Chapter Three - Kali

with Atticus

When I woke up the next evening I realized my mind had been…floaty. Focused, but only on the moment. What I was feeling, smelling, hearing. What Aisha had just said. Never really thinking about how my l was going to change. The fallout on work and family. I had two jobs, probably gone now. One younger sister and two older brothers who hadn’t heard from me for at least a week at this point. Not to mention my parents. God, my dad is probably dead via heart attack. We had always been close and a week with no contact, missing from work…yeah, I had a problem. I curled up under the blankets of the huge bed I was sleeping on. Aisha was nowhere to be seen but I could hear her elsewhere in the brownstone. Watching TV if the sound was anything to go by.

Instead of a panic attack I felt…empty, like I shouldn’t even bother worrying about any of the hundreds of thoughts racing through my brain. That worried me even further. That was not me. I didn’t wallow, I acted. I resolved my problems. I was not a procrastinator. Or I wasn’t. What was I now? What was I going to be? A monster. Humans could certainly be monsters all on their own. What would being a vampire add to that? Would I even have a choice? Get up. GET UP! I got up and shuffled over to the bathroom listlessly. More leftover solids expelled and a quick shower did wonders for my mood.

After drying off I stood, naked, and examined myself in the mirror. A patch of hair on the side of my head the size of my palm was just growing back. I picked through the hair and spotted a series of runes in four concentric circles tattooed beneath it. Another larger band circled my chest. Another circle on my stomach and one on the small of my back opposite it. The set on my forearms, two long lines of runes up the back of each leg and over my ass. Some of them seemed dormant but others were clearly alive. The set on my stomach and lower back seemed to slowly rotate, like they were grinding away at something, or refining it. I blinked. Where did that thought come from?

The band around my chest pulsed in time with my heart. I still had a heart beat, so much for being undead. The circles hidden behind an inch of hair seemed to dig into my head like a drill even though they were clearly not moving. Like an optical illusion almost. The arms and legs did nothing but look cool. Whoever did them was clearly a talented artist. In the light of the bathroom it was obvious that they were not quite colorless. In the right light there was a tinge of red, like old dried blood. Apart from the new tats and my ruined hair I looked relatively normal. I lost maybe fifteen pounds according to the scale. I had the feeling that that was everything in my gut getting pushed out over the last week, along with a far amount of water weight I would probably put back on.

It looks like all the runes are working as intended. That's good. It’s been so long since I’ve used them on another vampire and I’ve never applied them to a human mid transformation like that. Hmm, yes, this was well done indeed.

No red eyes. I still had my old dull browns. No pale skin. My Italian father and Indian mother left me with a darker skin tone than most of my peers, which appeared to be perfectly intact. A jagged scar on my right knee I had since I was six was gone. A few light acne scars I acquired during puberty were gone. I looked better but not really different. Maybe my family wouldn’t even notice. This all seemed very un-vampire if I was going to be honest. Actually, maybe they referred to themselves as leeches? That’s certainly what Aisha called them. Next, I needed to make a few phone calls. Speaking of which, where the hell was my phone? I dressed in a clean pair of gray sweats and white T left on the end table and went to find my minder.

She was passed out on the couch in the media room, almost in the same spot I had seen her last. I found the remote and muted the TV which caused her to jerk awake. “What? Oh, evening Kali.” She mumbled upon noticing me. God, she smelled divine. No, focus Kali. The smirk on Aisha told me that she knew exactly what I was thinking and she held out her right wrist and tapped the veins with two fingers from her left hand, like a doctor trying to find a vein. “You're sure you're okay to do this again?” I asked as I sat next to her.

“Yep. Eve said you're going to need to eat nightly for the first month. I’ve been running errands all day but I take a break to eat every two hours. Been doing about twenty thousand calories a day since I brought you home.” She patted her non existent belly with her free hand while I sucked on her right wrist. She was tall, almost six feet, but lean, like a model who had never eaten bread in her life. However, she didn’t have the face for that career, too plain. Like myself and most of my girl friends; pretty enough and attractive if we kept up with our workouts, but turn heads we did not. Aisha seemed to have the type of outgoing attitude that more than made up for any lacking she may have in the physical department. I was certain that she was serious when she said she could get sex anytime she wanted. When I was done I tried to extract myself but she pulled me in and hugged me while humming contentedly like I was a new kitten she was smitten with.

