The blood slaves’ houses had two rooms. My housemates had divided these up into one room for girls and women and another room for men and boys. There was a communal, concrete washing block at the back, shared by all of the blood slaves, from all of the five houses. I leant that they’d devised a system and took shifts to wash with girls and women going first and then boys and men. My housemates hadn’t thawed in their attitude to me, since our earlier conversation and, as the afternoon wore on, I accepted that it may take time to gain their trust. But I wasn’t going to waste my opportunity, away from the cameras of Beaufort Heights. The hairpins were still nestled within my quiff, like two rods of hope.
As night drew in, Samuel and CJ retired to their room and Grace handed me a rolled up mattress, and thin blanket, from a pile in the corner.
“Time to make your bed.” She said, suppressing a smirk. She was clearly enjoying seeing a favoured human reduced to the same living standards as she had to endure.
I took the mattress from her with a thin smile of acceptance.
Peeking out of the window, I saw that Mitchell and Peterson were still sat on the grass outside. I knew that vampires didn’t feel the cold so they wouldn’t be bothered by the chill in the air, in the same way that I was. At least their attention wasn’t on us. I rolled out my mattress and got under the blanket. Then, I withdrew one of the hairpins from my quiff and got to work, trying to unpick the lock of my obsidian dog collar. Groping, behind my neck, I twisted the collar around so that the lock was at the front. Then I felt for the tiny key hole and poked the hair pin into it.
I’d never picked a lock before and had no idea what I was doing. But I guessed that it should be quite easy - I’d seen enough films in which people used hair pins to pick locks. It must be a doddle, right? Wrong! I wiggled that hair pin around, trying for long enough that my arm started to ache. By now, the others were asleep and the sound of soft snoring drifted from Rainie. Eventually, the hair pin broke, skewering my finger at the same time.
Ouch! I yelped, then froze, realising I’d been a bit loud.
Rainie turned over and made a soft lapping sound with her mouth but she didn’t wake up. Glancing around, it looked like Grace and Paulette were also asleep.
I was about to get out my other hair pin, when suddenly I heard a sound that made me freeze. Heavy footsteps, coming from the front of the house and walking right up to the front door. Fear gripped my heart. Each footstep thundered like a hammer hitting concrete. I didn’t move or breathe as the door creaked, slowly open. Other blood slaves wouldn’t enter our house, at night so that meant it was a vampire. I thought of the way in which Mitchell had looked at me, lecherous intent in his eyes, since the first day I’d arrived at the house. Away from the cameras, there was nothing to stop him doing whatever he wanted to me - he’d said so himself.
Part of me wanted to shut my eyes and wish the monster away, just like I had done as a child. But I had to look, I had to know who was coming for me. Just as I’d feared, the unmistakable, imposing silhouette of Mitchell, appeared in the room. His metallic vampire scent invaded the room like a noxious gas. My thoughts raced. Should I just get up and run? But he’d easily catch me, within seconds. At least here, if I screamed, maybe, just maybe, my housemates would help me.
Mitchell walked over to my bed and crouched down. The light of the moon illuminated his face and the look of lust, combined with hate that I saw in his expression, chilled me to my core. His breathing was heavy and consistent, there was no hint of alarm in his body language. In contrast, I felt like I was about to lose control of my bladder. My heart thudded in my chest and I gripped my blanket, with clammy hands.
He tilted his head to one side and leaned his face down, putting his lips near my ear. “Shhhh.” He drew out the lisping whisper in a way that made him sound like a snake. “Don’t be so noisy, there are people sleeping.” His tone was jovial but laced with a dark threat. He stroked my hair, tucking it behind my ear. “You know, you’re a very pretty girl. You don’t belong down here.”
By now I was shaking. Tears sprang to my eyes which I jammed shut, to avoid looking at him.
His rancid breath poured over me as he stroked me with sweaty palms. He began to fumble with his belt buckle.
I started to whimper, so afraid I couldn’t even scream.
Suddenly, there was a rustle from the other side of the room. Paulette’s voice rang out, loud and clear, as she sat up. “Hey! What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
“It’s none of your business, slave!” he snarled.
