Chapter 6: Stolen Blood
The cold of the concrete seeped into Sadie’s bones, a deep ache that rivaled the fiery throb in her wrists. Silver manacles, etched with vile symbols, had eaten through her skin. She drifted in a haze of pain and blood loss, the world coming in snatches of sound and smell. The coppery tang of her own blood. The low, guttural laughter of the nest as they moved in the shadows above the warehouse floor.
A boot connected with her ribs, not hard enough to break, just to remind. “Wake up, vintage.” The lead vampire, Markus, crouched before her. His breath smelled of grave soil and cheap wine. “Time for a top-up.”
Sadie spat, the saliva tinged pink. “Get a new line.”
He backhanded her, the blow snapping her head to the side. Lights danced behind her eyes. She focused on the feel of the cold chain links in her raw hands, a tactile anchor. He yanked her head back by her pink hair, exposing her throat. The bite, when it came, was a white-hot puncture that quickly dulled to a deep, sucking pull. She bit down on a scream, turning it into a guttural groan.
He detached with a wet sound, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Dean Winchester’s sister,” he mused, tasting the name. “No wonder you’re so spirited.”
Her vision swam. “Fuck you.”
“Maybe later,” he chuckled, rising. “We’re saving you for the elder. He appreciates a fine finish.” The others circled like jackals, their eyes glowing in the dark. Sadie’s mind, fuzzy with weakness, latched onto a single, solid thought: Xavier’s grim warning in the safe house kitchen. You’ll get dead. The irony was a bitter pill. She let her body go limp, playing possum, conserving the last dregs of her strength. The chain felt heavier than the world. Somewhere in the echoing darkness, a door screeched open on rusted hinges.
The heavy footfalls that followed were all wrong—too slow, too deliberate, not the quick scuffles of the nest. Sadie forced her head up, the chain scraping across the floor. A new silhouette filled the doorway, backlit by a single hanging bulb from the corridor.
This vampire was older, his stillness more terrible than Markus’s posturing. The air grew colder. “The elder,” Markus whispered, his voice suddenly subservient. The man moved into the dim light, his eyes like chips of polished onyx. He didn’t look at the others; he only looked at Sadie.
He knelt, the old leather of his jacket creaking. A cold, dry finger traced the line of her jaw. She jerked away, but his hand fisted in her hair, holding her still. “The Winchester vintage,” he said, his voice a rasp of gravel and age. “I have waited for a taste of that particular rage.”
He didn’t bite her throat. His other hand went to the button of her jeans. Sadie’s breath hitched, a new, different terror cutting through the blood-loss haze. “Don’t,” she snarled, her voice cracking. He leaned close, his scent of dust and decay filling her nose.
“The blood is a communion,” he whispered, his lips nearly touching her ear. “But the flesh is a conquest.” The denim tore. The concrete was unforgiving against her bare skin. She fought then, a frantic, weak animal thrashing against the chains, a raw scream tearing from her throat.
It was swallowed by the echoing darkness. The elder’s weight was immense, a prison of cold flesh. He took his time. The pain was a distant, secondary thing beneath the overwhelming violation, the utter eradication of self. She bit her own tongue until she tasted fresh blood, focusing on that single, sharp point of sensation to escape the horror of his hands.
Somewhere above her, Markus watched, his quiet, hungry breathing the only other sound. She stopped screaming. She stared at a rusted bolt in the ceiling beam, her mind fracturing, drifting away from the warehouse floor. She thought of the motel shower’s steam, the heat of a different body, the choice that had been hers.
This was a theft. When he finally finished, he stood, adjusting his clothes with a chilling normalcy. He looked down at her, his expression one of casual appraisal. “Bitter,” he pronounced. “But complex.” He turned and walked back toward the door, the nest parting for him. “Keep her hydrated. I may want another tasting before we drain her.”
The door screeched shut. Sadie lay very still, the cold now inside her. She listened to the receding footsteps, her eyes dry and wide open, seeing nothing.
Markus’s phone glowed in the dark, a square of harsh light pointed at her broken form on the concrete. “Smile for your brother,” he sneered, zooming in on her vacant eyes and the torn clothing. He panned slowly, a director savoring his work, capturing every damning detail of what the elder had done.
The video file was compressed and sent with a simple text: A taste of what you owe us.
Dean’s phone buzzed on the motel table beside a half-empty bottle of whiskey. He played it on mute at first, his face hardening into a mask of confused dread. Then he fumbled for the volume, his hands shaking as the sounds filled the room—the tearing fabric, the elder’s graveled whispers, Sadie’s choked silence.
