Flesh and Blood

He shifted to his half-form, using his leopard-enhanced night vision to navigate and his heightened senses to keep tabs on the strange world unfolding around him.

From the narrow banks and grass thickets, animal eyes reflected the boat’s running lights. A large splash greeted him as he rounded an island of cypress thick with Spanish moss. Once, he caught sight of a snake slithering through the water. Damn thing must have been as thick around as his thigh. Reminded him why he hated the Glades. After dark, the place was a nightmare, rife with things that would gobble down a house cat like it was a snack.

No wonder people dumped bodies out here.

A large winged shape passed through the moon’s light, casting Doc in shadow for a moment. He glanced up, but the thing was gone. Too big to be a bird. What else lived out here, he didn’t really want to know.

Aliza’s house rose off the horizon at last. Doc slowed as he approached, happy the lights were on. Waking the old witch would only add to an already crappy evening. And, in a second stroke of luck, Chewie’s spot on the dock was empty.

Doc idled the engine and went fully human. Classic rock and laughter spilled from the house. ‘Aliza!’ he yelled to be heard over the ruckus. He was about to yell again when the screen door opened onto the wraparound porch.

‘Well, look what the cat dragged in.’ Aliza saluted him with a bottle of vodka and laughed like she’d said something original. A few of her coven members drifted out behind her. Most of them looked as sloshed as she was.

‘I’m here to talk about what we discussed.’ He recognized one or two of the women standing behind her but none of the men. He wasn’t about to air personal business in front of strangers. Especially when it was the kind of business that could be used against him.

‘What we discussed?’ She took a swig from the bottle. ‘Your little undead dead friend?’ Her audience laughed.

‘Yes.’ Once again, a trip to Aliza’s was not turning out the way he wanted it to. Surprise.

She leaned on the railing, dangling the bottle over the water. ‘I already told you what I need to make that happen.’ She glanced back at her friends, then at him again. ‘Begging ain’t gonna help you.’ She snickered. ‘Purring might.’ Her friends broke out in laughter and she joined them, snorting at her own hilarity.

‘I’m not here to beg. I have what you want.’ He had both items she’d asked for, including the Medusa.

She spoke to her friends but loud enough for him to hear. ‘If I had a fiver for every man who told me that … ’ More laughter, but she suddenly turned to look at him with more sobriety than she’d showed since she stepped out onto the porch. ‘You have the blood?’

The word turned the assembled crowd’s laughter into murmurs and whispers.

‘Yes.’

‘Show me.’

Again, not how he wanted this to go down, but what he’d done wasn’t going to stay secret once Dominic woke up anyway. He reached into the interior pocket of his jacket, pulled out the vial, and held it up. Aliza handed off the vodka and adjusted one of the security floodlights anchored to the railing to shine on him directly. The blood glowed like expensive wine. Deathly quiet spread over the crowd.

Aliza, suddenly all business, gestured toward the dock. ‘Get up here.’

He moored the airboat, jumped off, and climbed the stairs to the door. Aliza had it open and waiting. The smell of booze, pot, and magic assaulted him as he walked in. Beer bottles and cups littered the flat surfaces. Someone had strung fairy lights around Evie’s statue, and a mostly eaten sheet cake sat on the counter next to the sink. Black sugar roses trimmed what was left of it. ‘Am I interrupting something?’

Aliza shut the door behind him, her face somber. ‘Today is Evie’s birthday.’

He handed her the vial and a small packet of Medusa. ‘Well, this should mean she’ll be here in person next year.’

‘Yes.’ Aliza nodded, oddly quiet. ‘Stay here. I’ll be right back.’

As she left, her coven filtered through the kitchen getting drinks, cake, whatever excuse they could to check him out, all the while eyeing him like he might snap them up like field mice. Or turn into a unicorn. Varcolai and witches didn’t exactly run in the same circles, but they weren’t unknown to each other either. Or maybe they’d just never seen one who’d gotten blood out of a vampire and lived to tell the tale.

A few of them nodded in greeting. He just stared back from where he leaned against the wall. He wasn’t here to make friends.

Aliza returned, her face cranked into a scowl. She waggled the vial of blood at him. ‘This is no good.’ The few coven members left in the kitchen quickly disappeared.

He straightened. ‘Like hell it is. I took it out of Dominic myself.’

‘Oh, it’s that scum sucker’s blood all right, but it’s tainted. Laced with laudanum and silver.’

Frustration burned in his gut. ‘How the hell did you think I was going to get the blood out of him? I tried asking. Trust me. Didn’t work.’

‘You screwed up, shifter.’

‘No, you screwed up.’ He jabbed his finger at her. ‘You said get Dominic’s blood. You never said anything about what it could or couldn’t have in it. Now, you find a way to clean it and make it work.’

‘Are you threatening me?’ She squinted at him, but her gray eyes were too bloodshot to intimidate.