THE BLOODY BATTLE—FIFTEEN SECONDS EACH

CHAPTER 6

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It was early the next morning that Dan’s disappearance came to light.

Weary as she was from her deadly battle the previous night and from staying up almost all night preparing for the Count’s attack, Doris failed to notice her younger brother racing out to the prairie at the crack of dawn.

Having told D the details of her run-in with Rei-Ginsei and his gang, Doris had decided to go see the sheriff today to inform him. Though Dan had been told not to leave the farm until they were ready to go into town, the boy was just bursting at the seams with energy. Apparently he’d switched off the barrier and gone out alone with a laser rifle to hunt some mist devils.

Fog-like monsters that slipped in with the morning mist, the creatures were a nuisance on the Frontier mainly because they had a propensity for dissolving their way through crops and the hides of farm animals. They didn’t fare well against heat, however, and a blast from a laser beam was enough to destroy them. Being rather sluggish, they posed little threat to an armed boy used to dealing with them.

Hunting mist devils was really Dan’s specialty.

Soon after she awoke, Doris realized her brother wasn’t on the farm. She raced frantically to the weapon storeroom and saw that he’d taken his rifle, which let her relax for a moment. But when she ran outside to call him back in, she froze in her tracks at the entrance to the farm.

His laser rifle had been left as a paperweight on a single sheet of paper that was lying on the ground, right in front of the gate. The following words were written on the page in elegant lettering:

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Your brother is coming with us. The Hunter D is to come alone at six o’clock Evening to the region of ruins where we met the other day. Our goal is simply to ascertain which Hunter has the superior skills, and nothing more. We have no need of observers, not even you, Doris. Until this test of skill has been decided, you are to mention this to no one.

If you deviate from the above conditions in the least, a sweet little eight-year-old will burn in the fires of hell.

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—Rei-Ginsei.

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Doris felt every ounce of strength drain from her body as she returned to the house. She was still trying to decide whether or not she should show the letter to D when D noticed all was not right with her. Trapped in the gaze of his lustrous eyes, Doris finally showed him the letter.

“Well, half of it is true, at least,” D said, as if the matter didn’t concern him in the least, though it was quite clear he was being challenged to a duel.

“Half of it?”

“If he just wanted to face off against me, all he had to do was come here and say so. Since he took Dan, he must have another aim—to separate the two of us. The Count is behind this.”

“But why would he have gone to all that trouble? It’d be a lot faster and easier if he’d said I was the one who had to come alone ...”

“One reason is because the author of this letter wants to settle a score with me. The other—”

“What would that be?”

“Using a child to get you would reflect poorly on the honor of the Nobility.”

Doris’ eyes blazed with fury. “But he really is using Dan to—”

“Most likely his abduction is the only part of the plan Rei-Ginsei and his gang came up with.”

“The honor of the Nobility—don’t make me laugh! Even if it wasn’t his idea, if he approves of it it’s the same damned thing. Nobility my ass—they’re nothing but blood-sucking monsters!” After she spat the words like a gout of flame, Doris was shocked at herself. “I’m sorry, you’re not like that at all. That was a rotten thing for me to say.”

Tears quickly welled in her eyes, and Doris broke down crying on the spot. The recoil from putting all her violent emotions into words had just hit her. Her situation was grim, with one misfortune after another piling onto her as if she was possessed by some evil spirit that drew all these calamities to her. In reality, it was amazing she hadn’t surrendered to tears long before now.

As weeping shook her pale shoulders, a cool hand came to rest on them. “We can’t have you forgetting you hired a bodyguard.”

Even with the present state of affairs, D’s voice remained soft. But within the coolly composed ring of his words, the ears of Doris’ heart clearly heard another voice propped up by unshakable assurance. And this is what it seemed to say: I promised to protect you and Dan, and you can be certain I will.

Doris raised her face.

Right before her eyes was the face of an elegant, valiant young man gazing quietly at her.

It felt as something hot fell onto her full bosom.

“Hold me,” she sobbed, throwing herself against D’s chest. “I don’t care what happens. Just hold me tight. Don’t let me go!”

Gently resting his hands on the sob-wracked shoulders of the seventeen-year-old girl, D gazed out the window at the blue expanse of sky and the prairie filling with morning’s life.

