The Black Knight Chronicles (Omnibus Edition)

by John G. Hartness

  “All right, but I’m gonna need another drink.” I went to get more liquor, and a fresh beer for the lady, and settled in to tell her our story.

  Chapter 27

  “We were those kids in the corner of the lunchroom, invisible unless you needed someone to pick on. Mike, Greg and I were a modern-day Three Musketeers, tied together by the absence of athletic ability and a remarkable lack of success with women. We made it through high school with slightly more than the normal burdens of angst, self-loathing and wedgies, and off we went to college. Greg and I went to Clemson together. Mike went off to seminary, and we didn’t see him again until a whole lot of things had changed.”

  I looked over at Mike, and he gave me a slight nod. I’d erased some history, especially a big fight the three of us had right before high-school graduation. I’d said some pretty unkind things, including that I never wanted to see him again for the rest of my life. I didn’t. I’m not sure that he’s ever forgiven me for that. I haven’t.”

  “Greg got a degree in computer engineering, and I managed to flunk, cut, drop and incomplete my way to a BA in English with a minor in psychology.” I’d had no idea what I wanted to do except drink beer and play video games, but there’s not a degree path in that, so I thought English would be the next best thing.

  “One night a few weeks after graduation I met a girl in a bar. Unlike most girls I’d met in college, this one seemed interested. Thanks to my youthful stupidity and tequila, I believed a girl who was Playboy hot actually wanted to come back to our apartment with me. Of course, things probably would have worked out very differently if I had looked a gift horse in her mouth, but that would have ruined the story, wouldn’t it?”

  “I brought her back to the apartment I was sharing with Greg, and we got involved. Then we got very involved. And right as I was about to reach the peak of my involvement—”

  “I get it” Detective Law interrupted with a slightly pained expression on her face.

  “Sorry. Anyway, just at that special moment, she bit me. And I’m not talking a love nip. I’m talking a fangs-out, attack the carotid, drain you dry kinda bite. So she drained me, in more ways than one, and left me there, on my couch.”

  “That was cold,” Law said.

  “Yeah. Stone cold. She left me there, dead and naked from the waist down on my couch, which was how Greg found me a few hours later. And don’t think that hasn’t made for a few awkward moments in the last fifteen years.”

  “He found you . . . dead? Alive? Were you a vampire then?”

  “I was, and I was hungry. Greg got home a couple of hours after she’d killed me, and found my dead, naked body on the couch in front of the television. He tells me that he freaked out a little, checked me for a pulse, and then went to look for the cordless phone to call the police. But the damage was done. When he touched my neck, something inside me snapped awake. I could feel his pulse through his fingertips, and I could almost hear his blood calling to me. I sat up, conscious but not really in control of myself, and when I saw him on the phone, I snuck up behind him and drained him dry in the middle of the efficiency kitchen in our off-campus apartment.”

  That was a vast oversimplification of things, but she didn’t need to know how sweet the blood tasted right from the spring, how amazing and hot and rich it felt as it went down my throat, taking my dead flesh and pouring life into it. It felt like I was forcing his blood down into my desiccated veins, and with every beat of his heart I could feel myself getting stronger, more alive than I had ever been. Everything around me had new color, every sound was crisper, every smell sharper, and the taste was like the most incredible wine and steak and chocolate all rolled into one set of overwhelming sensations.

  And as I felt the life drain out of my best friend I didn’t care at all about what I was taking away from him, so focused was I on what I was getting out of the exchange. I could hear his heartbeat slowing in my ears, could feel the pulse in his veins getting weaker and weaker with every minute I stayed latched onto him like a pit bull with a T-bone. And I didn’t care. I didn’t care that I was killing my best friend. I didn’t care that I was drinking the life right from his throat like a comic-book monster. All I cared about was how amazing it felt.

  “By the time I drank my fill, Greg was dead. I drained him completely, and kept drinking until there wasn’t a spare drop lurking in his veins. I really freaked out then, and the only reason I lived through the morning was because I felt too awful about what I’d done to leave Greg’s body behind. If I’d run out looking for more food I would have burnt to cinders before I found breakfast.”

