Page 48 of Nosfer-Meet You

No, not just boots—it sounds like there’s a siege weapon rumbling inches away from my face, which makes no sense. I bolt upright and rub the sleep from my eyes, still far too groggy to make heads or tails of the situation. Juliette moans gently as she turns over onto her side, looking every bit the angel that she is.

But something feels wrong about this, so I place my hand on her shoulder and gently shake her. “Hey, Juli. Juli, wake up. Wake up, love.”

Juliette’s eyes flutter open, and she shoots upright in the cot next to me. “What is it? I smell…” She sniffs the air. “Humans. Lots of them.”

I quirk a brow at her. “You can smell them all the way down here?”

“Yes. I can smell their blood,” she says, looking up at the ceiling. “Can’t you?”

I shake my head. Not from down here, I can’t. Juli is incredible.

The candles on the crates tremble as something above us makes the salon shake like an earthquake. “And there’s at least two dozen humans above us right now,” she adds.

That’s an impressive skill to have. No wonder the Nosferatu were so dangerous back in their prime. We get up quickly and scramble to head out into the sewers. We trudge through the filthy water until we reach the ladder. Juliette places her foot on the bottom rung, but I nudge her away and shake my head. “No, love. Stay down here, just in case. I’ll go take a look.”

Juliette’s eyes narrow. “No. I have much more experience with situations like these. I will look. I can cloak myself in darkness if I need to.”

Reluctantly, I step away from the ladder and allow her to climb to the top. I watch her as she removes the manhole cover and pops her head out like a gopher.

“Juli!” I whisper-yell. “What’s⁠—”

She pulls her head back in just to glare at me. “Shh! Be quiet, mon couer. They might hear you! I’m going to have a look around. You stay here.”

“But what if something happens to you? How will I know?” I ask. I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all. Staying behind while she goes out and risks her life doesn’t sit right with me.

Juliette rolls her eyes. “If I’m not back in ten minutes, only then may you come looking for me.”

I nod and watch as she pulls herself out of the sewer, away from me.

Fine. Ten minutes? I can handle that. I’ve waited in line for concert tickets for up to four days in the wind and rain. Ten minutes will be nothing.

Ten minutes is agony.

I’ve paced the sewer so many times that I’ve burned holes in the soles of my boots. Counted all the weird cracks in the wall until I went cross-eyed.

Fuck this. I’m going up. The rumbling stopped a while ago and since then, it’s been nothing but silence. Why is that worse?

I climb up out of the sewers only to find … nothing. No people, no soldiers, and no Juliette, either. Not even the streetlights are on, which is both bizarre and disconcerting.

My stomach drops as I crawl out onto the streets and make my way toward the end of the street. When I pass an electronics store window, I check the analog clocks. A little after nine p.m.

I wander the streets for a good half an hour before finally getting frustrated enough to plop down in the middle of the street and drag my claws across my skull, tugging at my hair. “Dammit. Where are you, Juliette?”

I’m not worried about her. I’m not. She can handle herself, I know that… but the uncertainty is killing me.

A distant cry that sounds like Juli’s echoes somewhere in the distance. There’s smoke billowing from down the street, and I’m already running, not even bothering to think or consider I could be running into a trap. A vampire’s fight-or-flight response is stronger than a human’s, making us unstoppable creatures of destruction. Whether it’s our enemy’s destruction or our own doesn’t even matter, so long as something is getting torn to shreds. When I turn the corner on yet another dead street, I’m greeted by the sight of fire blazing … everywhere. My jaw falls open.

Every building on this street is caught in the blaze, and in the center of the street is an enormous pile of burned bodies.

Wait, burned bodies?! The fact that they haven’t exploded into ash upon their death can only mean one thing. I bite down on my bottom lip so hard I can taste the tangy copper of my blood as it fills my mouth. Then I notice the paladins tossing corpses onto the pile. Those sentient walking trash can motherfuckers. Yup. I fucking knew something wasn’t adding up, here.

They’re worse than the Helsings for one reason and one reason only: Zealotry. They’re evangelists who worship Reagan, one of the Seven and goddess of the material world. They hate everyone who isn’t a Reagan fanboy like them. For reasons unknown to me, when a paladin kills either a demon or vampire, their bodies remain behind. If you’re a demon, you go back to Hell where you’re reincarnated. No harm, no foul. But if you’re a vampire and you’re dusted?

I… I don’t actually know what happens. No one does. Some vampires believe our souls were left behind in Hell when we were turned, so when we die, we simply return to the Underworld. Others have theorized that upon our turning, our souls were cast into oblivion. A small minority believe we still have our souls, but I’m not that optimistic.

I spot a paladin lumbering over with a gallon of gasoline in my peripheral vision. He pours it all over the place, and I wince.

No, no, no.