“Thank you.” At least someone got it.
“Like all Wizard Warlocks, you speak in lies.” Not taking his attention off Damien, Slade bent down to try and capture Kara, again. “Come here, my Eternal-One. Let me protect you from this monster.” Apparently deciding she was mentally deficient, he made a ‘here kitty, kitty’ gesture with his hand, trying to coax her forward.
She scuttled out of range. In that second, Kara knew she had two options: Slade or Damien.
It wasn’t really much of a selection. They were both jerks. Still, given the option of Cro-Magnon man or Vlad the Imapler, she already knew which guy she felt safer with. It was instincts more than logic, but what the hell? Kara bounded to her feet, clutching the manuscript to her chest.
Then she very deliberately stepped to Damien’s side of the room.
Slade’s eyes widened to the size of Frisbees at her decision. The total surprise on his chauvinistic face made the choice entirely worth it. Adonis-like beauty collapsed into lines of distress. Now, his gaze cut around the perimeter of the room, like he suspected he was possibly on a reality show and searching for the hidden camera.
But his reaction still had nothing on Damien’s amazement. His refined jaw nearly hit the floor as she moved beside him. Kara barely reached his shoulder, but she had the weird feeling that she could have nudged Damien gently and he would have toppled right over. His patrician features lost their savage refinery as he gaped at her. “What in Gods’ name are you doing, woman?” He blurted out.
“I’m joining Team Evil. Deal with it.”
“But, you can’t.” Damien glanced over at Slade for a ruling. The two of them weren’t really attacking each other with blunt instruments, the way you’d expect. Tanya St. Clair must have just written them threatening and menacing this chapter. No real fight. They weren’t sure what to do with Kara screwing up their programming.
Slade appeared apoplectic. “Karalynn, you’re behaving irrationally. You must listen and come hide behind me. Damien is dangerous. Nothing but an evil, hollow creature.”
Van Helsing didn’t like being called that. Damien’s whole body stiffened, even as he shifted slightly away from Kara and took a step towards Slade.
“Don’t hurt him.” She caught hold of Damien’s arm. The last thing she needed was Slade staked through the heart. Kara wasn’t sure what would happen if the hero wound up dead at the very start of the book. It might ruin her changes to get home.
Damien stopped short and frowned down at her hand.
She quickly removed it from his sleeve. “Don’t hurt him.” She repeated. “Slade’s just confused.”
“I am not confused, Eternal-One. I am a warrior for truth and he is an empty creature.” Slade chuckled. “I could never lose my predestined battle with Damien.” He looked supremely confident of that and why shouldn’t he?
The good guy always won in the end of the story, right?
Kara felt something cold pass through her at the thought. She shifted closer to Damien’s side. “Yeah, well, where I come from Vampires aren’t seen as Boy Scouts, either.” She snapped. “So, calling him a creature is a little pot and kettle-y.”
Slade made a dismissive face. Either he didn’t understand her slang or he just didn’t believe her.
Damien’s ebony eyes met Kara’s warily. They probably didn’t even have Boy Scouts in 1892, but Eternal Passion at Sunset tossed in so many historical inaccuracies that Damien could piece together what that meant.
“I am not a creature.” The words were barely a whisper. He slanted Slade a hate filled look and then quickly refocused on Kara. “I’m not.”
“I know.” Creatures didn’t mourn their dead families for centuries. Tanya St. Clair had screwed up Damien’s one note villainy with that back story. Plus, he was the only character so far with some actual brains. No wonder he seemed as lost as she was half the time.
Kara wasn’t sure how she was going to get out of this nuthouse, but she knew she needed some time to think and an exit strategy from Dracula-the-male-modeling-years. Slade and his sex drive were definitely going to be a problem. Damien was the quickest escape route from her prospective groom. “Will you help me?”
Damien tilted his head. Even the raven was staring at her.
“No, no, no. The Vampires are the dark knights of the world.” Slade sounded like he was explaining something to a second grader. “The Wizard Warlocks are the enemy. You must ask for my assistance, Karalynn, and I will give it, freely.”
