The Blood That Bonds (33 page)

Sam shrugged, clearly unconvinced. Two
dragged at her cigarette, blew smoke into the dark room, tried not
to think about Theroen. She didn’t want to think of him until the
next evening, until she was working herself up to a fever pitch of
fury and hatred, ready to kill or be killed.

“
If I live through it, do
you want me to find you?” she asked.

“
Hell yes.”

“
I don’t have an apartment.
Give me your address and phone number. Maybe I’ll be in
touch.”

“
Sure.” Sam scribbled the
information down. Two stuck it in her back pocket and went back to
staring out the window.

“
Thanks for staying, Sam.”
She said finally. “I know you could’ve left a couple hours
ago.”

“
It’s okay. I spent the
time thinking up excuses to explain to my friends where the hell
I’ve been.”

Two laughed a bit at that. “I have no idea
what I’ll tell mine, if I see them. I’m not sure I could even face
them, after all the shit I’ve lied to them about since I met
Darren.”

“
I’m sure they’d forgive
you.”

“
Yeah. Can I forgive
myself? Don’t know. Probably doesn’t matter. Like you said … he’s
going to kill me.”

“
Right, but … What happens
if you win?”

“
Honestly, Sam? I don’t
think there’s much point in worrying about what will happen if I
win.”

“
Are there other
vampires?”

“
So I’ve been
told.”

“
Will they come after
you?”

Two smiled. “Get out of here, Sam. Go home.
Stop thinking about it. You’re practically human. I can hear it in
your voice. Another night, and this will all seem like some bizarre
dream.”

“
Yeah. Okay. Can’t say it
was nice meeting you, Two – things were too fucked up to call any
of it ‘nice’ – but I’m glad I know you, if that means
anything.”

“
It means a
lot.”

Sam looked around. “I’m glad to leave. I
don’t know how you stood this place for so long.”

“
It’s easier if you’re high
all the time.”

Sam headed for the door. When she reached
it, she turned. “Hey.”

“
Yeah?”

“
Goodbye. Good
luck.”

Two looked over at her, and smiled again.
“Bye, Sam. Thanks.”

Sam waved, turned and disappeared through
the door. Two sat, Tori dozing behind her, and watched as smoke
curled up into the darkness, lost in thought, lost in her plans for
revenge.

* * *

Midnight shopping was easier in New York
than anywhere else in the world, and Two had little trouble finding
the supplies she needed. She already had Darren’s gun and bullets
to go with it, the extra clips found in a desk drawer. To these she
added a machete, purchased at a hardware store, and even a few
wooden stakes, although seeing them sitting in the car truly drove
home how futile it all was. Wooden stakes? For Abraham?

Two drove from spot to spot, trying not to
think about it, picking up things she thought she might need. Tori
amused herself by playing with the various lit switches and dials
inside the car. Eventually the incessant noise of the radio
flipping from station to station faded into the background.

She and Tori fed on a homeless man under a
bridge somewhere in Brooklyn, but Two found her thirst waning
early. It was starting: she was becoming human again.

They left the city around four in the
morning, heading toward Binghamton. There she found a motel. When
the coming sun forced her into sleep, Two was glad for it. She was
ready for the end.

* * *

The drive was miserable, the walk worse.
They ditched the car a few miles from the mansion, and made their
way toward the house in a downpour that wanted to be snow, couldn’t
quite manage it, and settled for sleet instead. Two smoked, walked,
saying nothing. The gun was jammed into the waistband of her pants.
The machete hung in a sheath from her belt. She hadn’t even
bothered to bring the stakes.

Two walked. Tori stumbled along behind her,
insisting on walking but occasionally dropping to all fours to
catch up.

The mansion emerged from the surrounding
trees like a horror-movie haunted house. Huge, dark, lurking like a
thing alive. It seemed as if the evil of its owner, held back
perhaps by Theroen’s presence, had engulfed it. She found herself
losing her resolve. Did she really want to be here? Surely this was
madness. Hopeless. The fear pressed on her, taunting and shoving,
trying to force her back to the car and away from the mansion. Two
fought against it.

