Blood Calling (The Blood Calling Series, Book 1)

by Patterson, Joshua Grover-David

  Let me tell you, it was just plain weird.

  After a minute, Wash and Emma got control of themselves. Wash turned to Emma. “You’re right,” he said. “That is pretty funny.”

  I felt a tiny nick of anger. “Why is that funny?”

  Emma smirked. “Because everyone does that. I did. All the vampires I’ve turned over the years did it too. It’s mostly harmless and it gets the point across right away.”

  “What point?”

  Wash spoke up. “That you’re really a vampire, you have a whole new set of problems you didn’t have before.”

  I looked at both of them. The anger, once again, sluiced out of me. It was strange. I felt like I should have feelings. Anger. Fear. My entire life, or afterlife, was staring me in the face, and I didn’t know what to do first. I knew I should be screaming, or crying, or freaking out, but I just couldn’t manage it.

  I touched my face again. A few more flakes of ash came off on my fingers but otherwise, I was as good as new.

  Then it occurred to me to take a closer look at Emma. Specifically, at her eye. I couldn’t remember which eye got a bit of pointed wood in it. Either way, it didn’t matter. Both eyes were whole.

  “Okay,” I said. “So I’m a vampire. Now what?”

  Emma looked over at Wash. “You turned her. You know the rules.”

  I looked at Wash. “There are rules?”

  Wash rolled his eyes. “I wouldn’t call them rules, exactly. More like guidelines vampires prefer everyone followed. For the greater good of mankind. And vampirekind.”

  “The big one,” said Emma, “is that if you turn someone into a vampire, the person you turn is kind of your kid. You have to show them the ropes. Tell them what’s what.”

  My eyes flicked back to Wash. “So you’re my sire, then. Do you have some kind of mind control powers over me, or anything?”

  Wash walked over to his desk and sat down on the chair behind it. “It’s times like this I think we really should just put together a pamphlet.”

  Now it was Emma’s turn to roll her eyes. “Which we would then have to burn. Come on now, Wash. You’ve been a vamp for more than 150 years. You know why we don’t have literature.”

  Wash put his hand to the side of his head, as if he was warding off a headache. I found myself wondering if vampires could get headaches. Then I started wondering if we had to sleep at all. After all, it was full daylight outside now, and we were all wide awake. Then I remembered I hadn’t gotten an answer to my question.

  “So can you?” I asked.

  “Can I what?” said Wash.

  “Control me.”

  “Ah. Right. No, I can’t control you mentally or physically. As far as I know. And I can’t control weak-willed humans either, which is sad. I If I could do that I’d send people out of here with the firm conviction they’ll never drink, do drugs, or huff paint again. I’d probably have this place seventy-five percent cleared out.”

  “You’re getting off-message,” said Emma. “You need to start at the beginning.”

  “What’s the beginning?” I said. “The origin of vampires?”

  “No,” said Wash. “It’s best to tell you what kind of stuff can kill you and go from there.”

  I felt my heart totally fail to skip a beat. I wanted to feel frustrated about my lack of reaction but I couldn’t even feel frustrated about not feeling frustrated.

  “Like emotional Botox, isn’t it?” asked Wash.

  “What?”

  “Right now, you’re going crazy over the fact that you aren’t going crazy. That’s normal. It’s good, really. Most vampires wouldn’t make it through the first hour of their existence otherwise. I suspect some people would run screaming into the streets and burn to a crisp. Or maybe just attack somebody in a very public place, and the next thing you know, there would be a million possess all over the world rounding up bloodsuckers.”

  “Off message,” Emma sang. She totally would have been getting on my nerves if my emotional center hadn’t been broken.

  Wash continued rubbing at his non-existent headache. “Fine. Lucy, here’s what can kill you. Sunlight. Anything that would kill a regular human being, only it generally has to try harder. As you may have noticed”—Wash tapped his face—“you now have super-healing ability.”

  “Silver? Crosses? Garlic? Running water?” I said.

