by D. N. Hoxa
And then, the two times he went to feed, he spent at least two hours trying to convince me to go with him.
“I promise you, it won't be hard. You will be able to control yourself, and if something goes wrong, I’ll be there, right behind you. You can trust me,” he said, over and over again.
It wasn’t that I didn’t trust him. I trusted him more than I ever did my own mother. But I didn’t trust myself. I didn’t trust that I wouldn’t rip the throat of whoever was unlucky enough to get picked to give me blood. It had been two weeks, and other than thinking about blood twice a minute—I counted—I didn’t feel like I wanted to turn into a monster and destroy everything. Even Hammer was impressed by my control. He didn’t say so, but I saw it in his face every night when he woke up and asked me how I was feeling.
He never forgot to ask.
“This is the last one, unfortunately,” he said on the fourteenth night, well past midnight. He left the bottle of whiskey on the table.
“Shit. Where can we get more?” I asked. I couldn’t risk staying without whiskey for long.
“Very far. But I do have another thirty-one bottles of vodka and even a dozen bottles of red wine,” he said. “Here, try some of this. Maybe it’ll work for you.”
He handed his bottle over to me. I took it reluctantly and looked at the clear liquid inside it. It looked as harmless as water. I put the rim to my lips and took a quick sip, unsure of what to expect.
The new taste burned through my buds and fell lightly down my throat, much faster than whiskey. It wasn’t bad. In fact, it wasn’t bad at all.
“Holy shit, this is great,” I said, looking at the bottle from a whole new perspective now.
“Really?” he asked, brows curled in suspicion. I took another mouthful just to be sure and came up with the same answer. He then disappeared for a whole five seconds upstairs and came back with a dark brown bottle in his hand.
“Try the wine,” he said and offered me the bottle. I didn’t hesitate this time. I swallowed and clapped my tongue to the roof of my mouth until the taste registered in my brain.
“It’s good! A bit heavier than vodka, but still good. Grapy.”
“Well, it is two hundred years old, so it better be good,” Hammer said, looking at the bottle in my hand. “This is amazing, Morta. No one I’ve ever known has more than one poison.”
“What, you don’t like whiskey?” I asked him, and he flinched.
“Not at all. All I can drink and enjoy drinking is vodka,” he said.
I took another sip of the wine and liked it even better than the first time.
“No. Wine works for me, as well as whiskey and vodka. I couldn’t choose which one is better if my life depended on it,” I said, and he grinned.
“There’s no stopping the surprises with you.”
“Yeah, I’m full of them,” I said dryly. I held on to the wine, and he took back his vodka.
A few minutes later, Hammer stood up. He looked at the drapes behind which were the windows, as if he could see right through them.
“Bugz is here,” he said.
I jumped to my feet and followed him to door, excited, but also a little scared. Since Hammer trusted the guy, I knew I was going to be fine, but it was still so new to me. The whole thing.
Hammer opened the door to the cold air of the night.
We didn’t have to wait long. Very soon, a woman appeared at the doorstep. A freaking woman vampire.
Her dark brown hair was braided and fell all the way to her ass. She wore dark green military pants and a very tight white blouse underneath a vest made of fur. Her boots had low heels so she looked taller than me. She was goddamn beautiful. Dark brown eyes and skin the color of rich chocolate. Her lips were to die for.
“Bugz is a girl?” I hissed, though she could probably hear me clearly. Hammer smiled at her and then took her in a hug. She wrapped her arms around his waist, too, but didn’t take her eyes off me and my chest.
“So, you’re living with your food now?” Bugz asked Hammer, tangling one hand in his hair. I wanted to rip her arm off. “I’m proud of you, honey.”
Honey? Didn’t he say that his girlfriend’s name was Chandra?
“She’s not food. She’s a vampire,” Hammer said and closed the door behind her.
“No way in hell! Have you gone deaf?” Bugz said, her voice much more alive than that of any other vampire I’d met.
