by Logan Keys
High above the city I floated, almost up to the moon before I glided back down through the familiar broken streets, stop lights, cracked sidewalks until I came to the window ledge of Tristan’s bathroom.
Swooping in, I transformed.
Then, like any good guest and not a vengeance-filled Queen of the Undead, I flushed the toilet, checked my hair in the mirror.
Opening the door, I yawned and sleepily wandered back to his bed.
He was awake.
I could tell from his breathing and the flicker of his eyes under those beautiful lashes. A trained warrior, he gave no sign of that to me. He guarded his own dreams and I guarded my heart. What else could be asked from two strangers?
I lay next to him, not needing sleep, not wanting that terrible quiet to surround me. Overwhelmed with too much regret, too many things undone, I spent the last hours of nightfall fretting. Peggy, I’m coming. I swear. My child—she waited in the Darkness for me to save her.
If I could.
Breaking into a hunter stronghold? That was the mission of fools and madmen.
Reckless.
Tristan was awake and still I lay there, never truly sleeping. We both snuggled in bed, pretending to rest. Then, Tristan turned and put his hand on my body, touching my hip with a lingering caress.
“Celestine,” he whispered, “you must be an angel. My own miracle.”
As I leaned in to kiss him, I knew one simple fact: the time for pretending would soon be over.
In the bed and later in the dojo, Tristan led the dance.
Moving like a flowing river, he glided from one stance to another, full of muscle-memory and ancient perfection gained through repetition. I watched him move with cat-like grace and copied each change as he trained my body. I allowed myself to be clumsy, though I was not. I allowed my oddly fragile heart its strange dreams and attachments.
Afterall, who else knew my loneliness? Only Peggy, only her.
Dracula was dead.
Tristan was not my dracula. He was not my equal.
But his eagerness charmed me. His willingness to help. That loyalty that others sometimes inspired, he gave as a gift. Eager, generous with his heart, he lived innocent to lies and half-truths. In the scope of his world, he was the teacher.
He led, I followed. And in the process, this mortal changed me—little by little in the subtlest of ways. Less than twenty-four hours after I met him for the first time, Tristan altered me. Which was an uncomfortable feeling, but wondrous at the same moment.
Then, the dojo exploded.
With a slam that reverberated throughout concrete and wood, the building’s front doors swung open.
As did the back doors, along with every glass window shattering inward—all at once. A concussive burst of sound knocked Tristan over.
I didn’t fall. I knew what was coming: Monsters.
My army arrived, pouring in through every entrance, refusing the slightest of manners or the simple act of opening a door. One moment, the dojo held only Tristan and me. The next… well, there were more fangs than ten wolfpacks within the white-walled room.
All of them pointed at the mortal by my side.
In a mob, they leapt for Tristan. He held his form. He knew his defenses. That would never save him, no matter how good he was.
“Enough.” That was all I said.
A wall of ice suddenly appearing between my army and Tristan would have been more unlikely than every fanged vampire in the room halting their crazed attack for blood—but they did so, at my command.
Tristan looked at his students, now bloodthirsty strangers. And he looked at me, clad in the simple, white robes of the dojo.
And he knew.
Who I was. I could see each thought go through his mind.
Why do they stop?
Why do they listen to her?
Who is she? And then finally, the last, hardest question a man could ask…
What have I done?
I tried to make it easier for him. I took the blame that was always mine.
“What I told you last night is true. I needed these, for my army. They are mine now. I know you love them as their teacher. Now, I need you to lead them.”
He looked at me and saw only the monster, finally.
All the glamours stripped away, even the softness around my stone heart.
“I know,” I responded to soothe his troubled spirit. “You swore allegiance to me as well. Don’t you remember, Tristan? For a cup of tea and a blintz…you said. Now, I call that contract due.”
His eyes hardened. Innocence shattered was even more dangerous than innocence undefended.
“I spoke the truth, Tristan. This is all for Peggy. I did this for her. I ruined your life because I need your courage for this last battle to save one precious mortal child.”
I did not have to ask.
A queen doesn’t beg. All the same, I looked at him, one frail, mortal man surrounded by monsters, and I said, “Please? Help me.”
“You turned them,” he murmured, shocked. “You turned them all? …into what? Fanged beasts, what corruption is this?”
His mouth hurled these questions but his broken heart lay shattered on the bamboo floor.
I answered the question he was not asking. “What have I done to them? Transformed them into a race of warriors older than any human history. I have raised these mortals to the status of gods. And so they shall be for the rest of Eternity: better, stronger, and faster than their childish dreams. Wiser—in every way your superiors. But only if they live through tonight. Believe me, the hunters I face have no mercy. They will kill all your students without your guidance.”
Tristan looked sick.
His eyes—his beautiful, blue eyes filled with a revulsion at the change, the amazing gift that I had given the best students of his dojo. At the same time, he became wary of me. I could see it in the hardness of his smile. He knew—he stood in the presence of something not human. He could see what I had done in the difference in those familiar faces that he had taught for years.
“A day ago,” I spoke, trying to make amends, “I didn’t know you. Understand that I had nowhere else to turn,” I spoke quietly while the glares of newborn vampires focused exclusively on his bare neck.
