Envious Of Fire (Kissing With Teeth #2)

21. They Scream the Prettiest.

—?—

Kyle sits on a gold-lined chaise with red velvet cushions, his feet propped up on a glass coffee table centered on a lush rug the size of his living room, the furniture sandwiched by heaps of meaningless trash, glittering treasures, stacks of books, crates of earthenware, and a marble statue of a naked woman with a serpent coiled up her arm and resting upon her shoulder. Just another spot in the Devil’s Mouth, the towering piles of junk acting like walls between the spaces in this cavern, like rooms in a big mansion carved into the earth with no thought of architecture or a floor plan. The noises of vampire revelry, laughter, and music echo all around them, as if it never ended. It has been like this for hours and hours. Only now, they have wineglasses filled with the blood of drunk college students Kyle barely got to know, walking around the various scenes set in this large cavern, like guests at a party. Just in front of him, two naked vampire women sip from each other’s wineglasses like newlyweds on a nearby pile of feathered pillows, arms twisted around one another’s, and with each sip comes a tonguing kiss. One fondles the other’s nipple, blood is spilled, she licks it off the other’s skin, then presses her to the pillow. The more Kyle watches, the more his face twists.

“You look low-key grossed out.”

Kyle nearly forgot Drake was sitting on the chaise next to him, his denim jacket traded for a sleeveless white shirt, loose, the logo of some obscure indie band on the front. Somehow, the bright white band shirt makes his faded pink hair look even pinker. “Not really.”

“You wish that was us instead?”

Kyle frowns at him. “Huh?”

“Wanna lick wine off my nipple and make out with me by a pile of golden chalices like those two are? Side note, who needs so many freakin’ chalices? Where do we think we are? Medieval Europe?” Kyle looks away. Drake throws an arm over the back of the chaise, leans in. “Something about bringing blood home to my family gets me horny. Don’t know what it is. I think I get off on taking care of others. That a sexual identity?” He gazes at the side of Kyle’s face. “Taking care of loved ones?”

“You call these your loved ones?” asks Kyle with a note of mockery. “I bet you can’t even tell me one of their names.”

Drake lifts a finger and opens his mouth to answer, frowns, then drops his hand. “Fuck, you’re right. Maybe my fetish is taking care of total strangers, then. Is that a thing?”

“Yeah, it’s called totally bat shit. All of this. All of this is … is totally bat shit.” Kyle scoots away from Drake, leans forward with a sigh, rests his arms on his knees. “The second the sun’s down, I’m outta here.”

“So soon?”

The women are still making out. “Sooner the better.”

“Bat shit’s relative. I imagine bat shit is rather normal to … well, bats.” Drake scoots over, bringing himself next to Kyle again. “Maybe you’re too used to the big system, to convention, to what you think’s normal. Why can’t this be normal? Why are we all so submissive to this bat shit idea of— see what I did there? —working our asses off for dollars and cents, being owned by our jobs and our bosses, confining ourselves—rules, rules, rules. Such a waste of the precious time we’ve got with this life, y’know?”

“Brilliant. Moving words. You should start a podcast.”

Drake chuckles, elbows a smirking Kyle in the ribs. “You got a lip on you. That’s hot. I could listen to you shit-talk and sass me all night long while I’m rubbing one out. It’d do it for me. What’s your accent, by the way? I can’t quite place it. Texas, maybe?”

Kyle doesn’t bother to show his surprise at Drake’s correct first guess. He just rises from the chaise lounge and walks away.

After passing a couple of other heaps of junk, he comes to an abrupt stop at the sight of a cage. It’s in the center of a space lined with mine carts overflowing with dark stones. The cage is not generous with its space, roughly eight feet tall. Within, the young bodybuilder Kyle encountered in the desert stands at attention, only now he’s been given the dignity of the world’s tiniest golden thong, making his tightly-wrapped privates look as shiny as a Christmas ornament. Seated in front of the cage is Salazo, who watches his pet with unblinking eyes while the young man poses and flexes, as if for an audience. Despite the confident posing, his face reflects fear and sadness, terrified at all times that a wrong movement or poor performance could bear deadly consequences. “Yes,” sings Salazo in his phony, snakelike accent, “beautiful, my gorgeous boy, you’re a marvel. Do it again, but slower, more delicious, bigger, like a mountain rising from magma.” Despite being puzzled by the instruction, the young man proceeds, trying to please Salazo however he can. Kyle feels his racing heart, the uncertainty in his brain, the red hot fumes of humiliation wafting up his neck and cheeks. “One more pose just like that … yes, oh, how delicious you are, like a statue, how so, so very delicious …”

It’s then that the young man sees Kyle.

