The Foul Mouth and the Fanged Lady (24 page)

She wouldn’t have fed on me. I wouldn’t be
wearing my
Carebears
band-aid. Sideburns wouldn’t have died
. . . well, maybe he would have, but he might not have gotten ate
in the process. I would have had some crazy-vampire-sex on the bed
in the back of the plane, if not before then. That’s the thing . .
. I’d seen Annie B at her worst, at her own point of no return
where she had no choice but to feed, her body blazing hot and who
knows what kind of changes happening inside her.

It seemed to embarrass her.

That she’d broken the game between us. Like
what happened when you accidentally saw another person naked or
drunk or caught them singing along to Lady Gaga. She might have
beaten me twice in our fights but by pushing her to such lengths
I’d won the war.
Roma Victor
, Hannibal you stupid fuck.

When I looked at the twenty-something
business woman façade, I still saw the woman she showed me, but I
saw the beast inside she wanted locked away too.

I saw the real Annie B.

Vampire.

What to know something shocking?

I kind of liked her.

Liked her more than the fake her at
least.

Sure, she kicked my ass, but it’s
my
ass
. Not easy to kick
my ass
. Got to respect that.
Trying to seduce me? Okay, point against her, but she expected a
normal guy. Funny thing about me is I’ve never went for a woman who
came at me. I like to chase, I like to win the war, not the other
way around. Turned down Isabel Soto, turned down a shitload of
Intra girls that chased after me, turned down Sally after I came
back from the Asylum.

Not Annie B’s fault she expected something
else. What seducing she did do, the careful dance between revulsion
of her being a vamp but temping me with that beautiful shell of
hers, nicely played. The way she set up matters so we hit San
Francisco the moment the duchess was asleep and out of the way?

Yeah, I noticed. Smooth move on her
part.

Plus . . . Ceinwyn put her in my path . . .
points in Annie B’s favor. Ceinwyn was using me on Annie B and
using Annie B on me. She wanted us to get something out of the
relationship. Guess that means I needed to get over watching her
eat a guy . . .

“Not very much,” I finally said. “Too much
water.”

“Which keeps the temperature normalized,”
Annie B said, reaching into her travel bag. “We like coasts.”

My eyes couldn’t help but find the window
nearest to me, filled with afternoon getting along with itself, not
more than a couple hours of daylight left. By the time we got back
to Fresno, the Fog would be forming itself to coat the whole city.
“I’ve never been fond of water. Swimming ain’t my thing. Only do it
when I’m made to. I’m more of a sit-and-watch kind of guy around
the pool.”

She found what she was looking for, pulling
out a cigarette and lighting it.

I stared. Been years since my last and I
still remembered the feeling.

She took a draw, stray smoke lingering
around her face. “You aren’t going to throw up on me when we take
off, are you?”

I watched the end of the cigarette, the
burning gray and orange. “It don’t make you too hot?”

“Not when I’m full,” she said, glancing at
it. “Want one?”

“Quit at the Asylum.”

“
Poor baby
. They take the fun out of
life, don’t they?”

Outside my window, the plane started moving.
Taxiing for the runway, I think they call it. “I’ve never had a
problem with air or heights. Don’t like too much water or douchebag
necromancers though.”

The stewardess came back, refilled our
drinks, offered us some snacks in the form of little sandwich
things. I ate, Annie B didn’t. The stewardess was smart enough not
to say anything about the cigarette, which got smoked down to
nothing and replaced with another in minutes.

Annie B motioned with the new one, “Do you
like aeromancers?”

“Generally, yeah. Have some problems with a
classmate, but it’s more because she’s an ex’s best-friend than the
Mancy.” I took another sandwich thing and bit into it. Hadn’t
realized how hungry I was. My gut didn’t start hurting until the
food hit my mouth. Hunger . . . makes us all stupid and greedy,
human or vampire. “Plus, there’s Ceinwyn.”

“Yes,” Annie B murmured, “There’s always
Ceinwyn.”

Curiosity got me again. “How’d you meet
her?”

Annie B’s own eyes flickered out of a window
near her, her face turning profile towards me, that long neck of
hers leaning back. She took a long time answering.

“I’ve know the Dales for three
centuries.”

