Samantha Moon: First Eight Novels, Plus One Novella (74 page)

I was a wreck. My mind was a wreck. My heart was a wreck.

As my son suckled from my wrist—reminding me briefly of the babe who had suckled at my breast so long ago—something else amazing happened, something that made me realize there was no turning back.

The black halo began to recede...to be slowly replaced by a faint silver shimmering, emanating perhaps an inch or two from his body. My son’s beautiful natural golden and red aura was nowhere to be seen.

It’s happening,
I thought.

And still my son drank from my wrist. I could feel the blood being drawn from my arm, sucked into his ravenous mouth. The instructions had been quite clear: You will know he’s had enough when you begin to feel weak, as weak as you do in the presence of the sun. The instructions had come from a fellow creature of the night. A much older creature of the night. It was, she said, a fine balance of giving him enough but also not depleting myself.

In the hallway, I heard footsteps. In fact, two sets of footsteps.

They’re coming.

And still my son drank, biting down onto my wrist hungrily, drinking great gulps of blood from my open wound.

The footsteps were just outside the doorway. I could hear urgent talking now.

The weakness hit me with a shudder. I gasped and yanked my arm away, tearing some of the flesh. My son’s drinking had kept the wound open, kept it from healing supernaturally, as it was inclined to do.

But now as I pulled it free, I could already feel it closing, healing. I grabbed tissue from the bedside table next to me, and had just wiped my son’s lips and chin when the lights flicked on.

Doctors and nurses rushed in, and as I stepped aside, I discreetly wiped the blood from my wrist and pocketed the crimson-stained tissues.

* * *

The cause for the alarm had been simple enough.

My son’s heartbeat had rapidly decreased, so much so that the heart monitors had alerted the nursing staff.

I stood back, watching the nurses and doctors swarm over my son, and as they swarmed over him, my son sat motionless. Fully alert and awake.

Watching me.

Chapter Seven

While the doctors fussed with my son, I stepped out of the room and headed quickly for the elevators.

My hands shook the entire way down, even when I held them tightly together. As I stepped past the receptionist and security guards, I found myself cursing God, the Universe and everything in-between for putting me in such a shitty situation. The security guard said something to me, but I couldn’t hear him. I hid my face and walked quickly out into the night. Certainly, this hadn’t been the first time he’d seen an upset mother.

Outside, I took in a lot of air, filling my dead lungs, walking in tight circles, running my hands through my hair. I was a wreck. The tears flowed.

What had I done? What had I done to my baby boy?

You saved him,
I thought.
You saved him, dammit.

I fished out my cell phone from my handbag and called my rock, the man I had leaned on for so long, the man who had been just a name until recently. Now he was a name and a face...and teeth.

“It’s late, Moon Dance,” he said, his voice groggy. He yawned loudly, smacking his lips a little. It was only recently that my relationship with Fang had graduated from instant messaging to phone conversations and even personal meetings. Even so, I was still getting used to the gentle sound of Fang’s voice. A mellow tenor, so different than Kingsley’s deep baritone. “How’s your son?” he asked.

I told him much better. Much, much better, and he snapped awake instantly. I filled him in on my night, a night that had taken me from the depths of the Pacific Ocean, to my son’s side, and feeding him from my bleeding wrist.

Fang said nothing at first. As he digested this information, I realized that just by hearing his soothing voice I had calmed down enough to stop my hands from shaking. As I waited for Fang to speak, I saw a man standing in a nearby pool of light, smoking and looking up towards the heavens. The gleam of tears on his cheeks was evident. A children’s hospital in the dead of night is not a good place for a parent to be.

Finally, Fang said, “So, you really did it?”

“I had to.”

“
I’m not judging, Moon Dance. Actually, I think you made the right choice. A brave choice.”

“
Then why do I feel so horrible?”

“
Because it’s the unknown. Because it just happened. You saved your son, honey. He’s alive because of you. Because of his mommy.”

But I couldn’t escape the feeling of being selfish, that I had exposed my son to something dark and horrible just to keep him alive, just to keep me from dealing with a lifetime of heartbreak.

“You’re not being selfish, Sam,” said Fang, using my real name, which he rarely did. He also read my thoughts, which was of no surprise since he and I had developed an unusual psychic connection over the years. And meeting him recently for the first time had only enhanced that connection. “It’s your job to look out for your son. It’s your job to keep him safe from harm.”

“
But look what I’ve done to him.”

“
Only temporarily, Sam. Remember the medallion.”

“
But what if it doesn’t work?”

“
But what if it does?” he countered.

“
You’re ever the optimist.”

“
My friend is a gloomy vampire. Someone has to be the optimist in this relationship.”

“
But what about the psychological harm? I mean, even if I can turn him back, will he ever have a normal life again?”

The man smoking nearby snubbed out his cigarette. He glanced at me once and I saw the darkness around his heart. I didn’t know what that meant, but I suspected its implication: someone close to him was going to die. I tried to smile and he tried to smile, but in the end, we only stared at each other with empty eyes as he slipped back into the hospital.

Fang was thinking hard on his end. He was always thinking hard for me. Always helping. Always working through my problems with me.

