by R. A. Nelson
“Leaving.”
“He’s so close, Sagan. Do you realize this spot is only a little over a mile from the Space Center? He knows what he’s doing. This might be my only chance to catch him before he catches me. What would you rather do, face him when he’s trapped and helpless or wait for the big showdown with a vampire at full strength?”
“Neither.” Sagan looked at me a long time. He held up the Japanese sword. “And this is for …?”
“The head. That’s what Anton said. The stake is just to hold him down. Then you chop off the—”
“You’re serious?”
“I have to be,” I said.
We parked as close as we could. Got out and went up the stairs. The door at the top was smudged around the knob from use. The number was 218.
I was wearing rubber dish gloves. I looked around before seeing if the door was locked. Nobody in sight. The far end of the outdoor hall was a balcony that hung over a grassy slope. It would be a simple jump, even for Sagan. But I knew that was ridiculous. No way Wirtz could follow us out here: there was far too much light.
“I don’t like this,” Sagan said.
“Hush.”
I put my hand on the knob … cold, even through the glove.
I turned it slowly … very slowly. It clicked and held firm in my hand.
“Locked,” I said.
“We could knock.”
I raised my fist and Sagan caught my arm, swearing.
“I was kidding!” He let go. “Wait.”
“What?”
“A pretty nasty image just popped into my head.” Sagan pointed at the peephole. “Wirtz could be looking at us right now. Ready to jerk it open and yank us in.”
I shaded my eyes against the light. “He’d get toasted if he did that.… Look at the angle of the sun.”
I walked to the opposite balcony. Shoot. There was another door there. Another apartment.
“What?” Sagan said.
“I was hoping there were windows on the back side, but there’s another apartment there.”
“So?”
“So somebody might see me scaling the wall on the front of the building. You’ll have to keep a lookout.”
I walked back down the stairs with Sagan behind me. I edged along the front, looking at the wall. I needed something to hang on to. No spider hairs in the palms of my hands, thank you.
I was pretty sure I could bound my way up there, get my fingers in a crack near the top. Even if I missed the crack, what was the worst that would happen? If an eighty-foot fall couldn’t kill me, a twenty-foot one would be like stubbing a toe.
I stuck the handle of the mini-sledge in my belt. For once I was thankful I had hips, or my pants would be down around my waist. “Give me the stake.” Sagan handed me the stake and I tried sticking it in the other side of my belt. “It’s too tight! It won’t fit.”
“Whew. Let’s go,” Sagan said, acting like he was turning around.
I undid my belt, then redid it just tight enough to keep the stake from slipping out. “That’s better. Okay, if you hear a lot of noise after I go in, yell for help,” I said. “Wirtz would be surrounded with nowhere to go.”
“Surrounded by who? And you’d be just as dead. I’ve got a ridiculously bad feeling about this.”
I was running toward the building.
I made the jump easy enough and clung to the side of the wall like a fly. It wasn’t hard at all to lower myself hand over hand in the brick mortar cracks down to the jogger’s front window. Except the stupid stake kept digging into my back. I adjusted it and peered through the cracks in the plastic blinds.
Nothing.
But my eyes should have been able to see inside. Something was blocking the light.
I felt a long swallow rising in my throat. “Here we go,” I whispered.
“Be careful!” Sagan said. “When you get in, unlock the front door!”
“I will.” Just as soon as I know it’s safe. “Is everything clear?”
“If I lie, will you come down?”
“No.”
The screen had to go first. I didn’t want to just rip it out if I didn’t have to, but all the little white tabs you were supposed to pull were on the inside. Finally I managed to wedge my thumbnail through the glove between the edge of the screen and the window jamb. I pulled and the screen resisted, then finally came loose in my hand.
“I had to bend it a little,” I said to Sagan, dropping it to the ground. “See if you can fix it.”
“Don’t worry about that! Just hurry.”
