Page 5 of This Ravenous Fate
Neither Layla nor Mei had money. The best they could do wassell out whichever clanmate had crossed the gangster’s boundaries, but even that was risky. She glanced out at the glittering skyline. Music from the party downstairs still thrummed beneath their feet, making Layla consider the way life carried on despite the atrocities that took place every day.
As Mei lifted a hand to speak, the gang leader pulled the trigger. White light exploded around them, sending Mei stumbling back. The scent of blood filled the air, metallic and bitter.
Layla turned to see Mei pressing her hand to her chest. To a gaping wound right over her heart.
A sinister smile cracked Mei’s lips and she lifted a cold stare back to the gang leader as she lowered her hand, letting the blood spill. Layla caught the moment Mei’s hunger took over her senses, her eyes going black. She tried to reach for Mei, to stop her, but her clanmate shot forward and pounced on the gang leader.
His blood sprayed as he fell back, and his gun went off, the bullet downing one of his men. The chaos broke out in full as the other men rushed at Mei. But her fangs sank into the throat of the next man to reach her. As a reaper, she was already much faster than a human. But while starving, she was an apex predator, spilling blood her only impulse. In only a few moments, she had taken down three more of the Diamond Dealers.
Layla watched calmly, her arms folded. A starved reaper bred carnage, and she knew intervening while Mei drank her weight in blood would only result in a bloodier battle. She surveyed the bloodbath with vague interest, taking note of each man that fell. But herbreath caught when she realized the sixth man wasn’t among the dying. Layla raced to the edge of the roof to find him, bleeding and panting, making his way down the fire escape. He glanced up at her and his foot slipped, sending him crashing down the ladder. His hand scrambled to catch one of the last rungs before he could plummet to the dark alley below.
Layla leapt from the roof and landed hard on the first platform, rattling the metal ladder. Her eyes glinted in the moonlight, and she saw the fear flash across the gangster’s face. The smell of his blood filled the air, the wound at his side dripping over his shoes and into the darkness below. Layla’s fangs pierced her gums as they emerged.
“Help me, and I will let your clan go,” the man gritted out.
Amusement lifted the corners of Layla’s lips. “I thinkI’ll bethe one lettingyougo tonight.” She stomped the heel of her boot onto the man’s fingers. Layla watched him fall, his screams ending in a satisfying choking noise. She hurried down the fire escape, forgoing the final ladder to jump down the rest of the way.
Her bones rattled as she hit the ground, but an electric adrenaline lit her veins at the overpowering scent of human blood. Heat rolled beneath her skin, her body tingling at the thought of the pure human life source running down her throat.
The gangster lay before her in a bloody heap. His breath left him in wet rattles, which only quickened as Layla stepped up to him. She kneeled and pressed her knee into his spine. A pained gurgle left him. Layla almost relished it. But the sound of footsteps approaching had her leaning down and covering his mouth with her hand.
The faint voices grew louder as two young women walked down the alley. Layla could sense their innocence: young blood and desperation all rolled into one. Blood spurted from the gangster’s mouth, slipping between her fingers and coating her hand.
“You know nothing,” one girl was saying. “I can’t believe you’re going to France to seeSwan Lake, and you don’t even know who wrote it.”
Layla crouched in a pool of moonlight. As soon as the girls reached this part of the alley, they’d spot her if they looked over.
The other girl scoffed, “You don’t know either.”
“I do.”
“Who is it, then?”
Just then, the two girls stepped into the moonlight, and Layla let out a rough laugh. The girls stopped. As Layla stood, their gazes slid over her.
“Tchaikovsky,” Layla said.
She lifted a bloody hand to her lips and shushed them, her smile revealing her fangs.
Shrieking, the two girls ran out of the alley.
Layla watched with a bitter smirk. Only a few years ago, that had been her, whispering to her best friend about the roles she dreamed to dance in ballet. Now she stood over a dead gangster, her hands bloody from a fight she hadn’t started.
Layla stood and looked up to the roof and shouted, “Mei!” No response. Sighing, Layla hauled herself back up the fire escape and onto the roof. She was met with a bloodbath that had somehowgrown since she left it. Blood covered nearly every inch of the rooftop and had even splattered on the illuminated glass of the skylight. Mei was at the center of it all, her body limp and trembling.
She looked up as Layla approached. Blood smeared across her face and trickled from her mouth. Her fangs still protruded, their points digging into her lower lip. The usual dark brown of her eyes was glazed over with a golden sheen, her irises almost entirely black even in the moonlight. Her shirt was tattered and saturated with blood where she had been shot, but the wound was already mostly healed. Still, Mei swayed on her hands and knees, bloodlust ravaging her.
“I told you so,” Layla hissed. “Now I have to drag you home so you can sleep this off.”
Mei’s eyes rolled back into her head, and she collapsed.
Layla groaned. She bent to lift her clanmate into her arms. While the night had taken an unexpected turn, Layla had to admit Mei had done them a favor, despite how risky they left the scene. Their clan would be debt-free and no one’s target. For now.
***
Dawn light spilled across the floor like blood, its hues tinted red from the early sun. The other side of the bed was cold, but the smell of still-drying blood lingered on the sheets. Layla sat up at the harsh sounds of retching coming from her bathroom. “Mei,” she called, getting to her feet. A nearby mirror showed bags hanging around her eyes, her dark skin failing to hide the blue marks beneaththem. Despite having fed recently, she looked half-starved with her bloodshot eyes and nearly black irises. Their usual golden color had darkened to nearly black. There was no way she would be able to pass as a human, which would make today’s tasks difficult.
After scraping her honey-brown curls into a decent braid down her back, Layla pushed past her brain fog to deal with her sick clanmate. She nudged the bathroom door open and stopped in the doorway. Mei slumped over the toilet, her spine curved while she gagged.