“Yeah, she has a beating heart, but she’s a vampire. Trust me,” Hammer said and looked at me, but I kept staring at Bugz.
“You sure?” she asked, squinting her dark eyes at me.
“Of course I am. See? You don’t even feel the urge to suck on her,” Hammer said. “This is Morta. Morta, this little monkey here is Bugz.”
I barely gave a small nod, and the next second, she was right in front of my face. She watched me as if I were a piece of art, completely in awe. She even sniffed me. I couldn’t keep my eyes from rolling. When she touched my hair, I pushed her hand back as hard as I could.
“I don’t like people touching my hair. Or any other part of me,” I hissed.
Her brows shot up in surprise. “Yup, definitely a vamp,” she said and turned around to go to the kitchen. It was obvious that she’d been there before, and I had no idea why that pissed me off. Hammer waved for me to go after her, but when he saw the look on my face, he came closer to me and took my hand in his.
“Is everything alright?”
“No,” I hissed. “You didn’t tell me she was a girl!”
“Well, it never came up,” he said, shrugging like it was no big deal. And it shouldn’t have been a big deal. Too bad that for some reason it was. “Is there a problem with Bugz being a girl?” he asked again, but this time his concern was transformed into amusement.
“Yes! I don’t get along very well with girls.”
“I can hear you,” Bugz called from the kitchen. I wrapped my fingers tightly around Hammer’s. They would’ve broken if he wasn’t a vampire.
“Hey, it will be fine,” he said and pushed my hair behind my ear. “She’s fun. Come on, you’ll see.”
He practically dragged me into the kitchen.
Bugz sat on the only chair, a small bottle of brown liquid, very similar to my whiskey, in front of her. When we walked in, she saw mine and Hammer’s intertwined fingers and raised a brow.
“Cool touch you got there with the name,” she said, sipping on her drink.
“It’s her birth name,” Hammer said with a grin.
Bugz whistled loudly before she spoke. “I get that, Morta. My father was a bastard, too,” she said, frowning.
“Actually, it was my mother.”
“Oh, well. Shit happens,” she said with a shrug.
“Any news?” Hammer asked. He was very excited.
“Shitloads,” she said, flinching. Definitely not a good sign.
“Go ahead,” Hammer said and leaned against the table.
I walked over to him to take the bottle of vodka from his hand, because I didn’t exactly feel comfortable going to the other room for mine and leaving the two of them alone. I had no idea what the hell was wrong with me.
“You’re sharing poisons now?” Bugz asked.
Hammer grinned before he went to the living room. Bugz put her hand to the side of her mouth and mouthed: He never shares his poison!
Her face was actually very funny, and though I killed the laughter, I did give her a small smile. Hammer came back with both my whiskey and the bottle of wine. He gave them both to me, and I returned his vodka.
“Can we not stare at each other weirdly and move along with why you’re here?” Hammer said. I hadn't realized Bugz was staring at me with question marks in her eyes, while Hammer looked at her, me, then back again.
“Like I said. Shit happens,” she said with a grin, wiggling her brows at Hammer like she was trying to secretly tell him something. Whatever it was, I didn’t interrupt. I was a bit busy over there, sitting right next to the s
ink, wondering what the hell was wrong with me.
In the past, sure, I disliked people at the very sight of them. I mean, people! The absolute worst. But with Bugz, it was different. My dislike for her felt different. Unfortunately for me, I suspected it was very strongly connected to Hammer.
“Are you sure you want me to tell you everything here?”Bugz said, calling my attention, and though she moved her eyes pretty damn fast, I still caught the small glimpse she gave me.
“Yeah, sure. There’s no one around this place at this time. I’ve checked,” Hammer said, apparently ignorant to the meaning of her words.
“She means me, Hammer,” I said, rolling my eyes at Bugz. She didn’t try to deny it. She even confirmed it with a nod.
