Welcome to the Darkness (Darkness Trilogy) (2 page)

The thrill of the hunt
had long since ceased to exist; the necessity of feeding was his sole motivation. The tedium of the patrols the Queen ordered Nathaniel to carry out lay heavily upon his shoulders. What exactly did she expect him to discover in this little city outside of San Jose? Perhaps some information on the whereabouts of the missing vampire, Panagos. He sighed and turned his attention back to the task at hand. Everything in his field of vision had a reddish tint, as his inexorable thirst rose.

He waited
and observed the entrance to a pub a block and a half away from his position at the end of a row of quaint shops. At last, the tiny drinking establishment belched out a lone, tipsy customer. The man reeled drunkenly in an eastward direction.

Nathaniel leapt off the roof of the building and landed on the street below in near silence. Before the victim had a chance to register his presence, Nathaniel darted to block the man’s path and capture his gaze. He whispered soothing words
to put his prey into a relaxed trance. The human held completely still and did not utter a sound when Nathaniel bit into his neck, and quickly drank a pint of blood.

After
Nathaniel had taken his fill, he licked the two punctures to heal the wounds with his saliva. He released his prey into the gloom of night, relatively unscathed. The fresh infusion of blood seeped into his veins, and the drag of death drew him down. He leapt onto the roof of the building beside him and lay down for his death sleep. He half wished he would never wake up.

With a sudden intake of air, Nathaniel awoke with a start. His heart resumed a slow, but steady beat. A quick glance at his watch showed him he’d been dead for forty-seven minutes. In the early days, he was out for almost a full hour after each meal, unless it was an emergency feed to replace lost blood from an injury. After over two hundred years of nightly feedings however, the amount of time he lay in a state of death afterwards had grown gradually shorter. He knew Panagos required only slightly more than a half hour of death after each feeding as he approached four hundred and fifty years as a vampire. This was also the likeliest explanation for Panagos’ recent hiatus. Vampires close to five hundred years tended toward insanity, eventually meeting the sun by choice to end their long existence. A strict ritual typically accomplished this, yet Panagos had simply disappeared without a trace two nights earlier.

Nathaniel regained his perch at the apartment buil
ding’s topmost edge and recommenced his survey of the surrounding area. An odd scent caught his attention. Something peculiar he hadn’t sensed in quite some time; the moss and fennel smell of a newly made vampire. He moved in a sudden blur and leaped from rooftop to rooftop towards the source. When he reached the end of the block, he jumped down to the street level once more, crossed the main road and entered a small park. He followed the narrow pathway, which wound through the center of the park, as a light breeze stirred the leaves of the trees to either side. The light of the sparsely placed lanterns revealed the abandoned state of the park, with the exception of one young man, or teenager perhaps, who sat on a bench and stared into space. His eyes flickered to glance at Nathaniel, but returned to a vacant stare almost immediately.

How curious, Nathaniel
thought. This young man was clearly a newly made vampire, but where was his maker? It was standard procedure to kill newlings without a chaperone, but Nathaniel approached the bench to address the boy and hopefully find some answers first.

“Where is your maker?” Nathaniel said, wasting no time with introductions or pleasantries.

The young man swept his errant locks of brown hair out of his eyes and regarded Nathaniel with a look of complete incomprehension. “What?”

“Your maker.
The one who made you,” Nathaniel said with exceeding patience. “The one who made you a vampire.”

Ah, now there was a spark of interest at last, the young man’s
blue eyes widening. “The . . . the guy who did this to me? He’s . . . uh, he’s dead,” he answered.

“Dead?
How is that possible?”

The youngling remained silent and searched N
athaniel’s face as though contemplating whether to answer the question. He frowned and said, “Who
are
you?”

S
o much for dispensing with the introductions. “My name is Nathaniel,” he said, with a slight bow of the head. “And you are . . . ?”

“Reed,” he replied
with narrowed eyes.

“Reed?
Is that your given name or your surname?”

“It’s my first name,” he replied, looking somewhat a
ffronted. “My last name’s Hennessy.”

“Ah, then,” Nathaniel pondered for a moment. “You’re Irish I suppose?”

“What? No . . . do I sound Irish? I mean, sure, way back somewhere on my father’s side there’s some Irish genes. Anyway, who the hell are you? And I don’t mean your name.” Reed stood up and glared down at Nathaniel. The boy was a good four inches taller.

His hands raised in supplication, Na
thaniel said, “I apologize if I have caused offense. I merely endeavor to determine how you arrived at your present situation. It is an odd situation, I assure you. Perhaps I may be of some assistance if you would be so kind as to impart your recent experiences to me.” Although it was much more likely he would have to dispose of the boy, but he did not intend to make this youngling privy to such information.

“Fine then,” Reed replied, and relaxed his stance. “I was
attacked, in my home. My family–” and here he paused, obviously having some difficulty retelling the events. “Some psycho guy attacked my family. He slaughtered them. I thought I was dead too, but then I woke up. He was having a snooze on my couch, so I grabbed him, ‘cause I was thinking I’d drag him out back and chop his damn head off. The second I stepped into the sun with him though, he burst into flames, and I threw him off me and he landed in the house. The whole house burnt down with him in it, so he must be dead.”

“May I ask what this ‘guy’ looked like?” Nathaniel r
eplied, realizing something about the account bothered him.

“He was maybe five foot nine or ten,
and he had black, curly hair–”

“Panagos,” he hissed. So . . . Panagos had indeed su
ccumbed to insanity and lost control. He should have gone to meet the sun long before now, rather than cause a situation that had surely attracted the attention of the human authorities. Any vampire who risked the exposure of their kind was eliminated, however this was clearly a moot point as far as Panagos was concerned. Still, it was possible some “clean up” was required to cover anything that might appear out of the ordinary. Nathaniel thought for a moment longer to review what the newling had said. “Hold on a moment. You said you stepped into the sun with Panagos, but you must have meant you pushed him or perhaps threw him out into the sun’s light?”