He made it fourteen seconds. The phone shattered against the wall, plastic and glass exploding into the stained carpet. Sam found him on his knees, fists pressed into his eyes, a raw, animal sound of grief tearing from his throat. “We’re too late,” Dean choked out, the words barely recognizable.
Sam picked up the broken phone, the video still frozen on a single, horrific frame. His own stomach turned to ice. “Where was it sent from?” he asked, his voice forcibly calm, the hunter overriding the brother. Dean just shook his head, trapped in a loop of that awful footage.
In the warehouse, Markus tucked his phone away, satisfied. He tossed a warm bottle of water at Sadie’s feet. It rolled against her leg. She didn’t move. The concrete’s chill was the only thing feeling real, a numb anchor against the memory of those cold, dry hands.
She focused on that sensation, on the rough texture beneath her cheek. A single, clear thought finally formed through the static: Xavier was wrong. This wasn’t a distraction. This was the job.
This was the job. Dean’s hands wouldn’t stop shaking. He scrabbled through the broken pieces of his phone on the motel carpet, his breathing ragged and wet, until he found the SIM card.
He slotted it into Sam’s laptop with fumbling fingers, the video file a malignant icon in the folder. He punched in the number from memory, the ring tone a taunting chirp in the silent room. Xavier answered on the second ring, his voice flat. “Dean.”
“They have her,” Dean rasped, the words scraping his throat raw. “You were right. I was wrong. They have her and they—” He choked, the images replaying behind his eyes. “Dean, send me the video.” Xavier says, his tone chillingly deliberate.
“You don’t want to see it.” Dean whispers, pressing his forehead against the cool laminate of the desk. A long, static-filled silence stretched across the line, heavy with everything unspoken between them. Then, a low, dangerous sound filtered through the speaker. “Dean. Now.” Xavier growled, the command leaving no room for refusal.
Dean clicked send. He listened to the dead air on the other end of the line, imagining Xavier’s face as the footage played on his own screen. There was no gasp, no curse. Just thirty-seven seconds of absolute, frigid silence so profound Dean could hear the blood pounding in his own ears.
Then, a soft, metallic click. The line went dead. Xavier stared at the now-black screen of his phone, his grip so tight the plastic casing creaked. The cold, clinical part of his mind catalogued the warehouse acoustics, the type of chains, the elder’s accent. The rest of him was a white-hot void. He started the engine, the roar echoing in the empty parking lot outside a Toledo bus station. He had a destination now.
He had a destination now.
Back in the motel room, Dean’s pacing wore a path in the thin carpet. He stabbed Xavier’s number into Sam’s phone again, pressing it to his ear with a white-knuckled grip. It rang once, then went straight to a robotic voicemail greeting.
“He’s not picking up,” Dean said, his voice frayed at the edges. He threw the phone onto a bed where it bounced against the mattress.
Sam caught it, his expression tight. “Dean. Let him handle this.”
“It’s my fault.” Dean’s words came out in a rushed, suffocated burst. He stopped pacing, standing rigid in the center of the room. “I shouldn’t have lashed out at her and him. I wasn’t being fair.” He dragged a hand down his face, his breath hitching. “And now she was just raped by a vampire on camera.”
The sentence hung in the air, ugly and absolute. Sam had no rebuttal. Dean’s panic was a physical thing, vibrating in the close space between them. He stared at the shattered pieces of his own phone glittering in the carpet fibers.
“We’re not waiting,” Dean stated, the words final. He was already grabbing his jacket, the leather sighing as he shoved his arms in. Sam didn’t argue this time; he just nodded, a grim acceptance in the set of his shoulders. They moved in a synchronized, silent rush, gathering weapons.
The Impala’s engine roared to life a minute later, a deep-throated answer to the quiet fury tightening around them.
The Impala’s engine roared to life a minute later, a deep-throated answer to the quiet fury tightening around them. Inside the warehouse, time had dissolved into a numb, cold slurry for Sadie. She stared at the rusted bolt, her mind a blank page, until a new sound registered—a wet, choking gurgle from the catwalk above.
It was the sentry, Markus’s favorite lackey, clutching at his throat where a throwing knife now protruded. He toppled silently over the railing, his body hitting the concrete with a damp thud that finally stirred the nest. “What the—” Markus spun, his eyes scanning the shadows.
Xavier dropped from the ceiling girders, landing in a crouch between Sadie and the nest. He didn’t look at her. His entire focus was on the five vampires fanning out before him, his expression a flat, promise of violence. “Evening, gentlemen,” he said, his voice devoid of all inflection. “I’m collecting what’s mine.”
