Rebel Vampires: The Complete Series

by Rosemary A Johns

  I hardly dared breathe. Captain might as well have still had his hand over my mouth. “Why’s that then?”

  “Told you: I work for myself and keep my own secrets.” Emo ducked down.

  I forced myself to remain motionless, when I heard rummaging, followed by the clinical snap of gloves being pulled on.

  Nothing good has ever come of that snap sound.

  And I should know.

  When Emo loomed over me in black rubber gloves, clutching a metal tube with a look of intense concentration, I shrank back.

  “When they burn you, how will we know what it feels like?” Emo traced one rubbery finger down my chest, all the way to my stomach and then up again, before crossing from nipple to nipple. I fought to keep my breath steady. “Captain promises that I can watch Easter night, when you go up like a candle. I told them: burn him slowly or wet the wood. Then we can make him tell us how it feels as first his feet, then his legs, dick, guts, chest and arms burn.” I shuddered, when Emo slid his gloved fingers through my hair. “Even as your head flamed, before your tongue melted, you could’ve screamed something.” Emo pulled back sulkily. “But the Council said no. Tradition and that.”

  “Bloody shame,” I forced out through dry lips.

  “But Captain said that I could burn you now. That will still hurt, won’t it?” Emo smiled hopefully.

  My eyes widened, as I shook. What the sodding hell…?

  Emo scooped paste out of a metal tube, before painting it down the path that he’d traced on me: a cross down the center.

  It was sodding cold.

  Christ in heaven — white phosphorous.

  If that ignited, I was about to become sodding hot.

  I panted as I watched Emo slip his hand into his hoodie pocket. He smirked, pulling out long matches slow inch by slow inch like a striptease. I never reckoned that I’d be frightened to look into the fire. Yet I’d never been seared by white phosphorous before.

  This brat could learn about my pain, but he wouldn’t learn about my fear. Instead, he’d get a lesson in how a bloke faced the flames.

  I tilted my chin defiantly. “I don’t smoke anymore but thanks for offering.”

  Emo’s smirk faltered. Immediately, he struck the match: a beautiful flare. It united us in its fragile power and the heartbeat moment. Then Emo held the match to the phosphorous…and I screamed.

  White fire. A flaming cross. Searing agony, larger than me or the world. Bubbling, blistering, and bathing me in blinding agony.

  The fire burned out, sizzling down into a pattern of red scars. But the pain had burrowed so deeply under the skin that I didn’t know how to free myself.

  Emo had marked me.

  Through eyes blurred with tears, all I could see was Emo’s winged cartoon vampire, mocking me, as Emo asked, “How does that feel?”

  I shakily raised my hand in the two-finger salute, only to have the sadist in training clutch the fingers in his phosphorous smeared hand.

  No way was I losing my swearing hand…

  I tried to wrench back, but Emo had already flared the match to life and…

  White fire.

  And this time, Emo made me sing sounds that I didn’t even know I could make.

  Emo scrutinized me, as I cradled my burnt hand and sobbed. “How does that feel? We have a whole hour to play. If you don’t want to talk…”

  “Maybe,” I forced out as I shook from the shock of the sudden burns, and my whole body shut down, “you should try out these fun games on yourself? Then you’d really know how it sodding felt.”

  Emo tilted his head, as if actually considering it. “Did. Used to. Daddy said no more.”

  “Daddy?” I hissed as my skin split raw. “We talking First or Blood Life?”

  “We’re talking dead. He wouldn’t let me join the Black Parade, but Captain would.”

  “And that’s what this is?”

  Deluded kid.

  “I don’t know. I can’t feel. Anything. I think I’m dead. I’m everything that I ever wanted to be. Powerful and free. Only,” a crushing sadness swept across Emo’s face in one single lightning flash, “you can’t see the scars anymore. They always heal now, but I can see them on others when I make them pretty.”

  My insides curled black. That was why you didn’t author kids.

