Nightlord: Orb (41 page)

Visiting hours in an oncology ward aren’t like visiting hours elsewhere.  Technically, they have them, but realistically, visitors show up at all hours.  It depends on the patient, when they might be conscious, and how close they are to dying.  Unofficially, at least.  There’s always some traffic.  We went right in to a patient room.  I don’t think anyone even looked at us.

The kid in the bed was bald as an egg and thin as a shell.

“Now,” I told Mary, quietly, “don’t
take
anything.  Feel around.  You’ll find something inside her that doesn’t belong there—a sort of feverish vitality.”  Mary got a faraway look in her eyes.

“There are all sorts of different things in the flow of her life,” Mary reflected.  “Some parts of her are more alive than others.”

“You’re good.  It took me a long time to figure that out.  Remind me to see how you do with different parts of people’s brains.”

“Excuse me?”

“Skip it for now.  Concentrate on finding the brightest spot—the piece that’s burning with vital energy.”

“I found it.  It seems to… it’s mostly in the… there’s one big spot, then several smaller spots?”

“Probably in the lymph nodes,” I guessed.  “I hear cancer likes to do that.  Just find the big one for now.”

“Got it.”

“Drain it.  Kill it.  Just the tumor, not the kid—treat the tumor like a parasite inside her, a separate entity.  Wrap your tendril around the brightest part, surround it on all sides, wrap it up.  Then drain only the inside of that ball of tendril.  Carefully.”

While she did that, I felt around inside the kid with tendrils and scanned her with magic eyeballs.  My eyes see the flow of life and the pulse of vital essence.  She wasn’t in good shape, but there were glittering, seething places that shone fever-bright.  I touched them, identified them, and used some of my personal energies to craft a filtering spell.  My tendrils, like a fine-meshed net, swept through the kid’s flesh, harmlessly passing through everything except those fever-bright things.  Those bright, unnaturally vital places simply snuffed out.

I wonder if Mary could do that without a spell.  She has a delicate touch far superior to mine.  I have to cheat.

The kid was actually much better off after we were done.  A few more weeks of chemotherapy and maybe some surgery to remove a few dead lumps… assuming the kid would survive that long.  She really was in poor shape; even a healing spell would be too draining.  Instead, I bound up a little vitality, placed it in her, and wrapped it in such a way that it would release slowly over the next week.

“What do you think?” I asked Mary.  “Cancer tastes odd, doesn’t it?”

“It’s like straight energy.  There’s no… person.  Water without flavor is about the closest I can come.”

“I agree.  Weird, isn’t it?”

“Very.  But what did you do?”

I explained.  Mary considered my explanation.

“So, we can cure cancer?” she asked.

“Sometimes.  Surgeons can, too—sometimes.  This isn’t a cure for her.  At best, it’s a reset.  On the plus side, she’s just had the equivalent of thirty or forty radiation treatments without the radiation side effects.  She stands a chance, now, with proper medical help.  Considering she’s already in an oncology ward, she’ll get it.”

“Is this what we’re for, too?  Helping people like this?”

“Good lord, no.  We’re bloodsucking fiends, haunting the night and seeking out our prey from among the merely-mortal.  This is incidental.  We can do this if we feel like it.  I felt like it.”

“For a bloodsucking fiend, you’re a pretty decent guy.”

“I get that a lot.  I’m good at faking it.”

“So, do we do this sort of thing down in the morgue, now?” she asked.  “To get blood?  Or do we rob the blood bank?  I have to warn you, I’ve tried corpse blood before.  It’s awful.”

“Oh, that.  I think you’re going to
love
this next part.”

We retraced our steps, changed into our street clothes, and I led her out into the city.

“Remember how I said I look for someone who wants to die?”

“Yes.  I felt it.  I never felt anything like that before.  He really
did
want to die, and I could tell.”

