Nightblood

by T. Chris Martindale

  The soldier showed no alarm. “I blew its knee off, Del,” he said without turning. “It can’t walk, remember?”

  The boy was silent a moment, considering. “It might have healed itself or grew another one or something,” he decided. “You never know about these vampires. They’re dead. They’re all messed up.”

  “Oh, get real, you little dick.”

  “Screw you, Bart. I’d rather be a dick than an asshole.”

  “Hey, squirt, how about I stomp a mudhole in your ass here and now?”

  Stiles stopped and shined his light back on the tall redhead and the short dark-haired child. “You’re brothers, right?”

  “How did you know?”

  He shook his head. “A lucky guess. C’mon.”

  It was even darker in that stretch of the woods than along the drive where the boys had come in; the trees were dense, mazelike, and they couldn’t take three steps in any direction without fighting off the grope of low limbs. More than once Del shrieked, only to find in the glare of Bart’s Mag-Lite that he’d been snagged by a particularly unterrifying sticker bush. Stiles slipped through it all with quick, sure steps, as if the path had been burned into his memory on the way in. But to the boys it was bewildering—for all they knew they were going in circles. The tendrils of fog became opaque in the glare of the flashlights, not only obscuring their path but closing in behind them, hemming them in. “How much further?” Del kept asking anxiously.

  “We’re here,” Stiles said, leading them under the bough of a leaning dogwood. They found themselves facing a seemingly impenetrable obstruction of weeds and vine. A dead end. Del started to hyperventilate but then the soldier reached out with his gun barrel and pulled aside some of the creepers to reveal brick beneath. A wall . . . the privacy wall that surrounded the Danner estate. The boys sighed heavily as Stiles threw their gear over the top, then held out a gloved hand at waist level while keeping the machine gun ready with the other. “Step up, Del. You’re first.”

  He had to lean down to get the boy’s shoe in his hand but, once in place, Del locked his legs and was boosted to the top of the wall. From there he could see the man’s van, rusted fenders and all, parked just off the road in the underbrush and concealed by it. He dropped to the other side just as Bart stepped up. Despite Bart’s larger size, Stiles lifted him to the top as well. Then he handed up his rifle, took a few steps back and vaulted to the crest himself. From there, they dropped to the ground next to Del.

  “Now what?” the boy wanted to know.

  Stiles walked to the van with them still in tow. At least they’d let go of his coat. “First I put something on Bart’s wounds.”

  “And then?”

  “Then I take you home.”

  “And then?”

  Stiles turned and looked at them squarely. “Just what are you getting at, kid?”

  Del was incredulous. “Aren’t you gonna do something about that . . . that thing?”

  Stiles offered the machine gun. “You want to go in after it?” The boy begged off. “I didn’t think so. Look, kid, I’m not stupid. That thing may be crippled, but it’s still dangerous, especially in the close quarter of the woods. Why take the chance tracking it now when we can just wait it out? It’s already as good as dead.”

  “Oh yeah? And how can you be so sure?”

  “Experience,” the soldier replied. “I’m a hunter. I’ve stalked a lot of strange things over the years. And a few of them were like your friend out there.” He opened the side door of the van and ushered the boys inside, then followed after them. “Sit down here,” he motioned to Bart. “I want to put something on that bite.”

  Bart looked to Del fearfully. “What are we talking here? Holy water?”

  Stiles laughed. “Not quite.” He took a first-aid kit from one of the cabinets, and from that retrieved a bottle of Bactine anti­septic. “This might sting a little,” he warned, tilting the boy’s head so he could spray the wound.

  “That’s it?”

  “You watch too much TV. This isn’t any different than a dog bite. It only counts when they drain you completely.”

  “What you said ’while ago,” Del asked the soldier, “about hunting other things. What kinds of things?”

  “It’s a long story,” Stiles replied. “But there were a few vampires. Let me see . . . there was one in New Orleans, and one in California. And in Maine . . . hell, when I was in Maine, they were running like cockroaches. So, yeah, I guess that makes me an expert on the subject, and this expert is telling you that most of your movies and TV are full of shit.” He finished bandaging Bart’s neck, then reached into the cooler between the seats where the ice had all but melted and handed him a Coke to hold against his swelling jaw. “There. I think you’ll live, but you’d better see a doctor just to be safe.”

