Hallowed Horror

by Mark Tufo

  “I used to be stationed here.”

  “Wait. I thought this place was abandoned in the 1950s.”

  “Before that, silly. I’ve been around.”

  “Oh, yeah. The undead thing. How could I forget?”

  How could she forget? Here she was, strolling hand in hand, just like any young lady on a romantic evening at beach. And in her wishful thinking, she’d allowed herself to be swept in the romantic fantasy and forget that Luke was a blood-sucking, evil murderer of innocents.

  Well, he was cute.

  But she also had a mission here, Luke or no Luke. The Gog could be landing already, for all she knew, and here she was distracted by a schoolgirl crush.

  They crested the stippled dunes, and then the stretch of alabaster beach lay before them, the black water roiling in determination. The sea breeze tugged at Sabrina’s blouse, puffing it up and tickling her belly. Luke leaned into the wind and squinted as fine sand blew into his face. He pulled her over the dune onto the flat edge of the tide, and the breeze fell to a whisper.

  “Out there,” he said, unfurling the blanket and spreading it just beyond the water’s reach.

  “What?” Sabrina said.

  “They always come from out there.”

  Sabrina imagined great tentacled beasts rising from the inky depths, leviathans with legs, Biblical creatures drawn from visions of the maddest prophets.

  “I don’t see anything,” she said hopefully. She had assumed the Gog and Magog were more or less human, but why couldn’t evil take any form it chose?

  Luke sprawled on the blanket and lay back, staring up at the dim scattering of stars. She wondered what he saw, and what it meant. She went to him, kneeling, staring into the moist and mesmerizing glint of his eyes.

  “What do you believe in?” she asked.

  He gripped her wrist and pulled her atop him. “You.”

  She wrestled to get free, but only half-heartedly. He was fairly warm for a dead guy. “I mean, what do you think happens to your soul?”

  “If I ever find it again, maybe I will ask it.”

  “It doesn’t seem fair that you have to be stuck on this Earth without a soul.”

  “Hey. You’re dead, too. Maybe you’re a slightly higher grade of ‘dead’ than I am, but that’s sort of like being the second-best kickboxer in Belgium.”

  She wriggled atop him until their bodies aligned in that comfortable, familiar position, his heat intensified, and she felt the immoral cravings stir inside her. God’s sense of humor—giving her passion along with her wings.

  “My soul’s already spoken for,” she whispered above the surf.

  “Cool. Saves me having to pretend we’re soul mates.”

  She swatted him on shoulder. “Don’t worry. I’m sure I won’t have to worry about breaking up with you in heaven. Because you won’t be there.”

  “Score!” he said, grinning and flashing those dead-sexy fangs.

  Then he grew still and serious, and she could feel his long, slow heartbeat against her bosom. Buh-dump…eight seconds…buh-dump…eight seconds…

  He was turned on, or his heart would be beating once a minute. She lowered her face and pressed her lips against his, nuzzling, teasing. His breath was sweet with something dark and corrupt, but she loved him for what he was, what he must be. God’s love was unconditional, so Sabrina accepted it as a universal excuse to love a vampire.

  Or at least make out with one.

  Their kiss intensified, and she slid her tongue into his mouth, enjoying the weird thrill of brushing her tongue against his fangs. He retaliated, probing, running his fingers through her wind-tossed hair. She writhed against his body, feeling him swell, and then one of his hands brushed aside her blouse and slid inside her bikini top, finding her breasts.

  He alternately stroked her skin and fluttered gently with his fingers. Her nipples tingled under his silken touch as the nerves came to life. It was one of the side effects of her angelic condition, something she’d never experienced as a mortal. Her nipples were like electrical conduits plugged into the entire crazy sky, surf, heaven, and earth.

  “Luke,” she whispered, as his fangs grazed her neck. He’d never fed on her, not beyond a nip, because that would have been the darkest sacrilege, but just the threat caused her to moisten and squirm.

  Sabrina, you really need to get over this bad-boy trip.

