Wonderful.
Once up on the shallow concrete front porch, Tamara rapped sharply on the metal-reinforced door several times, peering into the dark front window as if to see if she could spot any movement inside. A few moments passed before the door was wrenched open, still safely anchored by a thick pair of chains, but moving aside enough to reveal a total letdown in the wizard department.
There was nothing wrong with Charles himself or at least what I could see of him. Not really. But the fact remained that he, like his house, just didn’t look like a wizard. A man somewhere in his thirties or so with short, utilitarian brown hair and a slight Native American cast to his skin tone and features with a serious case of “resting bitch face.” He wore a dark, heavy trench coat despite being indoors and was at least six feet tall, possibly more from what little I could see of him.
“Tamara. What do you want?” His tone was gruff and clipped as he scrutinized Tamara irritably before turning narrowed, wary eyes upon me instead. “And who the hell is this?”
“Hey, Charles! Nice to see you too. Got a minute?” She said it sweetly, leaning in closer, moving between us and recapturing his attention. “My friend Ashley here needs some help, and we’re looking for answers. Thought you might have a few.” She smiled up at the supposed wizard pleasantly.
“What kind of answers?” The tall wizard straightened as he glared down at us. Especially me. I was already getting the feeling that maybe he didn’t like my face or something. I caught a glimmer of someone moving in the darkness behind him and tilted my head, peering curiously into the dim room beyond.
Tamara defiantly shined a friendly smile at him. “You know, the kind I’d rather not talk about out here on the street, Charles.” She tilted her head and spoke insistently through her smile. “I think it could be very important.”
Charles shifted so that I couldn’t see past him anymore, looking us both over once more with critical, cinnamon eyes. “Nope.” He started to close the door.
“Wait!” Tamara held out a hand to pause him, though I noticed she was careful not to touch the door or get near the threshold. “Charles, come on! Don’t be like that.”
The wizard glowered at her, but stopped just short of shutting the door in my new friend’s face. Obviously reluctant, he sighed heavily. “Tamara, there’s no way I’m letting whatever that thing is past my wards.” He eyed me pointedly.
I blinked. While in a sense I could appreciate his bluntness, as I probably wouldn’t let me in either, the statement still caught me off guard.
“Hell, I know who you are,” the standoffish wizard continued, redirecting his glare to the Moroi, “and I’m not inviting you into my house either. I’m not crazy, stupid, or suicidal.” He shifted as he spoke, staring down at Tamara with a firm frown, most of his body still concealed defensively behind the thick door.
The door wavered as Tamara spoke in the most forceful, possibly dangerous tone I’d heard from her. “Excuse me?” The tension between them hung heavy in the air for a moment until the alabaster skinned woman let out an audible sigh, releasing the irritation from her features. “Come on, Charles. You know me better than that.” She stared him down or rather, up, hands on hips.
I wanted to say something to help convince the crotchety wizard to help us, but I didn’t think “Hey, c’mon, what’s the worst that could happen?” was going to sway the man to our cause. So I just kept quiet.
“Give me one good reason why I should walk out there with that…thing. Much less invite it in.” He grunted and cut his eyes in my direction once more. I barely restrained myself from making a face at him.
“Geeze. You’ve known me for what, two or three years now? And I’ve injured, hurt, harmed and/or eaten you how many times again?” She was starting to sound irritated.
“Yeah, you’ll forgive me if the word of one vampire vouching for another doesn't do much to assuage me.” Slowly, the door once again started to creep closed. Once, I might have stuck my boot in the way, but here and now, it didn’t seem like the best of ideas.
“Charles…” She sighed, dropped her head for a moment, then lowered her voice, peering up at him through a fan of purple bangs. “She really needs some help, and I just don’t know the things you know. Just a few questions, and you have my word we mean you no harm.” She held his gaze for a moment silently before adding, “Please?” Charles hesitated more significantly at the imploring tones in her rich voice. And when Tamara leaned in closer to the door, he cautiously leaned toward her as well. “I think she’s a Strigoi.” I could tell he heard her, because his thick brown eyebrows shot up so fast they nearly flew off his face.
