by Lee Hayton
When a few minutes had passed without incident, I stepped back out onto the street and carried on. The map in my head was a bit muddled by this stage. Either the next corner would lead me straight back to the hotel, or I’d lost count somewhere.
If it was the latter, I was probably lost.
Luckily, I saw the hotel sign lighting up the street to my left. Either I could start around the block the other way, or just walk straight along.
Heading down the same road as the hotel seemed the safest. I may not have the key to the room to let myself back in, but that didn’t mean I wanted to lose track of the place. Sooner or later, Asha would return, and I could slip in behind her.
There were few shopfronts further down the road, but no shops were open this late at night. A bell tolled out, a mournful cry across the city. A few people began to run, their footsteps ringing out as they slapped the pavement harder in their speed.
The first knife-edge of worry caressed a stinging trail along the edge of my cheek. Where we came from, there weren’t any curfews in the city. If there had been, our lot would just have ignored them, anyway. Other cities were different, though. I’d heard that some places ruled their curfews with iron-clad control.
I turned, intent on heading back to the hotel and the relative safety of its lobby. If me being there drew too many curious glances, I could always make a beeline for my room and just sit outside.
A clink of chains echoed across the quiet streets. It came from behind me, and I turned, knowing already what I’d see. That sound wasn’t one that would ever fade from my memory.
The soft clink was silver against the tarsealed road. A vampire chain gang was coming up the street.
One of the leading vampires caught my eye. I turned to the side, ducking my head down so my gaze was hidden in the shadow of my cap, but it was too late. The vamp’s eyes widened, and his mouth dropped open.
I tried to give him a signal—solidarity brother—but his reaction told me it was already too late. He reared up, bucking against his chains, even though it must have hurt him. With one finger pointed in my direction, he shouted, “It’s a free vampire. He’s out alone on the street.”
Fingers dug into my shoulder, hitting the muscles by the side of my neck and taking my breath away. I curled down, trying to escape them. Too late. I was caught.
Chapter Thirteen
“He’s mine,” Asha called out. She dug her fingers in again, hitting so many pain points that I screeched and dropped down to my knees. “I’ve been tracking him, ready to claim a bounty on him. You can move along, he’s mine.”
The guard supervising the vampires wasn’t so easily dissuaded. He barked an order at the gang to halt and walked over, rifle held at a diagonal across his chest.
“Where’s your ID?” He kept his hand on the gun, jerking his chin at Asha. “Show it to me.”
“Just a moment.” The pain-inflicting fingers lessened their grip as she dug into her pocket. I made a lunge as if to break for freedom and another hand joined my neck opposite the first for a second. “Stay down. You’ll not escape, so it’s foolish to try.”
A second later, she planted a foot on my back and removed her hands as she shifted her weight onto her right leg, pressing me down into the dirt of the street.
“Here you go.” With both hands free, Asha found the card easily and handed it across. “This one is my first capture.”
I looked up, able to see the action from the corner of my eye. The guard took the card in one hand, keeping the other perched on his rifle.
He examined it minutely, then handed it back across. Asha started to move her weight, but the guard raised one finger, wait.
“Connect to bounty head office,” he said aloud. The phone connected to his chest plate dialed the number as we waited. I stiffened, feeling trouble coming for both of us. If we ran, he’d catch up to me quickly while Asha escaped. After all, I was the one who still had to get to his feet.
“I’ve got a bounty hunter down in sector 18g on ID number 877109. Can you confirm that she’s chasing the bounty on a free vampire?”
Shit. The game would be up. If I scrambled quickly enough, I might have enough speed left in me to make it to the corner. I could possibly outrun the guard—it was fifty/fifty—but there was no way I could beat a hail of gunfire. He could shoot the legs out from under me, then take his time walking over. I knew it. I’d seen it happen before.
“Confirmed,” the voice came back over the phone. “That’s a bit off-track but within the zone provided.”
The call cut off, and Asha eased back on her foot. The guard gave a quick nod. “Okay. You can go.”
She grabbed my arms, holding them in a lock while navigating me to my feet, then along the road in front of her. Now, we were drawing attention from more than just the vampire chain gang. Curious eyes stared at us from cars passing by. When we turned into the lobby of the hotel, a dozen sets focused on us while we walked across the room.
As soon as the elevator doors closed, Asha let me go but only so she could turn on me. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing? This isn’t home. You can’t just wander around the streets out here at night like you’re a free man.”
“Yeah,” I said, rubbing at the spot where she’d gripped my neck. If I’d still had blood pumping around my body, that would definitely have raised up bruises. “I get your point.”
She grabbed me again as the light for our floor dinged and shoved me out in front of her. At the hotel door, she slid in the keycard and punched out a code on the pad. The door opened, and Asha shoved me indoors so hard that I stumbled and fell to my knees.
“Don’t help him!” she called out as Miss Tiddles rushed across to help me up. “He doesn’t deserve our help.”
“All right. Let it go. It’s only my safety that’s been in jeopardy. No need to get all up in arms about it.”
Asha’s hands bunched into fists. I could see the open craving on her face, she wanted to punch me so bad.
