by Hayes, Drew
Following her lead, I looked in, as well. So many tubes and machines… this barely seemed like living anymore.
Taking a mental step back, I tried to examine my hesitation. Was I afraid that turning her successfully was a curse? No… thanks to my friends and my life, I’d learned that being undead wasn’t some unbearable sentence. It was just one more way to exist among countless other options. The larger part of my fear stemmed from the more likely outcome: that I was about to kill this woman. No matter how many ways we twisted the situation, that was what would most likely happen.
But was it really all that noble to leave her to those machines? I wasn’t saving her from anything, only refusing to dirty my own hands with the deed. At least with turning, there was a chance, no matter how uncomfortable it made me. It was a tangled snarl of a question that I wasn’t sure how to start wrapping my head around.
Finally, the simple truth dawned on me: I was talking to the wrong people.
“Can I speak with her?”
“We pumped her with some meds to provide temporary energy, so I’d say now is the perfect time to have a discussion.” Deborah nodded to the door. I noticed that it had no lock—nor, I realized, was there any reason for one. No one was locked in or out. Everyone had chosen to be here, a point she was driving home at each opportunity.
As my hand closed on the door, I felt Krystal’s touch at my shoulder. She was checking to see if I wanted company, but I gave her a reassuring nod. Just seeing this must be hard enough; she didn’t need to come in. Besides, no need to overwhelm Sherilyn.
I stepped into the hall, taking a moment to gather myself, and then moved into the makeshift hospital room.
What hit me first was the smell. I’m not sure I’d have recognized it as illness without Deborah’s prompting, but once inside, it was impossible to miss. From the bed, I heard a voice.
“Debbie? Is something happening?”
In all honesty, it took me several seconds to realize that she was calling out for Deborah. My eyes darted to the glass, but I kept my focus largely on Sherilyn. She was the one I needed to talk to.
“Sorry, no. My name is Fredrick. However, most people call me Fred.” I stepped around, putting myself in easy view so she could see I was no threat.
As it turned out, such movements were unnecessary. At the sound of my name, what little mass she had animated. Her eyes burned with hope as she struggled to rise higher in her bed. “You’re Fred? You’re the one who is going to… save me?”
The gasp of air as she labored to finish her sentence cleaved deep into my heart. Every word, every act, was a struggle. Extra meds or no, she was fighting to have this talk. I had to make it worthy of her efforts.
“I don’t know, Sherilyn. They want me to try, but you understand that, by the odds, that would make me your executioner.”
“Never tell me the odds.” Her half-cocky grin lasted for several seconds before she turned serious. “Didn’t they explain? Even if that happens, you’re helping my family.”
I kept waiting for some trick, some deceit of the Blood Council to reveal itself: a lie they’d used to keep Sherilyn in the dark, a trap they were looking to spring. None were coming, however. I knew then what I was truly looking for: an excuse I could use not to face the real ethical dilemma they’d put me in. This was my predicament, and it ended only when I made my choice.
“Are you scared?” A simple, silly question, yet it popped out all the same.
To my surprise, Sherilyn laughed, which turned into a cough shortly thereafter. “Absolutely terrified. Vampires and magic. Death. Even if I live, I know it won’t be the same.” Her sentences were getting choppier as she worked to fit in breaths. A casual conversation was taxing her this much, while I could throw a fridge across the room with minimal effort. For the first time, I found myself wondering what it would be like to give that strength to someone else.
“Are you sure it’s worth it? What’s happening to you is tragic, but it’s part of the human condition. If you go down this path, assuming you somehow survive, you’ll never truly be part of that world again. It’s forever on the other side of the glass, visible and always out of reach.”
To my shock, Sherilyn jammed her arms down, slowly tilting forward, moving herself into a sitting position. The simple act had her sweating, but she was able to straighten her back as she looked me in the eye.
