Slay: Stories of the Vampire Noire

by Slay (epub)

  The change that came over the leopard was instantaneous. Lips fell. Ears shot straight back, lying flat against the skull. The animal’s boundless rage was inexplicably gone—replaced by what I could only describe as fear. Fear, yes… but not for us.

  As I peered again into those darkened plains, I saw that the leopard was staring straight at the site we had passed. That collection of poles that stuck straight up in the air that had once been a camp, or lodge, but could not possibly offer shelter for something like the matsatsaku maza.

  At first, the noises were distant. A faint, high-pitched snarling that I recognized at once. Then the grass between us and the vertical poles began to rustle. Whatever was coming was moving fast and low to the ground.

  “Mirèlha.”

  I heard my name distantly, as if in a dream.

  “Take this.”

  The leopard was forgotten as was the knife in my hand. In that moment, all I could do was stare at the unseen death rustling through the grass, coming straight for us.

  “Damn it, woman!” That time, Nico’s voice came with a physical component. The handle of his garden hoe pressed into me—lengthwise across my chest. “I can’t do this alone.”

  Finally, I turned to him. To my partner. My friend. The first I had made in a long time. Then I pushed the garden implement back towards him.

  “You don’t have to.” I kneeled to pick up a piece of broken oar from the ground. The movement caused the leopard to hiss at me before scrambling out and away, disappearing into the dark savanna.

  “Shit,” I said with a sneer.

  “Forget the cat.” Nico had his battle-hoe up and ready. “We’ll find it again. Carry its carcass back to Jua and then eat like kings and queens.”

  From behind my mask, I grinned. “As long as we live through the next few minutes, you mean?”

  “Minutes?” Nico smiled. “Think this will last so long?”

  “Maybe-maybe,” I said without meaning to. The set of weapons felt strange and wrong, but I had survived with less. Still, I couldn’t stop wondering if I should lead with the kitchen knife or the broken piece of wood. But after another second passed, the grass parted, and I had something else to think about.

  The masatsaku maza were utterly hairless—their skin a perfect pitch black. But this only served to accentuate certain other features. The white teeth, the talon-like nails and those hideous eyes—solid red like whole cherries. All these things flashed, but Nico and I stood our ground. For with their emergence came a small measure of relief. These four, were the small kind. The sort of monster that still approximated the size and shape of men… or in this case, children.

  If I had to guess, none had been more than fifteen when they last felt the sun on their backs. And though I knew they were all far older than they appeared, it was difficult to trick my eyes.

  I had faced others like them before. Killed them too. But it had never been easy.“Get the cat.”

  I realized the pack’s alpha was a girl. She spoke Swahili, but never more than a few words at a go. Though I wasn’t fluent, I managed to keep up.

  “Take it home” She hissed. “We follow.”

  Something like that.

  I watched as two broke from the rest and vanished into the outer dark. Right then I felt a great swell of outrage in my chest. They were going after the leopard. Our fucking leopard.

  I knew that a single bite was all it would take to spoil the meat. And that thought, at that particular moment, made me very angry. No—angry isn’t the word.

  My arm muscles brimmed with frustrated, potential energies. And when the moment finally came, my body shot forward, straight past Nico, straight for the alpha. As I rushed, she stood there unconcerned. As if an errant breeze was coming her way instead of a thoroughly pissed off Ugandan.

  I think I heard my name, but it was too late for thought. Too late for anything to stop the knife—already thrusting down. Even so, the little bitch didn’t move. I can still feel her eyes and that ever widening, piranha-smile, searing into my retinas. Right then, I didn’t know what was making her so damned confident... but I learned.

  Three more appeared from the grass. Hitting me in the side like a careening truck. Adding their weight to the two already standing by her side as they slammed me to the ground. Even a single young leech is a dangerous thing and right then, I had a dogpile of five to contend with.

  In frustration more than anything, I screamed obscenities in their faces. For there I was again—on my back, struggling in vain, helpless, waiting for the end. I could feel them gripping my arms and neck and legs. Reaching down with little hooked fingers, giggling their insidious liquid giggles.

