Nightblood

by T. Chris Martindale

  He listened a little longer, but the music did not improve. It reminded him that immortality did at times have its downside. And it reinforced his self-doubts.

  He was apprehensive of this new world. The television box didn’t only inspire him with wonder. It intimidated him. It overflowed with images that his turn-of-the-century mind fought to comprehend; not even the Master’s gift had prepared him for it all. Perhaps, if he’d lived it, if he had experienced the changes as slowly, as deliberately as the rest of the world. But to be thrust into it like a naked foundling . . .

  There was a voice in his head, and it whispered things that he did not want to hear. When he thought of moving on to the bigger city, away from this home that was never a home, this site of his misery and imprisonment, the voice said, Are you sure? And that kernel of doubt was enough to slow his advance. And when he thought of conquest and how the cities were like great gardens of fruit ever ripening on the vine, the voice said again, Are you sure? Is it time yet? Will it ever be? He’d struggled with the automobile as if it were some medieval dragon, while veritable children operated them with ease. This world was as alien to him as the moon—computers and calculators with their dancing blips of captured light and cameras that spewed color pictures and ovens that cooked in an eyeblink yet didn’t brown the meat. Even the tele­vision box was still an enigma—he could turn it on and off, turn it up and change the picture, but its workings were as arcane as a brujo’s spell. Yet such things were taken for granted in this world.

  The voice was insistent and its questions were ones he could not answer. And when he ignored them completely, it changed its tact. One more mistake. One more and you might finally meet the end you’ve eluded all these decades. Ignorance of the laws or customs or currency will attract attention, and in this day and age you can’t afford that. Here, in a small town, one man has fought you to a standstill. What if there are more of him out there, not with crosses and stakes, but with guns like his that fire so fast they could chop you to pieces in seconds?

  Begrudgingly, he agreed with the voice. At least on that point. Stiles’s impertinence had ingrained a certain wariness in him. He would be careful. He would approach everything slowly and deliberately, and he would plan before he struck. He already had a strategy of sorts in mind—he would stay in Isherwood as long as the food supply held, and he would use the time to learn. And only when he was ready would he venture to Indianapolis or maybe even Chicago. And there he would suckle on the teat of the city, thriving in its shadows. And his powers would grow, and the voice of doubt would finally fade. And then . . .

  His body screamed with hunger, reminding him. One step at a time.

  He drove on, searching.

  There were crouched figures along the street ahead, and upon seeing the car they rushed it and tried to leap onto the hood. But then they saw the face behind the wheel and they scrambled away, letting the cruiser move past. Danner spared them little more than a contemptuous sneer. Half of him wished them away, the lumbering ill-witted shits. They were all so grotesquely stupid. They didn’t even know when to wake, losing precious night hours. At times their wit and cunning could seem intact, but it was an act, and then only in relation to hunting their prey. Anything else, whether it be books or television or simply the weather, drew blank stares and mumbles. The dead were ever poor conversationalists, he had relearned of late. It was ironic; all of those years of solitude, hungering not just for sustenance but for company as well, for the spoken word of another, be he living or not. Anything but that perfect silence. But now he’d learned that words alone were not enough. He needed something . . .

  He dismissed that notion out of hand. I am a vampire. The vampire. I’ve survived for almost a century, and will do so for centuries more. I need nothing.

  Still, someone to speak to now and then . . .

  He felt his rage at Stiles and sought to determine its core. Vengeance? Surely. Few men had ever hurt him so. But a tinge of disappointment as well? He had wrapped it in a film of retribution and used it to humiliate Stiles, but his offer of immortality had been more than that. Perhaps he should have killed the man when he had the chance, but he had felt something. It wasn’t very strong—he did not care for this man, certainly not as he had for the Master. But there was something still . . . a recognition of likeness, perhaps. A kinship. Stiles would have made a good vampire, he’d seen that from the start. He would have accepted it, given time. And how he would’ve thrived.

