Page 27
I gasp and pull back, goosebumps slithering down my back as I bring some distance between us. My face feels flushed and hot, my chest sweaty. I was fine a second ago, goddamn it! How long is this venom high going to last? And Cor just stands there, eyelids heavy and low as he watches me fight against my libido. As if he knows exactly what’s going on. And he just lets it happen, waiting for me to decide on my next action. That way I can’t blame my burst of lust on him. That fucker.
I tug at my collar, then instinctively check my sleeves, my jacket, the sunglasses perched on my head, but everything is where it’s supposed to be. No neon signs proclaiming my hard-on for a vampire.
And for once, Cor doesn’t use my distraction to sneak up on me. It’s a little unsettling not to have him standing within licking distance when I look up. He tilts his head, brushes down his t-shirt-clad chest, and lifts his chin towards me. “We go?”
Outside the living room bay windows, a bird flies by, as if to mock Cor’s question. Its song isn’t anywhere close to melodious, but the message stays the same: Toasty times for vampires outside. The veils are semi-okay for vampires to walk around in, even in daylight, so if I get him to Looke’s, he will be alright—if the amount of light in the living room really doesn’t bother him, that is. But the way there is the problem, filled with sunlight and happy brightness, perfect for barbecued fanger. And I don’t have a car either.
I look back to Cor, making sure I understood him right. Going by his face, he doesn’t realize the weirdness of his question. “It’s day outside. You will burn.” I hesitate and lean closer to him, forgetting that nobody else can hear me asking stupid questions in here. “Vampires burn, don’t they?”
He nods his head once, making some strands of his dark brown hair bob into his face. He brushes them back carelessly, not noticing the wonder that is him, clean and washed. “Burn. Yes. Later.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “How much later?”
He lifts his hand and waggles it side to side, humming vaguely. There are tiny scars on his knuckles, paler now against his less latte, more cappuccino, skin. A fighter’s hands.
I was planning to hike to the veil, but I can’t do that with Cor in tow. And I can’t just call any old taxi to take us there, either. And I can’t stroll around and look for a car rental with Cor and his black eyes following me. Which leaves me with two options: calling Stanley again, or finding out how to call a supe-friendly taxi. And if I have a choice…
I scour the house until I find a bunch of flyers that shouldn’t exist outside of a veil, and leaf through them until I find something that looks like a transportation company. As an afterthought, I also pocket a little leaflet advertising a local deli, with local meaning the Moon Market. Can’t hurt to see if they sell weird shit like vampire blood, right? There are lots of uses for it, so there has to be a vendor. I think.
Cor trails after me as if he doesn’t have a care in the world, inspecting the bunch of leaflets I leave on the kitchen table, staring at my phone as I call the transportation company and tell them to bring a car with darkened windows, and finally watching me put on my black army boots in the front hallway. I want to say something when he puts his feet into a pair of abandoned flip-flops that I didn’t notice earlier, but they seem to fit perfectly, and he looks like he knows how to walk in them. Who am I to tell him what to wear?
As the car—taxi driver?—honks outside, I fish out my second favorite pair of sunglasses and put it on Cor’s face. He flinches, then stands very still as he lifts a hand to touch the thing on his face. Fortunately he leaves it where it is after a bit of groping, seemingly understanding what they are for. Or not, I really don’t know anymore if he’s just humoring me most of the day.
Outside, I throw looks back at Cor to see if he catches fire all the way to the cab. He doesn’t. His skin doesn’t even change color. He doesn’t look uncomfortable—yet—and my floundering makes him grin slightly. I can see the tips of his fangs, but nobody else does. The street is mostly empty, and of the few people who are there, nobody pays attention to us. They do look at the car braving the bumpy road, but not us. Phew.
Inside the sedan, I throw a glance at the driver. He looks middle-aged, but that doesn’t mean much. His sandy blond hair is thinning just slightly, but not enough to call him balding. His cheeks are tight and flat; his nose is wide but short. I am not sure what flavor of supernatural he is, but when the sunlight hits his eyes, the pupils go pear-shaped like goat’s eyes. They turn back to normal within a second, as if it never happened. He just watches me in his rearview mirror, dispassionate and calm. “Where to?” he asks, his voice a very ordinary baritone.
“Looke’s. You know where it is?”
The driver snorts. “Sure thing, boss. That’ll cost you forty dollars, though. I ain’t chauffeuring a Hunter into a veil for the standard rate.”
So he knows what I am. Great. I tighten my lips and nod. He snorts again and starts driving. At least he doesn’t kick us out or try to run us over. Looks like it’s going to be a good day after all.