  Les enfants infernaux. That was the phrase that popped into my mind as I lay buried. Something my mother might have said.

  “Little shits!” The voice of Nico Bramsen roared—cutting through the ravening hiss like a choir of fucking angels. “You get off her!”

  One shrieked, leaving my ears ringing. There was a surge in the crushing weight and then, some much needed relief as two from the pile above were pulled away. I gasped to regain some of my lost air, then turned to my right. Nico’s homemade spear had gone all the way through the first one’s heart and into the ribs of the second. That was the one who had shrieked in my ear and it was shrieking still. The three still on top of me were distracted. Seizing the moment, I thrust my knife forward, plunging it directly into one of their chests. Then I reached out and pulled the screaming thing toward me—squeezing until I saw the point of the blade stick out of its back.

  As it happens, the stories got a few things right. Sun burns, garlic repels, and the heart is always the spot you aim for. Thing is, the killing blow can be dealt with a consecrated stake of white oak, a kitchen knife or pretty much anything else, as long as it goes all the way through.

  The leech slumped down, covering me like a shroud. It was dead. I had killed something that looked a lot like a child, but I couldn’t think of it like that. Had to remind my eyes that they were lying. That however this creature appeared, like its brothers and sisters, it was a predator. And worse, our competition.

  With a great roar of effort, I freed myself and got back on my feet. Adrenaline coursing, I spun on my heel to swing the piece of wood in my hand. The broken oar whistled and then it smashed one of those Goddamned leech kids square in the jaw!

  “The leader’s gone!” From the sound of Nico’s voice, I could tell he was actively fighting. “She’s going back to that camp—or whatever the hell it used to be.”

  Nico finished off the one he was fighting, and I turned to the one I had hit. It was rubbing its jaw and appeared to be afraid… or at the very least, uncertain. It was a boy, or at least, had been. Maybe eight or nine when turned.

  “I think she sent the others after the leopard.” I shouted without taking my eyes off the boy that wasn’t. “As alpha, they might wait for her to eat first, but our leopard will be torn apart in seconds. We can’t let that happen.”

  “I wholeheartedly agree.” Out of breath, Nico stepped to my side.

  United, we stared down the last of them. Les enfants infernaux. Watching as those solid red eyes flitted between us and the dark unknown. It reminded me of a little bird that wanted to fly. Despite everything I knew—everything I had seen and done to survive since the world went red, right then, there was only one thing I wanted.

  “Fly, little bird. Fly away and don’t turn back.”

  2

  It’s funny the bits that come back… and the ones that never do.

  When I try, I cannot summon the name of my first professor or the way my mother smelled when she gave me that last hug before bed. But after Nico and I killed the last of those baby leeches—when we were running straight for those poles, I remember the wind. How cool it felt on my hot, blood-spattered skin.

  Once we reached the poles, it was clear that Nico had been right. The site had been one of those open-air lodges, complete with the skeletons of eight tents
that had surely once catered to a special breed of tourist.

  Between the poles there were piles of various things I could not identify. I moved in closer and saw that all matter of things had been used. Some items, like broken chairs and other furniture, had probably been part of the lodge. Others looked to be personal belongings. Packs and clothes, even things that might be used as weapons. Then there were the bones. Animal and human alike. Thousands of them, gleaming in the light of the moon. Collected by earth’s newest apex and placed in tribute to that which replaced their God.

  “Maybe there’s something here we can use.” I approached a long wooden pole sticking out of a pile. I had lost my knife in the last tussle and had only the broken oar to defend myself with. “Do you see her?”

  “No.” Nico circled the naked tents, checking to make sure the alpha wasn’t hiding behind.

  “This makes no sense.” I pulled on the pole, hoping for something the length of a quarterstaff I could whittle into a point. “Leeches need four walls, a roof—and even then, they black out the windows.” I pulled again, harder this time. “How can there be a nest here? There is nowhere to hide.”

  “I don’t know. But I have heard stories of leech men doing some very strange things.”