At once, Kyle feels the sting of guilt, feeling responsible for the young man’s botched attempt at an escape. That painful sting is worsened by the young man blaming Kyle, feeling betrayed by someone he mistook for a human, a deep and powerful distrust radiating from him in waves of anger. He believes he will never be free again. This is his life now. A toy for Salazo’s amusement. His good looks, now turned into a weapon against him. The years of work spent perfecting his body, now turned into a perverse joke for the pleasure of a sick, lustful immortal.

It’s then that Kyle realizes he can’t just leave. He can’t walk out of this cave, strut back into his life, put all of this behind him like a dream. He will never forget this guy’s face, nor the sting of betrayal in his eyes—and he will never forgive himself if he doesn’t do something about his plight.

And what if he isn’t the last “pet” to suffer Salazo’s lust? What if this barely scratches the surface of the vampire’s greed?

“Here!” Salazo claps his hands. “What distracts you so?”

The young man pulls his focus back to Salazo. “S-Sorry. I’ll do the—the—which pose did you want?—I’ll do the pose!”

Salazo turns in his chair, sees Kyle, doesn’t seem pleased to see him in the least. When he gazes back at his pet, suddenly he isn’t much pleased to see him either. “No,” he decides, at once moody, “no, it’s all wrong, it’s all … no, no. Where is your—oh, where did all of that delicious confidence go? You are now a tiny mouse. I do not like tiny mice.” Salazo rises from his chair, nearly standing taller than the cage itself, causing the young man inside to shrink back. “Stay like that, stay in there, stay in that outfit, stay until you become delicious to me again. I am so anticipating a taste of you later when you are more … ripe.” He sweeps his red robe about himself, annoyed, then saunters right past Kyle, not even dignifying him with a word or a look.

Kyle watches him float away around the corner. When he glances back at the cage, the young man is clinging to the bars, eyes shut, teeth clenched. “ Fuck me ,” the pet curses under his breath, hits his head against the cage, then keeps hissing the words again and again through his teeth.

“Is he more your type?”

It’s Drake, yet again sneaking up behind Kyle undetected, folding his arms on Kyle’s shoulders and leaning against him, smiling with dimples.

Kyle shrugs him off. “You can keep painting yourself as an innocent bystander to all this, with your so-called humane ways of survival. But while this guy still lives in a damned cage, there is nothing humane about this place. You’re complicit in this.”

“I only ask because my brother mentioned you’re a football player.” Drake nods at the guy. “Is he one, too? Is there some kinda jock-code-bro-code thing going on? Jocks before cocks? Players before vamp … ayers? Hmm, that last one didn’t work …”

Kyle leaves Drake’s side and strolls right up to the cage. He didn’t count on the young man stirring, gasping in fear, and at once moving away, back slamming against the other side. To be fair, there’s little space to move inside it anyway.

Kyle takes the hint, takes a step back, lifts his hands. “Hey, I’m not here to hurt you.”

“F-Fuck you,” the guy spits back.

“Promise. I’m really not. Ran into you by total accident out there in the desert. I didn’t realize you’d be dragged back here. I’m not one of these guys.”

“Yeah, you are.”

“Do I look like them?” Kyle gestures at himself, at his own hair, then opens his mouth and pokes at his teeth. “See? No fangs or weird hair. Hell, man, you’re even taller than me.”

“So? He’s one of them and he looks like us, too.”

