Christmas in Transylvania
A Deadly Angels Novella
By Sandra Hill
On-Sale 10/28/2014
ISBN: 9780062117557
Book Description:
For the first time ever the leader of the Viking Vampire Angels, Vikar Sigurdsson, has been talked into celebrating a traditional Christmas! The tree has been decorated, the gifts have been wrapped and the stockings have been hung. And that’s mistletoe, not cobwebs hanging from the ceiling of the creepy castle full of vangels…really!
The icing on the vampire cookie comes when vangel Karl Mortensen rescues Faith Larson, a battered young waitress, from her abusive boyfriend and hides her in the castle amidst the Christmas chaos. But what Karl thought was a frail young teenager is actually a very tempting woman. And she thinks his fangs are sexy!
But a strange “Christmas visitor” at the castle and demon vampires up to their old tricks could threaten the budding romance between Karl and Faith. It’s an impossible match: a human and a vangel, but Christmas is a time for magic.
Karl and Faith don’t stand a chance…
Available at Amazon
CHAPTER ONE
Santa
with fangs?…
“’Twas the night
before Christmas, and all through the castle, not a creature was stirring, not
even a bat--”
“Very
funny!” Vikar Sigurdsson elbowed Karl
Mortensen and almost knocked him off his kitchen stool. They sat side by side at the twenty-foot
island counter in the huge castle kitchen.
Karl’s halfbrained rewording of the famous yuletide story had been in
response to Vikar’s telling him that Alex, Vikar’s wife, wanted them to have a
traditional Christmas celebration this year, complete with holly, and decorated
trees, and caroling, and feasts, and Santa Claus, and jingle bells, and
gifts. All that ho-ho-ho nonsense.
‘Twas enough to
give a thousand-plus-year-old Viking vampire angel a headache!
Yes, Vikar lived
in a lackwit, rundown castle (more like falling down, if you ask me, which no
one ever does) in lackwit Transylvania, and, no, not Transylvania,
Romania. No, this was lackwit
Transylvania, Pennsylvania (Don’t ask!).
As for bats, three years ago when he’d begun the renovation of this
hundred-year-old, seventy-five room monstrosity, they’d had to first remove ten
tons of guano. (That’s bat shit, to you
uninformed.) And they still hadn’t
eliminated all of the irksome creatures.
Try sleeping at night to the sound of flapping wings in the
turrets. Not that vangels (Viking
vampire angels, to you uniformed, again.
Jeesh!), like himself, weren’t accustomed to the sound of flapping
wings, but usually it was from St. Michael the Archangel, their heavenly mentor
aka Pain In The Arse, whom they rudely referred to as Mike. (When he was not around.)
Vikar sipped at
his long-necked bottle of beer. He and
Karl were enjoying a mid-afternoon break from battle training down in the
dungeons while Alex was off somewhere, probably dreaming up more of her
honey-do jobs for him. Not that I
haven’t told her more than once that they are more like honey-damn-don’t
chores.
This is how the
conversations usually went:
“Honey, we need
another bathroom on the fourth floor.”
What was it with
this “we” business. Women always used
the “we” card when trying to convince men of one thing or another.
“We already have
two bathrooms on the fourth floor.”
Vikar recalled a
time when the only toilet facilities were wooden holes in an outdoor privy or a
private spot in the woods. It had been
cold enough betimes to turn a cock into an icicle.
“I know. That’s why we need three. Whew!
It is so hot today. I think I’ll
go take a bubble bath. I don’t suppose…”
Alex knew sure
as Eve tempted Adam that Vikar loved taking bubble baths with her. There was something about popping bubbles
that appealed to the boy in him. Or the
man.
Face it, she
pays no attention to my complaints. All
she has to do is smile in that certain way, or hint at some sexual play, and I
am Norse putty in her hands. Like this
most recent, brilliant idea of hers.
Holy clouds! She will be turning
us all into ridiculous Santa Clauses.
