Chapter Eight
“Ithink we stopped the destruction of Pine Ridge and all, but Penny’s out. Like, fainted, and twitching, and she’s not red anymore, she’s pale as one of us.” Brax shouted into his cell phone as he lay Penny on the couch.
Her apartment had damp, glistening walls, but her thermostat now read a sensible number in the seventies. He wouldn’t have known he was looking at a site of near death—if not for the moaning blonde with a bloody hand.
Mr. Minegold’s voice was grave. “Her fever was supernaturally induced, and now it’s broken—if the spell is—and it seems to be. The Kane brothers and a team of witches are out thawing the roads now.”
Brax couldn’t give a toss about the roads. “Well, what do I do with that? If it’s broken, she should feel better, not worse.”
“I wish I had answers for this, but I don’t. I would guess her human form has suffered from a fever that would cause seizures or even death.”
“And then she was out in the cold just now, in next to nothing, ‘cause—well, never mind, it worked.”
“Oh, goodness. You’ve got to regulate her body temperature.”
“You’re asking the wrong fucking person to do that!” Brax snarled. “I’m coming up to room temp, and she’s... Well, she’s pale but still hot.”
“Get her into a tepid bath, and keep her head above water. Get fluids into her. If this were pure heat stroke, I’d say a cold bath, but this is so far from normal—yes, dear, the eggnog is on the second shelf.”
“Are you having a party in the midst of all this?” Brax gaped as he rushed to the fridge. Penny had drunk anything liquid. He started filling cups with water from the tap. At least it didn’t bubble out steaming any longer.
“Our town has survived. Can you think of a better time to party? Besides, I already had my grandchildren over when all this occurred. I imagine the carol service will start an hour late, so no harm done. And if you’d like to come tomorrow for Christmas lunch...”
“I might. Maybe. I don’t know. What else do I do?”
“I’m already asking Farrah and Madge. If there’s something that’ll cure a magical infection, they’ll know it and have it over at Penny’s in a few minutes. That’s one benefit of living in a place like this.”
Brax grunted and hung up.
He knew someone else who could probably make sure Penny was okay.
Marietta. What about my soul for the girl’s life? If he thought it, would she come? What if he said it out loud?
Are you going to die for some little human?
He looked at Penny, half-convulsing on the couch.
For that little human—yes. Oh, shit, yes, I would.
“When’s the last time—you ate?” Penny whispered.
“Pen! Oh, baby, you’re speaking! You’re awake!”
“I know. I feel like I had the flu. Like I still do. And I’m bleeding all over the carpet,” she slurred.
“I’m gonna get you in a nice tepid bath and get lots of fluids in you, and you’ll be right as rain in a bit.”
“Yeah. Okay. We didn’t die?”
“No.”
“When did you last eat?”
“I don’t know. Earlier.”
“Well, I’m leaking, it seems a pity to waste it,” she muttered, trying to sit up. “Oh, nope. Not happening, yet.”
“I’ll find you a bandage. Let’s get you in the tub.
” Brax smiled, trying to stay steady. What little blood he had left in his system was running out, even though a drop of Penny’s blood had helped him more than a quart of animal blood, and the demon would subsist on will alone.
Subsist meant “not turn into a pile of dust.” It didn’t mean a lot else.
His body, while no longer meeting the qualifications to live in the freezer section, had also run out of the vampire equivalent of adrenaline.
Everything twinged and pulled, like aftershock tremors following an earthquake.
He hoped he didn’t pass out on Penny. It wouldn’t look very heroic, nor helpful.
“You don’t have to pick me up!” Penny protested, eyes latched onto his face. “You look wobbly.”
“I’m fine.” He scooped her up, keenly aware that her fluttering eyes were still zeroing in on his faltering smile and catching the way his eyes twitched in panic before he could hide it.
Doesn’t miss a trick. One of the few humans in these parts—or in the world—with any damn sense of self-preservation.
“What happens if a vampire runs out of blood?” She frowned. “Did you tell me?
“Probably, sugar, but who knows what you remember. Your brain was damn near deep fried.” Brax tried to laugh. “Don’t you worry. It’s nothing good.” Skeletal body. Sunken eyes. Withered skin. Weakness. Marietta’s dream for him, of course.
“But you can’t get blood if you hurt someone?”
“No, I’ll get the metaphysical blow to the head times ten. Although maybe if Marietta’s kicked the bucket, her curses have gone with her. Still—I wouldn’t go about getting blood the same way as I used to. I’m not sold on hurting any tasty little humans, so you don’t need to worry.”
“But when I was biting you, you liked it.”
Brax stumbled, partly because of her words and partly because of the weight of her on his suddenly weak arms. “It felt good. It can.”
“It can?”
“If you want it.”
“I’M FEELING BETTER.” Penny tried to smile as Brax put her on the edge of the tub. Her muscles disagreed. They convulsed painfully, like runner’s cramps and charley horses were invading every part of her.
Brax didn’t call her on her lie. She supposed that she was better—comparatively.
“Called Minegold while you were ‘napping.’ He said that you had a triple whammy of a magical infection, the human body’s response to a fever, and then the aftermath of exposure—standing in an icy blizzard in next to nothing.” Brax ended in tones that sounded a lot like scolding.
“Yeah, that’s not a good thing.” Penny shivered and shuddered.
The world was woozy again, and her body was.
.. what was the word? Refracting? Recoiling?
