The Dead Travel Fast

Chapter 4

4

For some reason, when I made eye contact with the woman, I half-expected to see the golden eyes of the runner. But it was not the runner. In fact, this woman was the most beautiful person I had ever seen. Her skin was pale—no, not pale. White. It was a colorless kind of white, not like the bright white of snow or the rich white of chalk. Her wavy dark hair was pinned up all around her head, and she wore an ankle-length coat with fur trimming, black velvet gloves, and a huge magenta hat covered in ribbons and artificial flowers. She looked like she had come straight out of a history book. When I tried to look at her face, my mind clouded and everything looked fuzzy. Her face was like a work of art—the nose delicate, the lips and chin strong, cheekbones high, and eyelashes long. I couldn’t get a look at her eyes because they glittered and sparkled so much in the winter light.

I couldn’t move. I could hardly even think or breathe. The woman smiled at me with very white and sharp teeth. “Why, hello, darling,” she said sweetly. “Could you help me, please?” She had a soft, melodic voice, and she spoke with a posh British accent.

I gulped. My mouth was very dry, and my thoughts were so clouded that I couldn’t process what was going on. I had forgotten about everything, everything except that magnificently beautiful face. Forcing myself to speak, I could only manage, “Um, what?”

She was unfazed by my slow reaction. With a wide smile, she said, “I am looking for someone. Have you recently seen a man in a long, dark coat recently? He may also have been wearing a hat and carrying a portmanteau.”

I couldn’t remember anything at all. “Uh…no. I don’t think so.”

The woman sighed dejectedly. “Oh, well,” she said. “That’s all right.” She was using that “it’s-OK-you-did-your-best” kind of voice that always made me feel worse. She turned, gracefully climbed out of the rose bushes, and started to walk away down the sidewalk.

She looked so sincerely disappointed that I cried, “Wait! Is there any way I can help at all?”

Stop. Stop right there. Do not help her.

That voice! There it was again. But I was too captivated by the woman to wonder at it this time.

She turned around. Her lovely lips were once again stretched into that beautiful broad grin, and she fluttered her eyelashes at me. “Of course. I would be very grateful if you could help me.”

“What can I do for you?”

“Have you seen a young woman lately? You would have seen her on the sidewalk around here. She might have been wearing—oh, what do they call them these days?—leggings and a vest. Her hair is dark, just like yours. Perhaps she passed by your house?”

I gazed into those gorgeous sparkling eyes and saw in them the image of that runner. I knew I had seen the runner before, so I opened my mouth to say-

Snap out of it, you i***t! Lie to her! Don’t tell her that you saw that runner!

I jumped. Before, the voice had only been an unfamiliar whisper in my mind, yet now it was a loud, piercing shriek. Something about the strength and ferocity of Celeste’s voice cleared my thoughts. Suddenly, I was able to function normally again. When I looked at the woman, who was gazing at me expectantly, I could see her properly now. She was still beautiful, but no longer dazzling in quite the same mind-boggling way. Her smile was full of odd, pointy teeth. And perhaps it was something about the sunlight, but I could finally see her eyes, and they were strange—a deep shade of blood red, and full of moving and dancing shadows. Not to mention that she fit into her surroundings the way a puzzle piece might be able to fit into the wrong puzzle. Her Victorian clothes made her look very peculiar standing there in the gritty snow and traffic of Boston.

All at once, I realized how odd this woman was, and that did not make me eager to open up to her. Stuttering a bit, I said, “N-no, I don’t think I’ve seen anyone like that recently.”

Unlike last time, the woman did not look dejected at my unhelpfulness. Instead, she glowered at me. “That isn’t true, is it,” she spat. “You know exactly who I am talking about, and you have seen her recently. You’re lying. I can smell it. Thank you for your help.” With a decisive rustle of fabric, she whirled around and strode off in the opposite direction.

I frowned, standing on the safe pathway of my front yard and watching her go. “I can smell it,” she’d said. What on earth did that mean?

As she crossed the street, I remembered suddenly that I had in fact seen the man she had asked about earlier. After I had just met the runner, she had disappeared around a corner. I had tried to see where she went, but all I saw was a man in a hat and a long trench coat.

The voice came back. Aren’t you going to follow her?

“What?” I muttered, shaking my head and wondering why I was bothering to talk to myself. “Why would I follow her?”

Because the dead travel fast, Abigail! Go follow her, now, before you lose your chance!

For some reason, I obeyed the voice. A minute later, I was hiding at a bus stop across the street, watching the woman strut purposefully down the sidewalk. A few people turned to gawk at the stunningly beautiful woman striding along in her long Victorian dress and her giant hat, but no one saw me dart from tree to bus stop in her footsteps. It wasn’t difficult to remain unseen—at least, I thought I was unseen.

