by Lumi Laura
*
Alex left her home at sundown and walked the short distance down hill to Dimitrie Ghica Park, where over the phone she'd agreed to meet Stefan. They were only to use her skills to identify the vampire and subdue it — hopefully one of the more aggressive ones — and see if Alex could turn it back human. This would confirm to Stefan that her blood was a cure.
These more hostile vampires had recently been seen around Sinaia Casino, which was a block away. Alex was concerned about Jaklin since the ICC was there. Alex could see light from it through the trees and hear faint voices from within. King Carol had built it in 1913. Originally, it had in fact been a casino, but when the communists took over Romania, one of the first things they did was to abolish all gambling houses, most of which had been restored. Now the Romanian government used Casino Sinaia as a meeting place and the ICC staged events there.
As the darkness deepened, Alex felt a chill and wished she'd brought a sweater. Her cellphone rang. It was Stefan.
"We have a live one," he said. "Undead one actually, on the loose a few streets over, outside the park.
Alex left immediately, crossed the main thoroughfare. The sidewalks were full of tourists out for a stroll and an evening meal. A couple of streets over, no streetlights lit her way, and pedestrians were nonexistent. Alex didn't like the looks of it. Out in the open and in a public place, she felt the situation wouldn't get out of hand, but out of sight in a private home? She wasn't so sure what Stefan would do.
At first, Alex saw no one and thought she must have gotten the directions wrong. Then she heard a faint cry from inside a house across the street, and Stefan appeared from behind a tree in the front yard.
"She's inside," he said. "Hurry, we may be too late already."
A female vampire. Alex realized this wouldn't be easy for her if it became violent.
"Who lives here?" she asked.
"An old couple," he answered.
It was a dilapidated, two-story building dwarfed by trees and surrounded by thick bushes. They opened a creaking back gate, walked through the porch and opened a door into the kitchen. Stefan motioned Alex in first, not something she was particularly crazy about. The house was dark, but she could hear the vampire at work upstairs. Probably a bedroom, she thought. "Kill your flashlight," she said. "I can see." She felt his hand on her back as he followed her.
They exited the kitchen into the living room, and Alex saw the stairs off to the right opposite the front door and started up it with Stefan's hand on her back all the way. She heard an old woman's voice raised in protest. Once inside the bedroom, she saw that the feral vampire had already killed the old man, lying on his back and blood drenched, and was on her knees astraddle the old woman working on her neck.
The female vampire was dressed in a black, fluffy blouse and jeans, long stringy hair pulled into a tight bun. She rose from her victim and turned to look at Alex as she entered, blood streaming from the corners of her mouth, fangs glistening in the pale light from the open bedroom window on the left wall.
Alex motioned to the window, and said to Stefan, "Close it." As he made his way toward the window, Alex turned to the vampire.
"Come to me. I can help you."
The vampire shrieked, levitated from the bed, kicked to repel off the far wall, rebounded off the right wall, and was instantly at the door from which they'd just entered, all the time shouting and screaming. The vampire didn't seem to be a woman at all, but a caged mountain lion. Alex thought she'd surely escape, but she seemed strangely transfixed on Alex, her eyes locked like laser beams. Alex felt sorry for her. The fear in her eyes was unimaginable.
As Alex tried to talk to her, she repelled around the room once again, and smashed into Alex so quickly that she was helpless to defend against her. Just as she was about to bite into Alex's neck, Stefan staked her from behind. Alex screamed to stop him, but Stefan was crazy for the kill. The vampire turned away from Alex, jerking the stake out of Stefan's hands and slung it across the room. He'd missed the heart. She then turned back to Alex, but had now become even more agitated. Stefan quickly retrieved his stake, and as Alex screamed, "No!" he drove it through the vampire's chest and this time found her heart, blood gushing, spurting up from the wound. The vampire gnashed its teeth, emitted a great shout, followed by words of poetry streaming from her lips.
Alex ran to her, held her head in her own lap as the woman coughed, sputtered, choked back clotted black blood. She looked up at Alex, grief emanating from her eyes. In a halting voice, she said, "Sorry. So very... sorry," and died. Alex thought that this feral hadn't been turned by choice.
Such a pitiful death. "It didn't have to end this way," Alex said. "I could have saved her."
As Alex rose to her feet, ready to take on Stefan, the old man, whom the vampire had killed, rose up from the dead and made for Alex.
"Back off this time," Alex said to Stefan. "Let me handle this."
Stefan ignored her and went for the old man with his stake anyway. Alex grabbed Stefan from behind just before he reached his target and threw him up against the wall. The old man came for Alex, and she let him take her to the floor, bite her. As Stefan looked on, the old man became confused, rose up from her vomiting blood and stumbled to the far side of the room. He stood against the wall for support as his body started shaking and trembling. It gradually became a full-blown seizure that enveloped his entire body. He fell to the floor screaming as sparks and flames started at his mouth and gradually crept over him. A smoky stench filled the room. Alex looked back at Stefan, but he'd collapsed also.
