far they seem completely unreachable. I imagine walking toward them, only to always find them out of reach, just over the next ridge, just beyond the horizon, always just far enough away to hold their majesty.

So much like the vampire next to me. Victor. How far away you always seem. Even when we’re close, parts of your heart are shielded, secrets held that were never meant to be revealed. Will you ever give in to me totally? Is that even possible with a vampire, with an Old Family who has seen the world change for hundreds of years?

After an hour of driving I sense Victor looking out suspiciously, his eyes darting back and forth, perhaps guided not only by sights but sounds I can’t detect.

“What is it?” I ask.

“The Infected. In the distance over there,” he says slowly, pointing across the desert.

I see sharp movements, violent and quick, running and bounding across the dunes. Gray and brown figures, wrapped in tattered cloth.

“I can’t believe they’re so far out,” I say.

“I didn’t know it was this bad,” Victor confesses. “I thought we had more time.”

It’s like a tsunami that started in Los Angeles years ago, finally toppling Lord Carrollton, and is now moving across the country, heading east.

“Richard’s father, Lord Carrollton, he’s dead,” I say quietly.

Victor curses beneath his breath.

“We went to his mansion. It was falling apart, but inside were so many Infected. They came after us. Richard drove like a demon out of hell and we barely escaped.”

“Richard loved Los Angeles. He must hate what Sin has done to it.”

“They should be in Denver by now, shouldn’t they?”

He wraps his hand around mine. “They’re fine. I would know if Faith was dead.”

“How?”

“I’d sense it, but I don’t.”

“Speaking of sensing things, how did you know where to look for me in the mountains? How did you know I was in danger?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t know. I just knew. It was like you were calling to me. Maybe I saw your dreams