by Ally Thomas
“Good thinking,” he said, leaning for a moment into me as we roared down the road.
Not having time for a proper kill sometimes was a reality. I prayed I would have the opportunity to feast on some demon blood if the situation got deadly. I assumed it would, but I was going to do this. I was a child of the Vampire from Hell. I could do this.
Chapter 9
Lynn’s Notebook
***
“The danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that man may become robots.” ~ Erich Fromm
***
September 3rd. Bookstore.
Fucking off time while waiting to speak to manager.
Vampires. They actually do sparkle!
Something funny to tell Rayea and Grace! Read this in a book called Twelve Years’ Study of the Eastern Question in Bulgaria (1877):
A fledgling and mostly harmless vampire, called an obour or ubour, who returns nine days after burial in “an aeriform shape.” One may see the obour in the dark by its sparkles, “a succession of sparks like those from a flint and steel,” and in light by its shadows. It is reported that citizens in one village, overrun with obours, gathered in candlelit homes at night, and took turns keeping watch, “to avoid the assaults of the obours, who lit up the streets with their sparkles.”
Thoughts.
Did Bella worry about becoming an obour when Edward changed her?
Would I have liked those books more if one had been called Blood Moon?
Am I still pinching myself because I know not one, but two vampires?
Yes.
Is Rayea coming back?
Fucking HELL YEAH!
If Rayea comes back as an obour, I’ll bitch slap her or more accurately put her in a bottle and use her as a night light. Haha. Not funny.
Werewolves. What is a Blood Moon?
The next blood moon is October 8th. Why have I not heard this term before? What happened to good old fashion Full Moon? Searched the internet for more information on this and discovered this:
The first Blood Moon eclipse in a series of four, beginning on the night of April 14-15, 2014. The next one will be on the night of October 7-8, 2014. At that October Blood Moon, there will be a lunar eclipse. The term Blood Moon has not been used in quite this way before this year, but now the term has become widespread in the media. The origin of the term is occult, at least according to Occult and Mystic expert Nathan Hagee, who wrote a 2013 book called The New Medusa Blood Moons.
To Do.
Figure out a way to ask Blick about blood moons.
Ask Grace if her ex-boyfriend writes books. Surely this isn’t him!!!
Zombies. Is the apocalypse here yet? Sightings?
No and no.
To Do.
See Dracula Untold with Rayea and Grace!
What is Universal Monsters?
Searched and found:
Universal Monsters or Universal Horror is the name given to a series of distinctive horror, suspense and science fiction films made by Universal Studios from 1923 to 1960. The series began with The Hunchback of Notre Dame and The Phantom of the Opera, both silent films starring Lon Chaney. Universal continued with talkies including monster franchises Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Invisible Man, The Wolf Man, and Creature from the Black Lagoon. The studio's leading horror actors during this post-Chaney period were Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, and Lon Chaney, Jr..
Thoughts.
Talkies must be talking movies.
Bela Lugosi isn’t as sexy as Luke Evans, but the creepy eyeball staring helps.
Want to see new releases of Frankenstein, The Mummy, and Creature from the Black Lagoon. Why did Norman Reedus’ face just pop in my head? Watching too much Walking Dead. Lol.
More from Twelve Years’ Study of the Eastern Question in Bulgaria (1877):
Another way to contain a vampire is to bottle it. A current and popular vampire hunting technique used in Bulgaria to overcome the obour, an immature vampire in vaporous form. After baiting a bottle with some of the obour’s favorite food, hunters run after the vampire with a cross and drive it toward the bottle. When the obour enters the receptacle, it is promptly corked and tossed onto a fire. This will destroy the vampire. [insert eye roll here. Add comment: Are you fucking kidding me.]
Thoughts.
This book is hilarious. Must buy or search on Amazon for better price.
Ask Rayea if she wants to get in the wine business like her idiot father did.
Second thought. Scratch that idea.
366 days since I’ve seen Rayea. Sigh.