What was he thinking about? The safety of the boy, his four foes, the Count, or something else? The emotional hue that filled his eyes remained a single shade of cold, clear black. Before long, Doris pulled back from him. With a spent, sublime expression she said, “I’m sorry. That wasn’t exactly in character for me. It’s just … I suddenly got the feeling you might stay here with me forever. But that’s not right. When your job’s done, you’ll be moving on, won’t you?”

D said nothing.

“This is almost over. Something tells me that. But what are we gonna do about Dan?”

“I’ll go, of course. I have to.”

“Can you take them?”

“I’ll bring Dan back, safe and sound.”

“Please, see that you do. I feel awful making you look out for him, but I think I’m gonna head into town to hole up. I’ll have Doc Ferringo put me up at his place. You know, he saved me the night before last. I’m sure I’ll be fine this time, too.”

Doris still didn’t know that the real reason the Count had run off was the protective charm D had placed on her neck. And most likely the reason D said nothing when the girl told him she was going to the physician’s home was because he knew he couldn’t guarantee that the charm would ward off someone with the Count’s power forever.

When the angle of the sunlight spearing through the window became sharp, the two of them got on their horses and left the farm. Regardless of what D had said, Doris’ expression remained dark.

If anyone can bring back Dan, he can—she had no trouble making herself believe this. But she remembered how powerful his enemies were. She could still hear the shrike-blade screaming up behind her in the ruins; the horrid sight of her horse falling over with all four legs cut off was burned deep into her eyelids. Now there were four such fiends out there. A dark spot of despair remained in Doris’ heart.

What’s more, even if D made it back alive, if the Count were to strike while D was gone, there was no way she could escape him this time. She’d said nothing about it to D, but she still wasn’t entirely sure going to Dr. Ferringo’s was the right thing to do.

On entering town, countless eyes focused on the pair as they rode down the main street. The looks were colored more by fear than by hate. For people on the Frontier, who lived surrounded by dark forests and monsters, a girl who’d been preyed on by a vampire and a young man with vampire blood in his veins were beyond the normal level of revulsion. Thanks to Greco, everyone had heard what had happened.

A little girl who seemed to recognize Doris said, “Oh, hi,” and started to approach, but her mother wasted no time in pulling her back.

Among the men, there were some whose faces showed the urge to kill, and they reached for swords or guns the second they saw D. Not because they’d been told what he was, but rather because of the eerie aura that hung about him. All the women, however, looked like they would swoon as they watched him go by, and given how beautiful he was, that came as little surprise.

And yet, the pair made their way down the street without a single hot-head running out to stop them, and finally they arrived at a house with the sign “Dr. Ferringo” hanging from the eaves.

Doris got down off her horse and rang the bell, and presently the woman from next door, who acted as a nurse and watched the place while Doc was out, answered. Apparently ignorant of Doris’ situation, she smiled and stated, “Doc’s been out since this morning. It seems there was someone out at Harker Lane’s house that needed urgent care and he went off to see to ’em. He left a note saying he’d be back around noon, but where he’s still not back yet, he may be dealing with something serious. You know, the lady of the house out there is apt to put anything in season into her mouth, even if it’s a numbleberry or a topsy-turvy toadstool.” Lane was a huntsman, and his home was out in the middle of the woods, two hours of hard riding from town. “I hate it when this happens. On my own I can’t do much besides treat scrapes and hand out sedatives, but since everyone always says that’s good enough I’ve been running myself ragged all morning. Why don’t you come in and wait. I’m sure Doc will be back soon, and if you’re willing, I could sure use the help.”

Uncertain about what to do, Doris looked to D. Sitting on his horse, he gave her the slightest nod.

She decided. Giving a bow to the housewife—who was watching D with starry eyes—Doris said, “It looks like I’ll be in your hair until Doc gets back then.” She sounded a little tense, but that was unavoidable. While she thought D would come with her, as soon as he saw she’d made up her mind, he started to ride off slowly.

“Dear me, isn’t he with you?” the woman asked Doris excitedly. She didn’t even try to hide her disappointment. At that point, before Doris could get angry at the thought of a woman of the nurse’s age getting all worked up about D, she was sharing the woman’s confusion.

“Hold on. Where are you headed?”

“Just taking a look around the perimeter.”

“It’s still midday. There’s not going to be anything out. Stay with me.”