“Fred, let me be clear. I’m not dead yet. I’m grasping. At life. At something to leave my kids… at anything. If I can’t be there… I can at least provide for them. You’re scared… own it. Don’t put it on me. I know where I stand. I don’t want to die. Only one of us could change that. So give me your fucking blood already. Please .”
A forceful personality. A fighter. On top of everything else, my former bodyguard had selected a candidate I was sure to see Krystal in, a person I’d inherently want to help. Deborah was right: this was so overt, I couldn’t even call it manipulation.
In the end, none of that really mattered. It was all just set dressing for the situation, not the predicament itself.
What mattered was that I had the chance to help Sherilyn, slender as it might be. There was nothing good or moral about holding back due to my own hang-ups. She wanted to take the chance, knowing that, even in failure, she’d have something to leave for her children. The only obstacle she had was my inflexible nature, and that wasn’t near a good enough reason to deny her probably final wish. This was Sherilyn’s choice, a terrifying one she’d made wholeheartedly. Time for me to get out of the way and help.
“Deborah, would you mind coming in here, please? I’ve never attempted a turn before, and I think, for Sherilyn’s sake, it’s best if I have guidance.”
Her tired form collapsed back against the bed, but she managed a weak smile and a few quiet words. “My friends call me Sheri.”
6.
It was strange to see Deborah interact with Sheri. Had I known the elder vampire only by title, I might have been shocked by the amiable, outright kind demeanor she displayed. The two had clearly formed a bond over however long they’d been at this. While Sheri was too exhausted to spit out more than a word or two after the effort of lifting herself, Deborah filled the silence with gentle banter as she adjusted her patient’s position.
“Here we go. Let’s get you nice and cozy. The process takes a few hours for someone in your state, and let me tell you, going down in the wrong position will give a crick in the neck that lasts ten years. It’s why most new vampires are so grumpy.” Deborah shot me a wink, then motioned for me to draw closer. It was nearly time.
“Pay close attention to this, Sheri. It’ll save me from giving you the same instructions in a few years.” Despite knowing the odds, Deborah was clearly putting on an optimistic front. Given the situation, it seemed the only viable option, at least for anyone with even a semblance of bedside manner. “To turn someone is to make them into what vampires are at our core: a corpse animated by magic.”
Her hand slid down, raising Sheri’s rail-thin arm. “Normally, we accomplish that by draining our selection down to near death, and then having them drink our blood. Inside our veins lies a potential fountain of youth, one that contains the magic to sustain the undead. You are, in effect, killing someone, and then trying to activate a curse or enchantment, depending on your viewpoint, before their soul leaves their body. This is all theory, mind you. We understand our own natures about as well as any other magic, which is to say, barely. But it’s a theory that bears fruit, even if not as much as we would like.”
From the bed, Sheri chuckled lightly. She was nervous, with extremely good reason, yet I caught not so much as a whisper of hesitation from her. This was her course, and she was set upon it.
“In this case, I don’t think you’ll need to take that much blood to get her there. No offense to Sheri, but this is more akin to turning someone on a battlefield while they’re bleeding out. You don’t need much blood: if the mortal is already on death’s door, then focu
s on expediency.”
That seemed as good a cue to get started as any I could expect. “I’m worried about trying to hit a vein with my teeth, given her condition. Perhaps we should draw blood with a syringe to be safe.”
To my surprise, Deborah looked momentarily confused. “Right, sorry. I should have prefaced with this: you have to drink from them directly. I don’t know why—part of me suspects some mage put it in play to keep us in check—but turning only works if you take the blood yourself. There are currently zero known successful turn-attempts recorded where another method was utilized.”
Much as I wanted to protest that such a stipulation made no sense, enough years of dealing with magic had taught me better. Magic made as much sense as it wanted to, and the more powerful it became, the less it seemed obliged to any sort of logic or reason. Bickering about it would accomplish nothing, save for wasting time—a truly precious asset in this particular room.
