The motorcycle's tires crunched across the gravel driveway at Hunter's house. He grabbed a remote from his pocket, pushed the button and the garage door opened to reveal three cars. One caught Donna's attention immediately. A classic white, convertible Volkswagen Bug with little red ladybugs, big yellow flowers and a license plate frame which read, “Not All Bugs Bite - Some Throttle.”
“That’s adorable,” Donna giggled. “But I can't see you driving it.”
“I can't either.” He pointed to the black mass of metal next to it, a brand new Ferrari. “I drive that, when I drive at all.”
Donna took off her helmet. “Wow. That must be a pretty good sized monthly payment.”
“I don't pay by the month. I used cash.”
Donna sucked in her breath. “You paid cash for that?”
“I pay cash for everything.” Hunter folded his long, lean leg over the bike and held out a hand to help Donna. She took it. “I've been around a while, sweetheart. In that time, I've made a little money.”
“No kidding,” she murmured.
“Come on, let's go inside.”
She eyeballed the Bug again. “Is that...?”
“Samee's car,” he said with a tone of sadness. “She can hardly wait to get her license.” He pointed to the last car in the garage, a black Suburban. “That's for whoever wants it, usually Trent. He does a lot of nighttime shopping, mostly for remodeling stuff.”
“Did Trent fix the exterior of this house?”
“Yeah.”
“He did good,” Donna said.
Hunter shrugged. “I’ll give the kid credit for knowing how to take a 2 x 4 and make a masterpiece.”
I hope “the kid” can make a masterpiece on Sunflower Street where now there is a hole in the wall.
Hunter indicated toward a door that led to the kitchen. He flipped on the light, which made the room look much different from the last time Donna had been in there. She immediately noted the table and chairs, which sat right in the center for any klutz with big toes to trip over. The sink, cupboards and hardwood floor were original and recently refinished. The room's windows were the old-fashioned kind with small, individual panes and would have made the kitchen warm and inviting on sunny days, if everything wasn't shuttered tight from outside. As it was, the only daylight that could ever filter in was through a tiny window on the back door. Somebody had pinned a dish towel over it.
“This is the fridge,” Hunter pointed, “and here's the stove.”
“Yes,” Donna giggled. “Appliances are somewhat obvious that way.”
“Well, yeah. I guess you're right.” Hunter looked at the floor and absently kicked his foot at a chair leg. He moved to the dining room, in which stood a chunky, walnut dining set. On top of it were mountainous stacks of paperwork, pencils, rubber bands, manila envelopes, an over-stuffed electric pencil sharpener, and a half dozen computers. It reminded Donna of what things might look like if a tornado ripped through an office supply store.
No wonder Samee was embarrassed to show it off.
“This is my temporary office,” Hunter explained. “I run the northern hemisphere command center for the Organization.”
“A CIA for vampires,” Donna noted. She glanced at the windows in there, also shuttered. “Do you ever open these windows?”
“Closed windows save energy,” he said.
“I've never before known a guy who can buy a fancy car with cash but who's afraid to let heat escape through windows.”
Hunter chuckled. “Closed windows save my energy, sweetheart. The more I remain in darkness, the less often I have to feed.”
“Oh.” Donna decided she might develop an appreciation for closed shutters if it meant her Eternal Partner didn't have to go out at night biting necks.
Hunter drummed his fingers on a nearby computer. “I hate these things. They never do what they're supposed to - like this one. It’s supposed to give us a database to find any undead creature within a certain field. For instance, 'find all female minions within 50 miles,' but it doesn't.”
Donna smiled. She might never become a successful lawyer, but she did know a thing or two about computers. “Do you mind if I take a look?”
“Please.” Hunter motioned for her to go right ahead. She examined the system for a moment, reset a few configurations and then turned to him.
“Try it now.”
Hunter sat at the desk, input his information and examined the results. Then he looked up at her and grinned lopsidedly. “Would you like a job as our computer tech?”
“When do I start?” she winked.
