By Blood We Live

He ran out. Sure. But he came back. Because he knew that there was more to the blood, more than just the taking.

One moment's courage…

Quincey stared down at the stake jammed through his beloved's heart, the cold shaft spearing the blue-pink muscle that had thundered at the touch of his fingers. The bowie shook in his hand. The piano man sang:

"There never could be such a longing,

In the heart of a poor cowboy's breast,

As dwells in this heart you are breaking,

While I wait in my home in the West."

Outside, the sky was black. Every square in the quilt. No moon tonight.

Thunder rumbled, rattling the windows.

Quincey put the bowie to his neck. Lightning flashed, and white spiderwebs of brightness danced on Lucy's flesh. The shadows receded for the briefest moment, then flooded the parlor once more, and Quincey was lost in them. Lost in shadows he'd brought home from Whitby.

One moment's courage…

He sliced his neck, praying that there was some red left in him. A thin line of blood welled from the wound, overflowing the spot where Lucy had branded him with eager kisses.

He sagged against the box. Pressed his neck to her lips.

He dropped the bowie. His hand closed around the stake.

One moment's courage…

He tore the wooden shaft from her heart, and waited.

Minutes passed. He closed his eyes. Buried his face in her dark hair. His hands were scorpions, scurrying everywhere, dancing to the music of her tender thighs.

Her breast did not rise, did not fall. She did not breathe.

She would never breathe again.

But her lips parted. Her fangs gleamed. And she drank.

Together, they welcomed the night.

FOXTROT AT HIGH NOON by Sergei Lukyanenko

Translated from Russian by Michael M. Naydan and Slava I. Yastremski

Russian writer Sergei Lukyanenko is the author of the international bestselling vampire novels Night Watch and Day Watch, which were adapted to film by Russian filmmaker Timur Bekmambetov. The third book in the series, Twilight Watch, is currently in production. The fourth and final book in the series, Last Watch, was published in January. He is among the most popular Russian science fiction/fantasy writers, and is the author of several other novels as well, but to date only the Watch books have been translated into English.

Lukyanenko's short work has appeared in English only once so far, in James and Kathryn Morrow's SFWA European Hall of Fame anthology. That story, like this one, was translated by Michael M. Naydan and Slava I. Yastremski.

This story appears here for the first time. It tells the story of a lone stranger, in a post-apocalyptic future, coming to a town overrun by lawlessness.

The town was lost between the mountains and the sea, like a man between the earth and heaven.

The train moved along the shore all night, and the rattle of the wheels merged with the sound of the surf in a single unending melody. In the freight car, Denis was barely able to sleep. He lay on boards that smelled of hay and horse dung, watching the infrequent flashes of stars through the holes in the slotted roof of the car. There were no horses here-the livestock pens were empty-but a little bit of hay remained, and he raked it under his head. Before going to sleep, Denis had undressed, and now wore only his undershorts. Boots stood beside his feet; jeans, a plaid shirt, and a velvet jacket hung off the side rail of the livestock pen. His left hand rested atop a heavy revolver in a frayed holster.

The wheels of the train knocked out their song. Denis began to stir, and whispered:

"The train is rushing-what a beaut,

The wheels are knocking-tra ta toot toot!"

– then dozed off for a short time.

Denis awoke as the car was gripped by the morning chill. He stood, grabbed his weapon, and walked from the end of the car to the caboose platform. In one of the pens, a vagrant lay still and unmoving in the shadows. Denis averted his eyes.

Daybreak. The door to the train car was open; he had entered the train through it last night. Outside, on the platform, he unhurriedly relieved himself, then sat down, hanging his legs off the side of the car, an endless ladder spreading out beneath him, the rails like twin steel bow strings and the rungs of the cross-ties dark from creosote. If you lay your head back it seemed as if the train were gliding down from the sky itself.

"The wheels are knocking tra-ta-toot," Denis repeated.

A quarter of an hour later, when the train had stopped in a small town, Denis stood in the open doors of the freight car finishing a cigarette. The train pulled onto track number one; on track two, a long freight train with tanks and storage containers began to sing and toot and started off in the opposite direction. Denis jumped down without waiting for the train to come to a full stop and teetered, but kept his balance.