“Oh, I’m making it my business. I’m sure Mr Beaufort would be very interested to hear how you’re treating his pet. I’m good friends with his regular blood slave, Yvonne. Just a word in her ear and he’ll hear all about it.”
Mitchell paused momentarily then sniped back. “He wouldn’t believe the likes of you, over me.”
She folded her arms and arched one eyebrow. “And you’re willing to take that chance, are you?”
Huffing loudly, Mitchell got up to his feet. “Cock teasing little bitch,” he muttered under his breath as he stormed out.
I let out a cleansing exhale and sat up. “Thank you so much Paulette - that was amazing!”
“Yeah well, I’m not going to pretend to be sleeping while another woman is being raped in the same room as me.”
I was in awe of her. She was so much more vulnerable than me, she could be bitten, or even killed, anytime the vampires felt like it. Yet she’d stuck up for me. “I thought you hated me.” I said quietly.
I heard her sigh. “I don’t hate you. Of course I don’t. I just think you’re a bit…ignorant… and misguided. But I can tell you’re well-meaning and that counts for a lot.”
Inside a small kernel of hope stirred in me. Was she extending a small olive branch, in my direction? “Maybe you could teach me how to be less ignorant?” I offered, my voice rising at the end, hopefully.
She huffed. “It’s not our job to teach you how to be anti-racist you know. It’s your job to find out.” And with that, she turned over and went back to sleep.
I put my head in my hands. So much for the olive branch…
Slop. I looked down at the simple bowl of porridge that had been ladled into my bowl by a scowling vampire guard. I’d learnt that they took turns to come and give us our food, wheeling a food trolley down the hill. The guards hated doing a task they saw as servant’s work so they usually left as soon as they’d served us. All except for Mitchell and Peterson. But after Mitchell’s performance on my first night here, they’d both kept a bit further away. Whenever I so much as glanced in Mitchell’s direction, he looked away, with a mixture of shame and anger in his eyes.
The food was generally cold by the time it reached us but we ate it anyway, knowing it was all we’d get until the next day. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed this food delivery process during my brief stay at the house. My time had been filled with lunches and pampering, in a way that now made me feel ashamed.
I’d been staying in the blood slaves quarters for three days but I hadn’t yet told the other housemates what life was like in Beaufort Heights, for the favoured humans. Now, as we sat on the floor to eat our porridge, Grace asked me. “What’s it like up there?”
I paused, chewing my porridge slowly before swallowing. “It’s…. really weird. We’re treated like a cross between children and pets. Beaufort spares no expense on spoiling his favoured humans. He buys us designer clothes. I was assigned a personal maid. We get massages, manicures, pedicures. I’ve heard there are also things like horse-riding classes, cinema nights and tennis lessons but I never got to do any of that, I left too soon. The food is exquisite…”
“Damn, Bree! Why do you want to leave? If that was the way I was living, I’d never want to go back to the real world. I’d just stay up there, being waited on hand and foot, like Lady Muck.”
I chuckled. “Yeah, it sounds amazing and when I first arrived, I was tempted to stay, I’m not gonna lie. I loved the luxury - I mean, who wouldn’t, right? But, it comes with strings attached.”
She wrinkled her nose. “You have to sleep with him?”
I nodded.
“Euww! You let that wrinkly old codger put his dick inside you?”
I dropped my spoon and waved my hands in front of my face. “No, no, no! He wanted to but I never let him.”
“Why didn’t he just do it anyway?” She cocked her head to the side.
“I wondered that too, at first. But it seems like Beaufort has a code of honour against rape or something like that.”
She burst out laughing and looked at Samuel. “Hey, you hear that Sam? Boss man up the hill has a ‘code of honour’ against rape… but not slavery.”
I joined in the laughter. “It is pretty ridiculous, isn’t it.”
Samuel wasn’t laughing. “No. It makes perfect sense to me.”
“How so?” I asked.
“He’s a white supremacist, right? He thinks that black people are inferior to white people - thinks we’re more like animals. That’s how he justifies treating us like this. But raping a white woman would rattle at his conscience.” He spooned some porridge into his mouth then swallowed.
“That doesn’t explain why he doesn’t rape any black women?” I asked before inhaling with wide eyes. “Wait. He hasn’t?…”
Grace interrupted firmly. “No. Not that I’ve heard.” She lowered her voice, “it’s the guards you have to worry about.”
