Tainted Blood: A Generation V Novel

by M. L. Brennan

  She gave me a withering look, and I wondered just how much of my thought process had been showing on my face. “This is a 2005 Bodegas Roda Cirsion, and it needs to breathe before being served.”

  “Really, Prudence? It’s like nine in the morning. We’re in alcoholic territory right now.” And unlike Lilah, Prudence definitely didn’t have unemployment as an excuse.

  The sound of the doorbell interrupted what I’m sure would’ve been an exceptionally cutting conversational riposte. Instead she gave a little huffy sigh. “Early. Eager little thing.”

  Following her down the stairs, I watched as she ushered in a man who, I was quickly informed, was Jon Einarsson, one of the young stars of her company’s legal department who had come over to discuss a few financial issues with her. Dressed in an immaculate gray suit, Jon was tanned, blond, and almost disgustingly fit and healthy. He had the slightly squarish, blunt good looks of a former frat guy who had done well and was on his way to doing even better. Prudence ushered us all back up to her living room, where we all settled on her white, expensive, and shockingly uncomfortable matching love seats. Jon wasted no time in flipping open his briefcase, removing a set of file folders, and proceeding to explain to my sister a series of financial options that I found completely incomprehensible—though I was able to pick up enough references to off-shore companies and other things that really seemed like they shouldn’t be legal. Had I not recently slept for almost twenty straight hours, I would’ve passed out from boredom. This was worse than watching one of those foreign films where all people did was sit at a table, smoke cigarettes, and have a conversation in French, without subtitles. I wondered if Dan was going to start sounding like this in another two years. It was a frightening thought.

  After twenty minutes, which I knew because Jon Einarsson was sitting conveniently under Prudence’s large art deco wall clock, my sister thankfully interrupted him. “How rude of me not to offer you a drink, Jon,” she said. “My brother and I will fetch some refreshments.” Jon opened his mouth, but it had clearly been an order rather than a request, and all he could do was snap his jaw closed again and shuffle his papers around a little as my sister and I left the room.

  Prudence set three wineglasses on the kitchen island. They were hand-blown, with just a single thread of color curving from the base up the stem. Each glass had a different color—blue, green, and red. Prudence selected the red glass, and placed it in front of her. Then, very matter-of-factly, she selected one of the lancets from her box and made a quick, deep slice across her left palm. She positioned the glass under her hand, and allowed her blood to drip into it, slowly filling up the bottom of the glass.

  “I really don’t like where this is going,” I said, feeling like it was somehow important that I at least make some token protest.

  “Hush. And grab me one of those paper towels.”

  Her blood continued to flow. It wasn’t as dark as my mother’s, I noticed, but it was definitely a bit more of a dark raspberryish hue than a human’s would’ve been, and I realized to my horror that I was actually echoing the language used on the back of the wine bottle label. Prudence continued to let her blood flow until the glass was nearly half full, then pressed the paper towel that I’d handed her against the cut, blotting the wound.

  “Pour the wine, Fort.”

  I wasn’t happy, but at this point I was pretty much committed to seeing exactly what the hell went on during a vampire feeding. After all, it was somewhere in my not-too-distant future. As I poured, however, I wondered why this couldn’t be as comparatively less traumatic than watching that horrific video of childbirth in sophomore year of high school. Prudence rinsed her hand off in the sink as I attended to my assigned task. The wine was a very dark red, almost black, and once each glass was filled, I couldn’t visually tell the difference between the regular and the blood-spiked. “Not sure this is a good way to improve a vintage.”

  Prudence gave another eye roll at my comment. She was patting her hands dry with a soft white cloth, and when I looked, I could see that although the cut on her hand had stopped bleeding, it was still red and open. She folded the cloth and held it in her left hand, like a normal fabric napkin, but positioned so that her cut was concealed, and picked up the red wineglass with her free hand. At her indication, I picked up the blue and green glasses, with their contents of regular wine, and followed her back into the living room, grimly aware of just who that spiked glass was for.

  Prudence handed the red glass to Jon along with a wide, perfect-hostess smile. “Here you go.”

