"Christopher Pike - The Last Vampire 04 - Phantom" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pike Christopher)

The Last Vampire 04



Christopher Pike




1



Someone knocks at the door of the Las Vegas home where I stand. It is late evening; the living room is
dimly lit, four walls of blurred shadows. I don't know who this person is. For that matter, I'm not sure
who I am. I have just awakened from a dead alchemist's experiment. My mind is foggy and my nerves
are shot. But before I embarked on the experiment, only hours ago, I was a steel-willed vampire--the
last vampire on earth. Now I fear--and hope--that I may once again be human. That I may be a young
woman named Alisa, the humble offspring of a five-thousand-year-old monster called Sita. The person
continues to knock. "Open the door," he says impatiently. "It's me." Who is me? I wonder. I do not
recognize the voice, although it does sound familiar. Yet I hesitate to obey, even to respond. Of those
few I call friends, only Seymour Dorsten is supposed to know I am in this Las Vegas home. My other
friends--well, a couple recently perished in the Nevada desert, in a nuclear blast. A lot has been
happening in the last few days, and most of it has been my doing.

"Sita," the person outside the door says. "I know you're in there."

Curious, I think. He knows my ancient name. He even says it like he knows me. But why doesn't he tell
me his name? I could ask him, but some emotion stops me. It is one I have seldom known in my five
thousand years.

Fear. I stare down at my hands.

I tremble with fear. If I am human, I know, I am practically defenseless. That is why I do not want to
open the door. I do not want to die before I have had a chance to taste mortality. Before I have had the
opportunity to have a child. That is perhaps the primary reason I employed Arturo's alchemetic tools to
reverse my vampirism--to become a mother. Yet I am still not a hundred percent sure the experiment
has succeeded. I reach down with the nails of my right hand and pinch my left palm. The flesh breaks;
there is a line of blood. I stare at it.

The wound does not immediately heal.

I must be human. Lord Krishna save me.
The knocking stops. The person outside takes a step back from the door. I hear his movements, even
with my mediocre human ears. He seems to chuckle to himself.

"I understand, Sita," he says. "It's all right. I'll return soon."

I hear him walk away. Only then do I realize I have been standing in the dark with my breath held.
Almost collapsing from relief, I sag against the door and try to calm my thumping heart. I am both