How to Hire A Vampire Consultant Read online

I shook my head. It wasn't common, apparently. I was a special flower. A special, time-stopping flower, on parole.

  "What about the library lady? What's her power?"

  "Beatrice? She doesn't have one." I blinked. "At least, I don't think so. I've never asked."

  "Call her and ask. No, wait, we should go to see her in person so she can't lie. It's easier to lie on a phone, especially for librarians."

  "Since when are you an expert about librarians?" I demanded, as we started for the door, getting trapped in the doorway together. Finally I stood back and he got the door and held it open for me, grandly motioning me through.

  "I'm a consultant, dear boy. I'm an expert in everything." He gave me a totally unnecessary wink.

  We headed back to the library. No more mention of being ravenously hungry, so it had all been a ploy. Damn.

  He seemed increasingly worried as we got closer. At last, he turned to me. "She might be too embarrassed to admit to her ability in front of me. I'll pretend to peruse the bookshelves while you ask her. More discreet that way, and I can still listen."

  I'll peruse you in a minute. I sighed. "Right. Vampire hearing."

  He looked surprised and opened his mouth, then shut it again.

  We went into the library.

  As he'd suggested, he went right over to stare intelligently at a shelf within sight of Beatrice's desk, but not close. He clasped his hands together behind his back, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet, looking intelligent as he gazed at leather-bound spines. It was strangely absurd, but also kind of nice that he was at least making a show of caring about her feelings. But I suppose it would have meant more if he hadn't been meaning to eavesdrop the whole time.

  I lowered my voice to make it harder for him—maybe impossible. "He figured it out. It's no use. I didn't tell him on purpose." We both glanced at the very clearly listening vampire. I swear his ears almost twitched, although he stared all the harder at the bookshelf, primly engaged, very seriously studying exactly the same spot on the shelf.

  "Goodness, Steven, I knew you were bad at keeping your own counsel, but this!" She regarded me reprovingly over her glasses.

  "I know, I know! He guessed, and I'm bad at poker. The point is, he knows and we can't change that. Now he has a theory. He thinks the two of us escaped because of some ability we have. My time twisting and your...?" I let the sentence trail off meaningfully, arching a brow. "Do you have an ability? I've never heard."

  She glanced again at the listening vampire. Frowning a little, she lowered her voice further. "Well, it's not something I talk about with many people. But I suppose under the circumstances..." She cleared her throat softly. "I've been known to affect luck. Odds."

  "You do? Really! Then why do you work at a—"

  She shushed me, as if aghast at the possibility of me disturbing patrons in the library, even though the three of us were the only ones in the whole place. "Hush! I'm a respectable librarian, and whatever you're thinking of wouldn't be legal or moral. I'm certainly not going to go out and buy a lottery ticket with greater odds of winning just because I could." She sniffed at the mere thought.

  "You mean you're never tempted, even just a little, to increase the odds of getting what you want?"

  "I already have what I want, for your information. At least, when everything is normal, I have what I want. A respectable job doing something I love. I live an ordered, comfortable, decent life that suits me very well."

  I wondered if she'd affected the odds to help her get that, or if she was a contented sort of person in general. Maybe she'd never had to find out. Maybe she used her ability to improve her life and didn't even know about it.

  Barnaby gave up his pretend browsing and rushed over to join us. "Have you ever worked your ability without realizing it—just naturally, to protect yourself?"

  She gave him a stern look. He was leaning forward, hands on her desk, eyes gleaming, voice eager. "Young man, how would I know if I've used it without knowing? Your question is ridiculous. Please get off my desk."

  "Oh." He moved his hands and turned to me. "And you? I guess you wouldn't know if you'd used your ability to save yourself from something you didn't even know was a danger?"

  I blinked at him. He was awfully close. Without all the muffling, his pale, thin face was kind of attractive. But like I said, a real twink. Totally not my type...

  "Hey." He snapped his fingers in my face. "You're thinking something. What? Has it happened before? Would you know if it had?"

