Bloodlinks

by Lee Killough

  Wal-Mart and Dillons looked buttoned down for the night as he drove around them, their parking lots empty, even behind where couples sometimes parked. Nothing moved among the lights inside the Hammond greenhouses or inside Gfeller Lumber’s building. He did take time to shake the yard gate and check its lock. The few cars remaining at the American Legion hall belonged, he knew, to cleaning personnel. He expected to find the same at the bowling alley.

  But as he started to pull out of the hall’s lot, a T-top Corvette with the roof panels off roared up the highway past him. Given tonight’s lack of traffic, dry road, and moonlight providing good visibility, he could forgive a little speed...but this idiot had to be doing at least seventy.

  He flipped on his light bar and gunned after the speeder. Instead of pulling over, however, the Corvette pulled away. Double idiot, choosing to run. The Corvette might outdistance his Crown Vic, but not the radio. Or maybe the driver thought a local cop had to give up the chase at the city limit. Surprise.

  They passed the city limit and crossed the Saline River with the Corvette still accelerating. And no more curves between here and the Rooks County line to slow it down.

  Garreth buried his foot on the floor to keep up and keyed his mike. “Seven, Baumen, I’m on 282 north of Baumen in pursuit of a speeder, silver T-top Corvette, local N-Nora — oh, shit!”

  Even focused on the Corvette, he registered the pale shape coming out of the hay field on the left and identified it as a deer headed for the highway.

  The Corvette’s brake lights flared as the deer, a big buck, appeared three or four hundred feet ahead...a couple hundred feet too close at the vehicle’s speed. Garreth yelled into his radio for Fire Rescue and a tow truck as the Corvette slammed into the deer with a sickening thunk of metal meeting flesh.

  Amid fishtailing and flying front end shrapnel, it carried the deer for another couple of seconds, then Garreth saw the animal slide across the hood and smash into the windshield. Not stopping there, to Garreth’s horror it bounced, rolling up the windshield, landing on the car roof with legs thrashing down through the open panels.

  The vehicle’s rear end slewed off the highway to the right and across the narrow shoulder into the bordering ditch. Spinning the front end around toward Garreth before tipping over onto the driver’s side in the ditch.

  Garreth bailed out of the patrol car with his portable radio as soon as the Vic stopped rolling and leaped into the ditch. Landing knee deep in water from the day’s rain. A glance past the buckled hood knotted his gut. Beyond the shattered windshield, the driver sagged sideways, head dipping into the water, apparently unconscious...female from what remained visible, with lacerations on her face and scalp.

  As he scrambled along the vehicle, Garreth met a flood of blood scents, animal and human. Tipping over had flipped the body of the deer, now dead, off the roof, but its hind legs remained inside. Garreth jerked it free and heaved it aside.

  A male struggled in the passenger seat. “Help me get out of here.”

  Garreth gave him one quick glance: early twenties, dazed eyes, also bleeding from multiple lacerations on his head and face.

  “I have to help your girlfriend first.” Garreth worked his legs down between door and driver to lift her face clear of the water, at the same time holding her head to keep her neck steady. He would hate to save her from drowning only to leave her paralyzed. Now he just needed to hold her here until help arrived.

  He risked moving one hand to key his radio. “I need that ambulance!”

  “It’s on its way,” Doris Schoning came back.

  But how long before it arrived? The girl might drown from other than water. Her nose had flattened...broken either by the deer or collision with the steering wheel. Her breathing seemed less respiration than spasms, each accompanied by open-mouthed, liquid bubbling. Blood from her nose filling her throat, maybe going into her lungs. Each breath brought a blast of blood scent, igniting hunger in him.

  The passenger groped for his seat belt. “Help me out. I feel like I’m gonna fall.”

  Garreth grabbed his wrist. “Don’t! Wait for help.” He could not catch the kid’s gaze, so he hoped the kid was coherent enough to pay attention and obey. “What’s your name?”

  The kid took a moment to think. “Todd.” Then struggled in Garreth’s grip.

