I tsk, amazed that even as a vampire, I can still feel such strong jealousy. “A few hours ago you were ready to dissolve her in a holy water bath, Wyatt. Now you’re worried about how she is?” The betrayal stings more than any harm Reece and his immortal fangs could do.
“That was then, Nora; this is now.”
“It sure is,” I grumble as Reece shuffles away to consult with Abby’s Healers.
“So,” Wyatt asks in a low voice as his Healers turn to add another helping of salve to their rough sponges before attacking his back once more, “what did the Ancients say?”
“I have to write vampire books,” I confess glumly.
“That’s it?” He lifts his face out of the hole in the massage chair to see if I’m pulling his leg. His eyes look alive and alert, his already thick lips looking even puffier—and ultimately more kissable—thanks to the fangs hidden deep beneath and the lifeblood coursing through his veins.
“Forever.” I spit out the punch line.
“Oh,” he says. “Well, consider yourself lucky.”
“What do you mean?”
“The Ancients paid me a visit too,” he confesses quietly. “Well, one of them anyway.”
“Let me guess. Lord Rothchild?”
“One and the same.” He smiles, though I can tell he’s still in pain. “He said—get this—he said my punishment was to be your personal . . . bodyguard.”
“Really?” I ask, a little too loudly, glad I can no longer blush. “What about Abby, though?”
“Let her get her own bodyguards,” he jokes. “Better yet, let the studio get her bodyguards.”
“Be serious,” I say, slugging his shoulder and instantly regretting it when I see the look of pain cross his handsome face. “Sorry.”
“Yeah, right. I dunno what Abby’s punishment is. Lord Rothchild paid her a visit too and whispered something in her ear. She nodded and smiled, so it couldn’t have been too bad. But honest, I have no idea. Ouch!”
One of his Healers has pinched his back, signaling visiting hours are over.
We stand there in silence for a few moments, his head slowly retreating into the turtle shell of his ancient massage chair, me watching the Healers work wonders on his young, smooth back.
I hear quiet footsteps falling across the tile floor of the Healing Room behind me.
“Bye, Wyatt,” I say as Reece tugs me away.
“Later,” Wyatt says, wriggling his fingers at me before cooing to one of his Healers, “Faster, ladies, faster. I’ve got a swim shoot later this week, so don’t let me down.”
Outside the Healing Room the halls are quiet and, for the first time, quite empty.
I walk next to Reece for a while, assuming he’s taking me somewhere.
Instead the halls turn into a maze of twists and turns.
I try to remember where we are, where we’ve been, to predict where we’re going, but the walls Reece leads me past now are no longer sterile and white. Instead, they’re varied colors, larger and then smaller, the floors wide and changing, and sooner than later I’m disoriented, at Reece’s mercy to get me back to someplace safe.
When we are quite alone, without a Guardian in sight, he turns to me. “I know you think you’ve won.” His breath is hot and redolent of fresh blood as it spills across my chest in waves.
“I don’t, Reece. I—”
“You haven’t.” He takes a menacing step forward as I try, in vain, to hold my ground against his sudden ferociousness. “Maybe you’re safe for now. Maybe you’re safe until the new book comes out, until your book signings are all over, until the interviews are all done and the eyes of the vampire world are off you for a little while, but no vampire—least of all you—is irreplaceable.”
“But the Council.” I know I sound pathetic but am powerless to control the quivering in my voice.
Reece’s rage is a physical thing, causing his already distorted face to curl into a mask of pure and unadulterated hatred: hatred of just one thing—me!
“The Council,” he spits back, “is outdated and impotent. My time is coming, Nora, and when it does, you and your friends back there are done for, finished, through. My power will be absolute, and there’s nothing the Council—or you—will be able to do to stop me!”
His face is flushed, his fangs out, his claws eager and sharp, his head jutting forward as I back into a cold, stone surface that feels like exactly what it is—a prison wall.
“Fine,” I manage to bluff. “Do your worst.”
He laughs, an empty, broken sound that echoes through the gloomy chamber he’s lured me into.
