Chapter #12: Kiss Of Death

"What are you doing here?!" I hear someone call out behind us angrily. We all jump about three feet in the air and hurriedly spin around. Mara spins so fast that she loses her footing and would've tumbled onto the ground if I hadn't been holding onto her, catching her before she faceplants. We shine our lights in the man's face and he grimaces from the brightness, blinded for a second. "Get those goddamn lights out of my face!" he bellows. I keep my light on him, though the girls point them down towards his chest, getting a good look at his appearance.

He's a Caucasian man, with black hair that's slicked back and shaved along the sides and back, a clean-shaven face, standing just under six feet tall, looking to be about 200 pounds. He has strange looking clothes, a nice black suit with a red tie, and black vest on a black shirt, but that's not what makes them weird. What's weird is that he appears to have stepped out of the 1920's with how the clothes are designed, reminding me of many pre-war era clothes we see on the internet about the roaring 20's, even though he can't be older than 40. He has a hand-rolled cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth, and even has oxford dress shoes on, which really doesn't fit the terrain one fucking bit. His hands are immaculately clean, though his nails are strangely long compared to the rest of his outfit.

"I said get the light out of my face!!!" he demands again. I slowly point the light down at his feet. He glares at me for a while before looking the three of us over. "What the hell are you kids doing up here? Are you here about that stupid urban legend again? There's no fucking flying monkey man up here! Why do people actually think that's real?!"

"We just wanted to check it out, it seemed like fun to get away up in the countryside," I lie.

"Well you all need to get the hell out of here, NOW. This is my land, and you're trespassing on private property," he says, coming closer. I take a step in front of the girls to cut off his path.

"We're sorry, we didn't know this was private property, we didn't see any signs or anything. But we have to go find our friend first. He went on ahead of us to the cemetery to look for the Rebob's, and he has the keys to the car," Mara replies. He glares at me again, and I swear that for a second, I see his eyes shine. Then he sighs and walks ahead of us.

"Fine, let's go get him so you can leave. I'm tired of waiting for the cops to come searching for dumb kids who wanna come fuck up my weekends. I'll lead you to the cemetery," he grunts unhappily, waving for us to follow. I give the others a worried glance and slowly follow the unknown man. They stay behind me, looking very troubled by the man. I can't really blame them, this is some weird shit, with way too many questions filling my head.

"Jack… this doesn't seem right…" Mara says with a hushed whisper, tugging on the back of my hoodie gently. I nod, acknowledging the strange situation.

"I know. Just stay close… as soon as we find Luke we're gonna make a run for it."

"Something is wrong with him…" she tells me with conviction, a deep scowl on her face as she stares at the well-dressed stranger who continues up the path, blowing out a trail of smoke. I keep her suspicions in the forefront of my mind as we continue on. Mara isn't often wrong when it comes to people and their personalities or intentions. There's been a good number of times when she's warned us not to do something really random, only for us to find out the next day that she was right. One time it was me not going to a party, only to find out it had been shot up later that evening. Another time it was Luke not taking a field trip to Sacramento, as we found out later that day that the bus got into a nasty crash that left 3 kids hospitalized. She was literally NEVER wrong. But, we still needed those keys to get the fuck out of here, so the sooner we find Luke's dumbass, the sooner we can ditch this creepy fuck and his vineyard.

"So… sorry again about this… If we'd known it was private we wouldn't've come up here in the first place Mister…?" I trail off.

"Arius."

"Right… Well, sorry again Arius," I reply as we continue toward the cemetery that's still nowhere in sight, though we've been walking for a good 20 minutes since we initially left the car, not including all of the times we've had to stop. "Hey, can I ask what's up with the getup?"

He glares back at me again, and I swear I can see his eyes shine when he first stares at my face before it goes back to its initial dark brown, so murky it almost looks black. He turns back around before answering begrudgingly. I feel Mara grip my arm, eyes wide like she'd seen it as well. "I was in the middle of a party my wife and I are throwing when she noticed headlights up on Patrick road. Nobody ever comes up this late unless they're chasing that stupid ghost story about the mad scientist."