Alex was confused. What had her blood done to the creature? Why didn't he become human? But then, in what seemed to Alex an unending saga, the old woman, who had also just become a vampire, shouted an oath and rose up off the bed. Alex grabbed her, and let her sink her teeth into her neck. Once again, the vampire became confused, then went into the same trembling-seizure routine that had been the ruin of the old man, followed by sparks and flames. Alex let her fall to the floor. The smoke made Alex dizzy, and she staggered to the window to open it and let in fresh air.
While the air cleared, Alex went into the hall and seeing a door open to another bedroom, she went inside. In addition to a single bed, Alex saw a desk with several sheets of handwritten poetry. A large bookcase against the far wall contained several volumes of verse but also many of philosophy from ancient times to modern. Humm, thought Alex. A scholar. Obviously, she was the daughter of the elderly couple she'd turned. What a tragedy they were feral. None of this was by choice, she realized.
Alex heard the rustle of footsteps and the banging of doors as two of Stefan's crew searched the rest of the house. Alex went back to the parents' bedroom and dragged Stefan's limp form out into the hall. She thought of inoculating him right there, heaven knew she needed the blood, but right then she was so mad at him that she thought it could wait awhile. She stood over him as he revived.
"What happened to me?" he asked.
"The smoke of burning vampires," she said. She helped him to his feet. "Made me a little dizzy too."
Stefan's crew loaded the three bodies, two of them badly charred, into a van.
"We have our own crematorium," said Stefan getting into the drivers seat. "We'll finish the job. Want a ride?"
"No. I want to walk back through Sinaia. Clear my lungs of vampire smoke."
"So tell me, what happened to this turning-back hypothesis of yours?"
Alex stood in the street staring at him through the van's open window. "You were right. These are different. I've turned five vampires back human, but these ferals burst into flame."
"You have holy blood in your veins," said Stefan. "As for you turning vampires back, I'll believe it when I see it."
"I can do it," she responded. "We can save the lives of regular vampires."
"For what? Toast the bastards."
"Murder isn't right."
Stefan scoffed. "They're all alike and should be killed and cremated.
This business of turning them back and forgiving their atrocities... No way. This is war."
What a disappointing evening, she thought. And here I reckoned I could save all the world's vampires. What could possibly have gone wrong? But she realized that these were a different type of vampire, much more violent and erratic. Perhaps Stefan was right about her blood. She'd heard that when vampires drank holy water, they went into spontaneous combustion. Her blood seemed to do the same thing to a feral.
Alex watched the van drive away. She hadn't told Stefan, but with the loss of blood, she had to feed, and soon. Already, she felt the fever and body aches. As soon as the van was out of sight, she found a secluded alley, and slipped into the darkness, attacked a young man on his way back to his hotel. While feeding, she thought she saw someone spying on her from behind a trash bin. She released her prey and quickly exited that alley and entered another a block away. And then she saw them following her. It was Stefan and his two associates. She stepped out into the open and called to them.
"You just had to witness it, didn't you?"
"You're a one-hundred and twenty pound mosquito." He drew a weapon from within his trench coat. "All vampires should die," he said. He raised the weapon and fired.
The impact knocked Alex backward. She stumbled and fell flat on the ground.
Stefan was on her immediately. "Look!" he said to his associates. "Everything born will die. Just like all the rest of those bloodsucking maggots. It's the crematorium for her. Quick! She might regain her strength." He handcuffed her.
Alex was so weak that she could barely move, but she managed to say, "Stefan, you fool!" and then passed out momentarily. She started to revive as they dragged her by the feet out to their van. Through her mist-filled consciousness, Alex heard someone shout.
"Stop!" The voice rang out. Then even louder, "Halt! We've called the police." It was just a couple of passersby, a man and a woman.
Alex ripped open the handcuffs and threw them aside.
Stefan and his cronies quickly abandoned the rapidly recovering Alex, and her two saviors were at her side. "Help me up," she said. "This ground is cold."
"We thought they'd killed you," said the middle-aged man.
"I couldn't be so lucky."
"Were they Gypsies?" the woman asked. "I've heard of abductions, but never witnessed one."
"Thanks for you help," said Alex. "But I'm in a horrible hurry." She had to get to the Monastery. Father Zosimos must know what happened.
"The police will be here any minute," the couple called after her.
Alex rapidly recovered and walked quickly to the Monastery. Inside the main gate, she saw what appeared to be Stefan's van. When she neared Father Zosimos' chamber, Alex proceeded more cautiously, went into the bushes and peeked through the window. She saw Stefan talking to the priest. She overheard bits of their conversation.
"We fired an ironwood slug from a sawed-off shotgun straight through her chest," said Stefan. "Firing one through the heart of a vampire has killed them every time."
"But not so our Miss Eidyn," puzzled Father Zosimos. "And she failed to turn the vampires back human. Really disappointing."
Alex had heard enough to realize that Father Zosimos had been complicit in the whole affair. She quietly retreated, tears streaming down her cheeks. She headed home to consider what to do next. She'd gone into a depression, and although she now cared little for her own safety, she cried for her child. How could she bring her little girl into such an unhinged world?