THE DARKMOON MARKET isn’t what I expected. I thought it would be this place filled with fluttering faeries and juggling gnomes, witches riding their brooms to work, and, oh I don’t know, magic in the air? I had hopes for it that I can’t quite explain, but I certainly didn’t expect it to look like just another district in a very mundane city, if a little run-down. Ten and a half blocks of magic too obvious to be running free, with artifact traders, potion makers, and creepy crawlies that would send a mere mortal screaming. I mean, it is the biggest veil in the U.S., with the biggest, baddest monsters in residence. Shouldn’t it at least have a little je ne sais quoi?
Instead, the district is mostly normal blocks of houses, if not as tall as in other districts this close to the city center. Three, maybe four stories—with very few exceptions—, admittedly less high-tech and a little aged, but I suppose it’s hard to find builders who won’t end up eaten by a resident.
There is no true sunlight; the sky being tinged in a slightly off-yellow and purple hue. Still bright enough to be uncomfortable for many of the more light-sensitive inhabitants, but nowhere close to life-threatening. I have no way to relate to the feeling of being burnt by the sun, but I assume that this level of light would be like a very sunny day out in Australia for a very pale person, from a vampire’s perspective.
The driver brings us all the way to Looke’s, and I tip him for sticking to his word, but that is where the good times stop. The moment we are out of the car, he floors it and flips me the finger, yelling, “Drop dead, Hunter pig!”.
The car screeches around the corner and disappears before I am even remotely close to reacting. The pretty healthy amount of shoppers watching us like a roadshow don’t look after the car, either. They keep their mixture of vaguely surprised to quietly annoyed glances on me. Some of them very much don’t look human, and in here, nobody cares. They do care about a full-blooded Hunter in their midst, though.
I might have underestimated the danger of ‘just a quick trip into a veil, no biggie’.
Looke’s neighborhood is surprisingly beautiful, though. Old Tudor style houses with wide, boxed window displays, wooden and brass signs swinging on medieval-looking brass holders set into house walls, and cobblestone roads and sidewalks, complete with black, cast-iron streetlights. The houses don’t look like they belong in the modern age, or in this part of the world even. But that is possibly why they are here; the beasts that can’t leave this veil probably need a piece of home to ease the imprisonment. It’s a blast from London’s past, and I very much dig it. Too bad my kind isn’t welcome here. I would have liked to come back.
Cor just kind of promenades around as I march towards Looke’s. He keeps close, but seems very much interested in the world as a whole and the display windows of this street in particular. It’s easy to forget he was in a box until recently, and that the modern world might be completely new to him. Well, not completely. Except for electricity and basic things like doors, microwaves, and the like, he seems to do just fine. Maybe he feels more at home on this Anglophile street than at any other place in the city. Who knows?
The shop display next to Looke’s shows an array of leather bags and coats from snow-white down to the deepest black. Cor stares at something there for a while, making me stop at Looke’s door and turn towards him. I’m not sure what he is looking at, but his face is still, frozen almost, except for his eyes. It should be impossible to see his pitch black eyes move, but I see them flit back and forth over bags and cloaks. He looks forlorn.
A group of three vaguely wolf-vibey teenagers drift closer to us. Fifteen, sixteen at most, but strong, athletic. Shifters age quickly in the beginning, and they feel the hormones a lot stronger than a mortal. Or so I’ve read. I’ve met just about as many shifters as I have met warlocks. I’m about to say something when they get within a few feet of us, to warn Cor as if he doesn’t have supernatural senses, but I don’t have to.
They drift closer to me instead of him, eyes dead and predatory, only to turn tail and walk off at a brisk speed when Cor gives them the side-eye. He doesn’t change his expression, doesn’t turn his head at all. Just one glance out of the corner of his eye, and they are gone. Predators recognize predators, I guess.
They aren’t the only ones paying us a little too much attention, though. By now, five or six people have stopped along the street on both sides, murmuring or simply staring at me with hostile eyes. The longer I stand here, the worse it is going to get. And at some point, someone with more backbone will come over here to voice their opinion.
I don’t want a fight, especially not with Cor getting into it. He might win, but we would attract even more attention than we already have. And I am still very much worried about the people who locked him into the box catching up to us. Grabbing the door handle to Looke’s, I push it open enough for the little bell to ring and then resolutely point at the small gap. “We go in here,” I say with as much gravitas as I can muster, wordlessly conveying to Cor that we need to go. Cor shoots me a quick, tight-lipped smirk and saunters towards me, making sure to not-quite-accidentally brush up against me with as much of his body as he can get into contact. It makes me shudder almost violently before I can stop myself. Fucker.