With fangs!
He glanced over
at Karl who was sipping with distaste from a bottle of Fake-O. Vikar could have told him it was better to
just chug the crap down and cleanse the palate with a bottle of beer. Fake-O was the synthetic blood vangels drank
when they’d been too long from feeding during a mission.
Karl was a quiet
kind of guy, the type that didn’t feel the need to talk just to fill gaps in a
conversation. A man’s man, modern folks
would say. He did the jobs that were
handed to him with competency. No
whining or complaints, like Vikar’s brother Trond was wont to do, especially if
it involved anything strenuous. Trond
was a sloth if there ever was one, although he was working to reform himself
from his grave sin, as they all were.
There was a
sadness about Karl, too, but not like Vikar’s brother Mordr who for centuries
turned his sadness into a berserk madness, killing practically everything that
got in his pathway. Mordr’s sin had of
course been wrath.
Vikar liked
Karl.
Breaking the
companionable silence, Vikar continued with his tirade, “It would be a sacrilege for us to celebrate
such a commercial holiday, wouldn’t it?
We’re practically angels.”
“Practically?”
Karl snorted. “You didn’t look very
angelic when I saw you coming out of your bedroom this morning.”
Vikar grinned in
remembrance. Three years he’d been wed,
with more than a thousand years of experience in the bed arts under his belt,
literally, and still his wife could surprise him.
“Besides,
Vikings back in your time celebrated the holiday season, didn’t you?”
In my time?
Vikar mused. Makes me sound
ancient. Which I am. Still, I like to think of myself as my
thirty-three human years.
Karl was a
Viking, too…all vangels were, by birth if not descent…but he was young for a
vangel, having died only about forty years ago during the Vietnam War.
“Vikings
celebrated the Yule season with great vigor.
‘Tis true. Yule logs and gift
giving. Feasts. Not a religious holiday, more a commemoration
of the Winter Solstice. It was nothing
like the secular extremes evident today.
Even though we did, of course, have reindeer in the Norselands. None with a red nose, though, that I recall.”
“It could be as
secular or not, as you wish,” Karl said.
“Besides, Alex is right. Kids
should experience the holiday season.
And this will be the first Christmas that yours are old enough to
understand.”
The traitor!
Vikar thought at Karl’s siding with his wife, but then he was probably right. Gunnar and Gunnora, Vikar and Alex’s
“adopted” twins, were three years old.
For the past four days, ever since Thanksgiving…another chaotic holiday
Alex had talked him into!…Gun and Nora had been yipping and yapping about Santa
this and Rudolph that and jingle belling ‘til Vikar’s head hurt. It had all started when they’d gone to
something called “Black Friggsday” at the mall.
Rather, “Black Friday.” Betimes,
he still fell into the old Norse words, like Friggsday for Friday, because,
after all, despite being a vampire angel, he was a Viking at heart. Which should be good enough reason to not
have to be reminded to ever fall for that trap again. “Honey, would you drive us to the mall? Gun and Nora need new shoes. It will be fun.” Hah!
If I never hear “Alvin and the Chipmunks” again, it will be too soon!
“Did you
celebrate Christmas when you were growing up?” he asked Karl.
The young
man…even though Karl had forty-two vangel years on top of his twenty-two human
ones, Vikar still thought of him as young…rarely spoke of his past. His situation had been unique amongst the
vampire angels since he’d left behind a young wife who lived out her human
years until she died two years ago at age sixty-two. Imagine staying the same age yourself but
watching a loved one grow older and older and then perish of a wasting disease!
Karl
smiled. A sad smile, Vikar noticed. “Yes.
I grew up on a small farm in Minnesota with a brother and two sisters. We were poor as church mice, even though my
Dad worked from dawn ‘til dusk milking cows and growing corn and hay. Mom had a big vegetable garden and put away
hundreds of Mason jars filled with different things every fall. String beans, carrots, peas, corn, limas,
beets, pickles, chow chow, peaches, pears, applesauce. If it grew, she preserved it.