  She wasn’t sure whether the words were her thoughts or a whispered decree of God, but she was listening to neither at the moment. All she could heed was the yearning deep in her belly as she wrestled Luke’s shirt open and fumbled with the zipper of his jeans.

  “Watch the sand,” Luke said, as he rolled her onto her side.

  “I thought you liked it rough,” she said.

  “Not that rough.”

  He peeled away her blouse and shucked her bikini top, and the moonlight cast an alabaster sheen across her breasts.

  The sky was wild with tossed clouds, corrugated rags of gray, violet, and silver twisted by the wind. The moon leered down and imbued the beach with a soft, erotic glow, and the whitecaps sparkled and whispered “Do it, do it, do it.”

  A love this profane is still better than no love at all.

  And then she was beyond caring, focused on their motion as they rocked as if they were riding the high waves. “I love you,” he whispered, but it might have been the splashing sea fooling her ears.

  Yes. Definitely the sea. He’d never say that.

  Their limbs entwined, and the wave crested, pushing them toward the sky, where the universe flashed, expanded, and collapsed.

  She fell limp against him, ear to his chest, and they lay quietly. He stroked his hair, gazing past her to the stars. Sabrina counted the slowing of his heartbeat as he returned to his usual undead self. When he was back to eight beats a minute, she said, “You said you loved me.”

  “Huh?”

  “When we were rocking and rolling there, you said you loved me.”

  “Huh.” He said it like he was already thinking about something else. If he were human, it would probably be a beer, a cigarette, or the Green Bay Packers. With Luke, it might have been the many people he’d murdered over the decades.

  “So?” Sabrina murmured.

  “So what?”

  “Do you?”

  He tensed, although his diminishing hardness was still lodged inside her in a melted sea of combined heat. “We don’t go there. You know that.”

  She tapped him lightly on the chest. “I’m a woman. I’m always going to go there.”

  “You’re an angel. You only get one love, and that’s way bigger than me.”

  “Love isn’t that small and cheap. If there’s one thing I learned by coming back from the dead, it’s that love is the reason for it all. In everything.”

  “What, did you meet John Lennon in heaven or something? The place he told us not to imagine?”

  “Don’t be an asshole.”

  “Listen. We have a good thing here. But we both know it can’t last.”

  “Talking like a sailor. Girl in every port, ship’s leaving the dock, two ships passing in the night, blah blah blah.”

  “This isn’t about you.” He continued stroking her hair, although his fingers weren’t as gentle as before.

  “That’s what every man says when he dumps you. So what else could it be about?”

  “You deserve better.”

  “That’s the other crappy line they give. Heard it before, Luke.”

  “This is different.”

  She eased back until she could look down into his dark, glistening eyes. The moon and sky were reflected in his red pupils, like two miniature heavens that blocked out all hymns and harps and angels. “So how is it different?”

  “You know I’ve been here for two centuries, right? And I’m not here today because God wanted me to get saved by Sabrina Vickers.”

  “You talk of destiny like it’s something you make instead of something that happens.”

/>   He rolled her beside him on the blanket, causing them to part. Emptiness and longing surged through her belly and joined the complex tidal waves of sensations. The physical and emotional tides made for ever-changing weather. That hadn’t stopped when she’d become an angel.

  Luke sat up and gazed out at the purple horizon where the ocean and sky melded into eternity. “I’ll tell you why we can’t be together. You know I was in the United States Life Saving Service.”

  “Yeah. The early form of the Coast Guard. Always a hero, huh?”

  “Right. A real American hero. And do you know why I did it?”

  “To save lives. Because I know you have a real heart in there. You have a soul. That’s the reason I’m here.”

  “Let me tell you a story, and then you tell me if I could possibly have a soul.”