Whatever. I should apologize and take my punishment. Instead my lower lip pooched out for a second before I snarled. “What the hell did he mean you’re cleared to chase down a free vampire?”
“It’s not you,” Asha spat back at me, moving past the cat to peer out of the window. The street must have been moving along satisfactorily because she pulled the curtain across, then spun to face me. “Believe me, if I’d genuinely been hunting down your sorry ass I would’ve handed you over.”
“What’s going on?” Miss Tiddles asked, jumping up onto the bed. “Why is everybody so loud?”
“Your stupid little friend decided to go for a stroll outside after curfew.” Asha whirled on her heel, staring at me with disgust. “Did you even bother to take a room key or did you just decide that whatever you wanted to do was fine?”
“I was waiting for you to show up so I could follow you inside.”
Asha snorted. “Great plan. You realize there’s a curfew that applies to everybody in the town. Did you not think you’d stand out like a sore thumb?”
“I didn’t know that. You never tell me anything.”
“You’re the one meant to be telling us stuff,” Asha shouted back. “This is your damned fool’s errand that we’re running. Why didn’t you find all this information out?”
I opened my mouth to point out that I’d spent most of my time since the decision was made inside a suitcase, then closed it again. That wouldn’t hold any weight. Asha had told me to stay in the hotel room and search for information. If I’d done that for just a few minutes, I could have worked all that out.
“You’d just better hope that the guard doesn’t decide to report the incident back to his headquarters. The last thing we need is someone chasing up the bounty office, wondering why I haven’t brought in my find.”
“Who the hell are you chasing, anyway?” I asked with a decided sulk in my voice. “If you’re not chasing after me, what free vampire is it that you’re looking for?”
“That
ceased to be any of your business when you proved you couldn’t follow simple instructions.” Asha paced back over to me, arms folded tightly across her chest. “If you want to be privy to information, then you’re going to have to prove that you can be trusted. That doesn’t start by disobeying the simplest instruction and putting us all in danger without any thought to the cost.”
Miss Tiddles rubbed the side of her head. “If you’re going to yell at each other, do you think you could do it more quietly?” she pleaded. “Maybe write each other a note detailing all the other’s worst faults? Some of us just want to sleep.”
I stamped over to the bed and lay down, staring hard at the ceiling as though it had aggrieved me. A second later, my arm was grabbed, and my body lifted and placed onto the single bed next to the cat.
“I don’t think so, buddy. If you want to lie on your own bed, then you can curl back up in the suitcase. Some of us have actually been out working and genuinely need some rest.”
Asha lay down and turned her back to us. Miss Tiddles shrugged, turned back into full feline form, and curled up, nose to tail.
“Did you find your witch?” I asked.
“You’ll find out in the morning,” Asha said. “Or whatever passes for that in Norman’s world. Now, shut up and let me get some sleep.”
I moved over to the window, sitting in a chair and staring out at the empty streets. I’d never felt more wide-awake in my entire life.
“Get a move on, sunshine.” Asha bounced her hand on my shoulder, making my whole body spring up and down on the bed. “We don’t have much time before check-out, and we need to sort out some transportation before then.”
I sat up, wiping my face. A few tangled wisps of dreams clung to me for a second, then blew away like cobwebs. “What transport? Where’re we going?”
“Far away from here. Delightful as it’s been. Hotel management isn’t pleased that I’ve got a vampire in my room, even if it’s one I’m about to turn in to the state.”
“What do I care if management’s happy?” I swung my feet over the edge of the bed and let them reacquaint themselves with the carpet. “How are you going to rent a car at night?”
“We’re not.” Asha flicked the curtains back enough for me to clock that it was still full daylight. “Back into the case with you, young man.”
Miss Tiddles was ready to go, sitting beside the door. She licked her paws to clean behind her ears, then looked at me expectantly.
“I hope you have a solid plan,” I grumbled, curling up in the confines of the suitcase. “It’s not pleasant spending long periods of time cooped up in here.”
“Oh, Norman. It’s not ever pleasant spending long periods of time with you. You’re always making full sure of that.”
Before I could return the jibe, the lid was zipped shut. Way to get in the last word, Asha. Using your unfair advantage.
As she dragged my weight along to the lift and then across the lobby, I tried to recapture my dreams and fall back to sleep.
I woke up next when the case was tossed into something. A thunk of a lid told me a second later I was stuck in the trunk of a car. My old friend claustrophobia joined me, crowding up the suitcase even more than it had been. I started to gasp, though I didn’t need the air.
The panic exhausted me so quickly, that within another half hour or so I fell back into a deep sleep. The next time I awoke, my case was being dragged along the ground, my weight causing a slight problem with the tiny wheels.
“Welcome,” I heard a female voice say. Or rather, croak. The woman’s voice was so full of phlegm that it reminded me of old-time smokers. They hadn’t been around for a good long while. I felt a sudden rush of nostalgia for the old cherry-flavored tobacco in my father’s pipe.
“We just need somewhere to put it where the sun won’t hit it,” Asha said. “That’s perfect!”