“You just did.”
Hunter led Donna to the living room. Samee had certainly not exaggerated when she said the place resembled a mission command center. The only other time Donna had been in that room it was pitch-dark, which might explain how she'd missed all the weapons and weapon-containing devices. Swords gleamed from hangers on the wall, daggers were decoratively displayed like flowers in vases, and a steel crossbow adorned a table. Some pieces looked ancient, others appeared almost futuristic. A few even resembled something out of a military nightmare. Along the north wall was a full gun rack and a row of medieval weaponry. In the corner, a single, silver cross.
“Hmmmm,” Donna pointed to the cross and turned to Hunter. “Where did you get all this stuff?”
“I have a source.” She was about to ask what kind of source could provide such a vast array of killing devices, but Hunter's phone rang. He flipped it open. “What is it?” His brow lowered as he listened. “I'll be there. Give me five minutes.” Hunter shut the phone then looked apologetically at Donna. “I have to go.”
Donna perked up. “Is it Samee?”
“It's my source.”
“The one with the weapons?”
Hunter shook his head apologetically. “The less you know about some things, the better.”
“I don't like being overprotected,” Donna grumbled.
“You never do, but it's safer for everybody.” Hunter kissed her forehead. “I gotta go.”
“You're leaving me alone here? I don't even know where the bathroom is.”
“It's upstairs. And I'm not leaving you alone. Trent will be here in a few seconds.” Exactly three seconds later, the kitchen door crashed open and there stood the dark haired guy who'd accompanied Dante earlier that night. “I'll be back before daylight,” Hunter promised. He folded his arms around Donna, kissed her hard then dashed right past Trent without introducing them or even acknowledging him. So there she was, face-to-face and all alone with another vampire she'd never met. This one was tall, dark-skinned with striking blue eyes. He didn’t look like a kid to Donna, but he did appear younger than Hunter.
“I'm Donna,” she extended a hand.
“I know,” he said. She glanced at her hand, still extended for him to shake. “Oh, sorry.” He laughed and then took her hand. “I'm Trent. And sometimes rude.”
Donna giggled. “Hi, Trent.” He lurked in the doorway, observing her closely.
“So you're the one whose front door I fixed.”
She nodded. “Well, it's my parents' front door, and thanks for fixing it. Unfortunately, there's more to fix now.”
Trent rolled his eyes. Like Mo. “There always is when it comes to Hunter.”
Exactly how often does Hunter have outbursts?
“My best friend Mo said you're a damned miracle worker.”
“Smart girl.” Trent tilted his head. “You really don't remember any of us? From before, I mean.”
Donna shook her head. “Before?”
“The life just before this one.”
“Oh, that. No. Do you remember me?”
Trent nodded. “Oh yeah.”
“Do I look the same?”
“Last time, your hair was the color of chocolate and your skin was dark, like mine. You were Spanish. From Spain.”
“I lived in Spain?” Donna considered it. “Did I speak Spanish?”
“Of course,” Trent smiled.
“How did you guys understand me?”
Trent laughed. “Vampires absorb new languages quickly. Hunter speaks almost every language on earth. You didn't know that?”
Donna looked down. “There's a lot I don't know about Hunter.”
“That's not true. You know just about everything when it comes to Hunter. You just don't remember you know it. It's a little like amnesia, probably.” Trent focused his attention on the floor, then pulled a hammer from a drawer and twisted it through his fingers a half dozen times before dropping to his knees and bashing the hammer's head against an unruly nail poking out from the kitchen floor. “Sorry,” he said when the noise made Donna jump. “I just refinished this floor and really can't stand to have it be less than perfect.”
“You sound like me,” Donna laughed. Trent laughed too and the sound of them laughing together was like water tumbling over rocks.
“Did you know me in other lives besides that one in Spain?”