“She asked me.” Damien snarled.
“As I said, she is overwrought. She does not understand that I am her protector from you. You are a vile evil doer. While I have never done anything wrong in my entire, noble life. Nothing. So, she…”
“You killed my fucking sister!” Damien roared in what was absolutely not the novel’s usual faux Olde Time-y dialogue. “You murdered her, you condescending son-of-a-bitch!”
Kara’s mouth parted. There was no way Tanya had written that line. None.
Damien said it.
“I never killed a woman, sorcerer.” Slade scoffed at the very idea. “All women adore me. They cannot help it. I am generous lover and honorable warrior who would never harm a defenseless female of any species. No matter how nefarious a creature she may be, I…”
“A Vampire killed her. I don’t know which one, but you’re their fucking king, so it’s your fault. You systematically wiped out my entire race!”
“Well, they were evil, weren’t they?” Slade threw is hands up like the last sane man in the world. “I fight to protect the helpless against the darkness. I fight for weaker people like you, Eternal-One. I respect the boundaries of nature, which the Wizard Warlocks have never done. Which Damien, especially, has never done. I am…” He paused, dramatically. “A hero.”
Damien swore in disgust.
Kara shrugged as Slade posed like Superman. “Maybe, but I still like Damien better than you.” Besides, right now she needed someone who wasn’t going to be all anal about following the rules.
That statement pulled Damien from his murderous contemplations… temporarily, at least. His head tilted in something like mystification as he went back to staring at her. He really did have the most amazing eyes. So dark she couldn’t even see the pupils in them, they glowed with intensity. It was like being X-rayed. As if he was trying to see her from the inside out. “Perhaps you really are crazy, woman.” He finally murmured.
Kara kept her gaze locked with his, willing him to just listen to her. “You’re not gonna understand this, but trust me when I say things have gotten all wonky, alright? It’s probably my fault and I can fix it. But…” She lowered her voice. “I don’t want to go with Slade.”
Damien’s attention cut back over to Slade’s fuming face.
“You can’t take her. You know you can’t.” Slade insisted. “She’s mine and that’s just the way it’s supposed to be.”
In the original text, it was a good bet that Melessa didn’t end chapter three by running-off with Damien. Slade probably had a point about that, but Kara didn’t care. Slade was never going to believe her or try to fix things. He was wrapped up in being the hero of the story. He saw no reason to deviate from the script in his head and woe to any ‘weaker beings’ who got in his way.
Damien was the villain, though. On some level, he had to know that this story didn’t end well for him. He was certainly the only one so far who could process changes in the plot and keep going. And, most importantly, he didn’t look at her like she was just a mannequin.
To Slade, Kara didn’t really exist as a person. She was simply there, sharing his scene and awaiting his throbbing male member with her quivering flesh. Damien at least saw her. He didn’t like her, but at least he responded to Kara like she was an actual human being and not a prop.
Besides, if Vlad didn’t adlib himself attacking Slade, then he wasn’t going to add any scenes where he killed her, either. The characters really did seem to be following the story
as best they could. She was the one messing things up.
Kara met Damien’s unreadable eyes, again. “Just help me out and I’ll tell you everything you want to know, okay?” She could give him all kinds of spoilers on the plot if he wanted. Kara didn’t exactly trust Damien. But, if she had to pick sides, she’d go with the guy who seemed least likely to suck her blood in the name of sex. “I’m not his Eternal-One. I swear it. I just need to get out of here.”
Damien still didn’t say anything.
“But, you can’t do this.” Slade’s tone turned whiny. “Karalynn, you belong to me. You must accept that. You can’t refuse the Eternal-Bonding. No woman has ever refused it. You just need to concentrate on what must be.” He started forward, determinedly. “I feel as if this whole conversation is very wrong.”
Kara was scared that Slade would just march over and drag her back to the White Hat’s side. It wasn’t like she could overpower him. The guy was built like an Olympian and she hadn’t been to the gym since… ever. She’d be fighting off his lunk-headed advances until he crept back into his coffin at dawn.
