Wait? Beautiful bride? Ooh, now this was getting interesting. Not only was I a kick-ass motherfucker, but I was apparently getting some too. I could dig this.
“Come here, my love, and share in our triumph.” Badass Bill raised his hand and held it out in front of him, pointing it to the left of where I stood.
“Of course, beloved,” came an eager reply from the crowd.
I knew that voice.
No fucking way!
Gansetseg, daughter of Ogedai Khan, strode forward. She was over three-hundred years old in my time, so who knew what age she was now. There was only one small problem – well, okay, a lot of small problems. For starters, Gan was batshit crazy. Under other circumstances, I could deal with that. The more pressing issue, though, was that she had been turned into a vampire shortly after her twelfth birthday. Physically, she had stayed that age ever since.
In short, she was the most psychotic munchkin to ever walk this Earth.
I blinked my eyes, not willing to believe it. Gan walked up to my future self and put her arms around me. He ... err ... I returned the affection. Ewww! That proved it. I was either in Hell or the vampire apocalypse was playing out in Arkansas. Neither was a particularly appealing proposition.
“Okay, you’ve got my undivided attention,” I said to the spirit beside me, a feeling akin to panic starting to settle in. “I get it. I’m a horrible, evil person. Just tell me what I need to do to avoid this fate.”
“Avoid it, my love?” the spirit replied, finding its voice at last.
Oh shit.
It reached up and removed the hood from its head. Gan’s face peered up at me, a large grin spread across her prepubescent face, her green eyes sparkling with excitement. “This is your destiny. There is no avoiding it, although I cannot imagine why you would ever wish to. Is it not marvelous?”
It’s about there that a lesser person would’ve probably cracked.
Oh who am I kidding? I am a lesser person. “Holy motherfucking shit!”
“I am pleased to see you too, beloved.”
When confronted by the most horrific destiny that they can imagine, some people man up and charge headfirst into their fate. Others beg for mercy like the whiny little bitches they are. Me? I prefer to think I’m my own person, an independent thinker, a free will if you please. Thus I did neither. Instead, I took what seemed to be the most logical course of action.
I turned tail and ran off screaming.
Gan’s voice followed after me as I entered the ether. “This is your future. You cannot escape your fate!” The last thing I heard as darkness closed around me was perhaps the most chilling of all. “By the way, our wedding was beautiful.”
Well wasn’t that just dandy like motherfucking candy? The world was in shambles, I was joined at the hip with the most dangerous pre-teen alive, but at least I knew how to throw a good reception.
Lucky me.
* * *
I’d like to tell you I woke up with some of my dignity intact, but let’s not bullshit ourselves here. I bolted out of bed, sweat pouring off my brow and a scream escaping my lips.
Bright light streamed through the windows. It looked like it was morning. Had I slept through the entire day, then night again? It certainly seemed that way. Oh, who cared? I was back in my own bedroom and the nightmare was over. I was so happy that I would have even kissed Gan had she been there. But just for the record, I was glad she wasn’t.
A sense of elation filled me. I had seen the very worst life had to offer me, including a nightmarish vision of the future, one that I would strive to avoid like the plague itself. Screw all that destroying mankind crap! If anything, I would embrace my humanity more tightly than ever before. There was no way I was going down that other path.
Oddly enough, that realization made me feel good, really good. I stood up, feeling light in my step. A smile on my face, I strode to the window and opened it, letting the cold morning air wash over me. I stuck my head out and surveyed the town ... my town.
“MERRY CHRISTMAS, BROOKLYN!” I shouted. Wait, was it Christmas yet? I couldn’t quite remember.
Thinking quickly, I looked down and saw a teenager, gift in hand, ambling down the street. When in doubt, ask.
“You there, boy,” I hailed him. “What day is ... OH FUCK!”
I began to sizzle as the rays of the morning sun hit me. I yanked my head inside as fast as I could and shut the drapes. Note to self: embracing my humanity was fine, I just needed to remember that there were still a few caveats attached to it.
