Blessed

by Cynthia Leitich Smith

  Freddy nodded. “Of which Dracula is believed to have been the first and last, though he sired others who predeceased him. They were closely related to eternals like you, my dear, conjured into being when the count tampered with the original spell that first created vampires. Or rather, the curse.”

  I double-checked my notes. “So there really are two kinds of vampires?”

  “Only two?” Freddy rested his hands on the back of an empty chair. “Quincie, a staggering variety of supernatural blood drinkers have flourished throughout time and around the world — Babylonia, Russia, Serbia, ancient Greece, Brazil . . .” He glanced at Zachary. “Don’t they teach children anything in the public schools?”

  I didn’t bother to ask who’d educated him. “In the novel, Van Helsing says the count studied at someplace called the Scholomance.”

  “With Lucifer,” Zachary put in, reminding me of last night’s conversation. “Some slip; some fall.”

  The two men went quiet, and I could tell by the way they traded looks that they were trying to decide how much to tell me.

  “The kukri knife turned up earlier this year,” Freddy finally admitted, sitting down again. “The bowie knife was believed to have been lost to the ages. Fortunately, the vast majority of eternals don’t take the legend seriously.”

  Zachary sipped his sparkling water. “I don’t think the individual now in possession of the kukri knife realizes that it’s more than an antique. Let alone that it houses half of Drac Prime’s powers.”

  That had been a carefully worded statement. “You don’t think he’s experimented with it?” I asked.

  “She’s wary of sorcery,” Freddy explained, “or at least of its price.”

  Noting the gender pronoun, I wanted to ask who we were talking about. But then again, maybe it was better if I didn’t know. We couldn’t risk having Brad rip that information out of my head. If I could help it, he wasn’t getting anything else from me.

  Zachary pounded the table. “If this Brad does have Morris’s bowie knife and he’s able to use it to tap any of Drac’s abilities, we have to stop him.”

  “And before he gets ahold of Harker’s kukri knife,” I agreed. “Given that he knows the legend is true, I’m sure Brad is looking for it.”

  Clyde peeked through the heavy red drapes into the private dining room. “Have you told them yet?”

  “Not yet,” I replied. “Shouldn’t you be washing dishes?”

  He bared his pointy teeth and went back to work.

  “There’s more?” Zachary asked.

  Glancing from one new ally to the other, I swallowed hard and then explained what Bradley had done with the chilled baby squirrels. I didn’t name names, but I did admit that some of our employees had been infected. “The victims should begin to transform in about a week and a half.”

  “Good Lord!” Freddy exclaimed. “Why didn’t you say something sooner?”

  “You’re kidding, right?” I exclaimed. “Think about it. Three total strangers with mysterious ties to the demonic show up just when I need them. Normal people don’t have a history with vampires. Normal people don’t think that vampires exist anymore. If I hadn’t realized last night —”

  “Quincie.” Zachary reached for Frank and turned to the October calendar, tapping where I’d circled the 11th. “It’s okay.”

  Freddy nodded, holding up a hand in surrender.

  “What matters is this,” I said in a rush. “According to Stoker, Mina’s life was saved when Dracula was destroyed. If we could hunt down Brad, his victims —”

  “Are likely still doomed to undeath and damnation, just like any of those blessed by common vampires,” Freddy said, drawing his PDA from his pocket. “It’s true that, with Dracula Prime, the transformation of his spawn — including Mina Harker — became dependent on his continued existence. However —”

  “Can we please not use the word spawn?” I muttered.

  “Yes,” Zachary agreed, shooting his friend a look.

  “Of course,” Freddy conceded. “But even though Brad might be using some Carpathian magic, he’s still a typical eternal.” At my puzzled expression, he added, “To whatever degree, Brad may have managed to co-opt those powers of the count contained in Morris’s knife. But Brad’s still Brad. Those abilities are not inherent in him. He transformed you, for example, and you’re not a Carpathian. Neither is he.”

  “Though from what you’re saying,” Zachary put in, “if Brad gets ahold of Harker’s knife, too, then he might as well be a Carpathian. He’d have all their strengths.”

  Damn. “So, there’s no hope?” I asked. “The infected are doomed?”

