Chapter 10 – Come to Me



This chapter is a bit of a homage to Christopher Lee’s 1965, Dracula, Prince of Darkness which I saw at the movie theater. Dracula, who had been reduced to dust in the previous movie, was revived by his trusty servant with a gallon of blood. (What was that guy thinking?) I never forgot that one.

Extra special thanks to dipole_dipole_attraction for the French translation of Bob the Warlock’s spell.

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The Watcher’s Journal of Sir Arthur Gosnard-Tisklin.

Brontley, January 3, 1901 - continued. I had no opportunity to call out or warn Lady Victorine. The vampire clapped his dirty hand, still filthy from his grave, over my mouth. His free arm clamped itself around me like a blacksmith’s vice, immovable and crushing. I struggled to free myself, stomping at his feet and elbowing his ribs to no avail. For the first time in my life, I knew what it was to contend with the strength of the Hell Spawn known as a Vampire.

His breath was rank and cold on my neck as he lowered his fangs and bit down. The pain was excruciating, but nothing compared to the appalling feeling as he pushed out his fangs, ripped into my flesh and began to feed, sucking, slurping, draining me of my life force and, along with it, my desire to continue the battle to save my life. The chill of death crept into my fingers and hands and clawed its way up my arms and legs. My chest heaved as there was less and less blood to circulate life-giving air from my lungs to my heart. I collapsed to the ground, almost senseless with pain.

≈§ ≈ § ≈


***

Buffy crept down the alley, watching for any sign that Spike was stalking her. She hoped he didn’t get it into his head to follow her tonight. She’d promised him to come back to the mansion when she got through patrolling and he’d seemed satisfied with her promise after she assured him that she wouldn’t get into any fun fights without him.

Taking one last look down the alley, she tiptoed down the stairs to the level below the sidewalk. She touched the door of Angel’s former apartment. A sign still hung on the door advertising the vacant apartment. She crossed the hall and extracted the apartment door key from its hiding place in a chink between two bricks and let herself in.

Angel had been gone a long time, hadn’t left much behind. Just the bed, stripped of its sheets. She curled up on the bare mattress and remembered that night, the way she’d felt, how happy she’d been, how she’d thought she was so grown up. The happy memories didn’t last long before horrifying events swallowed up the tender moments. Tears came to her eyes. Was I not good?

Metal scraped and Spike’s lighter flared up. He lit the tip of his cigarette and sucked in a long stream of smoke and stared at her for a long time. “Isn’t this cozy.”

Buffy rolled off the bed and started for the door. Leave it to Spike to show up and ruin her visit to Angel’s old apartment. She’d never be able to come here again.

“Don’t run off. I wouldn’t want to spoil your wallowing in misery party.” His hand shot across the door and blocked her way.

Buffy ducked under his arm and ran up the stairs. She stopped at the top of the steps and stared down into the shadows where only the glowing tip of his cigarette was visible. “I just came back to make sure no vampires had nested here since it’s empty.”

“You’re a bad liar, pet. You came back to commune with the soulful dead.”

“What do you care what I do? You don’t care about me.”

He flicked his cigarette butt away and followed her up the stairs. “I don’t like sharing. Especially not with Angelus.”

Buffy turned and went back to the alley. “You don’t have me, so no sharing is happening.” More to the point, Angel didn’t have her, so no sharing was happening.

Giles was wrong about one thing. Vampires do have some emotions. They’re jealous as hellfire. They’re all in touch with their Inner Ghacknar.

She hurried down the alley to get away from Spike. “Quit following me or lurking or stalking or whatever it is you’re doing.”

Spike grabbed her arm. “How long are you going to moon after the bastard? He left you.”

“He left for my own good. So I could have a normal life. He wanted me to be happy.”

Spike pulled her to a stop. “If I loved you, I’d never leave.”

Buffy slapped his hand away. “But, you don’t.”

Spike pushed her against the nearest building wall and placed his hands on either side of her head so she couldn’t escape. “I like you quite a bit. I think you like me, too. I think you’d like to forget about Angelus and think about me.” He lowered his mouth to kiss hers.

She forgot how annoying he was when he was kissing her. Or, maybe he wasn’t annoying at all when his lips were on hers.

“Don’t you think it’s time you forgot about him?”

“Why should I?”

“Make way for somebody new?”

She hated it when Spike figured out something about her that she didn’t know about herself. She wanted to forget about Angel. Really forget, not the half-hearted, sneaky, always thinking about him, pretending she didn’t care anymore while secretly moping around about him forgetting that she pulled around her friends.

