The swarm approaches a farm. A fly by. A plump, farm woman runs inside and slams a door, yelling for the farmer to get the gun! Parts like these, where Night Rides are more fun in the legendary air currents and terrain, the people 'know'. They just know. Nobody believes them, but they've seen it. They sense it; and they remember. A time when 'Juston' didn't seem so, you know, head to one side, affected. What happened to him? Is all the farm woman can think about when she remembers. But, these bats just chatter and laugh. These aren't just any bats in this cloud, and the farm fare won't suffice. No these bats are vampires, here to answer a call. The call of Nostramadeus, legend of the Underworld Castle. They swoop and dive, jeer and taunt the farmer, a visitor, lone campers, the occasional out-late walker, or the tragedy of the broken down car; however, most continue on to their destination arousing only a fear of bats, rather than a fear of vampires.
Along for the ride is a mutant, river bat for the first three flaps of its wings who soon trails off. He can't keep up. That inner breeding, her Father mumbles, and then laughs. He doesn't mean it, but he must distinguish himself above these divine, yet simple, creatures as they show respect to their side of flight. Ah, but it is worth it, Jessica’s father takes a dive, a plunge to the lead, they fall in behind from a pitch above, the thrill of flight on a Night Ride. Fifteen feet above the lip of a cliff they fly, each dipping down into the air current, a real rush she's heard it described during many a conversation between her Father and his friends. Hands-free travel at its best in the upstroke of a wing beat. This will be an excellent night!
Theopolis; the Vampire DeAngeliuson, the first; Ickabod; Peoneestlies Brutaevus, from the clown house; Mrs. Rita, aka Rita Ride; an instructor from Thaddeus, Mr. Berstallus; the head school master from her grammar school, Andreana Nosferia; a musician from a band that's played at Ickabod's mansion, Michaelis L'orno, and a famous scholar whom she’d once seen walking around Thaddeus Preference’s, and suspects him to be the writer of a letter urging her not to attend. Payback – and on her night of honor, well-done!
Jessica is given the title: Slayer of Angels (for DeAngeliuson) having killed the ancient Witch, or as the story goes, returns unscathed - whereas, the Witch wound up dead on a fake summons. A title given at the Night Ride distinguishes Jessica as a celebrity status vampire with a name - a known go-er by the code. It’s time now for her to think, “O, what would Drew say about this?” but she doesn’t. Instead, while he sleeps she immerses herself in tradition - vampire goth to the utmost; sort of glorified.
Jessica learns things not all vampires know during the ceremonious ride out into the night with her kind. A feed on this night - swooped down upon by the night’s cloud of vampire bats, the helpless victim becomes their captive - a vampire for eternity, immortal among them all. She had suspected as much when her fiasco at grammar school settled down in the press so quickly, but when she was invited back to school, the Headmistress seemed different, and then the whole mess immediately died down. Tonight however, she learns the sad truth - a vampire is made on these rides, changed forever, from mortal to being of darkness without end.
The vampires convene at a small estate in the country to discuss the next and most important victim to awaken among them to their - including Jessica’s - existence. Jessica’s Father suggests Crucious Port.
“He’s a troll!” Jessica exclaims, terrified at the idea of sharing fright life outings with the tedious cohort who got her involved in the Underworld Witch Scandal.
“No,” she says again, regaining composure.
He solemnly suggests, “Drew?” and she sighs.
“No, I couldn’t. He’s going to be so upset about tonight, as it is. I promised, you know,” she admits.
Andrea, the Head Schoolmastress laughs - the new ones always do in topics of mortality – and inquires, “You promised to try to be mortal for him?”
“Yes,” Jessica proclaims, “it was neither a problem, nor even difficult for me, until now,” she worries.
Her Father turns away, so Ickabod consoles him, “Worthy kill, the Witch, but I think you look rather ravishing in the darkness, dear. I suspect your curtailed lifestyle choice has held a little more haunting and hunting than you’ve been able to admit? Hmmm?” he mentions rather than asks. With that, and Ickabod being such a good friend of her Father’s, she opens up about her secret vampire life, so far withheld from Drew, as her head hits his shoulder to cry a single, vampire’s tear for her victims.
