Blood Harvest: Two Vampire Novels (43 page)

Cory’s vampire senses should have been able
to keep up with its movements. When a vampire ran so fast that a
human wouldn’t have been able to see it, Cory would see everyone
else besides the vampire as though they were the ones that slowed
down. But Vlad was gone before he could track its progress. He only
had the vague impression that Vlad launched itself straight up into
the sky, but when Cory looked up all he saw were clouds and a moon
struggling to be seen through them.

“Screa…” Dancer muttered. “Uhhhhh.” She
blinked several times, each one bringing a little more focus back
to her eyes. “Uh wha? Wha happened?”

Cory was about to ask her if she actually
remembered anything about the encounter they’d just had, but before
he could she jerked her head back around to the direction of the
tunnel. “Oh shit,” she said. Dancer vaulted over the railing before
Cory could voice any protest or ask what she was doing, but as he
looked over the edge and saw her drop he realized what Vlad must
have meant.

The face of the gardener. That would be Pig.
And if Fancy was seeing Pig down there, that likely meant that some
of the Dusters were here as well.

Cory almost followed her over the railing,
but it was at least five stories down. Dancer was obviously able to
survive that but she was in perfect health and had already had
plenty of practice jumping off the roofs of buildings. Cory, with
his current diminished speed and strength, would still likely
survive if he landed correctly. If he landed incorrectly, though,
like if something went wrong and he hit the ground head first, it
probably wouldn’t matter whether or not he was a vampire. That kind
of head trauma would still kill him.

He watched the entire skirmish—or at least
the parts that weren’t hidden under the roof of the tunnel—in that
same half slow-mo that he usually did when he saw other vampires
moving at their most inhuman speeds. Dancer hit the pavement in a
crouch that, from the sound of it, might have just cracked the
pavement. He saw at least one figure at the end of the tunnel,
although it took him a moment to realize this was Fancy and not one
of the attackers. One of the attackers came out of the tunnel in an
attempt to flank them, and Cory saw right away that this was the
skinny one who had come after him on that first night. He would
have bet good money that the other was the short, hefty one.

Get down there
, Gramma’s voice said.
You already saw what they’re willing to do, and now they have
vampire powers as well. FancyDancer might not be able to take them
alone
.

It was a heroic thought but not one Cory
thought was at all helpful. If he wasn’t going to jump then the
only ways to street level were either down the parking ramp or the
stairs, and going at his current top speed he didn’t think he would
be fast enough. Whatever fight was going to happen would be over in
a matter of seconds anyway, and there likely wasn’t much he could
do about it.

The tall one appeared to have a gun, but
apparently he hadn’t yet learned to proper way to use it in
conjunction with his new quickness. He fired several shots at
Dancer, but at their current speed the bullets appeared to move
sluggishly through the air, still going fast but not enough that
Dancer, already moving, was out of their way before the tall one
could even aim. She sped around him and disappeared briefly from
Cory’s sight as she went into the tunnel, but she must have used
the wall as a springboard because she was suddenly flying back at
him through the air. Her hand grabbed the gun before he could fire
again and she jerked it into an awkward position as he pulled the
trigger one last time. If she hadn’t been in the process of
knocking him down his shot likely would have gone right into his
own eye, but Dancer’s momentum worked against her and they went
sprawling in a fast, furious ball of fists and kicks. The bullet
grazed him in the side of the face instead, but Cory guessed that
would be enough to incapacitate him. It seemed unlikely, after all,
that they would still be going after vampires with mere guns if the
bullets weren’t still poisoned.

The tall one hit the pavement hard with
Dancer on top of him, his body convulsing at the sudden pain he
hadn’t been expecting. Although Cory rarely wished agony on anyone
he had to admit a certain perverse pleasure that this guy was
finally getting a little of his own medicine.

