Bloodlust

by Kramer, D. L.

  “A dozen to help you keep fifty or more in line?” I asked him.

  “I pair them off,” he shrugged, as if it should have been obvious. “The two you killed were a pair.”

  “They were incompetent,” I told him. “I killed them both in less than five minutes.” I didn’t mention that neither one was near two years into an infection.

  He sighed. “I suppose it’s to be expected,” he nodded. “Some grasp the ideas behind it better than others.”

  I nodded my agreement.

  “I’m hoping you can help me with that,” he said. “Like your friend, the detective. They need someone to give them advice, help them understand what’s happening to them.”

  “You’d be better at that than me,” I told him. “You’ve been doing this longer.”

  He seemed to consider that. “But there’s something about you,” he pointed out. “They’ll listen to you. They see me as someone giving them power and leading them to a new life, but not necessarily as someone who can show them everything this can give them.”

  It was old and it was powerful. And none of them would ever have it, because it wasn’t within Aleksander.

  “You want me to lie to them,” I realized. “Make them think they’ll be like me someday.”

  “Now I’d never ask you to lie--” Aleksander admonished me, then paused when I tilted my head to look at him, my expression saying everything. “All right, you know me well enough to know I would.” He chuckled. “You’ve known me too long, Mikhos.”

  “I would definitely agree with that,” I nodded to him, picking up my glass and taking another drink.

  “Don’t lie if you’re not comfortable with it,” he said. “But you could perhaps not tell them the whole truth?”

  “You know better than to ask me that,” I told him. I could feel my patience growing thin. I really didn’t want to sit here all night and listen to his posturing. “What about this meeting tomorrow night?”

  “Ah, yes,” he stood and went to refill his glass. “I’ll have most everyone there,” he said. “It’s almost time to move on, so I’ll be choosing who will be infected next and announcing to those who already have where we’ll be going next.”

  “And that is--?”

  “I was thinking I’d head south a bit, then continue west. I really sort of play it day by day, test areas, you know.”

  “Like Berlin,” I noted.

  He paused, then smiled. “Exactly!” he said, pointing at me for emphasis. “I was afraid you’d forgotten that.”

  “I’ve tried,” I told him honestly. “It’s kind of hard when it involved crawling through muck and slime to escape.”

  He chuckled and nodded. “But we did escape.”

  “Hopefully this time won’t involve angry mobs.” No, just three of us angry enough to kill him.

  Aleksander turned when someone knocked on the door. I saw him test the air. I picked up scents as well, but didn’t recognize any of them. One was someone infected, though, which drew my attention.

  “Ah, excuse me for a moment,” he said. He set his glass down and walked to the door. Opening it, he spoke quietly with someone in the hall, then opened the door and let them in. A rough looking young woman came in, leading two younger girls in maybe their late teens into the room. I could tell immediately the two girls were under the influence of something. Their heart rates were considerably slower than normal and their eyes had a distant look to them. The woman who led them was in her mid twenties and had obviously been infected some time before. She was somewhat heavyset and wore a faded plaid shirt and heavy jeans. Assorted tattoos covered the backs of her hands and disappeared up under her sleeves only to reappear back on her neck. Her hair was a dirty blonde and hung past her shoulders in stringy strands. Her skin was an unhealthy yellow, darker than most. Her eyes shifted to me and I felt her pull back some and make a conscientious effort not to stare at my scars.

  But I wasn’t the monster.

  “Mikhos, this is Trina,” he introduced the woman to me. “She’s one who’s been with me for a couple of years now--and is actually the one who introduced me to Gianna.”

  I stood and nodded to her, but didn’t say anything. She returned the nod and seemed relieved she wasn’t going to have to speak to me.

  “Mikhos is an old friend who’s joining our cause,” Aleksander told her. “His orders are to be obeyed as my own.”

  “I’ll pass word along,” she said. Her voice was deceptively feminine against her rough look as she glanced at me again. “Were these two going to be enough, or will you want more later?”

