The Slayer Chronicles: First Kill Read online

  He took a breath and let it out slowly before meeting Sirus’s eyes. “When do I see my uncle?”

  “The great Abraham McMillan? Most highly regarded Slayer of our time?” Sirus smiled, and then nodded slowly, as if making a decision about Joss—a decision he would not put voice to. “Depends on traffic. The cabin is about an hour’s drive from here, when nobody’s on the road. The girl you saw is my daughter. She knows nothing of the Society and I plan to keep it that way. Secrecy is our biggest ally. So watch what you say while she’s around, okay?”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll be careful with what I say.” He reached for his suitcase, but Sirus grabbed it first and led him out the station door. With every step, Joss felt more excited the farther away he got from the life that he had known. He was leaving it all behind; all for the love of his sister and his determination to locate the monster that had killed her and right a wrong that never should have been.

  Joss stepped out into the bright summer sun and squinted until a large, puffy cloud did him a favor and crossed over the sun, blessing him with brief shade. In front of him, Sirus had approached a beat-up pickup truck that had been red in its glory days, but was now closer to brown. After placing Joss’s suitcase in the back, he pulled a set of keys from his pocket and glanced around briefly. Before he could slide the key into the lock, the girl who’d run from the station—Sirus’s daughter—burst from behind the truck and ran into his arms. She was about Joss’s age, with hair so many colors—among them purple, blue, and pink—that Joss could barely count them all. The shorts and tank top she wore revealed bronze tan skin. She might have been a teenager, but at the moment, she was acting very much like a scared child. “Dad, I’m sorry. I was going to look for your friend, but there was this man, and he was acting really bizarre. It scared me. He—”

  Sirus smiled and gestured his eyes to Joss, who stood at the front of the truck, feeling unbelievably awkward. “Don’t worry. I found my friend. And you did the right thing to run. There have been some dangerous people lurking about lately.”

  Joss shifted his feet uncomfortably. He’d never been the best at lying, and had only really begun to withhold the truth from anyone since the night Cecile had been murdered. His parents had assumed it was some madman who’d killed their little girl. Joss had merely gone along with their assumption, but supporting their incorrect belief was just as bad as lying. He had a feeling he’d be telling a lot of lies from now on. The idea didn’t sit particularly well in the pit of his stomach. It felt sour and achy and not at all like the cool, familiar comfort of truth. But he would do what he had to do for justice.

  The girl’s eyes said she was both relieved and comforted by her father’s presence. She looked at Joss and offered a warm smile. “I’m Kat. What’s your name?”

  “Joss.” He cleared his throat. “What grade are you in?”

  “I’m starting ninth this fall.” She smiled then, and a peculiar, welcoming sparkle entered her eyes.

  “Me too.” He felt the threat of a smile edging up onto his lips, but it stopped when Sirus caught his eye. “Nice to meet you, Kat.”

  Sirus opened the driver’s-side door of his truck and shook his head, chuckling a bit before getting in. “Come on, you two. Abraham will be expecting us for dinner.”

  Kat walked around and got in through the passenger door, sliding to the middle and patting the seat next to her as Joss approached. After taking a deep breath, Joss climbed in and closed the door, leaving what he had known as his life behind forever.

  5

  ECHOES OF THE NIGHT

  Joss laid in his bed, his pillow wadded into a ball underneath his head. Moonlight poured in through the window, but apart from the dresser and the floor, he couldn’t see much of his room. A strange darkness surrounded him, one so thick and black that it seemed almost like ink. His covers felt heavy on top of him, so heavy that he was having a difficult time breathing. The cotton fabric felt stiff and thick, and Joss was certain that if he didn’t get out from under his blanket soon, he’d suffocate.

  A sound caught his attention and he turned his head to look at the door, at where the noise was coming from. It was soft and steady, like a snake hissing quietly. Throwing his stifling covers off, Joss stood and moved to his bedroom door. He pressed his ear against the wood and listened. For a moment, the hissing stopped.