“How are you feeling tonight?” She asked while stroking my hair. Now that my mind was clear, I kind of wanted to pull away. I barely knew this girl. I was not her little sister and certainly not a new pet. But then my mind jumped back to her constant care and even filled in some of what must have happened while I was sleeping, or blacked out. Every time I woke up during the last week I was as clean and comfortable as could have been, given the givens. She must have been feeding me as well, considering I seemed to eat every night. I decided to relax into it and hugged her back.

“Physically okay. Confused about a lot of things and worried about more.” I answered.

“Yeah, I can see that. What are you worried about exactly?”

“My family. Work. My roommate. Rent, the sun. You know, stuff.”

“Not the person or persons who attacked you?”

“No, them, I’m going to kill.” Whoa, where had that come from. I tilted my head to look at Aisha, a bit afraid, but she was beaming at me. Almost literally, I wouldn’t be surprised if that smile produced actual light. She squeezed me tighter and said “That’s the spirit! I’m so proud of you.”

I extricated myself and shook my head slowly. “Where did that come from?”

“Instinct I would imagine.” She said, unconcerned. “The rest of that stuff is fine by the way. Well, not in a state of emergency at least.”

“What do you mean?” I asked and snagged a bottle of water from the coffee table.

“You had all your stuff with you when the boss found you. So, probably not a mugging. Anyway, your family thinks you have the flu. Your roommate thinks you’re at your parents for emotional support after quitting both jobs. And they both got the same treatment, a letter from HR letting you go. Since you were part time at both jobs, no notice was required. As for rent…” She paused, clearly uncertain for the first time since I had met her. “Well, ideally, you would move in here but it’s not technically required. We can make it work either way, I’m certain.” Wow. She was afraid I was going to say no.

“Umm,” I started “I think that should be fine, moving in here with you I mean. I just need time to think about it. Get my head straight, you know?”

She brighted back up “Sure, sure. Of Course. That’s smart. Take your time. No hurry.”

I looked around the huge room and realized there were…three floors and a basement I hadn’t seen. Shit, brownstones cost millions of dollars in, wait, where were we? Alright one thing at a time. “You really live here all alone?” I asked.

“Well I ah, do now. I used to have a place in The Village but with you, we ah…” She trailed off, kind of looking around helplessly. Oh, this wasn’t her place, this was our place. Holy shit. All right, that cinched it. It was one thing to be crashing in someone else's pad. It was another thing to move into a new place with someone. I was just unconscious for the moving part.

I smiled at her and said “Alright then. What are the house rules? Do’s and don’ts for a brand new leech/demon duo?”

She laughed, clearly relieved and said “First off, leech is a slur, probably best not to get into the habit of using that around other vamps. Second…I don’t know, I’ve never done this before!” She practically squealed the last part. “How about, like um…operational security stuff?” I asked.

“Oh yeah, that’s good. Let’s say…no bringing randos up past the second floor. There’s four extra bedrooms on the second floor and a kitchen/living room on the first. Laundry and workout gear in the basement. A study and a library on the third. Media room on fourth, obviously.” She said with a wave around the room. “And two bedrooms upstairs. The windows up there are secured and covered, in both rooms. Bathrooms and closets are all over.”

“Rando’s?” I asked.

“Yeah; hookups, bar rats, school friends, co-workers, stuff like that.”

Operational security. Hmm, yes, I like that sound of that. Perhaps I should speak to Eve about something similar. “Gabe! Get me-

“Come on.” She said and almost dragged me off the couch. “I’ll show you the rest of the house!” and that’s exactly what she did. It was not what I was expecting. I thought everything was going to be modern, the best, or at least most expensive stuff. It was not. It was all old. Lots of solid, hardwood furniture. Books stocked the library and there were no dragons, swords, shirtless men or scantily clad women on the covers. In fact, nothing looked like it was printed within the last fifty years. Leather chairs that looked like they were from the eighteen hundreds and cared for in a museum. The rooms had simple beds with new mattresses and old comforters. The TV in both the living room on the first floor and the media room were state of the art while the kitchen appliances looked like they were top of the line, in maybe, the nineties.

