Plogviehze, Baby: 1/14
Prologue | Chapter 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14
Still rated T.
Plogviehze, Baby: Chapter 1
"Okay," said Polly. "Okay. Let's try this again, shall we?"
Something about this new morning reminded her of yesterday's new morning: the morning light was faint and a fire was burning, and Mal was sipping coffee as if it'd be Abominated tomorrow, and disaster was impending.
"Well," said Mal, and ran a hand through her hair.
"Take your time. Any chance of one of those cigarettes?"
One of those looks, and then Mal got up, slowly, and rummaged through a pack, and certainly took longer for that than she should have. "There you go," she said, finally, and threw a disintegrating pack as well as the matches into Polly's general direction. Polly caught both with ease and then settled for a bit of threatening silence, her anger bubbling this close underneath the surface.
"Polly," said Mal, folding up next to the fire again. "How much do you remember?"
"What am I supposed to remember?" asked Polly. "Just give me your version, and I'll compare it with mine, and we'll proceed accordingly."
"Polly, I've already tried to -"
"Yes," said Polly, "but, you know, what really escapes me at the moment is how nearly dying translates to waking up in a godforsaken Zlobenian cave to a lot of black velvet round my waist -"
"Klatchian satin, actually -"
"- a nervous bloody Temperance League vampire who's tending to the most pathetic fire in the history of the -"
"Yeah, well, it is burning -"
"- who keeps interrupting me on account of having a death wish, and finding myself, you know, sort of... undead, as opposed to dying?"
"Well, no," said Mal in an offended tone, "that's zombies. Common misconception. Vampires are more into the, well, immortal aspect of... not dying. Eternal life kind of thing."
"Yeah, you lot really are a positive bunch of thinkers, I noticed."
"Are you going to smoke that or not?"
"The explanation, Mal," said Polly, finally getting around to lighting up the cigarette she had been holding for a while. She caught Mal staring at her, and stared back.
Mal was the first to look down. "Right," she said. "The explanation. Here goes. Er. So can I skip the gory details and get right to where I bit you?"
There. Mal had said it. You bit me, you lying indecisive little... Corporals were not supposed to do that.
But the arrow had had barbs on it. Barbs!
"And that isn't a gory detail?"
"Not quite," said Mal. "Takes talent, though."
"... I see," said Polly. "Why did you do it?"
Polly was almost hoping for an unsatisfactory answer, something like 'all that blood on the battlefield made me sort of jittery', because that would, at least, give her an excuse to punch someone. Not that she could think of any answer that wouldn't.
"We lost the battle," said Mal. "Had to leave to field rather in a hurry, you know, on account of the rupert being a wet hen. Most could walk on their own, a few hopeful cases got carried, you got dumped, on account of not being a hopeful case at all."
Er.
"Hang on a moment," said Polly, taking a deep drag of the cigarette. Now that the things couldn't actually kill her, they weren't half enjoyable, she realised. " We lost? We were winning, Mal."
Yeah, winning the stupid battle when, actually, Polly had hoped that this war would not even happen on battlefields. But winning nonetheless.
"I'm a bit hazy on the details," said Mal, "but it might have had something to do with their secret reinforcements ambushing our secret reinforcements and it all went downhill from there. Sorry, sarge. Gimme the cigarettes back? Please?"
Polly was holding on to the pack without realising. She was still trying to get the picture.
"So wait, this leaves me dumped on a battlefield and you happily walking away with the rest of the army? How..."
"Almost, but not quite," said Mal. "This leaves you dumped on the battlefield and myself happily deserting without anyone actually objecting all that much. A while later, you're still dumped on the battlefield and I'm happily shooting at crows. A fag, Polly? Please?"
"Yeah, sure," said Polly after a few thoughtful seconds, and threw Mal the pack. "So you're shooting at crows - ew, by the way - and I'm still dumped? Face-down in the dust, I imagine?"
"Well, snow, more like," said Mal and lit her cigarette on the dying fire.
"Snow. And that was when you - ?" Polly asked.
"There were a lot of crows before that."
"Mal!"
"Are you sure you don't remember a thing?" asked Mal. "No waking up and seeing personified concepts walking around and being unreasonable and pressing decisions on people because they can't be arsed themselves?"
"Er," said Polly. "Big? Black? Scythe? Damn it, Mal, do I ever hate getting your hallucinations."
"That wasn't a hallucination," said Mal. "That was the reaper man. Likes to be known as Death, capital 'D', on account of being a self-important bastard."
"... Death," said Polly. "That's a story, Mal. For children."
"You saw him."
"I was delirious," said Polly. "I think I was. Did I talk?"
The look she got wasn't like anything she'd seen before.
"Yes," said Mal.
"Anything of importance? Last words sort of thing?"
"I thought you -," began Mal, and stopped to think. "I thought you asked me to -," another pause, a deep drag off the cigarette, "I realise I might have been wrong."
Cigarettes were the best. They gave you an excuse to just sit there dumbfounded without actually looking dumbfounded.