  “I spent the next few hours alternating between freaking out over being a vampire and freaking out over killing my best friend. Every once in a while I’d freak out over how I was going to tell Greg’s mom. After a few hours of that, I collapsed on the couch and fell asleep. The combination of dying and coming back to life really took it out of me, I guess. When I woke up it was the next night, and Greg was awake, facedown in the fridge with his head in a bucket of fried chicken.”

  “Kiss my ass. I was hungry,” Greg said from his chair. He’d sat through the whole story of his death without saying a word. I knew it still bothered him, but didn’t want to try to work group therapy into our confession with the pretty cop-lady.

  “I don’t remember this asshole killing me, I just remember waking up and being hungrier than I’d ever been before. So I stuck my face in some leftovers and went to town. That turned out to be a really bad choice, since I was no longer able to process solid food.

  “Fortunately, I was in the kitchen, so I was able to make it to the sink before the entire contents of my stomach came up in a spectacular mess. That left me hungrier than ever, and I could smell something coming from the living room, and it smelled good. I went in there to see what was for dinner, and the only thing there was Jimmy.”

  I picked up the thread here. “By now I’d guessed a little about what was going on, and I had opened a vein in my wrist for Greg. He proved my theory right, and latched on like his life depended on it. Greg drank from my arm, and when I started to feel my strength lessen a bit, I pulled him off me. It wasn’t easy, but I got him off my arm. A few seconds later, he calmed down, and I explained to him what I thought had happened.”

  Greg took over again while I went for another round of drinks. “As far as we can tell, the trait of vampirism is only passed on when the donor is drained completely. If the heart doesn’t stop, the donor does not become a vampire.”

  “What about animal blood,” she asked. “Does it work?”

  “Nope,” I answered. “Apparently there are nutrients in human blood that we don’t get from animals. Now, we haven’t tried gorillas, or animals that genetically close to humans, but after a few experiments with rabbits and cats we gave up on animals. And I wasn’t much of a pet guy when I was alive, so being dead has done nothing to increase my desire for a fluffy puppy.”

  “And for myself,” Greg said, “I have all I can handle trying to domesticate Jimmy, so I’ve never bothered to try to have a pet. But back to the story. In short, I fed from Jimmy, and then we went out to top off the tank, as it were. We didn’t drain those first donors completely, more out of satiation than out of any moral compunction against killing them. We just got full. Once we were thinking clearly, we realized that killing a bunch of random people would be a good way to get caught, and that would probably lead to unpleasant things happening in government laboratories, so we went for a more low-profile route.”

  There was a lot more to those first few nights than Greg was sharing, but even Mike didn’t know much about what we did when we first turned, and I was content to keep all that between the two of us. Let’s just say we became much more discreet in our later years.

  Detective Law finished off her beer and leaned back in her chair. It was a long moment before anyone spoke, and when she did, the rest of us leaned in to hear what she had to say. “So you’re vampires. And you’re detectiv
es. And you try to help people. But you still drink blood.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “That pretty much covers it, using broad brush strokes.”

  “Fair enough. And I suppose you can call me Sabrina. After all, I know more about you than I ever really wanted to know, so I suppose we should be on a first-name basis.”

  “Now you know our story. And while I enjoy your company more than I have that of any living woman in nearly twenty years, I’m tired. And somewhere out there is a crazy bun-headed demon lady with a plan to do something really nasty to the world. And tomorrow night is Halloween, when crazy people tend to do nasty things. I’m going to get some rest, so that when it comes time to punch, stab or shoot something, I’m ready.”

  Greg yawned and mumbled his agreement, and headed off to his room.

  Mike stood and gathered his things. “As much as I like you boys, your housekeeping leaves much to be desired. I think I shall retire to my parish house and get a little shut-eye myself.”

  “What about me?” Sabrina asked.