Kyle glances over his back, seeing Drake. He sighs, rolls his eyes, faces the guy. “Okay, some of us aren’t really transformed fully yet. And I never will be. I don’t drink blood.” He realizes that’s a lie. “I don’t drink nonconsensual blood.” That doesn’t sound much better. “What I mean is, I’ve spent decades drinking none of it, and my boyfriend is turned on by dating someone like me, so … he kinda … uh … Y’know what? This is an overshare. I realize that. My point is, no one deserves to live in a cage.”

“Hey, hero boy,” comes Drake, slinking up to Kyle’s side, then leaning against the cage, “this is cute and everything, but I hope you realize every vampire in this cave can hear every word of your conversation. Salazo’s probably on his way over to end you.”

“He can try,” snaps Kyle, baring his teeth.

Ten long seconds pass. No one comes.

Drake frowns. “Perhaps I’m mistaken and he’s … occupied.”

“Then now’s our chance.” Kyle circles the cage in pursuit of its door—ignoring the young man who keeps backing away from him, as if caught in a terrifying game of tag. “How does it open?”

“It doesn’t.”

Kyle shoots Drake a look. “Then how does the pet get in and out?”

“I have a name,” barks the cage’s inhabitant.

Drake shrugs, walks up to the cage, takes hold of its bars, says to the pet, “Duck,” then lifts it straight up into the air, the young man barely ducking in time to avoid being smacked over the back of his head by the cage. Drake sets down the cage next to him, then sweetly adds, “It’s lighter than it looks.”

The young man gasps. “I … I couldn’t budge the thing!” he protests. “It’s gotta weigh a ton!”

“It’s just that human and vampire muscles work differently,” explains Drake, then says nothing further than that, turning back to Kyle. “What now, hot stuff? We march out of here with him? Freedom and happy endings for all? You’re in charge now.”

Kyle glances around, suddenly unsure, feeling like they’re surrounded. Though Drake’s words seem sarcastic, his tone is sincere, which only works to confuse Kyle worse on whether he is here to help, or just to taunt how very improbable the notion is to “march out of here”, as he so helpfully said.

Drake pats Kyle on the back. “Let’s make this easy.” Then he saunters to one of the bins while Kyle and the young bodybuilder watch. After sifting through the items of several bins, humming to himself, he finally finds what he’s looking for with a happy cheer. “Here we go!” He returns with a length of chain attached to a thick spiked collar, which he starts to click playfully in his hands.

The young man backs away. “What the fuck is that?”

Drake stops. “A collar and leash, obviously.”

“I’m not wearing that!”

Kyle sighs, not in the mood for this. “Seriously? What’re you playing around for, Drake?”

“I’m not playing around. I’m problem-solving.” He wiggles the leash. “He’s a pet, right? And what does one do with a pet?” He gives them a second to guess, then winks. “We walk it.”

The bodybuilder scoffs. “No fucking way.”

“Cut through the party,” continues Drake, “onward to the tunnels, left and right and left again, give or take some lefts and rights, then straight out of the Devil’s Mouth like a thrown-up TV dinner.” He clicks the leash again. “So how about it?”

“No,” is the reply, even still.

Kyle frowns in thought, shakes his head, then turns to the guy. “Honestly, I think it might not be that bad of an idea. If we go running out of here right now, they’ll catch us in a few seconds. Even if we calmly walk out of here, they might suspect something’s going on, you-know-who will find out, and then it’s over. But if we’ve got you on a leash, we’re just part of the party.”

The next instant, Drake rushes for the cage, lifts it in the air, and drops it straight over the bodybuilder again. He’s so fast, it causes both the young man and Kyle to flinch back, the action finished before they realized it even began.

Two seconds later, they learn why: the tall shape of Lazarus appears around the corner and stops. “No one notices what?”

Drake responds with surprising haste. “That this hunky pet hasn’t had a protein shake in weeks. Isn’t he overdue? Salazo does like his muscle boys nice and pumped up.”

“What’s that in your hand?”

Drake peers down, pretending to have forgotten. “Oh. We’re gonna walk the pet. Get some exercise. Think Salazo will mind?”

Lazarus’s cold, needle eyes flit from face to face, Kyle, to Drake, to the pet, to Kyle again.

