At Death's Door (Wraith's Rebellion Book 1) Read online

  For some reason that never ends well.

  They knew what sustained me and were fine with it. They had been raised that way. Their parents had been raised that way. It was simply the way things were done from forever and on until ever.

  My stock grew up with Lucrecia’s stock. She wouldn’t allow crossbreeding because she had just gotten hers perfect. Despite that, she felt responsible for my upbringing still. In her eyes, helping to raise my stock was the least she could do.

  During the fourth generation, a boy came to me with big round eyes. He had heard a story from Lucrecia’s stock and was wondering if it were true.

  Lucrecia teaches about the last gift from a very young age. It’s up to each vampire to decide when and how. I had yet to decide, and so that was to be kept separate. This boy, however, snuck in and hid himself among the children of Lucrecia’s stock.

  He learned what the last gift was and that it was a special and sacred thing. The children aren’t allowed to watch until they become adults but are indoctrinated against the blood. Words like slaughter and food are avoided. It’s gift, donation, and rites, some vampires use blessing.

  Instead, Lucrecia has always focused on the calm that comes over those who are granted the gift. She teaches that those who are granted the gift are above others. That it is a noble way to die, to choose one’s demise and to allow her to give them the peace that they deserve.

  They are taught that their deaths do not go unnoticed, nor do they go to waste.

  In Lucrecia’s home, there are books and books. These books are filled with the names of every person she has given the last gift to, along with their date of birth and small notations on their lives. When she tells them that they will never be forgotten, she quite literally means it.

  Her stock decided at some point that this was a sure way not to become a vampire. They have closely guarded graveyards.

  No, wait, tombs?

  They’re underground.

  Anyhow, these underground chambers are filled with the skulls of those who have been granted the last gift. There is a pilgrimage once in every lifetime. On these pilgrimages, they take any new skulls to the final resting place. They consider it a great honour.

  The last rite and the last gift are two separate ceremonies, recall. The gift is done in private, the rite in public. The closer to the modern era we came, the fewer stock received these things. We no longer had to worry about killing the stock with multiple feedings, so we didn’t.

  Even back then, not everyone got it. You have a right to ask me to end your life, and I can and will do it if you are my stock. The gift is done privately because that matters to us. We become emotional and don’t want the stock to see us upset.

  Lucrecia isn’t even the one with the most pomp and ceremony for her stock. She performs publicly because they revere her and she feels she owes it to them.

  I’d much rather keep it private.

  However, if someone got a hold of a video of that, we’d all be screwed. And the only way to teach them is to show them what is going to happen. It’s like going to a celebration of life for those who come to witness.

  You go if your grandfather or great-aunt is chosen. You go if your father goes. And when it’s your time, your children, grandchildren, friends, and all the rest come to bid you goodbye.

  Do they have a celebration afterward?

  My stock does. Lucrecia keeps a more somber affair. She wants them to remember that someone is dead.

  For me, death has never been just the end. My family died, and my life went to hell. No one remembers them but for me.

  Mortal lives are fleeting, let them celebrate.

  Though I do discipline those party too hard or cause problems.

  Until that little boy asked, I had avoided the topic all together. He was asking uncomfortable questions that I didn’t have answers to. The boy was only eight years old. His whole life was ahead of him. He shouldn’t have been asking about the end.

  “Why, boy,” I said, “do you ask these questions when you are still so young and untouched by the world?”

  Because everyone talked like that back then.

  Of course. We also monologued and used big words all the time.

  “Grandpa,” he said.

  The little boy that the woman had given birth to before she died was this boy’s grandfather. Then I felt like shit. I had arranged work and education, even marriage for the boy but his life was now at an end, and I had never gotten to know him.

  Yet this young boy, who I hadn’t spoken to before, I hadn’t given permission to speak to me, came up to me. He asked me with big watery eyes why Grandpa, for all his service as an elder and through life, wasn’t going to be given the last gift.

  The child thought Grandpa was going to die without knowing I cared about him.

  So, I said, “And a brave boy, you are. To make such a claim as to know where I place my love.”

  “But my Lord,” he said. “I see you are often smiling at Grandpa, and you are never impatient with him when he loses his thoughts. Surely then, you hold him tenderly, for you are an angry master.”

  What?

  Yes, imagine that. I am God basically and a little boy just up and tells me I’m a pick.

  Except he did it in such a way that I can’t even be mad.

  There was nothing accusatory about the tone. It was just an eight-year-old being confused because the adults all know what’s going on but won’t say it.

  Nowadays parents shush their children at a younger age.

  I had no answer for the boy. I simply told him that I would take it under consideration and sent him on his way. Then I went to Lucrecia.

  Thankfully, she was home at the time, and not wandering.

  At first, she thought I wanted her stock punished. It took some time for me to convince her otherwise. When she finally heard what I had to say, she went silent.

