Vinnie De Soth and the Bride of the Werewolf


Some of you may remember that I'm intermittently working on a Vinnie De Soth novel. You may be less surprised to learn that it has probably proliferated into a Vinnie de Soth trilogy. There's still an awful lot of work to be done, including still writing a good two-thirds of the total story. In the meantime, here's a section which will happily slot into Parodyverse continuity too. It takes place about a six months before the Parody War, quite a bit earlier than Vinnie's first appearance in The Compound #1

Meanwhile I've finally caught up with my reading and replies. Thanks for your patience.

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Two years ago:

    Tanner dug his fingers into Vinnie's throat, drawing blood. "Give me one reason why I shouldn't tear your head off right now?" the elder werewolf demanded.

    "No," choked the young occultist. "If you don't know it's wrong to kill me then it's probably a bit late for me to explain now, isn't it?"

    Tanner snarled. His prominent canine teeth glistened with saliva.

    "Besides, you don't want to murder me right now," Vinnie went on. "You want to scare me so I'll talk."

    Tanner's grip tightened. "Yeah, that was the plan. Right now I'm rethinking it."

    "Let me know when you've reached a conclusion," Vinnie gasped. His face was turning puce.

    Tanner hefted the young man easily with one hand and slammed him into the hotel wall. "You think you're pretty clever, don't you, de Soth? I can change that."

    "I am pretty clever. You see what I'm doing right now?"

    Tanner sneered. "Bleeding on me?"

    "That's right. But now for the good bit." Vinnie mouthed something silently. He didn't have the breath left to vocalise.

    Tanner gasped as something gripped his heart and squeezed. He fell over, clutching his chest, shaking like an addict. His vision went red.

    Vinnie slumped to the floor, panting, clutching his torn neck. Two minutes passed before either man could manage to speak again.

    Tanner struggled up and forced himself onto his feet; but the fit muscular warrior was gone. Now he was a doddering ancient, his emaciated limbs barely more than sticks. "What did you do to me?" he growled. Random clumps of hair sprouted on his sallow flesh then moulted off again.

    Vinnie dabbed the blood from his scratched throat with his sleeve. "Blood magic," he answered. "You're pretty obviously a lycanthrope. Lycanthropy's in the blood. I just encouraged your body to take its template from my blood for a little while rather than yours. Basically I suspended your curse."

    The werewolf staggered but refused to fall.

    "I'm pretty impressed that you survived it, to be honest," Vinnie admitted. "I mean, usually the curse makes such changes in its host that even a temporary suspension is enough to kill him. Especially if it's a major curse that's retarded ageing like yours did."

    Tanner folded his thin fingers into a fist. "I don't need to be a werewolf to kill you, punk. I slaughtered men before I was changed. I still remember how, and now I've had fifteen centuries of practice."

    "There are folks who can kill with a Zimmer frame," Vinnie acknowledged. "I try to avoid them. Especially my Great Aunt Inferna."

    Tanner staggered across to loom over the slumped occultist. "You're a dead man, de Soth!"

    Vinnie looked up at the emaciated werewolf. "That's a pretty potent curse," he admitted. "Its already regenerating. And its modifying itself so it won't get caught the same way twice. Evolving. Generating arcane antibodies, I guess. Very impressive stuff. Somebody laid a primal elder doom on you, didn't they?"

    Tanner's limbs began to flesh out again. His vision began to clear.

    "Just to be clear, though," Vinnie pointed out, "I could have escaped while you were having your heart attack. Or I could have killed you. You were vulnerable then like you haven't been in centuries."

    "Nothing can kill me," the werewolf growled. "That's the curse."

    "I'm ingenious," Vinnie de Soth promised.

    Tanner stood taller. His skin resumed its normal hue. His hair regrew. "So why didn't you finish me off when you could?"

    "Because like I mentioned when you were choking me, killing people is wrong. I try to avoid it. And I was rather hoping you'd explain why you decided I'd look better without a throat before we go back to being mindlessly violent. Please?"

