AfterAge (10 page)

"Welcome," said a childishly sweet voice, "to the House of God."

REVELATION 1:18

I am she that liveth, and was dead;

and, behold, I am alive for evermore

~ * ~

Anyelet opened her eyes and the oceans of the world were made of blood. She stood at a pulsating shore and gazed upon the red vastness even as need rose in her body and her mouth began to fill with thick saliva. In a moment her fingers had undone the iron clasp at her neck and the velvet cape fell to the sand like a sheet of black oil. The air, heavy with bloodsmell, played across her collarbone and breasts, caressing her bared skin with a lover's icy, intimate hand; waves of blood swelled and ebbed before her, leaving wet, crimson shadows in front of her feet.

Anyelet’s deep red hair whipped heavily in the wind but the piercing gaze never blinked. Eons ago those eyes had been clear green; time had deepened them to a black so dark they seemed like twin pits within skin that glowed white in the deep dusk, the veins beneath blue-smudged trails of emptiness. She ached with fierce Hunger as she stepped forward, easing her foot into the hot bath of fulfillment as her lips parted in anticipation.

The sole of her foot met cool, dry sand. Anyelet looked down impatiently and saw the ruby liquid receding, as if the traitorous moon had suddenly pulled in the tide. She tried again, and again, but with every foot she gained the ocean receded an equal distance.

She closed her eyes and concentrated. Cold and beautiful, Anyelet spread her arms wide and felt power course through her as she reached, her mind's eye picturing her fingers locking as she enfolded mankind into her deadly grip. Her pain bled to agony, the collapsed arteries and veins becoming razor-studded snakes twisting within her body. Her eyes flew open and she gazed over the world she had so easily conquered, now a withered, dried-out sphere bearing no trace of the oceans of plenty she had envisioned. Fresh fever surged and her back arched, crushing the imaginary world against her chest until it began to disintegrate. Still her fingers would not open. She threw back her head and screamed as bits and pieces of the globelike form cascaded down her breasts and rib cage, then began to stretch and re-form against her rigid torso. It had been an eternity since she'd felt fear, but terror returned easily to her memory as her hands finally unclasped.

Too late
. There was no escaping the starvation-blackened arms that now trapped her. The form was taking shape, smothering her in its foulness as she beat at it with fading strength, the creature sucking away her energy in great, thirsty gulps.

Anyelet gagged helplessly and her head lolled, exposing her throat and its trail of barren arteries. Loathing filled her as this nightmare being opened a pus-encrusted mouth in which two rotted fangs slid forward.

No!
she howled frantically into its mind.
There is no food for you here!

Hideous laughter rang in her ears. The beast's head shot forward with a speed that she had never possessed and the cracked lips fastened greedily on her neck around its filthy teeth.

Anyelet's stomach convulsed as the artery in her neck gorged and blackness began to radiate from her throat. Despair enveloped her as she realized her captor wasn’t
feeding
.

It was pumping its filth into her body.

~ * ~

Night had arrived with arms open, like an old friend bringing comfort.

With it came The Hunger.

Anyelet's fingers stretched, opening like the petals of a black-red rose, the sharp nails dragging along the underside of her satin quilt, an old habit that soothed her and made her feel secure. She thought briefly of the nightmare, then dismissed it. She didn't need a portent to know the situation was harsh, but with Siebold's assistance things should slowly improve. She flung the quilt carelessly aside and rose, moving to light a couple of cut-glass oil lamps. The last of the sun was sinking below the horizon; even through these stone-and-steel walls she could feel its fading heat still trying to sear her flesh in her place of rest. She smiled complacently. The sun would never set its golden sight upon her again.

The lamps spread a rich glow as she scanned her closet. Her gaze stopped on a magenta silk pantsuit, an outfit Rita had found at Marshall Field's. Seeing Anyelet in it would please her dark companion and she pulled the suit from its hanger and tossed it on the bed, then let the floral nightdress in which she'd slept drop to the floor. Naked, she crossed to the woodstove in the center of the room, a huge, windowless storeroom in the subbasement of the Merchandise Mart. She could hardly wait for spring and the rising temperatures that would finally warm the ice in her body. The stove, vented only to keep smoke from permeating the room, did a passable job until about two hours before she woke each evening; now its surface was barely warm. No matter. Rita would arrive soon, and wrapping in the covers was worthless since she had no body heat to build beneath their surface.

Anyelet turned at a slight noise and saw Rita glide into the room. Beneath a striking copper robe, the taller woman's skin gleamed like polished mahogany in the lamplight as she crossed to the stove and tossed in a bundle of prefabricated logs. That done, Rita swept a hairbrush from the nightstand and stepped behind her. Anyelet's eyes closed contentedly as Rita began to pull the brush through the red spill of her hair. A log crackled as warmth began to rebuild. Behind her, Anyelet felt Rita finish and lay the brush down, then move to stand in front of her. Opening her eyes, she met the depthless dark brown of Rita's almond-shaped gaze. The tight cut of Rita's hair emphasized her sharp cheekbones and full lips; four-inch daggers hung from her ears and followed the long line of her neck to the jutting ridge of her collarbone.

Rita spread her fingers wide and drew her hands through Anyelet's hair, combing it back from her temples to her shoulders. She stopped for a moment, then eased her fingers down to rest just above the swell of Anyelet's breasts. Rita, normally so sharp-tongued, spoke for the first time since entering the room.

"Is there something else I can do for you?" The offer was tempting. The pleasure Rita could bring was almost excruciating and the coldness that ached between her thighs eased at the thought.

But The Hunger was agony.

Anyelet sighed. "Maybe later, Rita. I must have food."

