Fire and Fantasy: A Limited Edition Collection of Urban and Epic Fantasy

by CK Dawn

  “Baron?” She raised her eyebrows in surprise and he could have kicked himself. Why did he have to go and mention the baron? She didn’t need to know about that. She didn’t need to know about anything.

  “Have you been a servant to the aristocracy?” she asked.

  “I’ve been to servant to all sorts, Missus. Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll just take my stuff and go.”

  The fat woman shook her head, the wig slipping slightly as she did so. “Not so fast. I think you owe me an explanation. Why do you have a box of mushroom compost and why is it so important to you?”

  “Oh it’s not really mushroom compost,” he said. “The baron done that so no one would suspect. It’s just mud, missus. English mud.”

  The woman sniffed disbelievingly. “Why would anyone need a box of English mud?”

  “Most people don’t,” he said, “but I do. It’s real important, Missus, I couldn’t have slept without it. I gotta go now. I gotta find a place before daybreak.”

  She waved her empty glass at him. “Make another drink will you. The last one was delicious.”

  “Missus, please,” he pleaded. “I gotta be on my way.”

  “I think you should call me Miss Phoebe.” Once again she waved the empty glass at him. “Another one, please.”

  “Yes, Miss Phoebe.” He took the glass from her and scurried back to the bar.

  With a great deal of huffing and puffing she levered herself up from the couch and stood leaning on the arm. “I still don’t understand why you need a box of English mud.”

  “It’s to sleep in,” he replied, concentrating on measuring out the tomato juice.

  “To sleep in?” She walked unsteadily towards him and stood staring into his face. “Don’t be ridiculous; why would you sleep in mud; unless it’s some kind of beauty treatment? You do have very nice skin, very pale and delicate; but of course you’re very young.”

  “Not really, Missus,” he said, thinking of how old he really was; how old he was going to be; how she would be dead and buried and he would still be pale and delicate.

  “Call me Miss Phoebe,” she reminded him. “So, you’re not really young, and you sleep in mud, and you really look quite good.”

  He held his breath. She was going to arrive at her own conclusion any minute and she wasn’t going to like it.

  “Well, it’s a very effective treatment,” she said. “Would it work for me?”

  “It ain’t no beauty treatment,” he said bitterly.

  “What other reason could you possibly have?” she asked.

  He tried to hand her glass but she suddenly threw her hands up in horror and screamed. “Oh my god! You sleep in mud every night. You have to find a place to be by daybreak. Oh no, no. You can’t be. The murders, the...oh my God. Oh my God. Vampire! Vampire!”

  She fell back onto the sofa warding him off with crossed fingers. He dropped the glass and heard it shatter on the floor. The force of her crossed fingers drove him backward across the floor and he heard himself screaming. She glared at him with terrified eyes, menacing him with her crossed fingers.

  “Get away, get away,” she shouted. “Don’t touch me.”

  “I’m not gonna hurt you,” he protested. “Please missus, stop screaming. Why are you screaming at me?”

  “Because you’re a vampire.”

  “Not a real one,” he assured her, keeping himself well away from her crossed fingers. “I’m not a real vampire; not like the baron.”

  “What do you mean, not a real vampire?” She raised her fingers again and he scrabbled further away. “If you’re not a real vampire, why are you afraid of my fingers?”

  “Well, I’m a sort of vampire,” he admitted, “but not the kind that would hurt you.”

  “All vampires are the same,” she hissed. “I’ve read the stories; ravishing women in their beds and sucking their blood...”

  “I ain’t ravished no women,” he declared. “I ain’t that kind of vampire. The baron, he’s a real vampire, and if I was one like him them crossed fingers of yours wouldn’t keep me away. Old as the hills he is, and pure evil. It would make your blood run cold just to see him. You wouldn’t be asking him for no Bloody Marys and getting him to take your trash downstairs. Please, missus, Miss Phoebe, put your fingers down. I wouldn’t harm you. I wouldn’t harm a pussy cat, well maybe a stray one, but not anyone’s pet.”

