by Nancy Warren
Was he telling the truth? How would I know? “Congestive heart failure,” I repeated. “You’re certain that’s what she died of.”
“Of course,” he said, but he looked down at his clasped hands as he said it.
“Did you see any signs of struggle, or an animal attack on my grandmother?”
He looked at me strangely. “An animal attack? In Oxford?”
“I thought perhaps a dog had bitten her.”
He was looking at me as though I needed urgent medical treatment, so I said, “My grandmother was frightened of dogs. She’d been bitten as a young girl. I wondered if she’d had a run-in with a dog. That would have terrified her.”
“I see. Yes. A shock like that could have precipitated her final heart attack. But no. I’m not aware of any attack.” He leaned forward, his elbows on the desk, “Your grandmother lived a good, long life, ran a successful small business, and was very proud of her family. She had great friends and was a pillar of our community. She died, as we’d all like to, peacefully in her sleep.”
Had she, though? Then why was she wandering around her shop with bite marks on her neck? “I wish I’d been here.” I so very much wished I’d come straight to Oxford instead of visiting my parents first.
He nodded. “Of course you do. But we all have to go sometime, my dear, and the truth is there’s never a convenient time.”
He pushed a button on the computer and a copy of the MCCD emerged from his printer.
He collected the printout and handed it to me. He didn’t sit down again, a clear invitation to me to remove myself from his office. I rose, but said, “I do have another question. Who was the next of kin?” I’d done a bit of Google research and discovered that in the UK the MCCD is given to the next of kin who then takes the form to the registry office to register the death. Without that step, my grandmother couldn’t have been buried. My mother and I had both been unreachable.
Who, then, had made the funeral arrangements?
“Let me consult my notes.” He went back around his desk and typed rapidly on his keyboard. “Ah, yes. As both you and your mother were out of the country and couldn’t be reached, Agnes’s niece, I suppose she’d be your cousin, took care of the details.”
Agnes’s niece? As far as I knew, Agnes didn’t have a sister, so how could she have a niece? “Do you have her contact details?” I asked. Who was this supposed cousin? “I’d like to get in touch with her.”
He looked surprised, as though I ought to know how to reach my own cousin. “Yes, I’ve got her address here somewhere.” This time, he didn’t touch the computer, but opened one of the drawers in the desk and retrieved a notebook. He flicked back a few pages and said, “Violet Weeks. Here we are. I’ll write down the details for you, shall I?”
“Yes, please.”
He wrote in a small, neat hand onto a prescription pad, then passed me the paper. “Thanks,” I said. Violet Weeks lived in a place called Moreton-Under-Wychwood. On most days I’d have been charmed by the name of the village, but at that moment I simply felt numb.
The further I looked into my grandmother’s death, the stranger it began to appear. Not only was my dead grandmother appearing out of the woodwork, but relatives I’d never known about seemed to be doing the same. I took the paper and prepared to leave. Then I turned, and asked him my final question. “Was my grandmother cremated or was she buried?”
He seemed to ponder the question. “Buried, I think.”
“Do you have any idea where?”
“I’m sorry. I can’t help you any more. Your cousin will have that information.”
“I hope someone does. I can’t find anything online. No obituary was published in the local paper, there’s no record of her funeral. I find that very strange.”
“I believe it was a very small, private service, with only a few mourners in attendance. Perhaps because you and your mother were unavailable, your cousin felt it would be inappropriate to publish details about your grandmother’s passing.”
Perhaps, but it still smelled fishy to me—as did this whole situation.
I thanked him and as I left, a group of three college-aged kids entered holding printed forms. They saw me and said, “We’re here about the notice.” One waved it in front of me. “For the blood bank?”
“I don’t work here,” I said, and from behind me, Dr. Weaver said, “Yes, this is the place. Come in and have a seat.” As they settled themselves on the comfortable loungers, he said, “And who already knows their blood type?”
I LEFT with more questions than when I’d arrived. If my grandmother had suffered from congestive heart failure, why had she never told anyone? And how did I have cousins I’d never heard of?