  He looked decidedly taken aback. Clearly the poor guy had pictured something more along the lines of a glass of water. “Oh gosh, it’s just a little early for me—”

  My sister began talking blithely over him. “Now, some Rioja traditionalists will say that they’re skeptical, but I’ve found that this is quite a lovely Spanish red. A bit decadent at three hundred per bottle, I suppose, but I thought you’d enjoy it. Such a concentrated, yet ethereal balance, such elegant structure.”

  Jon had visibly paled when Prudence rattled off the price, and he clearly knew he was beaten. “So thoughtful of you,” he managed, accepting the red wineglass that Prudence offered him and taking a polite sip. I barely repressed a shudder at the sight, a reaction that I tried to cover by taking a quick mouthful from my own glass—a disappointing one, since I honestly couldn’t tell the difference between what I’d just taken a sip of and the ten-dollar grocery store bottles that I used to periodically spring for back when I dated Beth. And I frankly couldn’t imagine that Prudence’s blood was helping out that ethereal balance that she’d been harping about. I knew it was kind of hypocritical of me, given that I drank my mother’s blood on a regular basis and had a future trajectory that included drinking other people’s blood, but I couldn’t help it—it was kind of gross to know that poor Jon Einarsson had just gotten a mouthful of Prudence’s red stuff.

  He gave a polite compliment, and Prudence talked a bit about fragrance and texture and notes of flavor—those almost stereotypical natterings of wine enthusiasts that I’d always secretly suspected to be a complete sham. Jon nodded as she spoke, the look in his eyes suggesting that he agreed with me, but he continued taking small sips. The conversation then shifted back to financial black alchemy, and Jon took the reins. But I noticed that as the minutes passed, his descriptions of various legalistic loopholes became slower, and more lethargic, while every time he took a drink of his wine, it was deeper than the last. Prudence watched him, taking little tastes from her own glass, a tiny smile playing at her lips as she looked at him with horrible patience. Jon began blinking more, looking hazy and just a little owlish, and his pale blue eyes began to dilate. His hands shuffled through his papers awkwardly, but he began openly staring at my sister, apparently unable to help himself. By the time another twenty minutes had passed, his glass was completely empty, and he was just sitting, gazing at my sister like he was Moses and she a burning bush, his lips slightly parted like a Hollywood starlet waiting for a kiss.

  Prudence had that small smile fixed on her mouth, and she leaned forward, setting her glass down carefully on a coaster. “Jon, would you be willing to do me a small favor?”

  “Of course, Ms. Scott,” Jon said, perking up and sounding like this was just the opportunity he’d waited a lifetime for. “Whatever you need.”

  “I’d like just a pint or so of your blood.” Prudence’s voice was very calm and friendly. “Would you mind terribly?”

  Jon blinked very slowly, and mulled over the request for a second, then said, with a terrifying placidity, “That doesn’t sound like a problem.” The bright, sharp lawyer who had appeared on Prudence’s doorstep not even an hour ago now seemed entirely gone, replaced by Forrest Gump.

  “I’m so happy to hear that,” my sister said. “Fort, let’s all relocate to the kitchen.”

  “Um, why?” I asked.

  She shook her head at me. “This sofa is linen, Fort. Stains will never com
e out of it.”

  With Jon following at our heels like a contented little puppy, we returned to the kitchen. My sister’s box of historical horror remained displayed in all its glory on the island counter, but Jon seemed completely unfazed, simply looking around and saying, “You’re very into modern design, aren’t you, Ms. Scott. I feel like I’ve seen this kitchen in magazines.” He continued chattering happily like that, my sister just nodding agreeably to everything he said while she busily settled him on a tall stool, then assisted him out of his suit jacket and rolled up his shirtsleeves. He responded like a helpful toddler with his mother, watching all of her actions with benign sanguinity.

  I was feeling quite a bit less calm, especially when Prudence tied one of those rubber medical bands around his lower bicep with disturbing expertise.

  “Prudence, you aren’t going to hurt him, right?” I asked as she helped Jon curl his left hand into a tight fist, making the veins in his arm begin to pulse.

