The Darkest Colors Read online

  “What? No! God, no!” Raina cried. “Jesus, Lisa! What the hell?”

  “Well, isn’t that what you’re getting at?” Lisa immediately shot back with a shrug. “I mean, I can read the writing on the walls as well as anyone else. Everyone knows you’ve been hanging out with her, and anyone that’s met her already knows what she’s like. They might give you crap about it, but I don’t. It’s none of my business, and it’s none of theirs, either. I mean, you are who you are, and if that’s what you’re into, then I’m not going to judge you for it…”

  “Stop it, already! For Pete’s sake, just stop with it! What the hell is wrong with everyone, lately? I’m not fucking gay!” Raina exclaimed, throwing her hands in the air. “Good God, I just had this conversation with Brenna earlier this morning, and now I’ve gotta hear it from you, too? Do I have ‘I am a lesbian’ tattooed on my forehead, or something? Do I look like a friggin’ lesbo or something?”

  “No, no, of course not. I just…”

  “All I wanted to do was tell you that I’m quitting my job, dammit!”

  Lisa just stared at her for a few moments in complete silence, her elegant Asian features contorted into an unusual expression of shock and regret. “You’re quitting? Are you serious?”

  “Yes, I’m serious! I just dropped a note on Gretchen’s desk a minute ago and turned in my locker keys,” Raina declared with an exasperated sigh, rubbing another random itch at her waistline.

  “But … why? I mean, just the other day, you were talking about how you’re so glad to be out of retail, and how you’re thinking about going back to school to be a med tech…?”

  “Yeah, well, that was before my world went down the toilet,” she sighed as she unbuttoned her cuff and rolled up the sleeve of her blouse to show the two subtle marks at the bend of her right elbow.

  Her own eyes grew wide at the sight. There were no longer any marks to show, aside from a very slight reddish discoloration that remained of the once horrid-looking purple bruise. However, what she lacked in evidence of her injection was more than offset by the disturbing discovery that the very fine, light hairs of her forearm were shedding at an alarming rate. Even as she raked her nails over the surface of her skin, a slight snow of tiny hairs fell from her arm.

  “Oh, now, that’s attractive,” Raina muttered under her breath.

  Lisa grabbed her arm and looked closely at the remaining bruise and then the loosening of her hair. She knew enough about the medical aspects of vampirism to come to an immediate conclusion, drawing away from her abruptly with a gasp.

  “Oh, my God,” she cried, touching her fingers to her lips as she regarded her friend with something akin to terror. “Raina … seriously? You’re taking on the Change?”

  As quickly and concisely as she could manage, Raina gave Lisa the most honest version of the prior night’s events that she could offer. So much for the Grand Duchess’s request to trust no one and keep her Change a secret. Lisa seemed to regard her with a thinly masked reaction of skepticism, folding her arms under her breasts and cocking her hips slightly. She quickly picked up on her disbelief, and ended her pitch abruptly.

  “Please, Lisa, don’t give me that look,” Raina sighed as she buttoned the cuff of her sleeve again.

  Her friend blinked as though she’d been caught dozing. “What look?”

  “That look you always give people when you think they’re feeding you a line of crap. I’ve seen you use it on salesmen before,” she said. Raina paused, then backed away from her a full step, holding up her hands. “Look, I shouldn’t even be telling you any of this in the first place, okay? The less you know about this mess, the better. I thought I’d tell you, myself, because I figured that I owed it to you as my friend. But if you’re just going to stand there and tell me that I’m full of shit…”

  “I never said that, Raina.”

  “You didn’t have to say it,” she countered. “That look you were giving me was more than enough.”

  Lisa opened her mouth to say something, and then stopped herself. She reconsidered her words, then finally said, “Well … it just seems too … convenient, I guess.”

  “Convenient? Are you freakin’ kidding me? As of right now, I’m officially unemployed! I’m losing everything that I’ve got and getting flown off to God-knows-where by people I don’t even know! Hell, I’m even going to be losing my fucking navel, for Christ’s sake!” Raina exclaimed, scratching at the small of her back. “Hell, I’ll probably even be losing my head to Countess Wilhelmina before too long. Does that sound convenient to you? Do you honestly think I wanted to get mixed up in this kind of drama? Seriously, do you really even give a shit?”