“Nora, my dear, I plan on it.”
And with that promise, he turns and leaves me alone, his footsteps echoing down the long, winding corridor as his pace quickens and his rage slowly dissipates in the foul air he’s managed to leave behind.
But I am not alone, for from the shadows appears an Ancient. But not just any Ancient.
“Lord Rothchild,” I whisper, rushing to his side like a second grader who’s just found his mom in the crowded mall.
“Nora,” he says, not shying away from my vulnerable embrace.
I hug him, gently, because although he is obviously quite powerful, he is just as obviously quite frail.
“Follow me,” he says after a time. He walks slowly but surely, as if his legs aren’t as thin as broomsticks, as if his arms aren’t trembling at his sides. Still, his body is firm, as if he’s petrified, the organs long since withered and wasted away, and he’s filled instead with solid granite.
The hallways seem brighter with his presence, and I realize that is because his Guardian walks behind us, a flickering torch in hand and a grim, unreadable expression on his face.
“Your young friends are almost ready for transport,” he says as we turn down the endless tunnels through which Reece lured me so easily, so carelessly. “For obvious reasons, Reece will not be accompanying you on your return journey to Nightshade Academy.”
“What will happen to him?” I ask, trying not to sound too concerned.
“To Reece? Nothing, I’m afraid. Laws are laws, and unless he breaks one more, we are powerless to stop him.”
I follow him in silence, and he finally turns, just before entering the main entrance to the building.
“Don’t fear, Nora. You will not be alone on your journey through this afterlife.”
As if on cue, Wyatt and Abby are wheeled into the vast and glistening white foyer, smiling, though still pale and weak from their wounds. Abby is clearly the paler and weaker of the two.
“Safe travels,” Lord Rothchild says before leaving me with them. “And remember, Nora, you are one of us now. Write like one of us.”
Chapter 33
The Creature crawls from the freshly dug grave, gray hands groping through the rich soil, pushing aside white maggots and earth to climb, one inch after the next, to the surface.
I stumble away from him, ridiculously high heels slowing my progress, getting stuck in the wet graveyard soil, tripping over broken, crooked headstones that snag at my black stockings and bruise my fair skin.
The Creature finally frees himself from the grave and begins his pursuit in earnest. His movements are slow but steady, his body a hulking shape of rotting flesh and gray bone, a face crammed with broken teeth and dark, empty eyeholes.
“Wyatt!” I cry, straining my voice, but I don’t see him.
“Abby?” I yelp, limping backward as the Creature approaches and wrenching the small of my back against the top of yet another shattered headstone.
Abby too has abandoned me in my time of need.
Incredibly, I am alone again, running again.
Now the Creature stands to his full height of six feet or so, grave dirt still tumbling from his moldy, blue burial tux. (Why are they always buried in blue tuxes?) Mildew and decay waft off him like smoke from a raging fire.
Still on my feet, for now, I back carefully away as the Creature finally regains his bearings. His skin i
s more green than gray, the moonlight glinting off his rusty cuff links and the silver fillings where his teeth used to be.
His hands are half flesh, half bone, the fingers skeletal. From the second knuckle back, gray rotting flesh resembles one of those half gloves the guys at school will wear to play racquetball or to ride their hybrid scooters to the nearest Smoothie Shoppe.
He looks around at first, spying the headstones, the skin around his missing nose sniffing for flesh, sniffing, sniffing, until at last he spots me and growls, his dead, dry vocal cords emitting a ragged screech that sounds like four hundred pieces of broken chalk scraping the same big chalkboard all at once.
I turn now and run, scampering as a thick gray mist floods the graveyard and threatens to obscure the hundreds of headstones scattered across my path.
I cough on the thick fumes, the Creature at my back, dead lungs not affected by the mist. I stumble blindly forward, the dense fog crawling up my ankles, thighs, hips, waist, and stomach.
Grass crunches behind me, earth moving in front of me as I stop to gag, my hands on my knees, my lungs on fire, my eyes watering, tears running down my face, skin itching, muscles burning like I’ve just run a marathon.