The workout gear in the basement was a standing bike and heavy bag leaving the space mostly empty apart from the washer and dryer against one wall and a dusty wine rack against the other.

I think we are going to need to convert that basement into a proper workshop for a warlock and those wards need to be updated. That is some serious shoddy work. Who did that? “Gabe, who the hell did the wards on that brownstone we got for the new girl!”

…

Oh. Well, I have no idea what I was thinking at the time but that definitely needs to be redone.

When the tour was over Aisha said “I’ll give the crew a call and get someone over here to add a heavy door between the second and third floor to keep the riff raff out.”

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“It’s an amazing place. I don’t think I have even been in a brownstone that wasn’t converted to apartments. Oh, where are we by the way?”

“The Hill, in Brooklyn.”

The Hill? Clinton Hill? I’ve never been there. Haven’t spent much time in Brooklyn at all really. “I’m not really familiar with the area.” I said.

“Yeah, me neither. It’s a nice neighborhood though. A bit further from the school than I like.”

“NYU?”

“Yep.” she replied, pointing to the too big, red NYU shirt she was wearing.

“You're not missing any classes are you?”

“Yeah, I talked to the professors though. Told them I had some personal stuff come up and asked if I could audit their course instead of dropping everything. Said I would be back in a few weeks. They’ll probably let me test out if I don’t miss too much.” She shrugged like it was no big deal. “I mostly do TA work nowadays anyway. I was only taking two classes.”

“Oh, so where are you from?” I asked as we made our way back to the kitchen for Aisha to make something to eat. “I grew up in Jersey and most of my family still lives there.” I added.

“I grew up in the Third Circle of Hell but the boss summoned me…like eighteen years ago. I spent a few years just hanging around The Crossroads, that’s his restaurant, learning the lay of the land and figuring things out.” Between bites of ham and cheese she continued. ”Then I moved to The East Village and started going to school. Although, I still spend most of my freetime at The Crossroads, like I said.”

I shuddered “Third Circle?”

She nodded “Yep. Gluttony. Dante must have been into some real demonic shit to get as much right as he did.”

“Is heaven real then?” I asked.

“Sure. Though I’ve never been, obviously. Gods are a bunch of dicks as far as I know. Not much contact with us.

“Gods?”

“Yep. Technically, the boss could probably summon one, but he never would. You always summon down, never up.”

“What do you mean by down and up?”

She pointed down “You summon from hell.” Then she pointed up “Never from heaven.”

Oh. “Why’s that?” I wondered aloud.

“It’s ‘cause hell sucks. Everyone wants to get out and up here to the mortal plane. Heaven thinks of the mortal plane like you probably think of hell. It’s horrible.” Then she shrugged and started on another sandwich. “I assume it’s nothing but great food, orgies, sunshine and roses in heaven. I would be pissed if some dick summoned me from that, wouldn’t you?”

A surprisingly good explanation. How have I not had any interaction with this demon in the last twenty years? I’m going to have to have some kind of conference and re-familiarize myself with my minions. No, demons hate conferences. I could blame it on the apprentice? Maybe call it a party as well?

“Yeah, I suppose I would.” After a few minutes of silence, apart from Aisha chewing. I said “Now what?”

“Now what, what?” She replied.

I waved to myself and said “Me, what do I do?”

She nodded sagely and said “Call your family so they stop blowing up your phone. Schedule a time with your roommate for us to pick up your stuff, at night obviously. Then we get back to it.”

“Back to what?”

“Living.” She replied and got another sandwich from the fridge and along with a half gallon of OJ she drank straight from the carton. Deciding I could handle that list on my own I went upstairs to the media room where my phone was apparently charging. I found it right where Aisha promised it would be and checked all my missed calls. Dad mostly, everyone else just texted and there were a ton of them. I sighed and sat down to start going through them. It could be summed up in two categories; The first, the flu sucks, get better soon and do you need anything. Secondly, those bastards, I can’t believe you got fired from both jobs at the same time, what bad luck, do you need anything? Thankfully, Aisha had replied to most of them for me, using a style similar enough to my own that no one seemed to have caught on.

