CHAPTER 8
FLASHING STEEL CUTS THE CEREMONY SHORT
CHAPTER 8
.
“Let us out of here, damn you! Let us out!”
“If you don’t let my brother out, I swear I’m gonna come looking for you every night once the Nobility make me one of their own!”
Wham!
Slamming the door shut with all his might and cutting off further bluster from the Langs, the man returned to his cramped office. Moments earlier, the mayor and other important members of the community had headed home. Here in the asylum, with no furniture save a battered desk and chair, their buzz still seemed to hang in the air.
“Those freaking kids. I figured at least one of ’em would be crying and pleading, but both of ’em go and threaten a grown man.”
As he grumbled to himself, the man pulled out the wooden chair and took his post in front of the steel door that separated the office from the lock-up area otherwise known as the cages. There were ten individual cells in the cages, each surrounded by bars of super-high-density steel. They’d been built to be a comfortable size, and Doris and Dan had been locked up together. Originally, a family had kindly volunteered to look after Dan while Doris was confined, since the boy wasn’t involved in this, but Dan had fought like a tiger and said he’d die without his sister. There was also a very good chance that, if left to his own devices, he’d have tried to spring Doris, which is how the current arrangement had been reached.
Victims of the Nobility were confined here regardless of the degree of their affliction; if the Noble responsible was destroyed then the curse on them would be lifted and all would be well. If not, the standard operating procedure was to release the victim after a given period and chase them out of town.
That “given period” was the number of days until the frustrated Noble attacked someone else, but this varied from village to village. In Ransylva it was approximately three weeks. The reason it was so long was because, based on past experience, it took an average of three attacks before the Count was done draining his victim, and there was usually an interval of three to five days between attacks.
Of course, because every village could expect their asylum to be stormed by the Nobility during the victim’s confinement, for the most part the asylums were guarded by well-armed men confident in their fighting abilities. Because they’d have the Nobility to contend with, no village ever skimped on buying armaments for the asylum. In fact, in addition to the five fully automated, steel-spear launchers and the ten remote-controlled catapults surrounding this thirty-foot-long, half-cylinder building, there were also three laser cannons to neutralize the vehicles of the Nobility, and a pair of flame-throwers from the Capital. The villagers wanted an electromagnetic barrier as well, but the Capital’s stores were running low, and they were hard to come by even for those willing to pay black-market prices.
The man guarding the cages was a member of the mob that stormed Doris’ farm. The reason the mayor left only one man on watch was because he’d decided that, after sucking the blood from three people tonight already, the Count wouldn’t be in quite such a hurry to attack Doris. But if it came to that, the guard could wake up the whole village with a single siren, and the weapons outside could be operated from the control panel on his desk. Most importantly, in four more hours the eastern sky would be growing light. The man wasn’t concerned.
Just as he was starting to doze off, there was a rap at the door. The man raced over to the video panel and struck a single key. Greco’s face showed on a small video monitor inside the asylum. “What do you want?” the man said to the intercom operating through the wall.
“Be a pal and open up. I came to see Doris.”
“No way. Your father told me specifically not to let you in.”
“Come on, don’t be a jerk. You must know how crazy I am about Doris, right? This is just between you and me, but when day breaks they’re gonna bring her up to old fang-face’s place on orders from my father. Meaning tonight’s my last chance to see the woman I love. And, as you can see, you stand to get a little something for your trouble.” Greco pulled a few gold coins out of his pocket and waved them in front of the camera. They weren’t the new dalas currency the revolutionary government started issuing five years ago. These were the “aristocrat coins” the Nobility had used. When the revolutionaries finally managed to take power, they destroyed vast quantities of these coins in order to get their new government’s economic policies off to a good start. One of them was worth at least a thousand dalas on the black market. That was enough to live off for half a year out on the Frontier.
After staring at the shiny gold for quite some time, the man hit a button without a word. The electronic lock on the door was disengaged, the handle spun around, and in sauntered Greco.
“Thanks, buddy. Here you go!”
Three gold coins clattered down on the desk. Forgetting to shut the door, the man snatched up one of the coins and busily bounced his gaze back and forth between it and Greco’s face before eventually nodding with satisfaction. As he dropped all three into his shirt pocket he said, “I suppose it’ll be all right—but you’ve only got three minutes to see her.”
“C’mon, make it five.”
“Four.”
“Okay—you drive a hard bargain.”
The man shrugged his shoulders, and then turned toward the door to the cages and reached for the key ring on his belt. The keys jingled together as he chose one and fit it into the lock. It wouldn’t do to have this door opening automatically.
“Say—” As the man turned around again, his eye caught Greco’s strangely bloodless countenance, and a flash of white light headed right for his own chest.
