Iago Wick and the Vampire Queen Read online

  Iago Wick and The Vampire Queen

  Jennifer Rainey

  Iago Wick and The Vampire Queen

  I.

  Michael Locksley led a perfectly boring life until the night the woman in the red dress came crawling through his bedroom window. Yes, crawling. Despite her refined appearance, she had a rather animal tendency to crawl toward him. It was profoundly disturbing and a little alluring all at once. He did not regret inviting her in.

  She smelled of dusty roses, but there was also something pungent and heavy about her scent. Michael surely got a good whiff of it every time she crawled on top of him in bed. He liked the way she smelled, and he liked her. He thought about her as he tended to his duties as clerk at Englewood’s General Store in Marlowe, Massachusetts. If he closed his eyes, he could see her creamy and scandalously uncovered skin, her dark eyes, her red lips.

  After two weeks of sporadically encountering the woman in the bedroom he shared only with a one-eyed cat named Biscuit, Michael started staying up and waiting for her. There was something strange about her—besides the crawling, that is. He was never certain what they had done when she left, as though the night passed in the blink of an eye and all he had to remember it by was a bizarre sense of satisfaction and pleasure. He could remember only hazy details—watery moonlight and the strange, sweet flavor of her mouth.

  He always woke the next morning knowing something remarkable occurred between them. He just couldn’t remember what it was.

  It was peculiar, yes… but it was nothing compared to when he encountered the man in gray.

  Iago Wick did not make trouble. Rather, he looked for the seeds of trouble and encouraged them to sprout and grow.

  There were many people in the world like Michael Locksley, Iago thought as he sat upon the park bench across from Locksley’s small house on the south side of Marlowe. Iago wore his customary gray. He was polished and well-dressed, as any good demon should be, and appeared to be about forty years old, though his true age had recently entered quadruple digits. His brown hair was neatly combed.

  The spring air was perfumed, and the townspeople were out in their frilliest and finest pastels. Marlowe wore spring like a cheap costume. Women with rouged cheeks looked like flowery corpses brought back to life after the winter’s harsh cold. The sunny weather was always uneasy. It rained frequently, and when the sun showed its face, it only made the dark corners of Marlowe seem even darker.

  Easter was coming, the townspeople insisted. Iago could not bring himself to care. It was merely another Sunday certain humans used as an excuse to claim they were closer to their god than another person was to theirs. To a demon such as Iago, it was just another day.

  No, Michael Locksley was the sort of man—and there were many—who was not what he seemed. Not every man with shady eyes is a killer, not every little old woman tottering to church is a saint.

  And not every awkward and gangly general store clerk is entirely blameless.

  “Still waiting on Mr. Locksley?”

  Iago turned to see Dante Lovelace, a handsome man who didn’t give a damn if it was almost Easter and wore his usual conservative ensemble of black, black, and more black.

  “He’s lethargic this morning,” Iago answered as his partner sat beside him. “Any word on our blood-sucking mystery woman?”

  “Indeed. It is as you feared. The Morgans are in town.”

  Iago shook his head. “Of course, they are.” He’d had quite a run of good fortune lately. Leave it to a band of vampires to spoil it. “I’ll simply have to quicken my process. The woman in question is young, inexperienced. She’s overly amorous, as bloodsuckers tend to be.”

  Dante gave a small smile. “I seem to recall someone else who used to engage in more libidinous pursuits to capture sinners’ souls.”

  “Ah, that was before you came along, dear Dante,” Iago said. “No, such lustful tactics lack creativity. Though she is obviously a new member of the Morgan family—and thus, largely unimportant—it would still be lovely to spoil something for the Morgans.”

  The door to Michael Locksley’s house opened, and a sheepish Mr. Locksley stumbled into the sunlight. No burning. No spontaneous explosions. He was still human, though Iago had to admit there was something worm-like about him, too. This new member of the Morgan family wasn’t too concerned with physical beauty or strength, it seemed. Rather, she was a cat toying with a baby bird that had fallen from its nest.

  “Ah, there is our man,” Dante said. “He looks a bit peaked.”