  A slight breeze blew in from the crack at the bottom of the door. The skin on Joss’s feet cooled quickly and relief flooded through him. The room was just so hot he could barely stand it. He was debating opening the door to fill his room with cool air when the hissing started up again. Slowly, the sound changed from a low hiss—like someone releasing air from a balloon—to a whimpering cry.

  Joss opened the door and stepped out into the hall. He’d hoped for a burst of cool air on his face, but the hallway was actually hotter than his room. A bead of sweat trickled down his forehead and dripped off the end of his nose, but Joss paid it no attention. He was too focused on the sound of someone crying, and the fact that it was coming from the door just down the hall from his bedroom. The cries sounded familiar, and Joss’s heartbeat picked up its pace and joined the chorus of sounds around him.

  He shuffled quietly down the hall. By the time his hand closed over the doorknob, Joss knew who was behind that door, and who was responsible for the echoes of sadness that were reaching his ears. “Cecile? Are you okay?”

  But Cecile wasn’t okay. She was dead. She couldn’t be here in her room, crying for him to save her. She was dead.

  With a deep breath, he turned the knob and pushed the door open. Cecile was lying on her bed, her eyes closed. A line of blood traced down her cheek to her pink ballerina sheets. Only something was different this time. Her chest was rising and falling, and Joss could still hear her whimpers. Cecile was breathing. Cecile was alive.

  He crossed the room, stretching a hand out to brush her bangs from her eyes and comfort her. When his fingertips touched her soft hair, he relaxed. She was real. And she really was alive. He patted her head and knelt beside her bed, keeping his eyes away from the bloody line that ran from her mouth. “It’s okay, Cecile. Shhh. Everything’s okay.”

  Big, round tears spilled from her still-closed eyes and ran down her cheeks. Her voice was soft and sad. “No, it’s not, Jossie. It’s not okay.”

  Wiping away her tears with his fingers, he leaned close, lowering his voice to as comforting a whisper as he could. “Of course it is. Why would you say that?”

  Suddenly, Cecile’s eyes opened wide. Her sockets were empty black holes. Soulless tunnels that went on forever, into the deep, into the dark. For some reason, they reminded Joss of that thick blackness that had encompassed his bedroom. Her voice dropped into a deep, gruff tone, as if she hadn’t used her vocal cords in ages. “Because I’m dead. And it’s all your fault.”

  Joss moved back, terrified. He screamed, but even as he did, he knew that no one would ever hear him. Cecile lunged forward, her tiny fingernails sharpened into claws. Inside her open mouth, Joss saw white, glistening fangs.

  6

  A SENSE OF DUTY

  Joss sat bolt upright on his seat in the truck, alarmed by something he’d seen in his dreams. He wasn’t sure what it had been, but he wasn’t surprised.

  Ever since Cecile’s death, his nights had been plagued by nightmares—nightmares that he was grateful that he could not always recall.

  Sirus and Kat were looking at him, concern filling their collective gaze. It was Sirus who broke the silence. “Everything okay, Joss? You dozed off for a bit.”

  “Yeah. Everything’s fine.” He smiled weakly and realized the truck had stopped. “Just a bad dream. Is this it?”

  Sirus seemed to gauge him for a moment before speaking again. “The cabin’s just around the bushes and up the hill a bit. If you can manage your bags, Kat and I will carry the groceries.”

  Joss scratched his head and yawned, shaking off his bad dream. He nodded. “No problem. Sorry I dozed off.
”

  As Kat slid out the passenger door, Sirus leaned back inside and lowered his voice. “It’s okay. You’ll need all the sleep you can get before training begins.”

  Joss sat up, excitement filling him. He was ready for this, and anxious to get started. “When will it begin, anyway?”

  Sirus held his gaze for a moment, his eyes full of concern—a concern that Joss didn’t understand. “Probably sooner than you’re ready for.”

  “When’s that?”

  “Well.” Sirus sighed, as if doing the math in his head. “It’ll take us about three minutes to gather this stuff and get to the cabin, and another two or three for Abraham to realize you’re here. So I’d say you have about seven more minutes of freedom left.”

  Joss eyed Sirus for a moment, uncertain what to say. Sirus was acting like Joss was heading for his funeral instead of beginning his Slayer training. He couldn’t quite wrap his head around why.

