Where Loyalty Lies (11 page)

“No harm done.”

I mumbled another apology and made my way to the bathroom of Burger King, not knowing when I would next get the chance to go.

A brief glance outside at the car, while I was waiting for my food, showed me that it was empty. Nerves made me tap my foot against the tiled floor of the restaurant, feeling tense and jumpy under the harsh fluorescent lighting. I wasn’t really sure what I was expecting – people screaming, sirens blaring, one of those helicopters with a search-light beaming?

The young guy behind the counter showed up with my bag of food and I headed back out. I was just wondering whether to get in the car or wait outside, when I saw Holt rounding the corner with the woman I’d collided with. My eyes widened as I took in her appearance; she looked... normal.  Completely unalarmed.  She shot me another smile as she passed and then, still holding her bag of food, got into her car and drove off.

Holt got back into the car without saying a word. I stood by the passenger door, not quite able to bring myself to open it and get in.

I’d known about what vampires drank, but I just hadn’t expected it to be done so quickly and easily, in a public place where nobody had even noticed.

I stared at the handle of the car door. If I couldn’t cope with this, now was the time to decide, not when I was stranded in the middle of God knows where in Scotland. After a few minutes, it occurred to me that I’d been standing still for quite a while now, long enough for a group of lads who’d been standing around a car on the other side of the car park to be staring at me like I was crazy. Holt hadn’t said a word, nor had he wound down the window to tell me to hurry up; he was just waiting, letting me make my own decision, and I realised that this was a test. I had no idea how regularly vampires needed to feed, but I was sure that Holt could have waited and done it at another time without me even being aware of it. He’d deliberately left it till now so that I could have a small preview of what I was letting myself in for, and I could change my mind before it was too late. The realisation of that was enough to make me open the door and slide in.

As we pulled off, I noticed Holt giving me an odd look.

“What?” I asked as I cracked the window open, aware that the smell of my greasy food would probably linger in his expensive car for weeks.

“I wasn’t sure you’d get back in.”

I shrugged. “Some sort of mix of bravery and stupidity, I suppose.” After a pause, I added, “She looked so normal, like nothing had happened.”

“She isn’t aware that it did,” he replied and then, at my confused look, he continued to explain. “Another gift of vampires is that we have what we call Influence. Once a human makes eye contact with us, we can influence them into doing anything. So when we want to drink from them, we can make them agree to come with us, then afterwards we can convince them that nothing has happened.”

“You can make them do anything?” I was so horrified that I froze with my burger halfway to my mouth.

“Yes, but it’s against vampire law to harm anyone more than we need. We even heal the marks on their necks with a drop of our own blood so that there’s no evidence of what happened.”

Despite the topic, the first bite of my burger made me realise how hungry I was and I halted my questions so that I could pay full attention to filling my stomach. When I’d swallowed the last bite, I stashed the empty bag at my feet.

“So, if you’d asked her to get in this car with us, she’d have done it?” I asked.

“Yes,” came Holt’s simple reply.

“What if you’d told her to walk in front of the next car that drove by?”

Holt frowned. “Yes, but I ...”

He was cut off by my gasp, as I suddenly had a thought.

“Oh my God! Are you using it on me? Is that how you got me to agree to come to Rillith with you?”

“No.” Holt shook his head and then repeated himself with more emphasis. “No, I’d never do that. It probably doesn’t even work on you.”

He looked upset at my suggestion but I couldn’t get past it. He’d just told me that vampires could use Influence to make humans do anything. I felt like I’d decided by myself that I wanted to go to Rillith, but what if that was just what he’d told me to believe?

“Think about it,” Holt said. “If I’d used Influence to make you come, then you wouldn’t be doubting it right now. I’d have made it so that you were happy just to be here and not at all bothered why.”

“Okay, is that supposed to make me feel better?” I asked.

“Well yes, it sounds a little sinister but, actually, it’s true.”

He was right. Surely, if he’d made me come here, then he’d have made it so that I didn’t cause any trouble either? I’d just be sitting here like a dummy, not asking questions and accusing him of kidnapping me.

“I guess you’re right,” I said out loud so that Holt knew I was calming down. Then, feeling slightly guilty about my accusation, I added, “Sorry. It’s just that this Influence thing is a big deal to get my head around.” 

“I know you still have a lot of questions you want to ask, but if you don’t mind I’d like to ask you some.” Holt looked over at me to gauge my reaction and held his look long enough for me to worry that he wasn’t concentrating on the road.

“Okay,” I answered.

“What was it like for you, growing up? When did you first start to notice you were different?”

I thought it over. “I don’t know when it started because, at first, I didn’t realise I was different. The first time I knew something was wrong was when I was a child and I lifted one end of the sofa up right over my head to see if my book was underneath it. Mary saw me do it and totally flipped. I’d been left on her doorstep as a baby and she’d always told me that it was God’s way of making sure I was given a proper Christian upbringing, like children should have. After that incident, though, she told me I had evil rooted deep inside me and I’d clearly been left on her doorstep so that she could help me live my life as I should, in the hope that enough good behaviour and praying would make God remove the sin from my soul.”

Holt had a look of disgust on his face. “Typical of a human to see something they don’t understand and automatically class it as evil.” I was surprised by his reaction. It was the first time I’d heard him refer to humans so negatively. “But she treated you well?”

“I can’t complain. She was very strict and religious which was fine with me but, after that day with the sofa, everything changed. She was scared of me and any love she’d had for me disappeared and was replaced with a sense of duty.”

I stopped short, catching myself before the next sentence fell out my mouth. After Holt’s previous reaction, I didn’t think it was a good idea to mention that Mary had made me pray twice a day, asking to be absolved of sin so that when I died I wouldn’t go to hell. I changed direction.

