by D B Nielsen
“I have no intention of allowing my brothers to decide what to do with Dorian. His turning was a mistake,” Aislinn declared firmly. “One I feel the need to rectify and soon.”
“No way! Oh, happy day! Aislinn’s finally going to do it,” Caleb rejoiced. “It’s a sure sign the apocalypse is coming. Maybe Belakane wasn’t a complete bowl of beer nuts, after all.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Cooper said with a shudder at the memory of the high priestess’s hands on his body—and his response.
“But first, I intend to find out everything he knows,” Aislinn stated. Her eyes glittered with a momentary hunger. “But knowing Dorian, he’s hardly going to be cooperative.”
Caleb gave a vicious grin. “I know a few ways to make someone’s tongue loosen up.”
“Sounds promising. I knew I could count on you.”
Cooper coughed and looked embarrassed. “That’s something I can also help you with. We used to call it ‘Vampire Negotiations 101’ at the academy.”
“Seriously, they call it negotiating?” Aislinn asked incredulously. Her striking face was outraged, and her blue eyes were blazing. “Why didn’t they just call it, ‘The Art of Torture’ or better still, ‘The Art of War’?”
“Because that title was already taken,” Cooper retorted. “Besides, we’re Christian. Torture doesn’t suit the Church’s ethos of hope, charity, and love. We’re taught to love thy neighbor—right up until the moment we kill him.”
“This kid’s growing on me,” Caleb said, raising his tankard in mock salute. “Your first two offspring are no-hopers, but this one has his moments.”
Aislinn snorted. “Glad to know you don’t want to stake him.”
“Oh, I didn’t say that.”
Cooper opened his mouth in indignation, but Aislinn got in first. “Just let it go. And you, stick to Dorian.”
“With pleasure.”
“But I need Dorian alive. For now.” Her voice was cold and clear, like a sluice of ice water. “I mean it. Alive. Something that seems hard for vampires to grasp.”
“You should try vampire negotiation.” There was fire in Cooper’s dark eyes and a furious energy in his reply. “And if that fails, then as a final resort, we’ll just have to kill him.”
Caleb smirked. “Now wouldn’t that be a terrible shame?”
They were all pretty smashed when Caleb’s smartphone went off, momentarily silencing the group that had swelled to include Varya and Cole, the strident ringtone demanding attention.
Varya’s thick eyebrows almost retracted into her hairline, and a sudden smirk appeared on her broad face as a disheveled Caleb retrieved his cellphone from within the folds of his Shuka, now riding low on his hips like a Scottish kilt. He just reached down his front and pulled it out, causing Varya to give a low, drunken whistle and exclaim, “Holy moly! Is it getting hot in here, or is it just me? I guess that answers my question as to where they keep their gadgets.”
Caleb winked at her as he answered the call. “Hello, Usain. Didn’t take you long. Yes, we’re back.”
The others returned to their drinking games, ignoring the beefy Malum’s conversation since it was expected he would eventually check in with the London Coven’s concierge. All except Aislinn. She could hear the conversation between Caleb and Usain in the background, a low hum of vampire voices. Usain’s voice careful and proper but urgent as he explained his purpose, and Caleb’s unperturbed but coldly efficient. Trouble.
When the call ended, Caleb was stone-cold sober. “Is your phone on silent?”
She nodded, instantly on guard.
It was habit. She didn’t need the distractions when working. It was a bad example to set her employees, taking calls when serving customers. Besides, she was old school and didn’t like her movements tracked.
“Better check it.”
She was going to anyway, but at Caleb’s urging, Aislinn retrieved her iPhone from behind the bar. There were enough missed calls from Usain—and one also from Benjamin—to fill her voicemail message bank. Not to mention several text messages.
She opened these first.
“Now this is surprising,” Aislinn murmured. Despite the words being uttered low, the other vampires stopped in their tracks, waiting with bated breath for her to carry on speaking. “An extraordinary meeting of the Atum Council has been called.”
“Oh excellent. It’ll be like one big family getting together for Christmas, with all my uncles and cousins and brothers,” the fair-haired, ordinary-looking Sanguis sitting almost invisibly among the group said in a conversational tone, which held not one drop of sarcasm. “We can have blood sausage, blood pudding—”
“Surprising? What’s so surprising?” scoffed Varya, ignoring Cole completely. “Isn’t it what you’ve been hoping for?”
