by Lari, Simone
"You’ve become almost long-winded, I preferred you before" decided Vans, without obtaining response.
The hunter went to Nina, kissed her on the forehead and gave her a quick hug. "I know that you’re safe here, but be careful. See you soon."
"Certainly" she answered, smiling.
Christopher looked grimly at them.
Vans looked first at the clock, then at the faint light that was filtering through the drapes, and announced: "I’ll park the car in front of the entrance and leave the door open so you can jump inside. Okay, champ? I wouldn’t want you to get burnt, you know."
Christopher gritted his teeth, ready to answer back, but Katrina allayed the budding ardor taking the vampire by the shoulder.
"There will be time to take care of your personal matters, but now is not that time."
Chapter 5 - At Jared’s Farmhouse
When Vans’ blue people mover arrived at the house, the sun had already been up for a good half an hour.
Hearing them arrive, the uncle went out and waited for them under the portico, leaving the front door wide open.
Christopher and Katrina, wrapped in their overcoats, crossed the few yards beneath the morning sun.
"We need to nourish ourselves" Katrina began, a light smoke rising from her shoulders.
"Good morning to you too. I’ll go into the cellar to see what is left, my lady. Is a full bodied red of two thousand and eight okay?"
"Uncle, I assure you that this is not the time for jokes and for me to say that..." commented Vans, as he caressed Kira.
"I know what happened, my boy" he retorted gloomily.
"And how do you know? You haven’t moved from here" remarked Gabriel.
"I have my sources" he said cryptically as he went to the cellar.
"What does that mean?" asked Christopher with a condescending air.
"My uncle likes to be mysterious" said Vans, making light of it.
Some very long minutes of silence followed, broken only by the cat’s purr; the quartet did nothing but study each other.
Suddenly, as the elderly hunter returned, the two vampires turned to look toward the adjacent room.
"Look what I found down there" announced Jared, indicating Sting and Jude.
"Cheers, guys. Did we miss something?" asked the vampire.
Christopher went to him and grabbed him by the shoulders shaking him vigorously.
"You're the vampire of Prophecy! Do you know what this means?"
"You mean apart from the fact that I stole the show from you brilliantly?" he retorted sarcastically, extracting himself from the grip.
"Hello, people. I’m okay if anyone cares, eh?" said Jude.
"Nina will be happy to know that" said Vans.
"And so will Angelique, very much. She was concerned, she has tried to call you heaps of times" Gabriel told her.
"I was rather busy adapting to my new condition; it’s not as though I wanted to be talking on the phone."
"Have you noticed any changes?" asked Katrina, going to face the red haired vampire.
He shook his head and made a silly grin.
"I’d say not, I think I’m the same as always. I mean, I feel strong, and I haven’t even been aware of the power of the Teardrop. Apart from that, there's nothing to declare."
He unleashed his confident smile and sent his friend a vacuous look.
Christopher, doubtful, gazed more deeply at him, arguing: "Ossian has tried to eliminate you once already. I reckon that now he’d at least want to study you and maybe even her." He pointed to Jude and, irritated, added emphatically: "I thought you were smarter! Of all the places you could hide, you came to hole up here at the hunters’ house!"
"Try to calm down now, would you? Meaning, according to you, there’s a better place than this? Large reserves of blood, comfortable beds, daytime guardians..." He gave Jared a pat on the back.
"Hey! I’m not a daytime guardian and this isn’t a guesthouse. If you want make out with your concubine, find another place" the hunter replied.
"Concu- what?" protested Jude.
"You found a really smart one" murmured Christopher.
"Hey, good-looking, I heard what you said, you know? Vampire girl with excellent hearing, strong enough to be the envy of Wonder Woman... Show a lack of respect for me again and I’ll let you know about it!"
"I warn you, she could very well do so, she’s pretty strong" confirmed Sting.
"Does she nourish herself?" asked Katrina.
"Sure. She has a good appetite, but also excellent self-control. Something to really envy."
Jude smiled and patted his face. "Was that a vampire compliment?"
"Something like that" he confirmed grinning.
"How sweet you are. I almost feel like I want to open the windows and let some sun in" muttered Jared.
"Anyway, Sting is right, nobody would come looking for us in the hunters’ cellar" Jude agreed.
"Exactly. And try not to be so grumpy, uncle, I know who came to visit you last night..." he whispered in his ear.
"What is he talking about?" Christopher broke in.
"It’s none of your business, but it’s not a secret either. So, since red head has spilled the beans, I’m letting you know you that we have a new ally, who is familiar with black magic. For the moment I’ll say no more."
"Black magic? Uncle, normally we fight against sorcerers” Gabriel objected.
"Let’s say that this one is special and may be useful to us. Just trust me, for heaven’s sake. We’re already conniving with the fucking vampires, aren’t we?" he burst out, finally resting the two sachets of plasma on the table.
Katrina grabbed them quickly, threw one to Christopher and kept the other for herself. They went into the adjacent room together.