  “He always looks that way,” Iago insisted, and he stood to follow Locksley. “Dinner. The Golden Swine. I will not be late.”

  “You will, but I will forgive you,” Dante called. He stayed upon the bench so that he might enjoy the weather and observe the humans whose lives he was in the business of ruining.

  Invisibility was a stalking demon’s dearest friend, and when obscured by an outcropping of trees on the edge of the park, Iago became invisible to the human eye. He hurried across grass wet and springy from a spring shower and still-damp cobblestones to reach Michael Locksley. Presumably, Locksley was walking to the general store a full—Iago consulted his pocket watch—twenty-two minutes past the time he was supposed to report to the general store. Locksley hobbled and brought a trembling hand to his throat.

  Iago quickened his pace, narrowly avoided a woman pushing a perambulator, and craned his own neck to examine Locksley’s as he gained on him. There was a mere nibble on Locksley’s throat, poorly disguised by a hastily tied necktie and sagging shirt collar. The bloodsucker in question was only marking her territory so far, but vampire was a language Iago did not speak.

  Suddenly, Locksley stumbled a little. He turned off the street and stopped to lean against the brick of a low wall. Locksley closed his eyes and panted as though every monster in the world were chasing him. Admittedly, two monsters chasing him was nothing to sniff at, but he had a long way to go.

  Iago appeared beside him. “Mr. Locksley?” he asked gently.

  Michael Locksley looked up with a start. For a moment, his watery blue eyes shimmered in terror. “Oh. Hello,” he muttered. “I-I’m sorry. I’m a little uneasy this morning.”

  “You look as though you’ve seen a ghost,” Iago said, furrowing his brow in mock concern.

  “I… maybe. I can’t be certain. No, I don’t think she’s a ghost,” Locksley mumbled.

  Iago tisked. “Ah. An affair of the heart, then.”

  “Or something like that,” Locksley said bashfully. His hand fluttered to his throat again. “I’m sorry. I’m late and…wait. How on Earth did you know that?”

  Iago leaned casually against the wall and looked out upon the street. “You can always tell a man in love. There’s a profound stink about him.” Locksley wrinkled his nose before burying it in the sleeve of his coat. Iago laughed, “A joke, sir.”

  Locksley gave another sniff for good measure. “I’m really not certain it’s love.” Sniff sniff. “Perhaps it is love. I’ve never been in love before. I don’t believe I know what it feels like.”

  “It is an illness, I assure you. A wonderful, beautiful illness,” Iago said.

  “Are you in love? And does your lady love you in return?” Michael Locksley asked.

  Iago smiled and thought of the gentleman in black he had left at the park. “Let us not focus upon me, sir. You are the one stumbling through the streets, thoughts clouded and mind tormented by some member of the fairer sex.”

  Michael Locksley chewed upon his lower lip. “Yes. Tormented.” Iago could perceive—as all good demons could—the lustful thoughts in Locksley’s head. The clerk thought of her roaming hands and her sweet mouth and other parts o
f her body which pleased him. They came in flashes, these thoughts, like figments of dream. Locksley mumbled, “I want… I want to…”

  “You want to what, sir?” Iago asked innocently.

  “I want… to marry her.”

  Iago blinked. “Marry her?”

  “Yes. She shall wear a white dress. At a church,” he said with a firm nod. “I want to marry her.”

  Iago had a feeling that a creature of the night who drank blood and devoured the souls of the living was not going to be terribly keen on the idea of a Christian wedding. The happy day just isn’t as happy with a bride who bursts into flames within church walls (though it is a sight more exciting). “Marry her?” Iago said again.

  “Marry her. Run away with her. Start a new life out west.”

  “You are quite smitten, then. Have you relayed your plans to the fortunate lady?”

  “No,” Locksley sighed heavily. “In fact, I’ve never spoken to her. We’re often very close to each other, but we do not speak.”

  “And yet, you love her.”

  Locksley looked to the Heavens. “Yes, I suppose I do.” He breathed in spring’s sweet perfume and looked utterly pathetic.

