3 Blood Lines

by Tanya Huff

  There should be one more. She followed the fence up the driveway and, lips tight, entered the building.

  “. . . all right, the death of a child under her care might drive the rest of the day out of her mind—I’ll give her that, I’ve seen it happen before—but it’s the way she didn’t remember things, Henry. It just didn’t ring true.”

  Henry looked up from the pair of clippings, his face expressionless. “So what do you think happened?”

  “She was in the playground, not ten feet from where the child fell. I think she saw it. I think she saw it and it wiped the memory from her mind, just like it did at the museum.”

  “By it you mean . . . ?”

  “The mummy, Henry.” Vicki finished stamping down another length of the living room and whirled around to start back. “I mean the goddamned mummy!”

  “Don’t you think you’re jumping to conclusions?” He asked the question as neutrally as he could, but even so, it brought her shoulders up and her brows down.

  “What the hell do you mean?”

  “I mean, children die. For all sorts of reasons. It’s sad and it’s horrible, but it happens. I was the only one of my mother’s children to make it out of early childhood.”

  “That was the fifteenth century!”

  “And in this century children have stopped dying?”

  She sighed and her shoulders dropped. “No. Of course not. But Henry . . .” A half dozen quick strides took her across the room to his chair where she dropped to her knees and laid her hands over his. “. . . these two were taken by the mummy. I know that. I don’t know how I know it, but I know. Look, cops are trained to observe. We, they, do it all the time, everywhere. They may not consciously recognize everything they see or hear as important, but the subconscious is constantly filtering information until all the bits and pieces add up to a whole.” She tightened her grip and lifted her eyes to meet his. “I know the mummy took out these two kids.”

  He held her gaze until her eyes began to water. She felt naked, vulnerable—worth the price if he believed her.

  “Perhaps,” Henry said thoughtfully at last, finally allowing her to look away, “there are those few who take observing one step further, who can see to the truth. . . .”

  “Oh, Christ, Henry.” She retrieved the newpaper clippings and stood. “Don’t give me any of that New Age metaphysical bullshit. It’s training and practice, nothing more.”

  “If you wish.” Over the centuries he’d seen a number of things that “training and practice” couldn’t have accounted for, but as he doubted Vicki would react well to a discussion of those experiences, he let it drop. “So if you’re right about the mummy and the children,” he spread his hands, “what difference does it make? We’re no closer to finding it.”

  “Wrong.” She jabbed the word into the air with a finger. “We know it’s staying around the museum and Queen’s Park. That gives us an area in which to concentrate a search. We know it’s continuing to kill, not just to protect itself from discovery but for other reasons. Feeding, if you wish. We know it’s killing children. And that,” she snarled, “gives us an incentive to find it and stop it. Quickly.”

  “Are you going to tell all this to the detective?”

  “To Celluci? No.” Vicki leaned her forehead against the glass and stared down at the city. She couldn’t see a damned thing but darkness; since she’d entered Henry’s building, the city might as well have disappeared. “It’s my case now. This’ll only upset him.”

  “Very considerate,” Henry said dryly. He saw a muscle in her cheek move and the corner of her mouth twitch up a fraction. Her inability to lie to herself was one of the traits he liked best about her. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Find it.”

  “How?”

  Vicki turned from the window and spread her arms. “We know what area to search. You’re the hunter. I thought you got its scent from the coffin.”

  “Not one I could use.” The stink of terror and despair had all but obscured any physical signature. Henry hurriedly pushed the memory, and the shadows that flocked behind it, away. “I’m a vampire, Vicki. Not a bloodhound.”

  “Well, it’s a magician. Can’t you track power surges and stuff?”

  “If I am nearby when it happens, I’ll sense it, yes, as I sensed the demonic summonings last spring. But,” he raised a cautioning hand, “if you’ll remember, I couldn’t track them back to their source either.”

  Vicki frowned and began to pace again. “Look,” she said after a moment, “would you know it if you saw it?”

  “Would I recognize a creature of ancient Egypt reanimated after being entombed alive for millennia? I think so.” He sighed. “You want me to stake out the area around the museum, don’t you? Just in case it wanders by.”

  She stopped pacing and turned to face him. “Yes.”

  ‘If you’re so sure it’ll be at this party on Saturday night, why can’t we wait until then?”

  “Because today’s Tuesday, and in four days who knows how many more children may die.”

  Henry shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his leather overcoat and sat down on one of the wood and cement benches scattered out in front of the museum. A cold, damp wind skirted the building, dead leaves rising up and performing a dance macabre in the gusts and eddies. The occasional car appeared to be scurrying for cover, fragile contents barely barricaded against the night.

  This wasn’t going to work. The odds of him running into the mummy, even in Vicki’s limited search area, because it just happened to be casting a spell as he wandered by were astronomical. He pulled a hand free and checked his watch. Three twelve. He’d still be able to get in a good three hours of writing if he went home now.

  Then a wandering breeze brought a familiar scent. He stood and had anyone been watching it would have seemed he disappeared.

