I, Vampire

by Jean Marie Stine

  "What?" I said. "You're afraid I'm going to climb up to the top of St. V's with a copy of the Los Angeles white pages? And read the entire thing in three hours? You're fucking nuts, lady!"

  "Enough of your lies, Spawn of Darkness!" She waved the crucifix at me, plastering me to the wall. "Our Father, who art in Heaven, Hallowed be Thy Name."

  The prayer and all the Names of Power burned my ears, holding me pinned.

  "By Kingdom Come, Thy Will be done, On Earth as is in Heaven, Hallowed be Thy Name…"

  The prayer and all the names of power burned my ears, holding me pinned.

  "By Kingdom Come, Thy Will be done, On Earth as it is in Heaven…"

  "Someone – help me!" It was as close a prayer as I could get, but it must have worked, 'cause that was when Carl came in, knocking the rosary off the door, and making Sister Mary Francesca of the Fucked-Up Theology turn and point her crucifix at Carl. "By the Power of Jesus!" she shouted, and I swear, the Crown of Thorns popped off the J-Guy's head and went and hit Carl right in the chest.

  He slammed back into the door, his glasses flying, and his eyes went glassy.

  But my former date, and the current Croquet Mallet Murderer, had turned away from me, and as I said, I used to play football for USC. I saw my opening and literally went for a flying tackle, slamming Valerie to the floor. The silver crucifix burned my chest where I held it to her, then she shouted, "By the Power of Jesus!"

  I think I said that Carl had the Evil Eye, and Valerie had been taking it square-on. The curse fulfilled itself almost immediately, 'cause the new little Crown of Thorns shot straight up the way the crucifix was pointing and buried itself in Valerie's throat.

  I rolled off, patting at the smoking brand on my chest, then looked over at Carl. He was lying back slumped against the door, his eyes shut tight and blood bubbling up from between his lips. He was breathing heavy, and blood oozed out of his chest where the crown had struck him.

  "And that's a wrap," said a voice, and I looked over and saw Charlie stepping out of the mirror. "Congratulations, Carlos. You made it to Doomsday, and you get to die a hero."

  "Stay away from him!" I shouted. "He's not dead!"

  "Yet," finished Charlie. The fetch looked at his watch. "Give him another ten minutes and he's a goner. Trust me. I know." Charlie grinned like an imp.

  "You can save him," I said. "Go get help. He can't go until you take him."

  "And why would I want to do that, Jack? This is what we fetches live for. And you won't believe how happy that girl's was to finally finish up business with her." He pointed to the corpse of Valerie, the former Croquet Mallet Murderer. "And there's about to be another happy fetch real soon now."

  "Over my dead body!" I stood up and took a swing at Charlie. My fist went right through him and he laughed. "Try again, vampire. You ain't got no fetch, so you can't touch me!" I went and sat down next to Carl, holding his hand. "It's okay, buddy. It's going to be okay."

  "I lit a candle for you, Jack," Carl murmured. More blood oozed out of his lips and I felt my fangs slide out. He was delirious, and his hand was getting as cold as mine.

  As cold as mine.

  I lifted up Carl's wrist and bit down hard, taking a sip of what little blood he had left.

  "What in the Hell are you doing?" Charlie shrieked. His phantom hands waved through me, but I couldn't touch him, and he couldn't touch me.

  I lowered Carl's wrist and licked my fangs. "I'm killing you, Charlie. Three bites from the vampire and Carl becomes one of the undead. And you die." I looked at the two holes in Carl's wrist. "That's one."

  "Stop it, Jack! They'll kill you if you make another vampire!" I moved Carl's sleeve up for a spot higher on his arm. "They'll kill me anyway, Charlie. I killed Valerie. Doesn't matter that she was a nut who was going to kill me."

  "She killed herself," Charlie said. "She shot herself with her own wand. Jim knows. You'll get off free."

  "I'm gonna save Carl anyway." I bit Carl a second time, drinking a little bit deeper, letting the curse take a firmer hold. I raised my fangs. "That's two. You want me to make it three? Or are you gonna go get help?"

  Charlie looked around, but I know he knew I was serious. "This is blackmail, you know."