"Is it like a period party or somethin'? I haven't seen a suit like that anywhere except for movies, though it is really cool," I embellish, hoping to get him to talk more as my feeling of unease begins to skyrocket. I would take off with the girls and just leave Lucas' punk ass if I knew this guy wasn't going to draw a gun on us or something like that, and with how he's been acting, who knows what the fuck he might have on him. It's hard to tell in the dark with a pitch suit like that. I can hear the girls whispering silently behind me, but can't make out what they're saying.

"It's a Great Gatsby party. We throw one every year. My wife is obsessed with that dumb book, but it's like you said, I do like how we look in these clothes," Arius answers with a smirk.

"Were you out here earlier Mr. Arius?" Ella asks uncertainly, her voice carrying a bit of a tremor as she asks.

"No, why do you ask?"

"We saw someone here earlier, before we had even begun our walk to the cemetery, but just thought it was our imagination," Ella replies. "We were just wondering if it was you."

"Hmm, that's odd, we didn't see any other headlights heading up this way. In fact, as far as I know, you kids are the only ones who've tried to get to the cemetery all month. Just keep your eyes peeled, we've had a few crazies come up here before, doing that satanic shit. Don't want any of you gettin' hurt," he replies as he ashes his cigarette, blowing the smoke so that it smacks me right in the face. I cough with a grunt, glaring at him.

"How far away is this goddamn place?" I ask, beginning to grow impatient as my legs grow a bit sore. I mean, after jogging up and down the 2nd and 3rd floors of the school buildings just to make it to class on time, I'm already beat, but now we're power-hiking through the goddamn woods to go find Lucas' selfish ass, and I'm starting to lose my shit.

"Should be about another five minutes up this path."

"Good, I'm ready to get the fuck outta here," Mara whispers in my ear like she's reading my mind. I nod, agreeing with her completely.

"Mr. Arius, we also saw something weird farther back on the path. It was a deer, but it was completely gray with white dots, instead of brown fur, and it had a huge bite mark on its back," Ella says, bringing up the corpse. He doesn't really react, though he does wobble on his next step, turning his head a bit toward us without looking our way.

"That's weird, I've never seen anything like that before. And I didn't see it on my way up here to catch you guys. You sure you weren't just imagining things sweetheart?"

"Yeah, I'm sure. We all saw it. And don't call me sweetheart…" Ella replies snidely, a sneer curling her upper lip as she scoffs at his arrogant dismissal. I dig a hand in my pocket gripping the knife tightly, finger stroking the trigger to snap the blade out and lock it in place at a moment's notice. He laughs quietly, but doesn't respond, just continues to guide us until we come into a sort of clearing in the woods, a few old tombstones sticking out of the area.

"Here we are. Now find your friend so I can get back to this party," Arius urges, waving his hand around the area.

"Luke?" I call out, looking around the area, but not finding him anywhere around. "Luke!"

"LUKE?!!" Ella calls out, worried now as there's still no response from him. Even I begin to grow worried, because even if he'd strayed off of the path, he should still be able to hear us and call out. But there's nothing. No sounds of insects, no wind, no footsteps. It's just eerily quiet. We walk farther into the graveyard, looking behind headstones for him in case he's hiding anywhere, calling out the entire time, yet still finding nothing. I could feel the cold sweat dripping off of my brow as I felt the impatient stare of Arius burning into my back, and the fear of not knowing where our asshole friend is hiding.

"EEEYYYAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Mara shrieks from the edge of the cemetery, leaping away from a large gravestone.

"What's wrong?!" I ask as I hurry over to her, checking to see if she's okay, Ella right behind me. Mara's sobbing, and doesn't respond, simply points at the back of the grave with a trembling hand, her eyes wide and leaking uncontrollably. I glance at what she's pointing to and take a startled step back, my voice catching in my throat as I stare in disbelief.

"How…" is all I manage to get out as I look upon the horror lying in wait for us. I gag, having to hold in the rising bile trying to escape through my esophagus. Ella screams and wails at the sight of Lucas, our missing friend, laid out along the dirty leaves of the cold ground. Then as much as I had tried to fight it, I bend over to the side, and vomit up undigested pizza, a sour taste stuck on the tip of my tongue as I feel my eyes begin to water.