  “What about you?” I asked right back. “We’re getting some sleep. I suggest you do the same. Go home, Sabrina. Get a nap, get some fresh clothes, and meet us back here at sundown. You know we won’t be going anywhere until nightfall, so you don’t have to worry about us leaving you out.”

  “Fine, but this is my case. If you try to shut me out of this, I’ll show back up here at noon one day and give you a stake dinner you’ll never forget. Deal?” She stood and stuck out her hand. I stood up, too, because that’s how I was raised.

  I took her hand and shook. Her skin was so warm against mine, so alive that for just a minute I really, really missed being alive. “Deal.” I stood there and watched her walk up the steps and into the sunlight, and felt the darkness settle into my chest as she closed the door behind her.

  I stayed for a minute staring at where she’d been, until Greg came over, gave me an awkward pat on my shoulder, and said, “She’s so out of your league it’s not even funny. Now go to bed.” And I did, feeling more alone than I had in years.

  I was gonna have to bite somebody that night. To make me feel better, if nothing else.

  Chapter 28

  I slept for a long time, almost to dusk, and when I woke up, I felt like I’d barely gotten any rest at all thanks to dreams of Sabrina. Great. I love taking on a huge fight after a crappy day’s rest and while I’m carrying around pent-up sexual tension. I should have bitten her and gotten it out of the way. I walked into the living room, and found Greg still sitting at his computer. It wasn’t that unusual for me to come out and find him facedown on the keyboard, but this time he was still awake.

  “I think I know what the plan is for tonight,” he offered as I rummaged in the crisper for breakfast. He’d obviously slept very little, if at all.

  “Yeah, dude. We had that covered before we went to bed. We wait here for the hot cop chick, then we find the ugly demon-possessed chick, kick her butt back to Hell, and then hopefully I get to second base with the hot cop chick.” I jumped over the back of the sofa and landed with my feet on the coffee table. Sometimes the enhanced agility that came with being undead was handy.

  “Don’t you think the hot cop chick might have something to say about that?” Sabrina’s voice came from the stairs, and not for the first time I wondered why mental telepathy didn’t come with all the other fringe vamp benefits.

  “Nah,” I replied, trying to salvage some measure of my self-respect. “Once we save the world there’s no way she’ll be able to resist my charms. Breakfast?” I held the blood bag out to her.

  “No thanks, I ate on the way over. And I have faith in my ability to resist your charms. And in the necklace my daddy gave me at my first communion.” With that, she fished a delicate cross out of her shirt and dangled it from her fingertips.

  “That’s mean.” I leaned back on the sofa and finished my breakfast. “G, what was that about a plan?”

  “I think I know what Bun-Head is up to,” he said, his tone still flat. I was gonna have to spike his next meal with Red Bull or he’d be useless in the fight to come. Then what he said registered and I was over his shoulder in a matter of seconds.

  “Seriously? You’ve figured out her plan? How?”

  “The magic of the interwebs. When you went to bed, I couldn’t sleep, and we had no idea what Bun-Head’s next step was going to be. So I went back to her first steps to see if I could come up with some other nexus between the abductions. And after a couple of false starts, I came up with the answer—school staff.”

  “Huh?” I asked. “That doesn’t make any sense, bro. Teachers only teach at one school. How could someone work at a dozen different schools?”

  “She doesn’t. At least not permanently. Our bad guy, or in this case, girl, is a substitute teacher. When I ran the lists of substitute teachers in the system against the abductions, one name popped out as being at each school right around the date of the abductions. Janet Randell. She’s been a sub for two years now since losing her job as a teacher’s aide to budget cuts. She was at every single school the day of or the day before a kid went missing. So I did a little work to find out where she is today.”

  “And where is she?” Sabrina asked.

  “That’s where things got a little tricky. She wasn’t working anywhere in the district today. But I knew she would have to be somewhere, at a decent-sized school, since she needed a dozen victims in short order. I widened my search, and found her at Holy Trinity.” He leaned back in his chair, arms crossed over his round belly.

