by Alice Bello
~*~
Delia was just about to set the little house where Lucy Hart lived on fire. Since she couldn’t enter uninvited, she would simply and literally smoke the little blood-sack out. But then another human girl had shown up and started rapping pebbles against the girl’s window. How convenient. The human girl had Lucy out the front door and headed out into the woods behind the house in no time at all.
Delia followed, not making a sound, biding her time as the two strode through the woods and then into a graveyard.
Too bad Delia was no longer going to kill her rival for Gabriel’s love. Killing her in the graveyard would have been a splendid memory to have.
But no sooner did she enter the graveyard than she felt it. The little blood-sack’s power, the one that had stopped her in her tracks back in that filthy alley, the one that Delia would neutralize soon enough. But maybe not soon enough. What if the blood-sack had finally noticed her lurking in the background?
But then she saw what was happening. There was an altar set up on the top of a gravestone—and Delia could smell her rival’s blood. They were performing necromancy. Yes, that was the power the girl had, power over the dead. Of Course!
But Delia had never heard nor read of a necromancer powerful enough to possess or control a vampire. That was new and interesting. Delia felt the blood-sack’s power surge through the ground, running straight for her. She jumped, vaulting herself straight up into the air, landing on headstones as she hopped with lightning speed toward the walls of the graveyard. There she perched and watched the mayhem the little blood-sack and her witch friend let loose.
Foolish children, they had no idea what they were actually doing. With as much power as the little blood-sack had, and obviously no skill or control over that power, just walking into a graveyard was a dangerous proposition. Let alone filling the consecrated earth with that power.
Delia knew what was about to happen before it actually did. But she was impressed nonetheless. Grave dirt all over the graveyard started to churn, rotting heads and hands erupted everywhere as the dead gained access to the night air, and freedom.
They were animated, yet uncontrolled. Maybe Delia wouldn’t have to turn the blood-sack, maybe the freshly raised zombies would take care of Delia’s problems for her. No way for Gabriel to blame her for his precious Lucy being eaten by her own creations.
Delia felt a voyeuristic thrill, watching the two girls tremble and scream in horror.
But then a sharp spear of light caught Delia’s eye. Entering the zombie littered graveyard was the blood-sack’s doddering old grandmother. But she was running toward the two girls, swinging a baseball bat that gleamed with power. Every time she touched one of the zombies they fell over, shocked and disoriented—yet not returned to the ground. No, the old woman didn’t have the power her granddaughter did… but she had skill and control the other might… no, would never have.
Delia watched as the older woman took charge of the situation, and with remarkable skill used her own granddaughter’s considerable powers to lay to rest every last one of the zombies. It was impressive. Maybe even more impressive than her granddaughter’s near fatal raising of the graveyard.
Delia waited patiently as the old woman chewed her young charges out—making the little Goth-chick witch cry, her tears streaking her face with mascara rivulets. But in the blink of an eye she started to soothe her, as Delia had watched countless human women do over the centuries, by wrapping her arms around her and speaking cooing lies that it wasn’t as bad as it seemed. As always, that act fascinated her. No such thing happened in vampire society, especially not in the house of Tokar.
When the grandmother turned and began to lead the witch away, Delia found her chance. The little blood-sack had just stood up when Delia streaked across the graveyard at her. The first blow slammed her to the ground, knocking her unconscious with no more than a breathy yelp. Delia had her thrown over her shoulder and was already out of the graveyard before either the witch or grandmother could turn around.