"Are you trying to tell me this is all some sort of misguided philanthropy?" Polly asked.
Mal smoked, sitting by the fire, all silence and closed eyes and motionlessness now, and maintained a rather too hard grip on her cigarette. A few days ago, Polly would have gone over and inquired about this, now she might have gone over and punched her, if. If.
Maybe she'd be okay as long as she refused. Maybe she'd be okay as long as she just breathed -
Breathing -
Breathing brought with it the smell of Ankh-Morpork. Probably tobacco, she thought. Didn't matter all that much, Polly'd smoked dried maple leaves before and they weren't all that different.
She went back to intently watching Mal, as before, and she squinted and rubbed her eyes until she realised that there was something wrong with her sight.
The vampire had, once again, gone sort of fuzzy around the edges. The coffee mug was held by hands which Polly knew to be long and slender and as well-manicured as army life allowed, but when she tried concentrating on them, all she could make out was... something with fingers, and that maybe only because she knew there had to be fingers involved. A similar thing was happening with Mal's face, but far more frightening.
Someone inside Polly said 'Oh dear' in a very small voice.
"Mal, is there something wrong with your coffee?" she asked, while at the same time trying to carefully retreat without actually standing up.
"The coffee is fine," said Mal, after a long pause. "Look, I said I'm sorry."
Someone else inside Polly took this moment to explode with rage, but Polly said, through clenched teeth, "Mal, you're not actually being very helpful."
The vampire shrugged with frustrating nonchalance.
"What the bleeding hell is going on? And if you say you're sorry one more time I'm going to rip your throat out."
Whoops. Socks talking. And she wasn't even wearing any.
Mal winced. "Yes, I rather thought this would be the case."
Polly realised, bewildered, that she was shivering with what she suspected was suppressed anger, but not even socks explained this. And quizzical though Mal might be, she wasn't trying to provoke her, was she? More like the opposite...
What she did remember: pain and more pain and the reflection of moonlight off a scythe -
How real are stories?
Polly got to her feet, shakily. Mal looked up at her and carefully placed her coffee cup on the ground next to her.
"I think I'm going to kill you," said Polly.
Now, she hadn't normally done this. Attacking Mal had, somehow, never come up at all, because there had never been a convincing enough reason apart from the smug bastardness, and that didn't count. And what with the lack of motives, the fact that attacking Mal was also downright stupid, for reasons of superhuman speed and such, hadn't even entered her mind once. Up until now, anyway.
Still, Polly lasted about two seconds longer than expected before being back on her knees. Mal had gone from sitting on the ground to suddenly appearing behind Polly in the fraction of one moment and Polly hadn't had a chance in the world. Mal was holding her down in an iron-tight grip, one wiry forearm covering Polly's mouth.
"Listen, Polly," said Mal into her ear, still not properly enraged, which made Polly even angrier. "I'm really sorry, and also, I'm bad at apologising. For which I'm sorry."
The parts of Polly that weren't held down stubbornly tried to tremble, and as she attempted to concentrate on something, anything, her hunger... but this wasn't mere hunger, this was hunger and thirst and pain all rolled up into one single desperate need.
'Oh dear' didn't even begin to describe it.
Mal shifted somewhat, and held on, and this went on for a few seconds, long enough that Polly got the feeling of having missed some important prop. But she couldn't quite ask. 'Mmmpf' rather lacked some of the dignity she aspired in her life.
"For heaven's sake, woman, now bite already," said Mal.
No way out of this.
Mal hardly even winced. Polly drew blood at the first attempt, too, and drank, and some instinct she hadn't known she had whispered to her that this feeling was too good to stop and throw up now. Too good, even, to notice that the grip around her was getting weaker, or she herself was getting stronger, as if every cell of her body was saying 'yes' very smugly.
Mal wrestled her arm free in the end.
"Feel better now?" she asked, while standing up swiftly, staggering back and away from Polly. A quick glance at her face and Polly noticed the terror there. Polly blinked, and it was replaced by an expression of indifference.
Polly pondered the question. She did feel better, sort of. The hunger wasn't quite as prominent now. The need to murder Mal persisted, but at least, it seemed to come from more articulate parts of her brain this time.
"That," she said, wiping her mouth, "was disgusting."
Which was a very... socky thing to declare, considering she'd just drunk blood, and liked it. Disgusting though this undoubtedly was, 'frightening' seemed to describe the situation more accurately. Or 'absolutely bloody terrifying'. A job for Sergeant Jackrum if there ever was one.
And Polly was still kneeling, and she could feel her body losing tone just now, and she decided this was a very good moment to hide her head in her hands. This was not on. She could feel Mal looking at her, and wished she would just go away and die and leave her here to sort this mess out.
It took her a while, but when Polly was reasonably sure she could trust her voice again, she said, "I need a few answers."
"Whenever you're ready."
"Oh, just die already, will you?" Polly felt she was losing her temper again. Mal didn't say anything upon this. Polly risked a glance. If she's looking amused, she's dead, Polly thought. Mal was looking not amused at all, though.
