Victor shook his head. “The brain is just meat. It rots away eventually just like the rest of the body. As I said, the life force of a vampire is in the heart. This apparently includes the creature’s memories and sense of self. Please don’t ask me to explain it, because I can’t even pretend to understand how it works. I just know that it is true.”
“Are you guessing,” I prodded. “Or have you seen it happen?”
“I have not seen it,” he admitted. “I have read about it in the Church archives, however. There are extensive records in our vaults documenting, um, research let’s call it. Hundreds of years ago, vampires were kept locked up for extensive periods of time and various experiments were conducted to see how they reacted. Decapitation was one of the experiments I read about. Although it is not completely clear if there were any long term personality changes, the creature retained a full set of memories after regenerating the lost head.” He smiled at me, almost apologetically. “The Church is more humane these days. We do not trap and hold vampires against their will any longer. When we find them, we kill them as quickly as possible. As I attempted to do with you.”
I smiled tightly, acknowledging his attempt at humor. “So, just the heart?”
Only by destroying a vampire’s heart can you be assured it is dead.”
“Okay. I accept that.” I pointed to Victor’s gear scattered on the floor. “What about the rest of it? Why does holy water burn me? And what about the cross and the bible?”
“To answer that you have to understand something called ‘darkflesh.’”
I had never heard this term before. Andi had never mentioned it, and neither had Niven. I watched him closely for some sign that he was playing with me, but he appeared sincere. I had a momentary recollection of the oily blackness that had seized onto my soul as my body died. The memory of it made me shudder. With some effort, I pushed the unsettling image from my mind.
“Darkflesh?” I asked.
“Darkflesh,” he repeated. “When a person becomes a vampire, his body dies. It undergoes the same process of decomposition it normally would after death. The only difference is that in a vampire, as their human body degenerates, the tissue is replaced with darkflesh. You will never feel your body rot, because it is repaired as fast as it falls apart. You feel like nothing is changing, but in fact it is. When I kill a vampire, I can tell how old it is because the darkflesh turns to dust immediately, leaving only what’s left of the human corpse. From the amount of decomposition in the body I can guess how long the person has been a vampire. Up to about two hundred years, that is. After that, there is very little left to examine.
“Darkflesh is very powerful. The older a vampire is, the more his body is composed of the darkflesh, making him stronger, faster, and harder to kill through physical means. They are harder to cut or injure, and they heal faster.
“The positive side of this is that darkflesh is a pure physical manifestation of evil, and therefore is susceptible to physical manifestations of good. That is why holy water burns you. Right now, holy water or a crucifix is merely painful. Too much of you is still human tissue. In time, as more of you becomes darkflesh, those items will become truly dangerous to you. You will someday find it difficult or impossible to enter a church, or even walk through a cemetery where the grounds have been consecrated.
“Sunlight also will become more dangerous….”
“Wait,” I interrupted. “That makes no sense. The older I get, the less sensitive I get to sunlight.” I leaned in closer to him, suspicion growing in my mind. “If you are lying to me, or if you’re just wasting my time I’ll kill you right now.”
“You’re right,” he said, holding his hands up placatingly. “You are less sensitive to sunlight, but the older you get the more dangerous it will become to you. Remember I told you the only way to kill a vampire is to destroy his heart? Darkflesh is very fragile at first and burns easily in sunlight. As you age, it grows stronger, but direct sunlight will still burn you, and once your heart is exposed to the light, you die.
“Right now, you still have enough human flesh surrounding and shielding your heart that you could probably withstand several minutes of daylight before it finally killed you. It would hurt like hell, but you might survive it. This is true whether you stand in direct or indirect sunlight. An ancient vampire, on the other hand, is strong enough he can walk about by day without being hurt, providing he stays in the shadows. However, if he steps into direct sunlight he will be destroyed instantly because only darkflesh surrounds his heart.”
I interrupted him again. “I still don’t understand. It that’s true, then why did moonlight almost destroy me on my first night?”