  In the ‘60s my best and only mate had been a kid: Alessandro. Trapped in a twilight world between First and Blood Life, he’d been controlled and never allowed to grow up or witness the glories of the world, no matter how many decades he lived. Election amplifies emotions and hormonal teenagers aren’t exactly known for handling those well.

  No wonder this bastard was mad.

  Even though cringing agony was still washing over me in waves, I scrutinized the kid, who’d never known anything of Blood Life but Captain, in his fanged vampire t-shirt and black-and-green fringe, which he hid behind. Who did he have to guide him in Blood Life? With an Author like Captain, could he ever have turned out any different?

  I was shot through with hot shame that I didn’t even know his name. “So, what do they call you?”

  Emo shrugged. “Who cares?”

  I frowned. “There’s power to a name.”

  Emo considered this. His phosphorous gloved hand hovered dangerously close to my balls. “Blink. Does it help to know what to scream?”

  “It helps if we’re having a chat to know what to call a bloke.”

  “Rebel?” That sneer again. “I’m the true rebel because you’re all wrong: The Council, Government, and Renegades. There’s no such thing as rules, family, or home. Only what you want and can take. I don’t need anyone: there’s just me. You shouldn’t fear each other.” Emo bent closer, as fanatical as Plantagenet. “You should fear me.”

  Blink seized my blistered hand, bending the two scorched fingers — snap.

  I howled.

  “Now, how does that feel?” Emo examined me, soaking in my pain.

  You need blood to heal. I’ll call Pet.

  Is that the guilt talking?

  The trial’s tomorrow. You must look your most presentable.

  That’s like a soldier donning his best uniform for the firing squad, isn’t it? Or fattening the calf for slaughter?

  Wouldn’t you be whole when you face the flames?

  I haven’t been whole for donkey’s years, either on the outside or the in. Reckon I’m one to go quietly with bastard death? When you tie me to that stake tomorrow, I won’t stop fighting, until the flames have ghosted me to ashes.

  If I doubted that, do you think that I’d have listened to you? Believed you? Conspired with you?

  Conspired? You’re conspiring now?

  There’s a flaw in all leaders.

  All men.

  They believe that only they can change the world. They overlook the women who work, live, and love at their shoulders.

  Ruby, Kathy, Grayse, Sun…even Mother. You don’t reckon that I can see their talents, power, and danger?

  You forgot one. My name is Liberty. And there’s power in a name.

  I’ll ask again. Who the bloody hell are you?

  Drink first. Slice a main artery on Pet, we can stitch up after. Light needs the blood.

  I bloody well won’t drink from him if you do that. Scars don’t heal on First Lifers: he’s not Blink.

  Who is he that you care?

  A human. Haven’t you been following? Sometimes they’re prey, sometimes predator. But never my dinner. Not unless they want to be.

  Delusion. It’s most self-serving. Do you honestly believe that the homeless living under London Bridge wanted to be consumed?

  You despise, belittle, and bewail the drive for money but yet you steal? You use it to acquire your needs or influence.

  I never said that I was consistent.

  Even with Will. Coffee, wasn’t it? Your very first gift. Do you think that he’d have noticed you, if you’d possessed as little as he did...?

  Pet, if you raise your gaze one
more time, I’ll have you sent to Blink again for the night. He told me that he’d felt the most after his time spent with you, as he had since he’d been authored. I was overjoyed.

  That’s dead heart-warming. I’ve drunk my fill. Pet, you can go now.

  How about you tell me Blink’s secrets? The ones that he was holding back from our Author.

  I don’t know what you’re talking about, sweetheart. Why do you want to know about your brother?

  They were secrets about Pet. Come on, if you move your pawn, I shall move mine.

  How about you play with your brother instead? I was never one for chess.

  We’ve been playing chess since the first night. We have your file: every strength and weakness. I’ve analyzed you. You’re mine.

  Another wanker wanting to own me? Now there’s a turn-up for the books.

  Listen, Mr Blickle—

  How about you listen…Jade Spider. Let’s cut the bollocks because that’s who you are, yeah?

