Besieged by Kevin Hearne
I don’t want to give him my real name or my current alias either, so I make one up: “I’m Delilah.”
“Delilah. Excellent. Delilah, please look at me.” I do, and he immediately uses eye contact to attempt to charm me. I know what he’s up to, because the cold iron talisman resting out of sight beneath my shirt presses against my chest, warding off this direct attack. And I do consider charms an attack, something I’ve discussed at length with the sisters: They’re a subversion of the will, a mental assault, no matter how benign they’re supposed to be.
“If I give this letter into your care, you will be sure to give it to your co-worker as soon as she arrives, won’t you?”
“Yes,” I say, and nod for good measure, doing my best to play along and sound dazed. But I mess up somehow, because he doesn’t believe me. His head tilts to the side and he frowns.
“Are you sure? You sound uncertain.”
I do a rapid calculation in my head: A letter delivered to a signee of a treaty banishing vampires from Poland on the eve of that provision taking effect cannot be anything positive. It’s not a fond farewell, a “So long, and thanks for all the blood!” It’s a challenge and a provocation. And if I don’t meet it immediately—if Bartosz decides to get physical—I’m not going to survive, because he’s seconds away from figuring out I’m not like other humans, not easily swayed and controlled and consumed. But I don’t have my staff with me, and there’s no easy access to the earth’s power either. I am a weak human at the moment, with only one advantage: the ability to unbind vampires. Well, maybe two other advantages: surprise, and the American talent for bullshitting.
I flash a grin at him and nod, maintaining eye contact as I switch my language to Old Irish, reciting the unbinding that will separate his component parts and turn him into a slurry of minerals and blood. His frown deepens, because he doesn’t recognize the language, and halfway through he tries to interrupt. “Wait, what? Speak Polish.” I keep going, and it dawns on him that regardless of what I’m saying, I’m not charmed, as he thought I would be, and in fact something very untoward might be in progress. He might have been warned to expect something like it. His eyes go wide as the thought registers that I’m chanting something, not really speaking, and then he hisses and pops his fangs, lunging out of his chair to grab me as I complete the unbinding.
Those fine chiseled features shift and melt as the bones lose their shape and get pushed around by the liquefying muscles inside. I sidestep quickly to avoid an anticipated gush of blood from his open mouth—it vomits forth and drenches the drink-prep containers of citrus wedges and maraschino cherries. He deflates for a moment like an emptying bladder and then the skin comes apart, letting all that liquefied mess spew where it will. It fairly erupts out of his neck along with some chunks of tissue and brain, raining down on poor Maciej and plopping wetly into his beer pudding.
A goodly number of screams tear through the bar at the sight of this—most people don’t see it all but catch the end, where a dude just appears to explode, and their fight-or-flight instinct takes over and there’s an exodus for the door. Maciej lets out a raw, panicked yell and cringes a bit but otherwise doesn’t move. He sees I’m still standing and the creepy guy is toast, and that’s good enough for him, though after a couple of deep breaths he does start to shout, “Fuck! Shit!” over and over. I use the chaos to dart forward, snatch the blood-soaked envelope off the bar, and absorb the worst of the gore with a bar towel before cramming it into my back pocket.
Oliwia comes over from her end of the bar and says, “Oh, my God, what happened?”
“I don’t know; that guy just exploded.”
“What do you mean, exploded?”
“I mean he exploded.”
Maciej stops his cursing, looks at his jacket, now all gules, and begins to laugh. “That! Was! So! Metallllll!” he shouts. I step away from Oliwia and lean over the bar to speak to him in low tones.
“When the police come, I need you to say nothing about why he was here or what he wanted. He just sat down, ordered pudding, and told us his name was Bartosz before he died.”
“Hell yes,” Maciej growls. “That is exactly what happened. I will say that I asked him about his job and he just exploded. Must have been a very stressful occupation.”
“Good, that’s good. I’ll say the same. Your tab is on me today. Order whatever you like. Need anything now?”
“A shot of Żubrówka and a beer. And maybe a bar towel.”
“Coming right up. And let me get that out of your way, because eww.” I reach for his pudding goblet, now ruined with a small pond of blood and bits of brain in it, but Maciej stops me.
“No, no, wait, I need to take a picture first,” he says, taking out his phone. “Blood pudding is the most metal pudding of all, ha ha!”
The manager emerges from the kitchen, takes a brief look at the scene, then says we’re comping everyone’s tab because it’s not good business to make people pay for their emotional trauma. He closes the pub until the police arrive, and then for hours I’m busy pouring drinks and answering questions—from my co-workers, the police, and even the press, though I insist on no photos or images of any kind.
When I’m finally released, Scáthmhaide, my staff, is waiting for me in the employee area behind the kitchen. As soon as I pick it up, I draw on the power stored in the silver end and feel better; those two small bindings had wiped me out.
With a sliver of privacy at hand, I take the bloody envelope out of my pocket and open it. I read it twice and then dial a stored number on my phone, more pissed than I’ve been since I last saw my stepfather.