“I’ll be back soon.”

D let his horse go on without once looking back.

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After they’d gone a ways he took a left turn. In a needling tone, a voice asked, “Why don’t you stick close to her? You mean to tell me you’re so worried about that little tike you can’t sit still? Or is just that you can’t stand to see the suffering on his sister’s face? Dhampir or not, seems you’re still a little wet behind the ears. Heh heh heh. Or could it be you’re in love with the girl?”

“Is that what you think?”

Just whom was D talking to?

The road ahead was a dusty path that continued on between walls of earth and stone. Aside from the lethargic, vexing rays of the sun as it moved past noon, there was no sign of anyone around. And yet, there was still that voice.

“No chance. You’re not that kind of softy. After all, you’ve got his blood in your veins. It’s perfect, the way you told them to call you D.”

“Silence!”

Judging by the way the man in question had roared in reaction to his name, it seemed the voice had touched on a rather sensitive point.

An instant later his tone became soft once again. “You’ve been full of complaints lately. Would you like to split with me?”

“Oh no!” the voice exclaimed, sounding a touch threatened. But then, as if to avoid showing any weakness, it replied, “It’s not like I’m with you because I like it. Well, you know how it goes—give-and-take makes the world go round. Not to change the subject, but why didn’t you tell the girl about the mark you put on her neck? Out of loyalty to your father? Just a word from you would’ve put her at ease, I bet. It must be tough having the blood of the Nobility in you.”

The voice sounded sincere enough, but the fact that its heart held an entirely different sentiment was made apparent by a burst of derisive laughter.

Still, one couldn’t help but wonder if the young man had completely lost his mind to continue a dialogue with an imaginary companion as he sat there on his horse. But because the tone, quality, and everything else about the two voices were completely different, the weird scene only seemed possible through some truly ingenious ventriloquism.

D’s eyes sparkled brilliantly, but soon reclaimed their usual, quiet darkness, and the conversation came to an end. Shortly thereafter he took a left at the next corner, came to a similar corner, and once again turned the same way. Eventually, he returned to the front of the physician’s home.

“Any strange characters out there?” the voice once again echoed from nowhere in particular.

“None.”

Given the way he’d answered, it seemed he had in fact gone off to check the surrounding area for any hint of anything out of the ordinary.

However, he showed no sign of dismounting as he lifted his beautiful visage and grimaced at the sun listing westward from the center of the sky.

“Is that all I can do?” he muttered. Perhaps some vision of the grisly battle to come flitted through his mind; for an instant, a certain expression rose on his oh-so-proper countenance, and then it was gone.

A few horses hitched up across the street suddenly grew agitated, and people walking by shielded their eyes from the dust kicked up by an unpleasantly warm wind blowing by without warning.

The momentary expression on D’s face was the same one the Midwich Medusas had seen in the subterranean waterway—the face of a blood-crazed vampire.

Gazing for a brief moment at the closed door to the doctor’s home, D reined his horse around and headed out of town. The ruins were two hours away.

..

“Here he comes. You should see him on top of the hill any minute,” Gimlet said, returning with the wind in his wake. When Rei-Ginsei heard this news he pulled himself up off the stone sculpture he’d been leaning against. Gimlet was their lookout.

“Alone, I take it?”

“Yessir. Just like you told him.”

Rei-Ginsei nodded, then addressed the other two henchmen who’d been standing there for some time like guardian demons at a temple gate, with their eyes running out across the prairie.

“Everyone is set, I see. Engage him just as we’ve planned.”

“Yessir.”

Nodding as Golem and Chullah bowed in unison, Rei-Ginsei walked to the horse hitched up behind him. The place the four of them had chosen for this showdown was the same bowl-like depression where Witch had been killed. Challenging D to a grudge match in the same location where D’s aura had battered them and kept them paralyzed was just the sort of thing this vindictive ruffian would do, but consideration had also been given to how useful this location would be for restricting their opponent’s movements when they fought him four against one.

Rei-Ginsei squatted next to Dan, who lay behind a rock, gagged and bound hand and foot, and pulled down the cloth covering the boy’s mouth. Called a gag rag, the cloth was a favorite of criminals. The fabric was woven from special fibers that could absorb all sound, and its usefulness to kidnappers made it worth its weight in gold.

