
   
      
         
            Foster A. Ranney
            Nathan’s Bylichka
            
            Dedicated to Neil Gaiman, Radiohead and Black Sabbath
            
            Strange things have always happened to my family. It came in through my mother's blood; my Russian grandmother would always tell me stories, bylichkas, of ancestors with the "second sight", stupid mill owners who discovered bags of gold after letting a special fish off their hooks, and dark strangers who used to appear to help or interfere at crucial times. When I asked her if she'd ever seen them – before I was old enough to stop believing, I mean – she would always look sad and tell me, "No, not since the family came to America has anything happened to us. But if you ever should see a faerie, tell him that you are of the blood of Ivan Bogatyrivitch and he will not pass you by so quickly." As I got older, I shook the tales off with a nod and a "Yes, Nana."
            I got older and went to school, then to college, and I replaced the dreams my Nana gave me with the music DJs mixed for crowds in clubs, webs of pulse that shook us until we could believe anything. My girlfriend Rachel and I would go to the clubs near our school. Sometimes we'd get word that people were gathering under one of the bridges, and we'd rush down to hit it before the cops broke it up. Boston is a strange place at night. You wouldn't believe half of the shit I've seen, even when I was straight.
            It was a Friday night. Rachel and I went out to dinner, and when we finished, she saw that there was a message on her cell phone. She checked it there in the restaurant. Her head tilted into the phone as she listened, her pleather purse on her lap, shining jet against the worn black of her snug Dead Can Dance T-shirt. “It’s from Mitch,” she said, folding up the phone. “He says we should meet him tonight, there’s a good one going on in that church that closed down last month.”
            “I don’t know … it was going to be just us tonight. I’m not sure I’m up for a night out.” I was feeling calm and private that night. It seemed like tonight’s darkness was small and personal, cupped hands offering a place for two, not the burning, open darkness of a rave.
            “Baby, let’s go. It’s been over a week, and I want to dance. Let’s go together, you know you’ll have fun once you get into it.” She bit the inside of her bottom lip, looking at me like I was breaking her poor, sweet heart. I’m a sucker for that, and she knows it.
            “Okay, Rachel. Let’s go, you’re probably right.”
            She grinned and gave me a kiss across the table, her lips soft and firm and sticking just enough that she gave the feeling you were really kissing, not just pressing your face into someone else’s. 
            “Let’s not get fucked up tonight, though, okay, Rache? We don’t – ”
            “Sure, babe. Come on, I don’t have to get fucked up every time we go out just to enjoy myself. Let’s not waste any more time.” She stood up and I followed her out to the street. It was dark enough that I could actually see a few stars through the screen of city light. Without hearing the car horns, I could almost taste the air of late March through the street fumes. If it was March, that meant that we’d been together almost a year and a half. It was last February, after the winter break, that we moved in together. Now spring was back, under the concrete, and I could smell it even here.
            “Isn’t it an amazing night, Rache? Even the city feels alive when spring comes.”
            “Taxi!” She waved down a car and pulled me in. In a few minutes, we were getting out a block down from the abandoned church. After she paid the driver, she grabbed my arm, laughing, and we ran down the street. I heard the pulse already. We slammed against the doorway and I was laughing too, the pulse close enough to shake the doorframe and set up vibrations in my chest, Rachel in my arms because she’d used me to soften her landing. We kissed and slipped inside.
            The old vaulted church was stripped down: there was no cloth on the altar, just a DJ’s toolkit and his beer. Through the dark, I could see three bolts left in the wall from where they’d taken down the crucifix. A confessional too beaten-up to have been sold was shaking in a way that suggested activity inside, and where the pews had been taken out, a couple hundred people were testifying to the DJ’s moving sermon.
            Rachel stepped forward into the crowd while I took a moment to drink in the ceiling’s blue-lit, shadowed vault and the light-catching haze from who-knows-what rising between the DJ and the crowd. There was a terrific echo, each beat reverberating inside of the next, and the old stained-glass windows rattled in their frames. On the dance floor, people moved with their eyes closed and their hands in the air.
            I danced with Rachel for a while, but then something by the bar seemed to be pulling her eyes. She told me that she was heading for a drink and slipped out of the crowd. 
            When she hadn’t come back halfway through the next song, I glanced over at the bar. It was just a little set-up where someone had stacked a few crates and brought something alcoholic to share, mostly beer. Rachel was standing with a plastic cup, looking like she was having a conversation, but I couldn’t see anyone else there. The next time the crowd split, I saw him. He stood in front of a blue light, so I couldn’t see him clearly, but what I saw was memorable. He wore a jacket of what might have been blue velvet, and his hair gleamed black against his white skin. The blue haze seemed to stop just shy of his pallor, setting off his striking face without illuminating its details, and his wrists flashed white in the darkness. He didn’t move, just stared and held his drink. 
            The next time I saw them, his mouth was moving. She nodded and he took her arm. I watched them through the crush of dancers as they squeezed along the wall, and the feeling came to me that something was very wrong.
            Saturday morning, I woke up and saw that she still hadn’t come home. I called Mitch and our other friends, hoping that she’d crashed at one of their houses, but I had no luck. A couple of them remembered seeing her leave, but none of them had seen the thin man with her. I didn’t know how they could miss such exotic features, even in that distorting light.
            I caught a taxi back to the church. It was still a mess, but everything bigger than a soda can had disappeared. I walked across what had been the dance floor. The church was completely different now: sunlight fell through the stained glass, catching dust that still hung in the air and sending a dry, healthy warmth into the edges of the room, through the stone and the powdery concrete that had been covered last night by flesh and flashing lights. I realized that Rachel had disappeared without leaving a clue and I had no way to do anything but wait for her to show up – which, if she were in a situation where I should be doing something, would probably be never.
            Standing in the center of the church, I took out my cell phone and called the police. “I need to file a missing persons report. …Rachel Frieze. Last night, walking on West 2nd street around – maybe eleven or twelve o’clock. What? …But, sir, this is an unusual situation. She didn’t come home last night, none of her friends have seen her. …Sir, if she’s in any danger, it will probably be too late to help her by that time. My girlfriend has disappeared, I don’t even know where to start looking, and I need help! …Yes, sir. I understand.” The police wouldn’t file a report for someone who’d been missing overnight. I closed the phone. 
