A Guide to Vampire Hunting: ...and other failures (Alchemy Inc. Book 1)

by Janus Alexander

  “Where are we going?” Amelia asked, following Kristoff out. She was already planning the grilling she’d give him in the car.

  Kristoff didn’t falter in his stride, just kept moving toward the door in determination. “Back to my place, to plan.”

  Amelia glanced back to where Anya was still standing watching them, Anya gave a small smile and seemed to look threateningly at their retreating backs. “She doesn’t seem to like me very much.”

  Kristoff pulled open the doors and began to go around back of the shop. “That’s her problem.”

  “No, she seemed to be suggesting it was some sort of problem of mine.”

  Kristoff sighed deeply, “Anya has never been very fond of anyone getting close to Kolya or I, it’s jealousy on her part.”

  “And the lordship comment?”

  “Anya has never dropped our titles from her vocabulary, she’s very old fashioned. Her family has been attached to ours for generations,” He replied dismissively. The two of them reached the private parking lot behind the antiques store and came to Kolya’s Karmann Ghia Kristoff unlocked it and opened the passenger side door for her. Amelia got in, still troubled by what hadn’t been said by everyone involved.

  With Amelia settled in the car, Kristoff swung himself into the driver’s side and snapped the door closed. He exhaled tiredly, “Just ignore Anya. She’s a pest and always has been. I let Kolya deal with her mostly. Now, I have noticed in the time we were apart you became relatively proficient at Japanese short sword, I thought we would go over your fighting style to get to know each other’s rhythms.”

  Amelia forced herself to let go of the conversation till a later time, and responded warily. “Alright, but I thought we were making plans to take out Gianni.”

  “Practice first, but we will be doing that as well,” assured Kristoff. He darted out into traffic and eyed the road carefully.

  “What are you watching for?”

  “A tail. You don’t think Gianni will be in any way daunted by a car do you? He could just have the thing straifed with bullets to get to you. But then,” he continued. “He’s probably still attempting not to damage you. He already lost your sister to carelessness.”

  “Carelessness? He just killed her.”

  “I’m starting to think that he didn’t actually mean to do that, but then I may be wrong. It sounds like a feeding frenzy. I think it’s important that he returned the body as well. He was goading your family for some reason.”

  Amelia paused, considering Gianni’s intention of capturing her rather than killing, in that light it did seem odd he’d killed Mona. Not to mention that he returned Mona’s body to their doorstep. But then, her family didn’t know who was responsible for Mona’s death - so what sort of taunt would that be? Amelia shook her head. “If he was trying to start a war with the Dagdas - he should have been more forthcoming about his guilt in the matter.”

  “That is odd. - Unless he assumed that it would be obvious. Does your family have a history with the Italian clans?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Hmmm.” Kristoff seemed to be lost in thought. But he looked up into the rearview mirror and jolted. “I hate when I’m right. Hold on.”

  Amelia looked behind her, a large black SUV was cutting and weaving toward them at impressive speeds. Whoever was behind the wheel seemed to know that, while the Karrman Ghia could outrun them on a straight-away, it would be hampered by traffic in a city. “This looks bad. They have weight and inertia on their side…”

  Kristoff jerked the wheel and shot across four lanes to pull into an alley way. Once inside he gunned the car and darted down toward where it let out onto another road. The SUV, to a chorus of honking, followed.

  At the mouth of the alley, Kristoff and Amelia came to a one way street and paused. Kristoff seemed to be weighing his options. So when he darted all the way across the three one way lanes of the road, into another alley almost directly across it, Amelia grabbed the side handle and tensed in fear. As they cleared the street she glanced back to look and see if the SUV had followed. It seemed to be stymied by the one-way street and stalled at the mouth of the last alley. She heaved a sigh.

  “Don’t assume we’re out of the woods yet, we don’t know that that’s the only car following us.” Kristoff warned. And no sooner did he say that, but another SUV swung into place behind them. “I think we had better try losing them in the tunnel.” At which point he executed another dangerous turn and then darted out toward the warf.

  “This is taking up too much time.”

  “Really, we’re in a high-speed car chase and all you can say is it’s wasting your time.”

  “Well it is.”

