I know, I know, I said I'd update last week. I didn't want to give you an unedited chapter. But now that it's impeccable, do enjoy it!
Speaking of editing, I owe a big… no, a huge thank you to my new Beta Reader, FateMagician, who did an amazing job improving my chapters! The first two chapters got a spring cleaning as well, so that's how thorough Fate was :)
Don't worry, I still have lots of gratitude left for you, skye-speedy and time-twilight, who were kind enough to drop reviews! Thank you!
Now, this chapter contains quite a lot of information about my vampires, though not all of it. I'll go over my choices in the notes at the end. In the meantime, I hope you like what I did with our favourite blood-sucking undead...
"Oh no, you've gotta be kidding me…"
The human woman's horrified groan reached Enola's ears just when the headless creature took two quick steps towards her. So it was a trap. Great. Fix it. The Horseman swung his broadaxe; he was fast, and a human would have had little chance of dodging the weapon. But Enola wasn't human. She ducked, brought her leg up and then kicked him right in the chest with the sheer force of a power hammer, sending him crashing right onto the marble trinity knot that was about six feet behind him.
"NOW!" the dark-skinned woman yelled.
CLUNK!
Light. So bright and white that it washed all colour away. Enola yelped in surprise and hastily slapped her hands on her eyes, but it was too late. Bright blotches were already exploding behind her eyelids. Her strength dwindled so abruptly that she had to hold on to the door frame for a moment and her skin prickled uncomfortably. UV light, she understood with a hiss of displeasure, and she winced when a smell of burnt flesh filled her nose. Must be the Horseman. Makes sense that he's vulnerable to sunlight...
She felt someone run past her, heard the clack of closing shackles, then the click of a gun… two guns' hammers being cocked, one in front of her and one behind.
"Who the hell are you?" a feminine voice asked harshly.
Enola carefully opened her eyes to peek between her fingers, then she blinked a few times before lowering her hands and taking in the situation. The Horseman was still lying on his back, obviously in pain, his clothes smoking in the artificial sunlight, his legs restrained by fetters. Behind him stood the human woman, firmly pointing a gun at her with a steely look on her beautiful oval face. Next to her was the human man: long thin face, perplexed blue eyes, frowned eyebrows, stubble, and shoulder-length brown hair tied into a ponytail. Also, the clothes he was wearing were very… eighteenth century. A beige shirt laced on the front with a poet collar, brown breeches, black knee-high cavalry boots, and long black woolen coat. How... original, she thought with a quirked eyebrow. He was standing very straight and elegantly. A soldier? But with an upper-class education. He was probably in his mid-thirties.
The young vampire glanced behind her and caught a glimpse of a third human: a black-skinned and thin-faced man, slender but athletic, wearing a black suit and tie. Like the woman, his dark brown eyes were staring hard at her and he was threatening her with a gun. Early forties? Maybe a bit older…
She bit back the sarcastic 'You can't kill me with those guns you know,' poised on the tip of her tongue: it probably wasn't a good idea to make them even more distrustful of her. Instead, she raised her hands, her palms turned towards the human woman.
"I'm not a threat to you, but I'm pretty sure he is," she said, nodding towards the headless being. "So how about you chain him to these nice, big pillars, and then we talk?"
"The young lady has a point, Lieutenant," the strangely-dressed man remarked with a clearly British accent.
"And if you're wondering who's going to point a gun at me while you're busy, you should know that it can't harm me much," she couldn't resist adding, but she managed to keep sarcasm away from her voice. "Also I promise I'm not going to try and hurt you or run away."
"Captain? What do you think?" the woman asked the black-skinned man behind the vampire.
"I think she and Crane are right," he answered. "Besides, she did try to save your life; I'll take that as a positive sign."
"Fine. But stay away from the Horseman for now."
"No need to tell me twice," Enola agreed, and the guns were lowered.
Twenty minutes later, the creature had about as much freedom of movement as a fly in a web, and the four others were gathered in the small surveillance room. Enola sat on the table pushed against the wall under the large window, the three humans facing her.
"So, who are you?" the woman asked, folding her arms.
"My name is Enola Vallombreuse," the vampire began. "I teach French at Sleepy Hollow High School. And you are…?"
"Lieutenant Abigail Mills from the Sheriff's Department; this is Captain Frank Irving, also from the Sheriff's Department, and here's Ichabod Crane," the lieutenant quickly introduced. "And you didn't say what you're doing down here."
Enola shrugged casually.
"I followed you. I rent a flat in front of the cemetery, you see, and when I saw Mister Headless here going after you," she nodded at Ichabod, "I thought you could use some help. I didn't intervene sooner because I figured you were baiting him into a trap. Nice acting, by the way," she added with a nod in Abigail's direction. "You had me fooled too."
"Thanks."
"That was extremely reckless, Miss Vallombreuse," Ichabod chided her with a frown. "You could have been killed!"
The young woman couldn't prevent an amused laugh from escaping her lips, and she shook her head.
