Page 30 of Slayer Mom
“You should back up,” he said without looking up from his clinical work. He was so professional. Who knew that the Grand Master had a doctor on staff?
I followed his instructions, taking my seat back at the table. “Will he be all right?” I asked, like you do when you’re looking for assurances from a doctor.
“In the short term, it’s likely that I can remove all cankers before they infect him. He has a great deal of resistance to infection. In the long term, the Grand Master wants him well so that he can torture him at his leisure, so I wouldn’t use the term ‘all right,’ but that’s just me.”
He kept carving Tom with the same level of emotionlessness. It wasn’t comforting anymore, just eerie.
I turned back to the vampire with Gloria and got to see the vampire pull her hand out of Gloria’s mouth, removing a glowing purple stone covered liberally in blood and mucous. She dropped Gloria like that was that and then turned to go, taking the pulsing purple rock with her.
“Wait, is she okay?”
“You are in the Grand Master’s personal containment room. Perhaps the one you should be worrying about is yourself. Okay is not the word I would use for one used as the zombie queen’s vessel, but she isn’t dead, as the Grand Master personally requested. He will certainly make her wish she was.” She gave me a mild smile and then went out, slamming the door hard behind her.
The guy slicing up Tom said, “Don’t mindAgrippa. She was always resentful about her sister, Delores getting named the Grand Master’s Exterminator. Being shown up by a human is enough to upset any delicate vampire, like Agrippa. She wishes that she were suitable for massive slaughter, but she’s much better at precision work. She is the Grand Master’s assassin.”
I swallowed hard. “That’s cool. Way better than exterminator. What is your title?”
“I am the Grand Master’s torturer.” He gave me a slight bow and then continued with his work.
My stomach started getting positively queasy. Was it because I was hungry? How could I be hungry at a time like this? Because I’d slaughtered all those zombies in the movie theater. Who knew that killing zombies would burn so many calories? I picked up the phone.
“I’m not going to torture you. And calling for help won’t help,” Doc Torture said in a creepily pleasant voice.
I gave him a look while I spoke into the receiver. “Hi, can you deliver some chicken to my room? As many courses as you’d like would be great. Hopefully I’ll get the chance to eat them all. Thanks.” I hung up without waiting for the woman to acknowledge me. “Why would the Grand Master need a torturer when it’s his favorite thing? He told me all about it. You must not have a lot of work.”
He smiled slightly. “He doesn’t have as much time for pleasure as he would like. I have more work than I have time to do.”
“Oh, good. I’m so glad that you aren’t bored. The former exterminator didn’t do her job. Shouldn’t he have noticed and fired her, or eaten her, or whatever he does to people who don’t do their jobs, have you torture her, perhaps?”
“He has been preoccupied with other matters for some years.”
Was it the potion thing? Was he seriously waiting in that warehouse for the thief to come back for more serum? Naw. “I don’t suppose you’ll tell me.”
“He has made a great study of magic and mythology as well as humanity and the evils that spring up from supposedly wholeborn souls. He is embarking on an entirely new experiment which has the entire superior community uneasy.”
“Are you uneasy? What do you mean, superior?”
“You might call us supernatural, but we are simply superior.”
“Zombies aren’t superior. They’re disgusting. And that vampire, she spat on this beautiful carpet. A superior person wouldn’t do that.”
His thin smile flashed for a moment. “You are amusing. Perhaps he won’t kill you for some time.” With that, he stood up, cleaned his scalpel, and left me alone with Tom, who was bleeding heavily, and Gloria, who was still unconscious.
The phone rang, and I jumped, screaming slightly before I reached out and took the phone. “Yes?” Maybe it was a ghost. The phone could be possessed.
“You’re having dinner with me on the roof. Enter the hotel and take the elevator directly across the hall.” The Grand Master, at least that’s who it sounded like, hung up, leaving me with the dial tone. I hung up, scowling at the phone, then it rang again, and like an idiot, I jumped a foot. Oh, yes, I was so well-suited to the role of exterminator.
It rang again before I picked it up. “Yes?”
“Bring the paperwork. I’ll have a lawyer that can explain things to you.” He hung up again. I took my time putting it back on the receiver.
I wanted to ignore him, but I was hungry, and he had unpossessed Gloria, and taken care of Tom, sortof. Maybe I could argue that he should release them. No, probably not. He held all the cards.
I went to the cage, unlocked it, and carefully stepped over Tom, then I headed to the elevator across the hall. It was glossy black with a dragon carved in it. Fancy.
I stepped in the elevator and then only knew I was moving because of the sensation of coming to a stop. The doors opened, bringing me out to a lovely rooftop garden with an expansive view of the skyline and the river. A table was set near the edge of the roof with the most beautiful smelling food ever. I sat down and after glancing around, put a napkin on my lap and reached for the first course. Bisque soup, stuffed partridge, garlic and butter steamed vegetables, a steak the precisely right shade of well, while even the salad was beautiful and crisp. I ate until I couldn’t eat another bite, and then I wanted to climb into bed and sleep for a year. I jumped when I saw the Grand Master sitting across from me, like he’d been sitting there the entire time, just staring at me.
“Hi. You startled me.”