  She shivered, all heat from their passion now carried away like skirling sand. Her voice fell. “Okay.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  “It was 1896 and the hurricane season was hard upon the Graveyard of the Atlantic.” Luke’s voice changed, his grammar a little more formal. “Our Life-Saving Service crew was stationed a mile from here and I was on foot patrol. The wind was high and the waves were capping at ten to twenty feet, and the raindrops were thick as nails. I saw the first broken barrels and other flotsam riding up on the surf, and I knew a ship had run aground. I ran back to the base and rousted the crew, then returned to the shipwreck site.”

  It could have been Sabrina’s imagination, but the sea seemed to splash and slap harder to punctuate the tale.

  “I could barely see, so I waded into the breakers to locate the vessel. We later learned it was the B.E. Osterhagen, a three-masted schooner sailing from Norfolk, but that night it was just a sodden black hulk a hundred yards from shore, laden with a cargo of 180 screaming, scared souls. The crew set up the Lyle gun, a little cannon that shot a line out to the ship so a crew member on board could drag out a heavier safety line.

  “The first two shots failed, and our last stock of black powder was soaked by then. I volunteered to carry the line out by hand. Our commander was reluctant, because it seemed foolhardy. Of course, he didn’t know that it was impossible for me to drown.”

  “Vampire fringe benefits,” Sabrina said.

  “After I talked him into it, I tethered a line around my waist while the crew held the other end. I fought my way through the surf and soon I was out over my head, although the ship was resting on shoals barely fifteen feet deep. I saw someone swim past me from the ship, evidently unwilling to wait for help or for the storm to ease. One of the crew waded in and rescued him. I kept on, knowing most of the passengers would be afraid to enter the water. I was more worried the crew might jump ship and leave them all alone. Or maybe I was not worried at all. Maybe I was counting on it.”

  Sabrina shivered again. An angel shiver was not the same as a mortal shiver. It seemed to vibrate down into the earth and become a measurable physical force. “I am not sure I want to hear this.”

  “That’s why I have to tell you. Then maybe you’ll give up your little fantasies of love and redemption.”

  She started to proclaim that they weren’t fantasies, but he continued before she could form a convincing case.

  “I made it to the ship, and two of its masts were shattered and slanted into the water, the weight of the sales causing the ship to tilt. There was no hole in the hull that I could see, but soon it would be taking on water. Some passengers, mostly men, were gripping the rails and waving, either at me or at the shore. I reached one of the broken masts and dragged myself aboard. The grateful men took the line from me and began tugging, working their hands end over end to drag the heavier rescue line from shore and tie it off. From there, the life-saving crew could come aboard and use leather rescue breeches to carry people to safety, or the braver, stronger passengers could follow the line themselves.

  “Leaving the men to their mission, I made my way to the cabins and passenger area. I found families huddled together, eyes wide with fear. They seemed little relieved at my appearance. What was one man against the mighty wrath of your merciless God?”

  “He’s not merciless! He’s—”

  “Here’s how His mercy works. I escorted the families to the rescue line, women and children first. The deck was slanted and slippery and it was slow going. The ship’s crew was mostly of good mettle, endangering themselves to help the people who’d entrusted their lives and safe passage to their care. The exhaustion and strain showed in their faces, and soon they were counting on me to guide the rescue operation. My fellow crew members were occupied with helping the weaker of the victims, and soon I found myself isolated in the deepest corner of the ship.

  “By then, the waves had breached the deck and the ship was filling with water. Even though it had foundered and couldn’t really sink, it was in danger of breaking apart from the stress of the waves, so I knew we only had minutes in which to act. The last family was huddled together on a cot, a young woman and her two boys. I don’t know whether she was a widow, an unlucky prostitute, a lady of means taking a leisure trip, or someone sailing to meet her husband in a new city and a fresh start to their lives.

  “I didn’t care. The proximity of all that warm, living flesh had aroused me into a sickening state of arousal. The roar of blood in their veins was louder than the pounding of the surf against the planks. Even in the gloom of that cabin, I could see the woman’s wide eyes gleaming with hope. She held one of her boys to me, the youngest, and I could tell she would willingly sacrifice herself a million times over just to keep her child alive. I smelled him, the sweet, sustaining substance of him, the water of life and renewed unlife.”