Then something frightening happens: Lazarus smiles. “I’ve neglected you for the past few hours, Kyle. I see you are fitting in well with my brother. Have you become acquainted with any of the others? Asked your questions? You said you had many.”

Kyle swallows any instinct to be defiant. He suddenly has a mission. That gives him reason enough to fib. “Everyone seems preoccupied right now. I’ll have to ask my questions later.”

“Mm, I see. Whenever my brother returns with blood, it’s often a while before anyone is capable of decent conversation.” Lazarus’s smile persists. It really is a terrible sight. “I think few have caught any sleep at all today, the blood keeping them up. Here in the Devil’s Mouth, we are timeless, living in an eternal night for our sun-forsaken souls.” He approaches his brother, pats him on his pink-and-blond head of hair. With his height, it looks like a father ruffing up the head of his toddler. “Everyone loved the blood. Sweet taste. Subtle. Youthful. Even I got a vial or two for myself, quite the treat.” His smile persists. Is it there because of the blood? Is it there for his brother? Kyle still wishes it would go away. “But we’ll need more, little brother.”

“I figured as much,” mutters Drake with a note of sadness.

“Much more.”

Drake lets out a light sigh. “So we hunt again tonight.”

“We do,” confirms Lazarus. “This time, I’ll be with you.”

Drake twists his head around to Kyle, smirking, eyes half rolled. “He means he wants to babysit me.”

“We’ll get the work done faster together,” explains Lazarus through his smile. “I will ease the workload.”

“Because we will bring back a number of humans,” Drake then clarifies to Kyle, working as a sort of translator, “who shall all be sipped from directly, then returned before sunrise, with hopefully no casualties this time—keyword ‘hopefully’.”

“The sun is nearly set. It’s time.”

Drake lifts an eyebrow at his brother. “Already?”

“The day mercifully flew by. Be ready to depart. You won’t need your nursing supplies or needles. Just teeth. And perhaps your sedatives. Not the blue ones, they make the skin and blood taste sour.” Lazarus turns his gaze upon Kyle. Eye contact with a vampire is so like a literal weapon being pointed at the face, wielded with intent. “I wonder if you’d like to join us again?”

“I’ll pass,” says Kyle too quickly, awkwardly adds, “Thank you,” then wonders why the hell he’s thanking him.

Lazarus’s thin lips twist into a smirk, which is oddly more pleasant than the smile. “Are you saying you already wish to depart back to your … life?”

There is a faint belittling tone in that last word, particularly in the way he hesitates with saying it, like what Kyle leads isn’t worth calling a life at all.

Not too long ago, Kyle might’ve agreed.

But Kyle didn’t come here to prove himself to Lazarus. He came here for answers. He came here for security and peace of mind. He wonders if he’ll be returning home with neither.

“You did ask for just one night of my life,” Kyle points out.

“I did,” agrees Lazarus, “with the hope you might consider more. How can you understand the full breadth of your existence in a single night? You haven’t even witnessed a proper hunt yet.”

Kyle gives him a shrug. “Maybe next time.”

Lazarus studies him a moment, then gifts him with a nod. “Next time, perhaps. You know where we are currently staying. In a few days’ time, you may decide to visit us again. Our doors are always open for our guests to come or go as they please,” he says, with no irony acknowledged to the literal prisoner in the cage next to him. He eyes his brother. “Meet me at the exit of the cave when you’re ready. Be fast.” Then he saunters away.

Drake peers back at Kyle. “You’re wondering it, right?”

Kyle squints at him. “Wondering what?”

“If the front entrance is the Devil’s Mouth, then what’s the back one called?” He spreads his hands and all but sounds out the ba-dum-ching of his punchline. “Devil’s Butthole. C’mon. You were thinking it, don’t lie.”

“You gotta get ready for your hunt, don’t you?” Kyle turns away, moves back to the cage, where the bodybuilder has been standing there nervously watching, listening. “Better go before your big bro scolds you again.”

Drake pauses. “You mad at me? You didn’t laugh.”

“Why would I be mad? I don’t know you. Hell, maybe I was dead wrong and you really are totally okay with everything that happens in this cave, with the laughable amount of regard you and your brother spare for humanity. Well, not me. As it turns out, I’m not a maniacal human-hating hedonist.”

