by Justin Sloan
“Okay?”
“I said okay.” She walked forward, leading the way now, but a moment later he caught up.
“What I said was true, about being over Val. But out of curiosity, what happened out there?”
“You mean aside from a bunch of killing and two months of us having no idea where the hell we were going, exactly?”
He nodded. “With Val, emotionally. I sensed something before she left, really. Like we were great together, but there was something distant about her. Ever since that whole ‘going into the shadows’ moment of her life, I knew it.”
“It’s hard to think of her as just a woman, just a love interest,” Sandra admitted. “Trust me. And for her, too. It’s like…life is bigger than all this. Her purpose on this earth is bigger than all this. While we may not understand it, she’s here to save the lives of the good and bring justice to those who have committed evil.”
“You sound like a weird textbook recounting the story of Valerie the Great.”
Sandra laughed. “Maybe that’s my job in this world. I’ll be the great bard singing the praises of Vampire Princess Valerie.”
“I’d pay a few coins to hear that.”
“Great, now I have a Plan B for how to make a living if the others decide they don’t want my help running the city anymore.”
“Hey, if they ever don’t want you,” Jackson nodded and held out a couple of coins, “we could use someone like you.”
“Oh shit, don’t tell me you’re back at it.” She stopped again, but this time more to rest. The baby wasn’t that far along yet, but already it was draining her energy to the extent that even a walk like this was tiring. She was glad the whole mutiny thing had happened a week ago and not now. Funny how just a few days made all the difference.
“Back at what?” he asked.
“Factions, all that junk.”
“Oh, God, no.” He shrugged, looking around. “You all are doing your thing and it’s important, I get it. I’m staying out of your way, and we’ve put our focus more into changing the city in a different way.”
“Mind telling me what that is instead of beating around the bush all night?”
He sucked air through his teeth. “Fine, okay? We’ve started sort of an arts and crafts situation while working to bring help to the homeless. Get their minds functioning well enough for them to get into hotels or at least abandoned buildings instead of staying on the streets.”
“You’re serious?” She motioned him on, ready to move again. “That’s…so not at all what I expected from you.”
He laughed. “I could say the same. In fact, a few days ago my mind was in a totally different place. Then I met this woman who was already thinking that way but didn’t know how to execute. I have my resources, my people, and she just inspired me. When I say I’m over Val, I promise I have a very good replacement. I’ll never forget our time together, but…she fueled the violence in me. Henrietta calms it, makes me a better person.”
“You sound like a cheeseball.” She laughed. “But you know me, I like cheese. I’m happy for you.”
They reached the edge of the square, which was as crowded as ever. It had slowed down for a bit during the violent times, but people were growing bold again, refusing to live their lives in terror.
While cutting through the crowd, Sandra pulled the pregnant card more than once and told people to get the hell out of her way.
When they reached the opposite side not far from her café—which she saw was bustling, thanks to the help she had been able to hire—they made their way over to a side alley beside the building Jackson had indicated.
“Here’s the spot,” he stated. “This is where I lost them.”
She nodded, looking at the brick building and the large trash bins behind them, and then back at the bustling crowds.
A whiff of fresh bread carried to her nose from the café, offset by the smell of trash in the alley. What a weird combination of enticing and retch-making.
Then a thought hit her, and she bent slightly, hoping to kneel, but realizing that wasn’t going to happen right now—not in her condition.
“What is it you’re looking for?” Jackson asked.
“I remember a story Val told me while we were out there. Before the surprise farewell party, Cammie had taken her to this place underground, through the sewers.” She stood, arching her back to stop it from cramping up. “They found Michael’s old hideout, she told me, and his old armor.”
“And you think this relates…how?”
“She mentioned something about it being around here,” Sandra replied. “If this group is all about worshiping his kind and had the slightest idea it was down there, don’t you think they’d be doing their best to find his place?”
He shook his head, confused. “But how… Why would they even know?”
“Maybe they were around? Heard us talking?” She racked her brain. “I can’t remember if Loraine was at the party, but maybe she heard Cammie and Valerie discussing it there?”
Rubbing his chin in thought, he nodded. “Yeah, okay, I buy it. So we have to go into the sewers?” He gave her stomach a doubtful glance. “Or rather, I do?”
She sighed, glancing in the direction of the building to which Diego might have returned by now, and considered it.
“Forget that, I’m coming,” she stated.
“We could wait…”
She shook her head and set about looking for a way in. “Just be ready to grab me if you see me losing my balance or something. I’m sure as hell not going to explain being covered in sewage when I get home.”
“Same goes for me.” He chuckled and commenced helping her look for the entrance.
She had to do this, she thought to herself. As stupid as it was, she was driven to find this girl and her friends and tell them the truth about what it took to become a vampire or Were.
Although, a small voice from the back of her head said, maybe they were onto something? Weres and vampires could heal themselves and move faster, and in many ways were a better version of humans. Well, if you disregarded the problem that most vampires couldn’t be out in daylight.