  Lisa seemed to immediately back away from the position she’d begun to take against Raina, waving her hands as she said, “Raina, please, just … chill! Okay? I’m not trying to call you a liar.”

  Raina gave her a raised eyebrow. “Then … what?”

  “I … I’m not sure.” She paused, rubbing her temples as though she suddenly had a headache, while Raina began itching at her own stomach. “This is just … really, really weird.”

  “And the award for Understatement of the Year goes to…”

  “I mean, again, I’m not calling you a liar, Raina … but…”

  “But if it sounds like a duck and quacks like a duck…?” Raina said immediately, rolling her eyes and letting her arms flop to her sides. “Jesus, if I thought you were going to be like this about it…”

  “Hang on, wait. Look … look at me a second,” Lisa demanded, spinning her friend back around with a tug upon her arm. The motion made Raina’s slightly dizzied condition only worse, enough that Lisa had to catch her before she could fall. “God, are you all right?”

  As soon as she regained her balance, Raina shrugged Lisa’s hands away. “No! No, I’m not all right! I’m pretty fucking far from all right!” And, too late to stop them, Raina felt tears spilling from her eyes as her throat constricted. “Look, just … just forget it. You’re gonna draw your own conclusions about this no matter what I say, so why even bother? I’ll just say goodbye right now, and if I wind up dead tonight or whenever, then … whatever. It was nice knowing you.”

  She turned and began to make her way towards the ramp leading outside. Lisa hesitated for a moment or two before she hurried along to walk beside her.

  “Listen,” she said after a few seconds, “if you’re really serious about all of this, then at least let me help you.”

  Removing her sunglasses to wipe away her tears as she continued walking, Raina answered, “I appreciate it, but really … it’d be better if you didn’t. I don’t want you to get tangled up in this. I never wanted anything to do with this whole High Court thing, either, but look what’s happened to me already!”

  “I can help you with your Change,” she offered. “I know it takes a lot out of a person when they go through it. You’re already starting yours right now, so you probably shouldn’t be driving, anyway.”

  “Why not?”

  “Well … c’mon, look at yourself! You can barely even walk straight. You’re dizzy, sweating, shedding, itching, and…” Lisa laid the back of her hand against Raina’s damp forehead. “…God, you’re burning up! You’ve got a fever going on. You do not need to be behind the wheel of a car right now.”

  “I drove myself down here, didn’t I?” Raina replied with a shrug.

  “Probably not the smartest thing to do, though. And you did say something about being hung over from last night, too,” she responded. “Do you want to add a drunk-driving conviction to the list of stuff you’ve already got to deal with right now?”

  “I’m not drunk, I’m just sick, okay?” Feeling a foul, bitter taste in her mouth that had only become worse since she’d arrived, she began to rummage through her purse. “Do you have, like, a piece of gum or something? I’ve got some serious butt breath going on…”

  Immediately, Lisa whipped out a pack of chewing gum from her pocket and handed it to her frie
nd. “C’mon, at least let me give you a ride, for crying out loud. You’re obviously going through the Change way faster than normal. Who knows what kind of symptoms you might start developing while you’re at it? I mean, what if you start having a seizure while you’re on the highway?”

  “Then I’ll just drive without my seatbelt on,” Raina answered. “That way if I do have a seizure, I’ll drive into a light pole, take a nose-dive through the windshield, and die instantly. Problem solved.”

  She unwrapped the stick of gum and slid it between her lips, wadding the wrapper quickly before dropping it into her purse with the twenty or so other foil wrappers. It was one of those types of super-minty gum with those flavor crystal things in it, she noted, as she felt a bit of crunching as she began to chew it. She was about to say something else when she felt something warm and juicy in her mouth that felt like it came from the gum itself. That was, of course, until she bit down one last time, felt a really hard crunch, and felt other things in her mouth turn loose in the same instant. She halted abruptly in her tracks and winced with the surprise of pain, covering her mouth as she fought the urge to immediately spit out her gum.