  Aleksander came behind one of the girls and paused to sniff her hair. He then reached over and ran his fingers through the other one’s dark hair. The second one pulled away a bit, obviously not as under the affect of the drugs as the first one.

  “These two will do just fine,” he said, smiling almost to himself. “Tell everyone to be ready for tomorrow night.” He leaned against the one, sniffing her hair again.

  I bit back my growl. I had a good idea of what he had planned for them. I’d been around him enough in the past. If their families were lucky, they’d find enough to bury when he was done with them. I flexed my fingers, feeling my claws and having to force myself not to extend them and attack him now.

  Trina nodded to him, then left the room, closing the door firmly behind her.

  “Now don’t look at me like that,” Aleksander admonished me. “I’m not going to kill them.” He sniffed the first one’s hair again. “But I am going to enjoy them.”

  “I’ve had enough for tonight,” I finally said, not bothering to hide the growl in my voice. “I’ll have no part in this.” I picked up my hat and coat and pulled them on, not quite disguising my disgust with him in my movements.

  “I suppose that’s your choice,” Aleksander sighed. “But you know how weak I am when confronted with the fairer sex.” He gave me a meaningful look as he sniffed the one girl’s hair again. She swayed slightly and I doubted she even realized where she was.

  I walked to the balcony and paused, looking back at him. I pointed at him, a single claw extending fully from that finger.

  “They’re both alive the next time I see you, or I’ll kill you,” I told him bluntly. I didn’t bother telling him I planned on killing him anyway.

  I retracted my claw and turned to leave before he could respond. I felt the sudden jump in his heartbeat, however, as well as the sharp intake of breath.

  I wasn’t the monster.

  And I had the power within me to stop him.

  Chapter Twenty

  Fate and Reason

  My fingers burned. If they weren’t burning, they were stinging with a dozen needle points at each tip.

  I left Aleksander’s and went back to my studio. Exhausted, angry and frustrated. Part of my mind nagged at me that I should have stayed and protected the girls. But I knew it would have been pointless right now. It would have only led to another fight and one or both of them would have been killed.

  Hopefully my warning was enough to keep him from killing them when he was finished with them.

  And this Trina apparently had the role of finding and bringing him girls to entertain himself with.

  I’d have to make sure she was dead, too.

  I found myself pacing at my studio. My coat and hat tossed carelessly on the table, Rachmaninoff playing in the background, the notes sounding angry and forced to me instead of their usual flow.

  I was exhausted. It had been a long day and a lot had happened. I switched off the music and showered, then made myself go to bed. Even if for just a few hours, I needed sleep.

  I fell asleep fairly quickly, but it was far from restful. I kept dreaming of fire licking at my fingertips when I tried to paint. Bright orange, red and yellow singed me, turning my skin black and blistered. Until I looked closer and saw my fingers were normal again. As soon as I tried to go back to painting, the flames would return.

  I threw down my palette
and brush in frustration, then extended my claws, intending to shred the skin from my own fingertips. But my claws were different. No longer marbled yellow and white, they were now an oily black and green. Dark, hard and longer than usual.

  And they burned. The flames from my fingertips ran down the outer curve of my claws, dripping off the points like molten steel. I looked to where the drops fell, but instead of smoldering spots on my floor, there were…roses. I looked at my painting, the rose bushes now empty of every single flower. I looked back to the floor, seeing my minute brush strokes in each rose that lay there.

  White, red, yellow, pink, all the roses were there.

  Roses. Roses.

  Rosie.

  I bolted up in my bed, my heart racing and head pounding. Rosie. Rosie was in danger.

  I jumped from the bed, pausing only a second to get clean clothes from the wardrobe and glance at the clock.

  I’d been asleep nearly six hours. It was still early morning, several hours before Rosie would be opening the shop.

  Wait.

  I stopped. I’d been dreaming. My mind raced back through the images in my head, the flames, my painting.