  “Then, you must speak to her. Woo her. Let her know you are well-versed in the ways of love,” Iago said.

  “But I’m not.”

  “A little white lie never hurt anyone. Although…” Iago trailed off thoughtfully.

  “What?” Locksley asked, hands clasped.

  “Although, there is a way I might be able to help you. I could, I suppose, give you the tools necessary to woo this fair lady.”

  “What sort of tools?”

  “Confidence, a way with words, the courage of Casanova,” Iago answered. He wrapped a friendly arm around Locksley’s shoulders. “It is not the corporeal which truly woos another. It is what one has the fortitude to do with one’s tongue.” He grinned. “Verbally, of course, although one could make other arguments.”

  Locksley looked at Iago as though he were his savior, watery eyes glistening. “You could teach me?”

  “Better than that,” Iago said. “For a price, I can sell you these tools. In the blink of an eye, you will be well-equipped in your conquest, Mr. Locksley. It is a bounty many men would kill for, but I will not require blood.”

  “What would you require?” Locksley asked. “I have money, I…” He cleared his throat and tried to look away, but Iago reached to grasp Locksley’s chin. He forced their eyes to meet again. Iago’s demonic gaze enveloped the clerk and turned him to clay in his hands.

  “I know you have money. Hundreds of dollars in your chest of drawers, stolen from your employer, correct?” Iago asked.

  Locksley blanched. “How did you…?”

  “I observe, Mr. Locksley. You have pilfered money from your employer for the better part of three years. Two men have lost their positions after accusations of theft, theft that you committed. Yet, you remain. Mr. Englewood trusts you, loves you like a son. ‘It couldn’t be Michael. He’s a good man. The townspeople adore him. He isn’t capable of such a crime.’” Iago shook his head. “Sad. However, money is not what I require.”

  Locksley started to turn away again. “I should be leaving, I must…” He paused, and there she was in his thoughts again, pretty and horribly indecent. “What would the price be? Out of curiosity, of course.”

  Iago Wick conjured from his breast pocket a black book and a quill pen. “Your soul, Mr. Locksley. I only require your soul.”

  Locksley gulped. “Are you Lucifer?” he asked.

  “I am a mere servant of Lucifer, Mr. Locksley. The choice is yours,” Iago purred. “You have the money, the means to run away with your new bride. I can give you the tools that, if used properly, could win her heart. She could be yours, yours to touch and hold and have and love however you see fit.” Michael Locksley’s watery eyes darkened, his lips quivering in an animal way.

  Those of weak constitution were, admittedly, easy targets for a demon. Locksley signed away his soul so quickly and forcefully that he almost broke the quill pen in two. Humans were often blinded by matters of the heart. They acted foolishly, distracted by the promise of companionship and copulation (more the latter than the former, Iago often noticed).

  And as Michael Locksley wandered off with a mind full of sonnets and woo ready to pitch, Iago Wick walked toward home, the apartment above Willard’s Cigar Shop. It had been an easy assignment, but a unique one nevertheless, for he now had to prepare himself for the eventuality of a visit from the Morgan family.

  Now was the calm before the storm.

  Michael Locksley did not arrive at the general store that morning. Rather, he walked aimlessly around Marlowe, his mind in a whirl of love poems. Beautiful, seductive words were constantly humming in his skull. He wished he’d known the demon’s name, this man in gray. He wanted to thank him with a proper letter.

  “My mistress’s eyes are nothing like the sun…” Indeed, they weren’t. They were deep and dark and frankly, a little scary.

  “She walks in beauty, like the night…” Locksley assumed she walked as such. He’d only seen her crawl on top of him.

  “I wonder, by my troth, what thou and I did till we loved. Were we not weaned till then? But sucked on country pleasures, childishly?” She was awfully fond of sucking on his throat.

  He returned to his home, where he locked Biscuit, the one-eyed cat, out of his bedroom. He looked in the mirror and spoke to himself as though he were speaking to his love. At first, he hated the sight of his own face looking back at him. He was always such a pale, doe-eyed thing. His voice was frail at the start, but the more he spoke and honed his words, the stronger his voice became. Yes, he could be the Casanova his lady of the night deserved!