  But then the fanciful thoughts faded and he grumbled. Stiles was no longer an issue; kinship or not, he had stepped too far over the line. He had to die. And the vampire now derived a great deal of joy in planning just how.

  The patrol car rounded the corner at Ritter Street and Danner immediately stomped the brake hard enough to nearly shove it through the floor. The wheels locked as he swerved to the side, barely missing the rusted white van that sat at the curb there.

  Stiles’s van?

  He could scarcely control his anticipation—he ripped the driver’s door off in his haste to get out and almost did the same to the other vehicle. The van, he found, was empty. But the color, the outer rust, the upholstery . . . it had to be. He crawled inside and sniffed the air, straining it through supernatural senses. It was Stiles all right. He could feel his presence around him, thick, almost palpable. It vividly brought back the scene of last night’s confrontation. The scent of the soldier’s fear.

  The taste of his blood.

  It was faint on the tongue at first, but the recollection grew until Danner could almost taste it anew. It made his senses swim, like a sip of rare wine, and it left him wanting more. Sadly, he could not use it to his advantage—he had not drank deeply enough to control Stiles or to bend him to his will (if that could truly be done), but . . .

  Danner’s eyes widened. He leapt from the van and stood there on the sidewalk, sifting the night air and finding himself still heady with the scent of the man’s blood. So it wasn’t the soldier’s lingering scent that alerted him after all. It was the soldier himself! Danner closed his eyes; the taste of blood welled in his mouth and mind, and the perception of Stiles’s presence grew sharper. The empathy was tentative; he could not pick up thoughts or mental images the way he could with others. But he could intuit the man’s presence simply by detecting the flare of emotions. Excitement. A tinge of fear. And most of all, a cold rage.

  He looked around. The feeling was close by—Stiles was near.

  There were other cars lining the curb on either side of the street; their grouping in this otherwise deserted town was what had initially surprised him. The cars were closer to one house than any other. What did that mean? He started to smile, but remained wary. It just couldn’t be that easy.

  The windows of the Cape Cod-style house were still shaded, but Danner could see a sliver of light peeking between the heavy drapes. He started up the front walk and mounted the porch, astounded that this place was actually familiar to him yet not daring to suppose himself so lucky. Surely they weren’t that stupid. He went to the front door and twisted the knob until the lock broke, only to find other locks and dead bolts in place. “Really,” he smirked and gave the door a sound shove. There was a crack and it swung wide open, the bolts still intact but torn from the corresponding jamb. “Knock, knock,” he grinned, “anyone home?” The entry hall, which led to what he knew to be the living room, was empty. “Ah. Then you won’t mind if I come in.”

  He stepped across the threshold without invitation, for the one he’d received the previous night still held.

  What were the odds, he gloated, that these simpletons would choose one of his houses—one already breached by invitation—in which to barricade themselves? And this was indeed their fortress, he no longer had any doubts. The pungent, stinging aroma of garlic had attacked his nostrils immediately upon entering. But instead of repelling him, it had an opposite effect. It only confirmed his suspicions, a
nd it goaded him into searching further. He could feel Stiles. He could feel his own rage building.

  And the hunger. Always the hunger.

  The living room and kitchen were empty. But his discomfort grew as he neared the dining room. The garlic was stronger here—his eyes were streaming and his head pounded from the incendiary stench of the herb—but he would not back away. His anger, boiling now, was all that kept him there. It was also what blinded him to the perils of an obvious frontal assault, to the dangers that might lurk beyond the door if Stiles were there and if he were as well armed as before. The vampire was oblivious to all of it. All but the rage. It escaped his lips in a threatening growl as he catapulted blindly through the swinging tavern doors of the dining room.

  The full strength of the wretched garlic hit his eyes like a wave of fire and he gasped and staggered off balance, colliding with a china cabinet and nearly toppling it. His fiery wrath was extinguished and he knew immediately that he was in trouble. He flailed about, trying to find the door and defend himself before a broomstick found his heart or Stiles opened fire. But there was no attack. After a few moments only his own grunts and stumblings could he heard, and he finally calmed himself. The return of rationality also helped him fight back against the effects of the garlic, enough that he could open his eyes and look around.