  Garreth clamped tighter. “The thing is, Todd, you release your seat belt and you just might fall on top of us. That could kill your girlfriend if she has a neck injury. So why don’t you grab the edge of the window up there. See if you can hook your elbow over it and hang tight for a while longer.”

  The girl’s chest heaved, struggling to pull in air, while the gurgle of her breath worsened. Cold ran through Garreth. Where the hell was Fire Rescue! Her airway needed clearing and needed it now! If only he could pull her out and lay her on her side to drain the blood...but if she had a neck injury... “Doris, where’s the EMT!”

  “They’ll be there any minute.”

  Any minute...but any minute might be too late. The kid continued fumbling for the seat belt and Garreth clamped a hand over his wrist again while listening to the girl in anguish. Any minute she might drown in her own blood.

  She choked.

  The blast of blood scent increased his hunger....and brought a solution for clearing her throat.

  One he instantly rejected. No, he could not do that! He would not touch human blood. Dared not. There had to be another way!

  Desperately he peered through the shattered windshield toward town, but saw no flashing lights of emergency vehicles.

  The girl’s chest jerked. By moonlight he saw her face darkening with suffocation.

  His gut knotted. All right! he shouted silently, though to whom Garreth had no idea. Fate, perhaps, or Lane’s ghost. Just this once...to save a life, not take it...and spit out the blood, not swallow it.

  “Todd, don’t be alarmed but I have to give your girlfriend mouth to mouth.”

  He twisted down to her face and fastened his mouth over hers, sucking. Reminding himself not to swallow...to —

  Then the blood filled his mouth.

  Every cell of him screamed in joy. The hot, salty-coppery liquid flowed over his tongue with a richness animal blood never had. A richness the Hunger had been craving since the moment he woke in the San Francisco morgue. It snatched control, would not let him turn away and spit.

  He swallowed.

  The blood burned like fire in his throat, but a fire that cooled, not seared, soothing the other fire of thirst. And from it warmth spread outward through the rest of him, warmth and a crackling surge of energy. Awareness of everything around him faded to the distant edge of perception. Garreth sucked and swallowed again, and again, ravenously, greedily relishing every drop.

  Dimly, he heard a nearing siren. The chest of the girl heaved, finally drawing in a breath.

  A hand touched Garreth’s shoulder. “We’ll take over now.”

  Fury boiled up in him. No, not yet! He clung snarling to his prey. The hand shook him. “Mikaelian! We’ve got her!”

  The sound of his name broke through the Hunger controlling him. Horrified at himself, Garreth flung himself away, scrambling backward up the ditch until stopped by the pasture fence. Barbs on the wire pricked his arms and legs. He welcomed the pain...concentrated on it to forget the taste lingering in his mouth. Taste he wanted to be as loathsome as the beast the Hunger made him, taste he wanted to reject. But the taste sang in him...and the Hunger rejoiced.

  The scene became a swarm of vehicles and activity: EMTs examining the victims and putting cervical braces on them before the arriving wrecker pulled the ‘vette back onto the road where Fire Rescue could cut the victims free; the ambulance arriving and taking both to the hospital — bloodied but alive and the girl regaining consciousness, thanks to them actually wearing their seat belts. This being county jurisdiction, Sheriff’s Deputy Marvin Herbert drove down from his convenience store in Lebeau.

  Garreth watched i
t all from somewhere outside himself, his mind churning, urging him to flee this new nightmare. After tasting human blood, could he still force himself to drink animal blood, or would the Hunger control him now? Already, smelling blood in the EMTs, wrecker driver, and deputy had his throat tickling with thirst again.

  He vaguely heard Herbert ask him something and grunted an answer, then Herbert said, “It’s a shame to scrap that.”

  “The car?” Garreth watched its remains being dragged up on the flatbed.

  “Car?” Herbert’s snort shook his belly like Jello. “A Corvette ain’t a car, son. It’s plastic. Though her daddy loves it, god knows why, and is probably gonna ground Alexa for life...if he doesn’t kill her. No, I mean the buck. That rack had twelve points before it hit the windshield!”