Charles straightened, taking a deep breath and rubbing a hand over his facial stubble, but the gesture couldn’t completely hide a considering, even intrigued expression. “There aren’t any more of those,” he interjected unconvincingly. I could hear his heartbeat starting to rise as it thudded dully and rhythmically in the background. “Besides, that would just be one more damn good reason for me not to get mixed up in...Whatever this is.” He gestured generally at the pair of us, but he no longer sounded so adamantly certain of himself.
No one said anything as he looked past us with distant, thoughtful eyes, staring off into the starry night sky and continuing to stroke his lack of a proper wizard’s beard. Suddenly, he exhaled sharply and shrugged. “Fine. Come around to the back patio.” He glanced at me briefly, then back to Tamara. “Mind the wards.” The reinforced door slammed in our faces without waiting for a response, but not before I heard him mumbling something grumpy about “trusting vampires.”
Together, we stared at the scuffs and shallow rents in the steel surface of Charles’ door for a moment before Tamara finally shrugged. “Well, that went better than expected.”
8
Hug it out
I followed Tamara as we circled around the house, past the big black Chevy and through a gap in the low cobblestone wall standing its stony vigil around the back of Charles’ property. Situated as it was, right on the edge of a commercial district, with a sharp drop-off separating him from the nearest residences further down the mountain, I wasn’t sure the wall was really all that necessary, except maybe as a monument to just how much Charles enjoyed his privacy.
I didn’t know what wards were, but I stayed on the opposite side of Tamara and away from Charles’ house, just in case. I glanced over at her curiously. “So. He knew I was a vampire, just like that, but not what kind?” The more real this all became, the more it sank in, the more I wanted to know.
“It’s what I expected.” Tamara cursed under her breath as she stumbled over a garden hose, putting a hand on my arm to steady herself. “Thanks.” She smiled. “Anyway, powerful wizards like Charles can often see auras, spirits, energies—lots of stuff like that. Things that normal people or even some supernaturals or lesser magicians simply can’t perceive. Not that I know firsthand how it works, of course.”
“Good to know.” I stepped over the tangled, dirty hose, clearly visible to me even in the dim lighting.
Charles’ back “patio” wasn’t really a patio. It had cheap patio furniture, though, sitting out under the dark, open sky just past the back door of his home, so I supposed that made it close enough. A small, round, glass-top table and four matching wire chairs clustered together for comfort in the middle of his narrow backyard. Short, fluffy fir trees along the back perimeter of his stone wall loomed over us, granting him a living privacy curtain to further separate him from his mundane, suburban neighbors just down the mountain. More morning glories flanked the back door, marching drunkenly in irregular lines across tilled patches of dirt, interspersed with other plants whose names I didn’t know. A couple of rectangular planting boxes sat under the dubious protection of the shallow roof overhang, packed dangerously full with a motley collection of herbs.
I looked to Tamara, curious what the decorum was for meeting a wizard, but she just plopped down in one of the waiting chairs and kicked back as
if she owned it. I followed suit, but restrained myself from kicking my feet up on the table. I seemed to have made a bad enough first impression on Charles just by existing, after all.
We didn’t wait long for Charles to make his appearance. The wizard opened his equally-reinforced back door and just stood there for a long moment behind the threshold, putting both of us through an extended, final scrutiny. Even when he came over to join us, he left the door partially ajar behind him; maybe he wanted an easy escape route in case of vampire attack.
He was even taller than I’d expected, almost intimidatingly so, though his utter lack of a giant, pointy hat did him nothing but a disservice. His heavy coat masked his true build, especially combined with the shapeless dark t-shirt and thick jeans underneath it, but as best as I could tell, he was fit and lean with no gut to be found. That day’s worth of stubble darkened his face beneath his dark cinnamon eyes, which, upon closer proximity and inspection, burned with not only a sharp intelligence but also a more-than-healthy dose of paranoia.
