Blood Dragons (Rebel Vampires Book 1)

by Rosemary A Johns

This new need to be wanted was messing with everything I knew. And everything I reckoned I was.

  Your smile lit your peepers as much as your mouth; even though something told me it was a trick (and you couldn’t mean it), I still treasured it.

  You glowed, the same as any Blood Lifer - no, bollocks, it was different. Because this was life - true life - in a way I’d never stopped to scrutinise before. Only drain. It was real and I could smell it: courage, imagination and ambition.

  Was this what it’d been like for Ruby, when she’d found me? Before she’d decided to elect?

  Flash. The curve of your lips. The wisp of creativity.

  Flash. Black curls caught behind your ear. The edge of ruthlessness.

  Flash. Those blue peepers staring right down the lens, like a challenge. The scent of passion.

  I’d captured your Soul, forever mine, and you didn’t say a word.

  Flash, flash, flash.

  It must’ve been sodding hours I’d spend sprawled on my back each night in Alessandro’s room, drinking in your record over and over, until the lyrics were branded onto my brain and then haunted my sleep.

  Ruby would nudge me irritably when I’d start to hum the tune next to her in bed, without realising.

  You were eating me whole. A delicious torture.

  Whenever I was alone, I’d spread your photos out over the crimson covers, pressing my fingers to your face and trying to taste your spark, as the memory shuddered through me of that night.

  Had you felt it too? This…thing? I didn’t have a name for it. No sticky label.

  Ruby would’ve called it a perversion.

  Ruby still came to my bed but she hadn’t touched me. Not like...that. It was as if she could sense I was less than the Blood Lifer I’d once been.

  Bugger that, I was more, but Ruby couldn’t see it. She was too caught up in whatever dodgy business the twins had going. I knew there was no place in her new family for me.

  Did you lie awake thinking about me too? The dark things you wanted to do to me? Were we lying there at the same time, whispering each other’s names?

  Yeah, all right, I know the answer; I’m not deluded now. But then…that’s what I fantasized about, whilst this empty, bunched feeling, built twisted in my gut. I had to see you again, even if you called me freak or didn’t say a word and strolled on by, as if I didn’t even exist.

  The next Saturday, however, when I checked the lists at the club, you weren’t playing. I’d booted the sound system, sending the guitarists scattering. I could’ve ripped the joint to shreds.

  I needed a drink of blood so sodding badly I shook with it.

  Ruby was noticing at last: the grimacing pain when I stood, the way I grasped onto edges of chairs to stop myself from blacking out and the constant tremble, which I couldn’t hide any longer.

  I stumbled to the khazi, kicking through into its muffled quiet. I sprayed freezing water onto my ashen mush.

  A sudden low groan came from the corner of the latrines.

  Bollocks.

  Some berk tripping out on wacky backy had fallen, smashing his skull on the porcelain.

  I crouched closer, licking my lips.

  Blood was seeping from the wound in fat, purple clots and trickling down between the bloke’s spaced out peepers.

  I waved my hand in front of him: no response. Not a flicker. He was flying.

  My whole body was quivering… The smell… The intoxicating splendour of it, burst like stars in showers around me; I could reach out and touch them, closer and closer…

  Saliva dribbled, as my fangs shot out. I couldn’t retract them. This was happening.

  Christ in heaven, it was happening…

  I gripped the bloke’s shoulders, sliding out my tongue, further and further away from those teeth and deadly toxins.

  Then I was licking, drinking from the gash, as if I was a panther. The blood hit my anaemic bloodstream, like it was my very first kill. The whole world was alive. And I was resurrected.

  I shook with the high of pot infused blood; the kid giggled, whilst I fed from him.

  Afterwards, I wiped myself clean at the sinks, before staring down at the still quietly sniggering mess, who was sprawled in his own piss.

  I shook my nut, before swaggering back into the bar. The world was bright and small again in the brilliance of the blood’s light.

  Abstinence had neutered me, Ruby was right about that at least: we had to feed. The two drives were tearing me in two; I was blood but did I have to be death?

