Page 190 of White Wolf

He chewed at his lip with one white, sharp fang, and darted a glance to Nikita.

“It’s alright,” she said. “I have it on good authority he was a big fan of your dad.”

Nikita snorted. “Can I smoke in here?”

“No,” Lanny said.

Trina said, “Sure, go ahead.” She prompted, “Alexei. Please.”

He cleared his throat. Nodded. Looked down at his pale hands where they rested on the tabletop. “The wolf,” he started.

A low grow pulsed through the room, followed by another. Sasha, and then Nikita, echoing him.

“Sasha,” Alexei amended quickly, glancing between the two of them, head ducked down between his shoulders in deference. “Sorry. Sasha said that I…that mybloodtasted like Rasputin. So you all know Grigory, I guess.”

“We do,” Trina said.

He nodded. “It wasn’t just rumor, back then. He really did save my life. Multiple times. But it wasn’t through prayer.”

“When did he turn you?” Nikita asked. “At Spala?”

“No, it started before then, I think. But it wasn’t one incident.” He frowned, expression growing faraway as he remembered. “I used to bleed, you know,” he said, softly. “I still do, more than I should, if you cut me just right. It won’t kill me now, but I guess being turned didn’t take away the impulse of the flesh.” He shook his head as if to clear it, eyes closing a moment.

“I was in the nursey,” he continued, staring at his hands again, “the first time it happened. I was playing with Olga and Tatiana, and I tripped, and fell. Normal playing, you know? It wasn’t a big thing at all. Just a bump. But that night the bleeding started, under my skin, big bruises like flowers down my arm.” He rubbed the right one, shivering. “Our Friend Grisha had come to pray with Mama, and he came in to see me. I was shaking in my bed, teeth chattering. I was socold. And frightened. It hurt to bleed like that, when it was trapped and couldn’t get out. It–” He bit his lip again, a flash of a fang. “When Grisha walked into the room, it was like a warm blanket wrapping me up, the way I was suddenly calm, and it didn’t hurt as badly.

“He came to the bed and sat on the edge of it. Mama stood in the doorway, and watched, and her face was heartbroken. ‘We will pray, My dear Little Boy,’ Grigory said. He pulled the covers down and opened my pajamas, so he could see the bruises on my arm. ‘We will pray, and God will answer, and you will feel better.’ And then he bent his head and it hurt, just a moment, when his fangs went into my arm. But then it felt better. So much better.”

Trina risked a sideways glance and saw that Nikita sat perfectly still, the lit cigarette clenched between his teeth vibrating, betraying the fine tremors that coursed through his body.

“After,” Alexei said, “he opened a little cut on the end of his finger and pressed a drop of his blood onto my tongue. To help me heal, he said.” He shrugged. “It worked. Again and again, it worked.”

Nikita took a deep drag and exhaled smoke through his nose. Took the cigarette between his fingers again. “He turned you a little at a time.”

“Yes. I think he did. All I know is…” He hesitated, took a deep breath. When he spoke again, his voice sounded brittle, ready to crack. “The night they…the night they came to the house–”

“When the Bolsheviks shot you all,” Nikita said with a toneless matter-of-factness that Trina thought disguised his own horror pretty well.

“Y-yes. Then.” Alexei swallowed hard. “I remember the bullets ripping through me. I remember the pain, and bleeding. I even thought, ‘This is it. I’m dying.’ And it was black for a while. Probably a long while.

“But then I woke up. There was still pain, but…there was also strength. I could smell mud, and earth, and skin. They were all round me, my family, and they were all dead but me.”

Trina crammed her cold hands into her armpits, suppressing a shudder.

Alexei smiled, small and grim. “Everyone likes to hope it was Anastasia who lived, but it was me. I crawled out of that pit, and I wasn’t a sick little boy anymore. I was a vampire.”

It was silent for a long stretch.

Lanny said, “But, wait, weren’t you a little kid when you died?” Trina suspected the rustling behind her was because he lifted his arms to put air quotes arounddied.

“I was young, yes.”

“Vampires grow,” Nikita said. “It isn’t like in the movies, where turned children stay children.”

Lanny didn’t respond.

Light-headed, Trina leaned forward to brace her elbows on the table. “While I’m sure your story about coming to New York is fascinating, let’s skip ahead a few decades. I need to know why you turned Chad Edwards.”

“Oh,” Alexei said, caving in on himself like he’d been punched. “Poor Chad.”

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