Bloodlines

by Drew D'Amato

Vlad and his men have the power to put a human into a trance. Radu’s men do not have this trick. They get their information from more coercive methods. When a human is in a trance they cannot hide anything in their mind. They cannot lie. Vlad and his men can get whatever information they want from this process.

  “The guy told us they had received a large check—six figures—from a Remus Frumos. Isn’t that one of his aliases?”

  “It is. Figures he’d sympathize with the Muslims. He was one when he was a human. But this group doesn’t commit acts of terror like al Qaeda or Hezbollah. I’m not sure if giving money counts as a violation or if it is just like giving money to a political party, but I will bring it up at the meeting. So how did this source come about, was he a member of HT?”

  “No, a little while after we left the campus, while walking the streets of London, we passed by a bank that had mirrors built into the outside walls of the place, that made it look classy in the city. Well, that was how they noticed us, sans reflection.

  “They bided their time and waited for the opportunity to ambush us. We walked down an alley. It was the middle of the day so we had no powers at our disposal. As we crept into the alley a shot just missed Michael’s neck. We ducked behind a dumpster. They had two sniper rifles aimed at us, both guns with silencers on them. There we were with no powers to use, and no guns. We didn’t bring them because we expected to be home before sunset, so why carry guns without any threat of Radusons? Also unlike over here, England has ridiculously strict gun laws. The sight of one on us could probably lead to some type of hang up with the cops. Caught at a Muslim rally with them, I don’t even want to imagine.”

  “I get it. You didn’t want to risk being caught with a gun when you didn’t think you’d need one.”

  “It was also just Michael and me. The other three were back at the hotel entertaining female guests from the night before.”

  “Christ, you were in a bind, so what did you do?”

  “We were able to tell the shots came from the fourth floor windows of the buildings that made up the alley we were trapped in. We crashed through a window on ground level. We didn’t get cut, which I expected being in the sun and all.”

  “Jericho, we lose out powers in the sunlight, but we do not become human. If some mugger ran up and stabbed you right now, you wouldn’t die. You just won’t be able to turn into a bat and fly after him.”

  “You’re right, I forgot. I haven’t had much experience in the daylight lately.”

  “Well then I hope this walk will do you some good. Now continue.”

  “Okay, well we got up and ran up the stairs to the fourth floor. They were in separate rooms. Michael got to his first, and threw the shooter out the window. When I came through the door for the room of the second shooter, he shot at me with a handgun. I easily dodged it, his reaction was too slow. I grabbed the gun out of his hand and threw him against the wall. He was weaponless and in pain as I walked over to him. I checked the rounds in the gun, they were silver—he was a Crusader.

  “I told him he was going to tell me everything I wanted to know. He thought I had no powers since it was the daytime, but I showed him how wrong he was. We were indoors now, out of the light of the sun. I put him in a trance and found out everything. I asked him what business he had in England. He couldn’t have been there following us. He told me the coffer from the Dead Sea had been discovered. The contents inside it—the Blood of the Betrayer and the Dark Bible—were both in pristine condition. Water had never penetrated the coffer. However, that the Dark Bible was written in some ancient cipher.”

  “It is, I was never able to translate it myself. Radu knew how, but he never taught me. I only remember exactly the first three words of it.”

  “What are they?”

  “Lord forgive us.”

  Jericho looked stumped. Vlad explained.

  “There is no may the before it. The book is not written to other people, but to God himself. It is in second person. The methods they used to try to figure out vampires would resemble tactics used centuries later in the Scientific Revolution—the scientific method, and formulating theories out of established facts. Their approach was meticulous, but at the time the process was so new to them. So when they wrote their notes they didn’t write them like scientists dictating their findings. There were men trying to explain vampires to God, or hoping God would explain it to them. So the Dark Bible is one long dissertation written to God.”

  “Well,” Jericho continued. “The reason they were in London was they had taken the Dark Bible to this William Henderson, an expert in ancient symbols, to translate it. He lived in London and their mission was to protect the Dark Bible and transport it to him. He said it might take as long as a few weeks to translate it, but he would be able to do it.”

  “So they don’t know anything about it yet. Good. The Blood is far more dangerous though than the words in the Dark Bible. We could have the whole mess of a new army to deal with once they figure out what to do with it. What did he say happened with the blood?”

  “They brought it to CERN.”

  “The European Organization for Nuclear Research?” Vlad was surprised. “They deal with quantum physics, compressors, subatomics. They don’t do blood, they’re not Quest Diagnostics.”

  “You go to Quest if you want to know if you have diabetes, not if you want to know if you have the blood of the damned. For that you want the greatest researchers in the world working on it it.”

  “So they told CERN about vampires?”

  “No, they told them it was a saint’s blood.”

  “And that was enough?”

  “That and possessing the most powerful bank in the world; yeah that was enough. They also asked for reasons of possible embarrassment that CERN be discreet about their findings. They paid extra for that.”

  “What did they find?”

  “Nothing,” Jericho sniffed. “The analysis only took a few days. They found it to be nothing more than old blood from a dead body.”

  “Where the Crusaders disappointed with that?”