More to the point, if my grandmother had died of congestive heart failure, as the doctor had written on this form in my hand, then what was she doing wandering around the knitting shop in the middle of the day? And what was all this about vampires? I knew one thing, at ten o’clock that night, I was going to be down in that shop.
CARDINAL WOOLSEY’S was usually welcoming. It was a tiny little corner of the world that was as timeless as knitting itself. The atmosphere was normally cheerful, cozy, and inviting. However, at a few minutes before ten that night, as I crept down the stairs wondering what I would do if I found the shop full of ghouls, Cardinal Woolsey’s was none of those things. Frankly, I was terrified.
Nyx had watched me with green-gold eyes unblinking and her black tail twitching, as I made my preparations. I didn’t want to come across as aggressive and confrontational if I was about to meet a nest of vampires, so I tucked the silver necklace into my T-shirt neck and slipped a cardigan over top so the large silver cross wouldn’t show. That was the easy item to disguise.
The crucifix, garlic, and holy water were a little more tricky. I tried putting the crucifix in one pocket and the garlic in the other but it made the cardigan very lumpy. Also, it weighed down the two sides so it was clear that I had heavy things in each pocket.
I ended up loading the items in my handbag, hoping that if I needed to I’d be able to reach them quickly. Mostly, I hoped I wouldn’t need them at all. I’d get down there and find the shop dark and quiet and realize I had suffered some sort of hallucination.
The only thing I carried in my hands was a ball of bright pink knitting wool through which I had stuck the sharpened wooden knitting needles. Unless you looked carefully, they appeared harmless. It seemed reasonable that a person who had just inherited a knitting shop might wander around at night carrying a ball of wool and knitting needles.
As much as I wanted Nyx to come with me for the company, I had no idea whether vampires ate kittens. Did they? You never saw that in horror movies. I decided to leave her behind, but Nyx had a mind of her own and followed me. I took her back up and shut her into the flat, but she howled piteously.
With an irritated sigh, I returned again. This time, I put her out the window and shut it on her. She glared at me through the glass and then, turning her back pointedly, stalked along the ledge and jumped to the nearby tree.
Once more, I made my way downstairs to the shop. “Well,” I said aloud, as I reached the door, “here we go.”
I pushed open the door and walked into the knitting shop. Everything was quiet and still. I could barely make out the shapes of the baskets sitting quietly on the shelves. There was no noise, no sign of vampires; just the faintest smell of sheep’s wool and the light fragrance I would always associate with my grandmother. I checked my cell phone for the time. Yes, I brought my cell phone, thinking I could always call the police if I had to.
I heard tapping at the shop door and, with my heart pounding and one hand in my handbag, opened it a crack. In ran Nyx.
After letting out a squeak of relief, that it wasn’t a bloodthirsty vampire, I picked up the cat. She clearly wanted to be with me and her small, warm, body was a comfort. I decided to let her stay.
There was no one in the store, anyway. However, I couldn’t turn
around and run back to bed until I had checked the back room where Gran ran her classes. I headed toward the dark curtain that led into the back and paused feeling a chill run up my arm. Nyx’s ears twitched.
There was no point standing out here, I had to know. I pulled the black curtain aside and the sight that met my eye was so extraordinary I almost fainted.
There were about a dozen knitters busily, and quietly, at work. The first thing I noticed? They didn’t have pointed, bloodstained fangs, or black hair greased back in a widow’s peak. They looked like normal people, though admittedly they were all rather pale. They sat in a circle and every single one of them, but one, was knitting.
My grandmother sat in the middle of them, her expression intent, fingers busy, needles taking a loop of wool from one needle to the next in a way that was so achingly familiar it made my heart hurt. The woman who looked like a movie star, Sylvia, sat beside her, knitting black leggings I think, or else a sweater for someone with extremely long arms. Rafe wasn’t knitting, and he wasn’t sitting down. He stood apart and I could tell he’d been watching for me.