    Tanner snorted. "You got some balls, kid, I'll grant you that. Okay, de Soth, you earned a short answer." He turned back and picked up the satchel he'd dropped just before he'd attacked Vinnie. He reached inside and pulled out a gauzy bridal veil. It was soaked in old dry blood.

    He crumpled it into Vinnie's hands. "There," he spat. "Now do you know?"

    Vinnie looked at the torn train. "I'm starting to, I think. Who do you believe I am?"

    "You're de Soth. Don't deny it. I can smell you."

    "Yes. But which de Soth? Do you perhaps think I'm my brother Styxus? That would explain a lot."

    Tanner frowned. "You're not Styxus? Then which?"

    "Vincent Arcanus Greymalkin de Soth. I'm Styxus' little brother." Vinnie fingered the bloody veil. "Why were you coming to kill him?"

    Tanner pulled a business card out of his jeans pocket. He was almost completely restored now, although blood flecked his mouth where he'd coughed it up during his incapacity.

    Vinnie read the card. "Mr Li's Laundry?" It took him a moment to remember where he'd heard of that organisation before. "Wait - isn't that one of the Minor Offices?" He'd heard his father swearing about them at the breakfast table.

    "Yeah. I'm with them, working off some... well, working for 'em. Like the name says, they're a clean-up service. A karmic clean-up service."

    Vinnie held up the bloody veil. "This looks like a hard-to-remove stain."

    "That," gargled Tanner, "is a bit of cleaning that came our way after the last time your big brother and his cronies decided it would be fun to go to a wedding. Mr Li says it's not of our business if some young magicians think it's funny to crash a reception party with erotic beguilement spells and turn the whole thing into an orgy. This young bride didn't think it was such a joke when she killed herself the next morning."

    Vinnie went cold. "I knew Styxus was playing nasty games. I hadn't realised it had gone so far, or cost so much."

    "Mr Li says it's not our concern. I'm making it my concern."

    "It's already mine," answered Vinnie. "I was already here to stop whatever Styxus and the others were planning. I still intend to."

    Tanner flexed his long-nailed hands. "Me too. Permanently."

    Vinnie shook his head. "You've already found out that de Soths are hard to kill. Even if you tear Styxus' head off, the family subscribes to the Resurrectionist's service. He'll be in a new body within days and back to normal in less than a year." It would still hurt a lot and be very inconvenient for his big brother though, the young occultist consoled himself.

    "So what do you suggest?" the elder werewolf scorned. "A lecture on morality and a slap on his arcane wrist?"

    Vinnie thought fast. "No... How about a reflection incantation on the bride, so any charm rebounds on the casters? Instead of the wedding party being gripped with insatiable lusts it hits Styxus and his buddies. I don't think many of them swing that way but, hey, if he didn't put that kind of desire into his spell then they'll all be just fine."

    Tanner considered this. "Not enough. Not for a death."

    Vinnie nodded. "Okay. So after I've used up all the memory on my phone's video camera and uploaded it to youtube, then you can have words with them. Or claws, I guess. But don't kill Styxus."

    "Because he's kin?"

    "Lucifer, no! Because you should take him back to Mr Li for a good scrubbing." He considered what he'd heard of the Laundry of Doom. "A cleaning. Full spun cycle. Scrub, pound, press and fold. Rinse and repeat as necessary, for months if you need to. That should be a fate worse than death."

    Tanner thought about the staff of the wash-house; about the ancient Calleach, the washer-at-the-ford, and Legumo of the Secrets, and Boilface, and the holy golem Shadrach; and about the soft-spoken Chinaman who held all their contracts. A slow nasty smile blossomed across his stubbly face. "Yeah. I reckon it could be."

    Vinnie flexed his fingers. "You know, I could get to quite enjoy doing this kind of thing." He pushed through the doors into the wedding reception. "Let's go ruin Styxus' special day."

    Tanner hesitated a moment than padded after the young occultist. "You're not so bad for a wet-eared junior-evil overprivileged wizard brat," he admitted.

    That was the nearest he ever got to a compliment.

***

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And introducing I.A. Watson's Homepage, containing links to some short stories and sample chapters and a bunch of other writing and links.

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