Pity.
She breathed in, and out, and said, "What happened to your hand?"
Absent-mindedly, Mal was tugging at the threadbare rag that was knotted around her right hand. She seemed surprised.
Well, maybe this was a bit unusual a question, given the occasion -
"Had something of an accident with silver," said Mal. "It'll heal."
"Silver?" said Polly. "On a battlefield?"
She knew that Mal had reservations about randomly touching anything that even looked sort of silvery, because, as she'd said, silver burned. How strange.
Mal shrugged, and all things considered, Polly didn't feel sympathetic anyway.
"Do I get to turn into a bat?"
"No. Sorry," Mal said.
"Well, why not?"
"You need training for that. Oh, and a special licence."
"I... what?"
"I don't make up the rules, kid." With this, Mal had obviously gathered herself enough to reclaim the orphaned cup of coffee. Her skin was even whiter than before, Polly noticed and her shirt sleeve was covered in (delicious delicious oh damn) blood, and her eyes were reddened, and Polly couldn't bring herself to care.
"I didn't think vampires were sociable enough to even think up something like that," she said.
"If they can make life miserable for others? But of course."
This is one of the most emotionally trying moments of my life, thought Polly, if you can call this a life, because it's clearly... something else entirely, I'm sure, so why the hell am I engaging in small talk?
She tried the calm breathing thing once more, and was reasonably successful after a minute or so.
"So," she said. "You're a member of the Temperance League, right?" Polly held on to the anger as if it might slip away. Ha, no chance of that, she thought.
"That's, uh, the general idea, yes," said Mal, staring deeply at the contents of her cup, obviously disappointed at the lack of stage props it provided.
"So, being a member of the Temperance League generally involves consuming icky evil cocoa and disgusting little berry muffins, chamber music evenings with a bad harmonium player and a roomful of tetchy vampires trying to convince each other that it's great not to drink human blood, as you've described to me, in detail and more than once, especially the bad harmonium player on whom you seem to have an unhealthy fixation. Right?"
"There's also the ghastly pep-up songs," said Mal. "I'd take harmonium players over those any day."
Fed up with kneeling, Polly tried to shift into a more comfortable position. After she'd stretched out her legs and leaned against one rocky wall, it took her almost a minute to notice a certain unobtrusive fact: she had, just now, managed to find a comfortable spot in a freezing rocky goddamn cave.
This... condition certainly went deep, did it?
"So, Mal. Whatever bloody happened to the whole not drinking human blood part of the deal?" she asked, watching her intently. She almost enjoyed the nervousness she saw. Ha, she thought, if enjoyment were made out of contempt, maybe.
"I didn't drink, Polly," said Mal.
"Why?" asked Polly. "Am I not good enough? You could do with a meal."
"Because," said Mal. "I value my sanity rather a lot."
"Yes," said Polly, "yours and everyone else's, I'm sure. What are you going to do about all this?"
Mal looked up and not actually at her, but close. "I'm going to bring you to a safe place," she said. "Nice dark cellars, polite company, tasteful interior, and a bunch of... they call themselves professionals, I hear. Really awful food, though."
Polly tried to make sense of this. It sounded very much like some kind of mental institution. She tried to look at it from a vampire perspective and got to...
"You mean... like, a castle? With bats and coffins and a distressing Igor? Mysterious, handsome, and somewhat girly men wearing black taffeta and silk ruffles who don't drink... much of anything, really?"
Someone inside Polly was clearly not in line with the soul-crushing despair she felt. It was almost embarrassing.
"Temperance League, Polly," said Mal. "In Ankh-Morpork, Polly. You'll like it there, Polly. They're really, really nice folks, Polly."
"So who's sergeant here, then?"
"You are," said Mal. "It's up to you, really."
Polly thought about this. She saw the point, she really did, but she still felt distinctly patronised. Also, still angry. She opened her mouth to shout, but what came out was, "But isn't this an Uberwald movement? Uberwald's much closer."
"We're not going to Uberwald."
With that, Mal downed the rest of the coffee, got up in one of those blurred movements she was somewhat prone to in times of stress, one of those which very much didn't say 'reformed vampire, nothing to see here', and pulled the blood-stained shirt over her head. Polly barely managed to turn away and face the wall. Living together for two years rather promoted reflexes like this.
(Yes, but she'd never been quite that fast. Oh damn oh damn oh damn.)
"I'm touched by your discretion, Polly," said Mal, "but I'm actually wearing something underneath."
That was it. There were quite a few rumours about vampires, but this one was proven true: vampires could turn any given conversation onto the subject of lingerie.
Vixen!
Polly had to admit, though, that she'd have accepted anything that would take her mind off things. Grasping for straws, here; Mal in underwear was not as bad as it could be. As long as she just breathed, she might not attack anyone.
Slowly, Polly turned around. Anyone would, she told herself. Anyway, it was quite surprising.
"You, of all people, are wearing practical long underwear?"
