Genevieve 04 - Silver Nails

by Jack Yeovil

  'Is she always like this?' Sierck asked.

  Genevieve nodded. 'Isn't she adorable?'

  'Less of that cheek, child,' Melissa snapped. 'Where was I? Ah, yes. The gathering. This Clause 17 nonsense was much debated. Elder Honorio is concerned, and you know how unflappable he is. Baron Wietzak of Karak Varn chewed through a stone table. He actually did it. I saw the bite he took out of the thing. Ugly table, actually, dwarf manufacture. Have you noticed how they deliberately make the legs too short for humans? Just right for me, though. So hard cheese to their nasty little schemes. I'm babbling, am I not? That's what comes of being Little Orphan Elsie for weeks and weeks.'

  Sierck's mouth was an O of astonishment.

  'I take it back,' said Genevieve. 'She's not usually this bad.'

  'I'm not usually trying to save vampirekind from extinction.'

  Melissa sensed a rat behind the books on one of the shelves, little heart beating at ramming speed, warm blood pulsing through its thready veins.

  'Excuse me,' she said. 'Some of us have to make do.'

  She was across the room and back in a beat, having ferreted the furry creature out and even rearranged the books in order. She sensed the animal's panic and looked into its glittering eyes, ordering its tiny brain to go to sleep and not mind what was going to happen next.

  She popped the rat into her mouth and ate it whole.

  Then she dabbed her lips with a kerchief, looking to Genevieve for approval. Without mirrors, vampires had to rely on each other when it came to presenting a face to the human world.

  'A scrap on the upper lip.'

  Melissa dabbed.

  'There,' said Genevieve. 'Got it. You look pretty as a picture again.'

  Genevieve chucked Sierck's chin and finally shut his mouth.

  'The starving cats,' he said. 'You're the reason why they haven't been eating well.'

  'Kitty-kitties are overrated,' she said. 'Your ratters were fat and lazy. I'll have to start on them once the rats run out. So be warned. Unless, Herr Kind Genius, you'd care to open a vein for a poor little orphan without a friend in the world.'

  'Now now, grand-mama, none of that.'

  Melissa stuck out her lower lip.

  'You were talking about saving vampirekind from extinction.'

  'So I was, child. Very conscientious of you to remind me.'

  'Who are all these people she's talking about?' asked Sierck. 'It's as if I've come in on the fifth act.'

  'I've told you about the Convent of Eternal Night and Solace,' Genevieve told the human. 'The retreat for vampires in the World's Edge Mountains. Elder Honorio is the master there.'

  'A very old-womanish sort of master,' sniped Melissa.

  'You are hardly one to throw that accusation at anyone.'

  'What's a gathering?'

  'Just what it sounds like,' Genevieve explained. 'Elder vampires gathering together for a set period. It's not that different from the drinking, hunting and yarning festivals the League of Karl-Franz or any other fraternal organisation throws at any opportunity.'

  'Drinking and hunting?' Sierck looked stricken.

  'You've upset him, child.'

  'Shush, grand-mama. Detlef knows what vampires are like. Just because Tio Bland is an idiot doesn't mean that some, and I mean some, of us aren't bloodthirsty barbarians. Sadly, Kattarin wasn't that atypical of vampirekind.'

  Melissa remembered the tsarina well. She had been fond of bathing in the blood of her courtiers' children. Anyone could see that was excessive and would lead to trouble.

  'I told your sire not to make get of that Kislevite princess, child. Kattarin had a daemon in her before she was turned. But would Chandagnac listen? None of you fledgling vampires heeds your sire. That's something I agree with Honorio about. If you had respect for tradition none of this would have happened. Now, about this assassination plot against Tio Bland'

  Sierck gasped again, tiresomely.

  'The pair of you are here to assassinate Tio Bland?'

  Trust a human to get the wrong end of the stake.

  'Merciful Shallya no,' said Melissa. 'We're here to stop him being assassinated.'

  The rat-tail twisted in her stomach and she burped.

  'I do beg your pardon,' she said. The back of her throat clogged and she began to cough. 'It all comes from the wrong diet.'

