by Mazlow, J.
My brother’s face appeared around the door. “Don’t worry we’ll let you out when you’re done. I can’t risk an escape, he’ll let the General know everything.” The door pushed past the soil and swung into place followed by the click of the lock. When I turned around Abdul smiled at me weakly and I recoiled from his fangless grin. It made him look like a leech. His eye sockets were sunken so that his eyes bulged, and his cheeks had hollowed. His skin was paler than ever and wrinkled as it hung fell away from his bones. He wore the same clothing, now ripped and bloodstained, but this boot had been taken. My eyes flitted back and forth between his toothless maw, all pale gray gums except where they were bruised and oozing dark blood and his dirty feet.
“Not to worry, they’ll grow back,” he said and then began coughing. With each cough his body flailed rattling the chains that bound him hand and foot to the concrete wall. He leaned back against the wall in a crouch with his arms halfway raised into the air. “I wasn’t sure, but our gracious hosts were good enough to reassure me that I would be able experience them being ripped out again in a month or so. Amateurs. They never suspected that the fear of living fangless may be a greater pain than the actual pain they inflicted.”
“You told him why the General sent us?” I said in a quiet voice.
“That is what we were sent to do. It does seem now that the General has an inflated sense of his own reputation and the fear that it would strike in these people. Have a seat,” he waved at a dim patch of mud in front of me. The chill of the room had my flesh in goose bumps, and I fought the sudden urge to beat on the door demanding to be released. “I would join you, but unfortunately I am unable.” He slid down the wall a bit further and the chains pulled his arms straight into the air. “I know that you’re supposed to get information out of me. It’s easier to catch flies with honey than vinegar, the carrot, and the stick and all that nonsense. I think that your brother may also suffer from an inflated sense of himself.”
I sat in the mud cross-legged holding the candle in one hand and resting it on my knee thinking of my brother and his cronies outside, straining their ears and I couldn’t think of what to ask.
“How big is the General’s army?” I asked. Despite his shaky movements and ashen flesh sunk around his bones he looked at me with amusement. Even though he had been captured, tortured, and starved he exuded a palpable confidence that made me want to obey him more than anyone ever had. It was as if the idea of his own death was laughable. Maybe to one of the oldest living creatures on Earth it was.
“Oh, it’s big enough to crush this pathetic little camp. I tried to tell your brother he doesn’t know what an army is. An army isn’t a pathetic bunch of miscreants running around with rifles hunkered down on the edge of the world. That’s what I was sent to root out, that was what I was created for.” He sucked in a deep breath of air. “An army has glorious jets roaring across the sky dropping bombs from overhead and tanks thundering ahead of jeeps full of men in bulletproof armor and goggles. This is no army. Not even the General commands an army anymore, perhaps there’s not one left in the world, but what the General has is more than sufficient to destroy your brother. If your brother is smart, he will take the deal.” I trailed a finger through the mud not looking at him as he ranted. His voice had a ragged edge and I was afraid his mind was going.
“St. Louis has over sixty thousand vampires and countless thralls that are at the General’s disposal and that is only the base of the General’s operations. He controls the entire center swatch of the country from the cold northlands down to New Orleans and over to Dallas. There are hundreds of thousands if not millions of vampires in his domain. If the General whispered the existence of such an accessible little den of fresh blood, they’d begin moving this way almost instantaneously. More importantly the General has all the arms and ammunition he needs and most importantly he has fresh gasoline. He can put jeeps and trucks laden down with machine guns and vampires into the field.”
“Your brother’s vampires will fade away at the first loss. They know what the General is capable of and they know what the General will do to them if he gets his hands on them. They won’t die nearly as nicely as an ax blow to the neck. Prometheus will look like he’s on vacation to what the General will put them through.”
“And even if your brother were to defeat the General how will his pathetic little kingdom retain its conquests. The General has traded weapons for tobacco and men to the vampires that lie to the east, he has fought with vampires who came west along the coast from Florida. There is nowhere you can go but to the frozen north to escape us and even who knows to what measures the thirst will drive us. These vampires do not flee the cold. It will not be long before vampires creep northward looking for fresh blood.” He paused and looked at me with bright eyes, somehow fervent and sad. His thin chest rose slowly and slightly as he breathed. “Humans and vampires cannot share a niche. Would humans leave cattle untended to wander the earth contentedly munching on grass? Livestock is all that you are to most vampires, especially these naturals who have forgotten how the world was before.”