  Sirus laughed and patted Joss roughly on the shoulder. “Maybe ten.”

  Kat grabbed the grocery bags from the back of the truck and Joss moved around the side, lifting his suitcase from the rear and following Kat’s confident stride around a large group of bushes. “Is this it?”

  “Yeah, follow me.” Kat lead the way, following what looked like something that had once been regarded as a driveway of sorts. Joss got his first look at the so-called cabin.

  It wasn’t at all what he’d been expecting. Cabins, after all, are small, square, wooden simplicity, nestled in the too-wild woods, with no electricity and not a single modern convenience. At least, that’s what Joss’s impression had been up until he’d seen the house. What he was faced with was something that threw him completely for a loop. It wasn’t so much a cabin as it was a large, pale yellow Victorian-style house, with a wraparound porch. To its left stood a smaller blue house. Both were old. Neither was what he’d refer to as a cabin. Maybe it was the fancy carved wood accents on the outside, but Joss had a difficult time thinking of either place as home to a group of Slayers.

  Kat and Sirus carried the bags up the path, crossing the porch of the Victorian with a familiar comfort. Joss wheeled his suitcase up to the steps, then lifted it and set it down just as Sirus was turning the knob and pushing the door open.

  After he carried his bags over the threshold, Joss moved into the foyer, but didn’t follow Kat into the kitchen. He was waiting in anticipation, waiting for a man he hadn’t seen since the day of his sister’s funeral. He listened, but the house was silent, as if it stood empty. Even the sound of Sirus breathing beside him fell into the background as Joss listened for the sound of his uncle coming to greet him with open arms. Then, at last, Joss heard the slight creak of floorboards as someone descended the stairs. He looked up, but the face he saw belonged to a stranger—one with dark eyes and a scraggly beard. The man smiled at him and then nodded to Sirus, who responded, “Where is he, Malek?”

  Malek jerked his head toward the direction Kat had moved. “Out back. But be forewarned. He’s in a mood.”

  Sirus chuckled. “When isn’t he?”

  Malek smirked and brushed past Sirus and out the front door. After he’d gone, Sirus turned to Joss. “Leave your suitcase and backpack here. I’ll show you to your room in a minute. But first, your uncle will want to see you.”

  Joss glanced anxiously in the direction Malek had gestured before nodding and setting his bags on the floor. Sirus nodded, too, as if agreeing with some unspoken thing between them, and then strode down the hall, past what looked like an old sitting room on the left of the foyer, a formal dining room on the right at the end of the hall, and a small bedroom adjacent to that. Beyond that, they moved through the door that lead them to the kitchen, where Kat was putting groceries away inside tall, dark cabinets. Sirus set the bags he was carrying on the counter and nodded toward the back door. “Please close the door on your way out. It’ll keep the bugs out and give you some privacy. And Joss . . .”

  Something dark and heavy crossed Sirus’s eyes then. Something that hinted at a warning. “Be careful.”

  There was a moment when Joss hesitated. It probably only lasted a few seconds, enough for an eye to blink twice or a heart to beat once. But inside that moment, there was so much significance that Joss felt as if he couldn’t breathe. This was it. This signified the beginning of change in his life. It was a moment that would shape him, and bring him ever closer to finding justice for Cecile. He was ready, and so excited about beginning his training that he could hardly breathe.

  He looked at the door and nodded to himself, ready as he’d ever be. Crossing the room, Joss’s footfalls sounded heavy in his ears. He turned the knob and opened the door, then stepped outside. Sitting at the small table there on the back porch was Abraham, a newspaper in his hands, a pipe clenched between his teeth. Without looking at Joss, he removed the pipe and pointed wordlessly to the chair across from him. Joss took his seat and waited. For what, he did not know.

  Abraham was dressed in earth tones. Despite the fact that it was blazing hot, he wore slacks with boots, a button-down shirt and vest. He looked like a cool, young Indiana Jones, trapped in time. Instead of a whip, he carried a stake—a stake that was now held in a leather holster at his hip. And instead of hunting for treasure, he hunted vampires. Joss was mystified. Not a single wrinkle marred the fabric of his shirt, nor was a single hair out of place. Abraham was a perfectionist. In fact, his only flaw was the scar on his clean-shaven cheek—a four-inch-wide crescent shape.