  Wash shook his head no. “Folk tales. More than likely each one started when some vampire hunter in the distant past killed someone with a dangerous something-or-other, and it became like those people who don’t wash their lucky shirt until they lose a game of basketball while wearing it.”

  “I don’t quite get the metaphor,” I said.

  “Picture this. A vampire hunter heads out carrying a bunch of wooden stakes. He jams one into the heart of a vampire. The vampire dies. Then what happens?”

  “The vampire hunter carries wooden stakes with him the next time he goes on a vamp hunt.”

  “Exactly. But you know what? A wooden stake will kill just about anything with a heart. Vampires are no exception.”

  “So how does the healing work?”

  “Same way healing works in a regular person. The kindergarten version is blood goes to the wound and clogs it up, keeps it from getting infected, and lets the healing process begin. Vampires just do it more efficiently.”

  “And with someone else’s blood,” I added.

  Emma gave me a look that said, “Oh great, one of these.” I felt a twinge of annoyance, though once again it lasted less than a moment.

  “People use blood banks all the time,” said Emma.

  “That blood is donated,” I said.

  “So’s the blood we use,” said Wash. “Don’t you remember?”

  I realized I did have at least one emotion that still functioned correctly. Confusion.

  “She doesn’t get it,” said Emma. She looked at me. “Do you really want Wash to go into storytelling mode?”

  “He does that a lot?” I asked.

  Emma’s lips tightened. It was a silent yes but it was still a yes. She looked at Wash. “Just finish telling her about the death stuff, and let’s get on with the process.”

  “What process?” I asked.

  Wash shook his head. “Let me finish. There are a lot of things you need to understand, and the faster I get through them the faster we can start dealing with your new life.”

  “I don’t have a new life,” I said. “I have a new…” I thought for a second. “Death.”

  Wash sighed. “Fine. We’ll come to that. But pay attention. You already know sunlight is dangerous to you. Don’t go out in it if you can help it. If you can’t help it, try to cover yourself up with something thick. A sheet won’t do it. A blanket might. Rule of thumb: if you can see through it, chances are your skin is going to set it on fire.”

  I brushed my cheek but there was no more ash there.

  Wash continued. “Like I said, if something can kill a human, it can probably kill you, but it’ll be harder. Blood is your fuel and your currency. If you get hurt, and you have a lot of blood in you, you’ll probably be fine. If you’re running low, you’ll probably run out while healing and leave whatever injuries you have half-healed. That’s not good. You’re essentially human and vulnerable to human problems.”

  My head was spinning. I was a vampire. I couldn’t die. But I was dead. Except I wasn’t.

  And then it hit me again. I was dead. Really dead.

  I drew in an experimental breath and held it. I didn’t feel a pressure to let it out. Didn’t feel an urgent call for oxygen in my lungs.

  Wash kept talking. “Really, there shouldn’t be any reason for you to sustain a major injury though. If you’re smart enough to stay out of the sun, sunlight is a non-issue. It isn’t very often you’ll encounter a human with a weapon you can’t avoid. Your life is about maintenance. Eating when you’re supposed to.

  “Eating. That’s what we need to talk about next.”

  I s
poke, and the air I’d been holding in my lungs came out. “You mean bloodsucking.”

  “We’ve been over this.”

  I nodded absently. “I’m really dead,” I said to no one in particular.

  Emma nodded and sighed. “Yes, you’re really dead.”

  The implications slid into my brain, spread out, and started taking up space.

  I was dead. My dad and my mom didn’t know it. Couldn’t know it. I couldn’t tell them. To them I was just gone.

  My best friend would never know what happened to me. She’d just think she lost one of the most important people in her life for no reason, just like she lost the love of her life to a drunk driver.

  I was dead. But I was alive. But no one could ever know.

  My body twitched. It was headed towards anger, and fear, and all the other emotions and physical manifestations of shock. Then it all smoothed out again.

  I wanted to feel something. Needed to feel something.