  She hacked and spat a hairball out on the back of her hand. She was ready to scrape it off on the wall, but Genevieve hemmed and pointed at the waste-paper basket. Exaggeratedly, Melissa tidied the ball up and disposed of it properly.

  'Happy now?'

  'That's better, grand-mama. No need to make a mess.'

  Unlike Genevieve, Melissa d'Acques had sired prodigiously. Over the centuries, she'd made over a hundred sons-in-darkness. They had given her grand-get without count. But they'd mostly drifted, finding their own paths through life and death, barely remembering that she still lived. Too many of her bloodline had listened to the Counts von Carstein and wound up destroyed in the Undead Wars or the persecutions.

  Genevieve wasn't the sole survivor of Melissa's line, that of the great Lahmia, but she was the nearest thing the old woman had to family in the human sense. She thought that without Genevieve she would no longer take an interest in the affairs of the world, and for that connection she was grateful.

  It was all very well to retreat into contemplation like Elder Honorio or lose oneself in the red thirst like Kattarin, but it wasn't living. And being undead meant you still lived, no matter what the vampire-haters might say.

  She looked at Genevieve and Sierck.

  'It was Wietzak's fool idea,' Melissa said. 'He actually wants another Undead War. He is claiming kinship to that Sylvanian rabble. He went to his keep at Karak Varh, to terrorise the peasants and raise up bands of strigoi warriors. You know what strigoi vampires are like, my dear. No finesse at all. Just mindless mouths on legs, purpose-made footsoldiers. The von Carsteins relied too much on them, and we all know where that led. Baron Wietzak has decreed that all enemies of vampirekind should be smitten down blah blah blah terrible vengeance against the human upstart who dares bibbledy-babbledy-boo sure and certain swift angel of painful death and so forth.'

  'Wietzak is here?' asked Genevieve. 'Stalking Tio Bland?'

  'He's not that mad. No, he's sent assassins. Or hired some local leech to do the job for him. He's not short of a golden hoard or two.'

  'You won't find me grieving for Bland,' said Sierck. 'Death will shut the little stoat up, if nothing else will.'

  That had occurred to Melissa. Only a few hours ago, when the Temple Father gave her a pfennig and some blather about investment it had been all she could do not to sink her fangs into the soft pouch of flab beneath his chin and tear into a major artery. Still, she had to be reasonable about these things.

  'You know that's not true, Detlef,' said Genevieve. 'If a vampire kills Bland, it will prove everything he's been saying about us. He might be dead, but his cause will be taken seriously. Others will fill his place, and they'll be a lot less clownlike. Have you ever heard of the Tsarevich Pavel Society?'

  'Pavel was the one who did for Kattarin?' he asked.

  'Eventually, yes. There's been a Kislevite society in his name ever since. Die-hard vampire haters in high positions. They'll be watching Bland, seeing how popular his message becomes. I was nearly impaled by a mob this evening. Imagine those same mobs with watchmen and men-at-arms and witchfinders in their midst, backed by the force of Imperial decree. It won't matter if a vampire is guilty, innocent or a monster, we'll all be ashes or under the ground. And I personally will probably be killed, against which I happen strongly to be.'

  'Ah, me too,' agreed the overwhelmed human.

  'Now that's settled,' said Melissa, 'how are you two going to go about saving this Bland person's miserable neck?'

  VIII

  A huge poster outside the Temple of Morr showed fearless vampire-slayer Tio Bland holding up an annoyed-looking, enormously-fanged and red-
eyed severed head in triumph. A banner-line read 'Death to the dead!' and an engraving which was supposed to look like spontaneous graffiti declared 'Ashes or under the ground!'

  A stuffed black bat child's plaything with big red eyes and comical teeth, was impaled against a board with a wooden spike, red paint splashed around the heart-wound, with dribbles artfully swirled to spell out 'Rule one: no leeches!' In the bright light of early afternoon, Genevieve thought yet again that she was never going to get away with this.

  A pair of black-robed acolytes, just like the thugs who had roughed up the silk-merchant yesterday, guarded the temple door. They seemed to be comparing the length of their weapons.