  Another eye roll, as if somehow that question were utterly ridiculous, even though we had just roofied this guy and were now settling him down within arm’s reach of a whole collection of sharp knives. “I have no desire to dispose of a body today. Mr. Einarsson will be leaving here under his own power.” She tucked another of those soft white towels under his left arm, then asked, “Now, Jon, you wouldn’t mind if I bit you, would you?”

  He looked surprised, and a hint of mild concern was seeping through his bovinelike demeanor. “Bit me?”

  “It will only hurt a little. Just a tiny prick,” she reassured him. Internally, I couldn’t help but root for Jon’s brain to make a comeback here.

  “Oh.” He considered, and that flicker of self-preservation melted away like a snowflake caught on a palm. “Well, that doesn’t sound too bad.”

  “You’re being so helpful, Jon. I do appreciate that.” Her eyes darkened, the pupil expanding to completely encompass the blue of her iris, and her fangs slid out. To my relief, feeding from Madeline appeared to have put my instincts back under control, and I didn’t have any overt reaction to this apart from a deep sense of worry and discomfort on behalf of Jon, and a general sense of being horribly conflicted about what I was seeing, like the time I went to a party and walked in on a girl snorting cocaine off a very nice coffee table. My sister leaned down until her mouth was just above the bend in Jon’s elbow; then she looked over at me. “Now, Fort, despite what modern culture might’ve led you to believe, this is only as sexual as you’d like to make it. Just like eating a strawberry, or a hamburger.” With that helpful comment, and without further ado, she bit Jon quickly and neatly. He flinched at the contact but remained calm. My sister pulled back quickly, allowing me to see that her fangs had left two perfectly round, deep marks that were already flowing with bright red blood. She retracted her fangs, though her eyes remained dark, and leaned back down to drink, locking her lips tightly against Jon’s arm to form a seal. Just as she had promised, there was nothing sexual about what followed—though there were some extremely uncomfortable slurping sounds, and I could see her throat working steadily as she swallowed.

  Jon looked over at me with those calm, pale blue eyes. “She’s right, you know,” he assured me. “It really doesn’t hurt so much.”

  “That’s really great, Jon.” I said. Holy fuck, was this creepy.

  Meanwhile, Jon was settling comfortably into social patter, as if we were at a cocktail party instead of sitting in my sister’s kitchen while she drank his blood. “So, what line of work are you in, Fort?”

  I winced. “Well, I’m doing a bit of floater work for this small, privately run firm. Very exciting business model. Providing very specialized services to the home.”

  “Sounds great,” Jon enthused, and I had a strong feeling that five years earlier in his life he would’ve appended that statement with a “brah.”

  After just a few minutes that nevertheless felt even more torturously long than when Jon had been talking about money management, Prudence pulled up. With one hand she smoothly lifted the side of Jon’s towel to press against his wound, while with the other she dabbed delicately at her mouth with her white cloth napkin. It occurred to me that my sister had made some ridiculous choices in her color scheme.

  “Jon, could you hold that for me?” she asked, and he obediently reached over with his right hand to press the towel, while she untied the rubber band and dropped it onto the counter. “Excellent, Jon. Just keep steady pressure on that for a moment.” She then returned her attention to me and resumed lecturing academically. “You should feed directly from the vein every ten to fifteen days at least, and don’t stop drinking until you feel comfortably full. Usually that will be about a pint and a half, sometimes a little more. I didn’t take much from Jon today, but that’s fine because I fed very recently. I know Mother let you get into bad habits and stop feeding from her before you were completely satisfied, but you’ll need to understand that that kind of behavior simply won’t work when you feed from humans. Any less than a full feed, and at your age you’ll start sickening very quickly. When you’re a bit older, you might be able to go longer in between direct feedings in emergency situations, but ten to fifteen days is the rule for full health, even for a vampire our mother’s age.”

  “Ten to fifteen days, gotcha.” I’d now seen my sister feed, and all I wanted to do was beat feet for the door.

  She gave me a very quelling look. “That’s your minimum for a direct feeding, Fort, straight from the vein to your mouth. But that won’t fulfill your full blood needs.”

  My heart sank. “It won’t?”

