Vampire's Dilemma

by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

  The businessman was heavier than Wright, so the advantage should have been with him. Yet, he was obviously weak; his knees were buckling. He was sitting down on the pavement, his hands falling to lay open on the ground by his legs.

  Wright pulled slightly away, breathing hard, letting loose of the man’s neck to stand. He kept the body propped up by bracing it with his legs.

  Keiko made an involuntary sound of disgust. The Coin Man looked at us and saw her.

  We were both staring like fools. Keiko should have been running. And I—I should have been doing something to stop what was going on. But I just stood there, invisible, because I was seeing something I had never seen before.

  There was a woman who had not been there the moment before. She wore some kind of long garment, something that reminded me of Roman times or maybe those paintings by Waterhouse of knights and ladies. She was kneeling by the businessman, her arms wrapped around him and her mouth fastened to his throat. She repeatedly swallowed as though she was sucking something and her eyes were rolled back in pleasure. Her features were distorted, but I was willing to bet her face was the same as the one on the coin.

  It was horrific and as fascinating as watching a python swallow a deer. She had to be a vampire and vampires were nothing I wanted any part of. But if she was a vampire, then she was of a kind I had never heard of. I could see through her. She was like I had been my first decade or so as a ghost. What kind of a Supernatural was both ghost and vampire?

  I shook myself and went visible. I had to try to do something for that man on the ground, but first—

  Keiko! Get out of here. Run!

  The little Japanese turned towards me, then looked back at the vampire ghost and Wright.

  She could not defend herself and I wasn’t sure what I could do, but if I couldn’t do anything else, I could at least disappear. The smartest thing was for her to get out of the way. I saw the realization in her eyes and she jerked her head in acknowledgment and headed into the dark at a run.

  Too bad Wright was faster.

  He caught up to her quickly, forcing her back towards the body of the businessman. One of her arms was twisted behind her back, but she struggled, trying to kick him to get free. In response, he lifted her arm higher and I saw her grit her teeth in pain. She made no sound, but she stopped trying to kick him.

  I disappeared and reappeared next to him and punched him. He let go of Keiko, who stumbled away as I made to hit Wright again. Then I forgot all about him as my mind filled with the most pain I had ever experienced, alive or dead.

  Without paying any attention to it, I heard Keiko yell my name. It seemed to come from above me and I dimly realized that was because I was on the ground. I looked down at my left arm where the pain was centered and saw the vampire ghost with her mouth sucking at the inside of my elbow.

  If I had had the wherewithal to curse, I would have been unloading blasphemies enough to bring my mother back to life just so she could cuff me. For the second time that night, though, all I could do was stare.

  Faster than I could have guessed, I could feel my energy traveling out of me and into the vampire’s mouth. I could see her swallowing bits of me like she was eating candy and I couldn’t do a damn thing about it. I was going to find out what happened to a ghost after he died a second time. And it was happening so quickly, I couldn’t decide if I was angry, sad, or just annoyed about it.

  What a stupid way to go was all that ran through my mind. Useless, helpless, stupid.

  I could feel the cold of the concrete floor beneath me. It seemed as if it was getting colder or maybe I was sinking into it. I was having a hard time keeping my eyes open. I was aware that Keiko was still yelling, but the longer this went on, the less that seemed to matter to me.

  Something dragged at me for a moment and Keiko’s voice was briefly louder. I didn’t know if she was speaking in English or Japanese. I raised one hand towards the sound, but the sounded faded, so I let my hand drop.

  Time passed or it must have done.

  I felt like vapor, steam rising. I no longer had arms or legs. I didn’t know what was happening. I couldn’t tell what would happen. Existence was just a pressure on the last of me that could still feel. It was a gigantic, pulsing motor in my ears. But from the way the sound was dulling, I could tell it would soon be quiet.

  My eyes must have been closed; it was dark.

  Then there was a flash of lightning. Or someone turned on a spotlight. I put up a hand to shield my eyes, but it didn’t help. I opened my eyes and saw the light was shining right through me. I was about as solid as a jellyfish.

  I became aware that the pressure at my elbow was gone. So was the roaring engine in my ears. Instead, I could hear the squeal of car tires and a man’s voice.

  “I’m calling the cops,” it said.

  A woman nearby laughed in relief.

  I decided to take a nap.

  * * * *

  Wright watched as the little Japanese woman caught a streetcar and perched herself among the workers heading home, her face tight with worry.

  He felt an almost-camaraderie with the woman. Of all the items he had handled with Supernaturals attached to them, this was the first time he had come across anyone whose situation came so close to his own. Of course her ghost was not a match for the Lady, but he had provided the Lady with the first real sustenance she had ever known. Now that he considered it, he knew he should have realized that Supernaturals were the obvious food.

  There was an answering warmth from the coin at his neck. Now that the Lady knew what to look for, she would feed better. Soon she would be able to rebuild the gateway and they would both go to Avalon.

  Wright did not linger, but quickly walked away from downtown, returning to the empty house he had found to shelter in. Well, it was empty now, at least.

