Owl and the Japanese Circus

by Kristi Charish

  Her hand was like an ice-cold vise through the collar of my jacket, cutting off air and blood to my brain. I ignored it and tried to fix the mask in place. If not for my collar, I’d have been out from pheromones by now.

  Marie’s breath slid over my face, heavy with raw meat. Everything was blurring, including the straps of my mask. I threw it over my face while I still could and took a breath. Things cleared up somewhat, but with Marie holding my neck I had no idea for how much longer. One of the vases pressed against my back. I winced at the waste, but I was running out of options. I slammed it into her head.

  It shattered and didn’t affect her a damn bit.

  She tsked. “What’s the matter, Owl?” she said, her French accent tinting the words. “I’d think you’d be happier to see a friend?”

  “Marie,” I said, focusing on her green eyes and barely holding onto consciousness. “You’ve really let yourself go.”

  She didn’t like that. Not one bit. Her smile faltered, like cracks at the edges of an old painting. She slammed me into the wall.

  What have I said before about vampires being predictable? Grabbing your throat, slamming you against a wall . . .

  I dropped Captain’s carrier to wrench at the hand around my throat. “Nadya, run!” I yelled.

  Nadya hesitated. “She’s not going to kill me,” I said, adding, “she needs me—for the fucking translation, isn’t that right?”

  Her fingers dug in. “And you have a bad habit of pissing people off.”

  I laughed. “What? Did Sabine decide to make you her vampire bitch? Must have been right around the time you tried screwing me over at Ephesus. You should be dead.”

  She squeezed harder. “You’re only half right. I am Sabine.”

  What? My mind whirled through the vampire pheromone haze. Marie was Sabine? How the hell had that happened? The last time I’d seen Marie, she’d been on the wrong side of a closing door beneath the ruins of Ephesus. I’d thought she was dead—hell, I’d felt guilty about it ever since, even though it had been self-defense. If I’d known she’d ended up a vampire . . . I didn’t have time to mull it over.

  “Do you think I like being a vampire?” She smiled sickly sweet, much like the look I’d seen on Bindi.

  “You seem to have taken to the crazy part just fine.” No matter how much I pried, her fingers wouldn’t give. Just how the hell had she gotten so strong? She’d only been a vampire for a year.

  “Don’t worry, I plan on sharing the whole experience with you. Isn’t that what friends are for?”

  “Not possible. You can’t turn me in one bite.” Vampirism wasn’t all or nothing, it took multiple bites over days’ worth of pheromone exposure to set in. The problem was, after one bite you’d crave more. I tried loosening her fingers and failed. Damn it, why couldn’t vampires have lousy grips?

  “You’d like to think that, wouldn’t you?”

  Marie was settling in, getting confident. I needed to shake her. “I hear from Alexander you’re into some really kinky stuff—going through flunkies like a pack of cigarettes. You need to watch it, or you’re going to wear yourself out before your time—”

  “Vampires are evil pests, I’m just playing the role. What’s the matter, dear? Bring back fond memories?”

  She pressed her face up against mine and licked the bottom of my cheek where my gas mask ended. I resisted cringing. “You don’t like being a vampire? Too bad for you. Not my fucking fault—not my fucking problem.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong.”

  She opened her mouth and pressed her teeth up against the crook between my shoulder and neck. I’d never been bitten by a vampire. Oh sure, they’d threatened to do it, and Alexander had come real close in Bali, but none of them had actually managed to sink their teeth in yet.

  Sabine/Marie; whatever she called herself now, her breath was cold on my skin, as frigid as an air conditioner. I closed my eyes and braced for her fangs to pierce my neck. If I was ready for it, maybe I could even fend some of the euphoria off, at least until the first wave of pheromones was in my bloodstream . . . if I didn’t pass out first . . .

  Instead, Marie drew in a sharp breath and tensed. I opened my eyes in time to see Captain launch himself at her face, only this time he hadn’t announced himself with his usual hissing fit. Marie raised her arm to fend him off, and Captain was more than happy to oblige and sink his claws and teeth into her forearm. She was caught completely off guard and shrieked, releasing my neck so she could fend Captain off.

