Moon Child Read online

  Not wanting to short out Tristan’s overloaded mind, Mamoru didn’t get into the details about the remaining heikō and went straight into a two-hour lecture on the vampire, Tristan’s biggest topic of concern right next to the Uruwashi. There was so much to know about them, Tristan wasn’t sure he could even begin to understand it all right then. He listened intently, learning about how the vampire were made, the blundering toddler years of their new lives, their laws and beliefs, their undying lust, their motonō, seikonō and kōmajutsu, death rituals, everything Mamoru could possibly think of. Even useless stuff like, yes, the vampire still did have some of the mundane bodily functions like the need to urinate if they drank too much alcohol. For some reason, that topic alone almost sent Tristan into a fit of laughter. It was the shock, Mamoru guessed.

  As for the Uruwashi themselves, while Mamoru made it very clear that they were never considered shinwa or heikō, he didn’t really know what they were. Sure, they were a balance of human and vampire, but the history of their making was rather unclear. More than that, Mamoru didn’t really want to talk about himself. He did however make a few things known, whether intentional or not. Like when the man joined Tristan for a meal that was solids. Apparently most, but not all, Uruwashi were able to eat, enjoy and find nourishment from solid foods after their awakening, while at the same time finding pleasure in blood. Vampire blood, specifically. And unlike a vampire feeding on a vampire, an Uruwashi feeding on a vampire could actually fulfill some of their dietary needs. It was skewed for a reason. The Uruwashi were supposed to be the top of the food chain after all.

  He also knew that Mamoru could read his mind, just not as proficiently as a vampire. And Tristan couldn’t say with one-hundred percent certainty that it really happened, but the dude seemed to have this mild Jedi power where he could move things with the waggle of a finger. It could have just been the boat that made the salt shaker shift towards Mamoru just when he was reaching for it, but Tristan was convinced it was more than that. Dude really liked salt too.

  “I’m just overwhelmed,” Tristan sighed. “I guess.”

  Mamoru hummed his understanding. “I grew up with the stories, but I can see how getting a heavy dose of them all at once is a lot. Especially if you’ve never seen them.”

  “No, I’ve seen a few, mostly the shinwa.” In fact, he’d met over half of the shinwa now.

  “Troll?” Mamoru asked with a deep frown.

  “No,” Tristan answered sounding distant.

  Mamoru shuddered. “Hope you never do. That goes for the shinigami too… spiteful specters. Last thing anyone needs is a shinigami around, even if they are trying to wrangle a yokai back into hell.”

  Tristan looked over to him. Mamoru’d been a bit somber since he started his long lecture. He understood why, it was a strange business learning about all the races of shinwa and heikō. The fact that Ash didn’t seem to even know about the heikō bothered Mamoru more than it should have. Just what was Yukihime up to?

  “All right, back again. Where to now?” Tristan asked wearily.

  The pair stepped off the boat plank, finally, and stopped off to the side to get out of the way of the other disembarking passengers. Most of the passengers were walking into town, others gathering at shuttles to take them to their hotels in Gytheio and neighboring cities.

  “Hmm, I think perhaps we should start with the last place you saw Ash and go from there. Do you think you can—”

  “Can what?”

  Tristan realized then why Mamoru’d stopped talking. There was a man staring at them. He was remarkably short, but lean and fit looking with enough muscle to take down a man twice his size. His skin was dark with a healthy tan. The sides of his head were shaved down to a short stubble, leaving a long mohawk done up in complicated braids and dreads with colored ribbons falling to his middle back. The color was a dirty blond that got lighter at the tips, more of sun bleached rather than something out of a box.

  A tidy beard more red than blond wrapped from ear to ear to give his soft features more of a masculine appearance. His clothes went with his rough warrior look: a pair of thick brown cotton pantaloons that tucked into maroon-colored riding boots and a simple cut off-white cotton tunic with a deep v-front with a heavy leather belt at his waist. There was deep intelligence behind the sharp blue eyes lined in heavy black, watching them.

