by James Lyon
‘Of course not. Where would I hide it?’
‘You didn’t bring the stake?!’ Bear was furious.
‘Let’s go.’
‘Wait. I just bought her a drink.’
‘You what?!’ Steven exclaimed. ‘Have you lost your mind? You’re completely different since Petrovaradin.’
The barman placed a gin and tonic on a tray, which the waiter placed in front of Natalija. He whispered something to her and pointed at Bear. She acted surprised, looked across the room at them, smiled tentatively and raised her glass. Both returned her salute, Bear smiling, while Steven avoided her gaze.
‘See, she didn’t recognize us,’ Bear gloated.
‘I can’t believe this.’
‘Calm down…wait just a little longer. But don’t pay any attention to her. It drives women crazy when you ignore them.’
‘She killed Tamara and almost killed Vesna and now you’re flirting with her?’
‘It’s just reconnaissance. You got a better idea?’
‘Yeah! Let’s get the hell out of here. You know what her apes will do to us if she suspects? She’ll drink our blood through a straw for Happy Hour.’
‘Stefan, we’re okay. Just act cool. We’ll leave in a bit.’
Steven hung his head in his hands and stared at the marble table top, unable to believe what was happening.
They ordered more drinks, sat through the end of the set, and generally did their best to ignore Natalija. During the break another round of drinks helped Steven loosen up, and they bought drinks for a table of sponzoruse, and flirted openly.
By the beginning of the next set the parade of petitioners at Natalija’s table had evaporated. She lit a long, slender Cuban cigarillo and looked around with a bored expression.
The waiter approached with a note on a tray. ‘From the Lady,’ he said.
Bear opened it. ‘Would you care to join me for a drink?’ it said in a flowery hand. He handed the note to Steven and looked across the room: she smiled at them, her cigarillo clutched between her fingers.
‘What do we do?’ asked Steven, panicked.
‘Keep your mouth shut and let me do the talking,’ Bear said.
When they sat down on either side of Natalija her presence and perfume intoxicated them and she smiled so beautifully that all thoughts of Tamara and Vesna disappeared from their minds.
‘Good evening. My name is Natalija,’ she said as she raised a hand with ruby red nails.
‘I’m…mmph!’ gulped Steven as Bear kicked him under the table.
‘Such a tremendous pleasure,’ Bear responded, as he lifted her hand and kissed the air above it. ‘Please pardon my cousin. He’s from Chicago…you know how uncivilized Americans are.’ His voice was crisp and firm. ‘I am Vlada and this is Nenad. Thank you so much for inviting us. We watched you all evening…’
‘What about your little friends?’ she motioned jealously towards the sponzoruse. ‘Wouldn’t you rather sit with them?’
‘They’re kids,’ Bear said dismissively. ‘You…are a real woman.’
Her face glowed with satisfaction as she turned to Steven. ‘An American? How interesting. Tell me Nenad, are American women as beautiful as our women?’
‘Miss Natalija, no one even comes close to you, not even here in Serbia,’ he smiled flirtatiously.
Bear grinned at him and winked.
‘So, Nenad American, what are you doing in Serbia?’
‘I came to…’
‘He came to defend the homeland,’ Bear interrupted. ‘When he saw what the Ustase and Balija were doing, he joined Seselj’s Eagles.’
Steven glared at him.
‘And he just got back from Bosnia. He was in Bijeljina, you know.’
‘Oh, a genuine hero,’ she fawned.
Steven thought back to the police in the train station when he first arrived and said: ‘I’m just doing what every patriotic Serb should do when his country is attacked.’
Bear looked at him proudly.
‘You have such a sweet accent,’ she purred. ‘Were you born in America?’
‘Yes, but my parents are from Belgrade.’
‘And you Vlada, what do you do?’ she asked.
‘I work in the Army General Staff building…on the Seventh Floor,’ he winked knowingly.
‘Ooooooooh,’ she smiled back at him. ‘Such a strong young man, so fit and ready for combat,’ she squeezed his arm, ‘and with a desk job…someone’s daddy must be a big shot.’
‘It looks like yours isn’t too bad off either,’ Bear parried.
‘Touché,’ said Natalija.