He seemed almost angry to see me. “She’s here.” No greeting, no explanation. My grandmother glanced up and her beautiful smile lit up her face as it always did when she saw me. “Lucy. I’m so happy to see you again.”
“I’m happy to see you, too.” Though I have to admit I would have preferred her not to be dead.
Nyx struggled and, since none of the vampires seemed remotely interested in her, I put the cat down. She trod daintily forward on her skinny black legs straight up to my grandmother’s chair then she dipped her haunches and in one smooth leap jumped onto my grandmother’s lap. Gran glanced at the cat and then up at me. “Where did she come from?”
Of all the things I felt we had to talk about, a stray cat didn’t seem the most important. “I don’t know. She seems to be homeless. I’m keeping her until I can find her owner. Do you know who she belongs to?”
Gran was stroking the kitten under its chin and it bobbed its small head and purred loudly. “Oh yes. She’s yours.”
Had my grandmother got me a cat and died before she could tell me? If so, it was no wonder the poor thing was so skinny. It would mean she hadn’t been fed in more than three weeks. Nyx didn’t seem the kind who would meekly starve. She’d find another human willing to buy her lobster pâté and fancy tuna. “I’m not sure I understand.”
She looked proud and excited. “Nyx is your familiar.”
They all nodded as though they knew what she was talking about. “My familiar? Witches have familiars.”
“Yes. And Nyx is yours.”
If there was logic here, I wasn’t grasping it. “I’m not a witch.” And my grandmother wasn’t a vampire. None of it made sense.
The vampires knitted on industriously but were clearly listening to every word. “It’s time,” Gran said.
“Time for what?”
“Your powers, dear. You’re only beginning to feel them, aren’t you?”
She chuckled, “You’re a witch, from a long line of witches. Nyx here is your familiar. She’ll help you.”
She sounded as though this was good news, when I felt a creeping horror. “Wait, I’m twenty-seven-years old. Wouldn’t I know by now if I was a witch?”
“You’re a late bloomer. Always have been.”
She was right. I was the last one in my class who could read. I couldn’t tell time until I was eight. I still had trouble with left and right, and when all the other girls in high school were shopping at Victoria’s Secret, I was still in a training bra. Now it seemed I was going to be the last student at Hogwarts to get my wand.
CHAPTER 9
I was so busy staring at Gran and trying to absorb the latest shock in a day full of them, that I didn’t notice we had another knitter until Sylvia said, rather coquettishly, “Good evening, Doctor.”
I turned and saw Dr. Weaver standing toward the back of the room. I had no idea how he’d come in because the door to the shop was locked, but I was beyond such simple questions anymore. He’d taken off the lab coat and now I saw that the colorful vest was hand-knitted in such tiny stitches it looked as though it would have taken years to create. He carried a green and blue knitting bag in his hands.
“Dr. Weaver!” I said, shocked.
He looked a bit sheepish. “Ah, Lucy. I wasn’t sure how much you knew. I’m very sorry I misled you earlier, but we have to be very careful how much we tell the daywalkers.”
“Come and sit here, Christopher,” Sylvia said, gesturing to a wooden chair beside her own.
He nodded, but took the time to walk among the knitters. “I think the silver thread on that cushion cover was inspired, Mabel,” he said to a meek looking woman who looked as though she’d walked off the set of a WWII movie, complete with mousy brown hair in pin curls and a pale green twin set. Hand-knitted, of course. She’d have blushed if she’d still had the ability, I’m certain. “Thank you, Doctor,” she said in a soft voice.
One of the vampires sneezed, an explosive sound in the quiet knitting circle. And then he sniffed, his long nose bobbing up and down like a bird’s beak. “I smell garlic.” He sneezed again. “I can’t stand the stuff, I’m allergic.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Alfred,” Sylvia replied. “Do you think any of us are eating garlic anymore? I dream of garlic,” she said dreamily, “sautéed in butter and white wine and served over scallops. With a steak, a nice, juicy steak.”
A moan went up that seemed to come from all of them at once. “Stop!”
“It’s me,” I said feeling embarrassed. “I’ve got garlic in my bag.”