“No, if that’s what I’d meant, that’s what I would have said. So . . .  it’s true
then? I’m really a vampire? How could you tell? I look the same as before. I
feel
the same as before . . . well, mostly.” Reed’s questions continued to tumble out, although Nathaniel did not pay attention, lost in his own train of thought.

“You went into the sun,” Nathaniel breathed out in a whisper.

“Yeah, I was in the sun all day today, big deal. You’re totally ignoring my questions, Buddy. Don’t you get it? Do you have any idea what I’ve been through today? You’re not even paying attention. If you’re not going to help me, go away and leave me alone. My life is ruined, and I don’t know what to do.” His voice had started to crack on his last few words, and he turned away.

Good grief, this boy was an emotional whirlwind. I
gnoring the outburst of questions and accusations, and his decision made, Nathaniel said, “You must come with me. The Queen will want to see you.”

“The Queen?
What Queen? You don’t mean the Queen of all vampires or something like that, do you?”

“Not the ‘Queen of all vampires’, no.
The Queen of San Jose. King City is a part of her realm.”

“The Queen of San Jose?
That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of! God, just go away you weirdo freak!” He stormed off and shook his head.

Nathaniel moved in front of the boy. Reed stopped, narrowly avoiding walking into him. “Get out of my way,” Reed said, enunciating each word.

Reed’s fangs started to emerge. Strong emotions tended to have that effect and Nathaniel’s own fangs punched through his gums. “It was not a request. You will come with me,” he growled in a voice that no longer resembled anything human.

“No!” Reed retorted in his own growl with a threate
ning glare.

“Impudent child!”
Nathaniel ground out between clenched teeth. He grabbed the newling by the front of his shirt, and slammed him headfirst into the ground with a sickening crunch. Then he dragged the unconscious body of the boy the block and a half to his car, popped the trunk, and stuffed him inside. He took care not to slam the trunk so hard in irritation lest he damage the car with his superior strength. He climbed into the driver’s seat and started the drive towards San Jose, hoping the newling wouldn’t heal and awaken before they arrived.

I awoke with a gasp. “What the . . . ?”

I was on a hardwood floor in
a normal-looking living room. It was still dark outside, and there were two men standing on either side of a closed door to my right: a tall black guy and a thin guy with a big beard. They barely spared me a glance, and I shook my head to orient myself.

“You’re awake,” a voice said. I whipped my head to my left to find the source.

“You!” I snarled in disbelief. My memory returned in a flash. It was that thin, dark-haired jerk who’d slammed my head into the pavement. “I’m going to kill you!” There was a tingling in my gums again.

“I would not attempt to do so, if I were you,” Nathaniel calmly replied
, his dark gaze boring into me. “I am over two hundred years old, and you are but a day old. Your strength could not possibly compare to my own. Any effort to attack me would be futile, not to mention there are two other vampires in this room who would come to my aid.”

T
he two men, okay, vampires, stood by the door. They were paying attention to me now.  I turned back to Nathaniel, swallowed my anger and the tingle in my gums subsided. I stood up and crossed my arms over my chest, and gave him a defiant look. “Fine. What do you want?”

“I mean you no harm, Reed,” Nathaniel said. “I am so
rry for the method I used to bring you here, but there was no blood shed, and you experienced only a brief moment of pain. As you can see, you are fully healed, and we have arrived at the Queen’s residence without further incident.”

“This is the Queen’s house?” I asked. Not only did it seem like a perfectly ordinary house, from what I could see out the front
window it looked like the house was in a very regular-looking, suburban neighborhood. “I was expecting more of a castle or something.”

“We prefer to maintain what
you would call a ‘low profile.’ Inconspicuousness is imperative for our kind.” He paused, maybe to assure himself I had my anger in check. “It is time for me to present you to the Queen. You would be wise to treat her with utmost respect and the best manners you can muster. If you do not, more than your life will be forfeit. As you have seen, your body is capable of healing grievous injury, however, as long as you remain conscious, you will suffer pain. Do you understand?”

“Yeah, sure.
Let’s get this over with then,” I said. I hoped I didn’t look as terrified as I felt.

One of the vampires guarding the door opened it for us, and I followed Nathaniel in, and then down a set of stairs.

“The skinny guard with the beard looks like freaking Abraham Lincoln,” I said, hoping I could talk to cover up the deafening pounding of my heart.

“It would be best for you to keep any extraneous co
mments to yourself,” Nathaniel replied when we reached the bottom of the staircase, and entered a hallway with several closed doors.

“I don’t suppose you were buddies with old Abe back in the day, if you’re two hundred years
old or whatever,” I said, my voice wavering slightly.

“No, I was living in New York during Lincoln’s lifetime, but I did not meet him,” he replied. “Please, do not speak further unless you are asked a direct question. The Queen’s chamber is through this door.”

He opened the last door at the end of the hallway, and my breath caught in my throat as we walked into a shockingly large space. The room was half the size of my school gymnasium, and the walls were a mix of brick and stone. The entire floor was laid with an intricate design of mosaic tiles, and a dim, flickering light came from what seemed like hundreds of candlelit wall sconces. The room was deserted except for a middle-aged woman standing on a raised platform at the end of the room, and the large throne in the center of the platform, occupied by someone I assumed was the Queen. If this was the Queen, she was definitely not what I was expecting. She didn’t appear to be a day older than twelve or thirteen.