"Well," said Mal, once again rummaging through her pack, "it has got ruffles. Ruffles are practic'lly the epitome of being impractical."
She came up with a neatly folded white shirt, which, on account of having originally been part of an uniform, had hardly any ruffles at all. Mal then proceeded to disappear outside.
Polly wasn't done with her, though. She followed.
Lighting another cigarette, she said: "Mal?"
"Yes, kid?"
"You were bleeding, weren't you?"
Casting one meaningful look on her arm, then on Polly, Mal said, "You tell me."
"But I thought vampires -"
"Vampires," said Mal, "are defined by what they know. Or choose, if you're lucky." She worked some buttons, and added, "I could make my blood flow stop, but what's the damn point? It'd just give me an unhealthy complexion."
"Mal, I don't want to be rude, but you do have a rather unhealthy -"
"Look who's talking. Have you looked into a mirror today?"
There was an Offended Silence in which Polly tried not to scream.
"Sorry," said Mal. "It's a bit like the sunlight thing," she added. "We are perfectly able to learn."
She rolled up one sleeve to inspect her arm, making a grimace as she did so.
So they'd slipped into almost familiar conversation patterns, with Mal being pretentious and herself trying to make sense of things. This was good, wasn't it?
Well, it wasn't, but -
Mal sat down on a rock and began to wash the dried blood off her arm, using what Polly hoped was the last fresh snow of the winter. Polly watched, and found it strangely soothing that the snow was actually, truly melting on Mal's skin.
"We are not dead, Polly," said Mal, who might or might not have read her mind.
"Great," said Polly, and Mal looked up, a quizzical expression on her face.
"Great?"
Polly couldn't help but notice that the bite marks - a full set of teeth oh gods - had healed slower than they would usually have done, that was to say, they were still visible. Besides -
"No," said Polly. "Nothing's great, Mal." She wasn't going to let go of the anger, at least not until she'd had the chance to examine it, to decide whether it was good old Polly anger or psychotic vampire anger. She needed to know before she killed anyone.
Not expecting an answer, she went over to where the ground went from sort-of-horizontal straight to vertical. In some ways, Zlobenia wasn't entirely unlike Borogravia.
One step forward -
"Try to get some sleep," said Mal, who had, quite suddenly, appeared behind her, pulling the clean shirt over her head. "We're leaving at dusk."
Polly was hardly tired, but she did go back into the cave if only because, in situations like this, having someone who seems to have an idea of what to do is slightly better then the alternative, and also, because there was an inviting lack of Mal in the cave. Still -
"Mal? Mal! Where are you going?"
"Taking a walk," said Mal, sticking her head back in. "I'm not tired, and the way I see it, we are short of food." She noticed Polly's shocked look. "Not that kind of food, Polly. I'll find you something socially acceptable, don't worry."
And with that, she was off.
Polly sat down on her blankets,. She'd decided to at least give sleep a chance, because she'd always, always put effort into things, but restlessness brought her to her feet again after a few minutes.
The cave was not really all that big, a few steps into every direction. Breathe, thought Polly. One breath a step, until that didn't work anymore.
It was the silence, it got to her. She tried to scream, only her throat was too constricted for that. Faster.
Silence, silence still, and then the coffee mug hit the wall.
Fine shards sprayed Polly, and things felt clearer for all of a moment, and she took that moment to leave. Outside, temperatures were well over melting-point at this time of the day, she was thankful for that at least. The winter had gone on for too long.
The light was just a tiny bit too bright, and Polly waited for her eyes to adapt to the sunlight, and when that didn't quite happen, she cursed. A lot.
-
Polly found landscape, and more landscape, and plenty of caves. More importantly, Polly found Mal some hundred yards away, hanging upside down in that very still way Polly had seen before and that she'd come to associate with the exhausted sleep that you slept at those occasions where you were lucky enough to sleep at all. Mal had wrapped herself into her ancient black cloak, the same one she'd worn when they'd taken the shilling a million years ago.
Polly watched her for a while. Their faces were almost on the same level, and Polly was careful not to breathe. She was close enough to feel Mal's warm breath on her face, at any rate, and she raised one hand, almost touching her, but not quite. Raised it a little bit higher.
It was the silence, it got to her.
Mal had shown her where her heart was, once, as a kind of safety measure, in case she would ever get the urge to bite people again. Polly had gone to great lengths to not actually listen as such, but she was sure she could improvise. It wasn't completely out of reach, now.
She could do this, easily. Grab a stick, do it, just like that, and Mal wouldn't even have time to -
It broke her heart, she was so tempted.
Her hand was still hovering, but she realised she didn't have a stick. And that was it, or would have been, if Mal hadn't opened her eyes just now and stared straight into hers.
Polly's hand clenched into a fist and she drew it back to gather impact and then brought it forward faster than even Mal should have been able to follow. Her fist stopped half an inch away from of Mal's face, and Polly very much noticed the way Mal's eyes screwed shut in anticipation of the blow and she very much noticed the way Mal hadn't even attempted to block her.
She didn't react now, either, all closed eyes and pretended sleep again, and Polly left the cave.