Killed instantly by a stab to the heart, the man’s body was laid out at one side of the room, and then Greco turned the key still jammed in the lock, opened the door, and went into the cages. His knife was already back in the case on his belt.
“Greco!”
There were cages to either side of the narrow corridor, and Doris’ cry came from the first one on the left. “You bastard, you come here to get your block knocked off or something?”
“Shut up.”
Doris fell silent. She got a bad feeling from Greco’s expression, which was more foreboding then she’d ever seen it. What the hell’s he up to?
“I’ll get you right out of there. You’re gonna run away with me.”
Beyond the iron bars, the Lang children looked at each other. In a low voice, Doris said, “Don’t tell me you ... you didn’t seriously kill Price ...”
“Oh, I killed him all right. And he’s not the only one. My father got his, too. That’s what he gets for trying to whip the shit out of me when I came home. The old bastard. I help make his job easier, and that’s how the ingrate repays me. But that don’t matter now. At any rate, I’ve got to get out of town tonight. Are you with me?” His eyes had an animalistic gleam to them, but his voice was like molasses.
The propriety of his actions aside, some might even go so far as to say the devotion he showed to the woman he loved was admirable, but Doris said flatly, “Sorry. I’d rather go up to the Count’s castle than run off with you.”
“What the hell do you mean? ...”
Tears sparkled in the girl’s eyes. Tears of hatred. “You teamed up with that butcher and ... and killed him of all people ... Just you wait. I don’t care what happens to me, I’m personally gonna see to it you get sent to hell.”
She’d always been strong willed, but seeing in those beautiful eyes of hers a fundamentally different and desolate light, Greco abandoned all his schemes and dreams. “So that’s how it is? You’re saying you’d prefer the Nobility to me?”
When he looked up, all emotion had drained from his face, but the gleam in his eyes was unusually strong.
“If that’s the way it’s got to be, I guess when you’ve got to go, you’ve got to go—and you’re about to go join that punk in the hereafter.” Taking a step back, he drew the ten-banger from his hip.
Dan shouted, “Sis!” and grabbed onto Doris’ neck for dear life while she tried to hide the boy behind her back.
“You’re out of your mind, Greco!”
“Say what you like. But I’d rather do this than have any other man take you—vampire or otherwise. You and that smart-mouthed little squirt get to check out of this life together.”
“Stop!”
That Doris’ cry had been to beg for her own life was the last coherent thought to go through Greco’s mind. Someone behind him grabbed the hand with the ten-banger by the wrist. Though whoever it was was just barely touching him, his finger lost the strength to finish pulling the trigger. An unearthly chill spread from his wrist to the rest of his body. Breath with the sweet scent of death tickled his nose, and frosty, dark words struck his earlobe.
“Better you had killed me when you had the chance.” Larmica’s pale face eclipsed the nape of Greco’s swarthy neck.
Frozen in horror, Doris and Dan watched as Greco’s face grew paler and paler, like he was disappearing into a fog. Seconds later, the young lady in the black dress pulled away from the man and approached their cage. With a thread of blood running from the pale corner of her mouth, this beauty that seemed to sparkle in the darkness could be likened to nothing save a vengeful wraith. Perhaps her thirst wasn’t sated yet, for a glance from her bright red eyes shook Doris and Dan to the bottom of their souls.
An expression of unfathomable terror plastered on its face, Greco’s body fell to the floor, an empty husk drained of the very last drop of blood.
“What do you—”
The tremble in Doris voice was apparent, but Larmica simply urged, “Go.” The hue of madness had left her eyes and, quite to the contrary, her expression now seemed tinged with sorrow.
“Huh?”
“Make good your escape. Father will be coming soon. And when he does, I shan’t be able to do any more.”
“But ... we can’t get out of here. Get us the keys, please,” Dan said, grabbing the bars. His flexible, eight-year-old mind had already adjusted to this vampiress being their ally.
She seized the steel bars with dainty hands that looked like they’d break in a strong wind. What strength the vampires possessed! With one good pull, the bars of super-high-density steel tore free of the ceiling and floor, sending screws shooting in all directions.
“Unbelievable ... ”
Still trying to keep the wide-eyed Dan behind her, Doris asked Larmica, “You’re serious—you really want us to get away, don’t you? But why are you helping us?”
A shade of sorrow colored Larmica’s moonflower of a face when she turned around.
“He died ... but he defended you right to the very end. It would sadden him to see you fall into Father’s hands. I have no desire to cause the dead any more sorrow ... ”
As Dan took her hand and tugged her out to the corridor, Doris realized this fearsome young woman harbored the same feeling as herself.
“You ... you felt something for him ... ”
“Go—make haste.”
The three went into the office.
A figure in black stood in the center of the room.
“Father!” Larmica cried out in terror.