  She stared at him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Despite her menacing fingers, and her general air of fury, he realized that he was no longer afraid of the fat woman. Something else was happening, something much more important. He was feeling blood lust, the overwhelming desire to feed that blotted out all other feelings. He sniffed the air. Yes, there was something; something that would satisfy him.

  “You got mice,” he said.

  The woman shrugged her ample shoulders. “I might have mice,” she agreed. “I don’t know whee they come from. It’s not as though I leave food around. I hardly eat at all.”

  “I could catch ‘em for you,” he offered.

  He had her attention.

  “You’d have to put your fingers down,” he said.

  Slowly she lowered her fingers, and he felt himself able to move. “Alright,” she said, “but no monkey business.”

  He sprang to his feet and sniffed the air again. Yes, behind the sofa. He sprang across te cushions and dropped to the floor seizing his small brown meal with eager fingers. He stayed behind the sofa where she couldn’t see him. He knew how she would feel about the way he had to eat. Even after all these years he didn’t enjoy it himself; but it had to be done.

  At last he wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and set off for the front door. “I’ll be on my way now.”

  She was still staring at him with her frightened blue eyes. “You’re disgusting,” she said. “That was the most revolting thing I’ve ever seen or heard. You’ll have to hand me a chocolate. I have to get the taste out of my mouth.”

  It wasn’t in your mouth, he thought, but he followed her pointing finger and discovered a box of chocolates hidden beneath the cushion of the armchair.

  “Don’t touch anything with your fingers,” she ordered.

  He eased the box of chocolates out from under the cushion and presented it to her on the flat palm of his hand. As soon as she put the chocolate in her mouth he knew what he’d done. His thoughts ran in panicked circles around his brain. I’ve done it again. No, no, no, not again. Oh please, not again. I’m going to be caught.

  “Please, Missus, Miss Phoebe,” he said urgently, “please, just give me the word and I’ll be on my way and I won’t worry you anymore.”

  “What word?” she asked, through a mouthful of chocolate.

  “Just tell me I can go.”

  She stared at him. “You don’t need me to tell you to go,” she declared. “A strong young man like you, so quick on his feet, could hardly be stopped by a poor old woman like myself.”

  He desperately wanted to agree with her, but there were rules and he knew the rules. They’d been painfully learned over a great many years.

  “Actually,” he admitted, “you can stop me. You have stopped me. I’m sort of stuck here until you say I can go.”

  “And why is that?” she asked, selecting another chocolate.

  “I’d rather not say.”

  “You’d rather not say?”

  “Can I go? Please, Miss Phoebe.”

  The chocolates seemed to have calmed her, and he saw a quick intelligence in her face. He had taken her for a foolish deluded woman fancying herself irresistibly attractive to the opposite sex. What he saw now was an analytical brain at work. If he was any judge of character, and he’d had a long time to learn how to judge character, this woman was trying to find out how she could use her current situation to her own advantage.

  “I just want to get to the bottom of this,” she said. “You seem very nervous, but I’m the one who should be afraid of you. I assum
e that you were responsible for the dead body at the Amtrak station.”

  “Me?” he squeaked. “Blimey no, that weren’t me. I ain’t never. I know my place. Rats, cats, mice, that sort of thing. Not people, Miss Phoebe, not never, ever. That were my master, the Baron.”

  “Why do you call him your master?” she asked.

  He didn’t want to answer her. He didn’t want to explain. He’d said too much already; but there were rules and if she asked again, he’d have to tell her the whole miserable story. Fortunately, she didn’t repeat the question.

  “I need another drink,” she said.

  He went to the bar and selected another dusty glass. A horrible thought came into his mind. Perhaps she knew. Perhaps she knew all about him and that was why she was doing this. She was trying to keep him there and make him do all the things she needed him to do. No, he told himself; that was impossible. He’d chosen her address at random. There was no way she could possibly know. He went over it in his mind. She told me to come in, he thought, and I came in. Make me a drink, she said, and I made her a drink. Twice. And I ate something. I did that myself. What’s the matter with me? I’m doing it to myself.

