by Donna Ansari
“Yes,” she nodded. “I saw everything. I can’t believe you saved everyone. And you got my powers back. Thank you!”
She hugged me tightly and I hugged her back. “I did kind of save the world, didn’t I?”
“Don’t let it get to your head,” she said. “And hey, what did he mean by ‘parting gift’?”
“I don’t know.” I paused and looked around at everyone as they clustered about me. Alex pushed past the group of witches to take my arm.
“Oh, I see,” I said. “My witch potential is back. I don’t want to eat everyone anymore.”
“That’s terrific!” Tammy enthused. She looked around at the other witches. “And it looks like there is some witch potential left in them too.”
I blinked and looked around, a little disoriented by all the glowing auras. “Yeah, I can see it too, now.”
“You can see auras? But you never were able to see them before. Why now?”
“Maybe the demon gave me back more than he took?” I guessed.
Alex was still holding my arm, even though I was no longer in danger of freaking out and killing everyone. “Do you think the vampires have reverted to normal?”
“I have no idea.”
“I will need to get back to them, either way,” he said. “Are you sure you’re okay now? Can I leave you alone with these humans?”
“Yes, I’m fine,” I said. “Will you let me know what happens?”
“I’ll be in touch.” He gave me a brief kiss on the cheek and was gone.
Tammy laughed. “He’s pissed.”
“What?” I asked. “Why do you say that?”
“Did you even see how hot that demon was? And that very hot kiss he gave you? I almost felt it melt me all the way over here.”
“Oh. But that’s silly. He only did it to give me my powers back, like he said.”
“Em, come on. He sucked the power out of all the witches in the city, and he didn’t need to suck face with them to do it. And when that brat gave me my powers back, there was no smooching involved either.”
“Oh, right.”
That’s when we noticed that the two covens, Silver Moon and Silver Leaf, were both standing around us and talking excitedly. Gregor walked up to Tammy and hugged her. When they broke apart, he turned to me. “So you’re the one who was responsible for all this.”
“You’re welcome,” I said.
“No,” Gregor said. “Not you’re welcome. You are the one responsible for unleashing that demon onto the city and for causing all of us to lose our powers.”
“I didn’t invoke him. That was Amy.”
“Enough!” A few people moved aside to let Marie through the crowd. She was wearing the typical black hooded witch cloak and looked as annoyed as she had the last time I had seen her. But the surprising part this time was that she had a small child on her hip.
“Emma, I just met you a few days ago. When did you become a vampire?” she asked.
“Um, recently.” The child, who could be either a boy or a girl, was staring at me intently with large, brown eyes.
“Please don’t lie to me again. I have children. I can tell when someone is lying.”
“I’ve been a vampire for about six months. There was just a brief, human period, which is when you met me.”
“And did you knowingly summon the demon here to drain us all of our power?”
“No.”
“And did you both know what Amy was planning to do tonight?” She looked back and forth between me and Tammy.
“Yes,” we both answered at the same time.
Marie took a deep breath and the child rested its head on her shoulder. “As I am the head of this event, you should have notified me of what you were planning to do. I have questions for you both, but I have to put Sammie to bed, so I would appreciate an in-depth explanatory email in the morning.”
“No problem,” Tammy said.
Marie glanced from her to me, and then abruptly turned and walked away. The crowd once again parted to let her through, and then closed around us when she was gone.
“Who made her head witch of New York?” I asked.
“The council votes every year.” Tammy said. “Anyway, let’s see if we can sneak out of here.”
When we finally got home, David was waiting for us.
“Where’s Amy?” was his first question.
After having to explain again, we all sat down at the dining room table, exhausted.
“What about me?” David asked. “Can you guys read my aura?”
I concentrated on him for a bit and then said, “I see something. It’s like a red cloud, but very faint.”
Tammy nodded, agreeing.
David sighed. “I don’t even know if I’m hoping it comes back or not.”
“Why wouldn’t you want it back?” Tammy asked.
“So I could live a normal life, and not have to worry about what I might do one night every month.”
“Don’t you have any control over it?” I asked.
“Yeah, mostly. From what I hear, it’s a bit like you were with the blood sucking before you got your witch potential back.”
“Oh, that sucks,” I said. “No pun intended. To tell you the complete story, when Amy gave Tammy’s powers back to her, I was thinking about you, but not only were you not there, but I thought you might not be sure, so I didn’t want to make the decision for you.”
“It’s okay,” David said. “I guess we’ll just have to see what happens. But as I told you some time ago, being a werewolf is genetic, so it will probably come back on its own, probably just in time for the next full moon.”
There was a loud meow then from Gypsy, who had just come running down the stairs. Immediately, I jumped up and picked her up, kissing her fuzzy face. “Gypsy, I thought I would never see you again!”
“Why would you never see her again?” Tammy asked.
