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

  Accidental death had been covered in the orientation. We were protected by vampires and all they did, but a car accident or sudden heart attack could still result in death. The vampire, then, would not be held accountable for their actions.

  Therefore, I decided, Quin was concerned about keeping the car safe. We had only just met. I doubted he would change centuries of behaviour just for me.

  “Do you mean the list of standardized questions?” I asked as I reached for the seat belt.

  It hadn’t occurred to me earlier. I blame public transit for not having seat belts. Quin didn’t buckle up either, but if we got into an accident, he could walk away from it. I could not.

  I buckled myself in as he seemed to consider, brooding over the question. There was a crease to his brow as he appeared to consider what I had said.

  “I meant the questions that you want to ask.”

  “Do vampires have any weaknesses? Or more of, how many of the clichés apply?”

  “Well, I don’t sparkle unless you dump glitter on me, that’s for certain. Or if I’m coated in gunpowder and you light it up. That one’s not fun for me, though.”

  “For those ladies out there, let’s cover sex.”

  “We’ve only recently been allowed to have sexual relations with mortals again. The last century or so. That’s not what you wanted to ask.”

  “Fine, what about garlic?”

  “An excellent herb that’s not used often enough, or used the wrong way. Not allergic, it will not make me melt. I never understood why mortals believed the garlic bit. Poison, gunshot, and flame don’t hurt us but toss a clove of garlic at us, and we’ll run screaming for the hills. Really?”

  “That’s based on myth and the mystical properties that garlic is supposed to have. The same sorts of myths that say vampires even exist. And werewolves, witches, and all the rest.”

  “We are here to talk about vampires, not satiate your curiosity.”

  He didn’t deny the existence of other supernaturals.

  “Fine, be that way. I guess crosses, holy ground, silver, and not being able to cross a threshold unless you’re invited in, are out.”

  “Unless... uh,” he gave his head a shake as if recalling who he was talking to. “And anything to do with graves. Once we’re killed for good, we go into a grave, or our ashes do. Apparently, vampires take a long time to decay, which makes sense to me. Whatever makes us what we are is in our body, not our soul. So, the spirit leaves, the body remains.”

  “How do you kill a vampire?”

  “Guess.”

  “Something through the heart? Wooden stake? Cut off the head? Cut off the head and use a stake? Cut him to bits and then burn the bits to ash? Use lye? Use an industrial cleaner? Throw him in a volcano?”

  Each time I listed off an item, he shook his head. At my last, he frowned.

  “A volcano?” I asked.

  “No, industrial cleaner and lye products. We haven’t tried those yet.”

  “There must be some known way to kill a vampire. The Council has threatened to kill any of you who kills a human.”

  “No mortal can kill a vampire.”

  I was noticing that he never said the word human. He always referred to us as mortal.

  Stop using the word human.

  To a vampire, I suppose, vampirism was simply a different sort of life to lead. It was like having any chronic disease. They would live with it the rest of their lives.

  Though, they could also infect others.

  Which reminded me of something he had said, and brought up a very good question.

  “You said that in the last century you had been allowed to take mortal lovers again. Why weren’t you allowed to before, and was it just you, or all vampires?”

  “All vampires,” he said. “There was some concern that vampirism was transmitted sexually. We had an accidental turning seven hundred years ago. Had to put the poor child out of its misery.”

  “When you say child?”

  “I’d rather not discuss that further, as I had nothing to do with the events.”

  I was starting to suspect that I was touching on the boundaries of what interviewers were allowed to know. He didn’t try to dance around the subject either, cutting right to the point he was trying to make.

  “If we can’t discuss deaths or other creatures, how about what causes a human—sorry, mortal—to turn?”

  “The change is relatively painless. Some suffer from fever, aching joints, and swollen lymph nodes.”

  “That’s... sort of what I asked.”

  “I swear, your generation is more impatient than any other I’ve seen so far. Let me tell my story.”

  “Then don’t pause like it’s okay for me to counter with another question!”

  Quin smiled, the bastard. As he did so, he flashed his teeth. I noticed a distinct lack of fang. Surely, vampires should have had fangs.

  Surely, as well, if he had been born fifteen hundred years previously, there would have been wear on those teeth. Perhaps a few lost due to a sweet diet that a rich vampire Master might have provided to his, er, pupil.

  Yet I saw a mouth fill of straight pearly whites.

  Wouldn’t the wear of years just eating food have worn out his teeth entirely? The flesh was regenerated, but he had said nothing about the bone.

  Then again, ripping a vampire limb from limb didn’t kill him, so the regeneration process must have extended to all things. I wondered how that would work. Did his teeth grow like fingernails, or did they simply fall out when the were no longer useful?

  Did a vampire have to pull his teeth?

  It sounded like a painful process, which made me wonder if general anaesthetic worked on vampires.

  “You have a thousand questions now, haven’t you?”

  “Tell me how to make a vampire. Maybe that will answer my question.”

  “Very well, for starters, there’s a selection process. Not all mortals would make good vampires. A Maker can sniff them out. I’m told it’s much like attraction, which may be why so many Makers have slept with their Progeny.