“The strength was the first trait I became aware of and, after that, I started to notice other differences as well. I understood that the other kids in the playground weren’t running at that speed because it was the speed they liked to run at; it was the fastest that they could run! So I made sure I slowed up and fitted in with everyone else. Luckily my speed hadn’t developed enough by then to have caused any unwanted attention. Other little incidents made me realise that my sight, sense of smell and hearing were also different so I never commented on anything like alarms going off or strange smells unless somebody else had noticed them first.”

“How about the effect you have on people? I told you about Influence earlier, have you ever found that you are good at persuading people to do what you want?” 

I didn’t need to think that one over. “No, I’ve never had anything like that. Shame, it would have been handy at times.”

“Is there anything else? Any particular way that people react to you?”

I didn’t need to think that one over either. There was a very specific way that men reacted to me, but this topic of conversation would make me feel uncomfortable. I decided the best way to get out of this would be with a partial response that would answer his question just enough so that he’d move on.

“Yes. Not long after my fifteenth birthday, men started to notice me, and not in a subtle, appreciative kind of way. It was something different, more powerful.” I tried to look casual, like this topic was fine with me; I knew that one slip-up would make him dig deeper and I just couldn’t do that.

Holt nodded knowingly. “But you were always okay? You could handle it okay?”

If I hadn’t been so busy wrestling with my discomfort, I might have noticed the tension behind his questions, like the answers really mattered to him.

“Yes, most of the time. I soon learnt to ignore it and, if that didn’t work, a few harsh words usually did.”

Except for that one time, the one time I’d let my guard down and almost paid the price for it. My mind dragged up the memory before I could stop it.

It always seemed to come back in flashes, silent except for a high-pitched keening. I’d always suspected the noise had been the sound of fear – the complete and utter fear of a fifteen year-old who’d gone into a state of shock. The flashes were always the same. Me walking into his office with my coursework in my hand, spinning as I heard the click of the lock, him throwing himself on me with such ferocity that I fell backwards with him on top of me, terror taking over as his mouth moved over my face and neck, his hands rushing over me, grabbing hard enough to leave bruises, one of his hands slipping beneath my top and trying to pull my bra down, that moment, that horrible, sickening moment when he’d touched my bare breast had been a brick shattering my terror like a mirror. I’d pulled my arms out from where they’d been pinned by my sides, hard enough for the rough carpet to rip the skin from my elbows. I’d shoved him off me and run from the room, not stopping until I’d left the school and found a quiet place where I’d collapsed. I’d stayed there for hours, shaking and sobbing and trying to decide what to do. I’d finally come to the conclusion that I couldn’t tell anyone. Mary wouldn’t be sympathetic and the thought of telling anyone else was simply mortifying. The teacher who’d attacked me was well-loved in the school and the village; I was not. I felt sure that, if it came down to his word against mine, I’d probably lose and would ever after be known as the girl who cried “attempted rape”.

Needless to say, I never went back to his class and he never reported me for not showing up. I got good school reports from him and good grades and nobody ever seemed to notice that, for a whole year, I never showed up at maths classes. I took it upon myself to learn what was needed to pass my exams. I also assumed the role of keeping an eye on him. If I’d caught him even looking at another student in a way that was inappropriate, I’d have told somebody what had happened, but I never did. On the few occasions that our paths crossed in school, a look of pain crossed his face like he’d been punched in the gut. It was clear that it was my strange magnetism that had been responsible for his violent reaction. Not that that realisation had given me any sympathy for him; I hated him and I would for the rest of my life.  

I stared hard at the electric window button on my side of the car and forced myself into the routine I always adopted when this particular memory overtook me. I quietly took deep breaths, demanding that all my muscles unclench and, when they finally did, I allowed my locked jaw to relax and my gaze to wander from where it had been burning holes in the car door.

“That’s another vampire trait,” Holt said, thankfully unaware of the small panic attack I’d had. “It’s called Attraction and it’s exactly that. Humans of the opposite sex will always be drawn to us. It’s another reason why it makes it so easy for us to drink from them.”

I nodded. I was glad to finally have a name for something that had driven me crazy for so many years. Attraction. It obviously was a lot more than the usual human attraction. But this word didn’t really seem potent enough. It had made my life so difficult. Some men were more affected than others; Gus for example had been hardly affected at all, whereas the teacher at my old school had been affected so much that he hadn’t been able to control himself. It was why people like Chris had been so hostile towards me; Attraction had made him hit on me and, when I’d turned him down, he’d been humiliated and angry. It was also the reason why I’d never been able to maintain a serious relationship.

I thought of all the questions I still wanted to ask but, suddenly, I felt exhausted. I knew that what I’d learned was the tip of a very large, very strange iceberg and I realised I’d need years to learn it all. I understood now why Holt wanted me to go to Rillith; being amongst it all would open my eyes. I rested my head back on the seat and pushed all the new questions out of my mind.

Part of my notion of what the word “cabin” implied had been correct. Holt’s place was indeed in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by trees and made out of wood. But the place was larger than I’d imagined and surrounded by a wrap-around porch.

We carried my bags inside and I found myself in a lounge that somehow seemed cosy despite its size. Nothing matched but everything seemed to go together. The sofa was a corner unit, big and wide with a thick wool blanket draped across the back. Opposite the sofa was a huge fireplace made of grey stone slabs. There were numerous bookcases filled with books and the ones that didn’t fit were piled up on any other flat surface.

I ran my fingers over an old globe that was easily two feet wide and set into a wooden frame. It was next to a bottle-green wooden trunk with tan leather straps and rusting metal hinges. I wanted to take my time looking around at all the unusual objects but I was aware of Holt judging my reaction.