Grave Danger

by K. E. Rodgers

  Clarissa watched through the crack in the door as the brothers took Corrigan down the stairs. She had thought he’d seen her watching them, but then his face had become blank and then he’d nearly fallen on his face.

  “They’ll take good care of him,” Helen whispered near her ear. Clarissa turned around with a start nearly colliding with woman. “Sorry, I didn’t scare you, did I?” she said with a teasing grin.

  “They’re going to take Cor out whether he likes it or not,” Margaret Ann stated as she stood by the portable CD player set on the varnished antique dresser top. She was only half dressed and dancing to the Cranberries, the volume set to a high decibel.

  Most of the women were only partially dressed or in the process of changing, all the while dancing to the music coming from the stereo. Clarissa imagined this was what a burlesque show would look like.

  “You’re not going to wear that are you?” Margaret Ann said, sauntering over to where Clarissa stood by the door. “That’s way too formal.” She twirled around Clarissa eyeing her up and down. “What else you got?”

  Clarissa looked down at herself in her rose satin dress and matching shoes then to the other women in the room.

  Helen was wearing a short skirt in a dark plum color, a flowing matching top with tiny bell sleeves and large hooped silver earrings. Maude was kneeling gracefully on the large four poster bed in the guest room with her hands raised high above her head as she swayed to the next tune on the stereo. Aaliyah, if Clarissa wasn’t mistaken. She had on a dark, almost black denim jean, a shimmery top in her hands. At the moment she was just wearing the jeans and her pink lace bra, her red hair streaming loose around her body. Debora was in a tight camisole top, a frothy looking scarf about her long neck dancing at the end of the bed, one hand wrapped around one of the posters as Clarissa got a clear view of her blue underwear with a rainbow painted over the butt. Margaret Ann was wearing leggings dyed a dark fuchsia color and a pink top that started out dark on the hem and lightened as the fabric went on. She wore a sparkling gold belt over her slender hips and bright sequined flowers covered most of the top. They all looked like were in a sexy candy company advertisement.

  “Can’t you make things out of thin air?” Helen asked as she touched the sleeve of Clarissa’s coat. “I heard that ghosts can make things out of the energy of nature like magick or something.”

  “I’m not very good yet,” Clarissa said, trying to be modest, “but yes I can create objects using the energy of the earth. Clothing is a little more difficult because it has to be so precise or it comes off looking like a reject from Project Runway.”

  “Oh, I love that show,” Maude exclaimed from her position on the bed. “I’m sorry, Margaret Ann, but you are out. Auf Wiedersehen, Margaret Ann.” She tried to say it in the best German accent she could come up with as she made mock kissing noises to Margaret Ann who rolled her eyes at her.

  “If anyone should be voted off it should be Debora,” Margaret Ann said as Debora danced past her, dancing to her own rhythm in her head and not paying any of them any attention. Margaret Ann smacked Debora on her rainbow covered behind. “Hey, Isadora Duncan, put some pants on, we don’t have all night.”

  Debora made an angry pouting face at her sister as she massaged her behind. She flounced back in a way only Isadora could have pulled off without looking ridiculous, swatting Margaret Ann in the face with the tail of her scarf.

  “It feels so real,” Helen said as she touched Clarissa’s clothes. “Somehow I thought it would look different or that I couldn’t touch it.”

  Clarissa took her coat off, laying it on the back of a chair. “It is real, it just doesn’t last long. You can touch it and feel that it’s real because your body holds some of the same components that make up its conception. What makes you real also makes the clothes real and it is what makes me real.”

  “So let’s see,” Debora said from across the room as she stepped into her skirt. “Make some clothes to wear.”

  Clarissa felt their collective eyes on her as she began taking off her dress. She wasn’t used to undressing in front of people, but she had become somewhat used to putting herself on display after spending a day with Isabella. At least these were grown women who had more tack and if they saw something lacking in her physic would at least keep it to their selves.