The window was locked; I could see the latch was still in place. Going to have to break it, I thought. Holding on with the toes of my shoes and one hand, I used my other hand, lifting gently on the frame, then harder until the wood splintered and the latch tore loose and dropped inside the apartment.
So quiet. My heart was trip-hammering. I wondered if a vampire’s super-hearing worked as well when he was asleep.
Calm down. If he reaches out here to pull you in, he’s fried.
A dark blue blanket was hanging over the opening. I touched the blanket and drew back my hand with a little shock. There was something solid and heavy behind it, holding the blanket in place.
Great. It was set up like an alarm system.… If I pushed the solid thing over, Wirtz would hear the crash and come running.
I put my hand against the solid thing—whew—it wasn’t a body, but instead something that felt hard with an edge to it, like an overturned table.
I leaned in and put my ear to the blanket, listening. Still nothing. Okay …
I got my hand against whatever it was and started slowly moving it back, as soundlessly as possible. It took very little effort. The whole time I was pushing, I watched the edge of the blanket moving farther and farther away from the window opening. Expecting any second for Wirtz’s leering face to thrust itself into view, stopping my heart.
There.
At last the blockage was far enough away for me to slip inside. I pulled my hand back and the blanket came with it, until it covered the window again. I thought about jerking the blanket down, but the table would still be blocking most of the light and the vampire might hear the blanket coming loose.
I also hated the idea of sliding around the edge of the blanket—leading with my head, of all things. He’s waiting right over there, Emma.
I compromised and pulled the blanket down slowly. Very slowly.
Something was holding it at the top.… There was a lot of resistance—it had been threaded through a curtain rod.
I was right: I was looking at the top of a table—a wooden kitchen table with thick white tiles in the center.
“Hurry!” Sagan hissed below. “A truck is turning in!”
I put my fingers on the edge of the table and with paralyzing slowness slid it sideways. The room looked empty. I got my foot over the sill and slipped through.
Just a living room. A white leather chair and white leather sofa, both cheap and slightly cracked. No pictures on the walls—guys can be so spare—but at least there was a single drooping rubber plant in the corner. A little shelf held a Walmart stereo; skinny arms of wires ran out to black speaker boxes perched in the corners of the ceiling.
I could see everything in here so easily, it made me wonder how dark it really was. Somebody strong had pushed the table over here from its nook in the kitchen.
I took a couple of steps across the carpet, the very same carpet where I had seen the vampire push the jogger down. The kitchen was empty. The floor looked like it had been mopped.…
Licked.
The apartment had an odd smell … not a closed-in, musty smell … but of something different. Alive, but nothing that smelled human. Again I felt that lump rising in my throat.
I shoved the table over all the way and sunlight came through. Good.
The layout of the apartment was simple. The front door opened onto the living room, with the kitchen off to one side with a single hall going into t
he back. Apparently there was more than one room back there. Let’s see, one had to be the bathroom, so the others were probably two bedrooms.…
I took a step into the kitchen, taking infinite care not to make a sound. But to a vampire’s ears? Might as well be an elephant tiptoeing around in here.
I really didn’t want to look in the sink, but I did.… Nothing but dirty dishes. But that wasn’t the source of the strange smell.
Kitchen to my right, living room to my left. I took a step into the hall. Four doors ahead of me. No, five. The one at the end of the hall was probably a linen closet.
I took another step, blood pressure rising. I looked behind me: the living room, now bathed in glorious, delicious morning sunlight, made me feel stronger. I raised the mini-sledge and pulled the stake out from my belt. Took another step forward in a low defensive crouch. I’ve got you cornered. What are you going to do? Drag me into the back bedroom and …
I decided to open the first door. Whew. Empty except for a few coats, a red hoodie, and some folding chairs. A little red Dust Devil was mounted on the inside wall.
The next door was already open—I could see the edge of the tub and shower stall. Thankfully, the shower curtain was drawn back. The window was stuffed with the shower mat and a bunch of blue towels. A thrill of horror ran through my whole body.