He paused and peered at me in confusion. Slowly, understanding dawned on his face. “It didn’t,” he finally replied.
“I assure you it did,” I insisted. “I felt the flames cover me and burn away my skin.”
“Oh, I believe it burned you, and it was probably quite painful, but there could have been no risk of your being destroyed. Too much human flesh protected your heart from the light. You would have had to cut open your chest and remove your heart to be threatened by the light reflected from the moon. I am sorry to say, you were quite safe from complete immolation.”
Victor again gave me a long appraising look. “I must admit, I am very much surprised your sire did not tell you any of this. Either he was deliberately holding information from you, or perhaps he was just as ignorant and did not have the information to pass along.”
“Either. Maybe both,” I acknowledged.
“So tell me, did you part on good terms? Or perhaps not? Would you maybe like to see him destroyed? I might be willing to help you out with that if you wish me to.” He jangled the chains holding his wrists. “Of course, that might be difficult under current conditions.”
This man wanted to kill me, and he was skilled enough to have tracked me without my realizing I was ever in danger. But he had a manner about him that was quite entertaining. He was … charming. I must say I was starting to enjoy our conversation, despite the threat he posed. Not enough to completely relax around him, however. I was ignorant, not stupid. “Maybe later,” I told him. “I still have a few more questions.”
“As long as you leave me breathing, I’ll answer what I can. If you let me go, maybe I’ll even be your friend.” He smiled widely, his expression making it clear that by ‘friend’ he meant ‘person that will kill you at the first opportunity.’ He rattled his chains once more, almost hopefully.
“Again, maybe later.” I smiled back at him, mimicking his exaggerated show of teeth. Without bragging, I believe my display was a bit more off-putting than his, even without fangs. “First, I’m curious about some of the traditional myths. Are they true?”
“Such as?” Victor asked.
“I thought vampires had no reflections in mirrors. When I look, I see a rotting corpse. Why?”
“Darkflesh hides what it covers. You can even photograph it, although some older forms of photography come out blurred or hazy. Similarly, others can look at you in a mirror and they will only see whatever image the darkflesh presents. When a vampire views their own reflection, however, they see past the deception of their own image. Simply put, they do not fool themselves, they see what they truly are. You see only what is left of your human body and, as a vampire ages, that becomes less and less attractive to look at. Most vampires avoid mirrors for that reason. After a couple hundred years, when the human part has rotted away and a vampire is completely composed of darkflesh, he will in actuality be invisible to himself in a mirror.”
Victor winced and closed his mouth so fast I heard his teeth click together. He quickly composed himself again, but the brief expression of disgust told me he had said something he had not meant to reveal. I needed to keep him talking, however, so I moved on with my questioning pretending not to notice the tiny lapse. I could explore the details later. Right then, I needed to keep the conversation flowing.
�
��Garlic?” I asked, jumping on the next topic I could think of.
“Tasty, and harmless,” he assured me.
“Wolfsbane?”
“Fictitious. It doesn’t exist.” Victor rolled his eyes in thought, a pensive expression on his face. I could see the hunter searching his memory for something. “There is a plant called Aconite,” he said after a moment, “that the Greeks referred to as Wolf’s Bane. They called it Wolf’s Bane though because they used a poison derived from the plant to tip arrows when they hunted wolves. It has nothing to do with the mythical herb that could keep a vampire from rising at night. Ironically, Aconite is highly toxic and could kill me in minutes. It wouldn’t touch you, though.”
I raised an eyebrow in surprise. The extent of this man’s academic knowledge impressed me and I said so.
He shrugged. “Like you said before, in my line of work it pays to have a full understanding of what is true and what is bullshit. I have carefully researched a lot of the myths so I know what works and what doesn’t.”
I nodded, continuing my interrogation. “What about having to be invited into a home?”
