Page 50 of Death Dance

FIFTEEN

My heart hurt for them while my hatred for Jeremy Breckenan grew.

A pair of stowaway children, twins with dark hair and eyes as far as I could tell beneath the dirt and the grime covering them, armed with sticks roughly hewn to resemble stakes, cowered in a corner of the storage bay housing my father’s secondary arsenal. Their age horrified me more than why they’d been sent. I guessed at the who behind the situation: Jeremy Breckenan.

After slaughtering their parents, the children had been given sticks and knives, told to carve them into stakes, and if they wanted to live to see next week, to sneak on board the ship and stab the first vampires they could find.

Rather than stab anybody, the girls cried their eyes out, babbled apologies for sneaking aboard, and promised they’d be good. The words they didn’t say infuriated my spouse, and my father had the good sense to pull him aside so he kept control over his temper. That left me with Ben and my brothers, who struggled almost as much as Emerick.

Ultimately, I would need to be the one to handle the situation. As such, I quietly nominated myself to approach them, suggesting the men back away.

They did.

The girls kept crying, not that I blamed them. In their shoes, at their age, I could see myself doing the same. Worse, had my parents been torn away from me as theirs had been, I doubted I would have been able to go as far as them.

No matter the lies I told myself, despite the hardships—despite everything—I loved my parents unconditionally.

That realization would keep me awake many a day and night as I sought to come to terms with yet another matter of the heart.

I crouched just beyond reach, resting my palms on my knees. Should one of them decide to go after me with one of their crudely carved stakes, I would be ready.

In reality, I doubted they could do anything to actually hurt me even if they tried. While the girls technically had stakes, they hadn’t understood to make the tip sharp enough to pierce through flesh. Theirs resembled crayons more than anything.

I doubted the wood had seen much in the way of the sun, either.

My heart hurt for them while my hatred for Jeremy Breckenan grew. “Hey. It’s okay.” I hoped I wouldn’t be breaking my promise in the near future. “This is my ship, and since it’s my ship, I get to decide who can be aboard, and I’ve decided it’s okay for you two to be aboard. You’re safe now.” Pretending the girls were skittish puppies might get me stabbed with a blunt stake, but some risks were worth taking. Careful to keep my motions smooth, my voice gentle, and my body language friendly, I held out my hand. “Can I see your sticks, please?”

I would deal with the knives next, which could be a real risk to everybody.

While they still cried, the girls complied, dropping them in their hurry to hand them over.

I went for the largest of the two, and the moment my fingers brushed the wood, the stake’s anguish manifested as a whine.

One day, I might comprehend how one individual could create so much misery for others. I cooed to the stake, dug my hand into my pocket, and retrieved the pocketknife I tended to keep with me, one of the ones I’d liberated while on a dumpster dive hunting for sandpaper.

“My name is Pepper,” I said, and I rested the first of the stakes on my leg while I prepared my knife for use. Once ready, I began the process of whittling, taking care to avoid abrupt motions. As soon as my steel touched the wood, its pitiable cries softened. “You were told you had to stab the first vampires you saw, right?”

The girls nodded. They both began babbling again, tumbling over their words in their hurry to tell me they’d been told to use the stakes or be killed the instant they reached shore.

Once I had the first stake better shaped and with a tip that could, with work, pierce flesh, I picked up the second stake and repeated the process, cooing to it and reassuring it. All the while, I listened to the children cry, my heart aching that I couldn’t change their circumstances or bring their parents back from the dead—assuming Breckenan hadn’t turned them into vampires.

I found the possibility painfully probable.

However, it left me with several problems to contend with. “When did the bad man hurt your mommy and daddy? Do you remember the date?”

The girls regarded me with wide, teary eyes, and while they blubbered, they began the tedious process of attempting to control their emotions. Patience might win me their cooperation, and I settled in to wait, working on refining the two stakes and soothing them as best I could.

If my luck held, the two pieces of wood might become a comfort for them—and a tool for us to turn the tables on Breckenan.

“Ben, do you have a handkerchief?”

“I have two,” he replied, careful to keep his tone as soft as mine. “I’ll leave them behind you so I don’t scare them.”

“Thanks.” I waited for Ben to do as promised, and he tossed them within my reach, careful to use my body to block his movements from the children. Once I had both, I eased from a crouch to sitting on the metal grated ground. “It’s okay, really. If you tell us what happened, we can help you.”

“How?” one of the girls asked, and the suspicion in her voice pained me.

In her shoes, I’d be beyond suspicious, and it amazed me she had the fortitude and soundness of mind to even attempt to cooperate with me. “I am someone who helps the police and other nice people stop mean vampires, like the bad man who hurt your mommy and daddy, from hurting others. It’s my job, and I’m very good at what I do. The bad vampire probably wanted you to carve a stake to stab me with it because I’m working at making certain he never does that to anybody else. How did you get the wood for the stake?”