  Bart groaned. “Mom’s gonna hit the roof.”

  “She should,” said Stiles. “What the hell were you doing in there?”

  The redhead shrugged, embarrassed. “A bet. A stupid bet, and it almost got us killed. What were you doing in there, Mr. Stiles?”

  Stiles took off his coat, then his holsters, then his combat vest. “Like I said. I’m a hunter, of sorts.” He touched a button on the van’s built-in cot. A latch clicked and the front panel fell open, revealing the strapped-in Uzi pistol and magazines and the empty recess where he quickly mounted the H & K rifle. “You didn’t see this,” he cautioned the boys after shutting the panel. “Is that clear?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Del moved to the window and stared outside, into a darkness his eyes could not possibly penetrate. “It’s still out there,” he said, shivering. “I can feel it.”

  Stiles put a hand on his shoulder. “Let me tell you about vampires. We’re not talking about Dracula here. There’s nothing romantic or seductive about them. They’re just like you saw tonight: dead bodies who refuse to die, who have to feast on the blood of the living to survive. Aside from that, it’s hard to tell where the legends stop and the bullshit starts. There’s no black capes or hypnotic gazes. They can’t change into bats or rats or fog—”

  “Then how did he get out of the cellar ahead of us?” Del interrupted. “An outside door?”

  “No,” Stiles told him. “The outer door was still padlocked and nailed shut.”

  “Then how?”

  He gave it some thought, then shrugged. “How the hell should I know? But there has to be some other way, ’cause he didn’t turn into smoke.” The boy looked skeptical. “Okay, smart-ass, answer this. If he could turn into a wisp of fog, how come he didn’t do it while I was blasting the living shit out of him?” Del pondered that long and hard, exchanged looks with Bart, and finally settled for a shrug of his own. “Boys, if they could change, I’d have seen one do it by now.”

  “How much of the other stories are true?” Bart asked. “How do you stop them?”

  Stiles sat down in the pilot’s seat and swiveled it around so he could talk to them. “Some of the traditional ways hold up—wooden stake, sunlight, fire, the cross—”

  “No, I tried that one,” Del made a face. “The asshole just laughed at me.”

  Stiles nodded. “I know, I saw you. But the cross does work, the same as holy water and wafer and the Star of David and any other religious symbol. There’s just a catch to it. Their power is only proportionate to the faith of the wielder. If you don’t believe, it doesn’t work.”

  “Now hang on. I go to church every Sunday—”

  “And sleep through the sermon,” said Bart. “Admit it, Cap. We both go because Mom makes us.” He looked back to Stiles. “What about decapitation?”

  “Sure. And that’s where it gets interesting. If decapitation works, why not dismemberment? Hell, they’re flesh and blood, or flesh at least. They should obey the same basic physical rules as everyone else.”

  “Ph
ysical rules?”

  “Simple body mechanics,” Stiles explained. “If I cut off your legs, you can’t walk, right? The same goes for a vampire. Blind it, it can’t see. Destroy its mouth, it can’t bite, its knees, it can’t get around. It won’t die, but it won’t heal either. It’s dead flesh; there’s no regeneration. Whatever condition you leave them in, that’s the way they’ll stay.”

  He motioned toward the window. “Take our friend out there. He’s blind, faceless, crawling around in the dirt and the leaves. He won’t find prey. He won’t get off that estate, not with these walls to hold him. He’ll wallow around, searching for someplace to hide, a hollow tree or a shallow cave, and if he’s lucky he might find it. But sooner or later the sun will catch up to him, and when it does, Poof! Dustball. So there’s nothing to worry about, Del. It’s as good as dead.”

  The boy nodded his understanding. But he still kept his vigil at the window.