            Walking out of the church, a little gust of cold air caught me by surprise. A cold front must have hit while I was inside. Glancing down the street, I realized that I didn’t have a friend to drive me home this time, and it was a long walk back to the streets where taxis ran. I pulled my T-shirt’s sleeves down my arms as far as they’d go, but I wasn’t ready for cold. 
            Walking didn’t build up much heat; it just moved the air enough to chill me more. After I’d walked about a block, a car rolled up behind me. It slowed down as it neared me and I started to worry. This wasn’t the best of neighborhoods. I kept my eyes straight ahead and tried to walk more quickly without showing it. 
            I heard an automatic window roll down. “Hey,” said a male voice, “do you need some help?”
            I turned around. The man looked over forty, and he was driving a car I’d be afraid to drive on this street. “It’s a long way to anywhere worth going,” he said. “Would you like some help?”
            “Ah, I think I’m fine, thanks,” I told him, and turned back to the sidewalk.
            “Really, I’d like to help. Please, hop in. You don’t look dressed for this weather.”
            I glanced back over my shoulder. “No thanks, sir! I’m just fine. Really, don’t worry about me.”
            “Nathan Spencer, I offer you help. I advise that you not refuse me a third time.”
            I stopped and looked back at him, surprised. He met my eyes coolly. “How do you know my name?”
            “I know your family. Get in. We have a lot of work ahead of us, and it’s best to start now.”
            I walked around the car and got into the passenger seat. Before I had my belt on, we were rolling forward. “Okay,” I said. “I’m in the car. Now, will you tell me how you know my family, and how you happened to be driving by just now? In fact, why didn’t you call me by name the first time? And how did you recognize me when – ”
            “That’s enough! I can only answer one question at a time. I know your family because an ancestor of mine made a bargain with an ancestor of yours. I am here now because you called for help, and no-one else would answer.” He turned onto the next street and shifted up. “I will help you find your Rachel. I have to warn you, though, you won’t like what I have to tell you.”
            I shivered. Something in his tone couldn’t be disbelieved. “Tell me anyway. If she’s in trouble, I want to find her, wherever she is.”
            My driver took a deep breath. As he did, his neck stretched in a strange way and I noticed several thin lines, like wrinkles, running across the sides of his neck. “Nathan,” he began in the way that people speak when they start a long and difficult explanation, “Rachel met someone last night whom it is best never to meet. This person, like me, is not a member of traditional society. You see, Nathan, there is …separate from your society …oh, damn it. I’ve never had to give this conversation before. Come on, I have something to show you.” With that, he made a sharp turn onto a side street that I hadn’t noticed before. We drove between slummy housing and storefronts so decayed that I couldn’t tell whether they were abandoned. My driver turned again next to an old warehouse that I might have been in once when Mitch took us to a rave in sophomore year. 
            In front of a few houses, there were cars parked, but there were almost none on the streets. Their bumpers looked ready to drop off, and their paint was half smog. I got a strange feeling that we weren’t supposed to be driving here. “Hey,” I said, “are you sure that we should be going this way? I mean – ” 
            “Just ignore that,” he told me. “You’ll be used to the sensation in a moment.” That just unnerved me more. As we kept driving, the anxiety grew more pronounced. I noticed that there were some people on the street, people the same color as the soiled buildings. Someone standing just in the lip of an alley glared at me with gleaming eyes. “Okay, this is the spot,” said my driver, pulling over. He parked and got out. 
            “Is it really safe to leave the car …” he was already walking toward the squat, brick-windowed building we were parked next to. Glancing back at that gleaming glare, I decided that it might be safer to follow the driver than to wait with the car. I hopped out, ran after him, and reached him just as he was knocking on the door. Someone opened it a crack, then ushered us in.
            Inside, the building opened up. The ceiling was high and wooden, and I could see part of a DJ’s booth down the hall. It looked like we were in the back of a nightclub. Then I looked down and saw what had let us in. “Nepthys, my man! What up?” The hunchbacked being who let us in held out a scraggly paw for him to slap. “Nice, my man,” he said as they clasped hands. “Who’s the freak?”
            “This is someone from Ivan’s family. Did I ever tell you about them?”
            “Yeah, one time, man, but you were pretty fucked up. What’s your problem, kid?”
            The hunchbacked man came up to my stomach. His skin was brown and stretched, like some diseased sapling’s bark. It pulled back around his fingertips, which bore things that might have been nails or claws. When he grinned, I saw that his teeth were sharp and small, like a hunting cat’s. Under matted hair, his eyes had slit pupils.
            Nepthys quickly answered for me. “Girlfriend troubles. She came down here with someone after a party, and I don’t think it was one of your average pixies.”
            “Bummer. So, what’s the cat look like?”
            He turned to me. Nepthys nodded: “It’s okay, you can trust him. That’s why we came here.”
            It was easier to talk than to question. “I …I noticed him from across the room when I was looking around for Rachel. He was standing right in front of some blue lights, so I couldn’t see him very well, but I noticed the way that the light set off his pale skin. It almost looked like the light bent around him without actually touching him directly. He was slim, almost drawn, but he had a kind of … luster to him, I guess. He wasn’t a person you’d describe with normal adjectives, you know?”
            They nodded. “Oh, totally,” said the hunchback. “I get that all the time around here.”
            “He was wearing a sort of jacket …maybe blue velvet, I couldn’t tell in the dark, but it had ruffles at the throat, things like that. He really stood out. That’s why I couldn’t understand why no-one else remembered him. He had some rings, too. I remember that he hardly ever moved, just stared at Rachel. Even when he talked, he hardly opened his mouth. I don’t know how he could’ve been heard over the music.”
            The two glanced at each other. “What do you think?” asked the hunchback.
            “I’ve looked into it a little, and I do think we might be dealing with one of them. Have you seen anyone like that in your club?”