That moment of satisfaction was brief,
though, as another gunshot echoed in an eerily low, slow fashion
from inside the tunnel. Before he even saw Fancy stagger out he
noticed the way Dancer reacted first as though she were the one who
had been shot, grasping at her hip and screaming in pain before
falling off of the tall attacker. Fancy fell into view, allowing
Cory to see just enough to know the wound wouldn’t be fatal as long
as the bullet wasn’t still in her. She would probably be
incapacitated for the rest of the night, though, and maybe even
Dancer would be right alongside her.

No, CC, you can’t let this happen
!
Gramma said. Cory was certain that the other Duster would take this
moment to kill FancyDancer, but after a moment’s hesitation he
instead saw the short Duster come out of the tunnel. The Duster
paused for a second as the tall one pleaded with him for help, but
instead the short one dropped his gun and jumped up for the nearest
fire escape. He got a hold of it but didn’t quite make it over the
railing, instead flailing for a few precious moments to keep
himself from falling back down.

He’s not in as good of shape as the other
one
, Cory realized. Given enough time as a vampire his weight
would eventually stop being a problem, but for now…

You have a chance to stop him, CC. You
really do
.

He didn’t allow himself time to think out a
plan. If he took the time to think he would instead become
paralyzed by his fear and paranoia and self-doubt. He would
remember that he wasn’t in the shape needed for these kind of
heroics. Instead all he did was listen to that voice inside his
head, that sweet, grandmotherly voice that had always believed he
was something special even when he himself did not. It didn’t even
need to say any specific words. It just needed to be there.

Cory ran to the farthest side of the parking
ramp, took a deep breath that probably wouldn’t help his vampire
metabolism much anyway, and then ran back to the railing. At the
last moment he gave a small hop, just enough to put a foot on the
railing, and launched himself out over the alley.

He wasn’t moving at his full speed. Every
step he had taken to get his running jump had sent a fresh wave up
torture coursing through his body. He ignored it. But as he soared
over the alley he realized that, in his haste, he had made a vital
mistake. He wasn’t normal. He wasn’t human. A human, perhaps, would
have needed the running jump to make it across to the building on
the other side. He didn’t. And even at only a fraction of his full
speed, he looked like he just might overshoot the buildings and go
shooting right into Main Street.

As soon as the realization hit him he stuck
out his arms and legs straight from his sides in the hope that air
resistance would save him. The exact place where he had jumped off
the ramp didn’t help him any. If he had been farther to the right
he would have gone straight for the buildings with their apartment
on the second or third stories, providing something higher that
might have stopped his forward momentum. Instead he had aimed for
the roof of the tunnel at only one story high. A four or five story
drop and going far too fast. He braced himself. It didn’t matter
whether or not he was a vampire. This was about to hurt. A lot.

He hit the tunnel roof feet first and rolled,
trying to dig his fingers into whatever material the roof was made
of in order to keep himself from tumbling out into the street. He’d
thought that the pain he was already experiencing was bad, but
every bone in his body shook with the impact and threatened to
shatter. Despite his condition, however, his body seemed up to this
added abuse. He stopped just short of the edge and almost allowed
himself to drop down flat on his back in relief. Then he remembered
exactly why he had done this horribly stupid thing to begin with
and turned around.

On the building next to the tunnel the Duster
had climbed the fire escape to the roof, but he looked confused,
bewildered, as though he hadn’t thought any of this would get so
far. Cory ran over the tunnel’s arched roof and again jumped, this
time trying to make it up the building’s brick wall and onto the
roof with the Duster. Although he had a better idea of what he was
capable of this time, though, Cory didn’t quite make it all the way
to the top, instead grasping the edge of the roof and making more
than enough noise to let the Duster know he was coming. He pulled
himself up in time to see the Duster running across the rooftops,
his speed far below what should have been typical for a vampire.
There was a possibility Cory could still get him.

He almost slipped once as he pulled himself
up, and the Duster was a good hundred feet ahead of him at this
point. All the buildings on this side of the street were right
against each other and the same height so there was little effort
to go between them. Cory could probably catch him easily. The
Duster seemed to realize this too, because he stopped, looked back
at Cory, and then turned to Main Street.

