Blood Mother (American Vampires #3)

1 - Little Baby

Before he made you, he made me

It’s three forty-two am when I stumble through the back door of my house smelling of smoke and sex. I am so drunk I forget to take off my Docs and they clunk on every step as I make my way upstairs to my bedroom. On some nights this clunking would be enough to earn a beating from my father, but on this night, it’s not. He’s been drinking for three weeks straight. I haven’t even seen him for days. Heard him, yes—he and my mother are always fighting—but seen him, no.

The basement is his man cave so that’s where he likes to get his booze on. And when he’s on a bender like this, he doesn’t even come up to eat. Sleeps down there too.

I love his benders because while he’s still dangerous when he’s falling-down drunk, his aim is pretty bad. He still tries to hit me, but more often than not he breaks his knuckles on a wall instead of my face.

Sobriety, as far as I’m concerned, is my number one enemy. Both mine and my father’s. When he’s drunk, he’s too busy thinking about himself to care about me. And when I’m stoned, I’m too immersed in my own self-delusions to care about the truth.

Which is that my life sucks and is going absolutely nowhere.

I flop into bed, not even bothering to take off my boots. The room is spinning, but I don’t care. And since I decided to drop out of school so I can hang at Boyd’s house every day, I can sleep in as long as I want.

I moan as I turn over onto my stomach, and then pass out, hoping that my father stays drunk forever.

When I wake, I find myself in a place of emptiness.

But as soon as I think that thought, there is a mist here. Purple, but some gold too. It’s hard to see because there is nothing but darkness all around me, but I can feel it. It cools my burning hot body and feels good on my skin.

“Hello?” a voice says.

I don’t startle. I’m not scared. But maybe I should be? I’m not sure.

“Are you awake now, Echo?”

Echo? I make a face. Though I don’t think I’m really making a face because I don’t think I actually have a body. “Who’s Echo?” Then I’m even more confused. Because that’s my voice and how could I have a voice if I don’t have a body?

“Oh.” The other voice is calm, and low, and kind of seductive. “Oh, I see. You’re…” She falters for words, then tries again. “What are you? I mean, who? Who are you?”

Who am I? I don’t know. So I say, “I’m just me.”

“I think you are Echo.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“Well…” There’s some hesitation here, like this woman is about to explain something to me but doesn’t quite know how to start. “I think you are. In fact, I should just get to the point here, Echo. That’s your name. I should know. I made you.”

“ Made me?” I scoff. “No. That’s decidedly not true.” These words come out automatically and they come out with such certainty, the woman goes silent for a few moments, allowing me to think. To ponder my… conviction. Because how the hell do I know she’s not the one who made me? I have no memory of anything at the moment. I don’t even have a body.

Which, again, is contradictory since I do have a mouth and a voice.

“OK,” the woman finally says. “All right. Well, if it wasn’t me, then who?”

I shrug my shoulders, surprised that I have shoulders to do this. And I’m just about to say I don’t know, I just know it’s not her, when a name comes to me. “Josep did.”

“Josep?” Her response to my answer is filled with both surprise and delight. “Well. I guess I didn’t see that one coming. But who am I kidding? I didn’t see any of this coming. Well, the death. My own death, I mean. I knew that part.”

“You’re dead.” I say these words flatly and with no emotion. “Does that mean I’m dead?”

“Well, death, as it pertains to witches, can sometimes be… subjective? Yes. That’s a good word to describe it. You see, I no longer have a body but I live on in spirit. And isn’t that the only thing that counts?”

“No.” And again, I say this automatically and with a surety I don’t actually feel. Then more words are spilling out. Words I don’t seem to have any control over. “Spirit can’t fuck, witch. Spirit can’t eat, or drink, or feel things.”

The woman scoffs. “That might be true, but a spirit knows that those things—these things that only physical bodies feel—they are…” Again, she struggles for a word.