“No,” Trent returned the hammer to its drawer which squealed when he closed it. “I've only been Turned for half a century. In vampire terms, I'm still a baby. The irony is, I was Turned at twenty years old, so I'm a baby, a middle aged man, and still not old enough to buy alcohol, all in one. It's a bit of a nuisance,” he chuckled.
“Actually, that's bugging me.”
Trent cocked an eyebrow. “That I'm not old enough to buy alcohol?”
“No,” Donna giggled. “I'm worried about what happens when Hunter stays twenty-five and I go way beyond that.”
Trent looked at the ground. “According to Dante, that hasn't happened yet.”
“Because of Stephen?”
Trent nodded then they were silent for several awkward moments.
“Well, anyway,” he finally grinned wide, showing off a pair of pearly fangs. “Did Hunter show you around?”
“He showed me the kitchen and dining room, but we got sidetracked at the living room.”
“Yeah, that's Hunter - always sidetracked. Let me give you the rest of the tour.” He directed her to the right and to a short hall which led to a couple bedrooms. “This one's Dante's room.” He opened the door.
“It smells like a library in here,” she breathed in deep. The walls, painted rich blue and lined with shelves of a thousand books, explained why.
“Every single one is a book on some type of healing,” Trent rolled his eyes. “Each and every one. And these aren't even all of them. He has something like five hundred eBooks, too.”
“Dante's amazing.” Donna sat on a wicker chair in the corner. It creaked under her weight.
“When Samee was six, she broke her leg. Dante repaired it in thirty seconds.”
“He fixed what was broken in me, too.”
Trent nodded. “He's especially adept at healing mortals. Sometimes he sneaks inside hospitals in the middle of the night and heals very sick kids. Their families call it a miracle. ”
“Dante certainly does seem miraculous.” Donna took a deep breath. “I like it in here. It's peaceful.” The shutters were closed, naturally. But instead of it making the room feel shut out from the world, it gave the place a safe, secret feel - like a kid hiding under the bed covers and pretending the whole rest of the world didn't even exist.
“That feeling you call peaceful,” Trent said, “is the energy of a healer vampire. Odd as it seems to the mortal world, some vampires are actually good for humanity.” Donna had personally experienced Dante doing good for her humanity, so she nodded. Trent continued. “I was raised to fear vampires. When I became one, I was filled with self-loathing.”
“But you're not full of self-loathing anymore, right?”
Trent shrugged. “Nobody likes being a vampire, Donna. If we're lucky, we just...adjust to it.”
Like adjusting to being Eternal Partners with one.
“Want to see my room?” he asked. Donna nodded, and then followed Trent to his room, which was larger than Dante's and had two entrances. One was through the kitchen, the other led to the backyard. The room had six huge windows and of course, they were shuttered.
“Oooo,” Donna pushed open the porch door and leaned out to embrace the night air. “I like this room!”
“I do too, especially, in the evenings.”
She closed the door. “I hope I remember to keep the doors shut during the day.”
He shrugged. “Maybe you will, but Samee still hasn't.”
Samee…
“Come on. I'll show you my big project.” Trent led Donna to the basement. The stairs felt unstable. The air was clammy and echoed with dripping water. Trent pulled a string at the stairway base and a single bulb lit up the space, though not very well. Donna's eyes adjusted slowly and Trent waited patiently while they did. Then she looked around at the dirt floor and stone foundation. The water drip came from the south wall. A mouse scurried right in front of them, Donna screamed and jumped back. She glanced at Trent and blushed.
“Sorry. I'm just not much for scary things jumping out at me.”
Trent chuckled. “Then you'll definitely want to avoid Underworld demons.” He waved his arms in a wide flourish. “This is my big project. It's going to be the main headquarters for the Organization. Hunter's office will be right here.” He pointed to a dismal corner, perfect for the brooding vampire type.
“He'll love it,” Donna giggled.
Trent chuckled. “And you say you don't know much about him.”
“You guys go to a lot of trouble for the Organization,” Donna said. “Can you tell me more about it?”
