What Kills Me (11 page)

I walked into the field, the long
grass tickling my knees, a breeze catching in my hair. Jerome’s big
runners made me feel like I was wearing clown shoes. I followed a
butterfly in between some trees. It soared on the wind like a kite
with its yellow and black papery forewings and brilliant, royal
blue hind wings. I tracked its journey through the woods until it
spiraled, flew toward me, as if acknowledging my presence, and then
rose into the treetops.

I paused and I felt despair
descend on me. What was I going to do now? How would I survive? To
distract myself, I picked wildflowers: tiny yellow flowers, purple
flowers with spiky petals, blood-red poppies. I gathered tall stems
that looked as if they were topped with a bunch of grapes, and
others covered with white blooms that reminded me of lilies. I
reclined in a ditch softened by dead foliage and listened to the
forest. I imagined my mother in her garden, with her plastic
watering can and her yellow polka-dot gardening gloves. Wanting to
remember every detail of her face, I turned this picture of her
over and over in my mind. I never wanted to forget.
She has a brown spot under her left eye. When she
smiles, she has a single dimple in her right cheek.

Later, I returned to the quiet house
with my bouquet. In the doorway I surveyed the place and decided
that flowers would not help. I needed to clean. I opened all of the
cabinets in the kitchen. They were empty except for dead bugs,
cobwebs, tools, and knives.

Under the sink, I found a hardened
cloth, a half-empty bottle of dish soap, a plastic container, and
random mechanical bits. I pulled the container out, unscrewed the
cap, and smelled the liquid. I coughed. It was some sort of fuel. I
wet the cloth with soapy water and went to work.

I’m like Snow White, doing
housework in the forest for dwarfs. Lucas is definitely
Grumpy.

I cleared the dining table,
wiped the books, and stacked them in a corner. They were in
different languages. I placed Sun Tzu’s
The Art of War
on top of the pile. I
wiped away cobwebs and the coat of dust on the furniture. I cleaned
the floors. I arranged the flowers in two empty glass jugs and
placed them on the dining table and the coffee table. Then I
flopped down on the sofa and rested my feet on the
table.

I must have dozed off. I awoke with a
start when Lucas kicked my feet off of the table. The room was
already dark.

“I must have fallen…”

Lucas bent forward and yanked me to my
feet by the front of my shirt. “Hey!” I said.

“What were you doing?” he
demanded.

“What do you mean?” I said, trying to
pry his fingers from my collar.

“You left the undercroft in the day,”
he said.

“Ow! Let go of me. I left the
what?”

“The cellar, you left in the morning.
Why would you go out in the day? I thought I heard you go outside,
which is inconceivable. Then I heard you making all sorts of racket
up here. What the hell were you doing?”

I wrested my shirt from his grip. “I’m
sorry. I thought you were sleeping. I didn’t mean to disturb you. I
was cleaning.”

“Why?”

“Because I wanted to surprise your
dad.”

“Are you crazy, or just stupid?” He
stared at me. “How did you avoid the sun?”

“I…”

The stairs creaked as Noel emerged
from the basement.

“Whoa!” He exclaimed. His face
brightened. He rested his hands on his hips and took a tour. “Look
at this place. It looks like people live here.”

Jerome closed the trapdoor behind him
and smiled at me.

“And you even picked flowers,” Noel
said.

Lucas scowled at me with narrowed
eyes. “You went outside to get those flowers?”

“Yes.”

“In the day?”

“Yes.”

“How is that possible?” he
asked.

All three turned to me. No one said
anything.

“I don’t burn in the sunlight,” I
said.

Still no one reacted. It was as if I’d
spoken in a foreign language.

“I don’t know how,” I continued. “I
just don’t burn.”

Jerome appeared frightened. He looked
at Noel, but Noel couldn’t reassure him because he also wore a
bewildered expression.

“You’re lying,” Lucas said. He scanned
my body and then the living room. “How did you survive? Did you
have some sort of armor, or…”

His mouth kept moving but he was at a
loss for words.

“I don’t have a magic cape or
anything,” I said.

You have to tell them
everything. You have to explain or they’ll keep looking at you like
you’re a creature from outer space.

“What are you?” Lucas said, his tone
suddenly shifting.

“I’m not sure. I don’t think I was
supposed to be a vampire.”

“Then what were you supposed to be?”
he said.

“Dead.”

I started the story with Paolo. The
air in the room grew dense and humid. I told them about the church,
the well. About Uther, the soldiers and the Empress. Then I told
them about escaping and meeting Noel in the woods.

When I was finished, I sat on the
sofa, trying to interpret the expressions on their faces. The only
one who looked calm was Noel. He spoke first.

“That is quite the story,” he
said.

Please believe me. And if
you do, please don’t deliver me back into the hands of
evil.

“Thank you,” he went on, “for trusting
us with this information. I know that you’ve been through a lot and
it must have been difficult to explain.”

“I didn’t mean to deceive anyone,” I
said, looking at Lucas.

“We understand,” Noel said.

He came around the coffee table and
sat next to me on the couch. He stared into the bouquet of flowers
for a minute. “This cleric that rescued you, did he say how this
could have happened?”

“He just said that this had never
happened before and that the well was filled with vampire
blood.”

“I’ve never heard of anyone becoming a
vampire without the Monarchy’s blessing, without the ritual
process.” Noel looked thoughtful. “Only elders are able to create
new vampires.”

“Why?” I asked.

“It’s to ensure the purity of the
race. As well, a dying human needs to drink a lot of vampire blood
to change. Only elders are strong enough to withstand that much
blood loss.”

