A Bloody London Tale (Book 1): Unrest Rising

by Prichard, Cornelius

  We stepped into the house. “I always told you that.”

  “Yes, you did.” I squeezed his hand. “You worry me, you know, being out there.”

  “What else am I going to do, Tree? They need me.”

  “Paul?” Lise walked down the stairs. Her eyes narrowed when she saw Susie. “Okay, what happened?”

  “Nothing.” I didn’t want her to know she was right to have worried and I really didn’t want her to know I’d walked home from Alison’s. “I just ran into the two of them on my way back. Isn’t it nice to see Paul?”

  Paul’s laughter really didn’t help. “Don’t lie to me, Teresa. What happened to you?”

  “Some stupid human jumped her, Lise. She was about to stab him when we turned up and I thought I’d make things easier for her.”

  Lise shook her head. “I told you what would happen.”

  “Yes, and I told you I could look after myself.” I let go of Paul’s hand and made my way over to her. “I understand your worries, but I’m not going to let people like that stop me from living my life - I’m not going to let them think they’ve won.”

  “She has a point.” I glanced over my shoulder at Paul as Lise wrapped her arms around me. “If she stops living her life the way she normally does they’ve won, Lise, and we can’t let them win. Not if we want equality.”

  “I know, but Tree’s human.” She tightened her arms around me. “You’re someone who’s going to be really hurt if they attack you and I can’t lose you, Tree. You’re my friend.”

  I wrapped my arms around her. “I know. Will it make you feel better if I promise not to go anywhere alone?”

  “Yes, but… who are you going to get to stay with you? You need to go out during the day and we can’t be with you.”

  “If it helps I have a little sister who could do with a job. Her vampires…” Susie bit her lip. “Let’s just say something happened and now she isn’t needed any more.”

  Olivia

  Having Ben beside me helped. When I looked at him I still saw an eighteen-year-old boy, but it was obvious from his eyes that he was much older than that. Well, to me it was - Connor might not be able to see that himself, the same way I hadn’t been able to when I first met Ben, although that could have been because I had no real idea what I was looking for. Had I known I might have realised in advance what might happen to me if I got too close to him. I don’t know if I would have made different decisions based on that. Some days I think I would have kept my distance, until I remember that I didn’t really change when I became a vampire. No matter what happens I’m still very much the same person I was then and that is why I do what I do. If I wasn’t still that person I think I would have given up a long time ago.

  Connor was waiting for us. He looked between Ben and me. I was half expecting Connor to say something about me bringing someone with me, but he didn’t, which was a relief. Maybe he really had changed. Maybe he really did understand why I’d want someone with me after the way he’d reacted when I told him I was a vampire. “I’m glad you came.” He smiled, our eyes meeting, and I could see the hope in his eyes. “I didn’t tell Mum and Dad about this in advance, because I didn’t want to disappoint them. They’ve missed you.” He shrugged. “They never wanted you to leave in the first place, as they were certain we could make things work, so they were angry with me for a long time for the way I reacted.”

  “I wish they hadn’t been.”

  “Liv, they were right to be angry with me. No matter what you’re my sister and I should have known that becoming a vampire wasn’t going to change you.” He reached out and took hold of my hand. “I want us to start again from the beginning. I’m sorry I screwed things up. I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you. I’m sorry I didn’t find some way of fixing things sooner, but I thought you’d be too angry with me to listen.”

  “There was never a time when I was angry with you. Disappointed, yes, because I thought you’d be more open-minded, but that faded with time.”

  “She was more angry with me than she was with you.” Ben sounded amused. It had taken us a long time to get to that point and I was glad we’d taken the time to fix things, as I knew a lot of vampires who were still furious with the person who’d changed them, even if it had truly been an accident. “Ten years is a long time, Connor, and people do change, but Liv is one of the few people who is very much the same as she was when I first met her. She’s the same stubborn, passionate, woman, who believes that vampires and humans can live together, if not happily then peacefully.”

  As Connor looked between the two of us I could see the uncertainty in his eyes. He didn’t know what to think of Ben and I wondered if that was because Connor could see how old Ben really was. Sometimes I couldn’t help wondering if Ben had hid that from me, worried that I might not want to be with him if I knew he was a vampire. It was something we hadn’t talked about, mostly as I didn’t feel comfortable bringing it up, remembering how I’d reacted myself when he chose to turn me into a vampire. Knowing that I know now I can’t help looking back and laughing at myself. I was so scared I was going to become someone else, simply due to my eating habits changing. Becoming a vampire does change some people. For the majority, though, we’re the same as we were before the transformation - including all of our flaws.

  “You’re the vampire who changed her.”

  “I am. My name’s Ben.”

  “Has you name always been Ben?”

  Unable to believe my brother had just asked that question, because it meant he did know more about vampires than he had before, I studied him. What had happened to change things? He glanced at me, smiling, and I wished I knew why he was suddenly so different. I shook my head. It wasn’t sudden. I hadn’t seen him for ten years. He wasn’t the teenager I knew, but an adult, with two young daughters, and it was obvious that he’d matured in ways I could never have imagined.