“Oh no, not that,” Aislinn dismissed as she scanned the text. “It’s surprising because it’s been so long since the last Atum Council I attended. Gone are the days of messengers sent on horseback and invitations written on parchment scrolls in Latin. It used to be so formal.” Her tone was almost wistful.
“Like breaking up,” muttered Cooper. “Now everyone does it by text.”
“Oh, and blood tofu. I’m certain Uncle Shang will appreciate it. And then there’s blood pancakes—”
“Really? Humans are strange creatures. Personally, I prefer breaking up face to face.” Varya continued to ignore Cole as she drank from her tankard, her skin growing more flushed. “And possibly breaking the other one hundred and ninety-two bones in his body as well.”
Cooper stared at her in astonishment. “I didn’t know there were fourteen facial bones. That seems a lot.”
“Not enough,” muttered Varya.
Caleb stared at her for a moment. Then he began to laugh. “I think Benjamin might have other ideas about that. Poor bugger.”
“Don’t feel sorry for him!” Her eyes were dangerous, and her face flushed with blood ale and anger.
“Oh, not him. I mean the Bone Doctor,” Caleb responded heartily. “Broken facial bones are really annoying and super hard to reconstruct.”
“Speaking of Benjamin, he’s sent me a text asking for us to meet him at the warehouse by the docks,” Aislinn said, scrolling through her messages. “Seems like Psychic Seth has something he wishes to tell us.”
“And blood soup—”
“Vlad’s nuts! I’d forgotten about the imbecile.” Caleb looked distastefully across at Cole. “His mind is still as vacant as a lump of cauliflower.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Cauliflower has its uses.” Varya glanced over at the Romantic poet who was still forming his menu.
“Cole, dear, why don’t you leave the menu to the Chef de Cuisine?” Aislinn said gently to the young Sanguis. “Perhaps instead you might be so kind as to entertain Caleb with your poetry? After all, he’s been away for more than six months, and since then, you’ve composed how many? Four hundred or so?”
“Four hundred and three,” Cole said proudly, flushing in delight. “And it would be my sincere pleasure. I’ve been working on a new composition, and I was hoping to find an audience to test it on before I deliver it to Styx. He’s a perfectionist, you know? Such fine sensibilities. I’ve called this one, Transfusion Confusion. It has a really dramatic start: ‘Take this Type O and change it to A, please don’t let me B—’”
Caleb looked ashen. He was not feeling the love. Placing his head in his hands, he lamented, “Holy fuck! I always knew someone up there hated me. I could have died in battle. At least, it would have been an honorable way to go.”
Chapter 28
They approached a huge chained iron gate with the signage ‘Tobacco Dock’ displayed prominently at the top. The area was quiet this early in the morning as it was still dark. Rather than leap over the gate, they went around the side. The fence was far shorter here and gave easy access to the site.
Built in the Regency period, the enormous brick-and-timber warehouse in Wapping had long lay abandone
d and derelict until a consortium bought it. The consortium was a front for entrepreneurial vampires, namely Benjamin.
“C’mon, let’s get inside before it starts getting light out,” Varya said. She took several steps forward and froze, holding up her hand to get the others to pause and stay silent. “Shh. There are humans here. Trespassers.”
“Hunters?” asked Cole, suddenly afraid.
“No, just a group of stupid teenagers.”
“Yum. Breakfast. Early bird special,” Caleb murmured.
Aislinn looked at the burly drill sergeant in disbelief. “You’ve just spent the last few hours chowing down. You can’t possibly be hungry.”
“Meh. I can go for a bite.” Caleb gave a shrug. His muscles bulged beneath his Shuka which he’d retied around his shoulders, refusing to change into military gear since they were only visiting Benjamin. “Besides, you shouldn’t skip meals. According to scientific journals, breakfast is the most important meal of the day.”
“How can you think of your stomach at a time like this?” Varya snapped, thinking of the shapeshifter scum that lived around the docks.