“Now, I know a little more, Tristan. A little. And because of that, I will make one extraordinary offer. Help me take back what’s mine, come with me to rescue Peggy tonight. In return,” I looked into his narrowed, blue eyes as I swore, “I will release these few back to you, to their mortal lives. Only I can reverse the gift. And I can only save those who survive the night. Is that worth fighting for?”
He looked at me, seeing who I really was for the first time.
Then Tristan looked around the room.
Scanning the faces he no longer knew, Tristan measured the response of his fallen students. In their bloodshot glares ran the flush of pure adrenaline, unwavering hunger, and eventual madness.
That’s when he decided. His shoulders straightened. With the familiarity of years of discipline, Tristan held his body ready to fight.
“For the good of all of us, I will lead them,” he snarled. “For their lives, I will help you, Celestine,” There was not a single tremor in his voice when he agreed. Tristan would fight to the death. Not for me—to save the students he loved.
I could only hope that his sacrifice would be worth the cost. That in the end, my Peggy would still live. There was doubt that we could even manage to find her in the warren underneath the hunters’ Fortress.
As he walked out the broken doors surrounded by my army of newborn vampires, Tristan rebuked me under his breath, “You could have just asked, Celestine. I would have understood. But this? This is madness… I want no part of your gift.”
—4—
H-O-L-L-Y-W-O-O-D
My enemies had a terrible sense of humor.
I scowled at the blur of a moon up above, its brightness dimmed to a dull, red by the smog of the sprawling city. An angry,
sullen moon.
Curiously, that worked for me.
I stood there, in Griffith Park and felt my army come to me. Flowing across the jarring, screeching city, they moved in the shadows, instinctually hiding from the glare of headlights and the notice of drunken bar buzzards. Like moths to the candlelight, they came to me, my monsters, my last friends left in this dreary, unpredictable world.
“Up there,” I pointed to the enormous letters that spelled out H-O-L-L-Y-W-O-O-D as the last stragglers blended into the darkness under the trees.
“Before we go,” I advised them, “…you must know: any water they throw on you will likely kill you. Nothing is what it seemed before, when you were human. The simplest things can kill you now: a stake of wood, a few drops of holy water or the cut of pure silver. All of those can instantly take away the gift of Reborn and steal what’s left of your life. Avoid them like the plague.”
I looked out, at the rows and rows of glaring red eyes focused on my will. There were other things that stopped vampires but none of these newborns could do anything against the blood of a corpse or the saturated earth of a hangman’s Gallows.
These hunters weren’t expecting us. That was our advantage. They thought that they had wiped out my entire nest. They only missed me.
They would not be prepared with such complicated weapons.
Holding my army’s limited attention, I continued, “We search tonight for one girl. One mortal child. For my Peggy, I have called you here for her alone. You’ll know her when you see my mark upon her neck.”
I raised the medallion on my neck to their sight and turned it. “Protect anyone with this mark: the Flames of the Desecrator of the Cross.” I held it still.
“Now you know and you will obey. Find my mark.” As much as toddlers can understand their parents, the newborns tried to grasp what I asked. A bit of extra information was probably needed. “If you hear singing, go towards that sound.”
Before the attack, I had always had time to nurture and train the Reborn to the life of a vampire. Now, in my need, I could only hope they understood.
“Tonight,” I emphasized, “…we save my daughter.”
Next to me, Tristan listened to my warnings. He kept his students close.
They would not harm him. They did not have my permission. And there he was, standing among them—among the monsters. A fragile, mortal man readied for a war beyond his understanding. Yet he stood unafraid, calm when he should have been shaking.
“You’ll know my Peggy because of the way she sings. It’s her gift.” Newborn eyes glared red, full of hunger, bound to my service. They spared no thought for music.
“When she does, her skin glows white with a strange light. It will make your eyes blink and blur. Remember, she must be kept safe. We need to get her free of the bastards who kidnapped her.”
I didn’t ask if they understood.
It was enough that some did. Newborn vampires were not very smart. As a matter of fact, right now, they’re as close to a beast as our kind ever comes. These were no exception in terms of brains.
But they knew how to fight, savagely.
Some of these hulking men, the ones that I rescued from the back halls and ditch water of veterans’ trash piles—those men now stood strong and tall, even under the wildness of the blood-craze. Filled with new purpose, healed of the debilitating sicknesses that had struck each of them down, pulling them toward an early grave—the Reborn woke to a different world than the one that had tossed them aside.
Now: We. Are. Killers.
Being vampires didn’t change that part much, not from their perspective.
“Ready?” I didn’t wait for their answering roar.
Together we ran up the ravine, straight uphill.
Within a few moments, we gained the ridge. Streaming past the stench of trail horses at a tourist ranch. Yes, manure stinks, even to the undead.
Rushing past the trailhead, we plunged on. Steeper than it looked from down below, the enormous white letters towered above us. So near our goal.
At first, the defenses were automated.
The first of my army fell then, destroyed by a flux of silver-tipped arrows. My vanguard dropped in a cascade as we gained the hidden front door.
