I’d never left the continental United States before, and while I had flown in the past, I’d never flown over an ocean. I tried not to think about that longest stretch of the flight as I buckled into my seatbelt. Michael knocked his knee against mine, holding his hand out, palm up – a silent offer. I took his hand in mine, releasing a long, slow breath as he chuckled at me.
“You know, this stretch is going to be a long flight – over eight hours. You did great from Seattle to Dulles,” he commented.
“There isn’t an ocean between Seattle and Dulles,” I countered, swallowing.
He squeezed my hand. “We’ll just need to find a good way to distract you during the flight then.” He tapped a finger on his chin. “There’s movies, the plane has wi-fi so you can do whatever you want on the internet.”
He leaned closer, speaking into my ear. “Or I could just kiss the scared out of you.”
I blushed, then dared, “I’d like to see you try.”
Still next to my ear, he growled, the sound stirring inside me before he shocked me by nipping my ear. He sat back as if he’d done nothing at all, a mischievous smile on his face. I couldn’t help but smile as well.
Before long, the aircraft taxied away from the terminal and onto the runway. The bumpy takeoff made my stomach lurch a bit, like when you’re riding up a rollercoaster, but once we were in the air, the plane’s movements smoothed. We climbed to cruising altitude, the lights of the city below becoming smaller and smaller, eventually reminding me of my grandmother’s ceramic Christmas Village with their tiny lights.
I watched as the little plane on the screen in front of me started traveling over the Atlantic Ocean. Outside the window, the clouds looked like great frozen fields, light dimming as the sun set. A lot of people had already settled back in their seats with eye masks and travel pillows, most using the thin blankets that were provided by the flight crew. The silence between takeoff and sunrise felt almost sacred.
I let go of Michael’s hand, wanting to get my earbuds out of my bag. I thought I’d see what kind of movies they had available. No way I was falling asleep any time soon, so I picked a rom-com I’d never seen and settled into my seat as comfortably as I could. But it felt as if it was over as soon as I started it, and there was still over six hours to go before we touched down in Zürich.
I glanced over at the seat next to me. Michael was scrolling on his tablet while listening to something in his ear buds. Whether it was his music or an audiobook, it was evidence of his ADHD in action that he could both do that and comprehend what he was reading at the same time.
I nudged him, and he looked at me, taking an earbud out. “What’ve you got there?” I asked him? “Listening to or reading anything interesting?”
“Just some classics,” he said, lifting his phone so I could see a caricature of Tom Cardy.
I giggled at what he classified as “classics.”
He continued, ignoring my laugh. “I’m doing some reading up on Switzerland, specifically Zürich and Geneva since that’s where our guys are. Did you know that Zürich is the home to Lindt chocolate? They have self-guided tour and you get to see a 9-meter-tall chocolate fountain.”
“You had me at Swiss chocolate,” I said. “And I think I’ve had a dream about that chocolate fountain before,” I chuckled as I looked at the picture of the colossal, glorious thing – shaped like a giant whisk hanging in the air. “Whether we have time for a tour, I definitely want to get some chocolate while we’re here. I’m not passing up this opportunity.”
Michael nodded his agreement, grinning at my silly excitement. He went on, saying, “There are some gorgeous sites we can visit if there’s time. Look at these pictures of the Old Town.” Colorful buildings close together lined cobblestone streets. It was right next to Lake Zürich, and the nighttime pictures were especially beautiful. The buildings were lit up, even the cathedral spires shining.
He went on to talk about cathedrals, showing me old buildings with tall spires and beautiful stained glass. We discussed our excitement of possibly eating at a charming little café and just relaxing, watching people as they go about their business, imagining what they must be doing.
He pulled up a different tab. “I was looking at Geneva too. Lake Geneva, or Lac Léman looks just as beautiful as Lake Zürich, and there are swans too.” He showed me pictures of a Farris wheel right by the water and of what looked like a castle to me, butting up right against the water’s edge. It had its own Old Town, just as beautiful as the one in Zürich. Geneva looked like a more urban city than Zürich, a little more polished, but it was the home of the United Nations and the Red Cross, so I supposed that it made sense.
