Cat, vase, car, tree, and bookshelf.

Prepare yourself.

They had no clue what was coming. The sweet, black cat with the perfect four-pointed  star on its forehead and the butterscotch colored eyes seemed harmless, pitiful even, sitting on their doorstep, whiskers drooping in the heavy rainfall. It looked sorrowfully up at them and gave an imploring “Mew?” The nice, middle-aged couple and their three kids could never resist such a charming kitty.

But they would grow to wish they had.

Every day, the kids would look out the window of the first floor to see the kitty sitting in a huge weeping willow tree, it’s fur shimmering in the sunlight, ruffled by the light breeze. Alaric, as the cat had been named, was serene, so graceful that he could jump atop a vase without rocking it, and inconspicuous, but at the same time regal.  His fur was so black, it seemed to absorb the sunlight, and cast out darkness in it’s place.Alaric loved high places, especially the tops of bookshelves and trees. He wanted to be able to see everything without being seen. One night, as another rainstorm raged, the family was driving home from dinner in their car, a Prius.

They got out of the car and were soldiering through the cruel Illinois wind, rain whipping their faces. The woman saw a dark shape sitting expectantly on the porch steps. Amber eyes glowed out from the darkness, holding malicious intent. For a moment, the woman was scared, until she recognized Alaric.

“You scared me, sweet kitty,” she said with a smile, in the tone that all cat lovers use. She was so busy petting Alaric’s soft, damp fur that she didn’t notice the amber eyes as they slowly bled to red, didn’t hear the soft “ching” of his fangs coming out. She drew back to look at Alaric, but as soon as she saw that her “sweet kitty” was no longer a cat at all, but rather a bloodsucking vampire, the cat attacked.

Alaric drank his fill, killing the entire family. He licked the blood from his fur, then sauntered over to the neighbor’s house and scratched at the door. The elderly woman opened the door, and smiled at the cat she saw there. “Mew?” he said imploringly. The old woman couldn’t resist the beautiful cat.

But she would grow to wish she had.

Creepy, right? I admit, I am perpetuating bad vampire stereotypes, with the glowing red eyes/killing children/dark and stormy night thing, but this was my first vampire story. Ever. I’ll do better next time (I hope). Also, some charming vampire lolcats…

Vampire Cat doing what vampires do best

The Vampire Le-cat (bad pun, I know. Anne Rice would have my head)

  i wandered through the abandoned construction site, and into the deserted playhouse. I ducked under and around chunks of sandy earth, the smell of rot reaching my nose. I had never been here before, but I knew something was here. Finally, I came to a large mirror, framed in wrought iron, cloudy with age. I stepped up to it. This is what I was loking for. I placed my hand up to it, and it rippled as my hand sunk through the surface. It was cool but not cold, contrasting with the heated earth below me. I stepped into the mirror, immersing myself in the coolness of that ocean of what should have been hard, but wasn’t. I felt utterly fearless, the call still drew me forwards.

 I walked along the tall, wide tunnel, my sneakers sinkng into the sodden earth. I came to a crossroads, where many tunnels intersected my own, but that was not the oddest thing. There were children, probably hundreds of them, walking silently along the space where all the tunnels widened into one huge one. They didn’t socialize or fall out of step, or even move their eyes. I ran up to a girl clutching a teddy bear under her frail arm.

I tapped her on the shoulder. “What are you all doing here? What is this place?” I felt the first penetration of fear through the protective numbness that had gathered around me as she turned her glassy, ice-blue eyes on me and made her reply in a Drucilla from Buffy the Vampire Slayer voice.

“We are here because He wants us to be. Perhaps I shall be lucky today.” With a creepy, unsettling, high pitched giggle, the girl turned away. We came to a large cavern, the walls of which were set with emeralds, rubies and obsidian. The children all lined up, expressionless eyes trained on another tunnel that led to the cavern. From the tunnel came a hissing sound that chilled me to the bone. All at one the numbness evaporated. I wanted to run away, to get out and never have to see what comes out of that tunnel, but I was rooted in place.  Out of the darkness emerged a gigantic snake, it’s scales as brilliant green as the emeralds, its eyes as beady black as the obsidian. Its mouth stained as red as the rubies. Stained by blood. The dark eyes surveyed each child carefully, then its head shot down, and it swallowed the frail little girl with the teddy bear whole. The others looked on, dispassionately.