‘Where are you from,’ Steven asked, his head becoming hazy.
‘All over,’ she laughed.
‘Where is “all over”?’ Steven pursued.
‘Mr. Nenad American, you are quite curious. Don’t be, it complicates things. Why don’t we dance?’ It was an order masquerading as a question.
Mesmerized by her beauty, Steven said: ‘Sure, why not?’
Bear bit his lip, unable to restrain him as she led Steven on to the dance floor. The band struck up a tango with Hungarian Gypsy overtones.
She moved immediately into Steven’s arms and pressed her body close to his, humming softly. The skin on her bare back was soft, smooth and cold, as was her hand. Her body proved strangely compliant as he guided her with the beat, yet she pushed with her hips, directing his every step with her loins. Steven became aroused and for a second he remembered Vesna and Tamara. Yet Natalija’s closeness swept all thoughts of guilt from his mind as her humming became an opiate that deadened his senses and caused the other dancers to disappear in a haze.
As Natalija’s thick dark hair brushed against his cheek, he tried vainly to conjure up an image of Vesna or Katarina or Julie, but Natalija pressed her face against the left side of his neck, nuzzled him and purred. He inhaled deeply. Her perfume – a rich musky-sweet mélange of decaying fruit – entered his nostrils and left him disoriented. Cold lips left frosty kisses along his throat, then drew slowly apart as her tongue darted out to trace a small circle around his Adam’s apple.
Deep within his subconscious the thought occurred that he was dancing with a vampire and that she had her mouth against his throat. Yet her loins reached out through her thin silk dress to overpower his resistance, while her outward submissiveness drowned his remaining willpower. Time faded and soon the world became theirs alone. She moved her lips slowly up his throat with tentative nibbles until she reached his jaw.
She sniffed his scent, kissed her way up his jaw line to his earlobe, bit it gently and whispered: ‘Mr. American, are you sure you’re there? I can’t sense you at all. Do you sense me?’
‘Yes, I feel you,’ he gasped hoarsely, his heart pounding rapidly in his chest.
‘Let’s go somewhere else,’ she purred as she pressed herself against his chest. ‘My place?’
Was it a question or an order? Steven no longer cared, completely in her thrall. He followed mutely as she led him by the hand back to the table. The room had emptied of guests and Steven vaguely remembered Bear.
‘Where’s my cousin?’
‘He left,’ said a bodyguard.
‘Oh,’ Steven nodded dully, uncertain anymore as to who Bear was and why he should care.
Natalija picked up her scarf and purse and led Steven out to a large black SUV. On the back seat she leaned against him and placed his hand on her lower stomach so he could feel her heart pulse through the thin silk of her dress. The SUV took them to the old city center and stopped in front of a stately old triangular building with a mansard roof across from Toplicin Park. The bodyguards chaperoned them through the lobby and inside a small wood and glass elevator. As they entered, Natalija dismissed the bodyguards and pulled the elevator doors shut.
She used the narrow confines of the old lift to press herself shamelessly against him, pushing him back against the wall with her pelvis, breasts and stomach.
Her apartment occupied the ent
ire top floor of the old building, its elegant high-ceilinged salons decorated with overstuffed modern beige furniture. She removed her heels, stretched languidly, walked slowly across the room and placed her scarf and purse on the bar. ‘Do you like my place?’ she asked as she turned on a local radio station. She was much shorter now, barely five feet six inches.
A clock on the wall said 4:05. Already the night sky was becoming less black as Chet Baker began to sing:
I get along without you very well,
Of course I do,
Except when soft rains fall…
He stood, admiring her lithe figure and hair, breathed deeply and then walked to the bar. She walked to a window and opened it. ‘It’s stuffy in here,’ she said as she let her raven black hair fall to her waist.
As the physical distance between them increased Steven’s thoughts became less muddled, and suddenly it struck him: who she was, where he was and the predicament he was in. How did he get here? Where was Bear? He began to panic, realizing she had used her powers to mesmerize him.
‘You’re tall. I like tall men,’ she smiled flirtatiously and walked towards him, a self-satisfied look on her face. As she approached he struggled against the aura of her power, which strengthened the closer she came.
Although Steven thought of Vesna, Tamara, Slatina, the haze inside his head thickened.
