A Taste of Crimson

by Marjorie M. Liu

  Or rather, only some of them were smiling. She looked deeper, past the vampires nearest her, and caught the unmistakable wrinkle of deep concern rippling through the crowd nearest the bar. No one there looked happy.

  Bingo.

  Keeli moved toward the bar. A cold hand grabbed the back of her neck.

  “Look what we have,” said a booming voice. “Werewolf.”

  He might as well have called her a nun with a gun. A startled hush fell over the room, and dozens upon dozens of eyes stared and studied and judged.

  “She told me she was here as blood,” said another vampire, pushing close. He had the dry voice she had heard over the intercom, attached to a gaunt face that bore too many imperfections to be called handsome.

  The hand on Keeli’s neck tightened. “Is that so, wolf? You here to feed us? Maybe all of us?”

  “My blood is for only one vampire,” Keeli shot back. “And if he’s not here, then I’m gone.”

  The gaunt vampire sidled close. “She smells like trash. Looks like trash.”

  “Maybe we treat her like trash?”

  Keeli searched desperately for Michael. Near the bar, the vampires thinned out for just one moment. She looked hard, straining, and what she saw made her heart thud into her stomach.

  The reason for the looks of concern had nothing to do with Michael. Or maybe everything. There was a vampire slumped against the bar counter. He did not have a head.

  She was in a lot of trouble.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Viggo the doorman let Michael into The Bloody Pulp without fuss. Michael did not expect trouble from the skinny vampire, who liked to talk big but consistently folded under any hint of pressure. Marcus would be more of a problem, but that, also, was to be expected.

  Just ask your questions and go. Go back to Keeli, before she changes her mind and comes in here after you.

  Easier said than done. The resentment and fear he felt radiating from the crowd could have ridden the pulse of the room like its own music: hard and vicious. The Vendix was back, and that meant one of them was going to die. All of them deserved it; receiving the order was only a matter of time, borrowed time, playing in the belly of a bar, pretending to be immortal, when all it took was a phone call to bring down the hand of death.

  Silence descended. Men and women peeled back from Michael’s approach, trying to maintain dignity while pretending not to run for their lives. The last time Michael had been here there had been no warning, barely a glance. Walking, and then a flash of steel, the rolling thud of a lost head.

  And yet, he knew that not one of these vampires would leave their sanctuary. Forget sunlight—all of them had enough sunscreen to protect themselves, and if not, the bar had its own supply. No, the answer rested in pride, arrogance. Everyone here had it in spades, and no one wanted to be the first vampire to admit weakness in the face of death. It was a strange code of honor that had grown up amongst the lower classes of vampire, but it also made Michael’s job more dangerous, because that pride meant protection, for all of the men and women watching him wanted nothing more than his slow and painful death.

  Michael made it to the bar without any trouble. He leaned against the blue counter, studying the human men and women strapped naked to the wall with blood taps running fine and clear from their wrists. There were eight humans, four of each sex. All of them were impossibly beautiful, with glazed eyes that stared blindly into the room. Marcus provided small doses of painkiller and marrow stimulant—not enough to taint the taste of blood, but just the right amount to dull the discomfort of the blood taps and leather straps. The men and women worked four-hour shifts, providing drinks to the customers. Marcus was the only one in control of the tap.

  “Michael,” said Marcus, waddling to a blond human whose breasts jutted out like hard balloons. He turned the tap at her wrist; blood raced through the attached tube into a crystal glass. The woman never flinched.

  “Marcus.” Michael watched him hand the glass to a lithe vampire who bared her teeth at the rim, inhaling so deeply it seemed she would feed herself on fumes.

  “You come to kill?” Marcus leaned on the bar. His jowls shook, but his eyes—black and small, remained steady, sharp. Michael tilted his head. Marcus had always been a mystery. He was rumored to be one of the most powerful vampires in the city, but it was an underclass power, the kind that came not from money, but from information and pure stubborn immorality.

  “You’ve never asked me that question before,” Michael said.