  “Then we’ll try to make this quick,” Kristoff growled, and made another turn onto another one way street, then proceeded to go the wrong way down it. Weaving through oncoming cars. “Better?”

  Amelia was hunched back in her seat staring in terror out the front windshield. “Sure.”

  Suddenly one of the SUVs came from in front of them, barreling at speeds suggesting that they really weren’t against a head-on collision. To Amelia’s chagrin, Kristoff gunned it toward them. “I’m not sure this is wise.” Amelia gasped out.

  “Trust me,” said Kristoff grinning. The distance between the two cars continued to shrink until Amelia could see the image of the Karrman Ghia in the blackened windshield of the oncoming car. But at the last minute, Kristoff jinked around them into the right lane, and without slowing, slung them through the mouth of another alley and out onto another thoroughfare. Luckily on the correct side of the road this time.

  Kristoff slowed, then pulled sharply into a parking garage and turned off the car. Amelia gasped for breath. He just exhaled deeply and grinned. “Man,” he said punching the wheel. “That was fun! Even more fun than the tunnel would have been.”

  Amelia looked over at him like he was mad. “Sure… So how long do we have to sit here?”

  Kristoff glanced at his Breitling. “I’d give it twenty minutes.”

  Amelia sighed and relaxed back into the deep bucket seats. “Then shake me in twenty minutes, I think I need to take the time to have a breakdown.”

  “Aw, I thought we might have a nice chat about your upcoming sculpture.” He teased. Amelia gave him the stink eye. He smiled. “I was also going to propose a new art project.” Amelia rolled her eyes. “No, I think you’ll like this one - we’re going to take some shots of an abandoned warehouse.”

  “Now that would be a new direction for your art. Not.”

  “But you haven’t even asked which one.”

  Humoring him, Amelia asked, “Which one?”

  “Gianni’s base of operations.”

  Amelia jerked up, “You know where his lair is?”

  “I’d be a bad hunter if I didn’t know where every clan kept their home.”

  “Ok,” Amelia crossed her arms over her chest. “So what’s the plan?”

  “Go there tomorrow in daylight, crossing the rooftops, and scout it out. Take surveillance shots of how it’s guarded and any opportunities it offers.”

  “Daylight photography, I didn’t know you were capable.” Amelia snorted.

  Kristoff gave a fake look of hurt, “I may prefer shooting at night, but that doesn't mean I can’t do it in daylight.”

  “Sounds good. But what about Gianni’s wandering guards that are looking for me?”

  “They’ll probably be staking out your place and your parents’ to make sure you don’t come home. They’’ll assume you’ll need to return to somewhere you know eventually.”

  “What about your home?”

  Kristoff smiled, “Remember, I pay a lot for my privacy. What sort of hunter would let his own lair be pinpointed?” Amelia gave him an annoyed glare, he shrugged. “You’re new to this, mistakes will be made. Besides the Dagdas are pretty transparent about their territory.”

  Amelia sighed. “Has it been twenty minutes yet?”

  Kristoff once
more looked at his watch, “We’re good.” Turning on the car, he quickly squealed out of the space, and they left from the opposite entrance to the garage than they came in from.

  Amelia huffed and looked at the clock, “At this rate we won’t be home before one am. What a waste of time.”

  “You and your waste of time. This is the reality of hunting. You hunt them, they hunt you.”

  “It would be polite of them to just stand still and wait for me to kill them.”

  “But if they did, what would be the fun in that? It adds spice to life!”

  “From your lips, to God’s ears,” Amelia muttered, as she settled in to watch as they made their way home.

  Chapter 28

  By the time they got to Kristoff’s apartment around one in the morning, Amelia was beginning to waver on her feet from exhaustion. Kristoff smacked her roughly on the butt. “Wake up! You’re always falling asleep on the job.”

  Amelia glared at him. “It’s been a long day, I’m tired.”

  “The day’s not over. I need to gauge your skill with a blade and see what you learned in that second-rate dojo.” Kristoff teased. “Go upstairs and change.”

  Amelia stomped up the stairs to Kristoff’s bedroom and stared at the big bed with longing, then changed into some of the clothes she’d managed to take from her apartment. Without meaning to, Amelia sat on the bed and giving in, and throwing her arms wide, flopped back - she’d relax…just for a moment.