  Having checked the last of the roofless tents, Nico leaned on his garden hoe. “There was a man I knew in Mozambique. Raul. He claimed to have come upon one of them, just as the sun was about to rise. It was lying there—dead, he assumed, but only until it turned its head. Locking its soulless, cherry eyes with his. And so, Raul just stood there, too afraid to do anything but wait for the rosy fingers of dawn to turn the damned thing to ash.”

  I stopped what I was doing then. Just listened as Nico went on.

  * * *

  “Eventually,” he said, “the leech just put its head back down. Right in the dirt. Then, just as the sun’s light was about to reach it, something happened. Something that my friend Raul could never have expected. The dirt reached up. Made the monster a part of itself.”

  “The dirt...” I repeated the word, unconvinced. “Reached?”

  “It’s how Raul described it,” Nico said. “As if the earth itself were trying to shield that leech from the sun. Protecting it in a kind of cocoon.”

  “Huh,” I said. “Sounds like Raul didn’t have both his oars in the water.”

  Nico snickered. “Maybe so. But as we both know just because something has never been seen before does not mean it isn’t happening.”

  I relinquished a nod. My mind drifted back to those early news reports—to the rampant jokes, tweets, and posts that made believing the impossible even harder.

  “Dirt cocoons,” I said knowing that I had no right or reason to disbelieve a damn thing. “You really think that is happening here?”

  “Me?” Nico poked at an overturned chair with the toe of his boot. “Heck, I’m just making conversation.”

  With a sigh, my hands returned to the wooden pole—gripping as tight as they could. Then, mustering one final pull, the thing came loose! Unable to stop myself, I stumbled back. My heart raced as I inspected at my hard-won prize. The tip of the spear was solid steel, maybe thirty-five centimeters long. Sturdy, relatively free of rust. I thrust the weapon forward in the air—once and again.

  “Yeah,” I said. “This will do.” Just then, my foot stepped on something that wasn’t earth. Glancing downward, I moved my foot in an arc—sweeping some of the dirt away. “Nico, check this out. There are boards here. I think it’s a deck or some kind of patio.”

  Though the light was low, once we knew what to look for, the repeating parallel lines were hard to miss. The boards had been set directly into the ground. My eyes followed them around two of the tents. Then I saw it. The ultimate amenity one insists upon when booking an authentic trip to adventure.

  “I’ll be damned.” Nico’s voice dripped with disdain as much as wonder. “It’s a pool.”

  “Of course. What else?” I said with a snicker. “You can’t get that authentic safari experience without a swimming pool.”

  With practiced caution, I approached the edge of the deep, rectangular hole and glared down. The old pool was lined with concrete and tile, but it held no water—only what appeared to be a number of huge, crumpled tarps.

  “Dirt cocoons, eh?” I said with far too much sarcasm. “More like the roofs to all these tents. Still, that must have taken some real ingenuity. Finding this place and seeing a potential home.”

  “Home…” His tone had a distant, thinking-out-loud quality. “Home is where you make it… where you take your bread and break it.”

  “Don’t think these kids are living on bread, Nico.”

  He laughed then, but it was thin—automatic and mirthless. The eyes of the old Saffa were pointing past the pool at the coming pair of pitch-black forms rushing toward us. One of them had something over its shoulder. Something tawny and covered in spots.

  At that point, I cursed in Hausa. Can’t remember what was said exactly, but I’m sure it was colorful. The pair who had been sent after the leopard were returning to discover they had a couple of uninvited guests in their parlor. At a distance of perhaps ten meters, I could see that the two leeches had only three eyes between them. Suddenly, the one I’ve come to think of as Tall Boy hurled his prize—the limp body of the leopard sliding in the dirt, rolling until it came to a stop by one of the tent poles. It was dark and I only spared a second’s glance, but right then, couldn’t tell if the animal was dead or simply stunned.

  The shorter of the two was missing an eye. It was the first to lunge and was the first to be cut down. First, Nico delivered a hard jab with the flat of the garden hoe’s head. Then he pivoted—swinging with centrifugal force, burying the edge into the meat of One-eye’s right side. It screamed. And then it didn’t. Though I had seldom seen him use it, the edge of Nico’s trusty hoe had been sharpened to a razor. After pulling back the weapon, Nico lashed out again with that sharpened edge. Separating the still wailing head of One Eye from its post.

