Vampire Innocent | Book 11 | How To Stop A Vampire War In Six Easy Steps

by Cox, Matthew S.

  I look toward the voice. Two long-haired dudes in denim jackets, arms at their sides, race up toward me like a pair of ground-to-Sarah guided missiles. At this point, I am required by virtue of being my father’s daughter to point out how surface to air missiles are often abbreviated as SAMs, which is the same as my little brother’s name. Surprisingly, the reason I know this is not my father, but Sierra. One of her PlayStation games is sort of a flight simulator. I say ‘sort of’ because it’s not going out of its way to be a realistic recreation of flying. The game is more arcade than realistic. Only so much they can do flight sim wise on a console. Anyway, it has SAMs. It also has an ‘automated warning voice’ that would say ‘SAM lock’ about fifty times a minute.

  And yeah, I’m hearing the same voice in my head now.

  Blix screeches something unintelligible.

  “He says we have incoming,” shouts Sam.

  “I noticed. We’re a little low on chaff and flares.”

  “Want me to fart?” asks Sam.

  I blink. “You can fart on command?”

  He shrugs. “Dunno, but I can try.”

  “Umm. I don’t think it’ll help.”

  There is no way I’m going to get into a midair claw fight when I’m carrying my brother. Even if we survive, Mom would kill me. If anything happened to Sam, I’d be a total freakin’ mess… like worse than Charlotte, the Innocent I met in England. Her mind is gone. Poor woman acts like she’s maybe six years old despite having been twenty-one when turned.

  I pour on speed, pushing myself as much as possible. Sam’s wrists dig into the front of my neck. No big deal. Air is not one of my needs. The fastest I’ve ever managed to go—while holding my iPhone to check—is 140 miles an hour. A normal person can tolerate similar windspeed on a motorcycle, so I’m not worried about hurting Sam by speed alone. Many vampire powers are linked to emotion, so my desperation to keep my brother safe does seem to be increasing my top speed. However, the two guys are still creeping up on us.

  An Innocent pushing themselves into ‘redline’ is still slower than some other bloodlines can fly. Like Glim? I think he can do 180 or so, which makes no sense. The man can ‘shadow gate’ places. He doesn’t need to fly. Why does he get the golden flight plan? For him, a trip from Olympia to Seattle could legit take two minutes in the shadow realm. Also, Sam is contributing weight and drag.

  Blix is not contributing weight and drag—because he’s gone.

  Not sure when he lost his grip, but he disappeared. Maybe he let go on purpose to harass the guys chasing us? Once the two dudes are at the same altitude and no longer need to climb, they start catching up to me alarmingly fast.

  Shit!

  I can’t outrun these guys. They will catch me and do something bad to both of us. Since a fight is unavoidable, my best chance is to get on the ground fast and eliminate the possibility of Sam plummeting to his death. He gurgles when I abruptly dive; his weight lifts off my back, all of it pressing into my throat. I’m flying downward faster than free fall, pulling him with me like a living cape.

  At least I’m doing so until one of the vampires chasing us comes out of nowhere beneath me, crashing into us with all the fury of a hockey player pissed off over a bad referee call. I now know how a bird trying to fly across a road but getting hit by a speeding truck feels. And by truck, I mean his shoulder. A bwawk like a drop-kicked goose comes out of me as I fold in half over him.

  The severe impact breaks Sam’s grip on his wrist and sends him careening off into the sky.

  “Sam!” I shout, sprouting claws. Rage and worry burn in my veins as I go for the most prominent target in sight—this dude’s butt.

  I grab both cheeks and sink my claws in as deep as possible. He shrieks in agony, as loud as if he’d sat bare-assed on the grill table at Shogun West. Extreme pain overrides reason, causing him to freak out, abandon his bear hug and hurl me aside. I tumble once before righting myself and scanning the skies for Sam. Fortunately, the human eye is drawn to motion. I spot him right away. My brother plummets toward the earth, still moving laterally at over a hundred miles an hour.

  A second after I dive to chase him, the other vampire grabs me. I get a nice close up view of the crow tattoo on his left forearm. The bird, not Brandon Lee. Alas.

  “No! Get off me! Sam’s just a little kid! You asshole!” I struggle to break away, flailing and shredding at any part of him I can reach.