I had been waiting two hours for this blowhard of a manager to show. So I got up, shut my notebook quietly as I imagined myself slamming it closed instead, and went to go find the nice young lady who had explained that I had to wait on this idiot. Miss Bubbly was going to get a piece of my mind.
“Oh she’s at lunch.”
Rolling my eyes at another idiot, I asked when she would return. Answer?
“I’m not sure. She went to this rally in Union Square. I’ll take a message if you like.”
I shared with this other idiot who I realized was just doing her job what I wanted and of course she could not help me. So I decided to leave and keep coming back every day at this time until someone saw me. Rayea would start her book tour here. It would happen.
When I stepped outside, the sidewalks were busy as usual. Not anymore busy than I would expect around lunch time. Maybe the holiday traffic mattered some because it was Labor Day or close to it or something. I could never remember when that Monday rolled around and since I had lost my job at the Golden Skull (it burned down due to Stephanie trying to kick Rayea’s ass, a plan that failed or I hoped it did) but I did not tell Grace that. I told Grace that Rayea would be coming back no matter what, even if I doubted it more and more. But after reading that posting on Deadit.com, my faith was restored.
As I waited at the traffic light, a few guys dressed in all white bumped into me. I was about to say, ‘excuse you,’ when one tall and lanky guy shoved a flyer in my hand. I almost screamed when I read it.
The flyer read:
Join us October 7th in Union Square at Midnight
When the sun will be turned to darkness
And the moon to blood
On the great and awesome night
As the NEW MEDUSA comes.
Join us and
You will be saved!
Chapter 10
Demetri’s Discovery
***
“There's so many things that life is, and no matter how many breakthroughs, trials will exist and we're going to get through it. Just be strong.” ~ Mary J. Blige
***
This is what it’s like when worlds collide. It was the first thought that shot through my head when we arrived in Valeria. The next thought was, “Oh fuck! Is that Ray?”
The little bit of information I had found out on Valeria was sketchy. Valeria seemed to be a way station, or stopping point on one’s journey to the next place. If Beelzebub’s declaration was true, Mehen had put this place into operation after the collapse of the House of G. Without his son at his side, G had little motivation to restore order. Sad, but true.
Through the sea of cheering dead people, Blick managed to find his way over to us. It surprised me that he had not shifted into his werewolf form. But I think he was too startled to concentrate. The sight before us was beyond shocking. All of us, Grace, Blick, and me simply looked on in confusion. For a moment, I wondered what we could do, but the scene was spectacular. I did not move and decided very quickly that there was anything we could do, except stay out of the dragon’s way and watch. And yes, the dragon was Ray!
“The way to my soul is not through my legs, you demon fuck! No prince of Hell or otherwise touches me like that!”
Rayea’s words roared up to the ceiling as she blasted a stream of fire at Beelzebub. Each time he managed to reanimate himself or lessen the effect of the blaze with his po
wers, she hit him again. Lots of supernatural creatures have extra lives, kind of like cats do. Demons have sixteen to be exact and Beelzebub was rapidly depleting his existence.
“I got here right as Beelzebub was forcing himself on her. I was about to shift and save her and this happened.”
I heard Blick’s voice and he raised his hand at the scene. He couldn’t believe it either.
“Do you think we should help her?” Grace asked. “I’m ready to kick some demon’s ass!”
“How?” Blick and I asked the same thing at the same time.
Glancing over at Grace as she shadowboxed the thin air, I shook my head. Grace was certainly Rayea’s vampire child. I also decided now was the time to drop the nickname I had given Rayea when we had dated. Ray would no longer be appropriate. Fire-breathing dragon would be the obvious choice. What were we going to do? I sighed.
“Did you know this was going to happen,” I asked Blick.
“Oh yeah, I got the memo from the council just the other day. Your girlfriend won’t be judged because she’ll be burning the place down. Dragons do that, you know.”
Grace laughed.
I glared at her.