  Abraham returned his pipe to his mouth and finished reading whatever article had held his attention, then folded the paper carefully and set it on the tabletop. It was only then that he looked at his nephew. Silently, he went about emptying his pipe into a coffee can on the porch. After he was finished and had placed his pipe in its rightful place inside a leather pouch, he spoke. “Well, you’ve arrived in one piece. I suppose that’s something.”

  Joss bit the inside of his cheek and dropped his eyes to the ground, uncertain what to say exactly. He’d never spoken much to his uncle. In fact, prior to the funeral, he’d had the vaguest idea that Abraham preferred anyone’s company to his. But still, they were family. There was something to be said for that. And there was something to be said for the fact that of all their family members, he’d chosen Joss to train as the next Slayer. He’d seen something special in Joss, and Joss wasn’t about to let him down. “I’ve been working hard nonstop to develop my skills, Uncle. And I’m ready to begin my training now. I’m ready for whatever you have in store for me.”

  Abraham sighed and folded his arms in front of him. Joss raised his chin again, meeting his uncle’s eyes. For the briefest of moments, he’d expected Abraham to utter some words of praise to a boy who’d not only witnessed the death of his sister three years ago at the hand of a monster, but had worked hard to ready himself for training and had achieved a skill level that made him ready five full years early. But all Abraham said was, “They all think they’re ready. New Slayers come to us at eighteen years of age, full of bravado, full of pride, and none of them are truly prepared for the tasks that await them. How arrogant of you to think that at thirteen, you’re even moderately close to prepared. You’re a boy, Joss. And it takes a man to fully train as a Slayer.”

  Abraham was right. Joss wasn’t a man yet. McMillan men were sturdy, strong, reliable. They did not falter. They did not cry. His own father had reminded him of that many times. Joss had argued that Uncle Mike—father to Joss’s cousin Henry—was nothing at all like that. Uncle Mike was kind and generous. He cried at sad parts of movies and had told Joss one summer that it was perfectly natural to be afraid sometimes. But there was no getting his dad to listen to reason. As far as he was concerned, McMillan men were one way and Uncle Mike was decidedly another, which made him less of a McMillan somehow, less of a man. And though Joss wasn’t exactly certain he agreed with those assessments, he wanted to be capable and strong and reliable for those he loved. He wanted the strength to avenge C
ecile’s death. Maybe that would make his father notice him again.

  A sinking feeling pulled at Joss’s insides. “I thought you sent for me because I was ready to train.”

  Abraham slanted his eyes. “I sent for you because the vampire hive in this area has gotten out of control, and we have need of another Slayer. And since you’re the oldest new recruit on our roster, you’re it. That’s all. You’re not ready for anything. You’re not special. You were simply born before the rest.”

  A lump formed in Joss’s throat then, one that was difficult to swallow. He wasn’t special. He was merely conveniently aged. One step above being the invisible boy.

  Abraham picked up the newspaper from the table and opened it, snapping the creases from its pages and dismissing his nephew. “Don’t make me regret bringing you here.”

  With a short, simple, manlike nod, Joss turned and moved back inside the house. Wordlessly, he walked down the hallway, retrieved his suitcase and backpack, and headed upstairs. He wasn’t sure where he was going. He was only sure that boys wait to be told where to go. Men find their own way, and Joss was going to prove he had what it takes.

  The stairs creaked beneath his feet as he ascended, one hand running along the worn wooden banister. At the top of the stairs was a door on the right with two single beds. Past that, another room, this one with a daybed. Both rooms looked occupied, as both had personal effects here and there. Across from the daybed room was a small bathroom, and past that, back toward the stairs, were two more rooms, one with a queen bed and the other a king, both also occupied. At the end of the hall was another bedroom and a second staircase. Joss peered up the stairs, debating whether or not he should go up. A hand closed over his shoulder and Joss flinched. He turned to find Kat smiling at him. “I wouldn’t if I were you.”