  "Um." I tried to focus on something other than him being so close. I took a subtle step backwards. "Uh, sometimes I twist time just a bit, without planning to, without any obvious reason to do so. I always figure it's a hiccup or something, nothing serious."

  I shrugged. It wasn't something I talked about much. Manipulating time slightly, so I got somewhere a little faster than other people, or a little slower, or got through some chore faster or slower than expected. I'd always figured it was an ADHD thing, not some frustrating but life-saving aspect of my ability.

  I'd stopped time to protect myself, sure, but I'd never connected this time hiccup distraction thing with averting accidents. I'd thought I was just fucking up with my talent and using it accidentally. My mind wandered, so why not my ability? It only made sense. Not something I went around telling people, since I didn't like looking even less competent. Far better to be the mastermind time thief than the fuckup who has only partial control over his abilities, right?

  Beatrice was staring at me in a fascinated way, and the vampire nodded, looking pleased with himself. He put his hands on my shoulders and grinned. "I propose that you protect yourself from things sometimes, with the smallest possible correction to the speed at which you're living, as far away from the dangerous event as possible. And Beatrice, you affect the odds in very small ways, too small to be noticed, even by you, as far away from the danger as possible—steering things without conscious awareness to keep you safe."

  He stood back, regarding us both with a repugnant amount of self-satisfaction, crossing his arms over his thin chest. "You both look after number one all the time, without realizing it. No, no! That's not a bad thing. I'm just saying, that's why you're here and they're not." He regarded the librarian thoughtfully. "In fact, that's probably why I'm here, as well. You could have worked the odds to bring help here."

  "Well—" She looked abashed, the first time I'd ever seen her embarrassed. "A very small amount. I didn't expect to bring a vampire, however."

  Ha! So maybe that was why my talent hadn't kicked in to save me from the gollot and my own incompetence. Her luck talent had influenced events, had decided it was important to bring Barnaby here. I could save that nugget for later, if she got mad about the gollot.

  He waved her words away. "I'm the best consultant you could ask for."

  "Because you actually know something?" I asked doubtfully.

  His reply was proud and arrogant. "Of course." He looked way too pleased with himself.

  We stared at him, waited for him to go on.

  He shot his cuffs importantly and cleared his throat. "In my experience, people who just happen to use their abilities to protect themselves have the teensiest bit of clairvoyance added to whatever they can do. It's not coincidence at all."

  "Teensiest?" I said.

  "Your experience?" said Beatrice, raising a skeptical eyebrow. "Have you much experience in such things, Mr. Johnson?"

  He waved that grandly away. "Can I tell you what I know or not?"

  "We're on tenterhooks," said Beatrice dryly. She didn't seem entirely impressed by our guest. But we were both still listening. And apparently it was at least partly her fault that he was here—Beatrice and her luck.

  I realized I'd been leaning against the desk, which had turned into a slouch and then a full-on sit. I straightened up and tried to focus instead of fidgeting. "Get on with it, would you?" I didn't know how much longer my attention span could take before breaking.

  He s
hot me a frown. "I'm a vampire. I should be allowed to be dramatic."

  I made a winding hand motion, indicating he should speed this up.

  He sighed. "You could at least be wide-eyed and impressed. Fine. There's a thing that used to be called a ghost-trap. It's really something that's attracted to anyone with extraordinary abilities. People used to think they were some sort of devilish being, but in reality they're just monsters like the rest of what you guys hunt and catalog—creatures who don't belong here, that aren't suited to this universe, or this planet's, ecosystem.

  "They're attracted to large pools of ability, which is one reason all the great old colleges for magic and ability went underground and became small private cells instead. Safer that way. But obviously, one of these creatures is back in our world, and there were enough of you guys here to attract it. And it ate all of them but you."

  "Ate?" Beatrice looked faint. "It really ate them?"

  He hesitated, his face less animated now.

  "You mean there's nothing we can do?" I protested.

  "When I said ate..." He gave us an apologetic grimace, raising one hand, lowering the other. "I should have been more precise. I don't know what it really does. Maybe it takes people to an alternate dimension and feeds off their energy. Maybe it doesn't actually digest them."