A hand on my shoulder makes me scream as—
“Cut!” yells a disembodied voice. I can’t see because the fog machine is going bonkers, causing my temporary blindness. Again.
“Harvey, what did I tell you about the mixture last time?” the voice is screaming, cutting through the fog and assaulting my ears as the tears continue to flow. “It’s three parts water to one part fog juice, not the other way around. Didn’t they teach you that at fog machine school? Let’s regroup and start over. Nora, you all right?”
I laugh, taking the tissue Abby offers me as Wyatt pounds me on the back. “Yes, sir. Sorry. I just . . . couldn’t . . . breathe!”
“Hey,” says the director, a portly man in cargo shorts and a Hawaiian shirt, scratching his beard out of habit as he holds his ever-present bullhorn by his side. “You did the right thing. Better we burn through a few minutes of dead film than kill our guest star, right, Abby?”
“Sure, Norm.” She pats his big belly familiarly, as if this is something that happens every night on set. “When you need us, big guy, you’ll know where to find us.”
With that Abby leads us off the graveyard set, past the half-empty and crumb-covered craft service table and the Porta-Johns to her camper, which isn’t quite as big as I remember from my last visit to the set (was that Zombie Diaries 2 or 3?). It’s still more than three times the size of our dorm suite back at Nightshade Academy.
“Budget cuts,” Abby says by way of explanation as we crowd into the main sitting area. “The last one didn’t do so well on DVD. They’re hoping to leak this one online a few months early to generate more buzz. Until then, it’s home sweet camper!”
I smile at her from my leatherback wing seat, looking for any signs of scarring or disfigurement on her face and seeing none. Aside from a paler shade of skin, and the green contacts the makeup people have her wear “for continuity,” she’s the same old Abby.
“What, you drank all the Jolt Cola again?” Wyatt says, once again raiding Abby’s dorm-size fridge as he bends down, giving us both a great shot of his derriere, which is irresistible even in his tattered fake-zombie costume. “I thought you had some kind of pull around here. You know I can’t possibly drink this generic stuff.”
“You’ll drink it, and you’ll like it.” She tosses one of her promotional Zombie Diaries dolls—sorry, action figures—at his backside and misses. It lands in the sink with a clatter that echoes long after the doll’s feet get stuck in the drain.
So much has happened since we left the Council of Ancients, all of it surprisingly good (you know, aside from the whole being immortal and having to drink blood for the rest of our lives part).
Wyatt has more work than ever. Abby, despite her grumblings, is lucky to be undead and more popular than ever, and Hemoglobin Press says the anticipation for the fifth Better off Bled book is off the charts.
I suppose I should be stoked, but it’s pretty hard to get too excited when you know that buried within the pages, your book—your book—is a code only vampires can read, giving them directions to a place where after four days of vampire seminars and undead breakout sessions and dastardly meet and greets, they’ll feed on the good people of Lake Hammer, Texas, like fat guys at an all-you-can-eat buffet.
I don’t know how that’s going to play itself out just yet, but despite Lord Rothchild’s warnings, there is still a part of me more human than vampire. I keep waiting for it to wane, for myself to give in to the hunger, to become insatiable for blood, but so far I have been able to control myself fairly well.
Not that I’m any kind of saint, mind you, but I’m far from veering into Reece territory anytime soon, thank you very much.
Regardless of my own need to feed, the taking of another life—another human life—is something I’ve yet to experience and something I certainly don’t want to accomplish because of my next book.
Still, I had to run the code as is, or Reece and the Ancients and every other vampire on this planet would know the jig was up and would come looking for me. (After all, my name is right there on the cover!) And not just me, but as Reece warned, everyone around me: Abby, Wyatt, fellow students, teachers . . . even our families and friends.
I was in it now, deep in it, for better or worse, and unlike one of my books, I couldn’t just write my own ending and live happily ever after. This ending was going to be a lot stickier and then bloodier than even I could imagine.