“Hello, Granuaile. I expected a call from you tonight,” a cultured voice purrs in my ear.
“Fuck you, Leif. You knew he was coming?”
“I knew who…? Excuse me. Has something happened?”
“Yes, something’s happened! I had to unbind a vampire in my bar tonight!”
“Did you get his name?”
“Fucking Bartosz.”
“Hmm. I do not know a Fucking Bartosz, but I can consult my roster.”
“He’s not why I’m calling. Before I unmade his ass he gave me a letter, which I just found time to read. It’s signed by someone named Kacper Glowa. You recognize that name?”
“Oh, yes. Unfortunately. He is the reason why I expected your call—I heard a rumor he would not be leaving Poland as per the agreement.”
“That’s not a rumor. It’s a fact. Let me read you this shit verbatim.”
“Please do. I would like to hear what has made you so upset.”
“It reads: To the young Druid bitch and her upstart Viking boy: I will not be leaving Poland, and neither will my friends. We do not recognize your treaty or the leadership of Leif Helgarson and do not consider ourselves required to obey the demands of children. Instead, obey your elders: Leave Poland, and indeed leave Rome. You may think because you surprised some ancient ones grown stale in their thinking that you deserve to lead. That is not the case. You may both leave or die. That is all.”
“Ah,” Leif said. “Well. What is the modern parlance for that? Cheeky? Saucy? Clumsily stumbling over one’s own testicles? I think I have that right.”
“What? Do you mean ‘tripping balls’ or something? Gods, stop trying to sound hip, Leif. You’re even worse than Atticus led me to believe. What I want to know is why he called you a boy. Didn’t you tell us in Rome that you were the oldest vampire in the world now?”
“I believe I used the phrase as far as I know. I did not know at the time that Kacper was still walking the earth. I thought he was unmade in World War Two. Obviously I was in error.”
“So how old is he? I mean how much stronger is he than you are?”
“He is my elder by a hundred and thirty years, born into a tribe in the ninth century living near modern-day Krakow, before Poland became any sort of distinct political entity.”
“Which means his claim to leadership among other vampires is legit.”
“It is. He is a genuine threat. The vampires of Poland are certainly listening to him. Some have left, but I estimate that he has fifty to sixty more rallying to his banner, and perhaps others are coming in, urging him to contest my leadership.”
“Nobody rallies to banners anymore, Leif.”
“Old vampires do. His call to reject our treaty is reverberating around the globe, I assure you. I just learned of it myself today; he has picked his moment to emerge from obscurity. Tell me, has either Atticus or Owen received similar communication?”
“I don’t know yet. I need to check in with them. But I bet they haven’t, and you haven’t either, am I right?”
“You are correct.”
“I thought so. Because Kacper wouldn’t call Atticus and Owen anything demeaning, would he? Atticus is eight or nine hundred years older than he is, and while Owen hasn’t lived that long in subjective time, he was born before Atticus and wouldn’t stand for such language.”
“Surely you will not stand for it either?”
“Hell no, I’m going to unbind him just like his buddy Bartosz. As soon as I can find him. I don’t suppose you know where he might be?”
“My information on him predates the rise of Hitler. He used to hold properties in and around Krakow. He may have shifted his holdings elsewhere after the war, but I imagine he simply transferred ownership to a new alias unknown to me.”
“All right. I need you up here to help take care of this.”
“I could not agree more. This challenge must not go unanswered.”
“Call me when you’re in the country.”
I already had the next couple of days off, so that was fortunate. It might take more than that, however, to get the job done, and since the vampires were able to find me, my position at the brewery might be compromised. How were they able to do that? I wonder. I’ve only been here a couple of weeks and hadn’t done any obvious Druidic stuff in that time, and I’m protected from divination now. I should have been completely anonymous. Somebody at the brewery—either a customer or an employee—knows a vampire.
It’s late and I don’t feel like reviewing the story again to the coven, so I jog to the bound tree in Pole Mokotowskie, take off my shoes, and shift home to Oregon. The coven could hear about it in the morning.
My sweet hound, Orlaith, greets me with such happiness that her body shakes in all directions.
What is it, Orlaith? I reply through our mental link.
I can’t possibly. Tell me.
You’re right, it is! Wow! That’s a lot of puppies!
Can’t you both be magnificent?
That’s an excellent point, Orlaith. Let us say, then, that you are magnificent and Oberon is kind of okay as far as dudes go. You can tell him I said so.
You are the best hound and I love you too. Are Atticus and Oberon inside?
Oh! Of course! I’m embarrassed to have left him out, but Starbuck is such a new addition to our home; he’s a Boston terrier that Atticus rescued in Portland and I’m still getting to know him.
He really said it just like that, didn’t he?
Let’s go see them. I take six happy steps, one for each puppy, before a message shoots up through the sole of my foot from the Willamette elemental. There is something that demands Druidic attention in Tasmania, and I hurry in to call Atticus outside so he can get the message as well.
After a quick hello and turning the stove down low, he joins me outside.
“Don’t give an answer yet,” I tell him. “We need to talk about what happened today.”