  “You have a look about you. Something different from the other times you came to kill. Your sharp edge is not for death tonight.” He shrugged. “But I could be wrong. So I ask. What is your answer?”

  “No death. Not unless it is asked for.”

  Marcus smiled, humorless and cold. Michael sensed a shift in the air, a promise, and he ducked, whirling, just as a knife hacked into the bar top where he stood. Michael unsheathed his sword. The blade danced. The vampire’s head hit the bar, bouncing once before rolling to the floor. Blood spurted from the slumped body, striking the pale men and women who scrambled to create distance. They wiped their faces, disgusted.

  Michael cleaned his sword on the dead vampire’s silk slacks. He looked at Marcus. “Any other points you’d like to make?”

  Marcus shrugged. “The very young and newly made are so easy to manipulate. I knew you would kill him.”

  “Nice of you.”

  “Indeed.”

  “You come in for a drink?”

  “Answers.”

  “Then I need a drink.” Marcus turned the tap on a brunette. He mixed vodka into the blood, and then gestured for Michael to follow him. “Come. We go talk.”

  Michael glanced at the other vampires. None of them made eye contact. When he was sure that no one else planned on hacking him to death, he picked up his attacker’s knife, stuck it in his belt, and followed Marcus through a door set off to the left of the bar.

  The office was painted blue, filled with large, comfortable chairs and an uncluttered oak desk stuck in the corner beside a small armada of surveillance cameras.

  Marcus sighed, slumping down in one of his recliners. Michael did not sit.

  “I’m here because someone is murdering vampires.”

  Marcus laughed. “That is ironic.”

  “I suppose.”

  “No, you do not suppose. You know.” Marcus traced his fat cheek, and then pointed at Michael’s tattoo. “Murder is your calling, is it not?”

  “It’s what I do,” Michael said, sliding into the game. He had never spoken like this with Marcus, though he knew from rumor and reputation that The Bloody Pulp’s owner was shrewd, sharp as his years, with a fang pressed hard into the city’s dark pulse.

  Marcus sipped his drink. “The murders I know. Most of the dead were familiar faces.”

  “Walter Crestin was not the only one to come here?”

  “Of course not.” He smiled. “Even high-class vampires like to roll dirty, sometimes. Though do you know, none here believe the wolves are responsible for their deaths?”

  “Who, then?”

  “Why, you. You would make a perfect serial killer, Michael. Not a one doubts your ability to pull it off.”

  “I did not murder those men and women.”

  Marcus shrugged. “Perhaps it does not matter. Soon, the humans will be doing your job. Indiscriminately, too. And to think, there might come a day when our kind sing your praises as a gentle soul—sing, too, how you did not spare the rod to our spoiled blood-hungry children.”

  Michael suspected that Marcus took an inordinate amount of pleasure in hearing himself speak. He said, “Did you see anyone with Walter Crestin the night he died? Any rumors on who—or what—killed him?”

  “Plenty of rumors, Michael.”

  “Do not play games with me.”

  He smiled, sly. “No games. Just maybes and what-ifs. I will tell you this: Walter Crestin was not alone in the bar the night he died. He had a c
ompanion.”

  “Who?”

  “I never learned his name. He came in here sometimes. Never stayed long. Walter talked to him before he died. Walter had a thing for men. Pretty boys. This one had red eyes. Demon-breed, maybe, but Walter did not care. He was too hungry for a taste of sweet.”

  “What did they talk about?”

  “Oh, poor Walter. He liked to brag about the things he did to pinks, the humans. Sticking them the fang just so.”

  “Did he leave with this man?”

  “Left, and never came back.”

  Michael took a deep breath. So. It seemed that all the clues truly did lead back to his mysterious attacker. “You said the other murdered vampires were familiar. Did any of them ever talk with the demon-breed?”

  “As I said, he was here sometimes, but I think that was coincidence. Or not. It is difficult to remember. I do not know where he comes from.”

  “Can you remember the last time he came in?”

  “The night Walter died. I have not seen him since. As I recall, he did not drink much, and when he did, it was not from the tap. He wanted water.”

  “That did not strike you as bizarre?”