“Kyle …”

“Just fuck off already.”

It sounds as if Drake lifts his hand to touch Kyle’s arm or shoulder, then stopped. Kyle can’t feel or sense a single one of the vampires with his Reach, but he feels every bit of Drake just as strongly as if he shared his emotions. He feels Drake’s doubt. He knows it’s there. He also senses a lonesomeness—itself like a cave, yet without heaps of treasures or reveling guests, only emptiness and echoes of nothing. Is that lonesomeness the part of him that reaches for Kyle? Does he see Kyle as a companion at long last, after suffering the company of such monsters?

All hope for reaching Drake dies as Kyle listens to the soft sounds of his footsteps as he leaves without another word.

Kyle closes his eyes and clenches his fists, frustrated.

And now what? Does he just stand here twiddling thumbs? Does he wait for Drake to have a change of heart, return, and help him break this guy out of this cavern? Does he change his own mind and join Drake and Lazarus on their hunt, hoping to find the answers he came here seeking?

“Please don’t leave me.”

Kyle looks up.

The bodybuilder appears to be the one who has a change of heart instead, according to Kyle’s Reach. He is scared, but a warm light has kindled inside him, a warm light made of hope, glowing like a weak lantern in a dark and treacherous cave, and any stray gust of wind could knock it out.

Kyle frowns. “Oh, now you want my help.”

“Please, man, don’t give up on me! I’m Michael. Mikey. I go by Mikey, that’s my name, Mikey Kowalski, I’m begging you not to leave me here, please! My family must be fucking scared. I’ve been away from home for, like, maybe nine months.”

That surprises Kyle. “Nine months?”

“Or maybe ten. I don’t fucking know, man, I can’t tell time down here. That Salazo,” groans Mikey, clinging to the bars of his cage, “is a fucking sick-ass pervert fuck. Every single day, he makes me work out until I’m dripping with sweat, then licks my body dry, every fucking crevice, places I ain’t ever had a tongue before, even my fucking asshole. He pretends to set me free at night, then chases me down and drags me back here, and that’s the fucking worst part of all, because then he ties me down so tight my wrists and ankles ache, acts like I wasn’t allowed to run away, and punishes me by biting and sucking on every part of me, all over, even biting my d-d-dick.” He’s starting to cry. His fingers slip through the bars where he grabs hold of Kyle’s shirt, tugging. “You can’t leave me, man, you’re my only hope, you’re my only fucking hope, please, please, please !”

With every word, Kyle’s system is flooded worse with the desperation and horror that lives inside Mikey’s heart, pouring into Kyle through his Reach, filling him up to the top. Kyle’s own stomach twists with Mikey’s urgency, making him feel like he might throw up whatever he last ate. What did he last eat? Has he eaten anything all day?

Kyle fends off the assault of emotions as best as he can, his jaw tightening. “I don’t plan to leave you,” he states in a drone.

Mikey’s eyes light up. “Really?”

“But I don’t know how to get you out.” Kyle peers over his shoulder. Is it possible that Salazo can hear him? That Lazarus and all the other vampires can hear every word he says? Did they all just hear Mikey’s desperate pleas? Or is everyone too drunk on college student blood to pay attention? Perhaps now’s the perfect time. While they are all blood-drunk and distracted. While they are partying. “The sun’s down,” says Kyle, thinking it over.

“So?”

Kyle eyes him. “I may not look like them, but the sun can still burn me something awful. It’s important it’s down.”

Mikey’s eyes flicker as he lets go of Kyle’s shirt, perhaps having forgotten in his excitement what Kyle is.

“Don’t worry,” says Kyle wearily. “The last thing on earth I want to do is bite you. Like I said, the only blood I drink is my boyfriend’s, and that’s just ‘cause he wants me to.”

After a moment’s hesitation, Mikey finally nods. “Alright. I trust you, man.”

