An Unattractive Vampire (27 page)

In a desert land, a curse descended upon a mighty city, taking up residence in its temple and draining the area of all life . . .

In a dense tropical forest, a plague, taken form, hunted for prey as an inconspicuous insect . . .

Under the steps of a mighty pyramid, a god drank the blood pouring down from a hundred sacrifices . . .

Deep within the earth, a crying Chinese woman stopped clawing at the roof of her coffin and breathed her last . . .

And somewhere in Spain, an otherwise serene funeral procession was interrupted by an errant hen . . .

Still, as Catherine’s psyche was assaulted by other times and places, she sensed something looming over all the rest. She pushed past the other visions and literally fell into one that was hidden. She braced herself for impact, but her descent was halted abruptly. When she opened her eyes, she was hovering in the dark over the supine form of Yulric Bile. His arms were crossed over his chest, his hands clasped around an ancient battle-ax. At his side rested a full helmet, complete with an image of his face etched onto the front. Behind his head was a large leather-bound book the size and weight of a small child. This was the barrow of Yulric Bile, his final resting place. Here he was buried, with all rites and honors by people who feared what might happen if they dared neglect them.

But there was something wrong. Even as this thought floated before her, she could feel malevolence oozing around her, contaminating everything it touched. There was nothing amiss: no curse, no bite, no sign of disrespect. This was no outside eldritch force; this vile aura emanated from the body itself.

The eyes sprang open, and in the dark of the grave, she saw Yulric smile. Suddenly, she was no longer floating above the body; she was the body. She peered up at the image of herself looking down, and this time, it was she who smiled.

And then . . . agony, fiery and unbearable. The images dissolved around her as she let loose a bloodcurdling scream.

• •

A sharp pain split Yulric’s skull. It was as if someone had taken a red-hot acupuncture needle and shoved it through his left eye, into his brain.
⁶¹
Involuntarily, he hissed in a breath and brought up a hand to cover it.

A cry rang out in the hotel suite. Yulric removed his gaze from the television to see Catherine in the kitchenette, howling in pain. The boy was holding something to her face. The vampire was about to dismiss it as a helpful ice pack when he caught a familiar flash of silver, which made him wince. A moment later, the screaming died out, replaced by heavy, steadying breaths. The boy pulled away, and Yulric saw clearly the large silver cross in his hand.

Yulric’s mind raced. Why would she have such a violent reaction to the cross? Was it coincidence that he’d been in pain at the very moment she’d cried out or something more? What exactly had happened? He was about to investigate the incident when he was interrupted by Arru.

“What is the tiny man in the box saying now?” she asked. On the screen, Phantom and Sasha were standing close to one another in the rain.

Yulric’s suspicions evaporated as he was returned to his immediate purpose. Processing what he’d just heard, he translated Spanish into the most common language between them, Latin. “He said”—Yulric nearly vomited in his mouth having to repeat it—“I love you.”

There was a round of disgusted hisses from those who understood.

“Love, bah!” spat Cebrian.

“What does love have to do with anything?” Adze grimaced.

Tezcatlipoca growled something in Nahuatl. The other monsters gave him a mystified look, then turned back just in time to witness Phantom and Sasha kissing. The group erupted into jeers. Bits of popcorn, which Catherine had insisted on making them, were hurled at the screen, along with a glowing green energy that caused it to spark, smoke, and melt.

“I have seen enough,” Arru said. “You were right to summon us.”

“How could this have happened?” asked Yu Mei. The vampires turned to Adze, the only one of them who had not been imprisoned.

“Don’t look at me,” he told them. “I am still feared in my lands.”

Yulric shook his head. “I do not believe anyone here would be so careless. Only a fool would . . .” The English vampire trailed off as mental calculations were made. In a flash, he was in the kitchenette across from the two mortals. “We need to go to Tuscany.”

Even through the dull ache in her left eye, Catherine smiled. This was, by far, the best vacation ever.

It had long been understood by the vampires of Europe that it was only a matter of time before a member of the great families—the Hapsburgs, the Medicis, the Borgias—was to join their ranks. With the kind of power these dynasties wielded for centuries, it was impossible to imagine one of them wouldn’t seek to extend their influence beyond life. The only question was which of the many ruthless, cutthroat members would carry their names into eternity.

