Welcome to the Darkness (Darkness Trilogy)

by L. M. Justus

  What else was there? A cross? She didn’t have any of those lying around, and holy water was out of the question. What about silver? But she didn’t have any jewelry made out of silver because it made her skin turn green, so that was out. Wait! Grandma’s silver tea service. Sarah rushed to her china cabinet and pulled out the tea set. It was tarnished. Grandma would be so disappointed.

  She selected the least tarnished piece, the teapot, and carried it huddled against her. She crossed the room and knelt down next to Reed. Then she moved the teapot toward his face. Holding her hand as steady as she could, she brought the pot closer to his skin, one fraction of an inch at a time.

  Contact! And . . . nothing. Sarah released the breath she didn’t even realize she’d been holding. She placed the teapot beside Reed on the floor next to the discarded garlic bulb. So much for all the myths about vampires and their weaknesses. The most effective weapon she’d discovered so far was her gun. Considering Reed had just come in from outside during broad daylight, it was obvious the sun didn’t affect him either.

  She focused on his face and gathered her resolve. Normally, she tried to avoid reading people’s thoughts on purpose, but right now, she felt it was necessary. She wasn’t picking up any thoughts by accident, as she sometimes did, so it was time to delve inside his mind and see what she could discover. She concentrated and tried to slip inside his thoughts, but was surprised to find . . . a complete blank. It was as if he wasn’t there at all.

  Sarah stared at his face and realized with a jolt that he seemed familiar, and not just from his disastrous visit to her apartment yesterday. She kept a wary eye on him and went to retrieve yesterday’s newspaper from her coffee table. She flipped to the local news section and scanned the main headline. “Triple homicide in King City,” she read. Next to the article was a school photo of Reed, with a caption that read, “Teen wanted for questioning as prime suspect in triple homicide.”

  The article described the crime scene as a farmhouse just outside of King City. It had burned, and the remains of three people had been discovered inside. The bodies were identified as the father, mother, and daughter of a family of four; the fourth family member, the teenage son, was missing. Or not, she thought and turned to look at him lying on her floor.

  Turning her attention back to the article, she continued reading. A gasping intake of breath startled her, and she dropped the paper and scrambled to retrieve her gun. Planting her feet in a solid stance, she took aim at Reed’s forehead.

  He lay still, his eyes–which were back to their brilliant blue color–open wide. Silence stretched between them. Reed watched Sarah, waiting, and she was surprised he wasn’t grimacing in pain from his bullet wound. Had it already healed?

  Reed’s glance flickered down to his chest, then back at Sarah. “You didn’t stake me,” he said.

  Sarah’s pressed her lips together, anger bubbling up inside her. “Lucky for you, I forgot my stake in the car last night.”

  “What?” Reed’s brow crinkled in confusion. “Oh . . . you’re being sarcastic. I get it. Look, I know saying sorry doesn’t cut it, but I’ve never bitten anyone before, and I didn’t mean to, and–” He stopped mid-sentence and sniffed. He continued sniffing and spotted the garlic lying on the floor beside him. “What is that?”

  “Nothing,” Sarah replied. Her mind whirled in circles. Why was she hesitating? She should stop talking to him and call 9-1-1. Something wasn’t right here; this kid had gotten himself involved in something deep, and she had a feeling he needed help.

  “Garlic?” he asked, eyeing her.

  “And a silver teapot,” she added.

  That seemed to startle him and he tried to squirm away from the pot. There wasn’t much space for him to move and the ropes severely hampered him. Sarah grew more curious while she watched him wriggle a couple inches away from the pot. Interesting. He was afraid of the silver, even though nothing had happened when she’d touched him with it. She wondered why he wasn’t attempting to break free of the ropes. Was he not strong enough to do so? Or was he scoping out the situation before making another mad dash out of her place?

  Sarah picked up the discarded newspaper and shoved the article in his face. “Is this you?” she asked, holding the paper so he could read it. She waited for him to get the gist of the article. “Well?”

