Blood Isn't Always Thicker Than Water

To cut it short, I didn’t pass the driving test with flying colors. Hannah had to help me out a bit and use some of her, um, abilities, but I did pass. In one week. It was amazing that I did, considering the fact that Sacha had whispered directions in my ear throughout the whole thing. They didn’t really help that much, but it was nice to know he cared to any extent.

I sprang into the room with the really long table and the über gigantic fireplace that I fell into way back when. For some reason, this was where everyone hung out. Probably because it was a room with an actual heat source. The Furnace didn’t seem too keen on doing its job. “Samantha!” I called.

She looked up from some random thing she was reading. “Yeah?”

“I’m a licensed driver!” I shoved the proof in her face. AKA my driver’s license.

She stood up and hugged me. “I almost can’t believe it! The Prince of Vampires is a licensed driver.” She let me go. “Now, it’s my turn.”

I laughed, pushing her arms back to her sides gently. “Good luck.” Then I did one of those Cool Guy poses, using my brand new black leather jacket. “It’s not as easy as it looks.”

She snorted/scoffed. “Keep talking, mister.”

“Caspian, my brotha!” Fallen paraded into the room, closely followed by Pete and George. “Congrats!”

Sacha was riding on Pete’s shoulder, holding onto the Guardian’s ear.

“Ooh, Pete, Starling’s out,” Samantha said.

Sacha suddenly looked very alert. I then noticed that there appeared to be a second fairy, sitting on the long table with its four lonely chairs. The blazing fire reflected dully off the little female fairy’s navy blue hair. She looked very dainty and wore a pretty revealing blue dress. Her skin was tinted blue, as well.

“Starling?” I asked, looking at the little blue girl. She started swinging her tiny feet that were enveloped in royal blue moccasins. “She’s pretty.”

Why thank you, a voice said in my head.

“She talks to people that way,” Samantha explained when I grabbed my head in alarm.

“Okay. So…I’m not going crazy?”

Don’t be too sure.

“Oh, shut up,” I told the small fairy.

“Sorry, she’s like that,” Samantha said.

Sacha was gazing hungrily at the miniscule beauty container, eyes flashing madly in the flickering firelight. Hannah had appeared to have also added candles to the chandelier.

“If your dick is usually the size of an inch worm,” I told the outlaw, “I bet it’s the size of a cockroach now.”

I lay idly in bed and started thinking, Wow. Being Prince really isn’t that hard. My life was totally normal, except for being surrounded by more people than I usually was. And I always knew where Pete and Hannah were. Even though I knew that they meant me no harm, I still could sense their extremely dangerous presences.

Oh. Also, one more abnormal happening: I hadn’t slept in twelve days. And I wasn’t even tired. Twelve days ago, I became Prince. Today I asked everyone about when Lady Ivy was coming back—she could tell me if the King had had sleeping disorders too—but everyone shrugged in reply, except for Fallen who asked if I was anxious to see Lancaster again and Pete who told me that a lot of legal stuff and papers were involved. Turns out Lancaster was sent out by Pete to act as me—or Eli Marcus Carver, in this case. Lancaster does look a smidge like me, and contacts could take care of the eye color problem.

“Finally tired?”

I looked across the room to see Sandy striding toward me. One of the blankets in my divider had fallen to the floor after all of these years. I was not a talented seamstress—I mean seamster. I just had very efficient luck.

Say anything different, and I’ll send you one of Sandy’s fingers in an envelope. And when you open it, the finger will do the most horrifyingly devastating thing it can do…

WIGGLE!!

How anticlimactic.

“I’m as awake as ever,” I said, pushing the covers off me. I was in a muscle shirt—I am uncomfortable with the terms “wife beater” and “tank top” when referring to my own attire—and sweatpants. Top, white; bottom, black. Seriously, even my sheets were white and my comforter or top blanker or whatever was black. At least my bed was made of brown wood. It put some color into the picture. “And this is my room. Scram.”

He smirked. “I’m your personal servant, dude. I ain’t gonna jus’ leave cuzza old territorial issues ya got.”

I glared at him, but didn’t go into another crazy raging spasm like I had a week ago. “Fine. I’ll make an exception.”

Then it occurred to me that I hadn’t seen Monty all day.

“Sandy… Have you seen Monty?”

“The black and white fuzzball?”