  The way she used her forearm to occupy Captain’s teeth indicated there was no way she knew Mau bites were toxic to vampires. Besides, she’d “died” before I’d even come across Captain . . .

  Hunh, guess Alexander had kept his side of the bargain and hadn’t bothered to warn her. Go figure, an occasionally honest vampire.

  Without Marie to hold me up, I slid down the wall. My brain was short on blood supply, and standing proved to be too much. Nadya came up beside me and shook my shoulder.

  “Alix, are you OK?”

  I felt the skin on my neck before nodding. No bite marks—I probably would have been as high as a kite if she’d broken the skin, but it’s the kind of thing you’re still paranoid about.

  “Yeah, I will be. What the hell, Nadya, I told you to run!”

  “You’re very welcome.”

  Marie was on her knees, baring her teeth at Captain and trying her best to rip her red, swollen arm out of his mouth. Damn, I’d seen welts on Alexander and his bunch before, but nothing like this. I filed that off for later.

  I tested crouching. When the head rush didn’t come, I figured it was time to get us the hell out of the archives. “Get ready to run,” I told Nadya. “This time I mean it.”

  My plan? Extract my cat and run like hell before Sabine could get her claws back into me.

  She was so busy with Captain I escaped her notice, and Captain, well, he was oblivious to anything but his vampire dinner. Maybe he’d had enough by now.

  “Pssst . . . Captain!”

  He rolled his eyes towards me and hissed without letting go of Marie’s arm for a second.

  Well, so much for the careful, cautious way. I waited for the right moment and grabbed him by the scruff of the neck. He howled in defiance and dug his claws and teeth in tighter. Marie screamed. I gave him another good yank.

  “I said time to go!” This time I pulled hard enough to dislodge him. He howled, she howled . . .

  I dumped Captain into his carrier, spun on my heels, and broke into a dead run. I wasn’t fast enough. Marie’s hand snaked around my ankle and pulled, hard. I managed to toss Captain’s carrier through the doorway towards Nadya before slamming face-first into the floor, driving the edges of my mask into my face. Damn it, that was going to smart later. Before Marie could drag me back, I latched onto the doorway and held on for dear life. Marie snarled. Her eyes were dilated black, and she growled before biting down on my foot. Thank God I never cheap out on leather. She worked her teeth back and forth, trying to shear through.

  I caught a blur of black and red run past us.

  “Nadya, not a good idea,” I said.

  Marie lifted her face from my boot to regard Nadya as she disappeared back into the archives; the vampire was like a cat deciding whether to chase the bird or mouse . . . or settling for both. Not if I could help it.

  “Screw off,” I said, and kicked Marie in the face, two, three, four times before she finally let go.

  “How’d you like to see how the other half lives?” she said. In answer, I pulled my UV penlight out of my pocket and aimed. Yet again though, Marie was ready for me and faster. She slapped the penlight out of my hand and across the floor.

  “Get me that scroll and maybe I’ll only turn you. I might even let your friends live.”

  “Go fuck a vampire. No, wait, you already did,” I said. I tried to kick her again, but this time she caught my other foot. She pulled me towards her and pinned my arms. She smiled and sniffe
d my cheek again. I turned my face away, glad I couldn’t smell anything through the mask.

  “Fine, have it your way. After I turn you, you’ll be begging to do my bidding. Maybe I’ll have you turn all your friends for me. Starting with your Russian friend—” Marie’s eyes went wide, but not from anything I’d done. She reached for her gut and fumbled at the spear tip sticking through it. Nadya stood behind her, in her hands the shaft of the spear that’d killed Nuroshi. Nadya didn’t wait to see if she’d finished Marie. As soon as I’d scrambled out from underneath the vampire, she leapt past me.

  I didn’t need a hint. I trailed her into the stairwell, where Captain was howling through his carrier. If it hadn’t been for Marie’s laughter, I doubt we’d have looked back.