But the fact that most people either died or went crazy during transformation carried a stronger weight in her head, and the one that won out and pushed her to continue and warn these kids.
She hoped they hadn’t found a way to try to evolve yet.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Prince Edward Island
Dark waters lapped at the shore, sending spray onto the kids as they played nearby while Bronson prepared the airship. Clara and Platea stood nearby, pulling their jackets tight around themselves to break the night’s ocean breeze. While the weather was generally pleasant up here, that wind had a bite.
“You’re sure about this?” Royland asked.
“We’re now Val’s eyes and ears in the northeast,” Cammie replied. “Until she tells us otherwise, we hold this place down.”
“And if this is all some ploy to make a move on New York?”
Cammie considered the idea, and not for the first time. “I believe Sandra and the rest are capable of dealing with these two if it comes to that.”
He nodded. “If it’s good for you, it’s good for me.”
“You know, you’re kinda destroying me.”
“Impossible.”
“Shut up. That right there.” She laughed, pushing him away as he tried to give her a kiss. “I’m telling you, I used to be this badass man-eating chica, and now what am I?”
“In love?”
“Fuck you.”
“What?” He couldn’t help but burst into laughter. “I ask if you’re in love with me and that’s your response?”
“Only because you shouldn’t make me have to say it. Don’t fish for that kinda bullshit from me.”
“Ah…” He nodded slowly, as if she had just let him in on a secret. “So what you’re saying is, you have commitment issues and don’t like using that horrible, terribly scary ‘L word.’”<
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“Don’t psychoanalyze me.”
“When you’ve been alive as long as I have, it’s hard not to analyze people to some degree or another.”
She just stared at him. Of course she loved him, she supposed. Maybe.
“We’re not here to talk about stuff like that,” she commented, nodding to Clara and Platea. They were still standing close enough to hear, although both looked like they were trying very hard to pretend they hadn’t.
“Right.” Royland chuckled, then called to Bronson, “How’s she looking, Captain?”
Bronson stood up from whatever he was doing, smiled, and waved them over. “Looks like we’re ready. You sure I can’t convince you two to come with?”
“We have a duty here,” Cammie replied.
He nodded, then noticed a bag of clothes in Platea’s hand. “Ma’am, if I may?”
She let him take it from her and smiled as she followed him onto the airship, with Clara close behind.
“This’ll be war,” Cammie noted. “If it’s as bad as that girl says it is, you know it will be.”
“And we’ll be ready for it,” Royland replied. “New York’s a fortress, with our Weres and vampires at the ready.”
“But Prince Edward Island isn’t,” she argued. “We have us, but otherwise, what?”
“It’s an island!” He laughed. “It’ll be easy to keep attackers at bay.”
She thought for a moment. “It wasn’t so easy when we came knocking.”
“We knock a good deal harder than most, to be fair.”
“And the other pirates out there?” She looked back at the ocean. “Should we go knocking at their doorsteps? We don’t know what other horrors await. I say it’s stupid to assume we’re the scariest monsters around.”
“And I say it’s foolish to call us monsters.” He moved in, putting an arm around her waist. “Well, maybe you’re a bit of a succubus, but I’m an angel.”
“I’m not about to suck your b…whatever you said, so get your mind out of the gutter.”
“No.” He laughed. “A succubus.”
She removed his hand from her waist and turned to him with folded arms, not sure she liked him calling her names she didn’t understand.
With a sigh, he said, “A succubus is a supposedly mythical creature that, as far as I understand the legend, seduces men and then sucks out their soul, or maybe just kills them. Something like that.”
“Oh.” She considered it, then mustered a seductive grin. “Sure, maybe I am one of those. Sleep tight, and hope you wake up with a soul.”
“If vampires have souls to begin with,” he replied with a wink.
“You aren’t undead, idiot.” She hit him playfully, then wrapped her arms around his waist and gave him a kiss. “You heard what Michael told Val about aliens and nanocytes and all that.”
He shrugged. “Does that really seem more plausible than ancient curses stemming from Count Dracul or whatever?”
“What’re you going on about now?”
He rolled his eyes, but the smile remained. “I keep forgetting that you haven’t been around as long as I have, or heard the old stories.”
“So some Count was rumored to be the first vampire?”
“Maybe not the first, but definitely the main one. I’ve heard other stories that some Chinese or Mongolian warlord before him was the real originator, but both of those stories were around the twelve hundred to fourteen hundred A.D. timeframe. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Dark Messiah Michael himself created them, or some of his children did. I’d be even less surprised if they were just myths based around the real facts of Michael’s exploits. But who knows?”
“I didn’t know you were such a scholar.” She kissed him again, enjoying this side of him.
“How funny that knowledge of myths is what it takes to be considered a scholar nowadays.”
“Hardy har.” She turned back and saw that the airship’s balloon was filling and the kids were running up the plank to board. “Tell me, what about Werewolves?”
Royland looked up at the sky in thought, likely trying to pull information from some part of his brain he had not used for some time.
“It’s all probably as Val told us,” he replied ponderously. “But there are other versions. Older tales. I say you should believe what you want to believe.”