  Stiles finished putting his gear away, then started the van, and steered it out onto Sykes Road, heading back toward town. Bart climbed into the passenger seat while Del curled up on the cot in the back, pulled his coat over him, and fell silent. He felt a semblance of safety laying there atop the soldier’s cache of weapons. The sheer firepower granted him some solace. But when they passed the Danner gate even that wasn’t enough. He hid his head and kept it hidden most of the way to town.

  The boys were silent, and that worried Stiles. Del could’ve been asleep for all the rearview mirror told him but Bart was wide-eyed and staring. He tried to talk to the boy but received only monosyllables in reply. The shock was just now setting in, Stiles could tell; they were finally realizing that it hadn’t been a dream after all, nice and neat and set apart from the rest of the world. It was real, and it existed right alongside the Tunnel and the town and everything else they knew intimately. The sight of things familiar along the roadway was bringing the horror home.

  He wondered if they’d come through it okay.

  He had. But that was a whole different circumstance. He was battle-hardened by the time he had his first confrontation with the supernatural, and it had still left him numb and shaken for days. He’d gotten used to it, of course, but only because he had to; he had Alex’s mission to complete, an Enemy to hunt. But these boys . . .

  They neared the perpetual dark of the Tunnel and Bart tensed, squeezing the edge of his seat frantically. But his eyes adjusted quickly once inside and his grip loosened. He looked at the cars parked just off the roadway and surprised himself with an ironic chuckle. “If they knew what was running around just down the road,” he said, “what do you bet they’d shit their pants for sure?” He took the Coke can away from his jaw, popped the tab, took a big swig, and grimaced. “I hate Coke. Got any Mountain Dew?”

  Del roused in the back. “Did someone say Mountain Dew?”

  Stiles grinned. They were going to be just fine.

  They drove into Isherwood and turned off into the suburbs, passing streets with names like Chester and Walnut and Syca­more. Two houses past the corner of Greenbriar Avenue, the van eased to a stop before a small brick two-story with the proverbial white picket fence. Along the side of the mailbox MILLER was emblazoned in red letters. Stiles stared at it. Wasn’t that Billie’s last name, the girl at the diner? Nah. He shrugged. It was a common name—probably three or four even in a town that small.

  Bart pointed toward the empty driveway. “The car’s not here.” He sounded puzzled. “Mom worked s’afternoon . . . wonder where she is now?”

  “Take your gear inside,” Stiles said. “Maybe there’s a note.”

  “I doubt it,” the boy shook his head but complied anyway. “She wasn’t expecting us home. We’re supposed to be spending the night with a friend.” He loaded both bags over his shoulders and trudged up the walk a bit dizzily. He paused at the door to fish a key from his pocket, then went inside. Within a few minutes he returned. “She’s working an extra shift at the diner tonight,” he reported, “till two. Could you give us a ride over there, Mr. Stiles? I’d just as soon you were there when the shit hits the fan.”

  The diner, huh? “Sure,” he smiled. “I could use a cup of coffee about now.”

  Billie Miller didn’t realize her eyes had strayed to the front door of the diner until Frank Sipes’s voice chided her: “Billie old gal, I think I’d just as soon have my coffee in a cup, if it ain’t too much trouble.”

  She looked down, uncomprehending, to see a river of Sanka on the countertop and not a drop of it in the salesman’s cup. “Damn!” she cursed, with a few shits and hells thrown in under her breath for good measure, as she grabbed for a roll of paper towels. “Where is my mind tonight?”

  “If you ask me,” he continued, taking pains not to slur his speech, “I’d say you’re kinda expecting someone. Eh?” He gave her an exaggerated wink and guffawed loudly.

  Billie lined up his cup and hit it dead center this time. “Drink your coffee, Frank,” she ordered, ignoring his comments. “The quicker you sober up, the quicker your wife will let you in.”

  “To hell with Irene,” he sneered, throwing up his arms dramatically. Just as quickly his features softened again and he grinned and patted Billie’s hand on the countertop. “There are other places in town to spend the night. Eh?”

  That brought a raucous laugh from the older woman working the grill behind Billie. Sharon Lou Moore, the store’s owner, glared over her bifocals at the drunken salesman and warned, “Peddle your wares somewhere else, Frank. She’s waiting on someone, remember?”