Looking up from my bowl I saw Mitchell, staring at me. I quickly looked back down at my porridge bowl and shovelled some into my mouth, hoping I hadn’t inflamed his unceasing interest.
Samuel answered again. “He thinks we’re animals - how many men do you know who want to fuck an animal?” He put his hand to his mouth, a pensive expression on his face. “But why did he let you come down here though? Even house servants aren’t allowed to mix with us.”
I looked up to the ceiling. “It’s a long story but the short version is - I pissed him off enough that during an argument, he said, I put on Hugh’s deep, clipped, upper-class English accent why don’t you go and live with the blood slaves if you care about them so much”
Grace and Samuel both started laughing. “Great accent! Is that how he talks?” Grace asked.
I frowned at them. “You’ve never met him?”
“No. He has certain blood slaves he likes to drink from, doesn’t touch anyone else. Yvonne, in the second house down, is one of his favourites - poor woman.”
Samuel looked at her. “It’s not like getting bitten by the guards is any better.”
Grace nodded. “Probably worse actually.”
I could see Samuel’s mind was still turning over and I was right.
“Why didn’t he just kill you when you refused to sleep with him?”
I took another porridge mouthful, chewing and swallowing, as I thought how best to explain. “I’m a special case. He wants me to give him an heir.”
Grace’s eyes widened. “He wants you as his baby mamma?”
“Yep.”
Samuel blinked. “I didn’t think vampires could have children.”
“Neither did I but they can, apparently.”
“But why you?” Grace asked.
I hesitated. I hadn’t yet told any of them what I was. But I couldn’t avoid telling them forever and now was as good a time as any. “I’m an arcane witch. He thinks a witch-vampire hybrid baby will be really powerful and he wants his son or daughter to be special. See this?” I pointed to my obsidian neck collar. “It blocks my powers. Arcane witches are specialised, vampire-hunters. If I didn’t have it on, I’d be able to kill every vampire mother fucker in this mansion.”
Samuel placed his bowl on the floor and got up to take a closer look. “It’s locked in place. All we have to do is pick the lock and…”
“I’ve already tried - and failed.”
Grace did a double-take. “How did you try?”
I leaned closer and mouthed. With a hair pin.
“Do you have any more?” She whispered.
“One more. I’m too nervous to try it again in case I fail and stuff up our last chance.”
She was smiling. “You’re not going to fail because you’re not going to try. I am.” She dusted off her shoulders. “You’re looking at the best lock pick this side of London town.”
A broad grin spread onto my face as I looked at the beaming faces of Grace and Samuel. It had taken a few days but they were sort of okay with me now. Not only that but we had the beginnings of an escape plan. Now, we just had to find a way of breaking the spell on the perimeter fence and we’d be out of here.
Samuel was one step ahead of me. “If you’re a witch, I assume you can break the spell on the perimeter, right?”
I held my hand up in the air and twisted it from side to side. “I’m semi-confident.”
“Semi’s not good enough. You have to be damn sure.”
Grace glared at him. “Lower your voice Samuel, do you want to get us all killed?”
He whispered. “Sorry, it’s just - this is too good a chance to mess up. We have to be certain before we try anything.”
“I know” I nodded. I stared into space for a while, chewing my last mouthful of food as I mulled it over. “The thing is though. I don’t think we’re ever going to get that level of certainty. I wish I had a chance to practice it first but if I do that and get caught then we’ve lost our only chance. Either we try and risk failing or we stay here forever.”
Samuel gritted his teeth. “I don’t want to spend the rest of my life here.”
“Me neither,” Grace agreed.
Samuel continued. “We should try to leave on that food truck. It comes every Monday. If we sneak in and stow away in the back, we might be able to overpower the vampire driver then bust all the other blood slaves out too.”
I thought about it. I wanted to get all the humans out, not just the blood slaves. But I could come back for everyone else once I was out. The first step was getting free.
I smiled at him. “It’s a good plan. With my collar off, overpowering the driver will be easy.”
Grace replied. “Then we’re agreed.” She held her hand out and I placed mine on top. Then Samuel placed his on top of ours. We smiled, conspiratorially, at each other.
Finally, we had the beginnings of an escape plan.