With the fury of the scorned, my army launched its fangs and hunger at the camouflaged entryway. Within a few seconds, the solid-steel door bent and then burst apart. Not even metal could stop the stubbornness of my will.
“Careful now, my friends,” I warned them, “Now the real fight begins. Avoid close contact, and watch for flying daggers. Onward!”
Tristan ran beside me, his students flanking us in a wide circle. As long as the passageways allowed, they formed a wall between us and the building’s clever defenses.
Room after room connected in a maze, deep into the dark. I was careful to note the path that we travelled to speed our return…
If we survived.
At the front of this reckless surge, my army stopped, confused by a wall of water.
“Clever boys,” I snarled, my blood hot at the thought of my enemies’ exposed throats. The hunters had rigged a continuously flowing faucet that covered most of one doorway. A simple, smart barrier, designed to be impossible for vampires to enter and not get partially-drenched.
Fortunately, I was long past the silliness of holy water. Three centuries ago, I had travelled to the source: the mystic spring. I had bathed in the wretched burning water. I had coated myself in the oils of the priests’ flesh.
This trap did not stop me.
Quicker than a bat, I reached up and bent the pipes that were hidden under the rock fall, clamping down on the supply of fresh holy water. It took a minute for the drips to cease.
That was all we needed. Vampires moved very fast, did you know?
My nascent army raged forward, casting the largest possible net for my one darling girl.
Within another minute, the veterans of Foreign and forgotten Wars had run ahead of us. Around the next corner, they all but disappeared from view. I could still hear them. Their undead hearts called to me, along with their endless hunger.
Meanwhile, the students of Tristan’s dojo stood around us, dancing through the droplets, fearless heroes determined to live.
There was no need to speak as we ran. Only a few moments in battle demanded any words at all. Tristan’s familiarity with my body allowed him to read most of the signs I gave as warnings. I relaxed. I didn’t need to pay attention to him. He’s smart and fast. He would be fine, surrounded by his students.
I focused on Peggy.
Frantically, I searched the hovel for my lost jewel.
That was when we reached a corner of their lair, carved far deeper into the bedrock than I would have supposed possible.
Mount Lee holds more hunter secrets than I imagined.
But this one, this was special: a trap set by hunters to snare the unwary and savage beasts. Set in mosaics in a tile pattern I recognized, one that went all the way back to the fall of Constantinople, the stone floor demanded long-dead knowledge. One only a follower of Mars Alator would know.
Or one very furious, ancient vampire…
Even the pattern was eerily familiar. The connection of diamonds and squares shocked my memories back into the moment when the holy sept fell, long, long ago. Centuries in the past, all the intervening years bunched together like a flock of sheep cowering before the wolf. Back to the moment when I was altered forever. When Dracula changed me from a Sister of the Emerald Cross to the Queen of the Damned.
Venom filled my mouth with the bitterness of that loss and all the other tragedies that had followed: the death of loved ones, the broken promises, and the constant hunt for gold under the uncaring sun that burnt us from the inside out.
So many lies blackened my undead heart.
But always, this one truth: I remain the mistress of my own destiny. And this trap will not stop me. Peggy drove me to search the ends of the world.
This trap
meant nothing.
With great care, I danced across the pavers.
Lightly touching the triangles and the arches of the romanesque era, letting no arabic sigils take my power, I moved along the trap’s design. My stone-cold veterans followed after me, clumsily repeating each step I took. Cautious and perceptive, they knew what this room was after the first two of my troops had burst into flames while rushing inside.
It was the bane of all soldiers: a minefield.
As I gained the opposite wall, I heard her singing. Peggy. “My child…”
My army heard her too as they slid and flitted along the treacherous stones.
When most of them had made the delicate journey, I surged onward with the main force, a cresting wave of hatred, hunger, and revenge. We focused on one pure sound: Peggy’s voice.
She was there, just ahead, behind a lumpy, sloppy wall, bricked into her earthen prison. Three of my army tore at the thick mud and stone that formed the barrier. They damaged it a little, not much. And then, the first bone became visible.
Graves.
Corpses of the dead were laid within the wall, their bones casting ancient spells of warding and dispersal. As we watched, the nearest newborn vampires fell apart. First their fingers, hands, wrists, and their arms dropped like weights to the floor, unmoored.
Then, the undoing spells travelled higher. It only took a few seconds to leech the power of my gift from each undead body… leaving a pile of bones and stinking flesh.
Nothing more.
No Reborn one could touch that wall. Blood of the hanged man, soil of corpses? Not a single vampire, not even Dracula himself could get through that barrier.
“Peggy…” I whispered to the uncaring dark. My pain ripped through my chest with the precision of a jagged knife wound.
Somewhere, my enemies laughed at my pain, sneering at me. Rejoicing in the cleverness of their protections, they trapped us. Furious, we were powerful, but empty-handed. That’s when I really looked at the tunnel we were tightly-bottled inside. That’s when I saw the sprinkler system.
“Tristan… they knew,” I said, “The hunters knew we were coming.” The sadness in my voice would have caused angels to weep.