Still rated T.
Plogviehze, Baby: Chapter 1
"Okay," said Polly. "Okay. Let's try this again, shall we?"
Something about this new morning reminded her of yesterday's new morning: the morning light was faint and a fire was burning, and Mal was sipping coffee as if it'd be Abominated tomorrow, and disaster was impending.
"Well," said Mal, and ran a hand through her hair.
"Take your time. Any chance of one of those cigarettes?"
One of those looks, and then Mal got up, slowly, and rummaged through a pack, and certainly took longer for that than she should have. "There you go," she said, finally, and threw a disintegrating pack as well as the matches into Polly's general direction. Polly caught both with ease and then settled for a bit of threatening silence, her anger bubbling this close underneath the surface.
"Polly," said Mal, folding up next to the fire again. "How much do you remember?"
"What am I supposed to remember?" asked Polly. "Just give me your version, and I'll compare it with mine, and we'll proceed accordingly."
"Polly, I've already tried to -"
"Yes," said Polly, "but, you know, what really escapes me at the moment is how nearly dying translates to waking up in a godforsaken Zlobenian cave to a lot of black velvet round my waist -"
"Klatchian satin, actually -"
"- a nervous bloody Temperance League vampire who's tending to the most pathetic fire in the history of the -"
"Yeah, well, it is burning -"
"- who keeps interrupting me on account of having a death wish, and finding myself, you know, sort of... undead, as opposed to dying?"
"Well, no," said Mal in an offended tone, "that's zombies. Common misconception. Vampires are more into the, well, immortal aspect of... not dying. Eternal life kind of thing."
"Yeah, you lot really are a positive bunch of thinkers, I noticed."
"Are you going to smoke that or not?"
"The explanation, Mal," said Polly, finally getting around to lighting up the cigarette she had been holding for a while. She caught Mal staring at her, and stared back.
Mal was the first to look down. "Right," she said. "The explanation. Here goes. Er. So can I skip the gory details and get right to where I bit you?"
There. Mal had said it. You bit me, you lying indecisive little... Corporals were not supposed to do that.
But the arrow had had barbs on it. Barbs!
"And that isn't a gory detail?"
"Not quite," said Mal. "Takes talent, though."
"... I see," said Polly. "Why did you do it?"
Polly was almost hoping for an unsatisfactory answer, something like 'all that blood on the battlefield made me sort of jittery', because that would, at least, give her an excuse to punch someone. Not that she could think of any answer that wouldn't.
"We lost the battle," said Mal. "Had to leave to field rather in a hurry, you know, on account of the rupert being a wet hen. Most could walk on their own, a few hopeful cases got carried, you got dumped, on account of not being a hopeful case at all."
Er.
"Hang on a moment," said Polly, taking a deep drag of the cigarette. Now that the things couldn't actually kill her, they weren't half enjoyable, she realised. " We lost? We were winning, Mal."
Yeah, winning the stupid battle when, actually, Polly had hoped that this war would not even happen on battlefields. But winning nonetheless.
"I'm a bit hazy on the details," said Mal, "but it might have had something to do with their secret reinforcements ambushing our secret reinforcements and it all went downhill from there. Sorry, sarge. Gimme the cigarettes back? Please?"
Polly was holding on to the pack without realising. She was still trying to get the picture.
"So wait, this leaves me dumped on a battlefield and you happily walking away with the rest of the army? How..."
"Almost, but not quite," said Mal. "This leaves you dumped on the battlefield and myself happily deserting without anyone actually objecting all that much. A while later, you're still dumped on the battlefield and I'm happily shooting at crows. A fag, Polly? Please?"
"Yeah, sure," said Polly after a few thoughtful seconds, and threw Mal the pack. "So you're shooting at crows - ew, by the way - and I'm still dumped? Face-down in the dust, I imagine?"
"Well, snow, more like," said Mal and lit her cigarette on the dying fire.
"Snow. And that was when you - ?" Polly asked.
"There were a lot of crows before that."
"Mal!"
"Are you sure you don't remember a thing?" asked Mal. "No waking up and seeing personified concepts walking around and being unreasonable and pressing decisions on people because they can't be arsed themselves?"
"Er," said Polly. "Big? Black? Scythe? Damn it, Mal, do I ever hate getting your hallucinations."
"That wasn't a hallucination," said Mal. "That was the reaper man. Likes to be known as Death, capital 'D', on account of being a self-important bastard."
"... Death," said Polly. "That's a story, Mal. For children."
"You saw him."
"I was delirious," said Polly. "I think I was. Did I talk?"
The look she got wasn't like anything she'd seen before.
"Yes," said Mal.
"Anything of importance? Last words sort of thing?"
"I thought you -," began Mal, and stopped to think. "I thought you asked me to -," another pause, a deep drag off the cigarette, "I realise I might have been wrong."
Cigarettes were the best. They gave you an excuse to just sit there dumbfounded without actually looking dumbfounded.