Ickabod tells her, “There, there. You’ll be alright, but it’s got to be Drew, I’d say. We’ll make him one of us. Living in two worlds while in one dimension, isn’t a plan for the long term.” Ickabod pats distraught Jessica on the head. She lifts her head up, wiping her tear with the handkerchief he offers.
“You’re so kind, and your advice has done me quite a bit of good. I won’t agree that we should change my Drew in any way, but I do think, now, I can talk to him. It started tonight, our conversation. I must ask him - or at least tell him - first,” she explains.
Ickabod’s eyes and the eyes of the great Vampire DeAngeliuson meet. They both sigh as if to admonish their own past regrets about the difficulties vampires have being honest with mortals who have trusted that they were, in fact, being told all there is to know.
“O, the times we’ve all tried, Jessica,” Ickabod comments.
Mrs. Rita sighs too, and then asks, “Why is it always the same?”
“One thing’s for sure,” Jessica’s Father states firmly, “not Drew. Not tonight.” And, they move on down the victim-to-vampire list of prospects.”
“From hunted to hunter,” Peoneastlies adds, and her fangs catch the light for one quick moment when everyone looks at her. The notorious vampire interrupts the group’s pause to continue with their task at hand - for the night isn’t getting any younger - suggesting several possiblities whom only he knows.
“Date!” Jessica says, “we liked her so much.”
“You and Raven?” Theopolis remarks.
“Raven,” the Vampire states, “perfect!”
“Perfect,” Theopolis repeats looking at Jessica and sneering a bit.
“Well, whom do you suggest, then?” Ickabod asks him.
“I’m not here to make suggestions about drudging humans from their rotting eco-systems into eternal life. It’s just that this communal little band of gypsies seems to have become very Jessica-centric, don’t you think?”
“Not Mrs. Rita,” Jessica says, and then she tells the ‘little band’ about the portal she has found - Curmudgeon Cafe - and her surprise at finding Mrs. Rita Ride out walking, alone, in the night.
“I’d suggest the barista, but he’s something, already, among dark forces that go bump in the night - I can’t quite put my finger on it, but -”
“Dragon Rider,” Mrs. Rita says, “with a reptile-like magic,” she quickly explains what she knows.
Ickabod laughs, "Isn’t he in the wrong dimension! There aren’t any dragons to speak of, let alone ride. Must be very lonely for him. He’s my choice.”
“There,” Jessica quips triumphantly, “not Jessica-centric, at all.”
“Can’t,” Mrs. Rita strokes the side of her cape, her eyes look around to the shadows and back to the eyes of the group now upon her, “a very dark magic, there. He’s probably best left alone, now that he’s made it, here. We vampires do assume we are exquisite among Underworld beings, but the ancient art of the dragon and its masters cannot-” her voice trails off and she pulls her cape closer to her, “be tamed. Even we are unable to go into that realm,” she says.
“The waiter! He asked us, Father - great Vampire - if we’d like dessert. He’s been to the Underworld Castle more than once.”
“Excellent choice!” Theopolis booms out, “so we can get on with our night.”
“Fine,” agrees Ickabod.
“I don’t see why not,” says Mrs. Rita. Andrea is inspecting her fingernails, and Peoneastlies is missing her ephone.
“Sure,
” they both say.
“It’s unanimous,” the great Vampire says.
“Always is,” Peoneastlies chimes in.
For this next Night Ride calling, Jessica ventures out into the night with even more unease and worry from Drew about her behavior, and with even less of an excuse to ‘go out’. Eight vampires assembled on the breeze in the night, at precise moon time, create more than just a little anxiousness within Jessica to justify - and ultimately cover-up - a reasonable defense to join with the gang in its primeval form. The vampire of antiquity - original haunt of the Underworld Castle - Nostramadeus is among the called out, winged hunters in black capes and goth finery. His reason for attending the hunt is discussed after a thrilling ride through air currents above city lights, suburban canyons, eventual farmlands, out toward the haunted estate where their bat cloud descends in the night. They fall upon the house like the dark veil of a widow at the fake funeral of their most recently hunted down cohort.
