Black Fall Read online

CHAPTER 8

  “Sorry. I tried to warn you,” Eve said. She was wearing jeans, a t-shirt, and a green tunic-sweater with tight sleeves that let her move easily.

  “Yes you did,” Jonas said, feeling like he’d just had a near death experience. His head ached, his jaw hurt, and he felt so tired that he was shaking. “If you hadn’t, I might be worse off than I am.” He sized her up, hesitantly. She looked like a skinny teenage girl, but somehow he knew she’d hit like a fully-grown man. “I don’t know how much more I can do.”

  “We’ll take it easy, but you have to at least try or she’ll come down hard on you.”

  Jonas felt a lump in his throat. He glanced back at Viviane; the instructor didn’t turn but waved over her shoulder. He swallowed. “Okay, what do I have to do?”

  “It’s a blocking drill. Stick your arm out like you’re punching me in the chest.”

  Jonas stuck his right arm out, and Eve turned his hand so the top of his thumb was facing her.

  “Now, watch.” She pushed his hand to the left, backhanded his elbow, then trapped his upper arm against his body with her left hand. Immediately, her right arm shot forward and stopped inches from his chest, like she was stabbing him with an invisible knife. “Now, you do it,” she said.

  She was holding his right arm, so he pushed with his left hand, batted her elbow with his right, and pushed down on her forearm with his left. She let go of his right arm in the process, and he punched it forward.

  “What’s this drill for anyway?” he asked.

  She pushed, struck, held, and punched. “To stop you from taking a stake to the chest.” He pushed with the right hand. “No, left,” she said, correcting him.

  “They still use stakes?” Strike, hold, punch.

  Eve shook her head. “Most of the hunters use UV flash grenades or lasers these days. Explosive bullets too, because those work on everyone.” She went through her part of the drill quickly, with a tap-tap-tap. It was starting to hurt. “There are still traditionalists out there, though, and sometimes someone just wants to make a statement.”

  Jonas got his part wrong again.

  “I think you should just focus on the drill,” Eve said, her eyes flicking to look over his shoulder.

  He nodded, gritted his teeth, and tried again.

  ♟

  Jonas woke up late Saturday afternoon, arms flailing as he tried to stop an unknown assailant from staking him. Then he realized he was at home, back in his room, and the “assailant” was just his sheets. His memory of Friday was hazy. Bert almost had to carry him home. I’m safe, he thought. But he felt overheated and sore, as if he had a low grade fever. And his arms hurt. He was surprised to find they weren’t bruised. That was good. The pain he could deal with. At least nobody was trying to kill him… for now, anyway.

  He heard a knock on the door, then his mother came in with a glass of water.

  “Here, this will help,” she said.

  How did she… He checked his barrier, but Sam had maintained it after Jonas passed out from exhaustion.

  “You aren’t exactly a varsity athlete, Jonas, and you went straight to sleep when you went home,” she said.

  He realized it wasn’t magic after all, just his mother acting on intuition. He gulped the water, surprised at how thirsty he was. Afterward, she took the glass.

  “I’ll refill it for you,” she said.

  He heard the refrigerator open and shut, then she came back with another full glass and handed it to him.

  “Viviane sends her regards,” he said between sips.

  “Did she, now?” his mother said, smiling. “So, that means you met her old boyfriend. What was his name?”

  “François.”

  “Yes, that was it. Did she tell you she tracked him down, between wars?”

  “No. What did she do, kill him?”

  “Of course not!” Alice said. “That’s against Agency rules. He killed himself.”

  Jonas had just taken a drink and almost spewed water everywhere. “Seriously? How did she do it?”

  His mother smiled. “She used illusions to make others believe he was treating them the same way he treated her when she was human. His family and friends started to hate him. It drove him mad.”

  “And that’s legal?” Jonas said.

  “It was. The Agency had to revise the rulebook several times because of Ms. Lefèvre. That’s her gift, you see? That’s why she teaches fledglings.”

  “The Agency wants us to break rules?”

  Alice shook her head. “There are many rules that can’t be broken… gravity, the conservation of energy, entropy. But, every once in a while, it seems like one gets broken. Sometimes it’s because we didn’t understand the rule, and sometimes it’s because someone very clever understood it very well.”

  Jonas thought about it. “So that’s why, even though I was keeping my barrier up, and the image of François was gone, I could still see Viviane’s cigarette.”

  “Yes. You see a pretty French girl raising her hand to her lips, blowing, and tapping it with her thumb, and your mind fills in the blank. You’re letting her in.”

  “I’m giving her a window.”

  His mother smiled sadly. “You’ve been talking to Doris. She always liked that image.”