"Are you trying to tell me this is all some sort of misguided philanthropy?" Polly asked.
Mal smoked, sitting by the fire, all silence and closed eyes and motionlessness now, and maintained a rather too hard grip on her cigarette. A few days ago, Polly would have gone over and inquired about this, now she might have gone over and punched her, if. If.
Maybe she'd be okay as long as she refused. Maybe she'd be okay as long as she just breathed -
Breathing -
Breathing brought with it the smell of Ankh-Morpork. Probably tobacco, she thought. Didn't matter all that much, Polly'd smoked dried maple leaves before and they weren't all that different.
She went back to intently watching Mal, as before, and she squinted and rubbed her eyes until she realised that there was something wrong with her sight.
The vampire had, once again, gone sort of fuzzy around the edges. The coffee mug was held by hands which Polly knew to be long and slender and as well-manicured as army life allowed, but when she tried concentrating on them, all she could make out was... something with fingers, and that maybe only because she knew there had to be fingers involved. A similar thing was happening with Mal's face, but far more frightening.
Someone inside Polly said 'Oh dear' in a very small voice.
"Mal, is there something wrong with your coffee?" she asked, while at the same time trying to carefully retreat without actually standing up.
"The coffee is fine," said Mal, after a long pause. "Look, I said I'm sorry."
Someone else inside Polly took this moment to explode with rage, but Polly said, through clenched teeth, "Mal, you're not actually being very helpful."
The vampire shrugged with frustrating nonchalance.
"What the bleeding hell is going on? And if you say you're sorry one more time I'm going to rip your throat out."
Whoops. Socks talking. And she wasn't even wearing any.
Mal winced. "Yes, I rather thought this would be the case."
Polly realised, bewildered, that she was shivering with what she suspected was suppressed anger, but not even socks explained this. And quizzical though Mal might be, she wasn't trying to provoke her, was she? More like the opposite...
What she did remember: pain and more pain and the reflection of moonlight off a scythe -
How real are stories?
Polly got to her feet, shakily. Mal looked up at her and carefully placed her coffee cup on the ground next to her.
"I think I'm going to kill you," said Polly.
Now, she hadn't normally done this. Attacking Mal had, somehow, never come up at all, because there had never been a convincing enough reason apart from the smug bastardness, and that didn't count. And what with the lack of motives, the fact that attacking Mal was also downright stupid, for reasons of superhuman speed and such, hadn't even entered her mind once. Up until now, anyway.
Still, Polly lasted about two seconds longer than expected before being back on her knees. Mal had gone from sitting on the ground to suddenly appearing behind Polly in the fraction of one moment and Polly hadn't had a chance in the world. Mal was holding her down in an iron-tight grip, one wiry forearm covering Polly's mouth.
"Listen, Polly," said Mal into her ear, still not properly enraged, which made Polly even angrier. "I'm really sorry, and also, I'm bad at apologising. For which I'm sorry."
The parts of Polly that weren't held down stubbornly tried to tremble, and as she attempted to concentrate on something, anything, her hunger... but this wasn't mere hunger, this was hunger and thirst and pain all rolled up into one single desperate need.
'Oh dear' didn't even begin to describe it.
Mal shifted somewhat, and held on, and this went on for a few seconds, long enough that Polly got the feeling of having missed some important prop. But she couldn't quite ask. 'Mmmpf' rather lacked some of the dignity she aspired in her life.
"For heaven's sake, woman, now bite already," said Mal.
No way out of this.
Mal hardly even winced. Polly drew blood at the first attempt, too, and drank, and some instinct she hadn't known she had whispered to her that this feeling was too good to stop and throw up now. Too good, even, to notice that the grip around her was getting weaker, or she herself was getting stronger, as if every cell of her body was saying 'yes' very smugly.
Mal wrestled her arm free in the end.
"Feel better now?" she asked, while standing up swiftly, staggering back and away from Polly. A quick glance at her face and Polly noticed the terror there. Polly blinked, and it was replaced by an expression of indifference.
Polly pondered the question. She did feel better, sort of. The hunger wasn't quite as prominent now. The need to murder Mal persisted, but at least, it seemed to come from more articulate parts of her brain this time.
"That," she said, wiping her mouth, "was disgusting."
Which was a very... socky thing to declare, considering she'd just drunk blood, and liked it. Disgusting though this undoubtedly was, 'frightening' seemed to describe the situation more accurately. Or 'absolutely bloody terrifying'. A job for Sergeant Jackrum if there ever was one.
And Polly was still kneeling, and she could feel her body losing tone just now, and she decided this was a very good moment to hide her head in her hands. This was not on. She could feel Mal looking at her, and wished she would just go away and die and leave her here to sort this mess out.
It took her a while, but when Polly was reasonably sure she could trust her voice again, she said, "I need a few answers."
"Whenever you're ready."
"Oh, just die already, will you?" Polly felt she was losing her temper again. Mal didn't say anything upon this. Polly risked a glance. If she's looking amused, she's dead, Polly thought. Mal was looking not amused at all, though.
Pity.
