“Are you asking how we're going to avoid the Army or are you asking how we're going to convince Silas not to kill us for interrupting his sleep?” At this point, Kilian wasn’t sure who scared him more. The Army would send him to prison, but Silas... yeah, this was not going to be a happy reunion, even if Kilian survived the agony of going into a cathedral. He was young for a Judas vamp, and young meant weak in the face of Christian symbols. The thought of the wooden disk Silas clutched in sleep was enough to make something dark in Kilian’s soul writhe.
“Yes, that,” Stephen said. Kilian had to rewind the conversation in his head, and then he shot Stephen a grim look.
“So, what's your sire like?” Stephen asked after several minutes of silence. Maybe he had run out of ways to entertain himself.
Kilian snorted. “Short-tempered.”
“That’s not a very complete description.”
Kilian put on his turn signal in the hopes of getting around the sedan towing a small trailer. Unfortunately, the second Kilian signaled, the pickup truck behind him pulled around and cut Kilian off on the left. Asshole. Kilian tasted blood as his fangs dropped. His hunger was getting dangerous. He could go days without needing blood, but whatever was growing in his chest left him drained.
“You don’t need more. I’ll handle Silas.” And Kilian would deal with any punishment his sire wanted to mete out. This was a bad idea, but they needed information.
“We’ll handle him together,” Stephen said, a mulish expression on his face.
“No, we won’t. You might be right about needing to wake Silas, but the decision is mine. I’m the one who knows where he’s sleeping. I will take responsibility.”
“Say it again,” Stephen said with a weird gleam in his eye.
“Say what?”
“That I’m right. I mean, of course I’m right because I'm brilliant,” he rushed to add, “but I do like hearing someone else say it.”
“I never said you were brilliant.”
“I am willing to acknowledge my flaws, including an ability to annoy a dead man into leaving his grave to find a quieter spot in the cemetery. However, I also happen to be unforgivably and unashamedly brilliant. Don't take that away from me.” Stephen pointed a sharp finger in Kilian’s direction.
Kilian never knew where Stephen’s teasing stopped and his insecurity began. “When we reach the church, let me handle Silas.”
“Oh, right, I'll let the Judas vamp go wandering through the Christian cathedral where his sire who is centuries older than he is, is held helpless and immobile by the symbols of Christianity. Sure. That sounds great.” Stephen held up his hand with the simple silver banding ring. “Even if this let me stay more than fifteen feet behind, I wouldn't because you’re going to be damn near helpless. That leaves me to deal with your sire. I'm not afraid of a little Judas vamp, not even an old one.”
“You should be.” Kilian had seen Silas lose his temper, and it wasn’t pretty.
Stephen pursed his lips and affected an expression of disdain. “I won’t turn tail from a vamp, and certainly not a Judas vamp. Now a Nosferatu vamp? Oh hell yes I’m running from that, but that’s more a hygiene issue. Those guys are gross. But I will never run from a Judas vamp. Supernatural creatures are programmed to follow their own nature, just like humans are.” Stephen grimaced. “Of course sometimes you get an outlier, some fucking moron who kills himself to save the mother who is not interested in saving him. Whatever. Sometimes even psychology fails. But my point is that people are predictable, and supernaturals are still people. If you know their breed, you can make accurate predictions. The defining nature of a Judas vamp is guilt, and guilt is not scary the way anger or fear is. So even if Silas is pissed, he’s more likely to go the Catholic mother guilt route than evisceration. Feel free to explain any flaw in my assumptions.” Stephen's challenge hung in the stale air of the minivan.
“You shouldn’t be so confident. Judas vamps may have inherited guilt, but the power was stolen by thieves. Three thieves thought stripping a dead body of lingering god-magic was a good idea, so cutthroat anger, greed, and a deep well of disrespect is also tangled in that guilt.”
“The magic originated from Judas, not three witches who stripped his body, so I am confident that your sire is more likely to get revenge using guilt rather than a knife.
“Silas will kill. You are a demon interrupting his sleep.” Of course, Kilian suspected that Silas was more likely to eviscerate Kilian. After all, he was the one who was supposed to listen to his sire. “Judas vamps might react more strongly to guilt, but like you said, we’re still people. We have the whole range of human emotions, including homicidal anger.”
“This is a moot discussion right now. We need to find some gas and food. So, what's your preference? Do we steal money and buy supplies or do we skip the middleman and steal supplies?”
Kilian wrinkled his nose. Intellectually, he knew Stephen was presenting reasonable choices, but he hated both.
Stephen poked Kilian's shoulder with a bony finger. “See? There's the Judas guilt showing up right on schedule.”
“This is Catholic guilt programmed into me from the womb,” Kilian said.
Stephen made a pantomime of comparing two items on a Libra scale only to find they weighed the same. “Judas guilt, Catholic guilt. They’re not so very different, certainly not as different as your mother would prefer. Good argument on that, by the way. I am very impressed with your ability to emotionally manipulate your birth giver.”
Kilian cast a dark look in Stephen's direction. “Don't think I didn’t notice your manipulations.”
Stephen shrugged without an ounce of guilt evident on his face. “Yeah, but I was being obvious enough that even she knew I was guilt-tripping her. But you provided the final push to get her into the helpful column. I'm impressed. So, are you going to answer me? What kind of thievery do we engage in? I can offer you blood, but my blood won’t keep the car running, and it doesn't replace our need for actual food. In fact, I probably need to eat an obnoxious amount of food if we want to keep up the van illusion in your parent’s garage. Using magic makes me burn through calories. If I had known how good a demon worked as a diet aid, I would have bottled demonic energy and made a fortune.”
“I don't think you’d get FDA approval.”
“I’ll sell it as a health aid.”
