Dracul (2 page)

Which makes me wonder if Vlad Dracula really was the son of a dragon.

But of course, I can’t tell any of that to Constantine, or anybody else.

I’m just curious, and I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone by making the subject of my curiosity the topic of my senior thesis, but we can all see how that’s backfired.

Even Constantine can see it. He’s standing here in my kitchen looking at me with…I don’t know. Pity? Concern? No, that’s not quite it. He almost looks like he’s weighing whether he should try to help me, but of course, that’s absurd. That can’t be it.

No matter how much it looks like it.

I clear my throat. “Sorry, I’ve got to get to class.” I tear the bottom bit of paper off the open notebook page and jot my name and number as well. “Can you call me if that’s rabid?”

“I will call you,” Constantine vows with a somber smile.

And behind the smile, he still has that look, like he’s trying to decide…

But he shakes his head, plucks up the baggie, and heads out the front door.

I hurry out a few minutes later, in time to make it to class. It’s not until I turn my phone back on after class and listen to the message from the Diagnostic Testing Lab (whose call back number is identical to the number I called that morning) that I realize a couple of things.

One is that the university apparently doesn’t send somebody to pick up bats—you have to bring them the animal and fill out a form.

The other—and this is the one I probably would have realized earlier if I wasn’t in a hurry and trying to cover up the fact that I’d murdered the bat in question—is that when I called earlier, I left my name and phone number and a brief message about a bat.

I didn’t give them my address.

Chapter Two

My fellow students brush past me as I slow to a stop on the sidewalk, staring at my phone in wonderment.

There’s got to be a rational explanation, right? Like maybe…I don’t know…the student directory has my address. So maybe they looked it up and sent Constantine to get the bat even though that’s not their policy?

No, that’s just weird.

So how did Constantine find me? Does he even know how to tell if the bat had rabies?

The brisk Montana wind whips stray flakes of snow toward my face from the overcast sky. I tuck my head low inside my hood and shove my phone back into my backpack.

As I’m slinging the pack over my shoulder, a grip firmer than the wind tugs my bag free from my hands.

A tall figure in a black parka and blue jeans darts past me, my backpack tucked under his arm.

“Hey! That’s my backpack!” I leap after the bag-snatcher, but he has several strides’ head start.

Still, I’m fast. I need my bag, not just because it has my phone and my books from class, but because it’s mine. Historically, dragons are known for hoarding things. We like our things and we like to keep our things. Even if it’s not gold or treasure, that guy took my bag and I want it back.

So I’m racing down the sidewalk after the dude, planning in my head how as soon as I get close enough I’m going to jump on him and use some of my martial arts moves I’ve never had a chance to try on a person before, when a paunchy middle-aged guy sitting on a bench up ahead stands up and extends his arm just as my bag-snatcher runs past.

Just like that, the older guy is holding my backpack.

I slow my steps, unsure whether I should continue to pursue the bag-snatcher into the busy parking lot beyond, or stop and claim my bag from the helpful balding man.

The bag wins. I didn’t even get a good look at the guy and there are lots of parka-wearing males in the parking lot. Now that none of them are carrying my bag, I’m not even sure which one had it.

“This yours?” The older guy is a little shorter than I am. It’s not that he’s crazy short or anything. I’m just on the tall side, and he’s not.

“Yeah. That guy grabbed my bag.”

The man hands over my backpack. “He followed you as soon as you left the building.”

“What?” I look back at the brick structure I exited after class. It’s over a block away, but there’s a clean line of sight from the bench where this man was sitting to the door I exited.

“The man who took your bag was leaning against the building. When you came out, he followed you. When you slowed down, he slowed down. When you stopped, he took your bag. I saw the whole thing.”

“Did you see what he looked like?”

The man shrugs apologetically. “Ski mask.”

“Seriously?” I glance around and notice at least a third of the people walking past are wearing ski masks or balaclavas. Of course they are. It’s crazy cold out, and the blasting wind doesn’t help.

The older man doesn’t seem at all surprised that the perpetrator had his face covered. “Aren’t you going to check your bag and make sure nothing’s missing?”