It made me smirk. “So you’ve know her since
she was a kid? Almost impossible to imagine. Tell me she wore pink
dresses, that’d make my day.”

“She was a beautiful child,” Annie B said.
“Sad . . . driven. Responsible for her name and what it means to
the Mancy. The more pain she’s endured, the more she’s sunk into
her act.”

“What act?”

There was a third cigarette. Not like she’s
going to get cancer, I guess. One of the perks of being a
disgusting blood creature. “Pretending she’s studying humans
instead of being one.”

“Guess you’re the master, you’d know.”

Her velvet eyes came back from the window to
find mine, dirty brown all full of skepticism. “How many times do I
have to prove to you I’m not human?”

I finished the last sandwich. “I know you
ain’t, Annie B. But if a human goes off into the wild and lives
with some gorillas or some bears or some other wild animal, they
ain’t exactly like the rest of us when they get back, right? Same
thing for you. Years of knowing our names, watching us, living
among us—more than most Vamps I’d bet, on account of you being a
baroness and all. You ain’t as vamp as you like to believe, which
is why it ashamed you so much when I watched you take care of
Sideburns. Chomp chomp. Yummy yummy. Then that look . . .
what
did I do?
Then you tried to make me hate you.”

Her pale face got dark, the cigarette
quivered in her hands. “I’ve done worse.
Much
worse.”

“Not with me watching you.”

“You don’t matter as much as you think,
Artificer,” she hissed at me, looking just like many a woman I’ve
pissed off before. “I’m paying you for a job, using your skills;
this isn’t some long lasting relationship between us. I don’t care
what you think.”

“Now who’s pretending?” I asked, with
another smirk that positively pissed her off even more.

The plane took off.

[CLICK]

Sure enough, I didn’t hate flying. It’s not
all that different from a good looking woman studying her ass or
tits or whatever she likes most about herself in the mirror. High
up, I got to see the earth in a new way. All those mountains and
cities and coasts made small. Got to look at it from far away. Got
to enjoy what I loved from a whole different perspective.

It was nice.

“Your face looks like a ten-year-old’s,”
Annie B commented.

“Can’t help it, I’m not a billion years
old—I still experience new stuff,” I said back.

“What else haven’t you done?”

I thought about it for a bit, watching one
of the most beautiful sunsets I’d ever seen. “Haven’t been out of
the country . . . never seen the Atlantic Ocean . . . still
catching up on all the movies and television and music to come out
the last eight years . . .” Each bit brought more thought into her
expression. “Never voted . . . never broke a car axle . . .”

“Never killed a man?”

It stopped my list. “Not yet.”

“Planning on it, King Henry?”

“Not really . . . but I’ve come close a few
times just by accident. Bound to happen eventually once I put some
purpose into it, don’t you think?”

“Very flippant about death.” Annie B
frowned. “Most humans are much more reverent about it.”

“When am I reverent about anything?” I took
one last glance at the ground far below as the airplane drifted out
over the ocean.
Be back on you in an hour, old friend
.
“Enough bullshit conversation. Answer time.”

“Why should I bother? You’ve served your
purpose.”

I was carefully noncommittal. “Going to
bluff me, Annie B? Sure it’s the way to go after all we’ve been
through? I’ve been patient up till now, but I’m done with the going
along for the ride-on rails-magical-vampire-adventure. Time to
break into some employee sections of the theme park.”

“Let’s see: you can’t follow the item . . .
I already know who took it . . . you’re not
that
good in a
fight . . . why should I bother putting up with your crass mouth
any longer?” she threw back at me.

“Wrong. I can’t follow it. But I’ll know it
the moment I get near it. Which means, whatever you’re planning,
you’ll need me to confirm to you
it
is actually
it
and not a fake or a trick.”

“And what’s to keep me from getting what I
think is
it
and then bringing
it
to you at a later
time for confirmation, instead of hauling you along like the
annoying little pebble you are?” she asked.

“Mostly me.”

“Oh really?”

“Yeah, I’m done with this unless we do it my
way. You can take your paycheck and shove it up your perfect
ass.”

“Compliments . . .”

