Teeth_ Vampire Tales - Ellen Datlow [38]
The show was over. The audience had departed, drunk on alcohol and circus magic. Lenka’s parents sat in their booth behind their empty glasses and waited for their daughter to come to them.
“I’m not going to cry,” Mama announced.
“There is no reason for crying,” Papa agreed.
Lenka appeared on the other side of the table. She’d changed into jeans and a sweatshirt, but her face was still masked with the garish doll paint.
“Mama,” she said. “Papa. I’m glad you came.”
She sounded less glad than polite. Her father hesitated a moment, then slid out of the booth and hugged her hugely. “Princess mine,” he said. “Berusko. You have become a great artist.” He held her out at arm’s length. “You are well? Your hands are very cold. There is so much to say. You will come eat with us?”
Lenka looked at him gravely. “I can’t, Papa. I’m sorry. I’m on a special diet—it wouldn’t be any fun for any of us.”
Mama joined them. She opened her mouth to scold, to question, her arms half raised to gather her daughter to her. But when Lenka turned to her, smoke eyed, solemn, self-contained, she dropped her arms and said crossly, “We were worried, Lenka.”
“I know, Mama. I’m sorry.”
“And your health?”
A smile flitted over the painted lips. “I’m stronger than I’ve ever been.”
“And happy?” Papa asked.
“Yes,” she said evenly. “Very happy.”
A calico cat leapt up onto the table and meowed.
“I’m sorry,” Lenka repeated.
Her mother nodded once, shortly. “You have duties. Go. We will come again tomorrow.”
“It’s the same show,” Lenka said.
“Even so,” her father said.
The calico meowed again, flowed through the air to her shoulder, and settled around her neck like a furry scarf. Girl and cat looked at the Kubatovs, amber eyes and dark equally calm and disinterested. Then Lenka smiled, a bright performer’s smile, turned, walked through the stage curtain, and was gone.
Vampire Weather
by Garth Nix
“You be home by five, Amos,” said his mother. “I saw Theodore on my way back, and he says it’s going to be vampire weather.”
Amos nodded and fingered the chain of crosses he wore around his neck. Eleven small silver-washed iron crosses, spread two finger widths apart on a leather thong, so they went all the way around. His great-uncle told him once that they’d used to only wear crosses at the front, till a vampire took to biting the backs of people’s necks, like a dog worrying at a rat.
He took his hat from the stand near the door. It was made of heavy black felt, and the rim was wound with silver thread. He looked at his coat and thought about not wearing it, because the day was still warm, even if Theodore said there was going to be a fog later, and Theodore always knew.
“And wear your bracers and coat!” shouted his mother from the kitchen, even though she couldn’t see him.
Amos sighed and slipped on the heavy leather wrist bracers, pulling the straps tight with his teeth. Then he put on his coat. It was even heavier than it looked, because there were silver dollars sewn into the cuffs and shoulders. It was all right in winter, but any other time all that weight of wool and silver was just too hot.
Amos had never even seen a vampire. But he knew they were out there. His own father had narrowly escaped one, before Amos was born. His great-uncle Old Franz had a terrible tangle of white scars across his hand, the mark of the burning pitch that he had desperately flung at a vampire in a vain attempt to save his first wife and oldest daughter.
The minister often spoke of the dangers of vampires, as well as the more insidious spiritual threat of things like the internet, television, and any books that weren’t on the approved list. Apart from the vampires, Amos was quite interested in seeing the dangers the minister talked about, but he didn