Remembering that I had just exposed my vampiric nature to the world at large, I peeked through the curtains to see what was happening below. The kid I had yelled to was continuing on his merry way as if nothing out of the ordinary had just happened. Thank God for New Yorkers. This was the only place in the world where the heights of weirdness were barely worthy of a shrug.
Oh well. I stopped, dropped, and rolled to put myself out, then threw on a fresh – and unburnt – set of clothes. Slightly singed, but presentable, I opened my bedroom door and stepped out. Despite my little mishap of bursting aflame, my new outlook on life was still intact.
“Merry Christmas!” I shouted, spotting Ed in our kitchen nook, coffee cup in hand.
He took a sip and nonchalantly replied, “Christmas is tomorrow, Bill. I’m driving you to your parents, remember?”
“Of course I remember,” I lied. “But just because it’s tomorrow, doesn’t mean we can’t celebrate it today. Hell, we can celebrate it every day!” I turned and spied my other roommate, Tom. He was sitting on the couch with his lovely girlfriend Christy.
“Merry Christmas, you two!” I said, striding over. I gave him a hearty handshake, then pulled him to his feet and embraced him like a brother. I even bent down and gave Christy a little peck on the cheek.
“You’re in a surprisingly good mood,” Ed remarked, walking over. He raised one eyebrow quizzically and said, “I thought you weren’t excited about the holidays.”
“Not anymore, my friend. I’ve decided I need a whole new outlook on life. From here on in things will be different. No more moping and whining. I’ve been given a gift and, by God, I’m going to use it to make a difference in this world. Today is the first day of the rest of my life and it’s going to be a long, fulfilling life. It’s...”
“I knew it would work!” Tom cried, turning to Ed. “You owe me, dude.”
Christy swatted his arm. “Shhhh. You’re not supposed to say anything.”
“Say anything?” I asked, confused, albeit still elated.
“It’s nothing,” Ed said.
Tom nodded and replied, “Ed’s right, but he still owes me ten bucks.”
Despite knowing that more important matters awaited me, I found my curiosity piqued. “Why do you owe Tom ten dollars?”
“Oh, no reason,” he replied, sipping his coffee. I still had a grin on my face, but something about his tone bothered me. When you lived with people long enough you could practically smell when they’re bullshitting you from a mile away. This whole place stank of it right then and it was causing my veneer of good cheer to start cracking.
I knew Ed was a tough nut to crack. Thus I turned to the weakest link in the room. “Tom, why does Ed owe you money?” Christy opened her mouth to say something, but I held up a hand to silence her. “Care to enlighten me?”
“You’re probably gonna be pissed” he replied. Ed let out a sigh of disgust and walked back over to the kitchen. We could both tell when Tom was about to spill his guts. It wasn’t particularly hard. The dude couldn’t keep his mouth shut if it was Krazy-glued.
“I promise I will not be pissed.” I held up a finger and crossed it over my non-beating heart.
“Well, you’ve been a little glum lately, what with all the shit going on.”
“And,” I prodded, keeping an overly-friendly smile plastered on my mug.
“And I remembered Christy mentioning a couple of weeks bac
k that she knew this spell, something to do with using a person’s subconscious to help perk them up. Right, hon?”
“Heh. It’s a little more complicated than that,” she replied, quickly stepping behind him, a sheepish grin on her face.
“How so?” I asked conversationally.
“You know, dimensional doors, linking of minds through the astral plane. Silly stuff like that.”
“You don’t say,” I replied, feeling my smile falter as I gritted my teeth. “Truly fascinating.”
“I thought it was an awesome idea,” Tom continued, still oblivious to the hole he was digging himself, “but Ed told me it was all bullshit. We argued a bit until he bet me that Christy couldn’t change your outlook on life.”
“Let me get this straight,” I said, walking over and putting an arm around his shoulders. “Ed bet you that Christy couldn’t make me happy by fucking with my brain – all for the princely sum of ten dollars. And you accepted?” As I spoke, I slowly tightened my grip on him into a choke hold.
“Something like that,” he sputtered.