“There’s never a better time. Happy hour and emojis. Teenagers are like rocket fuel. All those hashtag raging hormones, hashtag secreting pheromones. Back me up on this one, kid,” Caleb said, turning to Cooper.
The younger Malum raised his hands, backing away. “Uh, no. Leave me out of this. Have fun at your dawn premiere of Blade vs. Teen Titans.”
Caleb’s eyes darkened. “Oh, that’s funny. You weren’t so tough at An American Vampire in London. And even more of a train wreck at An American Vampire in New York and Kenya.”
“I was not a train wreck in Kenya!”
“Okay, I’ll give you that—your balls had descended by then.”
“You two, quit it.” Aislinn’s voice held exasperation. She wasn’t interested in hunting down some rebellious teenagers. She had bigger fish to fry.
Ignoring them all, she quickly made a beeline for the warehouse. Her movements were little more than a blur to the teenagers nearby, like the wind shifting direction. The others followed close behind. The smell of dew and sunrise was beginning to pervade the air. Dawn as winter approached indicated shorter daylight hours and allowed for vampires and other nocturnal creatures to move about more freely for longer. But it was always heralded by a crisp, sharp, clean scent.
“Welcome to Tobacco Dock,” said its charismatic owner, as he stepped back from the doorway to allow them entry. “It’s quite fitting to be housed where drugs were imported into London. There’s something rather poetic about it, I think.”
“Got a cigarette?” Varya asked, pushing past the others.
A thickly accented, female voice from within the warehouse echoed, “Da, but is Russian brand.”
Varya zoomed in on the voice, hissing at Benjamin angrily. “What’s she doing here?”
A look of cool amusement lit Benjamin’s changeable hazel eyes as he gestured over his shoulder. “She’s with Stanislav.”
Despite killing Marcellus, rogue vampires, hellhounds, and two dark mages together, Varya and Zhenya were still at daggers drawn. Though the Russian vampire would never be a sultry, svelte femme fatale, she knew how to draw Varya’s ire as she approached Benjamin and, placing one hand on his shoulder possessively, leaned in while asking for a light.
Varya made to go at the other woman when a bellow of laughter filled all the spaces around them, diffusing the tension.
“Come, my friends, let us get started. Comrade Benjamin insisted we wait until you arrived. It is good to see your safe return.” Stanislav grasped Caleb’s shoulders and pulled him forward into a bearhug. “Zaebis. There was news of your death after Marduk’s temple burned. I see this is an exaggeration.”
Aislinn stopped dead, midstride. “You knew? And you didn’t tell me?”
“Po hooy,” Zhenya sneered. It was intended exactly as it was delivered—she didn’t fucking care.
Stanislav gave a small shrug. “I do not like to speak of the dead.”
“Unless he wants to get revenge,” Zhenya added, taking a drag on her cigarette. She winked at Aislinn as she exhaled, implying she and the Russian vampire mafia boss were alike in their ways.
Aislinn’s eyes narrowed, but before she had an opportunity to reply, Cooper stormed past her, exclaiming, “OMV! Dude! Fortnite!”
Inside the vast space of the windowless warehouse, humming with the noise of busy electronics, a noise not unlike the swarming of bees, Psychic Seth sprawled on a velvet-covered couch playing video games. His eyes were glued to the huge screens in front of him, lighting up with colorful explosions and the jerky movements of his avatar as it ran from zombie-like creatures.
Cooper manspread himself next to the mad Nubes on the couch. In between Seth and Cooper on the couch, propped up on a plush cushion, was Princess Twilight, wearing her usual plastic tiara and, this time, sporting a pair of 3D glasses which hid the hollow sockets from view. He didn’t even pay it any attention.
“Epic shootout! Teabag him!” Cooper cried.
“That’s disturbing.”
Caleb shook his head. “I seriously don’t understand this century. What’s wrong with kids today? There’s nothing like a fresh kill compared to a video game, something you can sink your teeth into.”
Varya’s eyes lit up with interest as she made her way behind the screens, getting an eyeful of Cooper’s boy bits. It went unnoticed by the young Malum who was far too engrossed in the game.
“Here.” Zhenya came to stand next to her, passing over the lit cigarette in unexpected solidarity. From then on, the cigarette passed between them as they continued their spectator sport. “I’m up for a two-on-one with the Jonas Brothers lookalike.”