“Somebody like you?” She touched a button on his shirt.

For a moment, Spike looked like he was about to say something, but he didn’t. He lifted his hands and backed away. “Let’s go over to Willy’s and play some kitten poker. Random acts of merciless card cheating always make me feel better. We can dust a couple of vamps in the alley if things get slow.”

“What’s kitten poker? Am I going to approve?”

“Not bloody likely. Give me a kiss first.” Spike kissed her again, harder this time.

Buffy was just coming up for air, when a steel battle ax whirled by their heads and thunked into the brick wall behind them. The handle vibrated back and forth with the force of the blow.

Spike shoved her to the pavement and they rolled behind an abandoned truck. Buffy peaked out. She saw nothing but a black motorcycle roaring away.


***


Rosamund sat in Bob’s kitchen. It was 11:50 p.m. She’d been hanging around Bob’s snooty Yuppiated kitchen, counting the tessellated granite tiles, for an hour while he ate a late night snack of beef and chipotle burritos and Puffo’s Blue Moon ice cream and otherwise screwed around when he should have been preparing to revive her sister. She was going to enjoy draining Bob when this was over. She might burn down the house, too, as her contribution to Fine Living.

“How much longer?”

“I told you. Midnight. Besides, I have to finish thawing this damn blood.” Bob opened the microwave and turned the gallon jug over so the blood would thaw evenly. “Clean off the table.”

Rosamund swiped her arm across the table, sending dirty plates, glasses and silverware to the floor with a crash.

“Gee, why didn’t I think of that?” Bob said. He pulled a handwritten list out of his pocket and read off ingredients as he took containers out of the cabinet over the sink.

“Bonebrake, sassafras, acidophilus, scales of blue-tailed skink, pulverized moonstone.” He measured and mixed the ingredients, along with a few other items that weren’t on the list that he didn’t want Miz Bloodsucker to know about, into a Tupperware bowl with runes written on the side with a black Sharpie magic marker. He mashed and pounded the ingredients into a slimy, olive green paste.

“Hand me the ashes.”

Rosamund held up the blue crystal vial of ashes and fingered the filigreed silver cap. “You sure this is going to work?”

Bob diced dried platypus fetus toes on a thick slab of butcher’s block. “Maybe you’d like to take your business elsewhere?”

She tossed him the vial containing all that was left of her sister. All that was left of her sister after the Slayer staked her.

He mixed the slain vampire’s ashes into the bowl and spread the goop in a thin woman-shaped layer on the kitchen table with a rubber spatula. When he’d scraped the bowl dry, he emptied the first bag of blood into the bowl to absorb the remaining ashes. He spread the bloody mixture over the mixture of ashes on the table. The blood percolated in and a cold, black vapor reeking of sulphur rose from the table.

He saw Rosamund twitching at the smell of blood and shoved the empty bowl at her. “Want to lick the bowl?”

Rosamund snarled. “Get on with it, prick. I’m paying you to revive my sister not audition your stand-up routine. Like I’d eat my own sister. Once was enough.”

Bob opened the next bag of blood and saturated the mixture again. He drew a circle around the edge of the table with lighter fluid and handed Rosamund a box of kitchen matches.

“When I start chanting and pouring the rest of the blood, set fire to the lighter fluid. Keep your mouth shut and try not to set fire to yourself. I hate the smell of vampire roasting on an open fire.”

Rosamund scowled. She had planned on sharing Bob with her sister, who’d no doubt be hungry as any fledgling, but now she was going to suck him bone dry herself. She might even turn him so she’d have the pleasure of killing him twice.

Bob began the chant.

Qui était mort, soyez vite.
Qui dort, rétablissez.
L'os et le sang, le nerf et le cartilage,
venez à moi quand je siffle...

Who was dead, be quick.
Who sleeps, revive.
Bone and blood, nerve and gristle,
Come to me when I whistle …

She scraped a kitchen match on the side of its box, tossed the flaming match at the table. She jumped back as the lighter fluid whooshed into flame.

Bob chanted and poured the gallon of blood inside the ring of fire, which burned long after the lighter fluid had been consumed. He whistled sharply as the blood pooled up inside the flames, then was absorbed into Sunday’s ashes.

Qui était silencieux, parlez.
Qui avait soif, alimentez.
Empestant comme les mauvaises herbes,
tranchant comme les chardons,
venez à moi quand je siffle...