I sat back down with the cat in my lap and explained what had been going on with the vampires.
“Lucky for you guys the werewolves in Brooklyn also lost their abilities, or you’d all be dead for real,” David said.
“Right,” I said. “Maybe I should have asked about the vampires too, but the only other vampire I actually care about is one of the only ones who didn’t lose his vampire abilities.”
“Why would you even care about the others?” Tammy asked. “Isn’t it better without Michael?”
“You would think,” I said.
My cell phone rang then and I saw that it was Alex.
“How is everything there?” I asked.
“I can’t tell. They’re not back to their usual selves. If anything, they’re a bit weaker.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m not sure,” Alex said. “I can only keep up this charade for so long before a vampire from another city finds out. Would you come over to the apartment and examine them?”
“What about Michael?”
“What about him? He may very well die due to lack of sustenance any moment. I have a half dozen vampires here, and most of them are only barely conscious.”
“Got it,” I said. “I’ll be over in a little while.” I hung up the phone.
“What’s up?” Tammy asked.
“I’ve got to go save the world again. Or at least the entire vampire population of New York City.”
THE END
Fresh Blood:
Vampire in the City
Book Six
Chapter One
“What does this look like to you, Emma?” Alex asked.
I squinted at the person lying on the couch in front of me. He was vaguely familiar, so I must have seen him before at some event or vampire meeting. He looked young, and was probably about twenty human years when he had been turned. His eyes were open, but had almost no life in them.
“Is he breathing?” I asked aloud.
“No. There’s also no heartbeat.”
The sounds of the various humans in the apartment was fai
rly loud, so I put my ear to his chest and concentrated for a few moments.
Then I sat up and looked at Alex. “I don’t hear his heart beating, his breathing, or even any blood moving.”
“Yes, I had already deduced that myself,” Alex said. “I was asking you to look at his aura.”
“Oh, right.”
We were in the large and expensive Manhattan apartment where Alex lived with Michael and a few other higher-ranking vampires. Fortunately for me, Michael was in the same coma-like state as the man in front of me, or he would have been very unhappy to see that Alex had turned me back into a vampire without his consent.
Unfortunately, this odd affliction had struck every vampire in New York City, save Alex, myself, and one other. I was perfectly happy being one of the only vampires left in the vicinity, but Alex had warned me that if any other vampires in other cities were to find out what had happened, they would come in and take over, probably killing us in the process. So anything we could do to cure the former vampires, or at least prevent vampires in other cities from finding out what had happened, was necessary.
I concentrated and stared at the man, but couldn’t see any aura. This was unusual, as everyone should have one. Not that I knew that much about it. As far as I knew, only witches were able to see auras, but as a vampire and a person born with witch potential, I suddenly found myself with the power to see them as well.
Looking up at Alex, I said, “I don’t see anything on him. And your aura looks normal for a vampire, so I know I can still see them.”
Vampire auras were black, werewolves were red, witches were white, and humans were blue. Mine was an odd mixture of black and white, but the person on the couch had absolutely none. As far as I knew, the only humanoid things that had no aura were zombies.
“I hope he doesn’t wake up and crave brains instead of blood,” I said, standing. “What happens if you try to force feed him a bag of blood? Would he eat it?”
“That was already attempted,” Alex said. “They just throw it up.”
“And what about human food? Or water even?”
“The same result.”
I leaned down again and pried open his eyelids. His eyes dilated slightly, but otherwise there was no response. He almost seemed dead, in a permanent, never moving again type of way.
“How will we know when they’re dead for real?” I asked.
Alex stepped forward and punched the man in the face. He opened his eyes briefly and let out a low groan. “When they stop responding to pain, I will assume that they’re past the point of revival.”
“And this is different from what happened with Henri?”
“Yes,” Alex said. “This one is much further gone than Henri, who was almost completely in charge of his facilities. When I tried to turn Henri back into a vampire, everything seemed as it usually does, but then he never woke up. Despite the fact that he ingested the usual amount of my blood, he will never wake up as a normal vampire.”
Suddenly, I remembered the state that we had left Heather’s apartment in. There were two dead bodies, Henri and his old blood doll, who Alex had also killed. The only conscious person we had left there was Ethan, who mentioned that he was going to work anyway.
“Should we go back to the apartment and clean up?” I asked.
Alex looked at his watch. “No, it’s too close to sunrise. We’d never have time to properly dispose of the bodies now.”
“What about Ethan?”
“Why didn’t you kill him when you had the chance?” Alex asked me. “You must have been annoyed at him for going to Michael behind your back. And you didn’t have the self-control of a witch at that point.”
“It all seems a little fuzzy to me,” I said, referring to the short time I had been a vampire with absolutely no self-control. I had almost immediately killed a man I fed on, and tried to attack a number of people, some in public. One of them had been Tammy even. It was odd because although I could actually remember all the things I had done, I was oddly disconnected from them. It was more like remembering a movie.