  “Friend of yours?” Tristan muttered, knowing immediately who, or more like, what the man was even without Mamoru putting a warning hand on his arm. It wasn’t that he could feel the newcomer, because he couldn’t. He just knew. “Yeah,” he muttered under his breath, “I know.”

  “Gentlemen, if you’d come quietly with me there is no reason to frighten the humans.” His accent was slightly Russian, like he was trying to eliminate it but it was so much a part of him he couldn’t completely be rid of it, even as gifted as a vampire was.

  “Who the fu—”

  The hand on Tristan’s arm tightened. “I believe in cases like this we need a more delicate touch.” Mamoru put on a hospitable smile. “May we know your name, fellow traveler?”

  “No. But you can call me Netty, for the sake of affability.”

  The two Uruwashi exchanged a look—Netty? It was hard to tell if the man was being serious. He had snarky eyes, full of mischief and cunning, ever smiling though he was actually frowning.

  “Will you come with me please?” the vampire asked again. At least he was polite and used please even if his tone left no room for a negative answer. He could have just ordered them to if he was as old as Mamoru suspected.

  “And if we don’t?” Tristan challenged and Mamoru sighed at him.

  “I would rather not do this here, but I will do what I must to meet my goals.”

  Mamoru’s voice sounded a little strained when he asked, “What goals?”

  Netty tilted his head to the side. “Will you come or do you refuse?”

  Tristan knew what his answer was, but before he spit it out with a handful of profanities, Mamoru managed to stay his mouth once again with a firm hold on his wrist and whispered to him, “We cannot do this here.” He motioned with a nod towards the innocent people, tourists and locals alike. “There are too many people, it would be impossible to erase all of their memories.”

  Tristan lifted a curious brow at the other man. “So you have the erase ability like the Water line, huh?”

  Mamoru’s mouth pressed into a thin line.

  “Fine,” he huffed. “What do you suggest?”

  “To go with him,” Mamoru answered with a shrug. What choice did they have?

  “None,” Netty answered dryly and motioned with his body for the others to follow.

  Tristan looked to Mamoru for guidance. He realized then that it was something he did with Ash. It should have been Ash at his side.

  Mamoru gave him a sympathetic look of understanding. “We’ll find her, don’t worry. Just remember what I told you on the boat.”

  He nodded. Part of Mamoru’s long lecture included some tactical strategies, thing’s he’d learned over the years. Such as many of the older—read: smarter—vampires wouldn’t break out with their seikonō on first blush. They’d stick with their base motonō and tricks until they were forced to call upon their higher powers for aid. It was one part smart warfare, one part pride—in that the older vampires tended to think they were better than everyone else. In many cases, when it came to other shinwa, heikō and humans, they were right. A man was just a man… until he was an Uruwashi.

  “Also…,” Mamoru looked up to him, eyes heavy with annoyance. “I just heard all of that. You’re not blocking your thoughts.”

  Oh. He was right. Crap.

  Mamoru sighed, shaking his head as he started to walk away. “Ikuze,” he grumped.

  Tristan chuckled to himself, even as his hand searched for his gun. He liked Mamoru, even if the guy was being so tight lipped about what he could do. The man did promise to tell Tristan all about it when they found their respective va
mpires and, you know what, Tristan believed him. Mamoru was a good guy, for a killer, and would do the right thing by keeping his word.

  The pair followed quietly after their new “friend” through town. When they’d reached Tristan’s car exactly where he’d left it yesterday, Netty stopped and turned to face him. “Show me where you last saw Genoveva.” Tristan made a face and Netty quickly added, “Please.”

  So he was looking for the crazy cross-dressing vamp too. Question was why? To help or hinder. “What’s in it for us?”

  Mamoru sighed at Tristan’s less than tactful response. But then, he knew he’d gotten himself involved with a rough around the edges young man.

  The vampire only harrumphed.

  “Sorry, pal, but no one makes me do shit.”

  “This is true,” Mamoru chimed in, “He’s rather stubborn. American’s…”

  Tristan shot him a look but then smiled when he saw Mamoru grinning at him.