Lucas is dead, his eyes bulging out of his skull, and his mouth wide open, caught in a silent, never-ending scream. His teeth are bared, showing off his gums and his tongue, poking out from between the two sets of teeth. His hands are brought up to his chest, and half curled, as if he'd been holding onto something as he was killed. His legs are spread wide, with his toes pointed downward, almost as if he'd been standing upright on his toes at first, but had been killed and pushed backward so that he'd fallen in this strange stance and position. His neck and head are pushed to the side, and there's a large bite mark on his neck, insanely similar to the one we'd seen on the deer. But the strangest part is that if it wasn't for his clothes and the features of his face, we wouldn't be able to tell this was Lucas at all.

His skin is completely gray. His eyes are dried out and unnaturally shriveled, as is the rest of his body, yet still somehow looking as if they're about to pop out of his skull. His lips are so dry that they're damn near nonexistent, much like a mummy, and his tongue is a small crinkled stump, jabbing out at us from between the ivory teeth and dried opaque gums. His fingers look meatless, just wrinkled skin clinging to brittle stiff bones. His body has lost all of its weight, leaving his clothes and shoes dangling off of his skeletal-like remains with an extreme bagginess.

But his face is what throws me off the most. He's the same age as the rest of us, had barely turned 18 last month, but the corpse we're staring at has to be at least 80 or 90 years old. His scraggly beard and mustache are the exact same, as is his long chin, and the scar on his eyebrow from when his piercing had been torn out during a fight. But how? How was this Lucas? How could this be him, now gray and old, as if time had targeted him specifically. I glance at the wound on his neck and see there's no blood leaking out, and that the flesh beneath the gray skin is white, just as it was with the corpse of the deer. And even his once jet-black hair, is as white as the moon shining brightly over us now.

"How the fuck did this happen?" I ask tentatively, my voice trembling with fear as I glance around, finding no tracks in sight around him, until my eyes settle on Arius, who is standing still a good 100 feet from us, right where he'd left us when he'd first brought us to the cursed burial grounds, smoking his goddamn cigarette like nothing is wrong. I almost call out to cuss at him when I notice he's staring directly at me, a large grin on his face, and his eyes glowing a shade of red brighter than the cherry of his cigarette. As I look on in fear, all the hairs on my body stand on end as I stare on.

"Please! Help us! Something is wrong with our friend!!!" Ella shrieks at Arius, who walks closer to us. I grab her hand and pull her back as she tries to rush over to him, keeping her beside us. Mara remains still, having already noticed this fucker's weird behavoir. She must've noticed his eyes as well. "W-wait! What're you doin'?! We need help!"

"He's not here to help us… I think…" I stammer as I feel cold chills run through my body twice, shivering hard. "I think he did this to Luke. I think he set all of this up…"

"What the fuck are you talkin' about?" Ella yells angrily, yanking her hand away from me and scurrying past me. Mara is the one who grabs her this time, simply shaking her head. "What the hell is wrong with you guys?!"

"Look at his eyes…" Mara says so low it's barely audible. Ella squints through the darkness as she shines her light on him, causing his eyes to glow brighter than before, even reflecting the light like a wolf as her hands begin to shake.

"We have to run," I tell them, crouching down quickly and patting Lucas' boney body for the keys, but finding nothing at all, not even his wallet or cellphone.

"You're looking for this I imagine?" Arius asks cheerfully as he dangles the car keys on his index finger, spinning them around before catching them and squeezing hard, until a crunching sound echoes throughout the graveyard. I watch in shock as he opens his palm to let the broken bits of Lucas' many keys crumble to the ground in glistening pieces. We stare on as he grunts and shakes his head like a wild dog for a second before his gaze fixes upon me again. He opens his mouth wide, grinning savagely at the three of us. His teeth are not as they were a minute ago, now jagged, pointed, and thick, like that of a large carnivorous predator. I quickly put two and two together, realizing that what had bitten into both the deer and Lucas was not a cougar, but this fucking monster named Arius.