“You need a thesaurus,” I say, which makes her laugh. “You talk too slow. You come off as very indecisive.”

“Is that so?”

“Finish your sentence. These things—fucking, and eating, and drinking, and feeling—they’re what ?” My words are angry. If they were a color, they’d be red.

“I was going to say they’re inconsequential. Is that a big enough word for you?”

I open my eyes, realize I’m sitting in a pool of glowing lavender water which is located inside some kind of cave, and look at the woman. She is very beautiful, but in an older way. She’s not old, per se. I just know she’s older than me and… well, youth is everything, isn’t it?

She’s wearing a tight red dress that is so low cut, her large, round breasts are spilling out of it. She doesn’t have any wrinkles, her body is perfect, and her eyes are bright. So she doesn’t look old. And now that I think of it, old is the wrong word. I seem to be fascinated with words right now, so I pause here to get it right.

Not old.

Wise.

Yes. She comes off as wise. Which is a good thing to be.

But she’s not exactly… here . She’s mostly intact from the torso up but her legs are a swirling mist of purple.

Witch, she called herself.

But I don’t think so. Maybe, at one time, she was a witch. Just like maybe, at one time, I was a girl named Echo.

“My name is Little Baby.” Once again, these words don’t seem to be my own. “You will call me Little Baby.”

The remnant of the witch smiles and her eyes twinkle. “Oh, that’s adorable. Little Baby. I love it. It actually suits you.”

I ignore her, turning my head to look around the cavern. It’s clearly someone’s home, even though living in a cave is typically a euphemism.

I blink and shake my head. Euphemism? Where the hell did that come from?

Anyway. There’s a lot of furniture here in the cave—couches and chairs, a bed and a desk—so it’s definitely a home.

Whose home? My home?

And then there’s that name again. Josep. This is Josep’s home.

I look down at my body and find that I was right. It’s not all there. I’m in the pool, so for a moment I think that maybe it’s an illusion because of the way the light refracts into the water. But it’s not. I have no legs. I’m a torso, like the remnant witch, but instead of being made up of a swirling mist of purple, I’m made up of water.

Which is the same thing, actually, when you think about it.

A small chuckle forms and then there it is, coming out of my mouth in the form of color. Gold, to be precise.

I feel very smart right now. I mean, refraction? Where did that word come from? I’m not sure, but it does describe the bending of light so I used it appropriately. Anyway. Mist is nothing but water in droplet form.

The magic surrounding my lower body is a concentration of the magic surrounding hers.

Which means I have more power than she does.

Makes sense, since I’m younger and isn’t youth everything?

“What are you, Little Baby?”

I sigh and look back at the woman. Then there it is. The name of what I am comes flowing past my lips, unbidden. “A remnant. Just like you.”

She smiles. “Would you like help out of that pool?”

I look down at the water, then back up at her. “I don’t seem to have any legs. So… no. I think I’ll just stay here.”

The witch laughs. “You can’t stay there, Little Baby. Where’s the fun in that?”

“Are you deaf? I just told you, I don’t have any legs.”

“Come now, of course you do! They’re there. They’re just not actualized yet. You’re in the middle of it. Well, I really think it’s over now. You just don’t know it’s over.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“The actualization. I don’t know what happened to you, but I’ve been around the block, Little Baby. I can take a good guess. You were turned. You used to be a girl called Echo. She was Paul’s favorite, so she must’ve been hanging about when Josep went upstairs. You can tell me all about it later, but for now let’s get you out of that water.”

Then she offers me her hand.

I don’t take it. My mind is swirling with the words she just spoke. You used to be a girl called Echo . She’s right. I know she’s right. But I have no memory of that. Which bothers me. Greatly.

“Come now. Take my hand. I promise, you can get out of the water.”

“Why should I believe your promises?” I’m irritated so these words come out as a sneer. “You don’t have any legs either.”

The witch bursts out laughing. Then looks down at the mist surrounding her lower body. I look at it too, and as I watch the mist fades and her legs appear. Well, not legs, per se, because she’s in a long dress.

