There was a hidden door behind Dummy Drac.
We crossed the tracks, and I stepped carefully to avoid tripping any switches or getting my boots caught in the rails. I was glad I’d worn the heavy things, because a rat ran out of the dark and raced over my laces, heading for cover on the other side. I managed not to squeak, though there might have been a dry rattling in my throat. Might.
Michael took hold of the knob of the door and lightly turned it, then shook his head. Locked, obv. That posed no serious issues for him, but it’d make some noise; the glow of the light under the door made me less of a blind human liability, so I pulled my hand free of his and pulled the snub-nosed revolver out of my belly pack. I didn’t like guns, particularly, but they were real useful around humans who meant me no good. I had a knife, too, but if it came to hand-to-hand with Mr. Batty out there, it wasn’t going to be an even match, and I liked advantages.
Michael twisted, hard, and broke something metallic inside the door with a harsh snap. The knob slid out, and he reached into the hole and manipulated things until there was a click and the door yawned open, letting loose a flood of what seemed like a five-hundred-watt spotlight . . . but it was just one bulb, not even remotely bright. My eyes adjusted quickly, and I shut the door behind us. Without the lock, it wasn’t going to do much good, but I followed Michael’s lead and reached into the empty hole where the knob had been to push on metal until the tongue slipped back in place. It’d slow them down, at least.
When I turned to look, I saw we were in a plain metal room. The one bulb was on a swinging chain hanging in the middle of the open space. There was a miniature viewing stand of seats that would hold maybe twenty people, if they were really friendly, and then there was the cage. It was the size of something you’d use for a lion or tiger act, big enough to move around in; it held a cot with a blanket and a pillow, and some kind of pot under the bed I assumed was their version of a portable toilet. Apart from that, it was just iron bars coated with silver, and a single stoutly built wooden chair that was bolted to the floor at the center of the cage.
There were stains on the floor around it, and a few soaked into the wood. Dark stains. I told myself it was chocolate, and left it at that. I was too busy staring at the vampire in the cage.
Because he was just a kid.
I mean, a kid. Maybe twelve, thirteen years old at the most—a thin boy with long legs that he had tented up as he lay on his back, staring at the ceiling of the room. He must have heard us coming, but he hadn’t moved, not an inch. From the still way he lay, I’d have thought he was regular dead, but he was the special kind. The kind that could still get up and kill us.
“Hey,” Michael said softly. “You need out of there?”
That made the kid sit up, with a sudden fluidity that made me glad there were bars between him and me; Michael didn’t move like that. Most vampires in Morganville didn’t, because they were trying to fit in, be less alarming to the people they farmed for money and blood. (To their credit, most of the blood donations are voluntary, through the blood bank. It’s sort of like the Mafia, but with fangs.)
Seeing a vampire move like the pure predators they are . . . that was a bit scary. So was the emptiness in this kid’s eyes, the utter lack of interest or emotion. He could have been the lion the cage was meant for, only at least a lion would have more of an opinion.
“Open it,” the kid said, and rattled the door. It was extra sturdy; he couldn’t hold it for more than a second before the silver began to burn him. He was wearing only a ratty, dirty pair of khaki shorts that was two sizes too large for him—no shirt, and his thin chest was as pale as ivory. Veins showed blue underneath the skin, like one of those see-through anatomy dolls. “Open it.” He didn’t even sound angry, or hopeful, or desperate. The words were just as emotionless as his eyes. Most vampires were faking it, to some extent or other, but this kid—I had the eerie idea that he might never have been human at all.
Michael was considering him thoughtfully, although he was putting on the leather gloves he’d brought along in the event of silver. Unlike with the kid, I could read emotion in my honey’s expressions . . . and he looked just as startled and worried about what we were facing as me. “In a second,” he said. “What’s your name?”
The kid blinked, a slow movement like he’d learned it from observation, not nature. “Jeremy,” he said. “My name is Jeremy.”
“Okay, Jeremy,” Michael said, in a soft, calming voice, the way you’d speak to a particularly dangerous-looking wild dog. “Are you hurt?” He got a headshake. “Hungry?”
That got a flat stare for a second, and then Jeremy turned it on me. “Let me have her, and I’ll be fine.”