I wanted to see everything just as badly as he did, but I teased, “You’re treating this like a field trip.”
“Well, when’s the next time we’re going to be here? I want to make the most of it,” he said with a smile. He leaned in to whisper, quiet enough that only I heard, “We can hunt for the world’s cleanest blood – and chocolate.” I chuckled but looked around all the same, hoping that no one else heard.
Across the aisle, I caught Syla’s eye and she winked with a faint smile. It must’ve been the first time in decades that she’d seen anyone joke about immortality and travel in the same breath. Unless Nikola did, but he hadn’t seemed the joking type. I shivered as his memory rose, and I stomped it down as hard as I could. He was dead. He could no longer hurt me, hurt us.
The overhead lights were almost all off, the cabin lights dimmed as we travelled through the night. Michael and I sat in the middle rows of seats, him sitting in the aisle seat. Across the aisle sat Syla and Antun. We were near the back of the cabin and everyone around us was asleep.
Antun leaned over toward us, and I leaned over Michael as he leaned over the aisle. In a quiet voice we could hear thanks to our vampiric hearing, he said, “The last time I crossed the Atlantic was by ship. It took months, and I’d watch the sunrise. It was one of the few times there were less people about – the only time when it was minimal crew and all the passengers were sleeping. Glad that this is just an eight-hour flight this time,” he chuckled.
Syla glanced toward the window next to Antun’s seat. “I used to love journeys. Not escapes, but real journeys. Where the destination was only the end product and all the gold was found along the way. When I moved to America from England, everything was new. It was like being thrust into a whole new world and I thrived. I made friends, though none of them knew about my vampirism.”
Neither of them had ever told me about their journeys to America, how they ended up in the States from England and Kosovo. I asked, “When did you guys come to the US anyway? I don’t think either of you have told us before.”
Antun motioned to Syla with a hand, saying, “Ladies first.”
Syla nodded at him with a grin, then she said, “I came in through Ellis Island around the turn of the century, 1898 if I remember correctly. I wanted something new – I’d been in England for over 150 years, only travelling as far as the countries nearest to me like Scotland and Ireland. I had to be extra careful as an English woman in those countries.”
“Anyway, like I was saying, I had gotten bored, and as it seemed to me that I was going to live forever, I decided to make the big trip. I know it was over 20 years of freedom for me in America, but it felt like it had gone in the blink of an eye. That next hundred years… well, you know enough about that.”
She turned to Antun, changing the group’s focus. “You’re up. When did you emigrate?” I watched her for a moment, wondering how much of that deflection was because she didn’t want to talk about it and how much was because she had simply answered the question and didn’t see the need to elaborate in such a public place. It made sense – even with the other passengers asleep, there was always a chance someone would wake up and hear us.
Antun smiled, “I think I’ll keep this to the short version for now. I left Kosovo to begin my travels in the early 1700s. I fought bandits and tribes in Montenegro and pirates on the Adriatic Sea, though I avoided the clergy in Italy. By around 1775 or so, I traveled almost straight north-west through the treacherous Alpine passes to pre-Revolutionary France. I survived that disaster and made it to England. I wasn’t there long as I was press ganged into the navy and sent to the Colonies. I defected the first opportunity I had. And that’s the short story.” He took a sip of Coke from the flimsy plastic cup.
The rest of us looked at him with a mix of shock, awe, and wonder. Syla was the first to snap out of it. “Well, your story certainly seems more interesting than mine,” she said with a quiet chuckle. “You do realize you have to tell us those stories now, don’t you? Perhaps not on the plane but I know I’m not the only one who wants to know.”
Both Michael and I nodded our heads emphatically, making Antun give his own laugh, muffled by his hand to not wake the plane. “I will, I promise,” he chuffed, shoulders still shaking with humor.