“Good idea.” I set the bag on the bench and open the top, eyeballing the contents and verifying my phone’s okay.

The older man holds the bag open wide and peers in with me. “Everything still there?”

“Looks like it. I don’t think he had time to take anything. He was running—”

“Why’d he follow you?” The man still has his hands firmly on my bag, but it’s his gaze that’s holding my attention. His eyes are dark and glinting, boring into mine like maybe there’s a reason that dude stole my bag.

Out of all the people carrying backpacks this morning, the bag-snatcher took mine.

I swallow uneasily. “I don’t know. Maybe because I stopped?”

“He followed you.”

“Everybody left the building about the same time. Maybe he was just following the pack.”

“You should be careful.” The man flashes me an
I’m-just-trying-to-be-helpful
look, revealing a gold tooth on one side of his smile.

I flash him a
thank-you-for-your-concern-but-I’ve-got-this
look and tug my bag back out of his hands. “Thanks for your help. I need to be going.”

My bag securely slung over both shoulders now, I walk briskly back to my house. Weird morning. First the bat, then Constantine, then the question of how and why Constantine showed up in the first place, then the thing with my bag.

I’d like to believe that was a random bag-snatching. Maybe a student low on funds, hoping to hawk a few textbooks in order to make rent. But the old guy didn’t seem to think so, did he?

*

My last class is over by three. Shortly after that, I’m sitting in my kitchen munching popcorn chicken and trying to decide whether I should return the call from the Diagnostic Testing Lab and tell them my bat got away from me, or maybe ask them if they know a guy named Constantine, when my phone rings.

The number is the same one jotted on the notebook in front of me, right above Constantine’s name.

“This is Rilla.”

“Hey, Rilla. It’s Constantine. I’m just calling to reassure you the bat did
not
have rabies.”

Normally I’d breathe a sigh of relief, but, “How do you know it didn’t have rabies? Do you work for the university’s Diagnostic Testing Lab?”

“No.”

“Did you take my bat there?”

“No.”

“How did you know about the bat?” I’ve spun some theories, like maybe that he was tapped into my phone (which is a long-standing paranoia in my extended family), but I’m not going to make any accusations until I’ve heard what he has to say for himself.

“I saw it go in.”

“What?”

“I saw the bat go into your house. I never saw it come out. I wasn’t sure if you cared, but then I thought
I’d
like to know if there was a bat inside my house, so I rang your bell.”

“You rang my bell to warn me about the bat?” I’m reviewing everything that happened this morning. I answered the door and all Constantine said was, “You have a bat
.
”

I’d interpreted his statement as a question, almost a prompt for me to produce the bat. But in retrospect, maybe he was warning me. Maybe the questioning note in his voice came from his uncertainty over whether I’d care to hear his news. I mean, it was a Monday morning and my sleep had been interrupted by the bat. It’s not like my analytical processing skills were in peak form.

But that still leaves one really weird thing.

“How do you
know
the bat doesn’t have rabies?”

“I study bats. That’s how I saw the bat go into your house. It’s very unusual this time of year for bats to be flying around at all, especially outside. They are supposed to be hibernating.”

“The ones inside my house are not hibernating.” I’m still kind of in catch-the-holes-in-Constantine’s-story mode, but I realize what I’ve accidentally revealed as soon as the words are out of my mouth.

Constantine breathes in sharply.

Oops.

Clearly, he realizes what I’ve said, too. “You have more bats inside?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. I mean, I’ve heard things. Maybe I’m just assuming they’re bats.”

“What have you heard?”

“Fluttering. Shrieking. Noises in the attic.” I bite my lip. How do I take back what I’ve confessed? Now Constantine knows about the bats, which my mom didn’t want anyone to know about. But I’m so sick of dealing with them all alone. In some ways it’s a relief that he knows about them. He said he studies them. Maybe he could help me get rid of them. Then I wouldn’t have to call an exterminator.

“May I take a look?” Constantine asks, a note of uncertainty in his words, that same not-sure-she’ll-care tone he used this morning when I opened the door.

But
I
care. I care very much about getting rid of the bats. At the same time, however, I can’t shake the words of the older man who helped me get my backpack back.
You should be careful.