I looked down at Sheri’s arm and knew it was a lost cause even as Deborah laid it back at Sheri’s side. The neck. It had to be the neck. That was where my fangs would find their way to her blood. My instincts, so often a nuisance than anything else, would ensure I didn’t miss the mark. This was how it was supposed to be.
Leaning in, I looked at Sheri one more time, wondering if this would be the face that haunted my dreams for the rest of my immortal days: the face of the first person I killed. “See you on the other side.”
No words, just a wink. That was all she had left. I dared not close either of my eyes as I moved in, tracking her pulse, the chugging movement of that essential liquid. In no time, I was there, fangs piercing easily into her thin flesh.
The blood came fast and hot, racing down my throat. There was a time I wouldn’t have been able to do this, to handle taking blood from a living being. Deborah had been the one to push me past that hindrance, the one who taught me to drink without having to kill. It was a thought that gave me hope in that mad moment; so far, she’d steered me in the right direction.
Pulling away after a few moments, I licked Sheri’s neck to close the wounds. Still, I could see her shaking. She wasn’t in a condition where suddenly being light on blood was something her body could shrug off. With panic, I suddenly realized that I had no idea how I was going to give Sheri my blood. Should I get a cup? Did it need to be taken in person, too?
Luckily, Deborah kept a cooler head than I, her hands falling firmly on my shoulders. “It’s okay. She’s not gone yet. Bite lightly into the palm of your hand, cup it like you’re holding water, and let her drink.”
By this point, I was working robotically, following her directions because I had no idea what else to do. My movements were slow, but precise. I sank my fangs deep enough to start the blood moving—though, even after having just fed, vampire blood is a tad too thick to be called flowing. Thankfully, enough soon gathered for me to hold it to Sheri’s lips. That was as far as I could take things. The rest was up to her.
I’d barely gotten my hand in place before a ragged slurp rang out. She clumsily tried to choke down the viscous liquid. Deborah rubbed her sternum, leaning over and whispering encouragement I was too distracted to hear. All of my focus went into holding my hand steady, matching Sheri’s movements, ensuring that not a drop was lost. Of all the ways this could go wrong, I wouldn’t let something as simple as not providing an adequate amount of blood to be our failing point.
After roughly a minute, I realized my wounded palm had healed. As I opened my mouth to bite once more, Deborah caught my arm. “That’s okay. She’s gotten enough. It’s started.”
To me, Sheri looked much the same, only with stains of red along her mouth. “How can you tell? If I’m learning to do this, that seems like something I should know.”
“Her heart. Listen to it.”
I trained my ears and found that I could easily discern the sound of blood pumping, albeit weakly. It was strange: there was something off about it, yet try as I might, I couldn’t discern what. Only that there was a wrongness that itched at the edge of my senses.
In the end, Deborah saw my struggling expression and took mercy on me.
“You can tell she’s under the enchantment because her heart’s fallen into a perfect rhythm. Normal hearts can’t sustain that; their rates go up and down constantly in response to stimuli. All blood flows to the heart, and that’s where our change begins. Now, her heart rate will drop, until it halts entirely. That’s when we find out.”
Seconds later, Sheri had a spasm that rocked her body. When it ended, I listened once more and noticed that her heart’s rhythm had shifted to a slower tempo. How long would it take? How long had it taken me?
Looking at her like this, my mind flashed back to how I’d been upon waking. Alone, abandoned, unsure of what had even happened. Everything I’d learned was pieced together from movies, lore, and general experimentation. It had been a hard way to start a new life. I was glad that Sheri would have a better experience—if she woke up.
“A more brutal wound spurs the change on faster as the body fails, but with chronic conditions like these, it tends to last for at least a few hours,” Deborah informed me. “You should be done with Claudius before we know. I’m going to be here waiting, so if we find out earlier, I’ll come tell you.”
Right. I’d nearly forgotten that this was only the first of my tests scheduled this night. Tackling the hardest first had seemed like a sound strategy at the outset, yet after the turn-attempt, I wanted nothing more than to crawl into a bed and lock out the world. No one to blame but myself; I was the one who’d chosen this order.