  So I brought my fist back and punched Wash, as hard as I could, right in the face.

  CHAPTER 36

  Or rather, I tried to punch him.

  A human eye would have seen me twitch and maybe my fist in the air for a split second, and then Wash holding my fist.

  My vampire eyes saw me rear back, my fist move towards Wash’s face, saw his hand come up casually, as though in slow motion.

  I watched him catch my hand, as though I’d lightly tossed him a softball.

  The entire time, I felt none of the explosion of emotion that comes with punching someone right in the face. Or at least, attempting to punch someone in the face.

  Wash glanced towards Emma, and they shared a meaningful moment of eye contact.

  Then his gaze moved to me. “I want you to go get some sleep,” he said.

  I glanced at my hand and he opened his fist. Even though I’d put the full force of my weight behind the punch, I didn’t feel any soreness in my hand. And my flesh wasn’t the deep red of skin grabbed and squeezed. It was a light pink for the barest of seconds, before returning to its normal paleness.

  I blinked as what Wash had said finally registered. “You want me to what now?”

  “Sleep.”

  I felt my eyebrows draw together. “Why would I need to sleep?” I paused for a moment, considering. “I can sleep?”

  Wash nodded. “Can, and should. There’s not really anything you can do at the moment. We’re all in here for the day, the police won’t come looking for you here for a while, and frankly, Emma and I need more time to figure out what comes next.”

  I turned my head, trying to catch Emma’s eye. She lifted her head and looked at the ceiling. I couldn’t tell if she was feeling malicious or embarrassed.

  “What comes next?” I parroted.

  Wash intercepted my gaze. “You have to trust me. There are a lot of factors I didn’t have time to think about last night. I have a lot of decisions to make, a lot of things to put into motion, and not much time to do so.”

  “Don’t you mean I have a lot of decisions to make?”

  Wash cleared his throat. “Right now? No. In very real terms, right now you’re a baby, I’m your father, and it’s up to me to make decisions for you.”

  A dark look danced across my face. “You do realize I’m an adult, right? I’m capable of rational decisions.”

  “I’m not questioning your adulthood. I’m telling you that you’ve been a vampire less than a day. If you don’t want to sleep, fine. Go lie on the cot in the back and figure out what you think you should do. I’ll take suggestions. But right now, I need the wisdom of experience.”

  “That would be me,” said Emma.

  I considered arguing or trying to get angry again but my body wouldn’t do it and my mind didn’t know how to respond to my situation.

  So I went to the back room, closed the door, and lay down on the cot.

  I stared up at the ceiling, trying and failing to collect my thoughts. I was a vampire. My sudden disappearance was going to emotionally scar my loved ones. I now had to drink blood to survive.

  And somewhere in there, I felt a twinge of guilt for turning into the kind of monster my grandfather used to hunt.

  Except I’m not a monster. I’m a thing designed to take away people’s suffering.

  My brain was spinning, is what I’m trying to say.

  As a kid, I had trouble sleeping. I’d get to thinking about something and toss and turn, Eventually I’d get up and wander to another room to check out what my parents were up to.

  I did this a couple times when I slept at my grandfather’s house as well. I remember very clearly that while my parents were always annoyed by my late-night pitter-pattering of little feet, it didn’t seem to bother my grandfather at all.

  I asked him about it once and he told me he’d had the same problem as a kid. And as a teenager. And then he’d gone into the military and all that changed.

  Naturally, I asked him why.

  “Well, on day one of boot camp, we all got settled in. We saw our bunks, stowed our gear, and put on our uniforms for the first time. It was pretty low-key.

  “Then night fell, we all got on our cots, and all of us were handed a canteen full of water.

  “You’ve got to understand that I was wide awake. Meeting new people, remembering names, trying to keep procedures straight. I had a hard time sleeping under the best of circumstances. I had no idea what was going to happen next.