That’s right. I should be careful. I don’t know anything about Constantine, other than that he studies bats, which is weird enough. And he watched one fly into my house, which could just be due to a coincidence of timing, or it could be because he’s been stalking me.

I am not cool with stalkers.

Not even cute ones.

“Why do you want to look at my bats?”

“They should not be active this time of year. Something must be wrong with them.”

“Rabies?”

“No. Bats are very small. Their bodies are quickly ravaged by rabies. You would not be hearing them for long if they had the disease. Besides, this time of year rabies tends to hibernate along with its hosts.” Constantine’s words, I realize, are not the usual Montana flavor. He’s got an accent—well-buried—but distinct. Something sort of Eastern European.

Who is this guy, and what’s he doing studying bats in Montana in February?

“What are you going to do with the bats, if you find them?” I, for one, have not poked my head up into the attic to see the bats for myself. I’ve heard them fluttering and shrieking up there, and I’ve seen enough of them in places like my kitchen to guess with near certainty bats are causing the noise.

For a moment, Constantine is silent. Then he offers, “I could get rid of them for you.”

Be careful.

Right. There are a lot of things I don’t know about this guy. But one thing I do know is that I want rid of the bats. My mom doesn’t want me calling an exterminator, or even letting on to anyone else that there may be bats around. I don’t want to go anywhere near the bats myself.

Besides, what the guy who helped me get my backpack back doesn’t realize is that I’m a dragon. I can take care of myself against Constantine.

And Constantine can take care of my bats for me. It’s perfect.

“When can you come over?”

“Later this evening. They may be most active then. Does eight o’clock work for you?”

“Eight’s great. See you then. Thanks.”

*

Constantine is two minutes early, which is super because by then I’m pacing the house, roving from the upstairs hallway to the front door and back again, stopping to listen now and then, and wondering what’s up with my crazy bats, anyway.

“This way.” I lead him upstairs and stop in the hallway beneath the wood-trimmed rectangle on the ceiling that marks the entrance to the attic. I point to the dangling pull-string. “It’s one of those ladder things—you pull the string, the hatch opens, and the ladder drops down. You kind of have to watch your head. There’s another string at the top for the light. One bulb in the middle of the room.”

“Got it.” Constantine nods solemnly. “You will need to stay back out of the way.”

“No problem.” It’s what I’d planned on doing.

Constantine hesitates, his eyes searching my face. “Before I open the hatch, I want you to go behind a closed door. Bats fly quickly. Stay out of the way.”

“I have no problem staying hidden,” I reassure him.

“Even if you hear…noises. Sounds of struggle. I do not need you to come to my aid. You would endanger yourself. Stay behind a closed door.”

“Right.” I head for the door to what used to be my mom’s room. Technically it still is her room, it’s just that she doesn’t stay here much anymore. “I’ll be in here. You…do whatever you have to do. I won’t come out until you tell me the coast is clear.”

Constantine gives me a sharp nod, but he doesn’t smile or anything. He looks super serious, almost like he’s going into battle. But I don’t really know the guy, so maybe that’s the way he always looks.

Whatever. All I care about is getting rid of the bats.

Once I’m on the other side of the door, both hands on the knob holding it shut tight, my ear pressed to the wood, I hear the sound of the attic hatch opening, and the clunk-a-thunk of the ladder shuttling down.

Muffled thuds, probably Constantine’s steps up the ladder.

Then, nothing.

I’m trying to envision what he must be doing up there. It’s a pretty lofty space, maybe ten feet from floor to beams in the middle, with a sharp slope down on all four sides. A single dormer with a vented window in the front. We don’t keep anything up there, mostly because we travel light and don’t have much stuff to store, and also because of spiders.

I may be a dragon, but I’m not fond of spiders. My instinct, when I see spiders, is to kill them by breathing fire, which might have a negative effect on the resale value of the house, insofar as it might burn it down.

So I avoid the attic.

Still no sounds from above. Maybe he’s being careful with the bats. He never did say what he was going to do with them. Take them home and study them?

It’s not like I care.

There’s a sound. Something low and constant. I press my ear flatter against the door.

Are those voices?