..
“What the hell, still nothing?!” the countenanced carbuncle spat in disgust, its face pressed to D’s chest. “A sword or spear wound wouldn’t have been so bad, but after taking a wooden stake, his little ticker ain’t listening to me. Beat. Just give me one good thump—c’mon and beat already.”
Making a fist of the hand it occupied, it rose to strike D’s chest as hard as it could, but stopped in midair.
Something was coagulating in the night sky.
A host of white, semi-transparent membranes swirled above the house, then started to come together to form a single mass. Once it had drawn itself together, the glowing cloud swooped down toward the farm, oddly shaped organs becoming visible through its partially transparent body. This was another of the artificial monstrosities spawned by the Nobility—a night cloud. A life-form able to reform itself from single cell organisms, by day the cloud remained in the freezing extremes of the stratosphere, and at night it came back down to earth in scattered form to hunt for prey.
Frighteningly enough, these damned things were dangerous carnivores that would form a single mass when they found a victim, enveloping their prey from all sides to digest and absorb it. They posed a major threat to lost children and inexperienced travelers, and, along with dimension-ripping beasts, they caused a great many people to go inexplicably missing. The electromagnetic barrier had been a godsend in that it alone kept them from wreaking havoc on Doris’ farm.
At one point the cloud came down about fifteen feet above D’s head, but it seemed to catch wind of something and drifted off to one side, toward the barn where the animals were stabled. Only pausing before the doors for a heartbeat, it spread itself flat as a sheet and easily slipped through a gap between the wall and the doors. The shrill cries of cattle reverberated, the walls shook two or three times, and all too soon it was silent again.
“Those things eat like pigs. It’ll be back soon. So get busy beating already, you lousy, good-for-nothing heart!” The complaining fist beat wildly against D’s chest and sucked in air. The body didn’t move in the slightest. “C’mon, you bastard!”
If there’d been anyone there to see the bizarre but desperate one-man show that went on for a few minutes more, they most likely would’ve laughed out loud.
And then …
The barn doors bowed out from the inside and splintered, flying everywhere. A second later, an unspeakably grotesque thing appeared in the moonlight. Within the semi-translucent cloud mass was a cow, writhing in agony as it dissolved! Its hide split, red meat melted, and the exposed bone slowly wasted away like popping soap bubbles. As flesh and blood mixed in a narrow tube that seemed to be an esophagus of sorts, the liquid swirled around and the cloud began glowing brighter than ever. It was feeding. For a few seconds the corpulent mass wriggled at the entrance to the barn and then, perhaps sensing other prey, it began to drag itself toward D. Thanks to the weight of the half-devoured cow, it was moving in slow motion.
“Look how close it is already. C’mon and start already!” The fist gave D another smack.
The cloud had closed within ten feet of D. Close enough to hear the tortured cow within it.
Three feet away. The cloud rose into the air and flew straight for D.
A flash of light raced through its translucent mass.
The blade seemed to pass right through it without meeting any resistance, but when the bisected cloud fell to the ground in two chunks, it lost its color before it had a chance to split into smaller pieces. It gave off a whitish steam and soaked into the earth. Only the remains of the cow were left behind.
D got to his feet, scattering moonbeams.
“Nice going. You know, you had me scared out of my wits, as usual.”
As if this somewhat inappropriate greeting for someone just risen from the dead hadn’t reached his ears, D asked, “Where are the two of them?”
“In the asylum, I’d imagine. Every village seems to put it on the edge of town.”
With that, all conversation ceased, and D leapt to his feet and headed for the stables.
..
The tall trees spread their branches like monsters, fending off the invading moonlight. The only light to speak of was the phosphorescent glow of guidepost mushrooms here and there among the roots of the trees, though that didn’t amount to much before the mass and density of the crushing darkness. Even a traveler with some source of light would have a hard time traversing this forest late at night without getting lost in the process.
This was the Ransylva Forest—where night was said to live even at midday. And through it, Dan ran desperately. He wasn’t alone. From the darkness less than thirty feet behind him came the growl and footsteps of a carnivore. Its identity was clear. The Count’s servant—Garou—pursued him.
Caught by the Count just as they were about to flee the asylum, his sister and Larmica had been put into the carriage, while Dan had been left there alone. Promptly deciding to rescue Doris, he’d headed back to the farm to arm himself. Despite his youth, it was clear to him it would be futile to seek assistance in rescuing his sister from anyone in town. And there wasn’t a moment to lose. The shortest possible route would be to cut right through the Ransylva Forest instead of taking the road. With only his sister in mind, he did it without a moment’s hesitation. However, less than a minute after he’d entered the forest he heard the snarling of the werewolf behind him.
The deadly marathon had begun.