Maybe ricocheting! Ricocheting, yes, bouncing from being boiled like a live lobster to settling into normal temperatures, hissing and pinging like a radiator cooling down.
Brax, on his knees, leaned heavily on the tub. “Just warm enough,” he muttered.
Penny looked at him. No more blue and black lines, thank God. But now... He was a uniform chalky color, with gray hollows on his face. “You burned up a ton of energy trying to stay warm. Trying to save me and everyone else.”
“It’s like that. Vampires don’t ‘digest’ food as much as they just convert it into energy.”
Penny nodded slowly and slipped out of her boots, legs sending up distress signals even from that. She let her coat fall to the floor with a twitch of her shoulders. “What happens... What happens if you drink the blood of someone who is sick?”
“What kind of sick?”
“Like a fever?”
Brax jerked his head towards hers. “You’re too weak for that.”
“I’m not! You can barely stand.”
“I can if I have to!”
Penny reached for him. It was odd to reach for someone—anyone, but especially a monster, a very recently reformed and possibly very untrustworthy vampire. “You could get the bad blood out of me. I could feed you. We could both get better.”
“Penny... Penny, I can’t do that.”
“I could cut my finger again?”
“It’ll hurt you. Not the finger!” he cut her off before she could finish, “The giving blood when you’re weak.”
“You won’t take much. We don’t want you to get sick.”
Brax hesitated, then returned the gesture of reaching for her, cupping her cheek. “You don’t want that, lover. It’ll turn you against me in your head. I’ve been the good vamp, the vamp who can’t bite, who doesn’t feed from humans anymore. If that changes—”
Penny staggered to her feet abruptly and aimed herself at the bathroom mirror, where a cloud of misty, normal steam was just kissing the surface of the glass. Her uninjured finger began darting and dragging.
I trust Brax. With my life.
He trusts me with his.
“Is that true?” she demanded, not looking at him.
“Yes.”
“Am I being stupid? Is this just how you got the others back before you were cursed? You acted like you’d die for them, you started off irritating as hell, and then turned into this patient, noble person?”
“I don’t know about patient, but I know about how I used to be.
I was never, ever noble for anyone, not even Marietta.
I protected her because it suited me. And, well, protecting you suits me, too.
But I suppose saving the rest of the town, which I couldn’t give a piss about, that might have been a little bit noble. ”
“Then the truce is still in effect. If you were doing this to hurt me, it’d hurt you, and I don’t want that to happen.”
“I remember that. You were carrying on at me something fierce about not wanting me to even give myself an itty bitty cut.”
“Because... Because when you think you love someone,” Penny slid to the tub again, sitting right beside him, her naked body pressed to his clothed one, “you can’t bear to think of them being hurt in any way, especially not because of you.”
“When you think it, hmm?”
“When you want to believe it, but you’re afraid it’s all part of a fever dream.”
“You seem way more lucid now.”
“Yeah. Just freezing and burning by turns, and aching everywhere.” She snuggled in as he immediately pulled her close and slid his coat around her, covering her under a leathery wing of fabric. “But my mind is clear. How’s yours?”
“Crystal.”
SHE SAT IN THE TUB and watched him unveil his body like a sculptor showing off a glorious new work in marble.
He seems paler than he was a minute ago. Losing a layer, even in this warm bathroom, makes him colder. And I’m not Ms. Hot Water Bottle anymore. This house isn’t the equator.
Cobalt and ink trails were running across his chest, larger veins showing up, more pronounced than the ones that had faded from his face and fingers.
Penny stared, following the map from a silent heart to an alabaster hip. A maze. So many veins, the body has so many veins, little highways of life that we never see...
I saw so much of Brax today. He saw so much of me. He shows me so many things. I told him so many things.
He listened. Held me. Good friend. Her body trembled, but it was nothing compared to the sudden vibration in her chest. I let him in. Took him inside me. He did the same thing. Let me in.
“Get in,” she demanded, and grabbed his hand with surprising strength for a sickly, feverish woman.
He obeyed, and there was a splash, and a sudden burst of energy from two weak people, jostling for position, finally finding themselves kneeling, tongues sparring as they seemed to try to devour each other.
“So warm. So good,” Brax moaned.
“Yeah. You are.”
Well, that brought a swift end to the proceedings. Brax reeled back, would have broken contact if she hadn’t stubbornly retained her grip on his arms. “What did you say?”
“You’re good. Good to me. You help me. Good friend.”
Brax looked at her. “You’re not entirely well.”
“You just now noticed?” Penny laughed harshly.
“I mean... You can trust a person without saying they’re good.”
“Are you saying you’re not?”
“I’m saying... I’m willing to try, but I don’t want you to get disappointed that I’m not always like this. Not always as good as I should be. Then, you’ll think I failed—and you’ll leave.”
Penny’s eyebrows jumped up to her hairline. “There’s some tragic backstory there, isn’t there?”
“Something about a girl leaving a poor boy for a rich man, so he got into a card game that put him in way, way over his head.” Brax tapped the white scar on his neck.
“Ohhh, I bet there are more details, too... But I don’t need them all. I’m not leaving as long as you’re trying—and the only one you bite is me. If I like it, that is,” Penny added hastily.
“I won’t do things you don’t like.”
“That’s one of the reasons I trust you. Kiss me again?” Penny smiled up at him, eyes fluttering shut.
“Kiss you forever, if you’ll let me.”