  "But you don't know. Does anyone ever make it back?"

  "Of course. That's the only way people figured out anything about these things. But to get back, they'd have to be unusually powerful and determined, and it would help it there's a large group of them working together."

  "Sounds like they've got a chance. Anything we can do to increase their odds?"

  "Yeah. Wherever they are now, it's bound to be a long way away, either physically or on another plane. They need a beacon of some kind to guide them home, if they have a chance to escape. If they don't know where to go, we're unlikely to ever get them back."

  "How does one make a psychic beacon?" Beatrice wondered aloud.

  Johnson waved a hand at the library shelves. "You've got a lot of knowledge here. I'd say it's time to find out."

  AS WE WERE SEARCHING the shelves and catalogues, I made my way to work beside Barnaby.

  Beatrice was searching much more intently and competently than we were, but I still waited till I was sure she was too distracted and far away to notice any chatting from us.

  "How'd you know all that stuff?" I said in a low voice.

  He looked at me quickly, slightly guiltily. "What?"

  "You heard me. All that stuff about this creature and old colleges breaking up. It's not in Beatrice's library, so how do you know it?"

  "Ancient vampire wisdom," said Barnaby, drawing himself up with as much dignity as he could manage—which wasn't much, considering how nervous he looked.

  "Uh huh."

  "It's true. I have all sorts of dark secrets and arcane knowledge. I am a vampire, you know."

  "You? You're a goth twink theatre kid playing dress-up. I'm not saying you don't suck blood, and obviously the sun burns you, but you're not some eldritch horror. In fact, I bet you don't know any more than I do, Barnaby."

  He drew himself up to his full height, opened his mouth to tell me off, and instead, looking horrified, he squeaked, "Barnaby? How—"

  Sue me, it was a funny name. Should I call him Barney for short? "You're not the only one with cryptic knowledge, twink-pire." I batted my eyelashes at him—and smacked him on the ass as I walked past, just for good measure.

  He gave an ungainly squeak, and glared after me.

  It was a nice ass. Wished I hadn't noticed that.

  Fighting with Barnaby was all well and good, but I needed to figure out what was really going on here, with his explanation laid out for us on a silver platter, but helpfully devoid of any concrete evidence or references to back it up.

  Beatrice said she'd never heard of such a thing, and if she hadn't, I was sure it didn't exist. But all the same, she was taking him at his word (all that dark vampire knowledge of his), and looking for some way to make a signal to draw them home. It was weird all round—that he'd know something like this (if true) or that she'd listen to him, if he was as full of bullshit as I thought he was.

  Did he have some source we'd never heard of? Was he making it up to get a good look at the layout of...the library? So far, I hadn't let him out of my sight, and I wouldn't. Did I think he was up to something? Nah, not really.

  He might think he was a big scary vampire, but he just wasn't that intimidating. So what was going on here?

  He sidled up to me, frowning. "How do you know my name is Barnaby? I mean, assuming that it is, which I'm not admitting."

  I didn't look at him but kept sorting books. I acted calm, but my heart thumped. I wished he wouldn't stand this close. He was too good-looking to stand so close to me, even if he was a vampire.

  "You've been keeping secrets," I told him. "Tell me where you're getting this information about a ghost-trap and I'll tell you mine."

  "You first," he said, scowling at me. Not pleased about the whole Barnaby thing.

  "No. This is life and death. If you think I'm okay with them being missing, possibly dead, and you, a vampire who thinks it's all a great, fun game, jerking us around about it—"

  He held up his hands. "Okay! Okay! Sheesh." He frowned at me and rubbed the back of his neck. "You don't have to go off on me. I'll tell you."

  "Yeah?" I waited pointedly.

  "But you need to tell me how you knew my name afterwards. Promise?"

  "Pinky swear."

  He started to put out his pinky finger, changed his mind quickly, and gave me a stern look. "You better not be jerking me around."

  "I'm not." I wouldn't mind jerking him off, though. It was an odd time to realize that. I wondered what Travis would think of me if he knew I was lusting after his arch nemesis.