She thought of Theroen, forcing herself to
contemplate the awful truth: he was gone, never coming back, and
she would have to live without him. She thought of all of the
things they had meant to do together, of the time they had planned
to spend, and it seemed her heart would break.

The hurt brought anger. The anger brought
hate, and Two looked up at the mansion with loathing in her eyes.
Abraham was up there, somewhere. He wouldn’t know that she had
returned. There might be some chance for surprise, some possibility
of success.

“
Coming for you, Abraham.
Going to cut out your heart, eat it in front of you, and then set
you on fire.”

Two snarled up at the mansion, and again
moved forward.

* * *

The front entrance was lit. Too dangerous.
Too obvious. Two knelt next to Tori, whispered in her ear.

“
Tori, I know you can
understand me if you try. Please try. Do you know if there’s a back
door? A side entrance? Something?”

Tori looked back at her, confused but
wanting to help.

“
See that? That’s a door,
but that one’s
bad
, Tori. Is there a different door? Somewhere else?”

Sudden understanding dawned in Tori’s eyes,
and she began to squirm about, excited to have the answer. She
pointed at the side of the mansion, pulling at Two’s hand.

“
Okay, Tori. Good. Thank
you.”

They crept along, skirting the edge of the
forest on the mansion’s west end, keeping the shadows. The lawn was
soft and wet, muddy in spots. Freezing water sprayed up with each
footstep. The sleet kept falling from the sky, and Two and Tori
both were both soon soaked and filthy. A normal human might have
been succumbing to hypothermia, but Two was still mostly vampire,
and barely felt the cold.

Two caught sight of an indentation in the
wall to her right; a door, possibly a servant’s entrance. It was
unlit and quiet. There was nothing between them and the entrance
except wet grass and a few cultivated trees. Rotten crabapples
littered the ground, slowly returning to the soil.

Tori lead. Two kept her eyes to the ground,
afraid to look at the mansion. The sense of menace was palpable,
like a wet cloth that wrapped them, stifling, suffocating. Two felt
as if could barely breathe.

They were nearly there when Tori stopped
short with a sudden yipping noise. Two looked up, and at once felt
her limbs go weak. There before them was a shadow within the
shadows, dark and looming, a presence so powerful it seemed to beat
upon her like a physical force. Abraham. There. Waiting.

“
Hello Two.”

Two could not find words, could barely
look.

“
You’ve come back to finish
this, have you? And you’ve brought my daughter. How lovely. Tori,
you have been a
very
bad girl. I thought we had trained you better than
this.”

Sudden anger blazed in Two, and she found
her voice. “Don’t you talk to her like she’s your fucking dog,
Abraham!”

Abraham turned his attention again to Two,
focusing his gaze on her. She stood up to it as best she could,
teeth clenched, holding on to her hatred as an anchor, remembering
Theroen. It was the only way to keep from screaming under the
onslaught of his gaze.

“
I will talk to her, little
girl, however I please.”

Calm turned suddenly to rage in his eyes,
and Abraham bent forward, eyes blazing, snarling at Tori. She cried
out first in fear, and then in pain. Abraham never touched her.
Tori thrashed on the ground, wailing, left finally lying on her
side, shuddering and weeping pink vampire tears. Two heard herself
screaming at Abraham. Semi-words. Noises of rage and hate and
terror. Abraham ignored her.

“
Now, Tori. Go!” he roared,
and sudden strength seemed to flow into Tori’s body. She leapt up
and ran, reverting to all fours, pelting across the yard to the
forest, yelping. Two felt tears on her cheeks, hot like branding
irons against the cold and the slush. She was growling obscenities
at Abraham, over and over, unable to stop. Abraham smiled at her,
quiet, in control once again.

“
You’re a fascinating young
woman, Two, but too good. Too good. It is in many ways a shame to
destroy you, but I think that were I to break you, I would destroy
the same qualities that make you so intriguing.”