“Handcuffs?”
“Manacles.”
“I still hate you, but I’m in,” Varya replied, never once taking her eyes from Cooper or blinking.
On the other side of the warehouse, Benjamin gestured at the skinny vampire on the couch, explaining to the others, “For some reason, gaming not only keeps him quiet, it makes him closer to normal.”
“Really?” Aislinn raised her eyebrows and looked at him dubiously. From here, it didn’t look like it. Psychic Seth was dressed in a flannel button-up shirt, white boxer briefs, army boots two sizes too big, and was still wearing Cole’s fez on his filthy, matted hair.
“I can’t believe he still has my fez,” Cole muttered angrily under his breath.
“Get over it, Cole. Lice, remember?”
But at least the clothes were clean.
Benjamin shrugged. “I didn’t say he was normal, only closer to normal. Just watch.”
“No, no, no! Shoot the other guy—the other guy to the right! What are you doing?” Cooper was trying to give Seth advice with a lot of arm waving and jumping up and down in his seat. “Dude, stairway to heaven.”
Aislinn crossed her arms and glared at Benjamin, unimpressed.
Slightly disconcerted at the way she was eyeballing him, Benjamin shouted, “Seth, we need you to come explain these symbols. Better get your pants.”
“I can’t pause the game.” The response was as rapid fire as his game and equally aggressive.
“Well, that’s a design flaw.” Aislinn’s voice was layered in sarcasm.
“Seth, get off the game,” Benjamin ordered tersely.
Still annoyed but without any stutter or hesitation, Seth shouted, “I’m still in a match. Just give me two minutes.”
“You’ve been saying two minutes for the past hour.”
“Two minutes!” His voice was belligerent.
The good-looking Malum wore a cold smile. “If you don’t get off now, I’ll get Netflix and download every episode of Grey’s Anatomy. Just watch it lag.”
“Fine.” Seth threw the controller in a fit of rage at the wall.
Benjamin turned toward the others with a shake of his head. “Damn. That was my next move.”
Without a controller
, Seth finally tore his eyes away from the screen and turned to look daggers at Cooper. His face was a mask of indignation. But suddenly, it cleared as he focused on what Cooper was wearing. “Your blanket. Give it to me. Now.”
The rake-thin Nubes straightened and began muttering as if to himself, his hands moving rapidly as if speaking his own sign language.
“It’s not a blanket, it’s a Shuka. And if you want one, you’ll have to go and earn yourself one by fighting with the Maasai,” Cooper said scathingly. “Good luck with that.”
“Mine.” Seth ignored him, reaching out to try to pull it from Cooper’s shoulders.
“Chill the eff out!” Cooper swatted Seth’s hands away. “Get off me!”
A little tussle between the two vampires began over the Shuka, with Varya and Zhenya watching fixedly from their prime position, encouraging Seth with hoots and whistles, hoping Seth would win.
“I want the blanket.” Seth bared his teeth like a wolf, his fangs extremely white but jagged, and lunged at the larger, stronger Malum. Between them, Princess Twilight tumbled from the cushion onto the floor. Cooper managed to elude him, suddenly standing beside Caleb as if for protection from the crazy Nubes. But Seth was no longer interested as he sat on his haunches next to the fallen skull, murmuring in an appeasing tone as he reverently picked it up and stroked it, replacing its tiara from where it had bounced away on the threadbare rug.
Aislinn’s eyes narrowed as she looked at Benjamin. “I thought you said he was closer to normal?”
Benjamin shrugged. “Around here, that’s as close as you get.”
As Seth refused to put on pants, Benjamin ushered the group to the far end of the warehouse where the strange humming was coming from. Every space was filled with racking shelves containing snaking lengths of cables, wires, colored lights, fuses, and circuitry, and teeming with Nubes, pressing buttons, flicking switches, tracking information, deeply occupied at their various workstations. In the center of the room was a matrix of enormous plexiglass screens, all displaying grids marking the city of London in detail, streaming alchemical symbols like DNA sequences, and images of the enormous slaughter stone which belonged to the dark mage they’d killed.