Bitter Fruits

by Daltry, Sarah

  “Actually, there is,” Henry says. “But it is something Nora and I need to discuss in private first.”

  And maybe I would have known what that something was if the windows didn’t implode.

  16.

  I expected Lilith, not revenants. I yearn for the sword Scarlet requested, but Caleb and Alec make short work of the monsters. I don’t know what I expected them to look like, but it wasn’t regular men in suits. I pictured zombies, something with rotting flesh, maybe some red eyes. Instead, it looks like a banking conference just landed in the living room. One grabs for Scarlet but Alec throws Caleb’s dagger through the air, slicing its arm off mid-reach.

  “Wow,” I say. I mean, I knew they were immortal and had all these powers like disappearing and memory erasing, but I had been so busy dating them that I rather forgot they had the ability to kill with ease. If Alec’s battle skills are impressive, Caleb has had more practice. Black char piles around him as he takes out five - make it six - revenants in the time it takes me to back into the kitchen. I feel useless, huddled against the fridge with Henry and Scarlet while the two guys battle the undead. However, the sharpest thing I can find in the kitchen drawers is a corkscrew. I consider it, but Scarlet just shakes her head.

  I don’t know what they’re after until I hear a noise in the hall and see a woman saunter into the doorway. She’s also dressed in a power suit, but there is something sinister about her - more so than the flesh-eating Wall Street horde currently in the living room. She grins, revealing a row of sharp teeth that put Alec and Caleb’s fangs to shame. I imagine they are the kind of teeth that sharks have.

  “So you’re her,” she says through those teeth. Her blond hair pours over her shoulders, but it is the only thing about her one could call human.

  “‘Her’ meaning...?” I reply.

  She doesn’t answer but instead flies across the room and gets her arms around my neck. Her breathing is heavy in my ear and her wet teeth are way too close for my taste. It’s not much different, I imagine, than the way a lion treats a gazelle. The thing is, I don’t want to be a gazelle. Henry moves to assist me, but Scarlet is smart enough to hold him back. Neither of them can do anything. This woman is too strong and far too fast. I don’t have a chance to say anything before she whisks me into the living room where the guys are fighting the last of the revenants. As the ash settles from its corpse, they turn, flanking the pile of what used to be Teresa’s army. I raise an eyebrow to show how impressed I am, even though it was all for naught now that Shark Girl is here.

  “Teresa,” Alec says.

  She laughs in my ear, but there is no humor in it. This is not the woman they loved; this monster is vile and oh so angry. I can feel the rage seething off of her.

  “You know, when you died, it killed me,” she says to Alec. “I was devastated, hopeless. Until your brother kindly wiped my memory of it. When I awoke three decades later, having been buried for days, you were nowhere to be found when it all came flooding back.”

  “I didn’t know,” he replies.

  “It doesn’t matter. I am here for her.” She holds me tighter; I don’t even attempt to fight her. Right now, her shark teeth are not buried in my flesh and I would prefer that it remain that way.

  “Why?” Caleb asks.

  “She is the only thing that matters to you. I wonder how you will do without her, when you have to fight without her inspiring you to feel,” Teresa says.

  “You loved me once,” Alec counters.

  “I did. And you abandoned me. As did your brother.”

  “I died.” It’s a simple argument, but a solid one nonetheless.

  “After that. You could have come for me. You-”

  “I didn’t even know you were alive until two days ago.”

  “He’s telling the truth,” Caleb says. “I never told him. I thought it was what was best for you. A chance at a new life, a life without us. Without all that we were.”

  “You? You were nothing to me,” Teresa sneers. “I loved him and you hated me for it. You were so jealous you murdered him and then made me forget the only man I ever loved. Lilith warned me before you wiped my memory. You pretend you’ve suffered, but you have no idea what it means to suffer. But you will. I promise - before I destroy you and Lilith, I will make sure you know.”