  “You never forget the first,” she said.

  She helped me set everything up. It is the duty of the vampire to place everything just so and oversee the work. There had been times when a jealous or angry party had done something to ruin the last gift.

  Thankfully, with her guidance, I’ve never had someone suffer as I do the deed.

  That first time, I went to him and asked if he’d like to receive the gift. To my surprise, he knew what it was, and what it meant. Despite not showing my stock, they had learned.

  Living alongside a mature stock does that, it’s unpreventable.

  He was elated to accept. He kissed my hands, tried to kiss my feet. I had never seen someone so happy to die.

  It frightened me.

  He wasn’t even a quarter of my age at the time. I hadn’t even started living until I was over twice his age. For the era, I suppose he was old. His body was worn down, and he was probably tired of struggling to go on.

  The only reason he continued was because he felt like his family needed him. It’s amazing how long a mortal can hang onto life because they feel they need to or to prove someone else wrong.

  He asked for it immediately. I begged him to give me a day to prepare. That much he granted me.

  Lucrecia was right. You never forget that first one.

  I don’t want to talk about the how. My method is very similar to Lucrecia’s because she was my only example. Having learned how others do it, I appreciate her version. Little blood goes to waste, and the venom floods them enough to give them a high above and beyond what else they are given. By removing the head, we avoid accidentally making a new vampire out of someone too old to enjoy eternity.

  I was anxious going in and coming out. The blood left behind, I took to Lucrecia. She mixed it with a little Maker’s Blood and made me drink it all. After the mix, it didn’t take much to convince me, however.

  You can share the gift, as Lucrecia had done with me. There were some you could not share. Such as that first one, or those who have a special place in your heart. To do otherwise is an insult to their memory.
r />   My stock had a modest feast in celebration. The next day they were happy as they prepared his body for burial. I had never seen mortals celebrate death before and was concerned.

  So was Lucrecia.

  She sent word to others across the known world. It was almost a year before we heard back, but while unusual, it was nothing to be concerned about. Some cultures don’t see death as the end, but a new beginning.

  When I was to give the next gift, Lucrecia sent word to others, and they raced to arrive in time. I hadn’t even known myself, that I would grant it.

  When I finally made up my mind, there were simply others there.

  My stock didn’t ask about the others. They seemed unconcerned. Of course, it was the grandson of the son, of the first woman. He who brought the gift to the people, so perhaps they saw it as something more special.

  I obviously never forgot the second, either.

  At that time, was the last gift different from feeding?

  Yes, we did risk feeding, otherwise what’s the point? Some died of infection. We had some thoughts, such as when multiple stock give blood, we recognized that taking a blade from one to the next seemed to up the chances of infection.

  Lucrecia always offered her donors a free bath and meal. I took that on, as has Sasha. She did it because her Maker did it. She simply adopted his habits as Sasha and I did hers.

  She never asked him why he did those things, or what stock was. He kept stock but didn’t call them that or think of them as anything but his. He was killed in the cull, you see.

  Lucrecia is referred to as an elder vampire because she is of the generation that survived the cull. So, when I asked why she did things, she puzzled over that and gave examples of vampires who didn’t do those things and failed in some way.

  Many of her generation were also culled.

  Infighting, she said.

  Which suggests there is a way to kill vampires without the tool.

  We keep searching.

  Anyhow, I waited until the fifth generation before asking for a donation. They gave it over, having been prepared by Lucrecia’s stock. After that donation, Lucrecia told me to leave. My stock was stable, I was beginning to build my base for income and possessions, and it was time for her to move.

  I took my people and transplanted them to another place. Then went wandering for the first time in a century. By this time, I was almost four hundred. Still young by vampire standards, but I was far behind my compatriots.

  I visited on my stock whenever I remembered they existed. They passed on the traditions, and the elders knew where to find me if need be.

  One time an army threatened them. I ate heartily then.

  Another time there was an internal rebellion. I had to make examples of those who began and participated in the rebellion. A few were chosen, and I slaughtered them with a different version of the gift. Their blood was poured to the ground.

  The elders were quite satisfied with this, but I was hungry at the sight of blood. I offered the gift to all the elders and promised to return for them when their time came.

  To encourage them to contact me, but satiating my appetite to see their blood spilled for being morons.

  They could have prevented the rebellion and didn’t.

  I did return to take the last gift, and I drank deeply of their blood, it was quite fabulous.

  The next time I visited my stock, they were a small city. To which my response was basically: Oh shit, what do I do?

  Lucrecia maintained a small stock of a hundred or so people, introducing new blood whenever she could. I had no example to go on.

  The Council is not just about settling disputes, thankfully. I went to them, and they gave me the answer I needed.

  I returned to the city and told them it was time to expand. I raised one up as a prince. Then I brought together twenty or so whose bloodlines I knew for a fact, and I laid down the blood I wanted to continue. They became my breeders, in return I paid them.