“That’s the one.”

“Nope.” Sandy plopped onto the bed across from me, staying on top of the covers.

I frowned. “Neither have I.” Then I shrugged. “He’ll show up when he wants to.” I lay down and pulled the covers up to my chin. “I just hope he hasn’t eaten anything bad.” I turned onto my left side and closed my eyes, concentrating on accessing my chemicals.

Sandy shimmied under the blankets and crawled over to me. He wound his arms around my neck from behind me, then his chest slowly started melding into my back.

I stared gloomily into the semidarkness. “This is so wrong on so many levels; I can’t even begin to explain it.”

“Well, sorry if I’m kinda cold-blooded and yer an excessively warm piece uh’ work.”

I sighed. “Nice to know how you think of me.”

I closed my eyes, and opened them again once the first ray of sun hit the floor of my bedroom.

Day thirteen. And still not a wink of sleep. It’s been almost two weeks[/i[! A fortnight! What was wrong with me?

I slowly dragged myself out of bed and descended the spiral stairs, still in my pajamas, still with Sandy snoring peacefully while molded against me.

I caught my cape as it came flying after me. I calmly rolled it up and tossed it back into my room.

I then almost tripped and fell down the next flight of stairs. Luckily, I stopped myself just in time and avoided falling into Lancaster, who was staring up at me from the bottom of the stairs.

I, however, was staring at the rat that had almost tripped me. “Freaky McHorrific?”

The early morning sunlight reflected redly off his retinas. “Good eye, Prince.”

“What’re you doing here?”

“Well, I’m Hannah's pet, now, aren’t I? Like that Monty thing is to you.”

“Have you seen Monty this morning?”

He shook his rat-head. “No sirree. Haven’t seen him since yesterday.”

I nodded. “Thanks.”

“Eh, don’t mention it.” He scurried of.

“Hey, Lancaster,” I said and waved to him. “Welcome back.”

“Thanks,” he replied, his cheeks tinged pink a bit.

“I want breakfast.” I slid down the stairs’ railing and landed lightly next to Lancaster. “Wanna come with?”

He nodded, looking a bit enraptured.

I don’t need fan girls like the ones George has. This guy is enough.

In the kitchen, we joined Samantha and Pete at the table. Lady Ivy was drinking some sort of steaming beverage in front of a window facing the sunrise.

I swiped probably ten sausages off the revived stove—I don’t know how it was brought back to life—and crashed into my chair before devouring the meat in the time it took for Lancaster to get his sausages and situate himself at the table. I stood up as he sat down and opened a red cooler Fallen had set on the floor by the fridge a few days ago. We couldn’t use the fridge because of Wally, our personal green monster, so this was where we kept all need-to-be-refrigerated goods, and, most importantly, blood. I opened one of the packets and drained it. I hadn’t had any blood in about a month. It tasted really good, and I felt rejuvenated.

“Ahh… That’s the stuff.” I threw the empty packet into the trash and sat back down after pulling two more packets out. Fallen would probably get really pissed off, but I couldn’t help it. I was really thirsty. Lancaster was only on his second sausage.

“Cas…what does that stuff taste like?” Samantha asked curiously.

“Um,” I stalled, putting my hands behind my head and tilting my chair back. Sandy had slid down my back a little, so I had enough space to fit my hands there. I frowned some then said, “I guess the human equivalent would be either wine, beer, or soda—most likely seltzer.”

Samantha frowned. “Why those three?”

“Well… Old people’s blood seems kinda fermented and a bit tart like wine. Middle-aged people have a strong, meaningful taste, and it’s sometimes kind of bitter. They’re like the beer. Then kids and young teens—sometimes even young adults—have the clear, sharp, almost bubbly taste of soda. It’s not as sweet though, so that’s why I said seltzer. It’s always tasted kinda…salty to me. But the blood… It’s like their liveliness is in the blood—that the blood is carrying life. Which, if you think about it, it kinda is.”

Pete turned in his chair to look at Lady Ivy. His hair was all messed up, and I could tell that he had had a good night’s sleep. Sam’s alertness and bright eyes showed that it was the same for her. Sandy’s snoring could still faintly be heard. Lancaster seemed to be drifting off a bit. All of these people slept on a daily basis.

Bitches…

“Do you think so?” Pete asked Lady Ivy. “Is the taste of blood the same for you?”