I noticed approvingly that at least he had a staff now, a long piece of thick, polished, stained hardwood only a foot or so shorter than himself. The head was a natural, intricately twisted knot of wood, like the still heart of an old tree, wound around and around with glittering silver and topped with a large, beautiful eagle feather. Almost every inch of its length was deeply carved with various runes and symbols similar to those adorning the Bookbinders’ sign next door, most of which were completely alien to me. Despite my ignorance of their meanings, I knew they were legit. The staff radiated with a thrumming, heavy power that hung in the air like a sound, vibrating just out of hearing range.
“No reason to bring out the big guns, Charles.” Eyebrows raised, Tamara directed her gaze toward the staff, sitting up a little straighter.
“If she is what you think she is, there’s plenty of reason.” The wizard eyed me as he seated himself across from us. “A strange vampire at my home is always reason enough, anyway.” No one had ever really considered sarcastic, hundred and thirty pound me dangerous before. It almost felt like a compliment.
“I’m probably asking the wrong person, but,” Tamara sighed, “don’t you think you’re being a little overly cautious?”
“No such thing.” Charles snapped off the answer like he’d prepared it ahead of time. I chuckled hoarsely, which was a mistake, because it immediately drew his harsh scrutiny once more. “We only ever make one big mistake, you know?” I fought the urge to shift uneasily or look away from his gaze until he finally turned his eyes to Tamara again. “So. Why do you think she’s Strigoi? It’s about two and a half centuries too late for that.”
Tamara huffed. “Don’t you think I know that, Charles? The Moroi know about as much about their lost kin as the Magisterium does.”
“Then you don’t need my help.” He picked up his staff from where it lay across his lap, as if to rise.
“Dammit, Charles, sit down,” Tamara finally snapped. “Remember, you owe me.”
Butt hovering an inch from the seat, Charles sighed and settled back into it.
Tamara took a shallow breath, wiping away her irritation. “I said my people do, not me personally. There’s a reason I’m here for your opinion instead of going to them, anyway. Can you tell for certain or not?”
“Maybe.” Charles had a pretty decent grumpy poker face, I had to admit. “But I’d like to know what made you think it in the first place.” He gave Tamara a firm look. “As far as everyone’s concerned, the Strigoi are hundreds of years in the grave now, so to speak. Most people wouldn’t even consider them a possibility these days. So what brought them to mind?”
“Ah, well…” She ran a hand through the short, choppy back of her stylish violet and black hair, smiling a little sheepishly. “I’ve always been fond of the old tales, so I know them a lot better than a lot of Moroi. I just don’t know how true all of the details are.”
“So you long for the times when the Strigoi and Moroi ruled over humankind with an iron fist?” Charles gave her a flat, caustic look from across the table, drumming his fingertips along the length of his staff as if making a statement.
“That’s not what I mean at all, and you know it.” Tamara shot him an irritated look. I watched them go back and forth, arguing about me, and wondered if I should interject or just let it happen. “No, I miss how they were supposedly a good complement and counterbalance to my people. I miss how they helped keep the Sanguinarians in check; they were afraid of the Strigoi. And look how far their influence has spread with the Strigoi gone.” She glanced at me. “Well, mostly gone. Besides, you’ve got to admit that genocide was kinda unwarranted.”
Charles grunted noncommittally. “You’d be surprised how far people will go when they feel threatened.” He heaved another heavy sigh, settling his staff across his knees and steepling his fingers thoughtfully. “Or want power badly enough. All beside the point, though. Give me your evidence, so we can get this over with.”
“Let’s see.” She started ticking points off on her fingers. “Daylight aversion and unconsciousness. Big-ass metal claws. Superhumanly strong and tough. A lack of pain response. Almost no bleeding or heartbeat. Skin pallor. Some sharpened senses. And no reaction to salt or anything like that.”
The wizard considered for a moment before turning to me. “How long since you turned?”
“You make me sound like a moldy block of cheese.” I frowned, trying to tally up the missing time. My eyes caught a flicker of movement at his door; someone was standing there in the shadow, watching us. “Two days?”
“Hmm.” He thoughtfully rubbed his bristly not-beard again. “That’s way too soon for Jiangshi or Sanguinarians to become that strong. Assuming she’s telling the truth.” I bristled a little. “You sure she was human a couple of days ago?”
