by Hunter Blain
Father Thomes nodded as if in satisfaction and said, “Let me pray on the matter of our alliance, my son. Meet me at my church tomorrow night for my answer.” With that, Father Thomes turned and began walking away, his hands clasped in front of him at his waist.
“Hey!” I called out, stopping him. He turned, and I asked, “How did you know where to find me?”
“You have some predictable habits, John.”
“Fair enough. But why did you attack me instead of just asking?”
“Did I not come upon you tearing a corpse limb from limb and feeding it to your now dead pets?” he called back.
My head shot to the river, where several reptilian bodies floated lifelessly in the water. My mouth hung open, and a tiny wheeze escaped my throat before I cried out, “My babies!”
“The shock wave did the deed, my son. But rest assured that it was for the best.”
Anger and shame at killing my pets interlaced with my words as I called back, “And why’s that, holy man?”
“Because they had a taste for human flesh, my son.” He turned and continued walking away before calling over his shoulder, “How long before they killed an innocent and further damned your soul?”
Lilith damn it! He was right. Plus, he had easily located me by my usual body-disposal location. Maybe it was for the best, especially if I was going to start working with the priest. Pretty sure the supernatural community would not approve and might even hunt me down. Pretty sure I didn’t give a shit, either. At over five centuries old, I had accumulated enough energy from the blood of mortals that I was a force to be reckoned with. Every drop added to the well of power, and that well grew deeper as I aged, allowing for more energy to be tapped at will. Though it took an excruciatingly long time to fill an ever-expanding well drop by drop, with enough time, it could be done. And one thing I had was time.
What’s my point, you may ask? Well, if they wanted to come for me, they were going to need a bigger boat.
“Hey!” I had to yell this time, as he was barely visible in the distance. “How will I know which one’s your church?”
Silence was his answer, prompting a scowl to crease my face.
“Damn cryptic holy man,” I whispered to myself as he disappeared into the darkness.
Chapter 2
Houston, 1990
Preternatural eyes locked onto the first tendrils of light that crested the horizon, signaling two things: the first being the obvious—dawn—and the second being my lack of time management.
“Lilith damn it!” I cursed as the gyrating stems of light danced in seemingly random patterns, promising a horrific and painful demise once they overtook the moon for dominance in the sky. I had a precious few minutes to get to safety before my preternatural essence was incinerated.
I can hear you asking, “But Mr. Vampire, sir, how can you see yourself in mirrors and not bask in the sunlight? I thought this was Urban Fantasy, not Fantasy-Fantasy.”
Easy. Mirrors at one point in time contained silver, which is a holy metal that cancels magic, much like iron. Modern mirrors are made with aluminum because it’s cheaper. As for the morning sun, it cleanses the world of most magic, with only a few exceptions. Creatures of the Earth, and those from Faerie, are immune from the wrath of the sun.
Werewolves are a notable exception that has always interested me. I met one of my dearest friends during WWII when we were slaying Nazis left and right. It’s actually where I got my black leather trench coat from. I took it off the body of a particularly delicious SS officer and decided to keep it—after removing all the patches and armband, of course.
Anyway, back on track: my friend, Depweg, is able to transform during the day. I can only assume it is because the werewolf virus is either crafted from the Fae or naturally occurring in nature. Both explanations are difficult to believe, but here we are.
I’m not of this Earth or created by the Fae, so sunlight fucks my shit right up. I have deduced that my vampirism merged with my soul and body, creating a perfect balance between being a mortal human and an immortal vampire. The sun cleanses my physical body of the magic; ultraviolently, I might add. Ha! See what I did there? I’m punny. Moral of the story is, I tend to steer clear of any sunbathing activities.
Standing near the embankment, I chuckled at my inner monologue before snapping out of it with a jolt.
“Shit!” I belted out like a super buff, manly dude and not at all like a five-year-old girl who just saw a spider.
