Vampires of the Caribbean

by Debra Dunbar

  Nor’s cold eyes never leave her. Gazing down the barrel of the pistol, he says, “If you’d just taken precautions, you wouldn’t be cursed with this bloody sentimentality. She was only human, Rayne … like this one.”

  Another voice rises in the hall. “Oh, dear, what’s going on here?”

  Penny blinks. It’s Dare’s voice, though she can’t see him in the gloom.

  Nor spins fast. “Take another step closer and I’ll shoot you!”

  “Shoot me?” says Dare, emerging from the shadows. “Whatever is that thing in your hand? It looks terribly primitive.”

  “It’s a pistol, Dare!” Penny cries.

  “To the Norns with this,” Nor says. There is a click from the pistol. Rayne and Penny gasp at once, but no shot rings out.

  With shaking hands and arms, Nor brings the barrel of the pistol to his face and peers down it, both eyes wide. “What the fuck?” he says.

  There is a crack, and Penny and Rayne pull back as blood, bone, and gore splatter against them.

  Willing herself not to puke, Penny glances to where Nor had been standing, and sees Dare standing over Nor’s body. Dare’s wearing a pirate getup like the rest of the vampires—and now the top is stained and bloody. He’s holding the pistol in one hand and keys in the other.

  Slipping the keys in one pocket, Dare turns the pistol over, gazing at it studiously. His finger slips onto the trigger, as though he’s testing it, the business end pointed at …

  “Don’t shoot Rayne!” Penny says, surprising herself.

  “Dare wasn’t going to shoot me,” Rayne says dismissively. Upstairs there is the sound of shouts and running feet.

  For an instant, Dare’s eyes meet hers, but he lowers the pistol and reaches into the pocket and retrieves the keys. “If you allow me, Your Majesty,” he says, stepping between Penny and Rayne. The door is open seconds later, revealing a cement stairwell to the ground level.

  “I’m not going with you,” Rayne says. Penny stops in the doorway, and looks back at him.

  “My prince,” says Dare, his words clipped. “Aurel is going to believe you killed Nor and let Penny and me escape. I strongly suggest you reconsider.”

  “I hear people coming,” Penny says, looking down the hallway. Her eyes go to the side of the door and see a fire alarm and above it a sprinkler system. Struck with inspiration, she pulls down on the handle. No water comes from the sprinkler, but a wail rises in the building. Dare and Rayne both scream, clutching their ears.

  “Come on!” Penny shouts, running out the door and up the stairwell into the parking lot behind The Cove.

  “What did you do!” shouts Rayne, hot on her heels

  She hears a slam, and looks over her shoulder to see Dare sprinting up the stairs. The emergency exit is closed behind him, and she hears pounding on the door from the other side. Catching up to Penny and Rayne, he says, “Good thinking, Penny! Do you happen to have access to a vehicle?”

  “Yes!” Penny says.

  “They have your keys in your handbag!” Rayne shouts, but Penny ignores him. She races over the ground, gravel biting into her feet. She finds her car just where she left it. The driver’s side has no window at the moment, so she doesn’t bother to lock it.

  “We can’t ride in this!” shouts Rayne, looking down in disgust at her white, 1990s era, Peugeot 309.

  Penny’s feet hurt, the memory of Nor’s head exploding will make her throw up if she thinks about it, she’s tired, wrung out, and her sister is dead. She doesn’t argue.

  “It’s unlocked,” Penny tells Dare. “Don’t get in, get ready to push!”

  Dare goes around the passenger side without asking questions, and Penny jumps into the driver’s side. She reaches underneath, rips off the duct tape there, tears the spare key off the tape, and jams the key into the ignition. She slips the engine into neutral, pumps twice with her foot, gives the engine a try … and gets nothing.

  Rayne slides into the back seat and slams the door. “They’re coming. Why do you keep a key in the car? Don’t you worry about it being stolen?”

  “They’d never be able to start it,” Penny says, jumping out of the car.

  “What?” screams Rayne.

  She ignores him and shouts to Dare, “Push now!”

