Blood Song (10 page)

“End of the line.” The vampire carrying Grace dropped her onto a stained metal table covered in rat droppings. Her head hit with a thud.

“For you, too,” said the other vampire as he shoved Ethan onto the top of a large shelf. “I’d hate to be in your shoes, mate. Have fun down here, but don’t drink her. Alexander has dibs.”

Ethan kept his eyes closed until the laughing vampires shuffled up the stairs.

“Grace,” he stage-whispered as he jumped down from the shelf and waded to the other side of the room. “Wake up!” There were no windows, so he couldn’t actually see the subtle light shift outside, but he felt it. He didn’t know how much time he had to rescue Grace before he collapsed facedown into the shit pond. It was amazing he’d been able to stay conscious this long.

He stared down at her closed eyes and saw jerky eye movements under her lids. Was she dreaming? Wherever she was had to be better than the reality she’d face when she woke up. It wasn’t going to be pretty. He sniffed the thick, noxious air. Even though his sense of smell was a hundred times more sensitive than a human’s, the odors weren’t as horrible for him since he was used to them. Grace wasn’t. “Grace! We’ve got to make a plan.” He patted her cheeks with no response.

Tempted to grab her and make a run for it up the stairs, he forced himself to keep trying to rouse her instead. He couldn’t imagine what would happen if he dropped her in the slime when his vampiric spark extinguished for the day. He stilled for a moment, trying to sense the familiar vibration given off by nearby bloodsuckers, the faint buzz he barely heard anymore unless he paid close attention. Nothing. Maybe they were too far underground.

“Come on, Grace. You have to walk on your own.” He pulled her into a sitting position, and gently shook her shoulders. Her head bobbed back and forth like her neck bones had dissolved. Damn Alexander for hitting her so hard. Wondering if his trance skills would work on her if he held her lids open and stared into her eyes, he moved closer. Holding the sides of her head between his hands, he used his thumbs to pry up the lids and locked eyeballs with her. “Grace! It’s time to wake up. You gotta do what Ethan, the angel from your dream, is telling you.” He kissed her forehead.

For an instant, he thought he saw a muscle twitch in her cheek. “Yeah! That’s it. Come on back.” He waited. Nothing. “Well, shit! Now’s a good time for you to be your amazing self. Hey, Amazing Grace. That’s you!” Without thinking he started singing, “Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now I’m found. Was a bloodsucking vampire but now I don’t know what the fuck I am...”

One of her eyes opened. Then the other. She coughed and blinked several times.

“Ethan? I hear your voice, but I can’t see you. I don’t think those are the right words to that song.” She rubbed the back of her neck. “I’ve got a major headache. That asshole hit me!”

“He did.”

Sniffing, she blinked a few more times. “Where are we? It smells so horrible in here. Did the sewer back up?”

He fished in his pocket for the old lighter he always carried, a remnant of his former life. He justified keeping it by figuring he’d be prepared the next time he came across some quality weed. Of course pot had no effect on the undead, but it was a good excuse. He flicked the flame to life, hoping there wasn’t any gas to ignite, and held it near his face so she could see him. “This place is
way
worse than any sewer.”

Trembling, she pulled him in for a hug. “I’m so glad you’re here. Who were those men who broke into my studio?”

“That was master vampire Alexander. My boss, I guess. Or more like my owner.”

“Your owner? He had a very odd energy. His aura was missing. No life force.”

“No surprise there, since he’s a vampire—a dead thing. Are you ready to accept that now?”

“Since I’ve never seen a live person without an energy field, I can admit he isn’t a normal person.”

“Are you saying you didn’t notice I don’t have one, either? I’m as dead as he is. Or at least I was before I met you.”

“You
do
have an aura. It’s not as brightly colored as most people’s and it has a different shape, but it’s there. I noticed it right away when you talked to me after the sound circle.”