Markus laughed, a nervous sound. “You’re outnumbered, hunter.” Xavier’s hand flickered, and a second knife buried itself in the eye socket of the vampire on the far left. “Not anymore.” The fight that erupted was a brutal, efficient ballet. Xavier moved with a terrifying economy, every motion designed to maim, disarm, and decapitate.
He wasn’t hunting; he was erasing. A machete blade flashed, severing a head that rolled toward Sadie’s feet, its dead eyes wide. She flinched, the movement sending fresh pain through her wrists. Xavier blocked a strike, twisted an arm until bone snapped, and shoved the staked heart of another into Markus’s chest as he charged.
Markus looked down, shocked, at the wooden handle protruding from his sternum. He burst into a cloud of ash that settled over Xavier’s boots. The silence that followed was absolute, broken only by Xavier’s steady breathing. He finally turned.
His eyes found Sadie, chained and broken on the floor. The cold fury in his gaze fractured, just for a second, revealing something devastated underneath. He crossed the distance in three strides, the ash puffing around his steps. He didn’t speak. He just knelt, his hands hovering over the silver manacles as if afraid to touch her.
“The key’s on Markus,” she whispered, her voice rusted from disuse. He shook his head, pulling a lockpick set from his pocket. “Silver needs a different touch.” His fingers, slick with black blood, worked with a delicate precision that belied the carnage around them. The first cuff sprang open with a soft click.
He gently freed her ravaged wrist, his thumb brushing over the raw, symbol-burned skin. A pained sound escaped him, almost too quiet to hear. “Sadie,” he breathed, the word an apology, a curse, and a prayer all at once. The second manacle fell away.
The second manacle fell away. Her arms, suddenly weightless, dropped into her lap. A full-body tremor took hold of her, starting deep in her core and rattling out to her teeth.
Xavier shrugged out of his leather jacket, the movement stiff. He draped it around her shoulders, its residual warmth and familiar scent of oil and road cutting through the warehouse’s decay. His hands, still stained, hesitated before gently tugging the torn fabric of her jeans together.
“Can you stand?” he asked, his voice rough.
She tried to push up, but her legs were liquid, buckling instantly. He caught her before she hit the concrete, one arm hooking under her knees, the other cradling her back. She didn’t fight it. The solid reality of him, the heat cutting through the cold hollow inside her, broke the last dam.
She falls into him curling herself as tight as she can into him as she cries. It’s a silent, shuddering collapse, her face pressed into the damp cotton of his shirt. He froze for a heartbeat, then his arms locked around her, crushing her against the steady, frantic hammer of his heart.
He didn’t shush her. He just held her, his chin resting on the top of her head, his own breath coming in ragged pulls. Her tears were hot against his skin, mixing with the ash and blood. “I’ve got you,” he murmured into her pink hair, the words a vow etched in gravel. “You’re out.”
He carried her through the graveyard of machinery, her weight nothing against the tension in his arms. The cold night air hit them as he shouldered the metal door open, a shocking relief after the warehouse’s stagnant decay. Headlights swept across the loading bay, painting them in stark white.
The Impala screeched to a halt, dust billowing around its tires. Both doors flew open. Dean emerged first, his face a wreck of fear and fury, his eyes immediately scanning the bundle in Xavier’s arms. Sam was half a step behind, his taller frame rigid with apprehension.
Xavier didn’t stop walking. He moved toward the car, his steps deliberate, his gaze locked ahead. “Is she—” Dean’s voice cracked, his hand reaching out but not touching. “She’s breathing,” Xavier stated, his voice hollowed out. “She needs a hospital. Now.”
Dean’s eyes finally took in the details: the jacket swallowing her, the angry burns on her wrists, the unnatural stillness of her form. A low sound escaped him. He moved to take her from Xavier’s arms, his movements abrupt. Xavier tightened his hold instinctively, a flash of possession crossing his ashen face.
“Dean,” Sam’s voice was a warning, a hand coming up to his brother’s chest. Dean ignored it, his fingers brushing Sadie’s arm. Her eyes opened then, glassy and distant, focusing on nothing. “Don’t,” she whispered, the word barely audible, but it stopped Dean cold.
He looked from her vacant expression to Xavier’s guarded one, the unspoken history between them now a tangible, ugly thing in the night air. “You,” Dean seethed, the accusation hot and suffocating. Xavier finally met his glare, his own exhaustion giving way to a cold, defiant truth. “Yeah. Me.”
