Chapter 388
The covens' basement was dark. The only light came from a feeble candle held by one of the bearded vampires. It revealed the outline of five large wooden boxes and the rough texture of an unfinished dirt floor.
"There is space enough, if you are friendly," the vampire said in his thickly accented voice.
Fethillen nodded. "It will do. Thank you." She motioned to her followers and they fell into line and laid down in rows, as if by practiced maneuver. Ume hesitated before she laid down between Quenby and another vampire, and Katelina thought she saw a flash of fear on her face. Did she know about Sushel's plan?
Katelina woke the next evening to darkness. Jorick helped her to her feet and guided her up the stairs. In the living room the bearded vampire sat before the radio. He was turned away from it, and draped across his lap was the bald woman. Her pale breasts were naked to the cold air. Bruises and bites marked her torso, and heavy scabbed lash marks cut across her back. Her pale tortured arm was jammed in the vampire's mouth, and he fed from her greedily. The woman's eyes were closed and her face was a mixture of pain and something else that made Katelina look away.
Jorick led Katelina out of the house to where Oren, Etsuko, and Verchiel waited. "Shall we?" the redhead asked cheerfully, though he didn't wait for an answer before he started across the snowy yard.
Katelina paused at a small shed whose door hung open. She poked her head inside and drew it back as quick. The smell was thick and overpowering; sweat, blood, and God knew what else. A bucket stood against the back wall and scattered bits of hay littered the floor. She realized instantly what it must be: the human's shed.
Jorick gently urged her away and she said savagely, "We have to do something."
"About what?" Oren asked disinterestedly.
"The humans. We can't leave them in these conditions."
Jorick cleared his throat and Oren said, "Yes we can. It's none of our business."
"How can you say that? Never mind. I shouldn't expect anything else from someone who used to feed on their servants." She turned to Jorick. "We have to"
Oren cut her off. "My previous household arrangements are no business of yours. However I did not feed from my servants."
Katelina called to mind an image of their maid, skinny and covered in bandages. "Right, then who did?"
Oren growled and Jorick interrupted before the fight could escalate, "The children. They were too small to catch their own food. Now enough."
She had a sudden punch of guilt. The children. Oren's children, turned vampires by their mother and murdered by Malick's favorite Executioners. "It doesn't matter," she said quickly. "What matters is that we need to do something about these humans. Did you see that woman? He whipped her. They sleep in a smelly shed with a bucket to piss in. It's horrible and illegal!"
"Not by the vampires' Laws." Jorick didn't meet her eyes. "Katelina, vampires kill humans. Why would they think mistreating them is worse? It's the same with humans and animals. No one bats an eye to a dog chained to a porch, or a pig left with only a leaky shed and a trough."
"But those are animals," she cried. "And some people think it's wrong."
"And so do some vampires," Verchiel said. "You didn't see grumpy boots throwing his slaves out in the rain." He jerked a thumb toward Oren. "But that doesn't give him the right to interfere in someone else's situation."
She didn't bother to look to Etsuko for support. No doubt the Japanese woman would agree with Oren from some sense of duty. "I love how you sanitize this. Someone else's 'situation', as if those aren't human beings suffering! You compared them to dogs, and I guarantee if I came across someone beating a dog I'd at least turn them in. Unlike vampires, humans have laws about that kind of thing."
Jorick's tone was pained patience. "If vampires had laws about it, the answer would be to kill the humans, Katelina, just as humans 'put down' abused animals. Would you rather they were dead?"
"That's the best you can come up with?"
Jorick started to rebuff her, then held up his hand. "Never mind. Let's feed so we can leave."
They walked for a minute when Jorick turned to Verchiel. "I don't suppose you have any foreign connections worth mentioning?"
"Me?" Verchiel asked. "Not really. Why?"
"In that case go on. I'll be back."
Jorick stormed toward the house and Katelina watched him go with confusion. "What's he doing?"
"He's not thinking of trying to intervene on those humans' behalf, is he?" Oren asked sharply. "The only thing he could do is buy them and we hardly need two half-starved slaves tagging along."
"He could turn them loose afterwards," Verchiel suggested. "Of course they'd have nowhere to go and no money, and the coven will take new ones." He grinned. "I'm surprised. I didn't peg ol' Jorick for a soft touch."
Oren gave Katelina a cold look. "He never used to be."
The vampires caught something furry that Katelina tried to ignore. They'd finished and were trying to decide whether to go back to the house or wait for Jorick when he appeared, looking grim.
"Happy Saint Valentine's Day."
Katelina peeked out from her coat. "What?"
"You wanted a present, so you got a present. And now we're broke," he added with irritation. "I assume that makes it expensive enough? Loren said the gifts had to cost a small fortune."
Oren groaned. "You didn't."
"Of course. What else was there to do? We'll turn them over to what's left of the Birlik in Uzbekistan. Unless you'd like to keep them?" Katelina stared at him, and he said, "There's no point in turning them loose here. The coven would simply track them down again. Now if you're finished interfering for the night, I'd like to feed so we can go."
The humans didn't speak English. When Fethillen impatiently volunteered to explain the situation to them in their native tongue, they gripped each other tightly, and stared at the ground with large, terrified eyes. Getting them to the helicopter was even worse, and when they were forced inside, the bald woman broke down in tears.
"Is this necessary?" Sushel demanded.
"If Jorick's coven wishes to buy more slaves it is their choice," Fethillen said. "Admittedly this is not the place for them, but tomorrow, when they do not need to hunt for their food and we do, you may think differently."
Katelina gaped. If Fethillen had told the humans that, then no wonder they were upset.
"I believe she only said we were their new owners," Jorick assured her as he fastened his seat belt.
Micah sat next to Katelina. "So what's the fucking deal with those bald people? We taking them as a brown bag lunch or what?"
"No! Jorick's going to turn them in to the guild-thing in Uzbekistan because their owners were torturing them." Owners. "I mean, those vampires were torturing them."
"Right, and the what's-it in Uzbeck-whatever are gonna be nicer? You two are whacked."
She didn't bother to reply.
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