Their calm about this current trip contrasted greatly with mine and Michael’s restless energy. I listened to them, realizing how much of history lived behind their sentences. They’d both travelled the ocean by ship before, and I couldn’t imagine being weeks or months at sea. My restless self would go absolutely crazy if I didn’t have a sooner arrival time. I was so grateful for air travel – that we could be on the other side of the world on the same day we left home.
I somehow did manage to get some sleep during the flight, my head drifting to Michael’s arm. And by the time we landed in Zürich, it was already morning again. We took a bus to our hotel, dropped our things off, and went straight to a café. None of us were going to dish-out for airport-priced coffee when there would be better in the city itself. Sitting with a pastry and my latte, I breathed in the crisp morning air before taking a heavenly sip.
When I said that the latte was divine, that was putting it lightly. The milk foam was perfection, and they put in the perfect amount of vanilla – not too sweet, complimenting the coffee’s bitterness. And the quality of the espresso was top-notch, without the leftover, burnt taste that some beans gave.
And the gipfeli, which to me had looked like a simple croissant, was so soft and flaky I almost wondered if I had bit into it at all until that wonderful buttery, slightly sweet flavor hit my tongue. For a minute, none of us spoke, and I wondered if the others were also having a spiritual experience with their food.
“I think I found a new way for vampires to die because this pastry is heaven,” Michael moaned, his mouth full. The others made their own sounds of pleased agreement.
Guess that answers that question.
“I’ll need to get the rental car here in just a little bit,” Antun said. “Cars aren’t as popular in the city but Stojan lives in the middle of nowhere. And I have a feeling he’d rather we didn’t have someone else drive us there.”
“He’s not expecting us, is he?” Syla asked.
“No, nothing like that. Just… I don’t know what he’s like now. I don’t know if we got a ride up there that our ride would get out of there alive. That’s most of what this visit is: risk assessment. We have no idea if any of Davor’s brood is behind anything, and hopefully they aren’t. But it would be extremely dense of us if we skipped over checking,” he replied, lifting his cappuccino to his lips.
I swallowed. I really, really didn’t want to face another Nikola. I barely survived him. How could I expect to be lucky twice in a row?
“Just in case there was any of Davor’s who is involved, I think not contacting them at all beforehand would be best,” Antun continued. “No emails, no phone calls. Besides being traceable, they are huge warning flares to all of Davor’s progeny, especially if any of them remained in contact with each other.”
“Face-to-face diplomacy – old-school espionage, got it,” Michael commented as he settled back in his seat.
I shrugged and agreed, “How can they hang up on us if we’re standing in their foyer?”
Syla laughed, soft and tired, but real – a sound still too rare. She’d been with Nikola for a century; I surely hoped it wouldn’t take that long for her to heal. “Exactly. Plus, there’s a lot that can be said through body language that you just can’t pick up from text or even through video. Meeting them in person is the only way we’ll be able to get a proper read on them,” Syla added.
Antun nodded before popping the last of his pastry into his mouth, closing his eyes in satisfaction. Wiping his fingers on a napkin, he leaned forward, arms resting on the tabletop. “Stojan and Argir… I haven’t seen them in centuries. I have no idea who they are now, just what we’ve been able to find out through research. Stojan was particularly hard to find intel on, and that makes me nervous. I get the feeling he prizes secrecy above kinship still.”
The relaxed atmosphere had tensed to a tactical calm as Antun brought up why we were here at all. I didn’t need a reminder, but it did make the mission begin to feel more real. We all went with Antun to get the rental car so he wouldn’t have to pick us up. After dickering around with the agent, he got us a discreet, small sedan.
We headed south and hit the A51 highway, heading east toward the Zürcher Oberland. The lake flashed silver-blue between buildings as we passed them, and I was excited to get a better view. Within 15 minutes, the view switched from city blocks to tidy suburbs to rolling countryside. Low, soft hills rose gradually, and we spotted dairy cows from time to time grazing in pastures near the road. Occasionally, we passed patches of beech and spruce forest, leaves turning yellow and copper already.
