I nodded. “You’re right. I don’t. But if you can help me locate Alice, perhaps I could be persuaded to allow you to leave. Older vampires like you, after all, feed much less regularly than younglings. Your existence is more tolerable than theirs.”
“She stole your abilities,” Wolfgang said. “That’s why no one can find her. She doesn’t appear as herself. She’s a vampire, but she shifts into whatever form her victims most desire.”
I took a deep breath. “I know how my own powers work.”
“Then you realize that catching her is like looking for a needle in a haystack… if the needle looked exactly like a piece of straw.”
“I realize it must be difficult…”
“Not difficult. Impossible,” Wolfgang said. “Unless…”
I stood there staring at the vampire, waiting for him to finish his thought. But he didn’t. “Unless what?”
“Unless you were working with a nightwalker,” Wolfgang said. “A vampire formerly of the Order of the Morning Dawn. One who knew her habits, the places she’d likely hide, the victims she’d likely claim.”
“And you know where I could find a vampire like that?”
“I do,” Wolfgang said. “But if you’re going to kill me anyway…”
I sighed. “Tell me.”
The vampire smiled at me. “In my human life, I was known as Wolfgang Fabricius Capito. Before the Order of the Morning Dawn existed, there was Der Orden des Erzengels Michael.”
I bit my lip. As an elemental, I’d learned a number of languages. Not well. My vocabulary was generally limited to whatever I’d acquired in song. But I knew enough. “The Order of Michael the Archangel?”
Wolfgang nodded. “Only after we came to the new world, as a group of preachers, Christian protestant humanists, did we adapt our order to the religious community of the new world. Der Orden des Erzengels Michael became the Order of the Morning Dawn. That particular aspect of the Order wasn’t developed until after Alice was turned. But I came before her, bitten and drained by the original vampire, Niccolo the Damned. Healed by faith.”
“I thought Alice was the first nightwalker.” I’d chosen to ignore the whole idea of faith-healing. I mean, seriously? Aside from the dubious question about whether faith is even capable of healing, why would faith be used to cheat death, escape the grave, and make someone into something more devilish than godly? No matter which god one purports to place his faith in.
Wolfgang nodded. “She was. The nightwalkers were the result of a particular initiative by the Order’s chapter in Rhode Island. I only joined them later, but I was a part of an older line that predated the Order. Very few members of the Order knew I even existed. But I was sent to this world to ensure that the Americas didn’t become a haven for vampires or witches. Ironic, perhaps, since I was a vampire. But I was also zealous. Committed to the cause. And for the most part, I suppose, I was successful.”
“And you know Alice well enough to know how I could find her?”
“I used to be her partner. As the only vampire the Order had worked with, it was natural that she and I would be placed together after she was first turned. I was the only vampire they could trust. The only one who could help her contain her initial bloodlust. I suppose, if you think about it, I’m something of an adopted sire to her,” Wolfgang said. “If anyone can find her, it’s me.”
3
I LEFT WOLFGANG chained to his chair. He was seated at the Edge of Hell—not just the artificially haunted human attraction. Literally, if I wanted, I could dispatch him to vampire hell.
Certainly I was tempted to do just that…
But what if he was telling the truth? Was he really Alice’s former partner and, even more, did he have information that might help me track her down?
It was risky.
Trusting a vampire is about as advisable as cuddling a viper. For most people, anyway. I wasn’t sure how a snake’s venom might impact me. I’d never been bitten by anything before Alice…
Not even a mosquito. They generally only bite things that bleed. I’m made of water—that’s my element. Because, well… until about five years ago, I was a water elemental.
I only had one friend who knew the truth about me: my roommate, Donnie. She was a trans woman. Like me.
I didn’t know what I was before I met her. I just knew that after I couldn’t return to the water, venturing nude into the human world for the first time garnered a lot of unwelcome stares.
I’d walked into a clothing store completely naked. The owner assumed I’d been mugged. Beat up. Whatever. He told me to take my pick from the discount rack. Anything I wanted—it was on the house.
Nice guy, right?
Until I picked what appealed to me the most. A form-fitting red dress…
“So that’s why you got the shit beat out of you?” he asked.
I’d looked at him, puzzled. It didn’t make sense. He’d told me to pick what I liked—so I did. I didn’t pick a dress for any specific reason. I just liked it. And given the fact that I had a strange appendage dangling between my legs, it seemed appropriate. I mean, why in the world would I want to cram that thing into pants?
It wasn’t all logic; the dress just felt right. The moment I saw it, I knew it was me. So I wore it and, with the storeowner rolling his eyes, I left.
Sure, a lot of folks stared. A totally different response than I got when I was walking around in the buff. I mean, when I was naked, people tended to look away as if my appearance hurt their eyes. And they were praying when they did. Why else would so many of them say, “Oh God,” or, “Dear Lord” when they saw me? I mean, they were shielding their eyes as if they were encountering the Almighty.
Clearly, I presumed, my nude form was too majestic for human eyes.
But now I was clothed, rocking a red dress and heels, and people were doing double-takes. I figured it was because I was so damned good looking.
