Chapter 4: Cold as Ice

The room was breathtakingly quiet, except for the sound of water splashing against the side of the yacht, mixed in with the sound of distant explosions. There was a flickering blue light penetrating through the glass, which was causing the shadows to go on and off, in the tempo of a pulsating heart.

The two frightened lovers, still quivering in fear, were sitting straight up in bed, looking at each other in bewilderment. Both of them were holding their breath, listening for any sound of the enemy, their boggling eyes trying to glance in every direction at the same time. Only a few minutes had passed since the dark vampire had left the room.

“Lacey,” Robert said, after exhaling heavily, “that was the voice I heard in my head.” His breathing sounded forced, as if he had suddenly forgotten how the simple act was done. “She said she would come, but I didn’t want to believe it.”

A tear managed to trickle from his left eye, but he turned his head away before Lacey could catch a glimpse of the clear sign of his fear. It fell from his face, plummeting onto the covers, and was immediately absorbed into the soft substance. If the room had been lighter, he would’ve seen the cover stained red. He had shed a tear of blood.

“What,” Lacey said, still not believing her senses, “was that evil thing?” She pulled the covers closer to her, in an attempt to stop herself from shaking. The room had grown mysteriously colder than when they had entered. “What do you know about it?”

“It was Seriphae…” Robert said, after a brief pause.

Where had Lacey heard that name before? She rubbed her head, trying to coax it to work once again. She rolled the name around on her lips, using her tongue to pronounce each syllable. “Seh-ree-phay,” she said, again.

Suddenly, it struck her, as if a light bulb had been turned on in her head. “That fairytale the old man was telling, about the… No, it couldn’t be!” Her eyes rolled in her head as she moaned. “It was something about a vampire-mermaid named Seriphae, but—”

“Yes, a vampire-mermaid, Lacey. It’s no fairytale,” Robert said, with a dreamy look in his eyes. “She chose me. Why, I do not know.” He suddenly gripped the sheets and, without seeming to notice, started to tear away at them. “She’s not going to get away with it!”

“How do you know all this, and why didn’t you tell me?” Lacey said harshly, hurt that he had hid something like that from her. “It would’ve been for the best, had I known what exactly was disturbing you...” She sighed, twisting her hands together, fiercely. Her long fingernails dug into her hands, making deep marks, some drawing blood. How could this be happening, to her, to her husband? She awaited his reply, looking at him desperately.

“She told me!” he yelled. “Lacey, don’t yell at me, please! I just didn’t want to burden you with such depressing information, and I thought you wouldn’t have understood me!” His face clouded in gloom, and he made and fist and punched his pillow. “Now I know I should’ve jumped off the side of the yacht before letting her come and do harm to you!”

“Don’t say things like that again!” Lacey gasped, with a concerned look upon her face. Then, managing to add a hint of humor into her sorrow-filled voice, she continued, “We’re in this together, and don’t you dare ever jump off the side of anything!” She sighed, staring sternly at Robert. “What are we going to do? She’s coming.”

Robert looked out the small window, and a dreary, distant look came upon his face. His forehead twisted into a frown; you could see anger filling his eyes, as if hot fire had suddenly decided to fill his sockets; and, as he finished ripping off another shred of the sheet, Lacey could see him biting his lower lip.

He looked back to Lacey, and his eyes mysteriously lost their anger and were filled with a different emotion. Sighing heavily, he said, “There’s nothing much we can do, at least that I know of, except hope that we’ll make it through this alive.” He let go of the sheet, ran his fingers through his hair, and continued, “I’ll try to stay up and keep a look out, while you go to sleep.”

“There’s no way I’ll be able to go to sleep, while knowing that that thing is out there, preying on you.” She set her mouth in a firm lock, and her eyes hardened, as if sending signals to him that he wouldn’t be able to change her mind, no matter what. “I’m staying up, also; and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Silence filled the room once more, as Lacey and Robert had a stare-down with each other. Both were the ignorant type, and neither of them would settle with not getting their own way. It was one of the things that kept them together; but, at the same time, divided them. Who would win, they both thought, their eyes locked, both determined not to lose.

Finally, after a minute or two, Robert looked down to the bed, and said in a giving-up tone, “All right, you won; but, remember, I don’t know whether or not she wants to kill you before she tries to drain me.”

“So be it.”

Seriphae, having recoiled back to the shadows of the hall, was now pacing around the room, in a mad fit. She wished she could go to the lower level and tear all the boards apart, sending the yacht to the bottom of the lake. She spat on the ground, sending a black ink-like substance onto the wood, mumbling curses underneath her breath. She had reached the other side of the hall, and was now turning back to once again trudge through the hall, though very silently.

She was thinking of how nothing like that had ever, in the long history of her existence, occurred before. It was a bloody outrage, if you asked her. No women had ever been so strong as to reject her. Lacey’s love was more than ten women’s love combined, or at least all the women she had encountered before.

She scowled, as she leaned against the wall, wishing she could reverse time and choose another man. This was impossible, of course, because, for one, she was not powerful enough to turn back time; and, for two, it was too dangerous, now that Lacey and Robert were fully aware of her existence.

She made a fist and, losing herself, hammered it against the side of the wall, cursing Lacey. Oh, how she now loathed her, her courage, her love. She swore she would do anything to cause her misery, pain, sorrow, and eventually a slow, agonizing death. “But how?” was one thing her nourishment-deprived brain was screaming at her. “You’ve failed once already. If you fail again, it will be the end…” She pounded on the wall again, this time using her strong, metal-like nails to penetrate through it and slowly bring them down, causing the panels to crack.

Suddenly, she gasped and walked away from the wall, in realization of how much ruckus she had made. She waited, sensing for any sign of movement. People still hadn’t turned in to bed yet, at least in their rooms. Plenty of them were now, at this time, sprawled out on the floor, cups in hand, sound asleep. All she heard was silence.

Seriphae let out a sigh of relief, for she did not sense that she had disturbed anyone’s slumber. If he, or even someone in a drunken slumber, had woken up, she would’ve been discovered in a blink of an eye, because, due to Lacey, she was now more weakened and in need of blood than she had ever been, which was causing her be unable to turn invisible.

“Now,” she thought, “I’ll have to do this the hard way.” She frowned, trying to conjure up enough strength; and, remembering what she needed for her plan ‘B’ to work, she crept towards the heavy wooden door, which now had the job of guarding against the supernatural. If doors could quake in fear, this one would’ve had an extremely good reason to.

Seriphae, making it to the unfortunate door, outstretched her numb arms and placed her hands upon it. She closed her eyes, concentrating with all her will-power, and then breathed words of enchantments and curses. Her breath came out like how frost comes upon a window on a cold night; and the words, coming forth from her mouth, took on a liquid form and started to ooze down the door, leaving ice-trails behind. The faster Seriphae murmured them into existence, the more they glowed a brilliant white, and the faster they made it to the crack underneath the door.

Seriphae whispered the final sentence; and the liquid words, now see-through, were disconnected from her body, making the enchanted water free to wander into the room, unknown to the unfortunate inhabitants. A grin slowly emerged on her face as death stalked in, cold as ice, invisible, and as vicious as any murderer.

Exhausted, Seriphae stumbled to the ground, barely able to remain conscious. That final attempt to fulfill her dastardly deed had drained her of more energy than even she had thought it would. She was now kneeling, leaning against the door, eyes closed, and ears open. Her hand rested on the door, as though to urge her creation onwards.

Her only hope now was that it would do its work properly.