He snorted as though surprised I had even asked the question. “I believe that is a myth created by people so afraid of vampires they needed to believe something to make them feel safe in their own homes. The truth is only doorways specifically blessed against your presence will bar you from entering. But, I think you knew all that already.”
I nodded. “I wanted to be sure you weren’t lying to me.”
Actually, I had not known any of the things he told me, but I sought to keep him from learning the true depths of my ignorance.
The more he talked, the more I realized just how much I did not know about my own kind. My lack of knowledge in vampire lore disturbed me. Why didn’t Andi teach me any of these things? If she wanted me to survive to be her thrall, why did she leave me so blind? And why had she lied to me? She told me going out into moonlight on my first night would destroy me. I had believed her whole-heartedly. Now, I knew it wasn’t true. What was the purpose of this lie? What had she gained from it? Was it to keep me under control, or was she possibly misinformed herself?
A new memory rose to the forefront of my mind: the first night Andi came to my apartment. As we left the bar she asked my permission to enter my home. Why would she ask when she did not need to? As a joke? Or could it be possible she did not know? Maybe her ignorance ran as deeply as my own.
I remembered her telling me to accept being her thrall, just as she must accept it from the vampire that created her. If she was wrong or lying about so many other things, could she also be wrong about this? Suddenly, I had a great need to ask a new question. As my mind wandered, Victor had continued talking, something regarding his technical studies of darkflesh although I no longer really heard what he was saying. I cut him off in mid-sentence.
“What do you know about thralls?” I asked sharply.
Victor paused and frowned as he adjusted to the sudden change in topics. He shifted his stance to lean back against the wall behind him and he ran a hand through his hair to buy time as he thought about my question. His chains clanked and rattled with the movements. “Thralls? Let me see. I believe a thrall is a vampire too weak to protect himself or escape from another stronger vampire. Usually the stronger vampire is his creator. A vampire has a psychic link of some kind binding him to the vampire that turned him. I don’t fully understand it, but I have seen it demonstrated. A Master Vampire can call his thrall to him at any time – there doesn’t seem to be a limit on the distance – and usually uses the thrall for food. The link can only be completely broken when the thrall or the master is destroyed.”
At his words, a window of hope opened inside me but I closed it back down, hard. I did not dare believe anything so dangerous. Not yet. I needed more information.
“When a master is destroyed, doesn’t the thrall perish with him? They are both created of the same blood, so don’t they share the same fate?” I tried, and I believe I failed, to make the question sound casual.
“I wish that were true,” Victor laughed ruefully. “It would certainly make my job much easier knowing for every vampire I killed, all of his progeny would die with him. But, no. Each vampire is completely autonomous and must be dealt with individually.”
He eyed me shrewdly for a moment. “Who told you a thrall dies with its master?”
I did not answer him, but his eyes widened and he nodded as though I had. “Aah. I see now. You are someone’s thrall. Aren’t you? And to keep you from fighting back he told you that killing him would be suicide. That makes sense,” he said talking more to himself than to me. “Most thralls are strong enough to break away after a few years, but you haven’t even tried or else you would already be free. He has you too scared to try.”
“She.” I do not know why I admitted that to him. I did not intend to share that piece of information, but it was out and I could not take it back. I began mentally kicking myself for losing focus.
“She,” he repeated. “Well, I’ll bet she is in for a surprise the next time she calls you.”
Trying to regain control of the conversation, I challenged him. “How do I know you aren’t telling me a lie just to get me to do your job for you? It would be exceedingly convenient for you if I killed both of us by my own hand. It would save you quite a bit of trouble.”
“Actually, yes it would,” he agreed with a nod. “I suppose you can’t know for sure until you try. But consider this: the only time you feel her presence is when she summons you. Ordinarily, you don’t share her daily pains and mishaps. You don’t share her thoughts. And I assure you, you won’t share her death. Besides,” he said with a small grin, “if I could kill all of you just by finding the one vampire that created you, don’t you think I would be concentrating on finding Vampire Prime, rather than chasing your sorry ass through San Francisco?”