  Jonas nodded.

  “You be careful around her. She’s very old, and very dangerous. And she’s not to leave the Agency lobby under any circumstances.”

  “Umm… Okay,” Jonas said. He couldn’t imagine how Doris — with her lisp, gray skin, and goofy wig — could hope to escape without the whole world noticing. But Jared had said the same thing, so he assumed there was a reason behind it.

  “In any case, you’re right about Viviane. She makes a small breach with a trivial illusion and uses it to push more and more through your barriers. It used to be knitting needles, before women’s lib made a girl holding a cigarette more likely. She’d sit in the corner of a room for hours, needles clicking away, until even I could see the scarf.”

  “She told me it calms her,” Jonas said.

  “I’m sure it does. Viviane is someone who likes to feel in control. You remember your father’s lucky coin?”

  “Yeah, he used to sit and roll it across his knuckles. He was teaching me how to do it, until you got upset… it wasn’t real?”

  She gave Jonas a smile, then did something he thought was odd. Reaching to brush his hair back, like she often did, she hesitated. The pause only lasted a second, then she completed the gesture, but it was like, for a second, she wasn’t sure he was really there.

  “You’ll never marry her, you know… Amelia. You’ll never fit into her perfect little plan of a house, two kids, and a successful husband.”

  Jonas sat back. Where did that come from? “You don’t think I’ll be successful?”

  Alice shook her head. “She doesn’t need you — I should say she doesn’t need you in particular — and pretty soon you’re going to realize you don’t need her either.” She looked at the heavy black curtains over the window and touched the black rose pin on her dress. “If I hadn’t needed Victor, on some level, even without knowing it, I never would have married him.”

  Jonas didn’t know what to say. We’ll find him if he’s still alive, he thought. If he’d gained anything from his experience at the Agency, it was the understanding that the world was strange and magical enough anything was possible. He struggled for the right words. After all, she had known his father for centuries; it wasn’t like she’d be able to replace him. Jonas had only known his dad for sixteen years, and he missed him every day. He couldn’t imagine what she was going through, and wanted to comfort her, but—

  “You’d better get ready, or you’ll be late,” she said, and walked out of the room.

  ♟

  An hour into the training session, after Eve had managed to find every bruise on his right arm at least twice and was starting to work on his left, Fangston walked in. Jonas was thrown off his rhythm and Eve knocked him b
ack two steps.

  “Ow!”

  “Pay attention,” she said. “You need to be able to do this while thinking of other things.”

  Viviane walked over to Fangston and they spoke in hushed tones. It was like watching two cats who didn’t like each other, but didn’t know who would win if their claws came out. Viviane pulled a cigarette out of thin air, brought it to her lips, and blew smoke in Fangston’s direction. He stood still, but Jonas saw his head move back a fraction. Viviane smirked. Jonas tried to see through the illusion. He thought the smoke might have gotten a little thinner, but he couldn’t seem to affect the cigarette itself.

  Suddenly, Fangston snapped his fingers and the cigarette went up in flames. Viviane dropped it immediately and stepped back, seemingly unfazed, as it hit the floor and continued to smolder. The stench of burnt rubber, from the scorched training mat, quickly filled the room.

  “Can we do that?” Jonas whispered to Eve.

  “Do what?”

  “Set things on fire.”

  “No,” she said, coughing. Her eyes were watering from the smoke, and Jonas realized his were too.

  “Then how did he—”

  In an instant, it all disappeared — the smoke, the flames, everything but the unlit cigarette, which was lying on the mat near Viviane’s feet. She bent to retrieve it.

  “Using props, Viviane?” Fangston asked.

  “Chocolate,” she said. She flicked her fingers, making the candy cigarette disappear, although from where Jonas was standing he could tell she’d palmed it and slipped it into her pocket

  “What just happened?” Jonas whispered.

  “Viviane knew he’d see through her normal trick,” Eve whispered, “so she used something real. Only the smoke was an illusion. The Director was so focused on trying to ignore the cigarette, he—”

  “That was clumsy, Marcus,” Viviane said. “The Roman in you is showing. You used to be more fun.”

  “And you’re getting a little old for parlor tricks,” he replied, looking her up and down. Jonas felt the temperature in the room drop. “The boy?”

  Viviane nodded and waved Jonas over. “The Director has something important he wants you to see,” she said, and then turned her attention to another group of students.

  “Come with me, Jonas,” Fangston said and walked out of the room. Jonas looked over his shoulder at Eve, who made a shooing motion with her hands. Then, shrugging, he followed the Director warily.