As we got further into the Oberland, the hills grew steeper, dotted with barns and terraced fields. It was a painting of orange and russet interrupted with green against a backdrop of the clearest blue sky. There was a point in the road that had a beautiful panoramic view all the way back to Zürich.
Here and there, clusters of storybook-like villages dotted the landscape with their classic church spires, slate roofs, and tidy gardens. On the ridge stood Bachtel tower like a beacon. The air was sharper than at home, this silence heavier. Even the colors were more vivid than anything I could remember.
We followed the directions that Antun had gotten from some contact or other into the hills. The forest was denser here, and it honest to God looked like a fairytale – the tops of the trees were just starting to turn amber while the understory was still green. But despite the gorgeous view, it felt like the gipfeli and latte were warring in my stomach. That, or my stomach itself flipped over.
After what felt like both forever and no time at all, we arrived in front of a concrete and glass building, the geometry severe against such a soft background. “Antun, are you sure you got the right address? That doesn’t look like a house,” I mentioned, swallowing dryly.
Antun took in a big breath and blew it out while looking at the paper his directions were on and his GPS. “Yeah, this is it.” He glanced around the car at the three of us. “Remember, everyone is innocent until proven otherwise. If we go in there with any other mindset, we’re setting ourselves up for failure.” Turning forward again, he sighed and climbed out of the car. The rest of us shared apprehensive looks, but we climbed out as well.
I spotted motion-sensing lights and cameras angled just so as I walked around to the other side of the car. “For a man who wants privacy,” I muttered to no one in particular, “he built a museum to it.”
Ahead of me, Syla followed behind Antun toward the unadorned front door, fidgeting with her thread bracelet. The knotted purple and blue ornament had become something of a lucky charm to Syla. She rarely took it off, playing with it whenever she was especially anxious. Her feelings matched my own.
Michael nodded his agreement, his hand finding the small of my back as he guided me forward. “Personally, I’m suddenly nostalgic for old-fashioned paranoia,” he replied. I looked up at him, and his face was set firm, jaw tense. Switching from my back to my hand, he held on and squeezed. I didn’t know whether he was doing that for my sake or his, but I was grateful anyway.
We walked up to the impressively blank door, its color matching the concrete edifice perfectly and nearly making it blend in. The only thing marring the surface of the door was the outside of a peephole. Even with all of these cameras and motion sensors, the man still had an old-fashioned peephole. I lifted my brows, bemused, but did nothing else.
Antun rung the camera doorbell, and stepped back so the camera could capture all of us. It was so silent, only the rustling of the trees all around us, hiding this place from most eyes. In a way, the way his home was also set in the woods like Antun’s was a tad humorous, but I didn’t have time to process the thought before the bolt of the door clicked and a tall, austere man with a neatly trimmed beard opened the door, his eyes immediately locking on Antun.
Stojan Goranov looked just like his picture. A little icily, and very bluntly he demanded, “How did you find me? And why are you here?”
His own face stoic, Antun answered, “The Stojan I knew would’ve preferred that we took this conversation indoors.”
Stojan stared down Antun, and Antun stared right back at him. What was probably only seconds felt like an eternity before the man growled under his breath. “Welcome to my home, my guests ,” he bit out the last bit. Apparently, he also knew the rules of hospitality when it came to vampires, but it was clear that he did not want us here and expected this to be a short visit.
The air inside his home was chilly, I’d say barely above what would be needed to make sure nothing fogged the windows, though I didn’t know if vampires could fog up windows. There goes my brain, thinking about foggy windows when I’m in an unknown vampire’s home. I tried not to rub at my arms or shiver, clenching my teeth to make sure they didn’t chatter on accident.
The door automatically locked when it closed behind me, a sound between a buzz and a hum. The mountain light vanished. It felt like stepping into a fortress – one built of silence.