Before I left, I took a towel from a nearby station and wiped the blood from Sheri’s mouth. She was unconscious, though whether that was exhaustion or part of the process, I had no idea. Without the force of her personality, she looked even more frail, like one good shock would break her to shards.
“How do you do this?” I asked, gently mopping Sheri’s face. “How do you roll the dice on people’s lives? I’ve known this woman for all of ten minutes, and I’m hoping with every fiber of my being that she makes it through, odds be damned. If she were a friend, a loved one…”
“The answer is an easy one: experience,” Deborah replied. “I’ve stood by, helpless, while people I loved died. Live that once, Fred, once , and you’ll understand. To be so powerful, and so useless, as the life slips from their eyes; it’s the worst kind of hell. There’s debate about what the successful turn rate really is—we don’t exactly have great data to work with. Some say one out of a hundred; others, one out of a thousand. There are even optimists who push the one in ten theory. The real truth is this: it doesn’t matter. Because when you see them fading, any shot becomes better than giving up. One in ten billion wouldn’t pause me for a moment, because I know with absolute certainty what happens when I do nothing. I’ve had an immense sample size to assess on that front.”
“That’s not going to make burying her any easier.” I finished cleaning and set the towel back down.
From her pocket, Deborah produced a phone and began to scroll. “Maybe, maybe not. But how many people get to die with sincere hope in their hearts? When the majority of humans take their final conscious breath, it is in terror or fear. Sheri closed her eyes knowing that they might yet open again. I like to think that matters, if only to us. Now, go back to the other room. I’m sure Claudius is climbing the walls waiting for you, and I’ve got a book to read.”
“I’m surprise he didn’t just barge in.” Claudius hadn’t struck me as the especially restrained sort.
“He would have, if he were allowed through that door.” Finding the correct app on her phone, she pulled up a wall of text, only then throwing a quick glance to the mirror. “As her caretaker, only I decide the ones permitted in here, by the order of the Blood Council. I wanted to make sure Sheri had some peace.”
If nothing else, those words reiterated the fact that Sheri was in safe hands. I couldn’t do anything else here, and there were still m
ore tests to get out of the way.
Moving with more speed than usual, I cut a brisk path back to the other side of the mirror. Time was of the essence; there was a chance I could get the other tasks handled before Sheri’s change was complete.
Aside from a spark of hopeless optimism, I didn’t expect her to make it. Life just didn’t play that fairly; the ones who deserved the breaks rarely got them. Which was all the more reason why I should be there. No matter how we dressed it up, I was responsible for taking her life tonight. I was fairly sure I could live with the fallout, knowing it was what she wanted, but that didn’t lessen my responsibility. I should be there at the end, if possible.
That was the very least I owed to the first person I’d killed.
7.
I felt as though I was sleepwalking through the remainder of the tests, so it was a good thing they required minimal participation from me. Claudius was indeed waiting, along with a shaken but still composed Krystal, both of whom had witnessed the entire turn-attempt. I was thankful, actually, for Claudius’s brusque nature; there were scarcely any words of greeting as he dragged us to a new room in the house.
It was a vast space, most likely used as a ballroom under normal circumstances. On this occasion, it was filled with various tools and equipment, giving it the air of a makeshift science lab combined with a medieval weaponry store. Taking me over to a large table, Claudius sat me down and began to poke my arm with different materials. A moment of thought was all it took to discern that he was trying to see if my silver weakness had been replaced with something else, the way fey were wounded by iron.
In truth, this didn’t quite seem like the second-to-hardest test, but I entertained the idea that they were giving me a bit of recovery time—that, or it was really going to hurt if Claudius found something. As he prodded one arm, the other found itself being gripped by Krystal. We said nothing as Claudius ran through his sample list, muttering to himself; we just held hands, feeling the other’s presence.