  “Ooo-lala, regardez tout que le lacet français et le satin.” Look at all that French lace and satin. Helen remarked as she and the other women finally saw Clarissa in her under garments. “I don’t think this was what I was expecting you to have on underneath that demure looking dress. Cor’s eyeballs must roll into the back of his head seeing you in this little François number.”

  Clarissa didn’t comment. Instead she closed her eyes, blocking them out for a moment as she concentrated on creating from the natural elements at her disposal. Breathing in and out she flipped through several choices she had seen in some of her fashion magazines. She’d set up a subscription to Eidolon Entertainment, a gossip magazine on the latest news about celebrity ghosts and Drop-Dead, a new fashion magazine.

  Whatever she picked it had to coordinate with what the other women had on. So going with the same theme of colors she chose a thigh length black skirt with a bit of dark blue lace at the hem. The top was a form fitting tank top with a matching cardigan. The soft fabric had intricate stitching detail, using bright pink and mauve and lilac interspersed with cobalt blues and periwinkle. To compliment the outfit she chose black strappy heels with splashes of hot pink and lavender on the toe and heel.

  The women watched as the clothes came together on her body, as each piece was formed from what looked like thin air. Clarissa’s hair moved as if a wind were blowing over her body, but there was no wind in the room. The dark colors made her natural glowing pale skin stand out even more. The stockings remained on her legs held up by a fastidious garter belt and if she moved in a certain way the top of it could be seen, a peek-a-boo invitation to the eager eye of any male.

  Clarissa opened her eyes to the pleased looks of her boyfriend’s sisters. She knew that they had asked her over, not as a simple invitation to go out with them on the town, but to put her to the test to see if she really did deserve to date their baby brother. She’d like to say that it didn’t matter what they thought of her, all that mattered was what Corrigan thought of her, but that wasn’t true. She needed their approval as much as she needed Corrigan to accept her as she was. She was part of his life/death now, but they would always be his family and that would always be a deciding factor in their relationship. In the end, when it came down to the bare bones of the truth she was not his species and they were.

  “Do you approve?” Clarissa asked, meaning the dress, but secretly meaning so much more.

  Maude looked Clarissa up and down as she placed her diamond earrings in her ear lobes. She brushed her long shinning red tresses over one shoulder, running her fingers through the ends. Her eyes met Clarissa’s with an intensity that would leave most wanting to bow at her feet in sublimation, but Clarissa remained standing meeting that look without flinching.

  “We’re getting there,” she said.

  ***∞***

  Wonderwall was streaming through his head as he sat on the couch in the sitting room on the first floor. Chas had put the ear buds in his ears and plugged him into his mp3 player. Chas knew what he liked and that Oasis was one of his favorite groups. He kept he eyes closed as the music swam through his brain as the fluid from the third bag of blood went through his system.

  Corrigan could hear the sound of his own shallow breathing inside his ears. When he finally managed to crack his eyes open it was to see the looming face of his eldest brother. The expression he wore made him wonder whether Ambrose was going to hug him or punch him in the face. If he’d been Xavier he would bet the latter one, but then a solid punch from Xavier was like a mother’s hug.

  Ambrose held up an empty bottle of his finest whiskey so it was clearly in Corrigan’s line of vision. He sh
ook it to emphasis its lack of content. There was deceptiveness in Ambrose’s appearance. That because of his youthfulness he wasn’t as great a threat as the others in the family. That was a lie. Despite his boyish good looks he was a man full grown with the knowledge and experience of many lifetimes to back him up.

  Ambrose knew how to survive and that he took any means necessary had always appealed to Corrigan in the past. But Corrigan wondered if his brute determination made him reckless and lately there were many questions left unanswered to create mistrust between the brothers. He’d never really believed his response to Cyrus’s meeting in their home and now there was a death bokor in town.

  Clarissa had explained on their way back to his house that she’d met the bokor that evening at the Eidolon dinner function at the ruling council member’s home. They’d been planning this for weeks but the surprise guest had only been revealed on the night of the dinner.

