30 Days of Night: Fear of the Dark

16

ROSE WATCHED THE HEAD roll away, its thin rope of tied hair flapping at the floor. Then she looked back at Marty. His right arm hung limp and useless by his side, but she knew the healing would already be starting. His clothing was shredded by Duval’s brief, vicious attack. His throat was raw and torn. The Bane swung from his left hand, heavy and bright in the poorly lit room. Every particle of light in there seemed to be reflecting from the wet blood around the object’s edge.

He looked down at the Bane and seemed hypnotized by its weight.

“Oh, Marty,” she said again, because her little brother was no more.

To her left, Patrick sat down, and she heard his body relaxing in relief. His mending would come, but it would be long and harsh. To her right, Francesco took one faltering step toward Marty. Stella Olemaun’s words echoed back at her once more: The balance is being challenged all the time, and that thing could tip it either way. And she knew what she had to do.

She sensed the Humains’ surprise as she darted to Marty’s side. He looked at her with wanting eyes, and she felt a surge of sadness. She touched his face and felt the strength in him, simmering below the shock. Then she shoved him backwards, snatched the Bane from his hand, and ran.

Rose was out of the door before she heard the first startled shout. It came from Francesco, and it was more a question that anything else: “Rose?”

She didn’t answer, because he’d know what she was doing.

Through the corridors, up the stairs, past the bodies, the thing clasped in her hand weighed heavily but gave her little else. There was no sense of complete power, no idea that this object could project her to the head of a vampire army or give her the power to be the greatest of vampire killers. It was just an old thing, buried and dug up, and now requiring burying again. Because though the thing itself might not hold the powers attributed to it by legend, the pursuit of it could lead some way toward realizing what those legends promised.

Around her in the British Museum, bodies both vampire and human awaited discovery. She knew that Francesco would be compelled to take care of them before coming after her, and that gave her time. It gave her plenty, plenty of time.

She left the museum the same way she had entered, moving swiftly through the shadows. The feeding had enlivened her. The fight had made her senses sing. Her wounds would be extreme for a human, but she could feel the itch of their healing already: her torn-off nose was re-forming, slashed flesh mending, bones knitting. Being out in the night air felt good. The farther she ran from the museum, the more she came to realize just what they had done.

It would be faster if she descended into the tube, but there were no shadows to hide in down there in the trains. Pausing outside a closed shop, she examined herself in the window, checking the wounds, confirming that she was still far too damaged to show herself in public. She smiled at her image. Lee might still have believed that vampires showed no reflection.

She had no idea what his intentions had been past tonight, but she chose to think of him as brave.

The fight in the museum had lasted less than half an hour, though it had felt much longer. Francesco and the others would be clearing up, retrieving every trace of vampire involvement. They’d take the bodies down deep, and burn them in the hidden roots of the city, close them into a subterranean room as the flames took hold and scorched away any trace of fused bone, undead flesh, and fang.

The night was young. Rose had plenty of time to reach her destination.

By dawn, she had healed. She descended into the tube system and sat amongst the human beings, staring down anyone who dared catch her gaze. No one lasted more than a second. Some of them picked at lint on their suits or examined their fingernails, and others looked into the middle distance with a distracted frown twisting their features.

She’d stolen some clothes from a shop, washed in an abandoned flat; her worst injuries were now little more than pale pink patches on her skin. Amongst the strange and stranger of London, she was just another curiosity.

She made her way down into the depths, not rushing, not dallying. Her hands were empty. She carried only the slight concern at what her brother had become, and what had been taken away from him.

Patrick met her in the short tunnel approaching their chamber. He was on guard, as quiet and unseen as ever, though she could see that his healing would take a lot longer than hers. He could walk, but his head still turned to the side, and his left eye was almost closed. The left corner of his mouth hung down, permanently exposing the teeth in his bottom jaw. He nodded at her, she smiled, and they entered the chamber together.

“Rose,” Francesco said, and he did not even glance down at her hands. He was old and wise, and he had not become their leader for nothing.

“Where’s Marty?” she asked. Francesco nodded into the far corner, and she saw the shape hidden under a pile of blankets and old coats. All she could see of him was his hair, long and greasy, untended. Marty had always washed his hair every day.

She knelt by him and pulled a coat aside, and he was looking directly up at her.

“Hi,” she said. He did not reply. “You knew it had to be hidden away, didn’t you? All the time we were looking for it?” Still no reply. “I’m sorry this happened to you.”

Marty blinked slowly.

“We got them back for Mum and Dad,” she said. “There’s that too.”

Marty’s lips parted. It was not a smile, nor an attempt to speak. If anything, he was just showing her his teeth.

“He hasn’t spoken at all,” Francesco said. “Caught a rat on the way down and fed from it. He’s been over there ever since.”

“Did he help you?”

“Yes. Patrick couldn’t really, so… Yes, he did. I didn’t even need to ask.”

“What did you do with the bodies?”

“Buried them deep. What did you do with the Bane?”

She glanced back at Francesco and smiled.

“Did you feel anything from it?” he asked, and he was trying not to show how keenly he needed to know. “Anything at all?”

“No.”

“Everything’s changed,” he said. “With Lee gone, we’re blind. We won’t know if others are coming for it. I doubt Duval worked alone. And we might not even know if it’s found, not unless… not until…”

“Francesco, it’s just a lump of metal,” Rose said. That closed the conversation, and she sat by her brother’s side. He was staring up at her still.

After a long time, Marty asked, “Where is it?”

“Somewhere no one will ever find it. Somewhere safe.”

“I’m so hungry, it hurts.”

“I’ll help you through,” she whispered. “The first weeks and months are… strange. Sometimes a trial. The hunger is strong, and it gets stronger from time to time.” She thought of the suit, and his terrified eyes. “But I’ll help you, little brother. Help you be strong. I’m your guardian angel, after all.”

That morning, there was no blood to wipe from her hand. Ashleigh Richards woke as ever, with her left hand hidden away beneath the covers, waiting to be exposed. She hated this moment every day, but she was used to going through with it. The smear of blood, the washing, the cloth to wipe it off should the stain appear again during the day. But today there was none, and she sat up in her bed for a very long time staring down at her unblemished skin.

She went about her business, but there was something lighter in her step. A weight had lifted. The memory was always there, and it always would be. In her more detached moments, she knew that she had gone mad, though she also knew that the madness had been brought on by something removed from her, not some malformation inside. But today, she felt better than she had in…

In a long time.

It was midday before she stepped to the front door and opened it, gun in her right hand and hidden behind the door. In the street, there were no faces. She dropped the gun and stepped outside.

The sunlight felt very good on her skin. The idea of walking struck her, and it was no longer terrifying. Yes, something had definitely changed.

Given time, and if the blood stayed away, she thought perhaps she might even welcome the night.