She smiled gently. “Yes. Exactly the same.” Her handcuffs glinted brightly in the sunlight.

“Hey, didn’t you guys go and get my stuff from Marietta?” I asked, setting my chair back onto all of its legs.

Lancaster nodded, smiling broadly, no longer existing halfway between consciousness and unconsciousness. “It was so much fun being you. I got to act as crazy as I wanted!”

“And he still wasn’t crazy enough,” Lady Ivy said. “Lancaster is much too calm to act you out.”

He shrugged. “But no one outside of us knows what you’re like. So it was fine.”

I nodded and began to attempt to wake up Sandy. I tugged on his hair and tried desperately to avoid getting a finger or more caught in his gelly body.

“Caspian, is it possible that you were arrested in 2007? It was on your record as something the authority wasn’t sure about,” Lancaster said.

I nodded. “I stole some bread and stuff while I was crossing the country. The police caught me, chucked me toward a cruiser—”

“Don’t you mean into a cruiser?” Samantha pointed out.

I shook my head. “You of all people should know how much cared freaked me out.”

She nodded.

“And now you’re a licensed driver,” Pete said thoughtfully.

I nodded. “Oh, the irony. Anyway, I ran away from the police before they could get me into the car—or even get my picture. But my face is probably stamped into their memories, since I totally outran them in an epic car chase.”

Pete started laughing. “You outran police cars?”

I nodded yes. “Then I ran into a nearby lake and they couldn’t follow me. And all for a loaf of bread…”

Lancaster was gazing at me like I was the most amazing thing on the face of the Earth. “You just get better and better, don’t you?” He blushed right afterward and Samantha made an awkward face while Pete stifled a laugh. Lady Ivy had slipped out of the room a while ago.

“What’s so funny?” I asked Pete.

He stopped almost-laughing. “You…don’t get that? The double meaning to what he just said?”

I blinked innocently at him. “What double meaning?”

He stared incredulously at me.

I blinked again, then: “OH! Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!!” My face heated up. “I’m not gay! I’ve never done anything like that!”

George came to a confused stop in the doorway.

“Shut up,” I grumbled in his direction. As he piled his share of sausages onto a plate, I made to stand up. At first, I thought I had fallen down and was sitting on the chair again. Then I realized that the chair had followed me, by means of Sandy.

Half man, half spindly piece of furniture, half gel monster. AKA the Prince of Vampires. What a nice spectacle, eh?

Oh no, I’m going Canadian. And I don’t like hockey or huge-massive-gigantic loads of maple freakin’ syrup on my pancakes!

What is wrong with you? Starling’s coldish voice asked.

“That’s what everyone thinks at first,” I said. To everyone else in the room it must have seemed to be a pretty out of the blue thing to say. “Starling,” I replied as an answer to their questioning looks.

“Hey, can I show you what you got from Marietta?” Lancaster asked, hazel eyes bright with hope.

I shrugged “Why not? Ooh, did I get a car?”

“That reminds me,” Pete said, and started digging in his pockets. He pulled out something shiny, and, of course, my interest levels reached their peak. “This is a sign of trust, Cas,” Pete said, giving me a weirdly fatherly eye. “Take care.”

I caught the glinting object as it flew through the air. I thought I heard George reluctantly mumbled, “Nice technique,” but I ignored him and started studying what I held in my hands.

Oh wow duh. It was a set of keys. One of them was tarnished gold and slightly shorter than the sleek, brand new-looking silver one next to it. Also on the key ring was this little card. It was black on one said and the other side had a barcode thingy on it and a whole jumble of numbers in a line underneath. “What’re these for?” I asked, admiring the shine of the silver key. “Like, why do I have two car keys?”

Pete shook his head. “That silver one is a car key. The gold one is a master key. It’ll open almost any lock you can fit it into. Now, I trust you not to behave rashly with this. Don’t abuse its power.”

I nodded. “It’s like my being Prince. I can’t abuse my power over the vampire nation, either.” And don’t I just sound like a dweeb.

Pete nodded acceptingly. “I’m glad you see it like that.”

Dweeb addict…

“But,” I began, “what’s with this card thing? What the hell do I use it for?”

“That’s the thing I worry about the most, Cas. It may look to be the most harmless thing on that ring, but I believe it’s the most dangerous.” Pete was giving me some sort of dark look.

