1
City of London. 2007.
Soil caves beneath my boot; my heart kicks once, painfully, against my chest. I imagine the cold fingers of a newly-undead wrapping around my ankle and pulling me down, and mutter a short prayer to the First Slayer—then my heel finds purchase in the soft moss covering and holds.
A grateful sigh dampens the pulse in my ears. Before my next step, I take a longer look at the ground below me, my fingers curling then loosening, as if tension were bags weighing in my grasp.
Of all the ways I imagine meeting inevitable death, being pulled by a musty-dusty vampire into their musty-dusty grave has never cracked my Top 100.
But stranger things…
Thank Sineya that I get to live another moment, I tell myself flatly. How lovely it is to be left to continue to wonder what my quick fate as a Slayer will be.
Not a fresh plot with a fresh sire clawing for its first taste of fresh blood. Not tonight, at least.
No. Fate has a different plan for the evening.
And it involves a rabbit hole hidden in the flattened grass, the secretions of the recently deceased some-type-of-slug demon I’d just killed with my last stake, and the soiling of my stylish-yet-affordable heeled combat boot.
I grit my teeth at the slimy liquid encasing my boot up to the toe and remind myself again how grateful I should be that I’m not dead yet. That this mistake isn’t the stupid, fatal, final one. Stepping in shit like this is just part of the job.
Predictable—and disappointing. I have never made the mistake of walking onto disturbed ground, so why would I now? Not like this, in a boring cemetery that I frequent weekly, slaying yet another boring group of boring demons. Each step I take in a graveyard is always with intention, and I’ve been doing this for so long that it’s become second nature. The smell of fresh dirt is one I’ve come to scent quite well, steering clear when unnecessary and heading straight for it when it matters.
That is how I was trained.
Still, my four years of slaying have also taught me one certainty: Arrogance kills slayers.
A thick sea of clouds veils the full moon, silvering the weathered gravestones and carved monuments as I weave between the tightly packed rows and columns. This part of the cemetery is too old and has too many large trees for the hazy lampposts to be useful for what I do here—here doesn’t even have a clear path, covered in ivy, traveling from one headstone to another. Much more neglected, unlike the section to the south.
Despite my slayer abilities granting me near-vampiric night vision, at this angle, with my own shadow swallowing my feet and the thick grass beneath me, I can only feel that I’ve stepped into the sluggy secretions; the demon—a jaundice-skinned masculine thing with green-black horns wearing a ratty tee-shirt and jeans—is sprawled on the ground to my left, his lower half smooshing a patch of wildflowers. Dead.
I raise my boot. The slime stretches as it clings to both surfaces—and suddenly, I’m wondering if I should expect my leather to start melting sometime soon due to some acidic attribute.
A few seconds go by, and my boot remains intact. Still, I’m careful not to let it touch my gloves, my exposed fingertips—that’s just asking to be infected with something, like an aspect of the demon itself.
Easing into a crouch, I pull the hood of my sweatshirt up, tucking my long, onyx braid within it to avoid dragging through the residue, then lean back to spill some moonlight on my feet. Though the change is minimal, I still try to examine the substance and the creature, taking in every detail.
I can safely rule out Chaos demon, having encountered them before; I’ll describe tonight’s demons as their bull-horned cousins, then leave the rest up to Moira and her books.
A break in the clouds gives me the chance to discern that the fluid appears translucent, perhaps a tinge yellowish—
Then a gust of wind blows its putrid scent directly into my nostrils. I start, nearly choking on it, and snatch up the scarf I’d lowered to my neck after killing the last demon, having needed a breather, and replace it over my nose and mouth.
Breather officially over.
Just as I’m about to rise to my full height, I notice dry slug-splatter along my pant leg, and the corner of my lip twitches in a grimace.
I should’ve expected that.
The secretion is harmless, indeed… aside from its reeking and definite staining.
I release a heavy, rumbling groan, the heat of my breath filling the scarf. And what of these two demons that didn’t go poof?
I can’t count on them to be ravaged by animals and insects before anyone notices it’s here, even though this section of the graveyard doesn’t have many living visitors…
Do I really have the patience for this tonight?
At least vampires have the decency to clean up after themselves.