  Caleb moves toward us and Teresa’s hold chokes me. “I thought I was doing what was needed. I cared for you, but if I had known-”

  “You always seem to be too late for forgiveness, for apologies. Don’t you, Cain?” It’s the first time anyone has referred to him this way and it feels weird to hear it. I’ve wondered why they only call one another “brother,” but I suppose when you take so many names over time, it becomes easier than remembering which cycle and life you are living now. Hearing the name, though, twists something in him. It is a reminder, of the life he’s been trying to shed, of his mistakes.

  “You know nothing about it.” The fire in him is evident even from where I stand. His rage blinds him and he moves to attack; fortunately, Alec is quick and stops him. He holds his brother back while Teresa’s teeth graze my flesh.

  “I will eat every last bit of flesh from her bones if you take another step,” she threatens.

  “What can she possibly give you?” Caleb implores her. “Fight us here and now and then face Lilith yourself.”

  “She could be the one to end it all. It’s dangerous to leave her in your hands to be the tool that can change destiny.” Her nails are long and scratch at the flesh on my arms. I don’t cry out, although it hurts. There is a thin line of blood where they raked my skin but I maintain my composure. If I get out of this with nothing but minor scratches, I’m chalking it up to a win.

  “She’s no one’s tool. I will die before I let you make her choices for her,” Alec says.

  “And you likely will,” Teresa giggles. She starts to move to the door, but Caleb breaks free from Alec’s grasp. He tears off his shirt and turns; the blazing Mark on his back is terrifying now, but Teresa does not show fear. The glow illuminates the entire room and yet she stands her ground.

  “Go ahead,” she says. “You’ll take her out, too.”

  “No, I-” Caleb says, but Alec, in a desperate attempt to save me, turns Caleb so his back is to the wall. A faint burst of light knocks over a lamp, but it’s pretty weak. I suppose God doesn’t waste his wrath to smite lighting fixtures. Before Caleb can explain to Alec that I’m safe from the Mark, Teresa grabs hold of me and drags me out into the night. They both try to follow, but waiting outside is another round of revenants. I only hear Alec’s screams echo in the darkness as we leave them all behind to fight.

  17.

  Teresa is apparently residing at a luxury hotel, which seems more than unfair given my motel stay with Caleb. I suppose being an evil damned creature has its benefits. She ties me to a chair with the open window behind me and leaves me to go do whatever women in her situation do. The cold air taunts me; freedom is so close, but I am bound by ropes. I stay there for far too long, contemplating my own death. That’s not something one should be forced to think about for an extended period of time. When Teresa returns, she sits on the bed and watches me. She peels her stockings from her legs, but what might be sexy in general is only creepy given the talons on her feet.

  “You’re not even very pretty,” she says.

  “You know, from you, that means a lot,” I reply. I’m pretty much okay with not being the evil monster’s type.

  “I just don’t see what they see in you.”

  “Well, although I cannot match your winning personality, I suppose I have something. Toenails, for a start.”

  “Charming. You know sarcasm is said to be the lowest form of wit.”

  “Great. Well, eating people and kidnapping college girls is said to be the lowest form of romance, but it doesn’t appear to be stopping you.”

  She stands up and slowly walks toward me. I think at first she is going to examine me, like a bug, but instea
d she winds up and smacks me hard across the face. Damn, it stings.

  “You are worthless,” she says.

  “If so, you wouldn’t need to tie me up. I scare you,” I reply. “And it’s a good thing, because I have nothing to lose, darling.”

  “Nothing? Really?” She taunts.

  “Without them, nothing. I won’t let that happen. I’m already planning to die for them, so nothing you can do-”

  “We shall see.” She says nothing else and walks back to the bed. Pulling her phone from her purse, she texts someone and grins when the phone vibrates a few seconds later. How is it that she has a phone and neither Caleb nor Alec does? Seriously, if I make it out of this alive, I am bringing them shopping. Ridiculous. I don’t know what sort of demon sexting is happening, but it seems to please Teresa and her attention shifts away from me. I wiggle a bit in the chair, but the bonds are tight. I have no supernatural powers, so all I manage is to get a little rope burn.

  “It appears I have Lilith right where I want her. That was my darling Chloe,” she says. “She has set the stage for Lilith and her army. I had rather hoped you would be able to see your lover killed by his own brother, but alas, it appears you may instead be watching them both die when I bring Lilith to her knees.”

