One day, in the middle of a training session, Gregory came to Tset and interrupted him.
Tset shot the paused demon. Gregory glared for a second and Tset shrugged.
"I have something for you."
"What's that?"
"There are vampires currently demanding entrance to my home. Normally I would handle them myself, but I think it's time for you to."
"Just regular old vampires?"
"No. This is the Elder Council from I think the Grey Falcons."
"Grey who now?"
"It's a smaller vampire clan. Black Hawk has been cutting them down for a long time, old enemies, and now the council thinks it's got something to gain by breaking and entering."
"Do they now?"
Gregory laughed, "Yes. They're all Masters. And not low-classed like the ones you fought at the Archembeaux compound. Grey Hawk is an old clan, with an old council. I would've had to have been smart in my dealings with them if I were to be the one to play host."
"Load up the silver, shut off the lights and let's party."
Gregory said, "Don't get cocky. Some of these older ones are entirely unnatural." Then he obliged.
The Masters found an in and came rushing down a corridor. They would pay Gregory for what he had done. The old fool had been meddling too long.
The putrescence of demonic blood filled their nostrils, a couple of the squires gagged, but all pushed forward.
The demon's lair was a huge underground vault set below a massive faux mansion, plastered and splattered with the blood of lesser demons.
There was a man down there, not Gregory.
He stood under the only spot-lit illumination - clad in jeans, a motorcycle jacket, boots, sunglasses and a t-shirt. He looked like an American James Dean knockoff.
"Good morning. I'm Gregory's door man and Dante's too, what can I do you for?"
The Masters were unimpressed. They brought out their staves of office - far more ornate and sinister than the ones Tset had felt before.
"We wish to speak with Gregory."
"Hmm. I'll make you a deal. I'll count each of you off. Everytime I do," Tset brought his Mossburg into the light, "I'll annihilate one of you. Starting from the edges."
"Human-"
"One."
One of the squires was torn to shreds by the splinter round.
"Two." The arm snapped back and out and another was blown apart, but the remaining squires were on him then.
However Masterlike the squires were in their own right, he was too fast, and much too strong - the attacks were ineffective and he parried and dodged each.
During a spin he killed one with his fist and another with the sudden appearance of a .45.
The squires were made short work of.
Tset had several rounds in either pistol and their smoke wreathed his set jaw and his glare. There were only three vampires standing.
And a fourth, on horseback, who hadn't been there - he was thin and looked like he was covered in glinting bones.
Tset put a boot tip under his shotgun and in one motion his pistols were hidden and the shotgun was in his grip.
The arm, again, slid back and out. In the silence, the reedy, plasticine clatter of the casing was almost as loud as the sharp sound of breaking brethrens' vertebrae.
"Do I make myself clear?" Tset was relaxed.
"What's unclear, human, is why Gregory has a little boy doing his dirty work for him."
Tset's grin flashed - he had finished his formal vampire bashing: "I'm doing an internship here. He liked my resume so said I could have door man. I get paid about four bucks a head, really."
The vampire stepped forward, while the others, including the one bestride a nightmare, watched.
The heckler looked like he had armor on underneath his robes.
"You're a bit of an idiot."
Tset dropped his hidden sawed off double barrel from his jacket with all the care of taking a cell phone call.
He cracked it and balanced it on his shoulder, with his knuckles he caught two shells ejected from his pump. The Mossburg was disposed of and the double loaded.
"And you're getting too close." He smiled ingratiatingly while thumbing his hammers back.
"You're also a coward, hiding behind your screen of cordite."
"Oh, too close to home on that one." The five foot distance was covered in a knee-led dive that cracked the Master's nose flat against his face. The vampire tumbled to the steel floor when he was struck.
The other two couldn't even move before their leader waved them off, "This is my fight. Let me show this... door man... how we work in Clan Grey Falcon." The others backed down, one with both barrels against his chin, "Touché." Tset said, and winked.
The staff twirled like a baton and the vampire stepped forward, casually, but obviously coiled tight. The shotgun went down and disappeared.
Tset assumed a boxing stance and feinted once, twice, and then dodged a real blow.
He threw a right hook which cracked against the staff.
The left hook was Papillion's - severing the staff and digging a rotting gouge out of the Master's face, blinding him.
Tset nudged the screaming lump over and emptied four rounds from his .357 into it before it quieted.
It spasmed.
"Are you ready to stop underestimating me?" The .357 vanished. "Maybe a number of you greater than a couple of neophytes and one lonely bastard of an ambassador could do something to handle me. Course it looks like it's just you two and the Lone Ranger back there," Tset waved, "Hi-ho, Silver."
The other two Masters ignored him and turned to face the one on horseback.
"You actually look like you're ready to bail."
The three looked to him and then resumed holding silent council.
Soon the two spoke in unison, "Yes, Lord." And knelt, handing him intricately-decorated longswords from beneath their cloaks.
He raised the swords up, brought them back down. Two heads rolled.
The swords were dropped like trash and the rider relaxedly dismounted and sauntered to Tset with an equestrian's gait, removing his winged helm.
