by Helen Harper
‘We all need to be vicious sometimes, Ms Blackman. Survival demands it.’ She smiles again, although this time it’s tinged with sadness. ‘You know that.’
Every part of me is desperate to run away. I can never trust a black witch, not after everything that’s happened. Nobody else says anything. All the vampires are watching me as if they’re waiting for my decision.
The Medici guy takes a breath but the Stuart guzzler next to him places a hand on his arm and shakes his head in warning. Even the loudspeaker system from behind us is silent; my grandfather is also leaving this up to me. I push my hair out of my eyes and sigh. I want to talk to Michael, I want him to tell me what to do. This can’t be my responsibility.
‘I will think this over,’ I say aloud. It’s hardly a decisive move but it’s the best I can offer right now. I see something flicker across Beth’s face. ‘I might want to talk to you some more in the meantime.’ I point at the witch. ‘You will come in with me and stay here until I’ve considered everything further.’
‘If you want a hostage,’ she says intelligently, ‘you should know that my people wouldn’t hesitate to think of me as collateral damage.’
Out of the corner of my eye, I see several other witches stiffen. I curve my lips into a smile. ‘Oh, somehow I think you’re more important than you’re letting on.’ I raise my head and address the others. ‘She comes. The rest of you leave. She’ll call you every hour so you know she’s alright.’
They don’t look happy but, at her nod, they’re prepared to agree for now. I bloody well hope I’m doing the right thing. I glance at her. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Hope.’
I start. ‘Bullshit.’
She frowns. ‘I can assure you I’m not lying.’
I shake my head. ‘Okay, if you say so.’
The other witches climb back into the waiting cars and drive off. Beth sidles towards me. ‘Well, this is weird,’ she whispers.
‘You’re telling me.’
‘Kakos daemons?’
‘You have a lot to catch up on,’ I say.
‘Such as why you’re living in a shed,’ she replies.
I grin. ‘There’s more to it than meets the eye.’ I nod towards the rest of the vampires. ‘Come on. We need to get inside and find some blood for you lot.’
Without being asked, two of them move up and flank Hope. She sighs dramatically but I just smile. ‘Things are changing indeed,’ I murmur.
***
My grandfather is waiting for us in the corridor as we enter. I expect him to tell me that I’m being stupid and I need to get rid of all these people at once but he simply gives me a benign smile. ‘You’ve been gone for some time, Bo,’ he chides as I pass.
‘I ran into a spot of bother. Of the human variety.’
His eyes narrow but he doesn’t comment. I lead my troop of bloodguzzlers and one witch into the main hall area, pleased to note as I enter that Rogu3 has dimmed the computer.
‘What the hell is this place?’ Beth breathes.
‘You know my grandfather,’ I tell her. ‘Take a guess.’
She stares round. ‘Oh.’
The Medici vamp pushes his way forward. ‘Is it safe?’
It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell him he can leave right now if he doesn’t like it. Then I realise from the expression on his face that he’s asking out of fear. ‘As safe as anywhere,’ I tell him.
Several of the others exchange glances. One receives a nudge and, swallowing hard, steps forward. ‘How long are we going to stay here for?’
I blink. Er…
‘What should we do? Most of the other survivors have left the country. Should we join them?’
Beth clears her throat. ‘Bo is still here.’
‘So we should stay? We should fight?’
Twenty pairs of eyes swing towards me. I lick my lips. ‘I don’t know.’
‘What would you like me to do?’ Hope enquires. ‘While you decide what to do with the witches?’
I stare at her. ‘There’s a television somewhere,’ I say weakly.
‘We should watch television?’ a Stuart vamp asks.
Someone else nods. ‘That’s a good idea. We can scan the news then we’ll have a better idea of what’s going on. That’s what you want, right? Ms Blackman?’
My mouth is dry. I know what I’d been planning to do but I’m not prepared to make plans for all these strangers at the same time. Their weight of expectation is palpable. Sodding hell.
The pale woman who was in Hale’s clutches the longest sways on her feet. The Gully vampire next to her only just catches her before her legs give way. His worried gaze flicks to mine. I stalk to the fridge. The first three shelves are stocked with blood bags. Taken aback, I blink.