A silence settled on the room and Abdul’s breathing slowed. There was nothing to see in the room but damp and dark. The walls were growing slimy from the muddy dirt floor up and a pervasive chill filled the air even though it was the warmest part of the day. I wanted to be back at the farmhouse waiting for dinner with a fire in the fireplace and beer circulating. Abdul’s eyes engorged by his shrunken flesh and enlarged by the dim light of the candle looked at me even while his chin rested on his chest. Tufts of his hair had fallen out and clung to his shirt or the wet floor around him. His matchstick arms were raised by the chains as if in supplication and his legs were tucked underneath him in a squat. Though olive tinted his skin had always been pale but now it had faded to a pasty sick yellow color in the candlelight. I wondered if I could kill him without a weapon. I could pluck out his eyes and rip his ears off, but I couldn’t think of a way to kill him. I couldn’t strangle him and even in his debilitated state he was probably capable of fighting it off. How sweet it would have been to kill him; kill him and start fresh in the camp as if I’d just walked in like the rest of the people. Except of course for my brother who wouldn’t forget, leaving me as the next best source of knowledge of the General.
“Take my advice my friend,” his voice cracked as he spoke until he coughed. “Leave this place if you can it isn’t right.”
“What do you mean it isn’t right? You mean it isn’t right that the humans aren’t imprisoned in cages and drained of their blood weekly. You mean it isn’t right that they don’t live in fear of vamp’s fangs, don’t constantly scuttle from place to place, and starve. A place where men can live and talk as they should?”
His eyes almost seemed sad; such a dim light encircled in the center of dark hollow rings. “You are naïve. The General was right when he said your brother had set up a nice kingdom here, but who has he paid for that kingdom. I will tell you this and you can tell your brother. Jose is the General’s through and through. If he doesn’t believe me then just tell him that Jose arrived in May two years ago.”
“So, what, what if he defected.”
Abdul shrugged. “Possibly, but I don’t think so. If I die in this shithole, I would pin the blame on him.”
I stood then, my legs stiff and Abdul stood the chains as well on his arms and legs clinking as he rose. I didn’t know what to say or do. Abdul was a vampire, but he’d saved my life and there were other vampires right outside the door with my brother free to move about as they pleased. It would have been better to kill Abdul right away then to leave him to rot in such filth. I knocked on the thick wooden door, dull thuds that felt puny. Hot wax ran onto my hand and I cursed and almost dropped the candle. I wrapped my sleeve around its base and waited. A few moments later the door slid outward and ground its way through the dirt admitting a thin slice of warm bright sun. I looked back as I slid out before the door had even opened fully and Abdul was lo
oking at me like a starving animal digging in the dirt.
I stood blinking in the hot white light of the sun welcoming the warm air that ran down my back and across the goose bumps which lined my arm, the door behind me still spilling its stagnant air out to mix with the fragrant beginnings of fall. The old-bodied vampire ground the door to a shut behind me as I inhaled deeply. My brother stepped out from the shade his eyes suspicious even over his easy grin and walked over me. When I told him, what Abdul had said about the General’s forces his face soured.
“I’ve heard all about those vamps, they’re nothing more than the scabs left on the wound to our world. We’ll pluck them off and cast them aside. They’ll break against a disciplined force. They ‘re little more than thralls, corrupt, lazy souls during their human life they continue in the same manner as vampires.”
I kept my voice calm and slow. “No, I’ve seen them. Once stirred they would become a tide of madness that will sweep over all of this.”
“Bullshit,” he said staring into the air back in the direction of the camp.
“They would, they’d devour it and spit out nothing but a dried husk. The General won’t even need to use his loyal and well-armed troops.”
“We’ll see, we’ll see. The General may have a lot of vamps but how loyal are they really. Are they ready to face the final death?”
“But what kind of arms do you have?” My voice rose against my will. “A few guns? He’s got machine guns, jeeps, maybe even tanks. How many vamps do you have? Fifty? One hundred? How many men? Two hundred?”
“Our force is smaller than his there can be no doubt about that and there’s no helping it either, but our cause is righteous. Their empire is little more than a house of cards, the vampires say it and the men say it.” He turned away from me and spat.