            “Not that I can remember, man. I can send you to a guy who knows all about them, though. If this cat’s for real, I bet my friend can tell you everything you need to know.”
            “You’re a wonder, Dvorov. We should head straight over. It won’t be long before nightfall.”
            “Oh yeah, man. Here, let me write down how to find him.” The hunchback pulled out a scrap of paper and scribbled something on it with his fingernail, then handed it to Nepthys. “Here you go, man. Good luck!”
            “Thanks, Dvorov. I owe you one. Let’s go.” That last one was to me. I waved goodbye to the hunchback as we left. He gave me a half-hearted wave that made me wonder what exactly we were chasing, and whether I should be wearing body armor. 
            Back on the street, I began to see things that I had never looked for until then. Still in my initial shock, I suddenly noticed qualities of the people that my mind hadn’t registered when we parked. I saw people with skin stretched so tightly across their cheekbones that the corners had broken through – people whose cheekbones had horns growing from them, and people whose skin was gathered back like a ponytail. The yellow of this sky wasn’t just smog: it had a leeching, heavy dimness. I saw men three feet tall with dusty black skin and eyes that shed yellow light. A corpulent, batrachian woman walked along with something on a leash that looked like a massive water beetle. Leaning from the rough-hewn window of one building on our right was something with long, green hair draped across the seven gangly arms hanging from its windowsill. Thirty-five thin fingers waved lazily like seaweed. I noticed when my back hit the wall that I was walking backwards.
            “We, and thousands like us, have been living separately as long as there has been a human society,” said my driver. I noticed that the wrinkles on his neck expanded as he breathed and realized that they were gills. “We interact with humans, take advantage of them, grant them boons, sometimes even become their friends, but the majority of both societies have little or no interaction. At this point, we have removed ourselves so fully from quotidian human existence that we are understood to be fictional.
            “The only place with any significant interaction between our worlds is on the fringes of yours. Love-ins, raves, gatherings where society is put on hold and humans open themselves to emotion: that is where entities from this world tend to go when they cross over, and that is where Rachel met someone from this world. Those of us who live permanently in this world tend to set up in places like this, where the human population is so overwhelming that they won’t be noticed in the right corner, with the right protective spells.”
            He took out the hunchback’s directions and glanced at an alley behind us. “Okay, Nathan. We should get started right away. There’s no time to waste.” 
            He saw that I wasn’t moving. Setting an arm on my shoulder, he said, “Nathan, what you see here might be frightening, but those things you saw are people just like you. They’ll be as surprised to see a human as you are to see men with seven arms.”
            “Thanks. It’s very reassuring that I’ll not only be an outsider but a curiosity.”
            “Nathan, you told me five minutes ago that you would do anything to help Rachel. Well, she’s here and she needs your help. Now, the more we can do before nightfall, the better.”
            “But why are you even helping me? Until thirty seconds ago, I didn’t believe in magic or any of that kind of …weirdness.” 
            “Nathan, I told you: my family owes yours a debt. In this world, one’s word is a promise. Now, can we get going?”
            I caught my breath and forced myself to look him in the eye. “Only if you stop beginning every sentence with my name.”
            “You’ve got a deal. Let’s go.”
            As we headed down the sidewalk, I said, “What is your name, anyway?”
            “That’s a question you learn not to ask here. What you may call me is Nepthys.”
            Holding Dvorov’s directions, Nepthys took us around the corner of the building into a skinny alleyway. I started wondering again how reliable my guide’s credentials were. Walking through an alley with rubbish piles that occasionally skittered from one wall to the other, he did not inspire confidence.
            “Just at this corner,” he said, interrupting my immanent panic attack, “we’re going to stop and turn three times widdersh – er, counterclockwise, then face east. East is that way.” He pointed at the wall to our right. “Don’t let the sun fool you. Then I’m going to shed a little blood, but don’t worry, none of yours.” I blinked at him, but he just kept walking until we reached the corner. “Okay, you might feel silly, but just turn three times to your left. Try to keep in time with me.” We spun around three times, and then something flashed across Nepthys’ hand and he shook a spray of blood onto the dust. The blood flashed into flames as soon as it hit the ground, and I jumped back. When it had all burnt, a thin outline of a doorframe appeared on the wall across from our corner. Nepthys walked towards it and pressed his bloody palm against it, opening the door. “Are you coming?”
            We slipped through the door and came out, not inside the building, but on a busy street in a completely different part of town. The sky, cupping over squat buildings, was less yellow here, and stands were set up everywhere the way I’d picture a market in the Middle East. Nepthys took us immediately to the right, where he led us to a cart filled with herbs. Spiced air hanging around the cart carried tarragon, rosemary, and scents I couldn’t place. The thing tending the cart reminded me of the caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland: it had the same opium-dream wise man quality I’d always given the caterpillar. Its arms were thin and long enough to reach any herbs from its cushion in the center of the cart, and with its long, many-shouldered pole of a torso, it rose over our heads even while seated. Its face was small and wrinkled, with penny-sized smoked glasses balanced on its thin nose. “Would the gentlemen care to purchase some fine herbs?” it asked. “There are no finer to spice a meal, nor purer to mix a potion. Please, let yourselves breathe the fine scent of these herbs.”
            “We’re not here to browse,” Nepthys told him. “We’d like to see a man about some garlic.”
            The thing frowned. “We have many fine cloves of garlic here on the cart, gentle sir. If – ”
            “You know what I mean. Please, if we could see him, we would be much obliged. I imagine that people do not come here for unimportant reasons.”
            It hissed thoughtfully. “True, true. Step behind the cart and enter through the door there, using your left hand to open the door and your right – ” he looked at me “ – to close it.”
            “Thank you.” Nepthys bowed slightly and we walked behind the cart.
            The latch opened under Nepthys’ left hand with a clack! The door took us to the bottom of a flight of wooden stairs. At the top was one door. We entered.
            The room held a bed, a bookcase, and a desk with one chair. Its only light came from a dying candle on the desk whose spark etched shadows in the roughly planked walls. On the bed was a small, ratty man. I smelled matted hair and cedar chips. He opened one eye when we came in but did not move.