‘I had a feeling we might be needing some more,’ my grandfather murmurs. ‘After what happened to the Medici bloodguzzler the other night, I took the liberty of restocking. It’s as fresh as I could make it and there will be a new supply delivered tomorrow. Obviously it’s not as good as straight from the vein but it should serve your purposes for now.’
I turn my head and look at him. ‘Thank you.’
‘You’re welcome, my dear.’
‘Can you take care of them for now?’
‘Of course.’ Relief washes over me. Thank goodness. ‘Go and see Michael.’ My grandfather raises an eyebrow. ‘I’m not responsible for telling them what to do with themselves though. This lot are your problem.’
Shit. ‘Sure,’ I trill. ‘I know that.’
I pretend not to notice his worried look and walk out. Hope watches my departure with clever eyes. I ignore her. As much as she might like to think she’s my first priority, she doesn’t have a clue.
Maria is sitting by Michael’s bed and the pair of them are laughing uproariously. I stand in the doorway watching them. It’s about as unlikely a pairing as you’re likely to get. There’s a large pile of rubbish by the bedside – Michael has obviously been partaking in my junk-food fiesta – and he looks like he might actually be getting better.
He lifts his head, as if sensing my gaze. The second his eyes land on me, they crinkle at the edges with laughter lines that were never there when he was a vampire. Having him look at me makes me feel that everything’s going to be alright.
‘Bo,’ Maria exclaims. ‘You no look good.’
I glance down at myself. She has a point: I’m covered in oil, dirt and a fair amount of blood, a lot of which is mine. ‘Hale made his move,’ I say.
Both of them stiffen. Alarmingly, Michael leaps out of bed towards me. ‘Are you alright?’ he demands. ‘Did he hurt you?’
‘Lie down! What are you doing? You’re ill!’
‘I’m fine. I think the strawberry-flavoured Pop Tarts did the trick.’
Maria shakes her head. ‘No. It definitely curry Pot Noodle.’
I can’t prevent the grin spreading across my face. ‘You do look better,’ I admit. Relief threatens to overwhelm me; not only does he look like he’s going to be alright, Maria is looking more relaxed.
Michael cups my face and stares into my eyes. My knees weaken. ‘What did that wanker do to you, Bo? I’ll rip his head off if he did anything.’
‘You kill him, yes?’ Maria says. ‘Drink his blood until nothing left.’ She nods in satisfaction.
‘No,’ I demur. ‘He’s still out there. I’m going to have to do something to sort him for good, though. I don’t think he’ll stop trying to get rid of all of us.’
Michael’s thumb brushes a streak of dirt away from my cheek. ‘You’re afraid that if you kill him, you’ll let the darkness back in.’
‘The darkness is still there. It’s … locked away for now.’
Maria stills. ‘It never go away. You just manage.’
I give her a shaky smile. For a teenager, she’s pretty bloody canny.
There’s a loud cheer from the other room. Michael raises his eyebrows. ‘Are we having a party?’
‘Not ex
actly.’ I point at the bed. He looks irritated but does as he’s told. Maria turns as if to go and leave us in peace but I gently touch her arm. ‘Stay. You need to hear this too.’
I outline everything that’s happened, from what I’ve learnt about Alice to Vince Hale. When I’m done, Maria bites her lip and frowns. ‘I never see these green men.’
‘You wouldn’t have. My theory is that they dress as aliens to hide who they really are and what they’re really doing. With you, there was no need to do that.’
‘Because my mother sell me. She no hide.’
I close my eyes, wishing I could make that better for her. It’s the ultimate betrayal and there’s nothing any of us can do about it. ‘Yes,’ I say quietly.
‘I still don’t understand,’ Michael says. ‘Why aliens?’
‘We live in a world with vampires and witches and daemons and ghosts,’ I say. ‘People will believe almost anything but cast around a rumour that you’ve seen an alien and you’ll be locked away. Everyone will think you’re crazy.’ I’m convinced that’s what happened to Alice’s neighbour. The poor guy probably had his house stripped from him by the state to pay for his ‘retirement’ in an asylum. It won’t be difficult to confirm; I’ll ask Rogu3 to look him up. ‘They dress as aliens so if anyone sees them when they’re snatching a kid, the witnesses are automatically disbelieved.’
