SWNOVELS Chapter CHAPTER FOUR
BERNARD AND ANTHONY HAD SET UP THE GUN and tripod in a perfect place, two parallel streets over from Jenny’s house in a small wooded area on a dead-end road. It supplied sufficient cover for the task at hand, and as soon as it was done, they would flee with the girl’s head in the bag. Their hearts weren’t into the job, but it was either her head in the bag or theirs.
Two beautiful cardinals flew around the space where they were situated, traveling around a substantial building. As Anthony puffed away on his Bolivar, the air smelled of intense Cuban cigar smoke. Bernard had knocked down a birch tree and now had a perfect line of sight past a brown garage on one street and between a house and a swing set on the other. They sat on the ground and told each other stories of past conquests and battles that had almost ended up with them being bones. It was a way to pass the time as they awaited the perfect shot.
“So I was just getting ready to kill this guy and drink him, and right when I was ready to jump on him, I got a tap on the shoulder. It was a red sheriff wanting a light for his Treasurer cigarette. I didn’t sense him, but sheriffs use magic like everyone else. I would have been bones for sure. I had a nightmare about it once. After I gave him a light, he pulled his sword and cut my head off.”
Bernard nodded. “Aw yeah. Probably wouldn’t be here with me right now. Probably be some other loser.”
“Hey, that’s not funny.”
“Aw yeah. It wasn’t meant to be.”
The sky was shades of gray and threatened to rain, but it had been an idle threat; not a single drop had fallen. A small engine plane buzzed up there somewhere, but the clouds concealed it. Bernard was short, just over five feet tall; he wanted to be anywhere else but his current location. He would prefer just about any other job than this one. Anthony was of average height with shoulder-length black hair and a stern face. His conscience was not a healthy thing but rather a sickly entity barely able to lift its head, and whenever it did so, it was knocked back down. However, his conscience was attempting to rise like a down-and-out boxer trying hard to get up.
The Winchester Model 70 extreme weather rifle with scope had a clear view of Jenny sitting on a lawn chair in the front yard facing her mother, but killing a little girl didn’t exactly sit well. She was sideways to them, and he was waiting for a better angle. Bernard took a discolored cloth out of his pocket and polished its stock, and Anthony shook his head at the act. But to Bernard, it was merely a slight distraction. He was polishing time to make it glide past a little easier.
“Bernard, what will you do with all that money?”
“Gonna give some to charity.”
“Yeah, right.”
“Aw yeah. My father was blind, so I’m gonna give some to the Institute.”
Bernard had to chuckle. “You belong in an institute. If it wasn’t that Sharpton would track us down, I think I would just get the hell out of here. That’s one vampire that I do not like. Notice how vampires go missing around him? Like when Arvel went to Italy. Italy, my ass. Not everyone is as stupid as he thinks.”
“Aw yeah. If I told him you said that you wouldn’t live very long. Don’t worry, I’m no rat.” Bernard was anxious to get it over and out of the area. He could sense some of Jenny’s energy but wasn’t sure what he was detecting or where it originated. It did make him a little edgy, but he decided not to bring it up. They didn’t need to be unnerved. Some things were best left unsaid. There was no choice but to complete the task, so they were going to, and that was it.
They were surrounded by a circle dug into the ground about three inches deep, filled with broken glass crystals. It created a temporary spell that allowed them to go undetected from Jenny. That small area had become invisible to her magical mind, like radar bouncing off a stealth fighter. Sharpton’s instructions had been precise on how to accomplish it, and it had taken them two days to complete the circle as they had run out of crystal. The crystals had to form a solid circle, or it wouldn’t work. A spell that wouldn’t function was a waste of time and energy. Any space where crystal wasn’t touching crystal would nullify the enchantment. The fragments had to originate from enchanted crystal balls smashed and sprinkled with flakes of dried vampire blood that contained a high level of magical properties, but at least Sharpton had taken care of that end of it, having supplied the glass. A wizard sold them the blood, and it had been his blood. A spellcaster’s blood had a reputation for being unpredictable when consumed, with tales of vampires melting from the inside out. But some stories were just that, perhaps put out there by a wizard.
Bernard stroked the blade of his 17th-century katana sword and looked nervous, starting to cut his hand open in slices and watching it heal. Even his blood was appealing as he stared at it. He loved killing and terrifying humans, but killing a child? This day would not be one to remember. Bernard thought he might use a spell to make sure he’d forget, but those things were expensive, so he wasn’t sure he wanted to dish out that kind of money. A wiped conscience was often a happy one. “That was so cool that Nash took that red sheriff’s head off. I wish it had been me. If you take a sheriff’s head, how other vampires look at you changes.”
Anthony ran his hand through his hair. He watched as Bernard sighted the rifle at Jenny. “Bernard, you shoot her in the heart when the girl stands. We’ll run over, and I’ll cut her head off and put it in the bag, then we can put this business behind us. Do not hesitate. In this business, nothing good comes from hesitation. Do you understand?”