“We had a
Christmas tree, of course, with strings of ancient lights that were probably a
fire hazard. And old ornaments. Homemade ones, too. We believed in Santa Claus, early on,
anyhow. We even believed the old tale that
animals talk on Christmas Eve. Many a
night, us kids snuck out of the house to the barn to listen. I swore I heard old Bessie say, ‘Moo-rry
Christmas’ one time.” He laughed.
And Vikar
laughed with him. It was a revelation
hearing Karl talk about his background.
He hardly ever talked about himself.
“Mostly our
gifts were practical ones. Maybe a
handknitted sweater or mittens or socks.
Nuts, hard candies, and some fruit that was out-of-season for us, like
nectarines, would be in our stockings, which we hung without fail over the
fireplace.”
There are thirty
fireplaces in this friggin’ castle, Vikar mused, and had a sudden horrifying
image of stockings hanging from every one of them. Some of the younger vangels were often like
children themselves and would sure as sin be wishing for gifts from the fat man
in the red suit. Images of Armod, the
sixteen-year-old vangel from Iceland, immediately came to mind. Armod fancied himself Michael Jackson
reincarnated. (You do not want to see a
Viking vampire moonwalking! Trust me!)
“Each of us only
got one present,” Karl continued.
Over the holiday
there could be as many as a hundred vangels in residence at the castle,
especially if his brothers came with their contingents. Knowing Alex, she’d probably already issued
invitations. Surely, he wouldn’t be
expected to go gift shopping for all of them.
Would he? Vikar shuddered with
mall tremors.
His headache
felt as if it were growing. Maybe he was
developing a brain tumor. Good
idea. That might be sufficient excuse
for Alex to get the Christmas bug out of her…um, head.
“One gift only,
but, man, it was always something special.
I remember the year I got a BB gun.”
“And your
parents didn’t worry that you would shoot your eye out?” Vikar asked, referring
to the famous line from “The Christmas Story,” a movie some of his vangels
loved.
“Nah! Growing up on a farm, we were used to hunting
and stuff. I got to be a pretty good
shot, too. That’s why I was recruited to
be a sniper in the Army, and--” Karl’s
words trailed off. He never spoke of his
time in Vietnam, the time of his great sin.
“Anyhow, there’s nothing for a kid like those weeks leading up to
Christmas. The smells of evergreens in
the house and the baking. Ma made a
dozen different kind of cookies, and pies, even homemade fruit cake. And the Christmas dinner was a regular feast
with turkey and stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, rutabaga and corn, string
bean casserole, cranberry sauce, fresh fruit salad, and rolls warm from the
oven dripping with butter.”
At the mention
of all that baking and food preparation, their cook’s head shot up. Lizzie Borden had had been sitting at the far
end of the counter skimming through a recipe book. He hadn’t realized they’d been speaking so
loud. And, yes, it was that Lizzie
Borden, who wielded her axe these days chopping vegetables and beef
carcasses. Lizzie was the most
sour-dispositioned woman Vikar had ever met.
She exchanged a look with him that said loud and clear, “Don’t even
think about it!”
Karl hadn’t
noticed Lizzie’s expression. Instead, he
was still lost in childhood memories.
“The excitement, that’s what I remember most. The anticipation of
Christmas was almost as special as Christmas itself.” He shrugged as if helpless to explain it all.
Actually, he’d
done a pretty good job, not of convincing Vikar that he should go all out with
Christmas madness as Alex’s plan would surely be, but showing a more simple
view of the holiday. “Is the farm still
there?”
Karl
nodded. “I’ve not been permitted to make
myself visible to any of my family, especially while Sally was still
alive.” He bit his bottom lip for a long
moment before going on. “Mom died a long
time ago, but my Dad is still alive.
Finally retired at eighty-nine.