“There are different kinds of wanting to die,” I pointed out.  “That man—Dennis—was at the end of his life and waiting for the clock to run out.  He didn’t have a choice, not really.  The kid didn’t want to die, but she was about to do it anyway—not really our business, even though we had the power to interfere.  Now, though, we find volunteers.”

“Volunteers?  Suicidal people?”

Instead of answering, I smiled my best inscrutable smile and turned with her to proceed down darker streets, narrower streets, less savory neighborhoods.  Comprehension dawned on her face and she smiled.  I like her smile, fangs and all.

The encounter went about the way it usually does, with the exception that the three robbers were not only interested in my money but also in my girlfriend.  While one of them put an arm around her neck and brandished a knife, the other two pointed guns and told me to fork over my valuables.

Those two bled nicely from the dismemberment; the blood humped up and crawled over both my legs, soaking into my skin and vanishing.  The man holding Mary suddenly had a broken arm, no knife, and her fangs in his neck.  She’s stronger than she looks and wickedly fast.  I think those moves were practiced.  I should ask if she has any martial arts belts.  Maybe I should ask how many, rather than if.  I should definitely get some pointers; I rely on superhuman speed and strength, not on skill.  That could be a problem, someday.

I pulled up a manhole cover with one finger and we ditched body parts.  I put money in my pockets, a pistol in the back of my belt, and Mary put the knife and other pistols in her purse.

“See?” I laughed, putting her hand on my arm again.  “I told you this part was good.”

“Yes, but I don’t think I like the taste of stoners.”

“Stoners?”

“The guy I drank was a regular user of marijuana.  I don’t care for the taste.”

“Oh.  Well, it’s better than possum, isn’t it?”

“Definitely.  So, our job is to take the souls of the dying and drain the blood from the evil?”

“Well, I ate their souls, too,” I admitted.  “I do it faster.”

“Yeah.  You’ve got hidden talents, Ancient Monster of Darkness,” she giggled.  The way she said it reminded me of Seldar’s joking about, calling me by humorous titles.  I wonder where he is, how he’s doing, what he’s become.  He’s had years to go from a young man to a grown man.  How has he changed?

“You’ll grow into it,” I assured her.  “I only do this part because I can’t always find someone both eager to die and physically accessible.  Hospitals have the first part, but if you kill someone in a hospital, all sorts of alarms go off.  It’s like they’re concerned with patient safety, or something.  These guys, on the other hand, volunteered to be dinner.”

“Couldn’t you skip the hospital?”

“I could.”

“Why don’t you?”

“Because, while these guys may be unwitting volunteers, the people in the hospital don’t have a choice.”

“Ah.  You’re being a nice guy.”

“I am not.”

“Yes, you are.  You’re taking a risk when you don’t have to in order to relieve the suffering of others.  You’re a nice guy.”

“Shut up,” I muttered.

“Why hasn’t anyone else ever told me about this doorway-of-death thing?” she asked, changing the subject.

“I don’t know.  Maybe something got lost in translation during the dark ages.  Or maybe someone thought it was obvious and never bothered to mention it to his children.  Who knows?  You may have something to take to the Elders and show them.  They might appreciate it enough to forgive you for helping me.”

“Maybe.  I’d rather keep helping you.  It’s more fun.”

“Well… so would I.”

“Good.”  She squeezed my arm and pressed close as we walked along.  “Someday, will you try giving me a drop of your blood?  Just to see what happens?”

“If you insist.”

“No hurry.  I’m curious about how it might affect the things I just learned.  Could I reach farther, maybe drain someone’s soul at a distance without help?  Or win at craps?  I can already clean up at blackjack.”

“Really?  How do you do that?  Watch the dealer’s emotional state in his aura?”

“Nope.  Professional dealers don’t care if they win or lose; it’s a job, that’s all.  They flip cards for a living rather than play the game.  What I do is feel the cards.  I know what the dealer has and what’s next in the shoe, so I know how to bet.”