  Garreth glanced toward the deer carcass, then scowled up at the deputy. “The buck? It’s the victims— ”

  “Who matter,” Herbert finished for him. “Yeah. But now I’ve finally got your attention, tell me why you’re looking like that buck likely did in the headlights. You must’ve worked accidents before.”

  He produced a shrug and grimace. “I...I’m just coming down from the adrenaline.”

  Herbert eyed him a moment or two longer, then slapped his shoulder. “Well, take ‘er easy. Remember, aside from the buck and Hot Wheels, no one died here.”

  But maybe control of his existence had.

  Chapter Seven

  If working the rest of the shift on automatic counted as taking it easy, he did...writing up his accident report and faxing a copy to the Sheriff’s office in Bellamy, rattling doorknobs downtown, checking for a prowler, shushing a barking dog...all with a minimum of conscious attention. The rest of his mind strained to forget drinking the girl’s blood, or make the memory as repellent as the mental image of him fastened to her mouth. In vain. No matter how Garreth tried to block it, he tasted her blood over and over...every deliciously salty copper drop. And he wanted more. Craved it.

  By the end of the shift, fighting memory left him exhausted...dragging as though he patrolled in sunlight. But he shuddered at the thought of going to bed and the dreams he might have. So he started walking...with no destination in mind, just keeping on the move while his mind churned. There must be a way to block the memory...put this behind him so he could sleep, and go on as before, drinking just cattle blood.

  Even thinking that, however, he suspected nothing would block the memory. How did someone forget ecstasy? So...since he craved the blood, treat it as an addiction...like alcoholism. Acknowledge the thirst but refuse to yield to it. Live one meal at a time. This time I will drink cattle blood. It is enough. Yes...that should work.

  A crunch of gravel underfoot broke into his thoughts. Looking around, he found himself on the entry drive of Mount of Olives cemetery. Yes, of course his feet brought him here. And they carried him in past obelisques and other ornate headstones of the older graves near the gate that bore names like Dreiling, Pfeifer, Pfannenstiel, Wiesner...and Bieber...to the far southwest corner. To a grave bristling with the short canes of a pruned rose bush but no headstone...just a metal stake with a laminated card reading: John Doe 10/31/83. Lane’s grave.

  Scraps of paper and a plastic bag from Wal-Mart had blown into the rose bush and stuck on the thorns. Kneeling beside the grave, Garreth gingerly peeled each free, trying to avoid snagging himself, until the canes stood clean again.

  The memory of Maggie’s voice whispered in his head. “I don’t understand, Garreth. The man tried to kill you and Ed Duncan. Why are you looking after his grave?”

  Being unable to tell her he came as Anna’s proxy, he always replied: “He wasn’t born a monster and has a mother somewhere who would want it tended.”

  Here he pictured not the killer vampire but Mada, the child she had been, that Anna loved...intelligent, a magical singing voice, yet tormented, her unusual height and quick temper making her a pitifully easy target for the ridicule of other children. Until anger drove the grown child to beg a vampire named Irina for the vampire life, then used it to take revenge on the humanity she despised.

  When the bush bloomed, blood red American Beauty roses covered it. What more fitting for Lane?

  Too late he realized the mistake of thinking her name. The reason for tonight’s wandering came flooding back through him and he imagined her standing before him, tall, red-haired, sheathed in a glittering red siren dress. Smiling in satisfaction. “Wasn’t tonight instructive? See, lover, that’s what this life is about. Human blood is what we’re meant to drink.”

  He shook his head. “It’s just a choice, like protecting people or killing them.”

  Her lip curled. “Really? But you want it, don’t you. You want it so much...not that pathetic cattle blood. Be honest. Admit it and embrace your nature fully.”

  “You’d like that.” He jammed the paper scraps in the bag. “To have me become like you. Well, I won’t.”

  “We’ll see.”

  The eastern sky began to lighten, bringing the weight of day. Garreth pushed to his feet. Time to go.

  Crossing to the nearest drive, the sound of running footsteps reached him...and a man in sweats appeared out of the morning mist. So intent was his effort, though, and his expression one of gazing inward, that he passed without seeing Garreth. Julian Fowler. The scent of his blood curled hotly off him.

