The door opened and my father stepped into the wine cellar, followed by my sister. I had lit several candles and they flickered in the draft, shadows dancing and twisting over the casks and the bottles in their racks.
"Drunk again, son?" he asked as he pulled a heavy oaken chair back, the oiled legs grating against old stone. He sat heavily. He was a heavy man, after all. Believe you me a wolf gone to fat is a sad thing to see.
"Not yet," I replied softly, raising my glass in a mock toast with a broken smile. "It's a work in progress though."
"Bah," he growled. His exasperation was genuine, as was his hypocrisy. His breath reeked of brandy.
My sister ghosted forward on near silent paws. It always made me wary, how quiet she was. "Let's not fight. These are hard times. Besides, James, father has made an important discovery about them. They have more weaknesses than we thought. Sunlight isn't the only weapon. In fact-"
My father's paw shot up, slowly curled into a fist. She fell silent.
I toyed with my glass, swirling a fine vintage from the 1860's. For a moment the silken sound of its slosh was the only sound in the room aside from our breathing and heartbeats and I closed my eyes, leaned back and did my best to blank the memories the word them had conjured within my mind.
The two of them seemed to sympathize. The psuedo silence stretched. Yet all good things, as they say...
"I received a communique from the research division I'm funding in Virginia," my father said. "The news however is a mixed blessing. Silver is anathema to the creatures but unfortunately we possess very little. Just the family collection."
"Do you propose we arm ourselves with spoons and butter knives to slay Grayson and his kin then?" I asked cynically, stealing a sip of merlot with a bitter smirk. "As I recall the set contains six knives. An expedition then, to stake the thousands where they sleep. We'll start first thing in the morning. Cake."
My father's lupine face contorted, his brilliant blue eyes burning in anger. He seemed on the verge of rising, perhaps to pummel me bloody as he had when I was a pup. "That mouth of yours, James, will be your undoing. I've had enough of your disrespect, your coy and callous disregard, your refusal to take this seriously. Fuck your flipness. You're not half as smart as you think you are."
I arched an eyebrow, surprised them both when I threw my glass aside. It's shattering was spectacular, filled the shocked silence as glinting shards exploded everywhere. "You're the reason she's dead!" I snarled, standing so fast the heavy chair I had been sitting in fell over on its back with a hollow boom. "There are no such thing as vampires. Do you remember saying that to her? I do, I was in the room. So she went outside, believing. And what happened next hmm!?"
He pulled a nickel plated .38 magnum from his Armani coat and pointed it at me. It gleamed in the candle light, six cylinders all afire. I stared at it shocked, and though it was shaking like a leaf in his grasp I believed in that moment he would do it.
I looked at the floor, at the shards of broken glass, at a vintage so old and so like blood as it puddled and soaked the soles of my shoes. "So this is how it ends. Go on then, father. Finish it."
My sister stood frozen, began to cry. I raised my eyes to hers and realized she wanted to help me, try to grab the gun, but she was as smart as I. It was that way in every movie and every stupid fiction, you fought the gunman and then the gun went off and then the very thing you were trying to stop happened anyway. Quintessential cliche.
My father, breathing hard, wheezing really, locked gazes with me. I saw a sorrow there, a grief so deep it sent chills down my back and raised my hackles up. Slowly, ever so slowly, he put the gun back in his coat and rose, the chair creaking as it was relieved of his great weight.
Suddenly overcome by guilt I bowed my head. "Father I'm sorry...I-"
"Shh," he whispered. "It's alright, really. You're actually right."
The words sounded as if they had been spoken by someone a thousand years old. "We should all just get some rest," he continued distantly. "The night will be a long one, as always. In the morning I'll tell you both my plan. We'll have revenge. And we won't give up."
I nodded solemnly. "I really am-"
"Shut up James," he said, some of the old fire and steel returning to his voice. "When this is over we can face what was and wasn't done. A house divided cannot stand. We'll speak no more of it until then."