“You’re hesitating when it comes to shutting up!”
Bernard’s dull green eyes looked like they had seen too much nasty business; he shook his head. “Aw yeah? Making the right decision just might come from hesitating. What the hell is next? Are we going to kill a baby in its cradle? I don’t know whether or not Sharpton knows what he’s talking about. She just looks like an ordinary girl to me.” But maybe the energy he was feeling belonged to the girl.
“What the hell do you expect to see? Magical dust flying out of her ass? Hey, moron, if you want to cut yourself, do it when I’m not around. Supposed to be something special about her, but I don’t know. She looks an innocent to me.”
“Aw yeah. She won’t be so special with her head in the bag.”
Anthony stared at Jenny and knew her head would soon be in the black gym bag at his feet. “Life is a lot more exciting now than it used to be. I can’t wait until we run everything, and it’s coming. Humans are just too weak.”
“Aw yeah? Shit is coming; that’s what’s coming—a big heaping pile of it, all stinky and nasty. Everyone’s going to be covered in it. Vampires and humans. We’ll be able to draw some nice and big stink lines on it.”
“Who spit in your blood? A vampire’s gotta do what he’s gotta do.”
On her front lawn, Jenny sat on the lawn chair facing her mother; she had a Steven King paperback in her hand, but she wasn’t reading. The girl was wearing a red blouse and a skort made with patches of black velvet with a single two-inch long blood-red diamond for color above her right thigh; she had had a lot of fun making the ensemble with her mother. It was just one of the things that they shared that made them happy. “So, where did Dracula go?”
“Your father went back up to his place in Canada.”
“Sure, now he’s my father. Before that, he was a blood-sucking monster who liked eating kids and kittens.”
“I can assure you that he was never that. Anyway, he’s got some business up there that involves you.” Allison knew it was difficult for Jenny; she could see the troubled look on her face. Perhaps it was more annoyed than agitated.
“What the heck is that supposed to mean? He better not start bossing me around. What kind of father shows up when you’re twelve? Are you my mother, Mother? Or did you find me in some garbage can?”
“Oh, you’re mine. I remember the day you were born. You hurt.”
“And why are you getting back with him now? Why did you break up in the first place? If you had never broken up, I would have always known.”
“It’s complicated.”
Jenny slowly shook her head. “People always say it’s complicated when they don’t want to tell you something. Everything is complicated if you look at it from the right angle. Just tell me why you broke up in the first place. Mother, it’s a simple question, so let’s hear a simple answer.”
“He wanted to turn me.”
“He wanted to turn you into a vampire?”
“No, into a piano.”
“Funny. So Dracula wanted to turn you into a vampire, but you didn’t want that?”
“That’s right. Drac didn’t want me to grow old and die on him. No way was I letting him do that to me, but you know what, someday I might reconsider. Time has a way of changing a person.”
“You’d let him turn you into a vampire? Do you want to transform before you’re all old and ugly? Not sure how I feel about that. I guess it beats the alternative, dead in a box.”
“It’s complicated. And don’t tell him what I just told you. Oh, he said it’s dangerous for you to use your magic without proper training.”
“Oh, Mother, it is not.”
“No? Have you forgotten the window incident?”
Jenny tapped herself on the forehead with the book. She could have accidentally tossed her mother out the window and killed her. The realization of it commenced sinking in. Her life would have been over; it would have been impossible to get over something like that. Maybe her father was right. “So, I’m not supposed to enchant anything?”
“We’re going to his place in Moncton in a few days. He wants you to meet someone up there who knows a blood wizard who can train you properly. Your father said many of them claim to know what’s what, but only a few do. He wants you trained by someone that knows what’s what.”
“And what about school?”
“We’ll figure something out.”
“And where is Moncton?”
“Up in New Brunswick, Canada. He says that he has a cat that he wants you to meet?”
Jenny looked into her mother’s green eyes with a bit of contempt. Her face tightened with curiosity. “He wants me to meet a cat? Does he have mental problems or what?”
“He said it’s a special cat.”
“Un-huh. A cat is a cat Mother unless it has two heads or something. Hey, do you think anyone can beat up Dracula?”
“I don’t know the answer to that question, but I sure wouldn’t want to try it. Jenny, I didn’t finish that book. You’re supposed to wait your turn.”
“Oh yeah, well, I didn’t know that Dracula was my father. See how that works?” She wasn’t as angry as she was pretending to be. “Hey, I could go to school and say that my father can beat up your father. I could tell it to anyone, and it would be true.”
“You can’t tell anyone. It could be dangerous.”
“Mother, you already said that. I could say my father can eat your father.” When Jenny stood up to give her the book, a bullet went right through her.
“Jenny!”