He moved his body to reveal broken shards of plastic; they were probably from a fractured sleigh or snowboard. It didn’t matter: they were perfect.
‘I’ve got some string in my bag. Come on, bring them here,’ I said. He moved quickly, though cautiously. Soon, he was at my side.
He wasn’t even breathing hard, even after having hiked through dense snow and climbed up a mountain. It revealed just how physically superior he was to me.
‘Have you ever actually made these?’ he asked.
‘No, but I know the theory.’
‘Don’t we all.’
We got to work. First, Eirik broke some of the larger pieces into things we could actually use. I told him to be careful: if he broke them too suddenly, they would form sharp edges. The last thing I wanted was to have myself cut by my own boots. He followed my suggestion. The pieces were designed to withstand high impact collisions with ice, the kind experienced by advanced snowboarders when going down steep slopes. There was a lot of engineering gone into that material.
Eirik broke them like twigs. I could clearly see he was restraining himself; there was no question of whether he could put more force in, if he wanted to.
‘That’s boss! How strong are you?’ I asked, more than a little bit impressed.
‘Let’s just say that I could easily toss around a couple of wrestlers if I wanted to.’
I whistled.
‘Could you lift up a car?’
‘I don’t know. I’ve never tried.’
Forcing my mind off Eirik, I concentrated on making something usable out of these things. The string I was using was a synthetic fibre, designed to hold up mountain climbers if something went wrong. Hopefully, it would withstand the test of time.
We worked there for several moments, the vampire and the human, building snowboots.
With my basic skill and Eirik’s more prodigious strength, it didn’t take us very long. Soon, we had snowboots: black and dull, with ugly multicoloured string around it. Hideous as they may be, they would do the job.
There was a break in the clouds. A few brief rays of sunshine illuminated the mountain in all its sparkling glory. I looked at my reflection in a frozen stream next to us.
The face that stared back at me was blond haired, with forest green eyes. I was normally pretty alright-looking, if a bit boyish, but the man in the reflection looked worn and tired. Less fashion model, more beleaguered soldier. Eirik, by comparison, was the picture of vampire elegance: strong, pale, and full of otherwordly good looks.
Then darkness fell again, and the image disappeared.
I sighed.
‘I wonder what your room mate will think of you when he sees you like this. He’d probably think you were in some kind of warzone,’ he asked.
‘Ha. More likely, he’d think I got drunk, then stuck in a ditch.’
We laughed at that.
***
For a while, we were able to enjoy what was around us. The snowboots also made the going a lot easier.
We saw hares, ox and several different types of birds: eagles, falcons, black birds and even an owl. Its eyes—a pale, iridescent gold—blinked in the filtered light of day. It looked at us, and blinked, before flying away, deeper into the forest.
Norway deserved its reputation: this was a landscape of primeval beauty, of tall rocky peaks and deep, ancient forests. We crossed several mountain streams, all frozen solid, mid-motion, as if nature were in some enchanted sleep.
Despite this, the weather was in no mood for sightseeing. The wind had picked up again, and it was cold. My clothes were relatively thin, because I dressed for a warm winter’s day, not for a blizzard. Dressing for the weather might be good Norwegian advice, but how are you supposed to do it when the weather is so unpredictable?
Thankfully, the constant exercise kept me warm. Eirik, despite being clothed much more lightly then me, hardly seemed to notice. His bare arms were full of colour and vitality, even though I felt my own would freeze.
I shivered, and Eirik put one arm around me.
‘Proud Peter. You’re next to living furnace, and yet you still insist on walking alone.’
‘Isn’t it strange that you run so hot?’
‘Why? Did you think we were some undead creatures that were afraid of mirrors and lived in coffins?’
I laughed at the absurdity of the stereotype.
‘But no, my questions are from a biological perspective,’ I continued.
‘Go on.’
‘Well, surely running at such a high temperature would require a lot of energy?’
‘Well, yes.’
‘But that would also mean you would need to find more food. Is the advantage of withstanding low temperatures and having a physical advantage over your peers really worth the cost, especially if you happened to live, in, I don’t know, Eastern Africa?’
‘Humans may have evolved in eastern Africa, but there’s no reason to say we did.’
‘You mean to say that you could have begun somewhere in the north?’
‘Quite possibly. After all, humans were nearly wiped out in an Ice Age. Neanderthals colonised northern Europe well before homo sapiens migrated out of Africa. Perhaps out relationship to humans wasn’t simply predatorship—maybe it was also symbiotic.’
I thought about his argument carefully. I had learned that an ice age had once brought down the human population to a mere few thousand; it was remarkable to consider how that might have affected human evolution.
‘But isn’t it odd that vampires cannot survive purely off animal blood?’
‘Not necessarily. We could have started out on animal blood, and then evolved to consume the human variant. That’s the thing with evolution—it’s expensive to maintain a trait, and once it’s gone, it stays gone. Mammals don’t have gills anymore, and penguins don’t fly. Vampires could have lived known to the human population. We might have had donors, and in exchange, we could have provided protection, and hunted…’
It struck me how similar our own situation was to that. Eirik caught on too.