  He doesn’t ask questions, just helps her get the Peugeot moving. Grimacing with the effort, she hears the crowd behind her milling around the building, and shouts of, “What happened?” and “Did you see a fire?” Somewhere in the distance, she hears the scream of a fire engine. She and Dare have just gotten the car rolling when Rayne shouts, “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot! We surrender.”

  Penny looks up and sees the business end of a rifle held by a vampire not twenty feet in front of them. Without shutting the door she shouts, “Get in!” Jumping into the moving car, she gives the ignition another try as Dare slides into the seat beside her. The engine turns over, she roars in fury, and hits the gas. The vampire with the rifle doesn’t so much leap as soar out of the way, as though he’s been yanked by strings.

  In the back, she hears Rayne chanting, “Norns save me!”

  In the passenger seat, Dare drops his head to the dash, panting for breath.

  Slamming her door shut, Penny guns the engine as they leave the parking lot.

  She’s just breathing a sigh of relief, feeling like she’s in the clear when Rayne shouts from the back seat, “How are you not sunburned, Count?”

  Penny glances over at Dare. “He’s still a little pink,” she observes. And in some places she can see his skin peeling, like at the end of burn when fresh new skin comes up from beneath.

  “You should not be able to move! I saw you earlier. You were a scarlet basilisk!” Rayne protests.

  “I think Your Majesty overestimated the severity of my burns,” Dare mumbles.

  She hears Rayne inhale, as though he’s about to speak—or shout—he seems to be in that kind of mood, but Dare cuts him off. “Your Majesty has been too wise and too prudent to ever get a sunburn … you don’t know how to judge how severe they are. It was minor.”

  Penny remembers Dare laying on the cold smooth cement floor and whispering, “ … I hurt,” and blinks. Also, by the way they’re talking, she can’t figure out if Dare and Rayne are on the same side. Her hand tightens on the stick shift. Somehow she feels that Dare is on her side.

  “They were ordered to roll you over a few times …” Rayne mutters.

  Nodding, Dare says, “It’s so hard to get good help these days.”

  “Still … even with a minor burn, you shouldn’t be as well as you are now …” Leaning forward so fast the tiny car rocks, he shouts between the seats, “Did you drink from her?”

  Dare doesn’t respond.

  “Yes,” Penny says, hand on the stick, thinking that she just might like to punch Rayne in the nose. “Stop shouting!”

  “He’s not strong enough to compel you to split your vein, woman! Why did you let him do that?”

  “Because I wanted to make him strong enough to kill you!” Penny retorts.

  There is an instant of blessed silence. And then Rayne falls back in the seat and bursts out laughing. “Dare? Kill me? Kill anyone? He probably couldn’t even kill a chicken.”

  Penny glances over at Dare. For an instant, she sees his eyes on her. She remembers asking if he’d kill the other vampires if he had to, and she remembers the answer. “Yes.”

  “You picked the wrong Night Elf to align yourself with, human,” Rayne cackles.

  Penny tightens her hand on the steering wheel, and silently wills Rayne’s head to explode. It doesn’t, and she’s glad, because she thinks he did try to save her, and did love her sister, even if he’s a coward. She blinks, remembering how he’d even been unable to open the emergency exit. Dare had known how … and that makes her think of another thing …

  “How did you get out of the cell?” she asks Dare.

  Rayne leans forward again. “Yes, how did you get out?”

 
“I think, Your Highness, that the door didn’t lock, because it swung open just minutes after you left,” says Dare. “Human technology, it’s befuddling.”

  Penny’s left eyebrow does this little dance she can’t control. He hadn’t seemed befuddled by the keys to the emergency exit. Her eyes slide to Dare, again. He’s holding the pistol with two hands, the barrel pointed at the floorboard in a perfect grip if she remembers her dad’s shooting lessons right.

  “That’s true,” says Rayne. “They’re too primitive to use magic. Blast that door, I thought I locked it.” Leaning toward her, Rayne demands, “Where are we going?”

  Penny’s hands shake on the wheel and stick. She hadn’t thought beyond escape.

  “Where do you want to go, Penny?” Dare asks.

  They’re heading south on 441 toward Gatorland. Penny feels herself go cold. “I want to see where they left Chantilly.”

