35. Ari
Ari
It isn’t that I don’t believe what Brody overheard.
It’s that I do believe it and I don’t want him to freak out.
I’ll have to do some digging, find out what is really happening here.
It must be a small splinter group who engage in this most illicit of sports.
It would be far too big a scandal if anyone found out.
Especially if there was even a hint of this leaked to the press.
Vampires have a bad enough reputation as it is, this would smash the fragile truce my species has made with the humans to smithereens.
Andrei, for all his terrible views and history of doing especially onerous shit, does have one redeeming quality; he’s opposed to the hunt mentality which has plagued our kind for centuries.
There’s no need for us to hunt. For food we have Sanguis which is actually more thirst quenching than human blood, and for pleasure – if bloodletting is the kind of thing you’re in to – there are hordes of willing humans who will line up and beg you to take a little sip.
Hell, if you just like the thrill of the hunt itself, try that fake scent hunting.
Or just take up fell running. Whatever takes your fancy.
Only those vampires who are sadists would hunt humans.
I’m still mulling things over when I spot a familiar face in the crowd.
He’s tall, especially by vampire standards, with a shock of very dark curls.
Teddy Johnson is younger than me by about five decades, but he used to hang with me and Kitty Marion and the others when he was barely out of his teenage years, with his smooth waxy newbie face and an absolute conviction in what is right and wrong.
I wouldn’t put him amongst this group of traditionalists.
Teddy raises his hand in greeting when he sees me watching him.
He’s talking to an older woman, one who looks like she’s almost seventy.
I do the mental maths. That isn’t possible, there are no vampires older than five hundred.
Unless… Is it possible she’s one of the Twelve?
The first vampire, the one who made a pact with the devil and cursed my species, turned twelve people.
People who had been alive and became vampires.
They are the parents of all the others, the Adams and Eves of my kind.
Teddy appears at my elbow. “Long time no see, Ms Haywood.”
“Hey Teddy. It’s been a while. This is Brody. Brody this is Teddy, he’s an old friend.”
“Pleasure,” Teddy says and tips his head in greeting. There is no attempt at a hand shake and I sigh inwardly in relief.
“Was that...?” I motion towards the old woman who is now talking to Mrs Gallagher, a wizened old hand stroking her cheek.
“Marjorie? Yep.”
“Wow.” I don’t know what else to say.
“My grandmother and Marjorie are friends. They go way back.” He flashes me a smile.
And then I notice it. The small pin on his lapel, so subtle I might not have notice. “I wouldn’t have pegged you as a trueblooder,” I say, trying to stay polite and not sound like I’m calling him a cunt to his face.
“Of course.” He says it like we didn’t spend years fighting for progress together. He must see the look on my face. “Did you really believe it all, back then? All that ‘women should have the vote’ schtick I did?”
“I…” but I don’t reply, because yes, yes I did believe it.
He throws his head back and gives a horsey laugh, almost a bray. “You are adorable. It was all just an act. Too good an opportunity to meet plenty of horny young suffragettes.” He winks at me and I throw up a little into my mouth. “You know what I mean, don’t you Brody?”
Brody looks panicked. “Umm…” he glances briefly at me. Help me screams from behind his eyes.
“Well, it’s been lovely to catch up,” I tell Teddy and take Brody’s elbow. “But Brody and I really need to mingle a little.”
“Of course. It was a pleasure to see you, Ari. And to meet you, Brody.”
I pull Brody away from him.
“What a creep,” Brody whispers in my ear as we head towards the safety of the far corner.
A waiter comes round with a tray of cut glass tumblers half full of a pale liquid, ice chinking as guests grab one.
“What’s this?” Brody asks him.
“Alba,” comes the rather flat reply. He’s obviously human and evidently more than a little bored with all our vampire bullshit.
“Oh.” Brody takes two and hands one to me. “Thank—”
But Brody is cut off by the waiter who has taken a step backwards, tripped, and is now falling, as if in slow motion. Brody grabs for him and I swoop in to rescue the tray of drinks.
Brody pulls him up, the waiter’s eyes like saucers.
“Are you OK?” I ask. He looks like he’s about to go into shock.
The waiter just stares at Brody. “OMG. You’re…” but he trails off.
I look down and see that he’s still holding Brody’s hand. Brody’s very warm, very obviously human, hand.
We all stand there, no one moving, no one saying a word. It’s awkward as all hell.
Eventually the waiter breaks the stalemate by cocking his head and looking intently at Brody. “You’re dressed like one of them,” he whispers.
“I am one of them,” Brody replies.
“No, you’re—”
“I am one of them,” he repeats, a little slower and a little more forcefully this time. I half expect him to tap his nose in that annoyingly all-knowing way.
“Oh. I see.” The waiter obviously does not see but what else can he possibly say.
“Well, I’d better, um…” I hand him the tray.
“Thank you.” He scurries off, looking back over his shoulder one more time to check if this whole bizarre exchange really happened.
I bare my fangs at him and he almost falls over again.
I don’t like to show my teeth, especially to normies, but I need him to know that I, at least, am a vampire.
Maybe he’ll think he just mis-read the warmth of Brody’s touch.
Or maybe he’ll just be too scared of me to do anything with the ripe little nugget of gossip he’s just discovered.
Either way, I need him to keep his mouth shut.
“That felt a little too close for comfort,” Brody says as he sips the drink that’s still in his hand.
I take a sip of my own. “Yeah.” There isn’t really anything else to say.
“This drink is really…” he makes a face like a dog sucking on a bee.
He isn’t wrong. Alba is bitter and strong and has very few redeeming qualities.
Vampires only drink it because there’s an old wives’ tale that says it makes blood taste all the sweeter, so for centuries this was served everywhere vampires and humans mixed in the hopes the humans would eventually fall in love with it and make it a staple of their own diets.
“Do you like it?” he asks.
I shrug. “It’s a bit of an acquired taste.” I drink the rest and watch as he also finishes his, even though he looks like he might bring it back up at any moment.
The waiter wanders past us again and I swipe another two glasses. The first has gone to my head a little and I’m feeling almost tipsy.
He chinks his glass against mine. “Well, when in Rome and all that,” he says and then drinks it in a single gulp. “Jesus,” he hisses.
A string quartet has set up in the corner of the room and now they begin to play. “We should dance,” I tell him, looking around at all the other guests who are shuffling towards the open space at the centre of the room.
The tempo is slow, almost languid, and we begin to sway gently.
I can smell him, his cologne is woody, but it’s faded, no longer capable of overpowering the natural scent of him.
He’s holding me gently, one hand on my waist, the other cradling my hand.
And then he leans closer and the world around me disappears. I want to crawl inside his skin.
But then I realise. It’s the Alba. I pull away. Not here. Not like this.
Not when all I want to do is sink my teeth into the soft skin at the base of his neck, plunge them into his flesh and drink from him.
I feel like I’m on fire. Burning for him. Desperate for a taste of him.