Finally, after walking a few blocks, the lady crossed a street and turned into a deserted alley. I hesitated a moment but went in after her. Thankfully, she did not see me; she had already slipped into an even deeper, narrower pathway. I stayed in the alley, pressed against a wall. I couldn’t see her very well from my position, but I could see that she was standing in a small nook, probably nothing more than the backyard of some building. There were a few dumpsters, many shadows, and not much else.

“I know you’re there, Goldie,” she said in a voice dripping with excessive sweetness. She looked around, a sly smile on her beautiful face. “No need to hide. Or perhaps you’re hiding because you’re afraid.”

A voice in the air, though I could not tell where it was coming from, replied, “You’re a fool, Cynthia. I am much older than you. You are an abomination, a mere shadow of what I am.” It was a strange voice, very flat and emotionless. It reminded me of the runner.

“Oh?” She c****d her head, smiling indulgently as if she were speaking to a toddler. “But you’re not beautiful, are you?”

“No. And I don’t squeal with fear every time I see garlic bread, silverware, or wooden poles. Oh, and crucifixes! We cannot forget those.”

Cynthia sighed. “It’s very hard for me in this city, you know. The Bostonians are much too religious. It’s like everywhere I go, there’s a giant cross staring at me!”

“Poor you,” the voice said unsympathetically. “You’re pathetic, all of you.”

“By the way, I ran into someone earlier. Well, I didn’t exactly run into her. I met the newest elemental. It seemed to me like your plan is already in motion.”

“Yes, obviously. You knew that already. Now, if you don’t mind, let us get to what I wanted to discuss.”

“I’m listening.”

“So, I take it that you are the leader of the International Clan?”

“Yes. In other words, I am the queen of all vampires. I’m the youngest queen in history, in fact.”

Vampires?

“But how can I trust you?” the voice asked. “The International Clan is barely an organization, just a bunch of elites cobbled together. Most vampires are independent individuals. Yet you are telling me that you have complete authority over all of them?”

“Tsk, tsk. For someone so smart and powerful, you don’t know anything about us. We are creatures of blood. We spread like a disease through the blood of humans, and we all share the same blood—the blood of the first vampire, whoever that may have been. We can easily communicate with each other, no matter who we are or where we are standing. We understand each other, too, and every vampire knows who has authority. In this case, I have the authority.”

“The International Clan—”

“The International Clan is only a tool that we use once every few centuries. What really matters to us is blood and tradition. We are like a big family, after all.”

Goldie snorted. “You are all disgusting, that’s what you are. Disgusting, horrible abominations.”

“Careful, Goldie.” Cynthia’s voice was soft. “You’re not going to win our loyalty if you speak like that.”

I heard a loud, deep laugh—though I still had no idea where it was coming from. “I will win your loyalty,” it said, “because I could smite you all off the face of the earth if I wanted to.”

For the first time, Cynthia’s smile faded. She bared her teeth and growled. I stiffened, horrified that anyone could even make such a sound.

“Hungry, Cynthia?” Goldie jeered.

With a rusty squeak, a door opened right behind Cynthia. A pudgy older man walked out with a huge garbage bag in his hand. Whistling loudly, he dropped the bag on the ground, then opened a dumpster. He bent over to pick up the garbage bag.

Cynthia, who had just opened her mouth to say something, stopped, turned around, and gazed at the man with an expression of irritation on her face. “No,” she said shortly. “If I were hungry, I would not look so youthful. Hungry vampires are old and ugly.”

The man jumped and looked up. His eyes widened and his jaw dropped open. He must have been experiencing the same feelings that I had felt. I doubted that he would be able to move even if he’d tried.

“Well, you still have to kill him,” Goldie said. “No one can know that we were here.”

The man apparently could not hear anything. He smiled faintly at Cynthia.

“Do I have to?” Cynthia whined. “He doesn’t look very tasty.”

“Yes. You’re a vampire. There are a thousand ways that you can kill him. Use your imagination for once.”

Cynthia rolled her eyes, but there was a wicked smile on her face. “Well, if I don’t have to eat him, this could be a lot of fun.” She beckoned to the man. “Come here, sweetie.”

As the man started to walk toward her slowly, like a sleepwalker, I backed away. I did not know what was going to happen, but I was pretty sure that I did not want to see it go down.

“Yes, my dear, that’s right.” Cynthia reached out and grabbed the man’s neck. With only her right arm, she lifted him high into the air. The movement seemed to take no effort at all. As if he had just woken up from a dream, the man started to kick and struggle. Calmly, Cynthia said, “It was nice knowing you. I hope you said goodbye to your family.” Her red eyes gleamed in the dim shadows.

I turned around and ran, diving out of the alley and into the busy street so fast that I almost got run over by a car. I wasn’t sure, but I thought I could hear the man screaming behind me. I could certainly hear evil laughter somewhere in the background, but I didn’t know if the laughter belonged to Goldie or Cynthia or Celeste’s voice or just my imagination. A few cars honked at me as I darted across the street, but I kept running and running and running until I got home.

Even there, I didn’t feel safe.