  “There’s always hope,” the angel assured me.

  After work, I parked The Banana on a residential street near the Pease Mansion. I’d brought the standard battle-axe that Kieren had used against the vice principal. The angel had worn his holy sword. Meanwhile, across town, Freddy was looking into the issue of Harker’s knife and how we could prevent Brad from acquiring it.

  As I locked my car door, I asked, “How does Freddy know so much about vampires?” I’d expected Zachary to be the one with all the answers.

  “Freddy was born and raised among human servants of the worldwide vamp royalty and aristocracy,” Zachary replied, coming around the convertible. “It’s a pitiable subculture, supporting truly revolting dictators. Walking away isn’t usually an option. But for most of his adult life, Freddy managed to stay on the outskirts of eternal high society. Finally, here in Austin, he’s left it completely.”

  “Except,” I said, “for playing the vampire chef every night at Sanguini’s.”

  As we started on foot through the Old Enfield neighborhood, Zachary explained, “It’s for a good cause. Freddy has always had to be something of a chameleon. Blending in, suiting others’ expectations to survive. But now, aside from the midnight toast, he has the freedom to be himself. And working with us on the side of good . . . That’s something he’s always longed to do.”

  I thought about that as we hiked in the dark to Bradley’s two-and-a-half-story 1920s home, entering the backyard through a side door in the tall wooden fence. The cops had been here already, but the angel had wanted to take a look for himself, and I’d insisted on coming along.

  With Zachary, I didn’t have to pass for human like I did with the Moraleses, with most of the world. And I didn’t have to be the one in charge, like I was at Sanguini’s and with Aimee and Clyde. Maybe I should’ve been awestruck that he was an angel, and it still caught me up short. But Mama used to say that God was always with us, and Zachary had explained that guardian angels were everywhere, all the time; it was just that they seldom showed themselves. So I kept telling to myself that the whole thing was business as usual.

  The back gate was unlocked, and a glass-paned back door offered a partial view of Brad’s kitchen. Peering in, I didn’t see any sign of activity.

  Meanwhile, my GA (AKA guardian angel) had slipped off his shirt — leaving him bare-chested in the moonlight — and wrapped it around his hand.

  Despite my devotion to Kieren, I still had eyes. I couldn’t help noticing Zachary’s shoulders, chest, abs . . . the inch-wide cherub inked into the skin over his heart. “You have a tattoo? Are you allowed to have a tattoo?”

  “It wasn’t entirely my fault,” he replied, punching through a glass pane. “There was tequila involved.”

  “Are you crazy? What if there’s an alarm?”

  “We’ll find out soon enough.” Reaching in, he opened the door.

  No alert sounded.

  “Show-off,” I whispered. “I could’ve just forced it open.”

  Inside the kitchen, I studied the Viking range, stainless-steel appliances, and the silver Colonial chandelier hanging above the marble island. I could almost imagine Bradley at the stove, sautéing porcini and veal kidneys in a veal stock reduction. That’s when I realized my hands were trembling, and I tightened them on the axe handle.

  We skulked th
rough open French doors and the empty dining room into the empty parlor. No leather club chairs, no antique clocks, no bowie knife above the mantel.

  Nothing in the sunroom or in the foyer or in the tiny restroom under the stairs or in any of the bedrooms or baths on the second floor.

  Nothing in the attic with the pitched roof or out on the south balcony.

  “He’s not here,” I whispered.

  “Aren’t I?”

  Damn. Brad might’ve kept his promise and left, physically left Austin. But what difference did it make if he could still penetrate my mind?

  Hauling the axe, I marched down to the basement door. I thundered farther down to the unfinished, windowless concrete room containing the antique iron-frame twin bed. I heard my GA following me, calling my name. But I couldn’t stop. Wouldn’t.

  I swung the blade into the rusted bed frame. “Damn.”

  I swung the blade again. “Damn him.”

  Again. “Damn him to hell!”

  Again and again, though I couldn’t feel it, not in my arms, back, shoulders.

  Though I couldn’t feel it, not in my heart or mind.

