La Vida Vampire

The time foretold had come. Triton must return to the ocean of his birth and reunite with his long -lost friend Francesca so that each might come into their full powers. As it was, Triton had delayed the trip long after he knew of Francesca ’s rescue—in spite of Cosmil’s spells of gentle persuasion.

The boy had grown more stubborn with age, but also more cautious. For that, Cosmil could not fault him. Especially not now as a dark force rose, an entity Cosmil called The Void when he dared name it at all. Like bilious black smoke, The Void concealed its identity while it fed on the powers of magical beings. The more unique those beings, the more power it derived.

Cosmil would move the moon itself to protect Triton and Francesca, for only through their reunion and the coming of their full powers might they help defeat The Void. There was time yet, six months, perhaps. But the sooner Triton returned…

Cosmil tugged on the sleeve of his black tunic and turned into the doorway of the house, considering which potions of high magick to prepare. Triton would not travel until after his shape-shift at the new moon, but he must arrive without incident. Pandora watched him go through slitted eyes, then bounded off the steps and loped to her favorite tree. She settled on a high, forked limb, one paw dangling, and closed her eyes.





FIVE


Old, scary vampire me is a ’fraidy cat?

Yep, I admit it.

The super meow of Super Cat—and her whiskered image appearing then vanishing at my window—made me jumpy all night. Every sound remotely feline, every shadow at the window, frayed another nerve and chased erotic thoughts to the far corner of my mind.

I kept after my design homework, but I was sidetracked more than I wanted to be. That the design program kept glitching on me didn’t help matters. I love technology, hate techno tantrums.

I usually only drink one six-ounce bottle of Starbloods a day, shortly after I wake up each afternoon. Tonight I downed one more during the early hours just to stay focused and ease my frustration. All that, um, protein wouldn ’t keep me from conking out when I was ready to hit the rack, but it steadied me enough that I finished my Craftsman cabinet drawing. The nourishment also eased the ache in my right arm where Stony had abused it. Odd that the spot bothered me at all, but what did I know about implant chips? Maybe it had worked itself too close to the skin surface. The weirdness wasn’t just about the computer or Cat. As a plain psychic human, I’d had similar feelings. Those jumpingout-of-my-skin something’s-happening-but-I-don’t-know-what feelings that drove me just as nuts now as they had then. I blamed it on full moons, new moons, changing seasons, you name it.

In truth, moon phases made my abilities stronger when I was human. As a vampire, my powers go haywire during full moons, deader than me during new moons. Don’t have a clue why the change, but it sure hadn’t made King Normand a happy vampire. I’d explained that psychics weren’t omniscient, but Normand the Nutcase had expected a perfect protégé princess, not a resentful rebel.

And though he was a royal pain, I never believed he was a real nobleman, much less a king. He’d hitched a ride on French ships with the soldiers who’d tried to hold Fort Caroline in what is now Jacksonville. When the Spanish slaughtered the French soldiers, King Normand moved south with his enclave of vampires and mortal slaves to settle outside the city gates. The Spanish soldiers, and later the troops of the British period, would’ve killed Normand sooner if they could’ve. My rotten luck they didn’t. I steered my thoughts away from Normand and back to tonight’s mind reading. Unprecedented since I’d become a vamp, so why had it happened? I’d read somewhere that the moon was moving away from Earth at the rate of 1.2 centimeters a year. Could that bit of distance lessen the moon’s influence over my psychic abilities? Wished I knew. Nothing is as scary in the light as it is in the dark. The sunshiny Tuesday morning dawned, and thoughts of the past and weird Cat faded. Picking up my sweet Chevy SSR with its aqua metallic paint job lifted my spirits, and so did stopping at Home Depot. Not to chew nails. To pick up a chandelier Maggie ordered and to ogle the playground of gizmos and gadgets. I returned to the penthouse and parked in the lot behind our building. Mostly it ’s bank parking, but each tenant gets one uncovered space. Since parking is hell anywhere downtown, I gladly paid for an additional slot. I mustered enough energy to brush my teeth before I fell into bed.

I slept dreamlessly and far later than usual, all the way to five thirty. Maggie breezed in looking as fresh in her blue gray business suit as she had this morning. She plopped her purse on the kitchen island just as I finished rinsing out a single Starbloods bottle.

She raised that brow at me. Or maybe it was at my butter yellow terry cloth robe and fuzzy dolphin house slippers —the kind with memory foam. I’m usually dressed by now.

“You look like something the cat dragged in. Have trouble sleeping?”