Oh shit, I just gave him ideas
, Cory
thought. Main Street was hardly narrow. No one should have been
able to make it across to the buildings on the other side, except
perhaps for vampires like FancyDancer that had some practice. The
Duster couldn’t possibly make it all the way across. If he did,
though, Cory didn’t think he would be able to follow and the Duster
would escape to warn the others that they were coming.

I can’t get to him in time to stop
him
, Cory realized. The Duster backed up all the way to the
edge of the roof the way Cory had, and Cory started running for
him.

I won’t make it. He’ll take off before I can
stop him. Unless…

Unless I jump too
.

The Duster took off on his running start.
Cory still had a good fifty feet to go as the Duster approached the
edge. Again he didn’t allow himself to think. That hadn’t served
him very well the last time and it would probably be something he
would regret again, but it was his only shot. Instead of aiming for
the Duster’s current position on the roof Cory angled himself and
hit the edge at the exact same time as the Duster.

The Duster launched himself out over the
street, making an arc far more elegant and graceful than Cory would
have given him credit for. But Cory did the same. He hadn’t had the
time to try figuring out the trajectories correctly, and for a
moment Cory thought they would pass each other in the air, the
Duster continuing on to the rooftops beyond and Cory plummeting
into the street. Instead they came within just a foot or two of
each other, just enough for Cory to reach out and grab the Duster
by the back of his shirt. The Duster made a noise something like a
squeak in his surprise, and then they were both falling.

Instead of going for the roofs or the street
their combined momentums interacting with each other sent them
slamming into the top of a street lamp, with Cory managing to just
barely get the Duster in front of him to cushion the impact. They
both fell the rest of the way into the empty street. Cory landed
hard on his feet and fell on his ass, all the wind knocked out of
him, but the Duster wasn’t so lucky. Cory heard a crack as the
Duster hit. When he finally caught his breath to look up he saw the
Duster lying on the curb, his neck curved at an extreme angle and
his eyes wide but unblinking.

I guess that finally answers that
question
, Cory thought.
A fall really can kill a
vampire
.

As though in response, the Duster’s body
started to blacken in patches and then dissolve into a putrid
smelling black goo.

we rise into the
sky we do not go far. Merely to the top of the hotel, the perfect
place for us to watch all that happens. We are surprised at how
invested we are in the well-being of these plants that the gardener
has allowed to grow wild. We also feel a strange amount of pride in
the way they manage to resist the gardener’s tools. The gardener
will not be pleased at all.

We feel the gardener trying to speak with us
through its public face as we watch the boy return to check on the
two females, yet we resist. For an entity as old as it, the
gardener certainly has very few tricks to use, unlike us. Yet we
cannot say we are surprised. It has grown complacent. It has
ignored the times around it and neglected its own potential,
instead feeding like a glutton on its fruit until its true power is
buried beneath the mountainous heaps of its own cancerous flesh. In
just the short time since we spoke with it we have decided that we
do not like it. Whereas we first intended nothing but to observe,
we now intend to intervene, at least a little.

The boy and the two females speak to each
other at the tunnel, discussing their injuries and what to do next.
We will be disappointed if they choose to retreat, especially given
what we found about the gardener’s plans for tonight after we spoke
with it. But despite their wounds the trio still appear determined
to find the rest of the gardener’s tools and deal with them. That
is good. We will go then to the church and await the final
show.

But we see there is one last thing we must do
first. Already we are helping these three by distracting the
gardener’s face, keeping it occupied trying to contact and stop us
so that it cannot tell its tools what is coming. But as the trio
leave we see that they left the injured tool behind, tied up with a
hasty makeshift rope. We wonder what they think this will
accomplish. Although we just saw the boy kill with our own eyes we
understand it was accidental, an act that the boy did through both
necessity and lack of finesse. They are not killers in their
hearts, these three. It makes us wonder how they will handle
themselves once they see what is ahead tonight. It will complicate
their lives, we think, as well as complicate any intentions we have
to vex the gardener.