  For tonight at least I was full.

  I banged on the counter for the barman. ‘Khazi needs checking. Something’s blocking it.’

  All right then, so most exciting lay there is: the jewellery heist. You’d have guessed that, right?

  Look, any lay gets my blood going. It’s not the money. It never is with me. It doesn’t need to be high value diamond bollocks either, as that’ll take you into a whole new league of headache on the planning side; I’m more for the cut and thrust of a good caper, clean and fast.

  So jewellery: best payoff, minimum boredom. Not to mention those glittery trinkets speak to the Soul, even though what are they but pretty rocks strung on string?

  That night, exploding with blood, I’d wandered the London streets searching for just the right hit because all I wanted was to share the moment with you. I knew, even then, lost as I was in the haze, that you weren’t thinking of me and maybe hadn’t since the day I’d snapped you. Yet still I couldn’t stop myself.

  I was addicted and I thought maybe…just maybe…

  Hope - that’s the true killer.

  I had the idea this was what you First Lifers did, wasn’t it? Courted with gifts? Or had the rituals changed so much since I’d been elected?

  I knew a lad bound and wrapped in scarlet ribbons, or a horsehair whip, wouldn’t be your thing. Jewellery though, I’d always relied on that to make Ruby smile. And I hungered to earn another smile from you.

  Then there it was in the window, displayed on black velvet cloth: a silver choker, with sapphire disc, for my Moon Girl.

  That’s when the fun started.

  Later, back in my room, I ran the choker gently through my fingers. I hadn’t seen Ruby all night and it’d soon be dawn. I traced over the sapphire; its cold burnt.

  Now I had it though, what the bloody hell did I do with it?

  I paced up and down, glancing at your mug smiling up at me, over and over, from the photos, which were strewn on the sheets.

  What did people even say in this new age?

  ‘I saw this and…’ I held out the choker loosely at an invisible you. ‘Well, it’s…and you’re, well, you’re blinding and…’ I shook my nut in disgust, as I paced away. ‘Look, I got you this, you fancy it, it’s yours, all right?’ I booted the bed, so hard the pictures became a trembling sea. Then I closed my peepers, holding out the choker towards your photo. ‘Please accept this as a token of my highest regard… Laugh at me, will you?’ I stared down at your mush, annihilated by your imagined mockery and my own frustration. ‘Why don’t you just sod off?’ I hurled the choker skittering down the length of the room. Immediately, I regretted it. I rushed to scoop up the choker, twisting it between my hands to check it over: it wasn’t broken. I breathed deeply, before holding it out again in front of me. ‘So, you like sapphires?’

  What you don’t know, is what it took for me to find out where you were renting in Soho.

  See, behind every important man in those days was a Secretary. Your agent’s was called Jane (this daft bint with pasty legs), who spilled her boss’ secrets for a bit of slap and tickle. I hope you don’t reckon she got the raw end of the deal: I whored myself for you. Doesn’t that just make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside?

  Yeah, I’m the big romantic me.

  Have the hearts and cupid shown up yet?

  All right then, so I had this spiel all planned out, with the choker snug in my pocket, because no way was I going to look like a g
ormless wanker again.

  My heart was wild stallioning, as I dived between the shadows, passing sex shops and illegal gambling dens. The night was alive with car horns and riffs of jazz drifting from coffee houses.

  This is how it would play out: I’d knock, you’d ask me in and I’d say…

  Then all of a sudden you were there.

  You were coming out of your flat in high silver boots and a metal tunic, over a mini-skirt, which transformed you into a futuristic Amazon queen. You slammed the door and marched straight towards me, before I even had time to think of a new plan.

  This I hadn’t practised, in fact, hadn’t even thought of in all my scenarios: yeah, I was a sodding genius.

  You still hadn’t seen me though, so there might be time to get out of it - for tonight at least.

  I hung back and nearly let you pass. My palm was tense around the choker, like it was a relic.

  Then came the fresh scent of you and it was too much: it overwhelmed me. You were devouring me.