  As subtle as Viviane’s trick had been — mixing reality and illusion — Fangston’s response had been overwhelming. Even Eve, knowing it wasn’t real, had been affected. Jonas tightened his barriers, wondering what would happen if Fangston used that power on him. Would he actually burn?

  They rode the elevator down in silence, and Jonas followed Fangston back to his office.

  “This is what I wanted to show you,” he said, pointing to a box on his desk. It was about three feet long, a foot wide and a foot tall, made of dark gray material that was warm to the touch and etched with arcane lettering.

  “What is it?”

  “Some of your father’s personal possessions. Go ahead, open it.”

  Jonas lifted the lid. Inside, the box was lined with red felt. It was about half full: a few pictures of Jonas and his mother, a very old Bible – the faded leather cover held shut by handmade metal latches – some coins, and a pair of blackened daggers.

  “You can have those when you’re older,” Fangston said, as Jonas turned one of them over in his hand.

  After removing all of the other items, Jonas also found a neatly folded, black leather jacket that he’d initially mistaken for the bottom of the box. It was old, well broken in, but otherwise in good repair. The coat’s leather felt soft, but heavier than it should have. Jonas checked the pockets. They were empty.

  “Is there something special about this?” he asked.

  “It’s lined in Kevlar. Other than that, just cow leather as far as I know, but well cared for and worn often,” Fangston said, smiling. “Check the bottom of the box.”

  Jonas looked to see if he’d missed something. All he could see was a small, circular recess in the bottom. He pushed it but nothing happened.

  “We’re missing the key,” Fangston said. “Something you might be able to help us with. Do you know what happened to your father’s coin?”

  Jonas felt the Director pushing against his walls.

  The coin wasn’t real, he thought, but immediately slammed his inner wall around the idea, willing Sam to protect it at all costs. If his father went through the trouble of hiding the information from Fangston, he must have had a good reason.

  “He always kept it on him,” Jonas said. “So it’s probably lost. Have you asked my mom?”

  “Alice and I don’t talk like we used to,” Fangston said, resting a hand on Jonas’ shoulder. It felt hot, almost burning. Jonas could feel his outer barrier cracking in places. “Are you sure you haven’t seen the coin?”

  “No, I’d remember if I had,” Jonas said, truthfully. He focused his thoughts on the box, while frantically repairing his inner barrier. “Why do you need the coin?”

  “I believe it opens the compartment in the bottom of the box. We think your father may have hidden something there, something that might tell us why he disappeared. It’s very important that we find out, Jonas.”

  “Can’t you just break it open?”

  “Yes, but not without destroying the… item.”

  Again, Jonas was able to sense some of Fangston’s thoughts. The last statement had been true, but there was something else he couldn’t put his finger on. It was strange. Sometimes when he looked at Fangston in a certain light, he thought he could see a skeletal outline through the older vampire’s face. "Can I take this stuff with me?"

  Fangston released his grip on Jonas’ shoulder. “I’m afraid the box has to stay here for now, and I think the rest should as well. You’ll tell me if you find the coin? It could be vital in helping us discover what happened to your father. Your mother might not last much longer without him.”

  Jonas swallowed. “Of course,” he said earnestly, placing the jacket and the other objects back in the box. “I want to know what happened to him, too.”

  Fangston blinked several times and shook his head, seemingly disoriented, then said, “Jonas?” His eyes flicked to the box on the table. “Oh… of course you do,” he continued, somewhat clumsily. “Now, do you have any other questions?”

  “No, sir,” Jonas said, confused. It was as if the anger and tension in Fangston’s face had vanished.

  “Very well then, you can head back to your training class. It’s always good to see you, Jonas. Stop by anytime.”

  ♟

  Sunday night, Jonas stumbled into his apartment, exhausted. He’d trained for three hours on Friday, three on Saturday, and had just come from completing another five to wrap up the weekend. His muscles and joints hurt, but he’d expected that; Eve was tireless. She’d worked him over like a machine, hitting anything that hadn’t been hit already, and then doing it again just to be sure. They’d started incorporating a half-squat into the drill, and Phillip basically had to carry him most of the way home.

  “How are you feeling?” his mother asked.

  “Thirsty,” he said, reaching for the water pitcher. He poured a glass and drank it, then another. He couldn’t seem to get enough water in him. “Do they always work the new trainees this hard?”

  “Is Viviane teaching you, or are you just doing drills?”

  “Drills,” Jonas answered. “Eve had me—”

  “Eve?” Alice interrupted.

  “My training partner. She had me—”

  “How old is Eve? In actual years, not how she looks.”

  Jonas felt the tension in the room go up a notch. “I think she’s just a year or two older than me. She was turned last year.”