She breathed in, and out, and said, "What happened to your hand?"
Absent-mindedly, Mal was tugging at the threadbare rag that was knotted around her right hand. She seemed surprised.
Well, maybe this was a bit unusual a question, given the occasion -
"Had something of an accident with silver," said Mal. "It'll heal."
"Silver?" said Polly. "On a battlefield?"
She knew that Mal had reservations about randomly touching anything that even looked sort of silvery, because, as she'd said, silver burned. How strange.
Mal shrugged, and all things considered, Polly didn't feel sympathetic anyway.
"Do I get to turn into a bat?"
"No. Sorry," Mal said.
"Well, why not?"
"You need training for that. Oh, and a special licence."
"I... what?"
"I don't make up the rules, kid." With this, Mal had obviously gathered herself enough to reclaim the orphaned cup of coffee. Her skin was even whiter than before, Polly noticed and her shirt sleeve was covered in (delicious delicious oh damn) blood, and her eyes were reddened, and Polly couldn't bring herself to care.
"I didn't think vampires were sociable enough to even think up something like that," she said.
"If they can make life miserable for others? But of course."
This is one of the most emotionally trying moments of my life, thought Polly, if you can call this a life, because it's clearly... something else entirely, I'm sure, so why the hell am I engaging in small talk?
She tried the calm breathing thing once more, and was reasonably successful after a minute or so.
"So," she said. "You're a member of the Temperance League, right?" Polly held on to the anger as if it might slip away. Ha, no chance of that, she thought.
"That's, uh, the general idea, yes," said Mal, staring deeply at the contents of her cup, obviously disappointed at the lack of stage props it provided.
"So, being a member of the Temperance League generally involves consuming icky evil cocoa and disgusting little berry muffins, chamber music evenings with a bad harmonium player and a roomful of tetchy vampires trying to convince each other that it's great not to drink human blood, as you've described to me, in detail and more than once, especially the bad harmonium player on whom you seem to have an unhealthy fixation. Right?"
"There's also the ghastly pep-up songs," said Mal. "I'd take harmonium players over those any day."
Fed up with kneeling, Polly tried to shift into a more comfortable position. After she'd stretched out her legs and leaned against one rocky wall, it took her almost a minute to notice a certain unobtrusive fact: she had, just now, managed to find a comfortable spot in a freezing rocky goddamn cave.
This... condition certainly went deep, did it?
"So, Mal. Whatever bloody happened to the whole not drinking human blood part of the deal?" she asked, watching her intently. She almost enjoyed the nervousness she saw. Ha, she thought, if enjoyment were made out of contempt, maybe.
"I didn't drink, Polly," said Mal.
"Why?" asked Polly. "Am I not good enough? You could do with a meal."
"Because," said Mal. "I value my sanity rather a lot."
"Yes," said Polly, "yours and everyone else's, I'm sure. What are you going to do about all this?"
Mal looked up and not actually at her, but close. "I'm going to bring you to a safe place," she said. "Nice dark cellars, polite company, tasteful interior, and a bunch of... they call themselves professionals, I hear. Really awful food, though."
Polly tried to make sense of this. It sounded very much like some kind of mental institution. She tried to look at it from a vampire perspective and got to...
"You mean... like, a castle? With bats and coffins and a distressing Igor? Mysterious, handsome, and somewhat girly men wearing black taffeta and silk ruffles who don't drink... much of anything, really?"
Someone inside Polly was clearly not in line with the soul-crushing despair she felt. It was almost embarrassing.
"Temperance League, Polly," said Mal. "In Ankh-Morpork, Polly. You'll like it there, Polly. They're really, really nice folks, Polly."
"So who's sergeant here, then?"
"You are," said Mal. "It's up to you, really."
Polly thought about this. She saw the point, she really did, but she still felt distinctly patronised. Also, still angry. She opened her mouth to shout, but what came out was, "But isn't this an Uberwald movement? Uberwald's much closer."
"We're not going to Uberwald."
With that, Mal downed the rest of the coffee, got up in one of those blurred movements she was somewhat prone to in times of stress, one of those which very much didn't say 'reformed vampire, nothing to see here', and pulled the blood-stained shirt over her head. Polly barely managed to turn away and face the wall. Living together for two years rather promoted reflexes like this.
(Yes, but she'd never been quite that fast. Oh damn oh damn oh damn.)
"I'm touched by your discretion, Polly," said Mal, "but I'm actually wearing something underneath."
That was it. There were quite a few rumours about vampires, but this one was proven true: vampires could turn any given conversation onto the subject of lingerie.
Vixen!
Polly had to admit, though, that she'd have accepted anything that would take her mind off things. Grasping for straws, here; Mal in underwear was not as bad as it could be. As long as she just breathed, she might not attack anyone.
Slowly, Polly turned around. Anyone would, she told herself. Anyway, it was quite surprising.
"You, of all people, are wearing practical long underwear?"
"Well," said Mal, once again rummaging through her pack, "it has got ruffles. Ruffles are practic'lly the epitome of being impractical."
