The Mourning Woods - 03 (48 page)

My air cut off (can vampires suffocate? Good question. Never bothered to ask about that) as he quickly increased the pressure to the point where I felt my head might pop off.

Ed and Tom appeared by my side. They each grabbed one of Francois’s arms, but they might as well have not even been there for all the good they were doing.

Suddenly Tom grabbed that dopey Optimus amulet still around his neck. He yanked it off and pressed it into Francois’s arm. Way to go, dude!

There was a flash and one of the hands choking me out began to sizzle; however, the pressure didn’t let up. Who was I kidding? This vamp had already shrugged off much worse damage than that today. Oh, well, it was a nice sentiment on Tom’s part.

“Die Freewill!” Francois spat at me, but his voice suddenly sounded far away.

A fist crashed into the side of his head, Sally’s. Unfortunately, she barely moved him. I saw blood begin to spurt over Francois’s arms. Hmm, wonder if it was mine. For some reason it didn’t seem all that important.

I felt all...floaty inside. It was kind of nice. I began to wonder why everyone seemed to be fighting against the friendly man in front of me. He was just doing me a favor...letting me rest comfortably while he...

And then, he wasn’t there. Another fist had entered my field of vision from the other side. It was now where Francois had been just a moment earlier. Before I could see who it belonged to, though, I found myself flopping to the ground, gasping, and holding my now-gushing throat.

Francois was gone, but the damage had been done. I had already lost far too much blood today. I didn’t have any left to spare. The world continued graying out. It was time for a nice long nap...

* * *

Or maybe not. An angel appeared in my field of vision, a pretty blonde angel. Gee, if Heaven was populated with babes like this, I couldn’t wait to get there. Rather than fly me to my final resting place, however, the angel then did something a bit
weird
. She held up her arm and then tore into her wrist with her teeth...her very long and sharp teeth. Did Angels have fangs? Maybe I wasn’t going to Heaven after all. Still, if she was indicative of the demons waiting for me below...that might not be so bad either.

“Don’t fucking argue with me, just take this!” the demonic angel shouted before jamming her arm against my mouth.

Ooh yummy!
I thought, slurping the blood from her wrist, although I could think of other parts I would rather suck on a lot more. This babe was definitely a tasty dish. I couldn’t believe Sally was...wait that was her name, Sally!

The fog suddenly began to clear from my head. I was lying on the ground and Sally was force feeding me her own blood. That was little out of the ordinary. My vision became clearer and I saw not only her, but the worried faces of my roommates looking down at me too.

How the fuck did...oh, yeah! Francois had tried ripping my head off...had done a pretty good job of it too if I remembered correctly. And Sally was...hot damn, Sally was saving my ass. She wasn’t nearly as powerful as some other vamps I had mixed it up with. Still, she was more than twice my age. That meant I would get at least a minor healing boost above and beyond my own abilities. Sure enough, it seemed to be working. I didn’t feel particularly wonderful, but I could sense the worst of the damage beginning to knit itself closed.

I took one last sip from Sally, then gently pushed her arm away. She and my friends looked down expectantly at me.

“I’d have rather been breast fed,” I croaked.

 “He’ll live,” she replied with mock disgust, not even bothering to disguise the smile on her face.

 “Help me up,” I said, my voice still ragged and barely recognizable, but alive...at least in the vampiric sense of the word.

* * *

Chaos had apparently broken out while I had been down. I could no longer see Turd. Just a sea of angry, smelly fur as the Sasquatches converged in a group, angry growls coming from them.

My friends were standing around me, probably making sure I didn’t suddenly keel over again. I turned and took in the rest of the surroundings. Our moderator hung in the air, glowing an angry green color, but otherwise not doing anything...which was probably a good thing. I saw James’s men off to one side in an apparent standoff against Francois’s.

Speaking of which, James had the asshole restrained in a chokehold. A silver dagger was in one of his hands, tightly pressed against Francois’s back. Francois, for his part, wasn’t struggling. Smart. More powerful or not, he wouldn’t have been able to do much before James dusted him. Regardless, a part of me kind of hoped that he would try.

The only one not doing anything was Nergui. Apparently still stuck under Francois’s compulsion, he stood there glassy eyed and unmoving. Even with the attack against me, the compulsion was still too strong for Nergui’s base beliefs to overcome. Oh, well, at least Francois hadn’t been able to compel him to attack me. Glass half full and all of that.

“What happened to not getting involved?” I called out to James once my throat had mended enough to do so.

He smiled and threw me a wink. “Your bad habits must be rubbing off on me.”

“It matters not,” Francois gasped. “I’ve still won.”

The sad thing was he was right. Peace was still the primary mission here. Saving my own ass or not, that didn’t change. Even if his little syrup scheme got disrupted, peace would still mean a significant feather in his cap. He would probably wind up with a seat on the Draculas’ coven, and at that point, I’d have made an uber-influential enemy.