She smirked at me, batting her eyes at me when she pulled that sassy Rayea look. “I don’t think Blick knew, honey,” she offered. “Besides you are the Angel of Death. What information do you have for us?”
“Don’t honey me, woman!” I growled.
She jumped around me pretending she had punched me in the stomach once or twice.
“Wait until I get you home,” I whispered, hoping Blick had not heard me.
A huge smile spread across Grace’s lovely face. Her meadow-green eyes gleamed. Before I knew it, she pulled me to her and squeezed my face in that silly way she did when she was playful. “Calm down, Demetri. We’ll figure this out. Right, Blick?”
“I thought you were afraid to do this!”
“Screw that,” Grace giggled, wrapping her arms around my elbow and cuddling up to me. “Maybe I can become a dragon too. I didn’t know vampires could shift!”
Again Blick’s words overlapped mine. “They’re not supposed to.”
“Can she really kill him like that?” Grace asked.
“It would appear so,” Blick added. “If she can’t shift back to her vampire self, we are in trouble.
When the screaming thrill of excitement rose up from the crowd of skeletons, we realized that Beelzebub was finally no more. His existence now would be worst than any death he could imagine. I elected not to think about it. Being the Angel of Death wasn’t my concern anymore.
Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw Blick shift into his huge werewolf form and take off running towards Rayea who was still a red dragon, breathing fire into the crowd now, and enormous. She stood probably 300 feet high, the length of a football field going up to the heavens, a skyscraper of red, gold, and orange flames. It was hard to tell where her body started or ended because she never stopped moving. She looked like a magical dance of rapidly raging destruction down on anyone in her path. Several wolfhounds rose up on all fours and left the crowd to stand near Rayea in her dragon form. They were not skeletons like the other creatures. I glanced back at the scene. White and blue lights enveloped everyone as Rayea breathed flames upon them.
“What is she doing?” I yelled.
Grace grabbed my arm and almost jerked it out of the shoulder socket. “We’re not missing this!” she yelled. “Come on!”
I raced after them hearing Grace’s laughter mingle with the others. If this did not prove that Rayea had passed her Judgment Day with flying colors, I did not know what did.
Chapter 11
Marry Me (Rayea)
***
“Never leave that till tomorrow what you can do today.” ~ Benjamin Franklin
***
The moment after I had vanquished Beelzebub, I engulfed the group of skeleton creatures with my flames, hoping we could ‘purify’ their bodies quickly. The intensity of the fire must have done the trick. I was thankful that we did not need Beelzebub to break them free of their incased prisons. Amid a bellowing cloud of smoke, dying out flames, and striking zigzags of white and blue light, each skeleton resumed their former human selves, so did each animal. I saw wolves, cats, dogs, dragons, lions and the like all emerging from the chaotic flaming light show and standing up on their legs, two-legged or four-legged lifelike forms. They were no longer the walking dead. Had I really just done that?
My body relaxed and I felt my shift into a dragon fall inward upon itself and retreat from the forefront of my thoughts into the depths of my soul as if it fled the scene to hide away in a dark corner of my mind. Just as I had calmed down, I had felt the shift begin. The flames diminished and I knelt to the ground. I expected the shift, from dragon to human, to hurt, but it did not. I wondered how that could be and thought to ask Blick about that the next time I saw him. Blick, that’s his name!
“Watch out!” I heard Jax yell as the howls of another wolf drifted towards us.
The other wolfhounds pushed me aside and I rolled over several times, headfirst like I was a ball being swatted out of the way. Once I gained my balance, I jumped up. The shift back into my human self had been effortless. I stood up; slowly at first, hoping I could manage it.
Oddly enough, I was clothed in a dark red suit that felt like it was made entirely from lightweight armor. Trying to forget the flexible body armor I wore from head to toe, I held my arms out before the crowd. “Wait!” I commanded. Thank goodness, those are my hands, I thought.