  I stepped out right in front of you, so close our faces almost touched.

  I hadn’t realised you’d jump like that. Then you looked pissed.

  ‘You,’ you gripped your bag closer, ‘what do you want? I’m late.’

  It’d never started like this in my head. ‘Well I…’ I began to draw out the choker. But then I frowned. ‘Don’t throw a wobbly, luv; Public Street last time I looked.’

  ‘Then you’re welcome to it.’ You skirted round me.

  For a moment, I listened to you march away.

  ‘Hold up,’ I dashed after you, but you kept on striding in those bloody high boots, towards the beat of the rock club on the corner and between the rush of the dirty traffic, ‘come on, sorry, I was…’

  ‘You following me?’

  ‘No, I…’ You stopped, raising your eyebrow. ‘Yeah, a bit. I just… Look, this is for you.’ I pulled out the silver and sapphire choker, which rested on my pale palm. Looking down at it, I wished I’d scrubbed my nails. I could see your peepers widening. But something was wrong because you weren’t taking the choker. Instead, you were simply standing there, under the off yellow of the streetlight, studying me with this look, which I didn’t understand. Was this what First Lifers did? It didn’t feel right; it was more kind of sickening. I gestured with the choker towards you, but you shrank away. Then I remembered something, which I’d seen other First Lifers do. ‘Right, sorry, want me to put it on you?’ I began to fumble with the clasp.

  ‘No, don’t.’ You hurriedly stilled my hand with your fingers; your unexpected touch was like a silver roar. ‘You can’t just… Some’at like this, it’s…too much. Don’t you..? I can’t accept it.’

  The silver roar transformed into a howling blackness: the type, which made me hunger to feast on the world because maybe that’d dim the pain. ‘Why?’ I clutched the sapphire disc so tightly it sliced into my palm; I felt my blood meld with the rock, like a sacrifice.

  Your voice was softer than I’d yet heard it. ‘You know nowt about me and if you did…maybe you wouldn’t want to.’

  ‘What if I say I do?’

  ‘Then you’d be a right fool.’

  ‘That’s my choice.’

  ‘No,’ you pushed me back with a firm shake of your nut, ‘it’s mine. Reckon this is a game? Little girl with a voice runs away to London for a record contract? Easy, is it? My life? What I want? I can’t have someone like you--’

  ‘That right? Someone like me?’ Anger flashed at last and it was laced with a raw, remembered bitterness. You never forget your First Life and you don’t forgive either. ‘Suppose you’d prefer a bank clerk?’

  ‘I’d settle for someone who wasn’t a freak.’ You bit your lip as soon as the words were out. I’ve always wondered if you regretted them, as much as they hurt me.

  You immediately put your nut down, avoiding my eye, as your strode deeper into the centre of Soho. You didn’t look back.

  This time I didn’t follow.

  The choker was buried in the flesh of my palm; blood poured down my wrist. I wrenched the choker out, gasping with pain. Tipping my nut back, I hollered to the stars, with the rage and humiliation.

  Then drawing my arm as far back as I could, I chucked that sodding choker in front of the wheels of a double-decker bus. I watched as it was pulverised; I wanted it to be ground back into the earth, so I’d never have to see it again. But you? I still yearned to see you and for the sweet torture to continue.

  How can someone trap you with simply a smile?

  8

  You smiled at me in the early hours of this morning.

  Will you ever understand what your smile means to me?

  Because for that moment, as we lay curled together under the warmth of the covers, you were with me again: you saw me.

  When I held you soft in my arms, you were Kathy and you remembered.

  Your blue peepers studied mine, as clear as ever, and then came that smile. The one, which has always caught me helpless on your lips. And you know what?

  For those few minutes before your peepers clouded, your smile wavered, and you were lost again - that was bloody hearts and cupid.

  AUGUST 1968 LONDON

  Another Saturday night in the dark buzz and clashing din of the Heartbeat, slouched with a smoke and a pint, flicking through the psychedelic pages of an underground magazine.