His father and sister had brought him here before in the relative safety of day, and he could even recall playing in the forest alone. Tapping all the knowledge he had, Dan raced down the most serpentine paths he could find, snuck into hollow trees, and hid in the brush in an attempt to confuse his unsettling pursuer.
But whenever he stopped, it stopped. If he ran again, it took off as well. No matter what he tried, the distance between them neither grew nor shrank.
Dan finally figured out it was toying with him. The moment this occurred to him, his admirable sense collapsed and pure, black terror became the sole occupant of his heart. He ran for all he was worth. And yet, the pursuer to his back remained the same thirty feet behind him as always.
His heart was about to explode and his lungs gasped for more air. He could taste his own salty tears on his tongue. And just when he thought he could take no more, he saw a spot of light in the darkness. The way out!
Hope pumped him full of energy. His feet beat the ground in powerful strides until something suddenly grabbed hold of them.
“Waaugh!” Falling face forward, he tried to get up again but was caught by a pair of hands. “Deadman’s hand!”
The scant moonlight barely spilling through the interwoven trees showed him what it was. A pale corpse’s hand reached from the ground, its five fingers wriggling in a disgusting way. No, not fingers but rather five flowers. Dan was being held to the ground by a pale blossom that looked just like a corpse’s hand. As the various botanical horrors sown by the Nobility went, these were rather bizarre but innocuous plants—and the fact that Dan had known where they grew and had still ended up jumping right into the middle of this patch said volumes about how the terror behind him had wiped everything else from his mind. But who could blame a boy of eight for that?
Using all his might, Dan got to his feet again. The deadman’s hand still hung from his wrist, pulled-up roots and all.
Just as he was about to start running again—
“Awoooooooooh!”
A terrific howl assailed him from behind, rooting his feet.
Seeing the exit so close at hand, this was the battle cry Garou gave when it decided the time had come to put an end to their horrifying chase. It’d been pursuing Dan because the Count was allowing it to dine on a living person for the first time in ages.
All the strength drained from the boy. Sorry, Sis. Looks like I won’t be able to save you. Tears of regret rolled down his cheeks.
And then, the howling abruptly halted. In its place, Dan could sense trembling.
At that same moment, Dan heard something. He caught the echo of hoofbeats out beyond the exit, distant but drawing closer with a vengeance. He couldn’t hear a voice or see a shape. But Dan knew in a second who it was. “D!” His hopeful cry speared through the darkness.
Once again a howl rang out behind him, and a black whirlwind raced by his side.
“D, watch out!”
He ran a few steps, kicking the tenacious deadman’s hand blossoms out of his way. An incredibly bestial roar rose beyond the exit, and was suddenly silenced.
Fairly tumbling headlong out of the forest, Dan saw a rider on a hillock ahead, bathed in moonlight. At his feet lay the fallen werewolf. D galloped over. Getting down off a horse Dan recognized, he asked, “What are you doing out here? Where’s your sister?”
Dan was overcome with emotion. “I just knew you were still alive, D. I ... I knew there was no way you’d die on us ... ” He couldn’t say anything more. When Dan finally settled down and explained the situation, D picked him up without a word and set him on the horse. He didn’t tell the boy to go home or offer to bring him back to the farm.
Looking out across the prairie at the Count’s castle with a steely gaze, D asked, “Are you coming with me?” It was the same question he’d asked the boy in the ruins a night earlier.
“Sure!”
There was no reason to expect any other reply from the boy.
..
There was one particular characteristic of the castles of the Nobility that suited their vampire lords. While there were gorgeous sleeping chambers ready for guests and other visitors, there were none for the lord and his family.
They slumbered in a place most befitting their rank, an exalted place that was the stuff of legend: in coffins beneath the earth.
In vast subterranean chambers filled with tiny organisms, where the stench of dankness mixed with the sweet perfume of ancient soil, here alone the true past slept, free of computer controls. The smell of long-unused torches hung in the air of this special place. A stone wall that looked to be perhaps thirty feet tall was covered by a colossal portrait of the Sacred Ancestor. On the crimson dais before it stood the Count in his black raiment and Doris, garbed in a gown of snow white. The girl’s eyes were lifeless. She was hypnotized.
To the left of the dais was Larmica, but her eyes looked just as dazed as they wandered through space, avoiding her father and his bride-to-be. This had less to do with the reprimand she’d been given by her father for trying to help Doris escape and more to do with something the beautiful vampiress’ heart had lost.
The dark nuptials were about to begin.
“Look. There you shall make your bed from this night forth.”
The Count gestured to a pair of black, lacquered coffins positioned on a stone slab in front of the dais. Below where the falcon-and-flames coat of arms was carved, the coffin on the right had a plate with the name “Lee,” while the one on the left had already been inscribed “Doris.”
