20
Their shoreline journey continued and for a brief time Dr. Starr and Michael Ro`dan trod the beach in silence except for the noises made by the wheelbarrow. The weight of the load and the sinking of the wheel into the soft resistant sand showed no outward effects on Michael’s sustained effort. He might as well have been pushing it while empty.
“What is this sleeping Haven inside me? Is that why the attack happened?” Cinnamon despaired.
“I don’t think so. They’ve been closing in on every member of the family. It wasn’t just your name written on the shopping list. Tonight, Misty happened on to them quite innocently. They’ve been playing Misty so they could zero in on the rest. As sad as this evening has been it could have been much worse.
It might have been their undoing, though they took some losses they weren’t expecting. We might well find them where they camp or send them running, but that’s not good enough. They need to be hunted down and stopped so that they don’t come back again. This is how they work.” He stopped and stared through the darkness into her eyes. “It’s how I work too, woman.”
Cinnamon felt a chill down her spine.
They resumed their journey and resumed being silent as they walked until Michael began speaking about his past.
“I was at a small fire before me, but I realized this slowly. I sat before it but couldn’t recall for the moment how I had come to be there. Over the flames, beyond in the flickers I could see the ten foot high wall surrounding the courtyard of my home in la Coruna. We were situated in this courtyard. I say ‘we’ because I became aware that a large figure of a man sat beside me to my left. He was a large man. Some would say he was a giant. Certainly he was of a size seldom seen by most. The quiet awesomeness of his powerful presence made me short of breath for a few moments.
“I thought it best to steal you away from Edwardo before he got too carried away with you.” This was spoken by the giant I had come to know as Ferdinand but I was not used to his voice. The last time he had spoken to me was in a dream and he’d been using don Lucido’s voice. I’m not sure whose voice he was using now but I assumed it was his.
“Thank you. You’ve done me no small favor.” I returned.
He closed his eyes briefly and nodded. “It is better to have Edwardo as a friend than an enemy.”
“How can you tell which he is?
“If you are still breathing and blood still flows in your veins, he is not your enemy or he hasn’t reached for you yet.” Ferdinand laughed slowly and low. “Edwardo so enjoys the hunt and its sweet tortures.”
“What do you enjoy, Ferdinand?”
“I enjoy family. I told you quickly because wringing out the moment as you dance nervously for the answer is not my way. I am the defender, the preserver…the protector. Join this family Michael Ro`dan. My job is impossible as it is. Your membership broadens my responsibilities but it makes my job easier.”
“Thanks…I think. Why?”
“…because you care about the family, young Ro’dan. When you offered your own life up to help Lucido and Veria, you showed your insanity. You are insane like those birds that pick at the teeth of a crocodile, walking among those who would kill you. It is as Elena has said; you are the ‘caretaker’ and that makes my job easier, and the two of us are allies in so many words. I won’t speak against you to the family.”
I was relieved to hear this but swept my arm slowly at the garden and garden walls surrounding us. “This is a dream. This is why you can talk to me.”
“Yes.”
“Why must we be in a dream for us to talk?”
“Because my language is ugly, abrupt and guttural, it lacks the nuances and clarity of ways we might speak in an ordinary life. Here I can wander, play, see some of my friends and move about unnoticed. My people are a race of giants. Have you seen any of my size walking around in the streets or riding around in wagons? There are only remnants. This is how old those of my race are…or were.”
Ferdinand stared into the fire as if looking down through the ages. I felt I should ask him more about what he had just said, but I also sensed I should let it pass. As I weighed this conflict he spoke again, making the decision for me.
“Let’s not spend any more time on that subject. It’s a trail of tears and we all walk them. Instead, let me put a few logs on here and we’ll speak of the change you are going to go through when you become a vampire.”
“Why would you put more non-existent logs on to an imaginary fire?” I asked.
He stopped and turned away reaching for more fuel for the fire. He was trembling, which at first blush, I mistook as rage. But when he turned to me I saw he had tears in his eyes, and further, he was shaking with laughter.
“Lucido.” He said, shouting at the sky. “This man has my blessing to join the family as a joker.”
“Do you dance?” He asked.
“Not in any formal way, but you should see me when I stub my toe.” I replied.
And we whooped and howled and laughed.
“Do you know magic tricks?”
“No, not magic, but I can walk through a room and not be noticed.”
“Naked?” He inquired, referring to a lesson don Lucido had thrust upon me, one that the family loved to tease me about.
We broke off into fits of laughter again. Once our mirth slowed, Ferdinand returned to my question regarding imaginary logs.
“I feed the dream fire with dream logs for no reason at all, little brother. I do it because I want to, and it makes no sense, that’s why I want to. It makes no sense that we are in this dream talking to each other either, yet here we are. The turn from human to vampire defies the senses too. It is not a painless transition. It can be confusing, lonely and challenged with doubt.”
“You can’t scare me away, Ferdinand, I have been on a collision course with this since I was delivered to the veranda of the House of Del Rio…before that really.”