I exploded, my feet no longer rooted, the strange curse lifted by the heat of my anger. “How can you just stand there and watch? Don’t you have souls?”

Hundreds of indifferent eyes turned towards me as they all uttered a single word in unison.

“No.”

I was woken by Liz poking my foot and asking me why I was sleeping on the couch. I guess the lesson of this story is that I sleepwalk.

A fine repayment that would be for helping a stranger, she thought bitterly. Unless it’s his secret wish to be reduced to ash. Somehow I doubt that. Only then did she glance up at the mans face. She froze, her mind scrabbling for some explanation, some excuse for why he looked exactly like the vampire who had changed Sarah. He leaned close and whispered chillingly in her ear,”The time has come to pick sides, Jane. Sarah doesn’t have the choice you do, she’ll fight with us. But when the time comes, who are you loyal to?”

He struts off, that arrogant smiles still in place, unfazed. He opens the door and Jane shivers, but it’s not from the icy fall air that flows like cool water into the room, lapping at Jane’s feet.

“Ma’am! Your groceries are all ready!” A confused, if friendly, cashier peeks at her from behind thick glasses. “Are you all right? Did that man say something nasty to you?”

“No, I’m fine, ” She replies, mustering a weak smile. “Really, I am” she adds when he looks doubtful. She pays for the food, and, hoisting the bag, steps out into the approaching dusk. The sun bleeds red, pink and gold across the sky, spreading its colors that dance in the sky before retiring behind the horizon to sleep until dawn.

“Hey there!” calls a jeering voice from across the street. Jane glances up and sees a small group of men, four at most, emerging from the bar. She keeps walking, expecting that they’ll leave her alone. She was wrong. They follow her progress, shouting suggestive comments and roaring with laughter. As they begin to cross the street, Jane ducks into a darkened alley, practically running now, her frantic footsteps echoing of the  brick walls on either side of her. Sarah burrows into her chest, softly stating, “I’m thirsty”.  The men round the corner into the alley, gathering dark and threatening as the shadows that we all switch our lamps on to ward off. The things of nightmares. As if I’m one to talk, Jane thinks, then a new fear hits her.

“Don’t touch me,” She says to no avail. The men just laugh, cruelly. The leader reaches out and she shies away like a nervous horse. “Don’t touch me,” she begs again, but the leader snickers and replies,

“After chasing you that long? Too bad, little lady,” he leered at her and reached out a hand. Jane looked about frantically, searching for a place to go, her blond hair shining like dull gold as her head moves. As soon as the mans finger touched her face, his hot breath which stunk of whiskey ruffling her hair, he combusted into ashes. Jane straightened, and the other men’s faces changed slowly from idiotic pleasure to outright fear. At this, Sarah leapt out of Jane’s arms, and before they could scream, drained each man dry. “I told you I was thirsty, Mother” her sweet voice that rang like the tinkling of tiny bells intoned, to which Jane shrugged nonchalantly.Playing cleanup, Jane brushed her fingers over each of them in turn, reducing their bodies, faces still frozen in shock and trepidation, to ash. Picking up Sarah and her groceries, Jane walks to the mouth of the alley as a wind picks up, ruffling the hem of her skirt and swirling the ashes around her.

“I told them not to touch me.” She murmers before setting off towards home.

“Thanks! You look great, too.” I was practically bowled over by the overwhelming smell of chlorine as the other guests of the pool party came over to admire the shimmery, aqua-marine pool coverup that I was wearing. They pulled me after them toward the pool, coaxing me to jump in with them.

“I-I can’t,” I said, stuttering as I am prone to right before I tell a lie. “I’m afraid of the water!” Half-truth. I wasn’t afraid of the water, rather of what would happen if I entered it. “I’ll just stay on the pool chairs.” My companions cast me sympathetic looks, then, heaving a cumulative shrug seemingly, they resumed their previous activities. I sat quietly, daydreaming about the warm sea and the silence it brought to my strained mind.I watched them, squealing and giggling when splashed, so happy and carefree. I didn’t want to, but I also felt a rush of bitterness. They would never know what it was like to watch the centuries pass them by, people they loved growing old and dying as they looked on helplessly. They would never suffer the realization that they had truly made a deal with the devil, and since that point had never, and would never be human. The greatest secrets they had to keep were who their crushes were. Lucky. No, not lucky, smart. Unlike me.