My little brother Erik works the land now. Quite a prosperous operation these
days.” He laughed. “I say little, but Erik is fifty-eight now,
and has not just grandchildren, but one great-granddaughter.”
Just then, Vikar
heard the loud bang, bang, bang of little feet stomping down the uncarpeted
back stairs. Laughing (Was there
anything sweeter than the sound of a child laughing?), excited chatter (Do
children know how to talk below a shout?), shrieking “I’m first, I’m first.”
Gunnora rushed
through the doorway of the servant’s staircase, shoving her brother aside with
a swing of her tiny hip. Her blonde
braids were half undone and she had a dirt smudge on her freckled nose. “Papa, look what I found in the attic.” She was carrying a wooden soldier nutcracker
almost a tall as she was. “Gimme a nut,
Lizzie,” she ordered.
“I’ll give you a
nut, you little tyrant,” Lizzie muttered and went back to reading her recipe
book.
Close behind
Nora was her twin Gunnar who carefully held a wooden stable inside of which
Vikar could see what appeared to be painted wood Nativity figures. Gun put it on the floor and began to arrange
the little statues of the Holy Family and animals. “I need some straw,” he said to himself. “Betcha that Amish man at the farmers’ market
has some.”
And then there was
Alex, his wife, who could still make his heart leap (and other body parts),
despite their being married three years now.
“Honey, wait ‘til you see what I found for you,” she said, placing a
dust-covered box on the counter in front of him.
Uh-oh. There is that “honey” again. Best I raise my shield and prepare for
battle.
Gun and Nora
were jumping up and down with excitement.
Open it, Papa. Open it.” And the gleam in Alex’s eyes was much like
that of a Norseman just home from a long trip a-Viking, offering some treasure
or other to a loved one. Maybe she was
not asking another favor of him, but granting one. He would be open minded.
“Thank you,
love,” he said graciously.
But then he saw
what was inside and thought, Screw open-minded.
He said, “Holy
shit!” before he could catch himself.
Alex did not like him to use foul language in front of the
children. But this required a “Holy
shit!” if anything ever did. Inside the
box, was a moth-holed, old-fashioned Santa suit, with a black leather belt, big
boots, and a ridiculous peaked cap.
Just then, Nora
let out a little squeal and set aside the nutcracker. Running over to the window facing the back
courtyard, she said, “It’s snowing! It’s
snowing!”
And Gun said,
“Maybe we can make a snowman, just like Frosty.”
And Alex, who
was tone deaf or close to it, burst out into song, “It’s beginning to look a
lot like Christmas.”
And Karl said,
“I’m outta here.”
“Can I come with
you?” Vikar asked.
“Hell, no,
Mister Scrooge!”
Once Karl was
gone and the children had gone off with a grumbling Lizzie to find some coal
and carrots and a cap for Frosty, he and Alex were alone. He glanced pointedly at the open box and
said, “Surely, you don’t expect me to…come on, Alex, sweetling…Santa with
fangs? Ha, ha, ha.”
She didn’t
laugh. Instead, she gave him that little
secret Mona Lisa smile…and, yes, he had met the model for the Mona Lisa
painting one time and knew exactly why she had been smiling. “Honey,” Alex purred.
Beware of women
who purr. “No, no, no!” he said. And he continued to insist, “No, no,
no,” until Alex yawned and mentioned
taking a little nap. He did so enjoy afternoon “naps” with his wife.
Still, he
protested, “A Viking Santa?”
Somehow Alex
managed to hop up onto his lap, straddling his hips. With arms looped around his neck, she said,
“Please?”
“I will be the
laughingstock of Vikings throughout this world and the other,” he said on a
groan of surrender.
Oddly, he found
that he no longer cared.
*****
About the Author:
Sandra Hill is a graduate of Penn State and worked for more than 10 years as a features writer and education editor for publications in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
Writing about serious issues taught her the merits of seeking the lighter side of even the darkest stories.
She is the wife of a stockbroker and the mother of four sons.
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