by Masha Dark
What a primitive individual!
She probably has long legs. I’m going to fuck her.
The girl was getting very nervous. Dalana needed to hurry.
Meyering. Stupid prick. Also a vampire. Why did she whack him? He fed on ugly Americans. They’ve probably got some real nice classified info over there. But we’re the best. No contest. CRUSS! Classified material. Stupid Americans. FBI. Agent Scully. I’d fuck her.
Now she understood. It was all because of her last mission. Mr. Meyering, that pseudo-vampire, even managed to turn things to shit when he was dead. Well, it was definitely time to get out of here, but first she wanted to bid adieu to the lovely girl. So Dalana winked at her, not really expecting the girl to see or notice. Human vision was still too weak. But strangely, the girl did see. And she rushed straight for Dalana.
Dalana recalled the beast, which by this time had already grown bolder, and now was inching its feelers towards the entranced boy.
Take him and return to your Master, commanded Dalana as she walked away. The future fate of this threesome no longer interested her.
Outside, the first thing she did was chuck her cell phone into the trash. But then Dalana’s nostrils caught the scent of a transmog, a turned vampire. There he was, in the guise of a taxi-driver, standing there, awaiting his next human passenger-victim. Sorry, my friend, but you are going to have to wait a bit for your supper. Dalana walked over to the transmog.
I need your help.
He responded immediately: he grinned at her wolfishly, but in a way that concealed the canines behind his lips. All vampires smiled so, both those who were Begotten of Old and those who had been transmogrified.
What should I do?
He was far from stupid. He took the correct view of the balance of power between them. Most likely he was not less than five centuries old.
I need shelter.
Dalana walked over to his car.
“Do you speak Swedish?” he asked.
Dalana nodded.
“Where do you want to go?”
“To the Metropol,” Dalana said loudly.
This dialogue was for the benefit of anyone listening.
I know a place. It will please you.
“And your luggage?”
“This is it.” Dalana raised the hand holding the valise in an ostentatious gesture. “I always travel light.”
They might follow me.
“Have a seat,” he offered, gallantly opening the door of his car for her.
I understand. I’ll lose them.
Ducking into the taxi, Dalana arranged herself as comfortably as possible. The car swung nimbly away from the curb.
“Excellent camouflage,” she said aloud, complimenting his car.
“I understand that it’s not what you are used to,” he began in an apologetic tone.
“There’s no need,” Dalana interrupted him.
“Filip,” the vampire introduced himself. Will you excuse me?”
And he took out his cell phone, hit two buttons and pressed the device to his ear.
“Lucinda, hi, will you do something for me?” he began without any preamble. “Yes, yes, and warn everyone that this time our guest is quite out of the ordinary. That’s all, see you later.”
He put his phone back in its place and added respectfully, “We would be honored to have a Begotten of Old accept our modest assistance. Are you hungry?”
“No,” she assured him. “And please, Filip, please don’t ask me anything more for a while. I need to think.”
He nodded and Dalana lost herself in her thoughts. The passport under the name Darla Van Glek, which had served her for almost ten years, would no longer be of use. And with it she must forget about the apartment in New York and the Moscow villa on Rublevsky Road, and about much else besides. The FBI must have already been working on that idiot Meyering when she took on the commission. Nice. The client had paid her a million dollars, but the apartment that she had lost, with its views of Central Park – that alone was worth ten times as much! But it couldn’t be helped. Such is the job – what you have today you lose tomorrow. Ultimately, the real estate loss was not the most upsetting result of this mess. Dalana was still a fantastically wealthy individual. She would have no problem securing new documents and new properties, as she had already done many times before. The other result was worse – because of this incident she had to ask for help from the transmogs. Of course, they had no idea that this Begotten of Old was one of the highest paid jewel thieves in the world. Was Dalana a hired assassin? No, by no means. Simple murder was usually too banal for her, and she had rarely engaged in it even at the dawn of her career, but it was often a requirement in the bigger picture of a job. At this point in time, she referred to such work as ‘assistance in the conclusion of an especially delicate problem.’ She had a few extremely serious rivals. An enchanter, a native of South Africa – he had a sublime gift for changing his appearance as did all changelings in principle. A Chinese man, a monk from the Shao Lin Monastery – he could control the wind, for he kept company with Gods of the Ethereal Elements. And mademoiselle Yuriko Ottiker – she was a female half-breed with whom Dalana was personally acquainted. European through her father, Yuriko resided in Switzerland and enjoyed a rabid popularity among the local male population, who were sincerely convinced that the mother of this marble-skinned beauty was a Japanese aristocrat. However, even her father, long dead in the course of time, never guessed that the Mistress of the Sea of Marmara herself had conceived a child from him. Yuriko was also very good at what she did, and she earned quite a bit of money, but unlike Dalana she preferred not to pass beyond the borders of Switzerland, only carrying out local commissions. Chances were that the list of rivals was not exhausted with these three, but to all the other ‘hatchetmen’ Dalana was generally indifferent. Furthermore, her worth was already so immense that she could have quit her profession long ago. She could have, but she did not.