  'I tell you, Willy, if a vampire attacked here and now, I would bring my silver-headed pike to bear and have its heart out in a trice.'

  'Very impressive, Walther, but I'd have shoved my silver-bladed knife through the selfsame heart in half-a-trice.'

  That's as might be, but within the merest quarter-trice, I'd have.

  She could foresee where this conversation was going.

  'Begging your leave, worshipful sirs,' she began, putting on an accent, 'be this the Temple of Morr?'

  The temple-shaped building was jet-black, had a statue of the God of Death on the roof, was covered in symbols of Morr and had 'TEMPLE OF MORR' engraved in gold over the doorway.

  'It might be,' said Willy the Knife. 'It depends on who's asking?

  'I be Jenny Godgift, come from far Wissenland.'

  She did a little giggle thing in the back of her throat and rolled her eyes.

  'That's a long journey for such a pretty little thing,' said Walther the Pike. 'You must have a good pair of legs under you.'

  Genevieve brayed like an Estalian donkey, laughing through her nose.

  'You be makin' me blush, illustrious personages. That be not kindly nor clever neither.'

  Her cheeks were rouged to simulate blushing. Vampires couldn't redden with embarrassment, which was why dabs of rosiness here and there made such a useful disguise. Anyone might take her for a living human if they didn't look too closely. Detlef, master of all the theatrical arts, had been meticulous in applying a thin, subtle coat of face-paint. Her vampire pallor was covered, and she looked like a girl who had spent a lot of time outdoors in the sun. The strangest part of it had been sitting still in front of a dressing room mirror, seeing her long-lost face re-appear in ghost-form as Detlef layered make-up over her unreflecting skin. Did she really look like that? With a wig and lipstick, her reflection seemed complete×except for the socketlike eyeholes. She wouldn't pass a real looking-glass inspection, but if she happened to walk past a mirror×there were bound to be many in the temple×she'd at least not appear as a walking empty dress.

  'Be this where the brave vampire-slayers work?' she asked.

  She was sure she was overdoing it, but Detlef said an actor should never be afraid of the obvious. Most real people weren't. Witness: Willy and Walther, the comedy relief guards.

  The clerics smiled indulgently at her. Genevieve let her lashes flutter. Thanks to facepaint on the eyelid, one of her eyes stuck shut. She got it open again before anyone noticed.

  'Mistress Godgift,' said Willy, 'you need not fear the undead in this district.'

  She made the signs of as many gods as she could remember, which came perilously close to an arm-dance.

  'Gods be thanked,' she said. 'I've a powerful loathing for the undead in all their evil forms. I've come to join up.'

  'Acolytes of Morr have to be apprenticed in childhood,' said Walther. 'Then work in a mortuary for two full years, pass exams in funerary rites, then'

  'But I wish only to slay the vampire creatures. Temple Father Bland must be endangered all the hours of the day and night, from bloodsucking fiends out to silence his holy pure words of justice. I am minded that one such as he needs a personal bodyguard.'

  'I'm sure you mean well, mistress. But it takes more than a good heart.'

  'I be practiced. I be very adept in all the latest techniques of vampire-slaying.'

  Willy and Walther, a bit bored with her eager country girl act, shrugged at each other.

  'I know how to put silver needles in their eyes.'

  Willy looked a bit queasy at the thought.

  'Leave your name with the mother superior's assistant,' said Walther, 'and a place where you can be reached by messenger. I'm sure we'll be in touch.'

  'Be you brushing me off?'

  Willy laughed uncomfortably. 'Not at all, Mistress Godgift.'

  'Be you giving me the once-around-the hayricks-and-left-in-the-spinney treatment?'

  Walther was more to the point. 'We're on duty. We're much too important to deal with the likes of you.'

  'Do you really think you be bravos enough to protect Antiochus Bland?'

  She was worried that her country girl accent had turned abruptly piratical.

  The guards were too annoyed to care. Willy tapped his knife-hilt, only it wasn't there. Genevieve held it up, careful not to touch the silver blade. She had lifted it from him with a swift grasp.

  'Looking for this?'

  Willy's face was dark. Walther's pike arced down. When its point scraped cobbles, Genevieve was out of its way. She had stood to one side, and had her foot poised to stamp down. She neatly snapped the pikeshaft.