Michael absorbs this theory, eventually nodding that it makes a warped kind of sense. ‘It still doesn’t explain why they’re taking children in the first place.’ He glances at Maria. ‘Is it, um…’ He can’t even say it but I know what he’s getting at. I guess his humanity really is coming back in force; he would never have deliberately hurt her before, but there’s a different, more considerate, level to him now. And he’s worried.
‘Sexual abuse,’ I say it for him. ‘And no, it can’t be. Maria’s Romany blood wouldn’t have stopped them if that were the case.’ Plus, she ended up in a damn brothel anyway. My skin twitches in barely concealed rage. Maria pulls her shoulders back as if she’s not going to be cowed. Good girl. ‘If these children’s minds are really being wiped then it’s something else.’
Maria mutters something and stands up again. ‘I go for walk,’ she declares.
I watch her leave. Maybe I shouldn’t have asked her to stay but she deserves to be in the loop. After all, we got this far because of her.
Michael’s hand covers mine. ‘You’re doing the right thing,’ he tells me, his voice low.
‘Are you also reading my mind now?’
‘I know you,’ he says. His jaw tightens. ‘I wish I could do something to help.’
‘You can help by getting better.’ I brush his hair away from his forehead. ‘That’s what I need from you. Okay,’ I amend, ‘that and some advice.’
He waits. I take a deep breath and look up at the ceiling. ‘We have these other vampires now. It feels like,’ I pause, struggling to find the words, ‘like they want me to tell them what to do. Hale was waiting for me before he did anything to the vampires. Hope, the black witch out there, wanted to talk to me.’ I ball up my fists. ‘I’m no one. In bloodguzzler terms, I’m a baby. I don’t need this kind of responsibility and I don’t deserve it.’ I take a breath. ‘I’m not good enough for it. The world is falling apart and everyone seems to think that I have the answers. I don’t have anything.’
Michael laughs softly. ‘Think about what you’ve done, Bo. You discovered that Nicky was trying to bring us all down with her crazy plots. You walked away from the Families and helped set up a company where different vampires could work together. You stopped a serial killer. You found a missing billionaire. You beat up a Kakos daemon live on television. You almost stopped Tov V’ra.’
I meet his eyes. ‘But the Families were brought down regardless of what I did to stop Nicky. New Order is in ruins. The serial killer captured and almost killed me. Everyone thinks the billionaire is still missing. The Kakos daemon thing on TV was a stunt. They manipulated everything I did. And,’ I say sadly, ‘Tov V’ra still won.’
‘We’re not dead yet.’
I point wildly at the door. ‘There are twenty vampires out there waiting for me to tell them what to do! I don’t have a sodding clue! I’m making all this shit up as I go along, Michael. I’ve got missing kids to find and a politician to destroy and a host of invincible Kakos daemons to beat and I can’t do any of it. Tell me what to do. Tell me how to sort all this out and I’ll do whatever you say,’ I plead. ‘This isn’t me. I don’t want this.’
He grabs hold of my flailing hands. ‘You’ve got this, Bo Blackman. I know it’s scary but I believe in you. You can do it.’
‘Michael, I need you to…’
He shakes his head. ‘No. You’re the vampire. I’m just a lowly human.’
My eyes widen in alarm. ‘Don’t say that!’
‘It’s okay. I’m not exactly at peace with that fact but I’m getting there.’ He lifts a trembling hand. ‘And, as helpful as all that food was, I’m still not strong enough to leave this place. You have to do this, Bo. I have faith in you and so does everyone out there.’
‘But…’
‘Get a grip,’ he says sternly. ‘Go be a hero.’
My mouth is dry. I want to argue further but I can see exhaustion creeping back into his face. His expectations of me are too high but he’s the love of my life. I have to do what I can.
Chapter Fifteen: Circling Round the Boogeyman
Rather than confront the waiting vampires immediately, I go into the nearest unoccupied room and take out my phone. I need to give them something and D’Argneau has had more than enough time. He should have been in touch by now.