  “I quit,” she’d said to him. At first he didn’t understand what she’d meant until she explained further. “I’m not on the advisory council anymore. I can’t be part of their scheming against your family.” Then a look of embarrassment had crept into her face and it had taken some cajoling to get her to finish. “I told him he could go,” she made a gesture that was easily understood. Corrigan was both shocked and a little bit proud. He would have liked to have seen the look on the old ghosts face. Cyrus was in many ways, though he’d never thought this before, very much like Ambrose.

  Corrigan felt the IV tube being taken from his arm. He felt almost better, but it would take a lot more than bags of blood to satisfy him.

  “Are you proud of yourself, Corrigan?” Ambrose said. He threw the empty bottle at Corrigan who managed to catch it before it made solid contact with his head. “I knew this woman would bring trouble down on my house.” He eyed his youngest brother closely. “You think I don’t know of the death bokor they’ve brought into town? You think I don’t see the way you watch me these days? She has brought mistrust between us, between you and your siblings. And you put us all in grave danger by your actions with a woman you barely know.”

  “I know her,” Corrigan said defensively.

  Ambrose paced back and forth across the room. His hands behind his back he mumbled to himself in French.

  Chas was lounging in one of the chairs, his arms crossed aggressively across his chest, his green eyes flashing angrily at his younger brother. “So you know she was a bokor. That she spent her life destroying things like us and if she wasn’t dead she would still be out there hunting our kind down. You think just because she’s a ghost now she doesn’t still have that drive to exterminate us? It’s engrained in them. It’s who they are, and you can’t change that. Just as we can’t change what we are.”

  Trueman was putting his equipment away in his oversized medical bag when a thought came to him. He’d spent a good part of his life and death studying the human body, first as a professor at Rutgers College and then later after his death, in his own home.

  Tradition had it that the flesh-eater needed to consume the nutrients of the living to keep themselves from becoming the mindless zombie creatures of Hollywood and the literary world. Neither of which had ever really got the history of them correct. But it wasn’t the blood and flesh that was so important, it was what was mixed in, running through like a living energy inside a human body that supplied the living with the one thing that separated the flesh-eater from them. And it wasn’t the soul, as one might imagine. No, it was the essence of life which wasn’t metaphysical but tangible. Animals had it in small doses, but not like in a human. If this could be harnessed it could not only extend a flesh-eater existence but that of anyone connected with the supernatural.

  And Clarissa’s life’s essence was almost completely intact in her ghostly form, which meant she had been strong in life to keep so much of it intact when part of her passed on. She’d retained enough that at times she acted almost alive. And she couldn’t die as a normal human would because there was no blood and flesh blocking access to her stream of essence. It was right there, perfect access.

  “No,” Trueman said, almost shouting. Heads turned and faces drew into similar expressions of disapproving confusion.

  Corrigan removed the ear buds from his ears just as Nirvana’s In Bloom was starting to play. Trueman had this look on his face that reminded him of a mad scientist from one of those B-movie horror films.

  “Trueman,” Ambrose said as his brainy brother remain fixed on the floor, his body still as his mind went into overdrive. Sometimes he would be talking to Trueman then he’d turn away for a second and when he turned back his brother would be gone. Ambrose had learned long ago that real geniuses had moments of insanity that most people mistook for a lack of social skills. His brain just worked differently than the average person. “What is it?” he continued after Trueman remained quiet staring off into a world of his own making.

  “If I could just find a way to replicate the essence then I’d only need a small amount.” Trueman was talking but no one was following along. He continued rambling using big words such as electrophoresis.

  Xavier crossed the room from his position by the door to pop his brother on the side of his head. Trueman immediately clutched his head, the pain in it making his brain slow down to a normal human level.

  “What the hell is the matter with you?” Trueman barked. “Why did you clock me in the head for?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” Xavier drawled. “I thought you were freezing up and about to crash. I always find it easiest to fix mechanical problems by giving them a good smack. That’s what I always do to the computer at home when it starts acting goofy.”