  Marie was on her knees, pushing the spear back out. She smiled. What with the blood loss from everything Captain had done, she wasn’t looking so good; her eyes were rimmed in red, and her lips were a grayish shade of blue. “Have to do better than that,” she said.

  “I thought you said the young ones couldn’t do that!” Nadya said.

  I shook my head, still working the shock out. “They can’t.”

  We both grabbed the handle to the stairwell door and pulled at the same time. One of the security guards must have done a pass and locked it from the other side.

  “Shit.” I fumbled my lock picks out and took to the door, more brute force than finesse. My fingers were shaking so badly that I bent the first one and dropped the second.

  I had half the lock worked with the third pick when Nadya gave my sleeve three sharp tugs.

  “What!”

  “Work faster,” Nadya whispered.

  I turned to see what Nadya was worried about.

  Marie stood now, the hole in her stomach sealing over. She shouldn’t have been able to do any of this. Only the really old vampires could do that, and she’d been a vampire less than a year.

  I focused back on the lock. My fingers weren’t moving fast enough.

  “Good friend you have there, Owl. Bet you haven’t told her what happened to me.”

  I’d had just about enough. Everyone lately was blaming all their worldly problems on me. Not this time. “What’s to tell? You tried to backstab me and ended up a vampire.”

  “You haven’t changed,” Marie snarled. “Not one bit.”

  The door clicked and I felt the handle give way. Marie was coming at me. I still had my heavy UV flashlight, so I aimed it at her; she shrieked and jumped back out of the beam as her skin started to sizzle.

  I left the flashlight wedged in the door handle, trained on the hallway. It wouldn’t keep her back for long, but it’d slow her down enough.

  We slid through the door and were about to slam it shut when Marie laughed. Both of us stopped to peek through the door; even Captain quieted down. We knew we should run, but we couldn’t help it. If you’d ever heard a vampire laugh, you’d get it. It sounds more like a psychotic bird than any sort of normal laughter, and the only time you hear it is when they’re on the verge of losing it.

  Nadya swallowed beside me. Marie must have heard it, because she smiled.

  “Careful dear, you never know when Owl will need someone to throw under the train.” She held out her hands. “Now you’ve had a firsthand look at what happens to the ones who don’t get to fly away.”

  That was it. Marie was twisting things, trying to get under my skin. “Wow, Marie, taking the high road. Even on the vampire sliding scale of morality, you managed to hit rock bottom. Even in your warped little brain, you don’t really believe you’re the good guy here. You’re just pissed I sold you out before you could do the same to me.”

  Marie smiled as her eyes again dilated to pure black. Only old vampires—really old vampires—are supposed to be able to dilate their eyes like that. “You’ll never know for sure.”

  I shook my head. “Enjoy your pool of blood. You earned every goddamn inch of it.” And with that, I slammed the door.

  My heart was racing. I had to believe what I’d said. If I didn’t, that made me just as bad as her. I went to lock the door and swore; I’d ruined it with my lock pick.

  “Son of a bitch. Nadya, I need a piece of metal—now.”

  “I don’t have any.”

  “Gimme the scroll,” I said.

  “What? No—”

  “Do you want to fight her again?”

  Nadya swore in Russian and tossed me the case. I slid the scroll out—carefully. I wasn’t sure what to do with it exactly, but I sure as hell wasn’t leaving it behind. I tossed it back to Nadya as I fixed the metal case between the door handles and tied them together with the lower half of my T-shirt for good measure.

  “I can’t believe you just opened that case—”

  “I’m not getting eaten so some client gets a premium product.”

  I tested the door one last time; it seemed like it would hold for a little while.

  “Ready to get out of here before security wanders by?” I asked. I pulled my hood over my head and did up the jacket to hide my torn, bloody shirt. Two bona fide fights in as many days. I was slipping. I had another problem too, as I looked down and saw Captain’s head poking out of a corner of the carrier. He was eating his way out. I let Nadya open the heavy door while I crammed Captain’s head back in and did my best to plug the hole. “Get it through your thick cat skull. We’re done here.”

  We headed out. At the last minute we opted not to go through the building proper but to take the back stairwell exit. Slamming into the metal door bar, I almost caught the carrier on the fire alarm. Captain complained.