  * * * *

  No one was more surprised than me when I was able to open my eyes again and see Keiko sitting in a chair in my office.

  She was still wearing the lamp charm, touching it and sliding it on its chain, looking at it as though willing it to speak to her.

  “Keiko?” My voice was kind of a croak.

  She looked in my direction but it was obvious she didn’t see me.

  I made myself visible and sat on the couch across from her.

  “How long has it been?” I asked.

  “Two and a half days,” she said.

  I looked at my hand and saw that it was somewhat less solid looking than I had been used to being lately. I didn’t feel like I had the wherewithal to be any more solid, either. “What happened?”

  “That—thing—was eating you. You were getting dimmer and I could see right through you.” She looked away from me to the floor, realized she was playing with the charm and dropped it.

  “I more or less remember that part.”

  “A man, probably a parking lot attendant, came by. He shined a flashlight on us. And he must have seen the body of that man. He said he was going to get the police and he ran up the stairs.

  “Wright grabbed the coin necklace off that man and ran into the garage. You faded away. I came back here, but I did not know if you survived or not. All I could do was wait.”

  She looked up at me and I was surprised and maybe a little happy to see her eyes were bright and her lashes wet. She glared at me as though daring me to say anything.

  Her frock was different, but she looked tired as though she had not had any sleep.

  “Were you here all this time?”

  There was that blush. “Of course not. I went home, I went to the gallery as usual.”

  As usual. Right.

  “Well, I may not be as much of a solid citizen as usual,” I grinned to see her roll her eyes. “But I’m still here.”

  A small smile touched her face. “Yes. And so is Wright and his vampire ghost. We should call the authorities.”

  “We don’t know where he is.”

  “They can search Los Angeles for him.”

/>   “It’s a pretty big city.”

  “I have found much smaller things in this city.”

  “And how many leads did you have?”

  “He was at the Mission. Perhaps he’s still on Skid Row. Is that not a lead? Martha Sue can tell them.”

  “Keiko, we can’t tell the authorities that. If we send them around the Mission, who knows what they might find that we don’t want them to find.”

  She thought about it. “And Wright has seen you.”

  “Yes.”

  “Kuso.” Keiko’s cheeks got a little pink so I had to guess that whatever she had just said, it was probably not lady-like.

  “We should call Martha Sue and let her know. Wright may come back to the Mission and she needs to know he’s dangerous. If she has a contact number for Laslo overseas, she should call him.”

  “I’ve already called her, Brownie, and told her to be careful. She said she would call Laslo. Fortunately, Wright does not know how we found him.”

  She looked at the floor and then at me.

  “I apologize,” she said.

  I was startled. “For what?”

  “If I had left sooner, the Coin Man would not have been able to use me against you. And I was not strong enough to get myself free of him.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” I told her. “I was caught just as flatfooted as you were by what we saw. I should have told you sooner. We were lucky that attendant came by.”

  “Lucky. Yes.”

  Damn lucky, really, because I had been completely helpless against the vampire ghost. I could not have gotten up a defense if one had presented itself to me on a platter. If it hadn’t been for the attendant, the vampire ghost could have done whatever she wanted with us. Keiko might have been the next victim. And me—I had figured I was going die again. But maybe not.

  I had no idea what happened to ghosts when they were exorcised. And I had never heard of a ghost being eaten. Would I simply have been erased from Creation? Did having all you were sucked out of you count as a bite? Could I have become another vampire ghost? Everything I thought I knew about being a ghost was now suspect. After decades or centuries, would I still be just a ghost or a ghost and something else? How much time might it take? How long had it taken her?

  We knew too much to feel easy and too little to feel safe. What we knew was that she liked killing. That she had a human accomplice. That she was still out there. We also knew that she felt somewhat vulnerable or she and Wright wouldn’t have run from the threat of the police. And she was tied to the old coin.

  What we didn’t know was if killing was all she existed for. Why Wright was with her. Where the coin came from. And most importantly, how to stop her.

  I put my hands in my hair and pulled. Being dead should be easier.

  Keiko cleared her throat.

  “Brownie…it’s time to do some research.”

  * * * *

  There were plenty of men wrapped in rags and newspapers sleeping in business doorways and practically lining the backs of buildings in the alleyways. They had already found one donor—a drunk huddled in newspaper between buildings. He had constantly mumbled and moved about, his hands swatting at the air near his head. Even talking in his sleep, the line of his mouth under his unkempt beard showed fear and disappointment.

  Wright had gone carefully, but the man never waked and did not even seem to notice as the coin necklace slid over his head.

  Once again, the vampire ghost had fed joyously until the sleeping man had become finally still. Wright could not help the answering happiness he experienced as he watched her grow more solid in appearance. Soon they could try again to open the portal. All that was needed was a little more power. A few more useless husks of Supernaturals sacrificed and he would finally see his dream achieved; something he could never have imagined when he was defending his doctoral dissertation on Arthurian England.

  He continued walking the streets of Skid Row, waiting for the vampire ghost to point out another sacrifice to the cause.