  "So sue me."

  Charlie glared. "I'm going to get him one day, you know. All you're doing is prolonging his suffering. And I promise you – he will suffer for this. You will too."

  "And so will you, Charlie, unless you go get help."

  "Okay, Jack," the fetch said. "You win. This time."

  He stepped back into the mirror and disappeared around the corner.

  Charlie was good to his word. Carl did suffer, 'cause he lay there in my arms for about two hours until the healers came.

  Charlie didn't take his soul in all that time, so the thaumaturgists had a hell of a time reanimating Carl, though not as bad as they would if Charlie had taken the soul. Luckily, with all the healing, the bite marks on Carl's arm got covered up, and Carl had been too far gone to remember much of what happened. And I wasn't telling, except that I said that I'd threatened to bite Carl, and so far as the law went, it wasn't illegal to threaten, so long as the person being threatened was a fetch, and Carl didn't want to press charges.

  There was a big to-do over Valerie's death, but it came out okay. I got off with probation, since even the judge had to admit that I didn't need my vampiric abilities to do a flying tackle. And if some serial killer got whammied by the Evil Eye, then shot herself in the throat with her own crucifix, well...

  The tabloids ate it up. As for the rest of it, Carl and I are both okay, and back at the Club, and even Charlie's there too, though he's pretty sulky. Jim's also filing a class action suit on behalf of Valerie's victims to get a necromancer to summon up her shade and get her to tell where she stashed the heads. The police are looking for them too, but I have more faith in Jim and the necromancers than I do the LAPD.

  And that's about it. It sucks being cursed, but when you're all in it together, it's a little bit easier to get by.

  Even with guys like Charlie.

  VYMPYRE

  WILLIAM F. NOLAN

  BLOOD. MY OWN. Sweet Christ, my own! Seeping along my chest, soaking my white pullover, a spreading patch of dark red. So this is how it finally ends? With the stake being driven in another inch, each blow of the hammer like a thunderclap ... closing my eyes in Paris with blood everywhere on the tumultuous streets, tasting it on my cool lips, with the guillotine hissing down, severed heads thumping wicker baskets ... King Richard there (was it the Third Crusade?), his battleaxe cleaving through the enemy's shoulder, sundering down through muscle, bone, and gristle, and watching the stricken rider topple from the tall back of the sweating gray horse ... in Germany's Black Forest, barefoot, my flesh lacerated by thorn and stone, pursued by the shouting villagers, the flames of their torches wavering, flickering through the trees, a strange, surreal glow ... gulls above the sunswept English Channel as I lower my head toward the child's white, delicately tender throat, with the warm sweet wine of her blood on my tongue. (So many myths about us. They call us creatures of the night, but many of us do not fear the bright sun. In truth, it cannot harm us, although we often hunt at night ... so many myths) ... on the high seat of the carriage, pitching and plunging through moonlit Edinburgh, wheels in thunderous clatter over the narrow, cobbled streets, hatless, my cape blown wild behind me as I lash at the straining team ... the impossibly pink sands of the beach, with a stout sea wind rattling the palm fronds, the waves blood-colored, sunset staining the edge of horizon sky and the young woman's drugged, open, waiting flesh, and my lips drawn back, the needled penetration, and the lost cry of release ... the limo driver's rasping voice above the surging current of Fifth Avenue traffic, recounting the intensity of the police hunt, and my quiet smile there with my back against the cool leather, invincible, the girl's corpse where no one can ever find it, with the puncture marks raw and stark on her skin ... the stifling, musky darkne
ss of the cave, the rough grained face of the club against my cupped fingers, the fetid tangle of beard cloaking my face, my lips thick and swollen, the hot roar of the saber-tooth still echo-sharp in my mind, and thinking not of the dead, drained female beside me but of the brute eyes of the beast ... the stench of war, of cannon-split corpses, the blue-clad regiment sprawled along the slope, the crackling musket fire in the cool air of Virginia, the stone wall ahead of me in the rushing smoke ... the plush gilt of the Vienna opera house, the music rising in a brassy tide and the tall woman beside me in blood-red velvet as I watch the faint heartbeat in the hollow of her arching throat, flushed ivory from the glow of stage lamps ... the bitter-smoked train pulling into crowded Istanbul station, the towers of ancient Byzantium rising around me, the heavy leather suitcase bumping my leg, the thick wool suit pressing against my skin, the assignation ahead with the dark-haired little fool who trusts me ... the bone-shuddering shock along my right arm as my sword sparks against the upthrust shield, the gaunt Christian falling back under the fury of my attack, the orgasmic scream of the Roman crowd awaiting another death ... the long, baked sweep of sun-blazed prairie, suddenly quiet now after the vast drumming of herded buffalo, the young, pinto-mounted Indian girl riding easily beside me, with the flushed red darkness of her skin inviting me, challenging me ... standing with Rameses II among the fallen Hittites, with the battle-thirst raging through me like a fever, the sharp odor of spilled blood everywhere, soaking deep into parched Egyptian sands ... the reeking London alehouse along the Thames, the almond-eyed whore in my lap, giggling, her breath foul with drink, her blood-rich neck gleaming in the smoky light ... the slave girl in Athens, kneeling in the dirt at my booted feet, begging me to spare her wretched life as the pointed tip of my sword elicits a single drop of crimson from her fear-taut throat ... at the castle feast, soups spiced with sage and sweet basil, the steaming venison on platters of chased silver, the hearty wines of Auvergne aglow in Jeweled flagons, with the Queen facing me across the great table, my eyes on the pale blue tracery of veins above the ruffled lace at her neck ... and, at last, here – with all the long centuries behind me, their kaleidoscopic images flickering across my mind – hunted and found, trapped like an animal under a fog-shrouded sun along the soft Pacific shore, in this fateful year of one thousand nine-hundred ninety-two, as the ultimate anvil-ringing stroke of the hammer sends the stake deep into my rioting heart ... to a sudden, unending darkness.