“They contain dirt. The same proud soil the Lee family castle is built upon. I am quite sure it shall give you dreams of sweet blood each and every night. Now, then.”
The Count took Doris’ chin in hand and tilted her head back, exposing more of her pale throat. “Before we exchange the vows of man and wife, I must rid you of that loathsome mark.” He pulled out a small signet from the folds of his cape. Its square face was carved with the same coat of arms that decorated the lids of the coffins.
“First the right.” White smoke arose from her pale throat as he pressed the signet down into the flesh, and Doris trembled. Performing the same act again, only a little lower, the Count said, “Now the left.” Once finished, he brought his abhorrent mouth closer to his bride’s throat. Though white smoke still hung in the air, now there wasn’t a mark on her virgin neck, aside from the pair of bite marks the Count left the first time he fed on her. Breath that reeked of blood crept along her throat. The mark of the cross that had kept the girl safe didn’t reappear.
“Very well. Now I need fear nothing when I give her my kiss.”
Grinning broadly as he returned the signet to his cape, the Count turned to his beloved daughter—in a stupor by his side—and said, “You shall have a new mother. Will you not recite some words of congratulation for us?”
Her vacant gaze focused on her father. Larmica’s mouth moved sluggishly. “I …” she began. “I, Larmica Lee, your three thousand seven hundred and twenty-seven-year-old daughter, congratulate my three thousand seven hundred and fifty-seven-year-old father Magnus Lee and my seventeen-year-old mother Doris Lang on the occasion of their marriage.” Her voice was vapid, but the Count nodded and pricked up his ears.
What at first had seemed to be Larmica’s voice bouncing off the stone floor and ceiling became a unified chant that reverberated through the dim subterranean chamber, like the cries of the writhing dead rising from the earth. “We give Count Magnus Lee our most heartfelt congratulations on the creation of this new union.”
The voices came from the occupants of countless coffins stuck in the walls and beneath the floor. A number of them shook and rattled a bit, causing the Count to narrow his gaze.
“Now it’s time—” Saying that, as he brought his lips to Doris’ still-upturned throat, the transmitter in his jacket pocket emitted a siren. “Oh, you infernal machine,” the Count said irritably and pulled it out. “Whatever is it?”
The metallic voice of what must have been a computer responded. “A pair of humans and a horse have just arrived at the main gate. One of the humans is male, approximately eight years of age, the other is a male estimated to be between the ages of seventeen and eighteen.”
“What?” The Count’s eyes glowed with blood light.
Larmica turned in amazement.
“They must not be allowed to enter. Do not lower the drawbridge. Open fire on them immediately.”
“Actually … ” the computer hesitated. “The bridge went down as soon as they drew near. We are unable to fire the weapons. It is my belief that the animal or one of the humans possesses a device that interferes with my commands. At present, all of the castle’s electronic armaments are inoperable.”
“You wretch ... ” the Count groaned with hatred. “So the stripling still lives, does he? But, how on earth did he come back? Even I know of no way to return from a wooden stake through the heart.”
“For one such as he ... ” Larmica muttered.
“One such as he? Larmica, could it be you have some idea as to his identity?”
Larmica said nothing.
“Very well. That question may wait until later. For the time being, I must first slay him. When something interferes like this in the middle of a ceremony, it is customary to postpone the festivities until the nuisance has been dealt with.”
“Understood, Father. But how exactly do you intend to deal with him?”
“I know of someone who would like very much to make amends for a blunder.”
..
As a pale blue finally tinged the eastern sky, in the castle’s courtyard D and Dan once again faced Rei-Ginsei.
“I haven’t been given any more Time-Bewitching Incense,” Rei-Ginsei said with a beautiful, devilish smile. On his way from Doris’ farm to the castle, Rei-Ginsei had encountered the Count’s carriage as it raced back from town at perilous speed, and had accompanied the carriage the rest of the way. “I can understand why the Count was so upset. However, if I dispatch you to the next life once again, I’m quite certain his anger will be appeased. Kindly dismount.”
They were ten feet apart, just as they’d been at the Lang farm. Dan took cover along with the horse behind a stone sculpture and waited for the battle to be decided.
But basically it was an absurd challenge. So long as he had no Time-Bewitching Incense, Rei-Ginsei had no way to overcome D. On the other hand, any critical wounds D might deal would be turned back on the Hunter through the extra-dimensional passageway in Rei-Ginsei’s body. And yet, each one apparently thought they stood a good chance of prevailing and both of them went into action at once.
“Ugh ... ”
D doubled over, and then fell to his knees. A flame danced atop the stick of Time-Bewitching Incense in Rei-Ginsei’s right hand. He’d deceived D. In the blink of an eye, a shrike blade was whizzing through the air.
