by J.D. Rogers
Chapter 4
The Count and his entourage reached the mezzanine, still walking single file. The females moved to the left, the males moved to the right, forming a semi-circle. The Count was still invisible, or more accurately, still compelling us to not see him.
I decided that it was time to put an end to that so I reached out with my mind, to the water that made up almost sixty percent of his body, the water that enabled him to walk and talk and compel people to not see him. Then I ordered that water to freeze, not flash freeze, just freeze, nice and slow like, just enough to drain him of the power that was compelling us to not see him.
It took a few seconds, but eventually the Count became visible. To say he wasn't what I expected was an understatement. I expected a middle aged man in a black suit, with short black hair slicked back with a ton of hair gel. That wasn't what I saw.
The Count looked more like a surfer, with sandals on his feet, tan board shorts, and an over sized red and white Hawaiian shirt. His black hair was short and had a lot of gel in it, but it stuck straight up, forming little spikes with frosted tips. Wraparound Maui Jim sunglasses hid his eyes. He appeared to be in mid twenties rather than his mid forties. Unlike his pale entourage, his skin was the color of coffee with cream in it.
Titus rose from his chair, then he did something I had never seen him do before. He dropped to one knee and bowed his head.
The Count ignored him and moved toward Savanna and myself. “Which one of you did that?”
I was a little taller than him, but only because the boots I was wearing had four inch cube heels. If I had been wearing sandals, like he was, we would've been the same height.
“Did what?” Savanna said.
The Count ignored her and looked at me. “I guess that means it was you.”
“My friend and I have this ongoing debate,” I said. “Is a vampire strong enough to withstand the water pressure at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, or will it crush him the same way it crushes the steel hull of a submarine. Step out of line and we'll get an answer to that question once and for all.”
I hadn't intended to threaten the world's oldest vampire, at least not when we first met, but what can I say. I'm a mermaid, and like all mermaids, I can be a bit, shall we say, impulsive.
For his part, the Count just smiled. His eyes still hidden beneath his wraparound sunglasses. “And here I thought this was going to be a boring stop.”
The Count moved in front of Savanna and looked her up and down. “You're not nearly as powerful as your friend.” He pressed his hand against her bare stomach then slid it up and under her cropped tee shirt. For her part, Savanna remained passive, probably because he was compelling her to do so.
“You really want to see that trench tonight?” I said, when he started to fondle her breasts.
The Count laughed and withdrew his hand. He turned toward Titus, who was still on one knee with his head bowed, then he held out his left hand. Titus took the hand and kissed the ring on it. The ring was crude, handmade out of gold. It had an ankh engraved on it. A symbol that was popular in ancient Egypt, which gave me an idea of where the Count came from, not to mention how old he was.
If he was from ancient Egypt, then he could be anywhere from three to five thousand years old. Realizing that made me think that maybe I shouldn't have been so quick to threaten him. Anyone that old must've picked up a few tricks, tricks that could get me and my friends killed.
“You may rise,” the Count said to Titus.
Titus stood up but didn't say anything. While he did that, Stringbean and Frat Boy circled the table, until they were standing behind the Count. Stringbean pulled out his badge and held it up.
“Nice of the local authorities to send a welcoming committee,” the Count said, turning and facing them. “Although it is a bit small.”
“We were sent here to warn you,” Stringbean said. “Step out of line and you'll face the full wrath of the law.”
The Count smiled. “Why would I waste time with humans when there are so many supernaturals to play with.”
He looked at me, like a child who had just found a brand new toy in his toy box.
“What you do with supernaturals is your business,” Stringbean said. “Although I should warn you, some of them got friends in the department.”
Stringbean looked at me, so the Count would know who he was talking about. Then he slipped his badge back inside his pocket, turned, and headed for the exit. Frat Boy hurried after him. The Count's entourage parted to let them pass, then closed their ranks.