  He gave her a sad look. “Yeah, but . . . I didn’t kill them. I didn’t kill my own family!”

  Truth. She could read his mind again, now that he was awake, and he was telling her the truth, or at least he believed what he was saying. “Listen, Reed. It’s time for you to tell me what’s going on. I might be able to help you. That’s what I do. I help people who are in trouble. That’s what I’ve dedicated my life to. I’ll show you some trust, if you do the same for me, okay?” Sarah paused for a moment to let her words sink in. “If I remove this rope, are you going to try to run away again?”

  His eyes searched hers as he weighed his options. Then he shook his head.

  Truth. She leaned over him, and started to undo the knots she’d tied in the rope. Her fingers brushed against the back of his hand and he felt warm, not cold like an undead corpse. He watched her intently while she continued her work. When the rope was loose enough, he sat up and shrugged out of it. Sarah pointed to her couch, motioning for him to take a seat, and he obliged, looking defeated.

  “How’s your . . . injury?” she asked. He hadn’t moved like someone in pain.

  “I’m okay. I heal really fast,” he said.

  What an understatement! Things were getting stranger by the minute. “All right,” she said, taking a deep breath. “Tell me what’s going on.” She leaned back, and listened while Reed told her his story.

  He related a shocking series of events, from the brutal slaughter of his parents and sister and the destruction of his home, to his harsh introduction into the world of vampires. He mentioned Nathaniel, a stern yet oddly helpful vampire who was over two hundred years old, and the Queen who had commanded Reed to bug Sarah’s apartment, and then to kidnap her when he had failed.

  When Reed finished, he stole a glance at the newspaper. “That article says there’s a funeral for my family in two days,” he said, his voice wavering with emotion. “That’s tomorrow! I can’t imagine not being there.” He turned away.

  Sarah didn’t speak for a moment, her brain working to come up with a plan to help him.

  “So what do we do now?” he asked. “I don’t understand what the vampires want with you. It doesn’t make sense.”

  “Hmm . . . I have a theory about that,” she replied. Should she reveal her secret to him? She never talked about it to anyone, but she wanted to show him that he could trust her. He had taken the first move in trusting her. Now it was her turn. He looked at her, waiting for an explanation. “I’m telepathic,” she said quietly.

  He blinked a couple times before responding. “You mean you can talk to people inside their heads?”

  “Well, no, but I can read their minds,” she explained.

  “That’s crazy,” he scoffed.

  “Ha! That’s rich. You’re a . . . a vampire, aren’t you? And you’re telling me that being telepathic is crazy? At least I’m human.”

  “Good point,” he muttered, looking at the ground. “Okay, so you can read my mind.” Crap! What kind of stupid things have I been thinking around her?

  She suppressed a grin and said, “It’s okay, really. I’m used to hearing all kinds of things better left unsaid.”

  “Wait, did you just . . . ?” he stopped, pointing at his head. “Don’t do that!”

  “Sorry. I try hard not to, but sometimes it’s impossible to control my ability. Maybe you know what that’s like,” she said, giving him a pointed look.

  “Yeah,” he mumbled, looking sheepish. “Would it help if I said I was sorry again?”

  Sarah waved her hand to dismiss his concern. “I’m upset, but I think I understand. We need to focus on a solution.”

  “So
. . . what the hell is the solution?” he asked again.

  She looked him straight in the eye and said, “I only see one option.”

  “What’s that?” he said and leaned closer.

  “This Queen you told me about, the one who asked you to kidnap me. We’re going to pay her a visit.”

  Reed

  The buildings of San Jose’s downtown core moved past the car window and I slouched in the passenger seat of the powder blue Chevy Malibu. Sunlight glinted off the windows of the buildings, which became smaller and spaced farther apart as we drove to the city’s outskirts. The cop–Sarah, she’d said her name was–seemed one hundred percent focused on driving. She wanted to take us to some top-secret weapon facility to stock up on supplies before going to visit the Queen and I wondered why she was going out of her way to help me.

  “You know you’re crazy, right?” I said, breaking the silence between us at last.