Trent laughed. “I don't always know that I understand it myself, but I'll explain it the best I can. The Organization exists to maintain law and order in the undead realms. It's a bit like a police department.”
“Except ours.”
Trent agreed. “Your mayor is at the helm of the minion takeover in the local department. He's amassed much power and influence there.”
“How has he done that?”
“It's a vampire thing,” Trent explained. “The longer a vampire manages to survive, the more strength he or she gathers.”
“Mo was right. She distrusted the mayor from the start.”
Trent nodded. “Michael controls many lives, including Stephen's.”
“Michael…it sounds so weird. I’m used to calling him Mayor St. James.” Donna sat on a rickety basement stair that protested under her weight.
“It sounds weird for me to hear him called Mayor St. James.”
“Well, either way it's hard to believe anybody has control of Stephen.”
“Michael does,” Trent assured her. “Many years ago, he owned a slave his army had captured in battle. And he knew that slave possessed an all-consuming obsession for a girl back home.”
“Obsession?” Donna shuddered.
“Or twisted affection. Call it what you want. Stephen calls it love. Dark feelings are the only ones he knows.” Trent sat on the stair next to Donna. It protested under his weight, too. “Michael hated Hunter even back then because Michael has long-standing aims to become a world leader. The only thing that stops him is Hunter.” Trent picked up a pebble and threw it at another mouse, which then scampered to the darkness. “Hunter represents the peoples' fight, the uprising of the masses. Michael represents ultimate control of the people. It's a bit like political warfare.”
“No wonder Mo is so good at getting the clues,” Donna wrapped her arms around herself to hold back the chill. “It's about politics.”
“Everything's about politics,” Trent replied. “And in politics, there are those who get their hands dirty, and there are those who direct those hands.”
“And Michael is a director, right?”
Trent nodded. “Michael, being a dictatorial leader, couldn't be seen getting his hands dirty. But he wanted Hunter dead. When his army failed to do the job on the battlefield, Michael Turned Stephen and released him to kill Hunter. But Michael didn't
yet recognize the cardinal Underworld rule-”
“Blood can't kill blood,” Donna whispered, then picked on her index nail.
“Yep. So Stephen did the only thing he could. He Turned Hunter out of spite. Then he killed you out of malice.”
Donna watched another mouse poke its head from behind a stone. “Why didn't Stephen just Turn me, too?”
“To make Hunter watch you die lifetime after lifetime provides much more torment to him than Turning you would have. If you'd have been Turned, Hunter and you could have married and loved each other in the undead realms eternally.”
Donna tasted blood and looked down to see she'd chewed the flesh around the tip of her index finger. She balled up her fists. “But if somebody else were to Turn me...” she looked hopefully toward Trent.
“No way,” his eyes widened and he wildly shook his head no. “Hunter would stake me.”
Why is everybody allowed to be Turned but me?
“You don’t want to be Turned, Donna.”
She shook her head. Did he just read my mind?
Trent continued without responding to that last question. “So anyway, things got sticky for Michael. Instead of a dead warrior, he got saddled with an undead arch-enemy with ten times its original power. It's pretty ironic. Michael's lack of foresight has actually kept him from achieving his sick dream.”
“So that's how it began? And it's been replaying itself for all this time?”
“Yep, for all this time.” Trent looked in Donna's eyes. “There was one who tried to warn you at the beginning.”
“Mo?”
Trent grinned. “Apparently, that girl has been by your side in every incarnation.”
“That's what she said,” Donna chuckled. The mouse came back, and this time Donna threw the pebble at it. “How long ago did Hunter start the Organization?”
“Hunter didn't start it,” Trent pointed to the pebble. “Good shot. A couple of shepherds located on opposite ends of the earth started the Organization. Their names are Raoul and Froederick. Though to be honest, they didn't so much start the Organization as they fell into the job when they were Turned by the gods.”
“Turned by the gods?” Donna scrunched her nose. “How is that possible?”
“With the gods, all things are possible.” Trent shifted on the stair and it groaned. “The shepherds went to bed one night as normal mortals and awoke the next morning as vampires.”
