A Bloody London Tale (Book 2): The Epidemic

by Prichard, Cornelius

  “Yes, she was.” He shook his head as he closed the door. “I couldn’t believe Sori would steal my child, but in the end it was the only logical explanation.”

  “No, it wasn’t. Tereza didn’t feel capable of raising a baby by herself. She’d lost the man she loved and she didn’t want me.” I brushed a hand through my hair. “She thought the best thing she could do was give me to her best friend, so I could be raised by someone who loved me, and I believe that’s what her letter’s going to say. Grandpapa is sending it to me.”

  “Tereza wrote you a letter?”

  Nodding, I tried not to feel any sympathy towards him, but the pain in his voice made that impossible. “Mama was going to give it to me when I was old enough to know the truth, but she didn’t live that long.” A tear trickled down my cheek. “You killed her before she could.”

  He stared at me. “Sori stole you. Tereza wouldn’t have given you up. She loved you the same way she loved me.” He shook his head and I had a feeling he was going to be doing that a lot. “Why would she have thrown herself in the river if she’d given you to Sori?”

  “She loved you and you were gone.” I shrugged. “I’m sure there will be an explanation in the letter, Remus, but until we get it I’m not certain why Tereza made the choices she did. Maybe she was terminally ill. Maybe she really could live her life without you. If I’d just lost the love of my life and found myself with a baby to raise I think it would be very hard to deal with. Throwing myself in the river probably wouldn’t be the decision I’d make. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t the decision she made.”

  “I can’t believe it. She had you to keep her strong.”

  “A baby who was going to rely on her for everything? I know you want to believe Tereza had the strength to keep living her life, but there is a chance she didn’t. Having to raise a baby alone, and I do have your eyes, might well have been too much for her.”

  Gareth

  Emma and I were still staring at the telly long after we should have gone to bed. “What happened to you?” She looked at me. “When I last saw you I think you were planning on heading to one of the last places Dracula was meant to have been seen.”

  “I got there. It was an anti-climax, but I saw it. Dracula wasn’t there.” I sighed. “I almost wish he had of been, because then I would at least understand why this happened to me, and right now I don’t have a clue. All I remember is feeling fine when I got on the plane to come back, before slowly feeling worse and worse as the flight went on. I convinced myself it was a cold, or the flu, or some virus I’d picked up, but when I look back it doesn’t make any sense. One of the air stewardesses was kind enough to help me. Polly took me back to hers. When I woke up I was hungry and feeling fine apart from that. I left the flat, planning on stopping off to get some food, only to find my sense of smell was much stronger than it had been before.”

  “That was strange. I remember the same thing and it was… smelling people… smelling blood…” She shook her head. “When I sank my new teeth into someone I realised there was something seriously wrong with me. Well, it took me a little while, actually, because it tasted so good, and the hunger was fading with every moment. That sensation… it was like eating a really nice steak. Only it wasn’t a steak. I was drinking the blood of someone I’d never met before and I didn’t quite know how to cope with that after it had happened. I remember feeling very sick. I remember dropping the person on the ground. I remember running away from the person, but that was when Jack stopped me. He grabbed hold of me and I was crying. Tears were streaming down my cheeks, because I’d drunk someone’s blood, and I didn’t know how to cope with that.

  “He calmed me down, before calling someone to pick up the person I’d fed from. Being told I’d just changed someone into a vampire was hard to deal with. Knowing it was my own stupidity…” She wiped the tears off her cheeks. “Jack told me I wasn’t stupid. I just didn’t know what I’d become and that was to be expected. I told him about getting off the plane and feeling like I’d come down with something. I think I was the fourth or fifth person to tell him that, so he started coming up with the theory someone was going this on purpose, and I agree. I don’t think this is something that’s been done by accident. Were you the only person on your flight who was ill?”

  “No idea. I didn’t stop to look. I think it’s something we need to think about though, because there have been three flights, I think, coming in from Romania since mine. There could be three more new vampires out there.”

  “You don’t need to worry about that.” Jack stepped into the living room. “For now what you should be doing is going to bed, okay?” All I did was stare at him. “We are keeping an eye on the flights, as best we can, but it’s hard. We don’t have a lot of human allies and we can’t go out during the day.”

  Nodding, I sighed. “I just wish I could do more.”

  “For now the best thing you can do is learn how to be a vampire. Today might have felt like it was easy, but it won’t be when you’re out there, dealing with the smell of people. Walking past them without biting them is going to be one of the hardest things.”

  Amalia

  Someone was waiting for me outside the hospital. I knew exactly who it was when I got close enough. Papa’s sister. My vampire aunt, Isabella. We smiled at each other. “You could have told me before you were my aunt.”

  “Yes, I could, but I didn’t know if you were ready for that. I know you’re very much like Ciprian. I should have known you were ready. I’ve just been very careful for a long time and it’s a hard habit to break.”

  “I’m glad it’s a hard habit to break.” When she reached out to take my hand I let her. “I want you to be safe. Losing you would kill Papa.”