  “No. One pint every three days will be necessary for that. Now, you can use the vein if you like for that as well, but here you should keep in mind the corrosive nature of our bites. The more each feeding source is used, the shorter the life becomes, eventually ending with full organ failure and death.”

  “Like Bhumika,” I said painfully.

  “Not quite. But you bring up a useful point.” She reached over to her box and removed the silver bowl and another rubber band, setting both on the counter. Then she flipped up Jon’s towel and nodded in satisfaction when she saw that her bite had stopped bleeding and was clotting up at the surface. She adjusted the towel so that it now stretched completely across Jon’s lap, then settled the silver bowl on top of it so that it was nestled snugly in the V of Jon’s legs, with the towel completely draped beneath it. Then she positioned Jon’s right arm so that his forearm was resting across the bowl, underside up, revealing paler and somehow more-fragile skin. All with that very practiced air, Prudence tied the new rubber band around Jon’s right bicep, and this time he made a fist without even having to be cued, smiling proudly at his own cleverness. Prudence rewarded him with an answering smile that filled my veins with ice, and I almost flinched when my sister returned her attention to me. She didn’t seem to notice, focused as she was on lecturing me. “Now, like our dear brother, I imagine you will probably make a fuss and raise all kinds of objections to the human impact of feeding directly every three days, so I’m going to show you the workaround. Please hand me one of the clean lancets.”

  Not trusting myself to speak, I reached into the box and removed a lancet, feeling the solidity of its silver handle, and passed it to her. She accepted it with her right hand, while with her left she carefully palpated and poked at the veins now bulging in Jon’s arm. Then she checked the silver bowl again, cautioning Jon not to let it fall. He nodded obediently. Finally, she rested the blade of the lancet gently on the skin of Jon’s arm. “Direction is important on this,” she said to me. “Always cut lengthwise, little brother. Otherwise you can sever the vein.” Then she made one deep, smooth slice across Jon’s arm. The blood rose up immediately, and she turned his arm carefully so that all the blood began draining into the bowl. All three of us watched silently as the bowl began to fill up, Prudence quickly untying the rubber tourniquet and wrapping her own hand around Jon’s fist to encourage him to continue squeezing.
When the blood level in the bowl reached the numbered sixteenth ring on the inside of the bowl, she drew the towel over the wound and pressed down firmly.

  “Fort, if you wouldn’t mind setting the bowl on the counter?” I reached over hurriedly and performed the transfer, flinching at the way the blood rocked gently against the sides of the container and the way that I could feel its warmth through the bowl. “Now, sixteen ounces is a pint,” she continued. As she talked, she opened a side drawer, revealing a very thorough collection of gauze and medical supplies. She removed a thick white bandage, which she taped across Jon’s wound. “Be a dear and hold that, would you, Jon? Thank you.” Walking around Jon, she came over to me so that we were standing beside each other, looking at the bowl of blood sitting on her kitchen island. “Now, that slice was no more harmful to the good Mr. Einarsson than a visit to a blood drive, but it becomes a rather significant hassle for us.” Another cabinet was flipped open, and her hand emerged with a small metal hand colander, which she passed to me. “Start agitating the blood, Fort.”

  “Um . . . what now?” While I often failed to understand my sister on an emotional level, this time it was very literal.

  “It’s a bit like hand-beating eggs,” she explained. Prudence took the colander from me, dipped it down slowly to the bottom of the bowl, then lifted it in a slow scooping motion until the bottom of the colander just barely broke the surface of the blood. Then she handed it back to me. “Just like that.”

  This was definitely a whole new level of weird, even in my family, but my brain was feeling almost bludgeoned by the entire exercise, and I just followed her instructions. While I continued the bizarre action of mixing a bowl of blood, my sister busied herself by getting her plastic garbage can out from under the sink and changing out the bag for a fresh one. She brought that over and began positioning it fussily just beneath the area I was working. I watched her for a second, trying to figure out what could possibly be coming next, but when I glanced down at the bowl of blood, I nearly jumped out of my skin. There was something forming at the top of the bowl, something filmy and weirdly fibrous. “What is that?”