  But I had been dreaming. After so many decades, I had been dreaming.

  I forced myself to take a long, deep breath. Tossing my clothes on the bed, I looked at my hands. My right hand scarred and thicker than my left from the burns. My left hand also scarred, but only from Jozef’s bite.

  And they burned. Each fingertip still burned. Like someone had shoved a tiny coal into each slit for my claws.

  I extended my claws slowly. Still yellow and white.

  Wait.

  One claw. I had pointed one claw at Aleksander last night.

  You have to accept it to fine tune it.

  Watching my right hand, I slowly retracted my claws. First the thumb, then the index and so on. Each one separately.

  I wasn’t the monster.

  I extended each one again. Something inside of me felt stronger, more powerful. Like I’d suddenly found a burst of energy.

  Rosie.

  My dream came back to me and while my conscious mind told me it had just been a dream, I had to make sure. I grabbed my clothes and dressed as I hurried across the studio. I picked up the phone and quickly dialed the shop. It rang, but no answer.

  No surprise there, the phone was downstairs and couldn’t be heard upstairs if the doors were closed. And it was still early.

  Marcella would be awake and she’d hear it, though.

  But she never answered the phone. She didn’t like them, so she refused to use it.

  Growling a number of curses, I grabbed my coat and hat and hurried out the door, then half-ran to the roof access.

  The hundred and forty six buildings between my studio and her shop flew by. I took the most direct route, only landing on some buildings for four or five steps before I was jumping to the next.

  I don’t know how long it took me, but it was longer than I wanted it to. I couldn’t shake the grip on my spine that Rosie was in terrible danger.

  The shop was closed. I could see it before I got there. The door was closed and locked, the lights out. No scent of fresh incense yet. I ran to the back of the building where Marcella’s rooms were and jumped up onto the window ledge, banging on the side of the window with my fist. The curtain pulled back almost immediately and Marcella opened the window, her eyes telling me my appearance had startled her.

  “Where’s Rosie?” I asked, easily jumping inside the room. Marcella often came and went through her windows, so they were more than large enough to accommodate me.

  “She went to get her things,” Marcella replied, her expression picking up my alarm. “What is it, Mikhos?”

  I forced myself to take a deep breath and steady myself as I pulled off my hat. “Did she go with someone?” I asked. “The police, like Rasmussen suggested?”

  Marcella nodded. “They picked her up about an hour ago. Nicholas called late last night and said he needed to leave town this morning so she had to come over early. She called Rasmussen and he arranged for someone to come get her.” She studied my face. “What is it?” she asked again, her tone more demanding.

  “I think she’s in danger,” I said. “I had a dream last night. Roses—Rosie—burning—claws--” The images jumbled together in my head. I turned to look at Marcella as she immediately pulled her hair back and tied it out of her way.

  “You dreamed this?” she asked me.

  “Yes.” I forced my mind to focus. “Let me call Rasmussen, maybe he can get a hold of the officers who went with her.”

  Marcella nodded. “Jozef went to look around that warehouse for Aleksander. I’ll go to the house.”

  “I’ll be right behind you,” I told her, heading for the door to go downstairs to the shop. I dug through my coat pocket for Rasmussen’s card he’d given me, taking the stairs four at a time. I reached over the counter for the phone, then dialed his number. It rang several times, but no answer.

  Damn it.

  I tried one more time, then slammed down the phone and hit the stairs running. Marcella was gone by the time I got back upstairs.

  I could follow her scent easily and did. Rosie and Nicholas had shared a small house not far from the shop. It only took me a few minutes to get there. I found Marcella in the alley across the street, staring at the house.

  “You smell them?” she asked me, her tone tense, angry.

  I paused to test the air. Three of them. All infected. And Rosie’s scent. I sorted the scents again. Trina. My stomach sank the same time the rest of my insides knotted.

  “Aleksander has her,” I said. “I recognize one of the scents from one of his people.”

