“You stink, why don’t you get a bath or some shit?” I knew that humans smelled, but I didn’t expect a sensory overload as I stood in front of Markus who surrounded me with the rest of the unit. I held my nose to block off the scent as much as I could, but the odour was damn hard to get rid of completely.

“What have you done?” He grabbed me by my shoulders and shook me incredibly hard, but I didn’t let go of my nose even once. “What have you done?” He asked once again as if I didn’t hear it the first time. From so close up, his voice was incredibly loud and I had a hard time controlling myself to not punch him to death.

“I solved a problem, do you have any issues with that?”

“That´s what you call solving a problem? Flooding everything and killing the whole army in one go? How merciless are you to consider such a plan?”

“Do you want to find out?” I licked my lips in anticipation and barely controlled my twitching hands from grabbing his neck. He shrank back and let go of my shoulders as he remembered all the blood strains on my body.

“I guess you don’t. Camp for a night and then go to the place the main army is staying. Oh, and forget everything you have seen in the last few minutes, alright? Have a great night!” I exclaimed and walked around a stunned Markus and then through the knights towards the carriage. Their gazes followed me with each step I took as the image they had of me turned around completely. Well, the destroyed dam didn’t change my responsibility for their colleagues’ deaths during our march, but I did see a bit of respect, coupled with an insane amount of fear.

As I opened the door, Tom greeted me happily. Once again, I shook my head and pointed towards the door after I took my seat.

“Not even a greeting?” He asked while I held my nose and bit on my tongue. The thirst was driving me completely insane and I couldn’t say for sure I would be able to hold back if he stayed with me.

“Get. Out.” Sometimes, I hated his uncooperative behaviour. And this was one of these times. My blood was boiling in anger and thirst. Instinctively, I pushed myself forward, grabbed his arms and pressed them against the wall. I sat down on his lap, knees to his side and heard very clearly how he gulped. I brought my mouth close to his neck and smelled the sweat, his fear, but also something akin to excitement and felt incredibly tempted to sink my teeth into him.

“How many warnings do I need to give you?” I whispered into his ear and watched how the hairs on his arms stood up.

“Are you suggesting you cannot hold back?” His words were on point. “The manipulative Lucinda is losing control, how amusing. Go on, suck my blood and throw me out afterwards. The knights are already suspecting something, but they keep their mouth shut for now.”

“Imagine having a subordinate who threatens you on every occasion.”

“I just want to hold onto my life, that’s all.”

“That’s the perfect opportunity to prove exactly that.” I let go of his arms and stood up while licking my teeth. Slowly, he opened the door and turned his back towards me. One last time, he looked towards me only to freeze completely. Blood was running down my chin as I bit into my tongue in an attempt to control the thirst.

“Go.” I snarled and he shut the door in a hurry. My hand was already moving towards the handle as I realized what I was doing. “Fuck.” I sat down on the bench and held my head with both hands. This wasn’t going well. I was the one manipulating emotions, I was the one steering the actions of everyone around me, nobody was even comparable in that regard. And yet, I was there, slowly sinking into the bottomless abyss of vampirism I read about. None of them could control their thirst fully or even wanted to. The new vampires were especially insatiable and apparently, I fell into this exact category. Only my iron will held me back from opening this door that blocked me from murdering everyone outside and made the voices outside bearable.

“Is this what you meant by live with it?” I mumbled underneath my breath, not really expecting an answer.

“Yup.” Aska´s voice resounded within my head and one look around showed he wasn’t there.

“For the last time, get out of my head!” I screamed and the voices outside stopped completely. I could feel how Aska was unhappy with my illogical reaction.

“And what exactly would that change? Your soul has now fully adapted to this body and there is exactly nothing you can do. Either give yourself into the temptations or control them, it´s your choice.”

“You know exactly what I am going to pick, so either help me or fuck off. I don’t need you to break my concentration right now.” I was giving my best to reign my bloodthirst, but it was honestly a near-impossible task. I trembled uncontrollably and my own fingernails dug into my hands.

“Ahh, right, Lucinda the control freak will obviously try to reign in her own emotions and desire. I give you a tip, although it´s not exactly one you want to hear. You should get back to the army … fast.” With that, he vanished out of my head, leaving me alone with my thirst and raging fury. His words implied that my plan failed miserably. I didn’t know the exact extent of my failure, or if it possibly backfired, but it didn’t work out like intended. I didn’t even think about how Aska got in contact with me, nor why he did it exactly then as I made the decision to heed his warning.

This worm had accurately guessed my intentions and possibly predicted everything. Furiously, I kicked the opposite bench and screamed my rage out until my voice got hoarse. I slammed the door open and stepped out of the carriage, surrounded by fearful knights, Markus who couldn’t exactly say what was going on, and a curious Tom.

“Pack your luggage, we will go now.” I commanded, and yet nobody moved.

“What? We just rode the whole day, the horses are tired and you expect us to ride through this chaos?” Asked one of the knights in understandable frustration. I went towards the knight, drew his sword and held the blade at his throat.

“Precisely.” I growled and pressed it even more against his skin without actually letting blood flow. I knew I wouldn’t be able to control myself after that.

“We cannot do that. Lucinda, you need to calm down.” Said Tom as he stepped close to me. I closed my eyes, tried to ignore the thirst and thought about this whole situation as objectively as possible. He was right, the knights were useless, I didn’t need them.

“Fine … Tom, guide these whiny pseudo-knights to a safe space away from the army. Don’t let anyone except me approach you and set everyone on fire who still tries to enter the camp, understood?” I asked, still growling.

“Aye!”

“Markus, we need the two least tired horses.” I said as I went to my luggage and retrieved a new set of clothing. “Don’t you dare tell me that’s impossible.” I entered the carriage and finally got rid of all the wet rags that barely covered my body anymore. Clad in a new, white dress, I stepped out of the carriage and directly sat upon a horse.

“You know how to ride these?” Markus asked as I held the reins.

“Fuck you.” Naturally I did, although the hoses Aska created in purgatory were way less docile than these. In any case, the horse soon galloped past a nearly endless stream of water through a rather hilly area and occasionally even waded through shallow water despite my constant nagging and screaming at Markus.

About halfway there, my horse couldn’t take it anymore and refused to move at all. Instead, it rather laid down to rest. I kicked it in anger, screamed at it until it must have gotten deaf. In the end, I sank my teeth into it and held it down as it struggled to end its pitiful existence.

“What has happened to you?” asked Markus, clearly concerned and shocked by my unusual behaviour.

“Shut up and keep riding, except you want to be my next meal.”

I ran ahead as I couldn’t stand the smell of him, so disgusting, but also strangely alluring. An hour before sunrise, we arrived at the supposed location the humans and elves were supposed to meet up, only separated by the large river. The area was still flooded and tent panes floated around near the shoreline on both sides. Both armies apparently noticed what I did early on and evacuated the area. Magical light came from deeper in the forest and campfires were set up to our left.

The humans survived and with them, these wormlings.