The Red Slayer

The next few hours pass in a haze of fatigue and relief. We’re taken to the nearest hospital where Luke’s neck is stitched up and his paralysis is almost gone by the time Elisa arrives to take him home. Olga and Dante come home with me and Dad, change back into their original clothes and head home themselves in taxis. I don’t get the chance to speak with Tara at all.

When all is said and done, Dad finds me in my room in my dressing gown, using sewing scissors to even out my hair. I stretch my arm out, expecting the scarlet strands to stretch their full length, only to find nothing but air between my fingers.

‘Does it look okay?’

‘Of course it does,’ he says, setting down a tray of sandwiches and two mugs of hot chocolate. ‘It’ll grow back.’

'I can’t remember the last time it was this short. I always wanted Little Mermaid hair. What will people say at school?’

Dad stops short of lifting his mug to his lips and raises his eyebrow. ‘Why not take a day off? Otherwise, you might be too tired for Prizegiving.’

‘You’re right,’ I say. ‘I’d only fall asleep in Maths anyway.’

‘We’ll do something special next weekend to celebrate.’

I clink my mug against his. ‘I hope that’s the only time I come across a Feral. Even with vampire DNA, I couldn’t take the thing down without Luke taking a metaphorical bullet and Olga and Dante having my back.’

Dad smiles and subtly nudges the plate of sandwiches in my direction. ‘After a performance like tonight, there won’t be a vampire in Britain that won’t fear the Red Slayer and her team.’

I take a triumphant bite of my sandwich. Turkey. Cunning. The ideal thing to induce sleepiness. What follows is probably the best night’s sleep I’ve had since before Michael Hughes got out of prison.

***

It’s another hangover breakfast the next morning. It’s strange not to have the ends of my hair dipping in the orange juice or getting splashes of maple syrup in it. Dad tells the school I’m crippled by my woman’s disposition today but will be able to sing tonight no problem. A delivery arrives not long after, a thick brown envelope addressed to me and marked confidential.

’It’s my script for Beautiful Sins,’ I say. ‘They must want me to read through it.’ I reach up to comb my fingers through my hair, only to remember it’s drastically shorter and squirm. ‘I need to get this seen to.’

I head upstairs to get dressed where my phone buzzes on my bedside table. I go for it immediately, thinking it’s Tara. For once I’m actually disappointed to hear from Kaarlo Rochester. His script must have arrived too.

He wants to meet up. Today. For coffee.

Now I really need to get my hair sorted. Thankfully, the salon on the high street takes walk-ins and offers a half-price mani-pedi when you get a cut. Why not? I think to myself. This is my reward for not dying.

I’m flicking through their complimentary copies of Elle with my fingers and toes wrapped in foil and my hair in rollers when I realise the woman sat next to me with foil in her hair and reading the French Vogue has a familiar cream suit poking out from under the black salon robe.

I see her game. ‘Don’t tell me ponchos are back in,’ I say to her in French.

'Mon Dieu,’ Sophia McIntyre replies.

I’m sure either Dad told her where I went or she has agents tracking me. If it was urgent, she wouldn’t be speaking to me as an acquaintance. But on the off chance the Russians are listening, I’ll be debriefed in French.

‘Your uncle is currently in our custody,’ says Sophia. ‘By the end of the month, he’ll be handed over to the United Nations.’

‘He’s not even my uncle, not by blood anyway. He’s just this guy, you know?’

‘He’s yet to tell us who hired him to supervise the Feral’s creation. If they were affiliated with a foreign power, it wouldn’t have happened on British soil.’

My stylist arrives to remove my rollers, paying no attention to my conversation with Sophia.

‘On the plus side,’ Sophia continues, still in French, ’My superiors are very impressed with your work. They want you to start training as soon as possible. I can arrange a part time schedule in November.

'Novembre?’ I reply, stopping myself from turning my head. ’That’s when I start filming for Beautiful Sins. I just got the script.’

‘Hence I said “part time”. You will be taken to a base near your filming location on weekends. Weapons training and such. All standard procedure.’

‘Well, we’re filming in Berkshire, so…’

‘So, Sandhurst. You’ll like it. I graduated from there.’

My hair is a mane of red curls when the stylist is done. I gaze at the Iorwen in the mirror. There’s something new in me which short hair had to bring out if I was ever going to notice. A part of me was lost last night. I’m not sure what part. But I can adapt without it. Isn’t that part of growing up? Adapting. Resourcefulness. Making the best of what we can.

I feel so sophisticated and grown up when I meet Kaarlo an hour later at a vegan café on Baker Street. I go to the table where he’s sat waiting and where he shakes his head, hardly recognising me. ‘Wow,’ he says. ‘Look at the new you.’

‘Do you like it?’ I ask.

‘Smashing. What brought on the idea?’

‘Oh, you know…long hair is nice, but it does become a nuisance. I can see why Olga wears her braid all the time.’

We sit discussing the show and the script for two hours. The cast are being set up in rented bungalows and we’re hopeful I’ll get to share with him and Hugh. I haven’t realised where the time has gone until Dad arrives at the café to pick me up, telling me we should drop by Tara’s.

I sober up, ready to face her. But our journey to the beige house is in vain. Not only is she not there, but the house is surrounded by police tape with disapproving neighbours looking on. Not even girlfriend status will allow the supervising constables to tell me where the family is, but they can take Tara’s stuff to her. I hand them over, including her phone and the black dress she was supposed to wear at Prizegiving tonight.

