Authors: Nerine Dorman
“Quick!” Trystan said to Arwen. “I need an address and a phone number.”
“So, I must face the grandmother on my own?” Arwen pouted and he wanted to shake her, hard.
“Please, Arwen!” Etienne begged.
“Fine!” She slipped out of the car, and slammed the door a lot harder than she should have.
Why oh why was he involving these kids? Maybe he was too yellow to do it himself, to have to answer difficult questions, manipulative jerk that he was. Or perhaps he was playing up to his true nature, gathering his own cabal of minions, just like the elders. They never did their own dirty work, did they?
So, he and Etienne remained in the car, with the windows rolled down, listening for sounds, like footsteps or raised voices.
Etienne said, “You really are a vampire, aren’t you?”
“Perhaps.”
“No, really.”
“Really, then,” Trystan said, and sighed. “And the less you know about it, the better.”
“How did Arwen–”
“Find out?”
“Yes.”
“She’s too bloody perceptive, that’s what.”
“Well, she is a witch.”
“As if that explains everything.” Trystan gave a dry chuckle. “What’s taking her so damn long?” He slapped the dashboard.
“Well, can you imagine how Helen’s gran might feel to be disturbed at almost ten at night? Arwen is doing some pretty fast talking now, as you can imagine.”
Trystan growled quietly. Anabel had been...persuasive. Oh, the irony of the vampire who got emotionally involved with a creature he should treat as food.
“I don’t understand why you can’t go talk to Anabel yourself, why you’re involving us.”
Trystan turned to face the dwarf. “It’s complicated. Why must I explain myself to you?”
Etienne narrowed his eyes, and inhaled deeply. “There’s more going on here than I know about. I’m not given to believing in the supernatural but...I’m tempted to believe Arwen this time. And it’s not just because you’re giving me the fucking creeps.”
“Well, I won’t be bothering your reality for much longer. You can have your weekend away from school, like you’d originally planned,” Trystan said. “I’m leaving both of you here nice and safe the moment I get the information I need.”
“How?”
Trystan laughed then, enjoying the look of discomfort which distorted Etienne’s face. He could taste his fear, and
reached
to read more of the small human’s welter of thoughts.
It would be so ridiculously easy to snuff–
Arwen yanked open the door, a sudden motion which caught Trystan unawares. He hissed.
“Drive!” Arwen commanded. “She’s marching over to my dad’s place right now.”
“Arwen, he’s–” Etienne began, only to be cut off as Trystan started the Hudson.
Rose’s
V8 engine thundered into life, no doubt waking half the road.
The last thing he needed right now was for Anabel to recognize the car. As if rumors of the ghostly ’48 Hudson patrolling the N9 National Road weren’t already enough.
He’d drop the kids off once he reached the drift.
“Where’s she staying?” Trystan asked.
“Twenty-two Highbury Road, Houghton. I asked for a telephone number but then she got suspicious, wanted to know why I was here so late. We started arguing.”
“Arwen,” Etienne said, “he wants to leave us here to go after Helen on his own.”
“Don’t you dare consider it, vampire! You’re not going to eat her!” Arwen yelled.
He slammed his foot down on the brake, and
Rose
skidded to a halt in a spray of gravel.
“Get out. Both of you. Now.”
“No.” Arwen clutched the dashboard, her gaze boring into his.
He broke eye contact first. “You’ll get out or I snap your fingers.”
“Do you expect us to trust you with Helen?” Etienne spoke from the back.
“This isn’t some cross-country jaunt with ice-cream and candy-floss along the way.”
Arwen continued to glare at him from beneath her fringe. “I wasn’t expecting it to be.”
“Neither of you know her that well,” Trystan countered. “Why risk your lives for her?”
“Why are you so concerned about her, death breath?” Arwen asked. “Why freak out at all? Why not continue to skulk around Nieu Bethesda as if we’re completely ignorant of your existence?”
“I can’t!” Trystan groaned. What was he getting himself into? By all rights he should kill them both now and throw their bodies out along the way for the scavengers to pick at their bones.
They were just god-damned stupid kids. He had been like that at their age and see where that got him.
If the Black Pope got these kids in his clutches– He’d surely have some fun tormenting the dwarf. Arwen would be another matter. She would have...uses, especially for a vampire such as he bent on dominating the rest of the southern Africa. And, if the Black Pope laid his hands on Helen, there was no telling what he could or would do.
Etienne broke the silence. “I’m in enough trouble as it is. I may as well go along for the ride. I don’t care if it’s dangerous. Helen is my friend. I may not have known her for a long time, but I don’t want to see anything bad happen to her, either.”
Trystan caught sight of the boy’s frown in the rear view mirror then rubbed a grimy hand across his eyes. “And you, Little Miss Magic? Why would a borderline sociopath like you give a rat’s behind about Helen, when you’d just as soon use her in your little esoteric experiments? Not even your father would be that stupid.”
“My father,” Arwen said, “is as yellow as you are, vampire. So, what’s Helen to you? Lunch, or something more?”
“You have no idea what’s going on, that you would commit yourselves to such...to such madness. If you must know, your little friend Helen is smack bang in the middle of a very nasty game.”
“What?” Etienne asked.
“If he tells you, he’s gonna have to kill you.” Arwen laughed, but there was no humor in the sound.