  Bloody hell, these First Lifers weren’t as blinkered or dull as us Blood Lifers conned ourselves, at least not in the world of these mags, which catered for the freaks out there. Free love and screwing the system right royally?

  Just add blood and I was sold.

  Here’s the thing, the more I wandered this First Lifer world without Ruby, the more I realised my Author, muse and liberator didn’t have a buggering clue what she was on about.

  Instead (for some reason I didn’t fully understand), Ruby was too frightened of the First Lifers, who were meant to be our prey, to dive headfirst into their world. Without the parent in the room, however, I’d been drowning in them. I luxuriated in the teeming, reeking humanity, with all its uncivilized barbarity. Sod that, because of it.

  So I’d died? Not like I wasn’t still here, kicking the hell out of the world. I breathed the same air. Pissed and shagged, just the same as any First Lifer. Were we really so bloody different?

  That’s why A Clockwork Orange blew my mind. Because there it was, in black and white screaming from the page at last: the self-awareness of this new age and the evolutionary jump to a subversion of everything that went before. It was enough to give me pause. It challenged all I knew about being one of the Lost.

  Now you First Lifers were in my territory.

  I downed my pint. I was meant to be helping Alessandro after closing with Advance’s books. That was more of the twins’ dirt on my hands then.

  The more I dug, the more I knew in my gut something was off.

  The money, power and empire-building? It stank.

  Was that the true Blood Life? Elected from death, simply to live through a rerun of First Life all over again? The same treadmill but this time only as a shadow, or a pale imitation in the darkness because none of us were getting a bleeding suntan, were we?

  This existence, which the twins were creating for us, seemed to me nothing but a sick charade of humanity, and greedy wanker that I was, I hungered for more than that: for something better, bigger – different. That was my own. And that I’d chosen.

  If I was finally outside the bullshit shackles of school, work, government and sodding money too (the bollocks of First Lifers, who can’t see the figures dance), then I’d earned the freedom.

  But Aralt’s little family? We had new chains.

  I’d just slipped out a new fag and lit up, when it started. The music.

  I didn’t turn round, move or even bloody breathe because I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction.

  …Everything’s changing, so we’ve gotta change too… It cut deep, bugger did you make me bleed�
�� But I’m alive, we’re alive, so we’ve gotta live… And you were, like every one of the bopping Mods in this swarming club: sweating bags of skin, pounding with hearts, veins and arteries, which coiled in blue and red, like the wax anatomical models under the glass cases in Florence.

  Yet here I was, trembling with hunger and the agony of the constant fight to leash it inside, but not one of you even noticed me – the dead bloke sitting right in your midst.

  What would you think if you knew? What would you do?

  I realised I was flicking my lighter - on, off, on, off - and staring into its orange flame, as your voice kept on singing.

  I wanted to turn around so badly but I bloody well wasn’t going to.

  It’s a myth that blokes think about sex every few seconds. Yet we’re still led by our todgers - that’s just nature - and when we’re in love, it sodding burns.

  It’s a type of madness.

  I wanted the thought of you - that worm squirming deeper and deeper into my core as you sang - incinerated.

  I passed my hand over the lighter, holding its shimmering heat against my palm. And then again, lowering my hand…lower and lower.

  The burn felt good. It was the first time in weeks I’d had something to really concentrate on. When it became too white hot even for me to bear, I snatched it away. Then, however, I forced my palm over the fire again. This time I held it there.

  The skin blistered, peeling in blackened strips. I shuddered but I didn’t pull back. Instead I struggled to absorb the pain. This way I didn’t have to listen to your siren song; I could feel nothing but the fire.

  At last, I wrenched my hand back; beads of sweat trickled down my forehead. Then I shifted my lighter over again but this time onto another spot.

  It took me a couple more moments to notice you’d stopped singing, maybe you had awhile ago, but I’d been too lost to the world, submerged under waves of pain.

  Breathing out with relief, I glanced over my shoulder, and there you were - my Moon Girl - dolled up and blinding as always.