“Hey,” came Kiara’s soft voice from beside me. I glanced up, startled. “Is something wrong? I’ve been calling you for five minutes. It’s starting to rain, but you were just sitting here with a really sad look on your face.”

“I…no, I’m fine, really. I was just lost in thought.” Another half-truth. Lost in thought, yes. Fine, no, and I haven’t been since my sixteenth birthday, when I made the deal that would destroy my life. Of all the people, Kiara was the one I hated lying to the most. She had been my friend since we met, and tolerated all my “weirdness” with supernatural patience. I was snapped out of my reverie when she rounded on me.

“I don’t believe that. You’ve been weird ever since I said I was having a pool party. What’s the real problem? Is it a guy?” She is also very frank, if off-base on this one thing.

“No, it’s not a guy. And what do you mean by ‘weird’? Weirder than usual, you mean?” I said jokingly, trying to get her off-topic. No such luck. The girl had a mind like a steel trap.

“Hmmm…I’m not done with you, but we need to go have cake with the others. You can’t avoid me forever!” She pointed a finger mock-threateningly at me. I screamed, clutching my heart, over-dramatizing until we were both convulsed with giggles. Still laughing, I headed inside, abruptly halting when I sensed a darkening in the air. How to explain it? Have you ever come across an electrical wire that was severed by a hurricane and known instinctively that it would start a forest fire if left unattended? Or discovered that a flammable gas had leaked into the room, just as someone lights a match? It was a sense of hideous foreboding and inevitability, but I seemed to be the only one aware of it. I felt the change when it came, shivers running repeatedly down my spine. Kiara turned towards me her mouth open as if to ask me something, when her eyes took on a glazed expression and she turned silently away as if she had forgotten my existence. I walked through the throngs of people but even if I tapped their shoulder, or called their name they seemed to not see or hear me. The doorbell rang, but only I seemed aware of it. I waited until the final reverberations left the room, listening for another ring. Then it came, tolling like the church bells on Sunday morning. Looking around myself once more, I answered it. Three people, who though dressed in contemporary clothing, reeked of ancient evil and seemed to pull shadows around themselves like a cover hog pulls the blankets. Not a good sign, to state the obvious.

“Who are you and what do you want? You don’t exactly look like pool party guests,” I said, pleased at the fact that my voice didn’t quaver.

“We’re coming back…Be ready or die…” Three hissing voices responded.

“Be ready or die?! What does that mean? Get your shadowy butts back here and answer me!”

I was met only with the faintest semblance of ghostly chuckles, and I spun around, infuriated. It seemed that now the people who had ignored me when under the temporary spell were now focused on one point, me, with identical “she’s crazy” expressions. Kiara broke the silence with her no-nonsense voice.

“Diana, mind talking to me for just a sec?” The casual tone didn’t fool me, she meant business. She hauled me off to her room, threw me down on the bed and uttered one word.

“Spill”

I replied, “There’s nothing to spill, I-I must have imagined something that wasn’t there.” I had been grasping at straws and as her face progressed from skeptical to very concerned, I knew I had picked the wrong excuse. Very carefully and gently she began to speak in the soothing tones one would use to address a frightened animal…or a deranged person.

” I know school life is hard for you, and living in an orphanage must be very difficult, but maybe you should consider–” I was saved from the agonizingly sympathetic speech when a sharp scream cut Kiara off. We ran out of the room to see with horror that the  screamer’s face was slowly graying, hardening as her now cold lifeless eyes continued to gaze forward with terror forevermore.  I glanced at the offending object, and froze at what I saw. The others began to move forward to see as well, but I held out a hand.

“No! Unless you want to end like Kelsey, don’t look!” I said as I hesitantly walked toward the bear. It was huge, dark hair matted with dark dried blood. Its head had been severed and staked on the end of Kiara’s banister, mouth open with an expression that would be comical had it not been so gruesome. Through the heart of the body was a long knife, almost a small sword, with a note attached.