            “We’re here for information about a vampire,” said Nepthys.
            “Oh, shit!” I said.
            “Sorry, kid. –Would you do us the kindness of helping us to identify an individual?”
            “Wait, Nepthys – you said nothing about vampires. Frankly, I don’t know if we can even doing anything against a vampire. There’s an entire industry in my world based around how unkillable they are. Are …look, are they as bad as people in my world think they are?”
            “I don’t know. They’re almost as rare here, and I’ve never heard a reliable story of someone successfully fighting a vampire.”
            “Only unsuccessfully, right?”
            “No, those people don’t usually leave stories.”
            “Oh, thanks, Nepthys, for your confidence-inspiring tales of experience. So they’re probably worse than we think, okay, that’s great. Now can you tell me what your master plan of attack will be before we go spinning counterclockwise into an Anne Rice novel?”
            “My plan is that you shut up while we’re trying to conduct business with someone who might be able to tell us what we’re actually going up against. Okay? Don’t forget, she’s your girlfriend. Now calm down while I talk to this gentleman. I can hear your heartbeat from over here.”
            I shut up and tried to breathe. Nepthys turned back to the little man on the bed, who had not moved. “Please, accept our apologies. As you can see, our situation is of personal importance to the young man. Now: may we ask you a few questions about an individual we believe to be a vampire? It would be a great help to us.”
            The little man drew a few loud breaths that died in the wooden room’s tight air. Finally, in a pinched rasp, he said, “My information is purely for the purposes of a collector. I do not want to provide help to someone who would do harm.”
            “Sir, we simply want to discover whether this individual is, in fact, a vampire. If there is any boon that you would have us do in return, we would be glad to do it.”
            He continued to lie in place, still breathing heavily. I tried to keep myself calm. Then, with a sigh, he said, “I have need of a certain stone that I once possessed. It would allow me to leave this bed, despite my current illness. My problem is that it was not made in this realm, but by a human, and only a human may handle it. The herb vendor will tell you where you can find it. If you would fetch me this stone, I would tell you what I can.”
            “Of course we will fetch you the stone,” Nepthys assured him. “You have our thanks.”
            Outside, the thing at the herb cart nodded when we mentioned the stone. He told Nepthys the name of a woman who lived on a certain street, and we set off.
            When we reached the street, I expected some sort of temple, or a row of antiquaries, or at least a sleazy, black-market relics merchant. Instead, it looked like we were in the red-light district: women who probably wanted more than our money eyed us from the alleys. Nepthys didn’t need to warn me not to speak to them. He took us to the door of a building like a short pagoda that had a sign hanging over it showing a face with hands uplifted, like a saint under G d’s light, and handcuffed. 
            Inside, the entrance room was hung with bright silks and scattered with velvet cushions. Sails of obscene orange and a green that insulted springtime hung draped across reds that might have been sensual elsewhere but here were only offensive. A large woman, similarly decorated, quickly drifted up to us.
            “Good evening, gentlemen,” she said. “May I invite you to have a cup of tea?”
            “No, thank you,” said Nepthys, “we regret that we cannot take up your kind offer. Are you the proprietor of this shop?”
            “Yes,” answered the woman. “I am Madame Entera, at your service. How can I help you gentlemen?”
            “We are here to see about a certain stone.”
            She raised an eyebrow. “Are you? Well, we don’t get many customers asking about that item. Please, walk this way.”
            She led us past the silks and through an arch decorated with pictures of wooden ships and what looked like African tribesmen. The next room had mosaics of what could have been Rome, with men in simple tunics working in a vineyard on one wall and men in odd, floppy hats on the other. After this, we went up a flight of stairs and past a row of doors barred on the outside.
            “Excuse me,” I said, ignoring Nepthys’ warning look, “but may I ask what is kept in these rooms?”
            The woman laughed. “Why, the merchandise, of course,” she said. 
            Nepthys leaned close to my ear. “This is a slave shop,” he explained quietly.
            The woman paused before another door, this one not barred but locked. As she brought out the key, she said, “We deal mostly in fairly mundane trades, but there are a few customers with more unusual needs and people willing to sell unusual items. We’ve had genies, indentured sorcerers, even golems and the occasional elf. This is one of the stranger items, though. It’s been in our collection for several years because only a human can activate it. If we only had a human on our staff, we could have done so ages ago and sold it off, but we have no such luck.” She opened the door and took us past several doors marked with odd geometrical designs to another locked room. “Here it is,” she said.
            With a flourish, she opened the door to reveal a room with walls inlaid with lapis and gold wire, intricate patterns like a Czar’s jewelry box crawling down the walls. In its center, under a spearing, white light, was a golden table draped with a blue velvet cloth, on which lay a gray, plum-sized rock.
            “A marvel, isn’t it?” she said. “That such a rock could hold so much magic – it’s a wonder.”
            “That it is,” Nepthys assured her. “What would convince you to part with it?”
            She considered this, looking him over. “You wouldn’t give me the human, would you? No,” she said, seeing his expression, “that would make the stone rather useless.” Nevertheless, she gave me what I can only describe as an “appraising glance”. I have never felt so appraised in all my life. “He looks healthy,” she said, “how about a pint of his blood?”
            “A pint? Madame, I have his health to consider.”
            “Half a pint, then – and his hair.”
            Nepthys turned to me. “Well, kid, what do you think? Remember, this is your quest. I’m not giving my blood.”
            “As if I wanted it,” interrupted the woman. 
            “I think it’s a fair deal, considering the return,” he told me, “but it’s up to you.”
            I thought about it, then nodded.
            “Marvelous!” cried the woman. “One half-pint of human blood, willingly given, and his fine head of hair for the stone.” 