“Humans can be so annoying,” the Count said to no one in particular. “But what can one do? They reproduce in such prodigious numbers, much like ants.”
“Weren't you human once?” I asked.
The Count paused, almost as if he was considering what I said. “Was I? You know, you might be right. It's been so long, it's hard to remember.”
“Do vampires become senile?”
The Count laughed. “If we do, I guess I'll be the first to know.”
“Without humans, you wouldn't have anything to eat.”
“Truth be told, I gave up human blood several millennium ago.” The Count snapped his fingers. One of the female vampires stepped forward, pulled her long black hair away from her neck, and tilted her head. The Count grabbed her by the shoulders and bit her neck.
“Isn't this the vampire version of cannibalism?” I said to no one in particular.
At least now I knew why he kept the entourage around. A lot of people like to snack when they travel, apparently the Count was one of them. The only difference between him and all those other people was that his snacks could walk and talk.
We waited for him to finish eating, waited for what seemed like forever. Eventually, the female vampire began to shrivel, her body collapsing in on itself, her skin wrinkling. The Count released her and stepped back. The female vampire fell on her back and bounced on the chrome floor, looking nothing like a vampire and everything like a dried out mummy that had been around for thousands of years.
“Much better,” the Count said.
He moved to Titus's chair and sat, then removed his sunglasses, dropping them in his shirt pocket. That's when I saw his eyes. They were two black orbs, you couldn't see the pupils or the irises, everything was just black, even the whites of his eyes were black.
“You,” he said to Savanna. “Get rid of that.”
He nodded at the remains of the female vampire. Savanna didn't even hesitate, she just walked over to the remains, picked them up, and carried them down the stairs. I was beginning to think that letting her stick around had been a mistake. The Count was way older, way more powerful, and way more dangerous, than I suspected. His ability to control Savanna made it pretty clear that she was in over her head, way over her head.
Stories circulated around the supernatural kingdom that the very first supernaturals, the Nephilim, had eyes like that, eyes exactly like those of the fallen angels that fathered them. Through the centuries, breeding with humans had made us more like them and less like the fallen angels that originally created us.
The Count wasn't like that. It was clear that he had more in common with the Nephilim and the fallen angels that fathered them than he did with the rest of us. That thought sent a shiver down my back, but I suppressed it. I reminded myself that even the Nephilim were half human, and if you had human blood flowing through your veins, you could be killed.
“Why the ankh?” I asked the Count.
He looked at the ring on his finger. “In ancient Egypt, it was the symbol of life. It was worn by physicians.”
“You were a doctor?”
The Count paused for a second, as if he was trying to remember his life as a human. “I believe I was.”
“You can't remember?”
“I'm not sure this body was designed to hold five thousand years of memories.”
“Was the vampire that turned you a Nephilim?”
“No, but the vampire th
at turned him was.”
That meant he was the grandson of the Nephilim, or the great grandson of a fallen angel. That explained why he was so powerful. Most supernaturals were mutts. By comparison, he was a purebred, or as close to a purebred as still existed.
“You can't remember your life as a human, but you remember being turned?”
The Count ignored me and turned his attention to Titus. “Why is she here?”
“She's one of my bodyguards.” Titus tried to sound confident, but I could tell that he was nervous. Which was different, since it wasn't too often a thousand year old vampire got nervous.
“Has she always been one of your bodyguards? Or did you hire her to protect you against me?” Titus didn't answer. Not that he needed to. It was pretty clear that the Count knew the answer to the question before he asked it. “That's what I thought.”
The Count sighed, like he had just reached a decision. I'm pretty sure I knew what that decision was. He was going to kill Titus, eliminate him for no other reason than he had hired me to protect him. I figured I better do something and do it quick, otherwise I wouldn't be much of a bodyguard.
“Can I ask you something?” I said.
“No,” the Count said.
“So who was better looking? Nefertiti or Cleopatra?”
The Count turned his attention to me. “You a student of history or something?”