After so long, I’m used to the gross and morbid and being surrounded by bodies. That comes with the job. It’s the little inconveniences: the time it takes to clean bodily remnants out of every nook and cranny of my weapons; the pesky splinters I have to pick out of my palm on the occasion I must spontaneously makeshift a stake; the dust-filled boogers I blow out every night… and the constant clothing subjected to replacement.
Without being able to access my funds or the rest of what wardrobe I’d brought overseas for another few days, I’ve been cycling through two pairs of jeans and a few tops the last week—especially since I was supposed to be on a date tonight instead of patrol. This pair of black jeans is my favorite, the only one that perfectly fits my slim curves and makes me look like I have an ass, and these damn demons ruined them. They weren’t even supposed to be here, by the routines Faith and I have learned since residing in London.
Before I dispose of their bodies, I seek out the weapons I’ve disarmed around the cemetery. Among them, I seek out my dagger first: a five-inch wavy-edged silver blade crafted and blessed by an Elder at a monastery. I last saw it a few rows of headstones North, a mere ten yards or so, buried between the eyes of another demon of the same sluglike species.
Lowering to that creature’s lifeless form, I take care not to step in the growing pool of slime, at first only noticing it from its smell wafting from a spot in the grass, but then I see it subtly glistening in the dim light of the fogged lantern posted at the end of the row. I wrap my long, tan fingers around the dagger’s gold-tipped hilt—underneath the leather wrapping is bone, intricately carved out to be a dragon head, a match to the tattoo snaking around my shoulder—and with an easy jerk, rip it out of the demon’s skull, the blade glinting upon being freed. I wipe the blood and brain juice across the dry splatter on my pant leg, and then sweep my eyes over the cemetery.
It’s been a busy night, so it’s worth it, I guess. Two relatively small zompire nests, four run-of-the-mill vampires, and the two slimy, horned slug demons have kept me busy the last couple hours when I should’ve been talking up a guy named San, deciding whether he’s worth having a fling with. He’d already earned points for asking me out instead of asking me to bed, even if that’s all I wanted when I gave him the time of day, so he must be semi-decent.
I take a moment to appreciate the stillness of the night, the calmness of my senses, the briskness of the autumn air. This is the part of the night I call “Deadsville”—referring not to the decaying corpses slumbering beneath my feet, but the settling moments after a storm is unleashed.
The neighborhood was quiet to begin with; even the local pubs don’t stay open long after sundown, causing the streets to be vacant by nine—but part of my mission here is to change that: to hold the line in London now that magick is dead and clean the city of the more dangerous things that are going bump in the night as a result.
Whatever else I felt lurking in the shadows tucked their tails and ran after they’d watched me dispatch nearly twenty demons without more than a few scratches and bruises to show for it; the tightness in my gut loosening was confirmation of their withdrawal.
Loosening, yet still lingering.
An average night, really… Except tonight was supposed to be quick, minimal slayage, with a drink at the nearest pub to end the shift.
If I were arrogant, I’d think that demons had to be a special kind of stupid to stay in a slayer-occupied city.
But I’m not that arrogant, and this level of activity means that something is coming.
“If you’re all going to cower,” I say casually into the night as I scan for my two larger blades, knowing my words are reaching at least one vampire in this graveyard, “it leaves nothing left for me to do tonight.”
I catch the flash of silver between a set of tall, tapered monuments that are more moss than stone—my battle axe. “…Aside from keeping an ear out for werewolves…” Every werewolf residing in the city is logged and then given a protocol to follow during this time of the month, but Faith and I haven’t seen a new pup since January.
Keeping my steps light, I bound toward the markers, now more mindful of hidden critter dens than fresh graves, and picked my axe out of the tall grass between them, swiping the blade clean on the cuff of my jeans. Since dirt isn’t going to harm them any further.
I have half a mind to hit San up, but… I’m far too unpresentable now, and it’s far too late—and the only reason I’m even considering it is because of the post-slayage high that makes me want only two things: Sex and food.
I’m not desperate enough to seek out a resolution for the former, so I choose to retire for the night. To return to headquarters—an abandoned hotel that Moira, Faith, and I have been laying low in—and let the remaining slayer-adrenaline putter out in the most unsatisfying way possible while stuffing my face with whatever snack food we have left.