“No shit? I guess that’s something else you’ve done to me. But we’ve got bigger problems right now.” He lifted her into his arms so she wouldn’t have to walk through the toxic sludge pooled around his feet. “I need to get you out of here before they realize I wasn’t zapped by Alexander’s eyeball hypnosis.” He sloshed through the chunky water, hoping he’d be able to stay conscious at least long enough to point her in the right direction.

Halfway up the third staircase, he thought it odd that he hadn’t encountered anyone yet, or even heard them, for that matter. When he reached the top of the fourth set of stairs, he froze, confronting a sight he never expected to see again. Something he never would’ve believed. Light. Grey, overcast light, but actual daylight. He almost dropped her in his shock. Stunned and trembling, his dead heart pounding, he stared out the broken doorway toward the eastern horizon and the beautiful sunrise in progress. How could this be? He looked down at Grace who was staring up at him.

“What’s wrong, Ethan? You’re shaking. And you’re holding me so tightly I can barely breathe.”

“Sorry.” He released her and moved closer to the door. “This is the first sunrise I’ve seen in four decades.” Moisture gathered in his eyes and a lone tear trailed down his cheek. “Even if I melt five minutes from now, I’m a happy dead dude.”

She took his hand. “I still don’t know whether you’re crazy or you really are a bloodsucking creature like Alexander, but I’m grateful to you for getting me out of there. Can we leave now?”

Leave? Go out into the sun? All vampires knew that was certain death. “I can’t leave, Grace. You know the myth about vampires bursting into flames in the sun?”

She nodded.

“It’s not a myth. It’s true. Watch.” He steeled himself, anticipating the coming pain, and stuck his arm out through the doorway, expecting to see smoke and smell burning flesh. He had to show her the truth of his reality, even if it destroyed him.

Resolved to die with dignity he waited, and felt... nothing.

“What the fuck?” He thrust out the other arm.

“Ethan, what if you aren’t a vampire and never were? Maybe they captured you and you got confused. Brainwashed. Did you have a recent head injury, or –”

He dropped his arms and stared at her, frowning. “I know what I was. I don’t understand. Not only did I
not
die at sunrise, but I’m not frying in the light. It’s you. You really changed me. But into
what
I have no frickin’ clue.”

“But, isn’t this good news? If I did have something to do with healing your condition, aren’t you glad?”

He pressed his lips together and strode out the door.

“Ethan! Where are you going?” Grace followed and caught up to him on a patch of dead grass a few feet away.

“I had to see if my body would explode if I came outside. Apparently—at least for the moment—I’m fireproof.” Tears overflowed his eyes again, and he raised his face up toward the sun. “I don’t get it.” He choked, his voice thick with emotion. “I should be truly dead. This can’t be happening.” He blinked, and then looked at Grace. “How is this possible?”

“I don’t know, Ethan.” She took his hand. “If you really were a vampire, maybe it was a mutation—something abnormal. If that’s the case, then it could be healed like anything else, right?”

He lifted her arm and studied the fang holes and dried blood then met her eyes. “I’ve got to find out if I still crave blood. I promise I won’t hurt you.” Before she could answer or figure out what he intended to do, Ethan extended his fangs and sank them into the wounds Alexander had made in Grace’s skin.

She gasped and tried to pull back. “Ethan, stop! No!”

He held tight while she kept fighting, and sucked for a few seconds, before he retracted his fangs and let go.

Eyes wide, Grace jumped away, rubbing her arm.

Ethan felt bad about scaring her, but he had to know. “I still like blood. It tastes good to me. For a second I was tempted to take a lot more from you, but I was able to control myself. That’s definitely new for me.” He scanned the horizon. “I don’t know if I’m disappointed or relieved that blood is still my Happy Meal. I didn’t die at dawn, and I’m standing in the sun. What the fuck am I?” He shifted his frightened gaze to her as his knees went out from under him and he dropped like a stone onto the grass.

Maybe I’m having an LSD flashback and none of this is real. Yeah. That’s it. I’m lost in a brain chemical nightmare. But vampires don’t have flashbacks and nightmares...