"What the fuck are you?!" I ask, taking a step away from him. His grin grows wider.

"Ahhh, good, a smart one, finally asking the right question. I get so tired of the same idiotic unintelligent hairless apes that come up here looking for flying monkeys, reeking of drugs and alcohol, barely able to rub their last two braincells together. 'What do you want?' Why are you hurting us?' Where are you taking us?' 'Where are my friends?' Who are you?' What did you do to them?' But never, in all my years prowling this glorious world, have I heard anyone ask that right off the bat. I think I'm going to save you for last. That's how the saying goes, right? 'You gotta save the best for last?'" Arius rambles, waving his hands as he does and ashing his cigarette a second time, flashing his long nails, which have changed quite a bit themselves. His cuticles are blackened against his pale ivory skin, and his nails have turned the color of pitch, matching his suit and growing longer than before, thicker, now resembling claws more than fingernails. He flexes them at me as he notices I've taken an interest, before waving his hand down nonchalantly and swiping four gigantic chunks out of a tombstone like it's a piece of soft tofu. "But as for what I am, I am a Seelensauger."

"…The fuck does that mean?"

"Well, the rest of the world has many different names for us. Ekimmu, Lobishomen, Aswang, Rakshasa, Alu, Dearg-Dul, Les Dames Blaches or Baobhan Sith, Devils of Hjalta-Stad, Dybbuk, Gwarch y Rhibyn, Jaracaca, Penanggal, Alp, Sampiro, Tikoloshe, Vrykolokas, El Chupacabra, Strigoii," his voice prideful of all the legends surrounding his kind, his eyes locking with mine. "But Vampire is one that people seem to be most drawn to now and days, though none of them are quite as correct as Seelensauger."

"What? That doesn't make sense…" I grumble to myself, glancing at Lucas' decrepit body. What kinda vampire does this shit?

"You're wondering how your young friend is so old now, yes?" he questions, now only ten feet away from us from where he was before. I feel Mara cling to my arm, her hand holding something as she presses it against my back as she pulls me away from the monster, hiding whatever she's holding from Arius. "Would you like a demonstration?"

With that, Ella, being the farthest away from the demon, sprints off, trying to make a break for the desolate road through the forest. I turn my head for but a moment to watch in disbelief as my friend since the first week of Freshman year leaves us to die in the hopes of saving her own skin, before whipping my head back around to keep my eyes on the monster. Only he's gone, vanished from the gravestone he'd violated. I can hear Mara whispering something behind me, but I can't really make it out since it sounds like gibberish. Before I can focus on her, I hear Ella shriek from our left, back where the path was that we had come up on. I shine my light over there, but can't see anything. I groan, and against my better judgment, start heading over there, Mara still clinging close to me.

I shine my light throughout the forest floor quickly, making sure to never leave it on one spot for too long in case the Seelensauger tries to rush after us, being much quicker than we are since the mother fucker keeps disappearing every time we take our eyes off of it. Ella shrieks again, but this time, it's strange, her screams sound different somehow, unnatural. I lift the light up and chase it down the road until it focuses on two beings. We take a few steps forward, so that we can get a better view, to find Ella being held up off of the ground and choked around the throat by Arius. His teeth are sunk into her shoulder as he drinks from her, and we watch, terrified, as the cute loudmouthed Ella gets older. Her hair, turning from strawberry blonde to gray, starting at the roots and growing out. Her skin begins to grow wrinkles and sags a bit. Her scream, aging to that of a woman in her forties. And as the Seelensauger drains her, he grows younger, until he looks to be just 20 years old. He whips his head back, gasping happily as he catches his breath, eyes fixed on us. Mara begins whispering faster now, panic creeping into her voice.

"I think that's enough for me, though you do taste magnificent sweetheart. I think I look just like the strapping young lad I was back in Germany, all those centuries ago!" Arius sneers, holding the sobbing middle aged Ella by the throat as she struggles to free herself from his grasp. But it's no use. It seems he has an even stronger grip on her now that he's fed again. He begins stalking towards us, a wide grin on his depraved face as he drags Ella behind him on the rugged terrain, clutching her by the hair now as she screams wildly.