“We all may develop a terminal case of ceasing to exist,” Trystan said, “if we are not careful. Which is why I’d rather you two stay put and live out your brief, natural lives in relatively blissful ignorance.”
Arwen spoke. “So, spit it out, vamp boy. We don’t have all night. What are we getting ourselves into?”
“Vampires,” Trystan said. “Lots of them.” He shouldn’t be doing this.
He restarted the Hudson’s engine. “Did you ever hear any urban legends about a phantom Hudson ’48 prowling the length of the N9?”
Chapter 29
Life is a Circus
They drove as far as a twenty-four-hour truck stop on the outskirts of Johannesburg where Trystan pulled the car to the side of the road.
“What now? Why’re we stopping? We’re almost there?” Arwen asked, wondering why they slowed down now that they were so close to their goal.
The night had grown pale in the east, the first signs they neared a big city apparent in the haze and the regularity of early morning delivery trucks.
Earlier, they’d passed one dismal town after the other. They’d all looked the same to Arwen, with their too-bright petrol stations and miserable huddles of corner cafes and liquor stores.
“Sun’s coming up. I’m going to wait it out. There’re some blankets in the back. You two can keep watch. You’ll need all your wits about you tonight,” Trystan said.
With a deft drag at the wheel, the vampire pulled the Hudson into a parking lot, and drove to the side of the neon-lit building where flashing signs advertised “topless waitresses” and “grand slots,” as well as “the best Lowveld pizza.”
The car ground to a halt beneath the low, spreading branches of an acacia.
So, vamp boy didn’t like sunlight. Arwen schooled her face so her amusement did not show.
“Don’t get any funny ideas, little Miss Magic. It’s going to take a lot more than a few hours’ sunshine to reduce me to a small pile of ash. You two look in the glove compartment. There’s some money. Go buy yourselves something to eat and for God’s sake, keep an eye on the car. I really don’t need to get more blood on the upholstery if some dumb criminal takes it into his head to try his luck.”
Arwen rolled her eyes. “Sure, Daddy-oh. We’ll behave, won’t we, Etienne?”
Trystan frowned at her but did not say anything as he climbed out and got into the back of the car while Etienne swung over the seat into the front.
Etienne rubbed at his face. “Don’t know about you, Arwen, but I wouldn’t mind taking a slash.”
“Gods, you can be so disgusting, Etienne. Sure. Just let me do my makeup.”
She watched Trystan in the rear view mirror as he settled down beneath a pile of old army blankets. She didn’t want to speculate too much on the darker stains marring the fabric. How long had he been...
Etienne leaned over, fiddled with the glove compartment lock and pulled the hatch open.
“You’re awfully close to pawing at my thigh, Etti,” Arwen warned him while she touched up her liner. “If you touch my thigh, I swear I’ll–”
“Oh my God! Exactly how much money do you have, Trystan?”
Arwen looked down to see what the fuss was all about. The glove compartment by her knees was stuffed with paper money, shoved into the space with very little care, as if the notes were no more important than tissue paper.
“Don’t spend it all in one go,” came Trystan’s muffled order.
Etienne’s face crumpled the way it did whenever he thought of something he did not like. “Don’t tell me, it’s from all the poor fools–”
“He’s murdered,” Arwen finished. When she looked skinny Trystan in the eye, he didn’t seem the monster but... It was undeniable. How else did he survive? It wasn’t not like the old days one read about, where vamps could set themselves up like lords with vast herds of people to do their bidding.
“C’mon, Etti.” Arwen grabbed a fat handful of cash. “The bastard can at least pay for us to have something to eat and drink. Let’s just hope this hell-hole’s kitchen is still open.”
If Trystan heard her, he gave no indication and lay perfectly still, for all intents and purposes a shrouded corpse in the back of his car.
Arwen stepped out of the Hudson, walked a few paces and stopped. How often did she stare up at the star-studded sky? Not often enough. The night was still warm, promising a scorcher of a day to follow. A few cars were parked in the lot, mostly beat-up pickup trucks and one or two rusty old Mercedes Benzes. A loud, pulsating beat emanated from within the rambling prefabricated building, causing the windows of the vehicles nearest them to rattle in their frames.
“Etienne! C’mon, I thought you were going to go take a piss or something.”
“I’m coming!” He dropped out of the driver’s side of the car.
“Pocketing some more change?”
“Whatever.” He shoved his hands into pockets that jingled.
“Suit yourself.” Arwen started for the building. “I could do with a beer.”
Then a loud, choking roar split the night and she froze. Lion! The sound was unmistakable.
Why here?
Like her, Etienne stood rooted to the spot. Quietly, he asked, “Is that what I think it is I heard? I know we’re not in Kansas anymore, Dorothy, but–”
“Shhh.” Arwen peered into the gloom, to the rear of the building where the animal had roared. The parking lot continued to an open stretch at the back of the pub, where a number of covered trucks and caravans stood. Something large threw itself against a metal surface and another coughing roar rent the air.
The logo on the nearest truck looked familiar, a stylized lion. Arwen approached the nearest truck. The beer could wait just that little bit longer.
Etienne grabbed onto her left hand. “It’s a–”
“Shhh! Do you want to stay here by the car, Etienne?”
“No.”
“Then shurrup and keep chips at our backs.” A circus. Distant memories stirred.
“Maybe we should just go in first and–”