She ran her fingers down one arm as she looked him in the eyes. ‘You’re so strong.’
He shook his head as he struggled against the tentacles wrapping themselves around his soul, choking his free will.
‘I can’t wait for what comes next,’ she cooed.
‘What did come next?’ he thought. His thoughts were clouded and muddled and he couldn’t focus or concentrate. And then he thought of Katarina and the pine cone and at once he found the mental clarity he sought, the memory dispelling the haze.
‘You witch!’ he yelled, grabbing her upper arms. ‘If you didn’t steal Vesna’s blood you’d be nothing but a withered old bag of bones.’
Her eyes widened in surprise and began to change to the now familiar feline red. She struggled fiercely to free herself, but he held her tight. She kicked, but yelped when her bare toes missed him and hit the bar. Suddenly she stopped struggling and looked him in the eyes.
He looked away to avoid her gaze.
‘So, it was you at Petrovaradin,’ she said calmly. ‘Congratulations. You’re quite cunning. Are you wearing a Hawthorne cross?’
He smiled without answering.
‘Of course, that’s why I couldn’t sense you on the dance floor.’ Her tone changed suddenly: ‘But now you’ve really ruined my night,’ she shouted. ‘Do you know how damn hard it is for me to get laid? Do you?’ She smiled revealing the two incisors that had drunk Vesna’s blood. ‘Most men are afraid to approach a beautiful woman, and the ones that do are usually jerks…like you.’
She suddenly calmed again and tried once more to move her body closer to his. ‘But you have captured me and I am yours,’ she smiled cat-like and batted her eyelids. ‘What are you going to do with me? Will you impale me?’ She tried to grind her hips against his, but he held her away as he fought the magnetic pull coming from her loins and inhaled deeply, only to be attacked by the elixir of her perfume.
‘I didn’t bring my stake with me tonight,’ he grunted.
‘I wouldn’t say that,’ she laughed naughtily, staring suggestively at his crotch.
‘Stop it! I want answers,’ he shouted, trying to concentrate and avoid her gaze.
‘Young man, you are trying my patience,’ she sounded exasperated. And then in an instant he found himself holding a large black cat that scratched his arms, jumped from his grasp and ran across the room and hopped on the sofa in front of the open window.
He quickly picked up her scarf.
Equally quickly, she transformed back into a human vampire. ‘Careful with that,’ she called from across the room. ‘It’s my favorite.’
‘I’m sure it is,’ Steven smiled, certain he now held the upper hand. He pulled Bear’s Zippo from his pocket, lifted the scarf and said: ‘if you want this, you’d better give me some answers.’
‘Don’t be annoying. Put it down!’ she said coldly.
‘Who are the twelve?’
‘Put it down or I’ll get really angry.’
‘Tell me or I’ll burn it.’ He flipped open the lighter and held it under the scarf.
‘You fool. You really think you know what you’re doing, don’t you?’ Her voice rang with furious exasperation.
He lit the scarf and let it fall into the bar sink, where flames consumed it.
‘You idiot!’ she shouted. ‘Now you’ve really pissed me off.’
‘So, you don’t like it when someone burns your burial shroud, do you?’ Steven gloated triumphantly.
‘Burial shroud my ass! That was my favorite Hermès scarf, and it’s quite expensive.’
Steven’s eyes widened with surprise. ‘It’s not your burial shroud?’
‘Of course not. Do you think I’m a novice like Stojadinovic? Now sit down and talk to me before I get really mad.’ She pointed at the sofa by the open window. ‘No need to fear, I won’t hurt you. I’m not hungry tonight…all I wanted was a good lay. I bloat when I feed…if I wasn’t watching my figure your girlfriend would be dead. She was tasty, by the way. You should try her sometime.’
Steven lunged at her, but she was nimble and dashed out of the way as he tripped and stumbled on a divan.
‘But now you’ve screwed things up. Men! You’re all alike! Give me a man who can… Oh, never mind.’
Steven stood behind the sofa and looked out the open window. It was five floors down. Outside the horizon lightened as dawn approached.
‘Can I get you something to drink?’ her voice became suddenly hospitable.