  And at precisely midnight, with Michael Locksley waiting in bed, his lady of the night arrived.

  He drew a deep breath and invited her into bed with, “My dark-eyed beauty, you have haunted me since we last met. I am, indeed, your slave.”

  Surprised, she paused in her sensual crawling, perching upon the edge of the bed like a crow. “Have I?” she said, and her voice was like velvet. She smiled. “My slave, you say.”

  “Everything I touch is foul, for it is nothing like your skin. Everything I taste is bitter, for it is nothing like your lips. Everything is dross, for nothing has the weight and value of your smile,” Locksley said. He was proud of his amorous groveling, though he wasn’t entirely certain what dross even was.

  His lady brightened. “Dear Michael,” she purred, and he nearly blushed at the sound of his name coming from her lips. “Such poetry.” She was upon him now, and she wore extravagant red lace. He could smell her strange, alluring scent. He wished to drown in it.

  They spent some indeterminable amount of time in each other’s arms, and he whispered such things in her ears, things he never would have had the courage to say before he met the man in gray. And she melted, and she sighed. Her black hair, long like the river that curled about the City of Marlowe, fell over her bare shoulders. She leant in to press her lips to his cheek, his throat.

  And then, she stopped.

  A strange look came across her face. It was highly unattractive, and Locksley wished she hadn’t made such an expression.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked.

  “You are promised to another,” she hissed. “When?”

  “What?”

  “Your soul!” she insisted and jumped to her feet. She placed her hands on her hips, a stance which was strange considering the way she normally crawled and floated atop him. Suddenly, she wasn’t so ethereal, but like an angry mother tapping her foot and demanding an explanation. “You promised your soul to Hell. When?”

  Locksley gulped. “This… this morning. There was a man in a gray suit. He gave me means to… I wanted you… I wanted to woo you and so…”

  He was silenced by a fierce wave of her hand. Her brow furrowed. “It must be Wick,” she growled to herself.

 
“What?”

  She said not another word, but charged to the window, boots clicking against the floor. With one last growl, she leapt into the air and transformed into a dark mist that seeped out his window and into the night.

  If one were to judge The Covington purely by its name, one might think it was the grandest and most exquisite restaurant in Marlowe. A rose by any other name smells just as sweet, and The Covington—no matter how it was named—left much to be desired. It was a dark and forcefully intimate place which allowed only men, and while it did not offer the most well-prepared food in Marlowe, it was good enough. The owner had lived in Marlowe his entire life, and his family had helped found the city. And so, his needs and business ventures were protected by his brothers in heritage; lineage meant everything in Marlowe.

  Iago Wick and Dante Lovelace sat in one of the more private booths near the back. A satisfactorily-prepared hen sat upon Dante’s plate, while Iago dined upon fish that was poorly seasoned, but not unpalatable. Demons did not require food. However, Dante so loved watching the other patrons of the restaurant—and Iago so loved dessert—that they made frequent visits to local establishments such as The Covington and The Golden Swine.

  “You’ve a ship to wreck, I understand,” Iago said.

  “Not really, dear. A river boat. Nothing too grand, I promise,” Dante answered.

  “There is no small tragedy, Dante. You of all people know this. What is meaningless to one destroys the world of another,” Iago said. He pushed his plate away and leaned back and wondered not if he wanted dessert but rather what kind of dessert he wanted. He was pondering when a man in a clean and well-made, but unfashionable wool suit with a rather paltry nosegay approached their table. He was a ghost of a man, with dusty hair and pale, empty gray eyes.

  “Mr. Wick?” the man asked.

  Until they were placed in Hell’s cross-hairs, no human in Marlowe spoke to Iago beyond the occasional polite “Good day” or “May I interest you in dessert this evening?” A demon’s presence made very little imprint upon the mind of the average citizen not targeted by Hell. Indeed, off-duty demons are truly seen only by those among the human population who have eyes to see them. (Unfortunately, that category of the human population is comprised largely of demon hunters.)