“You’ve got no choice,” states Kyle, perhaps unnecessarily. That’s when his eyes land on the pet leash lying on the ground, likely dropped there when Drake left. After listening to the echoes of laughter and revelry continuing in the other parts of the cavern for a while, Kyle comes to a decision. “Okay, here’s the plan: we’re doing Drake’s plan. I’m gonna walk you.”

Mikey makes a face. “What? No fucking way, man.”

“He had the best idea. It’s the only way I can ensure your safety.” Kyle peers back at Mikey. “You got a better idea?”

“I—Just—We can just—” His resolve crumbles as he sinks against the bars, deflated. “No.”

“Good.” Kyle swipes the leash off the ground and tosses it through the bars of the cage. After a sigh of resignation, Mikey picks it up with the petulance of a stubborn child. As he figures out how to put it on, Kyle grabs the bars of the cage and lifts—only to discover it is significantly less easy to lift than Drake made it look. “ Duck ,” instructs Kyle just as Drake did before. Mikey, still figuring out the leash, crouches low to the ground. When Kyle realizes there is no way to lift this heavy thing in the air, he resolves to simply allowing it to topple over, letting Mikey crawl out the bottom. When the cage crashes onto its side, both Kyle and Mikey freeze, praying with panicked eyes that no one comes to investigate the sound.

Mercifully, no one does.

Perhaps the noise is assumed to be a reckless partier who just knocked into a stack of decorative priceless china that could have gone for hundreds of thousands of dollars in an auction.

Kyle and Mikey look at one another, nerves wound tight, their eyes wide with uncertainty.

Kyle reaches out his hand.

Mikey, now with a thick spiked collar locked snugly around his neck, offers Kyle the end of the chain with a surprising lack of hesitation.

Kyle sees this as an act of trust. When he accepts the leash, he doesn’t take it lightly. “Say nothing,” he softly coaches him. “Bow your head. Look no one in the eye.”

“Fucking fuck,” whimpers Mikey, petrified.

Deciding they’re as ready as they’ll ever be, Kyle grips the leash tighter, takes a breath, then heads off. Mikey appears to have trouble walking at first, his legs stiff with fear, the leash tugging on his neck, but soon they find their stride, walking off.

For a while, no one is in sight, only their laughter echoing in all directions, sometimes distant, sometimes closer. Kyle and Mikey continue to move, following the path between piles and mounds and walls of invaluable things. Mikey trips, stumbling into Kyle’s back, mutters, “ S-Sorry .” This happens a few times.

The path opens to a larger area, the center of which holds no less than seven vampires, male and female, engaged in some kind of drunken orgy, cackling, one strumming a lute, another one singing along, one appearing to do naked yoga. Kyle pays them no mind as he walks by, attempting to maintain a look of total indifference. It isn’t easy, as their presence causes Mikey’s heart rate to skyrocket, which in turn forces Kyle to contain even more panic frothing inside him. He tightens his muscles as he walks, wrestling Mikey’s alarm into submission, breathing deep and long breaths, determined to get the fuck out of here.

It’s then that Kyle catches sight of someone peculiar he has not seen before. High up, sitting atop the tallest pile of junk, is a vampire. At first glance, Kyle isn’t certain whether they’re male or female, only that they are strikingly beautiful with long, flowing hair, just like Lazarus’s, only theirs is as white as snow. A porcelain, doll-like face, lightly-rouged cheeks, a pointy nose, wearing an almost playful expression, blissful, if not a bit bored and day-dreamy, perhaps waiting for something interesting to happen. The vampire wears a raspberry skintight catsuit with a slight sheen that covers their slender shape from neck to ankle.

And the moment Kyle sees the vampire, the vampire spots him right back, like an owl from a high-up perch sensing prey, or a perturbed housecat detecting movement.

The next instant, the vampire vanishes.

Kyle continues on, disturbed by that very temporary sight, and now his footsteps are much quicker. Mikey seems to notice, because his heart rate increases as he speeds up his own steps. The embarrassment from Mikey flushes in Kyle’s own cheeks. Perhaps it only now occurs to Kyle how humiliating this must be, to be paraded by a leash through the vignettes of vampires lounging around, partying, having sex or playing music, even if none of them seem to be paying attention.