Dean’s jaw worked, the muscles clenching and unclenching as he stared at the man holding his broken sister. The fury in his eyes didn’t lessen, but it fractured, undermined by a brutal, unwilling gratitude. He took a half-step back, the fight draining from his shoulders as his gaze dropped to Sadie’s ash-dusted hair.
“I don’t like it,” Dean said, the words forced out like shrapnel. He dragged a hand over his mouth, his voice dropping to a raw, private rasp meant only for Xavier. “I hate it even. But she’s never fought me on anything before. So that means you matter to her.” He looked back at the dark warehouse, then at Xavier’s bloodied hands. “And by some ungodly speed you got here before we could. So that’s something.”
Xavier said nothing. He just adjusted his grip on Sadie, her silent shaking still vibrating through his own frame. Sam moved then, popping the Impala’s rear door open with a solid thunk. “We need to go. Now,” Sam urged, his eyes scanning the empty industrial park. Dean gave one stiff, sharp nod, the decision made.
He turned and slid behind the wheel, the engine still running. Xavier carefully lowered Sadie onto the back seat, his jacket still engulfing her. He made to pull away, but her fingers, weak and cold, knotted briefly in his shirt. “Don’t,” she whispered again, but this time it was a plea, not a rejection.
Sam climbed in the passenger side, twisting around to look at her. “Hey, Sadie. You’re safe.” Xavier hesitated for only a second before folding his long frame into the space beside her, letting her lean into the solid warmth of his side. He pulled the door shut, sealing them in the car’s dark, familiar interior.
The Impala peeled away, leaving the warehouse and its horrors shrinking in the rearview mirror.
The Impala peeled away, leaving the warehouse and its horrors shrinking in the rearview mirror. Inside the car, the only sounds were the engine’s growl and Sadie’s shallow, hitched breathing against Xavier’s chest. He held himself rigid, afraid the slightest movement would shatter her.
Dean’s eyes kept finding them in the mirror, his knuckles white on the steering wheel. “The nearest one’s St. Luke’s, ten minutes out,” Sam said quietly, his phone’s glow illuminating his tense face. No one argued.
Sadie stared at the passing streetlights, each one a bleached streak in the dark. The vibrations of the road traveled up through the frame into her bones, a different frequency than the concrete’s static chill. “The silver,” she mumbled, her voice thick and strange. “It’s in the blood, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” Xavier said, the word rough. He’d seen the blackened veins spidering up her forearms. “They’ll flush it.” She gave a tiny nod, her temple still resting against him. The familiar scents of the Impala—leather, gun oil, Dean’s aftershave—usually felt like home, but now they just underscored how violated hers had been.
Dean pulled under the stark white glare of the HOSPITAL emergency room awning, the tires crunching on gravel. The automated doors hissed open, releasing a wave of antiseptic air that made Sadie flinch. A nurse with a clipboard took one look at them—at Xavier’s bloodstained clothes, at Sadie’s hollow eyes—and her professional calm snapped into action.
“Gurney, now,” she called over her shoulder, her eyes assessing Sadie’s wrists. Orderlies appeared, their movements efficient and impersonal. Xavier had to let her go as they transferred her to the rolling bed, his hands falling empty to his sides.
Xavier had to let her go as they transferred her to the rolling bed, his hands falling empty to his sides. He watched the doors swing shut, sealing her away with the bright, buzzing fluorescence and the smell of bleach. A deep tremor started in his own hands, the adrenaline leaching away to leave a hollow, shaking cold.
He became aware of the dried blood cracking on his knuckles, the vampire ash a fine gray powder clinging to his jeans. Dean and Sam stood nearby, a united wall of silent, shared dread under the harsh lights. They were ushered into a small, beige waiting room with plastic chairs and a muted television.
Time lost all meaning. Xavier stood at the window, staring at the black reflective glass, seeing only the warehouse floor. He didn’t sit. Dean finally sank into a chair, the plastic groaning under his weight, and put his head in his hands. The air hummed with the low drone of a news channel and unspoken recriminations.
“Hey.” Dean whispered to Xavier, his voice sandpapered raw.
“Hm,” was Xavier’s only reply, not turning from the window.
“I’m sorry for how I handled things…at the safe house.” Dean apologizes like actually apologizing, the words pushed out with visible effort.
Xavier looked at him for a long moment, his reflection in the dark glass superimposed over Dean’s weary face. He turned, his eyes bloodshot and impossibly tired. “It’s not me you need to apologize to.” Xavier says.
Dean held his gaze, then gave one slow, agonized nod, his eyes drifting to the closed doors where his sister was.