I wondered if it could possibly be true. Andi had been wrong on so many other points. Could she be wrong about this, too? My future could depend on whether or not a vampire hunter had lied to me. Pretty tenuous footing. Not much reason existed for me to put any faith in the man, so I decided to conduct a few experiments. A test, if you will, of his veracity.
“It’s late, Victor. Or early I suppose is more correct. I want to continue our conversation, but it will have to wait until the sun sets again tonight.”
I stepped into the prisoner’s booth with him and checked to be sure his shackles were still secure. I started to unbutton his shirt. “Sorry about this, but I need to be certain you stay put.” I stripped Victor’s clothing from his body. I did not want to risk him escaping by picking the locks with some type of tool he had hidden on his person. The only way I could be sure he had nothing concealed, was to make sure he had nothing at all. The shackles made the task difficult and I was forced to tear the clothes from him in order to get them off. As the strips of material pulled away from his body, I tossed the tattered remains of his clothing onto the floor outside of his reach.
When I had him completely stripped, I stepped back out of the booth. The chains holding him to the wall were long enough to allow him to sit on the floor, so he would not have to sleep standing up. That is assuming of course that he did sleep. It was very possible he would spend his entire day trying to escape the trap he found himself in. I didn’t want to leave him with twelve hours of unmonitored time to try to get free, but I had little choice. The sun would be rising soon and I did not wish to spend the entire day trapped in this warehouse with him. Besides, I needed to run some errands before we started our next question and answer session.
I closed the door of the hidden prison and sealed it so he could not be heard if he decided to yell for help. After locking the concealed door and then securing the warehouse, I left to find a place where I could sleep and wait for darkness to come again.
CHAPTER 19
When the sun set the next evening, I was immediately awake and active. It seemed as time passed,
I became more attuned to the coming and going of the light. I could almost tell to the second when the sun rose and fell. It was not so much a solid knowledge on my part, but rather a feeling somewhere deep inside me that told me when it was safe to once more step outside and move about.
As I crawled out of my most recent hiding place I looked toward the western horizon and could still see the slightest of blue in the sky. I had cut it very close this time, and even that suggestion of daylight left my eyes burning and watering. I blinked, wiped a few tears from my cheeks and began to run. I wanted to get back to Victor as soon as possible. Every moment he spent alone was another moment he had to make his escape.
But even with this urgency looming over me, I needed to make one stop first.
Before returning to the warehouse, I took a detour to do some shopping. I found a small grocery store in a rundown neighborhood that had already closed for the day. Most of the shops in this area did not stay open past dark. At a certain point in the evening, the clientele that came into the store became more likely to make a forcible withdrawal from the cash register rather than put anything into it. The law of diminishing returns dictated that the best course of action was to close and lock up before this happened. Most of the people that lived in this neighborhood also preferred to keep themselves safely huddled in their homes once the sun had gone down. I stood in front of the crosshatched, metal grating now covering the front of the business and glanced around. Except for myself, the entire street looked deserted. Good. That was exactly why I had come here.
I pulled my shirt up to cover the lower half of my face, then made a noisy, ungraceful entrance through the security gate and front door. Locks are no real deterrent to me and, as the vampire hunter had said, I did not need permission from anyone to enter. Inside the market, I grabbed deli meat, cheese, and bread from the shelves. Off of the back wall I grabbed a bottle of red wine and a plastic jug of water then exited before police could respond to the silent alarm I knew I must have tripped on my not so delicate way in. I noticed a few surveillance cameras as I moved around the store and I was glad that I had taken a moment to at least partially cover my face before going inside. I wasn’t worried about fingerprints. The police were too busy to print every petty theft scene in the city, especially one that looked like a homeless man had broken in and only stolen food. I never touched the register. With no money missing, the shop owner might not even file a report on the break in. Besides, even if they did check for prints and by some miracle they found one of mine, what were they going to do when they got a match with a guy that had died in a car crash four years ago?
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