  “No, it hasn’t. I chose this name when I started at Liv’s college and I’ve kept it, although normally I would have changed it by now.”

  Still smiling Connor looked at me again. “I know you want to ask questions, Liv, so go right ahead and ask them.”

  “Are you still my brother?”

  He laughed. “Yes, I am.” He squeezed the hand he was still holding. Until then I’d forgotten he’d taken my hand in the first place. “I know it’s hard to accept I might have changed, but I’m really not the same person I was before, and that’s something I hope you’ll accept.”

  “Why has this happened?”

  “Several reasons, but the main one…” Connor shook his head. “This isn’t easy for me to talk about, Liv.” He brushed his free hand through his hair and I gave him the time he needed to gather his thoughts. “One of my friends went missing.”

  “Daniel?”

  “You remember?” I nodded. “Okay, that’s going to make this easier then. It wasn’t long before you came home and told us you’d been made into a vampire. I thought then it was vampires that were responsible for Dan going missing, because he’d talked to me before about this girl he’d met - who just happened to be a vampire. He visited last week. We would be the same age if he hadn’t chosen to become a vampire himself.” He sighed. “From what he said he’d stayed away, certain he knew how I was going to react to what he’d done, and when he said that I chose to invite him in. I realised I’d acted like an idiot not long after my first daughter was born and I want to have a chance to get to know Dan again. He said the vampire who’d changed him was killed by a hunter about three years ago. He’s been on his own since then.”

  “How did it happen?”

  “The hunter found them when they were sleeping. Dan managed to hide and his girlfriend was dragged outside to burn in the sun. It wasn’t until he told me that I found out that vampires don’t have super strength.”

  I couldn’t stop myself from laughing at that. “No, we don’t.” I sobered, thinking about Daniel, about Connor, about everything that had happened. “Does Daniel need hel
p?”

  ***

  With twenty minutes to go before my meeting with some of the shopkeepers of London I was trying to get Daniel settled in to a new place. He didn’t want to be a part of the riots and after what he’d seen I wasn’t at all surprised about that. I’d seen videos of vampires dying before, because hunters had a bad habit of recording those sorts of things to put online, so I couldn’t help thinking there was a chance I could have seen his girlfriend’s death. “This will be your room. I’m just across the hall.” I smiled at him. “If you have any nightmare come wake me up. This is something I’ve dealt with before.”

  “I was hiding at the time.”

  “Maybe you were, but that doesn’t mean you didn’t see what happened. All vampires know about those videos, Daniel, and if that was me I would have felt the need to go looking to see if it did exist.”

  He nibbled his lip. “I wish someone had been there to tell me not to. I went to an Internet cafe, because we’d spent a lot of time travelling, so I could see if someone had recorded her death. From where I was I could hear her screaming and I knew there was nothing I could do to help. When I found the video I knew I should have left the site, but I watched it instead. I kept watching it over and over until my hour of time was up, unable to believe someone had done that to her. The hunters didn’t know her. The only thing they cared about was what she was and that meant she deserved to die. She’d never hurt anyone. She only changed me because I asked her to, when I decided she was the person I wanted to be with forever.” He smiled at me, but it quickly faded. “I know forever’s a long time. That’s a conversation the two of us had before she changed me. She wouldn’t do it until she believed I really had thought things through.”

  “You’ve been on your own for three years dealing with that?”

  “I have. I couldn’t bring myself to spend time around anyone for a long time after I watched that video, not even other vampires, but when I finally felt like I could be around people again I went to Connor. Even now I’m not sure why. I just… although I was worried he wouldn’t accept me I knew he was more likely to than any of our other friends and I needed someone to talk to. I had no idea that you’d become a vampire, Liv, not until I saw you on the telly. Have you really been spending time in 10 Downing Street?”

  Nodding, I sighed. “Yeah, it seems to have become my second home recently. I’ll be going there again later, as we still haven’t come up with ways we can put an end to these riots, but first I need to come to some sort of compromise with the shopkeepers of London, because they aren’t happy with their shops being attacked by vampires.”

  “Why you?”

  I laughed. “I ask myself that all the time, Daniel. There are probably other people who would be much better at this than I am, but vampire society is very much based on age, and Ben, apparently, is one of the oldest vampires living at this time. As I’m his child that makes my trustworthy and I’m able to talk with humans as I’m young myself.” I shook my head. “You, on the other hand, don’t have a place, unless you can tell me who your creator was.”

  Daniel shook his head. “I have a name for her, but I get the feeling it was one she made up for me.”

  “That doesn’t matter. It still might give me a chance of working out who she might be and where you fit into vampire hierarchy.”

  “You don’t need to.” Ben walked into the hallway, having come from one of the rooms. “I know exactly who his creator was as the two of us spent a lot of time together. As she turned him I can smell her.” I couldn’t find the words to tell him quite how creepy that was, so I stared at him, and he smiled. “Liv, when you get older you’ll probably be able to do the same thing.”

  “Great.” I shook my head. “Who was she then?”