Steven was taken aback. A vampire who had killed his friend was offering him a drink? Balkan hospitality was not to be underrated. ‘Just mineral water, thanks.’ He needed his wits about him.
She fixed herself a gin and tonic and poured him a mineral water, walked over to where he stood by the sofa and handed it to him. She remained standing for a moment and then sat down on the sofa. ‘Come, sit down. I’m not going to bite you…now,’ she chuckled, patting the cushion next to her.
He sat.
‘Tell me about yourself, Mr. American. Why did you come here? What do you want? Who sent you?’
‘Who are the twelve?’ he blurted out.
‘Please don’t be annoying. I’m being nice: you should too. How did you know my name?’
‘I saw your picture.’
‘My picture?!’ The drink fell from her hand and she cursed. ‘Dammit! My sofa.’ She jumped up and ran to the bar for paper towels. As she bent over to clean up the drink the front of her dress fell open revealing her alabaster bosom and flat stomach. Steven averted his gaze. She looked up at him and smiled knowingly, her eyes no longer red or feline, but opal blue, moist and feminine.
When she finished wiping up she mixed herself another drink and sat down again. ‘You saw my picture? Where?’
‘Hanging on a wall.’
‘Don’t play games with me,’ she hissed as her eyes reverted to feline red.
‘Your husband showed it to me,’ he said.
‘My husband? Marko? Damn him to hell!’ she screamed, flung her glass at the wall, jumped to her feet and began cursing.
In a flash her face became an elongated furry muzzle, her mouth gaping open to reveal canine incisors. Short, golden fur made a strange contrast to the black cocktail dress and pearl necklace and her claws were still clad in ruby red nail polish.
In her wrath she advanced on Steven, who sat frozen on the sofa. With a horrible growl and salivating jaws she turned away, knocked over a lamp and shredded a large love seat with her claws. Her necklace caught on a claw and burst, showering pearls across the floor and behind furniture cushions. She smashed the bar and shattered the mirrors behind it, bro
ke several more chairs and then turned her attention to the rest of the furniture. She picked up her stilettos and hurled them at Steven, but he ducked and they flew out the open window as she transformed back into human shape, her rage expended. She panted and trembled, fangs extending from her mouth. Blood trickled down her chin from where she had bitten her lower lip and tears ran from her eyes. ‘My Christian Louboutin-Dior shoes. I’ll kill Marko for that.’ She was sobbing deeply.
In spite of his revulsion and anger over Vesna and Tamara, Steven felt desire well up inside him. Unable to understand why, he stood up, walked towards Natalija and raised a handkerchief.
She recoiled.
But he waited, looked directly in her cat eyes and tried once more.
This time she permitted him to dab gently at the tears running from her eyes, trembling under his touch. As he did so, her incisors receded into her mouth and her eyes reverted to their human form and color. When he had wiped her cheeks, he dabbed at the blood on her chin.
Steven then raised his finger and wiped the last droplets of blood from the puncture wounds on her lower lip, stared directly into her eyes and placed the bloody finger to his own lips, tasting her essence: lavender mixed with hints of wild mushrooms and rosemary.
For a twinkling, they stared in each other’s eyes, bound together and adrift in a moment between night and day, dawn and dusk, 1992 and the timeless eternity the immortal damned are cursed to haunt. Suddenly the wounds on her lip disappeared and she broke the spell with a right round-house blow to his face that left him holding his nose.
‘How dare you?!’ she shouted, her eyes reverting to their vampire form.
She launched herself at him, metamorphosing into a werewolf in mid-leap. Her sudden charge knocked him backward and he hit his head on the hardwood parquet floor. He lay stunned, a golden short-haired werewolf straddling his chest, its jaws slathering over his face, his arms pinned to the floor.
‘No more games, American. Where is Marko?’ Natalija growled as she moved her jaws closer towards his neck. ‘Tell me now!’
Her breath smelled of rotten meat and Steven wanted to vomit. He stared directly in her eyes for a tense eternity until her breathing slowed and she calmed down sufficiently to metamorphose back into human shape. She let go of his arms, and stood up, directly over him. Under her dress, her marble thighs emerged from her stockings and disappeared in gloom, towards a shadow resembling a butterfly’s folded wings.