  * * * *

  We had been somewhat surprised to find that the coin was known and had been written about. Keiko had talked with the people she knew who dealt in antiques. We had gone to the Central Library and made detailed notes of everything we could find on the coin itself as well as the time period from which it originated. We added what we knew about Wright. We had talked to Laslo and he was digging into it from Europe. Now we were trying to put together the pieces.

  Since Keiko’s gallery was downstairs, I told her she should keep her lunches and anything else she wanted in the refrigerator in my place. She argued she could buy a refrigerator, but I pointed out that I didn’t eat anything, so I wasn’t using mine anyway except as a place to store Laslo’s coffee.

  While she made herself something to eat, I looked over her notes, some of which I couldn’t read because they were in Japanese.

  “I thought you came over here as a kid,” I said when she came back.

  She just shrugged that tiny shrug. “I learned in Japan first.”

  Keiko took the notes and looked at them. “The coin was originally found in England in the 1700s and became part of the legacy of the family on whose land it was found. It dates from the Roman occupation of Great Britain. I wonder how it got to Germany, if that is where Wright found it?”

  “That’s what Laslo told me. Wright found it in Germany. Maybe the Nazis took it off an Englishman or Wright got hold of it in England before he was posted to Germany. He was an authority on Arthurian legends. Speaking of legends, you mentioned one associated with it—”

  “Yes.” Keiko shuffled the notes. “Supposedly something was found in old parish records in the area about a young woman who fell in love with some sort of Supernatural. It seems she was abandoned and…” she rolled her eyes, “died of a broken heart. This would have been around the time of the Roman occupation. So the times coincide.”

  “But England wasn’t a Christian nation when the Romans were there. I don’t think, so why would there be parish records?”

  “I think the records were just held in the Parish church. They were historical documents. Perhaps it was felt they would be safer there.”

  “Well, as you said, the times coincide. My grandmother used to tell me stories about people being bewitched by the Fae in the old country. But I’ve never even heard of one person being able to prove they’d seen an honest-to-god fairy. Or an elf or a goblin. Though I’d much rather there were goblins than vampires or werewolves.”

  “Maybe he was a vampire. That would explain her feeding on others.”

  “But she doesn’t suck blood. And vampires are solid.”

  “Perhaps she started out as a vampire.”

  “Maybe. Or maybe she started out as a ghost and became a vampire.”

  Keiko frowned. “For what reason?”

  “Who knows? To stay alive until she could get back to her true love—whatever he was?”

  Keiko looked at her watch. “We still have some time before we can call Laslo in Berlin. Perhaps we should call Martha Sue and ask if she has heard anything.”

  “She’ll call if she does. What I’m concerned about is that there isn’t much known about the daily life and beliefs of these people. With a vampire, you know it’s vulnerable to the extent of what it believed when alive. An atheist who’s turned is going to be a lot harder to kill than one who was a good Christian or Jew. And we haven’t got any idea what this woman might have believed in, so we don’t know her weaknesses.”

  “But she is also a ghost, Brownie.”

  “Yes, she is.” I thought about when I had been attacked by a werewolf and how it had felt to be shredded while not being able to do anything about it. “You think Laslo’s arsenal has werewolf claws in it?”

  Keiko looked at me with her eyebrows raised.

  * * * *

  Another night had passed in which Wright and the Lady had sought out sleeping drunken men in the alleyways and doorways of Skid Row in Los Angel
es. They peeled away newspapers, bags and rags to uncover these cast-offs and take what was left of their humanity.

  It was slow going. They almost never found a Supernatural, and when they did, he turned out to be little like the ghost in the parking garage. Better than the Lady’s average meal, perhaps, but providing nothing like the energy she needed. And there had been a nights where they found no Supernaturals and the Lady had had to settle for what had been available.

  Wright had wanted to be more cautious—the Army was looking for him, he was sure. It would not do to be caught by the Los Angeles police, who had certainly been alerted to the escape of a patient from Camarillo’s mental hospital. But they would not have included certain details about all the reasons he might be missed.

  With just a little more time, he could perhaps find a trail to a haunted house or a werewolf or even a vampire. If he had ever had fear of these, he had lost it after seeing the Lady feed. There was nothing that could stand against her. He knew where such were to be found in Europe, but he had no way of getting back there without a passport. With time, even such a trip might be possible. He could buy or steal an identity…

  But the Lady seemed to be insatiable. Through their wordless communication, he could feel her impatience, her certainty that time was short and success very close. She was of no mind to be cautious or to wait for better feeding opportunities. If quality was lacking, then quantity would have to make up for it.

  * * * *

  So what else did Martha Sue say?

  “Not a lot.” Keiko parked her car behind a newer, sleeker model by Chevrolet. It was blue and white and seemed almost dainty next to the dark behemoth that was Keiko’s 1949 Plymouth, with its corrugated steel bumpers and massive, rounded body. “And only what I have already told you: Laslo called her. He made some suggestions for weapons. Martha has had some news through the homeless men. It is important we come quickly.”