I realized then I could feel his emotions. They whispered against my flesh, filled the space around us. And then I felt mine, weighted by his. And it was clear to me, in a single moment, I could see it all right in front of my blindfolded eyes. How can I explain this? It was like a glowing map in front of me. His emotions were cloudy, glowing white, filling the space around us. Mine were a hot little ball of red at the center of me. And I controlled from there. No need to let him know. I just had to stay there and he'd never find me. No one would.
"Megan can't sing any more can she?" I asked.
"I don't know."
I could tell he was lying. I felt the lie on my skin, the brush of it against the fine hairs on my arm.
"Take off your hood."
"Really?"
"We are far enough from the house. And besides, you've got one of the worst senses of direction I've ever seen. You couldn't find your way back there with a map," he said with a small chuckle, taking his hand off my leg. I felt anger at him. It was the first emotion to explode when given the space. I saw it like a rocket, arching out of me.
I pulled the hood off, turning to him. "What do you know about my sense of direction?" I asked. But before he could answer I saw that the car was enveloped in smoke. "What is going on?" I turned in my seat, scanning the area.
"Fires," he said. "This part of the city is burning."
"What?" I asked as a zombie came through the smoke, stumbling, half its face a gory mess, the other half splattered with blood, the one remaining eye swiveling in its socket. It stepped into our path and Dimitri swung around it. I watched as the creature swiveled and, arms outstretched, began to stumble after us. Soon it was invisible in the thick smoke.
"But... how long was I at your house? How long did I sleep?"
"Sometimes the world changes in an instant."
"Yes," I said, thinking of my father's death and how my world shifted. Reaching up I ran my hand over where that wolf bit me when I was fighting with them, trying to save my father's life. Desperate to save my own. It was healed by the time they opened that cabinet. The tears in my clothing remained but underneath my skin was smooth.
Dimitri hadn't left me alone while I showered. He'd followed me into the bathroom. His energy strange, pulsing. I could sense confusion, a need to touch me. When I glanced in the mirror I saw that my neck, where Megan bit me, was smooth. Just as smooth as it had ever been. But Dimitri said there was a mark there. Right before we...
Dimitri placed his hand on my thigh again. "I'm okay," I said.
"I told you, I like touching you."
The smoke began to clear and I could see abandoned streets. "Are they evacuating the city?"
"Quite the opposite," Dimitri said. "They are quarantining it."
"Will that help?"
"Nothing will help."
I turned in my seat again, staring around, trying to figure out where we were. I recognized the street but without people it seemed foreign, like we were in a different world. Dimitri took a left and I recognized the block that only the night before had bustled with people finishing up the zombie run. Today, it was clogged with cars. Their lights turned off, they stood empty, blocking the street. Dimitri eased up behind them and then pulled to a stop. "We'll have to walk from here."
"Okay," I said, taking off my seat belt, keeping my eyes fastened to the dead cars in front of us. "Why would people just leave their cars?" I asked. Dimitri looked over at me. His eyes unfocused as he stared at me. "What?" I asked.
"I'm not sure," he answered, leaning toward me. He sniffed my hair. "There is something about you... I can't..." He shook his head, a brief expression of frustration crossing his brow.
I reached into the back seat for my violin. "I need to go home," I said.
He touched my cheek as I pulled the violin toward me. Just a slight brush of his warm fingers against my skin before he turned to his door. Instantly, he was opening mine and offering his hand. I took it and stood.
Dimitri turned suddenly and his fist slammed into the body of an approaching zombie. Once a man, the figure was bloated, the buttons on its shirt straining, his neck grotesquely mauled, part of his lips devoured. The zombie's jaw continued to open and close, its eyes wide and hungry, not in any way human, as Dimitri reached up with his free hand and grabbed the top of the creature's head. It struggle against him, straining its tongue toward me.
With what seemed like no effort at all, Dimitri dug his fingers into the zombie's scalp, turning it almost into a bowling ball. I watched with fascinated horror as Dimitri pulled straight up, ripping the head loose from the neck. The body fell to the ground and Dimitri turned to me, the head in his hand, its jaw still working.