  Sam’s already a hundred feet down. Blix appears to be diving after him, too. But those tiny wings aren’t going to make much difference to a fall from this high up. I’ve got mere seconds left before it’s too late and I’ll never catch up to him. Snarling, I ram my elbow back, catching the vampire in the side of the head. He grunts, but doesn’t lose his hold on me.

  My brother yanks his shirt off—and sprouts a pair of demon wings, arresting his fall to a casual cruising glide.

  Stunned, I stop struggling and stare. “What the shit?”

  Crow Tat stops trying to crush my ribs, staring over my shoulder at Sam. “Whoa. That’s messed up.”

  “Do we really have to do this whole fight to the death bullshit right now? I’m babysitting my little brother.”

  “Are you trying to reschedule your ass-kicking?” Crow turns his head to look at me. He’s late twenties. Kinda looks like one of the metalheads from my old high school, plus a bit of goth. No, I don’t know him. I mean he’s got the same sense of style. Long hair, denim jacket, black band T-shirt with a completely unreadable logo. What is it with metal bands and extreme fonts?

  “I guess. Honestly, I don’t remember scheduling it in the first place. I’m just a newbie, and this is really a bad time for me. Can we do next Tuesday at ten? Or better yet, if you guys have a problem with Wolent, why don’t you go tell him to his face how you really feel, or are you afraid of him?”

  “You calling us cowards?” shouts the guy with ten holes in his backside.

  I shrug. “Umm, considering you’re attacking someone who isn’t even one year old yet, yeah, kinda. No, actually. I am definitely calling you a chicken.”

  ‘Claude’ snarls in rage and flies at me, his fist cocked.

  Right before his knuckles crash into the side of my face, I hurl myself straight down. Crow is bewildered enough at the sight of my brother for his grip to come a bit loose, but not fail entirely. I end up in a headlock rather than in a grip like we’re slow dancing—and ‘Claude’ wallops his buddy in the nose. Sounds like two sides of beef smacking into each other.

  Crow goes fly-tumbling away. ‘Claude’ hovers nearby, stuck between ‘aw, shit, sorry man’ and angry at me. I take the opportunity to add a few fashion slices to his shirt—and chest. He takes a swing for my face. I duck. The other one zooms back into the fray. Brawling in three dimensions is freakin’ weird. Our ability to fly around is much slower than vampire reflexes allow us to dodge, so it’s more difficult to evade punches, grabs, and kicks if an opponent gets close. Gliding around feels like slow motion to my amped up speed, but their attacks still look normal. It’s like we’re a bunch of martial artists doing wire work, only with more upside-down parts, no stunt doubles, and no food truck outside.

  These two aren’t as skilled as Mohawk—who I am sure had actual training in like jiu-jitsu or something. They are, however, much better at brawling than the idiots who jumped me at the parking deck. I focus on defense, attacking with claw swipes sparingly, aiming for sensitive spots. Every time one of them hits me, I go flying off to the side and they have to chase me again. I’ve totally lost track of where Sam went, but no point stressing out over him since the guys don’t seem interested in him at all. I mean, callous disregard for making me drop him isn’t much different than trying to kill him, but still.

  “So, uhh, what are you guys planning to do here? Kill me or just deliver a beating?”

  ‘Claude’ grabs for me. I zip out of his way—right into the other guy’s foot. Ow. Fish is okay. Not a big fan of filet of sole when it’s attached to a
Doc Marten. I go tumbling head over heels a few times from the force of the hit, hoping my neck didn’t snap. Blood drips from my nose into my mouth, but my body isn’t numb. Good sign.

  After a momentary battle trying to get their pants to stay up—thanks, Blix, for trying—they chase. I flip over and fly at them. Crazy electrocuted kitten technique works for a moment keeping them back, but I can’t score a hit before Crow grabs my right wrist and swings me.

  “Hey, can we just call my ass kicked?” I shout while he spins me around and around. Oh, dammit. Now that song is stuck in my head. “I really need to be somewhere. Parents are waiting for me. Already gonna get in trouble for fighting.”

  ‘Claude’ zooms at me, doing the ‘Superman’ flying punch thing. Crow’s about to swing me into the guy’s fist. Oh, this is going to hurt. Fortunate anatomical fact: my legs are longer than his arms. I swing my feet up, planting both sneakers in ‘Claude’s’ face, stopping him cold before his knuckles reach me. His nose explodes in a shower of red. The hit spins me behind Crow, but he’s still got my wrist. A quick claw slice across the backs of his knees makes him yowl and let go of me.