  “I know, which is why I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t do that to him when he’d done so much to protect me from the hunters, and from Papa, because I knew how hard that was for him. I love my brother, more than words can say, and the very thought of hurting him causes me pain.” She squeezed my hand. “At least he has you, Lia, which is the most important thing. You are so much like him.”

  “Papa and I have spent a lot of time talking about vampires. From the very beginning he taught me to see you as people, rather than… creatures, the way the other hunters do. They believe I’m too soft to be a hunter. They don’t believe I’d be willing to kill the mad vampire.”

  Isabella shook her head. “I can’t believe his own family did that to him.”

  Standing up for them wasn’t something I particularly wanted to do, but it was something I felt I need to do. “They were doing the best thing they could. I think they were scared. He’d become a vampire and they didn’t know how to deal with that. If I was in the same position it would be different.” I brushed my hand through my hair as we walked through the hospital. “They didn’t have the information they needed to be able to do what needed to be done. We need to change that if we’re going to stop this from happening again, but it’s not going to be as easy as it needs to be. The other hunters believe all vampires should be killed. For someone who’s just found their son, or daughter, has become a vampire calling on one of the hunters is going to be extremely difficult. When it’s family you’re not going to want them to be killed. It’s as simple as that.”

  “They did cage him up.”

  “I’m not saying they made the right decision. I’m saying they made the only decision they could if they wanted him to survive, because calling on the hunters would lead to his death. They have no way of knowing any of us are different and I wish they did. I wish they could have come to me and asked for help. I know enough vampires I could have introduced him to someone who’d be able to help him.”

  “One of the questions I’m not certain anyone has asked is who turned him in the first place. Someone had to have changed him. Did they choose him on purpose? Did they know what his family would do to him?”

  That very thought made me feel sick. I didn’t want anyone to have done that on
purpose, but it seemed far too possible. Isabella stopped and I looked at her. “We aren’t the only place dealing with these issues, Lia. Vampires are dealing with chaos in London, because someone’s been changing humans into vampires before they step onto a plane, so they arrive in London and have no idea what they’ve become.”

  “How is that possible?”

  “You have to drink very carefully. It’s something that has to be planned, because it involves leaving just enough blood for the human in question to keep walking and talking. From what I’ve been told I have a horrible feeling it might actually be happening on the plan, although, if it is, that means it’s not a vampire.” Isabella sighed. “I don’t think I’m explaining this right.”

  “You think someone is spiking their drink with the same thing in your saliva that turns a human into a vampire.”

  “I do.” She shook her head. “If that’s the case…”

  “A human working with a vampire, because the human’s been promised immortality.” I shrugged. “It’s not impossible. Horrible, but not impossible. However that does mean it’s going to be very difficult to stop.”

  “Unless they’re going to stop once the mad vampire is killed. At the moment he’s still out there somewhere and they can still blame this on him. When he’s gone it will have to be someone or something else causing the chaos.”

  “Someone’s been planning this for a while.”

  “Yes, they have, and I dread to think who it might be.” We started walking again. “I want you to promise me you’re going to be careful. He might well be out there and if he is he’s not going to have any problem with killing you.”

  I found myself thinking about all the vampires I’d met, wondering if it might have been one of them, although it seemed unlikely. Most of the vampires I’d spent time with wanted humans and vampires to live together. Personally I wanted the same thing, but we all knew how unlikely it was. I nibbled my lip. “Could this be someone trying to force things to change?” I tried to work out how to explain what I was thinking. “Could one of the vampires who wants humans and vampires to live together be trying to force it to happen?”

  Lena

  ‘My dearest daughter, Lena,

  ‘This is one of the hardest letters I’ve ever had to write, but I know I need to tell you the truth. You deserve it. I hope, if you’ve found Remus or he’s found you, you’ll show him this, so he can understand why I made the decisions I did. As I write this I’m looking at you, in your little crib, and I can’t stop. You are one of the most beautiful little girls I have ever seen and I wish I could stay with you. I wish I had the strength to keep going, but too much has happened. Losing Remus has changed everything in ways I could never have imagined. I always thought I’d have the strength to keep going, but I don’t. Not without him. So I’m giving you to Sori, my dearest friend, and all I can do is hope Remus will understand. I have a horrible feeling he won’t, but that doesn’t change the way I feel right now.

  ‘I’ve rewritten this letter more times than I can remember. The room is full of screwed up pieces of paper, because I haven’t been able to get the words right. I love you, Lena, and I’m not doing this because of you. I look at you and I see us. The love Remus and I shared before he became a vampire. He tried to change me, so we could be together forever, which was when I had to tell him I was pregnant, otherwise you wouldn’t be here now. He would have killed you. For a little while I thought he wasn’t going to care. He stared at me as though I was trying to come up with some excuse, when I wasn’t. Finally he accepted I was telling him the truth about you and he disappeared. When he did that… I was both relieved and disappointed. Growing you was one of the most important things in the world, but losing him was difficult. I knew there was no chance of him trying to change me again once you were born.