  “Have some faith, kiddo,” she replied. “I have a feeling everything’s going to work out.”

  I frowned. How could she think things would work out?

  “Can you predict the future?” I asked.

  “No,” she said. “But I feel confident we can meet with these people like civilized adults.”

  I snorted. “You were there for the part where I told you they cut my frigging finger off, right? Because they thought I wasn’t polite enough. These ‘people’ are totally insane, and they’re gonna kill you. Don’t you get it?”

  She signalled right, and pulled off to the side of the road.

  “This isn’t it, is it?” I asked, peering out the window. I didn’t see any building that looked like it could house a weapons storage facility.

  “No, I just want to talk to you for a sec. Listen,” she said, placing her hand on my shoulder. “They’re not going to kill me. Why would they go to all the trouble of bugging my apartment or getting you to bring me in if they wanted to kill me? Besides, I’m not walking into this blind. Thanks to you, I have a good idea of what to expect, and I’ll make sure I’m prepared for anything.”

  I tried to listen, but my focus was on her hand resting on my shoulder. Her warmth seeped into my skin and she smelled like flowers and clean laundry. She pulled her hand away, and rubbed absently at her neck, right over the spot where I’d bitten her. I turned toward the window, my face heating with shame.

  Sarah pulled the car back onto the road and continued driving. I tried to keep my mind blank, knowing that she could be “listening in,” but I found it impossible not to think about anything. I kept replaying the events from the last two days over and over again. She didn’t comment though, and we drove another few minutes in silence.

  We turned off the main road and onto a long driveway. A gray building without windows loomed at the end of the narrow road. We passed through a gateway in the chain-link fence that surrounded the large property and neared our destination. Sarah parked the car, got out and told me to hang tight for a few minutes.

  She entered the building and I sat back, trying to relax. I tapped my finger on the door armrest and scoped out the car’s interior. Bored, I popped open the glove compartment. I found a car registration with her name on it, Sarah Perkins, and her birthdate. So . . . she was only twenty-one. Not that much older than me. I continued rifling through the contents of the glove compartment, but there wasn’t much else besides a couple of maps and the car owner’s manual.

  The building door opened, and I shoved everything back inside the glove compartment and slammed it shut. Sarah walked over to the car, opened the door, and tossed a giant handbag onto the back seat.

  “Find anything interesting?” she said, glancing at the glove compartment.

  “No,” I replied. I was surprised to see that she looked exactly the same as when she’d gone in. “Um, where’s all the weaponry you went in there to get? I thought you were going to come out looking like that chick from Tomb Raider. You know, armed to the teeth, ready to face a horde of vampires single-handedly.”

  “The vampires aren’t about to let me waltz into their place with ammo and weapons strapped onto every inch of my body. We need to be subtle.”

  I reached behind me to grab the handbag off the back seat. “And we’re going to do this using the world’s biggest purse?” I pried it open and pulled out a can of hairspray.

  “Hey, careful! That’s dangerous,” she said, grabbing the can out of my hand.

  “What, is it full of mace or something?”

  “No, it’s an incendiary device. It’s disguised to look like hairspray.”

  I resisted the urge to laugh, although a silly grin tugged at the corners of my mouth. “You’re kidding right? You mean like in James Bond?” I fished around the handbag and pulled out a lipstick. “Let me guess, this shoots out some kind of laser?”

  Sarah grabbed the lipstick from my grasp as well, and shoved it and the hairspray back into the bag. “You’re not taking this very seriously,” she snapped. She tossed the bag onto the back seat again.

  “Come on. This stuff is a joke! None of those gadgets will protect you from the Queen or her psycho minions.”

  “It’s only for an emergency,” she said, starting the car and backing out of the parking spot. “Just in case. It’s good to be prepared.”

  I wasn’t sure which of the two of us she was trying to convince.

  The sunlight was strong for late fall, and I appreciated the feel of it warming my skin when I stepped out of the car onto the curb in front of the vampire’s lair.

