The Blood Hourglass Volume 1 Chapter 11

Deep in the night.

The moon was in hiding.

A ray of light pierced through the clouds

The night looked darker than ever. Two people stood outside

“Junyu, you came pretty fast,” one man greeted Xiaoyu. The man was in leisure wear and looked pretty relaxed. Next to him was another man in a suit, with a stern and forbidding expression.
    
“Xu Xing, how did it go?” Xiaoyu asked of the first man.

“It ran away,” answered the man with the scary-looking face.

“What are you talking about, Xu Qing? It ran away? Where did it go? There’s nowhere to hide around here.” Xiaoyu’s face became more serious, too, as if he was dealing with a crisis.

“It disappeared in the direction you came from. You didn’t see anything?” Xing waited for Xiaoyu’s reply.

“No, I didn’t see anything.”

“There’s one place worth searching,” said Xu Qing, Xing’s brother.
    
“Where?” asked Xiaoyu.

“That house.” Xiaoyu looked in the direction that Qing pointed and couldn’t say anything for a while.

“You mean that house?” Xiaoyu questioned.

“Yes,” the brothers answered in unison.

“Oh, no, we better hurry!” Xiaoyu shouted, and the three of them ran to the car. The car sped toward the castle. Someone in the car asked,

“Junyu, what’s wrong? Your face looks terrified.”

“Is there anyone living there?”

“Yes, I came from there.” Xiaoyu stepped on the gas and the car shot forward.

“Not possible. We were searching before you arrived. Rumor has it the house was—”
 
“—Dracula’s castle,” Xiaoyu finished.

“You’ve investigated, too?”

“No.”

“Then how did you know?

“Someone just told me. What happened there?” Xiaoyu’s eyes stared ahead, never leaving the house in his sight. He seemed to be afraid of something there.

“The file for it was very vague. Supposedly someone spent some money buying it.” Before the conversation ended, they’d arrived. The three people hopped out of the car and lightly closed the door. They didn’t go into the yard but stopped in front of it.

“We can’t let the girl in the house get hurt.” Xiaoyu touched the open yard door. He knew it was closed when he left, but now . . .  His gaze seemed to detect something. It must be hiding in there, which was why he warned his two friends.

“Okay,” the brothers agreed.

The three of them walked toward the living room, where the lights were on. The door was open there, too. Xiaoyu remembered that he didn’t close it, so it was probably fine. Maybe she was still drinking tea at the table. His heart squeezed with a pain he’d never felt before.

The yard door opened. Did Dad get off work early? Maybe he finished his work and came home. Living at this house is unnatural . . .  Who could believe a simple working person could afford to live here?

I rinsed his favorite mug in the kitchen and put it away. I got a new cup, poured tea, and waited for him to come in. I waited for him to say, “You’re still up? You didn’t need to wait up for me.” But a long while later, no one came in, and it stayed quiet. The quiet was disconcerting. There were no footsteps or anything else. So who pushed open the yard door?

“I’d know when he comes in.” I kept sitting at the table and waited for my dad. I sat and waited, listening for any sound at all, but there was none. I might as well draw a bath. I put down the cup and walked toward the stairs. Grabbing my nightgown, I headed for the bathroom. I filled up the tub and lay inside. Everything seemed very calm, as if nothing was happening. There seemed to be no one else in this house, but I knew I wasn’t the only one here.

Chapter end