  “We’re both searching for the same vampire. We both wish to end her rampage. Isn’t that mutual enough to work together?”

  Tristan narrowed his eyes at the vampire. “You want something else.”

  Netty raised a dark eyebrow. “That may be true but it’s none of your concern. That would be between me and Mamoru.”

  “Watashi—ah, me?”

  Netty stepped closer to the two Uruwashi making them both tense. Tristan had a terrible urge to pull his gun but settled with feeling it through his shirt in the back. When Netty spoke again it was in Japanese. Tristan scowled, disliking the idea the vampire did it to keep him out of the conversation, but then he didn’t need to understand word for word what was being said because there was one word in particular that Tristan knew very well.

  “Whoa, wait a minute. Did you… did you just ask him to kill you?”

  Netty straightened his back, lifting his chin. “I did.”

  “Why?” Tristan asked completely flabbergasted.

  The vampire considered him a moment before letting out a soft sigh, relaxing his stance. “I’m older than anyone needs to be. I—I have tried to kill myself, but I just, I can’t.”

  “Coward.”

  The others flinched at Tristan’s snarled accusation.

  “Excuse me?” Netty asked, stunned.

  “You’re a coward, suicide is the cowards way out. And you can’t even do it yourself. Pathetic.”

  Netty’s expression pinked with an angry flush and Tristan knew from that small reaction that the vampire had fed very recently and fully—thank you Mamoru for finally telling him the important shit, right?

  “Now you listen to me, Tristan Daniel Blum, you’re in no position to judge anyone. You don’t even know what you are.”

  “Right,” he interrupted, “and you do. Everyone else does but me, is that it?”

  Netty straightened again, looking confident. “Yes.”

  “Bullshit!”

  Netty turned his attention to the Japanese man. “He’s got quite the mouth on him, how do you tolerate this?”

  Mamoru shrugged, smiling faintly. “It does have a charm all its own, I suppose.”

  The vampire harrumphed and stepped into Tristan faster than the human eye was able to follow. Tristan gasped when it registered that the vampire was mere inches away and reached for his gun, but then his wrist was already trapped in a steel-hard hand. Next to him he felt Mamoru move and realized his companion had pulled a knife and had it pressed to Netty’s chest over his undead heart.

  “Impressive,” Netty said with a small smirk to Mamoru. The Japanese man nodded an acceptance in return, hand held steady over the vampire’s heart. In a low voice, attention back on Tristan again, Netty said, “My wanting death has nothing to do with cowardice and everything to do with the fact that my kind should not exist. I’ve lived far, far too long already… so long in fact that I’m unable to kill myself—not due to mental qualms or the such. I am physically unable to kill myself. I’ve tried over and over but I always live.”

  Something cold and laden with lead filled Tristan’s belly. “Just how old are we talking here?”

  “Older than Christianity, older than… well, I guess you may not even know who that is the way you humans skew your history… I don’t even remember when I was born anymore or my real name, you know, we forget the little things when we live this long. I do remember where I was raised though… Let’s just say that I was born a Viking and leave it at that.”

  “Holy shit,” Tristan whispered, seeing the seemingly young looking vampire in a new light.

  Eyes wide in shock, Mamoru muttered, “You’re… you’re a kodaijin.”

  “Yes,” Netty answered matter-of-factly. “I am. And probably one of the last few.”

  “Fuzaken na,” Mamoru hissed out.

  Tristan snickered, but refused to look away from the vampire holding his weapon hand. “And I’ve got a foul mouth?”

  “You understand then why you’re the only one who can kill me now?”

  The question was directed to Mamoru but Tristan understood. Netty knew about the Japanese man’s fire gift. It was the ultimate death for a vampire, burning.

  “Yes, exactly. Fire is the only way. I don’t care about upholding some perverted sense of…” He waved his free hand in a small circle in the air as he searched for the word he wanted. “Of self-preservation disguised as justice that my kind had invented… I just—” He let out a heavy sigh, eyes fluttering shut as if he were exhausted. “I just want to make this one thing right before I retire.”