Whenever I assumed human form, I tended to be abnormally attractive. Shifting into whatever a victim might find the most alluring tends to result in me taking any number of beautiful forms.
I spent weeks on the streets like that.
Eventually I started to put two and two together. Human males tended to dress one way, human females another way. I had the parts, the plumbing, that suggested I should conform to whatever a human male was supposed to do, but that didn’t feel right to me. I loved my dress. I watched women in heels—not because I desired them or was checking them out. It was because I envied their shoes…
I was confused. Why did I feel the way I did? Why was it that men and women had to act in certain ways, dress certain ways, if they wanted to blend in and go unnoticed?
I eventually secured my first set of heels. Nothing that I’d wear now. I’d pulled them out of a dumpster behind Goodwill. I still have the pair stashed away in my closest for nostalgia’s sake.
Then I learned more. Over time, I refined my tastes. I discovered designer shoes.
Christian Louboutin. Jimmy Choo. Guiseppe Zanotti. Sergio Rossi. All men responsible for some of the most luxurious designs in women’s footwear. Did people really expect these savants not to wear their own designs?
Bitch, please! How could they resist?
I didn’t feel like a man wearing women’s shoes. I felt like any other woman. The higher the heel, the better my ass looked in the mirror.
I was a natural. The way I glided down the sidewalk… like it was my own personal runway.
Let people stare.
I mean, all these humans had ever been to me before was dinner, anyway. Why should that change? I didn’t need their approval. I was doing me.
But then I encountered Donnie. I met her doing what I’ve since learned was one of our favorite activities—we were both shoe shopping.
She was like me.
She had a body that people told her made her a “boy” when she was born. But ever since she was a child, she’d gravitated to girls’ clothes. She preferred Barbies to action f
igures. She insisted that her parents let her grow her hair long, that she decorate it with barrettes. Not trimmed short or spiked like the boys.
Donnie told me that we were what is called “transgender.”
I shrugged when she told me. The word was meaningless. Of course, my vocabulary was relatively limited. I knew what I knew from my various shifts, when I’d change shape to hunt humans. Back when I was an elemental, my mind also shifted to speak a language that would resonate with the ear when I sang.
And the word “transgender” wasn’t one I ever recalled singing. I didn’t have any context for it.
In truth, the whole notion of gender was foreign to me.
Sure, I’d experienced male and female humans. But for the most part, aside from non-universal tendencies toward slightly different body compositions—more or less lean meat to chew on—they tasted the same.
The thing about elementals: we never had genders. For us, gender was fluid because, well… everything about us was fluid, in the most literal way possible.
We didn’t have communities at all, strictly speaking. From time to time our essences would intermingle. We’d come into contact with another of our kind and… whoops… we’d reproduce. Then we’d go on our merry ways. Each parent, and the child, going their own ways. Forging their own existences.
Things were just different.
Now, that life seemed like a dream. I couldn’t shift to whatever form I wanted. What I became was wholly dictated by my prey. What would he, or she, find most alluring? That’s what I became.
If I was going to eat you, and you were into buxom blondes, that’s what I’d be. Suppose you were attracted to well-built athletes with ripped muscles and an artificial tan. I’d appear as exactly that.
If you were in love, I’d appear exactly as the one you adored.
The vampire who bit me was apparently into insanely pretty men.
I’d always become someone’s version of attractive, someone’s ideal. That was the first step in the hunt.
The second step was to combine my physical allure with my singing voice—a voice that all of our kind shared, one unparalleled by any species. If all you heard me do was sing, you’d believe I was an angel.
Who could resist?
In all my existence, and over my many thousands of feeds, no one had yet. Not until that night…
I didn’t even know vampires were a thing, much less that getting bitten by one would leave me trapped in my current form. Unable to shift back.
Or that the vampire would thereby acquire my abilities.
Was Wolfgang a reliable lead? If I cut out his heart, I’d never know for sure. But if I kept him alive, there was a chance…
A chance he’d turn on me and kill me.
But also a chance he’d lead me to Alice.
“What took you so long?” Donnie asked, her hands on her hips as I stepped through the door.
“I’m not your ho,” I quipped back. “Why do you care?”
“Word is you ran out on your set,” Donnie said. “You insisted on performing there… I said it wasn’t a good idea. You’re not a queen, Nicky.”
I scratched my head. The LGBT community in Kansas City isn’t exactly small—but compared to other major cities, it’s certainly more intimate. With the aid of social media, gossip spreads faster than herpes.
I shouldn’t have been surprised that Donnie had already heard I’d skipped out on my second number. And she’d never been comfortable with me singing there. I won’t say she disapproved of it, exactly. But she had legitimate concerns.
“I know I’m not a queen,” I said matter-of-factly.
“Then why sing at a drag show, Nicky?”
I sighed. “We’ve been through this before. It’s the only place I could score a gig.”
Donnie shook her head. “It just reinforces stereotypes. If you’re a trans woman and you sing, people are going to assume you’re a queen. But you’re not. Drag queens are men—mostly gay men, but you and I know that’s not a hundred percent true. They dress up in drag first because they enjoy it, and second they perform to give the proverbial finger to what culture says it means to be masculine.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’ve given me the gender studies lecture before, Donnie. I get it.”