  “We only have an hour and a half before dawn,” Rayne protests.

  “I want to see where they took her,” Penny says, her voice hitching, her hands shaking more.

  Rayne starts to protest. “But—”

  “Let’s take her there,” says Dare in a slow, measured voice. “We owe her that.”

  They whiz past Gatorland.

  “We owe you that,” says Rayne, his words equally slow and measured.

  Dare lets out a long, deep sigh and seems to sink a bit.

  “Head toward Split Oak,” says Rayne.

  “It isn’t right,” Dare hears Rayne say outside the car.

  Dare’s managed to pull himself up into a sitting position, but he is exhausted and his skin itches from his healing burn. Without Penny’s blood, he’d be close to dead. Her blood had given him the strength to touch the magic thrumming through the building. That magic had healed the worst of his burn. That in turn had allowed him to soothe the shock that had probably incited Penny’s blood gift, and to compel her to go with Rayne. The magic in the building had given him the strength to magically probe the premises for other prisoners and to open the cell door and to force Nor to shoot himself. But that magical reservoir hadn’t been available to him when he’d thrown the man guarding the driveway through the air. Also, he really shouldn’t have used compulsion to make Rayne reveal Penny’s sister’s resting place. But Dare had felt Penny’s hurt in her shaking hands, and he had to.

  “The Veil … World Gate … Fairy Path, whatever you want to call it, is near the split oak,” Rayne continues. They’re just a few steps from the car, on the driver’s side. “You should come to my world, Alfheim.”

  Seconds later, Dare finds himself looking over the car, pistol firmly in his hand, but still pointed at the ground. He glares at Rayne, not remembering opening the door, or standing.

  “I’m not going with you,” Penny hisses, her back to Dare. He notices that her shoulders are wide for her wiry frame, and her strawberry blonde hair is falling out of a bun. She has freckles on her back. He feels a twisting in his stomach, and a heaviness in his heart that he hasn’t felt in a long time. It’s hopeful and painful in equal measure.

  Rayne sighs, and Dare tears his gaze from Penny. “Count, relax … I don’t want her blood … I can’t do that … not again.”

  Dare finds his frame softening, remembering after Gretta died, Jonathan, Pieter, and Porsche. Each time it hurt enough to make him think, Never again. His eyes slide to Penny, the thought of losing her someday already hurts.

  “You can’t protect her, Dare,” the prince says, and Dare’s eyes snap back to him. The prince’s lip curls. “I don’t know why I’m justifying myself to the likes of you. You should come back to Alfheim, too. You’re nothing against twenty-three vampires!”

  Dare’s fingers tighten on the pistol. Twenty-three? That will be difficult.

  “I’m not going,” Penny declares.

  The prince growls, “I’m trying to save your tragically short, dreary, mortal life. Dare is weak, he can’t protect you.”

  He reaches toward her, and Dare aims the pistol across the roof of the car. “Stop.”

  The prince steps back from Penny.

  “You wouldn’t shoot me, Dare,” Rayne says. “I am your Prince!” Raising his hand, palm to Dare, fingers splayed wide, Rayne says, “You will put the gun down.”

  Dare leans heavily on the car. The prince is trying to compel him, and Dare feels suddenly weary.

  “Don’t put the gun down!” Penny roars.

  And Dare’s head ticks, the weight on his chest lightens, and he raises the pistol. “I’m sorry, My Prince. You know how it is, blood is thicker than water and all that.”

  Rayne looks between him and Penny. “How much did you drink?” he asks, his voice incredulous. Dare didn’t drink that much, but the prince doesn’t know that, and he’s already backing across the parking area toward a well-worn trail.

  “I will be sure to tell Odin that you helped rescue Penny and me from your brother,” Dare calls out.

  “You’ll be dead!” Rayne retorts. Spinning on his heels, he takes off into the trees. Dare marks the direction—the World Gate must be that way.

  “Well, that went well,” he says as the prince vanishes from sight. The trees are towering and thin, and between them he sees growing brightness on the horizon. The air is hot, humid, and thick with the sound of insects and birds.

  Penny turns back to Dare. “The sun is rising soon.”