            She took us downstairs to a small room behind a red silk draping. There was a wooden chair, where she sat me down and asked me to wait. Soon, she came back with a lidded ceramic bowl, which she put on the table beside me. “Roll up your sleeves,” she told me. She opened the bowl and carefully, gingerly brought out a fat, dripping leech. It must have been larger than my finger. She laid it gently inside the hollow of my left arm. The cold thing stretched and cast around with its sucker-mouth until it found the soft spot inside my elbow, where it softly sucked on and began to work its way under my skin. I thought that I could feel a slight itching.
            “They take about a quarter-pint each,” said Madame Entera, drawing out another skinny leech. “They’re quick, too. We’ll be done with them before your hair is finished.” Then she clapped her hands and brought in the barber.
            Half an hour later, I left the room pale and bald, running my fingers over my scalp. At least the barber hadn’t nicked me. Madame Entera took me back up to the stone’s room, where Nepthys was waiting by the door. “Be careful you don’t let him touch it until you’re ready to use it,” the woman admonished Nepthys as she slipped the stone into a grey cloth pouch and handed it to him. “Thank you for doing business at our house, and I hope to see you again!”
            I left not a little unnerved, and still woozy from the leeches. “Come on,” said Nepthys, “you could use a drink.”
            We hit a bar on the next street over. “Vodka, straight up,” Nepthys told the bartender as we sat down at the counter, “and a Bloody Mary for my friend. Make it extra bloody.” When our drinks came, he poured a dollop of something from an inner pocket into my Bloody Mary. “That should help,” he said. “You could run on empty with a little of that stuff. It won’t refill your blood supply, but while that’s in your system, you won’t even need blood.” He grinned at me. “Drink up, kid.”
            I took about half of the Bloody Mary in one gulp and then ate the celery. Nepthys slapped me on the back. “Okay,” I said, “now that we’re sitting down, can you explain a little more of what’s going on here? I mean, what is this place, really?”
            He thought about that. “I think that our world is a reflection of yours, or yours is a more boring reflection of ours. This place is just a little of both. In America, things are still weird after the European conquest. The natives are still here, but so is everyone else. The Europeans mostly manifest as something like the underground society of your cities. We aren’t quite what you’d expect from reading the Grimms.”
            “What do you mean?”
            “Okay, take elves.” He caught the bartender’s eye for another shot. “You figure they’re some Lincoln-green pretty boys who run around in the forest with bows and live forever in halls of glory, right? Not in America. Here, they’re the snotty rich who show up in clubs because they like the ‘gritty ambience’ – you have them in your world, too, right? Except it’s worse here because they have centuries to grow disaffected and flirt with exciting and dangerous elements of society’s lowest rungs. Some of them actually commit to this society, though. There’s an amazing DJ who’s an elf. He has a real ear for it. When they do decide to do something for real, they’re always the best at it.” He downed the second shot. “I am glad to be out of the favor-trading scene for half a minute. It’s exhausting to talk to those people. One wrong word and you find yourself cursed with infinite earwax or something. So what else do you want to know, Nathan?”
            “I don’t know …hey, what about the nature spirits, things like that? I mean, where do the dryads fit in a place like this?”
            “If the tree isn’t around, the dryad isn’t around. It’s as simple as that.”
            That made me a little sad. They were always my favorite part of the Greek myths I read in elementary school. “Well, what about you? How did you get to America?”
            “My parents came over from Russia, just like your family. My real name is a little more ethnically appropriate, but we don’t toss those around in this place. They were spirits of a certain branch of the Volga and the village based around a mill on that tributary. When the Russian government dammed the river, my parents decided that instead of dying with the river, they would stick with the people of the village they’d protected. I was born here, and I was lucky enough not to get attached to any particular river. Sure, I miss having a place to settle down, but it’s better than waiting to get dammed.” He took another shot of vodka.
            “Shouldn’t you be going light on the vodka? I mean, we might have a lot of work ahead of us.”
            “Are you kidding? I can drink like a fish, kid. We should get going, though. Still woozy?” I nodded. “A little walking should get the stuff into your system. Come on, let’s go.”
            As we left the bar, I asked to see the rock. “Why?” Nepthys asked.
            “I’m just curious. I want to see what a magic stone looks like. Don’t worry, I’ll be careful not to touch it.”
            He thought about it, then handed me the pouch. I undid the strings and let the pouch sit on my palm so that I could see the stone inside. It looked like a normal river stone, a gray oval with a white stripe through it. As long as I looked at it, it didn’t reveal any magic sparkle or glow. 
            Suddenly, what looked like a little kid darted out of an alley and almost ran into me. I almost tripped over him, and the stone went flying out of the pouch. Nepthys tried to grab it, but, by reflex, I caught it first. 
            Immediately, I felt it grow warm and knew that I had done something very stupid. “Nathan,” said Nepthys, “I think that you just did something very stupid.”
            “I agree,” I told him. The stone was as warm as human flesh now, and there was a sort of glow that might have been light or just the stone’s soft heat, I don’t know. Then there was light, a kind of rosy glow, and I felt the stone slip out of my hand to float in the air. The air around me seemed to still sound, and light came in around the corners of my eyes. “Do you know what this thing does?” I shouted, hardly able to hear myself.
            Nepthys was saying something that looked like, “I have no idea!” but I couldn’t hear him. The light in the corners of my eyes rushed in, converging on the rosy glow around the stone, and for a moment I was blind. Then I opened my eyes again and saw a girl lying in the street. There was no sign of the stone.
            “I think I understand why we got that stone from a slave shop,” said Nepthys. The girl was as soft and rosy as the stone’s glow, and she was dressed in a white shift tied at the waist with a belt like a Celtic knot. Her arms and legs were wrapped in white linen up to her wrists and ankles, and soft, white leather boots held her feet.
            When she didn’t move, I knelt down and put a hand to her brow. As soon as I touched her, her eyes opened into mine and she grabbed my wrist. I couldn’t move.
            “Name me,” she said.
            I opened my mouth to ask for an explanation, but Nepthys stopped me. “Don’t name her ‘What did you say?’, okay? The next thing that comes out of your mouth is probably what she’ll respond to until we figure out how to put her back.”
            I was at a loss. I’d never named anyone before. I thought back to one time when I’d been thinking about raising a family and remembered that I’d always liked the name – 
            “Amy.”