  A lone figure walked east on Bloor, jacket collar turned up against the cold, chin and elbows tucked in tight, eyes half closed. Ignoring the red light at Queen’s Park Road, he started across the intersection, following the silver plume of his breath.

  “Good morning, Tony.”

  “Jesus Christ, man.” Tony scrambled to regain his footing as his purely instinctive sideways dive was jerked into a non-event by Henry’s precautionary grip on his arm. “Don’t do that!”

  “Sorry. You’re out late.”

  “Nan, I’m out early. You’re out late.” They reached the curb and Tony turned to peer at Henry’s face. “You hunting?”

  “Not exactly. I’m waiting for a series of incredible coincidences to occur so I can be a hero.”

  “This Victory’s idea?”

  Henry smiled at the younger man. “How could you tell?”

  “Are you kidding?” Tony snickered. “It has Victory written all over it. You’ve got to watch her, Henry. Give her a chance, give any cop a chance—or any ex-cop,” he amended, “and they’ll try to run your life.”

  “My life?” Henry asked, allowing the civilized mask to slip a little.

  Tony wet his lips, but he didn’t back down. “Yeah,” he said huskily, “your life, too.”

  Henry played with the Hunger a little, allowing it to rise as he traced the line of jaw, then forcing it back down again as he admitted he had no real desire to feed. “You should get some sleep,” he suggested over the wild pounding of Tony’s heart. “I think you’ve already had enough excitement for one night.”

  “Wha . . . ?”

  “I can smell him all over you.” Henry heard the blood rush up into Tony’s face, saw the smooth curve of cheek flush darkly. “It’s all right.” He smiled. “No one else can.”

  “He wasn’t like you . . .”

  “I should certainly hope not.”

  “I mean, he wasn’t . . . it wasn’t . . . well, it was but . . . I mean . . .”

  “I know what you mean.” He made the smile a promise and held it until he saw that Tony understood. “I’d walk you home, but I have an assign
ment to complete.”

  “Yeah.” Tony sighed, tugged at his jeans, and began to walk away. A few paces down the road, he turned. “Hey, Henry. Those crazy ideas that Victory gets? Well, most times they turn out not to be so crazy after all.”

  It was Henry’s turn to sigh as he spread his arms. “I’m still out here.”

  “. . . leave a message after the tone.”

  “Vicki? Celluci. It’s four o’clock, Wednesday afternoon. One of the uniforms just told me they saw you poking around the drains behind the museum this morning. What the fuck do you think you’re doing? You’re looking for a mummy, not a goddamned Ninja Turtle.

  “By the way, if you find anything—and I mean anything—and you don’t immediately let me know, I’m going to kick your ass from here to Christmas.”

  The house and garden looked vaguely familiar, like a childhood memory too far in the past to put a name or a place to. Remaining a cautious distance away, she walked around to the back, knowing before she saw them that there’d be hollyhocks by the kitchen door, that the patio would be made of irregular gray ffagstones, that the roses would be in bloom. It was sunny and warm and the lawn smelled like it had just been mowed—in fact, there against the garage was the old push lawn mower that she’d used every Monday evening on their handkerchief-sized lawn in Kingston.

  The baseball glove she’d inherited from an older cousin lay by the back step, the lacing she’d repaired standing out against the battered leather in a way she didn’t think it really had. Her fringed denim jacket, the last thing her father bought her before he left, swayed from the clothesline.

  The garden seemed to go on forever. She began to explore, moving slowly at first, then faster and faster, suddenly aware that something followed close behind. She circled the house, raced up the front path, leapt up onto the porch, and came to a full stop with her hand on the doorknob.

  “No.”

  It wanted her to go in.

  The knob began to turn and her hand turned with it. She could see her reflection in the door’s window. It had to be her reflection, although for a moment she thought she saw herself inside the house looking out.

  Whatever had been following her in the garden came up onto the porch. She could feel the worn boards move under its tread and in the window she saw the reffected gleam of glowing red eyes.

  “Noo!”

  She dragged her fingers off the doorknob and, almost incapacitated by fear, forced herself to turn around.

  Vicki shoved her glasses at her face and peered at the clock. Two forty-six.

  “I don’t have time for this,” she muttered, settling back against the pillows, heart still slamming against her ribs. In barely two hours she’d be heading over to Henry’s which made sleep the priority of the moment. Although that incident at the museum had obviously spooked her more than she’d thought, dream analysis would just have to wait. She dropped her glasses back where they belonged, stretched up a long arm, and switched off the light. “I’m going to blacken the next set of glowing red eyes that wakes me up,” she promised her subconscious.

  A few moments later, lying awake in the dark, she frowned. She hadn’t thought of that jacket in years.

  Thursday night, the house stood alone on a gray plain and the dream began by the front door. The compulsion to open it was too strong to resist and she walked in, closely followed. She caught just a glimpse of the contents of the first room when the light dimmed and she fought to hold it down.