  “With his eyes? I did not want to antagonize him. Besides, not everyone’s drink of pleasure is the same.” He gave Michael a pointed look that slid sideways to the monitors. Michael followed his gaze.

  At first he did not know what Marcus was trying to tell him, but he looked closer at a shot of the bar, and saw a tiny figure surrounded by vampires. A tiny black and white waif with short pixie hair. A large hand was clamped around her neck.

  Michael ran to the door. It was locked. Marcus smiled.

  “There is no key, Michael, so do not think of attacking me for one. The lock is voice activated; I must speak a code for it to open.”

  “Do it,” Michael said, watching in horror as the large vampire holding Keeli’s neck forced her to the ground. Her face contorted.

  “Fascinating,” whispered Marcus, staring at Michael. “I heard the rumor, but I did not think such a thing was possible. How deliciously perverted.”

  Snarling, Michael pounced on Marcus. He drew a knife on the vampire’s throat, pressing the blade into the crease of his chin. “Open the door!”

  “No,” said Marcus, unafraid. “Not until you answer my question.”

  “Anything,” Michael promised, watching the vampires in the bar descend on Keeli. Hair pushed through her skin; her cheeks shifted, bones rippling into the wolf. And still the vampire held her. Michael felt his life slipping away, the first true agony, worse than anything he had ever experienced.

  Something that could have been compassion stirred deep within Marcus’s eyes. “Ah,” he sighed. “So you are vulnerable.”

  Rage blazed hot, burning, and Michael threw away the knife and slashed open the vampire’s throat with his own fingernails. He dug his fingers into the wound, twisting. Blood spurted, hitting Michael’s face. Marcus howled.

  “Open the door!” He ripped his fingers out of the writhing vampire’s throat.

  “No!” Marcus gasped, blood frothing past his lips. “Not until you tell me how you killed Malachai.”

  Michael froze; his mouth tasted like ashes. No one had said that name to him in centuries.

  “He had me too,” Marcus ground out. “Longer than you. Only reason I have not killed you, paid for the job to be done right.”

  Michael felt like he was going to die. He tore his gaze away to look at the monitors. Keeli was fighting now; he watched her squirm free, slashing her claws through a knee. The vampire fell backwards, but there was another to take his place. Too many.

  “I cut off his head,” Michael croaked, looking back at Marcus. “I burned his body to ashes. He is dead. Now open that door before I do the same thing to you.”

  Marcus said the code. The door clicked open. Michael ran.

  The office had been perfectly soundproofed because out in the bar the blast of anger, excitement, and blood lust was loud enough to feel in his chest. He threw himself up and over the crowd—caught sight of Keeli’s pink hair, the blur of her body as she rolled across the ground.

  “Keeli!” he shouted. She spun, light, the wolf in her sharp face, inhuman eyes blazing blue and gold. Her cheek bled, and her body shone slick with dark fur. She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in his life: wild and strong.

  Blood covered her hands; several vampires were sprawled at her feet. Michael flew toward Keeli, stretching—she grabbed his hands and he hauled her off the ground. Vampires shot up after them; Keeli kicked one in the head. Michael slammed an elbow into a chest, whipping in a tight circle, spinning too fast for hands to catch hold. Keeli’s hair tickled his chin, her body squashed flat against his own. She smelled like roses, blood, her heart flashing a quick sweet rhythm. Something hard hit his back.

  Enough. He had to keep Keeli safe, no matter what, and this—this—could not be tolerated. Not anymore—not ever again.

  He flew behind the bar, sliding into a dive that had him skinning his back, Keeli riding hard on his chest. The humans were finally awake; they stared down at Michael and Keeli with wide, startled eyes, and began struggling in their restraints.

  “Michael!” Keeli gasped, but he barely heard her. He unsheathed his sword and jumped on top of the counter with a monster curling tight in his gut, vicious and hungry. Keeli touched his ankle.

  High-class vampires touted their refinement, played at being human—the lower classes reveled in myth, the human expectation of desire and cruelty and blood. But it was all the same in the end, born or made. Their existence was founded on masks, worn tight in games and play, hiding the true face of the beast, the shadow on the soul that was both power and death.