The rush of memories, flooding my mind, made my body whirl and I nearly lost my footing. For safety, I knelt down. The moment I had shifted, I knew who I was. I recalled everything from the second my father, Satan, had given me his blood and turned me into a vampire to the moment my sister, Stephanie, had ripped my heart from my chest in Max’s bar. The knowledge roared towards me, a small wave at first, and then more and more memories pounded before my eyes until I felt like I had been slammed into a cliff, and then washed out to sea during a great hurricane. I thought I might collapse under the weight of knowledge now raging through my brain. Searching for my vampire fangs, I ran the tip of my tongue over the roof of my mouth. They twitched under the touch. Still a vampire, I thought. I stood up again as a cold sensation tickled my ear. After I touched my ear lobe and looked at my finger, I realized my ear was bleeding. “J,” I heard myself say. Quickly, I checked my other ear and found nothing. Oh, wow. For a few seconds, I felt fine. But suddenly, my knees buckled underneath me. The memory of what I had done to J, G’s son lashed out at me. I had killed him that night in the bar. I had bitten him over and over, and he had been heard of no more. As I fell, I reached out for someone, anyone to latch onto. That’s when I saw the man from my dark dreams and pushed my guilt to the back of my mind.
The man shifted out of his werewolf form, took my hand in his, and held me securely by the elbow. “Miss me?” I heard him ask.
I erupted into laughter and forgot about everyone and everything around me, except him. “Blick!” I screamed and leapt into his arms. He fell backwards and I tumbled on top of him. I marveled at how fast he had shifted. He grabbed me by the waist and settling me on his hips, he asked, “Are you okay?”
“I’m fabulous,” I sang out.
Blick smiled up at me. “You want to let me up?”
“Not just yet,” I purred as I gazed down at him. I recalled my promise to myself. If I ever saw this man from my dreams, the man I had before me, I would jump into action. I would not let the opportunity pass me by. I had decided this moment would be the one I would complete exactly the way that I had imagined it night after night in my dark pit of despair and deadness. I would not take no for an answer. I heard people and animals gathering around us. I nodded in acknowledgment when I heard Grace and Demetri say hello, but I only concentrated on looking at Blick.
“What are you doing this Halloween?”
“What?” Blick looked at me, trying
to figure out why I was asking such a silly question in front of everyone who stood around us. “What are you talking about?”
“October 31st, whenever it is. What are you doing?”
He stared at me for a few moments. His deep voice held a steadfast confidence, yet his golden eyes radiated a quiet concern.
I heard Grace comment. “That’s a few weeks away. You mean next Halloween? You’ll have time to plan a wedding. I’ll help!”
When I heard my fledgling’s advice, I smiled to myself. “You’re right, next year then,” I replied to Grace, not taking my eyes off Blick.
He gazed up at me, searching my mind. “Maybe it is too much time to think it over?”
I grinned down at him as I rested on his lap. “I don’t need more time.” I admired his rising muscular chest as it rose and fell underneath a slinky grey fitted t-shirt. I wanted to run my hands under the cloth. The second I felt his mind reach out for mine. Then my brain locked itself down and I realized I had blocked his telepathic inquiry. He could not read my thoughts unless I allowed it. Cool.
He smiled back at me, his golden eyes now glistening with savage passion. A slight grin remained on his face. “Do you have something in mind?”
“Marry me. I want to spend my life with you.”
From the crowd, I heard a few gasps escape into the air.
I realized after I blurted out my proposal in front of everyone that Blick probably wouldn’t take me seriously. For a moment, I felt like an idiot. Popping my hands on my hips out of awkwardness, I glanced over at Grace and Demetri who stood holding hands, frozen in shock, looking at us. I smiled up at them. They both smiled back.
Blick did not take long with his answer. He did not say a word. Instead, he gathered me into his arms, pulled us both off the floor, whirled me around a few times, and buried his head in my neck. Finally, he whispered in my ear, “You never cease to amaze me. Are you absolutely sure?”
