Tracy ordered a full tox screen, and Raven and Davis reviewed the x-rays numerous times. No trauma caused this death-at least, no visible external or internal trauma. It had taken five hours to perform the routine autopsy. Raven had supervised Davis.
“Good night, all,” Raven said as she made her way out into the late afternoon sun. She wanted to stop at the farm stand before heading home. She craved a caramel apple pie, and Nigella’s Herbary and Farm Stand made the best. Nigella was a dear childhood friend who knew all of Raven’s secrets. Nigella also happened to be Bianca’s sister.
Raven started her car, a cherry-red Nissan Altima, and adjusted the rearview mirror after quickly applying a coat of mascara. Something was off. Making her alterations to seat positioning and mirror placement, Raven suddenly noticed she had company, and he was hungry.
Blue eyes stared her down. “Drive, okay? I’m not going to hurt you.” His voice was scratchy and unsteady.
She chuckled. “Me? You’re not going to hurt me?” Her incisors were sharp and long at this point, the adrenaline rush causing them to extend. Her eyes turned platinum. Raven looked back at him. She realized the identity of the man hunched over in her back seat. Adonis.
“Oh, gods! Derrick! What happened to you?”
“I was hoping you could explain it to me.” He wiped his palms on his pants, but he kept perspiring. “I don’t know. We have to go somewhere safe so I can talk to you. Not your place-your boyfriend will be there.” His eyes darted back and forth, and he kept looking behind himself, as if expecting to see someone following. The handsome man from the other night had disappeared, replaced with this pale and anxious one.
She thought of Bo’s schedule for the coming week. “Bo’s working tonight,” she said, gazing back at him through the mirror. He looked awful. His skin was pasty and discolored. The whites of his eyes were yellowed and bloodshot.
“No, he’s supposed to be at work, but he’s not… That little psychic talent I had has improved vastly since we last saw each other,” Derrick said, rubbing his red-rimmed eyes.
Raven drove to the water’s edge by Three Maidens Marina and parked at the end of the lot. She shut off the engine and turned. His aura was blotchy and grey. “Okay, here we are. Talk.”
He became suddenly still. “Am I…like you now? I thought I was dead. I don’t remember much of anything.”
Her heart went out to him. She’d witnessed only a few humans transform into Lamai. It did not appear to be a pleasant change.
“What does your spidey sense tell you?” she asked.
He looked at Raven with an odd expression. She’d aimed for humor and missed by a long shot.
“My psychic sense is telling me I’m in deep shit. Evil shit. You’re somehow involved, but I don’t know any more than that. I wanted to talk to you the other night. I had a dream about you, and it wasn’t good. You were in trouble, big trouble, life-and-death trouble,” Derrick rambled on. “Now, I can’t remember much of anything.”
“Me? Life-and-death? That’s kinda hard. You see I-I can’t die.” Raven pursed her lips and shook her head, hoping to convince him she was an immortal.
Shrugging, he said, “You’re only half-vampire. I thought you were still vulnerable.”
“True, but my father is one of the most powerful vampires around and, although he looks perpetually forty, he’s old-hundreds of years old, maybe even older. He won’t tell me. You could say I have all the benefits of being human, without the pesky threat of death.”
Of course, Raven could die, but not many people knew under which circumstances, and she preferred it that way. Most Lamai guarded that secret diligently. They held a great deal of contempt for those night creatures that gave interviews revealing Lamai vulnerabilities to mortals.
Derrick ran his hand across his sweat-soaked brow. “Where is your father?” he asked, his voice strained.
Raven huffed. “I don’t know. It’s better that way. Better for him, and better for me.”
“And your mother? Is she any part vampire, too?”
“No, she’s dead,” she said bluntly.
“Oh. Mine is, too. Sorry.” He leaned back and closed his eyes, wincing from the pain She knew the transformation was ravaging his insides. “How did your mother and father-h-how were you…?”
Raven was slightly amused. It was a common question, and she’d had it asked of her more times than she could remember.
“I was conceived like any other human. I carry my father’s DNA. Like all species, ours is designed for survival. Usually, the mitochondrial DNA comes from the maternal side, but when a vampire male mates with a human female, the father’s DNA is passed automatically to the child. It’s the opposite of humans. Why all the questions?”
He coughed violently before catching his breath once more. “Courtier de Sang is hell-bent on figuring a way to fi- He-blames…” A sudden shortness of breath stopped Derrick from speaking. The mottling on his face turned an intense magenta. He grabbed at his neck as if trying to pry a pair of hands off of his throat. Raven jumped out of the car and joined him in the back, clearing his airway, feeling for a pulse. It was thready and irregular. The changes were well under way within him. Somehow, someone had infected him with vampire blood.
She knew all the resident Lamai on the island, and each had this or her own method of quenching the immortal thirst. A few traveled to the mainland and helped to clean up the neighborhoods, so to speak. Others were past the phase of needing to feed, and still others had concocted a brew that came from animals due for slaughter. Then there was talk of a synthetic blood soon to become available. Raven had Bo, or Tracy ’s supply from the blood bank.
Raven tried comforting him. “I’m going to get you to the hospital, Derrick.” She hopped back into the driver’s seat and peeled out of the parking lot, heading straight for Seacrest Memorial Hospital.
“I think I need blood,” he whispered.
“Try to relax.”
“This feels so weird…”
“I know. Once we get you to the hospital, I can see about getting you some blood,” she promised.
“How? How can you get me blood?”
“Harvesting blood has become part of the ritual at our Halloween feast. It’s a sacred act that’s taken place on the local farms for hundreds of years. Have you ever attended the ritual?” she asked, trying to keep his mind off the pain.
“N-no. This was going to be my first time.”
“The ritual also insures a plentiful harvest. All the farmers participate-Lamai, fae, shifters, witches and humans. The surplus of blood is stored at the hospital for local Lamai. Don’t worry.”
His face relaxed a bit.
“None of the Lamai I know drinks from islanders. Besides, the counsel forbids the Lamai to transform humans without express permission and miles of blood red tape.”
Derrick’s face tensed once more. “He’ll…k-kill…me…he knows,” he croaked, still grasping at his throat. “He’s very powerful… I-I…”
“Why would he kill you? You know what, let’s save this talk for later. It’s normal to feel the way you do. You’re not dying. Not in any mortal way.” How comforting, she thought.
Derrick gagged. “H-how do you know? What’s going on?”
“You’re changing. This Sang guy won’t be able to get to you, don’t worry,” she falsely promised. Raven knew the workings of magick, and there was always a way around things, but she had to keep Derrick calm. She made it to the hospital in record time.
“You still with me, Derrick?”
She heard him grunt an answer as she pulled in front of the ER. The ER doors slid open. Raven’s gaze darted around the room, searching for someone familiar, but there was no one she recognized. She called out for immediate assistance. A young female resident dropped the chart she was working on, grabbed a wheelchair and followed her outside.