  The final blood is mine.

  CAPTIVE ANGEL

  S. P. SOMTOW

  In the excerpt from the third "Vampire Junction" novel which follows, Angel Todd, who has traded souls with vampire rock star Timmy Valentine in order to escape his trauma-ridden life, has been trapped inside a perfume vial by a Siamese shaman. Lady Chit, a Thai aristocrat, is traveling to Germany to join her husband, a member of the entourage that is accompanying Timmy Valentine on his world tour. On the flight, Angel's imprisoned soul speaks to her in her dreams, and tells her about his first day of being a vampire.

  flying

  NIGHT OVER ASIA: she was overcome by drowsiness yet could not sleep for a long time – even though there was no one in the first-class cabin with her. Lauren was supposed to have come with her, but after the conflagration at the temple he had gone into a deep depression; he hadn't even been able to work on the painting of the dead whore standing in the window in the rain.

  Now and then a stewardess shuffled past her aisle seat, poured her another glass of that insipid airline Beaujolais; Lady Chit had one eye on the movie - it was Jurassic Park- while in her earphones thrummed an easy listening adaptation of Vampire Junction. The cognitive dissonance did not inspire sleep. Nor did the dull ache in her breast, where the gash left by Angel Todd's bite had never entirely healed. It pained her now as she leaned back in the great leather seat and toyed with the controls of the stereo, switching from Pavarotti to k.d. lang to Kurt Cobain to Tori Amos and (by a sudden flick of the wrist) back to the familiar strains of Timmy Valentine.

  It was disorienting to watch women being gassed in black and white while listening to the saccharine harmonies of Timmy's early music, the songs she'd loved as a teenager back in the New Wave days. Then she remembered that Timmy had once told her that he too had been gassed once, in Auschwitz, because they thought he was a gipsy ... though he had not, of course, been killed, since he had not yet achieved mortality.

  A pang in her breast; not dull like all the others, but sharp, urgent; she was reliving it, the fang penetrating the soft skin. She touched herself through the silk of her blouse. It was throbbing, definitely throbbing, and with each throb a stab of pain. She reached in her purse for a Valium. Flying west, the nights are longer anyway, she thought, and now this.

  As she groped in her purse, she came upon the perfume phial.

