“Would you want to fight a second or third year?” she asked laughing.
I sighed and looked at Atticus who was curled up on the end of my bed. “It wouldn’t be fair to most of them.”
“Exactly.” She strolled to the mirror and began playing with her hair. “So the tournament then?”
“Sure,” I said with a shrug. “But I want to stop at the library first and check something out.”
It was quiet and mostly abandoned when we walked through the library doors. Books floated in the air above us, going to find their proper place, and a professor strutted by with her arms full of scrolls. A short-haired gray cat appeared and hopped up on a stool, a pair of glasses sat perched on its face. “May I help you two find anything?” she asked.
I looked up and the shelves seemed to go on forever but at the very top a skylight bathed the room in warm light. A spiraling ramp built into the wall led the way up and up. The main floor held countless tables and books of course. There was a potions area set up with cauldrons and an ornate fireplace adorned with gold fixtures and sculptures of warriors set off to the sides.
“I’m looking for books on Collweya.”
“This way,” the cat said and led us up the ramp and into an alcove of books. “Here you will find everything we have.”
“Thanks,” Legacy said as I had already begun browsing the shelves. My fingers slid along silver and gold lettering.
Legacy started on the opposite side of the small room as me. “What if the person who killed Finnick is just one of us and had weapons or even slightly shaped shifted to be part animal?”
She’d seen what I did and we hadn’t really talked about it. In the past week she’d dealt with it in her own way but she didn’t feel the guilt that I did. She didn’t blame herself like I did.
I considered her words, it hadn’t occurred to me it could have been a shapeshifter. Someone who could use magic to become something else. If that were true, it would have to be someone very talented. But I hadn’t told her about my other vision that involved the princes and myself, where I’d seen the human faces and red eyes of what I assumed to be hostile killers, and nothing about them looked animalistic. No claws on their perfect hands, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t have sharp predatory teeth.
“True but you heard those professors from Collweya saying they suspected something followed them from the cold north. So it sounded to me like it wasn’t just someone using magic.”
Legacy nodded slowly. “They mentioned a wolf, what if it’s part wolf by nature? I could just ask Aric and save us the time.”
“If you ask Aric,” I said pulling a book that looked promising by the title Creatures of the Dark, “that will lead to more questions about why we were there when Finnick died.”
“Aric wouldn’t tell anyone.”
I ignored her and sat down at the small round table. Flipping through the pages I saw many frightening sketches of terrifying things with claws and teeth and scales and stuff of nightmares, as Aric had once said but then I stopped at the beautiful face of what appeared to be perfectly human woman, and the only thing of color in the sketch was her red eyes. “You don’t need to ask him.”
“You found something?” She leaned over my shoulder.
I read aloud: “Corsea Bludara.”
“Blood drinkers,” Legacy said in a quiet voice.
I didn’t read the rest aloud because the page was full, and with Legacy leaning over me, she could read it herself.
Blood drinkers or vampires, as they are known in Collweya, are thought to be survivors from the previous civilization who founded the place under the protected dome. It’s suspected that dark magic created these beings and eventually they killed the spell castors and then each other except for a small group of survivors who integrated with our recent founders in secret.
In most physical aspects they appear human. Major differences include:
Drink blood to survive
Thrive in the dark
Skin burns and withers to ashes in prolonged sunlight exposure
Enhanced speed and strength
Fangs that only appear before they bite
Cold blooded
Eyes may turn red after a feeding
It is very difficult to distinguish a vampire from a human. Some clues: they only come out at night. They will try to lure unsuspecting victims with their beauty and seduction. There have been reports of some blood drinkers able to walk freely in the sunlight with the help of a spell. Said blood drinkers will be marked on their skin by the magic somewhere on their body.
My heart seized and nausea flared in my gut at the last sentence, and when I looked up at Legacy her face had paled. Her eyes welled with tears and she blinked several times. “He can’t be,” she whispered.
I swallowed hard and looked at the last sentence again. I replayed in my mind every interaction Aric and I had ever had. Every move he’d made, every sparring match, every meal. He didn’t appear to have enhanced strength or speed but that could be controlled—hidden. It only said eyes may turn red. “Let’s not jump to conclusions. Zyacus told me that mark is from a deal Kyria made during the Queens Challenge. She owes a life and they think