Who was silent, speak.
Who was thirsty, feed.
Rank as weed, sharp as thistle
Come to me when I whistle …

He poured the remaining bag of blood onto the table and whistled twice. The blood sucked into the mixture and the mixture levitated over the table and stretched and molded itself into the flattened form of a woman.

Qui était mauvais, retournez.
Qui était la mort, prospérez.
Les dents comme l'acier,
Cheveux comme le brin,
venez à moi quand je siffle.

Who was evil, return.
Who was death, thrive.
Teeth like steel, hair like bristle,
Come to me when I whistle.

He whistled three times and the flat woman form expanded into full size, levitated above the table and took shape, first a flat, curvy grey form that thickened into bones – spine, then thigh bones, tibulas and fibulas, arms bones – humerus, radial and ulna, fingers, toes, ribs, pelvis, scapulae. The skull blew into shape like a soap bubble, then hardened. Muscles and cartilage spun and wove around the bone, attaching themselves at the joints and extremities. The liver, gall bladder, stomach, intestines, ovaries, uterus, lungs and heart bloated up, fat and greasy, then burst and subsided into their final form at first death.

Nerves, blood and lymph vessels crept in a closely spaced net across the muscles and penetrated the form’s lungs and intestines. Transparent scales appeared at the ends of the fingers and toes and thickened into nails. The organs of the neck and throat popped open and crammed themselves under the thickening neck muscles and around the cervical spine. A dim shadow of brain tissue appeared behind the eye sockets of the skull, then the jellied eye orbs coagulated in place.

A layer of cartilage and fat tissue spread across the corpse, creating a nose, ears, breasts and belly. The first layer skin appeared, tissue thin and transparent gray. The skin was pierced by tiny veins and capillaries and grew rosy-hued. The lower levels of the epidermis expanded, then the pale pinkish-gray upper layer formed.

Tiny hairs sprouted to form eyebrows, eyelashes. Coarse hairs fuzzed over the skull and coarser dark-brown hairs spread under the arms and over the pubic mound.

As suddenly as the revenant process began, it stopped. Sunday floated an inch or two above the table, completely formed as she had last been in her unlife, before the Slayer flung a wooden stake through her heart.

She didn’t move.

Rosamund tapped her foot. Here was her sister. Why didn’t she move or talk or something? This warlock better not screw up. She was going to kill him whether he screwed up or not, but if he screwed up, she’d have to wait and she didn’t want to wait to kill him.

Bob looked puzzled. The spell was complete, but the subject had not returned to life or unlife or whatever these disgusting creatures called their existence. He’d never brought back a vampire before, only formerly living humans. What was missing?

He slapped his forehead. A sacrifice. How could he have forgotten that?

He fetched a female rat from a cage in his dining room – an albino rat with nasty pink eyes and quivering nose. The rat was a perfect substitute for this disgusting pale vampire. He slit the rat’s throat and trickled the blood onto the dead vampire’s lips.

Sunday popped open her eyes and licked her lips.

***

Buffy woke with a start. She was slouched on an uncomfortable straight-backed chair in Willy’s back room, gripping a bottle of booze. She’d been sipping, while Spike played cards with his friend Clem, and Burt and Jurt, a couple of newtle demons, and had fallen asleep after arguing with Clem about the necessity of playing for kittens.

The game broke up while she was napping and all the kittens were gone. Spike had fallen asleep on the poker table after consuming a bottle of scotch. He was talking in his sleep, which no surprise, since Spike never stopped talking.

“Why’d you do it, baby? Why’d you leave me?” He started to cry.

He must be having a nightmare. Buffy shook his shoulders.

Spike woke up, grabbed Buffy and held her close with an iron grip. Tears coursed down his face. “She left me. Why’d she leave me? She just left. She didn't even care enough to cut off my head or set me on fire. I mean, is that too much to ask? You know? Some little sign that she cared?” Spike sobbed and buried his face against her neck.

Buffy stroked his hair. Spike must be talking about Drusilla, but it didn’t make sense. Vampires don’t have feelings, except for bad ones like rage and jealousy. Giles always said so. Angel proved it when he lost his soul and his love for her on the same night. Still, Spike was upset and crying and she felt sorry for him.

Spike would be furious tomorrow when he remembered he’d broken down in front of her. There was only one thing to do.

“Willyam Boy, don’t cry,” she said in Cave Slayer. “Buffeee like Willyam.”

Spike sat up and sniffed. “Thanks, Buffy. I like you, too. Let’s go home.”

Buffy tucked her hand in his pocket and they walked back to the mansion, leaning together.