"There is only one way to kill a zombie," Dimitri told me. "The heart does not matter." He held out his other hand which grasped a still heart in it. Blood and gore dripped between his fingers around it. I swallowed down bile. Dimitri then held up the head with its animated features. "The brain," he said. "You must pierce the brain." I stared at the head. "Darling," Dimitri said, his voice low. "Kill it." I looked up at him. He smiled at me encouragingly. "You can do it," he said with a nod. I didn't move. Dimitri frowned.
"With what?" I asked.
He smiled. "There is a knife in the glove box."
I put the violin down at my feet and reached back into the car. A hunting knife sat where you'd expect to find registration papers. Its blade was curved, the handle black and indented with finger grips. I turned back to Dimitri holding the knife, my fingers relaxed, the way my father taught me.
"You don't need to worry about me," I told Dimitri.
"Let's see you kill this thing, then."
I shook my head. "I don't want to."
Dimitri frowned, his features pulling toward the center of his face. The head in his hand clapped its teeth together. Sirens wailed in the distance. I turned toward the sound but saw only smoke billowing from behind us. "Darling," Dimitri said, and I felt his will upon me, like a warm blanket wrapping around me. "Kill it," he said, his voice harsher than before, his fangs distending slightly.
"I don't want to."
"Why not?"
"I don't want to kill again."
He stared at me. "It's not a person."
"That doesn't change how I feel after."
"I can change that."
"I don't want it to change. I don't want to take pleasure from taking life."
Dimitri's influence pushed harder. "No," I said, anger pushing me to do and say things I didn't want. I could see it boiling over the spill line, bubbling out of me, invading his cloud of influence, fighting back.
Dimitri stepped closer, dropping the rotting heart onto the ground and holding the decapitated head up in front of me. Its lips, at least what remained of them, pulled back from its teeth, as it tried to reach me. "This thing will kill you."
"Take me home," I asked, putting a note of pleading into my voice. "I need to think. I'm confused by what is happening," I said. "I'm sorry." I could feel him trying to enter me, his mind probing like a tongue, rough and wet, sloppy and hungry. Both erotic and repulsive.
Dimitri smiled, "You don't control me, girl," he said, dropping the head and crushing it under one of his feet, without taking his pale blue eyes off of mine.
"I am Megan's."
He growled. And suddenly his hands were holding either side of my face, my back pressed up against the car. The stench of rot on his fingers strong. It almost hurt. Smoke billowed thick around us. His fangs descended. "What are you doing to me?" he said, his voice almost pained. "I just want to kiss you." His eyes narrowed. "I have not felt for so long, what are you?"
A scream tore through the air. It was coming from the building directly to our right. A three- story brick affair with a balcony filled with plants, blooming flowers, that didn't seem to know the world was ending. "Help!" a woman sobbed.
"We have to help her," I said to Dimitri. He licked his lips. "Please," I said. The scream grew louder, more d
esperate. "Please," I said again, bringing my hand up and wrapping it around his wrist.
He grunted, bent down and picked up my violin, then grabbing me roughly around the waist, crouched down, and launched us up onto the balcony. We landed lightly on the far side of the plants. I slid down his body, slowly, like he was taking his time letting me go. Long white curtains blocked the interior from my view but another scream urged me forward. Dimitri stopped me. "Wait here," he said, putting my violin on the ground.
"I'm trained in first aid," I answered.
"Stay," he said, his voice rooting me to the floor. Dimitri blurred through the curtains, leaving them lifted in his wake. Before they fell back into place I saw a young boy curled behind a couch, his hands over his ears, eyes squeezed shut, and tears running down his face. I fought to take a step but my feet would not budge from the balcony's wood floor. Another scream, this one rising higher until it died out.
My feet came loose and I stumbled forward, reaching out for the curtains trying to catch myself. I grabbed at the cloth but instead of it stopping my fall the whole fixture ripped out of the wall, bringing the bar and both curtains down on top of me as I fell into the apartment.