“What, Morta? Yes, of course. Yeah, she knows everything,” Hammer said, as if what she’d just asked was completely absurd. That surprised me more than Bugz’s question. Because it meant that he trusted me completely, and I didn’t know what I had done to earn such trust. In fact, I was pretty sure I’d done everything to make him not trust me, ever.
“Okay, what the hell is going on here? I’m going to need to know,” Bugz said calmly, crossing her arms in front of her and leaning back on the chair while she watched me and Hammer almost at the same time. Damn, I could see why Hammer said she saw everything. I’d never seen eyes move so fast.
“That would be none of your business,” I said, pretty sure that Hammer was going to flip.
“Oh, really? Is that so, Hammer?” she asked, pushing the so as if the two letters had a whole story behind them she didn’t want to put to words.
“No, it’s not like that. We made a deal to…”
“Hammer!” I hissed and jumped to my feet. “I don’t appreciate you telling my story to people.”
“Hey, it’s fine. I trust Bugz,” he said with a somewhat worried smile.
“Well, I don’t. So leave me out of it.” I was going to at least try to kick his ass if he ignored me. To his luck—and more to mine—he nodded.
“Okay. Fine. It’s fine, Morta,” he reassured me. No threat and no anger in his voice. I took my seat back with the bottle in hand.
“What the—” Bugz started to whisper, but Hammer stopped her.
“She’s been helping in my search for Everard. That’s all you’re going to get. Now spill.”
Bugz seemed like she wanted to laugh but held herself.
“I don’t see how the hell she could help you, but fine. If you say it’s fine, then it’s fine. Now, where were we?” she said, and leaned over the table again. “I ran into Bosko in Washington—”
She was interrupted by Hammer again. “You were in Washington?”
“Yeah, I was there when I got your message,” she said. “He said he saw Dublin and his gang over in New York. Said they wouldn’t talk to him, but he did hear them whisper. He heard Dublin telling them that once they were done with whatever assignment, they were to meet at a certain point to report. He didn’t catch anything else, but he did say that they were behaving weirdly, and he was certain they weren’t talking about feeding.”
From everything she said, I got nothing. At all. It was frustrating.
“Was he sure it was Dublin?” Hammer whispered. I hadn't noticed before, but I saw that he held his shoulders straighter than he normally did.
“Yeah, it was him,” Bugz confirmed.
“Who the hell is Dublin?” I totally felt left out.
“An independent vampire in charge of this gang of others like him,” Hammer explained.
“Wait, I thought you said being independent was a rare thing.” I was pretty sure he’d said so.
“How old are you?” Bugz asked me.
I said twenty-one the same second Hammer said three weeks. What the hell?
“Oh, that explains it then,” Bugz said with a nod.
“Explains what?”
“Your lack of knowledge of the vampire ways.” So she had meant how old a vampire I was.
“Anyway, I obviously went to check in New York on my way here, and Bosko was right. I saw Crip and Jeddy getting into water. I didn’t dare go after them. You know me and water,”she said and flinched. “They were definitely heading for Manhattan’s wall, I can tell you.”
“Did you get a why?” Hammer asked, his foot tapping on the floor annoyingly.
“Not exactly. But check this out,” she said and reached for something inside her vest. She took out a piece of paper and unfolded it on the table. I went closer to see. “I found it in the same place I found Crip.”
It was some sort of a map drawn by hand. I didn’t get much except for a badly drawn kind of oval shaped ball and then curvy lines on four sides, which I guessed could symbolize water. There was a big M drawn in the middle of the ball, and there were three X’s drawn around the outline.
“Manhattan,” Hammer whispered and touched the X’s with his fingertip.
“What does this mean?” I asked because my brain was buzzing with the need for a clearer picture.
“This is Manhattan. The X’s are drawn around the outline of the protective wall of RONY,” Bugz explained. I could see that much, but the words said out loud made my heart sink.
“What, like attack points or something?”
“I don’t know,” Bugz said with a shrug.
“Hammer?” I asked, because he was being unusually quiet, and it was kind of creepy.
