“Where are we going?” Nick asked me as I turned off the main road with the bodies of three dead vampires stuffed in my boot.
“Blackley Forest,” I said. “We need to bury them outside the city.”
“We don’t need to bury them at all,” he mumbled. “I need to find my brother. This is a waste of my time.”
I slammed on the brakes.
“What the—” Nick gripped at the door handle, steadying himself.
“Listen,” I said sternly, “you brought us to that nest of vampires and now you have to deal with the consequences.
“I will not be inclined to keep helping you if you leave me to clean up this mess by myself.”
He looked like he was about to open his mouth in retort, when I cut in again.
“Besides, any vampire with any information about Darren will be fast asleep for another few hours at least,” I said.
“I would advise you to get on their schedule instead of depriving yourself of rest entirely,” I finished.
He grumbled to himself but didn’t retort. So I accelerated the car again.
As we drove along the open stretch of motorway, Nick started to doze off—a combination of sheer exhaustion and the head wound the male vampire had inflicted on him.
But every time he started to nod off, he would quickly jolt awake and look around, like he was anticipating another vampire attack.
After three times of him doing this, I said gently, “We have a ways to go. You should get some rest so you can be in fighting shape.”
He scoffed at me, but the next time his eyes drifted shut, they stayed that way.
I peered over at him while he slept…so vulnerable. Stripped of his usual cagey demeanour.
And for the first time, I got a good glimpse of the damage to his head.
The cut looked deep and painful. And smelled like the most delicious meal.
It was dangerous how much I was drawn to him.
His blood was too distracting. I was looking at it longingly more than I was looking at the road ahead of me.
I gathered saliva in my mouth and spit onto the cuff of my shirt.
Then I reached over and dabbed my healing fluid onto his temple.
As the wound started to heal over, he stirred in his sleep. I giggled as a soft moan escaped his lips.
I was glad to make him feel better in all his distress, even wishing that he had another cut I could repair just to hear that moan again.
I wondered what the pleasure of the healing was doing to his dreams.
I woke up when I felt a tapping on my shoulder.
“We are here,” Scarlett whispered.
I peered out the window into the darkness and saw nothing but the silhouette of tree trunks surrounding us on all sides.
As I got out of the car and stretched out my limbs, I realised that my body felt incredible…
Like I had just got a massage that had released any tension that I’d been carrying.
Somehow, that nap had been the best sleep I’d got since Darren had gone missing…or maybe ever.
I put my hand to the wound on my head and—
I crouched down and looked at my reflection in the side view mirror. It was dark, but I could still see that my wound was healed over.
Not a scar, not a bruise… It was like it had never happened at all.
When I stood up, Scarlett was staring at me.
“How—” I asked. “What happened?”
“I did a bit of magic on you while you were sleeping. I hope you don’t mind.”
I lightly brushed my fingers over my unmarked forehead again.
I knew that vampires had healing abilities, but I didn’t know much about the different powers of witches.
I resolved to read more about them when I got back to my dad’s study.
But first, we had to get this useless ritual over with.
“This is going to take forever without a shovel,” I said, realizing just how unprepared we were.
“Relax,” Scarlett said, circling around the car. “I have one in the back seat. Always be prepared and all that.”
“You seem far too relaxed about this,” I muttered. “Who keeps a shovel in their car?”
“Would you prefer it if I freaked out a bit?” she asked. “Perhaps cry or beg you to comfort me?”
“No.”
“Well then, don’t complain. We have work to do.”
We walked a ways into the woods, looking for a spot far from any footpath.
When we found a good place, Scarlett took the shovel first and started digging.
As she worked, she didn’t break a sweat and her breath remained steady.
I wanted to ask her more questions about herself, but first I decided to get more information about the other vampires in the area.
I figured that would be more useful in my search for Darren.
“So…” I said slowly, “that guy that you—um—energy sapped…he mentioned something about another vampire named Rowland. He’s like the head vamp, right?”