“
Fuck you.”

“
No, little girl, don’t you
remember? I’m possessed of no such abilities.” Abraham chuckled.
The sound was like turning earth. Like scraping stones.

“
I’m here to kill you,
Abraham.”

“
I know. Oh, I know. You
might even have succeeded in surprising me. I must admit that this
is the
last
place
I had expected you ever to return. The very last. Yes, you might
have come upon me unawares, and at least had that small
satisfaction before your death. Alas, Two, you have not. I have had
some help.”

Two knew it before he spoke her name.

Abraham smiled. Moved aside. Gestured. “Is
this not true, Sam?”

Two turned to meet the eyes of her
betrayer.

* * *

“
I’m sorry, Two.” Sam
looked sick with fear and shame and regret. “I’m so sorry. Two, I’m
sorry.”

“
You fucking bitch
…”

“
You don’t understand!” Sam
was crying. “He came to me last night, after I left. He said if I
didn’t tell him what you were going to do, that he’d kill you
anyway, and he’d never finish me! I didn’t have a
choice!”

Two was taken aback. “Never finish you?”

Sam took a step forward.
“He’s a god, Two. We could be children of God. You know what it’s
like. Never sick, never weak. How could I
not
want it?”

“
Not like this, Sam. You
don’t want what he’s offering.”

“
I do! He gave me a taste
of the blood last night. It was … oh, God. I want it. I need
it!”

Abraham observed them, silent, smiling to
himself. Two whirled, faced him, hatred now beating down the last
of her fear.

“
Tell her! Tell her the
truth! Tell her what your blood does!”

“
The truth, Two? The truth
is that I have escaped the curse of my blood. I have discovered,
through much experimentation, that my blood can be diluted. I can
have now what I could never have before: a true fledgling,
dedicated and attentive. I will dole out my blood in small amounts,
and slowly Samantha will be transformed.”

“
A slave, Abraham. That’s
what she’ll always be to you. You’ll never finish her, and even if
you do, you’ll keep her here forever.”

“
Can you take the word of
this prostitute, Samantha? This unclean whore who would throw away
your chance at immortality for the sake of her dead
lover?”

Two turned back to Sam, plaintive. “Sam,
please …”

“
I’m sorry, Two.” Sam took
another step forward. A third. The distance was rapidly
closing.

Abraham spoke again. “This end was
inevitable, Two, from the moment you murdered my daughter.”

Two closed her eyes and felt despair
welling. It ate at her courage once again. Accept this? Get it over
with? Lie down and die?

Inside her something grew. A spark became a
flicker, a flicker a blaze. Death meant reunion with Theroen, so
what reason was there to fear it? If she must die, so be it. She
would do so on her own terms, though, not like this.

Sam was nearly within grabbing distance. Two
looked up at her, met her eyes, and shook her head.

“
I’m so sorry,
Sam.”

Action as instinct. Two moved so quickly
that Sam had no chance of stopping her. Abraham could have, if he’d
wanted to, but Abraham simply stood where he was, his black grin
never wavering. In one swift move, she drew Darren’s gun from the
waistband of her pants, leveled it at the girl in front of her, and
fired. Once. Twice. A third shot went wild, but it didn’t matter.
The first bullet hit Sam in the neck. The second entered at her
forehead and removed the top half of Sam’s skull, spraying it
backward in a gout of bone and brain. Sam’s eyes looked confused
for a moment, then went blank and lifeless. She exhaled in a long,
rattling sigh, and dropped to the ground.

Two was already spinning, pointing the gun
at Abraham, and now he moved. She felt it yanked from her grip
before she could squeeze off a shot. A hand she couldn’t see
collided with her midsection and sent her hurtling backwards,
rain-softened ground rising up to meet her. On pavement, the
landing would have shattered bone. Two lay in the grass, writhing
in pain. Abraham towered over her.

“
You’re very good at making
things difficult, Two.”