“
It’s because I’m a helluva guy,” he said, picking up on my thoughts.

“
And because you’re obsessed with vampires.”

“
Well, someone has to be. Now, speaking of vampires...six years ago, after your attack, when did you first realize that you were something, ah, something different?”

“
When did I first realize that I was a vampire?”

“
Yes.”

“
Weeks later. But I knew something was vastly wrong only a few days later.”

“
But did you suspect you were a vampire?”

“
No. Not at first. I just knew something was wrong.”

“
When did you crave blood?”

“
A few days later.”

“
How many days later?”

I thought back to my time in the hospital, and then to my first few days at home. “Four days. But I thought I was low on iron or something.”

I had an image of my son drinking blood and it was almost too much to bear. I started pacing again and hating myself all over again.

“
Calm down, Moon Dance,” said Fang, despite the fact that I hadn’t said anything, so pure was our mental connection. “The way I see it, you have four days to find him a cure.”

I stopped pacing; he was right.

He went on. “You have four days before your son realizes that something is wrong, that he’s something different.”

“
Four days,” I said. Relief flooded me. My God, he was right. I had four days to find a cure.

“
Four days, Sam, to unlock the secret to the medallion.”

“
I gotta go,” I said. “Love ya.”

The words caught him by surprise, as they did me.

“Love ya, too,” he said after a short pause, and clicked off.

Chapter Eight

I checked on my son.

According to the doctor on staff—a young guy who could not have looked more bewildered—Anthony’s fever was dropping at an astonishing rate, even though the fever hadn’t appeared to break; as in, my son hadn’t yet broken out in a sweat.

More astonishing, at least to the doctors, were his eyes. Red, swollen eyes were a hallmark of Kawasaki disease. Anthony’s eyes, however, had shown marked improvement. In fact, there was no indication of redness and the swelling was nearly gone. Same with his tongue. “Strawberry tongue” was common with children with Kawasaki disease. His tongue was a normal, healthy pink. Same with his hands and feet, which had earlier developed severe erythema of the palms and soles, now appeared normal and healthy.

The doctor just stood there by my son’s side, blinking and stammering and smiling. He was certain he was witnessing a miracle. He had—just a very different kind of miracle.

When the doctor left to order some blood work, I sat by my son’s side, holding his warm hands. He continued staring at me quietly, and I was having a hard time looking him in the eye. Did he know what I had done? I didn’t think so, but I suspected he knew on a very deep level. The soul level, perhaps. His outer level, the physical level, was still confused and wondering.

Finally, he spoke, and my son’s little voice sounded strong. He told me he felt weird and sick to his stomach. I remember feeling sick to my stomach, too. Years ago, I had been attacked in the woods while jogging, an attack that had changed my life forever.

Why?
I asked myself again.
Why attack me? For what purpose? What good was a vampire mama?

For now, though, I comforted my son as best as I could. I asked him if he was hungry and he shook his head emphatically, his black locks whipping back and forth about his forehead. I really needed to get him a haircut.

I told him to rest. He nodded and I hugged him tightly and did my best to ignore the guilt that gripped my heart. Six years ago, after my attack, I had slept often throughout those first four days. Perhaps the length of time necessary for the body to fully assimilate the vampire blood, for the transformation to be complete. I didn’t know.

Anthony would be sleeping often for the next four days, and for that I was thankful. After all, I was going to be busy looking for answers. And since his health was now assured, I felt free to leave his side.

I gave him a kiss on his cooling forehead just as he was drifting off to sleep. I got up from his side and closed the curtains tight, and slipped out of the room and out of the hospital and headed for my minivan.

I checked my watch as I stepped in. Two hours before sunlight.

As I started my vehicle, I made a call to the only other vampire in the world that I knew.

Chapter Nine

I was at Detective Hanner’s home in Fullerton.

The home was located in the hills above the city, and as we sat together on her second-story deck, she pointed out the rooftop of another home, barely distinguishable among a copse of thick trees. According to Hanner, the old man there was a Kabbalistic grandmaster, and was considered by many to be immortal himself.

“
Then again,” said Detective Hanner, crossing her bare legs and flashing me a grin, “neighbors do tend to talk.”

“
What, exactly, is a Kabbalistic grandmaster?”

“
One who has mastered the nuances of the Kabbalah, the esoteric Jewish doctrine that facilitates a deeper connection with the great unknown, helps one gain a profound understanding of other realities and illuminates the meaning of life.” Hanner turned her face toward me and I was struck again by the wildness of her eyes. They belonged to something untamed and free and hungry, a puma hunting at night, a tiger hunting in the jungles, a lion tracking its prey across the Serengeti. She grinned fiercely and added, “Or something like that.”

Hanner, who had known about my plans to help my son, did not know about the medallion. Wrong or not, I trusted my new friend, and so I told her about it, and about what I needed: answers to unlocking its secret.

“Where did you get the medallion, Sam?”

“
From the vampire who attacked me.”

“
Amazing. Others have been looking for it for a very long time. Others like us.”

“
There are that many who seek to end their lives?” I asked, confused.

She shrugged. “Or there are others who seek to end the lives of other immortals.”

“I don’t understand,” I said.