I hit the floor hard, on my side, wrapped up in the cloth. Strong hands instantly lifted me up, all the spots where I'd fallen no longer hurting. The cloth disappeared and Dimitri stood over me. "You are okay," he told me. I nodded, agreeing. "Sorry that you fell."
"It's fine," I said, trying to disentangle myself from him. He let go of me reluctantly and I stepped around him to where the little boy sat rocking back and forth, his eyes still squeezed shut, hands over his ears. I crouched down in front of him and placed a hand gently on his forearm. He flinched and turned away without opening his eyes.
Dimitri came up behind me and I could see his cloud of influence envelop the boy. The child dropped his hands looking up at Dimitri with red-rimmed eyes. "Boy, are you bitten?" Dimitri asked him. The child, his blonde hair tousled, shook his head. "Good," Dimitri said. "You will live for now then."
"What about my mom and dad?" he asked, his voice high but calm.
"Your father is dead."
"My mother?"
Dimitri turned back into the room and asked. "Are you bit?"
I looked over the top of the couch and saw a woman leaning against the wall, her clothing (jeans and a T-shirt) were covered in blood, her hair was half in a ponytail and half out, hanging around her face in strands stained with blood. Next to her lay the headless body of a man. She looked up at Dimitri. "Yes," she answered, her voice vibrating with shock.
Dimitri turned back to the boy. "If I do not kill her now she will become a zombie, just like your father did."
"No," he said, shaking his head.
"I can kill her."
"No," the boy said standing up, reaching his hands out, pleading with the vampire. "I want her to live."
"Not possible."
"Dimitri," I said. "Can't something be done? Shouldn't we take her to the hospital?"
"They would shoot her."
"No," I said, "they couldn't."
"The army is there. Crescent City is under martial law. They are trying to save the world, Darling, this woman's life means nothing to them." He looked down at me. "I can't turn her. There isn't time."
"So there is nothing we can do?"
"Mercy, Darling. Killing her is mercy." Dimitri cocked his head and listened. "We must go."
In a flash he was across the room, his hands on the woman's head, and then a crack. He dropped her and she slumped on the ground. Then he was back at my side. "Come," he said.
"What about him?" I asked, my voice high with panic.
Dimitri leaned down to the boy. "Men in uniforms are coming," he told him. "You tell them that you have not been bitten. They will care for you."
"Wait," I said, but he didn't. Dimitri's arm wrapped around my waist and he pressed me against his body. He stepped out onto the balcony and looked down. I followed his gaze and saw trucks, dark green with white stenciled writing, coming down the block, heading toward the blockade of cars that had stopped us. Behind them the smoke continued to grow thicker, the smell was horrible, a mix of building materials, chemicals, plastic, and something. Almost like BBQ, I thought. And then instantly hated myself for it. That was people, I realized. I was smelling people burning.
Dimitri tightened his grip and crouched, picked up my violin then jumped up, landing us on the roof. He hooked his free arm under my knees so that he held me like a child. Dimitri took off in the direction of my house. He ran so fast that I had to turn my face into his chest to keep the wind from blinding me.
<<<<>>>>
"So you began to understand your powers?"
Darling shrugged. "I didn't recognize them as powers. I didn't understand it but I accepted it." She laughed. "At that point, you can imagine, I wasn't holding onto too many of my beliefs too hard."
"Was it because..." my voice drifted off. For some reason I felt shy asking if it was the sex that awakened her powers.
Darling leaned back in her chair. "Was it the what?" she asked, her voice teasing as she caught my eye. "The sex?"
"Yes," I said.
"Something like that."
<<<<>>>>
CHAPTER SIX
In time Dimitri stopped. We were still on a roof, the smoke was further away. Dimitri glanced over the edge and I followed his gaze seeing my balcony below. There were no cars in the streets, no green trucks. "They are doing door to door searches," he said. "They have cleared your building already. You will be relatively safe here as long as you don't let anyone in."
He leapt down onto my balcony, landing in a crouch. "Do you have food and fresh water?" he asked as he let me down.
I took my violin from him nodding, then turned toward my balcony doors and, knowing they were unlocked, opened one. Stepping inside I turned to Dimitri. "Thanks for bringing me home," I said.