Recalling the transmog who was sitting in front of her, Dalana probed him through and through just to be on the safe side. But she could see nothing dangerous to herself save for the fact that the pseudo-vampire by the name of Filip craved her body, just like that human puppy.
The car, in the interim, had reached a strong, yet showy wall covered in monograms and emblems. Dalana stared at these pretentions of the modern nouveau riche. However, it could all be a bit more complicated than that. Filip slowed the car down.
“We’re here,” he told her.
And the gates in the wall, opened smoothly, allowing the car to pass into a spacious courtyard. A pair of magnificent Dobermans, barking furiously, met them at the entrance of the house. The dogs changed their tune as soon as they scented Dalana’s powerful musk. The door opened and Filip ceded the way to her. For a moment Dalana froze on the threshold.
This house was an abode of vampires. Vampires who, like Filip, had been transformed, who had once been human.
We are delighted to see our guest, Begotten of Old. Henceforth our home is your home.
Dalana stepped over the threshold.
3.
Hoc est vivere bis, vita posse priore frui.
To be able to enjoy a lived life means to live twice.
“So first of all, it is essential that I have a cell phone and a laptop,” declared Dalana.
They were sitting in a large parlor with an unlit fireplace. It was amusing that here amidst the design elements of the currently fashionable ‘High-Tech’ style, one encountered aspects of a Russian palace style. Dalana immediately recognized that the gilded details of the palatial interior were genuine. As was, so it now seemed, the coat of arms on the front gates. It was a hereditary coat of arms, and the creatures who lived in this house appeared to be members of an ancient, noble Russian family. By some whim of fate Dalana was being sheltered by Old Russian aristocrats…who by a similar whim of fate had become vampires more than seven hundred years ago.
“These need to be obtained immediatel
y,” continued Dalana. “The laptop must be fully loaded.”
At these words Filip rose from his seat and left the room. After a minute the car could be heard leaving the courtyard. The masters of this household knew what cellular phones and plasma televisions were, and what is more – they delighted in making use of all the goods of progress. But they still regarded Filip as their ‘go-to guy’ for that was what he was when, centuries ago, still a human, he sold meat pies at the local bazaar.
“The matter of documentation must be resolved within twenty-four hours. Any documents are fine with me, even if they are obviously forged. The most important thing is that I get them as soon as possible. The only requirement I have is that the name on the passport must begin with the letter D.”
Such an eccentric little kitty.
Vasilisa, Lucinda’s younger sister, was not able to control her random thoughts all too well. She was an entirely spoiled young lady, though she made no attempt to hide this. With an interior smile, which none of those present could see, Dalana remembered the vampire films she had seen not that long ago on the airplane.
You have such pretty ankles.
Would you look at that, the girl was eyeing Dalana up and down! This little grey-eyed rogue would certainly be a worthwhile companion for what’s his name…Lestat!
There’s a party planned for tonight.
It was clear to Dalana that the ‘party’ would involve this child hanging around with her friends – a bunch of freshly made transmogs wheeling their way through nightclubs in an orgy of blood. Extremists.
Would you like to come with me? It’ll be fun.
Not likely. Dalana screwed her face up into a distasteful frown, imagining the prospect of such festivities for a second. She had come here to work, not to roam around Stockholm.
I could show you a couple of things that would blow your mind.