  Crow screams in rage and pulls a huge knife from a sheath strapped to his leg. It’s definitely long enough to take a head off. Dammit. I try running (well, flying), but it’s again obvious they’re so much faster than me, I’m stuck in combat until they decide to go do something else or I knock them out. The three-dimensional brawl resumes.

  For a couple minutes, it feels like I’m holding my own. The dudes are unusually clumsy—again, thanks, Blix.

  I get overconfident and go for a claw swipe at Crow’s throat despite thinking it too easy. Yeah. When something appears to be too easy, it usually is. ‘Claude’ gets me from behind in another bear hug, pinning my arms to my sides.

  “Chin up, hon. Just gonna put you in a box and send you to your pal. Not gonna stay dead.” Crow sizes up my neck for a slice.

  Growling, I thrash, panic pouring energy into my muscles. On an intellectual level, I understand having my head chopped off is not going to kill me. However, there is no way in hell anyone—vampires included—can see a knife coming for their neck and not freak the hell out. ‘Claude’ is stronger, but I’m not defenseless. He’s really got to work to hold me still enough for his buddy to saw my head off. Again, Crow’s pants fall down to his ankles, causing him to delay stabbing me to fix them.

  “Get off her!” yells Sam, from a fair distance away. “Last warning!”

  Both guys laugh.

  Crow grabs a fistful of my hair, pushing my head back. I kick him in the balls hard enough to shatter his pelvis… and break my foot. His face turns red, his eyes bulge out—and he explodes into a shower of ash, embers, and a few loose, smoking bones, which tumble toward the ground along with his huge knife.

  Wow, I know some dudes get really pissed off if something hits them in the nuts—but exploding? That’s new.

  ‘Claude’ stops wrestling with me, frozen in bewildered fear. Yeah, same here. The sight of a vampire bursting into flaming bits in an instant is the sort of thing capable of terrifying any other vampire witnessing it into derpy silence. Even if I wanted to destroy him, something about fire…

  After a few seconds to process the sight—just enough time for any remaining sign of Crow ever having existed to fall out of view—‘Claude’ tightens his grip like a hostage taker, putting me between him and Sam, who is hovering about thirty feet away, flapping his little crimson wings.

  He’s kind of adorable, actually.

  “Dude,” I say. “Are you taking me hostage or cowering away from a nine-year-old boy?”

  “Umm.”

  “I get it, man. Really. Split-second immolation is pretty damn terrifying. Don’t think anyone would blame you for hiding, but if you want to go with using me as a body shield instead, I’ll keep your secret.”

  Sam points at ‘Claude.’ “My name is not Inigo Montoya. You didn’t kill my father, but prepare to die.”

  Screaming, ‘Claude’ lets go of me and rockets away in a steep dive, heading for the ground.

  I tense, bracing for the blast of fire, but nothing happens. Sam’s expression goes from ‘evil wizard mastermind glare’ to a huge, goofy smile. He casually flies over to hover beside me.

  “What the hell happened to you?” I pat him to make sure he’s real, then touch one of his wings close to his back. The dark red skin feels like warm leather. “Mom is going to freak out. She’s still not totally cool over having a kitten in the house, and she doesn’t even know about the dog yet.”

  “Relax.” He grimaces at the blood on my face. “They’re a temporary summon. I’m still Sam. It’s only magic.”

  I whistle. “Wow… Uncle Hank called you a little hellion, but he has no idea.”

  “Ugh.” Sam rolls his eyes. “You are turning into Dad. And demons aren’t all evil.”

  “Do I even want to know how you made Crow explode?”

  He scrunches his nose. “You knew those turds?”

  “Nah. Guy had a tattoo of a crow on his arm.”

  Sam tilts his head. “Actual crow or Brandon Lee?”

  “The bird.”

  “Oh.” Sam scratches idly at his shoulder. “I didn’t make him explode. Mel did. I asked her to help you.”

  Mel? Oh, ack. The succubus. I look around. No sign of her.

  “She left already. I couldn’t make the other guy blow up, but he didn’t know that.” Sam flashes an innocent smile.

  “Great. My li’l bro’s a gargoyle.”

  “Am not. It’s a buff spell, like I said. Temporary. Remember the beastmaster class?”