***

The police are at school too. One of their cars is sat outside the gates when we arrive. It’s all the other pupils can talk about backstage. The girls’ dressing rooms are abuzz with speculation over drug busts or gang violence. I bite my tongue and pray they don’t notice Tara’s absence, though the space beside me is empty.

‘Tara!’ says Penny behind me. I turn around to see her standing in the doorway. Though she’s already decked in makeup, I can tell she’s exhausted. She takes off her coat as she sits down next to me. She’s wearing the plain black I handed over, along with a beaded black choker.

‘I didn’t know if you would make it,’ I say.

She nods. ‘I wasn’t sure if I would until you sent the dress.’

‘Where have you been? I’ve been so worried.’

Her eyes narrow at her reflection. ‘Your lot put me up in a hotel. I’ve got a chaperone who’ll take me back there once the show’s over.’

I sit back. ‘“Your lot”?’

Penny comes and leans on the dressing table between us. ‘Do you have an eyebrow brush I can borrow?’

I dig into my makeup bag and fish it out for her. She kneels in front of the mirror and starts marking them out. ‘How come you two weren’t at school today?’

‘Cramps,’ I explain. ‘I was being sick and everything.’

‘Family row,’ says Tara. Her voice is tight, trying to hold her anger back, only to have it slip through her fingers bit by bit. ‘My mum’s boyfriend was a total asshole. I tried to get away from him, but he sent his mates after me.’

‘Oh, my god,’ Penny gasps. ‘Are you all right?’

‘Mostly. He’s out of the picture now. But I’m not going to live with my mum anymore. Dad’s selling his flat so he can take in me and my brother.’

I stifle a gasp of my own, nonchalantly adding extra highlighter to my face. Tara’s father lives in Richmond. It’d make her school commute impossible, unless she wants to get up at five in the morning.

‘Did you know about this, Iorwen?’ asks Penny.

‘Of course she does,’ says Tara snidely. ‘She was there.’

I turn my head and gape at her.

Penny backs off, finishes her eyebrows and leaves. I look around to check no one’s listening and immediately throw Tara a glare.

‘What is with you?’ I snap.

‘What do you think?’ she hisses. ’Michael’s mates turned me.’ She points to the spot on her arm where the needle hole once was. It’s fully healed over. ‘I spent most of the day having strangers in suits tell me what I was, like I chose to be one.’

‘Do you know how much blood was transferred? Are you a Dhampyr or a Dracul?’

She shrugs. ‘I don’t know. Somewhere in between. I can’t change others, but they said at least twice a month I’m going to crave blood and I’ll have headaches and nausea if I don’t.’

‘I’m so sorry,’ I reply. ‘I had no idea you’d be turned. I thought he was only going to hold you hostage.’

Her blue eyes are cold, her scowl heavy. ‘He watched while it happened. That blood going into me felt like acid. It’s the most painful thing I’ve ever been through.’

I hand her a box of tissues so she can stop tears from ruining her makeup. I want to say something, but Ms. Elliott summons us into the Drama Studio for vocal warmup. Tara is the first to leave, the rest of the girls’ choir follows with me in the rear. I can’t even stand near her as we’re lined up alphabetically.

Backstage is bustling, with no chance of pulling Tara into a corner for a quick word without five people packed in with us just trying to keep out of the way. It’s hard to have a conversation with everyone too nervous to speak. I occasionally act as dresser when a girl’s braid unravels or a boy’s tie is askew. Before I know it, the girls file onstage and begin singing Harry Styles’ Sign of the Times. Tara’s face is stiff throughout, looking vacantly to a high point in the room. Perhaps she’s absorbing the lyrics’ meanings. She wants to get away from here. From everything. When they’re applauded and filed offstage, I discreetly pull her aside.

‘You’re not leaving yet, are you?’

‘No, there’s still your song and the finale.’

‘After that though. At least give us a chance to talk alone. Please’

She frowns, sits in the very chair I waited in and crosses her arms and legs. Meanwhile, the boys’ choir are called forth and begin their rendition of We Are Young. One of the assistants from Year 12 hands me a sequined eye mask which makes Tara curl her lip when I put it on. As the song dies down, a technician shoves a microphone into my hand.

I look back at Tara as my name is announced and the girls’ choir heads back onto the stage ahead of me. Her face is blank, but I can’t let it bother me now. It wasn’t my fault she was turned. It’s no one’s fault but Michael’s. I earned my place here tonight. I push all my baggage away as I mount the stage and turn my back to the packed auditorium.

I’m not ashamed to say I have fun. Twitching my leg in time to the tempo before the music starts, taking off the mask when I sing, 'You’ll wind up like the wreck you hide behind that mask you use,’ and tossing it like a frisbee into the pit where the pianist catches it.

Dad, Elisa, Luke, Olga and Dante are all on the front row. The sight of them makes me throw more love into my performance with the choir backing me enthusiastically. After my final, 'I’m still standing! Yeah, yeah, yeah!’ I pump my microphone-wielding fist in the air and the crowd erupts in deafening applause.

The finale song takes on a whole new meaning with Penny and a Year 13 girl as Karen and Gretchen telling me I was “so fetch” and how fearless I was. Meanwhile, cheerleaders, jocks and geeks dance in the aisles, the marching band gathers upstage, the boys’ and girls’ choirs intermix and shout, ‘Fearless!’

I join hands with Penny and Lewis. We throw our arms in the air and swoop into bows. The crowd showers us with cheers and my happy tears break free. I’m a giggling, sobbing mess, especially when the conductor throws me a bunch of flowers. I want to pull Tara close and kiss her in front of everyone. Where is she?

I turn my head and spot her, walking into the wings, not looking back.

© Alice of Sherwood, July 2020