  “What’s wrong?” Lisa asked, watching as Raina took her hand away from her lips and found them heavily smeared with blood. “Oh, wow…”

  Raina stood with panicked indecision for a moment, looking around for something to spit into – a wastebasket, a box, a cup, or whatever would suffice. The hallway was as empty as ever. Rather than doubling back to make a run for the lab, where she would surely cause a big scene and alert everyone in the world to her condition, she half-ran to the ramp and made her way up it as quickly as possible. She couldn’t quite run, though she would have if she weren’t otherwise so dizzy. As it was, she already found herself practically bouncing off the concrete walls as she hurried into the heat of the early day’s sunlight, smearing a few bloody handprints upon the wall as she made her final exit from the hospital. Lisa finally took her arm to help her along as they rushed for the end of the ramp that met up with the south parking lot area. At the end of the ramp, Raina grabbed hold of the trash barrel that was chained to the railing of the sidewalk parallel to the ramp, yanked off the lid, and bent over it as she spat the contents of her mouth into her hand. The amount of blood and saliva she expelled wasn’t truly a lot, but its bright red crimson color in the almost blinding light of the sun, as well as the sight of two of her adult teeth in her hand, was enough to suddenly make her dizzy with horror.

  “Wow. See, kids?” Raina said almost drunkenly as she stared at her lost molars, seeing spots of color before her eyes again. “Candy really will rot your teeth out.”

  “Oh God, Raina,” Lisa gasped with horror. “How far along are you?”

  “I told you, I’m not pregnant!”

  “No, dammit! Your Change! How long ago did it start?”

  “I … I dunno.”

  “When did you say you took the Com— … uh … I mean, when do you think it started?” she asked, obviously refraining from blurting what she still suspected had happened. “How many days ago were you exposed?”

  Raina spat another bloody mouthful of saliva into the trash, feeling quite unladylike. “Last night.”

  “What?”

  “Last night,” she repeated, just as her legs began to give out. She clung to the rim of the metal trash barrel to hold herself up as she fell to her knees, banging her chin upon the edge as she buckled. The impact made another crunch in her mouth, and she felt more things turning loose. She hoped that nobody was watching.

  “This is insane, Raina. We’ve gotta get you to the ER,” Lisa said as she began to help her friend back to her feet. Raina leaned over the trashcan again, paused to spit more teeth out into her hand, and then waved her friend off.

  “Forget it. I can’t. They’ll kill me.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous! This is our hospital! They know who you are, and the ER is right there,” Lisa insisted, pointing to the entrance up the sidewalk and across the helipad near where a helicopter crew was preparing to take off. “Let me walk you over there, and…”

  “Not them!” she insisted, straining to hang onto her consciousness. “The others! The crazy chick and … and her friends … and stuff…”

  “Raina…”

  “Please! Please, just … take me home,” she pleaded, grabbing Lisa’s shoulder as firmly as she could with her left (and un-bloodied) hand. Her speech was horribly slurred by the strange new feel of the inside of her mouth and its sudden loss of a few teeth. “Just, like … call a cab for me. Something. I don’t care. Just let me get outta here. But don’t … don’t tell anyone. Please. Don’t let anyone know about this.”

  Lisa hesitated for a moment, let out a reluctant sigh, and then reached into the canvas bag still slung over her shoulder. She unscrewed the cap on a bottle of water and handed it to her friend as Raina leaned against the sidewalk railing, still covering her mouth with her hand.

  Begrudgingly, she said, “Look, I’m parked pretty close to here. Just wait right here, and I’ll come pick you up. Okay?”

  Raina sat down upon the warm concrete curb of the sidewalk next to the trash bin, opened the bottle of water with her clean hand, and poured a bit over her other hand to rinse away some of the blood. She wiped her face clean as best she could, although she didn’t have a mirror on hand to see whether it had made things any better or worse, and she swished a bit around in her mouth to try to rid herself of the oral carnage.