I oriented myself toward my secret hidey-home and leaped into the air hard enough to send chunks of dirt and grass flying. After landing at the edge of the city in one jump, I rebounded into the early morning sky right as the first sheet of light crashed into the now white clouds above. I handled the precarious situation with absolute grace and dignity.
“Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shiiiiit!” I said with extreme coolness, reminiscent of a vampiric hero who is worthy of his own Netflix series.
The sun’s tendrils—that only those with special eyeballs could see—grew thicker as they reached into, and devoured, the night sky. The morning light swept down the base of the clouds and toward me as I leaped from building to building, panic building at my core. I knew I could just land somewhere secluded and dig a hole deep and wide enough to sleep for the day, but I was stubborn and was willing to bet I could make it to my home on time.
As I neared my Fortress of Solitaire, which was buried underneath an old cemetery, I spotted a black church that I had never noticed before. It. Was. Awesome! A decaying wrought iron fence surrounded the ancient-looking building. From up above, it looked like a cross with an enormous pointed steeple rising from the center.
Atop the church’s roof were perched two stone statues that almost seemed to be watching me with grime-covered faces. One was an angel with its wings outstretched, while the other was a catlike gargoyle. They seemed to be keeping watch over the grounds.
The whole church was covered in ancient filth and moss. Stained glass windows were now opaque from years of neglect. The grass around the decrepit building was dead or dying, with gravestones that had been smoothed with time and rendered illegible. One of the short sides of the cross faced an empty road that if taken, led to my favorite hangout spot: Valenta’s Saloon.
That must be the church Father Thomes had told me about. It might also explain some of his “connections,” seeing as how he was so close to Valenta’s place. Supernaturals—or supes, as I called them—liked to hang out there. It was a safe house for our kind. Plus, Val kept special drinks that even a buff-and-not-at-all-fat vampire could enjoy. And no, I wasn’t lying to myself.
As I soared past the church, I thought how it was funny that you never saw something right under your nose until you were made aware of it. It’s kind of like when you bought a green car, and then all of a sudden everyone on the road had a freaking green car too!
Sunlight kissed the top of my freshly healed skull and incinerated it in a flash flame.
“AAAAAaaaaahhhhh!” I proclaimed in a deep, resonating voice that sounded nothing at all like a teapot starting to boil.
I landed on the ground and tumbled in the street, scratching my loyal trench coat. Luckily, an industrial brick wall halted my autobahn momentum. I rebounded off the wall and lay still, sprawled in all directions, and cursed the sun.
“Damn you, Mr. Sun, for having such a predictable schedule and not adhering to my faults,” I wheezed.
Having had a small portion of my energy burned away and the flesh on my head once again seared off, I was ready for this night to be over.
As if in agreement, the morning light crashed into the wall near the top of the building next to where I had landed. With my home only blocks away, I shifted from leaping to running at preternatural speed. My thick thighs pumped as my steel-toed boots padded on the ground, like a certain cartoon bird fleeing from his canine predator. I ran so fast that I would have come across as a blur to any mortal I had passed, though a blast of wind com
ing from nowhere would have probably been uncomfortable. I had never broken the sound barrier, though; something about not being aerodynamic. I just assumed it was because all my bulging muscles kept me from going that fast.
The cemetery came into view, and I sped through the open front gate and to my mausoleum. Stepping to the door, I placed my hands on the cold marble and pushed inward and then to one side. It slid open, screeching in protest, before I stepped inside and moved the stone door back in place. I lowered a titanium beam, securing the first entrance to my awesome lair.
In the center of the mausoleum rested a marble coffin sitting atop a platform. I walked to it and lifted the heavy lid to reveal a staircase that descended into the earth. One of these days I was going to put a supercool false panel on the wall and have a hydraulic system raise the second door, but I hadn’t gotten around to it yet.