She came up with a neatly folded white shirt, which, on account of having originally been part of an uniform, had hardly any ruffles at all. Mal then proceeded to disappear outside.
Polly wasn't done with her, though. She followed.
Lighting another cigarette, she said: "Mal?"
"Yes, kid?"
"You were bleeding, weren't you?"
Casting one meaningful look on her arm, then on Polly, Mal said, "You tell me."
"But I thought vampires -"
"Vampires," said Mal, "are defined by what they know. Or choose, if you're lucky." She worked some buttons, and added, "I could make my blood flow stop, but what's the damn point? It'd just give me an unhealthy complexion."
"Mal, I don't want to be rude, but you do have a rather unhealthy -"
"Look who's talking. Have you looked into a mirror today?"
There was an Offended Silence in which Polly tried not to scream.
"Sorry," said Mal. "It's a bit like the sunlight thing," she added. "We are perfectly able to learn."
She rolled up one sleeve to inspect her arm, making a grimace as she did so.
So they'd slipped into almost familiar conversation patterns, with Mal being pretentious and herself trying to make sense of things. This was good, wasn't it?
Well, it wasn't, but -
Mal sat down on a rock and began to wash the dried blood off her arm, using what Polly hoped was the last fresh snow of the winter. Polly watched, and found it strangely soothing that the snow was actually, truly melting on Mal's skin.
"We are not dead, Polly," said Mal, who might or might not have read her mind.
"Great," said Polly, and Mal looked up, a quizzical expression on her face.
"Great?"
Polly couldn't help but notice that the bite marks - a full set of teeth oh gods - had healed slower than they would usually have done, that was to say, they were still visible. Besides -
"No," said Polly. "Nothing's great, Mal." She wasn't going to let go of the anger, at least not until she'd had the chance to examine it, to decide whether it was good old Polly anger or psychotic vampire anger. She needed to know before she killed anyone.
Not expecting an answer, she went over to where the ground went from sort-of-horizontal straight to vertical. In some ways, Zlobenia wasn't entirely unlike Borogravia.
One step forward -
"Try to get some sleep," said Mal, who had, quite suddenly, appeared behind her, pulling the clean shirt over her head. "We're leaving at dusk."
Polly was hardly tired, but she did go back into the cave if only because, in situations like this, having someone who seems to have an idea of what to do is slightly better then the alternative, and also, because there was an inviting lack of Mal in the cave. Still -
"Mal? Mal! Where are you going?"
"Taking a walk," said Mal, sticking her head back in. "I'm not tired, and the way I see it, we are short of food." She noticed Polly's shocked look. "Not that kind of food, Polly. I'll find you something socially acceptable, don't worry."
And with that, she was off.
Polly sat down on her blankets,. She'd decided to at least give sleep a chance, because she'd always, always put effort into things, but restlessness brought her to her feet again after a few minutes.
The cave was not really all that big, a few steps into every direction. Breathe, thought Polly. One breath a step, until that didn't work anymore.
It was the silence, it got to her. She tried to scream, only her throat was too constricted for that. Faster.
Silence, silence still, and then the coffee mug hit the wall.
Fine shards sprayed Polly, and things felt clearer for all of a moment, and she took that moment to leave. Outside, temperatures were well over melting-point at this time of the day, she was thankful for that at least. The winter had gone on for too long.
The light was just a tiny bit too bright, and Polly waited for her eyes to adapt to the sunlight, and when that didn't quite happen, she cursed. A lot.
-
Polly found landscape, and more landscape, and plenty of caves. More importantly, Polly found Mal some hundred yards away, hanging upside down in that very still way Polly had seen before and that she'd come to associate with the exhausted sleep that you slept at those occasions where you were lucky enough to sleep at all. Mal had wrapped herself into her ancient black cloak, the same one she'd worn when they'd taken the shilling a million years ago.
Polly watched her for a while. Their faces were almost on the same level, and Polly was careful not to breathe. She was close enough to feel Mal's warm breath on her face, at any rate, and she raised one hand, almost touching her, but not quite. Raised it a little bit higher.
It was the silence, it got to her.
Mal had shown her where her heart was, once, as a kind of safety measure, in case she would ever get the urge to bite people again. Polly had gone to great lengths to not actually listen as such, but she was sure she could improvise. It wasn't completely out of reach, now.
She could do this, easily. Grab a stick, do it, just like that, and Mal wouldn't even have time to -
It broke her heart, she was so tempted.
Her hand was still hovering, but she realised she didn't have a stick. And that was it, or would have been, if Mal hadn't opened her eyes just now and stared straight into hers.
Polly's hand clenched into a fist and she drew it back to gather impact and then brought it forward faster than even Mal should have been able to follow. Her fist stopped half an inch away from of Mal's face, and Polly very much noticed the way Mal's eyes screwed shut in anticipation of the blow and she very much noticed the way Mal hadn't even attempted to block her.
She didn't react now, either, all closed eyes and pretended sleep again, and Polly left the cave.