“That must’ve been a shocker.”
Trent nodded in agreement. “It was. In their new undead state, Raoul and Froederick were faced with more than just being all alone and Turned. They were also each faced with a weighty book given to each of them by the gods. Each book came with instructions to learn the contents and share its knowledge and to never, ever, let it out of their sight. Never.” Trent repeated emphatically. “As you might imagine, that was a daunting expectation. So Raoul and Froederick took their books and clutched them tightly to their chest. Each only let loose long enough to read a few pages every morning before lying down to sleep. That fact, on its own, would have made it take the two eons to read. But as it turns out, the gods had mistakenly given Raoul the book written in a script only Froederick could read, while Froederick had received the book scribed in Raoul's language.”
Donna giggled. “The gods made a mistake?”
“They make mistakes all the time. Why do you think there's so much Chaos in the world?”
“I hadn’t really thought about it,” she admitted.
Trent nodded. “Raoul and Froederick traveled for many years, each growing increasingly weary and irascible under the burden of his book. Raoul traveled north from the South Pole. Froederick traveled south from the North Pole. They crossed paths at the equator, each vampire quite suspicious of the other and each clutching tightly to his book. They quickly picked up on each other’s native tongue and started to communicate. But it didn’t dawn on them share the books with each other, since neither let go long enough to show the other. So one night, a small but significant thing happened.” Trent raised an eyebrow and Donna's knuckles gripped the stair she sat on. “The gods of the Underworld shifted the earth under their feet.”
“Shifted? Like an earthquake?”
“Exactly like that.” Trent stomped his foot to scare away a different mouse, or maybe it was the same one that kept coming back. “The earthquake caused both vampires to lose their footing, and the next thing they knew, each had dropped their book to clutch to something more stable. When the quaking stopped, the vampires reached for their books, unknowingly taking the other one’s copy. Suddenly, Raoul and Froederick could discern the words within the books and they realized each book complimented the other. In a state of joy, they embraced and became brothers of blood oath by sacrificing a pair of oxen and sharing the animals' blood in celebration. They drank blood by the bucketful all night long, which sealed their fate as Eternally Connected.”
“Like Hunter and me?”
“Sort of,” Trent winked, “minus the romance.” Donna blushed. “As daylight broke, our heroes curled up together in a cave and slept in gluttonous bliss until the next nightfall. While they slept, the remaining blood of those two oxen leaked from the beasts' carcasses onto the books, making both books merge and become a single volume as per the blood oath ritual's Eternal Connection Law. And once the two books merged, it was no longer just a book. It became, and still is to this day, a living, breathing, Enlightened Prophecy.”
“Like a religion for vampires?”
Trent nodded. “At the very moment the two books became a single Prophecy, Raoul and Froederick awoke from their slumber and immediately began to argue over who was best suited to carry the book. In fact, the arguing kept them so busy that they failed at their job - as keepers of the Prophetic Records they were expected to understand the Prophecy, then go to the Underworld and spread the message of Prophetic fulfillment. Now they were so consumed with who should carry the book that they couldn't stop bickering long enough to get on with it. So while Raoul and Froederick slept in their cave one day, the gods sneaked away the book, made an exact replica and placed both books back in the cave.”
Donna leaned forward. “I bet that fixed the problem.”
“No, it made things even worse. Raoul and Froederick fought over which copy was the original.”
“But the books were exactly the same.”
Trent shrugged. “There was no convincing Raoul and Froederick. Each of them thought he was more worthy than the other to carry the original edition. They also argued over which book was the True Original. And after that, the gods realized neither vampire was up for the job of Prophetic Revelation. So one night while Raoul and Froederick were busy squabbling, two of the gods were sent to take both copies and teach the shepherds a lesson.”
Donna giggled. “That showed them.”
Trent shook his head. “Not exactly, because the gods who were sent to take back the books were Archer and Alicia -”
“Who?”