Sadly for the pride and honor of both the Medici family and vampires as a whole, the person who had finally achieved immortality was Cosimo II de’ Medici, an overweight and underambitious member of the family, who’d been perfectly content as a footnote in the future biography of Galileo. But he’d found himself gifted with immortality, thanks to an ancestor’s botched Satanic pact. Now the possessor of a host of supernatural abilities and a thirst for blood, Cosimo had taken to vampirism like a theater person takes to sports—badly.

And so it came as no surprise to anyone that, when Yulric Bile dragged the Italian vampire out of his ornately decorated sarcophagus in the private, unsanctified Italian chapel he’d had built, the first words out of his mouth were cries of “It wasn’t me!”

“What wasn’t you?” Yulric growled, throwing him to the tiled floor in front of the five other vampires.

The Italian vampire gulped. “Whatever it was you think I did?” His gaze darted around, apparently searching for an alibi. He pointed to his box. “I’ve been in a sarcophagus. See?”

Arru took a step forward. “In Latin, if you please, so we can all understand.”

Tezcatlipoca grumbled something in Nahuatl.

“So most of us can understand anyway,” Arru corrected herself.

Switching to the dead language most of them spoke, Yulric uttered only two words: “Proper vampyrs.”

“Oh,” Cosimo uttered.

“Yes,” agreed Yulric. “Oh.”

“So you read Douglas’s pamphlet then?” Cosimo’s eyes lit up. “Do you have it with you? Can I see? I’d love to know what changes he’s made since—”

Yulric held up his hand, and the Italian vampire fell silent.

“I want to know how,” Yulric bellowed, his voice echoed around the chamber, which, despite its Renaissance trappings, managed to avoid any actual Christian iconography.

“Well, you see, I was bored, and there weren’t any good operas, and there was this man named Darwin, who through a series of observations on the Galápagos Islands . . .”

The vampires listened intently as Cosimo began to ramble about finches and niches and the bizarre belief that animals change over time. A few of them tried to interrupt but to no avail. Even Tezcatlipoca’s rumbling jaguar growl only excited the little Italian, who went on to explain how this
evolution
had affected big cats in general and the jaguar specifically. In the end, there was nothing to do except wait for him to run out of steam. As his main claim to fame was a friendship with a famous astronomer, this took quite a while.

“And that’s why I say a leopard can change its spots. It just takes a million years,” he finally finished with a bit too much laughter. Once he had composed himself, Cosimo went back to his original point. “And I thought, well, if it works on finches, why couldn’t it work on vampires, too?”

“You tried this evolution on vampires?” spat Cebrian.

“What? No. No, no, no,” cried Cosimo. “I would never dream. I’m just a layman. I don’t have the skills. No, I found a proper scientist to do it for me.”

“The Doctor Lord Talby,” Yulric answered for him.

“Douglas was very keen on my ’dea,’” said Cosimo. “He had all sorts of marvelous thoughts. It was his idea to attempt a kind of social evolution to the vampire, as well. A perception change. We commissioned writers and painters and . . .” He trailed off as Yulric walked past him to stare at a fresco of Orpheus descending into the underworld.

“How did you conduct this experiment?” the English vampire hissed.

Cosimo, unwisely, took a few steps toward him. “Do you want to see the data? I’m sure I have my notebooks around here somewhere.”

“How did you make the vampyrs?” Yulric clarified, oozing contempt with every syllable.

“Oh, well”—Cosimo chuckled—“that took quite a bit of trial and error, let me tell you. Some of the results we ended up with—ha. In hindsight, it seems so obvious that the mingling of blood would do it. Take my blood, drink it, everlasting life, you know.”

The vampires clearly did not know. Except for Cebrian, who quietly explained, “It’s a Christian thing.”

“Can I ask a question?” Cosimo pleaded. With a wave of his hand and a glower, Yulric gave him leave. “I guess I don’t really understand, well, what the problem is?”

One of Yulric’s eyes blazed with anger. The other remained fairly pretty.

“You don’t understand?” he snarled. “You don’t realize what you’ve done to us?”

“No?” the Italian squeaked.

In a flash, Yulric had him pressed up against the wall. The marble behind him cracked under the pressure.