"Stay the fuck away from us!!!" I shout defensively, my hands shaking.

"But you are such good company, Jack! I think I'll take the rest of you back to see my lovely wife. She's not feeling the best, yet I know that she'd absolutely love to have the three of you for dinner!"

"Get ready to run," Mara whispers between her strange mumbling, which is starting to sound like an actual language now. Is it Latin? No… Gaelic? Before I can ask what the fuck she's talking about, Arius is upon us, his hands outstretched as he grabs hold of the collar of my shirt, pulling me in close. Before he can do any damage, Mara screams at him in the unknown language, and tree roots shoot up from the ground, catching both the monster and I off guard. Mara slaps a hand over my eyes and moves her other hand that had the device in it out from behind me. I hear something spray at Arius as he screams out in anger and pain and feel his grip on me loosen. She pulls me back and removes the hand from my eyes, allowing me to see the roots come to life and seize hold of Arius as his eyes water, now red and puffy from what I can only assume was pepper spray, as even my eyes sting a bit and I wasn't even directly hit from her spray. Before he can roar out in anger, a root wraps itself around his neck before slamming him down to the ground, gagging and binding him.

"RUN!!!" Mara commands.

"Wait, what about Ella?!" I ask, seeing that she's still held by the Seelensauger, now flailing painfully in the dirt as Arius holds tight, ready to tear off her scalp.

"There's no time! That won't hold him for long!" Mara responds in a panic.

"Wait!!! Please! Jack! Mara! PLEASE DON'T LEAVE ME!!!" the middle-aged Ella screams pitifully, tears soaking her face and torn shirt. Mara looks back uncertainly, and nods to me, second guessing herself. I rush over, avoiding the thrashing Arius who tries desperately to break free of the dozens of thick tree roots that have come to life. When I reach her, I take out my knife and cut through her hair as quickly as I can, and once she's free I pull her along, back to Mara who's waiting impatiently. "Thank you!"

"Fuck you bitch, you left us for dead!!!" Mara yells back before we begin to run. Ella instantly shuts up, knowing that Mara's right, and just continues to sob as we get as far from Arius as we can. "Are you okay?" she asks me. I nod, glancing back one last time to see Arius already freed one hand, and is trying to rip the rest of the roots away. "We have to hurry, he'll be free in a bit, and we can't start the car up now."

"What should we do then?" I ask uncertainly, glancing around at the nearby area. "Should we try one of the nearby vineyards?"

"He said his wife and him live nearby, remember? We have to try to get back to the town and hope that someone will believe us about Luke and what happened to Ella," she responds. "But I think we needa go through the woods to try to hide from him as well as we can since he'll be free in about three or four minutes."

"Yeah, I think you're right," I agree as we change course a bit, sprinting deeper into the woods in the hopes of throwing the monster off of our trail. "Mara, how did you do that?" She hesitates before answering with a tired huff as we begin to reach the four-minute mark.

"I'm a witch…"

"What? Really?" I ask, intrigue sprouting up on my face. Before she can respond, we hear a bone chilling roar emerge from where we'd left Arius, and we all freeze. "Hide! That bush, dive into the bush!!!" I yell in a hushed voice, pulling the two of them into a thick shrub with me. It's not too tall, so we all have to lay on the ground to avoid being noticed. We hunker down and wait, hearing the Seelensauger rush past us within a few seconds of hiding. He calls out for us as he flits around, unable to pinpoint us.

Yet it's only a matter of time until he finally finds us. I try to call 911, but none of us have service. I feel Ella tremble as she sobs silently, accepting her fate. Even Mara is shaking. None of us dare speak. We know what comes next for us if we're unable to find a way to stall him again, and Mara can't cast another spell without that fucking vampire finding us instantly. We're trapped.

"Come out you little shits! There's nowhere to go! Either way, I will find you! And the longer you make me search, the longer your death will take!" Arius growls, now calmly stalking the area, sniffing the air to catch our scent. He keeps his eyes closed before, his head snaps our way, his rosey maroon eyes focusing on me specifically.

"I. Found. You!"