I felt absurd standing there in the dank shadows trying to reason with him. We ‘d been born in the south; we’d lived in the south. He should have already known. He shouldn’t have had to be told, but instead he was looking at me as if I spoke heresy. Back of the trail just out of sight through the thick edging of trees the river gurgled calling to me, trying to circumvent my brain and convince my feet directly with its whispers of secluded groves and far off places. Here in the north, where vampires were rarer perhaps, I could find some kind of peace, but winter was coming, and the scraps of man’s fallen civilization had been picked over.
My voice dropped to a confidential whisper. “He also told me that there’s a vampire here named Jose. He said that he’s not to be trusted that he is a spy, that he came here in May two years ago.”
“That little shit lies,” he said his face filled with disbelief. “Either you’re gullible and stupid or else you’re in on it with him. Either way you’re useless.” But he stepped away from me muttering to himself and waved to the two brothers who followed him everywhere. They powwowed for a moment and then the two brothers went trotting off their rifles cradled loosely in their arms as Peter and Robert looked on with their two opposite faces. Peter’s face was as rigid as if it were cut from stone, all angles and shadows, his lips pulled back into a perpetual scowl, and his eyes grimacing. He watched the brother’s go with a measure of suspicion and loathing. Robert had a loose droopy face with cloudy vacant eyes and as the two brothers turned a corner on the trail and disappeared his vapid gaze turned to me with a smug expression that was laced with a hunger, barely contained.
When the two brothers had left, I approached my brother again. “Why fight anyways? Why not go further north and leave these vampires behind?”
“You don’t understand,” he said. “These people barely survive as it is. Oh, we had a good year this year, but what about next year? Any little thing could kill us off. Going north would just make all that harder. Not running is the only thing that keeps this group together and if we’re not going to run, we have to fight. We’ve waited long enough if we wait any longer then we’ll prove you right.” He looked off as if he could see to the horizon through the trees. “I’ve got things to do and this went nowhere.” He crooked his finger at the two vampires who lingered outside the shut and locked door of the cell and they loped off towards the camp.
I slowly followed them walking down the dirt path without really paying attention as I wound my way back to the camp. My stomach growled and cramped. Ryan and his men were back in the field harvesting the corn having had a filling lunch. I made my way back towards the farmhouse, walking through the trees that lined the river and then through the fields and finally the shacks that made up the village. I could smell roasting corn and meat and it drew me onward, until I heard a curt voice and I stopped stepping between the rough boards of two huts. I peered out into the alley and I saw Dottie shaking her head as she maneuvered the narrow spaces between the buildings. Not a single silver hair had strayed from her tight bun. Her disapproving glare seemed to take in each hut’s deficiency though she moved with focus. I slid away across several alleys and decided that I could wait to eat. After all I’d often gone days without eating. I tried to tell myself that the overabundance of food had made me soft and that missing lunch would help me to maintain the ability to go for days without food once I’d left this place.
The cornfield was only a short walk once I’d decided that I didn’t want to risk the wrath of Dottie and I didn’t really know what else to do. As I walked down the center of the hard packed road, between two wagon wheel ruts a low growling and hissing sound became apparent over the sound of the corn rustling and the birds squawking at one another as they perched and flew among the stalks. The miniature cacophony of Mucking ripped the natural sounds of the field asunder and sent a shiver down my spine. Though I felt a sense of dread I hurried my step. The road slowly curved as it made its way roughly parallel to the river and as it did the square outline of a wagon filling the road’s break in the corn. A man rose from the back of the wagon and another broke from the corn’s shadows handed up a full sack and then disappeared again. The wagon rider stacked the sack, flung sweat from his brow with one hand and then returned to the side of the wagon. Though I could hear the thralls I could not yet see them. The people working the wagon pointed at me as I drew nearer. Once I got within a few yards of the wagon I slowed down. The thralls were lined up in front of the wagon in two rows of three. Each row bore a large wooden yoke that fit across their necks and shoulders. A long wooden handle extended from each yoke back to where a man sat at the front of the wagon. They raised the nubs of their arms to the bags that fell around their faces growling and hissing with displeasure at their inability to remove them. One of the older men, picking at his nails stood in front of the thralls not far out of arms reach. I stifled an urge to scream a warning at him as the thralls shuffled near him. As a sack of corn was slung into its place on the stack shaking the wagon, the driver whistled, and the old man trotted forward a few yards. Before he had come to a stop the driver lifted the wooden handle and the bags lifted from the thrall’s head. Immediately they caught sight of the old man who disturbingly scuffled his feet in the dirt in the imitation of a dance his face lit up with a toothless grin. The thralls surged forward jerking the wagon so hard that the driver clutched the seat beneath him with one hand to prevent himself from tumbling backwards. The wagon creaked and the wood rattled as if it was going to fall apart. The old man jigged. The thralls snarled, the skin on their faces falling off in ragged chunks. Suddenly the bags dropped over the thrall’s faces again and the driver leaned back against the wooden lever that stuck up beside his seat and immediately the sound of the wooden wheels grinding filled the air. The thralls pulled forward a few more steps, their outstretched nubs swiping the air as the old man danced backwards a couple of steps laughing. The thralls growled and strained against their yokes as if they knew that the old man was just out of their fangless reach.
