by Lily Luchesi
“You taught me, true, but the biggest difference is you’re evil. I’m not. I have surpassed you, because I have value and love: things you know nothing about,” Angelica said.
“Is the farmer evil when he raises young calves, only to know they will be slaughtered by his own hand and consumed upon reaching adulthood?” Vincent asked. “You have cowed our people, just as my demons said. Vampires are Hell-adjacent, given their powers by Lucifer himself. It is only natural that we merge together. And if you won’t lead us, I have found another who will. … As soon as you and your little pet here have been dealt with.” His eyes turned black as ebony and he said, “Now leave.”
Angelica had a million other things to say, but right then she knew their chance at survival was greater if she listened to her father and left then. She couldn’t kill him on this plane, he needed to be topside. A place he hopefully would never be able to reach again, thanks to her ministrations.
Danny tugged at her hand and they backed out of the room slowly, her heart in her throat and unshed tears still burning her eyes.
“I told my demons to bring you to me unharmed upon your arrival,” Vincent called. “However, I never said anything about leaving you be as you exited.”
Neither of them responded as they both began to run up the stairs, bypassing level three, where the screams of those being tortured still echoed off the high ceilings, and reached the second level, where more minor souls were caged.
As they headed down that corridor, many of the trapped souls howled and shouted abuse. After all, Angelica had put many of them there.
Suddenly, there was the sound of locks clicking, and both Angie and Danny stood still as they tried to figure out where the sounds were coming from.
“Have fun,” Vincent’s voice said, echoing through the hall, despite his being two floors beneath them.
“Oh no,” Angelica said, as a few of the cage doors swung open, releasing the imprisoned souls.
Despite their still being alive, the souls could still hurt Danny and Angelica because they were on the same plane, just as a ghost could manage to touch a human on the Earthly plane. It looked like some of their old perps were coming back to haunt them.
Angelica didn’t recognize the faces of the damned, but then she’d killed too many creatures to remember them all.
“Do we run or fight?” Danny asked, still looking to her for a plan.
Her head was in such a muddle; she didn’t want to make any decisions right then, but knew she needed to. Their survival hinged on it.
“Fight. We can’t risk trying to outrun them all,” she said, reaching for her blades. This was no time for sentiment of any kind. Whatever she was feeling needed to take a backseat until they were safe topside.
The first doors to open belonged to a werewolf already transformed and an old vampire who vaguely resembled Count Orlok.
“I’ll take the wolf,” Danny said, dashing ahead, gun already firing.
Angelica turned to the vampire and didn’t say a word, just let it come to her. She let it think it had the upper hand until she ducked under its extended claws and stabbed it twice: once in the back to wound it, and then in the throat, decapitating it with practiced ease.
“You’ll have to do better than that, Vincent!” Angelica called as she watched Danny easily take down the werewolf.
“Are you crazy? Don’t taunt the bastard,” Danny said as more locks were opened.
Three vampires emerged, not nearly as ancient as the one Angelica had just fought. She recognized one, vaguely, as a kill she’d made a few decades back.
Danny backed her up, checking to be sure no other locks had been deactivated as they faced down the vamps. More locks opened, somewhere behind them, and Danny jumped.
“Are you ready?” she asked him. “It’s going to get bloody.”
“As long as I’m by your side, I’m ready for anything.”
7
Danny turned, facing the other way, as Angelica stared at the vamps before her. All she detected from them was pure malice. Where was the goodness she knew her species was capable of? Were the good vampires truly being outnumbered by those like the three she now faced?
She refused to let that happen.
The vamps clashed, blades against claws. She cut one’s hand off, kicked a second out of the way, and stabbed the third in the liver, buying some time. She moved like a dancer, just as she had been taught. Never give the enemy time to rest, always hit hard, but watch your back.
The handless vamp came again, and Angelica swung her blade like a baseball bat, sending the head flying away in the distance.
“Home run,” she called, hoping Vincent could hear.
She was knocked into from the side, falling against the metal bars and giving her temple a deep bruise. She lashed out blindly, slicing into the face of the vamp she’d initially kicked. The other vamp tried coming in on her blind spot, but it didn’t realize that she had no blind spot. While there were days where she was less sharp than normal, she was trained for this. They weren’t, yet they always underestimated her skills. Which was why they always died.
She stabbed it under the chin, her blade popping out the top of its skull. Not a kill shot, but enough to put it out of commission. Whirling around, she went to slice into the other vamp’s neck, but it caught her left wrist and smashed it against the wall, causing her to drop the blade and grunt in pain.
“You fucked with the wrong vamp,” she hissed, using her body weight to swing herself away and bring the vamp with her. She whipped her arm and it bashed its head against the opposite wall. She quickly decapitated it and the one on the ground with a hole in its head.
She turned toward Danny as she picked up her fallen blade, injured wrist already healed. He had killed two shifters and one hungry ghoul already, but the final shifter was one of Fiona’s hybrids, and those were stronger than the regular werewolves.
Angelica exchanged one blade for her gun and shouted, “Duck!”
Danny listened to her without question, unconsciously showing the loyalty she loved.