But the reason he’d defeated D back at the farm was because he had the muscle-amplifying components of the combat suit aiding him. His face twisted with agony, D knocked the shrike-blade out of the air and leapt.
It was like a complete reenactment of their duel at the ruins. What was different was that Rei-Ginsei didn’t dodge, but left his head wide open for the silvery flash. He imagined D would be aiming for his limbs. However, the instant he realized that the blade coming down at him was unmistakably aimed at his head, he let the extra-dimensional gateway within his body open and didn’t try to run.
D’s forehead split, but it was just a thin layer of skin. An instant later, bright red blood gushed from Rei-Ginsei’s abdomen. The dashing young man’s expression was one of stupefaction as he gazed at the blade protruding from his belly…the same blade that was supposed to split D’s head in two. The Vampire Hunter had swung his sword overhead and only cut the outermost layer of skin on Rei-Ginsei’s brow, then changed his grip on his sword in midair, and drove it right through his own stomach. Already linked by the extra-dimensional passageway, when the blade went into D’s body it materialized in Rei-Ginsei’s belly instead. Aside from his ability to twist and link points in space, Rei-Ginsei was otherwise a normal human who couldn’t survive that sort of punishment. This was the sort of absurd method of killing only a dhampir like D would be capable of.
“Dan, put that candle out for me.”
As he listened to the boy dash into action, Rei-Ginsei thudded to the ground. The incense left his hand, and his bright blood stained the earth.
“Hey, don’t you keel over yet. Do at least one good thing before your miserable life ends,” Dan said, stomping the incense out. A chill came over him as he watched the blade poking from the abdomen of the fallen Rei-Ginsei slide smoothly back into his body. D was pulling his own sword out of himself.
“And what is that ... one good thing?” asked Rei-Ginsei.
“Tell me where my sister’s at.”
“I don’t know ... Search to your heart’s contentment ... By now, the Count has made her his bride ... ” A clot of blood spilled from his mouth, and the last spasms of impending death twisted his gorgeous countenance. “If only I had been made one of the Nobility ... ” And then his head dropped to one side.
“He bit it, the damn jerk,” Dan said with sorrow. “If he’d actually acted good instead of just looking good he might’ve lived a nice, long time ... ”
“That’s right,” D said, breathing heavily. The effects of the Time-Bewitching Incense were gone the instant it was extinguished. The reason he looked to be in such pain was the wound to his stomach.
“Where do you think they’ve got my sister? This place is so huge, I don’t even know where to begin to look.” Dan was on the verge of tears, but D tapped him on the shoulder.
“You’re forgetting that I’m a Vampire Hunter. Come with me.”
..
The two of them went straight down to the subterranean chamber. Dan watched in wonder as shut doors flew open as soon as D approached. Nothing could stop them. From time to time, they passed expressionless people who seemed to be servants and ladies-in-waiting, but none of them so much as attempted to look at them before disappearing into the darkness.
“Robots, I guess,” Dan said.
“Leaders of a false life—this castle flickers in the light of destruction now. As the Nobility themselves have for a long, long time.”
Descending a narrow staircase for two stories, they came to a massive wooden door. Studded with hobnails from top to bottom, it testified to the import of the dark ceremony taking place beyond it.
“This is it, right?” Dan was tense.
D took off his blue pendant and put it around the boy’s neck. “This will repel the robots. You stay here.”
The door had neither lock nor bolt. It looked to weigh tons, but when D’s finger brushed it, the hinges creaked and the doors opened to either side. Wide stone stairs worn low in the center flowed down into the darkness. Somewhere far below there was a barely perceptible light. On descending the staircase, D came to the subterranean chamber. Far off to his right flames danced.
Coffins caked with dust, some with skeletal hands and feet protruding through gaps in the half-decayed boards, others with wedges of wood driven right through their lids—this was what greeted D in the darkness. Weaving his way through the final resting place of rows upon rows of the dead, D arrived at last at the blood-hued dais, where he came face to face with the Count.
“I am impressed by the way you managed to come back to life. And to come here.” The Count’s tone went beyond awe. D turned his eyes to Doris, standing stock still on the dais. A cool smile nudged his cheeks for an instant.
“It seems I’m just in time.”
At some point Larmica had vanished.
“There shall be plenty of time for that when you are dead,” the Count replied. “However, as Larmica herself has said, it is truly a shame to slay you. You came back to life after taking a stake through your chest—now there is a secret I myself should very much like to know. What say you? Will you not reconsider this one last time? Have you no wish to take Larmica as your wife and live here in the castle? She has lost her soul to you.”
“The Nobility died out long ago,” said D. For some reason, his voice seemed to have a sorrowful ring to it. “The Nobility and this castle are no more than phantoms forgotten by time. Return to where you belong.”