Paul walked down the lane behind the old man shaking his head. “You won’t be laughing if they get you Willy,” he said not unkindly.
“They won’t get me
and even if they do, what are they going to do, gnaw me?”
“You’ll be surprised.” Paul said as I walked up to the two of them. “They’ll pin you to the ground, hold you between their nubs and then who knows, they might just get lucky and nick you with a fang just regrowing. Then I’m sure you’ll piss your pants.” He looked at me. “I guess your brother finished with you.” I sputtered but he held up a hand. “I don’t need to know.” He pointed down the road behind him. “Try to get another bag filled before the wagon makes,” then he turned from me to the wagon. I trotted down the lane between the swaying stalks of corn my mind going blank as I absorbed the serenity around me.
We trudged back up the lane falling behind the corn laden wagon as the thralls pulled it along at a brisk pace, their lead-human practically sprinting ahead of them. The men were silent, tired, and red-faced from the sun, but they seemed in good spirits. They looked longingly and inhaled deeply as we passed through the cloud of aroma that emanated from the farmhouse. We stacked the sacks of corn in a barn surrounded by pasture just to the north of the village. The work went more quickly than I’d imagined with all of us forming a line and passing the heavy sacks from the wagon up into the stacks of the barn. As we finished and headed back towards the village I gazed off towards the thick growth that grew near the river where the block building that imprisoned Abdul lay as we walked up the rutted path to the barn. A couple of vampires ran off across the ridge on some errand I couldn’t imagine their motions smooth as if they had wheels rather than legs. Three of the guys headed off towards the mucking stalls, one leading the wagon and the other two riding; apparently it was their turn to delay dinner. The rest of us headed off to the farmhouse for dinner, a cheerful mood setting in as we walked through the fading dusk.
The mood soured up almost instantly as we came into sight of the farmhouse. My brother stood on the porch as if he were orating to the small cluster of new vamps that stood almost huddled beneath him. They were new vamps not only in the sense that they did not belong to the camp, I’d never seen them before and the men I walked with began grumbling about how over the last year new vamps were always popping up but men never made it to the camp, but also in the sense that they moved with the herkie jerky stutter stop motion of freshly turned vampires. Their faces bore a red tinge, bloodstains or maybe a rough scrubbing to remove bloodstains, and they shivered in the settling coolness as they watched us, some with hungry eyes others with unreadable expressions. My stomach turned at the sight of them standing there in the open so blatantly, my brother standing with them as if he were daring anyone to admit their existence. They were comprised of mostly men and boys, a single woman stood among them, her face blank and her shirt ripped down her back and flapping open. “No one is to feed without my express authority. The penalty is death.” My brother said and then halted as we approached. His eyes radiated mistrust pointed primarily at me. He must have known that everyone knew that they were all stepping around the subject, except maybe the preacher, all in a tacit agreement to keep whatever fragile existence they had from fraying. Now I had been abruptly inserted into the mix and everyone was waiting to see if I would upset the balance. The whole thing disgusted me, but I kept my feelings contained to a disbelieving glare. My brother nodded in greeting to me and said, “Evening,” to Paul and nodded or waved at the rest of the group as we went trudging by up the stairs. Even Paul’s good nature had been replaced by a scowl that seemed out of place on his round face. The smell of the beer of the camp was heavy in the air of the dining hall even over the aromas of roast and fresh cooked corn and one of our own group called for beer as we walked in. A fire was crackling in the fireplace, the room was warm, and the angry fear of betrayal that had suffused the atmosphere on the porch was borne away by drink and gaiety. No one spoke of the vampires on the doorstep, no one mentioned the group of humans who were to have arrived at the camp shortly and who would never be mentioned again because everyone knew that whatever remained of them had already arrived.