She fired her gun twice and the shifter never knew what hit it as its heart was shattered by the silver bullets. It howled in pain, the sound ricocheting off the stone walls, before it fell dead on the floor.
“Thanks,” Danny said, wiping blood from an already-healing cut on his forehead.
Behind them, more locks sounded.
“Do we run now?” he asked her.
“Fuck yes,” she said, grabbing his hand. “Just stay with me.”
“Always.”
Daniel stood at the foot of the open portal, the two witches sent to guard it laying dead in pools of their own blood behind him. Silly Angelica for teaching him how to properly kill magicians. He checked the time. It had been quite a while since the two of them had gone down, and he had heard nothing from inside the portal. Had something gone wrong?
Just as he was thinking that, there was a whooshing sound and hot air spilled out, the stench making him feel ill. A form slowly started to appear, kneeling on the floor as they were expelled from Hell.
Daniel watched as it turned into a solid, flesh-and-blood man. Or vampire, looking at his porcelain skin and gaunt appearance. The man stood up, eyes black like a demon’s, but fangs in his smile akin to a vamp’s.
“W-Who are you?” Daniel asked.
The man looked at him with a mix of contempt and amusement. “Oh, Daniel, we’ve spoken for months now. You’ve killed for me. Don’t tell me I need to draw you a bloody picture.”
“You’re the Lieutenant.” Now that he was faced with the demon leader, Daniel was having second thoughts about everything he’d done and planned for since Christmas night.
“My minions are keeping Angelica and Danny busy, but you know them: they’ll be out soon. I believe we should exit the premises while we’re still breathing,” the Lieutenant said. “Unless you also want to risk the siren finding us? Honestly, little Angelica has absolutely horrible taste in
men.”
Daniel shook his head.
“Is your flat still warded like I taught you?”
“My … what?” Daniel asked.
“Your bloody apartment,” the Lieutenant growled.
Daniel nodded.
“Then we shall go there. You will need the night and following day to prepare. The changes you will go through can be … difficult. Hold onto my coat and do not let go.”
Daniel did as the man said, and found himself rushing through the city as he had when Danny had carried him to the battle with Dakota. The wind whipped at his skin, and he wondered how he wasn’t being ripped apart.
Suddenly, they were at the door to his apartment. He let go of the coat and bent over double, trying not to vomit and get his breath back at the same time.
“Mortals,” the Lieutenant scoffed. “Well? You’ve got to invite me in. What sort of future Emperor are you? You know so little about us.”
“Wait,” Daniel said as he unlocked his door. “You were a vampire?” He entered and then motioned that it was okay for the Lieutenant to enter.
“Of course I was a vampire. Still retain most of my abilities, too, despite being a demon. A perk of my station.” He removed his long black coat to reveal a black bespoke suit that looked to cost more than Daniel’s monthly rent. “You truly do not know who I am? After all this time?”
“I don’t even know your name,” Daniel admitted.
The Lieutenant smirked. “I am sure my daughter mentioned me once or twice. I am Vincent Cross, father and former victim of your current Empress.”
Daniel moved away from him, stumbling into the wall. “You — you’re him? Yeah, Angelica mentioned you. She failed to mention that you ruled Hell.”
“Not rule, just oversee. And she didn’t know that until half an hour ago,” Vincent replied. “Now you understand how I know what I do: that she doesn’t care about the good of vampirism, just about her own power. She used me as an excuse to build her company and control as many species as she could. … Including you.”
Daniel felt his face flame as he recalled an earlier conversation, where Vincent had explained that the reason Danny and Angelica had never gone to see him was because he posed a threat to their rule. No one else could, except for him, the last descendant of the former Emperor Augustus.
They wanted their rule to be eternal, and telling him that he was technically next in line for the throne would have been detrimental to their plans.
“Vampires aren’t meant to feed in the shadows,” Daniel said. “But others believe as Angelica does.”
“Fools. Cowed, fearful fools, the lot of them,” Vincent scoffed. “When I had been turned and felt the first tingles of delightful hunger hit me, I was elated and enlightened. I attacked a servant in the manor, and in draining every drop of blood from his veins I knew: this was where our power lay. In the devouring not the blood, but the lives of mortals. Drinking bagged blood, drinking little pints here and there from donors, it has inhibited us. And the current regime will continue to keep us cowed.”
“How am I supposed to free the vampires?” Daniel asked. “I’m not a vampire!”
“Nor are you human,” Vincent commented. “If you were to be turned, and then get rid of the Emperor, you would be in power, even above Angelica. Then you could make sure that our species was never run by a tyrant again.”
Daniel’s heartbeat stuttered, and he wasn’t sure if it was from fear or excitement. Or perhaps both. As long as he lived, he had known he was meant for greater things than what people had told him. As a child, he had been called crazy by his own parents, sent to doctors who drugged him up and tamped down his power. He’d had to fake what they called sanity just to escape that oppression. And then in college, his ambition and drive were mocked as doctors and professors and classmates all tried to knock both of those things out of him.