Kyle supposes it’s understandable that Mikey doesn’t prefer to be wearing nothing but a spiked collar and leash with a tiny gold thong. Their first task will be finding Mikey some decent clothes, Kyle decides, as soon as they make it back to Nowhere.

Assuming Mikey wants anything to do with Kyle at all once they leave this evil place— if they leave this evil place.

Soon, Kyle spots the front exit of the den leading into the tunnels. Mikey seems to notice, too, as a burst of excitement rushes through his chest and his steps pick up more speed.

The moment they’re in the tunnels, relief washes over Mikey and spills into Kyle, inspiring them both. “Keep going,” says Kyle as they navigate through the dark tunnels. “We’re not in the clear until we’re outside. Watch your step.”

“I can’t fucking see!”

“Really? Not even a little bit? I can see just fine.”

“You’ve got your magic eyes, man, I can’t see shit!”

Kyle slows down, sighs with frustration. “Okay, stay close, then. Really close. Hands on my shoulders, if you have to. You gotta walk exactly where I’m walking. There are chasms in this tunnel, I’ve seen them, deep-ass chasms.”

“Are you fucking with me right now? Chasms?”

“Stay close, I said.”

With that, their progress slows considerably. Mikey clings to Kyle’s shoulders and back with annoying force, feeling like a heavy, fleshy backpack as the two proceed. Kyle realizes this is the second time he’s half-carried this guy through some kind of perilous situation. It’s far easier this time with Mikey being conscious, admittedly. “Watch your step,” Kyle coaches. “Stay by the wall on your right. The path drops off to the left. Good, just like that.” Mikey only replies with nervous grunts. It’s clear the young man is reevaluating his fear of the dark, terrified and relying completely and utterly on Kyle’s guidance.

It’s nearly an hour later. They are still worming their way through the tunnels. No sign of the exit in sight. “Are you sure you know where you’re going?” asks Mikey, voice echoing all around. Kyle doesn’t reply as he continues to pass through the tunnels, growing more and more frustrated by the minute.

Another half hour later, Kyle is certain they’re lost.

“Just admit you don’t know where in the hell we’re going,” says Mikey. “Admit that we’re gonna get caught, that I’m gonna be dead meat, that I’m gonna be punished because of your—”

Kyle comes to an abrupt stop.

Mikey, too, crashing into Kyle’s back. A moment’s pause. “What is it?” he whispers in a panic. “K-Kyle …?”

It’s Kyle’s Reach. It picked something up just now.

Something that wasn’t Mikey.

He turns his head, eyes searching in the darkness, senses nothing. Turns the other way, senses nothing. He listens more, listens further, reaching as best as he can.

He blinks.

Then: “Aww, you guys went without me?”

Both Mikey and Kyle slam against the wall, terrified.

Until the shape emerges from the darkness, and Kyle lets out an irritable sigh. “Damn it, Drake, what the fuck?”

Drake, who has donned his favorite denim jacket again, shrugs. “Sorry, boys, didn’t mean to give you such a spook.”

Kyle takes a second to catch his breath. “I thought you left with your brother.”

“Told him I had to run back for the sedatives. It was a lie.” Drake smiles. “I’m gonna help you boys get outta here first.”

Kyle squints at him. “Why?”

“No reason.” A swirl of excitement dances within Drake, a swirl that turns into a chuckle that flees his cutely curling lips. “Well, maybe your last words got to me. Just a little.” He meets Kyle’s eyes, turning soft. “I’m not like my brother. I’m not like you, either. I’m something else. I’m … me.”

“Profound,” states Kyle dryly. “Now are you gonna help us get outta these tunnels or not?”

Drake smiles, perhaps taking that as an acceptance for an apology he didn’t quite utter. “You did well without me, by the way. Almost there. Just a little further this way and to the left.”

“Lead the way,” says Kyle, then follows Drake through the darkness, Mikey clinging to his back every step of the way, still uncertain and completely blinded by the dark.

Soon, the first sign of actual light spills forth: moonlight from the exit of the cave. The sight of the exit is such a greatly welcomed relief, even to Kyle who wasn’t fully blinded by the darkness. The three of them hurry toward the pale light of the moon and the stars pouring in.