Rita nodded and stepped away, returning with the billowy pantsuit. A few minutes later the two women stepped into the blackness of the outer corridor, neither bothering with a light as they made their way along its length.

Five floors above, the Damned began their nightly screams.

REVELATION 2:23

And I will kill the children with death.

~ * ~

The child screamed his rage at the steel-bound walls that held him prisoner, then threw himself at the vault-like door.

Neither walls nor door acknowledged his tantrum.

In his other life, Tommy Gilbert had not been a particularly bright boy. That he had survived this long in his new existence could be attributed to his youth—now everlasting—and the fact that as a child he focused on instinct rather than intellect. The dark hours had been his friend ever since the Saturday night he and his twin had awakened to Mom and Dad—mysteriously absent all day—standing over them with hellish, hungry grins. Amos was smarter but never very healthy, and as their mother drained the smaller of the sons she had carried in her womb, so too had she drained away his life—permanently. Though Tommy had loved Amos after a fashion, he'd felt nothing but disdain the following evening to discover his brother had become only stiff, decomposing flesh. Forgotten now, at the time there'd been a cry of envy from deep in the darkness that had swallowed Tommy's soul.

His captivity now was incomprehensible. Tommy didn't know or care how he'd gotten here. The Hunger was overwhelming and the bloodsmell was driving him insane. He needed—

Bloodsmell
.

Where was it? He crouched in the corner and fought the urge to claw at the walls again, knowing it would only frustrate him. He hadn't seen electric lights in over a year and the harsh glow burned his eyes. Tangled at his feet was the rope and duct tape that had held him for only a few seconds, while smashed plaster left concrete block and steel rods exposed around the room. Now the boy's eyes searched the rubble more carefully, then followed the line of the door to the ceiling of the tiny room.

There!
Suspended from a hanger about seven feet above the floor was a small plastic bottle of blood.

A millisecond later it was down and he was fumbling with the cap, which was nothing more than the pull-type kind that bicyclists used. His prison wasn‘t warm but it wasn’t cold either, and the blood was a cool fifty degrees, maybe not the same as fresh but awfully close. He sucked the last drop out, then split the plastic lengthwise with a dark fingernail, his blackened tongue cleaning the inside like he was licking the middle of an Oreo cookie. For months he'd been living on subway rats, though the wily rodents were scarce and hard to catch and the tunnels full of others who wanted only to pull him apart for sport after making sure nothing worthwhile flowed in his veins. The blood—barely more than a pint—was a rare feast.

Stomach half-full, he tossed the bottle aside and curled up to sleep and dream of dark and evil innocence.

REVELATION 12:11

And they loved not their lives unto the death.

~ * ~

After all this time, Vic Massucci still felt screwed up when he woke at dusk instead of daybreak. He supposed he always would.

I am a vampire
, he thought. On the heels of that:
How disgusting
.

He sat up on the folded blankets, then stood and groaned as his muscles twisted into place. For a minute he just stood in the dark like a massive, shaggy beast, waiting for the sleep to ease from his mind, knowing that The Hunger would roar in to drive the last cobwebs from his tormented brain. He wondered how long he would have to bear this, and his mind immediately obliged with the answer.

Forever
.

He lit the candle stuck onto a saucer on the rim of the small sink, but its glow did nothing to relieve his despair as feeble light crawled into the recesses of the water and supply closet that he called "home." He plugged the drain and splashed an inch of water into the sink from a five-gallon plastic jug, then dampened a washcloth and brought it up, looking reflexively at the wall to the mirror.

But the mirror was gone, pulled from the wall when he'd claimed this room as his own. He could have left it—to look in a mirror didn't hurt or frighten him, an idea just as ridiculous as the notion that vampires had to sleep on the earth. Why would anyone, alive or undead, spend half their existence lying in dirt? Still, his eyes sought the space where his thirty-five-year-old mind expected a mirror to be. He found nothing, hence the reason he'd taken down the mirror. It was just too damned eerie to know you were standing there but not see anything, plus it did weird shit to him optically. Two seconds of staring and he started feeling dizzy; ten would put his ass on the floor.

Vic wiped his face then ran the wet rag around his neck and forearms. Sometime during the day a mouse had left droppings on his shirt; he curled his lip and pulled it off, choosing another from the hangers along an overhead pipe. The shirt was an expensive Ralph Lauren polo and it fit well, the white cloth molding snugly to the massive muscles in his chest and arms. In another time it would have shown off his gardener's tan; the thought that now it just made him look like a ghost made Vic laugh aloud as he tucked the shirt into his slacks, but his mirth died quickly.
Gardener
, he thought bitterly.
Yeah, that's me
. He had no business here; he belonged in the sun, surrounded by greenery and living things. He'd grown up an Italian boy from the northwest side and in his heart he hadn't changed. Even the engraved card in his wallet still read
Vito "Vic" Massucci, Specialty Gardens, Inc
. Unfortunately the living things of this earth could no longer bear his hand; how could he be happy when the most important things in his life now blackened at his touch?

He left his room and descended the stairs, feeling his leg muscles bunch as they worked faithfully. He had been at the peak of his weight lifting when immortality had put a timelock on his body. Even his strength hadn't saved him then.

Anyelet
. . .

Just thinking her name made him ache with conflicting emotions. In the tough public high school he'd attended, rumor was if you popped a girl's cherry, she'd put out for you forever. Anyelet had caught him outside his Elston Avenue greenhouse on an icy fall night as he was covering his hybrid roses because of a frost warning. With her lips against his throat to teach him the true meaning of cold, his struggles had been feeble tremblings and he had been the virgin. If there was any truth in that crude saying, it explained why he still found her irresistible, though he fought her mental hold at every turn and would have killed her for what she'd done to him had he not feared her so much.