A Girl's Guide to Guns and Monsters - Martin Harry Greenberg [79]
Seven o’clock came and went. I circled Kelly’s five times, expanding my search for parking by an additional block with each circuit. Saturday night at Kelly’s with Holly singing, I should expect something else? Wherever Holly sang her unique blend of traditional Celtic music, her own compositions, and upon occasion, parodies of science fiction/fantasy themes known as filk, she drew a capacity crowd.
I finally settled into a ten- level parking structure and forked over an exorbitant price for it. Then I had to trek through a less than savory part of town.
“Can you spare a buck for a cup of coffee,” a scruffy man whispered from a darkened doorway.
I hurried my steps past him and the sour wine and vomit odors of eau de neglect that permeated the neighborhood.
“Dear Scrap, wish you were here,” I composed a virtual postcard. I’m a Warrior of the Celestial Blade, trained in a variety of weapons. If I found myself weap-onless and couldn’t defend myself, I knew how to flee danger.
Yeah, right. When had I ever been prudent and fled?
I was on my own without a weapon. I had only the dubious pen and notebook in my purse, and my wits. Subtly I shifted the pen to my skirt pocket. Despite the cool of the evening it felt warm in my hand. An idea slithered around my brain. I scribbled it into the notebook as I walked.
The bouncer at the front door recognized me and passed me into the standing-room-only bar and grill. I was still scribbling when I spotted Holly discussing arcane equipment and settings with the sound engineer.
“Tess, you’re a lifesaver!” Holly Shannon said as she threw her arms around me. Tendrils of her bright red mane tickled my nose and threatened to curl into my mouth.
That edge of nervous laughter still clung to her voice. Her substantial body felt stiff and fragile in my arms. She clung a little too long for casual friendship, her fingers tight with anxiety.
“The crowd is really jumping tonight,” I said, looking around at the laughing patrons who raised glasses of beer and ate the excellent sandwiches, hamburgers, or corned beef platters. A series of loud guffaws drowned out the piped-in overly romanticized Irish ballads.
“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Holly said quietly into my ear. Not something to share with others.
I beckoned her to a tiny backroom. Cement walls muffled the noise to a dull roar.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, rounding on her as soon as I was sure of some privacy.
“Um.” Holly looked around warily.
“Spill it, Holly. We’re friends.”
A frisson of alarm climbed my spine and set my scar to throbbing. I don’t believe in coincidences. I land in situations like this for a reason.
And it had to happen on the one night in four years that Scrap had taken off for elsewhere.
“It’s been happening a lot around town. A musician gathers a larger than usual crowd. They start off pumped.” She hung her head, letting that fabulous hair swing forward, masking her face. (I’d give my eyeteeth for hair like that. Or hair that behaved. My short, dirty blonde, wire-tight curls never did what I wanted.) She forgot that at five-seven, she topped me by a good five inches. Dropping her face brought her closer to eye contact.
“What’s been happening? You should be thrilled with a crowd like this.”
“By the end of the show the crowd is listless, silent, dragging their feet, almost too tired to walk back to their cars.”
“Not good.”
“Last week a young man fell asleep at the wheel on the way home from my concert. He’s still in critical condition,” she wailed.
“Oh, my God!”
“The entire audience acted as if a vampire had fed on them. All of them!”
“There’s no such thing as a vampire,” I insisted, as much to reassure myself as her. “No one gets to come back from the dead.”
“Not a blood vampire,” she whispered. “A psychic vampire.”
I didn’t laugh. I hung out at the science fiction/fantasy conventions. Psychics got invited frequently. Where psychics gathered, so did those who needed to feed on their energy to fill a lack in their own personality or mental