Teeth_ Vampire Tales - Ellen Datlow [44]
Amos sat up, and a bucketful of tainted dust fell down his chest and across his legs. It smelled like sulfur and rotten meat, and the reek of it made Amos turn his head and vomit.
As he did so, his mother came close and raised a lantern near his head. When Amos turned to her, she pushed his head back, so that the light fell clear upon his neck.
“He’s bit,” she said heavily. She looked at Amos’s father, who stared blankly, then held out his hand. Young Franz gave him the bloodied stake.
“Father . . . ,” whispered Amos. He reached up to touch his neck. He could, quite horribly, feel the raised lips of two puncture wounds, but when he looked at his fingers, he could see only a tiny speck of blood.
“It is the will of the Lord,” said his father, words echoed by the somber crowd.
He raised the stake above his head.
Amos let himself fall back to the ground and shut his eyes.
But the stake did not enter his heart. He heard someone screaming, “Stop! Grandma! Stop!” and he opened his eyes again and tilted his head forward.
It was Tangerine shouting. She came running through the crowd of villagers, who parted quickly ahead of her but closed up behind as she faltered and stopped by the mound of ash and smoking flesh that had been her grandmother. She had his necklace of crosses in her left hand and a small golden object in her right.
“Another one,” said Amos’s mother. She raised her knife. “A young one. Ready your stake, Jan.”
“No!” shouted Amos. He twisted himself up and grabbed his father’s leg. “She’s human. Look, she’s holding crosses! She’s a person!”
Tangerine looked up from the remains of her grandmother. Her face was wet with more than fog, and her mouth quivered before she was able to get out a word.
“I—I’ve already called the police! And my dad! You can’t kill Amos!”
Amos’s father looked her up and down, the stake held ready in his hand. Then, without taking his eyes off her, he spoke to his wife.
“She’s holding crosses, sure enough.”
The older woman sniffed.
“This isn’t any of your business, outsider. A vampire’s bit my son, and we must do what must be done.”
“But he can be vaccinated!” sobbed Tangerine. “Within twenty-four hours of a bite, it still works.”
“We don’t hold with vaccination,” answered Amos’s mother. She looked at her husband. “Do it.”
“No!” shrieked Tangerine. She threw herself over Amos as Jan raised the stake. Amos put an arm around her and shut his eyes again.
“I said do it, Jan!”
Amos opened his eyes. His father was looking down at him with an expression that he had only ever seen once before, when Jan had broken his favorite chisel, broken it beyond repair.
“My phone is still connected to the 911 operator,” said Tangerine desperately. “Listen!”
She held up the tiny gold object. There was a distant voice speaking from it.
Jan looked at it for a long, long second. For a moment Amos thought he would throw it away, or crush it beneath his heel, but instead he reached out and took it gingerly between two of his thick fingers, as if it was a bug to crush. But he didn’t. Instead he lifted it to within six inches of his face and spoke slowly and heavily.
“This is Jan Korgrim, from New Rufbah. We need an ambulance for a vampire-bit boy. He’ll be by the mailbox. . . .”
The voice spoke from the phone, urgently.
“No, the vampire’s dealt with,” said Jan. He looked at Tangerine, and a dark, angry tone crept into his voice. “I reckon it was an old family one, let loose.”
The 911 operator spoke again, but Jan dropped the phone on the ground and left it there, squawking. His wife looked at him with eyes sharper than her silver knife and turned away. The other villagers followed watchfully, lanterns held high to illuminate the fog, stakes and knives still kept ready.
Only Jan remained, looking down at Amos and Tangerine, all tangled together in the dirt.
“Father, I—”
Jan raised his hand.
“There’s nothing