Chapter 19

From the dark recesses of a small alleyway nearly a block from the old jail, Arthur watched the scene unfold through expanded senses. Early jubilation turned into disgust as his gambit faltered. A small shudder passed through his body as the knot of emotions that had been Jimmy shattered and vanished; the fledgling's existence brought to an end by a wounded policewoman wielding a broken stick. With Jimmy's death, Mia's bond, which Arthur had passed to his morose fledgling at the close of the prior night, was also lost.

Arthur had been curious about the effect that the death of a Master would have upon its slave. Would the former fledgling be completely and immediately free or would it be compelled to carry out the last order that it had been given? To Arthur's great disappointment, the former turned out to be the truth. Inside Arthur's mind, the small knots of primitive emotion which represented his ferals winked out as Mia exterminated them in rapid succession.

Although Arthur's body remained absolutely motionless within the dark shadows of the alley, his mind writhed with indecision. It had been his hope to witness the anguish on Mia's face as she slaughtered her allies and her lover before seeking her own doom with the rising of the sun, but that was no longer an option. With the passing of her bond, it never would be again. He wondered at the action he should take now that James had failed him. He could just put an end to the treacherous bitch this instant; the majority of her friends were dead or wounded and garlic water no longer flowed from the ceiling. But no, he decided, that death would be too easy, too simple, for her. She owed him prolonged agony as payment for her betrayal and he was determined to collect in full. Besides, he reasoned, deferring her end was no longer a risk, now that her connection to him had been severed.

Arthur was pulled from his thoughts by the beam of a flashlight flickering about the alley before homing in and fixing on his face. He cursed his own carelessness. He had been so focused on the events in the old jail that he hadn't noticed the policeman's approach.

"Hold it right there, bud, and keep your hands where I can see them," the cop commanded as he approached, "This area was evacuated more than a half hour ago. What are you still doing here?"

With a contemptuous sneer, Arthur lashed out with his will. The flashlight clattered to the ground as the cop experienced the discontinuity of thought that comes with the sudden and dramatic loss of memory. Arthur tore into the hapless man's mind again. Eyes glazed over, the policeman bent over and retrieved his light before walking past Arthur, his mind refusing to acknowledge the vampire's presence.

Arthur waited patiently as Mia and the few remaining policemen in the old jail tended to their wounded and loaded the remains of James and most of the ferals into the large van formerly used by the city's SWAT team. When the van pulled away, Arthur followed. He kept pace as the van traveled outside the bounds of the city to a long abandoned steel mill that sat like a decomposing corpse among a throng of vacant, ramshackle houses. There, careful to stay downwind out of respect for Mia's exceptional olfactory sense, he watched from a distance as the bodies of his former minions were loaded into the rusted ruins of the mill's Bessemer blast furnace, doused with gasoline and set ablaze. Mia and the policemen somberly tended the fire, liberally adding more fuel as needed, until nothing but bone remained. They then took turns crushing the bones to fragments with a sledgehammer taken from the back of the van.

The light from the fire and the noise of the hammer drew the attention of a few bedraggled homeless people who were taking temporary shelter in the industrial ghost town. They gathered at a distance and stared, bewildered, at the scene. Mia moved among them and they dispersed to go about their business, retaining no memory of the grim activities they had witnessed.

Arthur's interest peaked when one of the policemen embraced Mia from behind and kissed her softly as she leaned back into him. Now he knew the face of Mia's lover. A small smile appeared on Arthur's face as he contemplated the man's extremely limited and agonizingly painful future.

When the police were finally satisfied with their disposal efforts, Arthur followed the van back to the station. There he watched Mia and her mortal climb into the rusty remnants of a first generation Ford Escort. He again followed as they traveled to a moderate sized apartment building and stood watching as they went inside. Once he had learned the apartment number, he faded into the night, not willing to tolerate the disgusting display of sentimentality for so much as a second longer.

The passage of less than half an hour found him in South Oakland, a neighborhood that was a curious mix of dilapidated houses rented out to college students for ridiculous fees and the far better kept homes of laborers. At this late hour, the vast majority of the residents of both types were deeply asleep in their beds. In a fit of pique, Arthur vented some of the pent up rage and frustration from the evening by reaching out to the sleeping minds with his own as he walked past; invading their dreams with horrific, nightmare visions. In his wake, formerly blissful slumberers woke screaming in terror or, in the case of several elderly residents, never woke again.

Shortly, he reached the small, one story house that he had purchased more than a month ago for just such contingent circumstances as those he found himself in at the moment. Entering the living room, lit only by the diffuse light of street lamps filtering through the curtains, he found Alicia sitting on the couch, her feet curled beneath her. Loud snores, emanating from the bedrooms down the short hallway, revealed the presence of the mercenaries.

Alicia stood to greet him, her lips curving upwards in a smile. Arthur could not help but notice that the dress he had selected at random from one of the Bollingers' closets did not fit his fledgling well; being far too small in the bodice and too large in the hips.

Running a finger over the exposed skin of one of the breasts that bulged obscenely out of what had been intended as a daringly low neckline for a far less amply endowed woman, Arthur commented, "We shall have to acquire some new attire for you, Alicia. You will find it difficult to remain inconspicuous in your current garb."

She responded with a non-committal shrug of her shoulders, sending delightful ripples through her mostly exposed bosom.

Noticing several tell-tale stains on the front of her dress, Arthur said dryly, "I see that you were playing with our guards. I trust that you did not cause them any undue damage?"