  Sarah grabbed the ginormous handbag from the back seat. It drooped heavily and she snagged it on the car mirror. There was a slight tearing sound as she yanked the bag to her side, but it didn’t fall apart.

  “So, this is it,” she said, joining me on the sidewalk.

  “This is it.”

  “Well, we might as well get this over with.” She marched up the front walk toward the door.

  I caught her by the arm, stopping her in her tracks. She turned to look at me.

  “You don’t have to do this,” I said. “It’s not too late to back out. You could run away. It’s broad daylight, so you’d have a good head start because they can’t come out during the day.”

  Her beautiful green and hazel eyes searched my own. “I’m going in there, with or without you, and I’m going to resolve this once and for all. Of course, I’d prefer to have you with me.”

  I let out a sigh. “All right. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  I stepped ahead of her to unlock the door and ushered her inside. The main floor was abandoned, as per usual during daylight hours, so we went directly to the stairwell leading downstairs. As we entered the lower hallway, a door opened and Dominic stepped out.

  He sniffed and his gaze moved to Sarah before coming back to rest on me. “You brought the human female. Very good. The Queen awaits you. This way please,” he said, indicating the door at the end of the hall that led into the Queen’s chamber. I wondered if the Queen normally sat around on her throne all day, or if they somehow knew we were coming.

  We stepped into the large chamber and Sarah took in our surroundings with a look of awe. “Wow,” she breathed.

  The Queen regarded us as we approached. Her usual entourage stood on the stage behind her throne. Sarah and I stopped at the same time, as though we’d choreographed our movements.

  “Greetings,” the Queen said, bowing her head.

  “Hello,” Sarah replied, bowing her head to mirror the Queen’s motion. “I don’t think there’s any reason to beat around the bush, so let’s get right to it. I believe that you’re interested in my ability to read minds, and I thought that maybe we could come to an arrangement that would be mutually beneficial. I don’t see why we can’t discuss things openly, so I’m here, of my free will, to share whatever information I can. I hope that you’ll be willing to do the same.”

  I remained quiet, hoping that the Queen would appreciate Sarah getting right down to business.

 
; The Queen’s cool gaze rested on Sarah. “Indeed. That would be most desirable. I am certain that we have much to offer one another.” She smiled, which seemed more creepy than reassuring.

  Suddenly, there was a tearing sound and I spun to look at Sarah. She grabbed her handbag, clutching at it to hold it together, but with another loud rip the entire contents crashed to the floor, scattering around us. I sucked in a breath as I watched the can of hairspray roll across the floor, coming to rest against the stage at the Queen’s feet. “Oh, crap,” Sarah said, looking sheepish rather than alarmed like I felt. “They sure don’t make things like they used to,” she muttered, kneeling to gather everything up.

  “Constance,” the Queen barked and snapped her fingers. “Fetch this young woman a new bag for her . . . numerous beauty items.” Constance hurried off to carry out the Queen’s bidding and the Queen leaned over to retrieve the can of hairspray from the floor. She turned it in her hands, regarding it carefully.

  “Do you find this product useful?” the Queen addressed Sarah with seemingly genuine curiosity.

  Sarah stopped scooping up her belongings to answer. “Um . . . yes, it works quite well.”

  “Perhaps I should try it,” the Queen replied, setting the can down on the arm of her throne. “My hair can be so unruly at times.”

  I tried not to look panicked, but not knowing how the can of “hairspray” actually worked, I had no clue whether it was about to blow up at any second. Sarah seemed remarkably calm though, so it must not have been that easy to set off by mistake.

  Constance returned, and helped us put everything into the new bag. We stood back up and the Queen addressed us once again.

  “I must apologize for what will seem inhospitable, however, I require you both to remain in one of our cells momentarily. We vampires are a suspicious lot by nature, so it will take some time to gain our trust, but I do assure you that we will find better accommodations for you in the near future.”

  Dominic and another vampire that I didn’t recognize came toward us then, to usher us to the door leading to the cell area. I stole one last glance at the hairspray sitting innocently on the throne as we passed through the door.