  A string of garlic cloves lay on the dining table, peeled to release their aroma. He grabbed the table with one hand and overturned it, sending the hated herb into the far corner and letting him breath easier. But he still felt vulnerable. He scanned the room suspiciously and began to back toward the door. Something was wrong here.

  Something brushed the back of his head. Danner leaped away and turned with a snarl while the other just swayed back and forth like a pendulum and gave off a soft shushing sound as his cotton garment scraped the wall. The man was wearing the same plumber’s uniform that Danner had left him in the night before; the embroidered stitching said STEVE over the left breast, just above the heavy dowel that pinned him to the wall. The stake must have been driven solidly into one of the wall studs, for it alone held the body, a good six inches off the carpet, arms hanging limp, legs swaying.

  Danner was livid. He held no special regard for the plumber—indeed, he would never have known his name had it not been emblazoned there on his chest. But to leave him hanging there as a warning . . . what gall! He grasped the stake and yanked it loose, tilting it so the body could slide off and crumple on the floor like a limp dishrag. A piece of paper that had been pinned to his chest fluttered to the carpet as well. Danner bent to pick it up.

  It was a scrap of Garfield stationery, folded in the middle with a smiling happy face drawn on the outside. Inside, it carried a one-word message: Boom.

  Steve the vampire-plumber was just struggling to his feet when Danner looked up at him anxiously. There were lumps under his coveralls, two just beneath the rib cage, two across the waist, two more in the side pockets on his thighs. And wire veins ran to each just beneath the cotton skin.

  “Thank you, Master,” Steve said, reaching out to fawn over him. Danner backed away, unable to identify the threat wired to his servant but recognizing it as danger and reacting by instinct. He was halfway across the dining room, almost to the windows, when his hypersensitive ears picked up the distant click of a toggle switch.

  The room erupted like a toppled volcano, blasting out a cone of lateral fire. Steve, for all intent and purpose, disintegrated in the blink of an eye. The concussive force of the blast shot Danner through a window and didn’t drop him for at least twelve feet. When he did come down, he sprawled end over end and rolled for another few yards, enough to snuff out the flames that danced along his back and shoulders.

  The vampire lay there in the side yard of the house, his mind swimming, his face and neck peppered with slivers of glass. His back was blistered beneath the scorched sweatshirt but he couldn’t heal it, not in his weakened condition. He could barely make it to his feet. Through the gaping hole behind him he could see the shambles of the dining room, its furniture destroyed along with its owner. But to his surprise, the damage was relatively minor. The house still stood, and no flames raged within; only the blackened walls were evidence of a fire at all. The charges had been directional—directed solely at him.

  Stiles’s handiwork was evident here, and so was his presence. The vampire could still feel him, close by. Was he still hiding . . . or could he be out there, stalking? “I’m still here, Mr. Stiles,” Danner yelled, forcing a laugh. “Do you hear me? Still here! Why don’t you come out and do the job right!”

  He heard the scuff of footsteps on the street out front. The opening of doors. The drone of voices. The vampire gathered himself and walked around the house to where the crowds were gathering. His children, his offspring, had been awakened in number by the explosion and now milled about in front of the house, drawn by some remnant of human curiosity, or perhaps the primal expectation that where there’s commotion, there might be a hot meal. There were between twelve and fifteen of them from the immediate neighborhood, some stalking through the ground fog in predatory poses, while others staggered about and wiped the sleep from their eyes. Most stood alone and eyed the competition warily, though some of the women and children did huddle together in unconscious recognition of their former family structures.

  Of course, there was no sign of Stiles among them. The challenge had gone unacknowledged. Danner fumed. He would have to keep looking . . . and keep finding the bastard’s traps. How many could there be?

  How many could he survive?