  “Sorry, the hallway’s narrow.” An idea struck me.

  “Hey Nadya, what were you telling me about this building and fires?”

  She frowned. “What? That they forgot the floor drains? The building floods every time the sprinklers go off—” Her eyes went wide as she caught on. “Nuroshi complained when they refitted the archives with automatic sealed doors to protect the storeroom.”

  I opened the door first and pulled the alarm. The siren started, and I pulled out a lighter. Never leave home without one. I tossed it to Nadya, since she was taller than me and could reach the sprinkler. Captain mewed as water began to rain down on us.

  “You attack vampires, but you cry at water? What kind of battle cat are you?”

  We were out the door and found ourselves on the side of a hill. It was dark now—we’d been inside longer than I’d thought, but it worked to our advantage. I really didn’t want to explain the blood to anyone. There were still people around, but no one paid us any attention. We backtracked through a garden to the train station. Nadya didn’t say anything until we were standing on the platform.

  “What the hell was she talking about?”

  I shook my head. I couldn’t bring myself to talk about it right now. Not while I was still processing it. There are a lot of things I’m not proud of, but there’s only one I’m ashamed of. “Nadya, I promise I’ll tell you as soon as we’re at Rynn’s.”

  She gave me a hard stare before nodding. “I need a drink.”

  We didn’t say much—well, anything—while we rode the train back to Shiyuba district and Gaijin Cloud.

  Why the hell is it the past always comes back to haunt us in loud, inconvenient, impossible-to-ignore ways? Why can’t it ever be a telephone call so I can hang up?

  11

  SO MUCH FOR STAYING OUT OF TROUBLE

  10:00 p.m., Gaijin Cloud

  I slid back onto the stool beside Nadya at the glowing red bar and shook my head.

  “No sign of Rynn anywhere,” I said. I’d done a lap around Gaijin and hadn’t caught sight of him.

  Nadya snorted and downed her glass of champagne in one shot. “Wonderful,” she said, and opened another bottle. “Shit. She really did a number on your face.”

  I’d hidden the black eye as best I could; I’m thinking the resurgence of heavy navy-blue eyeliner has less to do with fashion and more to do with practicality.<
br />
  “I’m more worried about these,” I said, and tweaked down the collar of my leather jacket to show the strangulation bruises. They’d ripened since we’d left campus.

  Nadya shook her head and raised her glass. “You are a walking disaster. Never have I seen someone who attracts so much trouble.”

  I took a sip of my Corona, only to find it was empty. I waved the bottle at Nadya’s host. He nodded but didn’t smile or wave like he normally did. Come to think of it, he looked away as fast as he could. Before I could put much thought into it, Nadya pulled my attention away.

  “Nuroshi was a rat and a sleazy old man, but he didn’t deserve to die.” She glanced up from her glass at me, eyes tired, but not from lack of sleep. “A lot of people are dying who don’t deserve to, Alix.”

  What could I say? She was right. “On the bright side, we didn’t get shot at.”

  “Yet.”

  I didn’t have an argument, so I checked my phone. Still no reply from Rynn to my earlier text telling him we were here and to come find us. I’d added exclamation marks to get the emergency component across. I didn’t want to admit it to myself, but I was more than a little worried. Doing business with me was becoming hazardous to people’s health. Besides, Marie had said she was going to start taking potshots at people close to me. I hoped Rynn hadn’t been first on her list.

  I just about dropped my phone as a Corona bottle rattled the glass bar under my nose. The host smiled at Nadya but again gave me a nervous once-over. OK, it wasn’t my imagination. He wasn’t exactly friendly with me, but he’d never been outright rude before.

  I turned to Nadya and nodded at her retreating host. “What the hell was that?”

  She shrugged. “Maybe Rynn said something to the other hosts.”

  “Like what?”

  She shrugged again. “Like ‘Stay away. She’s a train wreck and hazardous to your health’?”

  I snorted. Figured. I noticed the bartender removing an empty vodka bottle. “Hey, Yukio, right? Pass that over here.”