We stared at each other. Neither flinched.
It’s a really bad spot to be having a stare down—thousands of feet
in the air. If I broke apart any part of the plane to defend myself
then things could get bad quick. I don’t know if Vamps go squish,
but I know I do.

She blinked first. Or maybe it was in her
plans all along for me to tag after her. Never know with Annie B.
“Fine.”

I tried not to look too smug. She sneered at
me, so I probably failed at it. “What’s the plan? Break into the
Fresno Embassy and steal it back?”

She called the stewardess for another drink
and didn’t say another word until she got it. I waved off another
rum and coke, wanting to keep a clear head.

“It’s Plan A,” she finally said after a sip
of blue liquid that smelled like apple. Blue alcohol—damned
abomination. “Plan B is if we get caught, I engage in a duel with
their duke in the very small chance it will distract them long
enough for you to escape with the artifact and return it to San
Francisco.”

I frowned. “You said that like you don’t
expect you’ll be winning the duel.”

“He’s a duke,” is all she said to
explain.

“That’s it? Age wins?” I asked, affronted by
the thought you couldn’t break the rules somehow to win the
fight.

“That’s it, King Henry.” Annie B finished
her drink and motioned for yet another. Guess you couldn’t blame
her on account of her talking about dying. At what blood level does
a vampire get drunk, anyway? “We fight, he beats me and begins to
do to me what I did to Gentleman Shoals and I am left with a choice
of dying to cannibalism or escaping my own shell and attempting to
survive the night air . . . which is not very likely.” She laughed
with a particularly morbid note. “Even if I did, I’d lose the only
home I’ve ever had. The one I’ve worn since my birth. I’d have to
find another . . .” Her eyes flickered to me. “The closest on
hand.”

“Yeah . . . thinking you best get ate
then.”

“I wouldn’t necessarily need to kill you.”
Annie B, back to licking her lips. Winter clothes or not, the
hungry look returned when she talked of me as a shell. “You’d just
. . . hold me for a while until I could find a suitable
replacement. It’s not painful . . . it can even be enjoyable. Like
an invisible friend.”

My stare was no-nonsense. “You don’t pay me
enough.”

“You’d let me die?”

“I’d step on your gooey ass.”

“And here I thought we were becoming
partners.”

I changed the subject. “What is
it
?”

“Is this another of your requirements?” she
joked.

“Yeah . . . it is. That anima is out of this
world. Whatever
it
is,
it
is some scary shit I don’t
want to grab without knowing what
it’s
going to do. Fiddling
with unknown artifacts is how Artificers get dead.” I showed her a
scar on my hand that ran down the length of my middle finger.
“Touched what I thought was a yoyo in Plutarch’s office; only it’s
actually a weapon which spins out blades on impact, some old
Chinese thing. Only takes getting anima burned once. Or in my case:
close to losing my favorite finger once.”

She downed another drink. Guys trying to get
her drunk must have a hell of a time. Then all the effort and cash
and she eats them. Just cruel, Annie B, just cruel. “
It
is
classified.”

“By who?”

“They’re classified too.”

“Got Kings and Queens too, Baroness B?”

“Not quite, but something similar.”

“I’m not helping unless you tell me,” I
said, putting my foot down.

“Really? All the curiosity as an Artificer,
wanting to touch it and feel its power and you’d just give up and
go home?”

I picked my foot back up. “Come on . . .
don’t make me beg.”

She studied me. My shoulders, my arms, even
my face with the scar on one cheek and the other scar on an eyebrow
and the broken nose. Not an ugly guy but not a pretty boy either.
Wasn’t one before all the damage, sure as hell not one after it.
But Annie B still seemed to like something in it. “Maybe I should
make you prove your reputation as a lover to buy the information
from me. Tit for tat, as it were . . .”

“You know . . . I just don’t get why you
want to fuck me so bad. I ain’t that interesting. Ain’t good
looking. You can have any guy on this planet, why try so hard for
me?”

She gave me one of her looks that could make
a metal table pop wood. “Don’t sell yourself short.”

“It can’t be to get power over me no more,”
I thought aloud, wondering about it—it just seemed wrong, “You know
me enough to know it won’t work. Know I don’t like being chased
too, but you’re still doing it . . .”