  I swung the blade until, finally, the frame was nothing but scrap metal, and then I sank to my knees on the cold, gray floor. Crying.

  I didn’t know how to be what I was now. Brad’s fault, and in some dark corner of my mind, I blamed him even more for leaving me to deal with it alone. But then again, I wasn’t alone, was I?

  Zachary reached for the axe, and I let him have it. He set it aside and knelt, wrapping me into a hug. For a second, I stiffened, not wanting to be touched. But it was such a safe and comforting embrace, like I’d skinned my knee and he was the doting big brother. Like Kieren was to Meghan.

  “I hate Brad,” I whispered, hiccupping. “I hate him. I hate losing. I lost myself.”

  “You’re not lost, Quincie,” the angel insisted. “You’re still here.”

  “I’m dead. Mama and Daddy are dead. Vaggio’s dead. Uncle D. And I’m a dead, dead thing. A dead, dead ruined thing.”

  “Quincie,” Zachary said, gently raising my chin. “Quincie, look at me. Everybody who ever loved you still loves you. Your parents still love you. Vaggio still loves you. Your grandparents, too. I promise you, kiddo: the love never goes away. You just have to give yourself permission to feel it.”

  I pulled back, blinking at him. “That’s how it works? For real?”

  “For real.” He almost smiled. “Trust me; I’ve got connections.”

  On Wednesday, I walked in on Zachary and Freddy, seated at the table in Sanguini’s break room, folding napkins into bat shapes. It was a job that Nora and Sergio typically assigned to people who were getting on their nerves.

  “We fly,” Freddy said.

  “We drive,” my GA countered. “It won’t help to get there before —”

  “We have money,” Freddy replied.

  “Not buy-a-plane money!”

  “We don’t have to buy —”

  “You want to fly commercial?” Zachary countered. “With weapons? Do you have any idea what my supervisor upstairs would say if my sword was lost in checked luggage? Especially after that last fiasco, when it was confiscated by the cops?”

  When I laughed, Freddy looked up. “Quincie, we have a working plan to beat Brad to Harker’s kukri knife, and you would be a big help —”

  “You don’t have to,” the angel put in, tossing a napkin aside.

  “But if you don’t come along,” Freddy added, “Zachary can’t either because his first duty is to you, as your guardian.” At my GA’s glare, Freddy shrugged. “It’s true.”

  “Go?” I asked, joining them at the table. “Go where?” I paused. “Oh, wait. Never mind. I’m not supposed to know, right? So Brad can’t find out through me.”

  I hated the thought of leaving Sanguini’s, especially with so many of Brad’s victims scheduled to rise in just over a week. But there was nothing we could do to stop that now. All we could hope for was to limit the powers at Brad’s disposal before he could call the baby-squirrel eaters into his service.

  “Quincie,” Zachary replied, “we can find another way, if —”

  “I’m in,” I replied.

  Sergio didn’t mind my taking some time off. “You should get out more,” he said in the manager’s office. “Young girl like you, there’s a whole world waiting.”

  More like a whole underworld. “You sound like Vaggio,” I said. “He used to always tell me not to forget that I was a teenager. What are you going to do about Freddy?” Somebody had to temporarily take his place for the midnight toast.

  “Mercedes!” Sergio exclaimed, clapping his hands together. “She’s been begging me to let her play the vampire chef, and you know, she’s so fashionable, so witty —”

  “So sultry in a Jane Russell kind of way,” I said, quoting what he always said.

  I could hardly imagine either of them in the midst of their initial blood lust. God, Mercedes had a brown belt.

  Tonight was First Thursday, which meant all the shops on South Congress would stay open late. Parking had already become nightmarish, and the ninety-something-degree heat had no effect on the already impressive foot traffic.

  Outside Sanguini’s, Nora paced around the empty lot next door. “Quincie, do you know who owns this property?”

  I shook my head. “When Uncle D decided to remodel Fat Lorenzo’s, he talked about buying it, but the budget ran dry. Why?”

  “I think it could be turned into a wonderful garden. We could grow our own vegetables. It would bring more green onto the street.”