“See, now you’re making me envious.  You say that casually.  I have to really concentrate to feel something like that with a tendril.  I doubt I could do it fast enough to be useful.  I’d probably cheat with a spell.”

“Yours feel more like steel cables,” she pointed out.  “Mine is…”

“More feathery,” I supplied.  “Delicate.  Also more sensitive and responsive.”

“Exactly.”

That made me wonder if I could split a tendril into little pieces, feathering it out into finer and finer strands.  Could I turn a tendril into an even finer sensory organ?  Can I duplicate the feathery sort of thing Mary has?  Something to think about, surely.

Mary showed me around some of the city, pointing out her favorite hangouts without going into them; someone might be watching for her.  She also showed me a couple of places where Tony sometimes had formal meetings with the heads of the other tribes in town—
Conrad
for the Phrygians and Bruno for the Constantines.

“My guess is we’re pretty safe in public,” she told me.  “Nobody wants to tell the world vampires are living among them.  We’ve all heard stories about how vampires were hunted, and some of them from not so long ago.  I, for one, don’t relish the idea of having blessed silver buckshot burning holes through my torso.”

“It stings,” I agreed, and left it at that.  At least, I presume it does.  Blessed silver knives sure do.

“…right.  Anyway, nobody’s going to start something in front of a load of bystanders.  But we could be spotted and followed.  That’s why I’m not taking you into these places.”

“I understand.  Thank you for thinking ahead.”

“I am a little nervous, though,” she admitted.  “Everybody has employees of some sort, and the Phrygians have, uh, servants.  We stand a better chance of being spotted in the city.”

“True, but this is where the hunting is.”

“We’ve hunted.  I feel great.  Can we go home?”

“Of course.”

I called a cab and we went through an interesting dance number—watching for tails, switching cabs, and repeat—until Mary was satisfied we weren’t being followed or tracked.  Then we went home.  I went out to the barn to do some more deconstruction on a gate spell; Mary stayed in to do some cybershopping.

A kerosene lamp burned on the workbench.  I kept it there, not for the illumination, but for the potential flame-call.  Nobody came through on the lamp-flame, but you never know.

A little after midnight, Mary came out to the barn.  I was right in the middle of a tricky bit, so I didn’t look up.  She waited until I finished, then spoke.

“I need an account number.  I don’t want to charge anything to mine if it’s going to be delivered here.”

“Good thinking.”  I fished out my wallet and handed her a card.  “Use that one.”

“You know, most men would ask me what I’m buying and how much it costs.”

“Most men didn’t see the pile of cash we stashed.  Which reminds me, did you pick out a gun you like?”

“I did, thank you.  I put the ones we picked up tonight in the arsenal.”

“Thanks.”

“Still working on your spells?” she asked, lacing her fingers together over my shoulder and looking at the workbench.

“Yes.  It’s going to be a pain making all the ideograms, then making copies of them.”

“How many copies do you need?  I’ll help.”

“It’s a big project.  I’m trying to break the spell down into all its basic elements—no shorthand symbols, no loops, just a complete run-through.  It’s easier to comprehend fully when it’s all laid out like an exploded-view diagram.  That’s tough with something this big.  Once I feel I’ve mastered it, I’ll shorten it wherever I can to make it easier to use.”

“I’ll take your word for it.  So, you need multiple copies of individual symbols?  Is that the problem?”

“Think of it like setting moveable type.  I’ll need dozens of copies of each, at least, to make even one paragraph.”  I sighed.  It didn’t help.  “I suppose I could make molds and pour them… then all we’d need to do is grind them down and polish them.”

“Do they have to be metal?”

“No, I wouldn’t think so.  At least, not for my experiments.  Later, I’ll want metal ones for the durability, but it’s not necessary for this part.  Seems like a waste of effort, though, to make fragile ones when I know I’ll need the tough ones.”

“Okay.  You go ahead and keep making your ideograms.  Let me know when you have a complete set so we can copy the set.”