  The taste of her own blood was strange, not at all what she remembered it having been like in the past, such as when she accidentally had bitten the inside of her cheek about a week ago. The coppery, rusty sort of metallic flavor was there as ever before, but there was not the usual bitterness and alarming instinctive fright that came with the taste and/or scent of blood. Perhaps it was because of the chewing gum, she figured, because the already cool water felt positively icy upon her tongue as she held that mouthful for a few lingering moments with almost drunken bewilderment. She glanced around to see that nobody nearby had yet noticed her unusual behavior, so she turned her head and spat the blood-flavored mouthful of water upon the gravel area near the trash bin. The splash of water was a strange orange-pink color.

  Closing her eyes, she took a quick oral inventory with her tongue and found that she had lost three teeth – her upper and lower rear-most molars – and that several of her other teeth felt sickeningly loose, as well. She had noticed the ache in her teeth some time ago, but had never suspected that it might be related to the impending development of her vampiric dental structure. There was no way, no way at all, that she could have already begun to grow a new full set of teeth in just the past few hours. The physiology of it didn’t even make sense. It just couldn’t happen that fast. But then, perhaps it didn’t need to. Her body, having had a new string of DNA forcibly spliced into her natural gene sequence, was regarding certain features of her body as being foreign objects, or evolutionary waste, and it was shrugging them off as quickly as possible because they were “wrong.” Out with the old, in with the new.

  Raina knew enough about the Change in the past, especially after Brenna’s description the previous night of what to expect, to know that these things did not happen overnight. True, the Change took place at a phenomenal rate, causing things to grow that normally would take weeks or months (or longer) in just a few days’ time. But her exposure to vampirism had only been … what, twelve to fourteen hours ago? The sort of symptoms that she was experiencing should not have begun to take place until at least the second or third day into the Change. To say that her loss of bodily hair and the loosening of her teeth at that point were alarming would be a gross understatement; as she paused to consider this, her head dizzy now with stress as well as her fever, Raina found true panic creeping in around the edges of her psyche.

  How could her body just manufacture a new set of permanent, adult-sized teeth on such short notice? How could her internal organs cope with the assa
ult of what was essentially a super-powerful pathogen attacking almost every system of her body at once? Everything within her was receiving a new set of directives, a new list of priorities. For all she knew, her insides were literally shuffling about inside of her torso like a bunch of small creatures playing Musical Chairs in slow-motion. As much as her stomach growled and other things cramped and clenched, that vision very well could have been true. Who was paying the bill for this remodeling project? Where was her body going to get the resources it needed for the Change? What if she went over budget? Would the Grim Reaper show up to repossess her life for lack of payment?

  She already knew the answers to those unspoken and delirious questions. Unless she fed herself with everything she would need, as quickly and plentifully as possible, her body would begin to cannibalize itself in order to get the nutrients and organic building blocks that it needed to conduct the Change. This was how people died. This was how bloodlust began. If she failed to feed the initial demand of her body’s hungers, she would literally shrink in upon herself and die of malnourishment in a short period of time. If she consumed just enough to avoid death, but not enough to satisfy her physical needs, it was possible that the Change would alter her mental state to an instinctive default mode, and she would violently fling herself upon the first person (or creature) within reach.

  True, she could not tear open anyone’s neck with fangs that she had not yet developed, but nobody with a gun would likely hesitate to shoot her in self-defense in such a scenario, either. A vampire possessed by uncontrolled bloodlust was legally considered to have gone rogue and, thus, was perfectly legal to shoot on sight. And if such a condition overtook her after she had been given sufficient time to develop her fangs, as well as her other vampiric predatory traits, there was no way at all that she could possibly cope with the emotional aftermath of coming to her senses to find that she had killed someone in a fit of bloodlust.

  Just the same, no jury would ever take sympathy upon a vampire for murdering an innocent human being. Her defense could not simply rely upon the simple statement, “I just couldn’t control myself.” It had been tried in the past, and in more than one instance, always with the same result: a swift guilty verdict, and an even swifter execution of the condemned vampire. There was no such thing as a fair trial for vampires – not really. Vampires were never called upon to serve for jury duty, and it would be nearly impossible to expect any group of people to exonerate a monster for being forced to commit an act due to a condition that could not truly be fathomed by any human.