In the drawing room, the Vampire DeAngeliuson appeals to the others about their assemblage - aside from the fun of group flight - in the night.
“There’s been a request. Here,” he opens a letter sealed with a wax monogram, stamped LN, “from Old Nostramadeus from the Underworld. It seems Domina can never go back to being an Above World being, she’d be ancient by now - the metaphysics won’t work. He’s says, here, she has her whole life to live in the Underworld and he laments that she cannot go back to being locked in the Castle’s Tower. He has decided to make her immortal. Well, there,” the vampire puts the letter on the table for anyone who might want to read it.
“Yes, Domina! I agree the very thought of her being on a Night Ride with me gives me great pleasure - I cannot begin to explain how she has suffered a lack of ‘getting out and around’ for, simply put, years and years. Please Father, excuse me - Vampire DeAngeliuson - can I go along for the transformation?”
The Headmastress scans the letter, “He says she’s in the old Witch’s hut, now, making due. I guess the Ex-Witch’s hut would be more like it.”
“We’ve all a need to transfer tonight, then, into the Underworld’s dimension,” he tells his plan to the group.
When the cloud of night descends upon the little hut, Domina, at first, is frightened to the very core of her existence. From the sound of bats circling down, the haunted inkling of being circled, then stalked, to the realization that these divine beings encircling her aren’t really bats; Domina is frozen with fear. It is a sympathy taking of her mortal soul - trapped in a world without her kind, unable to rise toward home for fear of death in the body which had exited that world too long ago to be able to survive longer than one minute Above World. Domina succumbs to her transformation, frightened yet willingly.
Nostramadeus invites all involved in the waken to his Castle. Expressing good will at the Witch’s demise he holds a banquet while Domina acclimates to her new statue - a party - and then a Night Ride. The return, for most, to the Above World and their duties, their lives, their acts of sorrow, and for Jessica, her Drew.
Chapter Twelve
Mortal Predicament
Jessica stumbles back into the brownstone apartment she shares with Drew, three days later, at night, tripping over a lamp while trying her best to be quiet as a mouse, hoping Drew won’t wake up - or even notice that she had been gone. Drew is angry. Stewing, actually, where he sleeps.
“Didn't you find the note? I left a note,” Jessica explains.
Drew uncrumples the note from the bedside table.
He reads it aloud, “Went out, after all. Make it up to you when I get home?” He glares at her, “I've been waiting! Three days!!”
“Sorry. My first Night Ride to the Underworld. It was glorious! You've got to come along sometime?” She squints at him.
“CAN I?” Drew hisses.
“Uh, maybe,” Jessica attempts to be humorous, “We've got you on the list.”
Drew is not amused, “What?! To be a blood sucking, human form - I can't go there, Jessica. Not like you, apparently!”
“But, but-'” Jessica is interrupted.
“And for which side, Jessica? I’m starting to wonder! The drained, zombied out, form to recover - but not recover enough - undead?”
“No Drew!” Jessica grabs onto both of his hands, still smiling from her exhilarating Night Ride out of the Underworld to the Above World dimension. What would you say if there was a way, for you and me to be more alike?” She steps closer. Drew steps back.
“What?”
“You heard me,” she whispers, “what if you and I could blend - forge one and the same kind - escape our dividing line, converge our two different worlds?”
“You mean, I could be more like you?” Drew takes another step backward. His back is now against the balcony door.
“Well, that's one way, to think about it - I don't think the merge could go the other way, not really,” she tells him, too filled with her idea of transforming Drew to remember her vow to live life as a mortal, as best she can. (O, dearest, failed Jessica!)