  “Why can’t you leave?” she asked again. “Why do you need my permission?”

  He would have to answer her this time.

  He handed her the drink. “You’ve caught me, Miss Phoebe,” he said, “and it’s my own fault. See, I’m not the kind of vampire you read about in books. Nobody writes books about people like me. I’m a slave vampire. There are thousands of us and no one ever writes about us. We’re a secret; I mean if people knew about us, they’d be catching us all the time.”

  “Have I caught you?” she asked.

  “Well, sort of,” he replied. “Even a human can catch a slave vampire who is on the run, you know, one who don’t have no master, if they do the right four things. You invite them in, you make them perform a service, and you give them something to eat, and you did all that.”

  “That’s only three things,” she said sharply.

  “Yes, it is,” he agreed. He looked desperately around the room. He saw the danger and vowed not to be trapped. Not ever again. “I have to stay for an hour, that’s the rules. I have to stay and serve you for an hour, unless you let me go.”

  “And if I did this other thing?” she asked.

  “I’d have to stay for the rest of your life, or until you released me,” he admitted reluctantly.

  He saw eagerness in her expression.

  “I could have you as a slave?” she queried.

  He had to answer her. “Yes, Missus, unless the baron came and took me back.”

  “And how would he do that?”

  “If he took me native earth, I’d have to go with him, or I’d be dead soon as the sun came up. See, that’s why I have to get away. You don’t want him to come here and find me.”

  She said nothing and he disliked the speculative look in her eyes.

  “Anyway,” he added, “you can’t do the fourth thing. I’ve been very careful. I ain’t gonna get caught”

  “Why can’t I do the fourth thing?” she asked.

  “Because it’s not really up to you, it’s up to me,” he said, “and I ain’t gonna do it. This time I’m gonna get clean away. Every time I try to get away, I get caught, but not this time; this time I’m gonna do it. I ain’t going back to him. I’ve had a hundred seventy five years of him, and before him it was the Abbot, and before him… oh, too many people; too many to tell you.”

  “One hundred seventy five years,” she repeated weakly.

  “I go back a long way, Miss Phoebe,” he said. “A real long way.”

  “But I have you for an hour?” she asked.

  “That’s right, but I’d really like you to give me permission to leave. I really want to be getting along.”

  She took another sip of her drink and hobbled over to sit in the armchair. “I don’t think you should leave yet,” she said sweetly. “I get very lonely up here by myself with no one to talk to. My sister comes, but really talking to her is impossible. She’s just so full of herself; she doesn’t care about me. Always telling me to diet and exercise, as if I want to look like her, skinny little thing.” She gestured to the sofa. “Sit down. Go on, don’t mind about the dirt, we’ll clean that up later. Sit down and talk to me.”

  He sat cautiously on the edge of the sofa.

  “What’s your name?” she asked.

  Good question, he thought. What is my name? How many names should he give her?

  She noticed his hesitation and smiled gleefully. “That’s it, isn’t it? If you tell me your name, then I’ve caught you. I read that somewhere.”

  “Rumpelstiltskin.”

  “That’s your name?”

  “No, that’s where you read it. It’s a fairy story.”

  She nodded her bewigged head. “You could be lying to me,” she said.

  Lying, he thought, if only I could. “No” he said, “that’s a very clear law. Vampires don’t lie, not even master vampires. They can’t lie, not in answer to a direct question. Of course you have to ask the right question.”

  “So what is your name?” she asked.

  “Waterloo Station.”

  She wagged a finger at him, her rings glinting in the light. He saw that her red nail polish was chipped and the finger was slightly bent. Arthritis, he thought; the price of being human.

  “Waterloo Station is not a name, it’s a place,” she declared. “You told a lie.”

  “No, I didn’t,” he insisted. “That’s what the baron calls me. He renamed me after he caught me trying to escape from him. I was hiding out at the station and trying to get me box on a train, but he sniffed me out. So now he calls me Waterloo Station, just to remind me how he’s so clever and I’m so stupid.”

  “What do your friends call you?” she asked.

