Sleepwalk

Cass sat at the station, staring down at the young man across the table, her mind barely able to focus on the words he was saying. 

She glanced to her right where Deputy Ndibisi was writing quietly on an official report sheet. He had been on duty when Cass came in with the kid— Silas Abbot— and now the steady rhythm of the tip of his metal ballpoint pen scratching paper was the only thing keeping her grounded. The fluorescent light above them flickered, casting harsh shadows across the room, burning into her skin.

Silas's voice trembled as he recounted the night's events, his hands shaking as he wrapped them tightly around the plastic cup of water in front of him. 

"I told my friends to meet me in the woods. We were just gonna hang out, nothing serious," he swallowed hard. "I— I was gonna prank 'em but they didn't show up. It did instead."

Ndibisi looked up, pen poised, waiting for the kids next words. Cass stared forward, eyes tired. She already knew what he was about to say.

"It was… it was a bear," Silas stammered, his eyes wide, as if the memory of what he'd seen could still reach out and tear him apart. "Biggest damn bear I've ever seen. I—I thought I was done for. But then… this officer—" His gaze flicked toward Cass, a small shred of hope or gratitude in his voice. "She came out of nowhere. Saved me."

Cass felt a lump form in her throat. The words seemed to echo in the small room, pressing against her chest. She could barely look him in the eye. His testimony was wrong—no, not wrong, just... incomplete. She'd led him there, into a fabricated truth. There had been no bear, and the man who had saved him—who had jumped in front of those claws—was gone. Dead or dying. She didn't even know anymore.

No matter how fast she had run, how hard she had tried... She'd watched him die. The memory of his blood, of her hands pressing uselessly against the wound...

"Thank you," Silas said.  

Cass swallowed down the lump in her throat long enough to say, "You're welcome," before it reformed once more, choking her.

She was a liar. She was useless. She was weak. She hadn't saved anyone. The testimony was false. But they had to make Silas believe it, make him believe the lie. If not...

'Nobody can know.'

She could still hear Uriel's voice in her head, cold and firm as he wiped Jamee's blood from his mouth with his thumb. "Nobody can know what happened here, Sladosti." The words felt like iron shackles closing around her chest. Her fingers twitched involuntarily, still stained with blood no matter how much she scrubbed.

She could see him so clearly, standing there over Jamee's lifeless body. Uriel had crouched down, fangs dripping crimson as he had fed on her friend's dying form. The sound had been awful. A wet, slurping noise that made her stomach churn. She had stood there, frozen, unable to move as Uriel worked—his methodical calm such a stark contrast to the chaos in her own mind.

When Uriel had finally stood, Jamee's body limp beside him, Cass had been too numb to speak. She remembered kneeling there next to Jamee, unable to tear her eyes from the two puncture holes on his neck, her fingers stained with the blood she'd tried so desperately to keep inside him.

Ndibisi cleared his throat beside her, pulling her back to the present. "A bear attack," he repeated quietly as he wrote. "Bigger than you've ever seen. You're sure?"

The young man nodded shakily. "Yeah. I... I passed out. But it had to be a bear. I don't know what else could've done that."

Cass swallowed hard, feeling her chest tighten with guilt. It felt wrong, leading him to this conclusion, tampering with his testimony like this. But what choice did she have? She glanced at Ndibisi, his focus on the report, not noticing the turmoil brewing inside her. 

None of them could know what had really happened out there. Not Ndibisi. Not Chief Laughlin. Not anyone. If they did, what then?

"Alright," Ndibisi said, his voice calm and professional. "You're in shock, understandably. We'll get you to a doctor to make sure you're okay. But, uh... good thing Officer Pratt here was around."

Cass barely registered the words. His praise felt hollow, like an echo bouncing back at her from some faraway place. She wanted to correct him but instead, she forced a tight smile back, though it didn't quite reach her eyes. It felt like a mockery. She hadn't saved anyone tonight. She hadn't saved Jamee.

"Yeah," she muttered. "Lucky timing."

The man looked at her with such gratitude, his eyes filled with thanks, with hope that his brush with death was over. Cass bit her tongue, resisting the urge to scream that the monster was still out there, that they weren't safe. Instead, she stood, her movements robotic as she excused herself and left the room. 

The cool, conditioned air of the station hit her as soon as she stepped out into the hallway, the fluorescent lights buzzing overhead, too bright, too sterile. The world outside was moving as if nothing had changed. Her colleagues were filing in, hot cups of coffee in hand, calling greetings at each other. Outside, cars were moving on the road, people heading to work in a steady Tuesday morning routine. But it all felt wrong. Everything was wrong. The ground beneath her shoes felt like it might disappear if she let her guard down for just a second.

The night replayed itself in fragments as she stepped into the parking lot. 

The forest had been deathly quiet after the Vorvolak disappeared. Jamee's body had been cold, lifeless, and Cass had knelt beside him, her blood-soaked hands pressing uselessly against the wound in his stomach, trying desperately to keep him with her.

Then Uriel had come, moving with a terrifying calm as he bit Jamee, as he wiped the crimson liquid from his mouth, as he'd done exactly what she'd asked him to do.

"Yebat," he'd swore under his breath, standing up from the moist forest carpet. "Well, tonight has been shit."

Cass couldn't have agreed more.