Still, there was no call for the cruelty displayed by keeping a boy barely eight years old gagged ever since the morning.

“Look, your savior is coming. I put this plan together yesterday after hearing about you and your sister, and I must confess it seems to be going beautifully.”

Just as Rei-Ginsei finished speaking, the furious gaze that had been concentrated on him was colored by relief and confidence. Dan looked toward the hills.

Twisting his lips a bit, Rei-Ginsei sneered, “How sad. Neither of you is fated to leave here alive.”

“Ha, you guys are the one who won’t make it out of here alive.” Worried and hungry and looking gaunt, Dan still managed to fling the reply with all his might. He hadn’t been given so much as a drop of water since he’d been captured. “You have no idea how tough ol’ D is!”

His words were strong, but they were also a childish bluff. He’d never even seen D fight.

Dan thought Rei-Ginsei might fly into a rage, but, to the contrary, Rei-Ginsei only smirked and turned his gaze to his three henchmen standing in the center of the depression. “You may be right. That would certainly mean less work for me.”

Dan’s eyes opened wide, as if he must have heard that wrong.

But it was true. This gorgeous fiend fully intended to bury his three underlings here along with D. At first he’d only intended to take care of D and Doris, who’d seen his face, but after receiving the Count’s oath to turn him into one of the Nobility, Rei-Ginsei’s plans had taken a complete turn. The power and immortality of a Noble would be his—he would no longer be a filthy brigand wandering the wilderness.

So, in accordance with the Count’s plan, he left Doris for the Noble to handle, while he decided to add three more people to the pair the Count wanted him to kill. In his estimation, if he allowed his henchmen to live, he would come to regret it later.

If D should dispatch them all here, so much the better. But if luck is not with me and some survive, I shall kill them myself.

A solitary rider popped up over the hilltop. He didn’t reduce his speed, but galloped toward them at full tilt.

“Well, time to make yourself useful.” Grabbing hold of the leather straps that hung around the boy’s back, Rei-Ginsei carried Dan over to his horse with one hand, like he was a piece of baggage. The shrike-blades on his hip rubbed together, making a harsh, grating noise. Groping in his saddlebag with his free hand, he pulled out the Time-Bewitching Incense. “That’s strange,” he said, tilting his head to the side.

“Boss!”

At Chullah’s tense cry, Rei-Ginsei whirled around, still gripping the candle.

“D,” Dan called out, his shout flying off on the wind.

Rei-Ginsei’s sworn enemy had already dismounted and now stood at the bottom of the earthen depression with an elegantly curved longsword across his back.

“Dear Lord ...”

The beauty of his foe left Rei-Ginsei shocked … and envious.

“I wish I could tell you what an honor it is to have one of my blades knocked down by a man of your kind, but I won’t. The fact that you’re a miserable cross between a human and a Noble takes the charm out of it.”

To Rei-Ginsei’s frigid smile and scornful greeting, D softly replied, “And you must be the bastard son of the Devil and a hellhound.”

Rei-Ginsei’s entire face grew dark. As if his blood had turned to poison.

“Let the boy go.”

In lieu of a reply, Rei-Ginsei gave Dan’s leather bonds a twist with one hand. An agonized cry split the boy’s young lips.

“Ow! D, it really hurts!”

Though they looked like ordinary leather straps, they must have been tied with some fiendish skill, because they started pressing deep into Dan’s shoulders and arms.

“These bonds are rather special,” Rei-Ginsei said, twisting his lips into a grin and making a small circle with his thumb and forefinger. “Apply force from the right direction and they pull up tight like this. I figure for a child of eight, it should take twenty minutes or so for them to sink far enough into his flesh to choke the life out of him. If you haven’t finished us all off by then, this boy will be cursing you from the hereafter. Does that light a little fire under you?”

“D ...”

What an utterly heartless tactic. The bonds had already begun working their way through his clothes. As the boy writhed in agony, D gave him a few powerful words of encouragement.

“This’ll just take a minute.”

Meaning he would take care of them in fifteen seconds each?

“O … okay.”

Unlike the bravely smiling Dan, the four men were livid.

The ring formed by Rei-Ginsei’s three henchmen began to tighten like a noose. All of them were painted by the vermilion rays of the setting sun, but the palpable lust for blood rising from each seemed to rob the light of its color.