  Friends, he thought. How am I supposed to have friends? “I don’t have friends,” he said. “There’s people I see, other slaves like me. We see each other sometimes, out at night looking for food, but we don’t have names; we ain’t real people.”

  “I shall call you Wally,” she said.

  He nodded his head. It was a good name. Maybe he would keep it.

  “Where will you go, Wally” she asked, “when you leave here?”

  He thought about the shopping cart, the dream of walking away from the city, pushing the cart, just walking and walking away into the night.

  “I dunno, Miss Phoebe. I don’t know much about this city. We just arrived on the train from New York. The Baron couldn’t find what he wanted in New York; he said there was too many vampires there already. You wouldn’t believe it, Missus, some nights there was a vampire on every corner. The pickings was good for me, plenty of rats and mice and other stuff in Central Park, rabbits you know, and squirrels; but the baron’s looking for something special. He needs a new woman, a bride.”

  He saw Miss Phoebe’s expression change. “A bride?”

  She actually patted her hair. What on earth was wrong with her? Didn’t she understand what would happen to the baron’s bride?

  “He loses some of his powers when he don’t have a bride,” he said. “The last one got staked in New Orleans and he’s been looking ever since.”

  “Would his bride become a baroness?”

  He tried to choke down his rising panic. How long was she going to keep him with these ridiculous questions? How long would he be able to control himself and not do that last wrong thing?

  “Yes, Miss Phoebe,” he said, “she would be a baroness. Please, Missus, can I go now? I’ll just tiptoe away from here and it’ll be like I was never here. “

  “Well, I’m certainly not going to tell anyone about you,” said Miss Phoebe. “No one would believe me anyway. My sister’s the worst. She is just so nasty. Do you have a sister, Wally?”

  He thought back to a time so long ago that it was nothing but a misty memory. A face emerged. A little girl with brown hair
and a bright smile; a little girl who died before her time, but even if she had lived, she would still be lost now; lost in the mists of antiquity.

  “I had one once,” he said. “I don’t want to think about her.”

  “I don’t like to think about mine either,” Miss Phoebe said. “I did everything for her; changed her diapers, helped with her homework, walked her to school, but does she do anything for me? No, of course she doesn’t.”

  She paused in her criticism of her sister and for the first time her eyes truly engaged with Wally. He felt a momentary connection as though she actually recognized him as a human being, or at least a being; he had long ceased to be human.

  “Wally,” she said, “you’ve touched my heart, you really have. I feel sorry for you. I think your life has been almost as unhappy as my own. Of course I have this crippling pain in my legs and the diabetes is so inconvenient. I have to be so careful about what I eat.

  “So do I,” said Wally.

  “No sugar, nothing fried, no cakes, no alcohol, only low calorie meals,” she continued.

  “No fruit,” he said. “Nothing cooked, no cakes, no tea, nothing dead; only things that are still breathing.

  “I’m a prisoner in this apartment,” she declared. “It’s the water pills, you know. I have to take them to lose weight but then I don’t dare be far away from a bathroom....”

  “I need to be in my box by sunrise,” he countered.

  “Oh,” she said, “you’re not missing anything. There’s nothing going on in the daytime.”

  “I don’t know when I last saw the light of the sun,” Wally lamented.

  “Me neither,” she agreed eagerly and actually patted him on the arm. “I’m awake all night, and then I’m asleep all day.”

  She stared at him, as though his words had finally reached through her veil of selfishness. “You know,” she said, “I’d like to give you a little something; a souvenir so that you can remember your visit here.”

  “That’s very kind of you.”

  “Oh. think nothing of it,” she said dismissively. “Now, what can I give you?”

  She fingered the large fake diamond on her left hand and touched the crystal necklace at her throat. Obviously reluctant to part with these perceived treasures, she allowed her bulbous blue eyes to range around the apartment. She finally settled on a partially unwrapped gift on the dining table. “I could give you this,” she said. “Yes, I think you would appreciate it. When you’re out on your own you’ll need to be a lot more careful about your appearance and right now you have blood at the corner of your mouth. It’s really quite disturbing.”