“I thought vampires can’t
die.”

“When we’re drained of too much blood,
we risk falling into a state of perpetual weakness. But sunlight
will kill us—well, it kills most of us—and it’s hard to survive a
beheading.”

“If Zee is special, maybe she can
survive even that?” Jerome said.

“Why don’t we test that theory,”
grumbled Lucas.

Noel shot him a look. “Did anyone see
you escape?”

“No. I don’t think so,” I
said.

Noel stood and paced the room. Outside
rain began to fall. “It won’t take very long for the Aramatta to
find her. They’ll search the entire coastline. They’ll track her
here.”

“What’s the Aramatta?” I
asked.

“The Monarchy’s guards,” Jerome
said.

“We’re going to have to move quickly,”
Noel said.

Jerome looked frightened. “What are we
going to do?”

“We have to leave.”

“We can’t just leave our home,” Lucas
said, his voice rising.

“It’ll only be for a short time,” said
Noel. “Until we can figure something out.”

“Why do we have to go?” Jerome
asked.

Noel glanced at me. “Because Zee isn’t
safe here.”

“This is crazy!” Lucas shouted.
“Father, we don’t even know her.”

“Noel, it’s okay,” I said, standing.
“I’ll leave. I don’t want to cause problems.”

“Zee, sit down,” Noel said. “Lucas, we
took her into our home. We agreed to take care of her.”

“I never agreed.”

“Well, I did. I promised Zee that she
would be safe with us.”

“So what? You’re going to risk our
lives for a stranger?”

“What do you propose, son?” Noel
looked intently at Lucas. “That we send her out to be slaughtered?
That we stand by and do nothing when the Aramatta come to kill
her?”

Lucas looked wounded. Without warning
he whirled around and punched the wall. A stone chunk broke off. I
felt sick with fear and guilt. Noel had offered me shelter, and in
return I had brought chaos and disaster into his peaceful
home.

“Don’t worry, Zee,” Noel said. “It’ll
be okay.”

I didn’t believe him.

“I’m so sorry about all of this,” I
breathed.

“It’s not your fault,” he
said.

“Maybe they won’t come here,” I
said.

“They will.”

“How can you be sure?”

“We know them well. We served as their
weapons makers.”

Noel sent Jerome outside to lock up
the workshop and check the property while he and Lucas went
downstairs to gather supplies. Upstairs I did a nervous dance. I
couldn’t stop shaking, fidgeting, pacing. I kept looking out the
windows. They returned with backpacks and weapons. Across his back
Lucas carried two shorter blades, similar to the swords that the
soldiers carried. His father gripped a huge weapon, a sword on
steroids.

“It’s a broadsword,” he said, catching
my bug-eyed look.

“For chopping heads?” I said, with a
weak smile.

“That’s right.”

“What can I do to help?” My teeth were
chattering.

Noel handed me a lit lantern. “You can
light the way.”

“Where will we go?” I
asked.

“Don’t worry about that,” he said. He
gave me a backpack and I put it on.

“Father,” Lucas said. He had gone
rigid. We listened to the rain pelt the roof. Then I heard
something else. I heard the snapping of branches.

Lucas heard it too. He dashed for the
front door and threw it open. As I ran toward the door, I saw
Jerome in the distance. His back was to us as he faced the forest.
His white T-shirt was translucent in the rain.

“Jerome!” Noel shouted.

Suddenly, the forest began to move. It
was as if the shadows of the trees were coming alive. Soldiers
emerged from the murk. The rain fell in narrow slits and splattered
against their leather gear. They pulled their swords out of their
scabbards.

“Jerome!” Lucas screamed. Panic broke
his voice.

God no.

Jerome took a step back. A soldier
approached him with a weapon. Jerome turned as if to run away. The
soldier lunged forward. With one sweep he sliced Jerome’s head from
his body.

I was on my knees, screaming.
Screaming so hard I thought my throat would explode. Lucas’s face
was contorted, grotesque with bared fangs, fighting to break free
of his father. Noel wrestled him back from the door, back into the
kitchen. Noel was shouting, holding Lucas by the neck and shaking
him. It was like we were being wiped away by a tidal wave,
thrashing, screaming, drowning. Everything was noise, thunder,
until Noel grabbed us both and pulled us close.

“Listen to me!” he yelled. “Lucas,
take Zee and run. Do you understand? Run. Go now!”

“No!” Lucas yelled back.

“Go now!”

I stared at Noel. “What about you?” I
cried.

“I’m not leaving you!” Lucas shouted
at his father.

Noel held his son’s cheeks and pressed
their foreheads together. Lucas gripped his father’s wrists and
squeezed his eyes shut.

“GO!” Noel screamed. He threw Lucas
back and spun around, drawing his sword as he faced the
door.

The general was already standing
inside. Six of his soldiers slipped in after him and unsheathed
their own swords.

“Swordsmith,” the general
said.

Noel and Lucas appeared stunned to see
him.

“General,” Noel said. Lucas
bristled.

“Put down your weapon,” ordered the
general.

“Your warriors murdered my page, my
lord,” Noel said. “I have reason to be armed.”

“Do not make me warn you
again.”

“You attacked without provocation. I
demand to know why your soldiers killed my page.”

“You are in violation of the
Monarchy’s laws,” the general said.

“What law?”

“You are harboring an illegal
vampire.”

“We were unaware of any such crime,”
Noel said.

“Don’t play with me, Swordsmith,” the
general growled. He pointed at me. “That creature right there is a
fugitive of the Monarchy. You were preparing to move
her.”