  ‘Some days I wish I knew how to find him. I want to talk to him, to tell him how I feel, to tell him I was you to be raised by Sori, because she can give you the love I know I can’t. When I look at you I see Remus and it hurts. Every time I look at you I think of him. I don’t want you to grow up feeling like you’re not good enough for some reason. You are. I’m the one who isn’t good enough. I’m the one who should be better. I’m the one who should be putting you first, and I guess I am. I’m giving you to a woman I know will love you like her own, so I’m not at all worried about you, although I am worried about her. I don’t know how Remus will react when he finds out I’ve given you away, especially as I won’t be able to talk to him about this.

  ‘Every day is hard, Lena. I’ve been pushing myself to live for you, but I can’t keep going. My life isn’t the same without Remus in it and I don’t want to be a vampire. I don’t want to know you’re growing up somewhere without us. I don’t want there to be any temptation. You deserve a chance to live you own life, without the two of us making it more difficult than it needs to be, and I hope Remus will accept that. I think the best thing he can do for you is to leave you alone.

  ‘I love you, little one. I love you more than I can put into words and I’m sorry for leaving you, but I know Sori is the best mother you could possibly have.

  ‘Your sorrowful Mama,

  ‘Tereza.’

  All I could do was stare at the letter. I didn’t know how I felt, but Tereza’s explanation, that she couldn’t live without Remus, wasn’t a surprise. Carefully I folded it up again and returned it to the envelope I got it out of. Remus needed to see it, so I made my way up the stairs to his flat. I pushed the envelope into the letter box and walked away. I didn’t want to be there when he read it. I didn’t want to know how it affected him, because I knew it was all going to be far more difficult for him than it was for me. He’d killed one of his closest friends because he believed she’d kidnapped me. I shrugged. What hurt more was him taking my parents away from me - and Tereza being my biological mother wasn’t going to change the way I felt. My parents were the two people who’d raised me.

  Gareth

  Waking up hungry was terrifying. I knew what it meant. Breathing deeply, in an attempt to calm myself, I rolled over and found a bag of blood sitting on the bedside table. Jack knew. I shook my head. If course Jack knew. He’d been through the same things we had and he was obviously going to think about what we’d need first thing in the morning. Without stopping to think about what I was doing, because I knew I’d stop myself, I buried my fangs into the bag. Soon enough the bag was empty and I felt sated. I had no idea how long that feeling was going to last, but it was nice to feel that way without going out and doing something stupid. I slipped out of my bed, feeling more certain than I had done before.

  “Jack!”

  Emma’s yell had me moving before I’d put anything on. She was standing outside the door to Tom’s room. “What’s the matter?”

  It wasn’t a surprise to see Jack was fully dressed. “Tom’s gone.” Emma looked between me and Jack. “I came to check on him, the way I always do in the morning, but he wasn’t here. I thought he might have gone downstairs, but he’s not there either. I didn’t think I’d find him back up here. I just… he could have gone to the bathroom and I missed him, but I checked it, so I don’t know where he is. I don’t know where Tom’s gone.”

  “Gareth, get dressed. This is going to be your first major test. We need to get out there and find Tom as soon as possible.”

  Nodding, I did as I was told. I wasn’t certain I was ready for my ‘first major test’, but Tom did need to be found and I’d just eaten. I threw some clothes on and went to join Jack. “How are we going to do this?”

  “I’ll go on way, you go the other, and if you find him you ring me. I put my number into your phone. He’s going to have fed, so the most important thing you need to do is check the pulse of whoever it was he’s fed from. If they’re still alive they’re a drink and drop.”

  With that he was gone. For a few seconds I stared after him, before going in the opposite direction. I didn’t want to be the one to find Tom. I had no idea wha
t I was going to say to him or how I was going to help him. He hadn’t said anything to me the whole time we were in the living room together. Every so often I had felt his eyes on me, but when I looked over at him he’d pretended to be engrossed in the telly. I had no idea why Jack had chosen me to help when it was obvious Emma knew him better. Sighing, I kept walking, kept hunting, certain Tom couldn’t have gone that far. It just wasn’t possible for a hungry vampire not to grab the first person they came across. I looked across the road and there he was.

  “Jack permitted you out, did he?” Tom smiled. “They were worried about me, because I left without permission, even though they know I’m not an idiot.”

  “Maybe they do, but not being an idiot doesn’t mean you’re safe from your own hunger.”

  “I know. That’s why I come out here. I need to accept what I am and the best way to do that is to come out here. Now it’s become obvious there is a problem there are far less people out here, but there are enough for you to get an idea of what it will be like once this ‘epidemic’ is solved.”

  “You could have said something.”

  Tom shrugged. “I like Jack, but I’m fed up with him watching over me all the time. Being a vampire isn’t something I wanted. I didn’t want to go home and kill my sister. Even now, when I think back to what I did, it hurts. That doesn’t mean I can’t cope with this. I can. I know I can. I just need to get out of that house and have a chance to be the vampire I am, instead of sitting in front of that damned telly all the time.”

  I looked down at my pocket, where my phone was, and then back at Tom. “This is probably going to be the worst idea, but how about we go for a walk? I’m with you. I think we need to learn how to be vampires and we can’t do that by hiding away in that house.”