As I followed the steps, I let the stone gently rest back into place before letting my superspecial eyes locate the wicks attached to the torches that stuck out every five feet or so from the earthen wall. I asked the molecules to excite, and the wicks ignited into ambient flames. Not that I needed the light, but it was fucking cool to do.
Forty feet down was my home. I had procured used shipping containers from Florida and had them delivered with specific instructions to arrive at night. Using my handy-dandy blood energy, I had willed into existence giant shovellike manifestations that looked like they belonged on the front of big yellow machines, and began digging. After placing each of the containers, I had quickly covered them with the massive amounts of clay that the Texas soil contained before placing several feet of dirt on top. Afterward, I had dispersed the remaining dirt around the cemetery as to not attract attention from the lone employee. He was a young man, eager to do well in his new position by getting to work at sunup and not leaving until dusk. He even had a shack with running water and electricity. The next item on my to-do list was to siphon his resources and provide lighting to my underground lair. For now, my preternatural eyes and a few candles were more than enough to get the job done.
“Da, I’m home!” I called out in dramatic TV fashion.
“You need a watch, John,” a cultured British voice came from the area we had designated as the living room. A propane camping lantern rose off a coffee table made from wooden pallets and floated toward me. As the light washed over me, a tsking sound came from the man holding the lantern.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk. Another close call, I see. And oh my Lord, the smell!” Da emphasized his point by pinching his nose shut with his free hand.
If I said a man was holding the lantern, I would be lying; unless you believed that the man was only five inches tall and could float. Da was a faerie that refused to believe he was a faerie. Instead, he proclaimed aggressively that he was an angel. A five-inch-tall angel that could shift planes to Faerie whenever he wanted. I mean, maybe he was one of those angels that sat on people’s shoulders and constantly disagreed with an equally statured demon sitting opposite a confused mortal’s head. Either way, he was my friend.
Da had been there for me for several decades now and provided insight I could never think of. I called him my Devil’s Advocate, or Da for short, because I refused to call him by his self-proclaimed angelic name: Raziel. It was a cool name, but I refused to cater to his delusions. Plus, Da was a fitting name for my little sidekick—whom I would never call my “sidekick” to his face.
On the wooden pallet coffee table sat a huge twelve-inch TV attached to a VCR player. (Ask your parents what that is, damn kids.) An inverter was connected to a car battery, which powered the entertainment center.
I moved to the couch made out of—you guessed it: wooden pallets—and looked at the screen. It was paused to Jack Nicholson talking to a freshly burned body wearing a pin-striped suit.
“What’s this?” I asked Da as he sat down, picked up the comically too big remote in both hands, and pressed play.
Jack walked around the smoking corpse and had a one-sided monologue with it, “Grease ’em now? Well…okay. You are a vicious bastard, Rotelli. And…I’m glad you’re dead. HAHAHAHAhahahahaha. I’m glad you’re dead, hahahahahaha. Oh, I’m glad you’re dead. HA HA HA!”
“Holy shit. What movie is this, dude?” I asked Da, already completely in love with the film.
“The new Batman movie starring Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson,” Da answered without taking his eyes off the screen. It was apparent he was already invested in the movie. I picked up the empty Blockbuster VHS box (Lilith damn it! I said ask your parents!) and noticed a second VCR sitting atop the first. Wires ran from one to the other, with the bottom VCR set to record.
Feigning shock, I dropped the box, covered my gaping mouth, and looked at Da before I said, “Da! Are you copying a tape illegally? Did you not see the FBI warning at the beginning?”
“I did. It made me chuckle as I started. Now, thanks to you, I’ll have to start the whole process over unless we want twenty seconds of a paused screen in the middle of the movie.”
“Um, I kinda wanna watch this now. I mean, when I first heard that Mr. Mom was going to be Batman, I was like, not even. But this looks gnarly. Start it over!”
“Fine. But only if you promise to stop using teenage colloquialisms.”