  “What are you?” I ask. “And what is Chloe?”

  “I don’t know what you call us. In the past, our type were called lamia. I have learned to appreciate the name, as my studies at the university tended toward poetry. I don’t really know that the name matters, though.”

  “Lamia, immortals, revenants. You know these are all just vampires.”

  “Yes, and your kind are all dinner. Now shut up before I rip out your tongue.”

  Now, if a person were to wonder, he may think it is not so bad being tied to a chair while a woman paints her talony toenails and waits for the college girl she’s turned into some alternative form of vampire. The thing is, he would be wrong. It is terrible. I would kind of prefer the threatening shark teeth or more imploding windows to the boring redundancy of fighting against rope. Also, Teresa is dropping polish all over the bed; it just seems such a waste.

  Chloe doesn’t look well when she arrives. She is paler than she used to be, almost gray. I don’t think she’s washed her hair since the party and her clothes are wrinkled and dirty. I notice when she looks absently in my direction that she has matching shark teeth now. It kind of figures that I have been fucking two vampires and have nothing to show for it except a lot of brotherly angst, yet Chloe hangs out with this creepy chick and gets shark teeth. I suppose the trade-off is that she smells like rotten milk.

  Teresa and Chloe aren’t stupid enough to converse in front of me; instead, they move into the bathroom and turn on the shower so I can’t hear what they’re saying. I don’t know what to do, so I start singing. Maybe I will annoy them into letting me go; I’m tone deaf so it’s possible. It doesn’t work, of course, but they do eventually come out of the bathroom.

  “Listen to them, the children of the night. What music they make!” Chloe says, grinning her shark-tooth grin.

  “Really? That one doesn’t even make sense in this situation.”

  Dracula quotes notwithstanding, Chloe and Teresa appear to have confirmed something during their little shower talk. Teresa’s stupid grin stretches across the entirety of her face, which makes her look extremely creepy. I mean, creepier. I look away but Chloe turns my head to face Teresa and holds my face with her hands. Her nails scratch my cheeks.

  Teresa leans close; her breath also smells like rotten milk.

  “Chloe has gathered the remainder of our army and has been busy creating more. Tomorrow night, we will face Lilith in greater numbers than she has ever faced.”

  “Thrilling,” I say.

  “Part of me hopes your men show up; I would very much like to watch them die.”

  “You’re a bitch.”

  “I should thank you, really. My revenants were useless and, outside of gaining Chloe’s assistance, I learned nothing at the party. It wasn’t until I was able to piece it together from your professor’s office and your own notes-”

  “Wait. You ransacked my room? For my mythology notes?”

  “It all made sense suddenly. Lilith, her jealousy, the suppression of their will-”

  I interrupt her. “You could’ve just come to a class. There was no need to break in.”

  “It will be a wonder to see how it all plays out.”

  “You do realize that I’m going to get out of this chair, right? And you’ve told me, like, everything?”

  She pauses and considers.

  “Well,” I say. “That’s how these things go.” I don’t know that it is how these things go in real life, but luckily, I have watched enough bad movies on cable to guess it’s possible. Teresa, having lived mainly before the advent of cable, continues.

  “Anyway, Charles and Allen will be so heartbroken when they find out how you could have saved them.”

  “You’re just jealous,” I spit. “Because they’re willing to fight for me and they didn’t fight for you.”

  She tries to sputter a response, but I realize that’s it. This is just one extremely pissed off ex-girlfriend. She turns and takes Chloe by the arm, leaving me alone in the room; I hear their footsteps echoing down the hall. It seems dumb to go through all this trouble to kidnap me, only to leave me here unguarded. Maybe Teresa has some kind of supernatural GPS.

  I think of what I know, of what Lilith could possibly want with Teresa, and of what Teresa said about me saving Alec and Caleb. None of it makes sense; I get her being mad at the guys, although I don’t get being this mad at them. In keeping with the theme of my life being insane, I’m now facing the world’s worst ex. And it is fucking cold in this room.