  His mother seemed to relax. “Oh, I see. And what did she have you doing?”

 
Jonas wondered why she’d be concerned about the age of his training partner. Did it matter? He shrugged it off. “Not much, really,” he replied, “Just the same drills done in different ways. We took breaks, it’s just that every time I seem to catch my breath—”

  “Viviane makes you start again, or makes it harder,” she said, finishing his sentence. Her tone was academic, as if she’d been testing a theory.

  “Want to clue me in?” Jonas said, finishing another glass of water and reaching for the pitcher.

  “Yes, but before you drink that…” She turned and walked down the hallway, returning a few seconds later with an aluminum pouch, like the ones he’d seen in the Agency cafeteria. “Try this,” she said, and tossed it to him.

  He caught it, almost dropping his glass in the process. The thought of what was inside — some random person’s blood — made his stomach churn.

  “Humor me,” his mother said.

  He pulled the tab and felt the heat in his hands, then stuck the straw in, and took a sip. It was warm, tasteless, except for a slight metallic flavor, and had the consistency of thin soup. “Nothing,” he said, placing the packet on the counter. The bottom was flat, keeping it upright with the straw sticking out. “So what are they doing to me?”

  “I don’t know for sure, but I think they’re trying to provoke an immune response.”

  “To what? Am I sick?”

  “To death. The disease of vampirism — or curse, because there’s some magic in it too — is usually triggered by the victim dying. The fact that the stimulus and the disease vector are the same is irrelevant. It takes action to preserve itself by protecting its host.”

  Jonas stared at his mother. “They’re trying to kill me to see if I turn into a vampire?”

  “Yes… or as close as they can without actually killing you. We can come back from some things, but we’re not true immortals.”

  “Is there such a thing?”

  “Of course. There are angels and demons, and a few other things you might call a demigod or force of nature. You can fight them or bind them… sometimes you can even disperse them for a few decades. But they always come back. Then there are things, like us, that are just really hard to kill, or require a very specific tool.”

  Jonas’ head throbbed. I don’t even know how to start dealing with all this, he thought. Every time he talked to someone, the world got bigger, stranger, and more dangerous.

  Alice smiled. “I know that’s a lot of information to take in at once. If you want to learn more, there’s a library in the Agency building. Go read a few books, maybe you’ll find the right questions to ask.”

  He looked at her and checked his barriers in a panic. They were still up.

  Apparently she’d read the look on his face. “I’m your mother, Jonas. I’ve had sixteen years of extraordinary insight into the way you think. Now, is there anything else before I go to work?”

  “What’s up with Fangston’s name?” he asked. “It’s a joke, right? Because he’s a vampire?”

  Alice shook her head. “He got that nickname in the army, before he was turned.”

  Jonas frowned. “He was in the U.S. military?”

  “Roman legion,” Alice said, “back when there were less than 10,000 of them. We met a very long time ago.”

  “But you don’t like him?”

  She went blank, the way she always did when she was deciding whether or not to tell him something. Finally, she said, “I was an enforcer before the experiment… a high-ranking one.”

  “You said you volunteered for it.”

  “I did. We did — your father and me. I owed it to Victor.”

  Jonas was confused. “Why?”

  “Do you remember what I told you about letting Amelia know?”

  Jonas nodded. “You said humans don’t react well to abnormalities.”

  “That’s right, and your father was no different. He didn’t react well when he found out what I was; made the sign of the cross and tried to exorcise me. He was very devout.”

  “Wow.” Jonas said. “But it all worked out, right? You talked it over and—”

  “I bit him. He forgave me, of course — vampirism couldn’t change that about your father — but it took him the better part of a year to come around.”

  Jonas gaped.

  “Anyway, when your dad first approached me about the experiment – giving vampires the ability to withstand sunlight – I was fine with his fantasy of becoming a little more human. It made him happy to think we’d be able to enjoy a sunset together. Like I said, I owed him that. Then you came along – a wonderful surprise, but it wasn’t supposed to happen. Someone increased the dosage beyond what we’d agreed, and most of my powers were diminished in the process. I left the Agency.”

  “And you think Fangston did it?”

  She shrugged. “Did it, ordered it, allowed it to happen… it doesn’t really matter. I understood that he and I had radically different views of the world. But if he wanted me out of the way he should have just told me.”

  Jonas felt a surge of anger fill the room, similar to what he’d felt from Fangston during training, when the Director had set the cigarette on fire, but it faded much quicker.

  You must have been terrifying before, Jonas thought. He’d almost said it aloud but couldn’t quite find a way to turn it into a compliment. “Do you think he had anything to do with what happened to Dad?”