Letting my Irish mother tongue come out, I said, “I’m jes try’n to fit in wit tha times, lad.” Switching back to my southern, nondrawl accent, I finished with, “But fine. I promise.”
“Thank yo—”
“Psyche!” I tittered as Da sighed in defeat. As I leaned back against the wall in my mirth, I yelped in pain as my incinerated scalp touched the surface.
“That’s twice today I had my head set on fire.”
“Twice? What happened tonight, John?” Da asked as the tapes rewound.
“Oh, right. Check this out…” I went through the events of the evening in dramatic fashion, increasing in suspense and intensity the closer I got to the part where a wave of fire enveloped me, commencing the epic battle that followed. Da sat on the edge of the makeshift couch, letting tiny legs dangle freely as a hand stroked his chin.
As I finished, he dropped his hands to his lap and said, “How peculiar.” Da thought for a moment and added, “You are confident he used heavenfire?”
“I know what hellfire is, and this was not it. The flames were a very patriotic red, white, and blue without any of the green that hellfire uses.”
“Well, this might be a sign then, John.” Da looked at me intensely while he spoke, “Maybe now you can actually use your gift for something other than yourself. A real chance to do the right thing.”
“Hey!” I barked. “I killed countless Nazis, scores of murderers, and some-other-unit-of-measurement of things that go bump in the night.”
“John,” Da began, his expression smoothing into one of legitimate concern, “you did those things because you enjoyed doing them. It is important that you realize that fact before undertaking an alliance with Father Thomes. I feel confident that he will be able to guide you in a way I never could.” There was a hint of sadness in his voice, as if our time together had been wrought with fruitless trying on his part.
I took a steadying breath, held it for a few moments, and let it out while I said, “You’re right, Da.” Something hit me then, and I softened my voice before I said, “Thank you for all you have done. I am only ready for this next step because you helped set the foundation on which it will be built. What’s more, my friend, is you did so without asking anything in return.”
“I appreciate your kind words, John,” Da said openly, before smiling and adding, “I do hope that didn’t hurt too badly.”
“I’m melting, melting!” I pretended to screech. “Oh, what a world!”
As if on cue, the sun fully rose into the morning sky, dropping the bottom out on my energy levels. I could stay up during the day if I was so inclined, but my strength was greatly diminished and my eyelids fought to embrace.
Da noticed my instantane
ous change in demeanor and said, “Watch the movie tomorrow night?”
Through a yawn, I said, “Nah, go ahead and make your copy. I know Blockbuster loves its late fees. I bet one day that’ll bite them in the ass.”
“Hope not,” Da said. “I bought stock using your money.” Da was not only my friend, but also my accountant, financial investor, and seamstress. I couldn’t even tell you how many times that tiny faerie had brought my trench coat back from the dead.
“Good day, buddy,” I said as I stood up and dragged my feet to my room. At the moment, there was just a bookshelf with a hidden tunnel behind it, a dresser with some drawers, and a bed.
Hidden under the bed was my iron coffin, which had served me well for centuries. Iron aided in preventing divination or curses from being used against me while I slept.
I heaved the mattress up, which was supported by a homemade wooden frame (wanna guess where I got the wood?), and stepped into my resting place. The iron lid was attached to the wooden frame, and sealed my coffin perfectly once set in place. I winced as my slowly healing skull touched my pillow.
Once the lid was closed, I surrendered to the dawn and let myself be submerged under the calm surface of my consciousness.
Chapter 3
Houston, 1990
The endless expanse of nothingness filled all that I could see; an abyss that hungered for my dreams. A scene coalesced, as if being made from colored grains of sand, before solidifying and starting my daymare.
I stood in a vast cavern, bathed in the faint orange glow from a dying fire. Without a thought as to why, I approached the weak flames and stared into them. The dancing fire was not made of flames, but souls. Emaciated faces with gaping mouths and sorrow-filled eyes rose from the wood, only to deform and fade into the acrid smoke that stung my eyes.
