Savannah Vampire - The Vampire's Kiss Part 8

I felt like smacking him, but I wouldn't let him goad me into prolonging this fight with the humans around. It wasn 't worth it.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. Just know that Jack McShane and his buddies are in the house."

Just for good measure, and because they'd p.i.s.sed me off, I decided to see if I could manage another little show to impress them, something besides my glamorizing of the humans. I let out my fangs and concentrated on lifting off the ground. I spread my arms and raised one leg like in the kung fu movies, and sure enough, I rose a couple of feet and floated toward the werewolves.

Samson and his boys gasped. Seth said, "Dude, you can fly! That's better than the vampires in Salem's Lot."

"Awesome!" Connie breathed.

Determined not to show fear, Samson recovered quickly, belched out a forced laugh, and casually turned to go just like he was menaced by flying vampires every day. The others followed, all except for Nate, who turned to go back in the bar, presumably after Sally. I caught him by the arm. "Not a chance. We'll take her home." He shook me off with a nasty look but backed away from the steps and followed his father and the others.

When I settled to the ground and looked back at Connie and Seth, they were now staring at each other. Samson had called Seth a werewolf and Connie a witch within the s.p.a.ce of a heartbeat. I didn 't even want to know what kind of thoughts were pa.s.sing back and forth in those looks, but I had a feeling I was going to learn.

I walked between them and put an arm around each of their shoulders. "C'mon, kids, it's almost sunup and Uncle Jack needs his beauty sleep. Tomorrow night we've all got some 'splaining to do."

Six.

William I'd made it back to Olivia's with Donovan just before dawn. Postponing their sleep, Olivia's vampires had taken turns letting Donovan feed from them before he was put into his coffin to sleep. By my estimation, he would need at least two days ' rest to heal that sucking chest wound. The stake had actually touched his heart, and as eager as I was to hear what he had discovered, my questions would have to wait. So when the next sunset came, Donovan remained in his coffin.

Olivia and I rose before the others. I had deposited my seven-hundred-dollar shoes in Olivia's trash bin and taken still another shower to try to remove the funk that I could still smell from my time in the sewers.

Afterward, she and I sat at the antique table in the bas.e.m.e.nt lair next to the coffins. It was the first opportunity we'd had to talk alone.

"I've never seen anything like it," I told Olivia. "What kind of powers does he have?"

"I don't know of any extraordinary powers that he himself possesses," Olivia said. "But when we bathed him we did find a lorica tattooed over his heart."

A lorica is a kind of magic poem. A charm in the form of an incantation, if you will. "What did it say?" I asked.

Olivia recited from memory: "O G.o.ddess Brigid, protect this warrior Make him invincible Make him victorious Make him immortal among immortals."

"You're versed in the ways of the Druid," I said. "Do you think the lorica is what saved him?"

"I believe so, yes. The stake went directly through the verse. It touched his heart but didn't penetrate it. What else but the lorica could have accounted for such a miracle?"

I smiled. Olivia was a student of Celtic tradition and an avowed pagan. Algernon had told me that his second-in-command took her religion seriously. But who was I to argue? I, who depended on voodoo-infused blood for my very survival. "What do you know about this Donovan?"

"I know that he's quite ancient. He was a Celtic warrior and fought the Saxons for most of his human life."

"That explains why he took the name 'Donovan.'" In the Celtic language, Donovan means "dark warrior" and Baird means "poet." Interesting.

"He's a lovely man. Makes us our tea every morning. I think he knew Alger back in the day. That 's how he found his way to us. They had kept up a correspondence with each other for hundreds of years. He arrived here only days after I'd returned from Savannah. When he learned Alger had just been murdered, he was devastated."

"You said he was ancient. Do you know when he was made?"

"I believe he was made on the battlefield, just as you made Jack," she said.

It was common for male vampires to receive the dark gift on the field of battle and spend the day of their turning buried in the earth alongside their sires.

Vampires have stalked the shadowy corners of the killing fields since the beginning of time, drawn like sharks by the smell of blood. When night falls and the survivors have retreated with what wounded they can manage to carry with them, the blood drinkers come out to feed. The blood of the dead is an abomination, so they listen for the heartbeats of the ones still clinging to life and feed at their leisure until those hearts are still.

I must admit to being an old war dog myself. The sounds of armed conflict-the cannon's roar and the rifle's report-are a siren song. The fear is like nectar, the anger ambrosia. The sheer hatred of one human being for another stirs me.

Olivia looked toward Donovan's coffin as if she could see though the mahogany. "Alger said Donovan was mortally wounded defending one of the last Celtic strongholds on the northwest tip of Wales. Anglesey, I believe. I always suspected that Alger was a wee bit in love with him, but Donovan is a lover of women."

"Do you know that firsthand?" I smiled again. It had been my observation that Olivia herself was a lover of both men and women. Many blood drinkers don't discriminate when it comes to s.e.x.