  “Amelia, get off the bed and come on!”

  “How do you know I’m on the bed!”

  “Well aren’t you?”

  “I hate you!” She yelled back, getting up.

  “No you don’t, or you would have gone into the guest room to change.”

  Amelia blushed and glanced at his bathroom. She was doing a bad job of going slowly with him. Amelia came back down the stairs, and met Kristoff in the kitchen. He immediately handed her a cup of coffee. “Come on, we’ll make this a short melee. We will need to be up tomorrow to go after Gianni’s base.”

  “Aren’t you going to change?”

  Kristoff shook his head no, “This is close to what I wear hunting, we should practice like it’s the real thing.” He bolted his own cup of caffeine. “Let’s go.”

  Amelia too downed her cup, wincing at how it burned going down, and followed him to his practice space. Inside, Amelia found her sword sitting on top of his weapons chest. She picked it up and pulled it from its wrapping and sheath. Then Kristoff opened the box and pulled out two hunting daggers like Mona’s. He paced to the center of the room and gestured for Amelia to join him. Amelia stood across from him and put her sword en garde. No sooner did she do this but Kristoff shot his foot out at her shin and jabbed with his right hand. Amelia quickly stepped back from his kick and met his blade with her own. He smiled.

  Amelia raised an eyebrow but didn’t give in to his pause, still strung tight for his next move.

  “You’re learning.”

  Amelia took his momentary pause to make chitchat to dart out at him and bring the blade towards his neck. He just barely blocked it with his left knife guard, but then crossed his right dagger around her sword as well, momentarily trapping it. He too raised an eyebrow.

  Amelia glared, her blade was sharper, and she yanked it free with a short gruff pull. In response, he swung his left blade back at her exposed abdomen. Amelia swept the sword down to meet it in an echoing clang. Then she jabbed at his stomach. He jumped back quickly. Amelia pressed her advantage, drawing her blade into a clean arc, going for his left hand as it pulled out of her reach. Kristoff barely caught it with his knife guard. He stepped back.

  “I was wrong, your dojo wasn’t so bad after all.”

  Amelia fell back into a crouch. As she did, Kristoff dropped a roundhouse kick at her feet and Amelia went tumbling. Pressing his advantage, he went to go at her from above. But Amelia rolled and hopped back to her feet the way he’d shown her at the bridge that first night. She swept her blade at his exposed legs as she rose. Kristoff stepped off, quirked his eyebrow, and then came at her in force.

  Soon their blades rang like shrill chimes around the room, as Amelia’s sword and his knives pushing the battle back and forth from offense to defense. The balance of conflict wavered as each moved forward and back in a tension of see-sawing dominance. For once, Amelia wasn’t the only one grunting in effort.

  Several times Kristoff used the guard of his knives to try to disarm Amelia, and several times she used the momentum of his thrust to almost disarm him.

  Finally, the last time he shot his dagger out to hook her blade, she used his close move to swing around and punch him in the face like she had learned in boxing. Kristoff pulled back quickly and rubbed his cheek. “Unexpected. I like it.” He shrugged the tension out of his shoulders with a roll. “I have one suggestion though.”

  “I spent a lot of time working on my own so as not to hear your condescending ‘suggestions.’”

  Kristoff grinned and flipped one of his blades end over end, catching it by the point. “Here,” he said, offering her the knife hilt-first. Amelia narrowed her eyes. “Not a trick,” he assured her. “I think you would be more effective with both a reach weapon and one for close in.”

  Amelia took the knife and weighed it, then transferred the sword to her right hand and the knife to her left. Kristoff bent over and pulled another blade from the side of his boot. Amelia narrowed her eyes. “That is cheating. I didn’t know that was there.”

  “What you don’t know, can hurt you.”

  Glaring, Amelia gestured for them to continue the fight. This time, when Kristoff caught her sword between his blades, Amelia darted in at his side with the knife. She stood back and nodded, looking at the second weapon. “I think I like this.” Kristoff took her moment of distraction to kick out at her sternum and strike out to her chin.