  No one was more familiar with that dark nature than Michael. No one else had been stripped down to that pure essence of vampire, where the human was dead, the conscience drowned in blood. None of the vampires in front of Michael knew what that meant—could even conceive of such darkness, no matter how much they desired to be a part of it. Rebels. Rogues. They were weak. Pathetic.

  I will kill them all. I will kill them. For Keeli. For me. For all the people they have hurt or dream of hurting.

  Keeli jumped up beside him. He expected her to try to calm him, but instead he heard a low growl, the scrape of claws. He glanced sideways and found her facing the vampires, more wolf than woman.

  Ready to watch his back.

  I love you, Keeli Maddox.

  Marcus appeared in the doorway of his office. One hand clutched his neck; blood spilled over his fingers, staining his white shirt. He leaned against the thick frame, chest heaving.

  “Stop it,” he said. It took Michael a moment to realize Marcus was talking to the vampires in his bar. He staggered forward, trailing blood. He looked at Keeli.

  “She is your friend,” Marcus said.

  “The best,” Michael said, sensing Keeli stir beside him. “She never gives up on me.”

  Marcus turned to face the vampires. “Go away. Sit down and pretend you are clever. Do not bare fang to the wolf or you will answer to me.”

  “She’s a dog,” spat Viggo, wiping blood from his mouth. “A bitch. You gonna let that stand in here?”

  Marcus hissed, terrible violence rippling through his thick face. His jowls shook. “Do you want to fuck with me today, Viggo?”

  Even Michael did not want to fuck with Marcus now—not with that terrible brutality shadowing his face, transforming it into something terrifying and ancient.

  Viggo slunk away into the blue shadows.

  “You could have killed me,” Michael said, voicing that awful, humbling, realization. “Back in your office. You’re strong enough.”

  “I could have,” Marcus agreed. “But we are both sons of Malachai, and that is an uncommon bond.”

  The bleeding slowed. Marcus peered up at Keeli, who stood straight and tall beside Michael. Her chest heaved; cuts and scratches dotted her body, barely visible be
neath the dark fur and tattered clothing. Her sharp face was barely human. Michael reached for her hand and she gripped him hard.

  “How very curious,” Marcus murmured.

  A shiver ran up Keeli’s arm. She jumped off the bar counter, landing lightly on the balls of her feet with a wild grace that was both wolf and woman. Michael leapt after her and sheathed his sword. The floor was sticky with blood.

  Marcus approached, slow. Behind him the humans, still strapped to the blue wall, watched with large uncertain eyes. Michael briefly considered cutting them down, but realized it would be a useless act. They could walk anytime they wanted; Michael knew that much about Marcus. Those humans hung there, night after night, because they wanted to be food on tap. Because for them, whoring out blood was better than whoring sex. Might pay better, too. Michael thought it was a toss-up.

  Marcus glanced at Keeli, who stared back, defiant. “Michael. Did I give you the answers you needed?”

  “Do you have more answers?”

  “Not yet.” A mysterious smile touched his pale lips. “And I suspect you might have more than me.”

  “Emily?” Keeli prompted.

  Michael nodded. “We are also looking for a vampire who carries a silver knife with a hilt shaped like a crucifix. He likes to attack women, and the occasional werewolf.”

  Marcus paused. “If I see him, I will tell you.”

  “Will you really?” Keeli asked. Her face shifted back to full human, the fur on her arms receding. She looked past Marcus to the restrained humans. Her mouth twisted. “You don’t really inspire a whole lot of trust.”

  “A vampire is only as good as his word,” Marcus said. Keeli shook her head, unamused.

  “Thank you for your help,” Michael said, and then stepped close, savoring the taste of blood as his teeth cut into his lip. His hands felt sticky. Marcus did not move, not even when Michael touched his wounded neck and whispered, “If you ever put Keeli’s life in danger again, I will kill you. I will do to you what I did to Malachai, and I will make it slow. Do you understand?”