  You were never here to help or save me. It’s not been about truth or witness. All this time, you’ve been waiting, listening, and spinning your web, whilst knowing that I was condemning myself to death with my own words.

  And what’s worse, I was condemning my family too.

  How astute of you but what have you been doing, Light, if not spinning webs?

  Me and you? We’re the same. You play with words, just the same as I do.

  The difference is, you bitch, there’s no fire with your name on it at the center of my web.

  What is there? At the center?

  That’d be telling.

  Secrets, you’re seeped in them.

  And you’re seeped in betrayal. I told you that all great stories start with it.

  Then death and hope. Do they come tomorrow?

  You tell me. Except, don’t waste your breath because how would I trust you?

  I’m the best at what I do. Trust isn’t high on my agenda.

  I’ve always had such green eyes. My mum said that they were like jade. When I became a barrister… Everyone’s frightened of spiders, but it’s only the fly that needs fear.

  The Blood Life Council understand that.

  Bigger bleeding picture here than the Blood Life Council versus us Renegades. If the power of our venom’s abused…?

  Yet every bastard’s shifting their feet like it’s somebody else’s responsibility. That’s how wars tear worlds apart.

  We could hide. I’ve tried it. But then our safety wouldn’t be real. Some bugger or other would use us as slaves, weapons, or products. We’re not safe in the shadows.

  We have to step into the light.

  Wait…what have you done?

  What your Council should’ve done, if it’d had the balls.

  This Red Room? The guns? Captains bluster? It’s all a screen for dramatic effect. The scenery in a play. The real, raw power beneath, which is quiet, unassuming, and deadly…?

  Is me.

  When precisely are you planning to scuttle onto the stage?

  When I’ve spun a nest large enough to cage it…and no one can escape.

  This inquiry is my chance. I warned you at the beginning.

  Hold on… Why am I getting…? This is outrageous…

  Problem, sweetheart?

  You don’t play chess?

  I stick to saving the world.

  Why is Captain repeatedly messaging me about a disturbance on London Bridge? A…march? What in god’s name is this?

  That’s the bloody cavalry.

  14

  NIGHT 14

  I should be dead. I reckoned that I would be. Two weeks ago? I’d have bet money on it: I was a dead man talking.

  Yet life’s funny sometimes, or maybe nothing’s ever as simple as you think.

  And I’m to believe you now? Why would that be, Light?

  Because I’m here of my own freewill. Because every inquiry needs a conclusion. Because you and me? We’re the most unholy alliance of them all.

  I’d have booted my own arse, if I’d even thought about joining forces with the Blood Life Council back in the day. But look at me now.

  Here’s the thing: you adapt to survive, and I’m not ready for extinction.

  Dramatic buggery, don’t you think?

  Pure death sorted then? All records destroyed?

  I didn’t think so.

  Dramatic doesn’t even come close. With that CIE bitch still in charge...? This is the beginning, not the end.

  Tell me a story then this Easter night. Make me believe.

  It all started with simulated skin blood packets that could be taped over the heart. I was amazed at the river of blood that came out of one of them, when a knife was rammed through. Still, I’d had to burrow the blade deep enough to get the right reaction from Plantagenet; he wasn’t that good an actor.

  I’ll never forget the flash of pain and hurt in Plantagenet’s eyes.

  As I said, Plantagenet was no Laurence Olivier because in the moments when our lips had met, he’d forgotten the caper, lost in the touch, taste, and love. He’d been the one, however, who’d insisted that a leader had to sacrifice: he was right. Except the difference was, I reckoned that a leader should give their own blood and flesh.

  Bleed for their people.

  And this time? As Plantagenet had lain beneath me, still hard and panting, and so bloody broken?

  I’d known that it was Plantagenet who was bleeding out.

  Of course, after the staged death, came the betrayal.

  “My goodness, he truly was listening. I’d have owned your fangs before now, if I’d realized how useful you could be.” Captain arched his hands on the desk in his regimented front office, which was flanked by filing cabinets. Stress relief toys were lined like legal crack for executives across his desk; the yellow ball with smiley face was taking the piss.