  Garreth retreated from it, swallowing the hunger it brought.

  That movement registered with Fowler. He started violently and flung around white-eyed, then let out a gusty breath of relief. “It’s you, Officer Mikaelian. You gave me a bit of a turn. Disheartening, isn’t it? We think we’re such civilized, rational beings and then something moves in a misty cemetery and we jump out of our bloody skins.”

  “Yet you chose to run through the cemetery.”

  Panting, sweating, and away from Anna, Fowler seemed less threatening.

  “True...and I blame it entirely on Alistair Moore.”

  Garreth blinked. “Who?”

  Fowler laughed. “A spy character of mine who was to have used marathon running as a cover. A cousin with judgement I trust read the rough draft of the first Moore novel and said it was codswallop, that I hadn’t any idea of the realities of training for and running in a marathon. So I took up running to find out. As I’ve learned golf, horseback riding, rock climbing, lock smithing, brewing, scuba diving, photography, and the violin. I’ve interviewed serial killers, burglars, and embezzlers, and taken a turn as a bartender, waiter, and kitchen navvy in the interest of research.” He grimaced. “My cousin proved correct and I changed Moore’s sport to golf. But I’ve kept running because I discovered it’s excellent for freeing up the mind to think through plots. The cemetery choice...” He paused. “Call it eccentricity but I enjoy cemeteries. The history they reveal about a place, monuments like your War Memorial at the entrance, unusual headstones, and such...like that.” He waved a hand.

  Garreth turned to look, and carefully controlled his body and face. Fowler pointed at Mada’s grave. “There’s no headstone.”

  “No, but I fancy that’s a rose bush on the grave. Do you know that’s how legend says you keep a vampire in his coffin?”

  Fowler knew about that? Garreth’s neck prickled. He made his tone casual. “I thought it’s garlic and a stake through the heart.”

  “So claims popular lore,” Fowler said, “but one has to wonder how well a wooden stake will hold a creature that can supposedly turn itself into mist to slip out of coffins and under doors. Real vampire lore, not the cinematic rubbish, advocates covering the coffin or grave in mountain laurel or roses. The thorns supposedly have magical power against vampires, stemming, I suspect, from Jesus having worn a crown of thorns.”

  “I take it you’ve studied vampires?”

  Fowler smiled wryly. “And werewolves, ghouls, zombies, ghosts, banshees, and anything else going bump in the night. I started my writing career as a paperback horror novel hack...under another name I hasten t
o add. Even then I realized that while time may bury many sins, those of writers live on forever on bookshelves. Speaking of blood, however, do I see some on your uniform there?”

  Garreth glanced down. He had stains on the sleeves and front of his shirt...both deer and human from the scents...probably on his trousers, too, though there, evidence of the accident showed as wrinkling from water in the ditch.

  “From nothing serious, I trust. One doesn’t think of violence in a peaceful village like this.”

  The bald pitch for details irritated Garreth. “An injured animal. Enjoy the rest of your run.”

  Leaving Fowler staring after him, he trudged toward home.

  A block north of the cemetery, a siren burped behind him. When he turned, Bill Pfannenstiel rolled up beside him, a grin on his beefy face.

  “I think you’re in trouble, amigo. Maggie’s got a BOLO out on you.”

  Garreth stared at him in dismay. Maggie! Shit! “I forgot she was coming over.”

  Pfannenstiel winced. “If I was you, I’d think of a better excuse. I forgot never goes down well at my house anyway. Hop in; I’ll give you a ride.” He keyed his mike. “Let Maggie know I found him, Doris.”

  “Where was he? Is he all right?”

  Pfannenstiel eyed Garreth a moment. “He was just walking...and he looks okay.” He hung up the mike and put the car in gear. “There’s paper towels under your seat if you don’t want Maggie knowing you’ve been to that grave again.”

  Garreth started. How— The thought broke off as a glance down spotted the mud on his hands and trousers. He tore a sheet from the roll and scrubbed at his hands, and at mud on the knees of his trousers. Pfannenstiel’s laid-back manner and donut gut made it easy to forget his sharp eyes and knowledge of everyone’s business.