            Nepthys looked at me incredulously. “You awaken a magical being of unknown power from an enchanted stone, having purchased her with your own blood from a slave dealer, and you name her ‘Amy’?” Amy smiled at me and let go of my arm, but not before she brought my fingers to her lips and gave them one soft kiss.
            I stood up and Amy stood with me. “So …back to our garlicky friend?”
            “I suppose so,” said Nepthys, “and you’d better pray to whatever god you think will listen that he won’t care we woke her up.”
            We walked back to the herb stand. The vendor stared a little at Amy, his arms pausing in midair as he lit the stand’s little lamp, but we walked right around him and up the wooden stairs.
            When Nepthys opened the little man’s door, he rolled over and grinned to see us, but when Amy walked in, he blanched. “What!” he screamed. “You idiots! You woke it up? Get out of my sight this instant!”
            “But …but sir,” I said, “are you sure she’s no help to you?”
            “Not if you named it already, you ninny, and I’m sure that you have! Fools! Get out of my sight now – unless you know how to put it back? …I thought as much. Now leave, before I call the rats on you.”
            We left. Nepthys shook his hands at me like he wanted to wrap them around my neck. “You idiot,” he hissed, “do you know how much you’ve set us back? I should say, set yourself back, since it’s your girlfriend we’re looking for.” I thought about Rachel; in the excitement, I had forgotten why we were chasing down vampire experts. “You’re just lucky that Dvorov isn’t my only contact. Come on, we’re heading out.” He held the door for me and Amy when we reached the bottom of the stairs. Walking outside, I was shocked to see that it was already dark. “Night comes quickly here,” said Nepthys quietly as he came out behind me. “Didn’t I warn you?”
            “Okay,” he said as we hit the street, “we’re going to see another friend of mine. First, though, we are getting you a hat. You look ridiculous with a shaved head.” At a nearby stand, he grabbed the first hat that would cover my head and might pass back in real Boston. It was a black baseball cap that read “Dead Can Dance” in gold across the front. Amy liked it, I think. She still hadn’t spoken since I named her, so I wasn’t sure.
            He took us to a squat, long building whose roof bulged up like the ribs of a gutted animal. The black door opened as we came up to it, and a pale man opened the door. He was naked, but there was nothing to hide: his body was hairless and completely smooth. I only say “he” because he didn’t have a hint of femininity. His eyes were white. From behind him, I could hear something that sounded like a remix of the Cure’s “A Forest”.
            “I’m here to see Isis. Tell her that Nepthys is here to see her.”
            The man closed his eyes. A moment later, he opened them again and stepped aside to let us in. Nepthys walked straight past him and I tried to keep up, taking Amy’s small hand so that she wouldn’t lag behind. I shivered as I walked past the pale man’s blank eyes, wondering what they were staring at. Amy gave my hand a squeeze.
            Nepthys lead us down a hallway that matched the building’s façade, a vaulted, ribbed intestine of a hallway, whose black walls looked unsettlingly organic. I thought that I saw one rib shift in its setting, like a cat trying to scratch its back against a wall, but when I turned, it was still.
            Then there was a door, which opened as we approached. Inside, the space opened into a wide, square chamber mirrored and so dark that it could have been any size. In the center was a dais covered with white furs and a young woman, surrounded by more pale men. These were incontestably male.
            “Nepthys!” said the woman, slithering up across the furs to sit up. As she rose, her robes fell open and I realized that, except for what looked like a red silk kimono, she was naked – naked and stunning. I had an urge to cover Amy’s eyes. “It’s been years since I’ve seen you. Please, come and sit beside me, and introduce your friends.”
            “This man is here in search of his lover, who was stolen from him in the human world,” said Nepthys, ushering us toward the woman in silk. “The girl is …surprising,” he concluded.
            “And I am Isis,” said the woman, offering her hand to me. I took it and, dropping to one knee, gave her fingers a small kiss. It seemed appropriate. “It is an honor to meet you, Lady Isis,” I said.
            She laughed, liquid, alluring, alarming. “Oh, precious! He has lovely manners, Nepthys, despite his poor taste in hats. You may leave out the ‘Lady,’ boy. I don’t wish to be reminded of how old I actually am.” A wave to the pale men brought a bottle of red wine and a platter of grapes. “Now, how can I help the elegantly mannered friend of my Nepthys and his surprising young charge? I hope I can start by offering some wine.”
            Nepthys poured out wine for three of us. “May I have a little more of what you gave me before, Nepthys?” I asked. “I still feel a little woozy.” He poured a dollop of the clear liquid into one cup and passed it to me. The wine’s rich scent had a touch of something chemical that I recognized from the bar, but it filled my mouth and sank into my veins with reassuring warmth.
            Isis’ nostrils twitched slightly. “You’ve lost blood, boy? This story might be interesting. Does it have anything to do with why your head is shaved?”
            “It was part of the price for this girl, who was a rock at the time,” explained Nepthys. 
            “I have a feeling that she was worth the trade,” I added. Amy, still holding my hand, smiled.
            “She may be at that,” said Isis, gazing at her. “That sweet, small nose, and her soft lips – she’d kiss well, I should think, if gently. She has good blood under her cheeks. Good, round breasts, too, even though they’re small, they suit her.” Amy didn’t blush, and I hoped that she didn’t understand what Isis was saying.
            “She would have been worth it,” Nepthys interrupted, “if this fool hadn’t accidentally woken her up before we could give her to our contact. He was going to give us valuable information for her.”
            “Now I understand why you’re here,” said Isis. “So what do you need to know?”
            “You know I wouldn’t come to you if I could get this information another way,” said Nepthys apologetically.
            “Mmm,” she replied. I couldn’t tell what the thoughtful look on her face meant.
            “I think that the person who stole the girl we’re looking for might be a vampire. Isis …you know some way to locate the undead, don’t you?”
            “I do. Describe this one to me. If I know him, I can find him. If not, you’ll have to bring me something to work with.”