"Oh, don't worry, I'm very hard to kill!"
"Yeah, I saw that," the Captain agreed. "By the way, how's it that you're that strong?"
Enola tensed up and folded her arms, uneasy. She had no way of knowing how they would react, whether they would treat her as a monster or not, but she had to tell them if she wanted to learn more about what was going on. Besides, if the worst happened, she'd hypnotize them and make them forget about her. She quickly reached a decision.
"I'll tell you, but I want something in return," she said firmly. "First you tell me what this is all about, and then I tell you what I am."
"What you are?" Ichabod pointed out with a lifted eyebrow.
"Yes."
"And why shouldn't you begin?" Abigail inquired.
The vampire shrugged again.
"Because that way I'm sure I'll get what I want," she explained. "Information, that is."
"And how do we know that we'll get what we want?"
"I guess you don't. I promise you'll get your answers, for what it's worth."
The police lieutenant gazed at her thoughtfully. Granted, she didn't trust the younger woman, but she also knew she wouldn't harm them—otherwise, she wouldn't have tried to save her when she thought she was about to lose her head. Unless she had precisely been hoping to gain their trust…But there was really no way of knowing that for sure until she kept her promise.
"If we tell you the whole story, will you join our fight?" Crane asked, interrupting her thoughts. "We could use a new ally."
"It depends on what the whole story is. Also," Enola continued with an acid smile, "I don't know if you'll still be willing to have me around when I tell you what I am."
"Why? You do not seem to be a bad person," Ichabod pointed out. "I believe it is not what but who we are that matters."
"Well, we'll see if your values are reality-proof, won't we?" the young woman shot back in a light tone, somewhat belied by the cold spark that flashed in her eyes. "So, shall we begin?"
"Captain, what d'you think?" Abigail inquired, turning towards her superior.
The latter held up his hands in an 'I'm not getting involved' gesture.
"I may be your boss in the Sheriff's Department, but as far as I'm concerned, you and Crane are the ones in charge of this supernatural mess," he said. "It's your call."
"Right. Crane?"
"I think Miss Vallombreuse was honest when she promised us the truth about her nature. We should tell her."
"All right then," the lieutenant decided. "Where do we start?"
"So the other Horsemen aren't here yet," Enola commented half to herself as she fiddled with the ring around the middle finger of her right hand. "That's good."
"You don't seem very surprised by all of this," Abigail remarked in a tone that was verging on suspicion.
"I've been having... dreams lately. More like visions, actually. I kept seeing the Horsemen, those white trees you talked about and a white figure with horns—I'm guessing that's Moloch."
"You have prophetic dreams?" Ichabod chimed in with a very interested look on his face that matched the other humans'.
"Not really, I mean I couldn't tell you how this is all going to turn out. They're more like... flashes, warning me of an impending supernatural crisis that I'm going to be involved in. It's one of our many... gifts."
"Our ?" the lieutenant pointed out, her eyebrows raised pointedly.
Enola took a deep breath to try and ease off her nervousness, then took the plunge.
"Yes, I'm..." Right, remember you can still erase their memories if they try to shoot you. "I'm a vampire. See for yourselves."
Before the shocked humans, her irises and scleras were devoured by a blood-red wave that spread from her pupils, and when she opened her mouth they saw that her upper canines had grown into fangs. They recoiled at this sight, the two policemen's hands even reaching for their guns, and Enola thought that perhaps now was a good time to say something reassuring.
"Look, I know exactly the reputation we have," she said, putting her human mask back on to make the humans a little more comfortable. "Blood-sucking undead, monsters, blah blah blah—although the former's an accurate description, I suppose," she added with a faint smirk. "Anyway, a... friend of mine used to say that sure, we're vampires, but we don't have to be monsters. Personally, I've never killed anyone."
"So what, you drink animal blood or something?" Abigail asked skeptically, her eyes still wary.
"Ugh, please," Enola scoffed, rolling her eyes. "I'm not one of those sad excuses for vampires teenage girls like so much. You know those old Dracula movies with Christopher Lee?"
"Yes," Abigail and Captain Irving chorused.
"No," Ichabod answered at the same time.
"Well, they got one thing right: we can hypnotize people. So when I need to feed, I grab someone, compel them not to scream or fight, drink some of their blood and make them forget it ever happened. No one dies. And for emergencies, I keep a stash of blood bags."
"I don't suppose you acquired those legally," the lieutenant snarked, her hand moving away from her gun, much to Enola's relief.
"Are going to arrest me?" the vampire smirked.
"Something tells me you won't let me..."
"Why not feeding only from blood bags?" Captain Irving chimed in before Enola could give another smartarse reply.
"Because it would be like eating only canned food," she explained with a disgusted grimace. "Besides I'm not hurting anyone—well, not really. I don't leave wounds or memories to be traumatized about."
"No wounds? Do you not have to... bite them?" Ichabod pointed out with a perplexed frown.