Unless he pulled her in there with him.
Kara swallowed. Slade really wasn’t a rapist, but he certainly didn’t seem to accept that she’d refused his proposal, either. He’d just keep pushing, because he was sure that he was right.
Kara’s hand unconsciously came over to grip Damien’s arm, again.
The frightened move was all it took to make up Damien’s mind. He sighed, loudly. His free hand caught her wrist, pulling Kara completely behind him. “Stop, Vampire.” The words rapped out with cold command. “The woman doesn’t want you.” He snorted. “As surprising as it seems, given her attire, she actually has admirable taste.”
“You’re making fun of my clothes? The guy who dresses like The Penguin?”
“The who?”
“It doesn’t matter if she wants me or not.” Slade paced around in agitation, but he didn’t come any closer. He really wasn’t going to fight Damien in this chapter. No matter what, he would stick as close to the original book as possible. He really was a Boy Scout, under the ‘you know you want me, baby’ arrogance. “Fate has decreed that she is mine.”
“You’re never gonna get Melessa is you keep up with this entitled attitude, Slade.” Kara retorted, hotly. “I mean it. She’ll just stay with the cowboys.”
Once again, the hero of the tale pretended she wasn’t there. “Give the woman back to me, Damien, or we shall have a war like no other. She isn’t yours and this isn’t the way it’s supposed to go.”
Damien’s cruel mouth twisted up in a smirk. “But, she’s chosen me, Slade. I don’t believe that’s ever happened before. No one has ever chosen the creatures, the evil Wizard Warlocks, over the Vampires. I find it… Intriguing.” His hand stayed wrapped around Kara’s wrist, his finger sliding across her pulse in something like a caress. “And since very little intrigues me anymore, and since I know it will eat at you every second she’s gone, I think I’ll keep the woman.”
“The woman has a name, asshole.” Kara put-in, sourly. The gentle movement of his thumb made her insides flip, but five minutes back in his company and she already wanted to take off running, again.
He turned to look at her. “Kara Lynn.” He said, gravely. “Will you come with me?”
“Do not give your consent!” Slade roared. “If you do, he can transport you with his magicks. I will not be able to follow!”
Kara hesitated. That part was good news, but ‘magicks’ sounded kind of ominous.
Damien arched a brow, waiting. He didn’t expect her to agree. She could tell. And his compete belief that she’d refuse him pretty much dared her to prove him wrong. Well, that and her total undesire to hang out with Slade for next sixty-eight thousand words.
“Do not screw me over on this, Damien.” She warned. “I’m pretty sure with some White-Out and red ink I can erase right out of existence.” Kara turned her own hand so she could hold on to his wrist and braced herself for some kind of Star Trek beam. “Okay, go.”
Instead, Damien just blinked at her as if waiting for the punch line. “You’re actually giving consent? To me?”
“Yes. Just this once. And don’t make me regret it.”
“Why would you do this?” He demanded, like she might be plotting something.
Good. He was as wary of her as she was of him.
That boded well for their relationship.
Kara hesitated and wound up telling him the truth. “Because, I don’t belong here and, on some level, you know it. You’re the only one who sees.”
He frowned.
“And because I have nowhere else to go.” Kara continued, candidly. “I’m… lost.” Just saying the words made her eyes well. She swallowed hard. “We can help each other, if you’d just hear me out with an open mind. I swear.”
Damien watched, a strange expression on his face, as a tear escaped Kara’s eye and traced down her cheek.
“Something is backwards about this entire situation.” Slade groused. “You should be weeping prettily at me. I am a hero of my noble people. Damien is a creature who cares for no one.”
Kara sniffed and forced herself under control. Crying was pointless. Work the problem, step by step. Right. She frowned over at Slade. “This is a trade, genius. I’ll give Damien information, if he’ll…”
Damien flashed her out of the room so suddenly that she never got to finish that sentence.
One second Kara was arguing with Slade. The next she was pixilating into nothing and then reforming in an entirely different location. It as an unsettling sensation. Stomach churning and dizzying and kind of blue-ish, although she had no idea how something could feel like a color, outside of a LSD trip.