“Okay.”
We work it out so that he’ll go to Tasmania on the earth’s business, returning each night to make sure Orlaith and Starbuck are okay, and I’ll return to Poland to enforce the treaty.
“Don’t ever turn your back on Leif,” he tells me. “His allegiance is only to himself. You’re safe only so long as he believes you’re of more benefit to him alive. And watch out: The ones you’re after might be using infrared if they know you’re coming.”
He was referring to the single reliable way to penetrate camouflage—and, I assumed, the invisibility conferred by Scáthmhaide. The vampires had used it successfully against him in Germany. “Thanks for the reminder,” I say, and we leave it settled and enjoy the delightful chicken and, later, some private time together, with the hounds firmly instructed to leave us alone for a while. I sleep in until noon, local time, and wake to my phone buzzing. Atticus and Oberon are already gone.
“I’m in Krakow,” Leif says. “It is eight in the evening here.”
“Okay. I am shifting into Las Wolski forest above Old Town in a half hour. Where will you be?”
“At Stary Port, a sailor-themed establishment where they serve grog and sing sea shanties. The address is Straszewskiego twenty-seven. Please hurry. The singing is already intolerable.”
“I will be there soon after I shift, depending on how long it takes to run there from the bound tree.”
A quick shower and some kisses to Orlaith’s belly, some scritches for Starbuck, and a snack for them both, and I’m off. I shift into a forest on a hilltop above Krakow and descend, well rested and Scáthmhaide in hand, and give Malina a call to catch her up.
“Basically anything you can tell us about where Kacper Glowa or his alias might be would be helpful. We want to make Poland free of vampires as promised but could use some intel.”
“And where is Mr. O’Sullivan?” Malina asks. “He’s the one who made the promise.”
“He’s been called by Gaia to attend to something in Tasmania. I’m going to handle this with Leif Helgarson. He has a vested interest in making sure this gets done, and once it is, he’ll be out of Poland too.”
“And if Kacper Glowa is not in Krakow?”
“Then we’ll go wherever he is, if you can give us a lead.”
“The undead defy divination, so we’ll try to divine his thralls. I’ll call as soon as I have something.”
Stary Port, I find, more than lives up to its nautical theme. Dark wooden tables with thin tapering candles in the center of them line the walls, and the place is generally decorated in warm tones. Portraits of old-timey ships in gold frames beckon to drinkers, like Tennyson’s Ulysses, that “ ’tis not too late to seek a newer world.” Leif Helgarson has seated himself upon a square-topped stool, delicately crossing one leg over the other in a place that practically shouts he should be manspreading. He looks intensely uncomfortable as a group of red-faced drunken men shout their way through a raucous Polish sea shanty about rope burns, with what I think might have been a double entendre on the word rope.
“I am so grateful you are here,” Leif says as I take a seat. “They keep looking at me to join in. Do you know where Kacper is?”
“Not yet. Waiting for a clue from Malina.”
“So it may be a while.”
“Yeah. We should order something.”
“Please get two of whatever you wish and then you may have mine as well.”
“Have you, uh…eaten?”
He nods but provides no details, for which I’m thankful. I order two grogs with clove, cinnamon, and orange, and we pass the time reviewing what little Leif has been able to learn about Kacper and his Polish cronies.
I’ve st
“He’s in the Nowa Huta district, which got developed after World War Two,” she says. “He owns several homes that look like humble abodes built by the Communists on the outside, but they really serve as entrances and exits to an extensive underground complex. We’ve located two of the houses that contain thralls and can tell you where the hidden staircases are, but we doubt that those are all of them.”
“Okay, give me the addresses.”
What follows is a scouting mission where we take care not to be seen by anyone in the two houses Malina points us to: The Polish vampires themselves, never mind their human thralls, could be prowling about.
I notice that the houses, both dreary and in need of paint, are fully three blocks apart from each other, putting the complex underneath them at three blocks at minimum. They don’t look like anything much; a couple of decrepit cars with rusted fenders rest in the driveways, providing a disguise. No one rich or powerful could be living there.
“Okay, I need to try something,” I tell Leif. “I might be able to get a sense of the complex’s dimensions through the earth. The absence of living earth—the negative space, I guess—will sketch out the boundaries for me.”
“Good. Might you be able to sense the staircases as well, thereby establishing the locations of the other entry and exit points?”
“Hmm. Depends on how they constructed it, I suppose. If they built the staircases to drop straight down in flights or spiral from the foundation of the ground-level houses, I won’t be able to tell which houses are entry points other than the ones we already know. If they slope straight down, however, away from the foundations, in toward the center, I think I’d be able to pick them out.”
“I am confident you will find it to be so,” Leif says. “There is a saying along these lines…”
“Please don’t.”
“No, I assure you it is amusing! It is by way of asking a rhetorical question that the correct answer is rendered. Should you ask me if their staircases slope down at a forty-five-degree angle, I would reply, ‘Does a bear defecate in densely forested areas?’ Eh? You see? The answer is obviously yes.”