“But, you were sure you could,” Drew insists, “when I met you, and you weren't ever going to be like the vampires you knew - your Father, Theopolis, Ickabod. “
“Mrs. Rita,” says Jessica.
“No!” inhales Drew and then, like all mortals, his hand instinctively covers his throat at the (surprise) mention of a vampire’s name.
“You said they were making the wrong choice. You said that kind of life wasn’t what you wanted to live. They were the bad example, you said. And now, you're asking me to become... one of them?” His voice is high-pitched and he bumps the balcony door with his left heel - no way to step back any further, this time, away from Jessica and her new idea.
Jessica, still whispering and smiling, with white fangs barely hidden at the corners of her smile asks him, “What are you thinking, now?”
Drew (probably thinking words like ‘getting the heck out of here’) whispers back, “That I need a vacation.” This breaks the tension and Jessica laughs.
“Maybe we could go back to England, to old Thaddeus for a day, see London together, again,” he offers a plan to erase her idea, secretly checking over his shoulder and wondering if this is all just because it is a full moon. He continues luring her away from the idea to feed upon his mortal soul.
“You would remember, the choice that you made in London when you said you'd much rather be my wife than a vampire immersed in your status, any day. And that very day, you vowed that you would never be an-immersed-in-it-vampire, to me, mortal Drew. So we already are alike, aren’t we? Yes we are. Two kinds - one mortal world, remember?”
“O, that's a fantastic idea!! The part about England and taking a trip. We'll retrace the weekend we decided to get married, in London. And then, go back to see Thaddeus – we’ll rent a car and drive through for the day. Drew emerges from his post at the balcony door. He exhales a sigh of relief; he even smiles.
“I’m so glad you agree,” he tells her, “I’ll get the tickets.”
“Right away,” Jessica says.
“Right away,” Drew agrees.
“And we'll talk about this other matter, there,” she adds.
Now, for the first time, Drew does a very mortal thing - he talks, and sounds, almost under a vampire’s spell. Rather than his usual protesting in defense of rights deemed to his mortal kind in the agreed upon arrangement of their relationship; Drew says, as if enchanted, “Yes, Jessica, if that’s what you’d like,” but then, thank fright, he bounces back, adding, “Remember your decision while we are there.”
Drew lifts Jessica's chin, their eyes meet, and she smiles the prim smile he likes best, remembering why he first decided the effort would be worth it, and he smiles too, assuming he has helped bring 'clarity' to Jessica’s mind on the matter of her commitments to mortal life - and his safety - as part of her marriage vows.
“Okay, then. We'll go!” He hugs her and she presses her forehead against his shoulder, closing
her eyes, longing to 'hang'. After quite a long, moment, the tension of Jessica’s 3-day absence is gone, and with her forehead leaning against his shoulder, he realizes that Jessica just might have fallen asleep.
“Hey! You awake? You still with me?” Drew asks. Jessica opens her eyes, and rubs them.
“Uh-huh. Almost, asleep, not quite,” she says, “I'm just exhausted. You wouldn't, uh, be going out today, would you? I'd like to sleep a while.” Drew turns his head and looks at Jessica from the side of his eyes, inquisitive, not wanting to bring up all the stress they just worked through; not to mention, the fact that this time he fears an answer he is not ready to accept.
Attempting to remain confident in his new plan to curtail Jessica’s night haunts and carousing dark side - and djinn forbid hunting or feeding! - he says bravely, “Yes, okay, get rested up. I’m going out.”
Then he adds, “Whatever,” in a chipper tone and grabs his coat from the hook hung over the door.
Jessica follows him out of the bedroom, “See you later, then? You’re not mad, are you?”
Drew shrugs, “No. I'm not mad. See you at dinner,” he says. Upper hand with a vampire’s a very nice place to be. The less he fears who she is, the less he blames or worries, and so, the less she pressures him to change – or be changed.
The Nebulizer Potion and the Electric Compass (Vampire DeAngeliuson Book 3) Page 11