“And you thought this was a good idea?!” I asked Ed, feeling my fangs involuntarily extend.
“I take it, then,” he replied calmly, “that your outlook has not improved.”
“What the fuck do you think?”
“What do I think?” He turned his attention back toward Tom. “I think that proves my point. Kindly fork over the cash.”
I let go of Tom, feeling utterly exasperated. My God, what a bunch of pricks I lived with.
I turned toward my room, deciding that going back to sleep was my best course of action. Visions of Gan suddenly didn’t sound so bad.
“No hard feelings, Bill?” Ed called after me. “It was all in good fun ... and a little easy money.”
“Ask me that in about a hundred years,” was my reply as I slammed the door shut behind me.
I took a step toward my bed, then had a thought. Didn’t Christy say something about linking minds? Was it possible? Hmm. What the hell? It was worth a shot.
I stuck my head back out and said, “Oh, and just for your information, Sally hates rubies.”
The last thing I saw before shutting the door again were Ed’s eyes opening wide in genuine surprise.
It was only then that I allowed myself the ghost of a smile. Perhaps it was worth the ten bucks after all.
Bah Humbug indeed.
THE END
BONUS: BLOODY JOLLY CHRISTMAS
Author’s Note: This story takes place between the events chronicled in The Mourning Woods (The Tome of Bill – 3) and A Tome of Bill Christmas Carol.
Returning home to a frenzied commotion coming from inside one’s own apartment is almost never a good thing.
Unfortunately, such events had become almost commonplace ever since I died and was resurrected as a vampire. So, rather than call 911 like a sane individual, I juggled the small mountain of gifts in my arms so I could open the door ... before realizing the jamb was already torn out of the wall. So much for my security deposit.
Oh well, I figured I’d best check on my roommates. Human as they were, they tended to be a bit overly squishy when it came to things paranormal. Still, yelling meant they were alive. Glass half full and all.
I pushed open the door and then immediately wished I hadn’t. The boxes in my hands fell to the floor, momentarily forgotten.
“Get this fucking psycho out of here, Bill, before I blow her fucking head off!” Ed, one of my aforementioned roomies, not-so-casually remarked. He and my other friend, Tom, were backed into a corner of our living room. Ed was pointing his shotgun, a little keepsake he’d gotten shortly after my turning, at the diminutive figure sitting on our couch as if she owned the place.
“Sorry, wrong apartment.” I spun on my heel, but didn’t get more than a step before our uninvited guest noticed me.
“There you are, beloved!” Ugh! Her voice made my skin crawl. “I have been awaiting your return.”
Of course she had.
I turned back toward Gansetseg, Gan for short. She was the adopted daughter of Ogedai Khan – former elder vampire, now permanently deceased. Though her body was that of a preteen child, Gan was over three hundred years old. She was fast, powerful, and as close to batshit insane as they came. Oh, and she was also inexplicably enamored of me, much to my detriment.
Last time she’d been in town, she’d killed several members of my coven and gotten my ass kicked up and down 7th Avenue by the assassins her father had sent to retrieve her.
“Hi, Gan,” I said in as friendly a tone as I could muster. “Mind telling me why in fuck’s name you’re here.”
“She’s here to get her ass blown to...”
She silenced Ed with a look. “Kindly order your cattle to cease their prattling before I remove their tongues.”
“Gan, we talked about this,” I replied. “No killing my friends. They pay two thirds of the rent.”
She glanced around as if judging my living standard, before turning back toward me again. “I thought I might check on you, my love, considering what transpired up north.”
Oh yeah, that. I’d been making a serious effort to forget the events of the past few weeks, doing my best to kill those brain cells via alcohol. Sadly, my undead constitution made that difficult. “I really don’t want to talk about it.” What I actually wanted was to kick her ass for her part in it, but I refrained. All I wanted was a quiet holiday before my world turned to shit again.
If she noticed the resentment in my voice, she didn’t show it. “I see you are already stockpiling for the conflict ahead. Wise of you, my love.”
“What?”
“Those packages at your feet. I assume you were out draining the local populace for your own personal supply.”