Tamara rolled her eyes, laying a calming hand on my sweatered arm. “Yes, Charles. I looked into it.”
He watched me closely from across the table. “No other type of vampire, then. Obviously not a changeling. No aversion to iron, so no other type of Fae. She could be possessed, I suppose…” He frowned. “But I’d like to think I’d know. Anyway, it should be easy to tell.” Charles rose, gesturing for us to do the same and leaning his staff against the table, obviously within easy reach.
“You can? That’s good.” Tamara smiled, as if a little relieved, and stood as well. I slowly followed suit. “I figured you could just, you know, tell.”
“Then you really don’t understand how it works.” Charles shook his head and paused to crack his knuckles, a gesture that made me a little nervous. “Yes, I see something in her aura. Something potent, something with touches of death. But I’ve never seen a Strigoi before to compare it. Luckily, there are always physical signs of vampirism, things she couldn’t hide.”
“That’s good.” I glanced at Tamara. “That is good, right?” She nodded, a hint of a smirk toying with the corners of her mouth.
“Mirror?” the wizard asked, seeming impatient. Or maybe anxious. He wasn’t easy to read, keeping his emotions hidden behind his stony, irritable visage. He held out a hand towards Tamara expectantly.
“What? Oh.” With a nod of comprehension, Tamara reached around and unzipped the little black hip pouch she seemed to carry in lieu of a purse, patterned to blend in so nicely with her skirt that I hadn’t even noticed it earlier. After a couple of seconds of fishing around in it, she tossed him a little round makeup mirror. “Will that do?”
Charles only grunted in response, busy angling the little black mirror in a way that I supposed let him see my reflection. After a moment, he grunted again. “Okay. Next.” Ignoring our curious expressions, he tossed the mirror back to Tamara, and she caught it with a too-quick snap of the wrist.
“What now?” I tilted my head, honestly curious. What about my new, dead self had I potentially not even noticed yet?
“Now,” he leaned in suddenly, “we compare fangs.” Stepping forward without warning, he re
ached out and seized my jaw in a large, calloused, scarred hand.
“Dur fuhk,” I rasped out indignantly, complaining at him through a crinkled face. I didn’t like strangers trying to touch me; I never had. Charles’ sudden invasion of my personal space set me on edge and caused that potent anger to spike again. With effort, I battled it back down, but for a moment it was all I could do not to snarl and smack his hand away or at least tear free of his grip.
The whole time, he watched my eyes, judging, studying. “Open up,” he said after I’d gotten full control again.
I twitched. I could feel his heartbeat in the warm flesh of his hand. Thump. Thump. Thump-thump. He wasn’t as nonchalant as he seemed. I hesitated.
“Charles, don’t be such an asshole.” Tamara stepped closer, trying to come to my rescue. I wondered if her Moroi powers enabled her to perceive the depths of my discomfort.
I raised a hand, warding her off. “I goth dis,” I mumbled insistently around his hand. I wanted to know what he knew. I could do this.
I opened my mouth wide and let the standoffish wizard stick his index finger in and tap around carefully. I supposed it was no weirder than several of the things that had happened over the last two days. Just like an awkward dentist’s appointment, right? Still, I was glad he found what he was looking for quickly enough, pulling gently, then more and more firmly at something rooted tightly in the upper half of my mouth. My probing tongue identified something that hadn’t been there before, not like it was now.
I have fangs? That’s kind of badass. I think. Maybe? In place of my first two molars on each side, now a set of sharp, pointy teeth stuck down what I guessed was at least half an inch. I didn’t know how I hadn’t noticed them before, but my mouth already seemed to have adjusted to their presence, as if I’d been this way for a long time.
Charles gave one final, firm pull before letting go; neither me nor my teeth budged in the slightest, no matter how hard he tugged. Then he stepped back and wiped his hand off on his coat. The tall magician retrieved his staff and rested his hands on the ornate end, considering the pair of us thoughtfully as Tamara moved to my side.
Dead Girl's Ashes (Dying Ashes Book 1) Page 7