  Well. Whoever said I had to ask Travis's permission? If we got through this, got them back, and Barnaby didn't screw us over in the process, I'd have sex with him afterwards. If he was into it—and my gut said he definitely was.

  Barnaby scuffed his foot, and looked down. When he spoke his voice was unusually quiet and serious, like he really didn't want to speak at all. "My mentor got eaten by that thing."

  "Yeah? When?"

  "A long time ago." He glared at me. "What, I have to bare my whole soul to you? Just let me tell the story in my own words."

  Was it a story, or the truth? And since when did vampires even have souls? But silence was the better part of valor just now. I gestured at him to go on.

  He studied me sternly for a moment, making sure I was done talking. Then with a tiny nod, he continued. "When I say mentor, I really mean the guy who turned me into a vampire," he admitted. "It's a special bond, with a telepathic element for some. I'm one of them. He wasn't thrilled at first that I could hear his thoughts, and vice versa, but eventually he adjusted and used it to teach me when I had a question. He didn't like hanging out with me, but he'd tell me what I needed to know.

  "Then one day, he got snatched up by one of these creatures. There were a whole bunch of people inside it as well, from all sorts of times, all of them powerful or talented in one way or another. But a few were just monsters. Like my mentor."

  He grimaced and ran a hand back through his immaculate hair, messing it up. "His connection to me was faint with the distance. The thing was taking them away, probably to digest them or something. I don't know. I'm not sure anybody knows. But it seemed to be doing them all harm." He glanced at me guiltily, as if he wasn't quite sure he wanted to go on.

  "What happened?" I tried to sound like someone it would be okay to tell, but I already had a creepy feeling down my back. This wasn't a nice, cheerful tale.

  He shrugged. "I was the psychic signal, the lighthouse to guide him home. He called out to me in his panic, and used my location to steer himself back."

  "And they all worked together, using their powers combined to be strong enough?" I guessed.
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  "No. He drank the blood of enough of them to gain the strength to get free and return." He looked down at the ground. "He kept the connection open, between us. Usually I didn't have to hear him feeding..."

  "Geez," I said, revolted. If it was enough to make Barnaby, also a vampire, feel ill, it hadn't been easy or nice. It had involved a lot of murder.

  "Yeah," he said, as if reading my thoughts. "So, that's how I know. But I'm fairly sure they could have gotten back if they'd combined their powers somehow instead. Now tell me how you knew my name."

  "I paused time and frisked you. Couldn't have you bringing something dangerous into the compound. I happened to check your license."

  "Oh," said Barnaby. "Oh...the bug bite! I thought you were acting funny about that!"

  "Yeah, the sun touched your skin for a second before I shut your coat again. Now tell me about this lighthouse beacon idea. How can we reach our people?"

  He was busy staring at me in mingled disbelief, indignation, and reluctant awe. "You really are tricky."

  "I know. It's kind of my thing. Barely reformed thief and time manipulator, remember?" I spread my arms. "Now how about that beacon? I'd really like to bring everybody home so I don't have to run half the PRA by myself. I don't have the temperament, patience, or frankly, the knowledge. And I'd really rather not, Barnaby."

  "Barnaby." He tasted his own name like it was strange to him, then he grinned suddenly. "All right. If I can call you by your first name, you can call me by mine, Steven. As for the—"

  "Steve," I interrupted. "I'm Steve."

  "How do you do." He shook my hand formally, his cool touch rather tentative. He really was a twink-pire, whatever he thought. With his skinny wrists and pale features and the softness to his nature that even being a vampire couldn't overcome, he was nobody's badass. I kind of liked that.

  "Okay. Steve." He released my hand and took a deep breath. "I guess if we follow what happened in my mentor's case, we've got to find a special connection to somebody they took. With Beatrice's luck, it shouldn't be too difficult to stumble on. Let's start throwing ideas out there with her, and see what she suggests. Unless you think you might have a telepathic bond with someone, maybe your keeper, Mr. Delicious himself?" His eyes gleamed.