  The salesman blinked at them numbly as if hit, but slowly his grin returned, minus its bravado, and he just shrugged and stared into his coffee.

  Oh great, Billie sighed. Now his feelings are hurt. What a day this has turned out to be!

  But it had started off so well. She’d met this guy from out of town, a writer, and they’d hit it off from the start. There was something about him . . . It could’ve been because he was articulate, or funny, or simply because they could maintain a conversation beyond the weather-and-what’s-on-the-menu stage. And then again, maybe it was his looks. She wasn’t above the attraction of rocky muscle and rugged features. Even a beard. But whatever it was, it gave her the chills, and Lord knew she hadn’t felt those for a while. Hell, Gordon never gave her chills, not once, and she married him! This man Chris Stiles, he had something special. It had to be to make a grown woman feel like a giggling teenager, and even more so to make her act like one. Which is just what she was doing.

  Admit it. That’s why you volunteered for late shift. Not the money, though it was certainly incentive. You thought he might come back in. He didn’t say he would, but since the diner was open late tonight . . .

  “Snap out of it, Bill,” Sharon Lou interrupted, sliding two burger-and-fry platters along the counter. “Table three’s up.”

  The diner section of the store was relatively busy at close to one in the morning. There was Frank Sipes, of course, perched on his sobriety stool just like every weekend. Ted Cooper was also there, sitting at table three with his perennial sweetheart, Doreen Moody, ogling each other dreamily, holding hands and playing with each other’s fingers as they waited for their food. The only other customer, a tall, gaunt figure in dark clothes, sat at the farthest table along the wall. At first Billie didn’t recognize him; George Bailey seldom ventured down from the boarding-house-cum-nursing home on the hill, and the few times she had seen him he was always bearded and unkempt. But this man was newly shaven and had slicked down white hair and a well-pressed suit, if a bit out of style. He looked clean, like a wet cat. She’d never realized how skinny he was, how frail and old, at least in his nineties. Billie felt sorry for him. A forgotten old man, alone, getting dressed up only to sit by himself and stare into his coffee. She shivered. At least she had her boys.

  The cowbell over the front door clanked, louder than during the day or at least it seemed th
at way. Billie looked up and smiled, but the man coming through the door didn’t return her greeting. Charlie Bean was in no mood to smile.

  He came around the front along the chain cordon that separated the diner area from the drugstore. He wasn’t in uniform, just a white T-shirt and jeans, though the bulge of a pistol grip was evident beneath his shirttail. Everyone said hello or waved. But Bean was silent, and for him that just wasn’t natural.

  “Trouble on patrol?” Billie asked as he sat down at the counter.

  “At home,” he corrected, lighting a cigarette to replace the butt he’d flicked away outside the door. Lou was already moving, setting an ashtray and a bowl of chili in front of him before he could think to ask. “Thank you, Kreskin,” he nodded. “What about something to drink?”

  Billie sat his coffee in front of him. “What did Susie throw you out for now?”

  “She didn’t throw me out,” he said defensively, then softer, “She just won’t let me in.”

  “Here, here!” Frank Sipes cheered a kindred soul. Everyone ignored him.

  “What for this time, Chuck?”

  He sighed dramatically. “Because we had plans, and I had to cancel to take late shift. What is it with women? Don’t they realize that working pays the bills and puts the food on the table? What the hell are they thinking of?”

  Billie leaned against the counter, tired and annoyed. “That’s right, Charlie. Us women don’t appreciate how hard the world is. We’re too busy out buying minks and diamonds and making life hell for you men.”

  Bean grinned. “That’s what I thought.”

  “I’ve just had a brainstorm, Chuck,” Lou said. “Why don’t you use your keys to get in? Did it ever occur to you?”

  “Yes it occurred to me, wise-ass.” He leaned closer and cleared his throat to cover his words. “She’s got chairs jammed under the knobs.”

  “Here, here!” This time Bean stared Frank back into his coffee cup.

  “Just give her time,” Billie counseled. “She’ll simmer down. She always does.”