But the conclave is still a few months away, and I still have time to plan before the good people of Hammer Lake are led to slaughter.
“Think fast!” Wyatt says, tossing me a fresh bag of blood from Abby’s hidden supply.
“You sure you have enough, Abby?” I ask anxiously, desperate to slice off the silver foil seal and drain it dry before she can answer.
She shrugs. “It’s cool. You guys go ahead. I’ve got a pretty good connection: a guy in the makeup department. He gets it by the case from the blood bank downtown every other day or so, tells them it’s for research. He says the supply is pretty much unlimited, thanks to the hospitals being so particular about the blood supply lately.”
“So, what?” asks Wyatt, those perfect lips centimeters away from his straw. “These are like . . . rejects?”
“Takes one to know one.” She sighs without looking up from her latest script changes. “These in particular, I think he said, have, I dunno . . . hepatitis C?”
“Gross,” he says, lips still hovering over the straw.
“Dude, I’ve been sucking them dry all week and look at me,” she says, smiling healthily and looking none the worse for wear.
Wyatt and I shrug, sucking greedily until our bags are dry.
Without looking up from her precious script, Abby says, “You guys are gross.”
A few seconds later, there is a knock at the door, and Abby’s assistant swings it open to announce, “Abby, we need you on set.”
Wyatt and I start to get up, but she smiles. “Not you guys yet. We just need to do a few reshoots, and then wardrobe will be back to get you, ’K?”
I smile as the college intern turns at the foot of the camper stairs and waits expectantly for Abby.
Abby gets up, sighs, and turns to us. “Before I go, I should warn you that the tech guys have this ray gun, see, like on Star Wars? It detects bodily fluids . . . so keep your hands to yourselves, or this is your first and last guest appearance in the latest installment of the Academy Award–winning Zombie Diaries franchise.”
“Promise?” Wyatt asks before she slams the door. He sighs and takes Abby’s seat, putting his feet on my chair and twirling it around.
When I swing back to face him, his lips are waiting for me.
Epilogue
There is one at every book signing—the vannabes. Vampire wannabes.
&n
bsp; The one approaching is tall and thin and strong, and if she didn’t want to be a vampire so badly, she’d probably be really, really—I mean really—pretty.
Instead she covers her fresh, young face in pancake makeup, slathers her perfect, pouty lips in maroon lipstick, dyes her long hair a shade too dark, and covers her size-two body in outdated frills and drab collars in a size (or two) too big.
“Hi,” I say, trying not to wrinkle my nose at the strong, spicy, no doubt dramatically named perfume she’s wearing. “What’s your name?”
“Countess Alexandra the Eighth,” she says without a trace of irony, her steely young eyes daring me to dispute her.
I don’t argue this time. I smother a sigh and just sign her new copy of my book, smiling but not too widely lest she see the faintest hint of the fangs lurking just below my upper jawline. They feel awkward and unsightly, although not a single person all night has commented on my appearance one way or another.
It’s like when I had braces back in eighth grade. To me they felt big and awkward, and I could swear they were the first thing anybody saw when I approached, but no one ever noticed, and after a while I just started taking them for granted and basically ignored them.
I’m looking forward to the completely-ignoring-them phase, but I’m not quite there yet.
“Going to the conclave this year?” I ask Countess Alexandra the Eighth, signing my name with a flourish.
“Oh, uh, yeah, sh-sh-sure,” she stammers, and not even three layers of pancake makeup can cover up the blush rising across her young, hollow cheeks.
“Supposed to be a really good time,” I say knowingly, sliding the book back across my signing table.
“Yeah, can’t wait,” she continues to bluff, avoiding eye contact as she reaches eagerly for her hot-off-the-press, $22.95 copy of Better off Bled #5: Scarlet’s Sacrifice by Nora Falcon. Yeah, yeah, I know what Reece wanted to call it, but . . . my book, my rules, my title. Besides, the title wasn’t part of the message, anyway.
The Vampire Book of the Month Club Page 17