“Little Bears should not hide from their families,” it read. “nor should they pretend to be a house cats!” Though the words seemed harmless, they held more malice than anything else I’d ever heard. Only my mother ever called me “little bear”, and she had died the day of the…incident. I didn’t know who knew that name, but they must know more about me than I’d ever told anyone.

“Be ready or Die”

I understood now.

The land, blackened and rendered useless from years of war, would eventually regrow, prosper even, but so long as it continued to be, so would its taint. The two countries had been at war for centuries, supposedly in a battle over land.

The Cursed Ones knew better.

Each side had powerful necromancers, strong cavalry,good soldiers if not good morale, but one weapon that was to be the deciding factor was known only to the Masters of each land. They took very commonplace shapes: a woman and a child, a simple fisherman, a teenage girl, a young man in his early twenties. They all held curses that would lead not only their respective countries, but entire world to destruction if used incorrectly. The woman held the most beautiful child in existance, but could not stop crying. If anyone reached out to touch her, they would shrink into a pile of dust, but that was a kind fate in comparison to what the child would do if you touched her. Origonally, these two were simply a woman and child, living their lives in their village. That was before the vampires came. They raided the village, until at last they came to the woman’s home. While the mother cowered in a corner, begging for her life, the child walked, unafraid, up to the strongest vampire and said “Leave my mother alone, you big meany!” (She was just a little kid, so ‘big meany’ is the best she could do) The vampires laughed, and it tolled through the now silent town like a funeral bell.

” We won’t kill her,” He said, still chuckling. “or you, for that matter. All I’m going to do is bite you, then we’ll be on our way!” He bent his head slowly to the young girls neck, while she stood fearlessly and defiantly.

” No!” cried the mother, just as she realized what the bite would mean. Too late. “nooo…” She sank to her knees, gathered the now unconscious child into her lap and sobbed, while planning her revenge on vampires with the single- mindedness of someone who has lost everything. The master saw exactly what he wanted in the woman. His voice drifted down to her, cool and insideous as a poisonous mist.

“How would you like it if no body could hurt you, ever again?”

She glanced up, then gestured to the girl in her arms. “What about Sarah? Will she be okay?”

“Oh yes, she’ll be just as strong as you when she wakes up. You’ll never change from that moment, so you can have what you’ve always wanted, Jane. You and Sarah, together forever.” The quiet voice was as soft as silk stretched over satin, but Jane could hear a steel interior.

“Whats in this for you? Why would you do that for me?”

” Oh you’ll see. No worries, just be yourself. That’s all there is to it.”

“In that case…yes.”

In his castle, the master cackled. She had bought it hook, line, and sinker. Now to just cast the spell…

The others followed a similar story: the girl loved to swim, but hated people getting close to her while she did, so she was cursed that she needed to go in water every day to survive, but anyone within a half mile radius in the same body of water would die. The fisherman hated to see gaping wounds, so he would, at the sight of blood, dissipate into a swarm of hornets and devour the source. The cruelest story of all is the of the young man, though the others are hideously evil.

John Carter had been happily married for five years and had three children who he doted on. He was a blacksmith and made a good living for his family. One day, the Master generated an urge for him to take a short day at work. He walked home briskly, happy at the prospect of seeing his lovely wife. He opened the door to his house, and saw his “faithful” wife passionately kissing another man. A range of emotions flew across his face: disbelief, sadness, denial, finally settling on a burning fury. This was the Master’s chance, he worked quickly and mentally. He offered John the option to be something strong, fast…and lonely. John took it immediately. Fur sprouted on his body, course and dark. His senses sharpened, and he knew instinctively what he was: a wolf. He could smell the fear of his wife and his children who now were peeking out from the room they had been playing in. The curse came into play, and when the wolf left the house, all that was left were three small skeletons, and two large ones.

This last story was the cruelest because John, unlike the others, will never be able to pretend to be a normal human, or even a normal wolf. The Master had made good on his promise. John would always be lonely.

The war was never settled, but both countries fell, dissolving into new nations. The Cursed Ones are not only bound by their curse, but they are bound to their land. They will forever have to hide their secrets, but for now, they are safe. Unfortunately, uncanny happenings are beginning again. Some think its the Apocalypse. Some think its global warming.

The Cursed Ones know better.

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