“ENOUGH!” suddenly thundered through all of our minds. It wasn’t quite the same as a compulsion, but it got my attention the same way an air horn to the ear would. If that had been vocal, I’m sure there would be ruptured eardrums all around.

“THESE DISRUPTIONS HAVE BEEN TOLERATED, BUT NO MORE,” our moderator beamed out, again at triple volume. “ORDER WILL BE RESTORED NOW!”

I gave James a nod and he released Francois. It was pretty clear from the warning, that if he tried anything against me, he’d wind up a pile of ashes.

“ALL WILL LEAVE THE FLOOR SAVE FOR THE LEADERS AND THEIR RESPECTIVE PARTIES.” It did not sound like a request.

* * *

It took several minutes, even with the orb’s prodding, for order to be restored. Even then, the crowd continued whispering amongst itself. Turd’s people at first seemed more interested in tearing Turd a new asshole than listening, but at last, they backed off. They resumed their former places at the perimeter, but all kept their angry eyes locked onto their “leader.” Turd’s negotiators, meanwhile, had been replaced. Maybe they had been a part of the whole thing. Who knows? All I could tell was that a new group now sat at the other end of the table, Grulg amongst them.

For his part, Turd looked worried. A picture was beginning to form in my mind of what his share in all of this was. In exchange for letting Francois’s men tap their sacred trees, his technology fetish would be well fed. Before you knew it, Turd and his buddies would probably be all pimped out with Cadillacs, PCs, and big screen TVs. It would be only a matter of time before more and more members of his tribe were seduced by technology. If that happened, within a few years they wouldn’t be all that different from us (in a matter of speaking of course).

“YOU ARE STILL ACCUSED, FREEWILL,” the moderator began. “WHAT SAY THE ACCUSER?”

Oh, boy. Turd could still drag me down with him if he wanted. Peace would be maintained, but they could still demand my head on a platter.

Before Turd could speak, though, Grulg growled something at him in a language I couldn’t understand. The others at the table snarled similar vocalizations.

Turd finally spoke, worry still in his eye. “
Misunderstanding between us...me...and Tlunta Freewill. Accusation dropped.
”

My friends and I let out a collective sigh of relief.

I turned toward the crowd and caught sight of Francois. He noticed me and our eyes locked long enough for me to mouth “
Fuck you
” to him. I then turned back to the negotiating table with a smile on my face.

“THE CHARGES ARE DROPPED AND STRICKEN FROM THE RECORD,” Glow-ball said, thus making it official. Oh, yeah, case dismissed with prejudice! “AN ANNOUNCEMENT WAS TO HAVE BEEN MADE. SHALL THAT TOO BE STRICKEN FROM THE RECORD? IF SO, NEGOTIATIONS WILL CONTINUE.”

Oh, yeah. We were back to that. Damn, didn’t Alex say that peace had taken a year to hash out last time? I was really hoping, now that the drama was over and done with, we weren’t going to be settling in for the long haul. I was starting to jones for a hot shower.

Grulg stood and spoke, giving Turd one last snarl before doing so. “
New treaty invalid
,” he said. Yep, I’d better just change my name to
Tarzan
and get used to living in the wilderness. “
We instead offer Tlunta the Humbaba Accord. We reinstate old treaty as was done by our ancestors
.”

Whoa! That was a surprise...a pleasant one too. I once more sought out Francois in the crowd. The look on his face was priceless. I quickly flipped him the finger. No syrup for you, douche bag. Sure, he’d still likely get a seat on the First Coven, but at least he wouldn’t profit obscenely in the process. A small victory, but I’d take it.

“AN OFFER FOR PEACE HAS BEEN MADE. FREEWILL, DO YOUR PEOPLE ACCEPT?”

I didn’t bother to wait for Francois’s asshole buddies even to open their mouths. Alex had told me I was running the show, so it was finally time to take charge.

“We accept!” I said.

With that, the crowd went wild, except this time it was finally in my favor.

“PEACE HAS BEEN BROKERED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE TERMS SET FORTH IN THE HUMBABA ACCORD...”

Awesome!

“THE EXCHANGE OF VOWS WILL TAKE PLACE IMMEDIATELY TO SEAL THE PACT.”

Vows? OK, I guess we need to pledge ourselves to maintaining the peace. Not a big deal.

“AS WAS DONE BEFORE, SO AGAIN SHALL THE LEADERS OF BOTH PARTIES TAKE A MATE FROM THE OPPOSING SIDE AS A SHOW OF FELLOWSHIP.”

Hold on...What?

“Did he just...”

“I’m pretty sure he did,” Ed said, a smirk starting to work its way onto his face.

“Does that mean...”

“THE MATES SHALL BE SELECTED AND MARRIAGE BONDS MADE IN ACCORDANCE WITH EACH SPECIES’ RESPECTIVE BELIEFS.”

Tom started snickering. “Congrats, Bill. Guess you’re a family man now.”

“Fuck you, dude.”

“Yeah, Bill,” Sally added, not bothering to conceal her mirth. “Have fun staying with the in-laws over the holidays.”

“TURD, YOUR CHOICE?”