  “No, they actually wanted that. It proves the blood’s divinity. If it has power, it cannot be proven by science, only by God. Whether the blood was a blessing or a blasphemy, science and the world, will now have to bow to the power of Christianity. That last sentence was the source’s words, not mine.”

  Vlad gave Jericho a quizzical look. “So they plan to go public?” he asked.

  “When they have all their ducks in a row: all the testing done on the blood, and the Dark Bible translated—maybe even carbon-14 dated, too.”

  “So where is the blood now?” Vlad asked.

  “Still at CERN. The next move is after the Dark Bible is translated. According to this source the Crusaders have a plan to have this big ceremony at the Vatican inviting, he figured, the top Crusaders. This kid was young, under thirty, but well informed.”

  “Do they plan on making some vampires themselves?”

  “He didn’t think so, that is how I am able to keep a thumb on him.”

  “He wants to be one?”

  “Of course, so I offered him the curse, forgive me.”

  Vlad turned and thought for a moment. “Well it is worth the trade to have the Bible and the Blood. We can’t trust it in anyone’s hands. Power, once in your possession, can change you. They may have told him they will make no new vampires, but then an inner circle decides to have some fun. We need that blood. Have you spoken to him since?”

  “Yes, I spoke to him a few days after we met, which was the day of the attack in the nightclub. He said the Blood and the Bible will be together next at a Switzerland airport once the Bible is translated. His team with the Bible will go there, meet with the men in possession of the blood and then both will take a flight to Rome. The best opportunity to get both would be then.”

  “You did good Jericho, we will call this Plan A.”

  “Plan A sounds like you are expecting there to be a back up plan.”

/>   “There always are. What if he chickens out of becoming a vampire? He wants to now, but then later decides not to. Then he has no more motivation to work with us.”

  “Well, I also looked up this Henderson. He does exist and has his own shop. He is a collector of antique books.” Jericho handed him Henderson’s business card.

  FAVORITE THINGS

  William Henderson

  Proprietor of Rare and Antique Works of Literature

  Phone Number—20-7832-8280

  57 Queen Anne St, Westminster, London W1G 7M4, UK

  Vlad put the card in his wallet.

  “At least that is his cover,” Jericho continued. “I went to his shop without rousing any suspicion. I do know who he is, and if anything in this plan goes sour we can always put him in a trance and find out everything he knows. But right now I think we can trust the source, and not show too much of our hand.”

  “All right, but we give him a tail on the English to Swiss flight.”

  “He suggested that, but I thought about how he will be with a group of Crusaders. We only need one of them to recognize the signs of us. No reflections, white skin, our pupils don’t dilate, cold to the touch. It’s a risk.”

  “You’re right, and if this is a trap our trail will just be chasing a dead end. They’d have landed earlier, planned their attack, and not carry anything of value with them. We will just have to hope this source plays along.”

  Everything sounded good, but there was a question in Jericho’s mind that was yet to be answered. “Master,” he asked. “I understand the importance of the blood, but what is so important about the Dark Bible? Even if the Crusaders kept it, all it would do is fuel some conspiracy theories. At the end of the day there is no power in it. What is in it that we do not already know about ourselves?”

  Vlad took a breath. “Jericho, are you happy with what you are? Would you have rather died a human?”

  “You mean do I wish you never bit my fucking neck in that pub in Ireland over three hundred years ago? I don’t know. Didn’t the fight need me? Isn’t that why you made me a vampire?”

  “Yes, you are a great warrior, and I made you right after I first learned that Radu was making vampires for himself.”

  They approached an intersection. Vlad walked forward to cross. Jericho put his hand out and stopped him. A large pick-up truck flew by and would have hit Vlad if Jericho had not held him back. Jericho didn’t fear the truck for Vlad’s safety. Explaining how he survived the hit without a scratch, though, would be the problem.

  “You have great instincts,” Vlad smiled at him as Jericho lowered his hand off his chest. The two crossed the street. “You are cunning and strong and I needed to recruit. I had no reason to before Radu and I split. But once I learned he started to create a family, I knew I could not be alone in this. You were a great soldier. You had the things that don’t change when you move from one life to the other. Your mind, your awareness—you’ve saved my life before, so you were a wise bet. But what I am asking is, if the threat of Radu was gone, would you then want to be a human?”

  “Well—” Jericho paused to get out the rest. “When my daughter died a stillborn I heard my wife tell my son, his sister would be waiting for him when he got to heaven. I still like to think that possibility is real. If I make it to heaven, my family and I would finally be together. I want to see them again. I hope when I get there they understand where I have been. I’ve lived long enough, we all have.”

  “So part of you still wants to die and go to heaven?”

  “Don’t we all? But what does it matter anyway, we can’t go back?

  “The Dark Bible, has a passage, a prayer, that can turn a vampire into a human again. If this war ever ends, we can go back to being humans again.”

  “But first we have to kill Radu.”

  “Yes, first we have to kill Radu.”

  “And we can do that at the upcoming meeting.” Vlad turned his head. He didn’t want to continue this discussion. Jericho pressed on. “These meetings are a joke. We spend our time trying to kill each other, then every fifty years we meet to see if we can work it out, only to realize we still want to kill each other.”