  Her makeup is smudged, her hair in disarray, and she has dark circles under her eyes. She is artless, and were she a Night Elf, he wouldn’t find her beautiful. But she is a human, and what’s more, she has given him blood. Looking at her, his skin heats, his blood moves, and he has to struggle not to lick his lips—and it isn’t just blood he wants. It is exhilarating that blood still does this to him after so long and terrifying, too. Blood lies is a saying among the Night Elves.

  Dare leans against the car. “You want to see your sister’s resting place,” he says. Another saying is, blood compels.

  “He told me where it is; I can come back anytime. You’re going to die,” she says, opening the car door. “Help me get it started.”

  She is brave and generous. Sometimes blood is true.

  Chapter 3

  “How soon until we get there?” Dare asks, snapping Penny from a memory of the last time she’d seen Chantilly.

  For someone who had been a-okay with her hiking out to Lake Hart to see her sister’s final resting place, Dare is very nervous about the sunrise.

  “Another twenty minutes,” Penny says.

  He looks into the back. “This car doesn’t even have a proper boot.”

  “What?” Penny asks.

  “A boot,” says Dare. “You know, the place where you typically stash Night Elves when you’re ferrying them about?”

  Penny’s brow furrows. “Do you mean the trunk?”

  Dare smooths back his hair. “That might be the right word in this time and place, yes.”

  “I took off the board thingy between the seat and the back windshield that hid the boot,” Penny answers distractedly. “I don’t need someone jimmying the lock to the trunk and the damn thing flapping open when I drive.”

  Her mind drifts back to that last meeting, Chantilly had—

  “You don’t have a bumbershoot?” Dare says.

  Penny sits up with a start. “What?”

  “A thing for keeping the rain and sun off you,” Dare says, miming with his hands.

  Penny blinks. “If you mean umbrella—”

  Rubbing his jaw, Dare looks befuddled. “You don’t say bumbershoot anymore? But it was such a common thing to say … ”

  Penny’s eyes widen. “I have sunscreen in the glove box!”

  Dare snorts. “Red Vet Pet doesn’t work … as a redhead, you should know that.”

  Penny grasps the steering wheel hard. She has no idea what he is talking about but … “The stuff in the glove box does sure as hell work. That is micro-milled zinc, titanium oxide, full-spectrum, sunburn blocking ma
gic, and it’s waterproof, too.”

  “Is not,” says Dare, but he takes out the tube. “There’s no hocus pocus in this,” he mutters, sniffing at it.

  “It’s better than nothing!” Penny says exasperatedly. She wants to get home and then think about what she’s going to do. Rayne had promised Dare would be killed; by extension, she’s pretty sure that means her. The other vamps have her ID, but it’s from West Virginia, and isn’t going to help them. Her phone though was a cheap thing she got a convenience store, and it doesn’t even have a security code. She thinks back through her few contacts, and who among them have her address. Will they give her away?

  Rubbing sunscreen onto his hands, Dare says, “So, I don’t know what sort of myths humans now believe about Night Elves—”

  “We believe that you’re vampires,” Penny says, eyes on the road, somewhat irritated by having her thoughts interrupted. Again.

  “—but Night Elves can’t read minds. Or at least, I can’t.”

  So there are some that could read minds. She glances over at Dare. He’s found the cheap pair of sunglasses she’d put in the glove box and put them on. They look much better on him than her. On him they look like something out of the Ralph Lauren eye wear collection, not something she’d picked up for a buck from CVS.

  She downshifts, and guns the engine through an intersection. The morning is humid, warm, and ominous.

  “I’m worried about the other vampires finding their way to my home,” Penny admits.

  “I wouldn’t worry about any visits during the day,” Dare says, putting the sunscreen back in the glove box, where he’s also stashed the pistol. He slumps back in the seat. “If they come at night, we’ll deal with it.”

  He sounds exhausted, but not afraid. Rayne had said Dare is weak …

  Meditatively palming the top of the stick, she glances over at the vampire in the passenger seat. He’s leaning back, and even with the glasses on she can tell his eyes are closed. He certainly doesn’t look dangerous. But Odin wouldn’t send a weakling … would he?