“Are you ready to go home?” she asked.
“Yeah.”
She walked him to the door, holding it open for him. He attempted to say goodbye, but she closed the door before he could speak.
CHAPTER
2
She ought to have killed him. She should have drained him whole, broken his neck.
And then what would I do with a corpse, stuff it in the refrigerator?
It’s not like she knew the first thing about disposing of a body.
Izel would have known.
She wasn’t Izel and she couldn’t dwell on this. She’d done what she’d done. The boy would live. Let it be. No murder. It would not have been honorable anyway, he was no armed foe, nor the member of an enemy clan. Perhaps, considering that, Izel would have agreed it was best to let him go.
But you have no honor, a nagging voice that sounded like Izel whispered in her ear. Guilt spoke with her sister’s voice.
Atl stopped scratching the dog’s head and opened the bedroom window, letting in the night air. She felt strong. Alert. Giddy and brimming with energy. She thought about stretching her wings, sneaking along the rooftops.
It was too dangerous. Everything was too dangerous in this city. She missed the North and the desert with its endless dark skies, the coldness of its nights against her skin.
The Tlāhuihpochtin had moved around Mexico through the centuries. They had likely originated in the north of the country, coming in contact with the Aztecs long before the foundation of Tenochtitlán and the establishment of their empire. They spread through central Mexico during the time of the Spanish Conquest and several clans ventured back north in the nineteenth century. Atl’s mother was born in Sinaloa in 1895, and though she lived in Mexico City for several decades, she never forgot the North.
Atl sat by the window, trying to remain still, holding her cup of tea between her hands. She took a sip and grimaced. It wasn’t right. She headed back into the kitchen, in search of sugar cubes. She found them and discovered that the ants from the other day had returned and were eating the cubes she had left out in the open.
She crushed the ants with the palm of her hand, even though it would likely do little good. If they had found their way in once, they’d find their way in again.
She popped two sugar cubes into her mouth and wondered what she’d do about this pest. Ant repellent. What was a good ant repellent? Vinegar? Perhaps. Cinnamon. She didn’t like the smell of it. Pepper? She thought ants didn’t like pepper. Except for sugar cubes, some drinks, her tea satchels, and a bag of dog food, her kitchen was empty.
Atl supposed she ought to stop by the supermarket to buy pepper. She could also buy food. Cans of tuna and vegetables. Cereal. She would not eat it. It was for show. In case she had visitors, as she’d had tonight. Not that she planned to have many visitors. She wasn’t staying in the most elegant of buildings. But that meant more sanitation sweeps. If a sweep did take place, they would look around, either to make sure she wasn’t harboring illicit substances or to see if they could steal something. She could see a curious sanitation worker going through the kitchen drawers and finding them empty, a bit fishy, that. She could picture the worker staring at her. A young woman, alone, no ID papers and no food. Northern accent. Let me check … my, this woman’s body temperature is not right.
Maybe they wouldn’t peg her for a vampire. Maybe the curious sanitation worker would think she was a junkie or a Croneng. There were tons of people with Croneng’s disease running around these days. It was a virus that made humans hemorrhage from the nose and gave them sores, spoiling the blood supply so that now on top of cancers, STDs, AIDS, and tuberculosis, vampires had to also watch their food to make sure it wasn’t tainted with this new disease. Vomiting dirty blood was no fun.
She’d heard people blaming vampires for this, saying they had caused it, which was ridiculous, but humans had a way of blaming vampires for everything these days. Back in the Middle Ages—back when her kind was still half-hidden behind myth and superstition—some people thought vampires caused the plague. They did not, though the bubonic plague did help to expand the reach and power of the Necros. Necros, just like the German Nachzehrers, when in a pinch, could feed off carrion, something unthinkable to other vampires. They found a plentiful supply of corpses in Europe while other vampires would have starved, deprived of a clean blood supply. The old wives’ tale that vampires liked nubile virgins perhaps had some root in the sensitivity of vampires to tainted blood. If you had a virgin on your hands then you could avoid drinking the blood of a syphilitic. But since STDs were not the only awful diseases humans carried, that did not provide much protection against anything.
The boy had remarked about her lack of furniture. The furniture could be explained by a recent move, but the lack of food … yes, she must do something about that.
Atl sighed and put away the sugar cubes.
It was hard to think about those kinds of things. She wasn’t used to keeping up appearances. She hadn’t needed to. Back north, Atl had her mother and her sister and a host of servants to take care of her. The North was like a great oozing wound, and the vampires drank from it freely. Mexico City … it was not friendly to her kind. But she’d run out of options.
This was it. Her safe haven.
She hated the apartment, though. She hated the color of its walls and the scratches on the kitchen counters, the ancient dirt in the bath tiles and the way the pipes rattled. She hated the smell of it, the smell of the whole city. Dirty. When it rained, it smelled like wet garbage—and it rained constantly. The stench was worse in the subway, but she forced herself to take it. She lacked a license and ID papers, no way she could drive. Taxis were an option, but she was afraid of getting in an unknown vehicle. No place to run, there. It was better to brave the subway, to walk down the filthy streets with her umbrella. And she’d found him in the subway, at any rate, so good things did come from that place.
Domingo.
Atl wondered if she had made the right choice. Her instinct and her upbringing compelled her to drag her food to her lair, but she still did not know if this was wise, if the way she’d handled him was foolish or efficient. And yet, what other alternative did she have? If she had fed in the streets, someone could have seen her. The same went for the cheap motels that charged by the hour. Too many nosy people, both cops and criminals.
There were other problems. A willing donor, for example. Procuring a prostitute from the streets meant dealing with a pimp, and Atl did not want to pick a fight with a brute who thought she was bruising the merchandise.
No, too much trouble there. That narrowed the options. Young blood … Twice before she had found street kids sleeping in alleys. They were both out stone cold. She fed from them: no pimp, though she feared the eyes of vagrants upon her.
It was risky. Besides, the blood of the street kids was bitter from the cheap drugs and booze running through their veins. It gave Atl a headache and cramps. It almost made it worse than starving.
Atl had decided to change her tactics. Domingo had looked clean. No telltale signs of drug use. He smelled healthy, too. His blood, when she tasted it, was warm and sweet. Old blood, sick blood, drugged blood: that was like feasting on carrion. Finally she had found a fresh, delicious meal.
She must make it last. She must conserve her energy. Atl drummed her fingers against the ceramic cup. There was plenty of time before sunrise. Unlike European vampires, Atl could handle the sun, though it weakened her. It required too much energy to move through the city in the daytime. She must save her strength. This meant sleeping longer.