They had all tried to push him down, and they thought that they were “doing the right thing”. They thought they were being heroes, just like Angelica. Angelica wasn't evil or bad, but she was wrong. She needed to be shown another way. Daniel wasn’t sure if he could show that way to her, but he’d try.
It was killing Danny he had a problem with.
“Oh, after you slit your roommate’s throat at that very table, now you balk at murder?” Vincent asked when he mentioned his concerns. “While my daughter is just misguided thanks to her mother, Danny has always been … what do you say in this century? An asshole.” His eyes turned black with red irises shining through. “He left you and he left your mother high and dry. For his own gain. It is because of his placid complacence that Angelica continues on her false thought process. He enables her, following her like a lapdog. I have wanted to kill that man for a century, and I will relish the chance to do so.”
Daniel had been mad at Danny since he found out he had lived, all this time. It had hurt more than anything else. Danny had forsaken his family without a second thought and still tried to justify it.
“Without Pops dead, I can’t control vampires?” Daniel asked.
“Correct. I would have explained all of this earlier, but it was draining breaking the barriers to speak to you,” Vincent explained. “And I will be honest: I want to kill him. So no need to worry your silly head about patricide. I will do the dirty work, if that’s what you prefer. All you will need to do is be the mouthpiece, the voice of reason. Grasp your birthright and you, Daniel Castorini, can create a better world for the vampires. The world we always deserved. Perhaps my daughter will see sense and join us then.”
“And if she doesn’t?” Daniel asked, already knowing the answer.
“Then, sadly, she will join her husband in Hell.”
Daniel was silent, contemplating. This had been what he’d wanted, ever since Vincent had told him via automatic writing that his birthright was to lead vampires.
He wanted a world without hiding, without his potential being squashed and inserted inside of a box far too small to contain him. He wanted to be himself, for better or worse, and to be loved for that. The love he’d never gotten from family, he could now have as the Emperor of vampires.
“Power and admiration are right there. All you have to do is reach out and take it,” Vincent said. “And decide quickly. Because any moment now they will find the two magicians you murdered by the portal and you will either be declared missing, or my beloved daughter will put a price on your head.
“Choose now: power or mediocrity?”
Daniel moved from the wall, where he was still leaning, and said, “Go on, then. How do I go about becoming a vampire?”
Vincent’s eyes brightened to a deeper red. “Close your eyes. I promise the pain will be worth it in the end.”
Daniel walked closer. “You can still turn me?”
“I was not a human when Danny and Angelica killed me. I retained my powers when I rose above the other demons there,” Vincent said, his mouth opening. Daniel watched as his jaw extended to make room for the mouthful of fangs, each an inch long, except the canines: they were over four inches, descending down over his lip, glinting in the dim light of the room.
Oh, I hope I get fangs like Pops’ when I turn, he thought, disgusted. “Does it have to be my neck?”
“Afraid?” Vincent asked.
“No.”
“We choose the carotid artery because it is the quickest. I could drink from your wrist, but it would take much longer to drain you, and I can assure you, that would be quite painful for you.”
“Okay, my neck it is then,” Daniel said, removing his coat and pulling aside the collar of his t-shirt.
“You’re psychic: I cannot glamour you to not feel the pain. That is a good thing, as pain is the most constant companion of any vampire. This is but a mere taste of what you will experience in your new life,” Vincent warned as his face came closer to Daniel’s. Every instinct told him to run, to get Angelica and apologize, but he remained rooted to the spot, unable to give up on his dream to finally be free
.
At first, when the two longest fangs pierced his skin, he didn’t feel it. It took the rest of the teeth to sink in around the other two for the fiery pain of it to fully hit him. The pain tore down his left arm and into his chest, where his veins and arteries were being drained first.
He couldn’t think, as pain had dulled all other senses as his brain tried to cope with the magnitude of the sensation. His skin was tearing, veins being ripped open, his body was going limp and cold, and yet nothing dulled the pain he was feeling. He wanted to claw at his eyes, tear his skin off … anything to stop the fucking pain.
Tears fell from his eyes and he cried out, uncaring if nosy neighbors heard. And then the pain dulled as he finally fell into a swoon, the only thing holding him up the iron grip of the vampire turning him.
Suddenly, the intense pressure of the fangs was gone, leaving a burning that centered in the open wound.
“Drink,” Vincent commanded, and then a wet wrist was pressed to his gasping lips. He tasted copper and iron and salt and could barely hold his mouth open enough to drink. Vincent tilted his head and continued pressing his bleeding wrist to Daniel’s mouth. He finally began to drink on his own, the thick, Undead blood rushing down into his throat, somehow warming him despite its cold texture.
The greyness stopped swimming at the edges of his vision and Vincent removed his wrist. Daniel closed his eyes and felt Vincent release his death grip on his arm. He stood on his own power as he felt sensations hit him. The smell of his own blood, sulfur coming off of Vincent, the darkness of the vampire blood. He could smell the takeout leftovers that were in the fridge. The sounds of the city were so loud, it was as if he was standing in the middle of Michigan Avenue instead of his living room. Even the texture of the paint on the wall was more intense.