  Trueman stood up to his full height, staring down the distance to his stubborn older brother. “I’m not a mechanical device,” he growled low. Even though he was a brain, he wasn’t a weenie. If Trueman wanted to, he could easily take down his brothers; the glasses were as deceptive as Ambrose’s boyish looks.

  “Usted me podría haber engañado, el hermano,” You could have fooled me, brother.

  Trueman ignored Xavier. He wasn’t in the mood for a fight, not when he’d had such a great epiphany. He looked around at his brothers, men who under different circumstances would never have known each other. Now, with a great deal of work ahead of him, he could very likely find a means to save them and himself.

  “I think I found a way to satisfy and tame the beast.”

  Chapter 25-

  “Here,” Maude shouted over the music as she put a glass in Clarissa’s hand. They were all sitting in one of the booths in the in the lounge area of the nightclub. Located on the corner of Washington and Orange Avenue, Necropolis was a Goth Club that supported a vampire friendly environment; not that many of the undead actually hung out here. A very melancholy interior with New Wave/Alternative upstairs and Dark Wave and Industrial Goth downstairs, piped in through a fancy sound systems.

  “Thanks,” Clarissa shouted back as she held the drink to her lips. The glass swirled with a red liquid that looked like some sweet dyed syrup. It fit well with the theme.

  What did not fit in with the dark theme where the four women in their candy, rainbow inspired outfits. They stuck out more than a grown man at a Jonas Brothers concert.

  “Have you ever been in this club before?” Clarissa asked Corrigan’s sisters as they each held an identical drink to hers on the table in front of them. They shook their head, no, all while grinning at her, their elongated canines flashing white for a moment from their brightly glossed lips.

  That was the ‘in’ thing these days. And though everyone in this club dressed the part in dark colors, likely sporting tiny teeth attachments of their own, these candy colored confections of womanhood were the real deal. Clarissa watched as Debora pulled something small out of her sparkly rhinestone covered purse. It was a vial of some sort and when the lights flashed over their heads she could see it was a tiny vial of rich, dark blood. She always imagined that blood to them was like choco
late to the normal person, addicting and it came in varying quality and design.

  Debora splashed a drop in each of the women’s cocktail glasses, her own being a non-alcoholic version of the same thing. Lastly her hand stopped suspended, hovering over Clarissa’s for a moment. Clarissa felt their collective gazes on her as Debora held the vial of human liquid over her glass.

  Consuming the blood of a human was a sin. At least that was what she had believed most of her life. For a moment Clarissa had the image of the black and white cow from the Chick filet ads telling the customers to eat more chicken. That was what humans had been promoting all along. Eat the dumb chicken, not me. But in this world, they were the ‘dumb chickens’.

  Clarissa nodded her head, watching as the viscous fluid plopped into her already red swirling drink. But you could easily see the difference between the real stuff and the syrup. The women watched her as she slowly brought it her mouth. And as the blood mixed with the alcohol, hitting her taste buds, she instantly understood what all the madness was over.

  It was fresh, not from a bag from the chilled units at a blood bank. Frozen blood likely tasted just like frozen meat stored in the freezer, the freezing process destroying some of the flavors. Not that most humans would be able to tell the difference. The sweetness of the drink cut some of the metallic taste, but it was still there, coating her tongue like a living thing.

  It was absolutely spectacular.

  “There,” Maude said, taking a deep drink of her cocktail. “Now, you are one of the girls.”

  “But you still don’t trust me, do you?” Clarissa asked her truthfully. This was the first time she had been with Corrigan’s sisters without him. This was probably the best chance she’d get to make them see she wasn’t the woman she’d been in life.

  “If you were us, would you trust you?” Helen said, fingering the rim of her cocktail glass. “We all know what you did when you were alive, you destroyed people like us. Can you blame us for not being the friendly welcoming party to one of the only beings who could literally send us back to our graves?”