“I’m not trying to scare you, I’m trying to tell you what is known about the transformation. It is too late to turn away. I have been your protector too, and continue the watch. Don’t waste my efforts. This family exists beyond mere survival but to thrive in this uncertain age.
“Walk…though this is a dream…or is it?”
We sauntered from the fire. The garden walls I’d seen nearby were gone, and from where we stood all the way to the horizon, in every direction, lay lands of desert beauty to wander and explore. I was speechless momentarily, taking it all in.
Ferdinand spoke more softly as he moved next to me. “Most of us have tried to help you learn to journey through your dreams, something that many vampires do well. You ask what is real and what is a dream? Well, you will need to know this if you want to be with us. No one can truly tell you how to do it. Each traveler finds his own way. You will become lost but maybe you will find yourself along the way. For your sake I hope so. Otherwise, you will remain lost.
I have tried to remember if I felt the sensation of walking, and I’m quite sure I did. What I don’t remember is whether Ferdinand was walking as we moved along. I mean, I know he was beside me but usually, my experience was to work harder to keep pace with his larger strides but I don’t recall this being an issue during this journey. Rather than to places known to me, we walked some desert plains which might have been somewhere in Spain. But the mountain ranges in the distance looked more like the Alps. I was quite lost with the terrain.
“What mountains are those?” I asked.
“They are mountains, known by many names through the ages. They change too but not as fast as the people who name them. Come let me show you some mountain people.”
We climbed for a few minutes, keeping low when we finally approached the crest of a knoll. On the other side was a loose gathering of people dressed in animal skins. Some hovered near a small campfire. Another flame could be seen in the darkness of a cave which seemed to be the central shelter. Women cooked and tended to young children. Older children ran and chased,
while men worked on repairs or sharpened arrowheads and spear points. These people appeared primitive and not like mountain people I have encountered.
“This is in the past.” I said.
“Once upon a time,” Ferdinand replied.
We watched this small group interact during this brief section of their lives. They were hard, rugged people, physically strong and giants…like Ferdinand.
21
MacQueen had gone into hiding since his encounter with not one, but three vampires at the scene of where the barn had been burned to the ground. He had hoped to eradicate the she-creature that had been victimizing the surrounding countryside. He had bravely led the volunteer band of men and that had brought him some notoriety as well as fulfilling a civic duty to the surrounding community. For a few minutes, he’d been a hero in his own mind. But then he had encountered Lucido Del Rio. MacQueen’s night, no, his life had changed after that. To save his own skin, Del Rio had forced him to turn in three fellow members of the vampire hunting party, which he’d done but oh. how that had hurt. It burned now inside a hollow heart; living with the lives of three offered up so that he would go on living. MacQueen had been a shell of a man since then. Probably no one else knew what he’d done but he did. And so he avoided the others, keeping himself out of sight from the public, no matter what kind of hero others thought him to be. MacQueen knew what he’d done and now this hero had become a shadow of his former self.
Lillian, his wife, watched him as he drank his tea and looked out the window. She had been worried about him, a humorless man since he’d returned from that cursed hunt.
“What’s wrong dearest? I wish I could see what you see when you look about as you do. You’re face paints a thousand possibilities but I am left to guess what goes on inside. You seem so jittery of late.”
“Lily, it’s not me that’s nervous. It’s the horses. They were skittish as evening came on before I brought them in, but I still hear ‘em kicking the barn walls, snortin’ and rippin’.”
“My word! Do you think it’s a fox…something worse?”
“Well, I’ll go out and see what I can, check them before we turn in.”
Lillian became concerned. “I’ll go with you.”
“You won’t, you know,” Replied MacQueen. “I’ve been listening to the horses for a while, which is why you saw nothing in my face. No. You’ll stay here with our boys. I know you’re wantin’ to help but I don’t need to be worried about you being hurt or me jabbing at you with a pitchfork in the darkness. I’m warmed to know that you and the boys are safe. I’ll be careful. I won’t mess about.”
It was a gentle night, no wind, no rain but though this was true it seemed darker and foggier as he approached the barn-cooler too. His timid lamp light didn’t chase shadows away. They dodged and weaved while keeping their stronghold, which didn’t help to dispel the eerie mood and did nothing to build confidence. His ordeal at the burning barn a few weeks ago seemed to have left him less brave. Still he garnered what courage he had left and made the walk across the yard to the barn door and stepped quietly inside.
Since he had managed to cross the yard to the barn with little noise and no alarm sounding with would-be intruders, human or animal in response to his appearance at the door, he would continue his stealth by keeping the lamp low to the ground. So far so good, now to do a slow scan of the barn’s murky interior. From what he could see, things seemed in order, but what about the livestock, the horses in particular? They appeared unsettled and nervous with faces that would say plenty if they could speak. He’d been around horses for most of his life and knew how to read them.
MacQueen raised his lantern holding a pitch fork in the other hand. He had little choice but to move further in if he wanted to be thorough. Something was causing a ruckus. Tightening his grip on the fork, he edged toward the horses. Their eyes looked wild and even as he approached with the lantern they barely paid attention to him. He could see the lamp’s reflection in their pupils and strangely something else. Almost by reflex he held the light higher to see the reflection more accurately. As he stared into the horse’s eye, his pitchfork was snatched from his grip. MacQueen tried to reach after it but in no time at all the tines reversed their direction and were now pointed at him.