"I'll call Nina and Angelique to tell them I’m fine" said Jude.
"Just send a short message, there’ll be time to explain things later. For the moment, don’t go into too much detail" Sting advised her.
She took his chin with two fingers and shook it back and forth.
"My dear boy, don’t start getting a big head with this story of the Prophecy and the Chosen One: I don’t take orders from anyone."
He smiled in amusement.
"But I will take your advice." She winked at him and then switched on her smartphone.
Chapter 6 - The Bait
The minute he put foot in the club, Vans froze. It was almost noon and there was no lack of patrons.
He swallowed, clenched his fists and looked around at the tables: one was crowded with college kids, the other occupied by two truckers, the one next to the bathrooms was empty, but at the one before it there was a woman with her back to the entrance.
He gathered his courage and walked the short distance that separated him from table three. At every step he had to overcome an opposing force that was holding him back. A part of him wanted this meeting to end well; the other feared what to his mind seemed more logical: a trap. A disgusting trap orchestrated to appeal to human feelings, something that vampires regarded as one of the major weaknesses of the enemy: a weakness to take advantage of. But he had to give himself and that woman a chance.
At just a few steps from her, he accelerated his pace until he was in front of her.
The woman opened her eyes wide, surprised and amazed.
He did the same. That familiar expression and that face, albeit emaciated and aged more than ten years, belonged to a person he felt he knew in some way.
She opened her mouth a little, unable to breathe a single word, then took a hand to her face and rubbed it over her eyes, trying to hold back the tears which were imminent.
"M-mom?" he began.
She lifted her hand in search of her newly-found son’s cheek, patted it fleetingly, then recomposed herself in haste and invited him with a gesture to sit down.
He agreed without a word.
"But, how..."
In a broken voice, which she tried hard to control, the
woman answered quickly: "My son, I don’t know how to tell you the immense joy that I feel in having found you, but there is very little time for us, now more than ever. We will have the opportunity to talk about what was and what may be, but now we need to discuss other things."
She looked around nervously.
Vans imposed the same rigid composure on himself and, moved by common sense and putting aside his feelings, objected: "I would like to believe that you really are the person that you say you are, my mother. But so much time has passed, I was a little boy when you disappeared, presumed dead, and now you have aged. You seem... different. How can I be sure that it is really you?"
She gave a hint of bitter smile.
"Remember when your father reprimanded you because you didn’t know how to do things and you ran to me? I took you in my arms and you snuggled there, even if you were a heavy weight for a boy of that age. I kissed you and calmed you, telling you that you were my life."
"Okay, you have convinced me" he said, shaking his head in contrast with his own assertions. "I'm listening to you."
"I have been sent to lead you and the hunters into a mortal trap."
"Well, I’m pleased that you’re confessing that so openly" he said, perplexed.
"Let me explain! For all these years, I have been their prisoner. I don’t want to even begin to tell you what I was forced to do and what they have done to me."
Vans shook his head hard enough to detach it from his neck.
"They are slowly turning me into one of their progeny. They want to make me a daytime servant, someone who looks after their business during the day."
"And someone who will attract their prey to the trap, children including" the hunter remarked.
"They don’t know that I still have control of myself, partly at least. They think they have bent me. Perhaps, if I had been another person, I wouldn't have been able to react to their commands, but you are my son. They have given me the chance to see you again, and I will not make you one of their victims."
"If that’s how things really stand, then let's get out of here immediately. Come on, I’ll take you to safety." He jumped to his feet and held out a hand to her, inviting her to get up.
"No, Vans wait! We have to turn the situation to our advantage."
He sat down again, reluctantly.
"I had to convince you that I had come to pick up some bags of plasma to feed them."
"The excuse was feeble; with the pack broken I don’t see why they would have had to use the bags. Not to mention the way you were able to contact me."
"They had foreseen this objection from you and I was to tell you that they were doing this to avoid attracting too much attention from the forces of law and order. Furthermore I would have added that, due to a problem with the director of the clinic who wants more money, one of their leaders would have had to come with me tomorrow to get him into line, and you could have laid a trap for him."
"And who would this have been?"
"Abraham Tasker. From what I have heard, he has betrayed his people and has taken the side of the enemy."
"I wouldn’t have cared, I would still have insisted on getting you out of there, something that I will still do now."
"I would have told you that if I didn’t return with the bags, they would have nourished themselves differently, capturing young girls and sucking them dry, and about the importance of luring that person into the trap. This second thing, however, is true, because he will be in the group leading the ambush, and that is what pushes me to act pretending that I agree with their plans."
"And what would you suggest we do?"
She glanced around and then revealed in great secrecy: "We will follow their plan, but it will be us to get them into the trap, while they’ll think the opposite."
Chapter 7 - Truth from the Past
Jared banged his fists violently on the table.
"Think, for fuck’s sake! She is no longer your mother, the one you knew. The Zmeu do not create vampires, only enslaved monsters!"