The allergic vampire looked puzzled, as he drew out a neatly ironed cloth handkerchief and blew his nose. “Why would you bring garlic to a knitting meeting?”
Sylvia chuckled. “I suspect she thought it would protect her.” She shook her head. “It’s an old wives’ tale.” She glanced around at the circle. “The nonsense humans believe. The French vampires started that rumor about carrying garlic so their victims would arrive already seasoned.”
“I’ll go and put it in the other room,” I said, feeling foolish.
Alfred, the allergic vampire, sneezed again and said thickly, “If you wouldn’t mind.”
I reasoned that if they wanted to attack me and suck all the blood out of my body they’d have done it by now. I didn’t think six garlic bulbs would save me from a dozen hungry vampires. Anyway, they seemed more interested in their knitting than in the contents of my veins and arteries. Still, I left the crucifix and holy water in the bag, the silver chain around my neck, and I still carried the wool with the sharpened knitting needles.
My grandmother noticed the wooden needles when I returned from stashing the garlic in the other room and said, “Are you going to join us, dear? Have you been practicing your knitting?”
“No. I didn’t come here to knit! I came to find out what’s going on.” It was ridiculous. I had just discovered that my grandmother was a vampire and here she was sitting in a knitting circle as though it was the most ordinary thing in the world, and the cat was curled up in her lap purring. I was surrounded by monsters from the darkest realm of history and mythology, and yet, standing here, I felt like the odd one out while they happily knitted on.
“Let me introduce you,” Gran said, jumping suddenly into hostess mode. She glanced around. “Let’s see, Rafe you know, of course, and Sylvia. She began to name each vampire and they would nod as I tried to remember the names.
One of them, an older, plump woman with apple cheeks and a sweet expression, called Clara, said, “I’ll knit you a sweater, dear. What are your favorite colors?”
“No, wait. I want to knit her a sweater.” This came from the goth girl with the petulant look on her face. Of course, she was a vampire. Her voice came out like a whine.
“Oh, grow up, Hester,” Sylvia snapped.
The teenager glared at her. “I’m four-hundred-years-old.”
Sylvia l
et out a long-suffering sigh. “Then try to act it.”
The girl mimicked her, repeating her words, sounding more like ten than sixteen. Or four-hundred-and-sixteen. “And this is Hester,” Gran said.
The sweet older woman, Clara, said, “We can all knit Lucy a sweater. It can get very cold here in the winter and it’s always nice to have extras. Do you like blue?” Then she bent forward in her chair narrowing her gaze on my middle. “I don’t suppose you’re expecting? I do love to knit baby things. Those tiny booties are so sweet. And those little sweaters in pink and blue. I haven’t done a layette in years.”
“Seriously? You don’t want to eat me, you want to knit me sweaters?” These were the most ridiculous vampires.
Once more, Rafe spoke. “Unlike mortals, we have a long time to work on a project. We’ve refined a way to get the blood we need without killing people.”
“If it’s got anything to do with the butcher’s shop, then I don’t want to hear about it.”
Sylvia wrinkled her nose. “Animal blood. Please.” She glanced over at Dr. Weaver and then back at her knitting. “We have other sources.”
“Wait a minute,” I said, recalling the students sitting in those loungers at Dr. Weaver’s surgery donating blood. I turned to the doctor, who was sitting beside Sylvia, working with needles as thin as Vermicelli, crafting himself yet another waistcoat. This one in black and red. “You’re not running a blood bank at all. You’re stealing blood from undergraduates.”
“We don’t steal it. We pay for it. And it’s a small deception. They get extra pocket money and help keep the streets of Oxford safe.” He smiled slightly. “A fed vampire is a happy vampire.”
It still seemed wrong, and I was about to say so, when Rafe said, “We also have a connection at the hospital. The blood that’s no good for transfusions, because it’s stale or infected, doesn’t end up in the incinerator. It comes to us.”
“You drink tainted blood?”
He shrugged. “What’s it going to do? Kill us?”
