the night, if not the first of his kind. For indeed the Francezcis had their agent or watcher there, and there was also B.J. Mirlu and her pack. But while Mike wasn’t the first, he was nevertheless an especially brutal member of his species.
Within an hour of leaving his room he had found a girl in a maze of steep alleys not far from the great Castle-on-the-Rock. She had taken him back to her place—a pair of grubby rooms in a once-proud building, now a block of flatlets—where they had sex. Following which she’d demanded payment, which Mike had delivered in the form of a bite; indeed far more than a bite, for yet again his hunger and appetite had driven him to the edge.
It was only at the last possible moment, when she was about to fall unconscious or worse, that Mike had recognized her symptoms and remembered the Francezci brothers’ precept with regard to making more of their kind. And so, remaining by her side, he had let her sleep, watching over her until he was satisfied she would survive his feeding. Then, in searching her squalid flat, he had come across evidence of the girl’s drug addiction, which as an ex-dealer he had at once recognized. He had then reasoned that this was why she’d seemed so weak, which meant that if she died later it wouldn’t be down to him entirely. He knew that if he’d drained her to the dregs she would be dead already! And so he had seen no need to cover his tracks: a serious error, as he would discover soon enough. For Mike wasn’t “merely” a vampire, he was also a plague-bearer!
The incident had taught him a lesson, however: that he must be more careful in how he conducted himself. If the Francezcis’ agent knew he was here and was already watching him, he did not want any sort of adverse report finding its way back to Sicily! For he desired that his life, or his undeath—his very existence—should continue long after this unfortunate episode was over and done with.
And so for eight of the last nine nights he had managed to control his hunger—barely—and aware that time was narrowing down had concentrated on studying the comings and goings of the Mirlu woman and the girls who worked at her wine bar. There had been many occasions when he’d followed one or another of the latter from the bar to their places of domicile and back again, learning the routes which they habitually used, and in the main he had succeeded in avoiding attracting their attention. On one such occasion, however, as Mike had followed the black girl, he had come a little too close and it was possible she had noticed him: the way she’d spun on her heel at the entrance to the wine bar, spun in that abrupt, startled manner, and looked back. But Mike had ducked quickly out of sight and it seemed that nothing had come of it…
Also, there had been that incident four nights ago, when he had thought to put an early end to the game. With the phials in their container in an inner pocket—a pocket which in his paranoia he kept patting to ensure they were still there—and with the first small purple lump swelling in his left armpit, he had felt disinclined to bide his time. Why should he, when it would take just one bite, a mere nip, to pass his poisons on to whichever victim he chose to infect?
A single nip, yes! Then, letting his saliva do the work for him, he would “take fright,” run away, and in all innocence his victim—believing him to be a sexual deviant or common mugger—would eventually infect the rest of the pack. Even B.J. Mirlu herself…
Bonnie Jean. Ah! It would have been something to single her out for the pathogenetic transfer! But no, B.J. was seldom seen outside her wine bar; and anyway it probably wasn’t such a good idea to even consider an attack on the leader of the pack: somebody the Francezci twins had described as “a bitch on the brink of ascendancy.”
And so Mike had decided on one of the girls: the young one. She would be the vessel for the dispersal of his
Within an hour of leaving his room he had found a girl in a maze of steep alleys not far from the great Castle-on-the-Rock. She had taken him back to her place—a pair of grubby rooms in a once-proud building, now a block of flatlets—where they had sex. Following which she’d demanded payment, which Mike had delivered in the form of a bite; indeed far more than a bite, for yet again his hunger and appetite had driven him to the edge.
It was only at the last possible moment, when she was about to fall unconscious or worse, that Mike had recognized her symptoms and remembered the Francezci brothers’ precept with regard to making more of their kind. And so, remaining by her side, he had let her sleep, watching over her until he was satisfied she would survive his feeding. Then, in searching her squalid flat, he had come across evidence of the girl’s drug addiction, which as an ex-dealer he had at once recognized. He had then reasoned that this was why she’d seemed so weak, which meant that if she died later it wouldn’t be down to him entirely. He knew that if he’d drained her to the dregs she would be dead already! And so he had seen no need to cover his tracks: a serious error, as he would discover soon enough. For Mike wasn’t “merely” a vampire, he was also a plague-bearer!
The incident had taught him a lesson, however: that he must be more careful in how he conducted himself. If the Francezcis’ agent knew he was here and was already watching him, he did not want any sort of adverse report finding its way back to Sicily! For he desired that his life, or his undeath—his very existence—should continue long after this unfortunate episode was over and done with.
And so for eight of the last nine nights he had managed to control his hunger—barely—and aware that time was narrowing down had concentrated on studying the comings and goings of the Mirlu woman and the girls who worked at her wine bar. There had been many occasions when he’d followed one or another of the latter from the bar to their places of domicile and back again, learning the routes which they habitually used, and in the main he had succeeded in avoiding attracting their attention. On one such occasion, however, as Mike had followed the black girl, he had come a little too close and it was possible she had noticed him: the way she’d spun on her heel at the entrance to the wine bar, spun in that abrupt, startled manner, and looked back. But Mike had ducked quickly out of sight and it seemed that nothing had come of it…
Also, there had been that incident four nights ago, when he had thought to put an early end to the game. With the phials in their container in an inner pocket—a pocket which in his paranoia he kept patting to ensure they were still there—and with the first small purple lump swelling in his left armpit, he had felt disinclined to bide his time. Why should he, when it would take just one bite, a mere nip, to pass his poisons on to whichever victim he chose to infect?
A single nip, yes! Then, letting his saliva do the work for him, he would “take fright,” run away, and in all innocence his victim—believing him to be a sexual deviant or common mugger—would eventually infect the rest of the pack. Even B.J. Mirlu herself…
Bonnie Jean. Ah! It would have been something to single her out for the pathogenetic transfer! But no, B.J. was seldom seen outside her wine bar; and anyway it probably wasn’t such a good idea to even consider an attack on the leader of the pack: somebody the Francezci twins had described as “a bitch on the brink of ascendancy.”
And so Mike had decided on one of the girls: the young one. She would be the vessel for the dispersal of his
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