“Just tell him what the damn thing is, already,” George requested heatedly.

“Fine,” Pete said, sounding a bit whiny. “It’s a credit card.”

The chair that had been stuck to my back fell to the ground with a hug clatter. Lancaster pointed to it. “Was that planned?”

I shook my head, staring at the tiny little plastic card. It looked much too small to be a credit card. But I wasn’t complaining. “Where does it take money from?” I asked cautiously.

“A savings account I made of the money you got from selling the manor, succeeding King William—quarter goes to you; the rest goes to Ivy—the inheritance from your father and your inheritance from Marietta.” Pete paused for a second. “Enough fuckin’ jabber. Lancaster, get him outta here. Finish showing him his stuff, ’cause tonight…” Pete looked at Samantha and George for a second, “we’re talking business.”

I gave him a two-fingered salute then got dragged outside by Lancaster, after throwing away the empty packets of blood. We almost crashed into Hannah in one of the hallways and had to steer clear of a brooding Balto who was lying dejectedly in front of Jeremy’s door. Then, when we reached the lawn, beyond the creaky old deep brown wooden door, I stopped in my tracks. “There is abso-fuckin’-lutely no way that Marietta owned that,” I proclaimed, stealing Jeremy’s "abso-freakin'-lutely" and revising it from that time when he had been staring at the J*nas Br*thers for too long.

Lancaster smiled broadly, standing next to me. “I wouldn’t have gone down to Las Vegas and endured the endless hours of paperwork for anything less,” he said. “And my parents are probably freaking the hell out right now.”

I ran forward and stopped right in front of the nastiest sports car I had ever seen. It was sleek, black, completely aerodynamic, and—best of all—shiny. It was so perfect, I couldn’t bring myself to lay a finger on it. All I could do was admire it. Everything was either black or silver. The windows were tinted (black, of course) but I could just manage to see inside and make out the smooth leather seats that resided there. My insides squirmed at the luxurious sight.

Then, something caught by eye. I sprang to the front, and stared at one of those little figurines they sometimes put on the noses of cars. Like, for instance, the horses that rear up on the hood of a Mustang. This, however, begged to differ from normal standards. “It’s the Batmobile reincarnated!” I proclaimed, pointing a finger to the unmistakable form of a vampire bat. You could tell by the webbed wings with claw-like whatevers on the tips of finger-like bones going through the wings and outrageously large incisors. “What the hell is this thing? It’s a freakin’ weapon!” I let my fingers trail over the impeccably clean black rubber of a tire.

“Pete insisted. Said it was only fit for a Prince of Vampires to have a car that went with the part.” He shot a nervous glance at me. “Um…wanna take it for a rest drive?”

“Hell yes!!” I crowed, then wrapped my deathly pale fingers around the handle of the driver’s seat’s door. It felt like this whole thing was crafted to fit me—made for me. It was indescribably amazing as I sat down behind the wheel and let myself mold into the buttery leather of the seat.

Then I heard a squelching sound, and the good feeling was gone. “Aw, crap…” Sandy was still on my back.

Lancaster landed in the passenger seat and it took him a second to realize why I looked so down. “Oh…” he murmured. I then grabbed a chunk of Sandy’s hair and yanked on it. Really hard. Using vampire strength.

“LORD JESUS ALMIGHTY!” Sandy screamed. “What was that for?!”

I had accidentally pulled the thing of hair out.

“Oops…” I whispered.

“‘Oops’ is right,” Sandy agreed, rubbing his head.

“Sorry,” I continued sheepishly, staring in disbelief at the clump of hair in my hand. “Y…you wouldn’t wake up.”

He began to de-stickify himself from me, and gelled his body back to normal human form. Minus a patch of hair. He looked like he was prematurely balding.

“Gee, Caspian. A bit harsh, don’t you say?” Lancaster asked, one eyebrow raised.

I simply shrugged, eyes still transfixed on the blonde hunk of hair. Sandy shook out his arms, then wrenched the hair out of my grasp. “Hate it when this happens…” he grumbled, then shoved the roots of the hair back into his scalp.

Lancaster and I gaped in astonishment at the small guy sitting on my lap who was no longer prematurely balding. This was a bit unexpected, even for Sandy.

Sandy noticed our looks of all but despair, and said, “That’s just the beginning.”

Oh shit.