Most of them were appeased for the time being. First things first, I called my father. “Piccola, I thought you were dead.” My father answered the phone on the second ring.

“No papa, I’m fine. Just a bit sick but I’m feeling much better.”

“Hmm, well why didn’t you answer your phone then?”

“Well, apart from being sick a bunch of other stuff happened and I was just busy.”

“Yes? Like what? Something serious?”

“Yeah, but not bad serious. Is mama home?”

“She’s here, why?”

“Can you put her on speaker so I don’t have to go over everything twice.”

He chucked “Sure, sure. Hold on.” I heard a click and a few seconds later. “Kali, are you there?”

“Yes mama, I was just going to tell papa about the last week and didn’t want to go over the whole thing twice.” Dad laughed and said “Yes, and mama will inform the rest of the neighborhood.” I could clearly hear a smack over the phone and dad laughed again.

“So what happened besides the flu? You didn’t get your shot over the winter did you?” She asked and I rolled my eyes, if only it was just the flu. “Well, I lost both jobs, got a new one at a restaurant and moved to Brooklyn with a friend to be closer to work.” There, that covered everything that I was willing to explain. “What! All the way to Brooklyn?” Dad complained.

“It’s not that much further than New Brunswick and the commute would have been hell from the old place. The restaurant is in the City and we're renting one of our bosses' properties so the cost is low. It’s a whole brownstone papa, you will love it!”

“Hmm, what do you think?” He said and mom replied “What kind of work and is the pay good?”

“It’s administrative assistant stuff and the pay is great. It’s a whole brownstone mama. Five stories, in Clinton Hill. It’s a nice neighborhood.”

“And you're all moved over already?” She asked.

“No. It came furnished, mostly good stuff. I’ll get my stuff from the old place in a few days. Once I’m settled you have to come visit.” Aisha came up the stairs and gave me a thumbs up when she noticed I was on the phone.

“We will, we will but you need to call your sister.” Dad said. “She heard you lost your job and was worried sick.”

“What! Why didn’t you say something if you already knew?” I complained.

“I thought it was just a rumor, I mean, who would fire you?” Mom interrupted, “We are glad you are feeling better but we need to go, do you have any idea what time it is?” Shit it was after ten, mom was definitely asleep.

“Sorry mama. I love you both, talk to you later.”

I heard a click over the line and dad said “It’s fine, we love you too. Night Piccola.”

“Night papa.”

Vindication! She is just a child, stupid Gabe, he knows nothing. “Gabe! Your an idi-

I immediately called my sister, she was definitely not asleep. “Hey girl, I guess you're not dead after all.”

“Holy shit, it was one week. Why does everyone answer the phone with the same line?”

“It’s your dads fault, after three days he started calling hospitals, sure you were done in.”

“Well, I’m fine. Although I did get fired, how did you hear?”

“Gina told Sarah, who told Joey, who told-”

“Nevermind.” I interrupted, “I don’t care.”

“Yeah, I figured. So what happened?”

“Bad timing I guess. I was part time at the office and hardly even that at the paper.”

“So, are you fucked or what?”

“Nope. I got lucky and got a new job in the City. Made a friend who works at the same place and we moved in together.”

“You moved! What the hell? Where too?”

“Brooklyn.”

“Oh my god that soooo far. What were you thinking?”

“That I didn’t want a two hour commute…”

“Fair, I suppose. But Brooklyn? Isn’t that a rough neighborhood?”

“I haven't had much of a chance to explore yet but it's nice where I’m at, promise.”

“Fine. Well, are you excited and who is this new roommate? It’s a guy isn't it? Oh my god, you weren’t sick, you're knocked up, aren’t you!”

“No, I had the flu and no it’s not a guy. Her name is Aisha. She’s a TA at NYU but works part time at this restaurant called The Crossroads in the city. We met there and she helped me get a job.”

“Huh, never heard of it.”

“Neither had I. Just stopped in over the weekend and we hit it off. When I got the news we were hanging out and before I even left the building I had a new job. It was crazy. I was unemployed for like five minutes, if that.”