He answers on the second ring. ‘Thought you’d have called before now,’ he says.
‘Ditto,’ I snap.
He doesn’t appear to notice my tone. ‘I don’t have everything you’re looking for. Not yet.’
‘But you have some information.’
‘Yeah. You’re not going to like it.’
Big surprise there. I sigh. ‘Hit me.’
‘Well, I looked into the legal status of the vampires. It took a long time and I didn’t trust anyone else, so I had to do it all myself. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to decipher legal documents that are centuries old?’
‘My heart bleeds. What did you discover, D’Argneau?’
‘It’s not vampires that are above the law, it’s the Families. Everything I’ve found states that categorically. The Families were trusted to keep their bloodguzzlers in line and, without the Families…’
‘We revert back to the same rules as the rest of the country.’
‘Got it in one. Frankly, I’m surprised no one else has twigged this yet. After all, you left the Families so you should have been subject to those laws too. It’s probably because no other lawyers are as good as I am.’ He says this without a hint of his typical D’Argneau smugness. ‘I traced everything back to a single piece of legislation from 1623. Do you want to hear it?’
‘That’s alright. I trust you.’
‘Really?’ He sounds surprised.
‘Mm,’ I murmur. ‘So let me make sure I understand what you’re saying. Now that the Families don’t exist, vampires are exactly the same as every human, daemon or witch citizen.’
‘Yeah. I’m sorry, I know it’s not what you wanted to hear.’
‘And,’ I say, ignoring his pointless apology, ‘if a British citizen was rounded up and incarcerated by its own government without trial, under the pretence that it was for their own safety, that would be illegal?’
‘Yes,’ he says slowly, finally beginning to understand. ‘If they didn’t agree to the incarceration, then it’s an abuse of both human and triber rights.’ He pauses. ‘I suppose you’d like me to petition the courts to revoke the government’s recent ruling about that?’
‘I would indeed.’ I doubt that the law will stop Hale in his tracks – after all, it hasn’t so far – but it’s a step in the right
direction. ‘I need you to make as loud a noise as possible. Hopefully the media will pick it up and run with it. If everyone realises that vampires are subject to the same laws as everyone else, it might make them less antagonistic.’
‘This is the time to do it,’ D’Argneau agrees. ‘A lot of the population is sympathetic towards you but that won’t last for long. And it’s not going to stop people being scared of what you’re capable of.’
‘Just go ahead and do it. I’ll worry about the rest.’ I lick my lips. ‘What about Kakos daemons? What legal proceedings have you unearthed in relation to them?’
‘The last case was about fifteen years ago. A London-based man sued them for killing his wife.’
I feel a rush of optimism. ‘Really? I don’t remember hearing anything about that.’
‘Three days after the first papers were filed, he withdrew the complaint. I thought there must have been some out-of-court settlement because he had a good case. All the evidence was stacked in his favour. I called up his barrister, however, and he told me that there was nothing. Not a penny. The barrister is still disgruntled about it. No win, no fee, you understand. He thought the case was going to make him ‒ it seemed like a slam dunk ‒ but no matter what he did, he couldn’t persuade his client to go through with it. All the barrister gets to deal with now are petty speeding fines, that kind of thing.’ D’Argneau’s voice turns mournful. ‘He could have had a glittering career and it was all lost. I’m going to end up like that.’
‘They got to him,’ I say, thinking aloud. ‘The damn Kakos daemons got to the client.’
‘Eh? You mean they threatened him?’
I laugh harshly. ‘No. They’re much smarter than that.’ I twirl a curl round my finger so tightly that I cut off the circulation to my fingertip. Bastard freaks. The Kakos daemons have been getting everything they wanted for generations and no one ever realised. That’s the cruel beauty of mind control. I shake my head in disgust. ‘Tell me about Streets of Fire,’ I say through gritted teeth. ‘What have you found out about them?’
D’Argneau sounds regretful. ‘Nothing. All I know is what is publicly available. The CEO is a human called Gregory Smith. Everything seems kosher.’