ashes and be named victorious.
Lysander’s optimism was a little sickening. I had to stop reading for a moment. I looked at my father to sigh and roll my eyes. My father laughed.
“Don’t worry,” my papá said. “Heike teaches him pretty quickly. Go ahead, read on. Leo sees some action pretty soon.”
I rolled my eyes again, but continued reading.
Vampyres are still in upheaval. They are gathering far into the belly of this continent. Heike says the Queen has made more new vampyres in the last 10 years than she has in the last 100, even more now than during the Great War! They thrive on the evil and if there was evil in anything it was the war crimes perpetrated during this last decade ... Enough of that, my heart still grieves. We’re walking through the USSR now – not sure exactly where, though Tafari thinks Poland. It is strange, but I can still feel the oppressive weight of sadness and anger and wickedness in the air. Heike says we Trackers are made to tune into nefariousness. I understand I am supposed to be following my Tracking sense, but the odious air is suffocating. Tafari is struggling with the smells. He’s having a hard time retaining his skin.
“Who is Tafari?” I asked my father. I got confused, since sometimes it seemed like that Tafari person was a man and sometimes I wasn’t so sure.
My papá hushed me. “Just read on.” I read on. Lysander’s journal entries were becoming shorter and messier.
Tafari received a message from the leaders. He is not pleased. He and Heike spoke a long time together. Tafari is upset. I can understand. I told him he had a choice in the matter, but this angered him and I believe he would have attacked me if Heike had not intervened. I would not win against Tafari, I fear, and was grateful to Heike. I apologised, though I still believe he has a choice. We all have choices.
Wow, that was heavy stuff from a kid about my age. What was he really responsible for the preservation of the human race or was he just very romantic? I partially felt he was dramatic about the whole thing but the other part of me ... well, I had never thought that vampyres could be the downfall of man.
There were lots of stuff in the journal I didn’t understand - my papá refused to answer any questions when I looked up at him. He urged me to read on, although the journal was pretty boring. Lysander was really into capturing the mundanities of life – cooking, walking, traveling through the forests, walking, finding food, walking some more. It went on for pages and pages and I couldn’t help but wonder when he had time to write it all down. It was a like reading a slightly shorter version of Lord of the Rings, so it took awhile to read through the journal to get to the date papá wanted me to read to, but finally I got to October. There were about ten entries for October 1947 and, unlike the previous months, they lacked in-depth details and exact dates.
I don’t know for certain, but I believe Tafari and the others will break away from The Hunters and we’ll lose them. Tafari is a good warrior and I do not look forward to his loss. I do not blame them for breaking away from a group of men who are regressing into archaic,19th century thought. We Hunters are becoming a backwards group who care more for tradition than bettering ourselves at our life’s work: the slaying of vampyres and the preservation of the Human Race.
The next entry was even terser. I could almost see young Lysander scribbling anxiously as him and his hunting companions rested. I could sense his urgency, as if he didn’t know what was happening or what was going to happen. At first he was pretty cocky, but after awhile he seemed to rely completely on his hunting companions for guidance and support. His transformation was sad, in a way.
The wolves are going mad. I hear them bellowing in the night. It is a sickening sound and I cannot sleep. I am ill from the Tracking. Mile by mile we get closer to the scent,
Lysander’s optimism was a little sickening. I had to stop reading for a moment. I looked at my father to sigh and roll my eyes. My father laughed.
“Don’t worry,” my papá said. “Heike teaches him pretty quickly. Go ahead, read on. Leo sees some action pretty soon.”
I rolled my eyes again, but continued reading.
Vampyres are still in upheaval. They are gathering far into the belly of this continent. Heike says the Queen has made more new vampyres in the last 10 years than she has in the last 100, even more now than during the Great War! They thrive on the evil and if there was evil in anything it was the war crimes perpetrated during this last decade ... Enough of that, my heart still grieves. We’re walking through the USSR now – not sure exactly where, though Tafari thinks Poland. It is strange, but I can still feel the oppressive weight of sadness and anger and wickedness in the air. Heike says we Trackers are made to tune into nefariousness. I understand I am supposed to be following my Tracking sense, but the odious air is suffocating. Tafari is struggling with the smells. He’s having a hard time retaining his skin.
“Who is Tafari?” I asked my father. I got confused, since sometimes it seemed like that Tafari person was a man and sometimes I wasn’t so sure.
My papá hushed me. “Just read on.” I read on. Lysander’s journal entries were becoming shorter and messier.
Tafari received a message from the leaders. He is not pleased. He and Heike spoke a long time together. Tafari is upset. I can understand. I told him he had a choice in the matter, but this angered him and I believe he would have attacked me if Heike had not intervened. I would not win against Tafari, I fear, and was grateful to Heike. I apologised, though I still believe he has a choice. We all have choices.
Wow, that was heavy stuff from a kid about my age. What was he really responsible for the preservation of the human race or was he just very romantic? I partially felt he was dramatic about the whole thing but the other part of me ... well, I had never thought that vampyres could be the downfall of man.
There were lots of stuff in the journal I didn’t understand - my papá refused to answer any questions when I looked up at him. He urged me to read on, although the journal was pretty boring. Lysander was really into capturing the mundanities of life – cooking, walking, traveling through the forests, walking, finding food, walking some more. It went on for pages and pages and I couldn’t help but wonder when he had time to write it all down. It was a like reading a slightly shorter version of Lord of the Rings, so it took awhile to read through the journal to get to the date papá wanted me to read to, but finally I got to October. There were about ten entries for October 1947 and, unlike the previous months, they lacked in-depth details and exact dates.
I don’t know for certain, but I believe Tafari and the others will break away from The Hunters and we’ll lose them. Tafari is a good warrior and I do not look forward to his loss. I do not blame them for breaking away from a group of men who are regressing into archaic,19th century thought. We Hunters are becoming a backwards group who care more for tradition than bettering ourselves at our life’s work: the slaying of vampyres and the preservation of the Human Race.
The next entry was even terser. I could almost see young Lysander scribbling anxiously as him and his hunting companions rested. I could sense his urgency, as if he didn’t know what was happening or what was going to happen. At first he was pretty cocky, but after awhile he seemed to rely completely on his hunting companions for guidance and support. His transformation was sad, in a way.
The wolves are going mad. I hear them bellowing in the night. It is a sickening sound and I cannot sleep. I am ill from the Tracking. Mile by mile we get closer to the scent,
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