That was even less likely. Dalana was beginning to lose her temper. Transmogs always thought too much of themselves. They acquired their canines, lived for a few extra centuries and began to think they were insanely audacious. But when it came down to it, they still had to creep about in the dark to attack their victims. They did not even know how to fly. Only the Begotten of Old possessed this skill. Only they had sufficiently developed consciousnesses to raise their bodies into the air and move them through any space at their convenience. That was the entire secret of ‘vampiric flight.’
“We’ll resolve the issue of your passport within twenty-four hours,” said Lucinda. The sour expression on her face testified to the fact that she was listening to her sister’s mental monologue.
“Also,” Dalana said. “You will help me find more suitable accommodations.”
“In the countryside or in Stockholm?” asked Lucinda.
“I’ll think about it,” answered Dalana. “But I’ll decide after I see the passport.”
“I see,” replied Lucinda, chewing her lower lip.
She kept glancing at Vasilisa, but it seemed that her expression did not fluster the girl in the slightest.
And why exactly the letter D?
The little lamb was unreasonably curious.
Show me your canines.
STOP THIS RIGHT NOW!
I tell you what, how about you stay out of this and stop crawling into my thoughts!
Dalana would have preferred not to eavesdrop on family arguments, but the sisters were ‘yelling’ so loudly that any Begotten of Old would have heard them, even from a distance.
When Nicholaus returns I will tell him everything. EVERYTHING. Do you understand? About your debts and about the cocaine in your bedroom.
Boring old cow.
Shameless hussy.
Apparently, the third member of their family, the elder brother, was called Nicholaus.
Prude.
GET OUT OFT HERE! GET OUT NOW!
To the Dalana’s astonishment, Vasilisa did indeed get up and walk out of the room.
I’ll be seeing you.
That last was addressed to Dalana – the girl winked at her in her mind’s eye. Of course, she enjoyed behaving willfully, but she didn’t dare rebel against her elder sister entirely.
“Forgive her, please,” Lucinda said apologetically. “She’s gotten completely out of hand in the last thirty years. Such are the times.” She raised her hands, unable to voice her thoughts further.
She’s even more difficult with you around, she thought to herself and immediately flushed bright red, perceiving that Dalana had heard her thought.
The situation was becoming awkward.
“Perhaps you would like to rest from your trip?”
And Dalana had to find some way of extracting herself from it.
“I suppose,” consented Dalana.
Lucinda led her to a spacious, comfortable bedroom. The majority of the Begotten of Old relaxed, when they needed to, beyond the framework of everyday human experience. But transmogs were still humans, or rather, their patterns of thought had been formed while they were still human, which is why they almost always set up bedrooms in their dwellings.
“The sooner I receive my passport, the sooner I will leave your house,” said Dalana. “The name can be anything, just so long as you fulfill my requirements.”
“Most assuredly,” answered Lucinda. “Please let us know if you need anything else. Sleep well.”
And she left.
In the depths of her soul, Dalana did not really despise the transmogs, as did many of her kinsmen; instead, she pitied them. They were miserable creatures, not completely human, not completely vampire. All the more so since many of them were transformed into this borderline state against their will. Excommunicates from the human world, transmogs were never fully admitted into the world of the Begotten of Old, and so all the secrets of that world were unrevealed to them.
Each of the first names on Dalana’s numerous forged passports began with the same letter as her real name. In the Classical Period, the Athenians had known her as Despina. During the times when documents were still not required, some Begotten of Old had assumed names and used them for many centuries, if not millennia. Now everything was different. One thing remained constant – the First Letter of the Name. The ancient shamans knew of the enormous power that resided in the Names of all the living creatures in the Cosmos. Dalana’s requirement that her passport name begin with the letter D ensured that the ancient magic imprisoned in her Name would not be destroyed.
There was nothing to do while she waited for her documents and the other items Filip had left to obtain, and Dalana despised idleness more than all else on this earth. She glanced out the window, and decided that it would be a good idea to take a better look at the lands surrounding the house. It turned out that there was even a forest. A dying forest, to be sure, but a forest nonetheless. All the Creatures which had inhabited the forest since time immemorial had been forced to abandon it when humans had begun to take a fancy to this picturesque corner of the Stockholm region. Soon the humans constructed a slew of their destructive gated communities, but strangely they did not completely destroy the forest.