Until someone appears, eclipses the light.

Long flowing white hair. Slender shape.

The catsuit-wrapped figure Kyle saw sitting high atop the tallest pile of junk, watching over everything.

Only now, this close, Kyle realizes the vampire’s face is significantly more beautiful than previously thought.

And the raspberry outfit isn’t completely consistent in its color, nor is it shiny everywhere. It’s redder in places, darker or lighter and duller in others, like an uneven coat of paint.

“Blood,” the vampire recites in a shockingly deep voice.

Kyle would be more bold to speak, if it wasn’t for the fact that even Drake seems to have frozen to the spot at the sight of this peculiar individual. Kyle picks up Drake’s worry, feeling like a cold blanket over his shoulders, stinging and icy.

And from their visitor: Kyle feels nothing.

This is a full-blooded vampire for certain, like Lazarus and Salazo, only not quite as tall. Their eyes, slightly off-red in hue, maybe also described as raspberry, never once blink. Their lips, thin and wide, spread into an unsettling grin.

“My suit,” the vampire continues on, their lips never quite closing between words, always maintaining the grin that doesn’t quite touch their offputting, unblinking eyes. “It’s dyed in the blood of children I’ve killed.”

It’s only now that Drake straightens up, forcing himself to seem indifferent. “I don’t think anyone here has bought tickets to your performance, Uncle La-La, so why are you performing? Head back home. Salazo needs a backrub.”

“I enjoy killing children,” the vampire called La-La carries on. “They’re the most fun to kill. They scream the prettiest.”

“Work on your lines a little more,” suggests Drake, “and rehearse back at the cave with your theatrical friends. We’re on a mission to walk the pet. We’ll be back in an hour tops.”

In a flash of light, a fraction of a second, La-La now wields a weapon that was strapped to his back, unseen. A long, curved blade of a katana, beautifully reflecting the moonlight. La-La holds the sword out to the side, nearly scraping the cave wall with its tip. It is obvious without inspecting it closely that the blade is magnificently sharp, and considering the speed with which La-La drew it, Kyle wishes to be nowhere within range of that fearsome weapon or its greatly skilled owner.

“All of you are so young,” says La-La, still grinning. “I bet you scream just as prettily.”

“Should I go back and tell Salazo you stood in our way, my dear, demented uncle?” asks Drake. “Or should I send back his pet to report the news of such an obstruction himself? You have so many friends to play with. So many audience members in the den. Why waste your time on us?”

La-La’s only answer is dragging his long tongue across his opened lips, taking delight in Drake’s increasing impatience.

“Oh, I see. This is a test.” Drake smirks, appearing amused. “Alright, cool, you’re bored. C’mon, boys.” He gestures at Kyle and Mikey behind him—neither of whom share his confidence in drawing any closer to the vampire. “Don’t be rude, boys. Do make sure to greet my strange Uncle La-La as you pass by. Let’s go.”

Kyle forces his feet to move. At first, Mikey seems to cling to him in an effort to hold him back, then gives in, following on shaky feet behind Kyle and Drake. The closer they come, the more terrifying La-La appears, still grinning, still brandishing that menacing blade, the vampire’s long white hair swaying in the subtle night wind, gaze never leaving Kyle, wild grin never easing, lips never closing.

And then the three of them are out of the cave.

“Farewell!” sings Drake as he waves blithely back at La-La. “Let Salazo know not to worry. We’ll take good care of his pet, give him a nice walking, work him up to a sweaty delight.”

But it is only upon Kyle that La-La’s raspberry eyes seem affixed to. Only Kyle that La-La watches.

And it’s from the mouth of that cave that La-La lifts his delicate, pointy chin, grin persisting, and states: “I’m going to kill someone you love someday.”

Kyle stares back at that grinning face, the words becoming ice in his chest.

That ice lingers long after the trio make their way out of the abandoned quarry, out of the basin, into the open desert. As much as Kyle wants to believe that every footstep brings them closer to freedom, he can’t help the mounting sense of dread in La-La’s last words to him—words that sound less and less like a threat.

More like a promise.