“Holy cow.” Kara’s legs gave out and she hit the ground with a thud as the world spun around her. She fell down a lot in this reality.
Damien released her hand and stared down at her as she tried not to throw-up. “You get accustomed to the trip after a while.” He said, impassively. “There’s no way to avoid the disorientation the first time.”
“Thanks for the warning. God.” Kara pulled her legs up and dropped her forehead to her knees. “If you wanted to kill me there are more humane methods.”
“I have no desire to harm you, Kara Lynn. Which is… strange.” He stood over her and cleared his throat.
Kara realized that he was searching for something to say. These characters really weren’t used to ad-libbing their lines. For a second, Damien looked almost as lost as she did.
She decided to help him out. “Where are we?” It looked like a hotel room.
Jeffery Dahmer’s hotel room.
Gothic furniture and gargoyles and creeping paintings with moving eyes. Dark, velvet drapes shrouded the windows and the canopy bed looked like a crypt. The kind of place you’d pose the body of your victim for a few candid shots before you ate his skin.
“This is my lair.”
“Oh geez.” His lair, for crying out loud? Tanya seriously needed to lay off the Dungeons and Dragons.
Damien put his hands behind his back and adopted a superior sneer. “Where did you think I was planning to take you, woman? Back to the Vampire Isle?”
Kara was riding the thin edge between mystified confusion and abject terror. She was trying to stay calm, but it was taking most of her energy to keep the manic screaming at bay and now this. She looked up at Damien, her mouth parting. “The...Vampire… Isle.”
She didn’t expect the crazed laughter that bubbled up in her throat. Kara was just suddenly struck by how… stupid this all was. She wasn’t nuts, but the entire world had gone insane around her. Vampires had their own island? Kara had the sudden image of Count Chocula dressed in a cape and Bermuda shorts, sitting on a beach somewhere.
She lay her head down on her knees and positively howled at the idea.
She was such a nice normal girl. How could this possibly be happening to her? How could she possibly be stuck in a book w
here Vampires vacationed on Fiji? What was she going to do?!
Damien’s eyebrows climbed up his forehead as he watched her rock back and forth caught somewhere between laughter and tears. “Are you alright?”
“No, I’m really not.” Kara wiped at her eyes and tried to get her wild emotions under control. “It’s been a bitch of a day, if you want to know the truth.” She glanced up at him, trying not to cry. “I want to go home.”
He scowled, obviously searching for his next line and coming up empty. “I’ll get you some water.” Damien turned and headed for the door.
“Water?” Kara scrubbed her cheeks and fought for control. Actually, that did sound good. Hopefully, it wasn’t full of 1892 bacteria. Where did malaria come from? “Hey, if Tanya accidently wrote Dramamine into the story, bring that, too.” She still felt sort of seasick.
Staggering to her feet, she looked around Damien’s lair. Hard to believe that poor guy actually lived in this cliché. Out one of the cobwebby window, she saw something blinking. Not just blinking, flickering on and off. An illuminated sign. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.” Tanya had added neon lights to 1892? Kara stalked over to the window and peered at the anachronism.
World’s Fair Hotel was spelled out in twisty red tubes. The large sign glowed brightly in the otherwise pitch black night. As she watched, the word ‘world’ shorted out, only to fizzle back on. Then, off again. Then, on. Kara let the heavy drape fall back into place and pinched the bridge of her nose.
Donnelly Publishing also printed some true crime stuff, so she instantly recognized the name of the hotel.
It was the home of America’s first serial killer, H.H. Holmes.
That bastard had supposedly mutilated dozens of people, luring them to his hotel for the Fair. The place had secret doors and hidden rooms and all kinds of horror show material. Tanya St. Clair apparently saw no reason not borrow Holmes’ creepy murder motel for her book. And she’d stuck Damien in it as resident bad guy.
Which meant that Kara was stuck in it, too.
Oh no, no, no, no, no.
Not Another Vampire Book Page 5