  Why did I bring the damn thing with me anyway? she thought. Even though the ajarn had told her to wear it next to her skin, she had disobeyed him after the first couple of nights of sleeplessness ... she had tossed and turned and heard at her window a sound like the beating of great wings. And she had turned to her dwindling supply of Halcion and Valium to get her through the night.

  But she couldn't throw it out either. After all, it contained ... could you really call it a soul, when a vampire has no soul? But it was some kind of essence, some part of what had once been Angel Todd.

  She was looking at it again now. She was shaking though there was no turbulence and the sky outside the window was clear and cloudless and studded with stars. You could not see the original faux ivory; she had had it encased in silver down at the mall, and the ajarn had bound it tighter with a mantra of entrapment. It was warm to the touch. She could feel pressure against her palm ... like a caterpillar in a jumping bean ... like a baby kicking in the womb.

  Then she heard the whisper in her mind:

  Please don't put me away I need to feel you I need to touch your skin I need you I want you I need you to feel me

  She put the phial down quickly.

  It plunked into the airline Beaujolais, and the red wine fizzed a little.

  I know, she thought, you "nevairrr drink ... wine."

  She fished it out and dried it off and popped one more Valium. This time it better damn well work, she thought. And it did.

  Except that, stirring a little, an hour or so later, she felt an unwonted weight around her neck, a hunk of hot metal wedged against her breast, the stickiness from her once more oozing stigma...

  Then she fell ... no, rather she plummeted headlong into sleep, a deeper, darker sleep than she had experienced in many months ... and, sleeping, she saw Angel Todd once again ... just as she had last seen him ... on the threshold of undeath ... waiting.

  dreaming

  Listen to me. Listen. Listen. Another time. Another soul. You have to listen to me because you're the one who caged me inside of silver and imitation ivory. All that I am is in here until you set me free. Bitch! You tricked me. I needed you and you fucking tricked me. I came to you because I thought you'd understand. In a way, you do understand. That's why you got me here with you. I've touched the inside of you and your blood is in me and I know that even though you're afraid of me there's a part of you that loves me now with a love that's buried so deep inside you it's like a dead body festering in a grave. That's me. I'm your angel, your evil angel.

  In this phial there's no time and no space. Everything that ever happened to me is happening again, all at the same time. I want you to see it with me. That's why I'm sending deep into your dreams. So you'll see. So you'll believe. So you'll know why you're going to set me free.

  Look! Look! It's the moment of my becoming.

  Look again! See me without seeing. Touch me without touching.

  vampire junction

  You can say that life is a journey on a choo-choo train where you can't choose where to get on or off. You can't pick first class or baggage train or squatting in the tender with the coal dust choking you. You can say that every life
is a train trip. But most lives don't pass through Vampire Junction.

  Most lives, when they end, they go into a tunnel and they never come out. The tunnels don't go nowhere and they don't end, they just, you know, they're just tunnels. But you know that me and some of my friends have been through that tunnel and came out the other side only we weren't the same no more. Think back. We were in all caught up in the big dream together ... you and me and Timmy and Brian and Petra and many of our friends ... and then we were on the train ... and one by one, you all got off ... you went back to the real world. And finally there's only me, and Brian and Petra, and they're the ones that truly love me, and we're all like some kind of satanic version of Mary and Joseph and Jesus, you know. They want to nurture me. They're ready to throwaway their humanness and go with me. It's an awesome feeling. They're hovering over me. They cocoon me from the darkness as we start trundling into that big old tunnel. They shelter me with their bodies and I don't have to look out of the window at the great black nothing that is all that the tunnel is.

  And the tunnel goes and on and on and I'm scared shitless at first even though this is what I chose to be, what I've always longed for. But it's not the way I imagined it, no way. I'm all thinking: This is it, I've ditched my life and I'm gonna start over as a vampire and it'll all be one long party ... yeah, I saw Lost Boys and after I met Timmy Valentine I knew that wasn't all there was to being a vampire but I guess I still had this party feeling about going down into the darkness, but then it's like it goes on and on and on and time stands still and it ain't just the darkness and the loneliness but shit it's boring too, just moving on and on ... and I'm starting to think ... maybe there is no light ... maybe there is no end to this. Maybe my death is just a plain-wrap death like any other death, a death that goes on forever.