Cat Adams - Blood Song

Too much pain, from too many sources. I couldn’t feel parts of my body that I knew I should be able

to, and other parts that normal y stayed in the background were front and center.

“We need to get her to the hospital.” A woman’s voice. I knew that voice. Dammit, who was she?

“No! They’d just stake her and take off her head.” A man.

“Maybe they should.” Cold, rational. A thought I’d have if I could think straight.

“She’s not a bat. She’s not going to be a bat.” Such determination. He sounded positive and that

made my cheeks feel warm. Or maybe it was just that everything else felt so cold.

A pause, and then a skeptical tone to her words. “You don’t know that.”

“Yeah, I do. I can tel .”

“Because she’s your Vaso ?” Now the woman’s voice practical y dripped venom. Whoever she was,

she didn’t like me, that was for damned sure.

“I keep tel ing you. She’s not my Vaso.” The man’s voice was growing desperate. “Look, I know

somebody who can help her. Take her back to the lab. I’l make some cal s.”

I felt my body being lifted, and coherent thought was swal owed in a dark wave.

4

I rose to consciousness slowly, like floating back to the top of a deep pool fil ed with cold black water.

What the hell? What’s happening to me?

I knew who I was. But I had no idea where I was or how I’d gotten there. The last thing I remembered

clearly was wrestling the mirror I’d bought for Vicki’s birthday into the Miata and heading for

Birchwoods. The mirror hadn’t wanted to fit. In fact, it’d been enough of a problem that I’d been

seriously glad of the protection charms I’d had put onto it.

There had been no danger, no threat. It made no sense for me to have been unconscious.

Sounds and smel s that were starting to filter through the fog in my brain: The whir and beeping of

medical equipment I understood, but stale pizza, french fries, and Chopin’s Nocturnes ?

It took more wil than was pretty to force my eyes open, but I managed.

I wasn’t in the hospital. I was on a slab in a lab. A very familiar lab, as it turned out. I recognized the

gleaming wal tiles with flecks of gold and black and the acoustical ceiling towering forty feet above my

head. I’d stared at those tiles and that recessed lighting many times before, soaking in the words of

one professor or another. While I couldn’t actual y see them, I knew that there were seats set up in an

auditorium-style semicircle, with wide concrete steps leading up to the higher rows. Painted metal pipe

bent so as not to have any sharp edges served as the handrails up the steps. They were painted

glossy black to match the rubberized strips that served as trim and skid stops on the stairs themselves.

This was the room where Warren Landingham gave his lectures on control ing zombies and ghouls.

It seemed a little strange that while I wasn’t a zombie or ghoul, I’d been strapped onto the slab and put

in restraints.

Oh, shit. I don’t like restraints. I have never liked restraints. I have my reasons—reasons that I won’t

go into with anyone ever again if I have my say. Those memories were magical y blunted, not erased,

and I felt an instant wave of pure, high-octane terror.

I closed my eyes and forced myself to take slow, deep breaths the way I’d been taught. It helped a

little. I can do this. I’m alive. This isn’t the past. This is now. I’m not in too much pain, which means

I’m not in bad shape . When I opened my eyes I wasn’t calm, but I had managed to beat back the panic

for the moment.

There were tubes running from my arm to the medical machinery clicking and beeping to my right. But

I felt fine.

So why restraints? And why no injuries? I felt my stomach tighten as another wave of panic prepared

to hit.

I let myself be distracted by the click of heels on linoleum just outside of my vision. The footsteps

were louder than usual, but I recognized the rhythm of the footfal s. Emma Landingham. As ever, she

was the personification of brisk efficiency. Her clothes didn’t wrinkle or her hose run. Ever. They simply

didn’t dare, any more than her honey-colored hair would ever hope to escape from the tight confines of

its bun. I vaguely remembered hearing voices. Had one of them been Emma? I wasn’t sure. But it

would make sense.

“What’s up?” I tried to speak. The croak I managed wasn’t even close to coherent. I cleared my

throat and tried again. “Emma, what’s going on?”

She turned with a swift movement that was the essence of energy contained. I’ve never seen anyone

alive or dead move like that who wasn’t a gymnast. No surprise there. She’d been one. Emma wasn’t

graceful but was capable of explosive movements: power, energy. And she was beautiful: petite golden

blond perfection, as opposed to Vicki’s tal , dark elegance and Dawna’s exotic beauty. I was definitely

the duckling in our crowd.

“Who are you?” Emma snapped the question out sharply without even bothering to look up from the

readout she was scanning. Gee, glad to see she was worried about me.

“Celia Graves.” The “s” sound in “Celia” sounded … wrong, different from usual. It took me a second

to realize why. I had acquired the barest touch of a lisp. I’d never had a speech impediment. I didn’t

even have an accent. Pure plain American English without any tel tale anything. Not even the highly

mocked but reasonably accurate “Val ey girl” dialect.

I tried to lick my lips and found … fangs. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, oh shit—

The words ran through my brain over and over. I found myself gulping in air and had to close my eyes

and forced myself to go back to the breathing exercises. When I’d reached the point where I thought I

could speak normal y, I tried again. “What the fuck is going on, Emma?” I tried to sound tough. Pure

bravado.

Fear produces biological reactions. Fight or flight. Neither was a viable option right now, but I wasn’t

going to convince my nervous system of that. Adrenaline rushed through my veins, clearing away the

last of the cobwebs. My body tensed, poised for action. The metal restraints groaned in response. The

metal … groaned? These restraints were built to withstand a raging zombie without strain. That simple

sound implied a level of strength that sent another wave of panic coursing like ice water through my

veins. A normal human couldn’t put enough pressure against the restraints to do that. Which meant I

wasn’t human anymore.

“Tel me about your family.”

She was testing me, making sure I had memories. Smart girl. If I had fangs I’d not only been bit by a

bat, I’d also been at least partial y changed. Which made no sense. Vampires general y just bite you

and leave you. You either get treated and live, or you die. Once in a very great while a master vamp wil

do the whole bite and spel thing to bring someone over, but it’s a rare bat with the power to do it. So, if I

was a vampire, I should be feral and have no memories. But if I was human, I shouldn’t have the fangs

and superstrength.

Shit. How I answered would be incredibly important, not only to Emma but also to the authorities. If I