'No shit?' Danny asked, a strange grin spreading across his badly scarred features. 'That's just so fucking cool.'
'Watch your mouth,' Julia snapped, glaring at her son. It was such a maternal thing to do that she had a moment of dislocation, as though none of this was happening. It was all impossible. This latest news was only the latest in a string of impossibilities. But the tip of her cigarette burned and the smoke warmed her throat. She was awake and alive. Julia knew the difference between a dream and a nightmare.
Everything that was happening to them was real and true. Danny was
… what he was. But just with those few words, with the rush of instinct she had to chide him for his foul language, snapped part of her mind back into place. He was her little boy, still. No matter what. She had raised him, put band-aids on his scrapes and cuts, comforted him when he had a nightmare. How could she possibly think of him in any other way?
'Sorry, Mom,' he mumbled, averting his eyes.
She reached out and ruffled his thick, curly hair, and gasped when a handful of it came away in her fingers, floating to the floor. 'Dear God,' she muttered, staring at the bald spot that she had created.
'It's okay,' he reassured her. 'It's been falling out pretty steadily for the last few days.' He moved the hair on the floor around with the toe of his sneaker.
She felt the tears well up in her eyes. It took every ounce of her self-control not to break down sobbing.
Clay and Eve entered the kitchen, their focus on Squire.
'How are those eggs coming?' Clay asked.
Julia gazed sadly at her son and slid down into a chair at the kitchen table. Danny kicked at her chair lightly, playing with her, being a brat, but only to remind her of who they were, to let her know he was still there and still himself. She nodded, smiling weakly.
'Eggs?' Squire barked at Clay, flipping a golden brown omelet with a spatula in the frying pan. 'When have I ever merely prepared eggs, compadre?'
Clay laughed pleasantly, and Julia trembled again as she recalled how the handsome man had somehow changed himself into a mirror image of her, her exact doppelganger. How such things were possible she did not know. All she did know was that she was not going to be getting used to them at any time soon. She took another drag of her cigarette, now smoked almost down to the filter, and chose to focus on the kitchen conversation. She was becoming fairly adept at preventing herself from losing her mind. It seemed she had no other choice. What was that old saying? Adapt or die. Her version was a little different. Adapt or lose your marbles.
'A repast fit for a king,' Squire said, flipping another omelet on the burner beside the first.
'If it's anything like that goulash you tried to pawn off on us last fall…' Eve chimed in, drawing a glass of water from the tap.
'That was no fault of mine,' Squire protested. 'I was assured by the butcher that the meat was of the finest quality.' He broke one of the omelets in half with the spatula, flipped it onto a plate and handed it to Clay. 'How was I to know that dog meat was considered a delicacy in his particular dimension?'
Clay sniffed the food on his plate suspiciously and wrinkled his nose as if smelling something foul. Danny burst out laughing beside his mother and she jumped. Laughter had become a foreign sound in this household of late, and she had almost forgotten it existed.
'Are you partaking?' Squire asked, turning to offer Eve a fresh omelet on a plate.
The woman threw up her hands to ward him off. 'I'll pass.' She leaned her head forward and sniffed around the offering. 'Is that.. is that garlic I smell?' She asked him.
The ugly little man smiled mischievously. 'Chopped up nice and fine, just how you like it.'
'Asshole,' Eve spat, and Squire cackled.
Julia didn't understand the joke, unless it was simply that Eve didn't care for garlic. After she'd stubbed out her cigarette in a coffee mug, Squire brought plates for her and Danny and she thanked him, but could not bring herself to eat. Her son on the other hand, ate his own portion and then helped himself to hers as well.
'How long do we give Conan Doyle to find us?' Clay asked as he brought his empty plate to the sink for Squire to wash. The little man now stood atop a chair and was cleaning up, the sink full of hot soapy water.
Eve leaned in the doorway between the kitchen and living room, drinking her water. Danny could not take his eyes from the attractive woman, Julia noticed, and in a way, she could not blame her son. Eve was one of the most strikingly beautiful women she had ever seen, with the body and the fashion sense of a supermodel. In an ordinary woman, it might've made Julia envious. Yet there was something about Eve that made the hair on the back of Julia's neck stand on end. She wondered what her story was, what bizarre secret she kept in order to be associated with the likes of Squire, Clay, and Mr. Doyle.
'We give him as long as it takes,' Eve said, a dangerous edge in her voice. It was clear in her tone that she neither expected, nor would accept, an argument. 'I'm sure he's figured out what's going on by now. We wait for him. Then we'll make a plan.'
Clay stood on the other side of the island across from her and folded his muscular arms. 'And if he doesn't come back? If this Morrigan woman who's taken over the house gets the better of him?'
'I forgot what a bundle of joy you could be.' Eve scowled at him.
'Conan Doyle will come back, don't you worry,' Squire said as he scrubbed a plate clean with a sponge and placed in the strainer to dry. 'It'll take more than that nasty Faerie bitch to put him down for the count.' He turned atop the chair at the sink to look at Julia. 'Pardon my French.'
She was about to tell him that it was all right when there was a thump on the front door. Julia jumped, placing a hand against her chest. She could feel her heart racing.
Eve was the first to react, moving into living room and toward the door.
'Could it be Mr. Doyle?' Julia asked, hoping it was. She had met the man, and whether or not she had to think about their claims about his true age and identity, his presence would be welcome. At least he seemed human enough. But she wasn't sure if she could stand another bizarre stranger the likes of her current guests.
'It's possible,' Squire said, jumping down off the chair, drying his hands with a dishtowel.
Clay remained very quiet and still, positioning himself so that he could watch Eve as she went to the door. None of them moved out of the kitchen, however. Not yet. It took Julia only a moment to realize that Clay and Squire had remained where they were as protection for her and Danny. Yet for some reason, this made her even more frightened.
There came another thump, only this one was much more violent, as if someone or. Heaven forbid, some thing was trying to get inside.
'If it's the Jehovahs, tell 'em to screw!' Squire yelled, and Eve slowly turned to fix him in a menacing stare.
'She doesn't like you very much, does she?' Danny said to the little man.
'It's all a show,' Squire told him. 'She'd be lost without me.'
They all watched as Eve took hold of the knob, slowly turned it, and pulled open the door. Something growled at her from within the shifting red mist outside.
Then it erupted from the bloodstained night, bursting through the doorway.
The vampire lurched into the Ferrick house, arms pinwheeling, trying to regain its balance. It seemed more like the leech had been thrown into the house than any focused attack. Not that Eve cared. The thing was filth. She grabbed hold of the slavering, mad-eyed bloodbag and threw it to the floor, then dropped upon it, placing one knee in the small of its back. She grabbed a handful of filthy hair, yanking its head back toward her.
'Hey Julia, ever seen this asshole before?' she asked as the leech screamed and thrashed beneath her.
The Ferrick woman emerged from the kitchen practically hiding behind Clay. Squire and the demon boy came out after them. Julia shook her head, staring wide-eyed at the vampire. She kept shaking, like at any minute she was going to lose it completely.
'Watch her,' Eve said, eyes narrowed, gesturing to Clay. He nodded.
Eve focused on the leech again. Its stink filled her nostrils.
'Goddamned vermin,' she muttered as she twisted its head around so she could look it in the eye. 'So nobody invited you inside. Must be hurting you pretty bad to be in here,' she whispered in its ear, leaning in close. 'Breaking the rules and all.' Eve felt the bone structure within her hand begin to shift and change, fingers lengthening, nails elongating. She didn't need a wooden stake to slay the vampires of the world. Everything she required was at her