  Sabrina cringed and pulled her blouse over her bare chest. Her nipples were hard and cold, and an ache tickled something deep inside her immortal heart. “No,” she whispered, the denial inaudible even to herself.

  But Luke’s hearing was preternaturally keen. “Yes,” he whispered back.

  “You couldn’t.”

  “I couldn’t not do it. That is what I am, Sabrina.”

  “But you were a life saver.”

  “No. I was—and am—a vampire, doing whatever it takes to survive.”

  “But you did save people. Lots of people. You just said so.”

  “History records that the U.S. Life Saving Service of Portsmouth Island saved 174 people on that turbulent night. Six unfortunate souls were lost to the waves despite the crew’s valiant efforts.”

  “Did you—”

  “I only fed on those three. The others died of natural causes, at least if you consider drowning a part of nature.”

  “What…what did you do with the bodies?”

  “What any self-respecting vampire would do. I tore their heads off so they wouldn’t be cursed to the same fate, and then dumped them in the water for the sharks. Although in their bloodless state, the corpses likely ended up feeding blue crabs on the bottom. It’s all part of the cycle, Sabrina. The universe isn’t as pretty as you would like it to be, with your white clouds, golden stairs, and endless harmony. Sometimes it’s just meat and hunger.”

  Sabrina took a lungful of air and tried to savor its sustaining power. It tasted like seaweed and burned. “But you joined the Life-Saving Service, and now you’re in the Coast Guard. You want to be good. You want to do the right thing. And that means there’s hope of redemption.”

  “Hope is your currency, Sabrina. Not mine. I joined the Life-Saving Service because of opportunity. Why worry about having to hide bodies where people would eventually notice and cause trouble for me? Where better to claim victims than in a place where victims are expected?”

  She took his hand despite the hammering alarms in her head. “You…you’re not a monster, Luke. I know you are good. At your core, you are good.”

  He smiled a little, and his lips held ancient sorrows, all the weariness of a world that would never get it right. “You are what you eat. And I am a bottomless pit of death, pain, hor
ror, and blood.”

  Sabrina dug her fingernails into his arm. “Damn you, you are on our side. My side. Why do you care if the Gog and Magog take over the world, then? If all you care about is your own selfish needs, then why are you helping me? Seems like you’d be better off just waiting for the apocalypse so you could feast to your rotten heart’s content.”

  He shook free of her grip and turned his gaze from the wreckage of his past. His eyes burned into hers. “Maybe there’s just enough humanity left in me to commit the sin of pride.”

  “But you came here as a watchman first. Not as a blood-drinking member of the Life Saving Service. That proves you are on our side.”

  “I’ve only been here a couple of hundred years. I haven’t had time to make up my mind about which side I’m on.”

  “I suspect your loyalties change with each new opportunity.” Sabrina rose and gathered her clothes, pulling them into place and buttoning her blouse. Her bikini bottoms were sodden and the elastic had sprung, so she wadded them up and stuffed them in Luke’s back pocket. “And I guess that’s all I am to you: just another opportunity.”

  Luke shrugged, gazing past her and up across the dunes, the moon making a iridescent streak in his long, dark hair. “I never promised anything, so I can’t break any promises.”

  From the direction of the abandoned village, they heard a voice on the wind. “Hello! Anybody home?”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “Roy,” Sabrina said. “Guess his little beach party with Cherry didn’t last.”

  “Or maybe he’s out of beer and ready to head back to the mainland,” Luke responded.

  “Give him a break, okay? He’s only human. He may be an asshole, but at least he’s not sucking the juice out of women and children.”

  Luke tugged his jeans back into place, adjusted the diminishing bulge in his crotch, and zipped them. “I have no idea what Roy does or doesn’t suck. Why don’t you ask Cherry?”

  As if on cue, Cherry appeared in the gap between the dunes, no doubt following the natural path from the village to the beach. “Oh, there you are! We’ve been looking everywhere.”