Grace stood silently, staring down at him, an annoyed expression on her face. “You bit me.” She glanced down at the holes he’d opened in her arm, which were still bleeding.

“I know. I’m sorry.”
But not totally sorry.
You taste great.
Ethan sat up and held out his hand. “Give me your arm and I’ll make the wounds disappear.”

She stepped further away. “No thank you. I can heal myself.” Her stern tone of voice made it clear she wouldn’t be his snack again anytime soon.

His gaze drifted to the sky. Watching the sun rise was a surreal experience. Who—or what—was he now? As much as he’d hated his brutal life as a vampire, at least he knew what he was and what was expected of him. Now he’d awakened into a new landscape, one he didn’t have a road map for.

“Ethan?”

He snapped out of his daydream and looked up at Grace, trying to focus on her words. “Yeah?”

“I’m going to walk home now. I need food and a shower and at least twenty-four hours sleep. After that maybe I can begin to grasp the notion that vampires exist. And why my voice didn’t kill you.”

“What?” He jumped up. “Wait, no! You can’t go home.”

Grace’s brows rose, her expression tensed. “Why not? Are you going to keep me prisoner so you can drink my blood?” She backed up a few steps.

“Of course not, but there’s a much bigger threat than me.”

“What are you talking about? The bad guys are asleep in their coffins, or wherever they go to die during the day. We’re safe.”

“No. We’re not.” Ethan shoved his hands in his pockets and paced in a circle, deep in thought for several seconds. “As soon as they wake up, they’ll go to your studio to find us. If we’re not there, Nelson knows the general area where your house is because he was with me when the newbie attacked you. Alexander will smell you. They’re not going to give up on the bloody ritual they planned.”

Watching Grace, Ethan saw the exact moment she figured out how much trouble they were in.

“Oh, my God, Ethan!” She wrapped her arms around herself. “We’ll have to leave until they forget about us. Come on. I need to go home and pack.” She started walking, and he grabbed the back of her shirt. “Hey!” She spun to face him.

“You don’t get it. They’ll
never
forget about us. They have nothing better to do. Vampires
live
for situations like this. They have eternity to plot revenge and think of new ways to amuse themselves. We’ll have to...” He stopped before saying the words he couldn’t believe he was thinking. The ramifications of his plan caused his stomach to churn.

“Have to what?”

“Destroy them.” A wave of panic flashed through his body, and he trembled, light-headed with the intensity of it. But after saying the words out loud, he knew they were true. It was clear what he had to do. Grace would only be free of them if Alexander and his entire coven perished. And since the only ways vampires could be killed were by cutting off their heads and burning them, or by direct sunlight, his task was clear.

But that meant Nelson had to die, too.

Anxiety and fear twisted his gut. Ethan didn’t know if he could kill his friend, even though Nelson hated being a vampire and wanted nothing more than to escape in whatever way he could. He’d tried to kill himself many times since they’d met. Nelson had gotten very creative about his suicide attempts, but he hadn’t had the courage to walk into the sunlight.

Maybe destroying him would be a mercy.

“There’s no other solution.” Ethan locked his gaze on Grace’s. “We have to go back into the building and destroy them all.” He hurried through the doorway and started down the stairs, knowing Alexander and his minions could be found in one of the regular basement levels,
the bunker
, they called it, in honor of one of Alexander’s heroes, Adolf Hitler.

Ethan had spent years in a cardboard box down there, so he knew the territory.

“Are you serious?” Grace asked, panting from trying to catch up, disbelief dripping from her voice. “What are we going to do? Find an ax and chop their heads off? Or maybe pull them out into the sun.”

“Exactly.”

“I was kidding! That’s insane. We’re not murderers.”

“How can we murder something that’s already dead?”

She frowned and pursed her lips. “Well, regardless. How many are there, anyway? Ten? Twenty? Fifty?”

“Boulder’s pretty small, and it can’t sustain as many vampires as a bigger city, so there are only about thirty servants here in addition to Alexander.”