  “The mortal cannot have children, preferably no living relatives,” he hesitated and turned to me as we came to a complete stop at a red light. When I didn’t immediately ask my question, he smiled and turned back to the road. “Vampires are still human. We vary just the same, but we obsess something terrible. The centuries can seem long and foreboding. More than one vampire has been destroyed for meddling in the affairs of mortals.

  “The Council realized that only those who had had a child obsessed. So, they banned the turning of those with living children.”

  “Meaning, for example, I could become a mother, but—and this is only if it were an option—to become a vampire, my children would have to die?”

  “Yes, exactly. Do you have children?”

  “No, I don’t. Sort of abandoned thanks to a little problem with my university. But whatever, everyone has a shadow in their pasts.”

  “Some of our shadows cast greater darkness than others.”

  His voice had taken on a haunted quality. I’m sure with such a long life. Quin had seen his share of darkness and hatred. He may have even had a hand in that darkness.

  Which was an interesting topic that I wanted to explore because he didn’t seem bothered by the mentions of children. Besides, of course, expressing the desire not to mention it again.

  My reaction to wallowing in self-pity was almost always one of disgust. Most of those interactions in the past had involved people who had nothing to complain about. So, when my answer tumbled from my mouth in an irritated tone, I didn’t think twice about it.

  “And some of us still reach for the light despite our shadows. Now you sound like a vampire.”

  “Mortals,” he muttered under his breath. “I’ve killed men bigger than you with my bare hands. If that doesn’t frighten you, I’ve killed children smaller than you and didn’t cry over it.”

  “I’m protected by the Counc
il and have a GPS tracker embedded in me even. That’d be an awfully big mess for you to clean up, just to deal with one little mortal.”

  “Ballsy woman, aren’t you?”

  “Why do you say it like that?”

  “Like what?”

  “Like you’re frustrated about it.”

  “I am, I was promised a librarian type who would take my dictation and not ask any awkward questions. Instead, you keep poking topics that would make any vampire uncomfortable.”

  “I plan to poke all the topics, as you put it. So, get used to it. I have to be thorough. What kind of interviewer wouldn’t ask those questions?”

  “One who values their life.”

  “I’m going to die somehow, some way. Death by vampire is a little more unique than most.”

  “Do you have a death wish?”

  “No. But I think with the outing of the vampires, our obsession with death has been brought to the forefront. Not many want to die, and in you, they have a way to stay alive forever. So, we’re all thinking about death. It’s a topic you don’t often think about until someone points it out to you.”

  “Don’t think about Death too loudly, he might hear you.”

  “What’s the worst he could do? Kill me?”

  Quin seemed to mull over that information. His silence drew out for so long that my mouth fell open at the implication.

  He hadn’t said death with about lower case ‘d’. He had said it with a capital letter, as in the name of a vampire.

  “Is there a vampire called Death?” I asked.

  “So, to make a vampire, we need to bite a mortal and maintain the bite for several minutes,” he said almost at the same time I had asked the question. “The drawing of the last beat of the heart bit that some authors write about is there for how long it can take a weaker vampire.”

  “So, why aren’t there vampires everywhere?” I asked.

  It was probably safer to assume that I had touched on another grey topic.

  My heart beat faster at the idea. I wiped my sweaty palms on my pant legs, regretting not wearing a simple denim to the interview.

  There was a vampire named Death, and he was a big deal.

  “Some can hold it off, as long as they don’t get drunk off blood. The rest of us use caps or don’t bite. Despite what books say, there’s nothing attractive about biting sweaty flesh. How hungry would you need to be, to bite a cow, really?”

  “Caps? Fifteen hundred years ago?”

  “We found ways, are my point. Most aren’t interested in biting mortals in the first place. When it comes time to be a Maker we feel the urge. It’s somewhat like a heat. However, there’s only one way to kill rogues. If our population continued to swell the way it was, humans would have discovered us. We would have had equal numbers even.”

  “And no way to control the baby vamps,” I said.

  Just try to picture it. New vampires released from the mortal coil, able to go anywhere and do anything.

  Oh, and they can’t be killed except by one thing? One very specific thing, which I was pretty certain wasn’t easy to come by. Otherwise, the ban wouldn’t have been put into place in the first place.

  It would have been absolute havoc. Humans would have been reduced to little more than cattle.

  The Council had done it to protect mortals.

  “By doing so, the Council at the time also defended their personal stock. A threat was made, they didn’t believe it. The threat was carried out, and the threat was uttered once more about two hundred years later.”

  “What’s stock?” I asked.

  A tingle ran down my spine at the word. Of course, I knew what it meant, but I wanted to know what he had to say on the topic.

  “Lines of humans bred and protected by vampires. See, we couldn’t fight wars publicly. The little battles across civilizations were vampires sending their stock to settle a feud against another vampire.

  “After the law passed, the stock became much more narrow. Where all of us once carried on these human lines, they have dwindled. Only a few vampires maintain stock to this day. Volunteer lines of humans who give over a bit of blood for special privileges.