“Now, let’s show him what you can do one by one. Golem, you go first.”

As his boss gave him the command, not only Golem but all three henchmen began to look dubious. After all, the initial plan had been for all four of them to attack at once and kill him. But a moment later, Golem’s massive brown body raced toward D with the silent footfalls of a cat. The broad blade of his machete glittered in the red light. There was a loud clang! His machete was big enough to chop a horse’s head off, but just as it was about to hack into the Hunter’s torso, D drew his blade with lightning speed, bringing the tip of it down through Golem’s left shoulder. Or rather, it looked like it was going to go right through his shoulder, but it bounced off him.

Golem the Tortureless—a man with muscles of bronze. His body had even proved itself impervious to high-frequency wave sabers.

Once again, Golem’s machete howled through the air, and D skillfully dodged it with a leap that carried him yards away in an instant. And once again, the giant went after him, closing on the Hunter.

“What’s wrong? You said fifteen seconds each!”

Like a cry to battle borne on the wind, D’s angry roar shook the grass and filled the mortar-shaped depression in the earth.

..

Doris awoke from her nap as someone gently shook her shoulder. A warm, familiar face was smiling down at her.

“Doc! I must’ve dozed off while I was waiting for you.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m sure you’re exhausted. It took quite some time to take care of my patient at Harker’s, and I’ve just gotten back here myself. I swung by your place and no one was there, so I hustled back with the sneaking suspicion I might find you here. Did something happen? Where’s Dan and that young fellow?”

All her memories and concerns flooding back to her, Doris looked around. After D left, she’d helped the nurse deal with the patients, then she’d stretched out on a sofa in the examination room and fallen asleep.

There was no sign of the nurse, who’d apparently gone home, and the rows of houses and trees beyond the windowpanes were all steeped in red. The curtain was set to rise on her time for terror.

“Well ... the two of them are hiding out in Pedros. I figured I’d join ’em there once I’d paid my respects to you …”

As she attempted to rise, a cool hand came to rest on her shoulder. Pedros was the name of a nearly deserted village the better part of a day’s and a night’s ride from Ransylva. Even at that, it was still their closest neighbor.

“Even though you’ll have to get through at least one night before you arrive?”

“Uh, yeah.”

As he peered at her face with an uncharacteristically hard gaze, Doris unconsciously looked down at the floor.

Giving a little nod, the elderly physician said, “Very well then, I’ll press the matter no further. But if you’re really going to go somewhere, there’s a much better place for you.” At these surprising words, Doris looked up at the old man’s face. “I found it on my way back from Harker’s place when I decided to go through the north woods.”

Dr. Ferringo pulled a map out of his jacket pocket and unfolded it. The passing years had dulled his memory, so he often used this map of Ransylva and its surroundings anytime he had to travel far to treat a patient. It had a red mark on it in part of the north woods. It was a huge forest, the thickest in the area, and not a single soul in the village knew their way around the whole of it.

“Part of a stone wall caught my eye, and when I hacked away the bushes and vines covering it I found this place—ancient ruins. It appeared to be the remains of some sort of place of worship. It’s pretty large, and I only examined a small portion of it, but I guess you could say luck was with us, because that stone wall was inscribed with an explanation of the site. It seems it was constructed to keep vampires at bay.”

This left Doris completely speechless.

Now that he mentioned it, she could recall her father and his Hunter friends gathered around the hearth sharing stories about this place when she was a child. They said that far in the distant past, long before the Nobility rose to power in the world, people who’d been preyed on by vampires were locked up in a holy place and treated with incantations and electronics. Perhaps what Dr. Ferringo had discovered was one such facility.

“Then you mean to tell me if I’m in there, he can’t get at me?”

“In all likelihood,” Dr. Ferringo replied, smiling broadly. “At any rate, I imagine it’s better than trying to reach Pedros now, or holing up here in my house. Shall we go out and give it a try?”

“Yes, sir!”

Less than five minutes later, the two of them were jolting along in Dr. Ferringo’s buggy as it hastened down the dusky road to the north woods. They must have rode for nearly an hour. Ahead, tiny walls of trees blacker than the darkness came into view. This was the entrance to the forest.

“Woah!”

Once they were in the buggy, the elderly physician hadn’t answered her no matter how she tried to get him to talk, but suddenly he’d given a cry and pulled back on the reins.