  She wouldn’t be coming on the trip. We’d all agreed on that. But I could count on her and Sergio to take care of Mama’s restaurant while I was gone. It occurred to me, though, that staying behind might be harder, and not just emotionally. “You may be getting a frantic phone call from the Moraleses tomorrow.”

  Nora nodded. “That’s all right.”

  “Miz Morales can be —”

  “That’s all right, too.” She rested a hand on my shoulder. “Hon, I’m not promising they won’t be out of sorts when you return. But I’m not going to tell them where you’re going, both for your sake and theirs.”

  That had sounded ominous. Whoever had Harker’s knife, I somehow doubted she’d roll out the red carpet. Given Brad’s mental eavesdropping, I understood why I couldn’t know more about what lay ahead. But that didn’t make it any easier.

  Truth was, we might not make it back.

  Kieren and I used to talk every day. How strange that I could cease to exist forever, and he might never find out. God, I hoped he was okay.

  Zachary’s car had to have been the largest SUV ever manufactured. The design looked almost military, but its sparkling black paint with red racing stripes was all glitz.

  After loading up Nora’s care package, I turned to say good-bye to Clyde and Aimee.

  The Possum ran a fingertip down the hood. “Hello, Mystery Machine.”

  “We’re going with you,” Aimee announced. “Our parents think we’re spending the weekend at a youth retreat near Bastrop, sponsored by your church.”

  I was flabbergasted. “Who’ll wash the dishes?” Not my snappiest reply.

  “We found a couple of people willing to fill in at the last minute,” Clyde said.

  I marched past him to the back door of the restaurant and opened it to peer into the already frantic kitchen. “Mrs. Levy? Mr. Wu?”

  They waved from the sink.

  “If we all die,” Clyde called, “Sergio will have to hire replacements anyway.”

  Zachary drove, Freddy rode shotgun, and I sat on the first passenger bench next to Aimee, who had Clyde on her other side. So Bradley couldn’t track us, I’d offered to travel blindfolded. I felt stupid riding in the SUV that way, but he’d too often slipped into my thoughts and dreams for us to underestimate the threat.

  About three minutes out, it occurred to my GA that (a) his windows weren’t tinted and (b) d
riving with a blindfolded teenage girl in the back might look suspicious to people in passing vehicles. Consequently, Aimee and I traded places, putting me between her and the Possum.

  From the sound of the traffic, I could tell we’d gotten onto a busy highway, probably I-35. I tried not to dwell on it.

  It had been Clyde who’d realized that we couldn’t listen to the radio beyond the Austin stations’ broadcast range because the DJs and ads would clue me (and, again, possibly Brad) in on our location.

  The car, which Zachary had proudly referred to as a 1987 Impaler, had no CD or MP3 player. But Freddy had brought along his old Blondie, Pat Benatar, Billy Joel, and Pink Floyd tapes, if only for background noise.

  “When we get there,” Freddy was saying, “Quincie, and only Quincie, is going with us to retrieve the kukri knife.”

  Clyde said, “Fine by me,” as Aimee exclaimed, “No way!”

  “It’s not negotiable,” Freddy insisted. “Any argument, and we let you off at the next exit.”

  After a moment, Zachary added, “We both admire your loyalty.”

  “But,” Freddy reminded us, “there’s a possibility that, if you don’t do as we say, you could die or worse.” He paused before muttering, “Assuming we’re not arrested first for taking three minors across state lines without their parents’ permission.”

  “I’m already dying,” Aimee announced, just like that.

  “She ordered the chilled baby squirrels,” I clarified.

  “I’ve got — what?” she added. “Maybe a week left as a human being.”

  Zachary exited from the highway, explaining that he needed to speak with Aimee alone for a while, and a few minutes later, when they got out of the car, I could hear a fast-food intercom system in the background.

  Meanwhile, Freddy broke out Nora’s care package of bread sticks, pine nuts, walnuts, Italian sodas, and porcine blood.

  “No crickets?” the Possum complained.

  We talked and drove and drove and talked. Aimee’s mood had improved. She chatted about fantasy novels with Clyde and Zachary, who apparently had the reading tastes of a teenage girl. We all gossiped about people at Sanguini’s, and Freddy pitched the intriguing idea of opening a catering branch.