"You're impressive, boy." 'Remorselessly destroying friends. Klaxons.'
"I'm obviously above the age of twenty."
The vampire chuckled and stepped into the light, the white hair streamed to his shoulders, the same color as his skin, and all served to frame the crimson pools of the eyes.
Tset made a revolted sound, "You on the other hand look evil, old and ugly." There was not even a flash of anger or annoyance in the other.
'A vampire who doesn't react to cynicism. Definite klaxons.'
"Why don't we settle this like gentlemen?" The vampire unfurled what Tset thought was a cape, but was really a wrapping for an evil-edged sword. Refrains from Black Blade played in Tset's head.
"Since neither of us are, I'll keep my Remington." Both barrels flared. Tset was feeling very much less cocky, suddenly.
The smoke cleared, and splinters stuck every which way out of the vampire's palm. He looked unconcerned. "So be it, but your little knife and your little... needles... will do little against a vampire personally imbued by the gods with silv-" Tset fell on him, deftly hacking to no effect at parries and attacks.
While fighting one-handed the vampire shook the splinters loose from his gauntlet.
Tset now was breathing hard and the vampire switched hands.
Tset's attacks became finesseless and more vicious.
They broke apart, Tset heaving in his breathing, Papillion extended behind him, he was crouched. The vampire standing casually, sword tip down, like it was a cane. The jeweled face in the sword winked at Tset.
Tset strategized - get the sword away from him. 'How?'
A painful image flashed in his head. 'Oh, that's how.'
"You sure have a lot in you for a doorman."
"You're not gonna have much in you for an old man by the time I'm done, Gramps."
Tset leaped high up,
holding Papillion over his head and coming downward, hard.
The vampire did as expected and impaled him. It burned and hurt, stinging mightily and to Tset's dismay, steaming and stinking, but Tset was able to slash the sword arm and twist the sword free with his torso.
He removed the sword from himself, it was long and the process laborious while his abdomen tightened around the blade.
The vampire merely held his wrist, "Very impressive."
"Sure sign of an asshole to say he's impressed when very obviously he isn't." Tset grunted a snarl.
"No, no, I am. You just were impaled on a demon hunter but still stand. You'll notice your regenerative powers have been affected by the cauterization, assuming you had any." The lightest of emphases on 'had.'
Tset checked, sure enough, there was a ten inch steaming pucker of scar tissue Tset was afraid went all the way through. The pain hit him and made him dizzy.
He tossed the sword away. "Huh. One for one."
"Oh, I'm hardly wounded, my boy - I've just got another mouth to feed." And like a Far Side comic, there was another sharp-toothed mouth, gnashing, where the cut had been.
"You're a freak." Tset retrieved and reloaded his Remington now that he had a standoff.
"What are you going to do with that?"
"I'm going to try to shoot your hand off, honestly." Tset tipped to one side, but caught his balance. His wound was not closing and deep did not cut it.
He fired anyway, but the vampire blocked again and hit Tset like a truck, knocking him against a far wall.
Tset pulled himself out of the cavity he'd made and reloaded the shotgun with bloody fingers.
The vampire charged, Tset's finger slipped on the trigger, but the gun went off just the same, just as the vampire snapped the barrel off the stock.
It was the vampire's turn to bleed - the heads of spikes stuck out of his sternum.
"Hurts deep, don't it?" Tset's harsh grin was yellow and red with running blood.
The vampire growled. "You forget, I am imbued with silver." The vampire lifted him up by his jacket and held him high.
Tset fingered his triggers hopelessly, and then he noticed - in the original slip up, only one shell had gone off. He still had the second.
The grin tightened on Tset's face along with the deathly pale fingers. "You forget, so am I."
Tset had to act quickly, so most of the splinters went wide of the temple, but he did manage to blind his adversary.
Tset couldn't hear its howls over the ringing in his ears right away.
It thrashed, deafened and blind while Tset kept his distance.
The howling eventually subsided into sobs and it spoke, "Give me your name so I might curse it!"
Tset had wiped his mouth and lit a cigarette. Smoke trailed out of his chest. The filter was still bloody when he pulled it away, 'Eh. Stings.'
He looked up from his cig, "Tset." The word was soft.
"No." Shock.
"The one, the only." He was grinning. He'd won, "What's your name, old guy?"
"I am Fenrir." It kneeled. "My clan is broken, and you, the breaker, are a Lord. I serve you now."
Tset was incredulous. "You vampires are too fucking weird for words. I deny your humble bitch of a request and tell you to get the fuck out instead. I don't trust your ass, you creepy old bastard." Tset pressed his hand to his wound, it came away bloody. He wiped this on his shirt.
"You comprende?"
The vampire was shaking, "So be it!"
"Right. And get a haircut."
A door on the far side of the vault opened, allowing a breeze of fresh, midnight air entrance. It was laden with the dim sounds of crickets. The vampire stumbled, wounded, to his horse, he slapped it and it cantered towards the door. The vampire followed the sound and was soon gone.
"Least he can hear okay."
Tset turned to face Gregory, who stood behind. "How'd I do, chump?"
"You're delirious, so I won't take that personally."