“I’m not sure what I was thinking,” I said. “But I remember I was thinking about how Heather killed her best friend on her first night as a vampire, and how I had almost attacked Tammy.”
Alex nodded. “Yes, I can understand that, but the blood doll had betrayed you. And as Michael’s blood doll, he probably knows too much to live.”
“How many blood dolls did Michael have?”
“A good number. He culled them fairly often, but easily twenty at any given time. But I’m not concerned with the women. He never told them anything, and none of them lives with us,” Alex said. “I’m mostly concerned with the male blood dolls that he was considering turning.”
“He was really considering turning Ethan?”
“Yes, he signed a contract with him, and Michael was very serious about honoring all contracts.”
“How many of the twenty are men?” I asked.
“Four. But of all of them, I’m the most suspicious of Ethan, as he has shown himself to be disloyal in the past when he left you and sought out Michael.” He paused. “It would be best if he were to die. If you find yourself unable to do it, I can myself.”
“Do we have to do this now? What’s the rush? I’ll just take him as my blood doll again. And besides, Michael might recover.”
Alex shrugged. “He might, but people die all the time. He doesn’t have to know that I killed him.”
“Just wait, okay?” I felt somewhat responsible for Ethan, as I was the first vampire he had had contact with. I also hadn’t treated him in a stellar manner during our farce of a relationship.
“We can wait a little while before addressing this, but soon we will have to deal with all of them, including the women.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning that once they realize the only way they can live is by making a bargain to go to a Prince in another city and trade this information for mercy, they will actually become a treat to us.”
During my short interlude as a human, I had also been Michael’s blood doll for a short amount of time. But it had been enough to make me realize that it was a horrible existence. Blood dolls live at the mercy of their vampire masters, and usually only last for about five years before the vampire will get rid of them, permanently.
It was a facet of our lifestyle that I had always been uncomfortable with, especially since in New York City, almost all the vampires were men who had female blood dolls who they used for blood and usually sex as well. I didn’t know how other cities operated, but it was how New York was run with Michael at the helm.
Alex, as Michael’s second-in-command, was one of the only vampires I knew who was willing to turn female vampires. I had hoped he would be somewhat progressive on other counts as well, such as allowing blood dolls to live.
“How will we know if the other cities find out about us?” I asked. “And do you know which ones are likely to want to take over New York?”
“As you may have noticed, Michael is a bit of a luddite, and has not embraced the use of computers. But most other vampires have learned to embrace change. Cora has been keeping tabs on the others as much as she can without them finding out,” he said. “And as to your second question, Boston is the closest city with a large vampire population, so I would suspect them first. Washington and Philadelphia are also likely.”
“What can we possibly do to stop them?”
“Not much. If and when they come, they will be prepared to fight, and there are only the three of us to try and stop them.”
“What if we turned a whole bunch of people? Like every blood doll?”
“As you may remember, new vampires are hard to control. The general rule is that every new vampire must stay close to their sire until they become more in charge of their facilities and able to control themselves, and that can take a few years.”
I sat down heavily on the sofa, forgetting that there was a comatose vampire lying on it already. But as h
e didn’t seem to mind me sitting on his arm, I stayed where I was and put my head in my hands.
“Just how hopeless is it?” I asked.
“Hopeless enough that we will need to think of contingency plans for leaving the city.”
“Where will we go?”
“We will have to go far enough away that no one will know us, and to cities small enough that there are no existing vampires. And even then, I can’t imagine we’ll be able to stay in the same spot for very long, as those places don’t have enough people to support the three of us for any significant amount of time.”
“Ugh,” I said, standing again. “I guess I should get home since it’s almost sunrise.”
“There’s no need. Michael is in his bedroom and lacks the strength to move around that much. You can stay here.”
“Really?” Every time I had been at Michael’s apartment on the Upper East Side, the visit had ended in near disaster. So I was not particularly interested in staying over. But then again, sunrise was fairly soon, and I didn’t want to take the chance of getting caught outside. “Alright.”
Alex and I went into his bedroom, and he locked the door behind us. Like the last time I had been there, I noticed that his room was sparsely decorated in dark colors. There was a bed and a dresser, and not much else. I would have thought that someone as old as he was would have collected a bit more material possessions, but then I guess that vampires, more than anyone else, need to learn to let things go.
There were heavy burgundy drapes on the windows, and I went over to one and pulled them back to see that the entire window had been boarded up behind them.
“You ruined your view of Central Park,” I said.
“The windows in the other rooms are all open.” Alex came up behind me and put his arms around my waist, kissing the side of my neck.
I closed my eyes. “But looking out a window would make this scene all the more romantic and stereotypical.”
He laughed. “I suppose we’ll just have to make due.”
A few seconds later, the moment was interrupted anyway by the sound of a cell phone ringing.