  Bring art and culture, I was told. By this point, a few stock were entire nations, with close lines being kept. And that was acceptable as long as I could accept that those outside the lines would breed as they pleased and might even forget my name, or their purpose.

  However, as far as the Council was concerned, everyone in the city-state and nations that arose were stock. You just had to do things to cover what you did.

  We arranged wars between ourselves to pare down the people and feed deeply on the battlefield.

  Battles were controlled by the triplets, three identical vampires whose names we are not permitted to share. They would sup on the blood, and sometimes we would lose, sometimes we would win. Your city-state might become part of a larger nation, that was simply how it was.

  There was one tribe that was not stock, and they just fucked up anything in their way.

  Vikings?

  They did that too, I’m told.

  No, I mean, what about the Vikings?

  Odin makes a good God, don’t you think?

  There’s a vampire named Odin?

  No need to shout. Yes, there is. His stock tastes marvellous, and the women? Oh, my.

  Much of the human population was at one time or another stock.

  Except for that one tribe?

  Fucking them!

  Don’t get me wrong, I like them and mean them no harm. But when you have a very specific plan and in they’d sweep, wiping out villages and such?

  Ugh. Years of planning gone overnight.

  Suppose Romulus and Remus must have hated the unnamed tribe.

  They did not survive the cull. The only reason Odin did was because he vanished into the Americas, only resurfacing recently.

  We knew what stock was his, however, and were told to avoid it. Mainly because they were prickly, but oh so good in bed.

  The women, not the men.

  Of course, Lu is the only man I have ever laid with, and that was never exactly by choice.

  What’s that look for?

  Nothing. How is your stock today?

  They exist and thrive. I maintain a close number of about two hundred, with a secondary tier of well over a thousand. With modern technology and culture, that many are required to get everything done.

  I am constantly provided with blood from donations. They do keep most of it for blood banks, to help the sick and injured. In creating blood banks, vampires erased the necessity of feeding or being present.

  I report to the breeders on changes in flavour or consistency. They make small adjustments. I’m quite excited for the future.

  Though, the stress of modern life can leave a nasty taste in the blood. As can antibiotics and chemicals in all the drugs you people take.

  Those on the first tier keep away from the drugs as much as possible. I won’t give the last gift to anyone with that shit in their systems, so they have to be free of it for between twenty-four hours and six months depending on the drug.

  What about vaccinations?

  You cannot blame us for anti-vaccination beliefs. Polio tastes a lot worse than the vaccination for it. I hate to possibly upset people, but you do realize that those things you claim only exist now because of vaccines existed before?

  You know what we called those people? Stupid, retarded, sometimes just plain dumb. In the good cases, we’d call them savants, say they were eccentric. It existed before.

  There’s only one vampire I know of who insists that it’s better to suffer from disease, rather than get the tried and tested cure. He’s no longer allowed stock. The rest of us keep ours across the globe. Pockets of it both in the so-called homelands and in the west.

  No vampire will offer up the exact location or names of their stock. To do so would be disastrous. There are few descendants that would still turn heads.

  As Margaret said, most of us breed for sweetness. Death is the only one who managed a savoury flavour without getting a bitter aftertaste. Even Sasha lost it from the stock of his that she took on.

  Whe
n stock is released, they become descendants. We’ve all released a line or two. Not many survive beyond us. Releasing became more about exile than anything else, so we do avoid it as much as possible. Better to have the line killed off somehow, than to release them.

  Less panic among the others

  Personally, I’d much rather releasing them. It’s a waste to kill them, even if I can drink from one or two. Especially when the release has to do with numbers and not because they’ve done wrong.

  You mentioned a World War before, what happened there?

  Lu happened there. He was bound to Berlin at the time and got bored.

  Bored, Helen.

  So, he started a war to entertain himself. After we won—barely—and hunted him down, the Council put him under house arrest instead.

  Little contact with mortals. The others are afraid he’ll kill them, a few are scared he’ll start another war because he’s bored.

  His stock was stripped of him, though, so he has no one to do his dirty work. He is completely dependent on the Council.

  No one wants to be like that, so we carefully maintain and keep out of sight of mortals as much as possible.

  Quin slipped into the street side parking spot that was available, pulling off an impressive parallel park job. I don’t think an instructor could have done any better.

  Watching him park begged the question.

  “Do you have to retake the driver’s test often?”

  “Never taken it,” he said. “My aliases are all assigned a license and twelve years of good driving. One time I received an infraction for speeding on a new alias because I scared my new IT guy with my driving. Never piss your IT guy off. I’ve heard of some flagging vampires as terrorist risks. It grounds us for about twenty years or so. We think.”

  “You don’t drive like a maniac, which is what I would think of someone who had never taken the test before.”

  “For the sake of the cars, I learned to drive appropriately.”