"Will you invite me in?" he asked.
"Do you need an invitation?"
"It is considered polite to wait for one."
"But, I need to think without your influence," I said, leaning against the door, making sure to stay on my own floor.
"I understand," he said. "However," he took a step closer to me, "I can come in, or I can influence you from out here. Darling, I could influence you from across the world."
"You can?"
"Yes."
"Oh."
He stepped even closer and his fangs began to descend. I'm hungry was the thought running through my mind. His eyes lit up and he growled, "Invite me in."
"Please come in," I heard myself say. Dimitri stepped through the open door and closed it behind him. He took my violin from me and laid it on the ground then wrapped me in his arms and pressed his lips against mine. Lifting me up, he walked backward, our bodies pressed together as we moved to my couch.
"May I drink from you?" he asked, kissing down my chin. I leaned back and he suckled on my neck, nipping it gently where Megan had drunk from me. A shiver ran through my body.
"I don't think so," I said, my voice sounding unsure and confused. I could feel and see his influence. My breath was shallow, body vibrating. "You're trying to influence me," I said.
"No," he said against my skin, his hands roaming over my body. "I think you are influencing me." He stilled then.
"What?" I asked.
He sat up looking down at me. "That is impossible," he said. "It... you. Are you a witch?"
I laughed, the look on his face was priceless. "A witch?" I said. "No, I'm just a fiddle player."
He shook his head. "No, you are much more than that." He stood up and walked away from me. "I don't understand," he said, looking back at me, "how is this possible?"
"What?" I asked, sitting up, wanting the weight of him back on me.
He bit his lip.
"What's wrong?" I asked.
"You cannot stay here," he said. "It is far too dangerous. Pearl was wrong to send you b
ack here."
"Unless she wants me to die," I said.
Dimitri shook his head. "No, you are of her blood. She wants you to turn."
"Why?"
"The more of your blood that is turned the more powerful you are."
"So why don't they just use their influence and turn me without my consent?"
"You would not be a very good vampire then. Those who do not want to turn often die in the process. You must want eternal life, be willing to give things up for it." Dimitri looked up then. He sniffed the air. "Emmanuel," he said, his voice strange. There was an emotion in his tone I could not discern.
"What?"
"He is coming."
Dimitri blurred out onto the balcony and I followed him. Emmanuel's rusted red truck pulled over in front of my building. I ran back toward the front door. Dimitri followed and as I reached for the knob my body froze in place. "He is bitten," Dimitri said. "You cannot let him in."
"Let go of me," I said, struggling against the force that held me.
"Stop fighting me," he said.
"I want -" I began but Dimitri sucked my will from me. I saw it leave like a cloud of dust punched from a long abandoned pillow. I slumped against the force that held me, its black tentacles wrapping around my arms and legs, like vines. If he releases me now I'll crumple to the floor, I thought, and I didn't care if I ever got up again. That lack of will, the complete loss of all I'd wanted the moment ago brought tears to my eyes. A deep hopelessness seeped into my bones.
A knock at my door. "Darling!" It was Emmanuel, his voice sounded strained. Dimitri moved my body forward, placing my eye so that I could see out the peep hole. See, I heard Dimitri's voice inside my head. He is gone. Focusing on the figure, I saw Emmanuel, his curls, his brown eyes, but his neck, his beautiful neck was badly mauled, showing tendons, blood pouring over his shoulder and down his shirt. He coughed violently, blood expelling from his lungs, hitting the eye of my peep hole, leaving it dark. If you let him in he'll kill you.
"Darling, please, let me in. We need to go."
"I can't," I heard myself say. "You've been bitten."
Emmanuel banged on the door. "Please trust me," he said. "I'll be fine, I need your help. You've got to come with me." He coughed again and I heard him lean his weight against the door. "I'll come back," he wheezed. "Don't leave. Stay here. I'll come back for you."
Two Kiss: An Apocalyptic Urban Fantasy (Transmissions from the International Council for the Exploration of the Universe Book 2) Page 4