  “But once something happens at a meeting we no longer have the option to work things out. He may still change, there has been a world of technology at our hands since our last meeting. He wanted the world enslaved, but now that he sees how good the good life can be, this new world of information and luxury, he may now want to stay in the shadows and keep the status quo.”

  “He doesn’t care, Vlad. He can have anything a man can purchase. He just wants power, he wants to rule. He wants everyone to bow to him.”

  “Probably, but he would share an interest in the Blood of the Betrayer being out there. He doesn’t want a world of vampires either. The reason he keeps his number down on how many men he has is because he knows however many he makes I will make too, with no limit. I will have a world of vampires, before a world of slaves. He doesn’t want a world of vampires. He doesn’t want more people equal to him. He doesn’t want the Crusaders making another army of vampires. Also getting the coffer is going to happen in Europe, we might need him.”

  Jericho did not share in his master’s optimism so he decided to change the subject. “So with what you said before, do you want to die?”

  “My Elizabetta is also waiting for me on the other side. She has waited more than half a millennium. I don’t want her to wait much longer. I want to die. I only wonder which side we will end up on. Right now though I cannot leave this war. It’s funny, but this war is the only thing I am living for.” He stopped. “Well, here we are.”

  They stood in front of the The Auto Gallery Ferrari and Maserati in Calabasas. Their car was ready for him. Vlad could not wait to drive it. They walked in.

  “The Reynolds brothers,” said a balding, short, white man from his desk as he got up to shake both their hands. The sun pierced in through all of the wall windows of the dealership.

  “Stan, how are you,” Vlad said as he shook his hand.

  “Is she ready yet?” Jericho asked as he took his turn to shake.

  “Well I see you like to get right to the point,” Stan said.

  To live for five hundred years and to be able to buy and sell items, along with living in a house, paying heat, and even voting if one chooses to, meant one cannot keep the same name. Someone would notice if a man who was born in 1820 wanted to buy a Land Rover. Obtaining a fake name is not hard, it’s creating a fake identity that was a challenge. Vlad’s men each had multiple ones. Some were substantial that were used whenever a credit or background check of some form was needed, and some were disposable that were used when traveling or just to throw the police off their trail. They all lead to dead ends, and they were all high quality. Stan thought nothing out of the ordinary happened here today. Just Dave Reynolds and his brother Pete, two porn producers who worked out of the Valley, had come in to pick up another high-priced car.

  Jericho took out his lucky sterling silver Cross pen and signed the name Peter Reynolds on all the necessary paperwork.

  2

  Having the top down in a black Ferrari F430 Spider with over 480 horsepower going 120 miles per hour through Mulholland would make you think nothing could be better. Vlad blasted All Nightmare Long from the latest Metallica album as he drove. Jericho was busy checking out the scenery from the passenger seat.

  Today was a good day. It was always a good day. Not a threat in the world. It was the night, though, when the fear came back. A vampire alone is a scary concept. A vampire that fears the night more than the day is something far more terrifying.

  FIVE

  1

  A vampire can only stay good for so long. Humans need water and vampires need blood. It is the source of their power. Without it vampires are weak and powerless. Different bloods tastes different. Taste doesn’t vary by blood type like AB or O-negative, the difference is by the type of human who has the blood. HIV blood leaves a ba
d taste in their mouth. Virgin blood tastes the sweetest, and is the most powerful, pure. It is not very rare, but to extract it from one means to have probably killed a young child.

  Vlad and his men avoid this blood. He tried to keep some sort of morality amongst his men so that they were not murderers. They didn’t even need exactly human blood. They could substitute it with any mammals’ blood, but a minute steak is never as good as a prime rib. Aside from the taste, a mammal’s, blood regardless of its size—cat, elephant, gorilla—is never as powerful as a human’s. It would be like trying to live on just potato chips and candy bars.

  No, the fact was humans had to die. The truth was there were always enough humans who deserved it. You just had to find them. Vlad’s regulations required his family to kill only criminals or evil souls. Sometimes there were no criminals around, so homeless people were fair game. They had not much to live for anyway. Vlad believed this as a human, and he still believed it now. No matter how merciful Vlad was, he was still a vampire. He had to kill. If humans had to die, it should be the evil ones or the ones with nothing to live for. The rest of the world should feel safe.

  Vlad still loved the hunt. He was judge, jury, and executioner. There were more than enough scum who deserved to die, so let them—a killer, a drug dealer, maybe even a mugger would do just fine. Most vampires resided in cities. They can hide easier there. They can blend in with the rest of the world, and it’s also easier for a victim to disappear. He didn’t like it when all was right in the city. It made it harder for him to choose.

  Vlad hunted alone. He liked the time to think to himself. He carried a lot of weight on his shoulders. He was the closest thing to an actual god on earth and had thoughts that humans couldn’t even begin to understand. He knew truths of history not known to men now because the proper books or people that knew the truth were destroyed. He knew what went on behind the closed doors of the governments of the superpowers of the world.