“This is the east and Mohg’s gild is here,” he drew an X on the right of the map, “in Long Island. Where did you see them go into the water?”
“Crossing the Hudson from probably…” she said and checked the map again, “here.”
She pointed right in front of the three drawn X’s. I knew by the looks of it that this wasn’t good.
“Do you think Dublin is going behind Mohg’s back?” Bugz asked, but I didn’t think that was the case.
“No. What I think is much more dangerous,” Hammer murmured.
Bugz kept watching and expecting some explanation, but he was too invested in the badly drawn piece of paper.
“He thinks that Mohg and the other Doyens are planning an attack against humans,” I filled her in after taking a very long sip of my whiskey.
“They wouldn’t dare,” Bugz said, a dumbfounded smile on her face.
“Yeah, that’s what he thought,” I said, nodding at Hammer. “But then we got the letter.”
Hammer took it from his pocket and handed it to her. She read it four or five times before she looked up at me. The fear I saw in her expression only made the situation worse in my mind. She didn’t seem like one to get scared easily. But then again, I was sure I was underestimating Mohg’s power over all vampires, independent or not.
“I saw Tick and Jordy on my way here from Boston.” Hammer said. “Before them, I saw four others. Morta saw one and the shadows of probably many more.”
I was again surprised that he took my word for it. I wouldn’t, if the roles had been reversed.
“What the hell are they doing around the walls? Have the Doyens gone crazy?” Bugz shouted and then emptied the contents of her small bottle with one sip.
“What about the island? Got anything on that?” Hammer asked her.
“No. I didn’t hear anyone mentioning an island,” she said, shaking her head.
“I heard that preparations are being made. That vampires that go there aren’t returning,” Hammer said.
“Yeah, but where? Where is this island?” she asked.
“I don’t know that,” Hammer said. “But I don’t think this is something to be taken lightly. There’s something going on there, I’m sure of it.”
He’d told me the same thing almost every night. That he had a feeling that something was happening. His doubt leaked into my mind with ease. By the third night, I was very positive that I, too, had suspicions about something going on. I hated that he had that effect on me.
For the next half an hour they tried out theories about what it could possibly be and in w
hich part of the world the island was. At some point, Bugz seemed like she wanted to give up on the guessing.
“The world has gone crazy once again,” she whispered with a tired sigh.
“Take a look at the facts. He doesn’t want me to go after Everard, who has not been seen in more than a year. After he gets caught by the ROB, just like that. What are the odds of a Doyen being caught?” he said.
The picture his words painted of glowing green eyes and sharp teeth on my neck made me shiver. I squeezed my eyes shut and willed the image away from my mind.
“And Dublin is not stupid. This is his handwriting, and he sure as hell didn’t just lose it.”
“Well, I did find it on the ground.” Bugz shrugged.
“Which means he probably left it there. Why?” he asked himself.
It seemed to me that they were getting nowhere, even after another hour of guessing. Except for Hammer repeating over and over again that every little detail meant that he was right, that whatever secret Mohg was keeping had something to do with humans. My skin would crawl every time he mentioned this, and I imagined explosions as I had seen them when I was three.
I only remembered a little bit of it, but I did remember the bright red sky, the black clouds and the grey snow. I remembered that we didn’t leave our house for a month and nearly starved. I remembered how the ground shook, and the smell of burnt flesh made me want to throw up. Most clearly, I remembered the fear of the end. Back then, I was still too little to understand. My instincts had the best of me, searching, praying for life every night. The fear through those days seemed to come hand in hand with breathing. I think I never stopped crying.
And then I remembered the ROB soldiers as they blew our door to ashes. They had masks on, and they put one on each of our faces. They took us out and sheltered us in the building that used to be the hospital. It was still a hospital, but half of it had fallen to the ground from the earthquakes that came, one after the other. I remembered feeling sad for the earth. It couldn’t be fun to be shaken so much in such a short time.