  “We are not in a video game.”

  “Could’a fooled me.” He zips around me in a circle, playing with his wings. “And the beastmaster isn’t from a video game. It’s from Dad’s campaign.”

  Duh. I facepalm… then check him over for horns. Nothing. Seems like he’s the same old kid brother I’m used to having except for the wings. The skin on his back where they sprout doesn’t look any different. Like someone glued dark red pool noodles to him. Okay, yeah, they’re probably a temporary spell. My brother didn’t mutate.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you could summon wings? I practically crapped myself when you fell.”

  “I didn’t know I could.” The color drains out of his face. “Olmaz gave me wings like this for a little while ’cause Ronan fell down a place in the demi-plane. I had to go get him. He said he’d show me how to use them whenever I wanted if I helped him free Mel. But, I haven’t turned in the quest yet, so I didn’t know if they would work.”

  “Turn in the quest?”

  “You know, go back to Olmaz to tell him we freed Mel.”

  “Didn’t you say life isn’t a video game?”

  He raspberries me. “I was kinda scared at first. Thought you’d come catch me, but the guy had you. So… I hoped Olmaz was watching and asked for help. Glad I didn’t go splat.”

  I grab on, squeezing my little brother close. The surge of panic from when he first fell hits me hard without the adrenaline of two vampires trying to kill me. It’s so much worse when I realize he didn’t even scream. Is he really that brave or did he silently accept his imminent death?

  “I’m okay.”

  “You didn’t even scream when you fell. How are you so damned brave at nine?”

  “I dunno. Didn’t think about it. Umm. I had to try the wings. I probably would have started screaming if they didn’t work.”

  He’s obviously freaking out a bit, hiding it well. How do I know? The boy has wings and isn’t flying in circles while cheering, playing around, and making a ton of noise. He shouldn’t be this subdued. So, yeah, he’s freaked. Another big clue, he’s clinging to me pretty tight. We hold each other in midair for a few minutes until the ‘holy crap’ aspect of his almost falling to death stops ruling our thoughts.

  “Should I fly myself or do you want to carry me?” whispers Sam.

  “Umm, can you
keep up?”

  “Dunno.”

  “Race ya?” I smile.

  “Deal!” He does a midair ‘Bugs Bunny about to run’ pose, then darts off.

  He happens to be going in the wrong direction, but he’s trying.

  It’s easy for me to catch up, barely feels like walking to me. At a guess, he’s cruising along at somewhere around fifty miles an hour. I roll on my side and prop my head on my hand like I’m lounging in bed while gliding up beside him.

  “Show off.” He laughs. “Okay, you’re faster.”

  “Home is also northeast. You’re going west.”

  “Oops.” He slows to a hover. “You should probably carry me. We’re already late for the movie.”

  “Hop on, kiddo.”

  Sam lands on my back. His wings disappear into a faint cloud of brick red smoke. Perching on me is a bit too wobbly for him to put his shirt back on, so he holds it for now.

  “Where’s Blix?”

  “He’s chasing the other guy. Going to make him regret attacking us. He’s pretty mad.”

  Oh, wow. I would not want to be ‘Claude.’ Imps having casual fun was bad enough. What are they like when pissed? “Hope he’s careful. Little dude’s not exactly difficult for a vampire to kill.”

  “He knows… he, uhh, saw you pop some of his friends.”

  “Sorry.”

  “It’s cool. I didn’t mean friends like real friends. Other imps. He’s more mellow than them.”

  “I noticed.”

  Still shaking from emotion, I haul ass home. Question being, shall we ruin movie night by telling the ’rents what happened, or shall I stew on it until after?

  Hello, my name is Sarah Wright and I am a lousy liar.

  Here I am, lying in bed, staring at my ceiling and feeling like a horrible person.

  I managed to pull off a multi-layered logic gate to prevent my parents from losing their minds. This let me walk around the truth without technically lying, so my guilty conscience didn’t give me away. Sam has wings, or at least a magical ability to fake it enough. Having him knocked away from me is not my carelessness or incompetence. I didn’t ‘drop’ him. Our being separated in midair turned out to be no risk to his life. The risk to Sam’s life came from two vampires, which I successfully kept busy and away from him. We got into a fight with vampires on the way home. Not mentioning the fight took place in the air vs. the ground is not a relevant factor, given that both Sam and I can fly.