Something that Aunt Kali’s memories didn’t prepare me for was the all encompassing hunger after siring another. Emptiness spread from my belly to my brain, leaving me foggy but determined to find a meal. I dragged Aarti along, the fragrance of blood drawing me to a couple in an alleyway. The hunger heightened my senses, […]
There were no doubts in my mind that Ajit knew I was up to something. We had slept huddled together like cats since Devika and Vivek’s cult moved into our sanctuary, but when I brought Aarti home, I kept close to her, helping her adapt to a life of sleeping all day and remaining awake […]
Aarti, particularity, broke my heart. She was only a couple of years older than I was. Six or seven. That is, when I became. Her biological father had died when she was too young to remember him. Her mother married again, and her little brother died two days out of the womb. Her stepfather blamed […]
We left that same night, creeping out despite the torches surrounding our home. Why they didn’t immediately make it our funeral pyre, I’ll never know. Maybe they wanted to give us a chance to show that we were still human. That was something we were unable to do for them. Our quintet stood watching the […]
According to The Vampire Encyclopedia by Matthew Bunson, a rakhas (or, more formally, rakshasa) is tinkling-bell-clad, blue-throated, blood-stained creature with matted hair and five feet. One of the powerful vampires of India. I can tell you from experience that this is an exaggeration. It’s like playing that game—Chinese Whispers, is it?—where information becomes more muddled […]
I sat down the street from her bungalow in my new Mustang. Of course I wondered if Shelby would think I’d given up on her, with her not knowing I’d bought this car, one almost matching hers. It was my surprise to her. Yeah, it took all my savings, but it was worth it. Making […]