I didn’t want to go into that little space, the bathroom. If I couldn’t get to the window in time, Wirtz could come in right behind me and trap me there. Would Sagan hear me?
I sprang to the window and jerked everything down: floor mat, towels, shades. More light blasted in. He had to know I was here now. Unless vampires sleep like the dead. Shut up. The bathroom closet was nothing but shelves. I raised the mini-sledge over my head, sunlight washing over my shoulders from behind. Stepped warily back into the hall, standing for a moment in the block of light I had just let in. Three more doors.
The narrow one at the end—I took another couple of steps and pulled it open. Like I thought, a linen closet stuffed with shelves, a vacuum, and a metal air-conditioning thingy. Not enough room for a vampire. I closed it again.
The weird smell was stronger now … definitely coming from back here. I tried to slow my breathing. The last two doors were on the left and right, both closed.
Which first? Left, because it would have a window.
I slowly opened the door with the hand holding the stake, ready to run, kill, pass out.
The window across the room from me was blocked up like the others, but I could immediately see the space was empty except for a desk, chair, computer, and some boxes. I tore the blankets from the window, letting the light in. Slid the closet doors back and let light fill in there as well. Nothing but a folded-up stair climber.
One left.
It would have to be the other one. The bedroom with no window. If I were allergic to sunlight, that’s the one I would have chosen.
I hated more than anything leaving the room with the light. I left the door open to the hall, but the angle of the sun wasn’t good here. None of it would shine directly into the room I was about to enter.
The last door was slightly ajar. Nothing but a strip of blackness on the other side. I could see into the blackness, sure; if I watched through the crack and moved my head from side to side fast enough, I could even make out a shape, the edges of something.… It definitely wasn’t furniture … too irregular. The jogger’s body. Oh no.
I pushed the door open with a finger.
A bed had been turned on edge and was leaning against the far wall. A dresser, chest of drawers, nightstand had all been pushed into a corner next to it. To make room for …
Oh my God.
There were sleeping bags on the floor. Empty sleeping bags.
Here was the source of the smell hovering throughout the apartment that I couldn’t identify. The bags weren’t just filthy; they were coated in soil. Each one had a layer of dirt probably half an inch thick. Not Alabama red clay, but dark, loamy-looking earth. Almost black. Almost wet. The kind of soil you never saw in this state.
As if … As if it was brought in from somewhere else.
The closet was the last place. No window to uncover. Whoever was in there, they had a pretty good chance of getting between me and the door. After that …
I stepped closer to the closet and listened, one foot angled toward the hall. If they were in there, they were holding their breath. I thought about a way I could slow them down. I lifted my leg, aimed a kick squarely at the place where the two closet doors came together.
Slam.
By the time the closet doors had swung in their tracks, crashing against the inside wall, I was standing in the sunlit living room, breathing hard. I waited. Heard nothing. I waited some more. Finally I couldn’t stand it—I walked back up the hall and peeked in. One of the closet doors had come off its tracks. I could see nothing inside but the jogger’s clothes.
I looked back at the sleeping bags and for the first time noticed it—the imprint of bodies in the alien black soil.
I let Sagan in. We were standing in the jogger’s bedroom.
“Six.” Sagan swore. “Emma, how are we going to fight six vampires?”
“I don’t know. The same way you fight one, I guess. Over and over again.”
“Suppose they all come at once?”
“You were so confident you could out-think anybody. So? What do we do now, Mr. Warcraft?”
A hurt look passed over his face.
“I’m sorry,” I said. I squatted and lifted the corner of one of the sleeping bags. It felt heavy and sodden. “Any ideas?”
“Move to Saskatchewan. Change your name. I’ve seen how quick they … you … people can move. With the defenses we have set up … we could handle … two … maybe three. But this … this is suicide.”
“So I just throw up my hands and let them take me?”
