A Monster's Heart

Part 6: A Genie for Dinner

            It had been about three weeks since the affair in Transylvania. We were all calm again for the most part. But Mom remained slightly tense and became much more prone to turning if something threatened her at all. It was my second day of college and when I came home, I brought the mail in with me. There was envelope addressed to me without a return address. I opened it.

You have thirteen minutes.

The message exploded in my hand before I had time to figure out what da heck it was supposed to mean. "Hey Daniel," I called finding him in our living room sharpening his claws. "Do you know if Boppa has been drinking the extra fermented komodo dragon blood again?"

Daniel looked up from his "manicure" thing. "Boppa's been on a bit of a diet after eating one too many peanut butter and gunk sandwiches before bed. You can thank Mom for that. Why do ask?"

"Because I guess I now have 12 minutes to do something but I'm not sure what. The note thing just kinda exploded in my hand." I stretched out my palm to show him the burn when I realized just what kind of pattern had been seared into my palm. It was some sort of lamp and a demonic looking genie glaring up at me. Daniel took my hand, first sniffing it and then proceeding to lick it. (Normally that kind of behavior would really disgust me but at this point, I've learned to just roll with it.)

"Grandma Llewellyn joined The League!" Daniel started to turn because he was so angry.

"Hold up before going wild on me Daniel Wolfgang Lande!" I said pulling on his ears as hard as I could. "What's The League!?!"

"It's this group of psychotic radical Translyvanians. Every once in a while we get those few people with problems like you and even though they're Transylvanian and the League wants to purge them unless it can be proven that they're true Transylvanians." He whined and panicked obviously being very pained by my pulling his ears while trying to turn.

"How do I stop them?!"

"I don't know! Boppa probably does though!"

"Then sic him, Danny!" I said letting loose of Daniel's ears allowing him to go full were-wolf and gallop up the stairs to the balcony where I soon heard a long howl signaling that something was very wrong. Instantly, Boppa appeared in a puff of smoke.

"What's going on?"

"This is what's going on!" I shoved my hand in his face almost breaking down in tears now just because I was so stressed by what was happening.

Boppa took one look at it and then dragged me into the kitchen where he immediately took out one of Mom's knives. "Human blood runs red but her blood runs black!" To my horror, Boppa sliced a small cut on my arm and my eyes nearly popped as thick black blood oozed from my arm. I fainted.

My head felt funny. But I must have been lying on the couch given how some parts were ridiculously soft and some parts were as hard as rock. I heard low voices and canine growls but I couldn't pick out anything until I heard a girl's voice say "I found her blanket!"

I croaked. "Mama?" The living room lights were painfully bright and we live in the dark! Something big and hairy jumped on the couch and started kissing my face. I recognized the musky scent as my mother's fur coat. I threw my arms around her neck and just started crying. Something soft and fuzzy was thrown around my back. I knew from the thinning yarn, that it was my baby blanket, the only thing that had stayed with me when I was stolen from my family and thrown into the system. I never knew why I had held onto it. Now I guessed that it because it was serving as a promise that I would eventually return to my own family someday.

"Sustained." I heard a voice say. "Here is the last bit of evidence needed. The child reaching out for its mother displaying a sense of security around her. A level of trust that can only come from a child of her own womb. Llewellyn Puzzinni, how do you plead now?"

My vision cleared and I saw the Indian woman from the party wearing gold cuffs around her wrists and was kept in the tight clutches of two burly men. Probably Frankenstiens. There was also a vampire being kept at bay with a crucifix around his neck and a werewolf howling for mercy as her ears were being pulled off of her head. My grandmother wore a proud, smug look. "Unashamedly innocent." She smirked. "This is a being that doesn't belong and brings shame to the country Transylvania."

"And yet observe the girls eyes, very much like her mother's. Her forehead and chin, a carbon copy of her green father's. She accepts the blanket made from yak wool as her own. And as your late husband, Zojest Puzzinni, has just proven, her blood is black, a sign of true Transylvanian heritage." Sir Dracula said. "Members of the council. Vawt is your verdict?"

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty."

"Guilty by the council's verdict." Sir Dracula declared. "The sentence: your own blood."

That is how mygrandmother became a vampire's dinner.