  The others had grown silent upon seeing Danner and now stood there stoically in the welling fog and the cold wash of moonlight, waiting before him like foot servants called to their master’s side. It did not evade his notice. He grinned. Yes, that was it. His frustration began to ease. Perhaps they could be of use to him after all. He limped across the yard to the driveway pavement, in between a Datsun and a Chevy parked there, and approached them. Some backed away apprehensively, but not far. All listened. “There are people here,” he said, his soft tone carrying up and down the street with remarkable clarity. “Food. They are here. But they are hiding.” He leaned against the Datsun’s hatchback for support. “You will find them for me.” Each licked his or her lips in unison with the others, like individual cells forming a larger, more malignant entity. They nodded their agreement.

  “Then go. But mark me, no one is to feed.” They looked at him blankly. “At least not until I do. I demand first blood. Bring them to me.” His brow furrowed at any sign of discontent among them. His tone deepened. “Is that clear?”

  All nodded. All but one. A young woman in ragged pink pajamas was standing near the front of the small mob, but she was barely listening to him. Instead she wore a puzzled expression and kept fingering a length of yellow cord that looped twice about her neck. It was apparent that she had not put it there. Others sported the thick strings as well; about their throats or waists, their thighs, even around their foreheads like rolled bandanas. The girl turned the cord over and revealed a thinner wire leading away from it down her back, where she couldn’t see. But Danner could. A taped packet was pinned to the back of her pajama shirt, where a solenoid and miniature Radio Shack receiver were secreted.

  He felt the same unease as before and started to back up, but the Datsun was in the way. Then he picked up the transmitter’s trigger-click again and he thought he knew what to expect this time. But the result wasn’t the same. There was no great explosion as before. This time it merely set off the whiplike cracks of detonation cord going off through the gathered crowd. He covered his face from the sharp flashes but not before seeing a dark object hurtle toward him. The pajama girl’s head spun like a top as it sailed over his shoulder and smashed into the passenger window of the car. Other heads were rolling around at the base of the driveway like a child’s marbles, and the bodies they left behind wilted and died. The three
or four who remained were not so lucky. At least one staggered around in shocked silence, looking for his severed limbs, trying not to trip over the larger sections of cadavers on the pavement.

  Another pop went off to Danner’s right, near the Datsun’s bumper. It didn’t sound the same as the det cord, but its effects, at least to him, were much more pronounced. He felt the pain immediately; stinging, searing, right through his calf and thigh. He fell to one knee and ripped open a denim pantleg that was now marked by a rash of ragged pin holes. His fingers burrowed into the likewise punctured flesh like steel tweezers, reaming one of the minuscule wounds to get at the sliver of wire embedded there. Its silver content was not substantial, yet it was enough to cause him pain, even to burn his fingertips at the touch. Even as he extracted a single wire, a second jerry-rigged grenade came sailing overhead, and he caught the barest glimpse of it from the corner of his eye. The streamered shotshell arced out of the night and came down right behind him, hitting the Datsun’s fender. The wire shrapnel sprayed in a circular pattern and caught him in the lower back this time, choking an angry curse from his lips. He pitched over onto his face and writhed there in the driveway, at least until more incoming streamers convinced him to move. He scrambled around the edge of the Datsun as the shells went off, peppering the fender wells this time instead of him. But he knew it was just a matter of time.

  He looked to the patrol car. It was still in the road minus the driver’s door. Larson’s keyring still hung visibly from the steering column.

  He gritted his teeth and pushed off from the compact car, threading his way through the other autos that clogged the driveway’s mouth. His leg and back felt irrigated with liquid fire but he refused to stop, not even when more fragmentation shells rained down around him, not even when one exploded right in front of him. Needles of fire lanced his shins and knees but he waded through just the same. A few more steps and he all but fell into the driver’s seat. He twisted the keys with a shaking hand and stomped the pedal as he shifted into reverse and coaxed screams and smoke from the back tires.