I’d heard of Arval, but I’d never met him before. I thanked the Mariner, and we started to go.
“Wait!” he said desperately. “I have a tale to tell thee!”
“Sorry, but we’re rather busy at the moment,” I said and started to pull Devona away from the old man’s table. Once he got going with his story, there was no stopping him.
Devona resisted and stood her ground. “We really are too busy to stay, but why don’t you go on over and tell her?” she said, pointing to Glassine. “I’m sure she’d be glad for the company.”
The Mariner glanced over at the Transparent Woman, and for the first time since I’d known him, he broke into a smile.
“Thanks. I think I’ll do that.”
“Not until I’m done with my meal, you old fart!” the albatross squawked.
The Mariner gave the undead bird a solid thump on the head to quiet it. “That’s old salt, featherbrain.” He gave us another smile and a nod, picked up the plate with his bird’s meal, and started toward Glassine’s table, walking with a rolling seaman’s gait.
I looked at Devona and she shrugged.
“So I’m sentimental,” she said. “Sue me.”
“I can’t. No lawyers in Nekropolis. They’re too scary even for this city.”
Devona and I made our way over to the Arvel’s table. Given the way they eat, ghouls tend to run to fat, but this specimen was the largest I’d ever seen. His face was practically all jowl, his thick-fingered hands so swollen they resembled flippers. He was bald, as all ghouls are, male and female alike, and he had the same eyes- completely black, no white of any kind. His fleshy lips were ridged like a reptile’s, and his mouth was lined with double rows of tiny piranha teeth, top and bottom.
Ghouls normally go naked, and Arvel was no exception. We were saved, however, from having to gaze upon the entirety of his body by a large drop cloth that was spread across his chest and belly, a cloth covered with bloodstains and gobbets of partially chewed meat.
Arvel was so huge that he had to sit in a specially constructed chair made of steel and bolted to the floor in front of a cherrywood table which had been cut in a half moon in order to accommodate the vast spill of the ghoul’s stomach.
Vermen waiters tended him constantly, bringing him a steady stream of meat and blood which they shoved and poured into his mouth. Arvel chewed and swallowed, his flipper-hands resting on the tabletop, unneeded. I wondered how long it had been since he’d last lifted them. Quite some time, I suspected.
His moist black eyes were fixed on the big screen TV and the image of a buxom young English actress who was succumbing to the satanic charms of Christopher Lee’s Dracula. He didn’t take his gaze off the movie as we approached his table.
“Excuse me,” I began.
“Shhh!” he admonished, a bit of bloody meat falling out of his mouth and sticking to one of his upper chins. “Forgive me, but this is the best part!”
Christopher Lee made his move and the girl swooned as Dracula put the bite on her.
Arval let out a wet, bubbling chuckle. “They always react so melodramatically when he bites them. A ghoul wouldn’t waste precious eating time on such carnal preliminaries.” He looked up and saw us for the first time. “Pardon me for speaking so crudely, Miss. I didn’t realize a lady was present.”
Devona didn’t respond. Vampires and ghouls, despite their dietary similarities, don’t get along too well. Vampires consider ghouls disgusting mistakes of Unnature, while ghouls view vampires as little more than walking leeches with an unholier-than-thou attitude. I tend to agree with both sides.
“What can I do for you two fine people this glorious Descension Day?” Despite his appearance and physical mannerisms, Arvel’s voice was smooth and cultured, as if he’d OD’d on Masterpiece Theatre. Even so, he didn’t stop his gluttony to talk to us, but rather continued speaking his refined words through mouthfuls of meat and blood, spilling liberal amounts onto the drop cloth as he conversed.
I introduced us, and his lamprey mouth twisted into a delighted grin. “Your reputation proceeds you, Mr. Richter! I’ve heard quite a bit about your exploits, but I never thought I’d be fortunate enough to actually meet you!”
He clacked his teeth together twice, and a verman scurried up.