“But do you?” Donnie said. “When we perpetuate stereotypes…”
“We aren’t all the same, Donnie,” I said. “Being trans isn’t the only thing that makes me who I am. I’m also a singer. And since none of the other clubs will give me a chance…”
“How many other clubs have you tried?”
“All of them,” I said. “Every one I could find. And every one of them said I had a fantastic voice, but they all had excuses.”
Donnie sighed. “I’m sure they did…”
“‘We’re not looking for a gimmick,’” I said, beginning a litany of reasons why the other club owners in the city had rejected me. “‘You just don’t have the look we’re looking for…’ ‘I personally support what you’re doing, but it would just be too controversial here…’ ‘Trans performers don’t play well in the Midwest…’ Do I need to keep going?”
Donnie sighed, sat down on the couch, and crossed her legs. “I suppose I get where you’re coming from.”
“If anything, isn’t being trans about living out your genuine self? If I can’t sing, if I can’t perform… That’s as much a part of me—more, in fact—than my gender. I’ve had singing as long as I’ve existed. I only got into a world where gender mattered a few years ago.”
Donnie nodded. “It isn’t easy trying to navigate this life in a world that’s constantly saying you don’t belong.”
I nodded. Donnie was the only human who knew my story. Well, aside from a few of the nurses back at the asylum in New Orleans. When Donnie and I met, she immediately saw I was out of sorts. I was dejected. Wandering the streets, trying to come to grips with what I was.
At first she figured I was full of shit. She pretended to believe me when I told her my story. Secretly, she later admitted, she was looking for mental health services.
I realized that my story sounded crazy.
But she was kind. She understood more about me than anyone else. And I had to tell someone. I had to have at least one person who knew my truth. My whole truth.
But I wasn’t full of shit. I was full of water. Figured that one out when I shaved my legs, nicked myself, and I didn’t bleed.
I leaked.
I patched myself up, sewing the gouge shut with a few stitches from my hair. But Donnie was there. She saw it…
And she didn’t judge me. She accepted me.
She gave me confidence again. She helped me believe that being me was okay. If it wasn’t for her, I never would have gathered the courage to chase Alice down to New Orleans and back again to Kansas City. If it wasn’t for her, who knows what would have happened to Gina earlier that evening… If I hadn’t been there, if I hadn’t staked—or heeled—Wolfgang…
“So,” I said, “I have a vampire chained up at the Edge of Hell.”
“You what?” Donnie asked. “Just left there in chains?”
I nodded. “He says he knows Alice. If he can lead me to her…”
Donnie took a deep breath. “Would that make you happy?”
“To find Alice? Of course it would. I mean, I’ve been obsessing over that ever since I lost my abilities.”
“But is going back to your old life what you really want?” Donnie asked. “You’ve described what it was like to be an elemental before. You’ve used a lot of words. But happiness has never been one of them.”
I shrugged. “It was a simpler life. Maybe I wasn’t happy, but I knew what I was. I knew who I was.”
“And you’d go right back to eating people again?” Donnie asked. “After you’ve gotten to know us?”
“I wouldn’t eat you. I’d only eat assholes.”
Donnie laughed. “You should choose your words more carefully, Nicky.”
My eyes widened as it dawned on me what I’d actually said. “No, I mean…”
“I know what you meant,” Donnie said. “Think about this. Say you find this vampire, Alice. You kill her. What if you can’t get your old abilities back? What if once she took them, they can’t be returned?”
I shook my head. “Then I’ll know. At least I’ll know it’s done. But I think if I eat her heart…”
Donnie winced. “Eat a vampire heart?”
I nodded. “It has to work, right? I mean, it’s the best chance.”
“Seems like a gamble,” Donnie said. “It might also turn you into a vampire, right?”
I shook my head. “No, I’d have to be drained of my own blood and healed again. Only then… and I don’t know if consuming a vampire heart as a bit. I mean, maybe there’s something about the bite itself…”
“Never been done before?” Donnie asked. “I’m shocked!”
“Right? I mean, who hasn’t had a craving for vampire heart now and again?” I smiled slyly.
Donnie grinned. “Meeting you has been one of the strangest experiences of my life, Nicky.”
“Likewise. Of course, everything about my human existence has been strange. So don’t think that makes you special or anything.” I winked so she’d realize I was just giving her crap. Truthfully, I’d be lost without her.
And it wasn’t like she didn’t have a point. About everything. About performing with queens. I mean, you’d be surprised how many straight folks don’t realize the difference between men who dress in drag and trans women.
Donnie was right.
We aren’t the same.
But we also aren’t all that different. We’re all just expressing our true selves. We’re all fighting for the right to be the men, or women, that we are without other people telling us what it means to be what we know we are already.
But then again, I didn’t even know the difference between men and women at all until I became human. Or human-ish.
I hadn’t struggled with these issues my whole life.
Not like Donnie.
I just wanted to sing. It was the only thing I could do that resembled what I used to be. It’s the one thing I retained from my former self.
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