“The Underworld god and goddess of male and female beauty.” He said it as if it should have been obvious. “Archer tiptoed in and picked up one copy, Alicia took the other. Archer got away undetected. Alicia was caught with a book in her hand when she stopped to primp at her reflection in a pond. Raoul and Froederick found her there and pleaded with her to give them another chance.”
“And they got it?”
“Indeed, because although those vampires were oblivious to the charms of each other, they easily got one over on the goddess, whose beauty is matched only by her weakness for flattery by men - even those men.”
Donna grinned. “They flirted the book right out of her hands.”
“It was clever, but not clever enough because now the Underworld gods decided to teach the boys a harsh lesson about pulling a fast one on deities. They plucked out the last word of every sentence in the book and now, Raoul and Froederick have spent the past couple thousand years quarreling over every l
ast word.” Trent rolled his eyes. “So all this time's gone by and the Prophecy hasn't been fulfilled, much to the chagrin of vampires, who would love nothing more than for Order to rein in the Underworld.” Trent shrugged. “Demons like it this way, though. And as punishment, Alicia is banished to earth with lowly humans, but she's forbidden from meddling in mortal affairs of any kind.”
“That sounds harsh,” Donna felt sorry for the goddess of beauty.
Trent admitted it was. “Her brother Archer is locked in a dungeon until the lost copy is restored.”
“Lost copy?”
“Archer set his copy aside one day while hunting and somebody - or something - took it. Legend says a purple-eyed, red-feathered phoenix is to blame. We’ll never know for sure, of course. Just to be on the safe side, undead wisdom is to never trust a purple-eyed, red-feathered phoenix when you encounter one. I suggest you don't, either.”
“I've never even seen a purple-eyed, red-haired phoenix,” Donna said.
“Red-feathered,” he corrected. “And, now that you're living with one foot in the shadows, you just very well might. So thanks to the purple-eyed, red-feathered phoenix, the Prophecy remains unfulfilled. It will continue to be unfulfilled until either the lost copy is found or Raoul and Froederick finally agree on the final word of every sentence in the remaining copy.” Trent snickered, “I doubt either scenario will ever happen, but Hunter insists it's been decreed by the gods that the Prophecy be fulfilled.”
“So…Hunter believes in the Prophecy.” It hadn't entered Donna's mind that her Eternal Partner might have a religion. She pondered that for a moment then folded in deeper against the chill Trent seemed oblivious to.
“Hunter believes in the Prophecy now, but that wasn't always the case. At first, Raoul found him in Rome and approached him to ask if Hunter would have any interest in helping the vampires fulfill the Prophecy.”
“And Hunter agreed?”
Trent laughed hard enough to scare away the mouse. “Of course not, he's Hunter. He called the Prophecy 'delusions of idiocy,' and demanded Raoul and Froederick leave him alone. It wasn't until centuries later that Hunter came around. Even then, it took Dante's help.”
“How did Dante talk Hunter into joining the Organization?”
“After partnering with Raoul and Froederick, Dante sought out Hunter, who he hadn't spoken to in several mortal lifetimes. First he made amends with Hunter, and then he convinced him they were all after the same goal.”
“Stephen,” Donna whispered.
“Actually, Stephen and Michael. They know that without the Book of Prophecy, there's no fulfillment of it. So they seek to destroy both copies.”
“Does the Prophecy tell of Michael's failure?”
“Hunter's continued interference does a good job of that,” Trent said with a chuckle. “What the Prophecy does is guarantee Michael's Ultimate Destruction.” A bigger, uglier mouse scurried across the floor, sat up on its back legs and peered right at Donna and Trent with its beady, pink eyes. Then it twitched its nose. Trent hissed and the mouse ran back to the darkness. “I've told you too much,” he said with a tone of regret.
“But I want to know more. Hunter doesn't tell me much.”
“Then neither should I.” He reached for her hand. “Let's finish the tour, new roommate.”
And that was the end of that.
chapter nineteen