  Marcella growled, low and deep in her throat. I saw her claws extend to their full length. Did they follow her there? Had Nicholas somehow betrayed her? My head pounded from the whirlwind of questions and possibilities.

  Marcella’s eyes pinned on the door as she growled again, then stepped from the alley and walked directly over to the house. I stayed with her, just in case there were others still lurking around.

  I certainly wasn’t going to try to stop her.

  She didn’t bother knocking, but instead shoved hard against the door, pushing it entirely off its hinges and several feet back into the entryway. I heard a startled yell from further in the house and recognized Nicholas’ voice. Marcella heard it to and turned directly for it.

  Nicholas was in the bedroom, hurriedly packing a large suitcase when Marcella found him. He saw her coming and panicked, swearing and trying to run away. She moved with lightning speed, charging him and knocking him over. They rolled several times before she jumped up and grabbed him by the throat, sinking her claws deeply into his neck and slamming his back into the wall.

  “Where is she?” Marcella growled, her voice low and dangerous. Even I wouldn’t argue with her if she ever used that tone with me.

  Nicholas squirmed, gasping and trying to scream. Marcella tightened her fingers on his throat and I saw her give a slight flex to her fingertips. “I—I don’t know!” he managed, his voice coming out something of a squeak.

  “I think you’re lying,” Marcella growled. “You called her, she came here and now she’s gone. Where is she?” She brought her knee up hard between his legs, then slashed across his stomach with her other hand. Nicholas squealed and groaned and I could see he was close to passing out from the pain.

  I didn’t feel the least bit sorry for him.

  “I suggest you tell her,” I told him. “Or she’ll just make it worse.”

  Nicholas looked at me and I felt the absolute terror go through him. Good.

  “The—they came last night, said they needed to talk to her,” he managed, his voice strangled under Marcella’s grip on his throat. “They were waiting for her this morning.”

  Marcella didn’t give him a chance to say anything else. She let loose something between a growl and a shriek. With one quick movement, she tore her cla
ws through his neck the same time her other hand ripped into his chest. I wasn’t sure if his head hit the ground before she ripped his heart out or not. Either way, he was dead before he hit the floor.

  Marcella growled again, low and deep, straight from the pit of her stomach as her hand closed on the still-pulsing heart in her hand, crushing it. She dropped it onto Nicholas’ still form, then spit on him.

  “Where would he take her?” she asked finally, turning to look at me. I could see the fury in her eyes and feel it raging through her body.

  Aleksander had just made the biggest mistake of his life.

  I had no answer for her. “Possibly the warehouse,” I said. “Or the hotel he’s staying in.”

  “I’ll go to the warehouse,” she said, turning to leave the room, then the house. “Check his hotel. Find Rasmussen.” Without another word she was gone, disappearing down the alley once more, then up onto a rooftop.

  This was interesting, apparently she could be so enraged she completely skipped right over Italian and went back to English.

  I turned in the opposite direction, racing to Aleksander’s hotel. I made it there quickly, the images from my dream still prominent in my mind. I searched the area, but found no sign of Rosie’s scent. Wherever he’d taken her, it wasn’t here.

  Next was Rasmussen. I didn’t have his address and running around looking for his scent would take too much time. Where was it he said he’d had a place? I sifted through my memories as I paced around the roof. A dive on the west side. Maybe I could pick up his scent there.

  I worked my way west, heading for the poorer part of the city there. I moved in a zig-zagging pattern, looking for Rasmussen’s scent. After what seemed like forever, I found it, leading straight to a run down apartment building at the end of the block.

  I made my way over to it, not bothering to care who saw me or their reaction. Inside, I checked the mailboxes, finding his name on one for the third floor.

  I took the stairs in large leaps, pretty much as far as my legs could reach. On the third floor, I found his apartment almost immediately. I paused before I knocked, testing the air. He was there and no one else seemed to be. I banged on the door, hoping my urgency would be felt in the sound.