  “Blood from different families tastes differently. Stock is something like a fine wine. Except it’s a fine wine that a vampire is willing, and might even be granted permission by the Council, to kill mortals to protect.”

  “Are you allowed to tell me that?”

  “Of course. I won’t give you the names of any of the stock. In modern times, they know who and what we are. They may have once thought we were demons, or that they had sold their souls to the devil, but they are fiercely loyal. Only a handful have ever tried to share their heritage before.”

  “Which is where our stories come from?”

  “For the most part, yes.”

  Safer to change the subject on that one. The general population would have a fit over the vampires maintaining bloodlines for the purpose of voluntary blood bags. I didn’t want to be the one who broke that story.

  Call me a coward, if you must. I’d rather be called a pragmatist.

  “What about sunlight? You weren’t exactly bursting into flames back there.”

  “Sunlight making a vampire turn to dust is a change that we manipulated on purpose. Easiest way to show yourself mortal would be to step in the sunlight.

  “In truth, sunlight diminishes our powers. Those who don’t have powers suffer as well because it weakens our muscles and slows our movement. It is like suffering from a heatstroke and migraine at the same time. The light hurts our eyes, even sunset and near twilight.”

  “Hence the hat and glasses.”

  Which I only then realized Quin had left sitting on the cafe table. I hadn’t thought twice about it. His belongings were his responsibility, not mine.

  I had also been slightly distracted, what with trying to remember everything I had to do.

  The very thought made me stop and go through the list.

  Tablet, cords, phone, purse, identification, apartment keys.

  Apartments keys?

  I frantically patted at my pockets and finally found the little key. With a sigh of relief, I put the key into the purse, where it really should have been before.

  “What was that about?” he asked.

  “You forgot your glasses and hat at the cafe. It made me feel like I had forgotten something too.”

  Quin shrugged at the mention of his items. “I can replace them easily enough.”

  “Do you often just leave things when they no longer suit a purpose?” I asked.

  “We can go back and get them,” he said. “I was under the impression that you didn’t like that combination.”

  “That doesn’t mean you just discard it, and you’re avoiding answering my question.”

  Quinn made a turn. He seemed to make an unimpressed sound as he watched the road. Ever the careful driver, that was for certain, but then, one didn’t keep a classic car in good condition by driving like an idiot.

  “Some items, yes, I discard them when they no longer please me. Hats and glasses typically are such items. I have many of both, as it’s the only way I can go out during the day.”

  “Yes, but I didn’t like them because I thought you were a pretentious hipster who thought he was too cool to be seen. Sunglasses inside, especially at sunset makes you look like you think you’re better than everyone else.”

  “I have been wearing this clothing, and hats and big sunglasses since before they were cool.”

  I simply stared at Quin, wondering if he knew how that sounded. He was silent a long moment. Then his head jerked towards me.

  “I’m not a hipster.”

  “That’s practically their motto. They claim to have liked everything before it was cool.”

  “That is a stereotype, and I don’t think it’s fair to tease a vampire about liking something before it was cool. Fashion and fads are cyclical. Of course, I liked it before you knew it was cool.”

  “
Or one could argue that all vampires are hipsters.”

  “I’m not a...” he pulled out his phone and jabbed a button on it. “Look up hipster and email definition to modernization.” The phone went away, and he grumbled for a moment. “I am not a hipster. Change the topic.”

  “A vampire named Death.”

  Quin swore.

  His swearing made me smile because I had just blindsided a man who claimed to be able to read mortals so well. He glanced sideways at me.

  “After I get the glasses and hat, we’re going straight to the Archives, and I’m going to smack Margaret.”

  This time he used the English pronunciation. I wondered if it was a sign of his trying to keep up with the times. The last time had, perhaps, been a slip of the tongue. An older pronunciation even.

  “Death isn’t his name. It’s simply the closest translation from Vampire,” Quin said sternly. There was an edge to his voice, like when he has asked me to drop a topic only this time he didn’t verbalize the request. “The actual translation would be something like ‘bringer of the end of all.’”

  I almost asked about that but took his tone to heart. For whatever reason, Quin wasn’t comfortable talking about the other vampire.

  “Vampire, as in a language?” I asked.

  “Yes, I could lie and say something about how it’s a new language, oh so complicated. That’s not necessarily true. For a mortal to learn—or a new vampire—I suppose it is a difficult language, but it has evolved over thousands of years. The modern dialect is one that grew as I did.”

  “It’s a distinct language, then?”

  “No, it’s an amalgamation of every language we have ever spoken. We’ve chosen words to keep which have beauty or meaning that no other language can quite express. There are phrases from several dead languages, and many more from languages that were never written down before the last native speaker passed away.”

  “Can you say something to me in that language?”

  He said something, and I just stared back at him. I couldn’t even tell what sounds he had made. How could I translate something that I couldn’t translate distinct sounds from?

  “There’s a linguist professor.”

  “I could say it again if you’d like to record it with your phone.”