“Silence, stripling!” the Count moaned, gnashing his teeth in rage. “Born of Noble blood as you are, surely you must know what immortality means. Life given until the end of time—it is our duty to do just that, crushing the human worms underfoot all the while.”
As he finished speaking, the Count knit his brow. He had just noticed that D was not looking up at himself, but rather at the portrait behind him.
If it had been that alone, he wouldn’t have paid it much heed. What triggered this surprise—which was actually closer to horror—was that he saw that the face of the youth in the flickering torchlight was the same as the visage in the portrait holding his gaze.
At the same time, the Count realized words he’d heard twice before were ringing in the depths of his ears. Unconsciously, he let them slip from his mouth.
“Transient guests ... ”
In all the proud, glorious history of the Nobility, this one pronouncement of their godlike Sacred Ancestor alone had met suspicion and denial from all Nobles. The Nobility’s Academy of Sciences had developed a method of mathematically analyzing fate, and, after they cross-referenced these figures with the historical import of all known civilizations they canceled all presentations on the findings of their research. When they came under fire for this decision, it was the Sacred Ancestor who came to face the critics, appearing in public for the first time in a millennium to control the situation. And those words were the ones he’d let slip out then.
The great, eternally flowing river that was history had a civilization temporarily resting on its placid surface—the Sacred Ancestor referred to those propping up the civilization as transient guests. The question was, did he refer to the Nobility or humans?
The tangled skein of the Count’s thoughts grew more knotted, and then a single thread suddenly pulled free. A bizarre rumor that had circulated briefly among the highest-ranking Nobility whispered into life in his ear once more. Our Sacred Ancestor, it seems, swore to a human maid—they would make children and he would slay them, but even after slaying them he would still have her bear more. Impossible! The Count’s brain was driven to the limits of panic and confusion. He couldn’t possibly be … Could the Sacred Ancestor have planned the joining of human and Noble blood all along?
Not knowing what was truth or lies, the Count stepped forward, chilled by his own thoughts. “Stripling, I shall see to it you feel the full might of the Nobility before you die.”
As he finished talking, his cape fluttered. The lining was red and glistening. The air howled around the chamber and every flame danced a step shy of being snuffed. Astonishingly, the cape spread like a drop of ink dissolving in water and tried to wrap around D.
D drew his sword and slashed at the edge of it in one fluid motion. His blade stuck to the lining. This was the same blade D had used to destroy the bronze monstrosity Golem and slay a werewolf running at half the speed of sound!
The lining twined around and around his sword, tearing it from D’s grasp a second later. But actually, D himself had released it. Had he resisted, his own hand might have been wrapped up and crushed in the process.
“And now you stand naked,” the Count laughed snidely, taking D’s sword in his right hand. His cape returned to its normal dimensions. Making another grand sweep of it, the Count said, “This was stitched together from the skin of women who’d slaked my thirst, and it was lacquered with their blood. Thanks to secret techniques passed down through my clan, it’s five times as strong as the hardest steel and twenty times more flexible than a spider’s webbing. And you have just witnessed its adhesive power for yourself.”
Several flashes of light scorched through the air. The cape spread. All the wooden needles D had hurled dropped to the floor in front of the Count.
“Enough of your foolish resistance.” The cape opened like the wings of a dark, mystic bird and the Count threw it and himself forward.
D leapt out of the way. The sleeve of his coat sported a fresh tear. That was thanks to the trenchant blade the cape had become.
“Oh, whatever is the trouble, my good Hunter? Could it be you’re powerless now?” His snide laughter came over the top of the attacking cape. The speed with which he swept it around was incredible. Unable to close the gap between the Count and himself, D moved like the wind to evade the assaults.
At some point the two of them had changed positions, so that D now stood in front of Doris, shielding her.
The Count’s eyes glowed. His cape howled through the air.
As D was about to leap away once more, something wrapped around him from behind. Doris’ arms!
A heartbeat later D’s body was entwined in the cape. In this battle that demanded the utmost concentration, even he’d forgotten for a moment that Doris was in the Count’s thrall.
D’s bones creaked from the enormous pressure. His gorgeous countenance twisted. And yet, who else would’ve been skilled enough to push Doris out of harm’s way a split second before the cape engulfed him? D’s sword glittered in the Count’s hands.
“Your destruction will come on your own blade.”
The Count intended to lop off his head. D’s body was wrapped in a cape his blade hadn’t been able to pierce, and the sword mowed through the air with all the Count’s might behind it, until it suddenly it stopped.
At the same time the cape crumpled and D leapt clear of the bizarre fabric restraints. The instant the Count’s concentration had been broken, the spell over his cape had faltered as well. He landed right before the Count. And what did the Count make of that?