When I look back up at her, she’s smiling at me. “There. Legs. Satisfied now? You’re new, Little Baby. And while you do seem to have quite the command of the English language, the magic is something that must be learned. I can teach you.” She pauses here, letting those words hang in the air for a few moments before continuing. “Would you like me to teach you?”

And once again, she offers her hand.

I take it. Because I would like to get out of the pool. I really, really want legs. And the moment our hands touch, there they are. Smooth, and pale, and made of flesh.

The water changes color. The lavender glow subsides. But at the same time, I feel it. Not all around me this time, but inside me.

“That’s it,” the witch says. “You’ve got it now. Stand up. You can do it.”

“Stop talking to me like I’m a child.”

“Your name is Little Baby. Of course you’re a child.”

Reluctantly, I admit she’s right. I am a child. Not in body—I’m in my twenties, at least—but in spirit. So maybe she was onto something about that.

I hate being wrong. At least I think I do.

“Stand up. Baby steps for Little Baby.”

I sneer at her, but she just laughs. Which feels… disrespectful, since clearly?—

“Clearly,” she says, cutting off my thoughts, “you are a powerful thing, Little Baby. But experience is everything, dear girl.”

“Hmm.” I stand up—my legs weak and wobbly, but very much there—and, with her help, step out of the pool. We face each other, nearly eye to eye, and I tip my chin up. “Youth,” I say. “Youth is everything.”

“Spoken like a true child.”

I yank my hand out of hers and walk across the smooth rock towards a floor-length mirror propped up against the side of the cave wall. “You should be nicer to me.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because I’m more powerful than you.”

“Power is only useful if one can wield it, dear girl.”

I don’t say anything back because I have reached the mirror and I’m looking at myself. There’s a hazy mist around my body now, just like it was around hers. Only mine is still two colors instead of one. Lavender and gold.

I’m pale, pale white, and my skin kind of glows, making me almost appear silver. I’m thin, but shapely. My hips are wide and my breasts large. My hair is long and silver. Or maybe lavender, I can’t really tell.

I’m…

“Gorgeous.” The witch is right behind me and she coos this word into my ear. It sends a chill down my spine and my skin prickles up in response. I stare at her in the mirror, our eyes locked on each other’s. Then she gently pulls a thick strand of wet hair off my shoulder and smooths it down my back.

Again, I get the chills.

She’s making me feel weird and I don’t like it, so I step away, out of her reach, and cross the room to put some distance between us. “Now what?” I ask.

Her eyebrows go up. “Now? Well, now, Little Baby, we make a plan.”

“What kind of plan?”

“What kind of plan would you like to make?”

“I don’t know,” I say truthfully. “I don’t really understand what’s happening.”

“You mean you don’t understand what happened . Past tense.”

I shrug up one shoulder. “Fine. I don’t understand what happened so I don’t know what to do next.”

“Well, you’re in luck. Because not only do I have a plan, but I know exactly what to do next.” She says all these words as she takes herself across the room to a couch. Then she sits down, pulling her legs up and tucking them underneath her, getting comfortable. She pats the cushion next to her. “Come. Sit. I’ve been dying to tell someone everything I know about mirrors. That someone”—she pauses to sigh—“is otherwise preoccupied. But you’ll do, Little Baby. You’ll do just fine.”

“And then what?”

“Then…” She smiles at me. And in this smile I see something new in her. Something evil. Something devious. Something sinister. “Then,” she says again, “we’ll plot our revenge.”

“Why would you assume I want revenge? You don’t even know what happened to me.”

“Oh, I can take a good guess, Little Baby. I am no ordinary witch, you see. I am one of them too. I drink the blood. Not anymore, of course. I’m dead. But I was you once. I was… Little Baby, though Josep never called me that.”

“You know him.”

“Of course I know him. Before he made you, he made me.”