  Everything smelled of new carpets and bureaucracy.

  “I can even sing the alphabet,” I smirked, whilst eying the yellow face that was freaking me out, “backwards.”

  “Precious. The thing that I like best? I can make you sing anything I like.” Captain snatched up a bendy man from his row of toys, fiddling with its legs. “Time is money you know. The Council doesn’t run itself. So...?”

  “Give over: you don’t run it either. Far scarier bastards than you fucked or fanged their way to the top.”

  There went bendy man’s arms, as Captain twisted them all the way behind his back. Captain gestured at the black masked freaks with their guns at my elbows.

  What did they reckon I was going to do? Make a run for it through the office’s high glass windows into the sun?

  A colossus nudged me with a gun’s snout like I needed it spelling out or another bullet hole.

  “He still thinks that he can act the hard man, how sweet. I shall endeavor to find a solution for that. I’m ever so good at taking down fellows, who consider they can simply swagger through Blood Life like they did their First. As if they’re legends. Is that what you believe, Our Light?”

  Uncomfortable, I looked down. “I don’t believe in legends or myths.”

  “Excellent,” Captain slammed his brown brogues onto the surface of the desk, and the smiling yellow face rolled off, bouncing until it stopped against my foot, “because I make it my duty to slay legends. I cut them down to size. Too long have the old dominated, and now I reduce mythic Blood Lifers from ancient bloodlines to sniveling cry-babies. Just like your file shows you broke when you were a slave. Would you enjoy being broken the same way again?”

  I fought to keep my breath steady. I slouched as I stuck my hands into the pockets of my jacket. “I’m not a masochist, mate. Don’t add me into this new world of yours. You came smashing into our lives. We were simply getting on with it and staying in the shadows. We were hidden from…everything. No one saw us. Then you kidnap my family and send me on a mission to find the leader of the Renegades or murder them. So — job done.” I started to slide out the disk from my pocke
t but then I heard fingers easing onto triggers. “How much of a berk do you reckon I am?”

  Captain gave a smug smile, before gesturing to his guard dogs.

  Click — I breathed out.

  Captain waved me towards him, but instead I chucked the disk at his head. Captain fumbled, dropping the disk onto his lap.

  I chuckled…for about three seconds…before Captain signed for his minion to punch my lip bloody.

  I licked my lip, then chuckled again.

  Snap — there went Mr Bendy Man’s neck.

  Captain hurled the toy against my chest, as if its death was my fault. He smoothed his hair, before slipping the disk into his computer. Then he pulled a face. “Sweets, if I wished to watch your homemade porn, then I’d…” Suddenly he peered at the screen with comical urgency. “Plantagenet? You’re doing that with Plantagenet?”

  “I hope so, else I was truly drunk and went home with a stranger by mistake.”

  Captain’s leather chair squeaked, as he shoved himself up. “Let me make myself clear: are you in bed with the Magnificoe of your bloodline?”

  Something was off here. It was shadowed in my memory. Something Captain had once said about Plantagenet or the bloodline.

  My brow furrowed. “Why’s that a surprise? He was a slave.”

  “I was not aware.”

  I’d been right that there were scarier bastards than Captain, and they must’ve been the ones who’d handed over Plantagenet to Blake. Kane had called Plantagenet tribute from the Magnificoes, but where had Plantagenet been before that?

  Ruby had kept her family from me until the ‘60s, and by then Plantagenet had been gone. Just how long had he been missing?

  Captain had his nose pressed close to the computer screen; he was entranced. I didn’t blame him. Plantagenet had that effect.

  “I’ve only heard descriptions,” Captain breathed, “but none do Plantagenet justice. I must have him. He’d be the greatest legend of them all and so beautiful when he broke.”

  I was cold all over. I could never allow Captain to possess and break Plantagenet. “Shame that. You’re too late.”

  Captain’s gaze flicked to me, confused. Then he saw the tiny me on screen raise the knife above the unwitting Plantagenet.