“Ha!”
With a premonition of his firmly skewered foe bringing a smile to his face, the Count thrust the blade. The sword was caught and stopped dead right in front of D’s chest. Caught between the palms of the Hunter’s hands. Their roles had been completely reversed from their first encounter!
Without letting up in the slightest on the unspeakable pressure he brought to bear four inches from the weapon’s tip, D twisted both hands to one side. The Count didn’t go sailing through the air, but the end of the blade snapped off. The broken tip still between his hands, D leapt back ten feet.
“Why, that’s the very same trick … ”
It was truly grand the way the Count sent out his cape even as he shouted this, but the difference between being the one doing the trick and the one on the receiving end in this case became the difference between life and death. The tip of the sword flew from D’s folded hands in a silvery flash that neatly knifed through the heart beneath that black raiment.
For a few seconds the Count stood stock still. Then the flesh on his face began to melt away, and his eyes dropped to the floor, trailing optic nerves behind them.
Mere moments after he hit the floor, his rotting tongue and vocal chords forced out his final words.
“I ... I had to beg our Sacred Ancestor to teach me that very same trick ... Could it be ... Milord, are you truly his ... ”
..
D quickly made his way over to Doris, who lay on the floor. Something strange was happening to the castle. The faint ringing of the warning bell from the Count’s chest was proof of that. The Count’s deadly attack had faltered because the bell had caught his ear—turning him from the path of certain victory to a plunge into the abyss of death. The floor shook ever so slightly.
A light tap to her cheek was enough to wake Doris. There was no trace of the fang marks on her neck any longer.
“D—what in the world is going on?! You’re alive?”
“My work is done. The wounds on your throat have vanished.” D pointed to the far end of chamber and the way he’d come. “If you go up that staircase you’ll find Dan. The two of you should go back to the farm.”
“But you—you’ve got to go with us.”
“My work is finished, but I still have business here. Hurry up and go. And please be sure to tell Dan not to forget the promise he made his big brother.”
Tears sparkled in Doris’ eyes.
“Go.”
Turning time and again, Doris finally disappeared into the darkness. A salutation rang from D’s left hand, though it probably never reached her ears.
“So long, you tough, sweet kids. Godspeed to you.”
..
D turned around. To one side of the chamber stood Larmica.
“Was that your doing?”
Larmica nodded and said, “I reversed all the computer’s safety circuits. In the next five minutes the castle shall be destroyed—please, flee while you may.”
“Why not live here in your castle until the end of time, with the darkness as your companion?”
“There’s no longer time for that. And the Lee family died out long ago. It died when my father chose a pointless, eternal life of nothing save drinking human blood.”
The trembling grew stronger, and the whole chamber began to groan. The white detritus falling from the ceiling wasn’t common dust, but rather finely powdered stone. The molecular bonds of the entire castle were breaking down!
“So, you’ll stay here then?”
Larmica didn’t answer the question, but said instead, “Kindly allow me to ask one thing—your name. D … Is that D, as in Dracula?
D’s lips moved.
The two of them stood motionless, with white powder raining down. His reply went unheard.
..
Appropriately enough, the vampire’s castle turned to dust like its lord and was gone. Their field of view rendered pure white by the clouds of powdered rubble, Doris and Dan couldn’t stop coughing from all the dust.
They were atop a hill less than a hundred yards from the castle.
Wiping at her tearing eyes, when Doris finally raised her face again another sort of tears began to flow.
“It’s gone ... everything. And he’s not coming back either ... ”
Putting a hand on his distracted sister’s shoulder, Dan said cheerily, “Let’s go home, Sis. We got a heap of work to do.”
Doris shook her head.
“It’s no use ... I just can’t do it anymore ... Can’t use a whip like I used to, can’t look after you or do my work around the farm ... And all because I found someone I could depend on ... ”
“You just leave it to me.” The boy of eight threw out his chest. His little hand gripped D’s pendant. “We’ve just gotta hold on for five more years. Then I’ll be able to do everything. I’ll even find you a husband, Sis. We got a long road ahead of us—so buck up.”
He knew that he was no longer just an eight-year-old child.
Doris turned to her brother, looked at him like he was someone she’d never seen before, and nodded. Five years from now, he’d still be a boy. But in ten years, he’d be able to rebuild the house and hunt down fire dragons. It would take a long while, but time had a way of passing.
“Let’s go, Dan.”
Finally reclaiming her smile, Doris walked toward their horse.
“Sure thing!” Dan shot back, and, though his heart was nearly shattered with sorrow, he smiled to hide it.
With the two of them on its back, the horse galloped off to the east, where blue light filled the sky and their farm awaited them.
D had kept his promise.
Now it was the boy’s turn.