  The door opens and I prepare myself for a remark, but it isn’t Teresa or Chloe. Somehow, it’s Alec. See? I think. You’ve got to follow through on a kidnapping. I don’t know how he found me or how he got in, but I realize I don’t care. I am just so happy to see him. He rushes to the chair and unties me. I reach my arms around his neck and kiss him. I’m not one for being rescued, except when I am tied to a chair in an empty hotel room, waiting for a shark-toothed villain to return. Then, rescue away, I say.

  “Thank you,” I say.

  “She won’t be back tonight; they’re hunting.”

  “Why even take me if she’s just-”

  “When someone is brought back from the dead, the brain isn’t exactly…”

  “You and Caleb aren’t stupid.”

  “We have had a lot more time to relearn it all.”

  “She’s had twenty years, Alec. A two-year old knows that the first thing to do when you don’t want to lose something is to keep an eye on it.”

  “There is also the hunger. It can be all consuming,” he explains. “Teresa was also always an arrogant bitch.”

  “I thought you loved her.”

  “I did - as Allen. But hindsight-”

  “Yeah, yeah. Anyway, this might be a ridiculous question, but you and Caleb drink blood-”

  “Passion,” he corrects me.

  “Blood full of passion,” I continue. “Lilith drinks...”

  “Blood.”

  “Passion blood?”

  “Any blood. She isn’t particular,” he says.

  “Great. Revenants eat human flesh, which is nasty, and Teresa and Chloe-”

  “We don’t know what they are,” he says.

  “Oh, they’re lamia. At least according to Teresa.”

  “I haven’t heard that word in ages.”

  “So you know what they are?” I ask.

  “I do, and they’re repulsive.”

  “Alec, I don’t need a term for them to know they’re repulsive. My point, though, is what do lamia eat?”

  “Children,” he responds.

  “Come again?”

  “Children.”

  I try to shake the words off of me, as if I can be clean again now th
at I know such things. I have faced the stories I’ve learned with as much composure as I could muster, but there is a line when it comes to feasting on children. I shudder and Alec wraps his jacket around me, leading me to the bed.

  “We need to stop them,” I say. It’s not news; we needed to stop them before I knew this additional information. Still, the idea of them out tonight, seeking children... I want to disappear, to return to a place where this kind of evil is reserved for storybooks.

  “We will.” I’m surprised; there is a confidence in his voice that I haven’t heard since we met.

  “How can you be sure?”

  “My brother and I talked; I am willing to die this time. It isn’t murder when it is what’s right. He will not kill himself to break this cycle. And when I come back, we will look for yet another way. For too long, I’ve hated him. It’s time to look forward. I can die, because you have given me something to look forward to.”

  “No. You can’t die. I promised you-”

  “I must, Nora. And it must be my brother to kill me. I know Teresa is seeking to destroy Lilith and that may mean our cycle is ended permanently. If that happens, I need it to end with forgiveness. There has been too much hate, too much violence. If we had never done the things we have done, we wouldn’t be here today.”

  I take his hands. “I wouldn’t have met you, though. Sometimes, the darkness is the path to the light.”

  He smiles. “That’s pretty wise. No punch line?”

  I shake my head. “No punch line. I love you. I don’t want to lose you, although I don’t know anymore that it’s something I can stop. But I would not turn back the clock. Meeting you was the best thing that ever happened to me. I’m not giving up. Your reconciliation with Caleb is wonderful but-” I start to cry. I think I’ve been pretty strong through this whole ordeal, but we are facing the final dawn and this could be it. Alec brushes the tears from my cheeks.

  “Give me tonight?” He asks. “I don’t think there will be another.” His hands move over me and the ache from my bonds evaporates. Our clothing is discarded and we slide into the sheets of the luxury bed Teresa never planned to use. Alec is right; by this time tomorrow, it may all be over. The tears keep coming as he holds my hair back. He doesn’t ask for permission to drink because he doesn’t need it; if I have to die to save him, I will. It’s all I can think of as he drinks and his hands caress me. Tomorrow, I determine, I will go to my death if necessary. Tonight, I will love this man who has made my life worth living.