“Easy master, easy, we means you no harm. Stay ye calm and ye may still might walk out of here able to see.”
For the moment his eyes were not skewered by the pitchfork, and what they beheld in front of him was a craggy old woman holding the implement and her face was old yet spoke of beauty in former years, but there was also treachery and evil, a witch’s face if there ever was one.
“I made the horses call you out here.”
“What do you want in my barn, witch?”
“It’s another barn I speak of. Did you burn a barn fortnight ago?”
“Yes, and what of it? The deed was done and the price was high, believe me.”
The woman was small but her confidence in this situation was big. MacQueen was kept from an angry rage by the sharp points of the fork.
“Woman, what do you want with me? Why do you break into my barn?”
“Farmer, farmer how’s your cattle? Do they come in halves?
Yes, they do. This one’s a mother and this one has twin calves.” The old woman recited an old childhood nursery rhyme and ended with a brief cackle.
MacQueen studied her with a screwed face. “Are you mad?”
“Farmer, I want ye to raise something for me… something from the ashes.”
“Be gone, old crone. I’ll not become involved with your doings.”
“Are ye boys safe in their beds farmer, farmer? Is ye wife so all alone in the house?”
MacQueen was hampered by the lamp he was holding, but to fling it or drop it was to burn down the barn with its dry straw and valuable contents. And then there was the pitchfork that she held just under his chin. Still what he thought about most was his wife and family
“Ye’ll be paid…handsomely if ye do yer job. No one has to be hurt. But ye are the burner of the barn. Ye know where they was when it was burning. Find them…one…two…five? Be ye tightlipped and closed mouth about yer business. Find where they lie after the burning and scoop them up carefully into a vase…all ye can. Each has his own vessel; don’t mix them up. Be cagey. Tell no one…if ye want to have yer boys, yer woman, yer home and some coins in yer purse. If ye try to run away farmer, much worse will happen to ye, so curse yer part in it. Choices lead to choices and curses do the same. Don’t worry about keeping me informed, I’ll be watching…and waiting.
Go now, farmer and tell yer wife nothing. Just like you never told her you picked three others to die…turned ‘em in so you could live.”
22
I woke to find don Lucido watching me as I had been sleeping.
“Is everything alright?” I asked.
“I’m not sure yet.” He said. “I have brought Charlotte back. The timing is bad and yet if it didn’t happen now it might never happen. She is, after all, being hunted.”
“You feel badly about bringing her here…leading their trail to us?”
“I feel badly about bringing her here for many reasons. There are good reasons for her to be here as well. It seems we must revisit how things were in a previous time when you and I and Charlotte first met.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“For now, she is a guest. She is family and she is a prisoner.”
“…a prisoner?”
“For now…. Let’s see where this takes us, but one place it will not is your transcendence to vampire. She cannot take part in it, and must remain in custody while you transform. And further, until such time as I give leave, you cannot be alone with her.”
But why?” I asked.
“It’s for the safety of everyone, including her. Let’s get you turned. Then we’ll see.”
“Can I see her?”
“Not until you are turned. She doesn’t like it either but for
a chance to be with the family she agrees to abide with our constraints. Have you spoken to all who might speak for you or against you?”
“Everyone except Veria.”
“Then meet with her today. Eat little and stand in the sun while you can. You will come to miss that particular warmth.” Don Lucido withdrew to the door and paused there. “Stay inside today, no walks about the city. Stay inside the house or in the garden. Heed me in this; it is dangerous outside our walls this day.”
After that, I was alone with my thoughts which were plentiful, as I found my chat with don Lucido confusing. It had the feel of being scolded, the feel of being parented, and as so often it was with him, it was mysterious. I was going to make myself some breakfast but found the kitchen darkened, and there was a hooded figure sitting in one of the kitchen chairs. A candle was lit at the table and its glow revealed beautiful eyes piercing through the shadowy shroud. The hooded cloak was one of Veria’s favorite cove- ups from the ravages of the sun. The intensity of her low-lidded gaze made me nervous and I discontinued our eye contact, but that did not deter my approach. I took a seat across from her.
“Veria, I apologize for the quick words I spoke to you when last we shared time. I regret them, and regret them even more if they hurt you. I was wrong. You were right.”
“Whatever are you talking about, peasant boy?”
That response infuriated me yet sobered my words. I sent her a stare of my own and replied. “You know what I’m talking about.”
“I fixed you some bread and fruit. It might be best to have only a little in your stomach for now, and even that should be bland. Believe me; I wanted to fix you more. You know how I like to cook.”
I noted the change of subject, so typical of her. “I’m not hungry.”
“As you wish, but your chances to eat even food like this are dwindling.” She set the breakfast before me.
“I’m not hungry!” I stated again with a bit more emphasis.
The Blood In Between Page 11