“I like Val’s version, personally. I like the idea that we might get the opportunity to go into space one day and fight evil aliens hell-bent on destroying earth.”
“Better than sticking around here wondering which side will win or if we’re going to have to face an alien invasion any day soon.”
She nodded, lifting a hand to wave to Allan, the Were boy.
Bronson stepped out of the control room and waved too, then cupped his hands and shouted, “Tell Valerie she better come see me sometime. I’m still hurt she didn’t say good bye.”
“I’ll be sure to give her a good punch on the arm for you next time I see her!” Cammie shouted back over the sound of the filling blimp. When it was done, Bronson gave them a final wave and returned to the control room. In a matter of seconds the airship lifted off, given a boost by the antigrav technology at its base.
“You realize that if you punched Valerie in the arm she’d take you down with a flick of her pinky,” Royland noted.
“My man has no faith in me,” Cammie replied playfully.
“Hey, you’ve seen her in a fight.”
“I’d kick your ass at least,” she said with a wink.
“This again?”
She had just stepped back and motioned for him to come at her when a shot rang out and they both ducked. A split-second later she’d recovered, eyes searching for the source of the shot.
“There!” Royland shouted, seeing the person first. She spotted more shooters a moment later, but Royland was already moving.
What the hell were they shooting at? Another shot went off and she turned at a crack from above. They were shooting at the blimp! That could only mean they knew what Bronson and Clara were up to and meant to stop it.
Not today, assholes.
Cammie darted in the direction of the second shooter, only seeing her in the tall grass because of the glint of moonlight off the glass of a scope. These bastards had a sniper rifle and hadn’t told her!
When the woman saw her coming she quickly moved the rifle to fire, but Cammie had already torn off her clothes and transformed into a wolf; she wasn’t about to let a sniper rifle get anywhere close to shooting her. She made for the large target fast. With three bounds she was on the woman, teeth sinking into flesh.
Two more leaped out with knives flashing and Cammie spun, growling as blood dripped down her jaw. One sliced from behind and nearly caught her, but she flung herself sideways and then went for his leg.
One bite tore his calf clean off, and as he fell to the ground screaming she moved for the second’s throat.
By the time she had turned back to the first, Royland was there, sucking blood from the man’s throat.
She transformed back to her human form and, breathing hard, smiled. “You never told me you were into guys. We coulda made that work for us a long time ago.”
He pulled back, red glistening on his teeth in the moonlight, and inhaled deep and satisfied. “If it involves an evil bastard who tries to attack the love of my life and me draining his life so I can be rejuvenated, then yes. By that definition, I am into guys.”
She smirked, then looked up to see the airship moving away. “Think they’re okay?”
“They are,” he glanced around, “but you need to find your clothes. A group like this can’t have their leader streaking whenever she feels like it.”
“Shut up.” She grinned. “The ocean breeze feels damn good on my exposed skin.”
He let his eyes roam and bit his lip.
“Okay, creepo.” She started walking back to find her clothes. “Now I’ll get dressed. It’ll be better for questioning these jackasses, anyway. “She pause
d, kneeling beside the sniper, and turned her over. To her delight the woman still had life in her eyes, though her breath was coming in quick spurts.
In a flash, Royland had fetched Cammie’s clothes and handed them over.
“Thanks,” she murmured, wrapping the coat over her shoulders. “Not sure how much time we have here.”
“Let’s make this easy then.” Royland grabbed the woman by the throat, hefting her into the air. “Where’re the rest of you? How many?”
The lady stared at him with terror-filled eyes, but clenched her jaw.
“I can end this now, or you can carry your suffering into eternity,” he warned her, allowing his fingernails to grow into claws that tore through her skin. “Your choice.”
She whimpered and tried to open her mouth, but then just motioned.
“Today’s your lucky day,” he said, releasing the grip on her neck and taking her by the arm. “Your suffering ends the moment you show us where your compatriots are.”
For a moment she looked defiant, until Royland’s eyes glowed red and he smiled to show his fangs. She gave a small nod.
“Keep up,” he called over his shoulder to Cammie, and the two were off.
“Slow the fuck down!” Cammie shouted as she tied her clothes into her jacket, wrapped it around her neck, and took off bounding after him in her wolf form. She almost wanted to laugh at herself, running through the island like that, jacket probably making her look like a caped superhero.
Super-Were. That would be her name if she ever became a real superhero. Her mind was lingering there and she was starting to think that she really was a superhero in a sense when she saw the flash that was Royland and the sniper lady dart across the road.
Following them, she found herself in a two-story house from the old days that had miraculously survived. Men and women were screaming as Royland tore into them, and in a moment Cammie had joined in the fun.
It wasn’t that she enjoyed hurting people, or even killing them; it was that she had grown to love destroying evil.
And these bastards had tried to kill her friends. As far as she was concerned, there was no greater evil.
Finally, when blood was splattered across the house and all that remained was the sniper lady whimpering in the corner, Royland darted over to her and snapped her neck, leaving her to crumple to the floor.