"Yeah, gimme a bit before you dole out a beating."
Gregory scoffed, "You're an insane and twisted little creature!"
"Well, you're one to talk, you should know better than I do that looks aren't everything."
Gregory was unamused. "And you're masochistic."
"For someone who just watched an equivalent midget blind a demigod with a broken shotgun, you sure are a critical son of a bitch."
"You made a mistake, Tset."
"What now?"
"You denied that demigod."
"Oh, so Blindy's gonna come back and smote you?"
"No, probably not."
"He is blind."
"Tset, I'm not sure what he's going to do, but it's cause for worry. He is very evil."
"What would you have done, Your Bigness?"
"Killed him."
"Oh."
"Not bantered. You're also self-centered, and with the masochism, that's quite a complex."
"Don't start with the psychobabbly bull. But, check it, we may not have seen the last of him, but he's sure as a motherfucker seen the last of anybody else."
Gregory allowed a very small smile. "But have we heard the last of him and has he heard the last of us?"
"Give me a Bic lighter and a wire hanger and I'll make it so."
This got more humor out of Greg, "Tset, you're altogether much too tenacious for a little being on your level of the food chain."
"And you're altogether much too talkative for a creature on your level of the food chain, that said, let's go discuss it further over aspirin, sutures and hard liquor."
Gregory was in the reading room with a Dickens novel in his hand when Tset stepped out of the bathroom, shirtless, holding a snifter of brandy. "Greg, check it out, disinfectant." Gregory looked over, more focused on his novel, when Tset took a gulp of brandy.
This poured out from between the fine stitches he'd just tied off, and onto his jeans.
Gregory jumped to his feet, disgusted. "Eugh, Tset, you're house trained! Knock that off!" He went to another room, Tset's gargling laughter following behind - the gargle came about because he'd tried it again but couldn't swallow properly.
Tset took a careful sip, still more alcohol dribbled onto his belt. He looked down at his soaked stomach and pants. "This is probably not the best thing in the world."
The Old Legend
An hour went by, finding Tset still nursing a brandy in the living room.
Gregory, back from wherever he'd gone, obviously over the earlier incident, "Tset, it's time I show you the old legends surrounding your heritage."
Tset stood up from his couch, "Let's do this." He was careful of the stitches that ran from his hip to his second rib, they'd stopped leaking and he wanted to keep things that way.
Gregory took him to a seemingly small room in which the walls not blocked by bookshelves were plastered with tapestries and paintings. He pulled down a book and threw it to the desk in the middle of the floor.
"It's marked, read it, I'll be around."
Tset pulled up a creaky metal chair. "I'll have to get a tetanus shot from sitting on this piece of shit!"
Gregory called back, "You're the only person to have used it, be glad it's there and you're not just standing and reading."
Tset turned back to the book and opened it up to the page marked by a scarlet ribbon:
Tset turned the last page and found some uneven papers in a very fine copperplate hand - it looked like Gregory's handwritten notations. These read:
Tset shut the book. "Alright."
He went out to find Gregory. Gregory had two teacups and a little teapot on the table next to one of his ludicrously huge chairs.
"Well, what do you think?"
"It's a bunch of biblical horse shit." Tset poured a shot of rum into his tea and gulped it.
Gregory laughed. "I thought you'd say something like that."
"The writing is slightly less dry and crap than other biblical-period works, but otherwise the thing
is fucking retarded. 'They got to work.' Right, nicely, bluntly stated. In later translations it'll be 'They commenced fucking.'
Gregory's laugh was a bark. He slapped his knee.
"At the very least, it's nice to know my lineage. But your little notes make those bastards seem more sinister."
Gregory hmmed, "Well, they were bastards, actually, I never thought of it that way."
"That's not how I meant it..."
"Regardless."
"... And what about those other places? I'd dig going to Ireland and hunting around for more great tomes of knowledge."
"I haven't been able to go very deep beyond the evident existence of the last few generations. There were no leads in any of those places. The whole old legend could be a complete lie to explain away a genetic anomaly. Maybe you're just a genetic defender built into human makeup sometime back. Who knows?"
"Yeah, who knows. But did you notice... your notes, Black..."
"What about him?"
"What sort of guy was he?"
"Depended entirely on how he turned out."
"I mean in general, asshole, yeah?"
"Mmmh... depends."
"I'm not going to get an answer?"
"Not only would any answer I give you be a theory stated as fact, if it's a bad one, you might fall into a funk and not come out of it until everyone had hired you to kill everyone else or until there was no more alcohol."
"Woah, that period of my life is over. No more booze binges for me, man."
"No more binges?"
"No booze. No way."
"And...?"
"And what?"
"And killing?"
"What about it?"
"Never mind."
"I mean, it keeps me limber."
"Just shut up." Gregory stated this last amusedly while Tset smirked at him. He lifted himself out of his chair and went to pace.
"Tset, whatever you got out of these scriptures and translations, I don't want you to take it to heart."
"What do you mean?"
"You're thinking that you might be Black and may end up destroying yourself through your own ethical and moral shortcomings."
"And if I am?"
"How can I explain this to you?"
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