He'd pulled out his phone, his fingers rapidly moving over the screen as he made a phone call. His words were clipped, rushed as he barked orders at the person at the other end. He had bent down, checking Jamee's pulse before turning to her.

"Are you okay?" he had asked. His voice was soft, but there was no hiding the tension in his eyes.

Cass could only shake her head, her voice stuck in her throat. 

"Yeah," Uriel had said softly. "I don't imagine you would be."

His bluntness had been no comfort to her and she'd been too out of it to consider his presence as anything but a blessing. Uriel had muttered something else under his breath—Russian, she thought—but she hadn't caught the words. She was too focused on Jamee, lying there, pale and still.

Soon, Uriel's men had arrived, two dark cars pulling up silently through the trees. She had watched them move like clockwork, loading the young man's unconscious body into one car and Jamee's into the other. Another man had handed Uriel a gallon of water, which he had thrust into her hands.

"Wash the blood off," he had ordered, his voice sharp. "Now."

Cass had numbly obeyed, scrubbing at her arms, her hands, her face, watching the red water pool at her feet. The men moved with practiced efficiency, dousing the forest floor in kerosene, setting it alight without a second glance. It was like they had done this a thousand times before. They had it down to an art— destroying the evidence of lives broken, stolen away in the night. She wondered how many other bodies they had erased from the world, how many other truths they had buried under the smell of kerosene and ash.

Cass stood there, detached, watching the flames lick at the earth where Jamee had bled out just moments before leaving nothing behind but smoke and charred earth. It all felt so distant, like she was watching it happen from somewhere else. How was this her life now?

Finally, as they were preparing to leave, Uriel had turned to her, his face serious. "You're going to go to work and lie, Cassandra. Nobody can know what happened tonight, or we'll all be in deep trouble."

Cass had stared at him, her voice shaky. "What about Jamee? Will he—will he be alright?"

Uriel had looked away, his expression unreadable. "He'll survive," he had said, his voice low. Then, without another word, he had climbed into the car with Jamee's body, and they had sped off into the night.

Cass had been left to sit in the car with the unconscious young man, her heart pounding in her chest as the reality of what she'd just witnessed settled over her.

Now, the sun was rising over Havenfield, casting a pale light over the quiet streets. Cass hadn't slept, her body still running on adrenaline as she pulled into the parking lot of the Sleepy Tin Motel. Jamee's motorcycle was gone.

Her pulse quickened as she walked up to the front desk, the exhaustion weighing down on her like a heavy blanket. 

"Room 13?" she asked, her voice tight.

The manager nodded. "Still paid for the full month," he said. "He even mentioned he didn't want any disturbances."

Cass forced a tight smile. "Leave it that way," she muttered.

☼

She'd seen horrible things in her years as a law enforcement officer. Rotted bodies pulled out of ditches, kids with bullet wounds from violent turf wars. She'd lost colleagues, she'd had to comfort grieving partners at funerals. 

She'd seen terrible things.

Still, she couldn't shake off the sharp, yellow eyes of the Vorvolak. The pure malice in them. The way it's very presence seemed to render their environment devoid of hope. Cass could handle a human attacker, violence was easier to confront when it was something she could stop.

But the Vorvolak was not violent, it was violence incarnate. It was not malicious, it was malice. And she had faced it and seen nothing but death in the endless depths of his eyes.

By the time she reached Uriel's mansion, the weight of the sleepless night was dragging her down. She didn't feel human, didn't feel sentient. She felt like a zombie; sleepwalking. Sleep driving. Sleep living.

The guards at the gate checked her thoroughly, their expressions impassive as they waved her through.

She rang the doorbell, half-expecting the butler to answer. Instead, Uriel stood in the doorway. He looked... almost normal, wearing a simple T-shirt and shorts, his hair slightly mussed and his eyepatch askew, as though he'd been up all night like she had.

She stared at him for a moment, the tension between them palpable. 

The awkwardness of it all was not lost on her. The last time she'd stood at his door like this, she'd been dressed in a skimpy black gown and was fully ready to be made his bitch. Now, Uriel himself was the farthest thing from her mind even though he was standing right there.

"Jamee?" she finally asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Uriel said nothing at first, simply stepping aside to let her in. He led her down the hall to one of the guest rooms. When she saw Jamee lying on the bed, her breath caught in her throat. He was pale, deathly so, but his chest still rose and fell. His stomach was unmarred, the wound healed, but the bloodless skin was stretched taut over his frame. He looked fragile. 

Uriel muttered something under his breath as he watched Cass kneel beside Jamee. "I'm going to be in so much trouble for this," he said quietly.

"What do you mean?" she asked, her voice trembling.

He shook his head, his jaw tight. "Let me worry about that." Then, "You should get some sleep."

Cass stared at Jamee's face, her exhaustion crashing over her like a wave. "I don't think I can sleep," she whispered.

Uriel stepped forward, lifting her to her feet and turning her to face him. His hands framed her face, his thumbs brushing the tears she hadn't realized were falling. The touch was gentle, too gentle when it was the same hands that lifted Jamee's neck to glistening fangs. For a second, her mind flashed back to the night—to Jamee's blood on Uriel's lips, the sharp glint of his fangs against the dim light—

She blinked, pulling back slightly, her breath catching in her throat. Uriel's eyes narrowed for a moment, but he didn't pull away.

"Oh, Sladosti," he whispered, his voice low and soothing. "Don't cry. The worst is yet to come."