"I'll never tell." Olivia winked but then turned serious. "Anyway, I think it's good that we have some additional power to draw on. If he wrote a lorica that saved his life, Donovan could even be a shaman. Now we only have to wait until he wakes to tell us who staked him and what he saw when he followed Hugo and Diana."

"I'm afraid waiting is not an option."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm going back to the house to talk to Eleanor. See how she fares and if she's found out anything about Renee."

"Do you want me to go with you?"

"No, you stay here." I stood up and put on my coat.

"I don't feel good about your going out alone tonight." Olivia stood with me and followed me to the door.

"Your colony needs you. I wouldn't want them to have to deal with the loss of two leaders in so short a time."

Olivia shuddered. Made in the roaring twenties, she was a relative infant by the standards of blood drinkers. And like my Jack, she had led a mostly sheltered existence until recently. The carefree flapper became a carefree immortal. Reedrek had put a stop to everyone's fun, and the youngsters had to grow up fast. Except for the glaring mistake she'd made in not telling me Diana lived, Olivia seemed to be rising to the challenge.

As I walked out the door into the dark mist, I felt myself wondering if any of us so -called immortals would live to be another year older.

I stationed myself in the little park across from the house Hugo and the others were using, far enough away so that my presence could not be sensed by another vampire-that is, unless the other vampire was my offspring.

Invisible in the dense copse of trees, I could feel Eleanor reach out to me with her mind, probing my psyche. I chose not to block her. Startled, I drew in a breath as she touched me.

It was as if she was gripping my c.o.c.k and working it roughly. I was instantly aroused, my entire lower body tightening. My shaft stiffened as if she were kneeling in front of me, performing at her personal and professional best. I had to quickly open my trousers to free myself. I looked down, unable to believe that the lips, tongue, and teeth I felt so exquisitely were not physically before me.

As swiftly as she'd invaded my body, Eleanor barged into my mind, serving up image after image of our past lovemaking like a p.o.r.nographic film. The Best of William and Eleanor. The time we f.u.c.ked like animals in the midnight surf on Tybee. Me chained to her four-poster bed while she teased and tortured me in ways most men only dream about. She, riding me like a demon in the formal plantation garden as I met her stroke for stroke while the scorching fingers of the sun 's first rays broke the horizon. Her begging for mercy as I pinned her to the deck of the Alabaster in the moonlight, probing every inch of her, first with my tongue and then with my c.o.c.k.

And most intense of all, the night I told her I was a real vampire, not just another rich man with kinky tastes. She 'd f.u.c.ked me as no one had in five hundred years, showing me every move in her professional a.r.s.enal, bringing me to the most shattering o.r.g.a.s.m I'd ever known. That same night she began her campaign to persuade me to give her everlasting life.

"It can be like this every night until the end of time," she'd promised. As soon as she played her old promise in my mind, a new promise resonated there. It can still be that way, my darling. Take me home to Savannah and we can start all over again.

As the film ran in my mind, the feel of her velvet softness gripping me deep inside her was as real as if she was clinging to me here beneath the shadowy evergreens. I let her lead me over the edge and came with a bucking fury.

Panting, I leaned against a tree and righted my clothing. I marveled at what Eleanor had managed to accomplish from afar.

Perhaps I would let her amuse me in my off hours while I was here in London. If I was to rescue her, I would make her sing for her supper, as it were. I refocused my mind on the task at hand and waited.

At about the same time as the previous night, the evil little family came out of the house. My heart lurched when I saw my blond, inexpressibly beautiful Diana. It was impossible to reconcile the creature she now was with my memories of her as my human love.

And my son, reared under the influence of the wretched Hugo, was so malevolent I regretted saving his life with the gift of my blood. In fact, I had given Melaphia my solemn vow that I would return Renee to her even if I had to kill my own son to do it.

I had mourned both Diana and Will for five hundred years. Then, miracle of miracles, they came back to me, or so I thought. I now wished them as dead and buried as I had for so long believed them to be.

They walked in the same direction they had the night before. I thought to follow them, but I found I was moved despite myself by Eleanor's plight. When the three of them were out of sight, I went to the back of the row of houses and found my way to the cellar.

Eleanor was sleeping or unconscious when I entered. She had probably used the last ounce of her strength to minister to me in the special way she just had. In the dark, she looked much the same as she had the night before. At least she was still undead. I pulled the string attached to the overhead light and the bare bulb flickered to life. She stirred, blinking her eyes, and tried to stand.

"William?" she said.

"Were you able to find out anything about Renee?" I asked.

"You ask me about Renee after what I just did for you? Is that all you have to say?"

"Thank you," I said. "That interlude was most enjoyable. Now, on to important matters. What have you found out about Renee?"

Her eyes suddenly focused on something behind me and she gasped. A hand spun me around just in time for me to see the head of an iron mace go spinning past my cheek. I felt the metal spikes bite painfully into the flesh just above my shoulder blade, forcing me backward and off my feet.

My back connected with the wall and Will was on me in an instant, his face inches from mine, pushing the point of a wooden stake into the flesh right above my heart. His golden red hair was vivid under the harsh light of the naked bulb.