            Nepthys looked at me. I thought back to seeing the man in the hollow church and described his skin, his dark hair, the way that light seemed to flow around him, as best as I could. Isis set her elbows in the fur and rested her head on her hands while I spoke and tried not to stare at her full, hanging breasts. When I had told her all that I could remember, she blinked her black lashes and said, “I remember him.”
            “You do?” Nepthys could hardly believe her. “That’s amazing!”
            “It is. I would have sworn to you that he was dead. He should be. I hope that you can do a better job than the last lot.” She sat up, running her hands along her pale, round thighs. “All right, then. Let me see if I can find him.”
            Isis closed her eyes and lifted her hands. A dark glow coalesced around her palms. Amy leaned forward, looking amazed. The glow reflected on her pink face, casting a sickly pallor over her heartbeat-strong cheeks. Tiny drops of blood began to seep out of Isis’ palms as her brow creased. Her candy lips twisted into a frown. The dark glow grew stronger and larger, filling the air for about a foot around her hands. In her palms, the droplets of blood swelled into small pools. 
            The dark glow began to flicker, and Isis’ frown of concentration became one of worry. The pools in her hands grew deeper. She didn’t shed a bead of sweat, and I didn’t even see her draw a breath, but the glow around her hands shuddered like a stubborn candleflame. Then her fingers tensed and her arms began to shake. The blood in her palms, still filling up, began to ripple. Shivers swept through her body, and Nepthys reached out to touch her but I stopped him. He glanced at me with honest concern, probably the first honest moment he’d shown me: ‘Is she all right?’ I didn’t know.
            Her hands twitched and a drop of blood shook out, splashing on the crease of her thigh and hanging to one strand of the black hair between her legs. She gasped and the dark glow went out, taking the blood with it in a flash of heat and red steam. Isis collapsed on the fur, strings cut. 
            Now Nepthys lunged forward, took her by the arms. “Isis, what happened? Are you hurt?”
            She shook her head, rubbing her face into the white fur and murmuring something. “What did you say?” asked Nepthys.
            She rolled onto her back, her arms crossed tightly over her chest. For the first time, she looked vulnerable. When she finally spoke, I had to lean close to hear her. “I found your vampire,” she said, “but he might know that someone’s looking for him. He’s taken great pains to keep himself hidden. You should look for him at Dvorov’s as quickly as you can.” She turned to me with tired sympathy. “I didn’t see a girl with him. Hurry, though, and you might find him before he leaves.” A twitch of her fingers summoned her pale servants. “One of these will lead you out.”
            I stood, and one of her servants took me and Amy to the door. I looked back to see Nepthys whispering something to her. He stood to go, but she caught his sleeve and pulled him back for a moment. I turned back to the door. “Come on, Amy,” I said, “he’ll be along soon.”
            Nepthys caught up with us after a minute and walked silently to the end of the hall. When we got there, another pale servant was waiting for us with a box of dark stained wood. He offered it to Nepthys, who opened the box: on velvet lining, a wooden hammer and two stakes. 
            “Mountain ash,” said Nepthys. “That was very kind of her.” Closing the box, he paused beside the open door and looked back at me. “I really hope we find your Rachel,” he said. It looked like he was going to continue, but then he walked out the door.
            “I know a quick way to Dvorov’s,” said Nepthys. “I bet he’s kicking himself now for not having a way to contact me.” In a few minutes, we were back to the first door we’d knocked on in this town and Dvorov himself was greeting us. The pulse from inside made the building sound like a giant heart.
            “Yo, my man Nep! You got the sucker already?”
            “No, but we got a tip that he might be in your club. Have you seen him?”
            “Here, man? You’re crazy. I haven’t had a vampire here since you and – ” Nepthys shot a wicked look at him. “Anyway, long time, man.”
            “That’s odd. Do you mind if we check it out anyway? I have a real feeling that he’s in here somewhere.”
            Dvorov glanced over his shoulder, a little nervous. “I guess, man, but be quick. I don’t want my customers thinkin’ that anything’s wrong, you know?”
            “Of course. We’ll be in and out in a minute.” Nepthys stepped in and Dvorov walked us towards the dance floor.
            “So did you get anything out of the guy I sent you to?” Dvorov asked us.
            “No, he said that his research was purely academic, not for hunters.”
            “Bummer. I guess I probably should’ve known, though. I mean, he is kinda tight about that stuff.” He didn’t look very surprised. “Anyway, this is the dance floor, man. Good luck.”
            Something with too many arms was manning the turntables above the crowd, which looked more impenetrable tonight than ever before. Then I saw the bar on the other side of the crowd and knew where to start looking.
            I tried to slip along the edge of the crowd. Things with scales and claws kept flailing against me, pressing me into the wall, but I took a breath and kept moving. My nose filled with a reek of thick sweat. The music began to build, and a strobe came on. Somewhere toward the center of the dance floor, I heard a howl that sent bitter winds under my clothing – for a second, I was back with my family in Russia, hiding from the cold. Then I felt a tug on the back of my shirt and noticed that Amy was following me. I gathered her under my arm. Dvorov was somewhere behind me, too, negotiating delicately through his patrons. 
            Just in front of me, a massive thing slammed into the wall, sending up a cloud of granite dust. It slumped to the floor and I realized that it was a werewolf. Its haunches twitched in time to the music. As it started to rise, a man with thick, scaled skin stretched across rippling muscles leapt on him. I thought that my odds were better on the dance floor.
            Holding Amy in my arms as we ducked between the crush of dancers, I started to wonder if the chances of finding this vampire were even good enough to merit this. I wasn’t sure that I could survive the crush of the crowd. A cold thing with countless, writhing tentacles fell against me, thrashing as if in the throes of a drug overdose, tripping me and clutching at my limbs. A woman who could have been an elf twitched and jerked beside me, fingers trembling at the torn edges of her clothing. Then a looming shape to my right fell away, and I saw him in a flash of the strobe, his black eyes staring deadly into the crowd. The creature blocking my vision moved back, but I had seen all that I needed to see. 