“Just curious. We know what Nefertiti looked like because her bust is in that museum. The only images we have of Cleopatra are on the side of some Roman coins and they make her look more like a man than a woman.”
“I know what you're trying to do,” the Count said. “You're trying to protect your boss by distracting me.”
“And you still haven't answered my question.”
“I never met Cleopatra. By the time she came along, I wasn't living in Egypt. Does that answer your question?”
“Depends,” I said.
“On what?”
“On whether you're still planning on killing Titus.”
The Count paused for a second then laughed. “It's been awhile since I've run into a mermaid. I forgot how much fun your species is.”
“What do you call awhile?”
“Five hundred years, give or take a century or two.”
“I've got another question,” I said.
“Let me guess,” the Count said. “You want to know who's better looking, you or Nefertiti.”
“Don't be silly. Nefertiti was human while I'm a mermaid. It's not a fair comparison.”
The Count laughed, which was fine with me. My job was to protect Titus and I'm pretty sure he didn't care how I did it. “So what's your question?”
“What are you doing here?”
“By here you mean?”
“This country. This city. This club.”
“When you've been around as long as I have, you've seen everything, done everything.”
“So?”
“So, after awhile you grow bored.”
I nodded and finished the thought for him. “Which is why you move around a lot, looking for something that sparks your interest.”
“That's a good way to put it,” the Count said.
“You want excitement, all you got to do is walk into the local police station and start biting humans without their permission.”
“I said I was bored, not suicidal.”
I thought about calling him a coward, but Savanna's reappearance prevented that, which was probably a good thing. The Count's entourage parted to let her pass, then closed their ranks. Savanna returned to her spot next to me. There was a blank look on her face, the kind of look you might find on someone that was sleepwalking.
“What did you do with the body?” the Count asked her.
“Dropped it in the garbage bin in the alley,” Savanna said. Her voice was as emotionless as her face, which told me that she was still under the Count's control. Letting her stay had been a mistake, a big mistake.
Taking this job had been a mistake. Not just for her, but for both of us. Wormby was right, this guy was trouble, big trouble. Titus knew that, which was why he made me an offer he knew I couldn't refuse.
“I have another question,” I said.
“You're definitely a mermaid,” the Count said. “You are by far the most curious supernaturals that I've ever met.”
“Are you the oldest supernatural alive?”
“Why?”
“Someone your age, amusing himself with supernaturals that are thousands of years younger is kind of like an adult playing with four year olds, you can't help but get bored.”
“You're saying I should find someone closer to my own age to play with?”
“Might keep you from getting bored.”
“As well as keep me from playing with your friends here?” He nodded at Titus, then at Savanna.
I shrugged my shoulders. “That too.”
“I'll tell you what,” the Count said. “I'll give you forty-eight hours to find a supernatural closer to my age.”
“If I do that, you'll leave Titus and Savanna alone?”
“I'll leave them alone, alive, and in good health.” He looked at Titus. “Well, as alive as a vampire can be.”
“And if I can't find someone?”
The Count smiled. “Then your two friends will die.”
I thought about reaching out with my mind and ordering the water that made up sixty percent of his body to boil. It was an extremely effective way to kill vampires, regular vampires, but this guy was far from a regular vampire. Which meant I wasn't sure if it would work. I figured I better exhaust all other avenues, see if there was another way to get rid of him before trying to kill him, because if I failed, I wouldn't get a second chance. I'd be dead.
“Forty-eight hours?” I said.
“Forty-eight hours.” The Count checked the watch on his wrist, which I noticed was a Swatch. He could've afforded something more expensive, but I guess he figured it went with the surfer dude persona that he was trying to project. “Starting right now.”
I thought about changing into my own clothes, but glanced back at Titus and Savanna. Savanna looked like she was in a trance, no surprise there, clearly she was still under the Count's control. The look in Titus's eyes was completely different, it was more of a pleading look, one that was telling me to hurry.