“Around these parts, yes. He’s not the most powerful,” she said, “but he has the most influence.”
“But they all worked for Oscar?”
“I don’t understand it yet,” she said, sending a shovelful of dirt flying inches from my face.
“Clearly their allegiance is to Oscar. But Rowland basically owned Oscar, so by extension, he owns anything of his too.”
“Why do vampires have to be so possessive about everything?” I said, the disgust evident in my voice.
“Ever felt jealous?” she asked me with a flirtatious smirk. “It’s a universal problem.”
“Seriously,” I said, grabbing the shovel from her, “why do you know so much about vampire politics?”
“The harder I try to stay out of something, the more I end up tangled right in the middle of it.”
“I know that feeling,” I said.
Finally the hole was deep enough to fit all three bodies. Once we loaded them in, I filled the hole back up.
We spent some time arranging the debris so that it looked like the ground had never been disturbed.
I dragged an old rotting log over to cover a big part of the area.
When our work was finished, I stood back, impressed at how well we had covered our traces.
But as Scarlett stood in front of the makeshift grave-site, she wasn’t wearing a smile.
Actually, she looked like she was about to cry.
After a moment, she said, “May their souls rest in peace.”
“What souls?” I chortled back.
She looked back at me.
For an instant, her eyes glowed red, like they had in the warehouse.
It shook me to my core for an instant, like I was standing at the mouth of hell.
“I believe vampires have souls,” she said, when the glowing subsided.
“Different souls…changed after the turning. But I think some part of the original, human soul is retained.”
I was silent.
I didn’t want to fight with her about it then, but that assertion went against one of my most fundamental beliefs…
The same belief that had led my father and his father into the same job that I had pursued.
“They have no humanity left in them,” I said finally. “Otherwise, they wouldn’t be able to commit such awful, violent acts.”
“Mortal people do terrible things too, Nick,” she said.
I was genuinely curious. The more I learned about this witch, the less I seemed to know.
“They attacked first,” I stated coolly. “That’s self-defence. Plus, they died fighting, or at least…trying to. There is honour in that.”
In my 1,200 years of life, I had come to appreciate honour.
Something done honourably transcends subjective ideas of good and bad, right and wrong. It is rooted in intention, not outcome.
While I had adapted a lot of my beliefs to fit the changing times, I had retained that basic contract with myself.
“What? You do not think the way someone dies matters?” I asked, curious, interrogating his pensive silence.
He shrugged. “I suppose I haven’t really thought that much about it.”
“Tell that to a ghost and then come back to me.” I chuckled.
“Ghosts don’t exist,” he said abruptly.
My chuckle turned into a full-on laugh.
“Seriously? You believe in vampires and not ghosts?” If only I could introduce him to Lillian, she would have a field day.
“If I believed in ghosts, I would have to worry about these three coming back to haunt us. No, thank you,” he said, his voice firm.
“Oh, no, it is fine, they have moved on. We do not have to worry about them,” I said earnestly.
I bowed my head again, closed my eyes, and said one final prayer for the lives that we had taken.
To my surprise, when I opened my eyes, Nick was also bowing his head in something resembling reverence.
Is it possible that I was getting into his head? Could I ever make him believe that vampires are not just evil incarnate?
That they had feelings, dreams, and fears, just like he did?
“Listen,” I said, turning back towards the car, “I know you are impatient and you just want to find Darren.”
I continued, “But the more vampire bodies we have to dispose of, the more time we are going to lose. We need to go straight to the source. We need to go see Rowland.”
“How will we find him?” Nick asked me.
“I have a pretty good idea of where he is.”
It was a long drive back, and on the way, we decided that we would go see Rowland tonight.
I knew where he would be.
The same place where he was most nights: in a back room, with his own private feeders, sucking endless amounts of blood.
But first, we needed to go home, shower dirt and debris off of our bodies, and put on some fancy clothes.
I dropped Nick off at his house and then sped back to my flat to get ready for another visit to Club du Sang.