‘Yes, that is a rather… cold observation.’
‘I wonder what a biologist would think. They’d go crazy if they knew you existed.’
Eirik laughed.
‘They might learn some new things about blood.’
‘Quite a few things, I’d imagine.’
But this reminded me of my own hunger. Eirik noticed too.
‘We’ve still got some of the meat from that ox—even though we could carry only a portion of the kill.’
It had angered me when Eirik told me that. If we had to kill things, why not make full use of them? But Eirik had convinced me that even with his strength, we would be too bogged down to carry all the meat. Besides, the scavengers would be sure to appreciate it.
Eirik continued:
‘But look at these trees. Pines are good—their needles can be used to make tea, and they possess a resin within their trunks that is sweet and good to eat.’
So, not having any better suggestions, we made shelter and started our new fire.
***
I relaxed. Our new shelter was built on a depression in the ground; it allowed me to put my legs up, as if in an enormous hammock. We had built a small fire, as we didn’t have nearly enough wood for a bigger one. Plus, the shelter did a good job of keeping what heat there was inside.
We began talking about how we had gotten in this situation, and what we would do to get out of it.
‘I wish I’d been more cautious, better prepared, like you are,’ I began.
‘I wish NRK had more accurate reporting,’ Eirik replied.
‘Well, that too. I guess there’s not much we could have done about it, in the end.’
‘We still have to find a way to get out of here, you know.’
‘I still don’t understand what’s going on. We were gone for only a few hours, yet we’ve been travelling for days. What gives?’
‘Well, for one, we had a path to
follow. And there was far less snow. When you have to wade through metres and metres of snow, and when you’re sometimes going around in circles… well, it obviously makes the going much harder.’
Eirik decided to steer the conversation away from this.
‘Anyway, I’m sure we will find our way out. In the meantime, why don’t you tell me a little bit more about yourself? Do you have any particular beliefs?’
‘With the way the weather has been turned against us, and the fact that I discovered my best friend is a vampire… well, I’ve become a little more open-minded.’
‘How so?’
‘I don’t snigger every time someone tells me a ghost story, for example. And when a new age expert comes on-screen, I’m not quite so contemptuous.’
‘They are still crackpots, you know.’
I chuckle with dark humour.
‘Maybe. But I feel that we live through life without really understanding it; that we simply follow the path of least resistance, like electricity. I could have gone to a university in the UK, but I made a conscious decision to change my life, and come here.’
Eirik listened to me thoughtfully,
‘I know where you’re coming from—to me, humans seem superficial, short-lived, and obsessed with their own self-advancement. And by the way, I’m glad you came here.’
I smiled; I was glad too.
‘Have you ever told anyone—human, that is—what you are?’
‘No.’
‘Were you planning on… telling me?’
Eirik sighed, and settled himself in a more comfortable position.
‘Maybe. Eventually.’
I didn’t know what to think of that. On one side, I was offended that my friend didn’t think highly enough of me to tell me what he is. One the other, I could understand why he would want to keep everything under wraps, and the risk of entrusting me with his secret.
‘Does it feel lonely sometimes? Being with humans all the time? Especially students who are years younger than you?’
‘Sometimes, yes. But there is a vampire community, and it’s not like I feel the urge to tell everyone. I had a harder time getting to grips with my sexuality.’
He relaxed, ready to go to sleep.
‘That’s sad,’ I said.
‘There are many sad things in the world, Peter. Vampires are not one of them.’
‘No—I mean, that it was harder to come out as bisexual than it is to keep vampirisim a secret.’
‘Humans mistrust what is different; they do not understand what it means to be different. And what humans do not understand, they destroy.’
His words made me shiver, and not because of the cold. I watched as he closed his eyes, relaxing gradually into sleep. While he slept, I pondered our fate. Eirik had not shown the classic signs of hunger—yet. He told me how to recognise them: the excessive paleness, the twitchiness, the bloodshot eyes.
But I knew it was only a matter of time. I saw how he stopped drinking from the ox, the faint grimace of disgust as he turned away. The animal blood had not fed him much.
Eirik needed human blood; I needed Eirik. I would either have to willingly donate, or else only one of us would come out of this alive.
Chapter Five: Blod
Golden rays of light stabbed at my eyes, waking me from my slumber. I stretched in a way that would make a cat proud. With a meow, I spotted Eirik—who was already awake, naturally. Vampires were morning birds, he once told me.
‘I didn’t know you were such a fan of cats,’ he said, humour tingeing his voice.
‘I’m not really. It just seemed appropriate for the circumstances.’
Eirik shook his head in bewilderment.
‘Come on, we should get going.’
‘How early is it, anyway?’ I asked, shivering.
‘My watch shows eight o’clock.’
‘P.M?’ I asked hopefully.
‘Sure. It’s the middle of the god-damned night right now.’
We laughed as we prepared to move ahead. Laziness was my middle name, and I often experienced difficulty waking up so early in the morning—the fact that it tended to be so damn cold certainly didn’t help. I often wondered if I should have tried finding a warmer climate to live in.