  Amelia was quickly caught off-balance pulling away, at which point he grabbed her falling feet and yanked her ankle out from under her. Amelia grit her teeth, and as she fell, kicked out with the opposite leg to detach him. When he let go, Amelia rolled to a crouch and did her own roundhouse kick, knocking him off his feet. Kristoff laughed, sitting up to prop his wrists on his knees and breathe. “Nice.” Then he stood and sheathed one knife back in his boot and reached to help her up. Amelia looked wary. Kristoff gestured that the match was over, and nodded his head to his hand.

  Amelia took the hand and started to stand, at which point he yanked her and she fell against his chest. She huffed out a laugh. “I thought we were finished.”

  “Not yet. I think we should take this upstairs instead.”

  Amelia awoke in another of Kristoff’s t-shirts around one in the afternoon the next day and stretched. She was sore from their fight in the dojo - and the one after as well. Kristoff was wrapped around her from the back, and sunlight filtered weakly through his dark curtains. Amelia elbowed him in the side. Kristoff clutched her tighter, gave a sleepy annoyed huff and tried to settle back into sleep. So she did it again.

  “Are you trying to start something?” he growled sleepily.

  “We need to get up. We need to go stake out Gianni’s place today while it’s still daylight.”

  Kristoff groaned. “Right.” He rolled off the bed onto his feet, and Amelia untangled herself from the sheets. She stretched again and went to her backpack for new clothes. Kristoff blearily riffled through his dresser. “You know, I have room in my drawers for your meager selection of clothing. You don’t need to live out of your backpack.”

  Amelia froze, moving her stuff in with his seemed to suggest that he thought her living there was going to be more…permanent. She frowned. “No, I don’t want to settle in when I’ll need to move back into my apartment after this.” She could feel Kristoff’s gaze on her as she tried to avoid his eyes. Amelia glanced up and he shrugged. “You’re leaving, remember?” She reminded him. Kristoff frowned and tried to hide his disappointment. Amelia felt awkward, and tried
to brush it off. “I think we should skip breakfast and just get going,”

  Kristoff paused like he was going to say something, but stopped. “As you wish.” He shrugged noncommittally.

  Amelia straightened after dressing and went downstairs to the kitchen, leaving him to dress. She pursed her lips. He hadn’t denied his intent to leave, she had to remember that Kristoff was only around until his next hunt. Elsewhere. So she couldn’t let herself get too attached. Amelia started the coffee pot and leaned against the counter, soon Kristoff joined her. He studied her momentarily, “Thanks for starting the pot.” Amelia smiled and nodded, trying to regain their comfortable companionship. Kristoff’s gaze left her and his expression immediately changed, he ruffled her hair. She really hated that, and she suspected he knew it. “Ready to return to your rooftop stake outs?” He teased. The coffee pot pinged and stopped, Amelia poured out two cups.

  “Definitely.”

  Kristoff took his cup and moved to the guest room, coming back with his Nikon. Amelia raised her eyebrow. “Is that your ad-hock photography studio? I saw you move your stuff in from the warehouse a few weeks back.”

  He slung his camera over his shoulder. “Had to put it somewhere.” Kristoff drained his cup of coffee in that disconcerting way that he bolted hot liquids. Amelia shook her head and kept sipping, she wasn’t going to scald herself again trying to keep up with him.

  “So where is this hideout we’re going to case?”

  Kristoff grinned, “In the bad, bad, part of Hell’s Kitchen. We should be good about hiding from Gianni’s thugs if we’re careful. But there are still plenty of hoods to deal with.”

  Amelia finished her coffee. “Then we shouldn’t drive one of your flashy cars.”

  “We’ll take the metro,” he responded in the affirmative. Amelia grabbed her coat from the couch.

  “You ready?” She asked. Kristoff went to the banister and picked up his leather duster.

  “After you,” He said punching the button for the elevator. “Let’s go.”

  The metro ride was uneventful, but still reminded Amelia of their trip to the sculpture park. Once more Kristoff’s good looks and striking dress attracted attention of both sexes, and the way he stood holding the overhead strap even looked arrogantly self-assured. Amelia huffed, maybe Anya had something when she said that Kristoff wasn’t someone to be seen with her. Kristoff looked back, grinned playfully at her and winked.