  Was this the pain that Tristan sensed before? No, it was more than a life made weary by long existence, there was some other trauma in the vampire’s life that he carried heavily on his shoulders. Maybe it was part of the reason, but if this guy was really as old as he claimed, then Tristan agreed with him—two thousand plus years was too long for anyone to live.

  “You have nothing to lose by joining with me.”

  If he really meant it when he said he wanted to die, then he was right. There was nothing to lose. So why did Tristan feel so uneasy? Why was there unease coiled, hiding in the dark of his doubt waiting to strike?

  Netty let go of Tristan, taking a step back and dropped his aura. Both Tristan and Mamoru gasped when they saw how the man really looked… like a ghost. His hair, eyes, skin, they were all so white it nearly hurt to look at him. He was a man carved of virgin white stone he was so smooth, it looked painful to be so perfect. And the man’s fangs, they were so big he couldn’t keep his lips closed over them. Tristan was so busy staring that he nearly missed the very large sword on the vampire’s hip. Not that someone his age needed it, but he’d learned with Ash that it was more of habit to cling to human things like swords. And it never really hurt to be overly prepared when it came to the shinwa or heikō.

  Tristan had to clear his throat to find his voice again. “Just who are you? And why are you looking for Genoveva?”

  “I told you, you can call me Netty. More than that it’s none of your business and won’t matter after I’m gone.”

  He scoffed and looked over to Mamoru for guidance. The Japanese man was still holding the knife but had forgotten about it when Netty dropped his illusion. When he met Tristan’s dark blue eyes Mamoru let out a shaky breath and shook his head. Nervous, he was very, very nervous.

  Tristan took another step back, not that it’d matter. “Okay. But if you’re fucking with us, we’ll—”

  “Kill me? I told you, I’ve nothing to lose.”

  “So you say, but what if we don’t lead you to Genoveva first? What if we just kill you?”

  Netty shut his eyes, his aura slowly washing down his body again to make him look less ghostly. “Then I will have died with regrets.”

  “Okay, don’t be so dramatic. Get in, I’ll take you to the place.”

  “Thank you,” Netty answered and let himself in the car though it’d been locked.

  Tristan’d just pulled the key from his pocket when a hand grabbed him. His initial re
action was to swing out, defend—attack, but then he remembered who it was.

  Mamoru looked worried as hell. “Are you sure about this?”

  He sighed, looking over at the vampire sitting patiently in the car. “No. Not really, but I don’t see any harm in it.”

  “I…” Mamoru licked his lips and stepped so close to Tristan that he felt immediately uncomfortable. He looked up, wrenching his neck to look Tristan in the face and whispered, “I don’t know if I can stop him on my own if he decides to turn on us. He’s just too old.”

  “Yeah,” he sighed. “I figured that. But he seems sincere enough that even I’m willing to let my curiosity rule for the moment. You don’t know who he really is, do you?”

  “No. I can’t even tell which House he’s from, he’s blocking his presence too strongly.”

  Tristan nodded. Mamoru said with experience that he’d be able to tell what House a vampire was from just by being in their general vicinity. He’d experienced it himself in France with that kid vampire, Julien. Didn’t mean he could just tell what someone was by being near them now, he still had to work on it.

  “I knew of a few of the kodaijin, er, ancients but most are dead now or just off the map. Most vampire prefer solitude and that desire only increases as they get older. If it weren’t for their need for physical contact…and blood, of course, they’d totally take themselves off the map.”

  “Hermits, huh?”

  “Essentially. There’s a theory… or more like folklore really, that the old ones simply just turn to stone. It’s silly but now that I’ve actually seen an ancient one with my own eyes, I can understand the stigma.”

  “Stone?” Tristan snorted a laugh as he opened the car door to get in. “That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard all day and if you knew some of the crazy shit I’ve been told today…”

  The other man grinned knowing full well some of the things Tristan’d been told today. He was the one who told him all that crazy shit after all. “You’re a good kid, you know. Terrible mouth, but good.” Mamoru started to reach for the back door but stopped. “Can I ask you one thing?”

  “Sure.”