“So lucky, shit, I gotta go. We’re leaving and I gotta drive, everyone else is drunk.”

“It’s fine. Talk to you later.”

“Yep, love you.”

“Love you too.” Done. Mom would catch Ricky and Francis up. I just had to deal with my roommate now and she was a bitch, I would not miss her one bit. Aisha interrupted my thoughts from the couch “You are a pathological liar. I can’t believe you did that with zero prep.”

I just shrugged “How are we money wise?”

“Flush.”

“Good, one more call. No, I’m just going to text her.” I mumbled.

‘Got a new job. Moving out this weekend. I’ll drop by to pick up my stuff Sunday night and leave three months' rent.’

…

‘K’

Yep, not going to miss her one bit. Thankfully I wasn’t on the lease. If didn’t offer the cash she would have flipped. “Alright. Can we pick up my stuff Sunday evening?”

“Sounds good to me. Do you want to actually go or have someone else do it?”

“I better go or Karen might try to steal something.”

“Right. Sounds like a real peach, no wonder it was easy to convince you to move. Want me to eat her?”

I froze for a second “Like…out?”

“No, like nom nom.”

“Umm…you do that?”

“Not normally, but if she's really that bad I could probably get away with it.”

“Get away with it? Like avoid the cops?” I asked, pretty sure that wasn’t what she meant at all.

“Nope, like…it wouldn’t wreck my blood too badly, still I would do it if you asked.”

“Umm, thanks, I think. But no, she's not that bad.” She just shrugged like it was no big deal. Maybe it wasn’t to her? “Have you eaten someone before?”

“Yeah, but just for disposal. I didn’t kill them.”

“And that’s…normal?” She leaned back into her corner of the couch and looked up for a few long seconds, then patted the spot next to her. I got up and moved over to sit by her side, a bit scared if I was honest. “Yeah. It’s normal.” She said once I was in place. She began to slowly rub my back like I was a frightened child. I turned my head so I could watch her while she talked.

“This info comes straight from the boss and you should keep it to yourself. Killing a stranger for no reason, or even a frivolous reason will taint the blood of a demon, leeches as well but we're focusing on demons right now. So, most of the time that doesn’t matter one bit. Normally, a practitioner will summon as strong a demon as they are able, bind them to their will with a strict contract and have them do something for a few days, maybe weeks. Then the contract is over and the demon goes back to hell. Make sense so far?”

I nodded along and she continued “So a strong, older demon could kill a thousand people and it wouldn’t make a difference. They are already so tainted, it would be like a drop in the ocean. Yeah?” Another nod.

“Instead, the boss summons young, weak demons and binds them loosely. They slowly get stronger and are discouraged from doing things that will taint their blood. He plays a long game, a very long one. So, if I really wanted to kill someone and eat them, no problem. But it would taint my blood, which would slow down my Significance gain, as well as your own when you fed off the tainted blood. The taint would be greater or lesser depending on a lot of things. Why I did what I did and who they were are the big ones. Yeah?”

“I guess.” I answered.

“As long as you're following. So it’s pretty simple. Eat a dead man I just found laying around? No problem, meat is meat. Curse some innocent roommate for a few weeks? Then sneak in, kill and eat her? Major taint. Yeah?”

“Yeah, I get you. But…”

“But?”

“You wouldn’t like, feel bad about it? Or are you just worried about the tainted blood?”

She shrugged “Maybe once upon a time it wouldn’t have bothered me. But it would now. Don’t get me wrong, I have totally killed several pieces of shit and cursed even more.” She smiled that big smile and said “I’m no angel Kali, but the boss checked my blood before he let me be your minder. My purity is high and I’m an upstanding member of the community. No slaughtering kids for this demon.”

“So when you offered to eat Karen?” She winked at me and replied “Just checking where you were at. We needed to have this conversation soon anyway. To birds with one stone and all that.”

“I have to say Aisha, that is a huge relief.”

She laughed and pushed me off the couch “I will totally eat her out if she is hot though, maybe while we're getting your stuff?” I punched her leg from my spot on the floor and she just laughed all the harder.