"She is not one of them. She’s not a filthy vampire!"
"Then they have transformed her into a progeny, controlled and emptied of all human essence. She is not even a shadow of what she was, and you, for her, are no longer her son, unfortunately."
"She confessed their plan to me, don’t you understand? We’ll set up the trap against the enemy."
"You couldn’t convince me even if you were to repeat it ten times in ten different languages jumping on one foot. They want to make us feel sure of ourselves, lure us all together into one single place and set up a nice old style ambush for us!"
He approached, snorting anger and resentment, his nose wrinkled; his staring eyes displaying a certainty of intent that, instead, was weakening inside him. He quieted that voice of rationality and listened to his heart: "I must give her a chance. She is my mother."
"It is here that you are mistaken, my boy, because she is not, not any longer!" Jared retorted harshly.
"I know what I saw in those eyes, in her tears! She remembered me, our past. She can still think straight, not like you think."
"You were a boy when you lost her, together with your father. You can’t even be sure that is really her."
Vans stiffened.
"I remember every detail about that night perfectly, just as I remember every smile, every tear that I saw on the faces of my mother and my father when I was little. We don’t forget certain things, despite what may happen afterwards."
Jared swallowed and stroked his chest massaging it with the palm of the hand to ease the pain caused by some intercostal pain.
"I should have come with you. Sending you alone was a mistake."
"Let me do things my way" he insisted.
"Do it, go ahead and do it, you damned pig-headed boy! But I shall do things my way." He turned and went toward the door.
"You didn’t know that they had captured her, did you?" he asked him, as he had his back to him.
Without even turning, the other replied with resentment: "You don't deserve even a fucking response. Do you really think that I would not have done everything possible to save her, if I’d known?"
"You can do it now."
"No, I can't. It’s too late now." He slammed the door.
When he was outside, he met Katrina’s eyes. He knew that the vampire had heard everything but he didn’t care, indeed, this spared him a useless repetition.
As Jared and Katrina were leaving, Gabriel arrived from an adjacent room.
He went to the door, beyond which he heard his friend sobbing tears of anger.
He announced himself with a light knock, gave Vans time to recompose himself and then went in to hear what had happened.
Chapter 8 - Double Cross
In the cold alley behind the clinic, Vans waited alone for the arrival of his mother.
A mother does not betray her own son, he repeated to himself. Children yes, they betray, exploit, humiliate, expecting sacrifices from their parents and those who rear them without even realizing it, but a mother does not harm her son.
Facts at hand, which belied that idealistic theory, were being totally rejected in Vans’ mind.
He repented not having brought some beers to pass the time and cloud his mind. He took a silver flask, which had once belonged to his father, from the inside pocket of his overcoat and took a generous sip of the aged liqueur inside it.
He stared at it and remembered who had given it to him as soon as he had become old enough to use it for the purpose for which it had been made: Jared.
He called him Uncle, but he was just a colleague of his parents, a friend, one of the many hunters without a family. And yet he had created a family for himself, had gathered it together, raised and defended it as best he could.
It was as if he had adopted him first, then Gabriel and Lynn as well.
Lynn.
Thinking of her, it seemed like months since her sad passing, instead it was a painfully recent event.
He was about to take out the flask again when four figures emerged from the end of the dark alley.
One of them was his mother.
Next to her was a richly dressed vampire, with two of her species covering their backs.
They arrived under the same lamppost where he was standing and the vampire elder began: "Would you be the doctor who manages the clinic? You don’t look like a doctor."
The sight of the mocking smile stamped on the very pink face, which indicated that he had recently nourished himself and in large quantities, made his stomach turn.
"Yeah, well, actually I’m very good at curing illnesses. I also have a very particular specialization" he added waving his hands.
"And what would that be?"
"I’m in the field of prevention” he announced extracting a pointed spike. "I stop innocent victims from suffering serious bleeding after being bitten by pieces of shit like you!"
He gestured and numerous witches rushed to them, led by Gabriel and Angelique, with Christopher covering one of the flanks.
When the latter arrived at Vans’ side, he opened his eyes wide at the sight of his old master.
"Traitor! Your sham ends here!" he threatened.
He shook his head. "What fools! The only thing that is going to end tonight is your pathetic existence."
He snapped his fingers and several vampires came running quickly from the end of the alley, others appeared on low surrounding buildings, while some at the top of the street closed them in the trap.
"Martha, you have served us well" declared Abraham, caressing her. She seemed flattered. "As a prize, I will ask my friend, the being who created her, to give her to me as a gift. She will become one of my brides. And she will begin to nourish herself with your very blood!" he screamed in Vans’ face.
A subtle noise hissed in the air even before the hunter was able to fasten his gaze on the enemy.
Szock!
An arrow planted itself straight into the monster’s heart. A blinking light flickered on the tip and rammed into the vampire’s sternum. There was a small noise and then a detonation that shattered the rib cage.