  His mother looked surprised. “No, Victor was the closest thing Marcus had to a friend. He would never have hurt your father.”

  But Dad didn’t tell him about the coin, Jonas thought.

  “Anyway, that’s enough about that. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She leaned over and kissed his forehead. “Sleep well.”

  After she’d gone, he just sat there, almost too tired to move. But somehow he managed, putting his glass in the sink and then grabbing the blood pack to pour it out.

  It was empty. I must have finished it while we were talking, he thought, frowning. Then, realizing he had school the next morning, he tossed it in the trash and went to bed.

  ♟

  Jonas woke feeling sore, but rested. It was still dark outside - he knew because his room was the only one in the house without heavy drapes over the window. He tried to check his phone for the time, but it was dead. When was the last time I used it? He plugged it into the charger, threw on sweatpants and a t-shirt, and went into the living room.

  The display on the cable box read 5:30 a.m. It wasn’t blinking or anything, so the time seemed accurate. How am I not still asleep? He had two hours before he needed to get ready for school, and his mother wasn’t home from work yet. Normally he would’ve gotten back in bed, but he wasn’t tired.

  He was halfway through a bowl of cereal when his mother came home.

  “Hi, Mom.”

  She gave him an appraising look, like she was trying to figure out how tall he was. “How did you sleep?” she said.

  “Not bad. No dreams, and I woke up feeling like I’d slept for twelve hours.”

  “Well you didn’t, because I left a little over nine hours ago and you were still awake then.”

  He nodded. He’d gotten maybe eight hours, tops.

  “Do you need another pouch of—?”

  “No,” he said quickly, not wanting to go down that road again. Besides, he wasn’t entirely sure he’d drunk the other pouch of blood. One second it was full, the next it was empty. His mother had a look like she was about to say something else, but he spoke first. “I’ll let you know if I feel… thirsty. Seriously. I just don’t want one right now.”

  Alice clasped her hands in front of her. Jonas didn’t see her worried very often. The last time was when his dad hadn’t come home.

  “Mom, what’s wrong?”

  She looked him over again. “It’s nothing. I guess I’m just tired. We get… I get a little lethargic around sunrise.” She pinched her lips together, then added, “Get dressed in the living room this morning, and stick you
r hand under the drapes before going outside.”

  “What?” he said around a mouthful of cereal.

  “I don’t know how this is all going to work, Jonas. A human would have thrown up from downing a pint of blood that quickly, but you—”

  “I didn’t—”

  “You did. You just don’t remember doing it because you’re young and you blocked it out. That’s why, in the old days, a proper sire didn’t let her fledglings feed from humans without supervision. They’d kill without realizing it.”

  Jonas used his tongue to feel around his mouth. “My teeth are still normal.”

  His mother nodded. “On the other hand, a vampire would have thrown up from eating… that,” she said, waving at his breakfast. “I just want you to be careful, dear. There have only been a few vampires born over the past millennium and all of those because a pregnant woman was turned. Most of them died young, so we have no idea what abilities — more importantly, what weaknesses — you’ll develop, and how quick onset will be.”

  “Onset?” Jonas asked.

  “You could be unaffected, or start tanning more easily. Or you could step out the front door and burn like flash paper the second sunlight touches your body.”

  Jonas swallowed hard. “I’ll be careful.”

  “Thank you. I’ll have someone install heavier drapes in your room today, after I rest.” She walked to her room, and Jonas heard the door click shut.

  He dumped the rest of his cereal into the garbage disposal — he wasn’t hungry anymore — and grabbed his clothes, shoes, phone, and backpack from his room. Then he sat and stared at the clock. It was 5:49. He bit his lower lip and drummed his fingers on his knees. Checking his phone, he noticed that he had two voice-mails and six text messages from Amelia that he didn’t want to deal with. 5:55.

  “I need a shower,” he suddenly announced, and walked to the bathroom. He shut the door and stared at it for a minute. I’m being paranoid, he thought, then stuffed the bathmat into the gap underneath and got undressed.

  The shower was calming. He stood there for twenty minutes, letting the hot water run over him before soaping up. After another ten minutes the skin of his fingertips began to look like raisins, so he got out and toweled off.

  Cautiously, he kicked the rug out of the way and jumped back. This is stupid. All the curtains are drawn, there’s no sunlight in the house. He opened the door and stood there, wrapped in a towel. Nothing happened. “Phew,” he said.

  While he dressed in the living room, his eyes kept darting nervously to the window. It was 6:37, well past sunrise. He wondered what it would be like to live without a hand. Would it grow back? Only one way to find out, he thought, psyching himself up. He walked to the window, closed his eyes, and stuck his left hand under the curtain.