"Of course, but a few drops of my blood and they're as good as new. It has powerful healing properties, you see," Enola hurriedly specified when the humans lifted their eyebrows and grimaced. "Very useful."
"Are all vampires that strong?" Irving asked.
"We're stronger and faster than you, and the older we grow, the stronger and faster we get. Also, our senses," she made a vague gesture towards her ear, "are much more efficient. And let me tell you, sometimes it's hell."
"Yeah, I can imagine that," the lieutenant agreed. "So how old are you?"
"Oh, I'm young, especially by our standards," the vampire answered with an amused smile. "I'm twenty-six and I was turned three years ago."
"And sunlight doesn't affect you?"
Enola stiffened, very reluctant to reveal her weaknesses to almost-complete strangers. But she was about to ask them if she could join them in their fight and they wouldn't accept unless they trusted her—or at least trusted her not to turn on them. That entailed truthful answers to their questions and a leap of faith on her part since she didn't trust them much either. She sighed in discomfort and folded her arms before resigning herself to answering.
"It doesn't kill me but it... weakens me considerably. And after a while it sort of... stings. Like a sunburn, you know?"
She omitted the fact that it also kept her from shapeshifting because she didn't want the humans to ask for a demonstration. Now was probably not the right time to show them just how much like a monster she could look.
"So what does kill you?" the captain probed, his face as stern and his gaze as piercing as when he was pointing a gun at her.
This time a rasping hiss passed Enola's lips and her eyes flickered red, a warning that he was going too far, as her hackles rose and all her instincts screamed danger. Don't tell them, they snarled, protect yourself, don't give them a weapon to use against you, you should leave–
"I think I'll keep that to myself for now," she retorted sharply.
"You know how to kill us, it's only fair you return the favour."
"I already made a big leap of faith when I revealed my nature to you and when I told you about my weakness to sunlight. So that's two leaps of faith, actually. I think that's enough for tonight. The rest you'll have to earn."
"Miss Vallombreuse has a point," Ichabod intervened before Irving could argue further. "She has already divulged many of her secrets even though she barely knows us, and it would be unreasonable to expect more without earning her trust."
"Trust goes both ways," Abigail aptly pointed out.
"Then give me a chance to earn yours," Enola requested, gesturing at them with an open hand. "I'd like to join you. And for what it's worth, I swear I'm no danger to you... unless of course, you give me a good reason to be."
"This will not happen, Miss Vallombreuse, you have our word," Ichabod promised solemnly.
The memory of another man promising her not to hurt her flitted across Enola's mind but she promptly swatted it away. Both the men and the situations couldn't be more different. Besides, her instincts told her that she could trust Ichabod: there was an earnest sincerity in his eyes, something limpid and open. She cracked a smile and nodded.
"I believe you," she said. "The question is: do you believe me ?"
"Well, I do. Lieutenant," Ichabod went on, turning towards his partner, "I think Miss Vallombreuse can be a formidable ally, something we direly need, and I feel that we can trust her. We should give her a chance to fight alongside us."
Abigail thoughtfully looked at the vampire in front of her, weighing the pros and cons. She was extremely dangerous, yes, but to whom? And that was the essential question. Crane was right : they needed allies and Enola could be a formidable one. If she handled every creature Moloch threw at them as efficiently as she had the Horseman, the war would perhaps finally turn in their favour... and the lieutenant had a good feeling about the young woman too.
"Captain, what do you think?" she asked, not because she needed her superior's approval before voicing her decision but because she valued his opinion.
"I think you should have all the information before you make your decision, which you don't. But as I said, you and Crane are in charge when it comes to the supernatural, so whatever your choice is, I'll respect it."
"Hm. Can you control yourself in the presence of blood?"
The question was clearly directed at the vampire who sniffed testily.
"Of course, I'm not a newborn."
"Then welcome aboard, Miss Vallombreuse."
"Great!" Enola beamed, clapping her hands once in satisfaction. "Please, just call me Enola. And maybe one day I'll let you call me Nola."
Well, here we go. Enola is now officially a fighter in the war against Moloch. Let the fun begin!
Now, about my vampires… No, sunlight doesn't kill them. Did you know that the idea of sunlight being lethal to vampires was first introduced in Murnau's Nosferatu? Apparently, there's no mention of it in folklore. By the way, in Stoker's book, Dracula can go out during the day too.
I hesitated for quite a while about their eyes… At first I wanted to borrow the glowing eyes from Van Helsing's vampires (you know, the film with Hugh Jackman). It was a change from the usual red eyes, but since I haven't seen these glowing eyes anywhere else, it felt too much like plagiarism. So I fell back on the red eyes. Maybe one day I'll come up with another, more original idea. If you have one, feel free to share it :)
Hypnotism is a classic too. I like it because it gives my vampires the option not to kill people if they don't want to, while allowing them to drink human blood. Predators but not killers, right?
And what's this about shapeshifting? I'm afraid you'll have to wait and see. The only thing I'll tell you is that, no, they don't turn into bats.
Right, I think that's it… Any questions? How about a review?