“These?” I asked, looking down. “They aren’t full of body parts. They’re Christmas gifts.”
Tom, still cowering behind Ed, perked up. “Did you get me anything good?” Such an idiot.
“Christmas?” Gan asked, ignoring him.
“Yeah, Christmas,” I replied. “You know, a jolly old elf in a red suit, gifts for undeserving kids, shit like that.”
“Mistletoe too,” Tom added with a smirk. “Not that you would know anything about it.”
“I’m about two seconds away from walking out and leaving you alone with Strawberry Nutcake here.” That shut him up again.
“I do not know.”
“Huh?” I asked, turning my focus back to Gan.
“I am unfamiliar with this custom about elves. Do you feed upon them?”
“On Santa Claus? No, I think it’s more the other way around, especially the ones begging for change on every street corner.” Upon seeing Gan’s look of confusion, rare for one as arrogant as she, I added, “Hold on. Are you serious? You don’t know what Christmas is? What, don’t they have holidays in Mongolia?”
“Ah,” she replied. “Yes, there are human celebrations in my country, but my father considered them inconsequential, unworthy of our attention.”
“Sounds like a fun guy,” Ed commented.
“You have no idea,” I groused before addressing Gan again. “Christmas is pretty much the biggest holiday of the year here. It’s a time of joy and goodwill toward your fellow man.” Jesus Christ, I sounded like a fucking postcard. “It’s, I don’t know. It’s supposed to be a magical time.”
“Ah, magic. I am well versed in...”
“Not that kind of magic,” I quickly clarified. “It’s ... hard to explain.”
Ed lowered the barrel of his gun and stepped forward. “Bill’s got a point. It is hard to explain.” He turned to Tom and winked. “That’s why he should show you what it’s all about. Right?”
Oh no. They wouldn’t.
“Good idea,” Tom replied, a shit-eating grin appearing on his face. “It would also give you some alone time to get to know each other better.
Cock suckers! In the sp
ace of two sentences they’d thrown my ass under the bus. Oh, I was so going to kill them both.
Sadly, before I could tell them to go fuck themselves, Gan stood up, her green eyes twinkling with excitement. “An excellent suggestion. I am impressed. I did not suspect your cattle capable of anything more than pathetic mewling.”
“Even a stopped clock is right twice a day,” I said, continuing to glare daggers at my so-called friends.
* * *
Where the fuck are you?!
I hit send on my latest text to Sally, who I’d been trying to contact ever since leaving Brooklyn. She was my silent partner in the coven I oversaw. More important, she was better at thinking on her feet than me.
Sadly, she was also acquainted with Gan. Knew I should have made up a bullshit story about demon invasion or some such, rather than telling the truth in my first text. The bitch was purposely hanging me out to dry.
Already, we were getting strange stares. You could march a dinosaur through the middle of Manhattan and nobody would bat an eye, but Gan somehow managed to draw eyeballs thanks to her disturbing attempts at displays of public affection. Oh yeah, I was definitely ending up on a sexual predator watch list before this night was over.
“What did you have in mind with regards to this human celebration?” she asked, hanging off my arm like we were surgically attached. “So far, the only magic I feel is my love for you.”
Ugh! I could so beat her to death with a yule log.
Sadly, I couldn’t shake her off so easily. Her age afforded her speed and strength magnitudes greater than my own. Last time she was here, her father’s chief assassin, Nergui, was forced to drug her ass full of Mongolian Death Worm poison in order to get her back home. Sadly, it wasn’t something you could exactly pick up at the local Rite Aid.
Oh well, maybe I’d get lucky and the holiday spirit would infuse her crazy self with enough good cheer for her to just leave on her own.
Yeah, right.
“I thought we’d start with ice skating in Central Park.”
“Ice skating?”
Oh yeah, she was from the fucking desert. Probably not a big activity among the Bedouins she lived with. “It’s when you strap skates ... err metal blades, I guess, to your feet and use them to glide across the ice.”
Night Stalker - A Tome of Bill Companion Page 12