  Ben sighed. “My vampiric sister. The two of us were changed at the same time by the same person, before he decided to walk out into the sun. That’s something older vampires often do, because they don’t want to live any longer, and if it hadn’t been for you I might have chosen to do the same thing. I was beginning to get tired. Life was… hard. Immortality wasn’t a gift and I should have realised when I changed you, Liv, that you wouldn’t think of it as a gift either, but I loved you.” He shrugged. “I still do. It doesn’t matter that we’re often miles apart.”

  When I had some time I’d talk with him about that, but I only had ten minutes to get to my meeting. “Does that mean Daniel’s on the same level as me?”

  “Yes and no. He’s the child of an old vampire. My sister, however, wasn’t respected within vampire society as she never wanted to be a part of it, so Daniel would be just below you. If you were to ask him to take on certain jobs for you, in order to prove his trustworthiness, he would be on the same level.”

  As Daniel looked between us I could see the panic in his eyes. “It’s okay.” I reached out and patted his shoulder. “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. Should you decide you want to take that place you can. If you decide it would be simpler for you not to that’s absolutely fine. I’m not going to push you.”

  ***

  I stepped into a full room and everyone looked at me. Ben was behind me, but I was the person they’d all been waiting for. “Sorry I’m late.” I put on my professional smile. “Family emergency.” That wasn’t even a lie. “Now we all know what we’re here to discuss, so how about we just got to it, because none of us will want to waste time.”

  “Put an end to the riots.” That was a male in the back of the room, someone I was certain didn’t want to be there in the first place from the way his wife was holding tightly on to his hand. “None of you monsters deserve more than being put to death.”

  “David!” She shook her head. “I’m sorry, Ms. Mead, please forgive my husband, but this is hard for all of us.”

  “That doesn’t excuse him calling us names.” I’d really had enough of that and I wanted to put an end to it as quickly as possible. “You may look at me and see a monster, but you are the monsters.” Muttering filled the room. “Not nice is it.” I shook my head. “We are people, just like you, so I don’t see how anyone can stand there and call all vampires monsters.” I found myself stepping onto one of the tables, wanting to be able to see everyone. “You don’t know me. That doesn’t mean I don’t deserve your respect. You judge me, because of what I am, and it doesn’t seem to cross your mind that what matters is who I am. None of you have stopped to think why we’re rioting, because that doesn’t matter to you. All that matters are our shops, your livelihoods, which is understandable, but you will not get my help if you’re not willing to stop and think. Has it ever crossed your minds that you might actually be a part of the problem?

  “None of your shops are open late. I know what you’re going to tell me. It requires a special license. People aren’t going to work at that time of night. Why should you open up especially for us?” I stamped my foot on the table to put an end to the muttering. “I want to help you. In return for my help I want you to help us.” When a couple of mouths opened I knew exactly what they were going to say. “Of course. You didn’t come here expecting to have to do anything in order to get the money you deserve from the monsters that destroyed your stores. That’s tough. I’m not going to give you anything for nothing when I know it would be easy enough for you to get the majority of the money you need from your insurance companies. Unless, of course, they don’t pay out for riots, which I think is unlikely, as riots aren’t normal. They aren’t acts of God.

  “In return for the help and money you need to put your stores back together I want every single one of you to open at night for a year. You don’t have to do it every night. Four nights a week would be better than what we have now.” I looked around. “Do you know what it’s like to not be able to buy clothes? Do you know what it’s like when you can’t go anywhere and buy the things you need in order to shower? We’re very lucky, because we have humans who are willing to help us, as the other issue we have is with buying online - they all wan
t someone in to sign for the item, which isn’t possible when you can’t open the door in the middle of the day. Of course this wouldn’t bother you. We’re monsters. However we’re monsters with the money you need now.”

  I waited for someone to say something. For a little while I didn’t think it was going to happen, but then the woman who’d originally apologised for her husband nodded. “I think your proposal is one we can work with.”

  “No.” Her husband shook his head. “We’re not having those monsters in our shop.”

  “Love, it’s not our shop. It’s my shop. My father gave it to me, not to us. The decision is mine to make and I’m willing to put my livelihood ahead of your discomfort. I understand you dislike vampires, you think they’re monsters, but we need it to be open. Otherwise we’re not going to survive another month.”

  Money was, in the end, their main priority and I managed to get more shop owners involved than I thought I was going to in the beginning, but I knew I’m made the right choice when I pushed for them to do something to help us. Along with the money for the repairs I also gave them enough to be able to buy a night license. Hopefully the government would realise what that meant.

  Paul

  “Your sister worked with vampires?” It was the first chance I’d got to talk to Susie about that and I wanted to know why she hadn’t been comfortable with vampires before that. “If she did why…?” Finding the right words was nowhere near as easy as I needed it to be. “Do you understand what I’m trying to ask you?”

  Susie smiled at me. “I know exactly what you mean.” She brushed a hand through her hair. “My sister and I have never been close. There’s ten years between us and it was easier for me not to think about the job she was doing, rather than accept that she really was working with vampires. That, of course, was before I met you. After that I went to talk with her about the vampires she worked for and found her sobbing her heart out. I’ve never seen her like that before.”