She clapped her hands together, and a moment later I was dragged across the floor again and behind the slam of a door.
“If you can unzip the case, Norman, you can get out.” Asha’s voice held the hint of a taunt. Even though I tried my best to grab hold of the metal zipper, on my side the grip was so small that I couldn’t drag it along. Either that or she’d purposely locked it shut as another small torture.
Boredom forced me to sleep again, and the next time I opened my eyes, the suitcase was being unzipped by a monster. My eyes widened in horror as the gnarled skin, long pointy nose, and wart-strewn face peered in through the widening gap. Once again, I tried to operate the zipper from my side. This time, attempting to pull the damned thing shut.
“Your friend seems a bit discombobulated,” the hideous creature staring in at me said. She turned away for a second and I saw how hardened her skin was, like ridges carved out of plastic. I shuddered.
“Doesn’t he like witches or something?” the woman asked. “It seems a lot of trouble to come all this way just to act in so insultingly.”
Asha giggled and then dragged my case out into the room. They’d had me stuffed into a closet. The moon shone through the open window, staging a fight with the single bulb glowing overhead.
“Sorry,” I said as I clambered out of the case. “I was having a nightmare when you started to open the case. I didn’t mean to upset anyone.”
“For goodness sake, Dory. Just take off the damned mask. With that thing on, you’re hideous enough to frighten anyone.” Asha leaned over in a fit of sudden good humor and tickled me like I was a child. “Even this little monster here.”
“Ha!” Dory said, disentangling the fake façade from her own skin. She had the unblemished contours of a young woman in her twenties with lips that pouted out in a stunning shade of cherry red.
“I thought you said your friend was old?”
Asha slapped me on the shoulder. “Just try to make an effort not to be as rude as you usually are while we’re here. This is Dory, Dory, this is Norman. He doesn’t get out much, and apparently he was raised by wolves.”
I shook the young woman’s hand, still peering at her glowing skin with curiosity.
Asha cleared her throat, and when I didn’t get the message, she gave me another tap on the shoulder. “You can stop staring now.”
“Sorry,” I apologized again. That was more than I usually offered up inside of a year. “It’s just I’ve never met a witch before so I wasn’t sure what to expect.”
Dory frowned at me and turned to Asha. In an exaggerated whisper, she said, “Does that mean he doesn’t know about your thing?”
“He does,” Asha mock-whispered back, “but he’s just not easily impressed by anything that I do.”
“He’s also been repeatedly told that what you do is based on scientific principles and you didn’t like it when people called you a witch.”
Miss Tiddles snorted at that and moved out of the room, her tail curling around the door as she left.
“What?” I said with annoyance as a silence stretched out. “If there’s some protocol that I’m meant to follow, then you’re going to have to tell me. I don’t understand what you’ve already said to each other, and I don’t know what I’m meant to do now.”
“That much is obvious,” Dory said, turning her back and leaving the room. “We haven’t been talking about you up to now, if that’s your chief worry. We’ve been catching up on old times.”
“We used to have quite a lot of fun when we worked on jobs together.” Asha’s voice was filled with a dreamy hint of nostalgia and regret, and I stared at her with sharp eyes. Even though she scarcely talked about her past, when she did it was with speech fueled by anger.
“Do you remember that time we tried to get the chancellor of the university to only admit female students into his Ph.D. programs? Oh, that was a good laugh.”
“He still didn’t do it, though,” Asha said. “Even when we pulled out all the stops.”
Dory shook her head. “That’s because you sent him on a trip up to the heavens. If you’d sent him the other way, I’m sure h
e would have done what we asked.”
“You catch more flies with honey.”
At that, Dory threw back her head and laughed. “Who the hell wants to catch flies?”
“So you haven’t talked about the reason that we’ve come here at all?” I interjected. From the mutual appreciation society forming in front of my eyes, it appeared we could soon be stuck there all day.
“I’ve hinted at it,” Asha said. “But I thought you’d tell it so much better.”
“What is it, dear? What’s happened that you require the services of a witch?”
I opened my mouth to say it, then closed my jaw with a snap. If I said the words aloud, I’d sound foolish. Like an idiot who’d crossed the country on the basis of an urban legend.
Miss Tiddles looked at me with curiosity, her ginger head tilted to one side. She jumped up onto the bench and nosed along it, probably on the search for some hangover food.
Courage. That’s all I needed. The courage of self-belief. “I found some information out about this area of the country,” I said, intent on taking the longest path I could to get where I needed to go.
Asha sighed and shook her head. “You’ve heard of the vampire who changed back into a human?” When Dory nodded, she continued, “We heard that it all happened around here.”
“You’re joking, right?” Dory smile grew tentative as she looked at each of our faces. “Like, you realize that’s an urban legend? It changes details every time you hear it.”
“No.” My voice came out so much louder than I’d expected that I took a step back to compensate. “I found a whole lot of information showing the same things over and over again. It’s definitely real.”
“Well, sure. That’s how the legends work. The same core story is repeated with a few differences to introduce a local flavor. No different than the guy with a hook for a hand or the call coming from inside the house.”