“We have become shadows of our true selves. Defenseless, nearly powerless. Killed with a mere stake through the heart and turned to dust.”

“True, we never did figure out why that happens,” the Italian rambled. “I suppose it’s a result of the weakening of the curse. Though, personally, I’ve always wondered if it could be a psychosomatic reaction caused by . . . Ack!”

Yulric’s grip on the man’s throat had tightened. “You have traded our power and reputation for mere beauty. Do you not realize that vampyrs are now seen as . . . good?”

Cosimo pulled Yulric’s fingers away, just enough to croak,

“What’s so wrong about a good vampire?”

• •

The next morning, the residents of Tuscany awoke to find the small Medici chapel on the far side of town was gone. Where once it stood was a pile of oddly rounded marble and goldleaf pebbles, each no bigger than a fingernail. Those who lived nearby remembered being awakened by a horrible clap of thunder in the middle of the night, which was odd, because it hadn’t rained. The police and AISE investigated the possibility of a terrorist attack, but no one ever claimed responsibility and there was no evidence of an explosive device. In the end, it was labeled a gas explosion, and everyone involved went to lunch.

The same morning that the chapel disappeared, Catherine Dorset left Italy with a wonderful tan, a little boy, and six caskets in tow.

The Doctor Lord Talby sat at his desk, casually flipping through the files of future vampire candidates. “And how is Vermillion working out?” he asked the speaker on his desk.

“It took a while, but we figured out where to pose him,” replied a voice that remained deep and sultry despite the phone’s added tinniness.

“Good, good.” Talby set aside a file on
Johnson, Janelle
.

“Any sign that he might be falling into old habits?”

The voice laughed. “None. The look he gave those wannabes last week made the fat girl cry. It was hilarious.” Quickly, the voice composed itself with proper vampiric dignity. “It was tolerable.”

There was a slow, deliberate, and oddly sensual knock outside his office.

“Thank you for the update, Karos. Please keep me informed.” The Doctor ended the call and turned his attention to the door. “Come in, Phantom.”

Phantom entered sullenly. Phantom did everything sullenly. Back before, when he’d still been Bobby Samuels, he’d been a very upbeat, chipper person. They’d had to break him of that.

“Women,” he’d told the clay that would become a sex symbol, “don’t want happy. Happiness only comes at the end of a story, and do you know why that is?”

Bobby had shaken his head.

“Because there’s no more story to tell,” he had answered. “Until then, they want mystery and danger and lots and lots of brooding. So if it’s women you want . . . ?”

Bobby had nodded.

“Then, wipe that grin off your face,” he’d instructed.

Bobby had and had never looked back.

“Doctor?” Phantom called, rousing Talby from his nostalgia.

“Yes, Phantom, I’m sorry. What is it?”

“It’s our, er, guest. She’s gone.”

The Doctor chuckled. “There’s no need to be concerned, Phantom. Nora’s with her.”

“Are you sure?” Phantom questioned. “Because those other times . . .”

“Nora explained the situation to me herself,” Talby replied. “Ms. Linske is convinced that there is no escape from us, and the two of them would like some—how did she put it?—girl time. They’ll be back in the morning. Frankly, I’m surprised you even noticed with all the time you’ve been spending on the set.”

Phantom turned paler than normal. “You heard about that?”

Again, the Doctor laughed. “Phantom, this is a television studio. We have cameras, everywhere.”

The younger vampire shifted uncomfortably. “I’m sorry, Doctor.”

“Nothing to be sorry about, Phantom.” He rose from his desk and patted his protégé on the back. “It all adds to the mystique of the vampire.”

“I still don’t like it,” Phantom muttered.

“Phantom. Muttering,” Talby corrected.

“Sorry, Doctor,” Phantom let his hair fall in front of his face and squinted. “I still don’t like it.”

“You don’t like that Nora’s attention is somewhere other than on you, you mean?” The Doctor posed the question with a fair amount of insight.

The younger vampire coughed, but said nothing.

“Ah, Phantom.” Talby sighed, walking back to his chair. “We always want most what we can no longer have.” The door to the office opened and Berwyn stepped in. “Excuse me, Doctor Lord Talby?”

The Doctor gave a pained smile. He made a note that they would need to have a talk later about entering without knocking first. “Yes, Berwyn, what is it?”