“No. Of course not. But I don’t know, Emma. This is way more than … I don’t know.…”
I dropped the edge of the sleeping bag. “I know what’s creeping you out,” I said. “It’s not how many there are, is it? It’s seeing this stuff. It’s made it too real, hasn’t it? It was fun when it was all pretend, wasn’t it?”
“Now you’re pissing me off.”
“Good. I need you pissed off. I need you to help me, Sagan.”
“Great. You need my help. I thought I was the chump you keep saying would be dead the instant they got here.”
“I’m sorry. I deserved that. Okay, so here are the facts. They’re stronger and faster than you are. I’m asking you to back out now, Sagan. It’s too much to ask.”
“You want me to go when you need me the most.”
“Good. I was only saying it to be saying it. All right. Six vampires. That doesn’t mean we can’t come up with a strategy, does it? That’s where we even things out. I need you to think. They are coming for me, Sagan. Six Verloren. What are we gonna do about it?”
“You have to … give me a little while. Let’s look around some more.”
“There’s nothing else here.”
“Humor me.”
We went back over the apartment top to bottom looking for any kind of clue we might have missed. All we found was stuff that made us both heartsick: the jogger’s clothes hamper. The music he liked to listen to. (Alternative.) A picture of a little girl with bouncy brown pigtails, holding a toy horse. Sister? I thought about Manda and nearly started to cry. I brushed the tears away angrily.
Sagan found the jogger’s wallet lying kicked under a chair.
“Paul Freeman,” he read, pulling out the guy’s driver’s license.
Paul was a good-looking guy who had turned twenty-six years old three days ago. And now? Was he in pieces somewhere?
“So … not much to go on, but here’s what we know,” Sagan said. “They were here, but for some reason they left. Assuming what you saw last night was in real time … it means they only stayed part of the night. So why bring this stuff in here?”
He waved his arm at the filthy sleeping bags. “Doesn’t that kinda indicate they were planning on staying awhile?”
“Maybe … maybe they got set up, then something spooked them.…”
“What could spook six vampires?” Sagan said.
“Maybe they somehow knew we were watching?”
“But all you ever saw was Wirtz and the jogger, right?”
“Yeah, that’s true,” I said.
Sagan walked back and forth along the row of sleeping bags, touching the handle of his grandfather’s sword to his bottom lip.
“I think … here’s what’s more likely. They’re closing in, tightening the circle. But the closer they get, the more often they have to change their base. Because they have to hide each day. Wirtz knows how close he is to finding you, so this is kind of a staging area.… He followed Freeman home mainly just to grab this place. A place that is only a mile or so from the Space Center, a couple of miles to the tower. He’s called some of his nastiest followers.…”
“Nasty’s the word,” I said.
“So now that he’s set up, he brings them into his new HQ. Where they can start getting ready for the final assault.”
“I don’t know if Lena would say that Verloren do that much planning.”
“Well, this isn’t exactly long-range stuff here,” Sagan said. “Surely somebody will notice Freeman is missing sooner or later. He must have had a job, relatives. So this is a very temporary deal.”
“Okay … but why go to the trouble of fixing up a … haven … something like this, and then not even use it?”
Sagan rubbed his chin. “Uh-oh. You know what it could mean?”
“What?”
“They found something even closer.”
We moved faster after he said that. Rolled up the sleeping bags, dirt and all, and slung them in the Dumpsters. With any luck, today was garbage day and they would be part of a landfill somewhere before Wirtz and his killers came back. If they come back.
“You think … they really need the dirt?” I said as we sped away in the Jeep. “I mean, you know, dirt from their native land to sleep in? Like … Dracula?”
Sagan downshifted and waited for the noise to subside before answering. “Well … so far just about everything we’ve found out about vampires at least feels scientific. The whole thing about the zero-point field, electromagnetic particles from the sun. Maybe it’s just a comfort thing, you know? If the Verloren tend to be nomads, maybe that’s what they do to feel at home … bring a little home with them.”