            A bleeding, eyeless thing shuddered and beat its arms against me, but I ducked around it and toward the bar. I slipped past the waving monstrosity that had blocked my view before, a mountain of wet, veined flesh, and had almost passed through the crowd when a clawed hand grabbed my arm. 
            It was Dvorov. He pulled my ear down to his mouth. “You seen enough, man?” he shouted.
            “Yes,” I called back, “I saw him! He’s sitting right there at the bar!”
            Dvorov tried to peek through the crowd, but it had shifted again and we couldn’t see a thing. “I don’t think he’s there,” Dvorov shouted to me. “It must have been wishful thinking.”
            “No, I saw him! I have to hurry, too! Who knows how long he’ll stick around?”
            “Listen, man, he’s not there! I’m telling you, it’s not even worth checking the bar!” I turned to keep going, but he caught my arm again. “Don’t do this, kid! It’s a dumb idea. Even if you did find this vampire cat, he’d tear you apart! If he got your girl, she’s probably dead!” I shook him off and squeezed between two dancing nymphs, getting almost to the edge of the dance floor.
            Suddenly, Amy screamed. I whirled around and threw up my arm just in time to knock Dvorov away. His eyes were glowing red, and he had bared a set of fangs that could probably take my hand off. The dancers near us tried to clear some space. He shot back up, hardly touching the ground, and I kicked him back. He jumped at my arm while I was still off-balance, and I felt the surge of adrenaline that comes right when your body realizes that it’s too late to save itself.
            A heavy thing hit my arm with a thump and knocked me back against someone with rough paws who held me up. On the floor was Dvorov’s head, separated from his body by several feet and a growing puddle of dark blood. Nepthys stood over him with a blue sword in his hand. It flashed in the strobe where it wasn’t streaked with Dvorov’s blood.
            “He wasn’t the only one with a secret or two,” he said by way of explanation. “You spotted our boy, didn’t you? I bet his hide-out is nearby, too. Let’s hurry.” He wiped off the sword and sheathed it in a scabbard now belted to his hip. The crowd parted for us.
            The vampire glanced up when he saw the crowd split and his eyes flashed when he noticed us. In a blink of the strobe light, he was on his feet and dashing from the room. “Come on!” shouted Nepthys.
            We chased after him, Amy keeping up valiantly behind us. He bashed up a set of stairs set into the side of the wall, and we chased up after him, heading up a huge staircase that seemed to go up for more stories than the building could have held. Luckily, the vampire turned off after three stories. He ran down a hallway and slipped behind one of the doors, but Nepthys was close behind him and left it open for me. I called out to Amy to shut the door in case the vampire had any friends who might be trying to follow us. Inside was a dark room that looked like a storage space for DJ equipment. Nepthys urged me on from the back of the room, then made a turn out of sight. 
            When I came to the door at the end of the room, it looked like it had been torn off its hinges. I didn’t imagine that Nepthys had done it, and it wasn’t without alarm that I ran after him. 
            A black hallway opened into a space like a cathedral. The vault rose into obscurity above me, and a massive rose window stood ahead of me. The panes looked dyed black, and only a few cold beams slipped through the filter. Footsteps echoed through the stone chamber, and the sound reflected back to me from everywhere. I couldn’t tell how many people were running, much less where they were. On the steps in front of the altar, I saw pale forms and realized that they were Rachel and two other women. Then I heard Nepthys shout, “Nathan! Behind you!” I whirled and dropped in time to see the vampire shoot over my head, leaping like a panther. He smashed into the pews behind me and I heard him leap across the rest of the row. There was Nepthys, on the other side of the pews, holding the wooden box in his hand. He tossed it to me, and I just barely had it open before I saw the vampire again, turning to face me.
            I pulled out the hammer and one of the stakes. He leapt over the pews, soaring like a grasshopper, and drew a gleaming knife in midair. I dodged, but he tossed it, and I held the box in front of my face. The blade lodged in the wood, its silver point penetrating the velvet and nearly reaching my skin. My arms shook from the force of his throw. Then he landed heavy beside me and I scrambled to stand. His first move pulled out the dagger, almost wrenching my arms from their sockets as I held on to the box, and the second shattered the box with a crushing punch that sent me reeling backwards. I dropped the splinters and the broken second stake and raised my hammer, ready to drive the ash spike into his heart. Behind him, I saw Nepthys running between the pews. I braced my legs against the stone floor and he was on me. I raised the stake; he drew back the dagger for a slash that could doubtless open my neck from throat to spine. The stake went down, there was a blur, and then my hands were empty and I felt pain under my jaw.
            Two points of fire opened in my throat for an instant, then all went numb. Taste, hearing and touch became a single blur, and I do not know if my eyes were open. My mind began to dissipate, but then I felt the pain withdraw and a lifeless voice said, “This one’s blood isn’t worth drinking.” Hands closed on my neck and I felt my spine crack.
            I must have fallen to the floor then. I could perceive Nepthys’ sword flashing over me, and I heard steel crack, then bone. I thought I heard Rachel’s voice blearily calling for me. Then one set of footsteps began walking toward the altar.
            I was content to let myself drift away, and I had almost forgotten the body lying with broken neck on the cathedral’s hard tiles when I felt a warm touch on its cheek. A girl’s voice, soft and almost recognizable, spoke, “Nathan.” I felt my head turn and something in my neck reconnected. Then my eyes opened and Amy handed me the hammer and stake.
            I stood and turned toward the altar. The vampire was walking just steps ahead of me. I stepped up behind him and raised my hands, which almost seemed to be glowing. Then the stake came down into his back and one, two, three strikes with the hammer drove it in. The vampire fell forward and blood began to flow from his mouth.
            Behind me, Amy was kneeling beside Nepthys, whose arm and rib cage were knitting back together like a wooden toy that falls apart when its string is released but draws itself together at a slight tug. I pulled the vial of liquid that he’d been giving me from his pocket and ran to the altar.
            Rachel, her clothes torn and her face drawn, looked like she might cry when she saw me. I pulled her into my arms and she tried to put hers around me. “My fuckin’ hero,” she whispered. 
            
         
         
      
   