  It wanted to see what was in the house. Well, it could just take a flying fuck.

  Although her head felt as if it had been slammed repeatedly between two large rocks, Vicki woke feeling smug.

  She was giving him more of a fight than he’d anticipated. His lord would not be pleased. As she had no protecting gods, merely a strongly developed sense of self, the failure would be perceived as being his.

  Akhekh did not tolerate failure and his punishments were such that anything became preferable to facing them.

  He needed more power.

  In spite of the the cold and the damp, a Friday afternoon spent in the park beat the hell out of a Friday afternoon spent with the Riel Rebellion and grade ten chemistry. Brian tightened his grip across Louise’s shoulders and turned her face up to meet his.

  Now this is what I call getting an education! he thought as her lips parted and she flicked at his tongue with hers. I wonder if she’ll let me slip my hand up under her . . . ouch. Guess not.

  He opened his eyes, just to see what another person looked like from that angle, and frowned as he saw a well-dressed man watching them from no more than five feet away. Oh, great. A pervert. Or a cop. Maybe we should . . . we should . . .

  “Brian?” Louise pulled back as he went limp. “Cut it out.” His head flopped forward onto her shoulder. “I mean it, Brian. You’re scaring me. Brian?

  “Oh, my God.”

  He settled back on the bed, throwing the bags of feathers to the floor. Someday soon he’d have a proper headrest made.

  It was eleven forty-three—this culture’s preoccupation with the division of time into ridiculously small units never failed to amuse him—and she would be asleep by now, her ka at its most vulnerable. Tonight she would not be able to stand against him; he would throw all the power from the ka he had absorbed this afternoon at her defenses.

  He closed his eyes and sent his ka forth, following the path his lord had laid out, entering through the image of his lord’s eyes.

  It was as if something held her elbow and walked her through the house, observing, discarding, searching. She couldn’t shake free. She couldn’t dim the lights.

  She couldn’t let it find what it needed.

  Except she had no idea of what that was.

  They climbed a staircase and started down a long corridor with a multitude of doors off to either side. As they reached for the knob of the second door, she saw the pencil lines and the dates, realized who waited within, and thought—or spoke, she wasn’t sure—“Not the third door, anything but the third door,” and tried to push them forward.

  It stopped her, turned her, walked her down the hall, and into the third room. When they came out, it moved her on. It never came back to the second room.

  Obviously, it had never read Aesop’s fables.

  She managed to protect her mother, Celluci, and Henry. It found everything else.

  Everything.

  He knew how she would suffer. It would take a while to arrange, even with some of the necessary influences already in place, but his lord could not help but be pleased with the result.

  “You don’t look so good. Are you all right?”

  Vicki shifted her grip on the aluminum baseball bat and managed a smile. “I’m okay. I’m just a little tired.”

  “I’m sorry I haven’t turned up any leads these last couple of nights but, to be honest, I never expected to.”

  “That’s all right. It was a long shot. Henry . . .” She sat down on the edge of the bed and with one finger stroked the patch of red gold hair in the center of his chest. “. . . are you still dreaming?”

  Henry pulled the sheet aside to expose a ragged clutch of multiple holes in the mattress. “I drove my fingers through here this morning,” he said dryly. He flicked the sheet back, then covered her hand with his. “If I hadn’t caught a hint of your scent on the pillow, I don’t know how much more damage I might have done.” She looked away and he decided not to say the rest, not to tell her that she gave him reason to hold onto his sanity. Instead, he asked, “Why?”

  “I just wondered if they were getting worse.”

  “They haven’t changed. You getting tired of standing guard?”

  “No. I just . . .” She couldn’t tell him. The dream had seemed so important while it was going on, but now, faced with Henry’s basic terror, it seemed stupidly abstract and meaningless.

  “You just?” Henry prodded, knowing full well from her expression that she wasn’t going to tell him.

  “
Nothing.”

  “Look at the bright side.” He brought her hand to his mouth and kissed the scars on the inside of her wrist. “Tonight’s the night of the party. One way or another, something’s bound to . . .”

  “. . . happen.” Vicki drew her hand away and straightened Henry’s arm. Sliding her glasses back up her nose, she leaned the bat against the end of the bed. “One way or another.”

  Ten

  “Oh, my God.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  Vicki wet her lips. “Absolutely nothing. You look . . . uh, good.” Henry’s costume had been made traditional in a score of movies—tum-of-the-century formal wear with a broad scarlet ribbon cutting diagonally across the black and a full-length opera cloak falling in graceful folds to the floor. The effect was amazing. And it wasn’t the contrast between the black and the white and the sculptured pale planes of face and the sudden red/gold brilliance that was Henry’s hair. No, Vicki decided, the attraction was in the way he wore it. Few men would have the self-assurance, the well-bred arrogance to look comfortable in such an outfit; Henry looked like, well, like a vampire. The kind you’d like to run into in a dark alley. Several times. “In fact, you look better than good. You look amazing.”