And yet Dalana felt that someone was still living in this deserted and almost completely dead forest. She wondered who it could be.
Outside, evening was already settling in. But dark came quite slowly in these long August evenings, and Dalana would be at great risk of being seen by the human inhabitants of the community. She could well imagine the ruckus that would commence if someone suddenly saw a woman flying through the sky. Or a vampire soaring, as the case may be. The temptation was very great. However.
Dead leaves crackled softly beneath her feet. Dalana could move almost soundlessly even if the ground was strewn with popcorn.
Soon she saw him – a small Forest Man. The inevitable inhabitants of any forest, these tiny godlings almost never came into direct contact with humans, but every so often they were glimpsed from the corner of a human eye. The little Men did not have faces as such, simply black apertures in a
white or blue screen. Humans mistook these holes for eyes. The little Men could be one-eyed, but they could also have three, four, or even five eyes. In so far as Dalana knew, they preferred to appear in groups, not as individuals. But this one sat alone on a rotten log in the center of a glade.
Hello, Dalana greeted the godling.
He turned towards her. He had three eyes of different sizes.
Are you here alone?
Forest Men spoke very rarely, essentially performing the function of passive observers. But the Man comically wagged his head in a misshapenly elliptical pattern.
There were others. They left.
Where did they go?
The Man hesitated. Each his own way. To find a new home.
The godling’s head wagged again. Apparently that was how he demonstrated dissatisfaction.
It’s not easy. There are few forests. And many humans.
And where did the Master go?
The Master did not leave. Humans killed him. Not for food. They liked his large antlers. After this the others left.
Those who existed beyond the borders of the human world were generally alien to excess emotion. And yet…
But why did you stay?
This. Is. My. Home.
Well, that was his choice. The Forest Men died if their Forest, the House in which they lived, perished. The only other option for the godlings was to leave before their forest died in search of a new refuge.
Farewell, said Dalana.
The godling did not answer. He jerked his small, odd head for a moment, and then he disappeared.
“Farewell,” Dalana repeated aloud.
The forest did not answer; only the wind murmured though the leaves on the tops of the trees.
It was time to return to the manor. Dalana sincerely hoped that the sisters had managed to clarify their relationship and that Filip had filled her order.
Everything was relatively quiet in the house, at least at first glance. Dalana decided to take a shower. Any creature, even if it consisted not only of flesh and blood, or not of those at all, required regular cleansing.
Having finished washing herself, Dalana thought it might be a good idea to renew her wardrobe. In fact, she needed a new one entirely. Unfortunately that would not be possible until she settled the matter of her passport and residence. And this time she would not bother with investments in expensive real estate. She would simply rent a house or an apartment. She even thought about making do with a hotel room. It was true that she was now slightly alarmed by the fact that federal agents had her on their radar. Surely, these buffoons from the organization with the idiotic name CRUS (or was it CRUSS – she wasn’t quite sure) would first begin to search all the hotels in Stockholm. Although, to hell with them! Let them search. Dalana would hole up in a short-term rental in the city. Or better yet, she would rent an apartment within the city and a small cottage in the suburbs. Dalana thought she could complete her new mission, the one that had brought her to Stockholm in the first place, within a week, ten days at the most. And then she would leave Stockholm and probably not return for another forty years. It was something else that actually worried her: to what extent were the American intelligence agencies, the FBI and the CIA, aware of her? Which of them concerned itself with that damned Meyering? Yes indeed, she would have to come up with a clean biography, or maybe move somewhere else in Europe and lie low for two or three decades. However, no version of settling in Europe appealed to her. Simply put, Dalana did not share Yuriko’s love for everything European. She loved Asia, the United States and Russia. Moreover, each of her beloved countries fostered a completely particular feeling in Dalana. The Celestial Empire and the Island of Dragonflies – China and Japan – she loved tenderly and tremulously, just as humans usually love in their earliest youth. She felt a wild passion for the USA, comparable only to desires of the flesh. But what she felt for Russia could not be defined so easily. The feeling was like the country itself, unruly and defenseless, loyal and treacherous, proud and cunning…. There, in the very heart of its vast territory, was Dalana’s homeland. A portion of that country, that earth, lived inside the Begotten of Old, whether she wanted it to or not.