  'What if a vampire did that, sirs? What then?'

  A few passersby stopped to pay attention. Willy and Walther liked that even less than having their toys taken away.

  This was where she could use all those Celestial fighting arts she had studied under Master Po. A few passes of mantis style gungfu, and she'd be inside the temple and secure in her new job of bodyguard-in-chief to the Empire's most notorious vampire-hater. She reminded herself not to use teeth or claws. That would be a dead giveaway.

  'Two schillings on the foreign wench,' said a gambler.

  Genevieve would have bet on herself. Then someone barged out of the temple. He had to bend down to get under the lintel of the main door.

  'Your two and raise you two,' said another gambler. 'That's Lupo Preiss, the wrestler.'

  Oh wonderful. Genevieve gave up a silent lament for the days when clerics were reedy fellows with candlewax on their cuffs and weak eyes from too much reading. Back then, she could have trounced a whole temple-load of them without resorting to mantis-style. Sloth-style would have done.

  'A crown on Brother Preiss,' went up the cry.

  Genevieve's original champion muttered, 'Too rich for me.'

  'What is this racket?' declared Brother Preiss.

  'Mistress Nuisance is trying to force her way in,' said Willy No Knife.

  'She says her name is Jenny Godgift,' said Walther the Half-Pike.

  'I just feel Temple Father Bland should be properly protected,' she insisted.

  Brother Preiss hefted up his sleeves and cracked his knuckles. He had the sort of hands that suggested he crushed rocks to powder to keep in trim.

  'She damaged temple property,' whined Walther, holding up his broken pike.

  'And stole some too,' moaned Willy.

  Genevieve gave Willy his knife back. He made a play of cleaning its blade on his sleeve.

  'Do you still want to fight, girl?' asked Preiss.

  'I be a humble supplicant from far-off Wissen×'

  Preiss took her by the shoulders and lifted her off the ground. Some of the crowd gasped. Genevieve wished she were back in Konigplatz with the vampire-killing mob. At least they were amateurs.

  She turned in Preiss' grip, shrugging out of his fingers, and dropped to the ground. Taking her best shot first, she pivoted in her sprawl like a gypsy dancer, getting her shoulder and elbows against the cobbles so she could concentrate all the strength of her body into the tensed muscles of her right leg. She propelled a kick into Preiss' stomach.

  Her boot-toe took him low, doubling him over.

  She had to be fast to get out of the way as the ex-wrestler fell to his knees. Some bets started changing a
gain. She made axe-blades of her fingers, a Nipponese trick Master Po had been fond of, and chopped down on Preiss' neck. His cowl protected him, but he must have felt the blow. She had to hop to avoid his grasping hand. If he got his fingers around any part of her, he wouldn't lose his grip a second time.

  Honourably, she stood back and let Brother Preiss stand up.

  An evil vampire would have kicked him in the head while he was down. She gave herself a gold star for being good, and hoped someone remembered her Shallya-like mercy at her funeral.

  Preiss didn't show any sign of being hurt, though she must have given him at least a tummy-bruise with her first kick. She still felt the jarring of her foot against his packed-in meat, as if her leg-bones were jellied by the impact. The cleric was a trained fighter, which meant he didn't make the mistake of getting angry.

  'Why are we wasting energy scrapping?' she asked. 'Surely, we all hate vampires. Nasty dead-alive things spewn from the grave to bedevil good folk such as we.'

  Preiss made fists and came at her with a left-right-left hook-jab-jab combination. She leaned out of the first blows, but the third caught her on the forehead×she was sure he was aiming at her chin×and she staggered back.

  Her first panicked thought was that her face-paint would have come off on his knuckles, but luckily her well-fixed wig had a fringe appropriate for her country girl disguise.

  There were at least thirty-eight points on the male human body where a simple pass with her vampire talons or fangs would tap into wells of blood, leading within seconds to the loss of any capability of fighting back or even of life itself. Preiss left nine, or possibly ten, points totally unguarded. A vampire could easily take down the wrestling cleric and win herself supper into the bargain.