But in fairness, I doubt many countries could compete with beauty such as this. The snow, having been frozen, compacted and then re-molten several times, shone with effervescent crystals. Despite the shade of the nearby forest, I still had to shield my eyes; the sun was incredibly bright.
I was glad. Although I could still see some clouds, the weather was improving—the storm would soon be just a bad memory, ready to be forgotten. It made me inappropriately optimistic about our chances.
I looked at my boots, a sigh of frustration escaping my lips as I saw the state they were in: bedraggled, worn and discoloured. I would have to get new ones when I got back. If I got back.
Eirik interrupted my morbid thoughts.
‘Peter, you have told me little about yourself.’
‘There is not much to say.’
‘Of course there is. Kom, fortell meg om familien din.’
I smiled, noticing the fact that he was testing my Norwegian.
‘Me and my family lived in North West England, as you already know. Both my parents are middle class; my dad’s a teacher—he teaches Physics—and mum’s a nurse.’
‘I guess you’ve inherited her sense of empathy as well as your father’s love of physics.’
‘I hope so. In fact, I considered taking medicine at uni—it was possible, with my A-levels.’
‘What stopped you?’
‘A number of different reasons, really. Being a doctor or even a nurse is a highly stressful job, and requires calmness under pressure—not something I have. Besides, electrical engineering is much more interesting. Medicine is largely the rote memorisation of bodily functions.’
Eirik’s expression turned wistful.
‘I have to say, I do have trouble seeing you working in a hospital. All those people suffering, some of them not making it… it would really wear away at your easy-going personality. I wouldn’t want that of you.’
‘Vampires don’t work in hospitals either, do they?’
He quirks his mouth, almost in a smile, but not quite.
‘Very few of us do—the risk of discovery is greater and...’
‘There’s the blood.’
He gulped, his eyes turning away from my own.
‘There is that. But some vampires do chose to be doctors, even if it’s rare.’
‘Really?’
‘We are capable of empathy; of understanding pain and mortality and loss.’
‘But don’t vampires live forever?’
He scoffed at that. ‘We can live a long time, but no one lives forever.’
Conversation ceased after that. We were tired, really: hiking through the wilderness was hard work. If not for the snowboots, I would have given up of exhaustion. My stomach felt emptier than a rat-infested larder, and my muscles were sore. A pleasant hike through the marka is one thing—but this was something else.
Despite this, I could see why hiking was a national sport in this country. I couldn’t hear any cars, nor horns or ringing mobiles. The only sound disturbing the tranquil landscape was the occasional chirping of a bird or rustle of a breeze. The quiet weighed on my mind, calming me, relaxing me.
It was true that the modern world screwed with your emotions. So much of my life was spent busy worrying about grades, girls and bullshit, that I forgot about the good things in life. I forgot the simple pleasure of walking; of watching mountains blur into fjords and forests. I forgot the feel of the cold air in my lungs, the peppermint smell of pine.
‘Enjoying the view?’ Eirik asked.
‘Hmm?’
‘You’re looking very attentively around you.’
‘Yeah, well… did I mention how boring Britain was?’
This made him laugh.
‘It’s all rain and
grey,’ I continued. ‘I know of a place where the sand is brown, the river is brown and the sky is… also brown.’
‘That sounds depressing.’
‘It’s not all bad—I still miss my friends, especially when we went on trips to the Trafford Centre.’
‘The what?’
‘A huge shopping centre—one of the biggest in Europe.’
He did not seem very impressed. ‘That sounds a bit trivial.’
‘The people are great,’ I pointed out. ‘Plus the city has an old-school, industrial charm to it.’
‘The vampires who lived through the 19th century don’t use “industrial” as a positive description.’
‘It wasn’t a great time for human health, that’s true. But it is our heritage; and time can transform ugliness into beauty.’
He smiled. ‘How poetic.’
We fell into an easy silence, and we continued on our way. We passed a frozen stream: it was a small thing, winding its way through the green forest that surrounded it. Pinpricks of light escaped through the canopy, illuminating it in shining colour. A guide on our treacherous path.
We eventually came out of the forest, coming back to the rocky slopes of the dovrefjell mountains. Ice had stuck on their peaks, and they gleamed brilliantly. Looking carefully at them, I saw tiny fractures; they undoubtedly posed the threat of avalanche to any of the brave hikers who dared climb them.
Eventually though, good things came to an end. The sun, a beacon of hope in a landscape of desperation, was drowned by its evil sisters, the clouds. The wind picked up again, returning back to its old cruelty. The air carried with it the electric taste of an oncoming storm.
It was at that point that an old enemy met with us.
***
Eirik’s curse was a growl as he broke a tree.
I watched, a bit scared, as another tree—a great elm this time, easily capable of providing wood for an entire house—broke under his punches. It collapsed with a WHACK!, and I made sure to stay away from it.
‘Fuck it. Fuck the god-damn fucking map, the fucking compass and the fucking mountains!’
There was a good reason why he was doing this. In front of us, like some cut-off puppet mocking its master, was the abandoned ski-lift. The same stunted parapets; the same twisted lines; the same nail-biting frustration.
The Vampire Eirik Page 3