  Preoccupied as he was, Nico couldn’t see the attack coming from behind. Didn’t know that his actions had sent Tall Boy charging with outstretched arms that seemed too long on its frame. Fortunately, that old Saffa had Mirèlha Nanji for his partner. A girl who, once upon a time, had chosen javelin over table tennis as her sport of choice. It had been years since I’d thrown, but I didn’t waste time remembering how. My arm and my eye remembered how to aim. My hand, just when to release. The spear whistled as it flew. And then it didn’t.

  And though my strike missed the heart, it gave Nico ample time to spin round and thrust with the stake end of his weapon. Finishing the lanky, slathering Tall Boy off in one, well placed hit.

  Nico and I regarded each other.

  Both of us were out of breath and covered in blood that was not our own. For a second, I thought we were done. That we had made it through.

  But there was something pulling at my attention. A rustling sound drew my eye down, down into the deep, rectangular hole in the ground. To the crumpled mass of tarps which I could now tell, were moving.

  My heart skipped. My fingers desperately clutching for the weapon I had already thrown.

  “Mirèlha!”

  I pivoted round to see my spear already flying through the air. Instinct took over. My hand reached out, seized the moving shaft in mid-flight. I turned then, but the weapon and the arm wielding it were promptly pinned in a position that denied leverage. The alpha leech had leapt out of the pool and was on me, above me, everywhere! Its legs wrapped around and under my arms, squeezing, forcing the air from my lungs! Though it weighed very little, the strength of that damned little leech was enormous. With every step I stumbled backward, its gaping mouth moved closer.

  I remember the teeth. How whitely they had gleamed in the moonlight. How perfect. Like slivers of solid pearl. One hand shot free and without a second’s hesitation, I drove a thumb deep into the left eye of my attacker. There came a shriek and an incre
dible relief of pressure. Finally, with the damn thing off me, I could breathe.

  I lashed out with the spear. The new extension of myself. It was my set of claws. My rage. My first strike went through its throat. The child-shaped thing I could find no pity for. The alpha seemed dazed. Its remaining eye, wide and red with surprise. I had the strangest sensation that it wanted to speak or maybe, just beg. Maybe-maybe.

  Before it could do any of that, I pulled the spear out and shoved it right through the thing’s heart.

  I remember how I felt then. Breathing, standing there amidst those naked tents and bones and piles of collected treasure with the inky blood of the alpha on my skin. I lifted the Babanki mask and swept my eyes over the camp. Then I turned to my friend. Nico was tired and maybe, older than either he or I liked to admit.

  Like he had done so many times before, the old Saffa offered me a smile. And though I did not return it, I did allow myself to feel triumphant. To believe that, for one damn second, we were safe. But safe was an outdated concept. Had been for twenty-five years. Les enfants infernaux may have all been dead, but I had forgotten about the leopard.

  It all happened so fast.

  First, I saw movement in the shadows. Then a flash of color.

  I cannot say when the animal had awakened, only that it did not waste the quiet moment. The attack was well planned, well timed. The leopard struck fast, sinking its teeth into Nico Bramsen’s throat.

  I wanted to scream and to vomit. To lash out with my spear—to rip the spotted devil apart with my bare hands. By God, I wanted to do all of it. But I didn’t. Couldn’t. I was frozen, bewitched by those yellow eyes. The very same I first saw up in the shadowy branches of an old acacia.

  So, I watched, gaping in horror as my friend was dragged away. As the animal we had tracked for most of a day pulled at his already limp form and then, began to run.

  Disappearing into the grass and the long, merciless hours of night.

  3

  Remembering is hard, but it is also important. However painful, I remember that last night with Nico as if it were yesterday. In fact, if I concentrate hard enough, I can even smell the air. Sweet and a little spoiled. Like compost under a hot Tanzanian sun. Like meat that’s gone to the worms.