"You," he spat. "You were going to let me, a fellow blood drinker, die rather than give up your precious little human."

"I knew Gerard could save you with his vaccine. And so he did."

"You knew no such thing. It was a gamble with my life." He pressed the spike deeper and I could feel the blood begin to seep beneath my clothing. Behind us, Eleanor began to sob.

"I wouldn't have let you die." It was the truth. I would have found a way to save him. If only he had stayed with me in Savannah and left Renee alone. But why should he? As far as he knew I was nothing to him.

"b.o.l.l.o.c.ks! You would have sent me to h.e.l.l to rot for all eternity. Give me one good reason why I shouldn 't do the same for you."

I looked him in the eyes, and I couldn't imagine why he hadn't realized the truth the moment he met me. Will's eyes were not just the same as mine in hue, but also in what they held within. The rage sustained him just as it sustained me.

"Because I'm your father."

Jack The night of the brawl, Seth went straight back to my place to crash. Sally and I took Connie to her car and followed her back to Savannah to make sure she made it home without encountering any of the wolves. As I was seeing her to her car, I told her she should come by the garage right after sundown the next night and I would explain the world of shape-shifters. Well, as much as I knew anyway.

While I had Sally alone, I read her the riot act about drugs, the Thrashers and even prost.i.tution while I was at it. I couldn't tell her they were werewolves, of course, but there was plenty I could tell her. She cried and denied everything, but I wasn't having any of it. I gave her the facts about meth-how it would ruin her skin and her teeth, make her look so old before her time that, if she insisted on staying a wh.o.r.e, the only johns she'd be able to attract were the lowlifes that hung around the bad side of town. I also told her what the drug would do to her internal organs, especially her brain.

The next night, I thought about my talk with Sally as I was tuning up an Oldsmobile. Only time would tell if I got through to her.

Connie showed even before the irregulars started to trickle in. I wanted the chance to talk to her before Seth got there, but he strolled in about the same time she did.

Well, now, wasn't this just peachy? I figured this would be one freaky group encounter session. I could just picture me as one of those TV shrinks. Connie, Seth's a werewolf. How does that make you feel?

Connie poured herself some coffee and sat down at the dinette table. She looked like she hadn't slept a wink. Seth jammed his hands in his khaki pockets and looked down at his Weejuns. Connie stared into her cup as if she was reading tea leaves.

"Don't everybody talk at once," I said. "Do the two of you have some things to ask each other?"

"Okay, I'll start," Connie said. She glanced at Seth. "So, you're a werewolf?" Seth said, "Yeah."

"Have you always been a werewolf?"

"Pretty much."

Since Seth had all of a sudden become a man of few words, I added, "Connie, unlike vampires, werewolves are born, not made. That stuff about getting bitten by a werewolf and then turning into one is just something that happens in the movies."

Connie looked relieved. "So the business about the full moon and the silver bullets..."

"Well, now, that part's true," I said.

Seth rubbed the back of his head. "We have to...turn when there's a full moon. We don't have any choice. At other times, we can turn at will."

"Turn? Does that mean what I think it means?"

"Yeah." Seth looked away again.

"When he changes, he looks a little like Chewbacca the Wookiee," I explained helpfully. Seth gave me a look.

"I don't look anything like Chewbacca," Seth said.

"Oh G.o.d," Connie muttered. "Jack, do you have any aspirin?"

"Sorry," I said. "Vampires don't really get headaches. Except for hangovers, I guess.... Anyway, there is no aspirin around here."

"And I don't look anything like a werewolf in the movies," Seth said. "Not in the old ones, anyway." I guess I'd piqued his vanity.

"Relax, dude," I said. "It's not like the American Kennel Club has a standard for good-looking werewolves, but if they did I bet you'd win best in show."

Seth clearly didn't think that was funny, and he bared his teeth in that annoyed way he had. "Well, at least I have a pulse," he snarled. "And I can go out in the sun, which is more than I can say for you."

Now, that was just hitting below the belt, if you ask me. "You can, but you probably shouldn't," I said. "You know what they say about mad dogs and Englishmen. Besides, how do you get that sticky SPF 15 sunblock out of your fur?"

"Why you pale, gla.s.sy-eyed sonofab.i.t.c.h. I oughta-" Seth stood up and came at me. I set down my coffee and took a step toward him.

"Stop!" Connie shouted, and as quick as the Sundance Kid, she drew her service revolver out of her shoulder holster and pointed it at the ceiling.

Seth and I froze in place with Connie still seated at the table between us. "Are those silver bullets?" I asked her. "Because if they're not, you're just going to p.i.s.s him off."

"I'm already p.i.s.sed off, and not at her," Seth said. "Besides, she's going to shoot you, a.s.shole."

"Me? What'd I do?"

"Shut," Connie said, "up!" She reholstered her weapon and got up from the table. Her chair made a screeching sound as it sc.r.a.ped across the linoleum, which I reckon made her head hurt even more, because she winced.