Abandoned Warehouse
Outskirts of Tehran
June 16, 12:22 a.m.
While the others worked on their de-arming drills, I read through the vampire information Circe had obtained from Dr. Corbiel-Newton. Most of it was useless fairy-tale stuff or speculation without hope of verification. Some of it, though, was more practical, taking a look at the possibility of vampirism as a natural phenomenon. That was the same ground I had covered with Hu, but there were some things here that I found very interesting. Especially about garlic. In the movies, garlic simply repels a vampire, kind of like pepper spray, but it doesn’t kill them. In a lot of the world’s folklore, however, garlic was lethal to them, especially if introduced into the bloodstream or via a mucus membrane. In something called the “ritual of exorcism,” fresh garlic was placed in the mouth of a vampire. In some cultures garlic paste was used on skin or clothes as a deterrent and could kill a vampire if one of them bit skin that was coated with it. Of course… that would require a vampire with a head cold who couldn’t smell the damn garlic.
As I thought that, an idea skittered across my brain. It was there and gone. My three inner selves-the Cop, the Warrior, and the Civilized Man-all made grabs for it, but we came up dry.
So I went out and retrieved the Sabbatarians’ valise from the back of the vegetable truck, and then laid out the contents. Hammers and stakes to one side. I doubted they would be useful. Ditto the vials of holy water. But the bags of garlic powder and the jars of garlic oil… even touching them coaxed that idea out of its hiding place in the shadows of my brain.
I held a bag of garlic powder in one hand and a jar of oil in the other.
It was the Cop who figured it all out.
But it made the Warrior smile and smile.