  “How could she guarantee that she’d be teaching today, much less be at a large enough school to find a dozen likely victims?” Sabrina asked.

  I was glad she did the asking. Not only did it save me the trouble, but Greg wouldn’t razz her for not figuring everything out ahead of time.

  “She created a vacancy. The home-ec teacher at Holy Trinity was found dead in her apartment last night. Our Janet killed the teacher and set herself up as the sub on call so she could be close to her victims.”

  “Nicely done, partner.” Had to give him his props. “That gives us a location to start with.”

  “And end with,” he said.

  When Sabrina looked a question at us, I said, “Holy Trinity is a pretty tightly wound place, the kind of school that teaches Book Burning 101 and pickets rock concerts. Every Halloween they hold a religious fall carnival to combat the Satanic holiday’s influence on our children.”

  “Lucky for us,” Greg added, none too happy, “they’ll be hosting this carnival tonight at the school gym.”

  “Crap.” I actually paced a small circle as my brain worked it all out. “There will be hundreds of kids and parents there. If the final summoning needs a sacrificial component, then that would be the perfect place to do it.”

  I looked up. Both of them were staring at me, slack-jawed. “What? Just because I didn’t do the research I can’t come up with something more profound than ‘Hulk Smash?’”

  “Yeah,” Greg said. “True enough. We concentrate on the fall carnival, because that’s where she’ll most likely be. And we go over there, ruin her plans, and save the world from something we don’t really understand.”

  “What if we’re wrong?” Sabrina looked from Greg to me, and back again. “I think it sounds like a good plan. And all the logic works. It makes perfect sense. But life isn’t always logical and doesn’t always make any sense. What if we’re wrong? What happens then?”

  “Then we all die,” a deep voice said quietly before I could answer.

  Stunned, we all turned to the stairs. Phil. But not my Phil, the one I’d come to know and despise. This was Zepheril, the fallen angel, accompanied by Lilith, the first wife of Adam. Phil had his wings on display, and Lilith had on an outfit that put almost all of her on display.

  They looked like extras at a fetish party, only better armed. Phil had black leather pants and a sword belt with a sword on it. Lilith wore thigh-high boots with come-hither h
eels, a black leather miniskirt and a leather jacket unzipped enough for me to see that the only other thing she had on besides a bra was a shoulder holster. The first guy to build a combo bra/shoulder rig that’s comfortable will make a mint.

  I blurted, “What the hell are you two doing here?”

  Lilith gave me a little smile and came over to me, oozing sex with every step. As she approached, the room suddenly felt really warm, and my jeans suddenly felt very tight. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Greg wiping a bead of sweat off his forehead. Sabrina just looked grumpy.

  “Why, we’re here to help, little vampire. If tonight goes poorly for you, it could go very, very poorly for us.” She spoke into my ears in a low voice, almost a purr, and I remembered the feeling of her blood pulsing through my veins.

  Pulling back took almost everything I had. I poured all my reserve strength into looking, very carefully, into her eyes, which seemed about the only safe place I could look. “What do you mean, go poorly for you?”

  She chuckled and pulled back from me, giving Sabrina a glance as she crossed back towards the door. “You have no idea what awaits you in the afterlife, little vampire, if you even have one. Zepheril and I, however, know exactly what is waiting for us. And that’s why we have no interest in bringing about the end of our lives anytime soon. Because what we have in store is unpleasant beyond your wildest dreams.”

  Zepheril put a hand on her arm and spoke when she paused. “All that is important is that our interests align with yours for the moment. It is time to go.”

  “Oh, hell no!” Sabrina said from where she had stationed herself with her back to a wall and a clear line of sight to everyone in the room. “I am not going anywhere with Tinkerboy and his partner, Slinky the Super-Slut. I agreed to work with you two because there’s no other way to get this case solved, and I still only halfway believe in vampires. But I am not going into a firefight with a couple of . . . of . . . whatever you are at my side!”