“Bring chairs for my friends,” he ordered, his tone cold, completely devoid of feeling. When the rat-man had scampered off, Arvel was once again the gracious host. “Carbuncle will be back momentarily. While we wait, would either of you care for a beverage?” He smiled sheepishly, suddenly embarrassed. “Forgive me, Mr. Richter, I forgot that you have no need of nourishment. But surely you won’t pass up a tankard, Ms. Kanti? We serve the best blood in Nekropolis. It’s the real thing, too. None of that horrid aqua sanguis for us here at Krimson Kiss.” His smile widened, and I could see bits of flesh caught between his tiny sharp teeth.
Devona didn’t say anything at first. I don’t know if it was because she was too disgusted to answer, or whether she was actually thinking it over. After all, she was a half vampire.
“No, thank you. I fed earlier.”
I hadn’t seen her drink any blood during the time we’d been together, and I wondered if she was lying, or if perhaps she’d managed to sneak a quick snack while we were separated at the Cathedral.
“Pity,” the ghoul said. “You don’t know what you’re missing.” A verman hurried up with a full tankard. Arvel opened his mouth and the rodent poured the gore straight down his gullet. The ghoul didn’t even have to swallow.
Carbuncle returned then, carrying a pair of the simple wooden chairs that everyone else in the place but Arvel was using. The rat-man set them down at the table, took a few steps back, and waited for more orders, his whiskers twitching nervously.
Devona looked at me and I nodded. I wasn’t feeling especially sociable, but my years as a cop taught me that sometimes it’s better to go along with the program if you want to loosen someone’s tongue. We sat.
Arvel was brought another mouthful of meat followed by a mug of blood. As he devoured them, I said, “This is certainly an…interesting place you have here.”
He belched loudly. “Pardon me. Yes, it’s quite nice, isn’t it? Though I dare say that has everything to do with my delectable Sweetmeat. Dr. Moreau over at the House of Pain created the dear thing for us, using a combination of vampire and shapeshifter DNA, mixed with a few special ingredients of his own, of course. The Sweetmeat’s wounds heal almost instantly, and it quickly replaces the flesh and blood it’s lost-as long as we keep it well fed with the special nutrient solution the good Doctor developed. For all intents and purposes, the Sweetmeat is immortal. It will live-and taste delectable-forever.” Arvel shook his head, or rather, wobbled it from side to side a fraction. “Whenever I take another delicious bite of the Sweetmeat, I wonder why some of the Darklords are so against importing human technology from Earth.”
I thought of the misbegotten thing trapped in Arvel’s pit, constantly being bled and cut for the ghoul’s patrons. And if what Arvel said was true, the creature was immortal and could conceivably suffer this treatment for eternity.
“I can think of a few reasons,” I said.
Arvel ignored the dig. “Tell me, Mr. Richter, is it true what they say? That you’re responsible for Lady Talaith’s recent ill fortune?”
“I’d really rather not discuss it, if it’s all the same to you.”
More meat, more drink. “Ah, but there is something else you wish to discuss, no?” He licked a smear of red from his lower worm-lip. “Quid quo pro, Mr. Richter. We ghouls have an ancient aphorism: You feed me, and I’ll feed you.” He smiled smugly. I wanted to punch him in the mouth, but I’d probably just have shredded my hand on those teeth of his.
“Yes, it’s true. But it was a couple years ago, when I first came to Nekropolis.”
“Please, go on.”
I sighed. “My partner and I were investigating a series of killings on Earth. There was no connection between the victims’ age, race, gender, economic status, or location. The only similarity was in the way they were killed. Each victim showed no signs of having been in a struggle. It was as if they’d all just dropped dead, despite the fact that all of them were healthy with no history of serious medical conditions. Autopsies revealed something else strange: a tiny segment of their frontal lobe was missing-despite the fact that their skulls had all been intact before their autopsy.”