  “The drill sergeant yelled out, ‘Company, prepare to sleep!’ We all kind of huddled under our covers. ‘Ready, hydrate!’ We drained our canteens in about ten seconds flat. Then it was, ‘Ready, sleep!’ And we closed our eyes.”

  “What happened?” I asked.

  Grandpa smiled. “Well, I’m not sure about everyone else but I kept my eyes closed and spent a few hours just looking at the back of my eyelids. Eventually, I dropped off.

  “The next day came and we started training. Full-on, running and eating and running and eating, and then some running, followed by physical activities that still make me hurt all these years later. But you get the idea. We were on the move from dawn until dusk.

  “The second night it’s the same deal. Everyone in their cot with their water. The drill sergeant yells out, ‘Ready, sleep!’ I close my eyes and I pass out immediately.”

  I looked at my grandfather skeptically. “Really?”

  “Really. We did that for months. Training all day, then, ‘Ready, sleep!’ at night. By the end of it, I didn’t even need a cot. I could fall asleep on a chair, on the ground, anywhere. My brain heard sleep and I was out.”

  I grinned a little-girl grin and yelled sleep, and my grandfather dutifully tipped over onto my bed and started snoring while a gale of giggles tumbled from my mouth.

  Lying on my cot, looking at the ceiling, I thought of my grandfather and smiled. I closed my eyes and said, “Ready, sleep!”

  And I slept.

  CHAPTER 37

  When you’re a sleeping human, your body keeps on working. Your brain thinks, sometimes throwing ideas back at you in dreams. Your body heals itself.

  Your time of rest is a time of rebirth.

  When you’re a vampire, sleep is like that, only times a million.

  If your body is healing, it heals faster. If you’re trying to work on a personal problem, your mind takes all the data you’ve got, puts it in neat little piles, and cross-references it for you like it’s the world’s greatest secretary.

  But you don’t dream.

  Without dreams, there’s no real passage of time. There is the moment you close your eyes and the moment you open them. Unlike when you’re a human, there’s no residual soreness. You don’t wake up with one of your arms all tingly from where you slept on it. You don’t feel the aches and pains from the day before that you haven’t quite slept off.

  And for just a few glorious seconds, as your body reboots and preps itself for the day, your emotions, and all their physical manifestations, return.

>   Your heart pumps a few times in the morning, refreshing you, fixing any last-minute damage to your body.

  And all the emotions that’ve been sitting below the surface, being processed and sorted, hit you all at once.

  And if you’re me, and you’ve just woken up thinking about the emotional damage you’re doing to your loved ones, you cry. And wail. It all comes out, tears and snot and great wracking sobs.

  It’s over a few seconds later and your body sorts itself out. And you blow your nose, and go to the bathroom, and wash your face.

  And finally, you go to Wash, and say, “What’s the plan?”

  CHAPTER 38

  Wash and Emma were sitting in the laundry room, reading and watching clothing spin in the dryer. I wondered what they were washing since there had been no visitors.

  Then something occurred to me. I didn’t know how long I had been asleep.

  Wash and Emma were looking at each other, not answering my question. So I asked another one. “What day is it?”

  Wash looked slightly relieved to have an easier question to answer. “It’s still Saturday,” he said. “The sun just went down.”

  Emma looked at me then. “The plan is, you’re coming with me. We’re getting out of town. Right now.”

  I was about to argue when Emma held up a hand.

  “This is not a discussion,” she said. “Get your bag, get changed, and let’s get out of here.”

  “And go where?” I asked.

  “I don’t know yet,” said Emma, “But we need to go, and we need to go right now.”

  I turned to Wash. “This is really the plan?”

  “This is the plan,” said Emma.

  “I was asking Wash.”

  Wash sighed and looked away. “This is the plan.”

  “I thought you were, like, my sire or something. I thought you were supposed to take care of me.”

  Emma huffed something under her breath about sires and romantic trash.

  Wash’s eyebrows eased together. “It’s not that simple.”

  “Nothing ever is,” I said. “And I need to stay. I need to let my family know I’m all right.”