Can I really complain? I’d be lying if I said dating is more thrilling than slaying. Lying if I say finding someone to share the world with is as high on my list as protecting it from evil. Romantic relationships never fit easily into this life; between recruitment, training, and missions, it’s not safe to develop a relationship with anyone other than a few of my sister slayers… and Powers forbid I let the what-ifs of mundane life become a distraction on my missions.
It feels unnatural even to consider it.
I blow out a breath, holstering the axe over my left shoulder, and trudge toward the cluster of trees near the south gate.
He wouldn’t have been able to keep up with me, anyway.
I pause again at the first demon on the way to my sword, glancing between his body and where his friend lies those ten rows North, and the corner of my lip curves upward in triumph.
Some things are even too confidential to discuss at the proverbial Slayer Dinner Table.
A flicker of doubt ripples through me at the thought of sharing this part of my life—the only part of my life—with anybody, and my smirk falters.
I push onward through the cemetery, spotting my short sword jutting out of an old plane tree, embedded there after I’d whipped it across the cemetery to decapitate a vampire, and snake through the last rows of headstones to get to it.
Containing my frustration, I violently yank the sword from the tough bark and then return it to the scabbard on my back.
I may have better luck when the paranormal activity becomes less “para,” but ever since every existing Potential was activated and Buffy destroyed the Seed of Wonder, killing magick, it seems like evil is leaking out of every crevice of the earth.
The stakes I had brought found homes in the chests of the other three vamps, dusting along with them, and I leave the cemetery a bit lighter than when I’d entered, humming softly to myself as I stroll the streets, my right hand idly resting on the hilt of my dagger. Tonight’s melody is a random compilation of every Backstreet Boys song I know, mashed together in a way that doesn’t quite flow smoothly.
If someone were to see me right now, I’d look quite the sight. A tall, slender, 20-something who could be swept away by one too-strong breeze carrying two weapons on her back so casually, seemingly on a simple midnight stroll down an old London street. Relaxed, despite being armed to the teeth. But my adrenaline thrums steadily through my veins, my muscles, heightening every sense: the rustling of street rubbish, the soft flapping of shop awnings, the animals, and casual chatter from open loft windows—all of it sounds sharper, and I can approximate where each sound is coming from within a block in each direction. I’ve patrolled this area at least a hundred times since moving to London and know precisely how quiet a Tuesday in an urban neighborhood in the northern part of the city can be. So I know exactly what sounds don’t belong.
Ornate iron lamps line the narrow lane, casting the cobblestones in faint gold. Almost every window in the surrounding buildings is blacked out, concealing whoever is residing in them from the nightmares outside. Mundanes don’t dare walk the streets at this hour, but when one spends as much time in the realm of darkness and terrors as I have, they will find that there are still moments of beauty, of peace, to find light in. That even demons will stop to take in the world and what it offers, and life becomes one with the dead stillness of a graveyard.
Yet another reminder of how closely I walk alongside death. How my life is doomed to be shorter and lonelier than a mundane human’s. How every time I patrol, the risk of making that one wrong move increases.
Thinking about it makes it all the more daunting, the more real—and it’s not something I want to be distracted by.
If my fate is already written in the stars, then it is best that no one gets too attached to me. I can’t pretend that my luck isn’t running out. Especially with the state of the world now.
A magickless world; the absence of it has altered anything with a drop of it. The boundary that separates the vampire from its human self is no longer, the demon taking over and turning them into feral, bloodthirsty things. Powers have been stripped. Sineya’s essence has been depleted. No more Slayers can get Called. Nothing is in balance.
So if I had died tonight, would I have regretted not seeking something outside of the Organization? I scoff at myself. That thought is the hardest one to stuff into the metal chest tucked deep inside me, but I force it down and my gaze skyward. Slayers don’t live long; we know that.
The gold hoop on my nose glints in the dim light. London is normally cloudy, robbing me of a star-filled night that I had no problems seeing in the northern parts of Michigan, my home state. A sudden, cool wind breaks the clouds, as if knowing how much I miss seeing what lies beyond the foggy veil, revealing the sapphire sky, deep and glittering and vast like Lake Superior. The moon is so bright it nearly banishes all the remaining shadow, illuminating bins, boxes, discarded furniture…
And a tall something that I swear dashes across the lane.
